Maverick’ Is Now Paramount’s Biggest Movie Ever

Top Gun: Maverick is quickly flying into the territory of an absurd box-office hit.

I think most people figured Tom Cruise returning to his signature role for the first time in 30+ years would do pretty well at the box office. But Maverick has far surpassed any and every expectation. It’s not just a hit, it’s the biggest hit of Tom Cruise’s career — and now it’s the biggest worldwide hit ever in the history of Paramount Pictures.

Per Deadline, The film has now earned $606 million in the United States and $1.2 billion worldwide — higher than any other motion picture in the 100-year history of Paramount. (Technically Titanic still made more money, but Paramount didn’t release that movie overseas — Fox did — so it didn’t earn as much money for the company.)

Top Gun: Maverick currently sits at #22 on the list of the highest-grossing films in history, still well behind mega-blockbusters like Avatar and Avengers: Endgame but ahead of major hits like The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, Skyfall, and Joker. Paramount’s previous top-grossing film was Transformers: Age of Extinction, which earned $1.104 billion worldwide.

The original Top Gun was the biggest hit of 1986, grossing $176 million in U.S. theaters. Adjusted for inflation, that’s $475 million — meaning as big as the first film was in its day, Top Gun: Maverick is bigger. That’s pretty shocking too, considering that Top Gun is now regarded as one of the signature movies of the 1980s.

Top Gun: Maverick is still playing in theaters everywhere. (Obviously.) Now all eyes turn to Cruise’s next project, the first of two back-to-back Mission: Impossible sequels. This Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part 1 is currently scheduled to open in theaters almost exactly one year from today, on July 14, 2023.