There are blockbuster releases, and then there are ‘Avatar’ releases, films that don’t merely open in theaters, but arrive carrying the weight of cinematic history. When James Cameron unleashes another installment to his sci-fi epic, it is not a question of whether the film will be a hit. It is about the amount of money it will generate.
As the third installment in the saga, ‘Avatar: Fire and Ash’ now enters theaters around the globe on December 19, and it has a distinctly difficult task. It has to do well, of course. However, it has to do well symbolically. Anything less than enormous will still be profitable. Anything short of legendary, however, risks being labeled a disappointment.
‘Avatar: Fire And Ash’ Is Competing With Its Own Legacy
Purely speaking of business, ‘Avatar: Fire and Ash’ does not have to break box office history to be a win. The Hollywood rule of thumb is that a movie has to make approximately 2.5 times its production cost to cover the cost of marketing and distribution. With the film having a budget of about 400 million according to industry estimates, the minimum target is about 1 billion across the globe.
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The dream outcome would be that number alone for most franchises. However, ‘Avatar’ has never been just a franchise. Even James Cameron himself once admitted how high the bar is. With ‘Avatar: The Way of Water’, he publicly declared that the sequel would have to be among the highest-grossing movies of all time just to cover the magnitude of investment. Cameron also clarified that the future of the franchise after the third movie would be based on the financial performance.
So, ‘Fire and Ash’ is not another sequel, but a financial checkpoint. That setting puts all things in a new perspective. In case Cameron has the same expectations for the third movie, the actual break-even point can be around $1.25-1.3 billion instead of just $1 billion. At that point, the movie would break even, and Disney and 20th Century would relax.
However, even then, the story behind the release would be tricky. A $1.3 billion worldwide collection would be technically a success. However, at the same time, it would be a drastic decline compared to ‘The Way of Water’, which ended at $2.3 billion. That type of fall would be uncomfortable, whether profitable or not, in blockbuster terms. It is here that expectations are made even stronger.
‘Avatar: Fire And Ash’ Has Huge Shoes To Fill
Fair or not, the Avatar brand now exists under a $2 billion spotlight. The original movie is the all-time highest-grossing film with approximate earnings of $2.9 billion. Whereas, ‘The Way of Water’ has demonstrated its endurance with a gross of $2.3 billion. They both solidified Cameron’s reputation as the only filmmaker who transforms ambition into financial gravity. Due to that legacy, anything less than with ‘Fire and Ash’ will be subject to debate.
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Should the movie make it to the $1.7-1.9 billion mark, it would be in the top ten highest-grossing movies ever to be released. This is an incredible feat by any objective measure. However, context matters. That number would be another significant drop, which would support the claims that audience interest is slowly fading, although it is still enormous. The cynicism surrounding ‘Avatar’ has never been normal.
Although the numbers are record-breaking, critics tend to cite the comparatively low cultural presence of the franchise in comparison to superhero movies or established IPs. To a great extent, ‘The Way of Water’ shut down those arguments. But a softer performance from ‘Fire & Ash’ could reopen that conversation. The film doesn’t need to be the biggest movie ever. It doesn’t need to surpass its predecessors. But it does need to prove that Pandora remains financially unstoppable, not just viable.
