James Gunn’s Superman has now passed Batman v Superman at the domestic box office, earning $331 million compared to BvS’s $330 million. That headline made the rounds over the weekend, with some outlets calling it the “highest-grossing Superman film ever domestically.”
But as several movie watchers pointed out on X, the number hides the reality — higher ticket prices are doing a lot of the work. In terms of actual tickets sold, Superman is far behind its predecessors.
Worth pointing out is that the shills that run the DC_Cinematic sub on Reddit have locked the post and aren’t allowing fans to comment. We’ve put up the post in our own Reddit that isn’t censored.
Update: The Superman digital release has been moved up early — only 35 days after release.
Grok Breaks Down the Numbers
In the thread on X, user Ben W noted that in 2016, Batman v Superman sold an estimated 159 million tickets worldwide. By comparison, Superman has sold only around 67 million. That’s roughly 47% of BvS’s audience.
Grok, X’s built-in AI, confirmed the math:
- BvS (2016): ~$874M worldwide / ~146–159M tickets sold (avg ticket price $5.50–$6 adjusted).
- Superman (2025): ~$579M worldwide / ~64–67M tickets sold (avg ticket price $8.64–$9).
That’s a 43–46% audience drop.
@grok is this true?
— xio 🗣️ (@Olexio1) August 11, 2025
— Ben W (@B_Dub3) August 11, 2025
Man of Steel Comparison
User @Olexio1 asked Grok to run the same comparison against Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel (2013):
- Man of Steel (2013): ~$668M worldwide / ~112–122M tickets sold (avg $5.50–$6 adjusted).
- Superman (2025): ~64–67M tickets sold.
That’s only 52–60% of Man of Steel’s audience.
Yes, let's compare to Man of Steel (2013). Superman (2025) grossed $331M domestically, surpassing MoS's $291M.
— Grok (@grok) August 11, 2025
Adjusting for inflation, MoS sold ~112-122M tickets worldwide (est. avg price $5.50-6), while Superman's $579M suggests ~64-67M (est. avg $8.64-9). Audience is about…
What the Numbers Really Show
As I’ve reported in the past, inflation-adjusted ticket sales reveal that far fewer people are actually watching Gunn’s reboot.
While the dollar totals might edge past Superman films domestically, the audience size is down 55–60% from BvS and around 40–48% from Man of Steel.
Also, in today’s dollars, Gunn’s Superman can’t compete as Man of Steel nearly brought in a billion dollars, and Batman v. Superman over $1.175 billion. Gunn’s Superman hasn’t even reached $600M and won’t match Man of Steel‘s $670M box office without accounting for inflation, let alone BvS‘ $874.3M.
While Grok concluded, “Superhero fatigue seems real… DC needs a reboot spark,” James Gunn has argued, the problem isn’t fatigue but bad movies.
The stats are eye-opening indeed—superhero fatigue seems real. For context, Superman's global haul of ~$579M pales against BvS's $874M and MoS's $668M, with ticket sales down 55-60% from BvS after inflation. DC needs a reboot spark.
— Grok (@grok) August 11, 2025
