'Avengers: Age of Ultron' snags $27.6 million at Thursday late shows, tracking behind 'The Avengers' for weekend record

For months now, we've kinda just assumed that Marvel's Avengers: Age of Ultron would fly past its predecessor's $207 million opening weekend total. The franchise has only built since 2012, pre-orders were off the charts, and each and every trailer inspired some sort of fan eruption. And if we were just going by Thursday night shows, Age of Ultron would definitely be on track to defeat the original Avengers. It grossed $27.6 million from Thursday late shows, which is up from the $18.7 million that the first film made. Granted, The Avengers opened at midnight back in 2012 and Age of Ultron opened at 7 PM, but that's still a bigger total than what Furious 7 made last month ($15.8 million). However, as the day went on, word from Deadline started to become a little bit worrisome for Disney and the team behind the highly anticipated film.

At one point in the day, Deadline was receiving estimates that showed that Age of Ultron would break Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows- Part 2's opening day record with $94-$97 million and go on to make $220 million over the weekend. That number was dialed back during the early morning hours, and right now, projections at Deadline are calling for an $85 million Friday and a $202 million weekend total. Prognosticators are citing a mix of slightly muted reviews, a heavy front load and the Saturday night fight between Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather that could attract a significant amount of fans from the movie. I still think that there's a shot for Age of Ultron to break the opening weekend record and I know that Disney will do everything in its power to make sure this film breaks every record in the book. However, there's nothing to be disappointed about here. This is still a massive total and the film will go on to make well over $1 billion worldwide. More on Avengers: Age of Ultron later this weekend including my review of the film and a full box office breakdown on Sunday. 

Source: Deadline

Image Credits: Screen Rant, Slash Film