Superhero films rule! ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ has officially unseated director James Cameron’s 2009 science-fiction epic ‘Avatar’ to become the third-highest grossing domestic release in history.
By Justina Terhember
After speculation over whether or not Peter Parker had the legs to bump the people of Pandora from bronze, ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ collected the remaining $1 million on Monday to push ‘Avatar’ and its mighty $760.5 million at the North American box office to fourth place.
The latest Spidey adventure, a culmination of Tom Holland’s web-slinging trilogy, has grossed a stunning $760.9 million at the domestic US box office since launching exclusively in theaters in December. Those ticket sales are three times as much as the next highest-grossing movie of the pandemic era, which is Disney and Marvel’s ‘Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings’ with $224 million.
However, that might be the end of the road, as it would require an additional $100 million in domestic ticket sales to catch ‘Avengers: Endgame’ ($858 million) at the No. 2 spot and even more to match ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ ($936 million) in first place.
Globally, ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ is the sixth-highest grossing movie of all time with $1.8 billion. Like its domestic US competitors, challengers could remain beyond reach. That’s because the top five spots on worldwide box office charts have each cracked $2 billion. Without China, it may be unrealistic for ‘No Way Home’ to reach that benchmark.
Directed by Jon Watts, ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’ has cemented several box office benchmarks over the course of its impressive big-screen run. During opening weekend alone, the film landed the second-biggest domestic debut in history with $260 million and the third-largest global start ever with $600 million.
