It’s been a long wait, but Dune: Part Two finally arrived on Friday 1st March, releasing in thousands of cinemas – and now the box office scores are in, and they reveal the scale of the movie's success.

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The sequel to Denis Villeneuve's 2021 Dune boasts an an all-star cast, including Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, Florence Pugh, Rebecca Ferguson, Austin Butler and more.

According to Variety, Part Two has collected $81.5 million in its domestic debut, marking the biggest opening weekend of the year and the largest since last October’s Taylor Swift concert film, The Eras Tour ($93 million).

The sequel collected a further $97 million at the international box office, totalling a massive $178 million globally after one weekend.

As well as setting 2024 records, the sequel has topped the first film, nearly doubling the opening of Villeneuve's Dune: Part 1, which collected $41 million domestically.

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Zendaya as Chani in a stillsuit stares at Rebecca Ferguson as Lady Jessica in robes and with Fremen lettering tattooed on her face in Dune: Part Two.
Chani and Lady Jessica in Dune: Part Two. Courtesy of Warner Bros

The follow-up was originally scheduled to hit the big screen in October 2023, but was delayed due to the Hollywood strikes that would have prevented its star-studded cast from being able to promote the movie.

Part Two is based on the second half of the novel of the same name by Frank Herbert, and revolves around anti-hero Paul Atreides (Chalamet) and Fremen warrior Chani (Zendaya) as they wage war against House Harkonnen.

While it hasn’t yet officially been confirmed, Villeneuve has been quite vocal about his intention to make a third Dune movie, which would be based on Frank Herbert’s second novel in the series, Dune Messiah.

Villeneuve even suggested during an exclusive interview with RadioTimes.com that he had deliberately sowed the seeds for the next film when writing Dune: Part Two.

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"Which is very fun, by the way," he explained. "To make – like Herbert did when he was writing his book – myself like the main character, Paul, to make projections in the future and try to foresee what could be done and to create the foundations of ideas that could find their full potential in the future."

Dune: Part Two was released in UK cinemas on 1st March 2024. Check out more of our Sci-Fi or Film coverage or visit our TV Guide to see what's on tonight.

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