Rocio Mateos
It’s been six years since the biggest box office hit of all time premiered, and we’re still for a sequel. Well, that’s what we thought, at least until the ‘Avatar’ crew announced that there are 4. –yes, four– sequels in the making, with the first coming in 2020.
We’ve been expecting the sequel to the 2009 film ‘Avatar’ for years now, but the day never seemed to arrive. However, the movie’s Facebook page posted on Saturday a photo of director James Cameron and his huge film crew, announcing that they’re working simultaneously on the four sequels of the movie.
According to the post, ‘Avatar 2’ will hit theaters on December 18, 2020, while ‘Avatar 3’ will arrive about a year later, on December 17, 2021. Then we’ll have to wait another three years, for ‘Avatar 4’ on December 20, 2024, and ‘Avatar 5’ the next year, on December 19, 2025.
‘Avatar 2’ was initially set for 2014
It’s the seventh –and hopefully the last– postponement of the much-anticipated sequel. The first time Cameron talked about it, in 2010, he said we could expect it in December 2014. But then, he appeared in 2012 to say we’d better not rush, what about 2015?
On 2013 he spoke, once again, delaying the film one more year, and mentioning a third and fourth sequel. A few years later, on 2015, it was announced that the script was finally completed, and we should expect the film to arrive on 2017. Cameron blamed the wait on a “very involved” writing process.
He then appeared in 2016 to announce that the film is set to be released in summer 2018. But in January this year, the ‘Avatar 2’ was delayed again. Speculation surfaced, saying it would clash with the premier of ‘Star Wars – Episode VIII.’
Rumors about another sparkled after 20th Century Fox reserved December 21, 2018, for an ‘untitled Lightstorm project’ – Lightstorm is Cameron’s production company. Cameron shut down the rumors, without clarifying a release date. “What people have to understand is that this is a cadence of releases,” Cameron told The Toronto Star. “So, we’re not making ‘Avatar 2′, we’re making ‘Avatar’ 2, 3 4 and 5.”
Finally, on Saturday, specific dates for all films were announced, ‘Avatar 2’ arriving in 2020, and the last one in 2025, 16 years laters after the first title of the franchise.
Humans, Na’vi and some underwater exploring
In the middle of this coming and going off the release dates, Cameron has also been throwing us some clues and little advances of what we should expect, at least for the first sequel.
The film has been under development since 2010. Cameron announced in 2013 that he had begun co-writing the film with Josh Friedman (‘War Of Worlds’). They finally finished the script in 2015. In a statement to The Hollywood Reporter, Cameron said that the sequels would maintain and improve Avatar’s visual and emotional power. That, without leaving behind the balance between action and the “family story”. They will also explore the Na’vi culture in deeper levels.
Film producer Jon Landau confirmed that humans would be returning. “There are going to be good humans, there are going to be bad humans. There are going to be good Na’vi, there are going to be bad Na’vi,” he stated.
The team has also been developing underwater motion capture technology. Plans on ‘Avatar 2’ include exploring the oceans on Pandora. Weta Workshops, responsible for letting the magic happen in films like ‘Lord of The Rings,’ ‘King Kong’ and the first ‘Avatar’ movie, are the ones behind this technology. “It’s going to be like the ‘Floating Mountains’ in the first movie. It’s not going to be all underwater, it’s going to be a place we go to, leave and come back to,” Landau said.
Jake Sully and Neytiri will introduce you to their new family
The crew has been very careful about what they share about the movie, so there’s not much we know. Sam Worthington, who plays Jake Sully, only said that ‘Avatar 2’ will pick up eight years after the events of the first title. Also, he and Neytiri, played by Zoe Saldana, will have a family together.
At IMDb, it says that Sigourney Weaver and Stephen Lang’s characters will be back, which is weird since they are… err… dead?
Well, we guess we’ll just have to wait three more years, and see if the sequel manages to overcome the $2.7 billion the sci-fi, three Academy Award-winner movie has netted since its release.
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