Makoto Shinkai's New Film Surpasses Your Name's Opening Day Box Office

Makoto Shinkai's Your Name was the most critically and commercially successful anime films of 2016 and 2017, and one of the most well received films of all time. This naturally means that more eyes than ever were going to be focused on whatever the prominent director would release next, and this has already resulted in a major boost of support for that new film, Tenki no Ko: Weathering With You.

According to distributor Toho, as noted by Eiga.com (via Crunchyroll), the opening day gross for Weathering With You had an opening day gross that was 118% of the opening day gross of Your Name, released back in 2016.

While the full breakdown isn't available as of this writing, Weathering With You has had a much wider release than Your Name did. It was released in 63 more theaters in its opening weekend, and has 147 more screens overall. The numbers for its full opening weekend will be tallied after its all said and done, but things are looking good for the newest film so far.

Shinkai did mention in a previous interview that Your Name's success contributed to how Weathering With You was being developed, and this has seemingly had a greater effect on the box office. While the final tally might result in a different number, it seems that with more eyes on Shinkai's work there's a more successful box office.

Now released into theaters in Japan, Makoto Shinkai directs and writes Tenki no Ko: Weathering With You for CoMix Wave Films. Masayoshi Tanaka returns from Your Name to design the characters, Atsushi Tamura will serve as animation director, and Hiroshi Takiguchi will serve as art director. The film stars Kotaro Daigo as Hodaka Morishima and Nana Mori as Hina Amano along with Tsubasa Honda, Shun Oguri, Sakura Kiryuu, Sei Hiraizumi, Yuki Kaji, and Chieko Baisho in currently unconfirmed roles.

GKIDS has confirmed that they have licensed the film for an English language release with the current release window of 2020. They describe Weathering With You as such, "The summer of his high school freshman year, Hokoda runs away from his remote island home to Tokyo, and quickly finds himself pushed to his financial and personal limits. The weather is unusually gloomy and rainy every day, as if to suggest his future. He lives his days in isolation, but finally finds work as a writer for a mysterious occult magazine. Then one day, Hokoda meets Hina on a busy street corner. This bright and strong­willed girl possesses a strange and wonderful ability: the power to stop the rain and clear the sky..."

via Crunchyroll