It’s almost become a running joke in the film industry that James Cameron’s wildly ambitious Avatar sequels are coming together at a glacial pace. Almost a decade has passed since the director’s space oddity was crowned king of the international box office – to this day, Avatar remains the highest-grossing film in history with $2.79 billion, albeit when those figures aren’t adjusted for inflation – and though many have called the franchise’s staying power into question, 20th Century Fox recently staked out a handful of release dates between 2020 and 2025 for all four sequels. Count ’em, four.
The first, Avatar 2, is due to light up theaters in December of 2020, and we now have word of a new addition to the stellar cast: Cliff Curtis. Best known for his performances across The Last Airbender and AMC spinoff Fear the Walking Dead, Deadline is reporting that Curtis has landed the part of Tonowari, leader of the Metkayina – a clan of reef people, essentially. It looks set to be a fairly meaty role for the actor, too, given Tonowari is set to appear across all four Avatar sequels, though it’s unclear how Curtis’ sea dweller factors into this grand, galactic story.
In saying that, James Cameron has stated in the past that his long-in-development continuations will take a deep dive into the thriving oceans of Pandora, which ought to result in some truly dazzling visuals in 2020 and beyond. Heck, the director has long held a fascination with ocean life, and even ventured into the depths of the Mariana Trench – located in the Pacific Ocean, the cavernous trench is the deepest place on our planet – aboard a deep-diving submersible known as Deepsea Challenger. That means Cameron has first-hand experience when it comes to exploring the murky depths of Earth’s oceans, so it’s only fitting that the filmmaker will be taking moviegoers only a similar, yet much more fantastical journey over the next six-to-seven years.
Avatar 2 will get the ball rolling for James Cameron and Co. on December 18th, 2020. It’ll be followed in quick succession by Avatar 3 (December 17th, 2021), Avatar 4 (December 20th, 2024) and, finally (?), Avatar 5 on December 19th, 2025.
