Avatar: The Way of Water’s final trailer highlights the epic scope of James Cameron’s sequel

The final Avatar: The Way of Water trailer has arrived, and it offers a glimpse at the sheer scale of James Cameron’s sequel. The new footage takes us to a previously unseen part of Pandora with epic underwater shots, a glimpse at a coming conflict, and more insight into the story.

The trailer begins as Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), Neytiri (Zoe Saldana), and their children arrive at a new settlement after their forest home is no longer a safe haven. They’re welcomed into the fray and taught the ways of water, but a steep learning curve awaits as they adapt to a new world beneath the surface. 

It also seems like danger is never far away as a war brews with the humans. We get some more glimpses at this in the final trailer as robot warriors arrive and Pandora is set alight, but for what exactly is behind the conflict, we’ll have to wait until the movie’s December 16 release date.

In the meantime, the movie’s epic runtime has also seemingly been revealed. Per AMC Theaters, the movie will be 192 minutes (that’s three hours and 12 minutes), making it Cameron’s second-longest movie behind Titanic. 

Cameron told Total Film about the need for a lengthy runtime in our latest issue (with Avatar on the cover). "The goal is to tell an extremely compelling story on an emotional basis," he said. "I would say the emphasis in the new film is more on character, more on story, more on relationships, more on emotion. We didn’t spend as much time on relationship and emotion in the first film as we do in the second film, and it’s a longer film, because there’s more characters to service. There’s more story to service."

For other upcoming movies, check out our guide to movie release dates in 2022 and beyond.

Fay Watson
Deputy Entertainment Editor

I’m the Deputy Entertainment Editor here at GamesRadar+, covering TV and film for the Total Film and SFX sections online. I previously worked as a Senior Showbiz Reporter and SEO TV reporter at Express Online for three years. I've also written for The Resident magazines and Amateur Photographer, before specializing in entertainment.