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A grand movie palace's illuminated marquee and vertical blade sign blaze against the night sky.

Steve Morgan, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

CultureAP · ReutersAug 2, 2026

'Spider-Man: Brand New Day' opens to $355 million in North America and $927 million worldwide, one of the biggest debuts ever

'Spider-Man: Brand New Day' took in about $355 million in North America, the second-biggest domestic opening on record, and roughly $927 million worldwide in its first weekend, distributor figures showed. The blockbuster gave cinemas one of their strongest results since the pandemic. Its debut trailed only the largest openings in Hollywood history for a domestic bow.

Analogies

Juvenal, "Satires" X — "bread and circuses"

For that sovereign people that once gave away military command, consulships, legions, and every thing, now bridles its desires, and limits its anxious longings to two things only—bread, and the games of the circus!
Juvenal, "The Satires," Satire X, translated by the Rev. Lewis Evans (Project Gutenberg) →

P. T. Barnum on the crowds for Jenny Lind (1850)

Thousands of persons covered the shipping and piers, and other thousands had congregated on the wharf at Canal Street, to see her. The wildest enthusiasm prevailed as the steamer approached the dock.
P. T. Barnum, "Struggles and Triumphs: or, Forty Years' Recollections of P. T. Barnum" (Project Gutenberg) →

Shakespeare, "Julius Caesar" (Act I, Scene 1)

Knew you not Pompey? Many a time and oft Have you climb’d up to walls and battlements, To towers and windows, yea, to chimney tops, Your infants in your arms, and there have sat The livelong day with patient expectation, To see great Pompey pass the streets of Rome.
William Shakespeare, "The Tragedy of Julius Caesar," Act I, Scene 1 (Project Gutenberg) →

Lew Wallace, "Ben-Hur" — the chariot-race crowd

Forth from each stall, like missiles in a volley from so many great guns, rushed the six fours; and up the vast assemblage arose, electrified and irrepressible, and, leaping upon the benches, filled the Circus and the air above it with yells and screams. This was the time for which they had so patiently waited!—this the moment of supreme interest treasured up in talk and dreams since the proclamation of the games!
Lew Wallace, "Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ" (Project Gutenberg) →
A victorious Roman gladiator stands over a defeated opponent as the crowded arena tiers thrust their thumbs downward.

Jean-Léon Gérôme, "Pollice Verso" (1872)

Gérôme freezes the instant a triumphant gladiator plants his foot on a fallen foe and looks up for the verdict. Above him the packed tiers of the Colosseum surge forward as one, thumbs jabbing downward, faces bright with bloodlust. It is the ancient blockbuster crowd made visible: tens of thousands fused into a single roar by one staged spectacle.
Wikimedia Commons →
A densely packed theatre audience emerges from shadow, faces turned in rapt attention toward a brightly lit stage.

Honoré Daumier, "The Melodrama" (c. 1860)

Daumier turns his back on the stage to paint the audience itself, a compact wall of rapt faces rising out of the darkness toward the footlights. Lips part, eyes widen, and hands clutch at collars as the packed house loses itself in the drama. He captures the essential magic of mass entertainment: a crowd of strangers fused into one held breath.
Wikimedia Commons →