Tag Archives: Nav’i

Dec 21 2025

The World Of Avatar Continues To Astound With Avatar: Fire And Ash

The latest entry in filmmaker James Cameron’s sci-fi saga, Avatar, is out now in theaters and the question is does Avatar: Fire and Ash deliver the astounding cinematic thrills? Yes, it does, though some may want something different at this point.

Avatar: Fire and Ash takes place right after the  previous film, Avatar: The Way of Water, and deals with the aftermath of that film’s events.  For anyone who hasn’t seen these films, they take place on the moon Pandora which is inhabited by tribes of tall, blue-skinned beings called the Na’vi who are deeply in tuned with nature because of their ability to use appendages to form neural links with Pandoran lifeforms. They worship an entity called Eywa who makes up the collective consciousness of Pandora and interconnects with nature. Their existence is threatened by human colonists from a dying Earth who do not hesitated to exploit the moon’s natural resources and treat the Na’vi as inferior creatures. The films focus on Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), a human paraplegic former soldier whose consciousness inhabits the body of an artificially grown Na’vi known as an avatar. Sully rebelled against his fellow humans and eventually starts a family with his partner Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña), but they have to stay on guard from vengeful humans who want to bring Sully to justice. Sully is being hunted by another avatar, Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang), his former commander who is obsessed with capturing Sully. What is unusual here is that the actual Quaritch was killed in the first film and the Quaritch avatar is inhabited by implanted memories from Quaritch.

At the start of Avatar: Fire and Ash, the Sully Family is deep in mourning over the death of the eldest son (Jamie Flatters) who was killed by human forces in the previous film. One of the members of the family is Miles “Spider” Socorro (Jack Champion), a human teenager who embraces the Na’vi way of life and rejects his father who happens to be Quaritch. Sully fears that Spider cannot remain with the family in their sanctuary and transports Spider to a human colony made up of human scientists who also rebelled against their fellow colonists. As the Sullys are transported by a tribe of Na’vi called Windtraders who use giant aerial jellyfish-like creatures for transportation, the tribe is attacked by a rogue Na’vi tribe called the Mangkwan. This particular tribe has rejected Eywa, embraces violence, and are very hostile to the other Na’vi. Their leader is Varang (Oona Chaplin), who is nihilistically vicious and forms an alliance with Qauritch and the human colonists to hunt Sully in exchange for human weapons.

What complicates matters for the characters is that Quaritch is also obsessed with finding his son and repairing his relationship with him, which is odd since the actual Quaritch died in the first Avatar film. Meanwhile, the Sullys have another adopted child called Kiri (Sigourney Weaver) who is the child of yet another avatar, Grace Augustine.  The identity of Kiri’s father is unknown and Grace cannot answer this because she died in the first film. Kiri has an uncanny ability to connect with Pandora’s life forces and her actions in saving Spider drive the film’s narrative. In Pandora, humans cannot breathe the air and at one point in the film, Spider’s breathing unit breaks down and he starts to suffocate. Kiri is able to save him by implanting a mycelium symbiote into Spider that lets him breathe Pandora’s air.

After the humans learn about this they task Quaritch to hunt down Spider so he could be studied to see how this ability to breath Pandora’s air could be replicated for the rest of humanity. Sully fears this because he knows this event would be disastrous for the Na’vi. Adding to his woes are dealing with the bitter hatred and bigotry Neytiri has towards humans even Spider himself, and with the plight of his remaining son Lo’ak (Britain Dalton), who is wracked with guilt over his brother’s death and tries to measure up to Sully, while forging his own destiny.

As anyone can tell, unlike the earlier films, the plot for Avatar: Fire and Ash is more complex and filled with developed character nuances. A common complaint about the films is that they are essentially simplistic sci-fi versions of Dances With Wolves or Ferngully. Most people did not care, as seen by the huge box office numbers of the films. They came to theaters for the sheer spectacle of the immense and intricate details that James Cameron infused into the films. One of the main reasons that the films tend to take so long to produce is because of the revolutionary special effects, 3D technology and dense worldbuilding that are the Avatar films’ best assets. Just like the other films, Avatar: Fire and Ash has to be seen on large screens not on phones and other digital devices.

With that said as spectacular and jaw dropping the third Avatar film is, one can’t help wish that Cameron did not play it so safe with familiar beats. Sure, the action and the visuals are incomparable and the film gets a lot of credit for developing the characters especially Quaritch who once was a one-note military villain but is now slowly becoming an anti-hero and adopting the Na’vi way. But many of the story beats in the other films are repeated in Avatar: Fire and Ash, just done on a larger scale, such as bondings with the whale-like tulkuns and flying banshees, the final confrontation between the Na’vi, Pandora’s fauna and the human soldiers and whalers or having Sully’s children continually captured and rescued. However, these plot elements were well done, and there are intriguing new developments like the introduction of the villainous Na’vi and Kiri’s connection to Eywa, it’s just that with a runtime of over three hours, more should have been done to develop the overall story. It’s regrettable that with such a rich world to explore, Cameron did not introduce new biomes such as deserts or polar regions. Also, with all the talk about Earth dying, this begs a visit or a look at the planet. The closest we’ve seen of Earth was a deleted scene that originally opened the first Avatar. At least he did introduce antagonistic Na’vi with their own separate worldviews and by the way, Varang is one great villain and her obsession with human weapons added a new angle for the Na’vi. Hopefully, she’ll return in the sequels and that the other lingering storylines get resolved. These include the emotional journeys of Jake, Neytiri (who gets a lot of great material in this film), Kiri, Lo’ak, Spider, and Quaritch.

James Cameron has been coy lately over whether or not there will be more films in the Avatar franchise. About a quarter of the fourth film has already been shot, but he and Disney are waiting for the box office results to determine if Jake Sully and the Na’vis’ story should continue. This story must be allowed to come to its natural conclusion as Avatar: Fire and Ash left many questions and threads unresolved.

Putting aside the nitpicks about Avatar: Fire and Ash it has to be stressed that this is a great film and better than most of what is being released. The film is very engaging and well executed. It is so easy to get involved with the characters’ stories to the point that we care about what happens to them and get uneasy wondering if they will actually die.  As mentioned before, the film has to be seen on large screens in 3D and the story is done well enough to merit going out of one’s way to see this in theaters and marvel at Cameron’s rich vision.

José Soto

Dec 26 2022

Beyond Avatar: The Way Of Water

Despite what many naysayers predicted, Avatar: The Way of Water has proven to be a box office hit, which means that future films will be produced.

At this point, the third Avatar film is already done and will be released in two years. There are reports that the fourth film has been partially filmed, but that could just be effects shots that would be unfinished if the film never comes to be.

Given that director James Cameron envisioned five films to tell his Avatar story, where would the story go? There will be spoilers below for both Avatar films released to date.

One of the best features of Avatar: The Way of Water is that unlike the previous film, it actually opened up the worldbuilding in the franchise and dropped tantalizing hints of where the story will go.

The Kiri Connection

The film introduced many new characters and gave new and interesting developments for established characters. The most interesting new character was Kiri, the adopted daughter of Jake Sully and Neytiri. It was revealed that she is the daughter of Grace Augustine, who was killed in the first Avatar, but there are questions as to who is her father. More importantly, Kiri was shown to have a deep, spiritual connection to Eywa, a life force that is connected to all living creatures on Pandora, the alien moon in Avatar where the characters live. Her connection to Eywa was quite evident as she used it to defend herself against humans hunting her and her siblings, and when she was able to get bioluminescent fish creatures to help find her adopted mother and sister, who were in danger of drowning.

It has been theorized that Kiri does not have a father and is a product of an immaculate conception, which has many echoes of not only the Star Wars prequels but Christian religion. Another theory has it that Kiri is actually the personification of Eywa, who has taken physical form to better understand Pandora and the Na’vi. In either case, Kiri is being set up to be a conduit or a savior of the moon against the human invaders, and this will be the needed advantage the Na’vi people will need against the humans.

In our history, whenever a technologically advanced culture first encountered a native culture that was not as technologically advanced, the results were grim for the native culture, as it was overwhelmed. The Na’vi face a similar fate in the overall story of Avatar, and the Eywa connection will probably be the only way they could fight back against the humans. We’ve seen this already in Avatar, when out of nowhere armies of native animals viciously attacked human forces trying to destroy a Na’vi stronghold, and we saw it again to a lesser extent in the sequel when Kiri used her connection to Eywa to protect her.

Not only is Kiri the key to saving Pandora, but possibly Earth itself. It was mentioned in Avatar: The Way of Water that Earth was dying, which was why humans showed up in greater numbers to begin colonizing the moon. The title of the third film is for now, Avatar: The Seed Bearer, this could be referring to Kiri. If she turns out to be a manifestation of Eywa, she could provide the means to somehow saving Earth from ecological devastation.

James Cameron has said that at some point in either the fourth or fifth planned film, part of the story will take place on Earth. This is where Kiri and Earth’s salvation could come into play.

Other Points of Views

The director elaborated that Neytiri will visit Earth and be exposed to other aspects of humanity. She will learn that not all humans are evil. This is a bit odd given her romantic relationship with Jake Sully, who was once human, and that he has close ties with sympathetic humans on Pandora, who have aided the Na’vi. Then again the fact that her son was killed by humans could have hardened her against humans. A clue for this development was when she grabbed Quaritch’s human son Spider and threatened to kill him. For a moment in that scene, it really looked like she meant to do it, given her earlier rampage against human soldiers who killed her son.

On Earth, Neytiri will probably find human allies who are ready to join the struggle against human invaders on Pandora. It is possible the franchise could conclude with epic battles taking place on Pandora and even on Earth as Na’vi and human allies fight the invading humans who are bent on world conquest. One of those possible allies could be Quaritch himself.

When Quaritch was first introduced in Avatar, he was a one-note villain who only saw the Na’vi as savages or pests to be eliminated. He was killed at the end of the film. In the sequel he was resurrected in a way when an avatar body (a clone grown out human and Na’vi DNA) was created in his image and implanted with his memories. Throughout Avatar: The Way of Water Quaritch is out hunting Jake Sully, but in a Na’vi body. This allowed him to better blend in and survive the deadly environment of Pandora. In the film, Quaritch makes great efforts to adopt the Na’vi way of life to better understand his prey. This could eventually make him sympathetic to the Na’vi even though Cameron said he would be the villain in the next two films. We saw him soften from his tough-as-nails militaristic demeanor in Avatar: The Way of Water. He forms a fragile bond with the son of the original Quaritch to the point that he gives in to Neytiri when she threatens his son.

Continue reading →
Jul 29 2019

Avatar: Looking Back At The Sci-Fi Epic

Avatar Sully and Natiri

After it was announced recently that Avengers: Endgame had finally dethroned Avatar to become the all-time box office champion, everyone was whooping and hollering in joy. Sure, we’re entitled to feel that way and celebrate because Avengers: Endgame is so well regarded. But lost in all the hoopla was how dismissive many people were toward director James Cameron’s film which came out ten years ago. Yes, we all are entitled to our own opinions about everything, but some were too quick to put down Avatar, which is not warranted.

Even when Avatar came out in December 2009, there were those who were very critical towards the sci-fi epic. A common gripe was that its story was weak and derived from the “going native” trope, which is why Avatar was sometimes called Dances With Smurfs. Another critique was its too-on-the-nose environmental message or its simplistic evil capitalists vs. noble savages motif. These are valid points, but Avatar should not be disregarded so casually.

jake rides giant banshee

For its time, Avatar captured the world’s imagination thanks to the rich and immersive effects and world that James Cameron and his team of effects wizards created. Almost everything about the world of Pandora (a habitable moon orbiting a distant gas giant a few lights years from Earth) looked alien. From the six-legged creatures to the ultraviolet forests to the floating mountains. This was a landscape never before seen in live action. It was and still is breathtaking to take in.

While the story may be too familiar, it does resonate and has relevance to our times. It was reported back then that some viewers experienced a type of depression because they realized how unlike Pandora the Earth was with its pollution and disappearing nature. Now, climate change and other environmental concerns have become a more tangible problem and we can appreciate the idea of a pristine, untouched-by-man world. This is also inspiring many to look for other worlds and can be seen as a drive for the new upcoming space race. Avatar showed many the possibilities of what lies beyond our solar system.

Of course, the special effects and 3D technology are still unrivaled to this day. Cameron is known to be a perfectionist and insisted on the best usage of effects technology and 3D. This was why it took so long for the film to be made and this goes for the sequels that are only now being filmed. The result of Cameron’s strict standards was that audiences were floored by the stunning 3D and effects that gave the feeling that we were truly in an alien world. The 3D technology isn’t cheap and the top dollars spent on Avatar shows, and it lead to a new boom in the use of 3D in films. Sadly, much of the 3D in other films couldn’t compare and that is because truly impressive 3D has to be filmed with special cameras and is very expensive. Most films that use 3D these days are actually using a conversion process. Much of the time, it’s done well, but it cannot compare to Avatar.

Many critics state that the film isn’t anything without the effects or the 3D. That is not so. Avatar is actually very entertaining with exciting battle scenes and genuine moments of awe. The story is basic but effective; in the future, Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), a paraplegic former vet, takes an assignment on an alien moon being mined by a large company. He is to infiltrate the moon’s native sapient species, who are called the Na’vi, and get intel to use against them. He ingratiates himself by having his consciousness fused into a cloned version of the Na’vi. Over time, he comes to empathize with the Na’vi and eventually joins their side to fight off the human invaders. We have seen this story before, most famously in Dances With Wolves, but it is effectively reimagined in a sci-fi trapping that works for this epic. The film is still awe inspiring and packs some emotional weight. Just watching that final battle of humans against the Na’vi is so thrilling and inspiring.

It has been said that Avatar has not remained in the public eye for very long. That is debatable, the film represents the pushing of boundaries and a good example of this is with the land it inspired in Disney’s Animal Kingdom theme park. In the land themed to Avatar, which opened in 2017, visitors were and still are awestruck by how alien and majestic the land looks with its Pandoran forestry and even more with its headline ride that simulates what it is like to be a Na’vi riding a flying banshee. Interest has been renewed for the property and although cynics like to say that no one cares about the upcoming sequels, it is foolish to bet against James Cameron. Undoubtedly, he will create another winning sci-fi epic, the likes that he is famous for. Avatar 2 or whatever it will be called may not supplant Avengers: Endgame but it will most likely be a big hit and help keep Avatar in the public eye. Maybe by then, the original film will be looked at more fondly.

Aug 13 2017

Experience The World Of Avatar

By now everyone, especially tourists and sci-fi fans, have heard of the recent opening of Pandora-The World of Avatar at Disney’s Animal Kingdom. This land devoted to James Cameron’s sci-fi epic Avatar has been gestating for several years and puzzled many people. After all, why would Disney pour so much resources into creating a new themed land based on a film that came out last decade? Worldwide, Avatar is the highest grossing film to date, but it has not resonated deeply with most of the general public. Theme park and Disney fans wondered about the quality of the land and its attractions; for some time, The Walt Disney Company has faced criticism in recent years for neglecting its theme parks in the U.S. and Universal Studios has stolen Disney’s thunder with its hugely successful Harry Potter lands. Last month, the company formerly announced a slew of new rides and attractions for its parks and Pandora, which opened on May 27th of this year is the opening salvo.

pandora entrance

After finally being able to visit the land and experience the attractions, I can honestly say that it was worth the wait. Pandora-The World of Avatar is so deeply immersive and stunning with details and it is the best themed land in Walt Disney World. The Disney imagineers have taken great pains to recreate the primordial world of Avatar and their efforts have paid off. Part of the appeal in this land is the land itself. It will take several visits to truly take in everything and the land’s nooks and crannies are begging to be examined in detail. Huge and beautiful alien plants are intermixed with our Earthly flora and the landscaping is highlighted by the jaw-dropping Hallelujah Mountains that seemingly float over our heads. It is fun trying to figure out how the imagineers pulled off this trick, but to be honest, I’d rather not know since the revelation will spoil the illusion. These mountains are a bonafide engineering marvel and what makes them so imposing are their majestic beauty and roaring waterfalls that cascade down their sides.

Hallelujah Mountains Pandora world of avatar

Completing the immersive experience are the attractions themselves. There are only two of them in Pandora, but they are absolute must-rides. The best one is Flight of Passage, which everyone fortunate to ride will attest is one of the best rides ever created, even contending with classic theme park rides like the Spider-Man and Harry Potter rides in Universal. How should Flight of Passage be described? Basically, it is a simulator experience that is more immersive than most simulators since riders are given individual ride vehicles that are mounted like motorcycles.  The ride’s story is that you are linked to a Nav’i avatar that is riding the flying animals called mountain banshees. Thanks to state-of-the-art 3D and well-timed movements, I felt like I was actually riding a mountain banshee as seen in Avatar. The scenes in front of you are panoramic and the motions trick you at many times into thinking you’re diving through Pandora’s tropical forests, mountain ranges and beaches. Yes, there are many instances where you fly over the alien world’s seas, which provide distinct clues as to the sequels’ content. The ride even features new alien animals to marvel over and hope they appear in the Avatar sequels. As I flew over Pandora on my banshee, I actually wished James Cameron would hurry up with the followup films!

Comparing Flight of Passage to Nav’i River Journey is unfair. The former ride is a genuine thrill ride and worthy of being designated an E-ticket attraction. Nav’i River Journey is decidedly more tranquil and relaxed. It is a short boat ride taking you along Pandora’s river at night. Wondrous and unworldly sights and sounds surrounded me and made me feel like I was navigating the waterways of this alien world. The bioluminescent flora and fauna really pop out and my group and I had a joyous time picking out them out. Do not be put off by some reviews about the gentle ride. After the intensity and excitement of riding a banshee vicariously through a Nav’i, this boat trip is a nice way to settle down.

navi shaman

The complaints are probably due to the long wait times for the Nav’i River Journey, which can be more than an hour. Flight of Passage has even longer wait times (I’ve seen times posted as long as five hours during the day!), but since it’s a thrill ride many feel this justifies the long wait. Personally, I would never spend so much time just to get on a ride. If you are unable to get a FastPass and you are not staying on Disney property the only decent option is to arrive at Disney’s Animal Kingdom an hour before it opens. This guarantees that you will be able to get on the rides and be done in less than an hour. Or wait until the hoopla dies down, which probably will be when Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge opens in two years.

In many ways, Pandora-The World of Avatar is a good primer for Disney in crafting the next generation of immersive lands and attractions. Even if you are not able to get on the rides or are a fan of Avatar, it is worth visiting the newest land at Disney’s Animal Kingdom just to take in the ambiance. Plus, it gives us an idea of how Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge will be like when it is finally unveiled. Regardless, Pandora-The World of Avatar and its Flight of Passage and Nav’i River Journey are definite must-dos for your next visit to Disney World, they already are for me.

José Soto