Eager to prove to himself and the world that "it wasn’t just some big fluke the first time," James Cameron has been taking his sweet time with the trio of "Avatar" sequels he’s got cooking up. In fact, "Avatar 2" was originally scheduled to come out this month (imagine if it had faced off against "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" at the box office?), but the release date was pushed back to give Cameron more time to prepare and develop the trilogy of movies he plans to shoot simultaneously. And that’s not all. The world of Pandora has also expanded to theater, with Cirque du Soleil launching "Toruk: The First Flight" this week in Montreal. And Cameron used the occasion to provide the latest update on when we might see entries two, three, and four, in his cinematic saga.
“Christmas of ’17 is the target,” Cameron told the Montreal Gazette. “At least, that’s what we’ve announced. But I don’t consider that to be as important as the fact that when we get all three films done, we drop them a year apart. I call it a meta-narrative that runs across the three movies. Each film stands alone, but it also tells one much larger story.
“We have design more or less finished, which is an enormous task," he added. "It’s been about a two-year task. [We’ve finished] all the creatures and the landscapes, and the new worlds within the world of Pandora that you see. The writing is ongoing, but almost finished. Technical development is done. Stages are done. Infrastructure. So we’re really poised to start after the first of the year.”
So, it looks like Cameron is ready to rock, but with Marvel, DC, "Star Wars," and more now clouding the landscape, is there room for more "Avatar"? Is this the followup that audiences didn’t know they were waiting for? Let us know below.