April 28, 2019
by Carla Hay
Marvel Studios’ “Avengers: Endgame” shattered box-office records for the highest-grossing opening weekend in movie history so far. The superhero sequel (which opened worldwide on April 26, 2019) sold a whopping $350 million in tickets in the U.S. and Canada, and had a total worldwide haul of $1.2 billion, according to Box Office Mojo. The previous record was held by 2018’s “Avengers: Infinity War,” which had opening-weekend sales of $258 million in the U.S. and Canada and $641 million worldwide. With these numbers, “Avengers: Endgame” is easily on track to becoming the highest-grossing movie of the 2010s decade, surpassing 2014’s “Star Wars: The Force Awakens,” whose ticket sales totaled $914 million in the U.S. and Canada and $2.1 billion worldwide. “Avengers: Endgame” will also likely become the No. 2 highest-grossing movie of all time, surpassing 1997’s “Titanic,” which had $659 million in U.S. and Canadian ticket sales and a total haul of $2.2 billion in worldwide ticket sales.
Even though “Avengers: Endgame” clocks in at about three hours, several movie theaters (including AMC Theatres in numerous cities) stayed open 24 hours a day during the movie’s opening weekend to accommodate the demand for tickets and screenings. Some theaters remained open for 24 hours even after the opening weekend so that they could have round-the-clock “Avengers: Endgame” screenings for the movie’s entire first week in theaters. As previously reported, advance ticket sales for “Avengers: Endgame” caused crashes on several websites that sell movie tickets including AMC Theaters, Alamo Drafthouse, Atom Tickets and Fandango.
“Avengers: Endgame” has a superhero cast that includes Iron Man (played by Robert Downey Jr.), Thor (played by Chris Hemsworth), Captain America (played by Chris Evans), Black Widow (played by Scarlett Joahnsson), Hawkeye (played by Jeremy Renner), War Machine (played by Don Cheadle), Ant-Man (played by Paul Rudd) and Captain Marvel (played by Brie Larson). “Avengers: Endgame” reveals what happened to all the superheroes who “died” in “Avengers: Infinity War.” The remaining superheroes band together to go after supervillain Thanos (played by Josh Brolin), who was responsible for wiping out half of the universe’s population at the end of “Avengers: Infinity War.” Brother duo Anthony Russo and Joe Russo directed “Avengers: Endgame,” as well as “Avengers: Infinity War,” “Captain America: Civil War” and “Captain America: The Winter Soldier.”