#why do so many people like avatar 2 when they don't even speak the fake language or talk of the fake creatures. i mean it can't be the plot

[jjsanguine]

well researched hateration of blue avatar 2 the second one because it's not enough (for me personally) to say "it's racist and the plot sucks" and leave it at that

(even though that is facts)

I've seen the whole thing (and the first film so I knew to lower my expectations to 0) not in the cinema because I don't want to give James Cameron money because I enjoy hatewatching every now and then. I didn't like it because I came to hear some ejective consonants and they spoke in English the whole time, and also mostly because it was just kind of bad in ways that are frustrating rather than funny. It's just a rehash of the first film but with even more appropriation.

There isn't enough plot for 3 hours of film and there really could have been. The base full of sympathetic humans has gotten no supplies in like 10-12 years, it should be struggling, a lot. They would basically be space subsistence farmers as trying to keep their bunker sealed from even just the poisonous atmosphere would be full time work. The humans from the city could have decimated Jake's human support with a smallpox blanket.

So spider gallivanting using precious oxygen tanks should not be a thing. He can't go Earth because cryo damages babies or whatever, but also because earth's comparatively higher gravity would kill him. It's unethical for him to exist which is why every soldier going to Pandora is (or should be) sterilised. I was going to say that Jake's avatar body not being sterile is silly but actually, the government creating avatar bodies for the explicit purpose of intermarrying with the locals so they could have humanity sympathetic hybrid offspring and lay claim to the land makes a ton more sense than whatever their canon purpose is, and historically such tactic worked extremely well.

Anyway in spider's case that there's no other kids means he's a freak accident. He shouldn't just have an identity crisis, he should have a ton of physical health problems too from eating gruel all his life and having low gravity put his bones, joints and organs on the stretching rack while Jake sully's biological kids are eating real food (that humans can't eat) and doing backflips in the forest.

Not to mention lung damage from breathing outside air which he 1000% would have tried to do at some point just like every kid with a serious allergy. Like it would make more sense for him to be sympathetic to his racist ass daddy if quatrich is the only one who isn't treating spider like an inconvenience they have to tolerate or with pity like he's made of glass (which realistically speaking he is.) Plus him having deadlocks is silly.

I know it's because Jake has them but that's dumb too. The omatikaya have braids even though they have straight hair which, if you've ever braided straight hair will know is difficult, time consuming, and has to be redone frequently. In that case, Jake being the chief and having a hairstyle that comparatively requires no maintainance makes 0 sense.His and Neytiri's hairstyles should be the most elaborate both to show status and because it's a visual signifier that he relies on/ is accountable the community because he wouldn't be able to take care of that kind of hair by himself.

Maybe he deliberately got dreadlocks so he can have long hair without have to bother with all that which made sense since he's had a crew cut his whole life, but the omatikaya should find that really fucking weird. Like they're still finding the time to do their hair while fighting a guerrilla war, so rejecting that could have been a whole thing imo.

It wasn't, because the omatikaya just fucking vanish from the film, and there's no rhyme or reason to hairstyle choice on any na'vi characters other than James Cameron seeing a black person and going "that looks cool," and hitting the denegrofication beam.

The clothing design and just culture design in general is just so fucking lazy and kind of culturally appropriatative. Like the metkayina are just Maori people. If James Cameron wanted to be inspired it's whatever but the way he did it has just got to be offensive.

Like the tattoos. Where is the ink from? what significance do they have like age, rank, clan affiliation, history? They have to be important to the metkayina if they are ok with obscuring their bioluminescent skin to have tattoos when they're underwater (where it's dark) all the time. We spend a lot of time with those people (except at the end where they disappear so Jake can have his showdown) but don't get to know basic info.

The metkayina should not be speaking the same kind of na'vi. They live really far away from the omatikaya so Jake and neytiri would be struggling to communicate using a trade pidgin and spider should have no fucking clue what any of them are saying even if he speaks omatikaya na'vi natively. Since the kids don't know what sign language is it's unlikely, but if the na'vi don't have different regional languages because of the hive mind or whatever, a competent world builder would have expanded upon that. Like if they have time to (not) explain how Kiri exists they could have touched on language.

The plot point about the liquid in the brains of the sapient whales is silly. Stopping aging is cool and all but unobtanum is actually useful to non rich people. When Europeans colonised the Americas they didn't only grow sugar. There simply wouldn't be enough demand to keep the economy afloat on luxuries. Like the film brushing past there being multiple sapient species to do unobtanium 2 electric Boogaloo is certainly a choice I'll say.

I get why people like this film. Like if this thin veneer of a plot was churned out so James Cameron can have his OCs animated and voice acted, and people can project into his characters lack of character, cool. I can even respect it. I don't even like the property much and I essentially wrote a fix-it-fic. But it's just hinting at being good constantly and it's like biting into a jam doughnut and getting an air pocket instead of jam.

I even actually enjoyed the 1st film when I watched in 2009 but like, why are all the problems I was too in primary school to notice still there in the sequel. Like if an actual Maori person (or a black person or native American person cause he just kind of appropriated from everywhere) wanted to make a fantasy or sci-fi story inspired by their culture it would be too niche but some white guy throws stuff in a blender and it's ok.

Like think about how how rich the metkayina culture would be if it was created by someone who understands why ocean faring cultures are the way they are, or how deep the plot could be if he understood why colonisation works the way it does, or how cool the creature design would be if they weren't just earth animals but with 6 legs and glowing skin.

They're in another star system why are the na'vi mammals?? It was a plot point in the 1st film that they have sex the same way humans do but like, why. Why do Navi women have breasts and impractical beaded shirts that would only make sense as ceremonial wear. Why do they have the concept of women?? I know the na'vi have to look like humans do the audience can empathize with them, but why are they basically just big humans?? Another thing that should have been a thing is jake running his family like a millitary squad. Why. There's no indication "man is head of household" is a thing so like ?

TLDR If James Cameron wanted it to be light viewing that's fine, but the constant hinting at something deeper plot/worldbuilding that doesn't exist (and the appropriation) it's just so grating. This should be a cult classic that inspires kids to get into worldbuilding not something that is making money right now. I don't want to see more of this, I want to see more people inspired by this to make something actually good, and if this lacklustre stuff is cornering the market I just get more this.