James Cameron says he filmed Avatar sequels together to avoid the ‘Stranger Things effect’

James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water is now playing in theaters.

James Cameron shared recently that he filmed Avatar sequel The Way of Water together with the forthcoming third and fourth films to avoid the "Stranger Things effect," a word implying the growth spurt of child actors in between installments in multiyear projects. Trinity Jo-Li Bliss was around 7 years old when she was cast as Tuk in the sequel and is now 13, while 18-year-old Jack Champion, who plays Spider, was 12 and "growing like a weed," Cameron recalls to Entertainment Weekly.

James Cameron says he filmed Avatar sequels together to avoid the ‘Stranger Things effect’

“Otherwise, you get — and I love Stranger Things — but you get the Stranger Things effect where they're supposed to still be in high school [but] they look like they're 27," Cameron said. "You know, I love the show. It's okay, we'll suspend disbelief. We like the characters, but, you know.”

“She does not see herself as the youngest,” Bliss once told Variety. “The family might be protective of her, but she sees that as underestimation. She doesn’t underestimate herself. She’s got a really big heart and is so curious. She’ll do anything to protect her family and Pandora. Seeing Tuk on the screen in her final form was incredible… I just have so much love in my heart whenever I look at my little Tuk.”

In another interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Champion shared that watching The Way of Water feels like a “time capsule” as he witnessed himself grow up in front of the cameras through filming, “So it’s cool to see my teenage years onscreen, but I can still get immersed in the world of Pandora.” As Cameron shot two full Avatar sequels at once, he also waited to start filming until all the scripts for the rest installments were complete.

“They took that chance to launch on all three of those films,” Cameron shared in an interview with Collider. “But he had the books mapped out, so he could always show the actors what they needed to know about their character arc. So, I felt I had to do the same thing. I had to play this as if the books already existed.”

He continued, “So, the only way for us to do that was to write all the scripts and let the actors read all the scripts and see where their characters were going and what it all meant. Not that that’s actable in the moment, but I think it’s something that the actors could work into their preparation for their characters.”

Avatar: The Way of Water is now playing in theaters.

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