James Cameron notoriously takes his time in bringing his big-screen spectaculars to theaters – it took twelve years for the Oscar winning filmmaker to follow-up his mega-blockbuster Titanic (1997) with mega-blockbuster Avatar (2009) after all. He’s toiling away on a return to Pandora and, expectantly, that has been a slow progress. It was previously reported that Avatar 2 (which will expand into a multi-film franchise) wasn’t going to make a rumored 2018 release, but new word has risen on the status of the feature from actress and Cameron-regular Sigourney Weaver.

While speaking to The Hollywood Reporter at a screening for her upcoming feature The Assignment on Monday evening, the 3-time Oscar nominated veteran performer stated:

We’re starting! We’re starting training, and we’re starting — hm, I probably can’t say anything. We will be actually shooting it by the fall.

Weaver also mentioned, “I’m now starting the process of active prep. I’ll be working with the actors in the capture volume in August, so I’m booked in production every day between now and then” and further spoke on the progress, “I’m telling you, these scripts are so amazing. I’m not worried about [disappointing fans] at all. Am I worried about how we’re going to bring them to life? Yes, because they’re so ambitious. They’re so worth it. They’re well worth waiting for. I’m not worried about that at all. We’re trying to get it done as quickly as possible.”

While the Christmas 2018 release is certainly out of the question, Weaver’s comments spark an immediacy to the progress of Avatar 2, hopefully to the delight of fans of the film – Avatar is currently all-time worldwide box office record holder, having earned $2.7 billion at the global box office. Confirmed to return are actors Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana and Stephen Lang. Cameron along with Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver, Josh Friedman, and Shane Salerno penned the follow-up scripts.

Stay tuned.