As opposed to the other Avatar, which explicitly features Inuit and mesoamerican cultures resisting literal fascist, genocidal regimes. And deconstructs the “chosen one” trope while they’re at it. And (as of now) uses culturally appropriate VAs.

It's a white saviour rehash. Classic movie trope in the USA and yes it is incredibly insulting.

My favorite movie about an Indigenous person taking on an invading and/or colonizing force is Prey. No white savior there.

I completely agree with you. Cameron always gets so triggered whenever he's faced with this criticism as well, like all rich white American liberals. He doesn't even try to hide these views because he's so incredibly clueless:

In an interview with The Guardian in 2010, Cameron said the Lakota Sioux Nation was a "hopeless" and "dead-end society".

The interview was prompted by Cameron's visit to the Xingu tribe, located in the Amazon, who were fighting against the development of the Belo Monte hydroelectric dam.

During his time there he witnessed cultural ceremonies.

"I felt like I was 130 years back in time, watching what the Lakota Sioux might have been saying at a point when they were being pushed and they were being killed and they were being asked to displace," he said.

He noted that 'this was the driving force' in creating Avatar.

"I couldn't help but think that if [the Lakota Sioux] had had a time-window and they could see the future… and they could see their kids committing suicide at the highest suicide rate in the nation... because they were hopeless and they were a dead-end society – which is what is happening now – they would have fought a lot harder." Source

There's a reason it's commonly known as "dances with smurfs"

He thinks he's worldbuilding. It's fucking Propaganda

People watch Avatar because of the bleeding edge CG. It's not a unique story. It never has been. It's Pocahontas. It's Dances with Wolves. It's Fern Gully. It's A Man Called Horse.

Theyre all similar stories. Foreign heroes saving the "savage" local population that can't defend themselves from the technology, while learning about them along the way.

The story isn't why people go to watch Avatar.

tbf, when I actually watched movies I never cared about the plot before hand anyways. I'm there to experience it while it's playing, not learn about it beforehand, see trailers, hear what the movie is about then go watch it. it just ruins the movies

now since I can't get away from the world spoiling movies constantly, even in commericals about them.. and corporations just remaking stuff and having zero creativity, I completely stopped watching all movies/tv shows.

haven't seen a movie since like 2020 I'd say. no plans to even see another. nothing is interesting.

It's the movie equivalent of a roller coaster ride, so people see it because it's fun

The first doesn't really (and the thread they "re-opened" to connect the sequel is pretty bad), but the second one does leave a couple things open.

In general, the second one does improve a bit on the criticisms of the first movie. Not enough to make it great or special IMO, but at least it's a bit better.

Lol seriously! Found out today that someone I'm loosely related to's husband was a big fan boy of this "universe(?)", right after I made a captain planet joke about them. I didn't say anything, but I was just thinking "there's been two movies and some mediocre games¿" Just like tilting my head sideways, mouth agape and all.

Not mine. The Avatar crap was too boring to even watch at home.

The water one had a dogshit story. How often did one of Jakes braindead children get themselves caught? 4? 5?

Yeah, we had Forest Avatar and Ocean Avatar. Now we have Fire Avatar, which still leaves room for Earth Avatar and Wind Avatar before they have to go fight the space cats.

Each one will have the same story, but still get stretched to 4 hours.

Doesn't make enough money could still be hundreds of millions in profits.

Books don't require budgets that exceed those of cities.

You don't think the 'not-airbenders' were the ones who lived in trees on floating mountains and rode giant flying things?

IMO it's the cave-dwelling Na'vi we're still missing.

An absolutely blasphemous statement, and yet I can find no lies here.

I think that's more of a reflection of the non-linear technological leaps rather than effort/creativity on the part of the filmmakers. No modern CGI films really wow me in the same way the big features from the 2000s did.

A lot of the advancements right now are "smaller" (or maybe "background") enhancements. That basically just add to the overall look but don't necessarily stand out on there own.

The first avatar was a 'generational' leap in cgi work and compositing etc. The 2nd is more 'iterative'

I'd suggest you check out Corridor Crew on Youtube - they have a series called VFX artists react where they check out the good (and bad) work done in movies. A couple which feature stuff from the Avatar movies.

The videos are relatively short (probably averages around 20 minutes), informative and entertaining.