Every James Cameron Movie Ranked by Rating: From Early Misfires to Genre-Defining Classics
December 19 belongs to James Cameron as Avatar: Fire and Ash ignites theaters worldwide, a thunderous return to Pandora from the filmmaker behind Terminator, The Abyss, Titanic, and the original Avatar.
James Cameron has a new one in theaters today, so yeah, it feels like the right moment to look back at the whole run. The guy went from flying fish to box-office history to ocean docs to blue aliens, and he rarely does anything halfway. Below is my worst-to-best rundown of every James Cameron movie based on ratings, with the where-to-watch and the numbers that got them here. And yes, there are a couple of weird curveballs in the mix.
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12. Piranha II: The Spawning (1982)
Cameron’s first credited feature is exactly as wild as it sounds: flying piranhas terrorize a tropical resort. It’s campy, it’s messy, and it’s the definition of a rough start that’s fascinating in hindsight.
Cast: Tricia O'Neil, Steve Marachuk, Lance Henriksen, Ted Richert, Ricky G. Paull, Leslie Graves
Rotten Tomatoes: 4% critics, 13% audience
IMDb: 3.8/10
Runtime: 1h 24m
Where to watch: Prime Video -
11. Avatar: Fire and Ash (2025)
The newest Avatar hits today, continuing Jake Sully’s saga as he and Neytiri try to keep their family alive with Colonel Miles Quaritch still hunting them. The Na'vi face fresh threats from the Ash People, and the fight for Pandora escalates.
Early critics are cooler on this one than the last two, at least so far. That could change as more reviews and audience scores roll in.
Cast: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Stephen Lang, Oona Chaplin
Rotten Tomatoes: 69% critics (so far)
IMDb: 7.6/10
Runtime: 3h 17m
Where to watch: In theaters -
10. Avatar: The Way of Water (2022)
Jake, Neytiri, and their kids flee to Pandora’s ocean clans to escape Quaritch, which lets Cameron go full deep-sea fantasy. It ends on a gut punch with the death of the Sullys’ eldest son and a looming war.
Cast: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Kate Winslet, Michelle Yeoh, Stephen Lang
Rotten Tomatoes: 76% critics, 92% audience
IMDb: 7.5/10
Runtime: 3h 12m
Where to watch: Disney+ -
9. The Abyss (1989)
An underwater sci-fi rescue mission turns into a marriage drama with a mysterious presence in the deep. The water work was groundbreaking, and the performances hold up.
Cast: Ed Harris, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, Michael Biehn, Kimberly Scott
Rotten Tomatoes: 76% critics, 83% audience
IMDb: 7.5/10
Runtime: 2h 19m
Where to watch: Disney+ -
8. True Lies (1994)
Arnold Schwarzenegger plays a superspy whose family thinks he’s a boring salesman. Big action, broad comedy, and Cameron flexing his blockbuster instincts.
Small note: the Rotten Tomatoes critic score here is cited two ways in the materials — 72% in the grid and 77% in the write-up — but either way, it sits in the mid-70s. Audience score is basically the same.
Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jamie Lee Curtis, Tom Arnold, Bill Paxton
Rotten Tomatoes: 72–77% critics, 76% audience
IMDb: 7.3/10
Runtime: 2h 21m
Where to watch: YouTube TV -
7. Ghosts of the Abyss (2003)
Cameron heads down to the actual Titanic wreck with custom cameras and brings back eerie, beautiful footage. It’s a documentary, not a narrative, but visually it delivers.
Cast: Bill Paxton, John Broadwater, James Cameron, Charles Pellegrino, Lewis Abernathy, Mike Cameron, Ken Marschall, Don Lynch
Rotten Tomatoes: 80% critics, 67% audience
IMDb: 6.8/10
Runtime: 59 min
Where to watch: Disney+ -
6. Avatar (2009)
The one that turned 3D into an event. Jake Sully, a disabled ex-Marine, embeds with the Na'vi and switches sides, and Pandora becomes the franchise’s main character. The scale and world-building pushed it into the all-time box-office stratosphere.
Cast: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Stephen Lang, Michelle Rodriguez, Sigourney Weaver
Rotten Tomatoes: 81% critics, 82% audience
IMDb: 7.9/10
Runtime: 2h 41m
Where to watch: Disney+ -
5. Aliens of the Deep (2005)
Cameron teams with a Russian research crew to film hydrothermal vents and the strange life around them. It’s science-forward, more curiosity than character — critics dug it, general audiences not as much.
Cast: James Cameron, Anatoly M. Sagalevitch, Genya Chernaiev, Victor Nischeta
Rotten Tomatoes: 84% critics, 49% audience
IMDb: 6.3/10
Runtime: 1h 40m
Where to watch: Disney+ -
4. Titanic (1997)
Jack, Rose, an iceberg, and a filmmaker swinging for the fences. It’s an old-school epic that blends romance and catastrophe, and it worked on a scale almost nobody else attempts.
Cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet, Billy Zane, Kathy Bates, Frances Fisher, Bernard Hill, Jonathan Hyde, Danny Nucci
Rotten Tomatoes: 88% critics, 69% audience
IMDb: 7.9/10
Runtime: 3h 14m
Where to watch: Disney+, Hulu -
3. The Terminator (1984)
The breakout. A relentless cyborg assassin hunts Sarah Connor, and Cameron’s lean, mean sci-fi thriller becomes a career launcher for him and an instant genre classic.
Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Michael Biehn, Linda Hamilton, Paul Winfield, Bill Paxton
Rotten Tomatoes: 90% critics, 89% audience
IMDb: 8.1/10
Runtime: 1h 47m
Where to watch: Prime Video, Roku -
2. Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
Bigger action, effects that still play, and a surprisingly tender arc between the T-800 and John Connor. It’s the rare sequel that most audiences rank above the original, and the scores back that up.
Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton, Edward Furlong, Robert Patrick
Rotten Tomatoes: 91% critics, 95% audience
IMDb: 8.6/10
Runtime: 2h 17m
Where to watch: PlutoTV, Paramount+ -
1. Aliens (1986)
Ripley goes back, marines in tow, and everything that could go wrong does. It’s muscular, intense, and gives Sigourney Weaver one of the defining action-hero performances. Critics and audiences are completely aligned here.
Cast: Sigourney Weaver, Michael Biehn, Carrie Henn, Paul Reiser
Rotten Tomatoes: 94% critics, 94% audience
IMDb: 8.4/10
Runtime: 2h 17m
Where to watch: Disney+
That’s the spread: early chaos, landmark sci-fi, a disaster epic, a couple of submarine detours, and one very big trip back to Pandora today. What’s your favorite?