“Avatar: The Way of Water” was already a hefty 192 minutes, but James Cameron is now telling Empire Magazine to expect around the same runtime for the threequel (‘Fire and Ash’).
Cameron says Parts 2 & 3 are of “equal length,” and that contrary to some speculation, no release delay will happen since they are actually ahead of post production schedule.
The first “Avatar” clocked in at 162 minutes. The ambition of these last two sequels has clearly kicked up a notch. Hopefully, it doesn’t actually feel like 190 minutes. I’m reminded of an old Roger Ebert quote; “No good movie is too long and no bad movie is short enough”.
“Avatar: The Way of Water,” released in late 2022, cost $400M to produce, and turned out to be the year’s most profitable movie, grossing $2.3 billion worldwide. In addition, it placed James Cameron as the only filmmaker in history to have three movies among the top 20 highest-grossing of all time.
‘The Way of Water’ was seen as a major risk by many in the industry, but Cameron proved skeptics wrong, yet again. The result is that three more ‘Avatar’ movies are coming, released in the next six years. ‘Avatar 3’ in December 2025, ‘Avatar 4’ will hit theaters in December 2029, followed by ‘Avatar 5’ in December 2031.
More recently, Cameron confirmed plans for ‘Avatar 6’ and ‘Avatar 7.’ The filmmaker will be 76 by the time the fifth one is released. The good news is that it sounds like he won’t be directing 6 and 7, he’ll be “passing the baton” to another filmmaker, or so he says. He’ll probably still have a major say in their creative direction.
“Avatar: Fire and Ash” is set for theatrical release on December 19, 2025.