'Avatar' and 'Star Wars' films revealed at Disney event

Disney lifted the lid on Avatar: Fire and Ash and presented new footage from Star Wars and Pixar movies at a giant showcase in front of 12,000 fans in California on Friday.

Avatar director James Cameron took the stage at the company's biennial D23 fan gathering to announce the name of the latest instalment of his sci-fi franchise, due out December 2025.

"The new film is not what you expect. But it's definitely what you want," teased Cameron of his third visit to Pandora.

The previous two Avatar films are the highest and third-highest grossing movies of all time, earning $5.2 billion combined.

Images from the new movie, currently in production in New Zealand, showed its blue Na'vi characters dancing around a campfire, as well as images of giant floating ships and flying beasts.

The director promised higher emotional stakes, and "new cultures and settings and creatures and new biomes."

"You'll see a lot more Pandora, the planet, that you never saw before," he said.

The fourth and fifth Avatar films are scheduled for 2029 and 2031.

Also in Friday's presentation, Disney fans saw a first glimpse of The Mandalorian and Grogu.

Out in May 2026, it will be the first Star Wars film since 2019's divisive The Rise of Skywalker.

Disney, which had been churning out a new Star Wars film every year to that point, dramatically slammed the brakes in the face of diminishing box-office returns.

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