James Cameron prefers the "visual imagination" of George Lucas' Star Wars films to the "retrenchment" that was The Force Awakens.
The director and writer of the only two films that have made more money than the recent $2.0 billion grossing Star Wars flick was speaking to YouTuber Keely Stinner about how influential the energy and visual effects of the original 1977 film were when Stinner asked for his thoughts on the new one.
"I don't want to say too much about the film because I also have a lot of respect for [director and co-writer] J.J. Abrams and I want to see where they're taking it next, you know, see what they're doing with it," Cameron said. "I have to say that I felt that George's group of six films had more innovative visual imagination and this film was more of a retrenchment to things you had seen before and characters you had seen before and it took a few baby steps forward with new characters.
"So, for me, the jury's out, I want to see where they go with it."
Jump to 3:15 in the video below to hear Cameron talk about The Force Awakens.
The next Star Wars film, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, comes from Godzilla director Gareth Edwards and will be released on Dec. 16. Rian Johnson (Looper) is working on Star Wars: Episode VIII for a December 2017 release, Phil Lord and Chris Miller (The LEGO Movie) have a Han Solo movie coming out in May 2018 and Colin Trevorrow (Jurassic World) has Star Wars: Episode IX coming out in May 2019.
James Cameron is currently working on four Avatar sequels set to be released in 2018, 2020, 2022 and 2023. And as for Abrams, he has producing credits on the upcoming HBO series Westworld as well as Star Trek Beyond and Star Wars: Episode VIII.