Avatar: The Way of Water

[Wor-Gar]

There was an article by cinemablend last year in which I believe he stated he had filmed most of 3 already. I’m sure they’ll do reshoots as with every movie but I doubt it’ll be anything that changes the story drastically.

He steals so much of his stories, hodge-podges of other films, even his own, I guess it won't much matter.

I mean, what's the story for Avatar 2? Looks like Avatar meets Titanic/Abyss.

 

[csutkakoma]

I personally liked Avatar. It is not Cameron's best work but the movie and Cameron himself is still (even if he is not the same director anymore) lightyears ahead of almost every today's Hollywood movies and directors. He can still make the most basic story compelling and fun. At least this is how I see it.

Also don't really get the hate on forums for Avatar. It is a lot better than anything Marvel put out. I can't wait for the second one. However I agree it probably won't make as much money sadly. But we will see.

 

[abake]

Meh.
Looks pretty, but that's about it. Seems like a rehash of the first one, which wasn't terribly original to start with, wait, strike that, it was completely unoriginal.
I suppose I'll go see it in the theatre just for the spectacle of it.

 

[Dark_Knight_89]

Just to regurgitate something I mentioned in the unpopular movie opinions thread;

With respect; the argument that Avatar follows similar plot threads to Pocahontas and Dances With Wolves is a weak point and irrelevant for me. People will whine and moan about how it "rips off" other stories, like Pocahontas, Dances with Wolves, Fern Gully: The Last Rainforest, The Last Samurai, etc. Here's a question those decriers climb over one another to avoid; how can all those other films work, but not this one? Is there a magic limit that was reached where stories like this cease to function?

 

[ironwez20]

There was an article by cinemablend last year in which I believe he stated he had filmed most of 3 already. I’m sure they’ll do reshoots as with every movie but I doubt it’ll be anything that changes the story drastically.

Lol if this bombs then the third will go on Disney plus and Cameron will have a meltdown

 

[ironwez20]

I personally liked Avatar. It is not Cameron's best work but the movie and Cameron himself is still (even if he is not the same director anymore) lightyears ahead of almost every today's Hollywood movies and directors. He can still make the most basic story compelling and fun. At least this is how I see it.

Also don't really get the hate on forums for Avatar. It is a lot better than anything Marvel put out. I can't wait for the second one. However I agree it probably won't make as much money sadly. But we will see.

I think the hate come from it being so big . If it wasn’t the best selling movie ever then people would love it more and gravitate to it.

 

[YoNoSe]

There's also the audience turnover that old people like me hate to acknowledge. I would guess most people in "target audience" range haven't read John Carter, etc. Star Wars was a brand new story when I saw it and it was my gateway drug into older films rather than a hodgepodge of influences.

 

[Darth Snoopy]

Great post.

 

[jye4ever]

I just can’t take these blue cat characters seriously.

 

[jedibear]

I just can’t take these blue cat characters seriously.

I think the blue cat characters should run around with the red bear toilet paper family from those commercials (the animation looks about the same). Now there's an environmentally friendly paring to pull at the heartstrings!

 

[Wor-Gar]

You might not be far off. Clearly they run into the Turquoise People, who don't think too highly of the Darker Blue People.

But in the end, against the odds, they are all still.... Blue.

As is Water.

Poetry.

 

[Mandible]

The backpedaling has already begun from Cameron himself.

They will only make 4 & 5 if 2 & 3 are financially successful. If not, he'll wind up the story in 3. He went on to say the movies are hideously expensive to make, the world is a different place from when they released the original, etc, etc.

If he's openly saying this in interviews, my guess is 2 isn't trending well (or should I say, well enough to make the corporate ******* happy).

 

[MeatHookGekko]

Just to regurgitate something I mentioned in the unpopular movie opinions thread;

With respect; the argument that Avatar follows similar plot threads to Pocahontas and Dances With Wolves is a weak point and irrelevant for me. People will whine and moan about how it "rips off" other stories, like Pocahontas, Dances with Wolves, Fern Gully: The Last Rainforest, The Last Samurai, etc. Here's a question those decriers climb over one another to avoid; how can all those other films work, but not this one? Is there a magic limit that was reached where stories like this cease to function?

This is a really interesting question. Lots of depth to it. I'm glad you asked it because the types of responses would vary and they would all have some reasonable points to them.

My take is the the best way to see basic writers convention is to watch pilot episodes of TV shows. Most of them are not great at all. But they have to check off a ton of boxes to drive the audience into the complexity of a story that's already mostly unfolded in the lives of the main characters in progress.

It should say something that now when a "prestige" TV series drops now, it's rarely just one episode. Often it's 2-3 episodes that form a type of multi-pilot because there is so much ground to cover.

So for classic storytelling, i.e. the "Hero's Journey", in order for a young upstart to transition from naive, foolish and reckless into competent and wise, the older mentor character has to die. In The Godfather, clearly Don Vito and Sonny have to die at some point for Michael to rise into power and develop. Same for the Lion King, the foolish son and then Mufasa. Same for Star Wars, Obi Wan had to bite it for Luke to be forced to venture out alone and untethered so he could grow as a person and as a leader.

I consider Slumdog Millionaire to be a brilliant film. But if you break it down, it's just a live action fairy tale. It doesn't mean it can't move an audience and tell a good story, but the themes inside are timeless.

James Cameron stays in his wheelhouse, he sticks to very battle tested fundamental storytelling, he infuses his own scripts, often with horrible dialogue, but he knows how to give spectacle and adventure. It would be unfair to ask Cameron to do what Spielberg does ( i.e. gentle audience emotional manipulation)

Feature films have a limited amount of time, they need to hit certain standard check boxes for basic writing convention, thus most of what people see is usually predictable. I know what pizza tastes like, it doesn't stop me from loving it if I eat another slice of really good pizza.

I suspect a lot of criticism that Cameron gets is that it's expected at this point that his films will be ground breaking with every new release. He staggers his films with big gaps, he's extremely arrogant, and he's managed to surpass expectations more often than not. Where I figured out Cameron is a good storyteller was not Titanic nor Avatar nor Terminator, it was True Lies. That film really highlighted most of the best elements of what Cameron can bring to the screen. He'd probably be a great filmmaker for comedy, but he's just too arrogant to do anything else but grand spectacle.

I believe most people overestimate complaints when it comes to mass entertainment. A handful of people saying horrible things to Rose Marie Tran doesn't mean the entire Star Wars fanbase are full of terrorists and hateful people. Personally I think most people enjoy Cameron's films and leave it there. He's not Kurosawa, but he's not trying to be. Cameron's films are like eating Taco Bell for most people. In your mouth one day, and out the other side by the next morning.

 

[Khev]

The backpedaling has already begun from Cameron himself.

They will only make 4 & 5 if 2 & 3 are financially successful. If not, he'll wind up the story in 3. He went on to say the movies are hideously expensive to make, the world is a different place from when they released the original, etc, etc.

If he's openly saying this in interviews, my guess is 2 isn't trending well (or should I say, well enough to make the corporate ******* happy).

Yep, he's preblaming the "pandemic" and "streaming services" for any underperformance of Avatar 2 despite NWH and TGM utterly demolishing that excuse already.

“We’re in a different world now than we were when I wrote this stuff, even,” Cameron added. “It’s the one-two punch – the pandemic and streaming. Or, conversely, maybe we’ll remind people what going to the theatre is all about. This film definitely does that. The question is: how many people give a **** now?”

https://deadline.com/2022/11/james-...way-of-water-sequel-underperforms-1235166201/
TGM was in first run theaters from May until November but we need James Cameron to remind people what going to the theater is all about? Okay Jim...

 

[Khev]

I just can’t take these blue cat characters seriously.

I think that Jake and Neytiri still look cool but their kids look silly.

That said the 3D preview at the end of the Avatar re-release did look spectacular.

One thing I didn't mention after that viewing though was that after 3 years of no 3D movies both me and my kids left the theater with headaches so apparently it takes a bit of reacclimation. Hopefully the 3+ hour runtime of the new one doesn't induce full on migraines, lol.

 

[HAL9000.]

There's no such thing as a new idea. Even 'ground breaking' movies like Star Wars, The Matrix, Harry Potter etc all follow the hero's journey, tropes, and rags-to-riches themes. There's good reason for that: because they work well, and always will.

Personally, I think Cameron left it way too long. I saw Avatar a couple of times in the theatre, and the computer graphics + 3D made it a spectacle back then. The story telling wasn't great, IMO. Now we're all used to CGI, the story would have to be stellar, and I doubt it will be. I'm not sold on the water setting either. I get heavy uncanny valley vibes from the trailers. Hope I'm wrong. After all, Terminator 2 was freaking awesome.

 

[screamingmetal]

The trailer did nothing for me. Very sappy for a bunch of blue cat people I wasn't all that enamored with in the first movie. I think I liked the look and 3D of the first movie more than anything.
I side with the humans, was there ever a fan edit of Avatar that let the humans win and bomb that stupid glowing tree?

 

[Wor-Gar]

The movie will likely be called out for its democratic take on things and suddenly Cameron will have made a "political movie" with blue cats.

 

[Wor-Gar]

There's no such thing as a new idea. Even 'ground breaking' movies like Star Wars, The Matrix, Harry Potter etc all follow the hero's journey, tropes, and rags-to-riches themes. There's good reason for that: because they work well, and always will.

This is very true. The problem comes when a storyteller borrows too much from a movie itself instead of the broad structural road map (i.e. the Hero's Journey).

 

[Khev]

This is very true. The problem comes when a storyteller borrows too much from a movie itself instead of the broad structural road map (i.e. the Hero's Journey).

But even borrowing specific story points beat for beat can still be immensely satisfying if the characters are likable and the stakes are exciting like we saw with TGM so if Avatar 2 doesn't deliver Cameron won't have any excuse beyond himself. Especially with a decade of fine-tuning the "story" and having a blank check to achieve whatever he wants on screen.