‘Godzilla Minus Zero’ Roars in Box Office Triumph

This was Godzilla’s weekend, and we were all just living in it. Per Deadline, Godzilla Minus Zero emerged as the number one movie in the world with a $63 million global box office. That’s not just up from the $41 million open of Godzilla Minus One back in 2023, it sets some new box office benchmarks: it’s not just the highest-grossing opening day for any Japanese live-action film, it’s also landed the top opening weekend in North America for a foreign-language film, and the biggest IMAX global start for a Japanese film. In IMAX’s case, $21.3 million (or 34%) of the sequel’s global take came from the premium format. Minus Zero hit Japan on November 3, aka Godzilla Day, and select IMAX theaters in North America played the film that day and Wednesday, November 4. This is also Japan’s first “filmed for IMAX” production, and the marketing’s been sure to hype it up as one to see on the biggest screen possible—something fans have done, possibly at the cost of their eardrums. Critics and audiences have been fairly high on Godzilla Minus Zero. It helps that early November is just full of Godzilla: the King of the Monsters returned to video games last week with a remaster of the 2002 fighting game Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee, and will headline an Apex Legends event starting tomorrow, November 10. Add on his return to TV with Monarch season two back in April, and the world got to know Godzilla a lot this year. This whole decade, really, since the Monsterverse movies have paired him with King Kong in a saga continuing with March 2027’s Godzilla x Kong: Supernova. Minus One went on to make $116 million worldwide, so now it’s a matter of seeing how far Minus Zero can go. Its only real genre competition for the month is Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping (November 20) and Hexed (November 25), but until then? Might be a few weeks of seeing Minus Zero again, if one’s so inclined. Want more io9 news? Check out the best movies and TV shows to stream this month and all the upcoming sci-fi, fantasy, and horror books that should be on your radar.