New York, Oct 10 (IANS): Director James Cameron and his team are now planning to expand their "Avatar" franchise through the comic book format.

At the New York Comic Con, Cameron and Dark Horse Comics announced a comic book series based on the "Avatar" movies.

Since the director couldn't attend the event, he recorded a special video message to make the announcement, reports aceshowbiz.com.

"I'm excited that starting now, even before the release of the first sequel, Dark Horse Comics will be bringing you new adventures from Pandora, covering the time before, during, and after the events of the original 'Avatar' film," Cameron said of the new comic book series.

"For the past 27 years, Dark Horse has been associated with my films 'The Terminator', 'Aliens', and 'The Abyss'. Now they're working directly with me and our team at Lightstorm in an unprecedented ten-year partnership that's going to create new stories that will take you deeper into the world of Avatar," he added.

Cameron is currently working on three follow-up movies to "Avatar" with Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Stephen Lang and Sigourney Weaver expected to return.

He is writing the scripts of the sequels alongside Rick Jaffa, Amanda Silver, Josh Friedman and Shane Salerno.

"Avatar 2" is expected to arrive in US in 2017.