James Cameron has clarified that Michelle Yeoh will join his Avatar franchise in the fourth film.

The Everything Everywhere All at Once actress was photographed on the set of the Avatar series three years ago, leading many to believe that she would make her debut in the upcoming third film, Avatar: Fire and Ash.

However, Cameron clarified that Yeoh’s character Dr. Karina Mogue will actually make her first appearance in the untitled fourth film.

“Michelle Yeoh won’t be in 3. She’s in 4 and 5,” Cameron told Entertainment Weekly. “So that got a little bit misreported. She will be coming in soon to do her part, which is an interesting, fun character.

“We love Michelle. She was always a movie star, but she’s blown up into a huge, huge phenomenon. I look forward to working there.”

The Terminator filmmaker explained that he shot the second and third films at the same time as well as a portion of the fourth so that his young cast didn’t age too much.

“This whole thing has been planned for years and years. The scripts were all written years ago, through the end of movie 5,” he continued. “So we’ve been working on parts of 4 even as we go along, mostly because we’ve got this young cast. We had to shoot them all while they were still young.”

Late producer Jon Landau posted a photo of the Oscar-winning actress on set with Cameron in March 2021 and told his Instagram followers the snap was taken “between set-ups while filming Avatar 3”.

In addition, Yeoh confirmed to EW in 2022 that she “shot for a few weeks” in 2021 and “can’t wait to go back soon”.

Avatar: Fire and Ash is due to be released in December 2025, followed by Avatar 4 in 2029 and Avatar 5 in 2031.

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