Top Gun 2 Could be the First Tom Cruise Movie to Make $1B – The Hollywood Reporter
Nothing short of astonishment swept across Hollywood over the June 3-5 weekend when Tom Cruise’s Top Gun: Maverick dropped a mere 29 percent from its Memorial Day launch thanks to spectacular word of mouth.
That’s the lowest decline in history for a movie opening to $100 million or more, and a slim decline for any movie, according to Comscore. A decline of 55 percent would have been considered excellent, or even 50 percent. The bigger a Hollywood tentpole opens, the more inclined it is to drop 60 percent or more.
Take Marvel and Disney’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, which on Sunday became the first film of 2022 to cross the $900 million mark at the worldwide box office in its fifth weekend despite falling 67 percent in its sophomore outing.
So what does this all mean? For the first time in his 40-decade career, Tom Cruise, 59, has a movie that has a real shot at joining the billion-dollar club at the global box office. At the very least, it will ultimately become his highest-grossing film, not adjusted for inflation. (It already it is domestically.)
In its first 10 days, Paramount and Skydance’s Top Gun: Maverick — fueled by moviegoers of all ages and a coveted A+ CinemaScore — has earned an estimated $295.6 million in North America and $257 million overseas for a global haul north of $552 million, already making it one of the actor’s highest-grossing titles.
“To have this kind of success at this point in his career is amazing,” says a rival studio executive.
Box office sources tell The Hollywood Reporter that Top Gun 2 is destined to gross north of $900 million globally, including $500 million or more in North America. They say the only reason it may not get to $1 billion is the absence of a China and Russia release.
Cruise’s biggest film worldwide is Mission: Impossible — Fallout, which collected $571.5 overseas for a worldwide total of $791 million in 2018. Top Gun 2 will also pass up 2011’s Mission: Impossible — Ghost Protocol ($694.7 million), 2015’s Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation ($682.7 million) and 2005’s The War of the Worlds ($603 million).
On Saturday, Top Gun: Maverick became Cruise’s top-grossing film domestically when passing up War of the Worlds ($243.3 million). That’s after zooming past the first Top Gun ($180.3 million) and Mission: Impossible — Fallout ($220.2 million). Internationally, Top Gun: Maverick is already well ahead of the $176 million earned by the first Top Gun.
Top Gun: Maverick could prove a huge boost for the next Mission: Impossible movie, Dead Reckoning Part One. Paramount and Skydance open the film on July 14, 2023. “Top Gun 2 has introduced a whole new generation to Tom Cruise,” says the source. It’s a wise observation.