Avatar 2

[Henry88]

Avatar's success has gone far beyond anyone's expectations by grossing over 2 billion dollars worldwide leaving its Titanic predecessor in the dust. James Cameron has already acknowledged that he has plans for a full Avatar trilogy, but where will the story pick up? Over at MarketSaw they've managed to get the inside scoop on what we can expect from Avatar 2.

According to their inside sources, Cameron is under "immense pressure" to make Avatar 2 his next film. Even though the director has other projects waiting in the wings including the highly anticipated Battle Angel, which already has a significant amount of prep work done. There's also another film called The Dive, which was once considered his next go to project, so we're not sure what route he'll take.

As for the plot of Avatar 2, they're hearing that it will focus on a full blown war, that will take place off of Pandora. They also go on to say that a lot of the things that were left on the cutting room floor from the first film, will find its way back into the second.

If the Na'vi are going to be involved in another battle, I wonder if the humans will once again be their opponents of choice? We've seen that already, let's explore other native lands and watch some red or green people going at it. Let the entire rainbow get in on this action.

http://screencrave.com/2010-02-01/new-avatar-2-details/

There's been a lot of Avatar 2 talk in recent weeks. So what has been said and how likely is a sequel?

Avatar cost $310 million to produce and about $150 million to market and distribute. It's already grossed $393 million worldwide, and still has a way to run. According to market research firm CinemaScore, audiences are giving it an average grade of 'A', and together with overwhelmingly positive reviews, this means word of mouth is very strong. In short, Avatar is going to make a profit.

With Terminator 2 and Aliens under his belt, director James Cameron has shown he has no issue making sequels. In fact he's the best filmmaker in the world when it comes to quality follow-ups. Cameron was talking Avatar 2, and the Avatar trilogy, as early as 2006, and he's said again this week that two more movies is the intention.

So what direction will the story go in? (...BIG SPOILERS AHEAD...) Avatar 2 and 3 will follow Jake and Neytiri. Producer Jon Landau has said "here we are exploring the surface of the planet Pandora. The interior remains to be seen." While Cameron has pointed out that Pandora wasn't the only moon shown orbiting Polyphemus, and revealed that all sequels would explore these other moons.

The script isn't written yet but Avatar 2 won't take anything like the four years of production that the first film needed. The motion-capture technology, the computer-generated environments and the creatures are already perfected.

Avatar 2 - Sequel Plans (Avatar Trilogy)



Sort of. Director James Cameron says it makes no sense to call the follow-up to his megahit 3-D sci-fi movie Avatar 2 and offers up a few details about what he wants for the sequel. (Spoilers ahead!)

Not only would Avatar 2 be an unoriginal name, it wouldn't actually fit: The original movie ended with Jake (Sam Worthington) becoming an actual Na'vi, so he's no longer an avatar.

"Certainly I don't want to call it Avatar 2," Cameron said at the Visual Effects Society Awards ceremony in Century City, Calif., on Sunday, where he was honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award. "He's not an avatar anymore, is he? Maybe we'll call it Na'vi."

As for the story, a second Avatar film would emphasize the spiritual aspect of the Na'vi even further than the original, he said. Avatar was primarily an action/adventure with the spiritual nature of the Na'vi at its heart. Now that audiences have embraced the Na'vi culture, Cameron can give it more weight in the sequels.

"I think we can see that there's a greater receptivity to it on the part of the audience than certainly the studio originally imagined," Cameron said. "We pared back on it a fair bit in the first film, and I think we can go farther in that direction and not alienate people."

Earlier, Cameron had said he hadn't completed a deal yet to direct the sequel. But he made clear on Sunday that he wouldn't let anyone else direct the follow-up.

"I wouldn't do that for the second film," Cameron said. "It'd be premature to turn it over to somebody else right now. I think I'd have to use a film to train somebody to be able to take the reins, honestly. That's how I see it."

Cameron has mentioned plans for a trilogy of Avatar films. At least he's on board for the next one, even if he delegates the third.

To see Cameron's VES Lifetime Achievement Awards acceptance speech, watch the VES Awards on Reelz Channel March 5 at 10 p.m.

http://scifiwire.com/2010/03/james-cameron-dont-call-i.php

[Relaxing Dragon]

If the second one opens with mankind returning, setting up tactical satellites in orbit around the planet, and blasting the sacred tree thing to dust, then I'm there

[Scribblesense]

This puts a bad taste in my mouth, like when you're eating leftovers that tasted pretty damn good a few days ago, and they taste alright now but you don't really have the appetite for them but you're forcing yourself to eat them anyway.

That's how I feel about Avatar sequels: they're heating it back up in the microwave.

The movie was a good piece of cinema, it was entertaining, but I can't shake the novelty feeling I've come to associate with it. I think, so long as they don't rush it (trying to cash in on popular movies by putting out two sequels back-to-back, ala Pirates of the Caribbean or The Matrix) they'll be able to do a good job with it and create movies that stand on their own. People won't get sick of the pretty blue cat people in Ferngully in awesome (SARCASM!!!!) 3D.

What I'm saying is, take your goddamn time with it. I don't want to see another Avatar film for at least five years.

And while I don't want to see the humans return to dig up more Unobtanium (more like MacGuffinite, am I right guys? Hahaha) it's dangerous to completely remove the human element from a story, especially in one with as exotic a locale as Pandora. It's almost a necessity.

I kinda don't want to see Jake being the protagonist again. It was "cute" watching him bumble his way into the Na'vi culture, but now, he's the chief of the tribe (or whatever) and I think, to be an effective character, he would have had to mature and adapt a lot - he would have to become completely alien (his personality), so much so that we barely recognize him. He's no longer human. He's no longer the person we saw in Avatar 1. And watching him learning, adapting, and struggling with alien culture needs to happen off screen, because I wouldn't buy him as an effective leader if I had to watch him being given the Na'vi equivalent of the "Birds and the Bees". But, of course, on Pandora it's the "Flowerbirds and Flame-Spewing, Hummer-Sized DragonBees".

But then, it's way too early to tell. This is just a faux-intellectual rant from someone who's trying to get their money's worth out of their college degree, while secretly hoping to see some more out-of-focus alien humping.

[Henry88]

EXCLUSIVE: Source Update On AVATAR Sequels ! Something More Valuable Than Unobtainium !! More Worlds!
Something More Valuable Than Unobtainium? Is it Loveobtainium, Super-Unobtainium?


Interview: Author Michael D. Sellers on John Carter, Tarzan and the Gods of Hollywood

Bob Leeper:
As you cite in your book, the John Carter of Mars stories have been "strip-mined" for material by countless authors and filmmakers over the past century and yet John Carter's popularity has waned in recent years. Why do you think that is? Is it lack of recognition or consumer apathy?

Michael D. Sellers:
Well, the strip miners didn't exactly footnote what they did, so the average filmgoer doesn't know that Star Wars was inspired to a very great extent by Burroughs, or Avatar. James Cameron did admit in about five interviews that when he made Avatar, he was trying to make "a John Carter of Mars type of story". . . but that kind of thing doesn't get out beyond the two percent of people who read about what went into the making of a movie. The general public had no idea — still has no idea — that Avatar is an homage to Burroughs.

I think any hundred year old book series is going to face a gradual diminishing of interest unless someone does something dramatic to renew the interest. Disney's John Carter was that one big opportunity, and it didn't turn out as well as we all would have hoped — but it has certainly spawned a new generation who is newly aware of Burroughs and is reading the books. At least there's that.