Score one for the ladies. Wonder Woman, the first major superhero movie based around a female character, has turned out to be a rousing success. The Gal Gadot-led film brought in a hefty $100 million in the box office, making it the highest-grossing film of the week, and giving director Patty Jenkins a box office record.
Wonder Woman has set the record for the biggest opening weekend for a female-direct film. This is only Jenkins’ second movie as a director, following the Oscar-winning Monster in 2003. One would think Jenkins will have the opportunity to direct a lot more movies now. Although, given how the comic book movie world works, she may be a little busy with Princess Diana for a while.
What’s particularly impressive is that Wonder Woman is also a critical success. The film has a 93 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which greatly outpaces the other recent DC movies such as Suicide Squad. While DC’s other “Extended Universe” movies have brought in a ton of bucks, and even more money than Wonder Woman, they were also largely derided for their quality. The movie also got an “A” from CinemaScore, so audiences were really into Wonder Woman as well.
The critical success of Wonder Woman comes as something of a relief for comic book movie fans who didn’t want another Batman v. Superman-esque slog to get through. It’s also, of course, very cool to see a big action movie starring a woman and directed by a woman be such a rousing success. That may ruffle the feathers of those dudes who got angry at the all-woman screening of the movie, but, frankly, that’s just another point in Wonder Woman‘s favor.
Now, if we can just get her skateboarding in the sequel:
