The Force Awakens - $1.1 billion
Rogue One - $523 million
The Last Jedi - $712 million

That's not "down down down", especially when the competition we're talking about trends up or down based on the sub-brand.

Avengers: Age of Ultron - $946 million
Ant-Man - $339 million
Captain America: Civil War - $745 million
Doctor Strange - $445 million
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 - $473 million

The two major differences between Star Wars and Marvel overseas are China and the potential to cross over franchises for extra hype. So while I do think Marvel is more important outside the United States, it isn't nearly as clear-cut as Star Wars going "down down down" and Marvel going "up up up."

Marvel movies are increasing but I wouldn't consider them going up always from their universe's immediate sequel (like Ant-Man 2 from IW). For SW I don't think the franchise hasn't yet stabilized from the initial high of TFA once it does they will routinely do those $350m+ OS numbers.

RO was boosted by TFA hype and fell by 50%, TLJ fell by over 30% and flopped in many growing markets. The trendline for SW overseas is a decline, not growth.

The issue is Solo will likely make less than Doctor Strange overseas and this will be the case for many non-Skywalker Saga films. Even a film like RO that tied heavily to the Skywalker Saga did around 500 overseas below your typical Marvel fare like Homecoming and Thor 3.

So it is true that TFA was a massive global hit but that was the high water mark but in comparison 5 MCU films IM3, CW, Ultron, Avengers and now IW made more money then TLJ overseas, and a uncertainty if Episode 9 will grow much from it or likely decline.

The thing is that SW movies could easily settle down at $500m OS with the strength of non-growing markets and that's not an easy mark yet for all MCU movies. We'll have to wait for a few more installments from SW to gauge the trend.

Manny, I know you got banned from Theory for trolling about TLJ, but please don't do it here.

You can't say TLJ "declined" WW when it increased over Rogue One. Nobody expected it to increase over the BIGGEST GROSSER OF ALL TIME. Of course it was going to decline in comparison to TFA. But then every Marvel film has declined in comparison to Ultron... except IW now.

Manny, feel free to troll here as much as you like. The more you do it, the more likely it is that they'll make you a mod.

No & no!

It is trolling to you because you do not want to get your head out of the sand and see the trends.

TLJ WW performance went lower than most conservative expectations and it also performed rather badly in many developing markets with poor legs and WOM. It did well in developed markets, but that is where SW cannot really grow much more or if at all.

My point which you guys do not get is that SW makes a lot of money WW, but the trendline is not growth and we shall see that with Solo which will go below all the recent MCU films.

Yes, Manny. The 25th best Overseas performance of all time was "bad".

That's not surprising though, Spider-Man has always been more global than Star Wars. Spider-Man 2002 destroyed Attack of the Clones, Spider-Man 3 destroyed Revenge of the Sith.

No TLJ was not bad but I think its rather clear that MCU is now a bigger brand Globally now.

Yet all the numbers disagree with you.

Lol Civil War made more OS than Last Jedi. Internationally, the numbers indicate that Marvel is now bigger. It doesn't matter if the B-list characters don't make as much. The flagship multi-character Marvel films are more popular than any of the Star Wars films at this point.

tl:dr

No they won't. Unlike Marvel, which is actively building its mythology and iconic characters in the minds of moviegoers right now, the selling point for the new Star Wars films was seeing the original trio again. Now they're all gone. No1cares about Rey, Kylo Ren and Finn. They're all non events. Star Wars has maxed out its potential at this point because it was all dependent on nostalgia for 1977-1983. They literally killed what made people nostalgic. Now they have a big universe, meh new characters that some people like, and a big brand name, but they don't have the mega selling point of Han/Leia/Luke anymore. It's time for diminishing returns. Chewbacca, the Falcon, force ghosts, etc and 2 minutes of CGI Carrie Fisher in Episode IX will not prevent the downward trend.

It was the same with the prequels, what made Sith bounce back was that the advertising made it very clear we would finally see DARTH VADER.

There's no card like that they can pull with Episode IX. Considering the feminist all-women writers room that came up with the stories for the new Star Wars films, they probably wanted to keep Leia alive after killing off Luke and Han, but unfortunately they forgot to take Carrie to rehab so they shot themselves in the foot. Leia with a lightsaber would have been a mega selling point for IX.

What? Chippy's back? Again?

Damn, he really is like genital herpes. It never really goes away.

And to answer the thread question. I would say not yet, but it's getting there very quickly. If Solo gets beaten by Ant-Man /Wasp worldwide then IW2 will have no problem crushing episode IX.

Although to be fair, it's a little bit of an apples vs oranges comparison when taking into consideration the amount of movies per brand released, the time between releases and some other factors.

Precisely.
Unfortunately for SW, the brand remains very strong in the old markets (Europe, Australia, Japan - which are NOT growing at all) but it failed to connect in the emerging ones, sometimes in a pretty miserable way. In South Korea, Last Jedi was the 54th (!!!!) release of 2017 in terms of gross, it even got beaten by...Happy Death Day. Similar situation in China. In the Philippines the damage was limited, but the movie was still beaten by a considerable margin by all MCU films. In Brazil it was 15th for the year (hardly a huggernaut), again behind every MCU movie. In Mexico...21th.
What's even more alarming is that these (and other) markets seem to have embraced SW7 only because of ots phenomenon status, but then they often rejected it (in China TLJ dropped by almost 50% from TFA, in South Korea by an incredible 67%).
Ultron increased over Avengers when adding China, and even in local currencies once you remove China from the equation, while TLJ lost a good 37% of its audience (keep in mind that while a 35% drop from the original is normal in the US, OS brands tend to follow a different trend). Anyone thinks SW9 could even come close to IW's OS total? Unless Solo somehow reverse the trend, this OS comparison is a no brainer for anyone who's got a brain.

Is this a surprise? The Marvel movies grew. Most of these emerging markets don't have easy access to the Original Trilogy, which makes the new movies hard to follow even without considering the weird sequel-prequel-sequel-prequel rhythm.

SW is still the champ domestically but that is based on the past and the iconic status of the film in pop culture.

I am not sure it holds for the future when TWO MCU films beat it in less than 5 months and it is uncertain if Episode 9 can increase from Episode 8. However, on a film avg basis, SW is unbeatable likely domestically to other franchises.

The issue is of the future and not of the past I think.

Episode 9 will not increase form 8 if Luke is not in it. If it is just Rey and red, no way.

Marvel is putting Star Wars on the ropes, but Star Wars still holds the belt! How long will Star Wars be able to last before Marvel claims the crown?

This is the correct post.

If Ant-Man were to beat Solo, and Ep 9 loses to IW2, I'd say this thread it right. But as of now, it's not.

Meanwhile Disney profits

Ant-Man is expected to beat Solo in which universe? I think the expectations have to be in-check. We should compare Solo to something like Iron-Man's $406m adjusted numbers. Rogue One should most likely be compared to Guardians and that is a battle SW won handily.

Nobody said Ant-Man is expected to beat Solo.