Godzilla vs. Kong, a monster movie in which a radioactive lizard goes toe to toe with an oversized monkey on top of an aircraft carrier, debuts to monstrous results at the local box office. Serving as a sequel to both Kong: Skull Island and Godzilla: King of the Monsters, the latest instalment in the MonsterVerse is now the number one movie in Malaysia.
The Warner Bros. distributed film surpassed box office expectations and achieved regional revenues in Southeast Asia, India and Korea of US$25.2m on its opening weekend, with US$2.1m in Malaysia. This made it the biggest industry opening for a pandemic-era movie and the biggest opening weekend ever for a MonsterVerse film. It also captured 90% of the market share.
It is apparent that audiences are excited to return to theatres to enjoy blockbuster titles on the biggest screen possible. In Asia, Godzilla vs. Kong also made history being the biggest IMAX opening of the Monster Universe in 13 international territories including India and Taiwan. In China, the film opened on March 26 and is distributed by Legendary Pictures, took $70.3 million USD from 42,000 screens, taking in an astounding 82% of the total box office.
In the United States, Godzilla vs. Kong has also set a new pandemic record at the box office with its opening weekend haul of $48.5 million USD. The crossover film’s impressive haul greatly surpassed the previous record of $16.7 million set by Wonder Woman 1984. More impressively, the latest MonsterVerse instalment isn’t an exclusive offering to cinemas, as it had it debuts on HBO Max, a streaming service that sells monthly subscriptions for $15 in major cities in the US, while opening simultaneously in theatres.
