James Cameron might not take you swimming with Avatar 2 until 2015

By Scott Younker April 6, 2012

Last year, James Cameron said that Avatar 2 and Avatar 3 would be shot back-to-back and released in December 2014 and 2015 respectively, setting the hearts of geeks everywhere aflutter and probably causing the executives at 20th Century Fox to begin drooling with dreams of massive box office numbers. However, according to Cameron’s producing partner, Jon Landau, fans may have to wait until 2015 for Avatar 2 to come out, which means that number three would be delayed until 2016 at the earliest.

In an interview with Empire Landau said, “We’re not naming dates, but I think 2014 will be a tough date for us to make. It’s about getting it right. Movies make release dates; release dates don’t make movies.”

Special effects work is already under way on the sequel, which will take place in the oceans of Pandora. Weta Digital has already begun working on an underwater motion capture system, but only a portion of the film will be submerged, according to Landau. “It’s going to be like the Floating Mountains in the first movie,” he said. “It’s not going to be all underwater; it’s going to be a place we go to, leave and come back to.”

Landau also confirmed that despite the back-to-back filming schedule, Avatar 2 and 3 will be separate films, each with their own narrative arcs and climaxes. “Each one has to work alone,” said the producer. “That’s where movies fall into trouble – when they try to say, ‘You know what? It’s really one movie and there’s an intermission’ – so we want each one to be a standalone movie. The next one will kick off where the last one ended, but just like Avatar resolved itself and doesn’t feel like a set up to another movie, you don’t want Avatar 2 to feel like a set up for 3.”

Editors' Recommendations

Topics

Sci-Fi

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Entertainment

James Cameron’s sci-fi epic Avatar returns to theaters, but has its magic faded?

Sam Worthington and Zoe Saldana fall in love on Pandora.

There were plenty of reasons to wonder, in the autumn of 2009, if James Cameron had finally flown too close to the sun, burning a big budget on a boondoggle. Nearly a dozen years after emerging from a troubled production with the biggest movie of all time, the disaster-weepie phenomenon Titanic, the blockbuster maestro had once more secured enormous investment in pursuit of a bank-busting special-effects spectacle to rule them all. Except this time, the movie in question looked, from a distance, like the height of overreaching silliness: A sci-fi fantasy about a species of lithe, ocean-blue, vaguely feline aliens, prancing through a tropical paradise. The first trailer prompted chortles. Cameron, however, would have the last laugh.

Avatar, like Titanic before it, did more than silence the skeptics. It vindicated all the grand, hubristic ambition of its creator, at least from a commercial standpoint. Somehow, Cameron had done it again, and unbelievably surpassed the box-office success of his last conquest of the record books. Avatar, a hodgepodge of science fiction tropes in a cutting-edge package, was the big-screen event that everyone had to attend. Globally speaking, it quickly became the biggest movie of all time — a title it lost a decade later to Avengers: Endgame, then won again thanks to a rerelease in Chinaduring the pandemic. Even adjusted for inflation, the movie sits toward the top of the all-time charts.

Entertainment

James Cameron on pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in Avatar and Super/Natural

James Cameron is on a mission to push beyond what's possible. The Academy Award-winning filmmaker quickly became a visionary for his early work in The Terminator franchise and Aliens. Titanic went from a film plagued with production problems to 11 Oscar wins and the first film to reach the $1 billion mark. Cameron's Avatar dazzled the world with its use of 3D technology on its way to becoming the highest-grossing film of all time, a title it still holds today.

Despite becoming one of the most important filmmakers of the last 40 years, Cameron is an explorer at heart, and his fascination with the Earth is on display in the new National Geographic series, Super/Natural. Executive produced by Cameron, Super/Natural takes viewers into the minds of the world's extraordinary creatures. Thanks to scientific and technological advancements, the series displays some of the most fascinating imagery ever recorded.

Entertainment

September 2022 movie preview: Harry Styles debuts as a leading man while Avatar returns

September is the first month of the fall movie season, and it also marks the release of the feature film debut of one of the most popular music acts today, Harry Styles. The former One Direction singer, who just released one of the year's bestselling albums, Harry's House, teams with actress-turned-director Olivia Wilde for the surreal thriller Don't Worry Darling. If this film is good, it will cement Wilde as a director to look out for and Styles as a bankable leading man.

Other exciting films are coming out in September as well. From a major re-release of a James Cameron modern classic (Avatar) to the first commercial LGBTQ+ rom-com from a major motion picture studio (Bros), this month has many movies for many different audiences. If you want to see a new film in theaters in the next four weeks, then here are some movies to keep an eye on.