It’s-a-me, Mario number one!

The Super Mario Bros. Movie must've eaten a healthy serving of mushroom power-ups, because it crushed the box office over the five-day weekend. The story of two working-class plumbers brought in $377 million worldwide, the biggest opening for an animated film… well, ever (Frozen II previously held the record with $358 million).

And for Nintendo, the studio behind the video game and Mario Bros. movie, that might just mean a profit of *Dr. Evil voice + pinky raise* 1 billion dollars. Yes, you read that right: profit.

• According to financial senior analyst David Gibson, the film is on pace to bring in ~$1.2 billion in global box office sales.
• Add another ~$2.3 billion from its digital release, deduct the costs to make and market the film and – Mamma Mia – you’ve got ~$1.1 billion in profit. Yahoo!

🎮➡️🍿 Zoom out: Mario is the latest in a string of Hollywood success stories for video game adaptations. Sonic The Hedgehog 2 and Uncharted, both based on video games, were the 13th and 14th highest grossing films of 2022.

And it’s not just the big screen – HBO Max’s The Last Of Us (also a video game adaption icydk) was the most in-demand show across the world for nearly two months, following its premiere in January 2023.