Infinity Castle’ Breaks Box Office Record On Release Day

Demon Slayer is back with a vengeance. It seems that Ufotable’s decision to end the series with a giant trilogy of movies rather than more TV episodes is going to pay off in spades. Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle Chapter 1 just released in Japan and destroyed a box office record there. A record set by…Demon Slayer: Mugen Train, its previous wide-released movie.

Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle reportedly made 1.7 billion yen in its first day of release, passing up Mugen Train’s 1.2 billion yen record at the Japanese box office before this. Now, as of a few hours ago, it’s surpassed 3 billion yen, and the weekend has barely started. The overall opening weekend haul is going to be enormous.

The release of Demon Slayer: Mugen Train back in 2020 was hugely profitable. Even during the height of the pandemic, the movie made $485 million worldwide in its box office run (a rare ~85/15 international/domestic split). If we want to do a very rough estimate about how Demon Slayer: Infinity Castle might perform given these first-day increases of 40%, that could mean something closer to a $700 million global haul. However, it’s worth noting that some of the Japanese figures could be due to how the yen is getting weaker over time, so it’s not possible to directly compare, perhaps, in that context.

So yes, all of these records we’re talking about are just in Japan, but soon the film will be rolling out for international release. Here are the release dates, with many regions, including the US, needing to wait about two months:

• Japan – Friday, July 18
• UK – Tuesday, August 12
• Indonesia – Friday, August 15
• Philippines – Wednesday, August 20
• Brazil – Thursday, September 11
• Mexico – Thursday, September 11
• UAE – Thursday, September 11
• India – Friday, September 12
• South Africa – Friday, September 12
• Canada – Friday, September 12
• USA – Friday, September 12

This is not confirmed, but new reports say that the next two movies in the Infinity Castle arc will air in 2027 and 2029 respectively. First impressions of Infinity Castle have fans positively raving about it, especially its animation, which Ufotable is already famous for. While Rotten Tomatoes scoring isn’t open yet, Infinity Castle has a stunning 9.4/10 on IMDB, which, no joke, would make it the best-reviewed movie in history. The Shawshank Redemption has a 9.3/10.

I mean, sure, we can calm down. Those are just a few hundred super fan reviews in, but it’s clear that initial reactions are hugely positive and that fans are not being let down by the first chapter of the last chapter of the series, which remains one of the biggest animes in history (though here comes Solo Leveling). We’ll have more box office data in soon, and the rest of us can see how the movie is in September.

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Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.