Black Panther Tracking for $100 Million+ Opening Weekend

We are just three weeks away from the release of Marvel Studios’ highly-anticipated, and long-awaited Black Panther solo movie, and the film is going to make a big splash at the box office when it debuts.

The Hollywood Reporter brings word that early tracking for the film has it opening in the range of $100 million to $120 million at the North American box office. Should those numbers hold, Black Panther would open higher than Marvel Studios’ last debut movie, Doctor Strange, which opened to $85 million in November of 2016. The highest opening February release is Fox’s Deadpool movie, which brought in $132 million.

Box office numbers this early still have the possibility of fluctuating in either direction, but Black Panther set a Marvel Studios record earlier this year by selling the most pre-sale tickets in its first day, eclipsing 2016’s Captain America: Civil War which previously held the title. Civil War opened to $179 million, the third-highest for the MCU (2012’s The Avengers leads the charge with $207 million).

Marvel Studios’ Black Panther follows T’Challa who, after the death of his father, the King of Wakanda, returns home to the isolated, technologically advanced African nation to succeed to the throne and take his rightful place as king. But when a powerful old enemy reappears, T’Challa’s mettle as king—and Black Panther—is tested when he is drawn into a formidable conflict that puts the fate of Wakanda and the entire world at risk. Faced with treachery and danger, the young king must rally his allies and release the full power of Black Panther to defeat his foes and secure the safety of his people and their way of life.

Black Panther star Chadwick Boseman in the title role along with Danai Gurira, Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong’o, Martin Freeman, Daniel Kaluuya, Letitia Wright, Winston Duke, with Angela Bassett, with Forest Whitaker and, returning from Avengers: Age of Ultron, Andy Serkis.

The film is directed by Coogler and produced by Kevin Feige with Louis D’Esposito, Victoria Alonso, Nate Moore, Jeffrey Chernov and Stan Lee serving as executive producers. Ryan Coogler & Joe Robert Cole wrote the screenplay, based on the Marvel Comics character who made his debut in 1966 during Stan Lee and Jack Kirby’s epochal Fantastic Four run.

Black Panther will debut in theaters on February 16.