Merie Weismiller W, Dreamworks Pictures

It takes more than sorority girls and muscle cars to knock Ben Stiller and Co. out of the No. 1 spot.

Tropic Thunder held on to the box office crown for the second weekend in a row, with an estimated $16.1 million in ticket sales, bringing its total gross to $65.7 million.

The politically incorrect action-comedy starring Stiller, Jack Black and Robert Downey Jr. outearned four new releases, which might give strength to speculations last week that its underwhelming debut was caused by the Olympics (or specifically, Michael Phelps).

The Anna Faris-led comedy The House Bunny, about a booted Playboy bunny living in a college sorority, hopped into second place, with $15.1 million in ticket sales. Jason Statham's futuristic kill-or-be-killed action flick Death Race opened third with $12.4 million.

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Stephen Vaughan/Warner Bros. Entertainment

Second place never looked so lofty.

The Dark Knight pushed past the original Star Wars Saturday for No. 2 among Hollywood's all-time moneymaking champs.

Elsewhere at the box office, the Ben Stiller-led Tropic Thunder rebounded from an underwhelming debut to post a $26 million Friday-Sunday take, tops for the weekend, per studio estimates compiled by Exhibitor Relations.

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Merie Weismiller W, Dreamworks Pictures

This was supposed to be the weekend The Dark Knight loosened its bat grip on the box office.

But the movie math was being rethought after Tropic Thunder, the presumptive and still-potential No. 1 weekend movie, opened with a relatively quiet $6.5 million Wednesday, per Exhibitor Relations-compiled final figures.

"I think it's not going to be as big as people thought," Exhibitor Relations box-office analyst Chad Hartigan said today of the Ben Stiller-directed comedy.

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Warner Bros. Pictures

Beware, Lord Vader.

The Dark Knight brought its overall domestic gross to $441.5 million today, per Exhibitor Relations estimates, moving the film to third among the all-time box office champs, and leaving it perhaps only a week away from trumping Star Wars for second place.

The Batman movie's Friday-Sunday take of $26 million gave the blockbuster its fourth-straight weekend box office win—a feat not accomplished since Lord of the Rings: Return of the King ruled in 2003-04.

Assuming the studio estimates hold, the weekend gross moved Dark Knight up four spots on the all-time list, as the film bypassed Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest ($423 million), Star Wars: Episode I—The Phantom Menace ($431 million), E.T. ($435 million) and Shrek 2 ($441.2 million).

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Darren Michaels/Columbia Pictures, Stephen Vaughan/DC Comics

The summer box office continued to cook yesterday, with The Dark Knight express well on its way to blow by E.T., and Pineapple Express off to an unexpectedly fast start.

Having passed Spider-Man for seventh on the list of all-time grossers on Tuesday, the Batman movie took in an estimated $5 million Wednesday, Exhibitor Relations said, bringing its overall domestic total to about $410 million.

By the end of the weekend, the box-office tracking firm said, The Dark Knight  "should be up to at least No. 4" on the all-time list, meaning it would have passed E.T., currently in fourth with $435 million, and positioned itself to take down Shrek 2, currently in third with $441 million.

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Warner Brothers

Eighteen days.

That's all it took for The Dark Knight to break $400 million.

The Batman movie grossed another $6.3 million on Monday, per final numbers from Exhibitor Relations, bringing its overall domestic total to $400,038,494 and setting yet another land-speed record.

The fastest film to $100 million, $200 million and $300 million is now the fastest film to $400 million. By a lot.

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Warner Bros. Entertainment.com

The Dark Knight isn't king of the world, but it's getting closer.

The fastest-grossing blockbuster in Hollywood history took in another $43.8 million at the weekend box office, per studio estimates, staying on course for a potential run of $500 million—or more.

The latest Mummy movie, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon, did about what was expected, if a little less than the most outsized predictions, coming up with $42.5 million. If estimates hold, it'll finish second behind The Dark Knight.

For The Dark Knight now, it's not so much about where it places—although it's the first movie since 2007's Disturbia to top the box office three straight weekends—but how fast it movie descends the mountain of money it made in its opening days.

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Warner Brothers, Disney

It posted the biggest opening weekend in Hollywood history. It scored the biggest opening week in Hollywood history.

It didn't come close to toppling Titanic.

The box-office tale of Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest might help explain why reaching $600 million, even in the age of the $15 IMAX ticket, is the tallest of orders.

No one ever said making history was easy, Dark Knight.

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Warner Brothers, Paramount

Ten years after sailing off with $600.8 million, Titanic remains the top-grossing movie of all-time, a title which, up until The Dark Knight onslaught, hasn't been seriously challenged.

Why?

Statistically speaking, says Jeffrey Simonoff, borrowing a famous line from screenwriter William Goldman, "Nobody knows."

"Many people have noted if the stock market is a high-risk market, the movies is far riskier," says Simonoff, professor of statistics at New York University's Stern School of Business.

Huge opening weekends and great buzz certainly increase a movie's odds of making lots and lots of money, but beyond that, Simonoff argues, it's all guesswork.

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Warner Brothers

Next up: $400 million.

The Dark Knight was primed to enter a stratosphere reached by only seven films in Hollywood history after grossing an estimated $75.6 million this weekend, and surpassing $300 million domestically in record time.

Among the box office also-rans, Will Ferrell got his mojo back, while Scully and Mulder had theirs abducted.

More than anyone, Batman was again the man. Where once a $400 million overall take for the latest Caped Crusader adventure was considered a possibility, now it's considered a lock.

"Certainly, $400 million, boom, that's going to happen," Media by Numbers box office analyst Paul Dergarabedian said today.

"The trajectory it's on has never before been seen. This is absolutely unprecedented."

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