Official poster for Avengers: Endgame (Photo/Marvel.com)

Days out from the release of Avengers: Endgame, Chinese audiences have shown their enthusiasm for the movie, making it the most popular Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) movie to hit the nation, and also, perhaps, the most expensive.

Kevin Feige’s “Infinity Saga” finale will be released in China on April 24, two days ahead of its worldwide release. Hype surrounding the film reached fever pitch across China, as it crushed the record for time taken to surpass 100 million yuan in presale tickets, selling out in just 10 hours, breaking China’s opening-night presale box office record with a whopping 62.7 million yuan (US$9.35 million). 

A screenshot shows the presale ticket price of Avengers: Endgame’s midnight opening in a  Beijing cinema (Photo/dianping.com)

As the craze for the film skyrockets, so too do ticket prices. According to Maoyan, China’s largest movie ticketing app, presale tickets for the midnight screening reached an average of 64.8 yuan, and exceeded 200 yuan in first-tier cities, quadruple the average ticket price.

Shanghai Wanda Cinemas even promoted a “King’s Seat” special for the midnight opening priced at 300 yuan on its official Weibo account. “Can’t afford to watch Avengers 4” has become a trending hashtag on Weibo, racking up 130 million views in total. 

Shanghai Wanda Cinemas' official poster for Avengers: Endgame promotes “King’s Seat” for midnight opening

“It is more difficult than scrambling for tickets during the Spring Festival travel rush,” some Weibo users said.

Avengers: Endgame is anticipated to be a healthy boost for the seemingly sluggish foreign film market in China. In 2018, foreign films that showed in Chinese cinemas accounted for 38 percent of the total box office, an 8 percent drop from the previous year.

Among all the foreign movies in China’s cinemas last year, the highest-grossing was Avengers: Infinity War, which garnered 2.39 billion yuan (US$356.6 million) at box office. The momentum of the imminent MUC film signals that it is perhaps only a matter of time before it breaks its own record again.