Call it market saturation or audience fatigue when it comes to new superhero movie releases; whatever the cause, Marvel’s iron grip on the box office has been slipping for a while now. For more than a decade, the studio could count on at least one of its upcoming Marvel releases to land among the year’s top earners, no matter what else was in theaters. Such is not the case this year, thanks to another Disney release.
According to Box Office Mojo’s 2025 tally, The Fantastic Four: First Steps has been pushed to No. 11 on the worldwide box office chart, edged out of the top ten by Zootopia 2.
First Steps has amassed a very solid $521.8 million worldwide, with a slightly domestic-leaning split ($274.3 million in North America, $247.6 million abroad). In most years, that would be more than enough to crack the upper tier. Instead, it’s looking up at a top ten that’s dominated by animation, franchises, and a surprising lack of Marvel entries.
The Current Top Ten Belongs to Everyone But Marvel
The 2025 movie calendar global leaderboard isn’t light on familiar brands, but it is noticeably light on superheroes. Leading the pack is China’s Ne Zha 2, which has pulled in a staggering $1.9 billion worldwide — nearly all of it from the international market. Behind it, Disney’s Lilo & Stitch remake continues its impressive run with $1.03 billion, followed by A Minecraft Movie at $957.9 million.
Then comes the sequel, nearly a decade in the making: Zootopia 2. With $938.4 million worldwide — $715 million of that from overseas — the animated sequel has become the fourth-highest-grossing film of the year. And in doing so, it nudged Fantastic Four: First Steps out of the top ten entirely.
The rest of the list reads like a snapshot of what modern moviegoers are showing up for. Here's the full top ten lineup:
- Ne Zha 2 — $1,902,323,300
- Lilo & Stitch — $1,038,017,312
- A Minecraft Movie — $957,949,195
- Zootopia 2 — $938,415,739
- Jurassic World: Rebirth — $868,908,127
- Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba – Infinity Castle — $664,277,546
- How to Train Your Dragon — $636,251,264
- F1: The Movie — $631,527,111
- Superman — $616,684,465
- Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning — $598,767,057
As you can see, not a Marvel movie in sight. However, superheroes were not entirely underrepresented, as James Gunn's Superman (2025) landed in the number 9 spot.
Fantastic Four: First Steps Lands Just Outside the Line
Marvel’s lone new release to come close, The Fantastic Four: First Steps, has earned a respectable $521.8 million globally — $274.3 million domestic, $247.6 million foreign. Those numbers would’ve been top-ten locks through most of the MCU’s peak years. Now they barely clear the top twelve.
And First Steps isn’t the only Marvel project feeling the squeeze. Captain America: Brave New World sits at No. 14 with $415.1 million, while Thunderbolts trails close behind at No. 15 with $382.4 million. Both are fine mid-tier hits, but they’re far from the billion-dollar runs that once defined the studio.
That’s a wild shift when you remember how dominant the MCU has been. Per The Numbers, across 40-plus films, Marvel averages about $875 million worldwide per release, with domestic box office averages north of $350 million. This is the franchise that gave us Avengers: Endgame’s $2.7 billion run, Avengers: Infinity War, Black Panther, Captain Marvel, and Spider-Man: No Way Home, all landing easily in the billion-dollar club.
Even as recently as 2024, Deadpool & Wolverine (available to stream with a Disney+ subscription) cracked $1.3 billion worldwide, proving the MCU could still hit that old gear when everything lined up. But taken as a trend, things are sliding. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 topped out at $845.6 million, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania stalled under $500 million, and The Marvels became one of the lowest-grossing MCU entries with just over $200 million worldwide.
James Cameron’s Avatar Is Coming
If Marvel hopes to maintain its current position, another challenge looms. The upcoming Avatar: Fire and Ash is still on the horizon, and history says it’ll bulldoze the box office the moment it arrives. Three of James Cameron’s films sit in the all-time global top five — two of them Avatar franchise installments — and each new release tends to yank the rankings downward for everything beneath it. When Fire and Ash lands in theaters on December 19, it’s safe to assume it will knock at least one title out of the current top ten, maybe several, and if that happens, First Steps could slide from No. 11 into the teens before the year wraps.
Audiences haven’t abandoned big spectacle; they’re still showing up for dinosaurs, great animation such as Zootopia 2, racing epics, anime blockbusters, and Tom Cruise hanging off things. What’s changed is Marvel’s automatic draw, and whether that’s a temporary slump or the start of a reset depends on what the studio does next.
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