The sci-fi comedy, "Guardians of the Galaxy," debuted at US$94 million, taking the record of third-highest opening of 2014.

The adventure-comedy film came second to the year's bigger debuts, "Transformers: Age of Extinction" and Disney's "Captain America: The Winter Soldier."

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"Guardians" is also considered the best opening for the year's non-sequel films. Because of the opening success, Walt Disney Co. already announced the film's follow-up to be released in 2017.

Adding Marvel's "The Amazing Spider-Man 2" and "X-Men: Days of Future Past," the comic book creator covers the four top spots of the six biggest openings of the year.

Global media measurement company Rentrak said it tallied the sales for the weekend and "Guardians" stood on top. Next in line was Scarlett Johansson's "Lucy" with US$18.3 million. The third spot went to Universal's "Get on Up" with US$14 million. "Hercules" came in at No. 4 with US$10.7 million and "Dawn of the Planet of the Apes" landed fifth with US$8.7 million.

However, even though "Guardians" topped the charts during its weekend debut, a couple of Hollywood experts expected the movie to perform better than US$80 million during its opening week.

Dave Hollis, Disney' theatrical distribution president said the summer weekend turned out "to be a benefit." Since people had a longer weekend, they would want to see "something fresh and original," he said.

Greg Foster from IMAX Corp. said the movie did well especially to the family groups and fanboys.

Most of the audience gave the movie an A rating, according to CinemaScore. It is a good indication that the film will continue its profitable run for the following weeks.

Internationally, it opened at US$66.4 million across 42 markets, according to Wall Street Journal. The international debut is better than Marvel's and Disney's other openings for the year. However, the U.S. opening still tops the charts.

TagsGuardians of the Galaxy, Walt Disney, sequel