Avatar: Fire & Ash Box Office Passes 2 of the Best Sci-Fi Movies Of All Time

James Cameron just keeps winning. His threequel, Avatar: Fire & Ash, continued dominating the box office over Christmas weekend, bringing in $64 million—and that’s not including the $88 million since Christmas just last Thursday. That means that Fire & Ash has officially outsold other sci-fi masterpieces, Interstellar and Dune: Part Two. The first Avatar film, as well as Avatar: The Way of Water, still hold the top 2 spots as the highest-grossing sci-fi movies of all time. This could see Fire & Ash holding its own box office top spot well into 2026, especially considering that its predecessors held their spots for a consecutive 7 weekends—a well-deserved win with how much fans have enjoyed the film. 

Though it seems that Cameron is prepared to walk away should the film not continue performing well financially. Speaking with The Town, the director said, “I’ve been in Avatar land for 20 years. Actually, 30 years, because I wrote it in ’95, right, but I wasn’t working continuously on it for those first 10 years. There was a brief flurry of interest in ’95, and then everybody said, ‘You’re out of your mind,’ and I shelved it for 10 years, and then we got serious in 2005. Yeah, absolutely. Sure, if this is where it ends, cool.” At this point, though, the money is there, and the potential plots for the fourth film seem too good to pass up. 

Read Next

James Cameron Reveals Plan for Ending Avatar Franchise if Fire and Ash Isn’t a Box Office Hit

Could We See Fire & Ash Pass $1B?

It’s incredibly likely. The Avatar films linger in their success, drawing in money long after they’ve debuted in theaters, and they tend to perform better globally than simply nationally (in China, Fire & Ash pulled in $57.6M, doing slightly better than The Way of Water’s opening weekend). They also maintain the speed they pick up over the holidays for a decent amount of time, with Fire & Ash hitting the $500M mark as of Christmas. 

Looking forward, there are only a few upcoming films that could potentially dethrone the third Avatar film from its top spot, with most contenders not even debuting until February. Possible candidates are 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, Return to Silent Hill, and Scream 7. Cameron has stated that Fire & Ash needs to bring in the big bucks for Disney to be convinced to release the next two movies (though part of the next installment has already been filmed, including scenes featuring newcomer Michelle Yeoh, and a release date that is already scheduled for December 21, 2029), but with the money that it’s currently bringing in, it doesn’t seem like Fire & Ash will be considered a miss for the studio. 

Did you enjoy Avatar: Fire & Ash? Let us know your thoughts in the comments, and then head over to the ComicBook forum to see what other Avatar fans are saying.