James Cameron really doesn’t like Marvel or DC movies

James Cameron, who will subject audiences to five Avatar sequels, really doesn’t like Marvel or DC movies.

James Cameron thinks there’s no character depth in Marvel and DC flicks. Picture Rohan Kelly

In case you weren’t aware, James Cameron really, really doesn’t like Marvel or DC movies. They really get in his craw.

Cameron has doubled down on his curmudgeonly crusade against Marvel and DC, hitting out at the franchises while on the promotional tour for his Avatar sequel, The Way of Water.

Cameron contextualises his comment by referencing the 15-year time lapse since the first movie and the fact the characters played by Zoe Saldana and Sam Worthington are now parents, which changes the level of risk they’re willing to take.

“As a parent of five kids, I’m saying, ‘What happens when those characters mature and realise that they have a responsibility outside their own survival?’, Cameron said to The New York Times.

“When I look at these big, spectacular films – I’m looking at you, Marvel and DC – it doesn’t matter how old the characters are, they all act like they’re in college. They have relationships, but they really don’t.

“They never hang up their spurs because of their kids. The things that really ground us and give us power, love, and a purpose? Those characters don’t experience it, and I think that’s not the way to make movies.”

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James Cameron on the set of the first of five planned Avatar sequels.

Now, not to be a pedant, but there’s every possibility Cameron hasn’t watched all the Marvel movies – and in his defence, there are so very many of them, 29 at present. So he may not know any better.

But if he did, Cameron might catch on that Iron Man/Tony Stark’s character arc in Avengers: Endgame was centred on the choices he had to make as a father to his daughter Morgan.

And as for hanging up their spurs for their kids, that’s exactly what Hawkeye/Clint Barton did before they were disappeared by Thanos’ snapture. His grief over his loss drove his years-long murderous vigilante rampage as Ronin.

There’s also Ant-Man/Scott Lang, who has a well-developed relationship with his daughter Cassie. Cassie is to be a main character in the upcoming Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.

Tony Stark’s fatherhood was a critical point in his character arc. Picture: Marvel

It’s not the first time Cameron has taken a shot at superhero flicks. In 2018 he said he hoped audiences would soon tire of Avengers movies because “there are other stories to tell” – you know, like five more Avatar movies.

He also said praise for Patty Jenkins and Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman was “misguided” and that it was a “step backwards” because the character was, in his view, overly sexualised.

Jenkins wasn’t having it. At the time, she responded, “James Cameron’s inability to understand what Wonder Woman is, or stands for, to women all over the world is unsurprising as, though he is a great filmmaker, he is not a woman.

“If women have to always be hard, tough and troubled to be strong, and we aren’t free to be multidimensional or celebrate an icon of women everywhere because she is attractive and loving, then we haven’t come very far, have we?

“There is no right and wrong kind of powerful woman.”

Of course, Cameron is entitled to his opinion.

Just as we are to ours – like the tragedy of a once-great filmmaker responsible for some of the most iconic moments in cinema history having nothing more to offer than Avatar sequels.