New AVATAR 2 Concept Art and BTS Photos and Actors Had to Learn to Hold Their Breath for a Long Time

One day James Cameron’s Avatar 2 will be released in theaters, and that will be followed by three additional sequels. This franchise has pretty much become Cameron’s life work. He’s super passionate about this franchise, the story he is looking to tell, and the technology he’s using to bring these films to life.

While we wait for the first of these sequel to be released we have some new new concept art featuring and Na’vi family and some behind the scenes photos to share with you featuring Cameron directing the film and the actors shooting underwater. As you know, this film will primarily be set underwater, which has required years of technological research and months of training actors to hold their breath for lengths that are said to “impress even a Navy SEAL.”

It’s explained that each actor trained with professional divers and learned how to free dive, and they also learned to hold their breath for minutes at a time. Cameron revealed that 72-year-old Sigourney Weaver “could easily hold her breath for six and a half minutes.” Then there’s Kate Winslet, who "blew everybody away when she did a seven-and-a-half-minute breath hold." She plays one of the Metkayina, a mysterious character named Ronal. That’s pretty damn impressive!

Producer Jon Landau recalls, "One of my favorite memories was we had this circular tank, maybe 40 feet wide, with a big glass portal in it. I walked by one day and I see Kate Winslet walking on the bottom of the tank. She's walking towards me and sees me in the window, and she just waves, gets to the end of the wall, turns around, and walks all the way back."

While the studio tried to get Cameron to shoot the underwater scenes ‘dry for wet,' by hanging people on wires, like how Aquaman is shot, Cameron wouldn’t do it. He said, "I said, 'It's not going to work. It's not going to look real.' I even let them run a test, where we captured dry for wet, and then we captured in water, a crude level of our in-water capture. And it wasn't even close."

The underwater performance-capture process that has been engineered for the film provides “a way to accurately record the actors' tiniest movements and expressions while submerged. That footage was then animated by artists at the multi-Oscar-winning visual-effects company Weta Digital.”

Cameron says, "It sounds kind of nuts, the process. I mean, if Avatar hadn't made so much damn money, we'd never do this — because it's kind of crazy." I guess the question is, is there still a market for the Avatar franchise after all of these years? We’ll eventually find out! I just don’t think it will make anywhere near the amount of money that the first movie made because the cinema landscape has changed so much.

Cameron even says, "The big issue is: Are we going to make any damn money? Big, expensive films have got to make a lot of money. We're in a new world post-COVID, post-streaming. Maybe those [box office] numbers will never be seen again. Who knows? It's all a big roll of the dice."

When talking about the story for the sequels, Landau said, "Ultimately, the sequels are a story about family, and the lengths parents will go through to keep that family together and keep them safe. I always say that Jim's movies have universal themes — and really, there's no more universal theme than family."

So, I guess they are taking a page from the Fast and Furious franchise with the core theme centered on family. With the story being set mostly in the and around the ocean, it’s explained that we will be introduced to a “new clan of reef-dwelling Na'vi called the Metkayina.” Landau also describes the new tropical beaches and shores of Pandora as a seaside paradise saying, "Bora Bora on steroids."

Avatar 2 and Avatar 3 have finished shooting and they are both in the post-production process. Avatar 4 and Avatar 5 are currently set for 2026 and 2028. It’s explained that these film are being made on a much bigger scale and they are putting much more detail into the performances of the actors, bring more diversity to world they have created and are building.

The Avatar sequels also star Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Joel David Moore, Dileep Rao, Stephen Lang, and Matt Gerald. New cast members include Michelle Yeoh, Vin Diesel, Jemaine Clement, and Oona Chaplin. Avatar 2 will be released in theaters on December 16th, 2022.

Check out the additional photos below. Thanks to EW for all of these photos, interview and details.