James Cameron, the visionary director behind ambitious film projects likeThe Abyss,Titanic, andAliens, has revealed his intention to expand the universe that he created with theAvatarfranchise. While he has a road map of feature films that go all the way up toAvatar 5in 2031, Cameron has plans to exploreotherformats and mediums while staying in the universe of Pandora and the Na’vi. It’ll be a first for the filmmaker, as he’s revealed that animation is the way to go for the planned spin-off.
TheTerminatordirector is currently tweaking the thirdAvatarmovie for its release in a few months.Avatar: Fire and Ashwill land in theaters on July 07, 2025, andfrom what we’ve seen so far, it looks like yet another triumph for Cameron. He recently spoke with Empire magazine about the current status of the franchise, and where he plans to go afterAvatar 3.
Cameron revealed that he has pitched an animated spin-off to Disney, and while he didn’t share the reaction of the House of Mouse’s execs, he seems confident that it’ll come to fruition. He also shared the status of the project, saying it’s still in an early stage:
“I said, ‘Look, I want to do an animated anthology series that’s essentially in the world, but stories that you wouldn’t have expected from that world.' There might even be an animated feature in there – it might be a feature for streaming, or a theatrical feature.
“We haven’t done much with that yet. We’re still gathering our stories and that sort of thing, and I’ve got to find the boutique filmmakers, the animators, that want to do it.”
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The director also offered a few detailsabout the stories he plans to tell with the spin-off. FiveAvatarfeatures should have been enough, but he has a point in saying that the films don’t exactly explore the origins and “backstory on characters and tangential stuff that happened off-camera within the movies.” He continues: “Who first landed on Pandora? The first expedition. You could go anywhere you want.”
James Cameron Will Take Inspiration From ‘The Matrix’ Spin-Off ‘The Animatrix’
What’s also interesting about Cameron’s idea is that he also shared some of the previous work he’s using for inspiration. “A good early example isThe Animatrix, where they went afield in theMatrixworld,” the director said when offering a rough idea of where he plans to go with the animated spin-off. “These are all great examples for how we can add texture and baroque detail to the world ofAvatar.”
The animated anthology film won’t inspire Cameron in terms of the story, buthow it ties into the universe ofThe Matrixfranchise. Released in 2003, the short features collection was a great experiment that received a strong reaction from fans of the movies, and those seeking to know more about the origins ofThe Matrix.
Perhaps the most popular short isFinal Flight of the Osiris, one of the few that was actually shown in theaters prior toDreamcatcherscreenings. However, they were all quite relevant to the film series, and provided a great artistic contrast to the films by the Wachowskis. Some of the shorts are anime-style, which makes perfect sense; the popular Japanese style of animation was a huge influence when the directors were mapping out the universe ofThe Matrix.
Source:Empire
The Animatrix
