Sam Worthington and Zoe Saldana have signed on for the three upcoming Avatar sequels, Fox has announced. They also starred as Jake Sully and Neytiri in the highest-grossing film of all time in 2009.
Avatar 2 is scheduled to hit theaters in December 2016 and the next two sequels will be released in 2017 and 2018, respectively, produced by James Cameron and Jon Landau.
According to Deadline, Worthington and Saldana have signed new deals for the sequels but they’re similar to their deal for the first one.
The sequels will be filmed back to back, with Fox and Lightstorm Entertainment looking at December 2014 or January 2015 as a start date, filming up until March 2015.
Last August, Avatar creator and director, Cameron, hired Josh Friedman, Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver, and Shane Salerno to help him with screenwriting.
Little details about the plots for the sequels are known, but The Hollywood Reporter notes that Worthington and Saldana’s characters have kids in them.
“Jake Sully is a rare combination of passion, strength, street smarts and soul, which requires a lot from an actor. Sam brought to the role a combination of sensitivity, vulnerability and strength,” Cameron said in a statement. “Zoe captured every aspect of the character I envisioned, bringing to Neytiri a mix of delicacy, fierceness and incredible physicality. I am beyond pleased they'll be returning with us to Pandora."
image: Wikimedia Commons
