'Barbie,' and every other billion-dollar box-office blockbuster

Jurassic Park blew the world away, so it's no wonder that when the original trio came back for Jurassic World Dominion, fans were going to stampede to theaters to see if Jeff Goldblum would make the 2022 release as much of a must-watch as he did back in 1993.

Heath Ledger's performance as Joker made this one of the must-see movie events of 2008.

Lord of the Rings swept people away in the early 2000s. So it was no surprise that when it was time to step back into The Shire, The Hobbit fared just as well as its predecessors.

Harry Potter books caused quite a stir, but that level of fandom intensified into hyperdrive when the first of several movies was released in 2001.

Tim Burton and Johnny Depp have done a lot together, but it was 2010's Alice in Wonderland that got them into the Billion-Dollar Club for the first time.

Disney came through with this buddy cop film that ends with a very M. Night Shyamalan-like twist very few saw coming.

It was the return of Star Wars and likely the reason the world now has abundant content from a galaxy far, far away today.

Finding Dory just kept swimming to become a box office dynamo.

There are at least four generations of people who grew up playing with Barbie. So it should’ve shocked no one with those people, now grown adults with disposable incomes, flocked to theaters to see this pink fever dream.

Creating something that will inevitably ingrain itself into pop culture is not easy, but the animation studio Illumination did that when they came up with whatever Minions are in the Despicable Me series.

Jack Sparrow is an undeniable presence that will make a movie a lot of money.

Disney started to remake all of their movies into live-action ones, and while it’s up for debate whether all of them are necessary, one can’t deny how many people have paid to watch them.

Star Wars started its journey in the ‘70s and has since jumped back and forth in time to create a whole world. Rogue One took fans back to how it all began.

Not every movie based on a theme park ride will flourish, but with the right casting and enough finesse, one can strike gold.

Toy Story 3 should have won Best Picture.

Many believed Toy Story 3 was the end of the road for Woody and Co., but Disney and Pixar said, "Nah, let’s keep this going." It delivered another heartfelt goodbye and gave way to one of the most relatable animated characters ever, Forky, a handmade toy made from a spork that continuously said, "I'm trash!"

Movies about superheroes and whatnot usually have this over-the-top look, and perhaps that’s why so many loved the more reality-based tone of Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker.

Kylo Ren came in like a wrecking ball in this one, didn't he?

So nice, Christopher Nolan decided to make over a billion dollars twice with his Batman trilogy.

Transformers: Age of Extinction scored less than 20% on Rotten Tomatoes, but despite a horrific showing with critics, it still managed to get into this exclusive club.

Audiences had never seen dinosaurs on the big screen like that until Jurassic Park, and after all these years, it holds up. This is why fans will still go to theaters to see this masterpiece on the big screen whenever it re-releases.

In hindsight, Transformer movies of the 2000s were like the Black Eyed Peas of cinema. They weren’t the greatest, but they were there, and everyone sort of just consumed them because why not?

Just one of the many, many Marvel movies to make Kevin Feige’s bank account have more zeros than a binary code.

One has to wonder, are fans going to see a fun superhero movie or see Tom Holland and Zendaya be adorable on screen together?

James Bond may not be as hip with the kids as he once was, but Daniel Craig’s version helped Skyfall be the only Bond movie to score mega cash in theaters.

At the time, The Return of the King was believed to be the end of the road for these hobbits, elves, and other mythical creatures, so many rushed out to see how it would all wrap up. Of course, a new series came and went years later, as well as an Amazon series.

A shirtless Jason Momoa will drive ticket sales. Let’s just say that.

Whenever a Marvel movie enlists a multitude of heroes, it’s going to be a money-maker. Plus, this was the first time fans got to see Spider-Man in that universe, so, yeah, it was a big deal.

Where would Facebook be without Minion memes shared by everyone’s aunts?

Robert Downey Jr. didn’t come to play when he was cast as one of the most beloved Avengers.

People see these movies for…family.

Incredibles 2 was the movie Disney fans were waiting anxiously for, and it delivered not only for them but monetarily for the company.

One of the many live-action remakes from Disney that led fans to theaters to see how some of their favorite characters were brought to life.

“Let It Go” haunts parents in their sleep to this day.

Another sequel, another billion dollars. 

Director Rian Johnson only had three other major motion pictures under his belt before being tasked with taking on this Star Wars film.

Harry Potter fans were rabid throughout the entire series, but knowing this was the end made them likely see this movie more than a few times during its original theatrical run.

Black Panther was more than a movie; it was a cultural moment.

Super Mario Bros. has been one of the most popular video games since the ‘80s, and while Hollywood has tried before to make a movie based around it, there is no denying that they finally got it right with The Super Mario Bros. Movie in 2023.

Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen carried Age of Ultron to victory.

Parents everywhere were not thrilled that another Frozen was happening, but wanting to make their kids happy, they reluctantly took them to theaters, even more so than when the original dropped.

Tom Cruise is no stranger to big box office showings, but this was his first movie to cross the billion-dollar mark.

One cannot lose when pairing Dwayne Johnson and fast cars together.

Marvel fans had been waiting, most of them their entire lives, to see all of the Avengers assemble. That moment when they did made them a lot of money and became one of the most iconic scenes in movie history.

When Disney meets nature documentary, the results are apparently golden.

Jurassic World could’ve been a disaster because many hold the original so close to their hearts, but Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard helped a whole new generation fall in love with these modern-meets-prehistoric tales.

As soon as rumors started swirling about the possibility of seeing all three Spider-Mans on screen together, everyone knew that this movie would swing straight toward the top of this list.

Even knowing that this wasn’t the end all be all, it still had people assembling in theaters like they were being called upon to fight Thanos. 

Star Wars fans showed up for The Force Awakens in droves because it was the first of a new trilogy that they could obsess over.

No superheroes, hobbits, Jedis, dinosaurs, fast cars, or giant robots. Just a love story told around one of the biggest disasters in history.

James Cameron may have taken 13 years to create this sequel, but his absence apparently made the heart grow fonder because fans showed up like it was their job.

When Infinity War left fans hanging and many in the dust, it was only a matter of time before Endgame surpassed what came before it by almost a million dollars.

If there is one thing director James Cameron’s going to do, it’s create a few movies that have sold over $2 billion worth of tickets, including the movie that almost topped three billion!