For a few hours in November 2025, it appeared that an 18-year-old actor had done something Hollywood had not seen since Jim Carrey’s extraordinary breakthrough year three decades earlier.

Mason Thames seemed to have three movies reach No. 1 at the North American box office in the same calendar year: How to Train Your Dragon, Black Phone 2 and Regretting You.

It was an eye-catching comparison. In 1994, Carrey had exploded from television comedian to movie superstar as Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, The Mask and Dumb and Dumber all became No. 1 films within the same year. His run remains one of Hollywood’s most famous examples of a star seemingly becoming unavoidable almost overnight.

More than 30 years later, Thames appeared to have joined him.

There was just one problem: when the final ticket sales arrived, the record had slipped away by barely half a million dollars.

Yet what Thames actually accomplished may still be the more interesting story.

Three Completely Different Mason Thames Movies

Thames entered 2025 with recognition from horror fans thanks largely to The Black Phone, the 2022 supernatural thriller in which he played kidnapped teenager Finney Blake opposite Ethan Hawke’s terrifying Grabber.

But his biggest test came from an entirely different kind of character.

In June, Thames took over the role of Hiccup in Universal’s live-action H

, directed by Dean DeBlois.

The movie immediately became his largest theatrical success.

It opened with $84.6 million in the United States and Canada, taking the No. 1 position, and eventually reached roughly $636.6 million worldwide.

For Thames, the role required more than simply carrying a major studio production. Hiccup already had years of history with audiences through the animated films, meaning the young actor had to make a familiar character believable in live action without losing the qualities viewers associated with him.

Then Thames went almost directly from dragons to horror.

Hiccup Disappeared — and Finney Returned

In October, Thames returned as Finney in Black Phone 2.

The tonal difference could hardly have been larger.

Hiccup was quick, awkward and adventurous. Finney was older, quieter and still shaped by the trauma of surviving the events of the first Black Phone.

Thames later recalled that switching between the characters was difficult enough that director Scott Derrickson occasionally noticed traces of his previous performance. At one point, Derrickson told him, “I hear Hiccup.”

The adjustment worked commercially.

Black Phone 2 debuted at No. 1 in North America in October. Its final opening figure was approximately $27.3 million, and the sequel eventually collected more than $132 million worldwide.

Thames now had two No. 1 movies in a matter of months.

And one week after Black Phone 2 arrived, moviegoers could see him doing something completely different again.

Then Came Regretting You

Thames played Miller Adams opposite Mckenna Grace in Regretting You, director Josh Boone’s adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s novel.

Instead of dragons or supernatural killers, the film placed Thames inside a family and romantic drama.

The movie opened to $13.7 million domestically. It did not win its first weekend: Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc finished ahead of it.

But a week later, something unusual happened.

Halloween fell on a Friday in 2025, studios largely avoided launching major new releases, and the overall theatrical marketplace became unusually quiet.

That left two Mason Thames movies fighting each other for first place.

On Sunday, Nov. 2, early studio estimates placed Regretting You at approximately $8.1 million and Black Phone 2 at $8 million.

If those estimates held, Regretting You would become Thames’ third No. 1 movie of 2025.

The Jim Carrey comparisons quickly followed. Thames himself was asked about being placed in such company and said it was “really, really crazy to even be in that conversation.”

Then Monday arrived.

The Final Numbers Changed the Record

Weekend box-office reports published on Sunday are estimates. Once actual ticket sales are reported, positions can change — especially when two films are separated by such a tiny amount.

That is exactly what happened.

The final figures showed Black Phone 2 earning $8,323,210 for the weekend.

Regretting You finished with $7,818,889.

The difference was $504,321.

Instead of Regretting You taking first place, Black Phone 2 reclaimed the top position in its third weekend. The final North American weekend chart therefore gave Thames the No. 1 and No. 2 movies simultaneously — but not a third separate No. 1 film for the year.

That distinction matters.

The widely repeated claim that Thames definitively matched Carrey’s three-No. 1-movies achievement was based on Sunday estimates, not the final weekend results.

But removing the record does not make Thames’ year ordinary.

Why the Jim Carrey Comparison Still Makes Sense

Carrey’s 1994 run was remarkable because audiences were repeatedly turning out to see distinctly Jim Carrey-driven movies.

Ace Ventura arrived early in the year. The Mask followed in the summer. Then Dumb and Dumber closed out 1994, helping establish Carrey as one of Hollywood’s defining comedy stars.

Thames’ route was very different.

How to Train Your Dragon belonged to an established family franchise.

Black Phone 2 continued a successful horror property.

Regretting You came with the built-in recognition of Hoover’s bestselling fiction.

So the films cannot simply be treated as evidence that Thames personally sold every ticket.

What stands out instead is how differently those movies asked audiences to see him.

Within months, he was a fantasy hero, a traumatized horror survivor and a romantic leading man.

Collectively, the three films ultimately earned roughly $859 million worldwide according to Box Office Mojo’s reported totals.

And during one extraordinary Halloween weekend, two of them sat at the very top of the domestic chart at the same time.

Thames did not quite inherit Jim Carrey’s 1994 record. Final ticket sales made sure of that.

But coming within $504,321 of creating one of Hollywood’s strangest statistical echoes — while moving between three completely different genres at only 18 — made 2025 the year Mason Thames stopped looking like simply the kid from The Black Phone.

He had become someone Hollywood could build very different movies around.

And that may prove more important than the record he almost had.