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Can ‘X-Men: Apocalypse’ Compete With Marvel’s ‘Civil War’ And ‘Dawn Of Justice’ At The Box Office?

By Dustin Murrell
Published on: 10:22 PST, May 15, 2016

Captain America: Civil War was No. 1 at the box office for the second weekend in a row. While met with some mixed reviews, the DC Comics-inspired Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice left fans in anticipation of Suicide Squad, coming in August. Between Civil War and Suicide Squad comes a film from the other Marvel universe, X-Men: Apocalypse. The latest in the Marvel Comics-based franchise, one that started long before Captain America and The Avengers, hits theaters in less than two weeks.

In February, Deadpool — also from Fox, the studio (and “Marvel universe”) from which the X-Men movies come — did even better than expected, and gave several nods to the X-Men films throughout. Working against X-Men: Apocalypse during opening weekend is the fact that Alice Through the Looking Glass is being released on the same date.

In an era where every Marvel or DC movie is expected to be a blockbuster, is there any way that X-Men: Apocalypse can have an opening weekend that competes with Captain America: Civil War or Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice at the box office?

Captain America: Civil War opening weekend

As reported by Deadline, the latest installment of the Avengers franchise and the Marvel Cinematic Universe had the fifth-best opening weekend (domestically) of all time. Captain America: Civil War pulled in $179.1 million. Two of the four movies that outperformed Civil War for domestic opening weekend box office are MCU films, including The Avengers and Avengers: Age of Ultron.

It is believed that Civil War will end up being the “highest-grossing live-action film of the summer,” pulling in around $450 million.

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice opening weekend

The opening weekend for Dawn of Justice wasn’t quite as impressive as Civil War. Chapter two in the DC Extended Universe franchise ended up with $166 million for its opening weekend, about $13 million less than Civil War.

About seven weeks after its release, Dawn of Justice has done $328.2 million domestically, and an estimated $868.8 million worldwide.

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Projected box office for X-Men: Apocalypse

The predictions for Apocalypse‘s opening weekend aren’t very optimistic, at least compared to the numbers being reported for Civil War and Dawn of Justice. One projection at IMDb had X-Men bringing in around $110 million domestically. That’s about the same that Days of Future Past had its opening weekend. Some analysts think the overall domestic box office will be as low as $200 million, while Movie Pilot argues that it will be the highest-grossing film in the X-Men franchise.

There are two major factors hurting the release of the new X-Men. For starters, it’s being released the same date as Alice Through the Looking Glass, another sequel to a film that did very well at the box office. Additionally, Marvel’s Captain America: Civil War will still be showing in the theaters, pulling some fans away from the Apocalypse release.

Release Dates

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was released to theaters on March 25, 2016. Captain America: Civil War was released less than two weeks ago on May 6.

X-Men: Apocalypse hits U.S. theaters on May 27.

[Photo credit Fox Movies]

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