‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ takes $37.8m opening day, the third biggest of 2014

Marvel Studios and James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy, starring Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Dave Bautista and the voices of Vin Diesel and Bradley Cooper, opened on Thursday night with previews that amounted to $11.2 million, more than any other movie this year including Marvel’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier. As of Saturday morning, the space-based comedy-adventure is estimated to have grossed $37.8 million, which is the third-biggest opening day of the year behind Godzilla and Transformers: Age of Extinction.
With an A CinemaScore, there’s very little stopping “Guardians” from making 2.4 to 2.5 times its Friday for the weekend which amounts to an opening in the $95 million range, better than at least two of the summer’s superhero sequels, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and X-Men: Days of Future Past. It will be interesting to see if it ends up beating the $95 million opening for Marvel Studios’ other 2014 movie,Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which is currently the highest-grossing movie of the year domestically with $258 million.