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James Cameron is never leaving Pandora.
That much is certain after seeingAvatar: The Way of Water, his sequel to 2009s ginormo-hit,Avatar.
Thats the secret of his success as a showman.
The firstAvatarhas this duality, too, on both a formal and narrative level.
The existential divide that lies at the core of that picture has not disappeared.
If anything, its expanded.
(They have demon blood!
one yells, noticing that Jakes kids, unlike purebred Navi, have five fingers.)
Theres a twisted kind of transformation happening on the bad guys side, too.
(Yeah, colonel, get some!
Just to check that we get the point, Cameron cuts between Sullys and Quaritchs respective efforts to adapt.
On the one side is generosity, openness, and humility in the face of nature.
On the other side is pure macho supremacy.
And here Cameron cant help himself.
But something else emerges during these sequences.
In creating Pandoras forest world for the original movie, Cameron clearly borrowed liberally from existing marine ecosystems.
And on land, floating tentacular spirits and bioluminescent creatures do in fact look otherworldly.
But now, in this underwater setting, they look lovely, and, weirdly, almost ordinary.
But, more important, Cameron hasnt lost the ability to convey his dorky-sweet enthusiasm to the audience.
Good thing, then, that there are now living beings to care about.
This time around, it feels as if Cameron has taken the criticism to heart.
Teenage rebels, outcast anxiety, warring cliques, budding intertribal romances, domineering parents its all there.
Neytiri chastises Jake for being too hard on his boys.
This is not a squad.
It is a family, she reminds him as he sits there, grimly cleaning his gun.
Again, why return to Earth to tell your stories when you could bring your Earth stories to Pandora?
Ultimately, all that time spent with these characters pays off.
By the end of the movie, all that talk of family actually starts to ring true.
None of this is particularly original, of course, but Camerons forte has never been originality.
He likes to present familiar stories in bright new variations with more force and authority than ever before.
Cameron isnt afraid to be corny because he can back up the outsize emotions with both sincerity and ruthlessness.
But the sentimentality hasnt entirely dissipated; the savagery has a purpose, and its a surprisingly cathartic one.
For even here, hes ultimately telling an Earth story.
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