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Top Gun: Maverick Expected to Surpass Titanic’s Domestic Box Office Record
Top Gun: Maverick is likely to become the seventh biggest film ever at the domestic box office, a record currently held by Titanic. Top Gun: Maverick premiered this May and has been screening in theaters ever since. It's the sequel to the original Top Gun (1986), also starring Tom Cruise and Val Kilmer, with Miles Teller, Jennifer Connelly, and Glen Powell joining them in Top Gun: Maverick cast. The movie follows Maverick (Cruise) as he trains a group of TOPGUN Navy fighter pilots.
Top Gun: Maverick has been doing extremely well at the box office, breaking many records. On June 17, Top Gun: Maverick became Cruise's highest-grossing movie of his entire career, and on June 26, the movie officially crossed the $1 billion mark for combined domestic and international box office numbers. Many fans and critics have praised the movie for being even better than the original, while some have critiqued it for being nothing more than tired, cookie-cutter U.S. military propaganda. Regardless, its massive box office numbers speak to just how popular this movie has been and continues to be.
Now, Variety writes that Top Gun: Maverick is set to break another record: the domestic box office's seventh biggest movie ever. As of today, Top Gun: Maverick has grossed over $657 million, while Titanic has grossed over $659 million. And as Top Gun: Maverick is currently in theaters while Titanic is not, the $2 million gap between the two movies is almost certain to close soon.
Of the top ten movies on the All-Time Domestic Box Office list, Titanic is the only one left that was not released in the 21st century. It's also one of the few on the list not released as a sequel or part of a larger universe like the MCU. As many movie lovers have expressed frustration that few truly original movies are being greenlit by Hollywood executives, it's interesting to see how movies like Top Gun: Maverick, which are based on existing IP, are doing extremely well numbers-wise, often surpassing their originals. For example, Top Gun: Maverick has far exceeded its original in terms of box office numbers; the original has only grossed $180 million at the domestic box office, only a third of its sequel.
Titanic isn't guaranteed to permanently relinquish its spot to Top Gun: Maverick, though. For its 25th anniversary, a remastered version of Titanic will be hitting theaters, likely in early 2023. Depending on how popular that ends up being, there's a chance that Titanic will be able to climb the ranks of the All-Time Domestic Box Office list again. Top Gun: Maverick is slowly losing its box office dominance, as it looks like it may exit the domestic box office's top five movies for the first time ever this week.
