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.
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
