Godzilla Minus Zero Box Office Capsizes In Week 2 With Unprecedented Drop

Nov 14, 2026 - 20:05

0 0

Godzilla Minus Zero Box Office Capsizes In Week 2 With Unprecedented Drop

The kaiju is powering up in Godzilla Minus Zero

Published Nov 14, 2026, 11:31 AM EST

Brennan Klein (he/him) is a senior news writer at Screen Rant, host of the Attack of the Queerwolf podcast, and contributor at Alternate Ending and Horror Press. He has been writing and podcasting about pop culture (especially horror movies) for over a decade at platforms including Blumhouse, Fangoria, Dread Central, The Backlot, and Arrow in the Head.

Godzilla Minus Zero is subtracting a lot from its box office grosses during its sophomore weekend.

2026's Godzilla Minus Zero, which is a direct sequel to 2023's Godzilla Minus One, features Takashi Yamazaki returning as writer, director, and visual effects lead alongside returning cast members, including Ryunosuke Kamiki as pilot Kōichi Shikishima, Minami Hamabe as his wife Noriko, and Hidetaka Yoshioka as Large-Scale Disaster Response Bureau director Kenji Noda. The movie debuted on November 6, earning a 3-day domestic total of $30.6 million that saw it not only earning the best domestic debut ever for a Japanese-language Godzilla movie, but the best domestic debut in history for a live-action foreign language movie.

Per Variety, Godzilla Minus Zero is projected to follow its record-breaking debut by earning a 3-day total of $7.5 million at the domestic box office during its sophomore frame. This will see it dropping a staggering 75% from its debut weekend. If these numbers hold, it will not only tie with 2008's Blindness and 2017's Free Fire for the 123rd worst sophomore drop of all time, but also officially earn the worst domestic drop in history for a Godzilla movie in its first run.

The only sophomore drop that was more severe was the drop of the 2025 re-release of 2016's Shin Godzilla (-78.6%), but re-releases tend to be fan-forward with viewers prioritizing opening weekend, which often leads to substantial drops. Even if Godzilla Minus Zero has a surge by the end of Sunday and decreases its drop, it is still likely to break the record, as the previous worst domestic drop for a first-run Godzilla movie was the 67.7% fall of 2019's Godzilla: King of the Monsters.

Below, see a breakdown of the box office performance of the only Godzilla movies with domestic sophomore drops of more than 60%:

Title

Domestic Debut

Sophomore Drop

Worldwide Box Office

Godzilla Minus Zero (2026)	$30.6 million	-75% (estimated)	TBD
Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)	$47.8 million	-67.7%	$387.3 million
Godzilla (2014)	$93.2 million	-66.8%	$525 million
Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (2024)	$80 million	-61%	$572 million
Godzilla 2000 (2000)	$4.4 million	-60.5%	$10 million

This drop sees the new movie comparing extraordinarily unfavorably to Godzilla Minus One, which only dropped 24.8% during its sophomore weekend after debuting with $11.4 million. In fact, the 2023 movie's drop was so narrow that even though it debuted significantly below Minus Zero, its 3-day sophomore weekend was actually higher than the new movie's projections, hitting $8.6 million.

However, because of its significant head start, Godzilla Minus Zero is far from a flop. Ahead of this weekend, the movie had already hit a cumulative global gross of $72 million. While it remains to be seen if it is able to outgross Godzilla Minus One's $114 million global haul, it has already earned more than four times its estimated budget of $13 to $18 million, meaning that it was almost certainly in the black by the end of its first full week in theaters.

There is also a solid chance that the movie will be able to outgross Minus One by the end of its theatrical run, especially if it doesn't drop quite so much in international markets. While its drop was severe in North America amid competition from holiday season releases such as Ebenezer and The Cat in the Hat, Godzilla Minus Zero reviews (which have earned it 91% from critics and 96% from audiences on Rotten Tomatoes) have indicated that it could still be a strong word of mouth contender.

Enjoy ScreenRant's box office coverage? Click below to sign up for my weekly box office newsletter (make sure to check "Box Office" in your preferences) and get exclusive analysis, predictions, and more: