Top Gun: Maverick continues to soar high at the box office as it has now surpassed the domestic box office total of The Dark Knight. Released 36 years after the original Top Gun, Top Gun: Maverick sees Tom Cruise return as Pete 'Maverick' Mitchell training a new generation of fighter pilots for an impossible task. Originally set for release in 2020, the film was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic and after two years of waiting, finally was released in theaters on May 27, 2022.

Waiting appears to be the right choice as Top Gun: Maverick broke the Memorial Day Weekend box office record that Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End had held for 15 years. Top Gun: Maverick has continued to hold exceptionally well within the following weeks, coming in at number one for two weeks in a row and holding its own in the top five against major competition from Jurassic World: Dominion, Lightyear, and the recently released Minions: The Rise of Gru. Top Gun: Maverick has already passed $1 billion worldwide and has become Tom Cruise's highest-grossing film of all time, and it isn't slowing down anytime soon.

Related: Why Top Gun 2 Made $1 Billion In 2022 (When Marvel & DC Couldn't)

According to Variety, Top Gun: Maverick came in at number two at the weekend box office, bringing in $25 million in its sixth weekend of release and dropping only 14%. According to the box office tracking site The NumbersTop Gun: Maverick's domestic box office total now stands at $545 million meaning it has surpassed both 2019's The Lion King ($543 million) and 2008's The Dark Knight ($533 million). Top Gun: Maverick is now the 12th highest-grossing film at the domestic box office, not adjusted for inflation.

Top Gun Maverick

Top Gun: Maverick currently stands as both the highest-grossing film of summer 2022 and the highest-grossing film of 2022 overall, surpassing titles like Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and The Batman. It will be interesting to see if the movie can hold onto these records. It might be able to hold the summer box office title as the last major bit of competition it will face is Thor: Love and Thunder, but for the rest of the year the movie will have to compete with both Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and Avatar: The Way of Water—both sequels to films that are still above Top Gun: Maverick on the domestic box office charts.

The continued success of Top Gun: Maverick is incredible news for Paramount Pictures. In 2016, Paramount suffered a string of box-office flops like Zoolander 2, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows, Star Trek Beyond, and Ben-Hur, and the studio was struggling to keep up with the competitors like Disney, Warner Bros. Universal, and 20th Century Fox. Yet in 2022, the combined strength of Top Gun: Maverick alongside Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Jackass Forever, Scream, and The Lost City has put the studio back on top.

Next: Which Upcoming 2022 Movies Can Take Top Gun 2's Box Office Crown?

Source: Variety/The Numbers