The Avatar franchise has been trying really hard to actually be a franchise. It's been planning sequels to go on about as long as the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The only problem has been, the release date for the second film keeps getting pushed back. The last time Avatar 2 lost a release date it was simply removed from the calendar entirely. However, it now looks like the first of three planned sequels to Avatar finally has a new date that it might even keep, December 21, 2018.
At least, we're assuming it's Avatar 2. Technically, 20th Century Fox has announced an untitled film from Lightstorm Entertainment, James Cameron's production company will be released on that date. However, as Deadline points out, it pretty much has to be Avatar 2 we're talking about. Indications have pointed to the sequel finally being set for 2018 for awhile and we know that these have always been set as Christmas movies so it makes sense.
When Avatar 2 was first announced, it was supposed to be released in December of 2014. However, due to the epic script that James Cameron was writing, that eventually became three movies rather than the previously planned two, it simply took much longer than anybody expected. Eventually, the movie was delayed into 2016, and then 2017. Following the announcement that Star Wars: Episode VIII was delaying their own release date into December 2017, Avatar 2 was pulled from the release schedule entirely with no new date.
We're going to cross our fingers and hope that they're serious this time. James Cameron so clearly wants every chapter of the Avatar franchise to revolutionize Hollywood in some way that the movie never seems to get any actual traction. His dreams are so big they really seem to have become bigger than the actual movie could ever be.
We're really hoping that the fact that the movie has been given an actual date again is an indication that Avatar 2 is actually ready to move forward. Somebody screwed James Cameron's feet to the floor and interrogated him until he promised he'd be ready with an actual finished film by the end of 2018. We hope that's what happened. We're not putting any money down in Vegas on the release date not getting pushed back again.
Will Avatar 2 ever actually happen? I'm still not convinced, to be honest. At this point, it really seems like the production process just feeds off of itself in order to sustain life, but with zero forward momentum. Do you think we'll ever actually see Avatar 2 ? Do you think we'll see it in 2018? Let us know what you think in the comments.
