Lively-Reynolds Box Office Apocalypse: ‘It Ends With Us’ Takes on ‘Deadpool & Wolverine’ With Huge $7M in Previews

Wife-and-husband duo Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds are creating their own Barbenheimer moment at the box office as Lively’s new movie It Ends With Us goes up against Reynolds’ blockbuster Deadpool & Wolverine.

Sony’s female-fueled It Ends With Us earned a huge $7 million in Thursday previews, confirming speculation that the film would do much more business than predicted. Tracking services, along with Sony, had suggested the movie would open to $23 million over the Aug. 9-11 weekend, while exhibitors thought more along the lines of $40 million based on presales. Others thought $50 million or more.

Based on the preview number, It End With Us now has a shot at coming close to or even beating Deadpool, which is on course to gross $48 million to $52 million in its third weekend. Some think It Ends With Us could climb as high as $55 million, but that will all depend upon how front loaded it is.

Don’t feel bad for the record-shattering Marvel Studios/Disney superhero pic — Deadpool & Wolverine is on the verge of clearing the $1 billion mark at the global box office on its way to beating Joker and becoming the No. 1 R-rated movie of all time. The tentpole earned another $9.1 million Thursday in North America for a domestic tally of $440.1 million and $924.6 million globally.

As noted earlier this week, the last time a married couple had their films top the domestic box office was 34 years ago. In 1990, Bruce Willis’ Die Hard 2 stayed atop the chart in its second weekend with $14.5 million, and Demi Moore’s Ghost opened in second place with $12.2 million.

Some are pitching the dueling Reynolds-Lively movies as a showdown, but the opposite is the case, according to insiders. Reynolds, a marketing savant, and Lively hoped the two very different films would indeed result in a Barbenheimer moment whereby both films become top of mind. It Ends With Us is one of the only films in the marketplace for adult female audiences and while reviews have been mixed, the film boasts a stellar 95 percent audience score on Rotten Tomatoes and a 4.5 rating on PostTrak exit polls.

It Ends With Us, based on the best-selling romance novel of the same name by Colleen Hoover, stars Lively as Lily Bloom, a woman who overcomes a traumatic childhood to embark on a new life in Boston and fulfill a lifelong dream of opening her own business. A chance meeting with charming neurosurgeon Ryle Kincaid (Justin Baldoni) sparks an intense connection, but as the two fall deeply in love, Lily begins to see sides of Ryle that remind her of her parents’ relationship. When Lily’s first love, Atlas Corrigan (Brandon Sklenar), suddenly reenters her life, her relationship with Ryle is upended, and Lily realizes she must learn to rely on her own strength to make an impossible choice for her future.

It is the first of Hoover’s books to be adapted for the big screen, so there is plenty of pent-up demand. The film is directed by Baldoni and cost a modest $25 million to produce before marketing.

Reynolds and Lively have been supporting each other’s films in major ways, and it may not entirely be a coincidence that they opened so close to each other. It Ends With Us was originally supposed to hit theaters June 21, but was pushed back to Aug. 9. Lively is one of the producers of the film, and likely had some sway when the new date was selected.

Earlier this week, Reynolds posted a humorous Instagram clip of himself, his mother (Tammy Reynolds) and Deadpool & Wolverine co-star Hugh Jackman separately interrogating Sklenar during a recent press day for Lively’s new film.

Jackman and Reynolds — who are besties — also flanked Lively as she walked the pink carpet of It Ends With Us‘ world premiere earlier this week.

The weekend’s other new nationwide entry is Lionsgate’s big-budget Borderlands, which bit the dust Thursday evening with $1.32 million in previews. Tracking has the movie coming in at $10 million to $15 million for the weekend.