James Cameron has revealed that during Avatar 3’s lengthy post-production process, he realised he’d left an important character out of the movie.
We’re just a few weeks away from the movie event of the year, with Avatar: Fire and Ash hitting screens worldwide on December 19, 2026.
As a sequel to the most successful movie of all-time – as well as the third biggest film ever – anticipation is sky-high for the movie, which commenced principal photography way back in September 2017.
In a new interview to promote the US rerelease of Avatar: The Way of Water this week, writer-director James Cameron revealed that he completely forgot to include a beloved creature in the forthcoming movie.
James Cameron forgot to put the Toruk in Avatar 3
Spending the best part of a decade making a movie means you can come at it with fresh eyes years down the line, and Cameron said that was invaluable when figuring out what was missing from Avatar 3.
“I don’t really second guess my creative impulses,” he tells Variety. “Unless – and this happened a little bit on Fire and Ash – I’m looking at it going, you know, I’m not that much of a genius screenwriter. There’s something a little off here in the storytelling.
“And so, our Toruk is back, right? You know, the big bird that Jake rides. I’ve always been waiting for the question, ‘Why doesn’t he just go get the big red bird and kill everybody like he used to do?’ Because that doesn’t exist in The Way of Water at all.”
Cameron continues: “It didn’t exist in Fire and Ash. And I went, ‘Oh, he’s got to go get the bird.’ Come on! I was saving it for a later film. I was like, ‘F*ck that! He should get the bird. Get the Toruk.’
“There’s something in Jake’s destiny that requires it, right? So I just re-wrote it, and we went back and we shot two or three scenes around that concept, and I threw some stuff out and stuck that in.
Avatar: Fire and Ash now clocks in at three hours
That change has affected the runtime of the movie, with Cameron reporting that “we’re at three hours, big surprise! But it works beautifully, and the actors were super-excited about that idea. It’s like, oh, okay, that feels right, you know?
“So it’s not set in stone. It’s a constantly evolving creative process. And that’s what keeps you vigorous and engaged.”
