Just when it was beginning to look like Avatar: Fire and Ash might underperform (and by "underperform," we mean fail to reach $2 billion worldwide), James Cameron's threequel has found its legs.
The movie massively overperformed on Christmas Day, grossing $24 million on December 25 ahead of an estimated $60 million second weekend (that's a drop of only 33% from its opening). That's significantly better than Avatar: The Way of Water's 52% decline, but still nowhere near Avatar's minor 1.8% dip in 2009.
While updated box office numbers are a little slow to come in—thanks to the holidays—Avatar: Fire and Ash's current domestic total stands at $153.7 million (that should rise to over $210 million by close of business tomorrow).
Internationally, the movie has grossed $390.6 million as of yesterday, giving Cameron's latest trip to Pandora a whopping $544.3 million global cume. Whether it will still rise to upwards of $2 billion is very much TBD, but make no mistake about it, Fire and Ash is a box office hit.
Here's what the Top 10 looked like on Christmas Day:
1. Avatar: Fire and Ash ($24 million)
2. Marty Supreme ($9.5 million)
3. Anaconda ($9.1 million)
4. Zootopia 2 ($5.1 million)
5. Song Sung Blue ($4.4 million)
6. David ($4 million)
7. The Housemaid ($3.5 million)
8. The SpongeBob Movie: Search for SquarePants ($3.2 million)
9. Wicked For Good ($1.4 million)
10. Five Nights At Freddy’s 2 ($1 million)
Entertainment Weekly recently spoke with Cameron and asked the filmmaker what would happen if Disney decided against moving forward with Avatar 4 and 5 (two projects he's already suggested aren't a priority for him).
"Here's what it is. If we don't get to make 4 and 5, for whatever reason, I'll hold a press conference, and I'll tell you what we were gonna do. How's that?" Cameron deadpanned after perhaps growing wary of questions about the Avatar franchise's future.
Adding that he'd like to adapt the Avatar movies into novels and perhaps continue the story that way, Cameron noted, "There's so much culture and backstory and lateral detail in these characters that's been worked out. I'd love to do something that's at that level of granular detail. There's no business model for it anymore. People aren't reading."
"It might be good to have the canonical record of what it was all supposed to be," he continued. "I don't know if the saga goes beyond this point. I hope it does. But, you know, we prove that business case every time we go out."
What did you decide to watch in theaters over the holidays? Let us know in the comments section below.