The chorus of skeptics is invited to calm down: the first reactions from critics of James Cameron’s new film, “Avatar: The Path of Water” (or “Avatar 2”, for most of us), who watched it at the first press screening in London, have already taken to Twitter and range from Very enthusiastic to quite positive. Variety cited, among others, Eric Davis from the Fandango website, who called the film “phenomenal, bigger, better and more exciting than ‘Avatar’… the plot, the spirituality, the beauty – this is cinema at its absolute best”, and Perry Nemiroff from the Collider website who wrote “I believed in James Cameron raises the bar with the effects, but it exceeds all expectations. One spectacular frame after another.” Tom Beasley (Yahoo) even wrote that the film “fulfills every broken promise its creators have made about cinematic innovation.” And Guillermo del Toro, who saw the film even earlier, wrote that it was a “tremendous achievement, full of wonderful plays and epic, epic emotions” and called Cameron “a master at the height of his power.” Other positive reactions focused mainly on the script, with a greater emphasis on the characters and not just on the effects.
The first film in the series, released in 2009, made history as one of the most expensive films of all time – although its price tag has been hacked over 20 times since then and is currently only 24th on the list, below several Marvel films, Fast and Furious and Pirates of the Caribbean”) – and still tops the highest grossing films of all time, with close to $3 billion in revenue. However, for years after its release, many critics questioned its cultural relevance beyond the crazy hit it was at the time. Scott Mendelsohn wrote in Forbes in 2014 that the film was “forgotten” and that, unlike other giant brands, it has no fan base.
This did not prevent Cameron from first announcing two sequels, which he originally planned to release on screens in 2014 and 2015, from not meeting the deadline, announcing no less than four sequels and shooting the second and third at the same time (filming ended in 2018). The massive delays in both filming and the release of the films (“Avatar: The Way of the Water” was supposed to be released last year) caused many critics and viewers, as mentioned, to be skeptical that Cameron would be able to reproduce the success and that it is possible that the new and ambitious film – the four planned sequels have a combined budget of no less than a billion dollars (ie, 250 million for one film). Based on the initial reactions, Cameron has at least managed to make an excellent sequel (not that this is new to him: he signed two of the best sequels of all time, “Terminator 2” and “The Eighth Passenger 2”). Now he is facing his real challenge, at least in terms of the future of this franchise – will he succeed, also in 2022, in bringing to the theaters an amount of viewers that will justify the insane costs of his films.