‘Avatar: Fire and Ash’ Nears Final Box Office Milestone After Being Snubbed at the Oscars

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Image via 20th Century

Published Jan 24, 2026, 10:27 AM EST

Rahul Malhotra is a Weekend News Writer for Collider. From Francois Ozon to David Fincher, he'll watch anything once.

He has been writing for Collider for over two years, and has covered everything from Marvel to the Oscars, and Marvel at the Oscars. He also writes obsessively about the box office, charting the many hits and misses that are released weekly, and how their commercial performance shapes public perception. In his time at Collider, he has also helped drive diversity by writing stories about the multiple Indian film industries, with a goal to introduce audiences to a whole new world of cinema.

Swing and a miss > measured victory. Also, #JusticeForHan. (He/Him).

Following a month-long run at the top of the domestic box office chart, James Cameron's Avatar: Fire and Ash is projected to slide to the number two spot this weekend. It is being replaced as the biggest film domestically by the sci-fi mystery Mercy, which is underperforming in its debut weekend. Mercy stars Chris Pratt and Rebecca Ferguson, and received poor reviews heading into its debut. Nonetheless, it's poised to gross around $12 million this weekend, which would put it ahead of Avatar 3's projected $8 million sixth-weekend haul. By Sunday, Cameron's film should be in the vicinity of the $380 million mark at the domestic box office, after which it'll make a final push for the $400 million milestone. Earlier this week, Avatar 3 missed what would likely have been its final shot at a comeback when it was essentially snubbed at the Oscars.

Avatar 3 scored only two nods, which isn't going to do much for its declining box office momentum. It remains the lowest-grossing installment of Cameron's generation-defining trilogy, which began in 2009 with Avatar. The first film has grossed $2.9 billion at the global box office, and is the highest-grossing hit in history. A direct follow-up, Avatar: The Way of Water, was released amid massive skepticism over a decade later, but it ended up making $2.3 billion worldwide and is now the third-biggest hit of all time. Cameron is the only director responsible for four movies that have made more than $1 billion each at the global box office. Three of them, including Titanic, have grossed over $2 billion.

The Future of the Avatar Franchise Seems Unclear

Avatar 3's current global box office haul stands at $1.3 billion, making it one of the 25 highest-grossing films of all time. Passing the $1.5 billion mark doesn't seem like a certainty at this stage. The movie reportedly cost $400 million to produce, and the franchise's future depends on its success. Cameron had initially announced plans to make at least two more sequels, but he seemed reluctant to make any definitive statements about them in the run-up to Avatar 3's release. More recently, he said that the sequels would need to cost much less if they're ever made. Avatar 3 opened to the least enthusiastic reviews that the series had seen, and is now sitting at a 66% score on the aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes. You can watch the film in theaters, and stay tuned to Collider for more updates.