When the audience last saw Pandora at the end of Avatar: The Way of Water, the Metkayina clan and the tulkun had won a decisive victory against the RDA, with Payakan destroying their intimidating SeaDragon ship during an oceanic fight and forcing the RDA to retreat. But as the upcoming Avatar: Fire and Ash resumes the story, the RDA have regrouped, recovered, and are ready to go.
This time, they have a ship that’s more than double the size of the SeaDragon — a huge Factory Ship (pictured above), which production designer Ben Procter explains is “essentially a moving oil platform that is designed to capture and process the tulkun on an industrial scale.” But these giant ships hold more than just industrial processing mechanisms. Procter shares, “Coming out of these vehicles is an army, and all of that leads into a war.”
The ensuing showdown will be on multiple fronts. “We’re going to see an airborne and water-borne battle for the ages, as the Pandoran forces and RDA clash in a really interesting environment,” says Procter. The fight will be “something of a scale, in terms of conflict, that we have not seen before.” The Pandoran troops will have to find a way to overcome obstacles bigger than anything they’ve ever faced — Procter teases that the battle that will make the finale of Avatar: The Way of Water seem like “nothing but a skirmish.”
Stay tuned to Avatar.com for all the latest news on Avatar: Fire and Ash, only in theaters December 19.
This information originally appeared in Empire magazine.
