Avatar 2 Gains War Of The Worlds Screenwriter Josh Friedman

It’s about time some news came out about Avatar 2, the sequel to James Cameron’s epic sci-fi fantasy film, which four long years ago broke box office records to become the highest-grossing film of all time.

Now, The Wrap is reporting that Cameron has brought Josh Friedman on board to work on the screenplay for the highly anticipated sequel.

Friedman previously interacted with Cameron when he served as the producer and screenwriter for FOX’s Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, a TV continuation of the characters from Cameron’s Terminator 2: Judgment Day. The show, which starred Lena Headey, Thomas Dekker, Summer Glau, and Brian Austin Green, ran for two seasons before FOX decided to terminate it (sorry, couldn’t resist). 

Friedman has also worked as a writer on Steven Spielberg’s War of the Worlds adaptation, Brian de Palma’s The Black Dahlia, and two short-lived FOX shows, Locke & Key and The Finder.

Leads Sam Worthington and Zoe Saldana are expected to return for Avatar 2, with Sigourney Weaver also confirmed to reprise her role as Dr. Grace Augustine in the sequel, despite the fact that her character perished in the original film. The sequel is currently scheduled for release in 2015, with production beginning later this year.

Friedman seems like a solid choice to contribute to the Avatar 2 screenplay considering his past experience working with Cameron on The Sarah Connor Chronicles, but details are still frustratingly scarce about the film, and will likely remain scarce until next year. We know that Cameron is planning to write Avatar 2 and Avatar 3 together, and that the director plans to explore more aspects of Pandora in the sequels, including the planet’s exotic oceans.

I was a fan of Avatar‘s gorgeous visual effects back in 2009, but I was certainly less enthusiastic about the movie’s plot, which struck me as a rip-off of Dances with Wolves and Pocahontas. Friedman certainly has experience with big-budget sci-fi, so maybe he’s the right choice to improve the sequel’s screenplay, but only time will tell.

Are you excited to revisit Pandora, or has Cameron waited so long to film the sequel that your interest in the franchise has wavered or completely evaporated? What plot points or new areas of Pandora would you like to see explored in Avatar 2? Let us know in the comments.