Tom Cruise’s Top Gun: Maverick Has Crossed A Huge Box Office Milestone For The Pandemic Era
We’re coming up on one month of Top Gun: Maverick playing in theaters, and Tom Cruise’s return to the role of Pete “Maverick” Mitchell continues to triumph a the box office. Going into this past weekend, the sequel crossed the $800 million mark to become Cruise’s highest-grossing movie of all time, overtaking 2018’s Mission: Impossible – Fallout. Just days later, Maverick has now crossed $900 million, making it just one of three movies to do so in the pandemic era.
As shared by THR, Top Gun: Maverick’s worldwide total currently stands at $901.9 million, with $474.8 million coming from domestic showings and $427.1 million coming from its international run. The only other movies to achieve this since the pandemic starting hampering the theatrical business in March 2020 are Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Spider-Man: No Way Home, with the former taking in almost $950 million worldwide and the latter’s global haul resting at nearly $1.9 billion. Paramount Pictures, the studio that released Maverick, claims that 16% of the movie’s audience have seen it more than once on the big screen.
Top Gun: Maverick stands as the second highest-grossing movie of 2022 yet, and it might not be too much longer before it passes by Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness to claim the #1 spot. Not only that, there’s a distinct chance that Maverick could being the first movie of the year to hit $1 billion, though that’s far from guaranteed. Even if that doesn’t happen, Maverick has more than enough box office accomplishments to tout, including being the highest-grossing 2022 movie domestically and scoring the highest-grossing opening Memorial Day weekend, an honor previously held by Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End.
As if box office glory wasn’t enough of a feather in Top Gun: Maverick’s cap, the sequel has also been met with critical acclaim from both professional reviewers and regular moviegoers. CinemaBlend’s own Eric Eisenberg gave Maverick 4 out of 5 stars in his review, calling it “a movie that feels like it is the best version of itself, and it’s a thrill.” Clearly it’s a winner if so many people have gone back to see it in theaters, which also means it’ll likely be a while until it becomes available to Paramount+ subscribers.
Taking place over three decades after the original Top Gun, Top Gun: Maverick sees Tom Cruise’s character being tasked to train a group of aviators who graduated from the TOPGUN academy for a dangerous mission. Cruise was accompanied by Val Kilmer reprising Tom “Iceman” Kazansky, and the lineup of new faces includes Jennifer Connelly, Jon Hamm, Ed Harris, Glen Powell, Monica Barbara, Lewis Pullman, Charles Parnell, Jay Ellis and Danny Ramirez. Joseph Kosinski directed Maverick, and Ehren Kruger, Eric Warren Singer and Christopher McQuarrie all worked on the script.
If you’ve already seen Top Gun: Maverick, be sure to read our breakdown of the sequel’s ending and take a peek at the 2022 release schedule to figure out what movies you’ll watch later in the year.
