The Force Awakens held the all-time domestic crown for almost 11 years. It fell on a Tuesday, in a week that also brought soft streaming numbers for the newest Star Wars movie.
Star Wars had a rough Tuesday.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day passed Star Wars: The Force Awakens on Sept. 16 to become the highest-grossing movie ever at the domestic box office. Both films sit at roughly $936 million. The gap between them, when Brand New Day crossed, was something like $100,000, which in box office terms is a rounding error.
The Force Awakens had held that record since December 2015.
Is Spider-Man really the highest-grossing movie of all time?
Only if you skip the asterisk, and most coverage this week has skipped it.
These are unadjusted numbers. They count dollars without accounting for inflation or the fact that ticket prices in 2026 are nothing like ticket prices in 2015, let alone 1939. Adjust for inflation and Brand New Day is not in the conversation. Gone With the Wind still holds that title by a wide margin.
What is true is that Brand New Day made more raw dollars domestically than any film before it. That is a real achievement and a genuinely enormous run. It is also a Sony release rather than a Disney one, though Marvel Studios is a producing partner.
Worldwide, Brand New Day is at about $2.45 billion. It opened July 31 and is now in its eighth week.
How did The Mandalorian and Grogu do at the box office?
Not well, and the numbers being passed around are wrong.
The film finished with $177.7 million domestic and $168 million internationally for a worldwide total of $345.7 million. Several outlets have run $321.7 million or $344 million. Those figures are either outdated or incorrect.
Against that total sits a $165 million production budget, or roughly $300 million once marketing is counted. Studios typically need somewhere around two and a half times the production budget to break even theatrically, which puts this one underwater.
It is the lowest-grossing live-action Star Wars film. That qualifier matters, because the lowest-grossing Star Wars film overall is the animated Clone Wars from 2008, and plenty of coverage has dropped the distinction.
Its $98.1 million opening weekend also came in under Solo: A Star Wars Story, which had held the live-action low since 2018.
How is The Mandalorian and Grogu doing on Disney+?
Better than theaters, but not by as much as Lucasfilm would like.
The film hit Disney+ on Sept. 2. For the week of Aug. 31 through Sept. 6, Nielsen clocked it at 727 million minutes viewed. That made it the second most-watched streaming movie for the week and the tenth most-watched title overall.
Second place sounds fine until you check what else was running. Masters of the Universe pulled 1,172 million minutes in its debut week. Project Hail Mary landed somewhere between 860 and 922 million.
So the biggest Star Wars release in three years debuted on Disney+ at roughly 60 percent of what a He-Man movie did.
Was the movie actually cheap for Lucasfilm?
Comparatively, yes, and that is the part working in its favor.
At $165 million, The Mandalorian and Grogu cost less to make than most modern Star Wars features. Jon Favreau directed, the runtime came in at 132 minutes, and the production leaned on existing sets, crews and technology built up over several seasons of television.
A film that underperforms on a smaller budget is a different problem than one that underperforms on a $300 million production spend. It is still a problem.
What comes next for Star Wars on screen
Ahsoka returns for its second season on Jan. 20, 2027, with Rosario Dawson back in the title role and Anakin Skywalker returning.
Beyond that, Starfighter is in the pipeline, and Kathleen Kennedy stepped away from running Lucasfilm in January to go back to producing full time. Dave Filoni and Lynwen Brennan run the studio now, with Filoni as president and chief creative officer and Brennan as co-president.
Filoni came up through the animated series and helped build The Mandalorian. Brennan spent decades at Industrial Light and Magic. Both of them make things, which says something about what Disney thinks Lucasfilm needs.
The record is gone either way. Records usually are, eventually.
Article compiled with the help of the Pirates & Princesses newsroom.
Pirates and Princesses is your destination for Disney news, theme park updates, and the pop culture you love. From Disney cruises and travel tips to Disney fashion, food, collectibles, and movie news, PNP covers it all. Visit us at piratesandprincesses.net for daily coverage. Follow PNP on Facebook and Instagram, and listen to the Pirates & Princesses podcast on Apple Podcasts and YouTube.
Hat Tips:
TheWrap, the Sept. 16 record crossing, the unadjusted figures for both films, and the $2.45 billion worldwide total
Boxoffice Pro, the precise domestic figures that put the margin near $100,000
The Hollywood Reporter, the Nielsen streaming figures for the week of Aug. 31 through Sept. 6 and the comparison titles
Star Wars News Net, the streaming placement and the theatrical context
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