Avengers Fatigue: Avatar Director James Cameron Hopes We'll Get Bored Of Superheroes

James Cameron's sci-fi epic Avatar is still the most successful movie of all time, but by the time the first of four planned sequels arrives, it will have been 11 years since it was in theaters. The landscape of blockbuster cinema has changed a lot of since then--back in 2009, Star Wars was yet to return and the Marvel Cinematic Universe has barely started. Cameron has now spoken about how Avatar 2 will fare with a modern audience in love with superheroes.

In an interview to promote the docuseries AMC Visionaries, Cameron stated that he was hoping that "Avenger fatigue" sets in. "I'm hoping we'll start getting Avenger fatigue here pretty soon," he said, via IndieWire. "Not that I don't love the movies. It's just, come on guys, there are other stories to tell besides hyper-gonadal males without families doing death-defying things for two hours and wrecking cities in the process. It's like, oy!"

This isn't the first time that Cameron has spoken about the possibility that Avatar's huge audience might not be there for the follow-ups. In November, he admitted that if Avatar 2 and 3, which are being shot back-to-back, didn't make enough money, then parts 4 and 5 wouldn't happen.

The director also provided some new details about what to expect from the new movies. "I've found myself as a father of five starting to think about what would an Avatar story be like if it was a family drama," he said. "What if it was The Godfather? It's a generational family saga. That's very different than the first film.

"There's still the same setting and the same respect for the shock of the new. We still want to show you things that you haven't even seen or imagined, but the story is very different. It's a continuation of the same characters… but what happens when warriors who are willing to go on suicide charges and leap off cliffs, what happens when they grow up and have their own kids? It becomes a very different story."

The first cast image from the Avatar sequel was revealed in September. Avatar 2 is set to hit theaters on December 18, 2020, with the third part arriving on December 17, 2021. If all goes to plan, we'll see Avatar 4 and 5 on December 20, 2024 and December 19, 2025 respectively.