James Wan Makes History as ‘Aquaman’ Earns More than $1 Billion Worldwide

January 14, 2019

“Aquaman” passed the $1 billion mark on Saturday, making director James Wan the second filmmaker, alongside James Cameron, to helm two $1 billion-plus grossers for two different studios.

Wan’s first billion-dollar hit was Universal’s “Furious 7” which grossed $1.5 billion in the global box office in 2015.

“Aquaman” is the first DCEU film and the third DC comic book movie adaptation to reach $1 billion in ticket sales. Among the Warner Bros’ cinematic universe films, only “Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice” and “Wonder Woman” came close with $873.6 million and $821.8 million respectively.

Aquaman’s worldwide earnings currently stand at a whopping $1.02 billion, including $288 million domestically and $742 million internationally. The film is expected to soon overtake “The Dark Knight Rises,” which earned $1.084 billion in 2012 as the biggest DC superhero film of all time. Meanwhile, “The Dark Knight” also exceeded the billion mark in 2008 by taking in $1.004 billion.

Wan’s film now also ranks as the eighth-highest grossing live-action superhero movie ever made, just behind the three Avengers films, “Black Panther,” “Iron Man 3,” “Captain America: Civil War,” and “The Dark Knight Rises.”

The impressive box office numbers also put James Wan in the group of only eight directors (with the Russo brothers counted as a singular unit) to have two movies raking in over $1 billion. The elite group includes Chris Nolan (for “Dark Knight” and “Dark Knight Rises”), Michael Bay (for Transformers 3 and Transformers 4), Peter Jackson (for “Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King,” “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey”), Joss Whedon (for “Avengers,” “Avengers: Age of Ultron”), Pierre Coffin (for “Minions” and “Despicable Me 3”), the Russo Bros. (for “Captain America: Civil War,” “Avengers: Infinity War”) and James Cameron (for “Titanic” and “Avatar”).

Wan, who first gained global popularity for his work on multiple horror hits (Saw, Insidious, The Conjuring), took to Twitter to express his thanks to those who helped him make the film possible and the fans who supported it.

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Featured image via Instagram/creepypuppet

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