Every now and then, when a high-profile 3D movie fails, critics predict that the process may finally be entering its second (or third if you count the 1970s boomlet) series of death throes.

The astonishingly sluggish performance of Mars Needs Moms– a flop on both sides of the Atlantic – has again set the wishful thinking in motion.

Desperate to further the case, pundits note that Toy Story 3, the biggest film of 2010, accrued a smaller than expected percentage of its takings from 3D screenings.

Well, James Cameron is having none of it. "Our strategic plan is to make 3D ubiquitous over the next five to 10 years on all platforms," the director of Avatartold the Hollywood Reporter.

He was speaking in his role as supremo of the Cameron-Pace Group, which seeks to persuade film-makers, broadcasters and games developers to utilise the new technologies.

“We are shifting from having to create 50 to 70 camera systems for movies to thousands of rigs that need to be got out there for the rapidly growing broadcasting business,” he continued. Cameron believes that, once technology emerges that enables viewers to experience the effects without wearing glasses, the “adoption curve [will] go ballistic”.

He may have a point. Nintendo has already pointed the way with its spectacle-free 3DS video game console.