Avatar 2: They're Blue (Da Ba Dee)

I remember watching the first Avatar film in the theatre, way back when 3D movies were new and exciting instead of something to be avoided. At the time I liked it — I’d never seen anything like it before. Like most people, though, the plot didn’t really stick with me, and all I can remember is that it was some sort of white saviour story in space.

Well, I saw the sequel: Avater: The Way of Water. I liked it! I have complaints, and no movie should ever be more than three hours, but I ended up having a good time.

Thoughts:

• The intro brings back humans attempting to colonize Pandora again. That undoes the ending of the first movie, but okay…
• And then it brings back the villain from the first movie. He’s now a Na’vi. He has a crew of fellow marines turned Na’vi. Okay…
• We then see Jake Sully lead an insurgency against the humans. Okay…

But then there’s a scare. Sully’s built himself a family, and his sons have to be rescued from the evil military folk. Thus he abandons the fight and takes his family to live among the ocean Na’vi, and then…

The movie opens up. We ditch the combat (mostly) in favour of watching his family try to fit into this new world. We get teen drama, endless beautiful ocean scenes, and talking whales.

And then, of course, the military crew shows up to ruin things. But by then it’d suckered me into caring about the kids, and it ends with a massive battle on a whaling ship.

All I can say is: James Cameron knows how to make a movie.