Ryder v. Cameron

In long-running copyright fight between author of science fiction story and director James Cameron and producers of Avatar film series, district court dismisses claims alleging that Avatar sequels copied from author’s work, finding no substantial similarity between protectable elements, and grants plaintiff leave to amend to allege intermediate-copying theory.

After a failed attempt at suing for copyright infringement on the original blockbuster motion picture Avatar, Eric Ryder, author of environmentally themed science-fiction story KRZ, sued director James Cameron and Lightstorm Entertainment, alleging that defendants copied from KRZ to create the second and third Avatar films.

Ryder worked on the initial drafts of KRZ between 1996 and 2001 and presented the project to Lightstorm in 2000 in the hopes it would be developed into a feature film. Lightstorm ultimately passed on the project in 2002. KRZ was based on Joseph Conrad’s novel Heart of Darkness and is set on Europa, an ice-clad moon of Jupiter, where a corporation called Malloc mines organisms called “Kahrs” from ocean vents beneath the moon’s surface using humans and android robots. In 1995, Cameron wrote a highly detailed script-length treatment in narrative form for an initial Avatar film, known as the “Scriptment.” At the time, Cameron held off on moving forward with the film because technology was not sufficiently developed to produce the film in the way he envisioned. In 2005, he determined that the technology had progressed enough and proceeded to write and direct Avatar 1, which premiered in 2009.

In 2011, Ryder sued Cameron and Lightstorm in Los Angeles Superior Court, alleging that Avatar 1 unlawfully appropriated ideas from the KRZ materials Ryder previously shared with Lightstorm. The Superior Court granted summary judgment in favor of Cameron and Lightstorm, holding that it was “undisputed that Avatar and KRZ are not substantially similar as a matter of law” and also that it was undisputed that Cameron had completed and circulated the Avatar predecessor script prior to the creation of KRZ or Lightstorm’s access to it. The California Court of Appeal affirmed the holding that Avatar and KRZ were not substantially similar as a matter of law (read our summary of the Court of Appeal decision here).

In 2013, Cameron relaunched his writers’ room to begin working on screenplays for four Avatar sequels. Avatar 2 premiered in December 2022, and Avatar 3 was released in December 2025. Ryder initially sued Cameron and Lightfoot in December 2025, and amended his complaint in April 2026. He brought claims for copyright infringement, alleging that defendants copied KRZ for Avatar 2 and 3, along with state law claims for breach of contract, breach of confidence, breach of implied contract and unfair competition. Defendants moved to dismiss, arguing that Ryder’s claims should be dismissed because neither of the sequels were substantially similar to KRZ, and concurrently filed an anti-SLAPP motion, seeking to strike Ryder’s state law claims.

Before delving into its copyright infringement analysis, the court found that the California Superior Court and California Court of Appeals decisions were subject to judicial notice.

The court first addressed Ryder’s argument that his copyright infringement claim independently rested on a theory of intermediate or literal copying, based on Cameron’s writers’ room notes. The court rejected this argument, finding that the amended complaint identified the theatrical releases of the sequels —not the creation of the notes—as the acts of infringement. The court distinguished its own prior decision in Alcon Entertainment, LLC v. Tesla, Inc., where the plaintiff had expressly pleaded two distinct theories of liability: an “end-product” theory of infringement arising from the image the AI system produced and a “literal copying” theory arising from feeding the copyrighted work itself into the AI image generator.

Turning to the end-product infringement, the court first assessed whether there were any non-protectable elements that it must filter out and disregard. In addition, the court excluded elements of the sequels that were merely carried forward from either the Scriptment, which pre-dated defendants’ access to KRZ, or Avatar 1, which was previously found not substantially similar to KRZ as a matter of law. The court accordingly limited its substantial similarity analysis to only genuinely new elements introduced in the sequels.

Applying this framework, the court examined the remaining elements across five categories and found no substantial similarity in any of them.

As to plot, the court found that although the sequels and KRZ shared certain general features, they were not substantially similar and did not give rise to a plausible inference of unlawful appropriation. The analysis focused on what Ryder identified as the “one major story element” at the center of his claim—the harvesting of an animal-based life-extending substance—and found that the specific expressions of “Kahrs” and “amrita” differ materially in their biological sources, harvesting mechanisms, visual presentation and narrative function. The court filtered out the general idea of a life-extending natural resource as a “well-known trope” across films and literature that pre-date KRZ. The court likewise rejected alleged similarities in other plot elements—including consciousness-transfer technology, character arcs involving shifting corporate allegiance, antagonist-protagonist confrontations and underwater action sequences—finding that each either originated in the Scriptment or Avatar 1, constituted unprotectable ideas or scènes à faire, or were expressed in materially different ways.

The court next addressed characters and dialogue, focusing on two allegedly similar character pairs, and found key differences in their respective roles, narrative functions and fates, which ultimately precluded a finding of substantial similarity. The court noted that Ninth Circuit precedent requires a “very high degree of similarity” between characters, and the alleged parallels here did not meet that standard.

With respect to the setting and mood, Ryder alleged that both works were set in a water environment and contain “marine oriented dramatic gimmicks,” including an illuminated 3D map depicting the underwater ecosystem, mini submarines, underwater walking submersibles and various deep sea sequences. The court found that the general idea of an aquatic setting was not protectable and that the more specific setting elements were either not actually substantially similar to elements in KRZ, were scènes à faire flowing from the aquatic premise or were already present in Avatar 1.

Similarly, with respect to themes, the court identified the shared themes—corporate greed, environmental preservation, spiritual interconnectedness and fear of colonization—as all present in the Scriptment and Avatar 1, and therefore not indicative of copying from KRZ.

Finally, the court rejected Ryder’s theory that even if individual elements were not substantially similar, their selection and arrangement created a protectable pattern that defendants copied. The court found that Ryder had not identified a specific, original arrangement shared by both works, and had instead “cherry-picked” broad similarities across roughly nine hours of film material while obscuring numerous differences between the works.

The court granted the motion to dismiss with leave to amend, noting that Ryder may attempt to allege an intermediate copying theory in an amended complaint. Because the federal copyright claim was dismissed, the court declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over the state law claims and denied defendants’ anti-SLAPP motion as moot.

Summary prepared by David Grossman and Elena De Santis