It's weird and interesting that Toy Story 4 and Jurassic World are the highest grossers of their respective series.

Global for Way of Water is up to an estimated $855M through Sunday.

With most people being on vacation this week and the winter storm clearing up, it should be a strong week.

Brian Earl Spilner said:

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Here's some good benchmarks for Way of Water going forward.

Monday:
Maverick: $33.8, -7.8% (Memorial Day)
Avatar: $16.3, -33.8%
Rogue One: $17.6M, -53.3%
Way of Water: $16.2, -55.5%
Wakanda Forever: $11.1M, -72.8%

Second weekend:
Maverick: $90M, -29%
Avatar: $75M, -1.8%
Wakanda Forever: $66M, -63%
Rogue One: $64M, -58.7% ($96M holiday weekend)
Way of Water: $56M, -58% ($82M holiday weekend)

Third weekend:
Avatar: $68M, -9.4%
Maverick: $51M, -42%
Rogue One: $49.6M, -22.5% ($65.5M holiday weekend)

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Still pretty early, but so far it's not looking like it'll quite have the legs of Maverick.

Added in Rogue One, which so far has been the closest comparison. (Even the same Christmas dates.) Should be the best benchmark going forward.

The box office websites are able to give you Saturday, Sunday and Monday estimates somehow, so that's what we're doing in this post.

Way of the Water made $15 million on the 24th, $21.5 million on the 25th, and an estimated $26 million. Couple that with $19.5 million on Friday and its raked in $72 million in 4 days to reach a total of $279,681,686 domestically.

• The $21.5 million on Christmas Day is good for 9th all time. #1 is The Fore Awakens with $49.3 million in 2015.
• The $26 million predicted for tomorrow is the 12th biggest Monday ever. #1 is Black Panther with $40 million in 2018. The biggest December Monday is The Force Awakens with $40 million on 12/21/15.
• Avatar's $197m made in its first 7 days is 28th all-time. #1 is Endgame at an obscene $473.9 million.
• Through 10 games, its domestic total is 31st all-time at $253 million. It's the 4th highest 10-day gross this year, trailing Maverick, Dr Strange 2, and Black Panther 2.

The Numbers does sa cool thing where it shows expected performance for a film based on its opening weekend box and says 95% of the films fall in the shaded area. A film like Mavericks went way above its expected. Avatar 2 is currently right in the middle of its curve at this point.

Speaking of BP2, it pulled in another $4.7 million in the last 4 days to get to $427,355,401 for its run. That moves it past Captain Marvel into 27th place. BP2 trails Toy Story 4 by $7 million and ET by $10 million. ET is 25th all-time. BP2 getting to some pretty rareified air. It is now the 8th top grossing superhero movie ever, if you don't count Incredibles 2, which I don't. I realize it is literally about superheroes, but since it's animated, I put it in that category.

Puss in Boots 2 is up to $24.6 million in 6 days, doing some nice business in Avatar's wake. The first one made $149 million.

excluding 2020, this is the first time in almost a decade that both the domestic and the international box office are topped by non-marvel/star wars movies

— John DiLillo (@JohnDiLillo) December 25, 2022

That's actually pretty crazy.

Avatar Christmas Day was $8MM higher than estimates putting the weekend at $64MM not $56MM. Christmas Day haul of $29.5MM will almost certainly be exceeded today. That beat, and a likely Monday beat of the previously estimated $26MM, recalibrated the potential box office here materially higher.

I think people are just being patient with this movie and not rushing out but they've got it on their agenda in the coming week…

Gig-Em2003 said:

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Avatar Christmas Day was $8MM higher than estimates putting the weekend at $64MM not $56MM. Christmas Day haul of $29.5MM will almost certainly be exceeded today. That beat, and a likely Monday beat of the previously estimated $26MM, recalibrated the potential box office here materially higher.

I think people are just being patient with this movie and not rushing out but they've got it on their agenda in the coming week…

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I saw that discrepancy between the Numbers and Box Office Mojo. Really a huge gaffe to undervalue it so much.

That Christmas Day take is the fourth-best ever for a movie behind Star Wars: The Force Awakens ($49.3M, 2015), Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker ($32.1M, 2019) and Spider-Man: No Way Home ($31.6M. 2021) and ahead of Star Wars: The Last Jedi ($27.4M, 2017) and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story ($25.8M, 2016), the latter being the comp used against Avatar 2.

~$96M for the holiday weekend.

So the course correction for Avatar 2 bumps it up to $287 million through Monday. That is through 11 days.

Puss in Boots continues an impressive streak of improving its daily box day after day, making $7.58 million on Monday to reach $26 million in 6 days.

Avatar 2 is up to 110th all-time, just ahead of Home Alone and behind Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.

It will be in the top 100 by the end of Tuesday. Getting to $300 million in 12 days ties it for the 18th fastest domestically along with FInding Dory, the Dark Knight Rises, Catching Fire, Wakanda Forever, and Doctor Strange 2.

The original Avatar made $23,095,046 on Christmas Day 2009. Avatar 2 made $29.5 million.
Through 12 days, the original was at $250.4 million, Between 12/25-1/2, the original movie made $148.7 million, that's where it really picked up.

Monday was $31.5MM, $5.5MM higher than estimate. Through 11 days it's at $294MM.

Will cross $1B today.

Brian Earl Spilner said:

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Will cross $1B today.

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Pajama pants!

Huh?

Maybe a reference to getting bigger/larger, except in this case it's the box office.

MORE: Not including 2020, the last year two films topped the global box office that weren’t Marvel or Star Wars films was all the way back in 2014. That year it was Transformers: Age of Extinction & The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies. pic.twitter.com/8E3995axcG

— Erik Davis (@ErikDavis) December 28, 2022

Gig-Em2003 said:

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Monday was $31.5MM, $5.5MM higher than estimate. Through 11 days it's at $294MM.

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did the person who did all the electoral college polls in 2016 get a job doing box office estimates in 2022? They were off by $14 million for Avatar 2 on Dec 25-26.

It's tough to get a good gauge on people going to see Avatar 2. Some people don't take the call, some won't admit to going to see it, and others prevaricate just to mess with the box office estimates.

Faustus said:

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It's tough to get a good gauge on people going to see Avatar 2. Some people don't take the call, some won't admit to going to see it, and others prevaricate just to mess with the box office estimates.

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all I know is that if you search "avatar" or "Navii" (or however it is spelled) on furaffinity or deviantart, there really is not that much furry/fan art tied to WOW.

$23.8M Tuesday

Avatar 2 box office has been re-reupdated

Christmas Day was officially $29.179 million.
12/26 was $32.27 million, more than a million over the previous estimate. That got it to $293.29 million.

12/27 was another enormous day, first estimate is $23.8 million. That puts it up to $317 million through 12 days. And $1.029 billion globally.

It is now up to #85 all-time domestic, a few dollars behind Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. For 2022, it's at 8th, and probably a day or 2 from passing Thor 4.

It is the 49th movie ever to break $1 billion worldwide and is already up to #43 all-time worldwide.

Its $712.7 million in foreign money is the 30th-highest of films that have passed $1 billion worldwide. Americans like Avatar, the rest of the world is crazy about it. The sequel's box office is 69.% of the total gross right now.

Tuesday's box has been retconned to $24,128,503.

12th largest Tuesday ever. $6 million more than it made on the 20th of Dec.

About $5 million less than The Force Awakens on its second Tuesday, which was on 12/29/15.

So now up to $317,418,839 domestic and $1.030 billion overall.

85th al-time domestic, between Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

Quote:

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12th largest Tuesday ever. $6 million more than it made on the 20th of Dec.

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This here is a big sign this is gonna have Cameron style legs. I think $500M+ domestic is almost guaranteed from here.

$500MM guaranteed at this point and I think $600-650MM is in the cards.

Brian Earl Spilner said:

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Quote:

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12th largest Tuesday ever. $6 million more than it made on the 20th of Dec.

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This here is a big sign this is gonna have Cameron style legs. I think $500M+ domestic is almost guaranteed from here.

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Well to be fair, many more people would have taken the 27th off with Christmas on a Sunday than the 20th off with Christmas still 5 days away.

I'd call it very surprising if it doesn't get to $650 million domestic off this start. It should past $500 million by the time everyone goes back to work/school on the 2nd/3rd.

When back home this week, the wife will want to go to get favorite mall. I usually tag along and see a movie. With Avatar the only choice, I might, but that run time, man... what a turnoff.

BOX OFFICE: At $1.1B, #AvatarTheWayOfWater is on pace to pass #TopGunMaverick ($1.5B) to become the year’s highest grossing film worldwide. Only 6 films have ever crossed $1B in under 2 weeks. THE WAY OF WATER is the first ever Part Two of a franchise to achieve this milestone. pic.twitter.com/Jg2DgVFHpv

— Erik Davis (@ErikDavis) December 29, 2022

Avatar officially performing above expected range per Numbers. Not surprising. It's now making more than Rogue One every day and those gaps will continue widen. $2B international is a lock. Crazy!

It's crazy nobody talks about the movie that did $1B in only one day pic.twitter.com/O4RaZLdStQ

— PEAK CINEMA+ 🎥 (@drip_marvel) December 29, 2022

Avatar 2 made $20.58 million on Wednesday, down 15% from Tuesday, to reach almost exactly $338 million for its domestic gross.

Puss in Boots 2 continues to thrive as the family viewing alternative with $5.8 million, and Black Panther 2 re-took third place on the day from Whitney Houston's biopic with $1.6 million.

Avatar 2 is up to $338 million in 13 days. In the next 48 hours it will surpass Thor 4, The Batman, Minions 2, and Jurassic World 3 and be into 4th place for the year.

It is now 67th all-time, between Zootopia and MockingJay Part 1. It needs $38 million to reach the top 50.

I did an extra layer to see how it compares through 13 days to the current top 10 domestic of all time. The Avengers (2012) is currently 10th on that list at $623 million.

Box Office Gross through 13 days

The Force Awakens $629,034,583
Avengers: Endgame $652,935,585
No Way Home $536,859,166
Avatar $268,886,074
Maverick $334,210,732
Black Panther $428,792,346
Infinity War $479,116,406
Titanic $112,594,173
Jurassic World $436,936,980
The Avengers $395,813,047

After earning the highest grossing Tuesday of 2022 with $24.1M, Avatar: The Way of Water also notched the best Wednesday of the year yesterday with $20.4M beating Top Gun: Maverick's June 1 take of $14.8M, and Avatar 2's first Wednesday of $14.4M. At a running total of $337.9M through 13 days, the James Cameron directed, Jon Landau produced sequel is pacing 1% ahead of Top Gun: Maverick at the same point in time.

Puss in boots took $30 of my money with the family while I took a nap from puss in boots.