KB News Desk
Marvel’s web-slinging franchise swings into Korea on July 29 with nearly half of all ticket bookings already locked up
“Hope” has practically owned the Korean box office since it opened July 15. That grip might not hold much longer.
The threat comes from a familiar face. “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” opens here July 29, two days ahead of North America, and the numbers suggest it will hit the ground running.
As of Thursday morning, more than 357,000 tickets had been booked, keeping the Marvel sequel at No. 1 on the presales chart for a fifth straight day, according to the Korean Film Council’s tracking service.
That amounts to nearly half of all tickets sold in advance during that period. “Hope,” by comparison, sits a distant second at 25 percent.
So far, the sequel is off to a promising start, moving tickets at a pace comparable to Hollywood hits of recent memory. It reached the 300,000 mark quicker than “Avatar: Fire and Ash” did ahead of its opening last year, and outpaced “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” (2022) at the same stage of its rollout.
Both went on to become sizable hits here, finishing at 6.74 million and 5.88 million ticket sales, respectively.
Directed by Destin Daniel Cretton, “Brand New Day” is the fourth Spider-Man film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the first since 2021’s “No Way Home.” Tom Holland, by now a fixture in the role, is back for a fourth solo outing, joined this time by Jon Bernthal’s Punisher and Mark Ruffalo’s Hulk.
If history is any guide, the franchise has a real shot at big numbers here. Past Spider-Man films have sold a combined 20 million tickets in Korea, including the 7.55 million drawn by “No Way Home” in the thick of the pandemic, when the rest of the box office had all but flatlined.
“Hope,” meanwhile, still has plenty to show for its run so far. Na’s big-budget alien epic got off to the fastest start of any film this year, passing 2 million admissions in five days on its way to 2.53 million as of Thursday.
While it remains firmly at No. 1, the shape of its run has been less encouraging. Daily attendance fell on each day of the three-day holiday stretch that followed its July 15 debut — from some 595,000 admissions to under 400,000 — thinning out just when holiday crowds typically peak.
For comparison, Yeon Sang-ho’s zombie thriller “Colony” drew bigger crowds each day of a similar three-day holiday in May on its way to 5.71 million tickets sold.
The slowdown comes as the debate around the film shows no sign of settling. Audiences remain sharply divided, with one camp cheering its sheer audacity and another frustrated by a story that explains little and ends with even less resolved.
Naver’s ticket-verified audience score shows 53 percent of users awarding 9s and 10s against 23 percent handing out 1s and 2s. Over on the review platform Watcha, the tug-of-war averages out to a tepid 3.1 out of 5.
Some have even taken to social media to go after film critics who scored the film favorably, accusing them of colluding with industry insiders to talk up the year’s biggest homegrown production.
Budgeted at upwards of 50 billion won ($36 million), “Hope” faces a steep climb to profitability, though record overseas presales are said to have somewhat lowered the bar for its theatrical run. Industry watchers estimate the film would need at least 7 million to 8 million admissions to break even.
