While it took 13 years for the first Avatar sequel to materialize after the original 2009 film, Pandora devotees won’t need to wait nearly as long for another installment in this saga. Avatar: Fire and Ash will seep into theaters on December 19, 2025. This new entry in James Cameron’s massive franchise will introduce audiences to new corners of Pandora, including fire-based Na’vi known as the Ash People. Anticipation is already running high for the feature, which will see David Thewlis and Oona Chaplin join the Avatar series.
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There are many elements that are clear about Fire and Ash, including how it will allegedly have a heftier runtime than Avatar: The Way of Water. However, a key element about Fire and Ash is still shrouded in mystery. When will the first trailer be released to the public?
Select attendees of events like CinemaCon 2025 have seen footage, but when will the general public get to finally see a Fire and Ash trailer?
When Did The First Trailers For Past Avatar Movies Drop?
Perhaps some clarity on this subject can be found in when the trailers for the first two Avatar movies dropped. Back in 2009, audiences didn’t get a very first glimpse at Avatar until late August 2009, when a trailer premiered with Inglourious Basterds. Premiering a trailer for a big original blockbuster just four months before its release was a gamble. For comparison’s sake, fellow 2009 tentpole 2012 dropped a teaser trailer an entire year before its November 2009 bow. Obviously, though, Avatar’s marketing approach worked.
Avatar: The Way of Water kicked off its marketing campaign much farther away from its theatrical debut. The first teaser premiered exclusively in theaters with the May 2022 blockbuster Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Eschewing the traditional online premiere platform for a new movie trailer ensured that audiences knew The Way of Water was something made for the big screen, not a streamer. Plus, putting the teaser on a massively anticipated movie like Multiverse of Madness ensured plenty of eyeballs would be glued to this tease of the next Avatar movie.
Given the precedent of Multiverse of Madness, it would make sense to believe that Disney/20th Century Studios would premiere the Fire and Ash teaser on theatrical showings of this year’s early May Marvel movie, Thunderbolts*. However, right now, that doesn’t look to be the plan. Instead, Disney appears to be attaching trailers for The Fantastic Four: First Steps and Predator: Badlands to Thunderbolts*. Disney didn’t have a deluge of other live-action movies in the year’s second half to promote back in 2022, which made it easier to launch a December blockbuster’s marketing campaign early. With a crowded slate of new Disney releases between now and December, Fire and Ash’s teaser will have to wait.
[RELATED: James Cameron’s Avatar 3 Tease Has Us Excited for Fire and Ash’s Story]
So When Will The Fire And Ash Teaser Debut?
It’s doubtful Fire and Ash‘s teaser will just drop on any movie. Given that this is one of 2025’s most anticipated films, one can expect its trailer to debut on one of summer 2025’s biggest titles rather than just floating by on screenings of The Last Rodeo. Right now, July 2025 has the two most optimal candidates for a teaser launch. Disney could reserve the trailer for The Fantastic Four: First Steps or the Mouse House could debut the teaser two weeks earlier on Superman.
Both movies are guaranteed to draw in plenty of moviegoers to large-format and IMAX screenings, which make them ideal as the next motion pictures that could house a Fire and Ash teaser. Wherever this teaser drops, expect it to remain a theatrical-exclusive event for a few days, much like The Way of Water’s teaser. If any teaser trailer should be experienced first and foremost on the biggest screen possible, it’s the first footage from a new James Cameron movie.
This venue inevitably will let moviegoers appreciate every detail of Cameron’s Fire and Ash vision while instilling in viewers the sense that this impending tentpole is a must-see big-screen event. Pandora fans are undoubtedly getting impatient for a Fire and Ash teaser by now, especially since the teaser will drop closer to Ash’s release date compared to when Water’s teaser premiered. However, given Cameron’s track record, it’s highly likely that whatever this teaser trailer contains will blow away all expectations and dispel impatience.
Avatar: Fire and Ash opens in theaters on December 19, 2025.
