'avatar' sequels cast adds edie falco as evil general

_Avatar 2 _ may have its bad guy. 20th Century Fox announced Wednesday that Edie Falco (_Nurse Jackie_, _ The Sopranos_) will join the cast of the _ Avatar _ sequels. Falco will be playing

General Ardmore, commander of the RDA forces. "Edie Falco is one of the greats," director James Cameron tweeted. "I can't wait to watch her kick some ass on the big

screen." In the _ Avatar _ future mega-corporations, often more powerful than governments, control extra-planetary resources with private armies. Falco's character, General

Ardmore, is a commander for the Resources Development Administration—a gigantic corporation with the exclusive exploitation rights to the planet of Pandora. Sure, Jake Sully (Sam

Worthington) and Neytiri (Zoe Saldana) successfully rebelled against the RDA in the first _ Avatar_, but you didn't think they'd give up that easily, right? Falco's Ardmore is

the one sent to take it back. Falco joins other cast members new to the _ Avatar _ series, including Oona Chaplin (_Game of Thrones_), David Thewlis (_Naked_, _ Wonder Woman_) and Kate

Winslet, who will play a Na'vi with close ties to the ocean named Ronal. Filming has already begun on the _ Avatar _ sequels. Returning cast members include Worthington, Saldana and

Sigourney Weaver as Dr. Grace Augustine. Many other Na'vi and human characters will also be back to flesh out the sequel cast, including CCH Pounder as Mo'at and Giovanni Ribisi

and Dileep Rao. Surprisingly, Stephen Lang will also return as _ Avatar _ villain Colonel Miles Quaritch, even though he was killed in the first movie. It seems the Tree of Souls on Pandora

stores and, somehow, recreates people who have died on the planet's surface. "I'm not going to say exactly how we're bringing him back, but it's a science fiction

story, after all. His character will evolve into really unexpected places across the arc of our new three-film saga," Cameron told _ Deadline Hollywood _ in 2013. Maybe Quaritch

won't be the villain this time? While little is known about the plot of the _ Avatar _ sequels, new performance capture technology designed for underwater filming was created for _

Avatar 2_, suggesting that Pandora's oceans will be a big part of at least the first _ Avatar _ sequel. While it's been a long time since the 2009 original, Cameron claims people

will fall back in love with the series, telling _ Vanity Fair _ in 2017, "If you loved the first movie, you're going to love these movies, and if you hated it, you're probably

going to hate these. If you loved it at the time, and you said later you hated it, you're probably going to love these." _Avatar 2 _ will be out in theaters December 18, 2020 and

is just the first of several planned sequels, with _ Avatar 3_ following in 2021, _ Avatar 4 _ in 2024 and _ Avatar 5 _ in 2025.