“Despicable Me 4" dominated the Fourth of July weekend at the box office—ending the uber-successful streak of "Inside Out 2"—with a $75 million gross over the three-day weekend that rises to $122.6 million in the five days since it opened Wednesday.
"Despicable Me 4".
The sixth film in the animated franchise outperformed its 2017 predecessor in both metrics—"Despicable Me 3," which also opened over the Fourth of July weekend, grossed $72.4 million over three days and $99 million over its first five.
However, "Minions: The Rise of Gru," another film in the franchise, managed to outperform both and remains the highest-grossing Fourth of July weekend release ever, according to Box Office Mojo (it grossed $107 million in three days and $140 million in five in 2022).
The $75 million three-day gross of "Despicable Me 4" places the opening weekend for the film in the middle of the franchises' performances—"Minions: The Rise of Gru," "Despicable Me 2" ($83.5 million opening) and "Minions" ($115.7 million) all had better opening weekends, but it did top "Despicable Me" ($56.3 million in 2010) and "Despicable Me 3."
Internationally, "Despicable Me 4" grossed $106.9 million across 52 markets, Variety reported, bringing global gross to $229.5 million in five days—more than double its $100 million production budget.
“Despicable Me 4” is the second animated film of the summer to dominate at the box office—”Inside Out 2” last weekend became the first movie of the year to gross $1 billion globally and it was the highest-grossing film of every weekend from its June 14 release until the Fourth of July.
Over the holiday weekend, it grossed an additional $30 million as the second-best-performing film, followed by "A Quiet Place: Day One” with $21 million, "Bad Boys: Ride or Die" at $6.5 million and “Horizon: An American Saga — Chapter 1," Kevin Costner's ill-fated Western, grossed another $5.5 million.
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The six movies in the “Despicable Me” franchise have made the series the highest-grossing animated film franchise of all time. The first film sees Gru, a criminal mastermind played by Steve Carell, adopt three orphans to help him carry out the largest heist in history. The franchise follows his life as a father to the girls, his career as a former supervillain-turned-secret-agent and the antics of his fan-beloved army of yellow minions. The franchise has out-earned "Shrek," "Toy Story" and “Frozen” and is the 15th-highest-grossing franchise of all time, according to Box Office Mojo. It has spawned six feature length movies, 18 short films, a holiday TV special, a "Minion Land" with rides at Universal Studios Florida, several video games and other ventures.
“Inside Out 2” and “Despicable Me 4” have helped to revive a summer box office that was previously falling flat. To date, the summer box office has grossed $1.6 billion, about 42% of the $4.03 billion reported at the box office last summer, the highest-grossing summer season since the start of the COVID pandemic.