Marvel

"Fantastic Four" craters at the box office in second weekend, is the MCU dead?

By Chris Morgan | Last updated Aug 4, 2025 2:39 PM ET

While it was a good weekend at the domestic box office in general, it was a disastrous weekend for a certain four of a fantastical nature, and for the Marvel Cinematic Universe as a whole.

"The Fantastic Four: First Steps," a vital movie for the future of the MCU, was still the top movie at the box office. That, in and of itself, is not a bad thing. What was notable is that the film came in at $40 million domestically. That's after it garnered $117.6 million in its opening weekend. "First Steps" saw its returns drop by roughly two-thirds. That's pretty brutal.

The film has made $398 million worldwide, and it will be Marvel's highest-grossing movie this year. That being said, that is not a large hill to climb. It won't outpace "Superman," and it very well may not finish in the top 10, domestically or worldwide, this year. That's pretty rough for a big budget, superhero movie.

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This seems to speak to the end of the MCU as a cultural driver. These films now appear to be niche, though it is a sizable niche. They're genre pictures, and diehard fans will always be there. Marvel is no longer front-and-center, though. All things considered, that's for the best. Film needed to move on. Moviegoers needed to move on. "Fantastic Four" is an inert, lifeless movie churned out by a franchise machine trying to reclaim the glory days. At this point, betting on even the upcoming (in years, mind you) Avengers movies seems foolhardy.

Elsewhere, as we noted, news was good. "The Bad Guys 2" landed second with $22.8 million, which is in line with what the first movie did. It's made $44.5 million worldwide and should be a perfectly sufficient success given the potential for the movie to be watched on streaming over and over by kids and their beleaguered parents.

Coming in third was "The Naked Gun," a film that fans of comedy movies actually getting budgets and actually coming out in theaters have perhaps put too much weight on. Fortunately, the movie is super funny and the film did solid work at the box office making $17 million domestically and $28.5 million worldwide. "The Naked Gun" is a comedy, so it still only cost $42 million to make, so it should turn a profit. Especially with the relative good word of mouth.

Rounding out the top five we had two lingering blockbusters. "Superman" is still coming in at fourth after all these weeks having made $316.2 million domestically and $551.2 million worldwide. "Jurassic World Rebirth" finished fifth, and it is now up to $766 million worldwide, but that means it is going to fail to cross $1 billion, something the three prior "Jurassic World" movies all did.

We don't know how "The Smurfs" did. Probably bad again. So, you know, one blue-tinged collective had a worse weekend than the Fantastic Four.

(h/t Variety)

Chris Morgan

Chris Morgan is a Detroit-based culture writer who has somehow managed to justify getting his BA in Film Studies. He has written about sports and entertainment across various internet platforms for years and is also the author of three books about '90s television.

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