Saturday, July 20th 2019. SDCC19 in full swing and Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige is set to reveal the upcoming slate of movies in the fourth phase of the Marvel Cinematic Universe only a mere fortnight after Phase Three came to a close with the release of Spider-Man : Far From Home. Then something that is remarkable in both timing and notion happens. Avengers Endgame officially breaks the record for highest grossing movie of all time that has been held by Disney’s Avatar for an entire decade.
To call this feat an achievement would be a vast understatement. You see, it took Avatar it’s initial theatrical release and an entirely new re-release in 2010 with finished, additional footage culminating in a total of 228 days/38 weeks in theatres to finish up with its (now beaten) record. In the case of Avengers Endgame, it’s taken one official release and one booster “re-release” as a marketing push for Spider-Man : Far From Home culminating in a total release window so far of 87 days/13 weeks that will continue for at least another two-three weeks yet.
The original six Avengers cast members with Kevin Feige
Of course, one can’t forget that Marvel already broke a number of records with Avengers Endgame before taking the throne from Avatar including highest opening weekend gross (crossing $1.2 Billion internationally, beating the record previously held by Avengers Infinity War at $640 Million) and highest initial release gross, dethroning Avatar on the first of several records. A full list of records set or broken by Avengers Endgame can be found here.
So why Endgame?
Some may have wondered why it was Endgame that took the title from Avatar, and no other instalment in the MCU that came before it and the simple answer is, it’s where the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe has been leading to since it kicked off in 2008, back when Tony Stark really was just a genius, billionaire, playboy and philanthropist. The events that had transpired across the previous twenty one films came full circle and marked the end point for half the original Avengers team with Chris Evans, Robert Downey JR and Mark Ruffalo seemingly bowing out at the climax of the movie and though we saw Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow make the ultimate sacrifice on Vormir, she still has yet to appear in the upcoming movie of the same name, kicking off Marvel’s Phase 4 whilst others like Chris Hemsworth and Jeremy Renner will pass the baton in Thor : Love and Thunder and Disney+ Hawkeye series, respectively.
But the importance of Avengers Endgame’s success doesn’t simply lie with the fact that it finally took Avatar’s title in the history books but actually with the fact that it proves that James Cameron’s comments on ‘superhero fatigue’ were ultimately the catalyst that helped a superhero movie dethrone his two biggest movies with the same, superhero movie and pushed Marvel Studios to the very top for the first time in cinematic history. That’s the biggest success of Avengers Endgame, that it put that stamp of history onto Marvel Studios for creating the highest grossing movie of all time.
But the importance of Avengers Endgame’s success doesn’t simply lie with the fact that it finally took Avatar’s title in the history books but actually with the fact that it proves that James Cameron’s comments on ‘superhero fatigue’ were ultimately the catalyst that helped a superhero movie dethrone his two biggest movies with the same, superhero movie and pushed Marvel Studios to the very top for the first time in cinematic history. That’s the biggest success of Avengers Endgame, that it put that stamp of history onto Marvel Studios for creating the highest grossing movie of all time.
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