Top Gun: Maverick Becomes Tom Cruise's First Ever Billion Dollar Movie

The legacy sequel to the 1986 action film is Tom Cruise's first movie to hit the $1 billion milestone, making it the highest grossing film of 2022.

Maverick is now also the 50th Hollywood movie to surpass $1 billion at global box office, not adjusted to inflation, and is only the second movie to break a billion following the recent pandemic. It now joins MCU's Spiderman: No Way Home in the hall of fame.

Directed by Joseph Kosinski, as of Sunday (26 June) the film grossed $521.7 million in the US and $44.5 million overseas.

During its first weekend, Maverick grossed an impressive $126 million in 4,700 US theatres.

It's already trumped MCU's Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, which was released three weeks prior.

Surprisingly, for Cruise, this is the first time he has reached the billion dollar landmark during his four decade long career.

It officially became the highest grossing film of his career just last week, when it passed $800 million. Previously, 2018's Mission Impossible: Fallout was his highest grossing movie at $791 million.

The film exceeded expectations, especially impressive considering the movie wasn't released in Russia or China and was up against Jurassic World Dominion and Lightyear.

The achievements do not end there, as the film also broke the Memorial Day weekend domestic box office record, ending Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End's 15-year long record.

Repeat viewers could be responsible for the record sales as Paramount reported that more than 16 percent of viewers had seen the movie more than once, while four percent of the audience have seen it four times or more.

The long-awaited sequel is also Paramount’s biggest live-action movie in 15 markets, including the UK, Australia, France and Brazil. It is also their second highest grossing original release, behind the 1997 classic Titanic.

Top Gun: Maverick stars Tom Cruise, Miles Teller, Jennifer Connelly, Jon Hamm, Ed Harris, Glen Powell, Lewis Pullman, Danny Ramirez, Monica Barbaro, Manny Jacinto, and Val Kilmer.

The movie follows veteran fighter pilot Pete ‘Maverick’ Mitchell who leads a team of young recruits on a dangerous mission.

The first Top Gun, released earned $357.8 million at the worldwide box office, unadjusted to inflation.