Just over a month after the resounding success of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever propelled Disney past the $3 billion mark at the global box office, the House of Mouse has done it again, surpassing $4 billion for the year with the release of Avatar: The Way of Water.
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The current global total for the company stands at $4.049 billion with that number continuing to rise as James Cameron’s sequel film continues rolling along.
Individually, The Way of Water is already nearing half a billion globally at $497 million. It’s the last piece of the puzzle to what has been a massive year for the company.
Banner films from Marvel Studios like Doctor Strange In the Multiverse of Madness ($955 million), Thor: Love and Thunder ($761 million), and the aforementioned Wakanda Forever ($789 million, still in theaters) carried their weight and more this year as the theater business really turned the dial back to normal.
Even the studio’s misses at the box office like Toy Story spinoff Lightyear ($226 million) still drew a solid enough chunk of change to shore up Disney’s numbers.
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Disney has firmly cemented itself as the top studio globally at the box office this year even as other studios found massive successes themselves. The big film of the year, Top Gun Maverick, didn’t even come out of the Disney fold. Neither did the gigantic box office hit that was Jurassic World: Dominion which also managed to surpass any of the studio’s offerings globally.
Universal’s successes this year even made it the first studio to cross the $3 billion mark since 2019, accomplishing the feat back in August. Disney, however, has managed to keep steady throughout the entire year with consistent, sustained successes from the MCU and now the sequel to the highest-grossing film ever
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This year’s success could continue rolling straight into 2023 for Disney too. The Way of Water will likely keep playing well into January and potentially longer, leading right up to the release of their next blockbuster Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania on February 17.
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From there, a packed year will follow with Marvel leading the charge with the hotly anticipated Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 and The Marvels also on the docket. It’ll be a banner year for non-MCU content too with the release of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny on the way, marking the end of Harrison Ford’s tenure as the titular adventurer, and the latest project from Pixar Elemental among other things.
For right now, The Way of Water continues going strong as it projects to have a healthy Christmas weekend box office performance.
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The long-awaited follow-up centers on Jake and Neytiri’s family as they face down a resurgent human threat with returning cast members Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldaña, Stephen Lang, Joel David Moore, Sigourney Weaver, Giovanni Ribisi, and Matt Gerald back on Pandora. Also on board are Jamie Flatters, Trinity Bliss, Britain Dalton, Kate Winslet, Cliff Curtis, Edie Falco, and Jermaine Clement.
