Move over Top Gun: Maverick, because Avatar: The Way of Water has just unseated you from the throne of 2022 films. At least, in terms of the grossing department. And only just barely at that. Your mileage may vary on whether it’s a better film than Top Gun: Maverick.

Avatar: The Way of 2022?

"Avatar: The Way of Water" poster from IMDb.
It is the way…wait, wrong franchise.

Deadline (and other news websites) have just reported that Avatar: The Way of Water is now officially the highest grossing film of 2022. This epic sci-fi sequel to the equally as epic 2009 sci-fi film Avatar has just barely managed to wriggle past Top Gun: Maverick to reach the box office finish line. By how much, you might ask? Well, let’s take a look at the numbers.

The box office numbers don’t lie, and neither do alien fish.

Deadline reported that Avatar: The Way of Water managed to gross $1.516 billion USD at the box office as of this writing. In comparison, Top Gun: Maverick “only” reached $1.489 billion USD at the same. Yeah, you can clearly tell that James Cameron‘s film beat Joseph Kosinski’s film here. However, with only a difference of $27 million USD between the 2 films, you can also tell that it was a very close race. It could’ve gone either way between them, but it was just that Avatar 2 captured just a bit more critical reception and audiences than Top Gun 2. It’s kind of funny how both films are sequels that managed to make the top grossing films of 2022. However, that’s a story for later.

Just like how Tom Cruise’s membership in Scientology is a story for later.

So what about the 3rd highest grossing film of 2022, you might ask? It was Jurassic World Dominion. Jurassic World Dominion only grossed $1.003 billion USD. While it’s a pretty respectable amount of money, it’s nothing compared to the other two films.

Someone should’ve told production that dinosaurs do not work that way…repeatedly.

Source: Deadline