'Avatar: The Way Of Water' Dominates New Year's Weekend, Reaches Over $1.4 Billion

James Cameron's "Avatar: The Way of Water" continues to defy and outperform expectations at the box office, much like the original film did in 2009-2010. The sci-fi sequel was once again the top star at the box office for the New Year's weekend, outperforming the three-day weekend over the Christmas holiday, per the figures from Box Office Mojo.

"The Way of Water" closed out 2022 strong, earning an estimated $66.8 million for the holiday weekend. The weekend take was actually up more than 5% from the previous Christmas day weekend, which drew $63.3 million domestically.

This brings the domestic total of "Avatar: The Way of Water" to just under $425 million in North America and $1.4 billion worldwide. The film also ends the year at No. 4 overall for 2022. However, in a matter of days, the film should surpass the $1.488 billion worldwide gross from 2022's biggest film, "Top Gun: Maverick." At its current rate, "The Way of Water" could surpass that figure of the Tom Cruise sequel by this upcoming weekend if not sooner.

Early on, there was a lot of conjecture and negativity after the opening weekend performance of "The Way of Water." However, as has been the case throughout the box office history for many of Cameron's films, the box office race is truly a marathon and not a sprint. However, the film has been drawing good word of mouth and audience retention, and it came out at the right time over the winter holidays when there isn't a hefty amount of competition.

In fact, "The Way of Water" will be fairly clear of major theatrical competition at the box office for all of January 2023 and most of February. The biggest theatrical release on the horizon is Marvel's "Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania," which won't be out until February 17. That is another IP that is owned and released by The Walt Disney Company.

By the time "Ant-Man 3" is released, "The Way of Water" will have likely made most of its money for its box office run, or it won't be at a point where it would be a major threat to the Marvel sequel's release. Disney is usually good at spacing out their releases, the case of "Strange World" opening poorly last November notwithstanding.

One other notable performer at the box office over New Year's weekend was another sequel, this one from DreamWorks Animation, "Puss in Boots: The Last Wish." While the $90-million budgeted CG-animated picture opened relatively soft over Christmas weekend with only $12 million, it held on and did much stronger for its second frame, drawing $16.7 million domestically.

"The Last Wish" has proven to be a strong performer after having a slow start. The film was highly beloved by critics, with an impressive 95% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Based on the 93% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, and the film's second-weekend box office performance, the "Puss in Boots" sequel looks to be spreading exceptional word of mouth among audiences, and the film has become a strong family counter-programming picture and alternative to "Avatar."

"Avatar: The Way of Water" is definitely drawing a lot of attention right now, but its three-hour-plus runtime is a bit of an issue for some audience members. "The Last Wish" is considerably shorter and has broad family appeal, which has allowed the film to emerge as a decent earner.

The sequel has now earned $65 million at the domestic box office and $135 million worldwide. The previous "Puss in Boots" movie, released in 2011, finished with $149 million domestically and $554 million worldwide. "The Last Wish" still has a long way to go, but the lack of strong competition in the coming weeks, coupled with the clearly strong word of mouth, will likely open the door for the film to have more time to fill the coffers.

For now, though, the box office world is being dominated by "The Way of Water," and it looks like that will continue to be the case in the coming weeks ahead. The first "Avatar" finished at $749 million and $2.743 billion for its original domestic run. "The Way of Water" probably won't reach those heights, but it looks to be well on its way to crossing over $600 million domestically and possibly even $2 billion worldwide.

The sequel is directed by Cameron from a script he co-wrote with Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver. "Avatar: The Way of Water" is playing now in theaters.