Ive seen a lot about avatar in the last few days. Is it just one guy with a problem with it or something?
Is it just one guy with a problem with it or something
Its the far right again, they hate anything with empathy. Theres not a lot of news about this but the Bluey TV shoe gets a lot of hate from them too, and for the same reason.
I never did get all the hype for Avatar. I saw the first movie, and I liked it. But it was no juggernaut, nothing super special. The media machine can sure artificially pump things up though.
The cultural impact is to prove that setting a new bar for mind-blowing gorgeous CGI was still possible a decade after Babylon 5. The Way of Water repeated that incredible feat.
I didn’t watch that Fire And Ash yet; so don’t know whether it further ruins every single other modern movie further or just keeps them disappointing by reinforcing standards which seemingly no one else is willing to consider.James Cameron proved that there is a massive market for movies without witty punchlines and convoluted plots which require one to have the booklet (or nowadays phone) at hand to read along like when going to the opera.
He took the most overused classic western plot and made it work great on the big screen for a heterogenous global audience. He didn’t need any well-established franchise to back his adaptation of “White men invade land of natives; all hope is lost. But then one of the whites turns out to be the savior and helps the natives to repel the invasion.”
It was refreshing to watch a movie that let me pick a side without coming up with some forced gotcha-everything-is-morally-gray bullshit. That shit even infested the comic adaptations by now.The plot couldn’t be more bland. The characters couldn’t be more forgettable. The movies still are masterpieces regardless. Yes, I cringed at some points. But overall, they were a great experience. And yes, I also like Western.
Btw, Papyrus is a fitting choice for the title font.
I’m not a big Avatar fan, but you make a compelling case. Extra points for a B5 reference.
The morally-gray stories CAN be good, but not in the hands of most modern movie/streaming writers who somehow all seem to have gone to the school of “Trust me bro, I’m somehow better than the internationally acclaimed author who wrote the IP I’ve been handed” with a major in “mystery boxes” and minor in “identity IS character”.
I’m genuinely surprised the sequels are making money. I didn’t see any of them in theatres. I didn’t think people cared about this franchise. Maybe some are going mainly for the visuals, that’s the main reason I go to see the Jurassic movies
I’m genuinely surprised the sequels are making money
The second one did well, but the third made half what the second made. I dont expect we’ll see a fourth
It still made more than most blockbusters could dream of. Literally the 16th highest box office ever. We’re definitely getting a 4th.
I agree. Understanding that the visuals might be highly regarded, I truly don’t know of anyone in my network who goes to see these sequels. It makes me wonder if the numbers for viewership are inflated.
There are people overseas who have only ever been to the theatre to see Avatar because it’s like a theme park ride
I think the cultural impact it has is that it proofs that adults do want to see a full feature animation in the theater that is aimed for adults and isn’t a kids comedy. Cameron succeeded where Zemeckis failed. Beowulf crawled and stumbled so Avatar could run.
Beowulf animated is dope, though. Anthony Hopkins kills it, as does the actor for Beowulf. And Grendel.
Let’s not forget the extent to which these movies have inspired people to bitch about them on the internet. If that’s not a cultural impact I don’t know what is.
It’s cultural impact is the idea that it so remarkably didn’t have one
These are movies you only want to watch in the theatre with 3D, and cultural impact requires the youth to obsessively re-watch the media at home.
It was just Pocahontas with aliens.
It was just Fern Gully but CG.
It was just Dances with Wolves, but blue, and no wolves
I really feel like the vast majority of people misunderstand these movies. They are visual feasts, made specifically to be pretty and push tech used for movies further along. I have never seen anything from Cameron or anyone else involved say otherwise. They aren’t trying to be story telling masterpieces, they are popcorn flicks that you go to the biggest and best cinema to see and just be wowed by the spectacle. And I really enjoy them for that, seen all three in cinemas, biggest and best screens with 3d in my city. Had a blast every time, it’s all about knowing what you’re watching and why.
Okay, yes, true, but they also constructed the entire N’avi language, created a fuckton of lore about the planet, and thoroughly fleshed out the lore and design of Earth and its voyage to and from Pandora.
This wasn’t a visual feast made for the viewer, this was a feast made to employ all these skilled artisans in a massive production, and EVERYONE except the writers fucking blew it out of the water.
But that’s the whole point. The highest-grossing movie of all time was a popcorn flick with zero cultural impact. That’s exactly what this meme is saying. How are people misunderstanding this?
We’re talking about it now.
So you’re saying Avatar had cultural impact because it made it to front page of lemmy this one time? Great point.
And that’s perfectly fine if you like that kind of movie. But people who don’t like that kind of movie have no reason to watch these
exactly. expectation determines your enjoyment. movies often get slammed for doing exactly what they were trying to do.
Jason Statham movies won’t move you emotionally, horror movies won’t make sense, just watch it for what it is
i once got 3rd place in an avatar trivia competition on a modded minecraft server
i still have not received my prize
I was thinking about this the other day - I saw the movie and I know what a Navi is, but I can’t recall a single memorable quote or name a character. There is no memorable SNL sketch except the one masking fun of the Papyrus font. There is no fandom, there is nothing
The fauna was beautiful and well-thought out EXCEPT for the Navi because four-armed, collar breathing bipeds would probably won’t feel human enough for the target audience
I don’t want to undersell the design or technical achievements of the films. They are truly beautiful and it’s clear where the budget went. Other than being pretty to look at and inspiring a Disney Park, what is the cultural impact?
For contrast, Kevin Smith made a movie for the cost of a car that people still quote 30 years later.
I do remember a few notable scenes, one being him jumping onto the massive bird.
I remember sex scene that overlaps with bird bonding in a very unusual way.
The pacing of releases was whack.
Too long between 1 and 2, not long enough between 2 and 3.
I also heard that 2 and 3 were basically the same movie, and that they weren’t even that good.
2 and 3 are the same movie. I came for the bombastic spectacle, I watched it in 4D with moving seats, steam machines and a wind tunnel and I had a good time. I knew the story would be forgettable trash and with the right expectations I had a good time.
not long enough between 2 and 3.
You’re wrong about that. It’s exactly enough (maybe even too long) given they’re the same exact movie.
I mean, 1 didn’t make me crave sequels, even if they were soon available.
It was a fun action movie, sure. A visual spectacle. But not a world I felt invested in.
I felt like it was a world where a loooot of effort was put into certain aspects and then other parts of the world were neglected. Seemed like a waste of potential. For example some of the visual effects are kinda good even today, not just cause of the fidelity but also cause it seems like one cohesive piece. Talking about cohesion, the first and second halfs of this movie are two different movies, both with the storytelling and the visual effects and i like the first half muuuch more. Feels like if the movie focused on the Na’vi more it wouldve been better. An actually interesting story about slowly fitting more and more into a different culture got turned into some generic about natives fighting back, which you can do but then use one of the thousand examples irl, dont waste such a good oppurtunity to make something special. This is why i think so few fancy, high-budget movies tell good stories, without visual effects and huge sets you actually have to tell a story worth hearing to make your movie special. This of course doesnt mean visually captivating movies cant be narratively engaging, im just saying its rare.
That’s overcomplicating it.
Maybe that’s the issue.
The characters just… weren’t charismatic/engaging. I can’t name a single one. The world was intricate, and exotic, and gorgeous, and… kind of superficial?
I think the other Avatar is a perfect contrast.
Iroh. Zuko. Toph. Azula. Korra, Tenzin, Zaheer. To me, these character are instantly memorable because they were so distinct in purpose and culture, even extending to minor characters like Suki or Su.
And take bending. It’s a concept as simple as a rock, but they embed it in everything, from mundane chores to personalities and cycles to martial arts scenes. They never need to explain anything about it in words or narration.
Hence it’s be cool if the James Cameron Avatar characters where sharp, so distinct you could cut yourself on them. If their nature synergy, dependence on unobtanium or whatever was really woven into mundane life and such, to make it feel like an important system. There’s nothing wrong with another “natives fighting back” story, but I didn’t feel anything pull me into the struggle.
Yeah, I think movies could really be used to great effect in sci fi and fantasy where setting is a major character, but it’s rarely done. I understand why, it’s a more artsy thing to do, but one that demands large budgets. However I do think it’s something Avatar should have leaned more into and it’s something I really liked in the Dune movies.
My understanding is that it was an unexpected success and it was used as a technology demonstration for Alita. However Alita was much less successful.
Alita was super fun.
The eyes freaked me out. Like I get that the anime/manga has them, but everyone did. In the movie, only she had them and that was weird.
I didn’t even know there was a 3rd one, I thought everyone was talking about the second one this whole time.
Number 1 was a retelling of Ferngully the Last Rainforest. https://spotlightonfilm.com/2012/05/13/avatar-vs-ferngully-the-last-rainforest-a-case-of-plagiarism/
Or dances with wolves
As someone who hasn’t watched FernGully (but should), I’m increasingly skeptical of these types of “plagiarism” comparisons between movies. Lindsay Ellis recently broke down the “Aladdin was stolen” narrative and compellingly showed “it’s complicated”, and more obviously, YMS five years ago fucking eviscerated the then-popular argument that The Lion King was a ripoff of Kimba the White Lion.
(Edit: I’d say this especially goes for someone like James Cameron who clearly takes immense pride in his work and setting himself apart. That’s circumstantial, of course, but it seems totally out-of-character.)
As someone who had FernGully on VHS, there are marked similarities, though it’s not exactly 1-to-1. The main conflict is resource extraction, although instead of a gung-ho colonel we get Tim Curry as literal pollution. The protagonist gets transformed to fit in with the locals, but it’s an accident by one of the locals instead of deliberate choice. Instead of a cranky Sigourney Weaver, we get a spastic Robin Williams as a bat.
Overall, Avatar is closer to FernGully than to a lot of other going-native movies. Environmental conservation is the driving theme of both films.
Was Kimba also based on Hamlet or something? As far as I’m concerned that plotline is in the public domain. Or is it just using lions to tell the story that was supposedly stolen?
Also, how could Aladdin be “stolen” when it obviously takes direct inspiration from several stories in 1001 Arabian Nights? Are people claiming that it was stolen from some other story that was inspired by the same book?
- The accusation for Aladdin is complicated and is based on The Thief and the Cobbler.
- On the other hand, your instincts are entirely right about The Lion King, and when I say “YMS eviscerated it”, I mean that it’s the most comically ridiculous yet superficially believable accusation of plagiarism you could possibly come up with. This is genuinely worth 147 minutes of your time, and it’s one of the funniest videos I’ve ever watched. One of the comments summarizes it best: “Damn, can’t believe kimba invented Africa, and real life just ripped them off like that.”
And now people are accusing the upcoming Disney movie Hexed of being a ripoff of Owl House because apparently Owl House invented the idea of a hero being transported to a magical world.
I understand Owl House fans are mad that Disney canceled the show prematurely and made the ending rushed. I agree that Disney shouldn’t have done that. But I’m not going to fault Disney for making another story where a character is transported to a magical world. Heck, Disney did it decades ago with Alice in Wonderland and with Peter Pan. They also did it with the Chronicles of Narnia and there are many more examples, both Disney and non-Disney
I see. From wikipedia:
In 1973, a promotional booklet was released with a public announcement by Williams about the status of his project:
Nasrudin was found to be too verbal and not suitable for animation, therefore Nasrudin as a character and the Nasrudin stories were dropped as a project. However, the many years work spent on painstaking research into the beauty of Oriental art has been retained. Loosely based on elements in the Arabian Nights stories, an entirely new and original film is now the main project of the Williams Studio. Therefore any publicity references to the old character of Nasrudin are now obsolete.
So it seems the Thief and the Cobbler was based in part on the Arabian Nights, and the original plot was also from Arab folklore.
So in other words, Aladdin is merely based on the same work of classic literature, which I believe is public domain. So allegations of plagiarism are foolish, unless all references to Arab folklore are now off the table too.
One of the comments summarizes it best: “Damn, can’t believe kimba invented Africa, and real life just ripped them off like that.”
That’s pretty funny. I might watch the video another day. From your comment I gather enough to conclude that the main premise of the accusation is “Shakespeare told by animals,” and I concur that that’s laughable.
From your comment I gather enough to conclude that the main premise of the accusation is “Shakespeare told by animals,” and I concur that that’s laughable.
It’s somehow baser than you suspect for the accusations against The Lion King – but more complex for Aladdin. I’d highly recommend Lindsay Ellis’ video for a history lesson exploring the nuances. I’ll at least spoil that Kimba has nothing to do with Shakespeare and that whatever level of tepid, token generosity you’re willing to grant the plagiarism accusations, it’s dumber than that.
So the plot wasn’t even similar, and people were just upset that the characters were lions? That is indeed even more laughable.
Some people must really get off on hating on the Lion King because I’ve also heard it called racist for the following reasons:
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The characters have African-sounding names. (Um, what, would it be somehow less racist to name them “Steve” and “Nancy”?)
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They didn’t employ black voice actors in enough main roles. (Mufasa was voiced by a black man).
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The hyenas were allegedly depictions of racist tropes. (As a kid watching the Lion King, I never made this supposed connection that the hyenas were ostensibly caricatures of black people; they were just hyenas. The critics who apparently perceived that connection are racist for doing so).
I’ve also heard people criticize it for ostensibly promoting monarchy (it’s a fucking story, and it’s based on a plot by shakespeare about a monarchy. I don’t think the intent was to make a political statement about the advantages of monarchy)
Anyway, I read the backstory behind The Thief and The Cobbler and it sounds like all the nuance has less to do with Aladdin and more to do with Nasrudin. It’s not Aladdin’s fault it took the producers 40 years to put out a subpar film. And it’s not like Miramax owned the rights to Arabian Nights or even the “Arabian aesthetic.” It might be complex, but none of that complexity is Aladdin’s problem.
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The Aladdin bit is that there was another project in the Disney pipeline by a famed director that also had a lot of Arabian aesthetics, and I think a lot of the people upset are bitter that the other one just didn’t turn out very well.
You should watch the Lindsay Ellis video, it’s pretty good.
TIL that the Arabian aesthetic can only be one person’s intellectual property /s
And yeah, I just read about The Thief and the Cobbler. The reason it didn’t turn out well was because it was in production for 40 years, changed plots/themes/characters multiple times, was started and finished by different producers, and there was a falling out early on with the owners of the original story it was supposed to be based on.
So that had nothing to do with Aladdin incidentally also borrowing themes and tropes from 1001 Arabian Nights.
You can’t just take 40 years to do a shitty job at something and then blame someone else for taking less time to do a better job at something only vaguely similar…
I don’t remember the director himself instigating this feud.
I mean, I’m sure it reached him. Maybe he felt bitter, maybe he got over it. I think the plagiarism thing was pushed moreso by fans and Disney haters, though.
I didn’t mean to imply that he did, just the fact that the critics try so hard to make something out of nothing.
I saw both. Avatar is a marvel of VFX, but the story is definitely ferngully.
Interesting.
I’d bet it’s an example of coincidental convergence. Take the median/average of the tropes for that premise, and I can see writers coming up with a similar story.
The end action sequence was just the end action sequences from the first 2 films stacked on top of each other.
The thing is, it was still visually gorgeous, and I loved watching it in the theatre. Avatar is eye candy, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
Oh - and I do think the idea of trees with shared root systems forming a planet-wide distributed consciousness is actually pretty awesome sci-fi.
Pretty sure the Exodites from Warhammer 40k have something similar going on, problem is Exodite lore is fucken barren. GW give me space murder elves, Athel Loren in space with dinosaurs is all I want, let me feed Abadon to the trees GW.
This is what frustrates me. The Avatar universe has the bones to have some amazing lore and world building, but really missed on execution.
Oh - and I do think the idea of trees with shared root systems forming a planet-wide distributed consciousness is actually pretty awesome sci-fi.
Spot-on.
3 was a waste of money and I’m saying this as someone who liked 2
They are stellar if you like worldbuilding and pretty worlds. They are ok to good story-wise. In terms of worldbuilding, for me, they stand on the same level as the LotR movies (not the books mind you).
Amazing VFX though 🤌💋
Oh yeahhh, they made a third one too. I forgot about that.
It was basically 2 part 2
I made it through maybe 10 minutes of the second one before turning it off because the plot was just that fucking dumb.
Nahh! Another cultural impact is, that if you are one with natur it is acceptable to put your tentacle thingies into your girl, pull out, and into an animal it goes. You can even force it into a bird and people will like you for it. I newer saw them wash it after pulling out of an animal, probably it went straight back into the girl off screen.
I guess I need to watch Avatar.
Wait what
When I saw it in the theater back when it came out, it was with my extended family and I knew nothing about it. I assumed it was an Avatar: The Last Airbender movie (which I also knew almost nothing about other than the name). It was a ways into the movie before I realized that I was watching the movie and not some sort of extended preview of another one.
The movie was fine. Great visuals, mediocre plot. It doesn’t deserve to have had much of a cultural impact.
Pocahontas, in space!
last two was just Moby Dick, with Quaritch becoming Ahab.
Also Warcraft iii
I’ve watched both of the sequels now (on the high seas), and they were actually pretty entertaining.
But I agree that they aren’t nearly as culturally significant as the PR would like you to believe
Does it have a cultural impact? The franchise seems to have very few hardcore fans and hardly any casual fans. I was at a comic con this weekend and i have seen a guy dressed as a navi. That was the only cosplay i have ever seen. There is also a guy that has his car airbrushed with avatar stuff ever since the first movie came out. Other than that i don’t think i have ever even seen an avatar tshirt
Never seemed to be marketed that way.
I like the films - then again, I’m a sucker for big cinema and IMAX 3D, so from an eye-candy perspective, it’s glorious. Is the story anything earth-shaking? Of course not. It’s escapist fluff… but oh… how it looks.
I feel like saying “James Cameron made a film about nothing” is unfair. I don’t think it’s about nothing. It’s about colonialization. It’s about inter-species racism, but in like a corporate kind of way.
And yet, it really feels like a film about nothing. I wonder why that is.
Is it just that it has nothing interesting to say about how colonialization works? It’s been a long time since I’ve seen the film, but I do sort of remember it coming to really obvious conclusions.
I think it fell into a ton of tropes is all. Eh, it was a product of it’s time - as all films are - and I found it similar to Dances With Wolves. Banged up protaginist, left broken by his service goes to the frontier and finds a new life…
There it is…
iirc that was all it was ever really touted as.
Supreme eye candy, nothing more, nothing less.
Didnt Disney build an entire theme park section based on the franchise?
They built an area in the Animal Kingdom part of Disney World that is more or less just a bit of fake jungle and rocks that looked like it could be on the planet the movie takes place on. Like the A Bug’s Life section that they had years ago. I don’t even know if it had a ride.
The park itself (Disney Animal Kingdom) is just basically a zoo. And not even a good one.
Ferngully did it better.
Haven’t watched Avatar, but I think it at least shows the “real bad guys” instead of a monster that isn’t even a proper reference to the CEO of the corp
Also, oh my god there is a Ferngully 2!? WHY???
Ferngully 2!? WHY???
Just wait for the live action remake! They’re coming for your generation’s childhood next…
Signed,
An old fart
(NGL, Masters of the Universe looks like it could be pretty dope)
I was entertained, it was pretty, it pushed for better facial animations. Other than that it’s no real major impact.
the Cinema version if “this meeting should have been an email”
“This movie should have been a 5 minute tech demo”
it pushed for better facial animations
It genuinely pushed for a lot of technical achievements. Knowledge/skills that will be able to improve future films. Sure, the Avatar films may not be good films on their own. But they are being used to develop technologies which will make for better films from other people who actually want to make good films.
eh. I think cameron’s masturbating.
he’s just pushing stuff around and making nifty bits and bobs, but there’s none of the genius that was present in terminator, aliens, the abyss, etc., it does advance the tech but in no way meaningfully and the vast majority of the big advancements are too expensive for smaller creators to leverage.
but there’s none of the genius that was present in terminator, aliens, the abyss
T2 was just the start, beginning with the morph CGI.
The big studios want to do away with animatronics, stop-motion animation, miniatures, physical VFX and prosthetics, believing them to cost so much to shareholders, and spend on and scale up CGI but at the expense of enthusiasts wanting suspension of disbelief over realism.
I thought T2 was pretty great but yeah, it’s all building off abyss’s water tentacle creature. literally a series of morph targets
I remember avatar being really pretty, and then realizing as the credits rolled that if what they said about unobtainium is true, that it’s a room temperature semiconductor and that these are the only proven deposits of it, and that the Earth is a dying planet that needs unobtanium to stay habitable for billions and billions of people, RDA would probably just throw a big rock at Pandora and comb through the rubble. Us or them.
