The Hollywood Reporter reveals that Avatar: The Way of Water opened with $134 million at the North American box office this weekend, a strong debut but one that's quite a bit lower than $150 million - $175 million estimates. However, this is far from a disaster because James Cameron's sequel is likely to have serious legs over the festive period.
The Avatar sequel received an A CinemaScore from moviegoers, while it's also "Certifed Fresh" on Rotten Tomatoes with a respectable 78%.
Internationally, Avatar: The Way of Water debuted to $301 million, giving it a global cume of $435 million. Once again, that's below those $525 million estimates, and we're sure Disney is going to be keeping a close eye on these figures. Why? The movie cost $350 million - $400 million to produce, making it one of the most expensive features in history.
Cameron has previously said the sequel needs to make around $2 billion to be considered a success, and while the expectation is it will hit $1 billion by the end of 2023, we don't anticipate it reaching that next benchmark.
A coveted day-and-date release in China didn't pay off as much as expected, with Avatar: The Way of Water becoming the latest Hollywood blockbuster to underperform in the Middle Kingdom. The hope was it would gross over $100 million; instead, it opened to $57.1 million.
What went wrong? At this point, we're not sure anything has. Avatar opened to $77 million in the U.S. in 2009 and is now the highest-grossing movie in history with $2.92 billion, so the coming weeks (and months) will be crucial for this franchise. The runtime is proving problematic in terms of showings, though, while interest in the property has waned with a 13-year gap.
"Avatar: The Way of Water’s epic visuals are impossible to find fault with," we said in our review this weekend, "but with a paper-thin, painfully boring story and little in the way of character development, this three-hour snoozefest is all style, no substance."
What did you guys think about Avatar: The Way of Water?