Avatar: The Way of Water has overtaken Top Gun: Maverick at the worldwide box office

Avatar: The Way of Water has officially overtaken Top Gun: Maverick to become the 11th highest grossing film of all time.

Tom Cruise's blockbuster sequel was a long time in the making (just a casual three decades), as was James Cameron's followup to 2009's Avatar.

They have both made an astounding amount of cash, with Maverick being the biggest money maker for 2022.

However, the record set by the adrenaline-pumping flick has now been overtaken by The Way of Water.

Avatar 2 has now earned USD$1.51 billion (AUD$2.231 billion, £857 million) at time of writing, which just eclipses Maverick's USD$1.489 billion (AUD$2.201 billion, £845 million).

If we're not careful, Tom Cruise may lose it and jump out of a plane or something to reclaim the title.

Wait, he already did. Never mind.

There's a pretty good reason why fans are watching the global box office numbers so closely.

James Cameron recently revealed Avatar: The Way of Water will have to become the 10th highest grossing film of all-time in order to break even.

That equates to the film taking home USD$1.5 billion (AUD$2.2 billion, £1.2 billion) at the worldwide box office.

And, while that seemed like a highly ambitious goal before the movie's release, Avatar 2 is closing in on that figure.

Cameron explained last month that he'd warned the film studio the sequel would be 'the worst business case in movie history' because it was 'very f***ing expensive' to make.

The director, who is also the man behind the Terminator films, Point Break, and Titanic, told GQ that if The Way of Water is going to make a profit, 'you have to be the third or fourth highest-grossing film in history'.

He added: "That’s your threshold. That’s your break even."

Paramount

That would have meant The Way of Water had to make more than USD$2 billion (AUD$2.9 billion, £1.6 billion) at the box office.

However, an interview shared on social media by Culture Crave show Cameron walking back on those comments.

"I was a little inaccurate with that," he said of the follow-up film.

"It's probably more like the 10th highest to break even. But yeah, it has to achieve at a very high level."

The film soared past the USD$1 billion (AUD$1.4 billion, £829 million) mark in global ticket sales in two weeks, meaning it earned itself the title of the fastest movie of 2022 to hit that box office milestone.

That in itself is an impressive feat.

As for Top Gun: Maverick, well it took Cruise's passion project 31 days to make that sort of money.

So will Avatar: The Way of Water crack the top 10? Well, we'll have to wait and see.