We can talk about superhero fatigue not being a thing, as those making superhero movies often do, but here in 2025? There’s significant evidence that is indeed happening, no matter how well-liked the films may be. They’re earning far less than they used to, and that is especially true overseas in places like Asia. Many countries like China are just…done with this genre.
With Superman and Fantastic Four slowing to a crawl in terms of their earnings, we now can say for certain that this is the worst-earning year for superhero movies since 2011, 14 years ago, and when the MCU was first spooling up with movies like Thor and Captain America and X-Men: First Class. But none of them passed $700 million, and now that is true of 2025. Only one barely made it to $600 million. Here are the totals, along with some other relevant information.
- Superman – $604 million, 42% international, 83% critic score, 90% audience score
- The Fantastic Four: First Steps – $490 million, 47.5% international, 87% critic score, 91% audience score
- Captain America: Brave New World – $415 million, 51.7% international, 46% critic score, 76% audience score
- Thunderbolts – $382 million, 50.2% international, 88% critic score, 93% audience score
What points am I making here? Again, Superman is the only film to cross even $500 million, though Fantastic Four may limp there. And this performance is despite the fact that at least Superman, Fantastic Four and Thunderbolts were very, very well-liked by the critics and fans that actually saw them. There were just…less fans that actually saw them. These aren’t bad movies!
The international percentage may seem okay with most hovering around 50%. But keep in mind this is the entire rest of the world. To cherry pick a few examples, Avengers: Endgame had 69.3% international earnings. Spider-Man: No Way Home had 57% international earnings, and so did Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness. Famous flop The Marvels had 59% international. That 42% for Superman in particular brutal, and James Gunn even blamed anti-American sentiment on that. Albeit, Captain “America,” was almost 10% higher than that.
2026 is a big test. Spider-Man: Brand New Day should easily earn a billion dollars, and if it doesn’t, that’s even more evidence that things are crashing. Avengers: Doomsday is allegedly out at the end of the year, and that too needs to be a huge earner. That said, this year was also a test with a big new DCU-launching Superman movie out and the arrival of the enormously important Fantastic Four. But again, record lows. We’ll see if things can improve from here, but the golden age simply seems to be slipping to silver or copper.
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