Dark Horse's next release in the franchise was Avatar: The Next Shadow on January 6th, 2021, a year after the supposed release date of The High Ground. During Lo'ak's ikran training session, Lo'ak falls off a cliff, frightening Jake although Neytiri insists the danger is part of the trial. Much better than the first volume since I could actually track what was happening (except for most of the battle since it would definitely make more sense on screen) and the art was a lot more consistent. They fire guns to the windows of a space ship (like guns are more powerful that all the pressure of the take off) and go through them and he people there don’t die?

The ship carrying Jake, Neytiri and Neteyam descends back to Earth, with RDA ships chasing after them.Akwey supports Jake's choice, though before the group can continue debating, it is noticed that Jake's children are gone, with the exception of Neteyam. Through flashbacks, it is revealed that Spider's mother Paz Socorro had died during the assault on Hometree. Despite this, Joshua Izzo clarified that all three issues of The High Ground are indeed canon, even mentioning, "James Cameron (my boss) says it's canon. It was decided to relaunch the Avatar: The High Ground script in the form of a graphic novel that tells the story of the Na'vi between Avatar and Avatar: The Way of Water.

Jake insists even though he is not human, he still feels he is a marine and that he is still like the Sky People. Eventually, he wrote a 130-page script to see if it works as a movie, but Cameron felt that it was missing a critical element for a sequel: "It didn’t go enough into the unexpected.Jake and Neytiri are horrified that their plan seems to have failed by this unexpected turn of events. Jake and Neytiri fly to Hell's Gate on their banshees to rescue the children with Neteyam following after them. Although the plan was quite interesting and intriguing, I did not really like the whole idea of this story.

Spider manages to escape his cell using a fire extinguisher to bash the windows, and he rescues the Sully children. Neytiri also tries to convince Jake that their people need hope, although Jake feels as if he is lying to his people.

After a large battle in space, Jake and Neytiri manage to get away, though Ardmore refuses to give up and proceeds to follow. The commotion lets Jake and Neytiri separate and, with Josh Winslow, they decide to find the ship's auxiliary weapons to threaten the other RDA ships. The item listing offered a little background information including that it was based on an early screenplay for Avatar: The Way of Water that was not used, and that it would be released in three volumes.