Inside Out 2's Massive Box Office Record Was Toppled By The Sequel No One Saw Coming
Somewhat quietly, cinematic history has been made. The Chinese blockbuster "Ne Zha 2" has been on an absolute tear in its native country for just under three weeks now, demolishing just about every box office record there is to be broken in China. Now, it's coming for global records too, and it just passed a big one. Amazingly enough, "Inside Out 2" is no longer the highest-grossing animated film in history.
Just five months after "Inside Out 2" passed 2019's "The Lion King" remake at the box office to firmly become the biggest animated movie ever, its reign as the champion of animation is over. According to Reuters, "Ne Zha 2" has passed $1.69 billion globally, just barely edging out Pixar's blockbuster sequel. "Inside Out 2" made, more precisely, $1.698 billion during its run last year and was sitting pretty as the eighth biggest movie ever globally. It's now going to have to settle for ninth place, with "The Lion King" ($1.66 billion) falling out of the top 10 entirely. The decimal points hardly matter, though, seeing as this animated sequel still has a lot of gas in the tank. It's going to climb much higher before all's said and done.
Director Yang Yu's "Ne Zha 2" has essentially made $1.7 billion as of this writing, having recently opened with $7.2 million at the U.S. box office this past weekend as "Captain America: Brave New World" topped the charts domestically. Mind you, this movie has accomplished all of this by making the vast majority of its money in a single country. Its North American total is akin to finding change in the couch cushions (i.e. it's nothing in the grand scheme of things). Even so, it's now the only Chinese film on the top 10 all-time list but, more importantly, it's breaking these records in newfound ways. What we're seeing is truly unprecedented.
Ne Zha 2 is a blockbuster the likes of which the world has never seen
A week ago, "Ne Zha 2" become the first movie to ever make $1 billion or more in a single country, passing "Star Wars: Episode VII — The Force Awakens" ($936.6 million) for that record. The rate at which the sequel to 2019's "Ne Zha" (which grossed $742 million in its day) has made its money is almost unfathomable. For some added context, "Inside Out 2" took months to claim its record, and did so by making more than $1 billion internationally. This movie has grossed fractional amounts of money in countries other than China. This is all being driven by China.
As of this writing, "Ne Zha 2" also sits ahead of 2015's "Jurassic World" ($1.67 billion) on the all-time charts. Looking ahead, In a matter of days, it's going to overtake 2021's "Spider-Man: No Way Home" ($1.95 billion) to climb even higher on the charts. It's all but assured that this will become just the seventh movie ever to make at least $2 billion worldwide, joining "Avengers: Infinity War" ($2 billion), "The Force Awakens" ($2.07 billion), "Titanic" ($2.26 billion), "Avatar: The Way of Water" ($2.32 billion), "Avengers: Endgame" ($2.79 billion), and "Avatar" ($2.92 billion).
Just how high can we expect it to climb? At this point, it's probably going to land somewhere between "The Force Awakens" and "Endgame." We could be looking at the third-biggest movie ever before long. That is truly wild. This is a big reason why Hollywood can no longer depend on China for box office grosses, as the country is prioritizing homegrown releases. It's not hard to see why.
On the plus side, this does help demonstrate that the global box office is on an upward trajectory after a rough few years in the aftermath of the COVID-19 lockdowns. It may not help Hollywood directly, but it can and probably will be taken as a good sign nonetheless, broadly speaking. I spoke more about the movie, as well as some other box office and movie/TV news, on today's episode of the /Film Daily podcast:
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"Ne Zha 2" is in theaters now.