Avatar is one of the most profitable movie series of all time, with its first installment grossing over 2.9 billion dollars, and its second installment not falling far behind at 2.3 billion. As IMDb notes, they are the 1st and 3rd highest grossing movies of all time, respectively. The franchise follows a group of humans who attempt to colonize another planet, called Pandora. Pandora is inhabited by blue humanoid aliens called the Na’vi, who resist the human invaders.
With this impressive box office track record, the third movie, Avatar: Fire and Ash, was expected to follow in the footsteps of its predecessors. Approximately a month after release, it grossed around 1.3 billion dollars worldwide. While still successful, it hasn’t broken the 2 billion dollar threshold of its predecessors.
With a declining box office, is it likely that the Avatar franchise will continue with a fourth movie? One way to answer this question is to look at what the director, James Cameron, thinks. In an interview with the Hollywood Reporter, Cameron discussed how “moving forward with the
final two films, whose budgets would be as enormous as the first three movies,
depends on the box-office success of Avatar: Fire and Ash.”
But how much money does Avatar: Fire and Ash have to make to be considered a success? It’s unclear, as while 1.3 billion is low for an Avatar movie, it’s still a huge accomplishment compared to other films. It even ended up being the 3rd highest grossing movie of 2025, right behind Ne Zha 2 and Zootopia 2.
Cameron has discussed alternatives if a 4th and 5th movie aren’t released. “I don’t know if the saga goes beyond this point. I hope it does,” Cameron told Entertainment Weekly. “If we don’t get to make 4 and 5, for whatever reason, I’ll hold a press conference and I’ll tell you what we were gonna do. How’s that?” In that same interview, Cameron also discussed turning the scripts of the movies, which are already written, into novels. Either of these possibilities could be final endings for this beloved franchise.
Another factor to consider is the reviews. The first Avatar movie scored a 7.9/10 on IMDb with over 4k reviews. However, Avatar: Fire and Ash scored a 7.4/10 on IMDb with only 1.5k reviews. This shows a decline in not only ratings but also the amount of people reviewing. Maybe this represents less audience interest.
Desiree Smith, a freshman, commented that, “[My interest] in a fourth movie depends on who’s in it.” Just the spectacle of the iconic Avatar CGI or the ongoing story of clashing cultures may not be enough to pull in audiences.
In an interview with TVBS News, Cameron commented, “Michelle[Yeoh] is definitely going to be in 4, if we make 4. Here’s the thing: the movie industry is depressed right now. Avatar 3 cost a lot of money. We have to do well in order to continue.”
If Michelle Yeoh had a role in a 4th movie, it could incentivize more people to watch the movie in theaters. Yeoh’s recent projects include Everything Everywhere All at Once, Wicked, and Wicked: For Good. If the studio producing the Avatar films, Disney, hired her for the Avatar 4 project, fans of her previous work may be encouraged to see Avatar 4 as well.
One problem that every film in the Avatar franchise faces is affordability. The first movie cost 237 million dollars to produce, and the second and third jumped even higher to budgets of about 400 million dollars each. It isn’t clear if Disney is willing to spend so much money on a fourth film that is not guaranteed to be successful, based on Fire and Ash’s reduced performance.
The box office results over the next few weeks for Fire and Ash may provide evidence to Disney about whether a fourth movie would be profitable enough to continue the series.
