Marvel’s Black Panther has now passed Star Wars: The Last Jedi at the domestic box office. That’s a milestone no one would’ve considered achievable just a few months ago. But Black Panther – directed by Ryan Coogler and based on a script by Coogler and screenwriter Joe Robert Cole, and starring Chadwick Boseman as T’Challa/Black Panther – has proven time and again that it’s a movie that will continue to be remembered and talked about for a long time to come.


Ever since Black Panther broke Deadpool‘s February opening record last month, the film has been on a hot streak, breaking all sorts of critical and commercial records. So far, it’s tied for Rotten Tomatoes’ highest-rated superhero movie ever and is the highest-grossing solo superhero movie at the U.S. box office. And now, after spending five weekends in the top spot on the domestic charts, fending off all sorts of major new releases, Black Panther just crossed yet another major milestone.


Black Panther has earned $618.64 million as of Friday, March 23, which is $1.25 million shy of the final tally for Rian Johnson’s Star Wars: The Last Jedi ($619.89 million). As long as Black Panther isn’t removed from virtually every major theater in the United States, it should pass The Last Jedi‘s domestic gross today – Saturday, March 24. By doing so, the 2018 Marvel film will become the sixth highest-grossing movie ever to release domestically. It remains to be seen, however, if Black Panther can top The Last Jedi‘s global gross of $1.332 billion.


It’s a foregone conclusion at this point that Black Panther will also pass The Avengers ($623.3 million) to break into the top five highest-grossing films of all-time at the U.S. box office. It only needs a couple million dollars more to do so, which it’s expected to earn by the end of this weekend. When it does, it will become the top-grossing superhero movie ever (solo or otherwise). The question now is, can it top Jurassic World ($652.2 million) and Titanic ($659.3 million)? While Titanic‘s total includes re-releases, it’s worth noting that all the aforementioned totals are unadjusted for ticket price inflation, as is standard procedure for calculating box office records.


Needless to say, Marvel is definitely going to make Black Panther 2. In fact, Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige has already said that they have a pretty good idea of where they want to take T’Challa’s story next and he’s hoping that Coogler will return to helm the Black Panther sequel so that it’s the best that it can possibly be. And considering how successful the movie has been so far, Marvel would be remiss if they didn’t try everything to bring Coogler back for a second film. But, until there’s actual movement on the sequel, Coogler and co. and continue to revel in Black Panther‘s astounding critical and commercial success.