Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 is finally in theaters. The movie is set to be the swan song for the Marvel super team, and based on the early numbers, it looks like fans are turning out in force to say goodbye. The movie brought in $17.5 million in Thursday night preview ticket sales, which marks a high point for the franchise.
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 did $17 million in Thursday previews according to Deadline, up significantly from an originally projected $14 million, which means the new entry only just squeaked out a box office win over its predecessor, but that also means the last film in the series is probably a good comparison for the new one.
Guardians Vol. 2 ended up with a $146 million domestic opening weekend and finished its box office run with nearly $400 million in domestic sales and over $850 million worldwide. If Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 continues along a similar trajectory, even if it doesn’t do quite as well, it will still be a solid hit.
If Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 continues to outpace the previous movie, even slightly, it could be on its way to an opening weekend on par with Captain Marvel, which did over $150 million domestically, on its way to breaking the $1 billion mark globally. That would be a huge success for Vol. 3. 10 of the MCU films have hit that milestone so far. It would be an impressive way for James Gunn’s franchise to go out.
Critical response to Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 has been overwhelmingly positive as well. The new movie is absolutely the emotional finale that fans of these characters have been waiting for. What future they have in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, if any, still remains to be seen, but most seem to be in agreement that this movie has a very satisfying conclusion for the trilogy.
Considering the way that Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 was delayed following the firing and rehiring of James Gunn, it’s possibly even something of a surprise that the new movie is doing as well as its predecessor. Originally Guardians 3 was going to be the movie that launched Phase 4 of the MCU, but after Gunn was let go there was a significant question regarding whether or not the movie would even happen. Clearly, this was a movie fans were waiting for.
Regardless of where the box office ends up, it seems clear that James Gunn is going to have some high expectations and his focus shifts fully to the DCU, where he is the co-head of DC Studios and will be writing and directing the next Superman movie.
