Almost 10 years after James Cameron’s original Avatar, the sequel is finally… uh, three years away from premiering.

The head-scratching and very long-winded case of the Avatar movie series continues. Following the box office success of the 2009 original, James Cameron has been working on not one, but four sequels that will be filmed back to back, and are set to be released in the period of 2020-2025.

And after an extensive pre-production period, principal photography has finally begun, according to Deadline.

Related: Fear the Walking Dead star Cliff Curtis joins James Cameron’s Avatar sequels

The budget for the four films is even more astonishing than imagining ourselves in the cinema in 2025: it will allegedly exceed $1 billion. But considering that 20th Century Fox is probably expecting a similar intake as the original’s $2.7 billion box office haul, this is basically pocket change!

One also has to consider that Cameron is basically building an entire new world in CGI; a lot can be said about the plot of Avatar, but it completely changed the game in terms of visual effects and 3D technology. I for one am very curious to see what they do with the sequels… if the world is still here when it finally premieres, of course.

The four Avatar sequels are set to be released on December 18, 2020, December 17, 2021, December 20, 2024 and December 19, 2025 respectively.

The movies will star Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver and Stephen Lang, with Cliff Curtis joining the cast as well.

We’ll be curious to see how this ambitious project progresses.