# A quick question about Avatar **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 7, 2010, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239 "2010-06-07T03:30:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Lunchy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/848f3c/32.png) [@Lunchy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lunchy)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 7:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/21 "2010-06-08T07:28:45Z")
It was "The Last Samurai’’ in space. 40 minutes longer. Not as good. ---
**Author:** ![Meyer6](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/cc9497/32.png) [@Meyer6](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meyer6)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/22 "2010-06-08T07:35:18Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > I can’t believe that anyone really demands originality of this level. What’s wrong with having ideas similar to previous movies? There’s barely a single movie made per year that can realistically be claimed to have been based on a unique idea. Why does this one get all the shit for it? It was more than just unoriginal (I agree that many plotlines can be traced to previous work, and it’s not always bad) - it was so incredibly predictable. You could see every plot point coming from miles away - there were no twists whatsoever. Every character was such a caricature they might as well have had signs around their neck - “nasty bad guy”, “sexy love interest”, “pencil-pushing weenie”. To my mind part of this stemmed from the cast - especially Sam Worthington\* and the lead female Navi. I liked Sigourney Weaver, but seeing her as a Navi was unsettling to me (especially the teeth for some reason). Neither of the leads were particularly good actors IMHO and I really wonder if they were chosen largely because they are relatively unfamiliar faces so they wouldn’t set off that ‘uncanny valley’ response. In any case, I found both of them lacking in subtlety. \*Yes, I know he’s been in other stuff, but he is less immediately recognized than, say, Matt Damon, who I heard was up for the role too. ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 10:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/23 "2010-06-08T10:28:04Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > I can’t believe that anyone really demands originality of this level. What’s wrong with having ideas similar to previous movies? There’s barely a single movie made per year that can realistically be claimed to have been based on a unique idea. Why does this one get all the shit for it? Because it copied an idea so corny and cliched that we’re sick of it. I’m going to litter my recyclables just to piss the environmentalists off. ---
**Author:** ![Superhal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Superhal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Superhal)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 10:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/24 "2010-06-08T10:32:07Z")
> [@Lunchy](#): > > It was "The Last Samurai’’ in space. 40 minutes longer. Not as good. Also, with the creepy nerve-molestation thing with animals. ---
**Author:** ![pancakes3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ba9def/32.png) [@pancakes3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pancakes3)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/25 "2010-06-08T12:04:18Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > I can’t believe that anyone really demands originality of this level. What’s wrong with having ideas similar to previous movies? There’s barely a single movie made per year that can realistically be claimed to have been based on a unique idea. Why does this one get all the shit for it? you can still present cliched ideas but present it in a fresh manner. star wars (original trilogy) is the classic example of repurposing old ideas, but doing so with enough “new idea” packaging that it seems fresh and new. also, the twists could have been better concealed and frankly, better written. instead, the story relies heavily on a series of coincidences: daring escape with the invalid, the pilot going rogue, the psycho-sarcophagi remaining safe, the large dragon beast being tamed and capable of taking down the heli-bomber, etc coupled with super-saccharin and hollywood endings of the bad guys getting defeated/exiled, jake staying alive, jake becoming permanently Navi’i, jake flipping from bitter/jaded marine to full fledged eco-terrorist committed to all things navi’i as well as clunky dialogue and yeah. you’re going to draw the ire of a lot of dopers. ---
**Author:** ![NinjaChick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/71c47a/32.png) [@NinjaChick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NinjaChick)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2010, 2:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/26 "2010-06-09T14:20:03Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > I can’t believe that anyone really demands originality of this level. What’s wrong with having ideas similar to previous movies? There’s barely a single movie made per year that can realistically be claimed to have been based on a unique idea. Why does this one get all the shit for it? There’s nothing wrong with reusing ideas - people have pretty much been doing that since shortly after humans mastered speech. However, you’ve got to add something new _to the story_. This was (to me anyway) a standard “white man meets natives, natives are kind and love the earth, white man turns on his own kind to live with natives.” Which was done most famously in Dances With Wolves and Pocahantas, but also continually pops up from time to time in any story where you’ve got Culture A (typically the white Christian Europeans, but generic earth men makes an appearance a lot in science fiction) showing up where Culture B lived. It can be a decent story. The problem (and again, this is just my opinion) comes down to the fact that none of the characters were really strong enough to make that story their own. Jake ends up doing what no Navi had done before? Well, give us more about what a super awesome, highly decorated Marine he was and/or some handwavium about how the Avatars can do some things that the true Navi can’t. The pilot chick decides to turn against her own people and helps save the day? Give us a reason to care about her - a clue about her motives, her past, etc. Again, I thought the very premise of the movie was a little bit shaky, because I didn’t see any real compelling reason for the Avatars. But it still could’ve told a good story had they said, "Okay, look, we’ve got the Avatars because that’s what we want to make the movie about. Here’s this amazing soldier, but he’s not a soldier anymore because \. He gets grabbed for this Avatar program. Here’s the interesting backstory about some of the people around him, so that you feel they’re people, not just characters needed to move the story along. Here’s fewer scenes of glowy plants and six-legged horses, and more scenes of how Jake in Avatar form is learning more about and adapting to Navi culture.” etc. It’s not the lack of originality that bothered me, it was that they took a basic storyline, and…just left it. The stories that are constantly retold (hero ends up in a different culture! hero goes on a great voyage! etc) are _frameworks_ to build upon, and I felt like they didn’t do that in Avatar. (I’ve also been reading a lot lately about “the _x_ number of basic plots” and Joseph Campbell’s framework of the quintessential hero’s journey and other storytelling stuff, so that’s been on my mind to begin with.) ---
**Author:** ![Munch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/munch/32/5281_2.png) [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2010, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/27 "2010-06-09T15:00:48Z")
> [@GuanoLad](#): > > I can’t believe that anyone really demands originality of this level. What’s wrong with having ideas similar to previous movies? There’s barely a single movie made per year that can realistically be claimed to have been based on a unique idea. Why does this one get all the shit for it? Because it was promoted for god know’s how long as being the newest, most original movie ever created. I don’t demand a lot of originality these days - but if you’re going to put yourself out there as such, you better deliver with the freshness. ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2010, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/28 "2010-06-09T15:45:03Z")
> [@Superhal](#): > > Imho, it’s crap in 2D. Too bad you didn’t watch it in 3D. > > If it helps, try to imagine that the Navi are live-action smurfs. How about if you watch it on a tiny seatback screen on a trans-Atlantic airplane flight? That’s the only time I’ve seen it. It was OK. ---
**Author:** ![Rattlehead02](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rattlehead02/32/3944_2.png) [@Rattlehead02](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rattlehead02)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2010, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/29 "2010-06-09T18:20:29Z")
I think maybe it was Wired magazine that described Avatar as, “The Blue Man Group does Ferngully.” My favorite annoyance with Avatar was how it is in the future. And in the future people can smoke on spaceships. In the present you can’t smoke in a bar, but in the future? Anything goes! Oh well, I guess having Weaver as the bad guy and NOT be an evil smoker just wouldn’t be any fun. Also, she was not at all convincing to me, as a former pack-a-day smoker, handling her cigarette. I only made it like 45 minutes into the movie before getting bored so I can’t comment much on the overall plot other than to say it wasn’t entertaining enough to watch for more than 45 minutes. ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2010, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/30 "2010-06-09T20:45:11Z")
> [@GildedLily](#): > > My favorite annoyance with Avatar was how it is in the future. And in the future people can smoke on spaceships. In the present you can’t smoke in a bar, but in the future? Anything goes! Oh well, I guess having Weaver as the bad guy and NOT be an evil smoker just wouldn’t be any fun. Also, she was not at all convincing to me, as a former pack-a-day smoker, handling her cigarette. I was berated rather soundly before the film came out for stating that I had no interest in seeing it at all. I am a very big science fiction geek, and I have read stories for the past forty years which handled everything that was supposed to be so special in Avatar, and handled it better. I still don’t care if I ever see the film. However, if they come up with an easy treatment or cure for lung diseases, I’ll will start smoking again in a New York minute. ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2010, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/31 "2010-06-09T22:32:03Z")
> [@GildedLily](#): > > Oh well, I guess having Weaver as the bad guy and NOT be an evil smoker just wouldn’t be any fun. …Bad guy? I mean, I don’t pretend to like the film, but did you even watch it? ---
**Author:** ![Shade](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2bfe46/32.png) [@Shade](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shade)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2010, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/32 "2010-06-09T22:59:09Z")
Blah blah blah yadda yadda. I saw it a little while ago, and now I can remember less and less about the details. In every way other than characters, plot and script it was awesome, the graphics and (I don’t know this, but seem to recall hearing) the editing and sound were awesome. They did incredibly new things not seen before. However, remembering what HAPPENED in it, I find I really don’t care. The plot is not bad – it’s actually very good, it’s just not in any way whatsoever new. Starwars took a lot of old plot elements and combined them in a space setting into something fantastic. Avatar did the same, and ended up with a lot of boring cliched stuff. If you’d never seen a film or heard a story before, ever, Avatar is quite possibly the best one to see, ever. It has everything: the culture, the love, the grief, the reluctant hero, the semi-bad-guy-turned-good, the uplifting deus ex machinas, the misguided and eventually evil tough soldier man, the parables, etc. But if you HAVE seen a film before, ever, you’ve seen all this stuff before, and it just plays it out again. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2010, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/33 "2010-06-10T01:37:31Z")
> [@cmyk](#): > > Huh? That’s what I meant by “technological”. The CGI was state of the art, almost mind-boggling. A triumph that currently has no equal. . The scenery was creative but the computer graphics weren’t any better than the later Harry Potter movies (from 3 on). I think Cameron completely misused the 3D effects. I don’t think he understands what makes a good 3D still image and it is magnified more so on the big screen. I actually groaned a couple of times during the movie at the missed opportunities. ---
**Author:** ![Rattlehead02](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rattlehead02/32/3944_2.png) [@Rattlehead02](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rattlehead02)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2010, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/34 "2010-06-10T17:19:26Z")
> [@Bosstone](#): > > …Bad guy? I mean, I don’t pretend to like the film, but did you even watch it? Well, as I said in my post, I only watched about 45 minutes of it. ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2010, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/35 "2010-06-10T17:21:53Z")
> [@GildedLily](#): > > Well, as I said in my post, I only watched about 45 minutes of it. Ah. :smack: My apologies. Weaver does start out bitchy, but when Mr. Marine Protagonist starts opening up relations with the Na’vi again she softens significantly. ---
**Author:** ![Bayesian\_Empirimancer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6de8d8/32.png) [@Bayesian\_Empirimancer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bayesian_Empirimancer)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2010, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/36 "2010-06-10T18:08:12Z")
> [@Lunchy](#): > > It was "The Last Samurai’’ in space. 40 minutes longer. Not as good. But it has SPACE MARINES! Wait, I thought that made all movies good, like Starship Troopers 2… ---
**Author:** ![Rattlehead02](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rattlehead02/32/3944_2.png) [@Rattlehead02](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rattlehead02)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2010, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/37 "2010-06-10T19:48:15Z")
> [@Bosstone](#): > > Ah. :smack: My apologies. Weaver does start out bitchy, but when Mr. Marine Protagonist starts opening up relations with the Na’vi again she softens significantly. Ah, I didn’t realize that. Lemme guess, at that moment does she look at her pack of smokes, crumple them up saying, “You know, it’s about time I quit these cancer sticks.” as she tosses them into the trash can? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Bosstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/22d042/32.png) [@Bosstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosstone)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2010, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/38 "2010-06-10T19:50:36Z")
> [@GildedLily](#): > > Ah, I didn’t realize that. Lemme guess, at that moment does she look at her pack of smokes, crumple them up saying, “You know, it’s about time I quit these cancer sticks.” as she tosses them into the trash can? 🙂 Honestly, I can’t remember that fine a detail. On the other hand, I also don’t recall her smoking in the later half of the movie after she softens up. So hell, you might still have a point. ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2010, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/39 "2010-06-10T20:32:13Z")
“Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit smoking.” … “Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit drinking.” … “Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit sniffing glue.” … ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2010, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239/40 "2010-06-10T20:52:04Z")
> [@GildedLily](#): > > My favorite annoyance with Avatar was how it is in the future. And in the future people can smoke on spaceships. In the present you can’t smoke in a bar, but in the future? Anything goes! Oh well, I guess having Weaver as the bad guy and NOT be an evil smoker just wouldn’t be any fun. Also, she was not at all convincing to me, as a former pack-a-day smoker, handling her cigarette. I like Larry Niven’s science fiction stories, but you can tell which ones were written in the 70s by the amount of detail he devotes to how people smoke in space. 🙂 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-quick-question-about-avatar/542239.md?page=3)