Lucasfilm Congratulates Avengers: Infinity War for Having a Bigger Opening Weekend Than Star Wars: The Force Awakens
Okay, sure, one Disney subsidiary congratulating another isn’t typically something that warrants its own headline, but when one has an opening as massive as Avengers: Infinity War just did, and it knocks the record that Star Wars: The Force Awakens set a mere two-and-a-half years ago, I think it’s worth taking a minute to recognize that. There’s also an interesting tradition involving Lucasfilm (or similar parties) congratulating another studio, which continues here.
So here we have an image of Rey handing Iron Man a lightsaber with a note personally signed by Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy:
Congratulations, @MarvelStudios and @Avengers: #InfinityWar. pic.twitter.com/PnHfaouOlP
— Star Wars (@starwars) May 1, 2018
Mark Hamill, ever the joker, added this in reply:
Well done, @MarvelStudios and @Avengers: #InfinityWar.
(FYI #IronMan: Wait until after she leaves if you're going to toss that away. Trust me on this one.) From Mark and everyone at the Hamill house! https://t.co/U18od1q8TR— Mark Hamill (@HamillHimself) May 1, 2018
This is actually part of a long-standing tradition of congratulations being passed around to movies that either surpassed or were surpassed by Star Wars, starting back in 1977 with the original film beating Steven Spielberg and Universal’s Jaws, causing Spielberg to release this note to his best friend George Lucas:
And not too long afterward, E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial came along and outgrossed Star Wars. So Lucas fired back with another letter congratulating his pal:
Decades later, when the Star Wars Special Editions helped the original film reclaim the record, Spielberg congratulated Lucas once more:
Of course, Lucasfilm didn’t keep the record for too long as Titanic became the highest-grossing movie ever by 1998:
Years passed, and instead of talking about global box office records, people focused on opening weekends. Jurassic World beat the opening weekend record set by The Avengers:
And then, like the Star Wars Special Editions and Titanic before it, Star Wars: The Force Awakens beat the record that Jurassic World set in short order, allowing the dinosaur-based franchise to concede its accomplishment to a new champion:
…And here we are! That’s about it for today’s fun little history lesson, but we’ll be sure to cover more pieces like this over the newly-launched Movie News Net. Stop on by!
Grant has been a fan of Star Wars for as long as he can remember, having seen every movie on the big screen. When he’s not hard at work with his college studies, he keeps himself busy by reporting on all kinds of Star Wars news for SWNN and general movie news on the sister site, Movie News Net. He served as a frequent commentator on SWNN’s The Resistance Broadcast.
