James Cameron has made a career out of proving people wrong and doing the impossible, but he’s really set himself a difficult task with Alita: Battle Angel: Turning a live-action film based on a manga into an international blockbuster.

Cameron didn’t direct Alita, but he was heavily involved in the film’s development as writer and producer. (Sin City’s Robert Rodriguez directed the movie.) After recent high-profile flops like Ghost in the Shell and Netflix’s Death Note, which both garnered far more negative press than headlines, Cameron and Rodriguez will look to turn things around with Alita, which follows the adventures of a futuristic robot on a journey of self-discovery.

Here’s the official synopsis:

From visionary filmmakers James Cameron (AVATAR) and Robert Rodriguez (SIN CITY), comes ALITA: BATTLE ANGEL, an epic adventure of hope and empowerment. When Alita (Rosa Salazar) awakens with no memory of who she is in a future world she does not recognize, she is taken in by Ido (Christoph Waltz), a compassionate doctor who realizes that somewhere in this abandoned cyborg shell is the heart and soul of a young woman with an extraordinary past. As Alita learns to navigate her new life and the treacherous streets of Iron City, Ido tries to shield her from her mysterious history while her street-smart new friend Hugo (Keean Johnson) offers instead to help trigger her memories. But it is only when the deadly and corrupt forces that run the city come after Alita that she discovers a clue to her past - she has unique fighting abilities that those in power will stop at nothing to control. If she can stay out of their grasp, she could be the key to saving her friends, her family and the world she's grown to love.

Alita: Battle Angel opens in theaters on December 21, where in an irony of ironies, it will compete at the box office with the movie version of Aquaman. (On the TV show Entourage, James Cameron directed a big-budget version of Aquaman that became a massive hit for its star, Vincent Chase.)

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