James Cameron has opened up about how difficult it was to film scenes with Jack Champion’s character Spider, revealing they had to be shot 2 years apart.
Released in UK cinemas last month, Avatar: The Way of Water has already grossed over $1.37 billion. It’s a good thing too, seeing as there are set to be 3 more sequels after this one.
The second movie has already been met with rave reviews from critics, but there are a couple of details about the long-awaited flick that has fans up in arms.
If you are totally new to the Avatarverse, and the world of Pandora, then let’s get you caught up. This is also a good time to mention that there will be spoilers up ahead, so tread wisely.
The first film ended with its hero, Jake, being transferred permanently into his avatar body, so that he can live on Pandora without dying, as humans can’t cope with the planet’s atmosphere.
This also has the bonus effect of meaning that Jake can live with the Na’vi, and more specifically, his love, Neytiri for the rest of his life.
However, in Avatar: The Way of Water, fans noticed something about one scene towards the end of the film that was just really off. So much so that some have even deemed it a plot hole!
The point in question revolves around a scene where Jake and Neytiri are fighting the sky people.
Fans spotted that during the big fight scene, there are supposed to be more Na’vi helping the leading heroes out, but they’re quite frankly just not there.
Reddit user u/TurboZangief said: “So at the very end of the battle, when Jake and Neytiri are fighting aboard the sea dragon alone, why the hell aren’t Tonowari and the rest helping???
“They just kind of vanished from the movie at that point, they didn’t even move to help when the ship is sinking and the Sully family is clearly trapped inside, they were not nearby to try and help Neteyam either, why they disappeared, did I miss something?”
But that’s not the only thing people criticised about the latest instalment, it seems Jack Champion’s character Spider didn’t go down too well with fans either.
One Twitter user wrote: “The character “spider” in Avatar 2 is very cringe.”
While another commented: “Spider in avatar 2 gotta be the most annoying character ever.”
“No spoilers, but I just saw Avatar and where the hell did all the rest of the water Navi go at that final fight? And screw Spider what a dumb a** kid. I would have appreciated the writing pertaining to him at the end more if he had followed through all the way,” a third said.
Since then, director James Cameron has opened up about Champion’s character in an interview with Vanity Fair, revealing that it was “hideously difficult,” to shoot scenes with him.
“The beauty was, we got to do it twice,” Cameron said about filming Spider. “So [cinematographer] Russ [Carpenter] would light the scene, so everything that we did with Jack photographically, we did previously with him in terms of capture.”
Cameron explained, “Jack did his entire performance twice, once for all the other actors like Sigourney and Britain [Dalton] and Sam, so that he was there kind of off camera. And he was like 13 at the time. And then later when we shot, he was 15, so he changed in size and vocal range a bit, but we capped him and then we had these capture scenes.”
