An Avatar 2 Star Thought The Movie Came Out Years Ago And Bombed
Edie Falco, who appears in Avatar 2, thought the movie had already been released and failed at the box office.
Shooting on James Cameron‘s science fiction epic Avatar: The Way of Water concluded so long ago that star Edie Falco had assumed that the movie had already launched and failed. Falco recounted on The View that her role in Avatar 2 had concluded filming four years ago, and she had moved on to other projects. Falco was surprised when a friend mentioned that the movie was nearing release and later said “I’ve been busy doing stuff and somebody mentioned Avatar and I thought, ‘Oh, I guess it came out and didn’t do very well.’ Because I hadn’t heard anything. I thought, ‘Oh, well it happens!'”
The film has taken its time in production after the first Avatar, which came out in 2009. Avatar 2 followed 13 years after, and three more films are currently planned for release in 2024, 2026, and 2028. Although Cameron has been quoted as saying that if the second movie didn’t perform well, the series might conclude with the third film.
Although it did better than the original did out of the gate, Avatar 2 still opened to disappointing sales, possibly due to it being, like the original, a spectacle movie that primarily relies on IMAX and 3D for its effect. 3D movies were going through a burst of popularity at the release of Avatar, but interest in stereoscopic cinema has declined since then, with some considering it to have been a fad.
In addition to the decline in the popularity of 3D, the film has been harmed by the popularity of more recent blockbusters. Disney bought Marvel Studios the same year Avatar came out, setting the stage for the massively successful Marvel Cinematic Universe, and fellow Disney subsidiary Lucasfilm released the massive Star Wars sequel trilogy. Audiences have glutted themselves on big-budget special effects movies in recent years, making it much harder for a special-effects-focused extravaganza to rise above the pack.
Avatar 2 had been slated for a release in 2014, but a variety of issues have plagued the continuation of the epic that began over a decade ago. James Cameron has said that the delays have been due to the difficulty of making several movies back-to-back. Producer Jon Landau has said that the primary reason for the delay was the desire to have scripts written for all five movies in the series ready to go before shooting could even begin.
The first film set records for box-office sales but made a surprisingly shallow splash on the culture. For a movie that grossed more than Avengers: Endgame or Titanic, relatively few people talk about the movie today. It is possible that the delay since its debut means that, as a film franchise, Avatar may already be past its expiration date.
James Cameron has long been known in Hollywood as a director who can deliver crowd-pleasing blockbuster hits. He got his start working on Roger Corman’s Battle Beyond the Stars but swiftly moved on to bigger things. Cameron became known for high-profile science fiction after directing the first two Terminator movies and Aliens and branched out a bit with the romantic drama Titanic in 1997. The latter film is still the third highest-grossing movie of all time, even without adjusting for inflation. Avatar has been his biggest hit to date, and it now seems unlikely that Avatar 2 will be seen as the crown jewel of his career.
