Los Angeles, Dec 26 (IANS): "Spider-Man: No Way Home" is well on its way to becoming the first pandemic-era movie (and the first since 2019's "Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker") to net over $1 billion in earnings at the global box office.

Trade analysts were confident that the finale of the Tom Holland-led trilogy would establish this milestone on Sunday (Monday morning, IST) after the film added another $19.6 million from 4,336 theatres across North America on Friday, putting the film well within grasping distance of picking up $92 million to $100 million over the traditional weekend.

Reporting these figures, 'Variety' commented: "Those are huge box office receipts at a time when several new films (such as 'The Matrix Resurrections', 'Sing 2', and 'The King's Man') are opening nationwide to notable ticket sales." Despite concerns about the Omicron variant of Covid-19, the domestic box office will reach its highest levels for a single weekend since 2019 during the lucrative Christmas corridor.

Should estimates hold, according to 'Variety', the latest Spidey adventure will have made $478 million in its first 10 days across domestic cinema theatres. That's more than double the next highest-grossing movie in Marvel's Universe, "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings", which earned a mighty $224 million.

Reaching the billion-dollar milestone despite rising Covid-19 cases would have been impressive enough, but what is really remarkable is that "No Way Home" is going to surpass the mark without playing in China, the world's largest movie-going market.