I think that the fall of 2026 could be one of the most compeтιтive periods coming up at the box office. While the actual fall season technically begins in mid-September and ends in mid-December annually, in Hollywood terms, the fall movie season generally runs from the beginning of October through Christmas (which kicks off the winter movie season). While many awards season releases come during this time, major blockbusters have also taken advantage of the Thanksgiving holiday period, including quite a few of the Harry Potter movies, all of the Hunger Games movies, and four of the five Twilight movies.

I was distracted at first by the prospects of the summer of 2026. The summer movie season of any year is typically jam-packed with blockbusters, taking advantage of the fact that most schools have breaks over the summer. 2026 is no different, as it will see the releases of new installments from huge franchises, including Minions 3, Toy Story 5, Spider-Man: Brand New Day, and the live-action Moana remake, in addition to Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey and an unтιтled Steven Spielberg movie. However, the fall of 2026 is looking to have an even more robust slate of box office performers.

Avengers: Doomsday Is Landing Among A Huge Roster Of Blockbusters

It Was Just Moved From May To December

What first brought the fall of 2026 to my attention was the fact that the upcoming Avengers: Doomsday was moved to December 18, 2026 from its original release date of May 1, 2026. Doomsday is the fifth movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Avengers subfranchise. The crossover superhero movies form just a small part of the overarching franchise, which will include 39 theatrical releases at the time when Doomsday premieres, but the four previous Avengers тιтles have collectively grossed more than $7.5 billion worldwide.

While I feel confident that Avengers: Doomsday could become the biggest hit of the year, given the precedent set by the previous installments, it lands among a wide field of promising тιтles that also includes the dystopian prequel The Hunger Games: Sunrise on the Reaping, a Chronicles of Narnia adaptation from director Greta Gerwig (who most recently helmed the $1.447 billion 2025 movie Barbie), and long-awaited sequels from two major animated franchises. Below, see a breakdown of the most promising blockbusters that are currently scheduled to premiere in the fall of 2026:

It seems entirely possible that the release date of Dune: Messiah, which is the third installment in Denis Villeneuve’s franchise adapting the works of Frank Herbert, will be rescheduled now that Avengers: Doomsday has landed on the same weekend. I think that Warner Bros. may not want the movie to have such major compeтιтion, especially because it’s a riskier prospect, adapting the less generally well-regarded sequel to beloved 1965 novel Dune. However, for the time being, December 18 in particular is packed with major franchise releases, all of which could set the box office alight in the lead-up to Christmas.

Fall 2026 Could Have Multiple Billion-Dollar Movies

Avengers: Doomsday Is Just One Of The Potential Smash Hits

Considering the fact that all of the Avengers movies have grossed more than $1 billion, Doomsday seems set to be a billion-dollar release. However, I don’t think it will be the only one to pᴀss that coveted milestone. This will almost certainly not be the case for Greta Gerwig’s Chronicles of Narnia movie, which is a Netflix release that is only getting a limited run in theaters. Dune, Jumanji, and The Hunger Games, are also part of franchises that historically do well, but haven’t recently come close to topping $1 billion.

However, Shrek 5 and Ice Age could harness nostalgia and the many years they have spent out of theaters to push past the peaks of their earlier installments (which include the $886.7 million Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs and the $933.8 million Shrek 2).

On top of a few potential billion-dollar franchise blockbusters, the fall of 2026 could also see quite a few movies become box office hits outside of its impending IP-related тιтles. The upcoming roster includes an unтιтled collaboration between Tom Cruise and The Revenant director Alejandro G. Iñárritu, a new DreamWorks movie called Forgotten Island, and Jordan Peele’s fourth directorial outing, any of which could forge a strong connection with audiences.

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