James Cameron’s Avatar is, without a doubt, one of the most defining films of the 21st century. It’s a movie that signaled a seismic shift in the landscape of blockbuster filmmaking. It almost single-handedly kicked off the 3D craze that dominated much of the 2010s, and it created a brand new (if not somewhat derivative) fantasy world for entertainment fans to embrace and fall in love with. Upon its release, Avatar was a one-two punch of a story that really resonated with people and truly outstanding visual effects that people had to see to believe. It’s no wonder it became the highest-grossing film of all time.
Yet, as the years went on after the release of Avatar, the hope of seeing a sequel to the film started to dwindle. Despite assurances from the studio and James Cameron that more Avatar was coming, year after year went by without any tangible developments. Well, after 13 years, the wait is nearly over. With the release of Avatar: The Way of Water set for this December, fans will finally be able to return to the world of Pandora and revisit the characters of Jake Sully, Neytiri and the rest of the Na’vi. It’s been a long wait, but there’s a real energy of anticipation in the air regarding The Way of Water.
Avatar is returning to a very different film landscape than that of the first film’s release. While franchise filmmaking has long been a dominating force in Hollywood, that is true now more than ever. With major franchises such as the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Star Wars, Game of Thrones, The Lord of the Rings, and more dominating both big and small screens, the high fantasy and adventure genres are much more competitive these days. However, Avatar is still poised to make a big splash upon its second coming. But will it stick the landing and become a true long-term competitor in the space?
The Success of the First Film
There is a lot of fuss being made about the success of the original Avatar, but that is not for lack of reason. Prior to the release of Avatar in late 2009, and its lengthy success, which continued into 2010, the highest-grossing film of all time was another James Cameron-directed classic, Titanic. That seafaring tragic romance grossed over $1.8 billion in its original theatrical run in 1997 and 1998; re-releases in the years since have brought its total up to $2.2 billion. While Avatar did eventually catch up to and far surpass the numbers of Titanic, it took a while for that to happen, and much of that success came from outside the domestic box office.
In the United States, Avatar opened to $77 million, which is a respectable number, but hardly what one would expect of the highest-grossing film of all time. For some perspective, Avengers: Endgame opened to over $350 million domestically. Where the true wonder of Avatar’s box office run came, was in the weeks that followed. Avatar had a relentless endurance at the box office that hasn't been seen in the years since. While most films, especially major blockbusters, typically drop somewhere between 45-65% in their second weekend, Avatar only dropped a minuscule 2%. It made an additional $75 million in its second weekend in the US. That tiny drop in box office week-to-week would become a pattern for the film, and it defined Avatar’s box office domestically. The film's weekend box office numbers wouldn’t drop below 50% of its opening haul until over a month after it began its theatrical run.
From there, Avatar’s success only continued. It became a phenomenon. In the United States, it wouldn’t conclude its initial box office run until August of 2010, after 34 weeks and nearly eight months. If you include its special edition re-release, then Avatar would play in theaters through November. The bulk of its cash, however, was made before May. It pulled in $750 million domestically, easily making it the highest-grossing film of all time in the US and Canada. However, the bulk of Avatar’s gross came from overseas. It found astronomical success globally, pulling in nearly $2 billion and bringing its total theatrical haul up to $2.74 billion. It thoroughly earned its title of the highest-grossing film of all time by a margin of nearly $800 million. It eventually was unseated from that throne by Avengers: Endgame in 2019, which brought in $2.79 billion. However, Avatar’s box office story wasn’t over, as a 2021 re-release of the film in China resulted in Avatar reclaiming that number one spot, which it still holds today.
There is still tremendous interest in the first Avatar film. It was recently re-released in 3D with a new 4K remaster throughout the United States and the globe. It marked the first time Avatar had played in US theaters since 2010, and fans were eager to revisit it. With the re-release, Avatar brought in over $10 million domestically and $40 million globally in its first weekend, beating out Don’t Worry Darling in its opening weekend internationally. That success was driven both by a desire to experience Avatar in 3D on the big screen again and also by the anticipation of Avatar: The Way of Water, which is only a few months out at this point.
Sequels in the Works
James Cameron has wanted to make a sequel to Avatar since before Avatar was released. But there wasn’t any official announcement of a second film until after the original's immense success. There were two follow-ups green-lit shortly after the release of the first movie, and they were initially given release dates of December 2014 and December 2015. Obviously, that didn't happen. And it is interesting to consider that Avatar 2 was originally supposed to come out around the same time as Into the Woods and the final film in Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit trilogy. As time went on, though, the next two Avatar films were delayed time and time again, due to a mix of developmental problems and Cameron’s decision to rework the films entirely.
The biggest update came in April 2017, when not two but four new Avatar sequels were given release dates. Avatar 2 and 3 were set for December 2021 and 2022, respectively, with Avatar 4 and 5 to follow in December 2024 and December 2025. Eventually, the films would be delayed yet again, partly due to a global pandemic, before they eventually settled on their current release dates. The second film, Avatar: The Way of Water, will open at the end of this year, on December 16, 2022. Avatar 3 will follow in December 2024, with Avatar 4 in December 2026 and Avatar 5 in December 2028. This decision to space the films out with two-year gaps was initially made to give Disney (who now owns Avatar thanks to their purchase of 20th Century Fox) time to release their Star Wars films in the holiday seasons every other year, with new releases set for 2023, 2025, and 2027. However, with the continued delay of Star Wars films like Rogue Squadron, there is an opening to bump up the release dates of the Avatar sequels, which are already deep in production.
With the incoming four sequels to Avatar, it looks like all of Cameron’s dreams are coming true. The universe that he established way back in 2009 is finally coming to fruition and developing into a lengthy saga for fans to delve into. The Avatar franchise will be expanding to meet the competition of other grand fantasy universes like those of Star Wars, Dune, The Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, and more. It has taken a long time for Cameron and the creative team behind Avatar to get their ducks in a row to make it happen, but considering the immense anticipation for the second film and the success of the recent re-release, The Way of Water seems poised to land with a bang this holiday season.
The James Cameron Factor
The question remains regarding if Avatar can really become a franchise that rivals the likes of the MCU and the other major series of today. While nothing is set in stone as of yet, things are certainly looking good for The Way of Water. As the years went by without an Avatar sequel, there was a lot of talk regarding if people were still interested in the world of Pandora and the Na’vi. With so many blockbuster franchises dominating the multiplex, some argued that there was not as much room for Cameron to come in and dominate the way he did nearly 13 years ago. People had and continue to already be getting their science fiction and fantasy fixes elsewhere through any number of the aforementioned franchises.
However, if the last few decades of Hollywood filmmaking have shown anything, it is never to doubt the success and mind of James Cameron. This is the filmmaker that came out swinging early in his career with classics like The Terminator, Aliens, The Abyss, and Terminator 2: Judgement Day. Then, he put the cap on all of that with Titanic in 1997. Since then, he’s only directed a couple of oceanic documentaries (Ghosts of the Abyss and Aliens of the Deep) in the early 2000s and then Avatar in 2009. He was involved in two major films in 2019, with them being Alita: Battle Angel, which he co-wrote, and Terminator: Dark Fate, which he produced. While both of those films ended up disappointing, Cameron’s directing track record still remains intact since he passed directing the new Terminator and Alita films in order to focus on his Avatar sequels.
This is all to say that if anyone can push their way to the top of this current king-of-the-hill style franchise war, it’s going to be James Cameron. The world he established in the original Avatar has really held up as one of the most interesting and developed fantasy worlds of the 21st century. Now, he has spent more than a decade figuring out how to expand that world and tell new stories with those characters. The long wait is finally (hopefully) going to pay off come December. A film doesn’t just accidentally or casually make almost $3 billion dollars worldwide; people love Avatar and they are ready to visit that world once again. Of course, there’s always the possibility that The Way of Water comes out and everybody hates it, but that just doesn’t seem likely at this point. Fans and casual viewers alike have loved the trailers and the few bits of footage of the film that have been released. While there’s no telling if The Way of Water will repeat the same otherworldly box office success as the 2009 Avatar, it’s not entirely out of the question, which is a massive achievement in and of itself.