Box Office Battle: ‘Avatar 2’ wins New Year’s weekend with $86.3M

"Puss in Boots: The Last Wish" placed number 2 with another $22.6M

"Box Office Battle" is The Fly’s weekly roundup of what movies topped the weekend’s box office.

Disney’s (DIS) “Avatar: The Way of Water” won this New Year’s weekend with an estimated $86.3M for the four days for a domestic total of $444.4M as it crossed $1.4B in worldwide ticket sales on Monday. Overseas, the movie grossed an estimated $186.7M for the three-day weekend for a foreign cume of $956.9M.

BOX OFFICE RUNNER-UPS: Comcast (CMCSA) subsidiary Universal’s “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish” placed number 2 with a projected four-day total of $22.6M. Behind it was Disney’s “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” with an estimated $6.5M as the movie approaches the global tally of $820M. TriStar Pictures’ “Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody” placed number 4 with $4.9M for the long weekend. Rounding out the top five, Paramount’s (PARA) “Babylon” earned an estimated four-day total of $3.4M.

NEW YEAR’S WEEKEND BOX OFFICE:

1. “Avatar: The Way of Water” – $86.3M
2. “Puss in Boots: The Last Wish” – $22.6M
3. “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” – $6.5M
4. “Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody” – $4.9M
5. “Babylon” – $3.4M

Other publicly traded companies in filmmaking include Sony (SONY), Warner Bros.’ (WBD), and Lionsgate’s (LGF.A).

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