Avatar star and sci-fi pioneer Sigourney Weaver has been discussing her surprising role in the upcoming sequel, Avatar: The Way of Water, with a new image possibly offering further clues regarding her Na’vi character. Speaking with EW, Weaver described her role in Avatar: The Way of Water, which finds the 72-year-old actress starring as the adopted teenage daughter of Jake and Neytiri, as the “biggest stretch” she has ever undergone as a performer.

Weaver felt an instant understanding for the character, with the actress herself having experienced her own award adolescence as a nearly six-foot-tall 11-year-old. “I was 5’ 10” or 5’ 11” when I was 11,” Weaver has said previously. Thus, she “felt strongly that Kiri would feel awkward a lot of the time,” Weaver added. “She’s searching for who she is. I was thrilled to be given that challenge by Jim.”

“So Avatar I can’t really talk about, but I would say that it’s the biggest stretch I get to play in every possible way. I think if Jim Cameron didn’t know me really well, he wouldn’t have cast me as something as goofy as this. I had to work in a completely different way to play this character, a very physical way.”

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The actress offered details of the training that was required for the role, which included “a lot of parkour. We had to do burpees. We had to do freediving.”

Sigourney Weaver will play Kiri in Avatar: The Way of Water, the adoptive teenage daughter of our heroes Jake and Neytiri. Since this revelation, several theories have since emerged positing that Kiri is in fact the reincarnation of Dr. Grace Augustine, Weaver’s character from the first Avatar, who has been resurrected by Eywa. While this is still just a theory, a new image from the sequel has teased that there could be some truth to it…

Is Kiri a Reincarnated Grace Augustine?

     20th Century Studios

This latest image from Avatar: The Way of Water could finally be confirmed that Kiri is indeed the reincarnated Grace Augustine, the human character played by Weaver in Avatar and who takes the side of the Na’vi before dying during the conflict. The image finds Kiri and Grace in the same shot, with the former seemingly looking at a video recording of the latter. Could this be when she realizes who she once was?

While we wait and see whether Kiri and Grace are indeed connected (they have to be, right?) we do know that Avatar: The Way of Water will introduce audiences to Jake and Neytiri’s new family. Set more than a decade after the events of the first film, Avatar: The Way of Water begins to tell the story of the Sully family, the trouble that follows them, the lengths they go to keep each other safe, the battles they fight to stay alive, and the tragedies they endure.

Directed by James Cameron, Avatar: The Way of Water stars Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldaña, Stephen Lang, Giovanni Ribisi, Joel David Moore, Dileep Rao, CCH Pounder, Matt Gerald, Sigourney Weaver, Kate Winslet, Cliff Curtis, Edie Falco, Brendan Cowell, Michelle Yeoh, Jemaine Clement, Oona Chaplin, Vin Diesel, and CJ Jones.

Avatar: The Way of Water is due for release on December 16, 2022.