James Cameron has been working on the screenplays for his sequels to Avatar for some time now, and it sounds like he’s just starting to build up some critical steam for the process. Speaking with Play Goes Strong (via Bleeding Cool), the writer/director briefly talked about his writing process and how that has impacted his work in developing Avatar 2 and Avatar 3.
I’m working on ‘Avatar 2’ and ‘Avatar 3.’ I was talking the other day with Peter Jackson and said, ‘You had it easy dude. You had the books when you did the second and third ‘Lord of the Rings.’ I have to create my own books in my head and extract a script from it. I’m deep into it and I’m living in Pandora right now. There is that start up torque where you feel it’s coming to you. Then you build up momentum. That’s when it gets fun. The characters talk and it’s writing itself. I’m almost there right now. It’s building fast.
I suppose that there is also just a bit of pressure of exceeding the highest-grossing film of all time. But Cameron denies that there is any pressure at all.
Pressure, no. It’s a little daunting because sequels are always tricky. You have to be surprising and stay ahead of audience anticipation. At the same time, you have to massage their feet with things that they know and love about the first film. I’ve walked that line in the past, so I’m not too worried about it. At the same time, I definitely have to deliver the goods… As for a release date that will be determined by when I get the script out. No pressure!
Whether or not he is really feeling any pressure aside, it is starting to look as if the first sequel won’t be hitting its announced release date of December 2014. A few months back Cameron stated that he wanted to have the screenplays finished by now in order to start shooting as quickly as possible. However, it sounds like he still has a substantial amount of work to go on the screenplays. I would be very surprised if the film’s relase doesn’t get pushed back into 2015.
