With every year that passes, summer blockbusters continue to one-up each other at the box office. Take Furious 7, for instance. Back in April, Toretto and his crew of petrolheads stormed to the top of the charts and even stole Avatar‘s crown as the fastest film to gross $1 billion worldwide. Fast forward a mere two months and change and Colin Trevorrow’s Jurassic World has snatched the title in a mere 13 days.
Nevertheless, the fact that both films released under Universal has propelled the production company to a record high, and it’s likely that ideas for a potential sequel are already being spliced together in the studio’s genetic labs. After all, Trevorrow’s reboot is now the third film of 2015 to join the hyper-exclusive billion dollar club, following in the footsteps of the aforementioned Furious 7 and Avengers: Age of Ultron. Moreover, buoyed by good word of mouth, Jurassic World even earned the title for the highest-grossing second weekend at the domestic box office with an eye-watering $106 million. All in all, Universal’s genetically altered beast is already a lucrative juggernaut.
Though the film itself was not without its fault, it underlines the lasting appeal of the Jurassic branding across the globe that Trevorrow’s quasi-sequel now stands as the fastest motion picture to break through that all-important billion-dollar barrier. Whether the blockbuster has the legs to challenge Titanic and Avatar – the real heavy-hitters – atop the list of the highest grossing movies of all time remains to be seen; still, it’s a remarkable achievement for not only Universal, but Trevorrow, given his humble background as a filmmaker.
Jurassic World has punched through the billion-dollar ceiling in a mere 13 days, but the real question is whether Star Wars: The Force Awakens will blow its new-found fame out of the water come December.
