Toy Story 5 aims for $90M-plus second frame, threatening Supergirl's weekend lead

Toy Story 5 is lining up to post a near $90M second frame, and the market implication is simple: Disney and Pixar are poised to outnumber Supergirl at the weekend box office. Deadline frames the moment as the “snake in Supergirl's boot” for DC’s theatrical run, which is arriving at an awkward time for Warner Bros’ comic book business.

To understand why that number matters, connect it to the basic theater arithmetic executives live by. If Toy Story 5 is trending toward roughly a $90M second weekend, that is a big enough hold to keep the title’s audience funnel wide open. Meanwhile, Supergirl is the $170M DC Studios feature positioned for its own wide run, expected to open in the upper $40Ms across 3,600 theaters stateside. That means Supergirl is not just trying to launch, it is trying to launch while another franchise is still strong enough to dominate the weekend conversation.

Deadline’s preview adds an extra layer for industry watchers: Supergirl is not the first DC Studios release under the newer leadership. It is the second production under the James Gunn and Peter Safran run at Warner Bros’ comic book division, following last summer’s Superman. Superman opened domestically to $125M, which sets a clear internal benchmark for performance in the same general tent of superhero-market attention.

That benchmark is why Toy Story 5’s timing is so potent. When a major animated sequel carries a strong second frame, it can effectively “pre-empt” some of the weekend interest that would otherwise swing toward a new live-action title. Theaters, marketing teams, and distributors all plan around expected audience demand. A near-$90M second weekend does not just say “the sequel is doing fine.” It signals that the film is still pulling families and casual viewers in a way that makes it harder for newcomers to seize the top spot.

Supergirl’s own launch conditions also point to how much pressure is embedded in the weekend numbers. The preview notes an expected upper $40Ms opening at 3,600 theaters stateside, a wide release footprint that typically signals the studio expects strong first-week pull. But a wide rollout is only as useful as the hold rate of competing releases and the overall weekend pull. If Toy Story 5 keeps its legs and turns a large first-week push into a nearly $90M second frame, the “battle for the weekend” becomes less about Supergirl’s opening strength and more about whether it can quickly convert that opening into sustained dominance.

For executives, this is where incentives and portfolios start to tug against each other. Warner Bros is juggling a DC Studios brand that now sits under Gunn and Safran, and each release carries not only financial stakes but also strategic signaling about the franchise direction. Deadline’s framing of Supergirl as the second production under that leadership highlights that this is not simply another movie in the pipeline. It is an early checkpoint in the post-Superman era of DC Studios decision-making.

Meanwhile, Disney and Pixar’s playbook is different. Toy Story 5, as a long-running animated franchise, benefits from an audience base that tends to return for sequels and shareable family viewing. A near $90M second weekend suggests that the film is not merely getting an initial spike. It is sustaining attention at a level that can reduce the impact of an incoming competitor’s launch week.

The second-order implication is for everyone else managing release calendars. If the weekend dynamic plays out the way Deadline expects, it reinforces a blunt industry lesson: launching into a weekend where a major franchise is still pulling like a first-week release is harder than it looks. Supergirl’s wide 3,600-theater plan and upper-$40Ms opening target are both designed to win the weekend narrative. Toy Story 5’s near-$90M second frame threatens that narrative before Supergirl even gets the chance to fully define its own momentum.