James Cameron’s AVATAR is slowing down incrementally, but primarily due to a lack of stiff competition, the 3D techno-pic stretched its box office domination to six weeks this weekend. With Sunday estimates included, Avatar added another $36 million this weekend to its domestic take. That brings its to-date domestic total to $552.7 million, as well as $1.19 billion in foreign markets, for a worldwide box office total of $1.74 billion to date.

The strongest new entrant out of the gate was the angel-centric action flick, Legion, but even that film managed only half of Avatar’s running total; $18.2 million, still good enough for second place and certainly no travel emergency.

The Book of Eli was close behind with $17 million for third place, while The Rock powered the family flick, The Tooth Fairy, to a $14.5 million debut. The week’s most disappointing bow went to Extraordinary Measures, which struggled to find $7 million and reach seventh place – evidence of the waning box office punch of co-stars Harrison Ford and Brenden Fraser. Just don’t blame Keri Russell!

Anyway, next weekend brings the debut of the murky Mel Gibson flick, Edge of Darkness, as well as the perky rom-com, When In Rome. Can either of them come close to knocking Avatar off its first place perch?

I doubt it, but I’m willing to bet When In Rome comes closer to that feat than Edge of Darkness.

Although slowly losing some steam, Avatar made it five straight weekends at the top of the box office charts following this weekend in which the 3D techno-flick drew $41.3 million domestically, bringing its total to $491 million in the US alone. You can buy a lot of Branson vacation packages with that kind of jing. Add in $1.1 billion additional worldwide and you have a flick that has globally produced $1.6 billion in worldwide box office to date.

The Book of Eli debuted well with $31.6 million, good enough for the second spot on the charts, but still $10 million behind Avatar’s pace. Then in third is a personal favorite; the Peter Jackson-directed thriller, The Lovely Bones, which drew $17 million in its first week of nationwide release. However, with a $100 million production budget, The Lovely Bones will have to have the staying power of Avatar at that rate to even hope to make its money back. Still, it’s the best pure storytelling movie I’ve seen in a while, so The Lovely Bones gets the HollywoodIdiocy.com stamp of approval, even in third place.

Alvin and the Chipmunks II stayed strong with $11.5 million to take fourth place, lurching ahead of Robert Downey Jr’s Sherlock Holmes flick, which rounded out the Top 5 with just under $10 million and just ahead of The Spy Next Door, which drew $9.7 million.

Everything else is fading fast.

This coming weekend’s new flicks don’t impress me. Extraordinary Measures seems pedantic and overly earnest. Legion just seems stupid. The Tooth Fairy, starring The Rock, should make a decent flick for kids who are tired of seeing Avatar in 3D, but none seem likely to knock off Avatar, and hopefully The Lovely Bones benefits from solid word-of-mouth so it doesn’t get lost in the mix.

Glee has moved to the head of the class, so to speak; after taking a load of herbal diet supplements, the cast was overjoyed to hear they’ve already been approved by Fox for a second season. Word is, terrific merchandising sales on the two soundtrack albums and the first half-season collection of episodes on DVD haven’t hurt the freshman show at all, and played a role in the early renewal.

How well the show will wear over time will be the next big test; NBC’s Chuck was a hot show in its first season and only barely survived to a third season, though it is definitely a welcomed respite from an otherwise dreary NBC lineup this season, now that Chuck is back!

Hopefully, Glee will wear well, and will be wise enough to graduate its cast off the show, and cast wisely their replacements, each and every season. No one wants to see these 22-year-olds playing 15 when they’re 26-year-olds playing 19 and somehow still in high school, like the Sweathogs.

Fox’s Kevin Reilly isn’t saying much, but has admitted that should Conan O’Brien become “available,” his network might just jump back into the late night game. Fox has been without a serious competitive late night show since axing, what was it… Chevy Chase?

While the whole NBC blow-up is enough to make anyone need the best cholesterol medication available, in the end I think O’Brien is the funniest of the three. Best of luck, Conan!

Michael C. Hall, start of Showtime’s hit drama Dexter, in which he plays a serial killer who works as a Miami blood spatter analyst, has been diagnosed with cancer, according to multiple sources; fortunately for the 38-year-old, it is Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a highly treatable form of cancer from which many patients fully recover and remain cancer-free, and he will not require exotic treatments like glucomannan.

“I feel fortunate to have been diagnosed with an imminently treatable and curable condition, and I thank my doctors and nurses for their expertise and care,” Hall said in a press release.

Hall will attend both the Golden Globes and the SAG Awards, and so long as there are no setbacks in his treatment schedule, is on track to return to his role as Dexter Morgan later this year, when the show is scheduled to begin shooting its fifth season.

Conan O’Brien offered NBC an ultimatum this week: move the Tonight Show later than it has aired for 60 years, and I’m walking away. While he hopes NBC will choose to keep The Tonight Show in its traditional spot with him as host, O’Brien’s ultimatum is viewed by some network execs as his resignation papers. This means NBC will effectively have given Conan only seven months on the Tonight Show after a 16-year partnership.

If NBC boots Conan, Jay Leno would be free to return to the Tonight Show, but as damaged goods; he’s already the butt of national jokes that paint him as the reason NBC is now viewed as a “minor-league” network on par with The CW and MyNetworkTV. NBC trashed five hours of scripted programming last spring to launch The Jay Leno Show, simply to hang on to a relationship with the aging comic; now, they could be trashing the future of The Tonight Show by losing out on its natural successor in O’Brien.

Sure, O’Brien is joking about selling the best weightloss products in a matter of weeks, but the truth is that he will immediately become the focus of a bidding war for his services, with Fox being the most natural suitor.

NBC muffed the Carson-to-Letterman transition, opting for Leno about 16 years ago; now they’ve muffed the Leno-to-O’Brien transition. Nitwits.

Word has hit the street that Sony has put the kibosh on Spider-Man 4, releasing director Sam Raimi, star Tobey Maguire and the rest of the existing Spidey cast from all future contractual obligations to the Spidey franchise. So instead of one more go-round with Maguire, Dunst and company under Raimi’s direction, Sony will back-peddle and allow a new director and cast to start over.

Considering the vast success of the first three Spider-Man films, it’s unlikely the new franchise will attempt to retell Spider-Man’s origin story, which took up much of the first film, but an early version of the prospective script, penned at this point by Jamie Vanderbilt, will toss Peter back to his high school years and cover territory missed between Spider-Man and Spider-Man 2. However, any rumors that Parker’s biggest enemy in the new flick will be severe acne are patently untrue.

Sony is currently touting director Marc Webb, whose biggest achievement to date is (500) Days of Summer, a rom-com that was barely a box office blip a few months ago. However, the studio liked his ability to capture the angst of youth, which is a major player in the teenage Peter Parker’s life.

No word on whether some supporting actors, like J.K. Simmons, who played J. Jonah Jameson to a “T,” will reprise his role in the reboot, but he’s one bit player who I’d love to see return and would be hard to replace.

Of course, there are any number of young actors in Hollywood who could take on the roll, and they need to look about 15 years old at the time the Spidey reboot launches in 2012 – one year later than Spider-Man 4 was set to debut. That means kids who are no older than 16 or 17 right now, at most. One prominent name that springs to mind for the role of Peter Parker is current Glee cast member Kevin McHale, who plays wheelchair-bound Artie on Glee. However, McHale is already 22 right now and will only look older in two years. Plus he’s contractually bound to Glee.

I’m sure Webb or whoever eventually wins the reigns of the franchise will find apt replacements; the other big change to the franchise is that Sony wants the Spider-Man reboot to be done completely in Avatar-esque 3D… meaning your friendly neighborhood wallcrawler will be swinging right at you in a couple years’ time.

While business has slid off a bit – about 29 percent – James Cameron’s blockbuster technopic, Avatar, is still far and away the top movie in the nation and the world. With Sunday estimates figured in, the film is looking at a $48.5 million weekend, bringing its domestic gross to $429 million and although worldwide box office won’t be calculated until later today, Avatar is already the number two movie of all time in worldwide box office.

Just maybe Cameron and company have finally made enough money on this one to book a pleasant suite of rooms at some Orlando hotels.

Meanwhile, Sherlock Holmes looks to stay steady at number two, drawing a $16.7 million weekend, and the Chipmunks movie sequel drew $16.3 million, just behind Holmes, to stay latched onto the third spot without quite overtaking Holmes.

Coming in at the four spot is the vampire flick, Daybreakers, which appears headed toward an “only OK” $14.5 million debut. It’s Complicated rounded out the fifth spot with what’s shaping up to be an $11 million weekend, beating out the new rom-com, Leap Year, which looks to draw in only $9.5 million. But the biggest disappointment had to be Youth In Revolt, the latest Michael Cera teen flick, which may be lucky to draw $6.5 million, well below expectation.

Some people say James Cameron could have filmed his birthday party with a Canon camera and done well, but his 3D tecnopic, Avatar, has stayed steady since its release and just crossed $1 billion in worldwide box office this weekend.

Domestically, the film had another modest dropoff, garnering a $68.3 million weekend domestically, to bring its US cumulative to $352.1 million, but by passing $1 billion in only 17 days of release, the film, which cost half that to make and promote, is now ensured to see black ink.

Sherlock Holmes, the Robert Downey Jr. vehicle, did well enough to remain in second place, but fell sharply from its debut to a $38.3 million weekend and $140.6 million in 10 days domestically. The Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakuel was close behind with $36.6 million weekend and $157.3 million to day in 10 days domestically.

It’s Complicated, The Blind Side, Up In the Air and The Princess and the Frog all did well over New Year’s weekend, gaining over $10 million or more, but none came close to the top three.

New competition arrives next weekend with the vampire movie Daybreakers, the rom-com Leap Year, and the Michael Cera teen comedy Youth In Revolt, with perhaps only Leap Year best positioned to break into the Top Three; however, right now, Avatar appears positioned to enjoy a very long run at the top of the charts.