A mega-barrage of publicity and hype are driving a pivotal weekend that will set the stage for the summer sales season at pop culture stores.  With the Spider-Man film opening on more than 7,500 screens, industry experts are predicting a record May opening that will eclipse the $68.5 million that the Mummy Returns earned during its debut on the first weekend in May in 2001.  Meanwhile newspapers all over the country are covering 'Free Comic Book Day,' with many papers placing Free Comic Book Day coverage as a sidebar to stories about the opening of the Spider-Man film.  The result of these two events should be an unprecedented influx of new customers (see 'Expectations High for Free Comic Book Day').

Expectations for Spider-Man's movie debut have risen so high that Sony has felt the need to dampen the enthusiasm of some analysts who think that Spider-Man might even be able to better the record $90.3 million that Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone racked up last year.  Since Spider-Man will be on 600 fewer screens than Harry Potter was, it does appear unlikely that the webslinger will be able to overcome the apprentice wizard, but the most telling testimony to Spidey's drawing power could be the other Hollywood studios' refusal to open any film of stature during the first two weeks of Spider-Man's run. Sony is concerned that even a $65 million opening could be perceived as a 'failure' -- like last summer's Pearl Harbor, a film that did over $450 million worldwide, but which is still considered a disappointment by many because it didn't garner the record-breaking numbers that many had predicted for its opening weekend.