We now have the numbers for Captain America: Brave New World’s second weekend at the domestic box office, and it’s not good news.

Over the weekend of the 23rd February, the movie brought in $28 million dollars. This is a drop of 68% from its debut, when it had an opening of $88 million, and a worldwide total of $192 million.

This is comparable to what Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania scored when it released in February 2023, with a similar opening weekend of $106 million domestically and $227 million globally, before dropping by 70% in its second week to just $31 million domestically.

I use the comparison with Ant-Man 3 as both these movies have similarities. Both are based on established characters from the MCU, both have previous hits behind them, and both were released at the same time of year, with no direct competition. With all of this, it’s fair to assume that BNW will have a similar overall total. Quantumania eventually made $476 million, so it’s a fair assumption that BNW will be closer to $450M, unless it manages to hold out better overseas. Back here in Britain, it only fell by 54%, bringing in something like $2.9M, after an $8M opening ($2.5M lower than AM3).

But regardless, these aren’t good numbers, and there’s more to them than just their face value, and they could be responsible for big changes in how the MCU goes forward.

Because, if it wasn’t already clear, Marvel can’t rely on their flagship movies to make money. When Ant-Man and the Wasp was released in 2019, it made over a billion dollars. That wouldn’t happen now. Yes it’s true Deadpool & Wolverine made a ton of money last summer, but that’s very much an anomaly, and it’s not something the MCU can capitalize on.

In a lot of ways, Brave New World was an important movie, as it was meant to establish Sam Wilson in the role of Captain America. Now that it’s failed to make a splash, that means it’s failed to bring that character out as the new face of the franchise, which is a bad thing. Right from the start, the franchise was lead by the double-header of Tony Stark and Steve Rogers, which not only provided for a solid story, but also solid movies that could be relied upon to make money, simply because they featured these characters. Now, the franchise doesn’t have that, and they don’t have a way to change it.

Thunderbolts and Fantastic Four: First Steps are both centered around relatively unknown or completely new characters. While there is the possibility of F4 making a big enough impact to drive the MCU in a new direction, it still doesn’t fix its problems.

When Avengers: Doomsday hits theatres in 2026, who is going to be the main team here? Who will be leading it? Will Doctor Strange be enough? It certainly seems he’s a better bet than Sam Wilson, as his last movie made near a billion dollars.

But there’s more to it than just the money. If you’re going to put Captain America in the Avengers, you can’t sideline him, but do people know or care enough about him?

This movie was the chance to set him up as the next big lead, something the franchise has lacked clearly since Endgame, but now he’s clearly seen as less of a draw than Ant-Man. There’s little chance he’ll get his own trilogy, and little chance of him becoming a recognizable character.

So once again the franchise doesn’t have a leader.

Which I think means the MCU needs to go back to being a “normal” franchise again, and really, it’s had an amazing run, with 23 movies in the Infinity Saga, and 11 billion dollar hits to their name, making a cinematic franchise that dominated at the box office for ten years, and an unbroken continuity that kept people coming back for each new movie.

But now it has been broken, and they should go back to making good standalone movies, which tell the story one hero at a time, getting to know them personally, and building them up. Give them some loose continuity, maybe, but don’t rush to try and artificially build another cinematic universe. Use a few heroes that are still popular, maybe, like Spider-Man, but just take it easy for a while.

Or else do what so many other franchises desperately need to do but won’t, and take a break.

Thanks to Kieran Burt who provided me with some of the numbers used in this post.

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