The second avatar movie, Avatar: the way of the water, yet to come out, though avatar 3, 4, and 5 have already been written and partially filmed. Director, writer and producer of the series, James Cameron, is not shy about brightening up future sequels. He recently spoke to Colliderhighlighting a creative director’s surprise when he turned in the script for Avatar 4:
“I can’t tell you the details, but all I can say is that when I turned in the script for 2, the studio gave me three pages of notes. And when I turned in the script for 3, they gave me a page of notes, so I got better. When I submitted the script for 4, the studio executive, creative executive on the movies, wrote me an email saying “Holy f**k.” And I said, ‘Well, where are the notes?’ And she said, “Those are the notes.” Because it gets crazy in a good way, right?
While fans will have to wait a little longer until avatar4, to be released in 2026, The way of the water is imminent and will be released on December 16 of this year. avatar3 is expected in 2024. It may seem unusual that it took 13 years for the first sequel, when each subsequent sequel will only take two years, but there’s a reason for that.
avatars The filming process is based on Under the spell of the Ring Movies
The reason it took so long Avatar: the way of the water was that James Cameron decided to write four sequels in their entirety before filming the first sequel. He compares this process to the filming of Peter Jackson Under the spell of the Ring trilogy:
“My model was what Peter Jackson did with Under the spell of the Ring, which was a crazy bet in its day. And really hats off to them for taking that opportunity to launch all three of those movies. But he had mapped out the books so he could always show the actors what they needed to know about their character. So I felt I had to do the same. I had to play this as if the books already existed. So the only way we could do that was to write all the scripts and have the actors read all the scripts and see where their characters went and what it all meant. Not that that’s playable right now, but I think it’s something the actors could use as they prepare for their characters.
Essentially, Cameron had to write the “books” for further avatar sequels before a single frame was shot. Next, the actors had to read their scripts and gain insight into their full character arcs. Finally filming could start, but Cameron wanted to film the whole thing The Way of the Water, Avatar 3, and even part of it avatar4 first before the first sequel is released in theaters.
He points out that this process is similar to filming Peter Jackson Under the spell of the Ring trilogy. Production on the trilogy began in 1997 and all three films were shot simultaneously in just over a year, well before The Company of the Ring ended up in theaters. But, of course, Peter Jackson’s trilogy had the books to feast on, while James Cameron had to write his own, taking up a significant portion of the 13-year wait. The way of the water. Cameron explains that this was necessary to keep all the actors ‘motivated’ during filming:
“So they knew, ‘Okay, we’re going to come in and film this in bite-sized chunks, not necessarily in order. We’re going to film parts of 2parts of 3parts of 4 on a certain day.’ That’s a challenge… but I felt this was the right way to approach it with the actors. And also to show them where it is all going, so that they are well motivated and enthusiastic. Because the story is a cork. By the time we’re down 4 and 5if we are so lucky, wood is right, to get this far, which is obviously driven by market forces, we have to be successful.
Avatar: the way of the water will need to be a huge blockbuster to break even, but early screenings of the film have already received rave reviews.
Avatar: the way of the water will be released exclusively in theaters later this month, on December 16. Director and producer James Cameron co-wrote the screenplay with Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver. 20th Century Studios is handling the distribution of the film. The cast includes Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Kate Winslet and Stephen Lang.