Guardians of the Galaxy's Opening Weekend Box Office Could Top Captain America: The Winter Soldier

While still far from a sure thing, new projections indicate that a solid performance on Sunday [...]

By Russ Burlingame

While still far from a sure thing, new projections indicate that a solid performance on Sunday could give Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy the second-biggest opening so far this year, outpacing the studio's acclaimed Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

Cap 2 opened at a little under $95.1 million, and the latest numbers suggest that Guardians of the Galaxy could open as big as $95.5 million, making it the second-highest opening weekend of the year so far, according to Deadline.

The film was expected to make around $70 million, with the original thinking being that continued strong word-of-mouth would drive it to take the August opening weekend record, eclipsing the $69.3 million from 2007's The Bourne Ultimatum.

After a slow, disappointing summer at the box office, Guardians will take the August opening-weekend record and inject some much-needed cash into theaters. Last year, the #1 movie on this weekend was another comic book adaptation -- 2 Guns -- with around a third of what Guardians will make.

Only five films so far this year have topped the $90 million mark on opening weekend, and three of them -- Captain America: The Winter Solder, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and X-Men: Days of Future Past -- are based on Marvel Comics properties. The others, Transformers: Age of Extinction and Godzilla, are ironically based on properties that had their own Marvel Comics titles at one point.

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