Michelle Yeoh joined the filming of the “Avatar” sequels in 2019, but she will not appear until “Avatar 4” in 2029

Oscar winner Michelle Yeoh joined the filming of the Avatar sequels long ago (2019), but she will not appear in them until Avatar 4 in 2029.

James Cameron himself denied in an interview with Entertainment Weekly that the veteran actress will appear in next year’s Avatar: Fire and Ashes, refuting previous reports that she would play a role in the third sequel.

“Michelle Yeoh is not in the third one. She’s in the fourth and fifth… so it’s a bit of a false alarm. She’s going to show up very soon and play a fun, playful character. I mean, we’re kind of jumping the gun now. This whole thing has been in the planning for years and years,” he told Entertainment Weekly. Although we haven’t met Michelle Yeoh’s character yet and don’t know exactly what her role is, we’ve known her name for a while—Dr. Karina Mogue. Whether she’s the good guy or the bad guy of RDA remains to be seen (although she appears in this 2021 IG photo next to Giovanni Ribisi’s evil RDA boss), but it all but confirms that she won’t be another new Na’vi character.

“The scripts were all written years ago, leading up to the end of the fifth movie. So we’re doing that while we’re doing the fourth, mainly because we have a young cast. We have to get them all done while they’re still young,” Cameron added. After filming wrapped on Avatar: Water’s Way, it was reported that most of the cast would be filming Avatar 4, but it appears that much of the fourth film is still waiting to be filmed. Instead, Cameron and his team recently completed filming on the third film and then entered post-production. That said, considering the involvement of the young cast and Cameron’s confirmation that there will be a big jump in time once the fourth film begins, it makes sense that parts of Avatar: Water’s Way will be filming concurrently with principal photography on Avatar: Water’s Way.

Michelle Yeoh is obviously hotter than ever after winning an Oscar for All That Is, but she was already a major player in Hollywood in the years before starring in this fantastic film. Next, she played two major sci-fi roles in Star Trek: Precinct 31 (a spinoff of the Star Trek: Discovery series) and Prime Video’s Blade Runner 2099.

Avatar: Fire and Ash is currently set to hit theaters on December 19, 2025. Then, barring more delays (please don’t), it’ll be a pretty long wait until Avatar 4 hits theaters on December 21, 2029, and Avatar 5 will hit theaters two years later, on December 19, 2031. Yes, Cameron will direct all of these movies, unless he “gets hit by a bus” or something.