Marvel's Eternals had a strong opening weekend with $71 million in ticket sales, but it failed to surpass the opening weekends of Black Widow and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.
As reported by Variety, Eternal's opening numbers were a bit shy of the high-end expectations for the film that saw it debuting to $75 million to $80 million. It also earned less in its opening weekend than other pandemic-released films in the MCU like Black Widow's $80.3 million and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings' $75.3 million. It also fell short of Venom: Let There Be Carnage's $90 million.
Internationally, Eternals brought in another $90.7 million, bringing the film's global total to $167.1 million.
One of the reasons that Eternals may not have caught up to the other MCU films could have to do with its divisive critical reception. With a Rotten Tomato score of 48% as of this writing, Eternals is the first MCU film to receive a "rotten" score.
In our Eternals review, we said that it "is beautifully shot and terrifically acted, but it bites off more than it can chew in its third act."
“You have to keep things in perspective,” says Jeff Bock, an analyst with Exhibitor Relations. “For any other studio, this kind of result would be a major, major hit. But the disturbing news for Disney is the critical reception for ‘Eternals’ and how that will impact word-of-mouth going forward. You could see a steep drop in the box office in its second or third weekends.”
Dune placed second this weekend with $7.6 million, bringing its domestic total to $83.9 million hot of the heels of the official announcement that a sequel would be on its way.
No Time to Die, which will be available to rent on November 9, took the #3 spot with $6.2 million; Venom: Let There Be Carnage took fourth with $4.5 million, and Ron's Gone Wrong nabbed the fifth-place spot with $3.6 million.
For more on Eternals, check out how Zhao only needed 25 minutes to film the MCU's first sex scene, our explainer of the ending, mid-credits scene, and post-credits scene, and our look at the history of the Eternals and all the other members of the team.
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Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.