The first "Avatar' sequel helmed by James Cameron has now been set for an official release on Christmas 2017, as announced by 20th Century Fox chair-man CEO Jim Gianopulos.
Aside from helming the upcoming three sequels to his 2009 blockbuster movie, Cameron has also been working on their screenplay and has made plans to unveil these films one after each other for three consecutive years.
Initially, the first film was set for a release in late 2016 but was pushed back to late 2017, as announced in January.
According to Gianopulos, he is strongly confident that the first "Avatar' sequel will be finally unveiled over the 2017 Christmas holidays while the next two movies are set to follow in 2018 and 2019.
"James Cameron has his own pace," the 20th Century Fox executive said.
He also revealed that he has recently paid Cameron a visit at his headquarters in New Zealand.
"It's a room"¦ which is covered floor to ceiling with images, characters, worlds, settings," Gianopulos shared. "It's the most amazing, breathtaking thing you've ever seen. His challenge is to put all of that in a movie."
He also quipped that the director's approach in filmmaking left Fox executives bewildered.
"In the first movie he created technology that was so far ahead of its time," Gianopulos added. "Of course now he's gone past that"¦all the pieces are in place. The story is being finalized."
According to Cinema Blend, there have been several major reasons as to why "Avatar 2' has experienced delays in its release.
First, Cameron's plan is to develop and shoot the upcoming sequels "back-to-back." Similar to Joe and Anthony Russo's approach in "Avengers: Infinity War', the helmer is expected to merge the filming of his movies to increase efficiency and save time.
In addition, the absence of source material has also been cited as one of the main reasons for the delay as opposed to film franchises, such as "Harry Potter' and "The Hunger Games', which have their books as references.
With its record-breaking release in 2009, "Avatar' went on to become the highest-grossing movie in history after pulling in approximately $2.8 billion in cinemas worldwide.
In the following year, the epic sci-fi film was nominated for nine Oscars and went on to bag three awards in technical categories. Cameron filmed the first movie in New Zealand and announced his plans of shooting the sequels in the same location following a preferential tax negotiation with the country's authorities.
