Avatar: Fire and Ash Roars Past $136M, Proving the Doubters Wrong
Lukewarm reviews aren’t slowing Avatar: Fire and Ash. Despite being the franchise’s lowest-rated on Rotten Tomatoes and trailing The Way of Water domestically, the threequel has already surged past $136 million worldwide.
Avatar: Fire and Ash isn’t winning the gold star from critics right now, but the box office clearly did not get that memo. The third movie is already off to a loud start worldwide, even as the usual discourse tries to will it into a flop.
Where the money is landing so far
- Global gross has already cleared $136 million before the full opening frame finished.
- Industry forecasts have the opening weekend landing around $340 million to $350 million worldwide.
- That would be under The Way of Water’s $441.6 million global opening, and domestic is expected to start about 30% lower than that last film’s opening haul.
- For context, Fire and Ash is currently the lowest-rated entry in the series on Rotten Tomatoes, but early turnout isn’t reflecting the naysaying.
The culture war vs. the cash register
There’s a whole cottage industry of takes about Avatar having 'no cultural impact.' Meanwhile, people are buying tickets. Social feeds are full of folks dunking on the doomers and posting memes as the numbers climb.
'No cultural impact' just hit $136M. Interesting.
Why the opening weekend isn’t the whole story
Here’s the industry math that actually matters with Avatar: these movies aren’t front-loaded. There aren’t big spoiler landmines or must-see-first-week chatter. Instead, they play and play. The Way of Water didn’t post a flashy opening by superhero standards but legged out to a 5x multiplier, which is almost unheard of now when 2x to 3x is considered strong.
With COVID no longer suppressing attendance and no major four-quadrant competition immediately on deck, Fire and Ash’s third weekend will be the real tell. Even with a healthy 5x or 6x multiplier, cracking $2 billion looks like a high bar from this start. Then again, if there’s one filmmaker you don’t bet against in theatrical endurance, it’s James Cameron.
Cameron’s aim here (and why that matters)
Cameron has been blunt that these movies aren’t engineered to sell toys; he makes them to let you disappear into Pandora on the biggest, nicest screens you can find. That squares with how audiences are showing up: not necessarily stampeding on day one, but turning out for spectacle and premium formats over weeks, not days.
Bottom line
Fire and Ash is opening below The Way of Water but still very big by any sane metric, and the word-of-mouth runway is what will make or break it. Early signs say the anti-Avatar narrative isn’t moving the needle where it counts. We’ll know the trajectory by weekend three. Until then, the franchise’s superpower is the slow burn.
Avatar: Fire and Ash is now playing in theaters.