Weekend Box Office: 'Aquaman' Is Now The Highest Grossing DCEU Movie

It's official: Aquaman is now the champion of the DCEU. A few years ago, if you had told me a movie starring Aquaman would outgross one featuring Batman and Superman, I might have laughed. But things change, and audiences can't seem to get enough of James Wan's underwater hero. The Warner Bros. flick remained at the top of the box office for a third weekend in a row, with Escape Room coming in a distant second.

The King of Atlantis is now the King of the Box Office and the King of the DCEU. For the third week in a row, Aquaman remains at the top of the charts, hauling in yet another $30,700,000 at the weekend box office (via Box Office Mojo). This officially makes Aquaman the highest-grossing DCEU film to date. Here's the breakdown. The dollar amounts are total foreign and domestic box office grosses.

1. Aquaman – $887.6M

2. Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice – $873.6M

3. Wonder Woman – $821.8M

4. Suicide Squad – $746.8M

5. Man of Steel – $668.0M

6. Justice League – $657.9M

That's right. In just three weeks, Aquaman made more money than Justice League did in its entire theatrical run. Yikes. How do we explain this success? There are a variety of factors. Man of Steel received mixed reviews and word-of-mouth, which kept it from being the hit it should've been. Suicide Squad was terrible, thus failing to attract a bigger audience. Wonder Woman was the first DCEU film to earn generally favorable reviews, and the first time the character had ever lead her own movie, thus resulting in high box office. Batman v Superman was the first time Batman and Superman were on the big screen together, which made it a hit. But people were unhappy with Batman v Superman, and the one-two-shit-sandwich of that and Suicide Squad resulted in Justice League taking a significant hit.

As for Aquaman, the superhero film earned itself positive reviews, and also has people buzzing – primarily because it's fun. It also arrived at a time when there were no other superhero films to compete with (unless you want to count the PG-13 cut of Once Upon a Deadpool). Aquaman also remains one of the only big movies at the multiplexes in January, which the weekend box office totals reflect. The only other new movie out is Escape Room, which came in second and made $18 million on a $9 million production budget (cheap horror always sells, kids). Mary Poppins Returns holds at number three, and Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse is set at fourth place.

Next week sees the release of M. Night Shyamalan's Glass, which should finally knock Aquaman out of the top spot.