Today in James Cameron trash talk: Oh baby, just wait 'til they get to Avatar 4
Studio executives apparently didn't even bother to give Cameron notes for his script on the franchise's possible fourth installment
We’re in a James Cameron renaissance of sorts at the moment—a Camerenaissance, if you will. Because while we might all have varying opinions (that James Cameron doesn’t care about) about the soon-to-be-released Avatar: The Way Of Water—and whether or not it looks like a five-year-old PlayStation 4 game about wet cat people—we can all hopefully come together to acknowledge that the sheer amount of bragging and trash talk that Cameron is doing as part of his press tour for the movie has been something of a joy.
Take, for instance, a recent interview Cameron gave to Collider about the writing process for Avatars 2, 3, and 4, all of which were penned before filming began so that a) Cameron could tell his actors about the entire arc of their characters (“Family,” we’re guessing), and b) so that they could film the whole thing all at once in the interest of saving time and cash. But three scripts means three different script approvals from Cameron’s backers at Disney-owned 20th Century Studios, who do, despite the very blank check they’ve given the director here, at least have ostensible oversight over these movies.
Here’s the good bit, as Cameron describes how much better he’s apparently gotten at writing Avatar movies over the last few years (or, possibly, how much more exhausted the people bankrolling him have gotten toward the Herculean task of reining him in):
I can’t tell you the details, but all I can say is that when I turned in the script for 2, the studio gave me three pages of notes. And when I turned in the script for 3, they gave me a page of notes, so I was getting better. When I turned in the script for 4, the studio executive, creative executive over the films wrote me an email that said, ‘Holy fuck.’ And I said, ‘Well, where are the notes?’ And she said, ‘Those are the notes.’ Because it kind of goes nuts in a good way, right?”
And goddamn if the ol’ Titanic man hasn’t got us again, because now we’re actually kind of curious about Avatar 4. (Our prediction: The Na’vi start Avatar-ing into human bodies, and the whole movie takes place back on Earth as they work menial jobs in New York to make ends meet while trying to get their break in the city’s thriving, but cutthroat, theater scene.) Avatar 4, which Cameron co-wrote with Josh Friedman, is currently slated for December 2026 on Disney’s release calendar, so fingers crossed that we’ll all still alive by then.