Zoe Saldaña has reminded people of the passage of time by confirming how old she’ll be when Avatar 5 finally releases
Freshly minted Bafta award-winning actress Zoe Saldaña may be enjoying her first award season as an Oscars front-runner thanks to Emilia Pérez.
However, she’s still committed to one of the huge franchises that helped boost her career over 15 years ago – and that commitment stretches years into her future still
Thanks to her work on the Avatar, Guardians of the Galaxy and Star Trek film franchises, Saldaña, 46, has actually appeared in three of the highest-grossing films of all time.
Avatar (2009) and its long-gestating 2022 sequel Avatar: The Way of Water are the number one and three top box office movies of all time, with director and writer James Cameron confirming three more to come in the series after the second’s $2.3bn success.
Saldaña was 28 when she made Avatar, and has now revealed how old she will be by the time the final film is released.
‘I think, if all goes to plan, I’m going to be 53, 54 for the fifth and very last one,’ she confirmed on Deadline’s latest episode of The Actor’s Side, released on Monday.
Three more Avatar films ahead
Responding to host Pete Hammond’s amazement at her 26-year dedication to the franchise, she added: ‘It’s a gift to be able to revisit a character that has given me so much, to revisit a place that has been so magical – not just for me, but for so many people around the world.’
The third movie, Avatar: Fire and Ash, is set for release in December this year, almost three years to the day after Avatar: The Way of Water.
Disney confirmed this release for the movie through subsidiary studio Searchlight Pictures in 2023, delaying it by a year from its anticipated 2024 arrival after it was filmed back-to-back with The Way of Water.
The expected release dates of all Avatar movies have also already been confirmed – and it seems Saldaña’s maths still more or less fits in with that.
Avatar 4 is anticipated to land on December 21, 2029 – when the actress is 51 – while the most recent release date for Avatar 5 was December 19, 2031, 22 years after the first Avatar movie, and when Saldaña will be 53.
Discussing what’s next for Sam Worthington and her characters in Avatar, the Lioness star shared: ‘The challenge for Jake and Neytiri in this next instalment of Fire and Ash for Avatar is they’re going to be really tested in the most unimaginable way for parents to be tested.
‘They’re going to have to make these strong choices – do we stay together and continue to fight for all our existing children, or do we just give up and you go with you beliefs somewhere else and I’ll go with my beliefs somewhere else, and we’ll just see what comes of the children?’
‘In a way, even though they’re set upon this amazing planet of Pandora, a moon of Polyphemus, they’re still such a universal family that are trying to figure so much out,’ she added of the film’s sci-fi setting.
In The Way of Water, oldest son Neteyam (Jamie Flatters) dies in the climactic battle while trying to rescue his adoptive human brother Spider (Jack Champion) from the RDA.
Jake and Neytiri also share adopted daughter Kiri (Sigourney Weaver), son Lo’ak (Britain Dalton) and daughter Tuktirey (Trinity Bliss).
Avatar: Fire and Ash will hit cinemas on December 19, 2025.
Zoe Saldaña, 46, reveals age she’ll be for final Avatar movie after starting at 28