Avatar 2 Delayed Again: Christmas 2018 Release "Not Happening"

"It's an epic undertaking," James Cameron says of filming four sequels back-to-back

By Zach Johnson Mar 10, 2017 4:25 PMTags
Zoe Saldana, Sam Worthington, Avatar20th Century Fox

James Cameron has already ruined Christmas 2018 for Avatar fans.

The second sequel in the planned five-part film series has been delayed for a third time, after it was initially scheduled to hit theaters in December 2014. "Well, 2018 is not happening. We haven't announced a firm release date," Cameron tells The Toronto Star. "What people have to understand is that this is a cadence of releases. So, we're not making Avatar 2—we're making Avatar 2, 3, 4 and 5. It's an epic undertaking. It's not unlike building the Three Gorges dam."

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"So, I know where I'm going to be for the next eight years of my life. It's not an unreasonable time frame if you think about it," the 62-year-old director explained. "It took us four-and-a-half years to make one movie and now we're making four. We're full tilt boogie right now. This is my day job and pretty soon we'll be 24-7. We're pretty well designed on all our creatures and sets."

Avatar 3 was previously set for a 2020 release, followed by Avatar 4 in 2022 and Avatar 5 in 2023. However, the production shift for Avatar 2 could affect the release dates of the others.

"It's pretty exciting stuff. I wish I could share with the world," he said. "But we have to preserve a certain amount of showmanship and we're going to draw that curtain when the time is right."

Zoe Saldana and Sam Worthington signed to reprise their roles as Neytiri and Jake Sully, respectively. Sigourney Weaver will star in a different role, and Stephen Lang will also return.

Cameron isn't leaving Avatar fans totally in the lurch. This spring, Pandora – The World of Avatar will open at Walt Disney World's Animal Kingdom, where "you can fly on the back of a banshee, walk under floating mountains and journey down a mystical river where the forest comes alive in a brilliant bioluminescent glow." Paul Faris gave fans a sneak peek on Good Morning America Thursday, as she toured some of the attractions with Joe Rohde, Sr. VP Creative at Walt Disney Imagineering and Jon Landau, who is a producer on the Avatar films.