Even before Avatar: The Way of Water was released last year, director James Cameron had been touting how far ahead they were on the rest of the franchise. More than once it was confirmed the second movie was shot alongside the third movie, with reports also arising that footage from Avatar 4 was also shot at the time. In a new interview however franchise star Zoe Saldana seemed to indicate there was still work to be done. Speaking with Entertainment Tonight at The Oscars (H/T Screen Rant), Saldana revealed that this summer will see the cast reconvene to film more footage for the sequel.
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When asked by the outlet if the third movie was finished filming, Saldana replied: “Yeah, I mean, we’re gonna go back this summer and finish it up. We’re 70% done there. But, we have time.” ET added that Academy Award winner Michelle Yeoh is set to make her debut in the series with the third film, prompting Saldana to add: “How stoked are we? We’re pinching ourselves, but nobody more than James Cameron. Jimbo is pinching himself going ‘I told you, man, I bet on the right people.’ And we bet on him over and over again. I’m proud of him. I’m proud of him and his entire team. I feel so lucky to be a part of something that gets to really change lives and change cinemas history. I just love it.”
An official title for Avatar 3 has not been confirmed just yet, but we do have an idea of what we’ll likely be able to find when the sequel does land. Screenwriters Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver previously teased to Variety some elements of the plot of the third movie — particularly, the dynamic between Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), Neytiri (Zoe Saldana) Tonowari (Cliff Curtis), and Ronal (Kate Winslet).
“There’s a lot going on between husbands and wives and between the two husbands and the two wives,” Jaffa explained. “There are a lot of dynamics set up that continue to play out.”
“You have this kind of deeply relatable series of dynamics, inter-family, interpersonal, inter-clan, played out on these incredibly inflated scales of different worlds,” Silver echoed. “The clans that you’re going to meet and the worlds that you’re going to find on Pandora — you can’t even imagine what they are. Just like the tulkun were a revelation for this movie, there’s lots more of that stuff to come. It’s incredibly exciting, the story that happens to the Sullys. You couldn’t predict it.”
Avatar 3 is scheduled to be released on December 20, 2024.
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