If you’ve been paying attention at all over the last few months, this isn’t going to come as any kind of surprise to you, but it is still one hell of a feat. Marvel’s latest superhero opus, Avengers: Age of Ultron, has passed a huge milestone, breaking the $1 billion threshold at the box office.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Age of Ultron hopped this particular fence today, Friday, May 15. In crossing this line, it becomes the third Marvel movie to do so, joining its predecessor, 2012’s The Avengers, as well as Iron Man 3. In fact, it’s this is a pretty damn exclusive club as, in the whole history of blockbuster movies, this is only the twenty-first movie to earn a billion dollars, though eight of these have been Disney-owned titles.
Age of Ultron is the second movie of 2015 to hit ten figures, joining Universal’s high octane Furious 7 on the list. The Joss Whedon-directed adventure still has some ground to cover to catch up with that one, which currently sits at number four on the all time earnings list, right behind the first Avengers. It is, however, close to topping it domestically.
Since we’re apparently pitting these two movies against one another right now, Age of Ultron also failed to eclipse another of Furious 7’s accomplishments. It took the latest Marvel movie three weeks of international release to earn $1 billion, while the James Wan-helmed automotive actioner managed this feat in just 17 days, the shortest time ever.
One of the biggest questions leading up to the release of Avengers: Age of Ultron was whether or not it would be able to top the massive $1.51 billion haul of the first movie. There is still a great deal of ground to cover before they get to that one, and there is some question about whether it will eventually reach that mark or not. The movie is performing well in all territories, including $69 million in China and $76 million in South Korea, though with mixed reviews (response has still been positive, but not as overwhelmingly so as with the last film), it might not have the same legs. That said, there are still some as-yet unopened regions of the world for the film to conquer, notably Japan, where the movie doesn’t hit theaters until July 4.
There was even, for a while pre-release, speculation that Age of Ultron could hit $2 billion, but that’s not going to happen. Still, whatever the grand total winds up being, whether is surpasses the original or outlasts Furious 7, the simple fact remains, Avengers: Age of Ultron has already made a crap ton of cash.
