Why Avatar: The Way of Water is over three hours long

James Cameron has explained why Avatar: The Way of Water is over three hours long.

The second Avatar movie has been in development for over a decade following the enormous success of the first film in 2009.

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On a reported budget of $237 million, Avatar earned never-before-seen box office success, earning $2.847 billion in ticket sales.

The 2009 movie saw Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), a paraplegic former marine, enter the world of Pandora and eventually fall in love with Na'vi native Neytiri (Zoe Saldana) while dealing with the insurrection from the human army, led by ruthless Colonel Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang).

Some of the characterisation within Avatar received criticism, but Cameron says the second movie will focus more on this aspect, which has extended the runtime.

"The goal is to tell an extremely compelling story on an emotional basis," he told Total Film.

“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.”

The official plot synopsis for Avatar: The Way of Water is:

'Set more than a decade after the events of the first film, Avatar: The Way Of Water begins to tell the story of the Sully family (Jake, Neytiri, and their kids), the trouble that follows them, the lengths they go to keep each other safe, the battles they fight to stay alive, and the tragedies they endure.'

Avatar: The Way of Water trailer