Marvel’s Black Panther has reached a new milestone by being the latest movie to gross more than a billion dollars at the box office.
.Marvel’s latest superhero movie crossed this coveted threshold in less than a month having been released on February 16.
The movie is only the 33rd film to earn more than $1 billion, but it is the 16th Disney movie and the fifth film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe to do so. Marvel’s other entries into the billion-dollar-club include The Avengers, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Iron Man 3, and Captain America: Civil War.
In terms of domestic numbers, Black Panther has earned more than $521 million and is expected to earn $40 million this weekend, which would put it ahead of The Dark Knight, which grossed $535 million stateside.
As successful as Black Panther has been in the United States, a lot of the film’s success is owed to its strong showing in China where it earned $20 million on its first day. The film’s opening weekend has not yet concluded, but it is projected to earn as much as $60 million during this time.
Black Panther is unique because it dispel the notion that a big-budget superhero/action movies with a mostly black cast can make profit just as the Wonder Woman helped dispel Hollywood’s fear of casting women as leading roles in superhero movies.
Black Panther stars Chadwick Boseman as the crime-fighting ruler of Wakanda, a fictional African nation, Oscar winner Lupita Nyong’o, Michael B Jordan and Daniel Kaluuya in the lead roles, with The Hobbit star Martin Freeman as CIA agent Everett Ross.
