‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ And ‘Avengers: Age Of Ultron’ Make Disney $5 Billion In 2015

With all of the money Star Wars: The Force Awakens has managed to make in its opening weekend, 2015 has proven to be a very fruitful year for Walt Disney Studios. In fact, for the very first time in its long and prestigious history, the studio’s earnings for 2015 have officially topped the $5 billion mark.

According to Variety, the studio reached its recording breaking numbers thanks to the success of three movies in 2015. These titles included the release of Avengers: Age of Ultron, Inside Out, and Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Each one of these films was produced through three of Disney’s top brands: Marvel, Pixar, and Lucasfilm.

As far as Pixar is concerned, the studio managed to make over $800 million in total sales for Inside Out, while Disney also raked in close to $550 million with Cinderella. For Marvel, the year proved to be even more generous as Avengers: Age of Ultron made $1.4 billion in global sales, while Ant-Man made the studio about $500 million worldwide.

At the same time, although the new Star Wars film was only recently released, it is already shattering a number of box office records going into its first full week in theaters. In its opening, the movie managed to make $248 million in the U.S. and $529 million in global sales. This breaks the previous record set by Jurassic World, which made $208 in the U.S. and $524 million globally.

According to Geek, the new records set by Star Wars: The Force Awakens are particularly impressive given the performance of Jurassic World. Along with breaking the record for opening weekend sales, the iconic dinosaur film became the fastest movie to reach the billion dollar mark, which it did in just 13 days. The previous record was 19 days and was held by three films: The Avengers, Avatar, and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2.

By the time Jurassic World’s run was finished, the movie claimed the spot as the third-highest earning film ever to be released at the box office. Jurassic World’s $1.6 billion dollars grossed worldwide fell short of Titanic and Avatar, which are both sitting above the $2 billion mark.

Despite its record-breaking year, Star Wars has managed to eclipse just about all of the records set by Jurassic World. In fact, The Force Awakens now holds the record for highest Sunday earnings, highest domestic debut, highest worldwide debut, largest average gross per theater, fastest to earn $100 million, highest weekend earnings for a PG-13 movie, and the highest domestic and worldwide IMAX release.

The only record that Stars Wars did not take from Jurassic World is the highest gross for a Saturday. Stars Wars earned $68 million on Saturday while Jurassic World came in at $69.6 million.

With plenty of time left in 2015, the only question remaining is whether or not Star Wars: The Force Awakens will be able to break the $1 billion mark before the year is out. Either way, the movie might be set to top Jurassic World’s spot in the all-time earnings list before the film leaves theaters. Topping the likes of Avatar and Titanic, however, might prove a little harder to do.

All of that being said, Disney’s earnings were not the highest for 2015. Its biggest competitor, Universal, managed to rake in some $6.8 billion in worldwide earnings in 2015. Universal’s highest-earning films included Jurassic World and Furious 7. Still, the numbers for Disney in 2015 are a clear indication that there are new standards of success in box office earnings that future films will be measured against.

Tell us! Have you helped Disney reach the $5 billion mark by seeing Star Wars: The Force Awakens more than once? Let us know in the comments below.

[Image via LucasFilm/Disney]