James Cameron's Avatar: Fire and Ash arrives in theaters this weekend, and the review embargo has now lifted.
Like the social media reactions, the full reviews are mostly quite positive, but there is one common criticism running through a lot of these write-ups.
As you'd expect, the visuals and action sequences come in for pretty much universal praise, and several critics have hailed the threequel as a "technical masterpiece." The movie's new villain, Varang (Oona Chaplin), is also said to be a major highlight.
On the more negative side, Fire and Ash is said to feel way too repetitive, and far too similar to the previous film, The Way of Water.
At the end of the day, it doesn't sound like this movie is going to make any converts, but devotees of the previous films will want to catch this sci-fi spectacle on the big screen.
Fire and Ash currently sits at 71% on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 100 reviews. There's still plenty of room for fluctuation, but as things stand, this marks the lowest RT score of the franchise so far following The Way of Water's 76% and the original movie's 81%.
We recently learned that Avatar: Fire and Ash will clock-in at 3 hours, 15 minutes, making it the longest movie in the franchise so far. 2009's Avatar ran for 2 hours, 42 minutes, while 2022's The Way of Water was 3 hours, 12 minutes.
Though these movies definitely have their detractors, the first two films were massively successful at the box office, and we fully expect Fire and Ash to follow suit - especially as it's now been confirmed that the first trailer for Avengers: Doomsday will screen ahead of the movie.
Avatar 3 will see the return of cast members Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldaña, Stephen Lang, Sigourney Weaver, Joel David Moore, CCH Pounder, Giovanni Ribisi, Dileep Rao, Matt Gerald, Kate Winslet, Cliff Curtis, Edie Falco, Brendan Cowell, Jemaine Clement, Britain Dalton, Trinity Jo-Li Bliss, Jack Champion, Bailey Bass, Filip Geljo and Duane Evans, with David Thewlis also on board as a new character named Paylak.
Fire and Ash has been hit with numerous delays, but is finally set to release in theaters on December 19. Two additional sequels, the still untitled Avatar 4 and Avatar 5, are in various stages of production and are expected to be released in 2029 and 2031, respectively.