She’s part of two of the biggest franchises on the planet, “Avatar” and “Fast and Furious,” but actress Michelle Rodriguez says she doesn’t think she should return to the former as it doesn’t make storytelling sense.
The actress starred in the 2009 film as combat pilot Trudy Chacón who worked for the government Avatar Program and died in battle – sacrificing her life to support the Na’vi of Pandora.
But she has denied appearing again in the franchise and, as she tells Vanity Fair, she explained why to “Avatar: The Way of Water” director James Cameron himself:
“Dude, when I saw Jim [Cameron] recently, he was like, ‘I was thinking, ‘What if Michelle came back? A lot of the other characters came back. I was like, ‘You can’t do that – I died as a martyr.'”
Part of the reason she turned it down is that she has already been resurrected from the dead at least three times on-screen in other franchises. She explained to Cameron:
“I came back in ‘Resident Evil,’ I wasn’t supposed to. I came back in ‘Machete,’ I wasn’t supposed to. I came back with ‘Letty’ [Fast & Furious] I wasn’t supposed to. We can’t do a fourth [time]. That would be overkill!”
She goes on to say that Hollywood often isn’t sure what to do with her if she’s not serving as someone’s love interest or isn’t defined by a relationship:
“I don’t understand. It’s so weird. I guess they don’t know what to do with the girl who doesn’t have a boyfriend. ‘She doesn’t have a boyfriend. Should we keep her alive or kill her?'”
Rodriguez can currently be seen in “Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves,” which begins previews tonight and will go head to head with “John Wick: Chapter 4” in cinemas this weekend.
