Box Office: Marvel's Ant-Man Takes $23.4M On Friday

Initial tracking had Marvel's Ant-Man coming in at $55-60M for its debut weekend, but as opening day approached tracking bumped up to $65M, but now that Friday's numbers are in it is headed for the low-end of expectations.

Ant-Man earned $23.4M on Friday, which is below 2011's Thor ($25.5M) and Captain America: The First Avengers ($25.7M) first-day tallies. Ant-Man is now on pace for a $58M weekend, which would be the worst opening weekend for a Marvel film since 2008's The Incredible Hulk ($55.4M) and $7M short of Captain America: The First Avenger and Thor's $65M and $65.7M debuts, respectively.

Things aren't all negative: Ant-Man has received an 'A' CinemaScore from audiences, which should produce very good word-of-mouth. Its 130M estimated production cost is below Thor's $150Mand Captain America: The First Avenger's $140M.

Meanwhile, last weekend's box office champ Minions is headed for second-place with $47.3M. That's a drop of 59% from last week, which is a steeper drop than what Despicable Me and Despicable Me 2 incurred in their second weekend.

In its sixth weekend, Jurassic World has surpassed the $600M benchmark and now has a total domestic gross of $610.4M.

Armed with the astonishing ability to shrink in scale but increase in strength, con-man Scott Lang must embrace his inner-hero and help his mentor, Dr. Hank Pym, protect the secret behind his spectacular Ant-Man suit from a new generation of towering threats. Against seemingly insurmountable obstacles, Pym and Lang must plan and pull off a heist that will save the world.

Ant-Man hits theaters on July 17. And for a complete list of Marvel Studios' other release dates, head to ComicBook.com's Comic Book Movie Database here.