Box office hits and misses: Star Wars becomes 2015’s biggest movie

J.J. Abrams’ sequel to the blockbuster sci-fi saga broke more records at the box office over the weekend, adding another $88.3 million to its domestic gross and continuing its meteoric rise up the all-time box-office rankings. Along with setting a new record for films in their third weekend in theaters, The Force Awakens is now the highest-grossing domestic release of 2015, needing just three weeks to pass the total gross of Jurassic World over the course of its 23-week run in U.S. theaters.

With all of the records The Force Awakens has put in its rear-view mirror, the number of Hollywood high-water marks the movie hasn’t reached is getting smaller by the day.

Still on the horizon for The Force Awakens is the 2015 worldwide box-office record, which is currently held by Jurassic World and its $1.67 billion gross. Abrams’ sequel is also just $20 million shy of breaking the all-time domestic box-office record held by James Cameron’s 2009 sci-fi film Avatar, which earned $760.5 million over the course of its 34-week run in U.S. theaters.

A bit more distant down the path to box-office glory is the all-time worldwide record, which was also set by Avatar. That record currently sits at an impressive $2.79 billion for Cameron’s sci-fi adventure.

Without any new releases vying to be among the weekend’s highest-grossing films, several projects took advantage of the situation to turn a tidy profit.

Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg’s comedy Daddy’s Home finished just behind The Force Awakens for the second straight week, and the film’s $115.6 million gross clearly indicates that poor reviews won’t stand in the way of the film’s success as a popular alternative to Star Wars. Similarly, the wider release of Quentin Tarantino’s western The Hateful Eight brought audiences to the theater to the tune of a $16.2 million weekend.

The lull of the new year continues this upcoming weekend, which is conspicuously absent any new, major theater releases. The most notable film hitting theaters is the horror story The Forest, which stars Game of Thrones actress Natalie Dormer. Still, the weekend box-office rankings are likely to look familiar next week as The Hateful Eight continues to expand its run, and as many of the current projects wind down in the shadow of The Force Awakens.