Venom 2 beats Shang-Chi, gets biggest box office opening of the pandemic

Let there be carnage indeed…at the box office. Venom: Let There Be Carnage won big in its first weekend, raking in $90.1 million in North America, according to SyFy Wire. Not only did it improve on the opening weekends of big movies like Black Widow and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, but it did so at a time when people are still unsure about going to theaters on account of the pandemic.

After the success of Shang-Chi, many studios decided to move forward with the release of their movies rather than delay them again, and Sony is surely ecstatic they didn’t push the date back. After all, a delay could mean the movie would be in competition with the likes of Chloé Zhao’s Eternals, which releases on November 5; better to be the only superhero game in town in October.

The release of Venom 2 also sets audiences up for December 17, when the world will finally get to watch Spider-Man: No Way Home. Will the two cross over? Rumors abound.

Of course, the world has also been waiting for Daniel Craig’s final stint as James Bond in No Time To Die and the sci-fi extravaganza of Dune. Both movies have had success in the global market but won’t be released in U.S. theaters until later this month.

Venom: Let There Be Carnage SPOILERS below

It’s nice to know that the movie theater industry is inching back to normal. “The power of Venom to draw moviegoers to the cinema was on full display this weekend and demonstrated the ability of an edgy and interesting character outside of the MCU to create enough excitement among fans to drive massive box office numbers,” Comscore analyst Paul Dergarabedian told SyFy Wire. “Given the incredible weekend results, the decision to team up with Venom and bring the character into the MCU fold is a stroke of genius and will add even more revenue-generating horsepower to the Marvel Multiverse moving forward.”

Yes, that’s right: The reveal in Venom 2’s mid-credit scene has all of our heads spinning, since it teases Venom officially crossing over into the MCU. I have so many questions about what Eddie Brock/Venom (Tom Hardy) was experiencing in the scene and how it could potentially align with the events of Loki, WandaVision, and the future of the multiverse.

Whatever happens, this is something fans have waited a very long time it is. Let’s not forget it was just too long ago that Tom Holland was pulled out of the MCU and told that he would only be a part of the Sony Spider-Man movies. Something magical has happened since then, and we are not complaining.

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