'Solo' Scores $14.1 Million Opening Night Domestically But Is Dead On Arrival In China

Search
Home

It’s a tale of two countries when talking about the opening of “Solo: A Star Wars Story.”

It’s being reported that Thursday night “previews” for ‘Solo’ came in at $14.1 million domestically. That’s a great start for the spin-off film and is a record for Memorial Day weekend. Many are expecting ‘Solo’ to come close to the record (and maybe break it) for biggest 4-day Memorial Day weekend. Currently, “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End” holds that record with $139.8 million over 4 days. If ‘Solo’ were to break that record, then it appears that Disney would have another hit on their hands, albeit a smaller hit compared to the rest of the franchise.

However, one place that isn’t as excited for ‘Solo’ as we are in the States is China. Unlike other major franchises like ‘Fast and Furious’ and the Marvel Cinematic Universe, China hasn’t quite embraced the galaxy far, far away. In fact, they seem to be actively spurning Lucasfilm’s advances.

READ MORE: ‘Solo’: Ron Howard & Lucasfilm Craft A Safe, Fan Service-y, But Entertaining ‘Star Wars’ Adventure [Review]

According to early estimates (via Jonathan Papish of China Film Insider), ‘Solo’ has a first day’s total of $3.3 million in China. Comparing to the first days of the other new “Star Wars” films, an alarming trend emerges. ‘The Force Awakens,’ which broke records in the US and around the world had a fairly strong opening day in China with $33 million. However, when ‘Rogue One’ opened a year later, the film’s opening day dropped to $12 million. Things got worse when ‘The Last Jedi’ opened in December 2017, with only $10 million on its first day in China.

Now, we have ‘Solo’ only pulling in a third of what ‘The Last Jedi’ did. If you use the first day to predict the future of ‘Solo’ in China, using the total from ‘The Last Jedi,’ you can expect the newest “Star Wars” film to finish with about $15 million. Yeah, that’s not good for a franchise that needs to bank on global ticket sales to cover the huge production costs.

Not to rub salt in the wound, but when you compare it to Disney’s other major franchise, ‘Solo’ looks even worse. “Avengers: Infinity War” had an opening weekend of almost $200 million just a couple weeks ago in China. Now, after 10 days, the Marvel superhero team-up has crossed $300 million.

I know what you’re gonna say now, “But that’s Marvel! That doesn’t count!” Okay, fine, let’s dig further.

Last month, China saw the release of “Rampage.” The Dwayne Johnson monster movie has underwhelmed in the US but had a solid opening weekend of $27.2 million in China. The film currently has a Chinese box office total of $107 million. So, as is clearly evident, ‘Solo’ is doing poorly by anyone’s standards.

What does this mean for the future of “Star Wars” in China? We’re not sure, but it doesn’t look like the country is ever going to embrace the franchise unless Disney changes something, and fast.