Amazon MGM Studios is making waves in Hollywood, and it just might have a franchise on its hands. Ryan Gosling’s “Project Hail Mary” dominated the box office on its opening weekend, bringing in $141 million worldwide. It was a far bigger debut than anyone was expecting heading into the weekend. Word-of-mouth is stellar, and the sky now feels like the limit. That begs the question: Will Amazon make a sequel? And at what point would a sequel make sense from a commercial perspective?

Directed by Phil Lord and Chris Miller, “Project Hail Mary” carries a $200 million budget, which raises the stakes for all involved. That’s a superhero movie budget, meaning that it needs to make superhero movie money, essentially. Fortunately, in the early going, it’s on pace to do precisely that. As of today, the film will pass the $100 million mark domestically and is rapidly coming up on $200 million globally. It should easily win its second weekend at the box office. So, depending on how well things go, it could be at or near $300 million come Monday morning.

Things will change next week when “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie” sets a new high bar at the box office for 2026, as the sequel is assured to post our first $100 million domestic opening of the year. Even so, Lord and Miller’s beloved sci-fi flick should be able to hold its own as counterprogramming to an animated movie aimed at children. All of this is to say, the outlook is better than anyone could have expected.

Back to the question at hand. What number does this movie need to hit to justify a sequel? Over/under $500 million worldwide is probably the rough target, but it’s more complicated than that.

A very rough guide for “hit or bomb” box office movie math is to say a given movie needs to earn around 2.5X its budget to be considered a success. In the case of “Project Hail Mary,” that means $500 million. Now, since theaters keep around half of the money from ticket sales and production budgets don’t account for marketing expenses, that 2.5X rule-of-thumb doesn’t usually equate to pure profit from theaters alone. However, it generally means a movie can make money in the long run after VOD, Blu-ray/DVD, streaming, merchandise, and so on, is factored in.

In the case of Amazon, things get even more complicated. Amazon is a massive tech company worth billions upon billions of dollars. It doesn’t need movies to profit purely in theaters, and it’s ultimately trying to service Prime Video. It just needs the movies it premieres in theaters to not completely flop. An Amazon film’s theatrical release can almost be viewed as a major marketing tactic for the eventual streaming debut.

That being the case, “Project Hail Mary” might not need to hit that $500 million figure to trigger sequel conversations. So, what does “sequel level success” look like for an Amazon-produced blockbuster? It could be “Alita: Battle Angel” ($405 million worldwide/$170 million budget). That one was close but not close enough for Fox to make a sequel at the time. Even so, director Robert Rodriguez has said an “Alita” sequel is still possible.

Moreover, that one was close even by traditional studio standards. By Amazon standards? It would probably clear the bar, especially when we consider that “Project Hail Mary” is more widely acclaimed than “Alita,” with all due respect.

So much of this is going to come down to author Andy Weir, whose acclaimed novel was the basis for “Project Hail Mary.” If he doesn’t want a sequel to happen, there’s virtually no way that Amazon, Ryan Gosling, Phil Lord, Chris Miller, or anyone involved could will it into existence.

That said, Weir hasn’t ruled out a “Project Hail Mary” sequel in recent updates. Money tends to talk, and he has more financial motivation than ever to make a follow-up. That said, it also could be one of those rare situations where someone truly leaves well enough alone, walking away on top.

If we assume that Weir has an idea and a sequel book moves forward, even if “Project Hail Mary” tapers off and doesn’t hit that over/under $500 million mark, a combination of critical praise and optical bragging rights could get a big screen follow-up over the line. Think about something like “Mad Max: Fury Road” ($380 million worldwide/$150 million budget). It wasn’t a big, outright theatrical success, but it was met with near-universal acclaim and ultimately found Oscar glory. That led to the eventual prequel, “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.”

What that prequel didn’t work out nearly as well, the praise for this movie has been similarly effusive. /Film’s Ethan Anderton even described “Project Hail Mary” as “one of the best sci-fi movies ever made” in his review. That’s not an isolated compliment. People love this film, so Amazon could see upside in turning it into a franchise and banking on finding a bigger audience for the potential sequel. In short, a follow-up is far from out of the question right now.

“Project Hail Mary” is in theaters now.