If the rumours are to be trusted, we’re in for a marathon runtime with Avatar 3.
The headlines were instigated by entertainment industry insider Jeff Sneider, who indicated James Cameron had submitted a completed nine-hour cut of the forthcoming threequel back in December (VFX and everything).
Now, Sneider has revealed how it’ll supposedly be released on a recent episode of his podcast The Hot Mic.
“Months ago, I put out a rumour about James Cameron having a nine-hour cut of Avatar 3 that he wanted to finish the visual effects for,” said Jeff Sneider.
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“A lot of people were like: ‘Why would the studio pay for that? Why would he insist on doing visual effects if then he’s gonna cut the movie?’”
“The idea is that Cameron would do all the visual effects for his nine-hour cut of Avatar 3 and then release it on Disney+ as a limited series after the theatrical cut is released.”
Incidentally, prior to the release of Avatar: The Way of Water, Cameron had inadvertently referenced this possibility in anticipation of the audience’s grievances with its three-hour-plus runtime.
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“I don’t want anybody whining about length when they sit and binge-watch [television] for eight hours,” James Cameron told Empire Magazine.
“I can almost write this part of the review. ‘The agonisingly long three-hour movie…’ It’s like, give me a fucking break. I’ve watched my kids sit and do five one-hour episodes in a row.”
“Here’s the big social paradigm shift that has to happen: it’s okay to get up and go pee.”
Looks like some moviegoing habits are too strong to break. Even for a man of James Cameron’s sheer calibre.
Avatar 3 is currently scheduled for a December 20th, 2024 theatrical release date. At the time of this writing, Avatar: The Way of Water has generated over U$2.3 billion (AU$3.4 billion) against an estimated production budget of US$350-460 million (AU$522-686 million).
