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Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero Film Beats Broly to Reach Top 5 All-Time Anime Films in U.S.
posted on by Adriana Hazra
The Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero anime film is earning an estimated US$30,761,982 after its second weekend in North America. That brings the film above Dragon Ball Super: Broly (US$30,712,119 in 2018) and puts it in the top five highest-grossing anime films ever at the U.S. box office (unadjusted for inflation).
The anime films that have earned more in their final U.S. box office totals are Pokémon: The First Movie, Demon Slayer – Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Mugen Train, and Pokémon 2000 - The Movie. The Box Office Mojo website reported that Jujutsu Kaisen 0 earned US$29,693,448 last year, while The Numbers website reported US$33,919,605.
Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero is bringing in an estimated US$4,565,668 this weekend which ranks it #5 for the timeframe, below Top Gun: Maverick and above DC League of Super-Pets. Its daily box office tallies so far are:
- Thursday, August 18: US$4,303,671
- Friday, August 19: US$6,611,743
- Saturday, August 20: US$5,813,401
- Sunday, August 21: US$4,395,234
- Monday, August 22: US$1,514,414
- Tuesday, August 23: US$1,593,787
- Wednesday, August 24: US$1,053,705
- Thursday, August 25: US$910,359
- Friday, August 26: US$1,320,925 (revised)
- Saturday, August 27: US$1,894,743 (new)
- Sunday, August 28: US$1,350,000 (estimate)
It opened on over 4,000 screens in over 3,100 theaters, including those with premium offerings such as IMAX, 4DX, Dolby Cinemas, MX4d, and DBox. In its first extended weekend, it earned US$3.4 million on 327 IMAX screens — a record IMAX U.S. opening for anime films. 17% of the film's first weekend total came from IMAX screenings, and 40% came from all premium large format screenings (including IMAX and its competitors).
Box office Mojo lists the film as having made US$53,890,827 worldwide, before this weekend's estimated box office returns.
The film earned with US$21,124,049 to top its opening weekend in North America. The first weekend box office alone already made it the #6 highest-grossing anime film ever at the U.S. box office. The film has also opened in Mexico, Argentina, Peru, Ireland, Chile, and other countries outside the United States with US$12.3 million (about 1.7 billion yen).
The film is the third anime film to top the U.S. weekend box office, and it is #3 in highest U.S. openings, after Pokémon: The First Movie with US$31,036,678 in 1999 and Demon Slayer – Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Mugen Train with US$21,234,994 in 2021.
Comparatively, Dragon Ball Super: Broly earned US$9.8 million in its opening weekend in 1,236 theaters in the U.S. and Canada.
Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero opened in Japan on June 11. The film sold about 498,000 tickets for about 670 million yen (about US$4.99 million) in its first two days. The film has earned 2,442,861,650 yen (about US$18.11 million) as of August 7.
Crunchyroll and Sony Pictures are screening the film in theaters worldwide this summer, with the widest opening ever for an anime film. The film opened in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., and Ireland on Friday. The screenings include both the original Japanese audio with subtitles and with a dub. The companies is distributing the film in "all continents, including North America, Latin America, Europe, Australia/New Zealand, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia (excluding Japan)" in 13 dubbed languages and 29 subbed languages.
Tetsuro Kodama directed the film, and Naoki Satō composed the music. Nobuhito Sue was the art director, Chikashi Kubota was the animation director, and Jae Hoon Jung was the CG director. Dragon Ball original manga creator Akira Toriyama worked on the film's original story, screenplay, and character designs.
Update: The final box office tallies for this past weekend are:
- Friday, August 26: US$1,322,147
- Saturday, August 27: US$1,912,862
- Sunday, August 28: US$1,428,110
Sources: Email correspondence, Box Offcie Mojo
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