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Walt Disney

As of Sunday, Black Panther had earned $631.3 million in North America, giving it a whopping 3.125x multiplier and making it (as of now) the fifth-biggest grossing movie ever in North America, as well as the biggest superhero movie ever in unadjusted domestic grosses. And in its path, it left a whole bunch of would-be event movies nursing bumps and boo-boos, which (you could argue) makes it more impressive than something like Titanic or even Avatar, which competed mostly with smaller films. The sheer extent to which Black Panther controlled the entire domestic box office market over the past five weeks has been a mix of glorious and terrifying.

From Feb. 16, 2018 to March 25, 2018, all movies in domestic release had earned $1.378 billion. Of the total gross from movies in North American theatrical release, $631.3 million went to Black Panther. That means 45.8% of all movie tickets sold in a North American theater over the last five weeks also went to Black Panther. We’ve seen situations where one movie just outright dominated the competition (The Force Awakens controlled 48% of the market in its first five weeks). But that usually happens in a scenario where a mega-movie like Titanic just steamrolls over small flicks like The Replacement Killers, Dark City and The Big Lebowski. That Black Panther dinged the likes of A Wrinkle in Time and Tomb Raider makes it a different kind of box office giant.

Just as The Wedding Singer thrived alongside Titanic, smaller-scale fare like Game Night and I Can Only Imagine succeeded alongside Black Panther. We can debate as to whether the overwhelming quality and four-quadrant/one-size-fits-all appeal of Black Panther did a number on the arguably inferior would-be biggies, or whether the middling quality of Tomb Raider, Pacific Rim: Uprising and A Wrinkle in Time contributed to Black Panther’s incredible legs. It’s probably a little of both, along with the new normal of moviegoers A) seeing the same tentpoles that their kids flock to and B) no longer going to the movies just to go to the movies.

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What’s going to presumably change now, with Ready Player One in play (and hopefully Dwayne Johnson’s Rampage and Blumhouse’s Truth or Dare providing one last pre-summer blast), is that Black Panther will no longer be making the lion’s share of the daily and weekly box office totals. But it helped maintain an incredible streak of nearly 19 weekends where the box office was topped by a movie not starring a white man. From Coco to The Last Jedi to Jumanji to Fifty Shades Freed to Black Panther to Pacific Rim: Uprising, conventional wisdom got a real workout over the last four months.

Black Panther should pass Jurassic World ($652 million) and Titanic ($658m) in the next week and change to become the third-biggest domestic grosser of all time. I won’t pretend to be thrilled at the idea of one movie, any movie, earning 46% of all ticket sales over the last five weeks. Better for it to be Black Panther since it’s one the best movies of the year and what should be a huge blow against conventional wisdom. While rank is arbitrary, the continuous domination of the likes of Coco, The Last Jedi, Jumanji and Black Panther shows that moviegoers are exhibiting relatively good taste. Your move, Teen Titans Go to the Movies!

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