Avatar: The Way Of Water has hit the $1 billion mark just days after it was released.
The movie, which is the sequel to the 2009 highest-grossest movie of all time, Avatar, was released on 16 December and has hit the milestone after its second box office weekend.
The film, set 14 years after the original, has been in the works since 2012 but only began shooting in 2017.
Advert
And it's been a serious hit among fans and critics.
Comicbook’s Brandon Davis gave the film a thumbs up while labelling it a ‘visual feast’.
He wrote: “Avatar: The Way of Water, being more than 3 hours long, is both fulfilling and indulgent. It still ends wanting you to know a third is coming. Constantly a visual feast, creative plays with frame rate, and never boring despite. Overall, I liked it.”
Meanwhile, CNN's Tom Page said the sequel had done the unthinkable in the movie industry by being better than the original.
Advert
The official synopsis for the sequel reads: "Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) and Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña) have formed a family and are doing everything to stay together.
"However, they must leave their home and explore the regions of Pandora. When an ancient threat resurfaces, Jake must fight a difficult war against the humans."
Deadline reports that its success at the box office means that it's become the third highest grossing film of the year behind Top Gun: Maverick and Jurassic World Dominion in less than two weeks.
Advert
The outlet added that the Avatar sequel was expected to cross the $1 billion mark on Tuesday evening (27 December), and Fandango journalist Erik Davis later confirmed it had crossed the milestone.
It's also expected that the film will continue to storm ahead for the foreseeable, with many now wondering if it could even surpass the first movie's total of $2.9 billion.
Earlier this week, we told you how creator James Cameron revealed he’s already begun filming Avatar 3 and 4.
Advert
Cameron admitted to Entertainment Weekly that he has begun shooting his films back to back to avoid the ‘ageing issue’, especially for some of his younger characters.
He said “I love Stranger Things – but you get the Stranger Things effect, where they’re supposed to still be in high school [but] they look like they’re 27.
“You know, I love the show. It’s okay, we’ll suspend disbelief. We like the characters. But, you know.”
Advert
Not much is known about the films, but they sound pretty epic.
He added: “I can’t tell you the details, but all I can say is that when I turned in the script for two, the studio gave me three pages of notes.
"And when I turned in the script for three, they gave me a page of notes, so I was getting better.
“When I turned in the script for four, the studio executive, creative executive over the films wrote me an email that said, ‘Holy f**k.’ And I said, ‘Well, where are the notes?’ And she said, ‘Those are the notes.’ Because it kind of goes nuts in a good way, right?”
Topics: Film and TV, News
Lucy Devine