New Details Emerge About Avatar Special Edition DVD/Blu-Ray

Disc Announcements, News

While the recent rerelease of Avatar in theaters may not have made quite as big of a box office splash as James Cameron had been hoping for, there is still a healthy number of fans (myself included) who are waiting patiently for the release of an Avatar special edition Blu-ray and DVD.

We’ve already reported that the upcoming collection will include 16 minutes of new footage — including the film’s restored opening set on Earth. Now, Bleeding Cool is reporting that the upcoming Avatar Special Edition will include two minutes of test footage of an aborted project from James Cameron.

Quite a few years back, Cameron optioned the book Brother Termite by Patricia Anthony. The novel is a sci-fi comedy told from the point-of-view of a leader of extraterrestrials who have infiltrated the U.S. government. A script was writen by John Sayles (the original Piranha, The Howling and The Spiderwick Chronicles). The project never quite took off beyond the pre-production stage but the upcoming Avatar special edition will include test footage from Cameron’s early work on the film.

Brother Termite was the first stepping stone in Cameron’s development of the performance capture technology he would later go on to use in Avatar. The footage from Brother Termite will apparently include an early test of this technology. Whether this means we’ll see half-realized creature designs or just footage of actors making faces while covered in dots is yet to be seen.

Other special features discovered to have been included in the special edition are 68 minutes of deleted/unfinished scenes, production featurettes (“Sculpting Avatar”, “The Amp Suit”, “Na’vi Costumes”, “Speaking Na’Vi” and “Pandora Flora”) and several other production diaries and mini-documentaries.

The special edition of Avatar will be available to own on DVD and Blu-ray on November 16. A 3D version of the Blu-ray will be bundled exclusively with the Panasonic 3D Viera Plasma TV in early December and won’t be made available on its own until probably 2011.

Robert Saucedo is an avid movie watcher with seriously poor sleeping habits. The Mikey from Life cereal of film fans, Robert will watch just about anything — good, bad or ugly. He has written about film for newspapers, radio and online for the last 10 years. This has taken a toll on his sanity — of that you can be sure. Follow him on Twitter at @robsaucedo2500.