The Batman Box Office Soars With Surprising $258M Worldwide in Opening Weekend

As it turns out, The Batman was even more successful this weekend than the projections indicated. On Sunday, it was reported that Matt Reeves and Robert Pattinson's new take on the Caped Crusader was hauling in a global total of $248.5 million in its opening weekend, delivering the second-biggest domestic debut since the start of the pandemic (behind only Spider-Man: No Way Home). Well, The Batman actually out-performed those initial numbers. 

News broke on Monday morning that The Batman actually made $134 million domestically, higher than its $128 million projections. According to Deadline, the international totals were also higher. The overseas box office for The Batman's first weekend actually came in at $124.2 million, giving the film a global weekend haul of $258.2 million. That's almost $10 million higher than the initial Sunday estimates. 

Those international figures put The Batman ahead of The Dark Knight, Justice League, and Wonder Woman, and just a hair behind The Dark Knight Rises. That bodes incredibly well not just for the future of DC films on the big screen, but the box office as a whole. The Batman and Spider-Man: No Way Home have been huge wins for theaters, but the box office has seen plenty of smaller victories as well, with Scream, Uncharted, and Dog all finding success.

It's worth mentioning that The Batman is also the first Warner Bros. movie in quite a while to get an exclusive theatrical opening. In the wake of the pandemic, WB made the decision to release each of its 2021 films on HBO Max the same day they hit theaters. Films like The Suicide Squad, Dune, and The Matrix Resurrections were all released day-and-date on the streaming service, lessening their theatrical impact. Warner Bros. made it clear that there was no intention to keep that train going beyond 2021 and The Batman is showing exactly why.

The Batman is the first of four total theatrical releases for DC films in 2022. Reeves and Pattinson are leading the charge this year, being followed by Black Adam, The Flash, and James Wan's highly anticipated Aquaman sequel. DC started off the year strong with the debut of James Gunn's Peacemaker series on HBO Max, continuing the story that was started in The Suicide Squad back in 2021.

The Batman is currently playing in theaters.