New Photo: “Avatar: Fire and Ash”

There have been various bits of concept art so far, but what appears to be the first official still from James Cameron’s “Avatar: Fire and Ash” has been released via Empire Magazine.

The show teases the return of Payakan, the whale-like tulkun who was outcast from his own society. The emotional rebel warrior whale, who could communicate, formed a special bond with Jake Sully’s middle child Lo’ak.

VFX supervisor and executive producer Richard Baneham says the whale “turned out to be one of the most popular characters” from the second film. While always a part of the third, his presence was beefed up given the audience response: “The reaction emboldened us to go forward and play Payakan at the very highest level.”

In the new film Payakan now has a female tulkun friend, a fellow outcast named Ta’nok, and the pair even have their own character dynamic. There are also more insights into the tulkun societal structure, including the inclusion of clan leaders, Matriarchs, and Patriarchs.

The photo follows on from a successful screening of the first footage from the new movie at CinemaCon, that clip showing off the Ash Tribe and Wind Traders in several action sequences, one of which sees a Fire person fighting Neytiri and yelling at her “Your goddess has no dominion here”.

Cameron is still finishing “Avatar: Fire and Ash” which opens in cinemas on December 19th.

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