After recording $18.5 million from early Thursday night screenings, Jurassic World went on to add another $64.1 million on Friday alone, a number that has never before been achieved in Friday box office history, topping both the recent $52 million from Furious 7 and both Avengers films with The Avengers scoring $63 million in 2012 and Avengers: Age of Ultron bringing in $57 million earlier this year.
Of course, those are for purely Friday numbers, if you include Thursday night showings it’s the third largest “Friday” release behind Avengers: Age of Ultron ($84 million) and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 ($91 million).
Predictions heading into the weekend for the Jurassic Park sequel, 22 years after the original film, ranged from $110-140 million, but those numbers are already in the rearview as this one will quite likely cross the $180 million mark and, if it manages to hold up well over Saturday and Sunday, it might make a bid for the all-time opening record currently held by The Avengers at $207 million. However, it is more likely to fall just shy of Ultron‘s $191 million weekend.
Add to the fact it is playing in the largest number of IMAX screens worldwide ever (445 internationally, 364 domestically) and 13,551 theaters worldwide means this is the largest Universal Pictures release ever and it sure seems to be paying off as it has already grossed $212.8 million internationally since opening on Wednesday.
I’ll be back tomorrow morning with a look at the weekend box office and we’ll see how this turns out.
