Avatar review thread

[Guardsman Bass]

I'll say it again the background source material from my reading from third sources state that the maglav trains are key to Earth's economy.

Possibly, but keep in mind that they got along well before they started major mining operations on Pandora, and the "mag-lev trains" bits are only on Earth (the same source material also mentions that they have colonies off-world in the solar system in the Avatarverse).

Also note that its very silly to counter this by using the statement of people fighting in a SA hellhole, it could be possible for a large portion of the earth to be a mega cities and certain areas to still be hellholes.

Alot of the information for the film actually is never said on screen but is in the material released with the film, alot of it detailing the shiny rocks importance.

Keep in mind that the source material is secondary to whatever is shown on screen. If it contradicts what is on-screen, then it's wrong. Moreover, the Source Material is hardly unbiased - in-universe, it's basically an RDA manual that was captured by a subversive person.

But they're annoying. They're preachy and they're in tune with nature and they're infinitely better than the humans. That kind of implausible perfection just makes me root for the villains.

Well, yeah. It's not exactly a subtle movie (it makes the Na'vi as sympathetic as possible to the audience, while portraying the bulk of the human presence as ruthless assholes), and to be honest, I didn't think particularly highly of the plot either. What made the movie for me were the characters and the scenery (I thought both were very good), and the plot's main value was that it didn't distract from those things.

[Ugolino]

The graphics kept me watching, but they didn't redeem the movie.

Because the ultramarines are intelligent, nature-loving, treehugging, preachy, moralising people in tune with their environment?

No, because they're too perfect.

Avatar's message might have been good, but the way it beat the watcher over the head with it wasn't. Some subtlety wouldn't have been out of place.

[PeZook]

Avatar's message might have been good, but the way it beat the watcher over the head with it wasn't. Some subtlety wouldn't have been out of place.

And yet, people still try to justify the RDA's assholery. If the Na'Vi were more in line with Earthly tribal societies (which they may have been ; we don't see much of their society, really), you'd give those kind of people more ammunition for their hare-brained justifications.

"Being annoying" isn't really deserving of wholesale slaughter and destruction of your way of life. It's kind of ironic that you are rooting for the bad guys because the Na'Vi annoy you. That's why the humans went all apeshit, after all: because the locals annoyed them.

They literally went to slaughter the unrealistic peaceful nature-loving noble savages because it would inconvenience the corporation to mine unobtainium somewhere else, and the annoying savages refused to abandon their ancestral home to accomodate them

EDIT: It's a funny little human reaction, to be honest, this "too perfect" thing. Good people should be praised for being good, not derided for being "too perfect" if you can't find something wrong about them. For example, I'd prefer living on Ultramar to just about any other place in the Imperium, for example, and I'd be glad I could.

[starfury]

And yet, people still try to justify the RDA's assholery. If the Na'Vi were more in line with Earthly tribal societies (which they may have been ; we don't see much of their society, really), you'd give those kind of people more ammunition for their hare-brained justifications.

And of Course, when Cold machines decide to apply to same logic to humans, watch the same people howl, how dare these mechanical monsters decide to rid themselves of the annoying little and worthless meatbags. just ask the C'tan like the Nightbringer or Skynet.

[starfury]

On the destruction of the Navi:

Yes, they're the good guys. Yes, the RDA is a bunch of complete monsters. Yes, the Navi are intelligent, moral, etc etc.

But they're annoying. They're preachy and they're in tune with nature and they're infinitely better than the humans. That kind of implausible perfection just makes me root for the villains.

It's fiction. I support their destruction because I find them annoying and badly written, not because such an action could be considered anything but monstrous in real life.

It's more or less for the same reasons I hate the 40k Ultramarines.

Then I support your precious Mon-keigh to be fed to the Ct'an and the Nercons, who clearly need some feeding and worthless meatbags like the RDA and other wankers are just what the cook ordered, I am Sure Craftworld Biel-Tan won't shed make too much of fuss, Stupid Mon-Keigh managed to make a nice feast for their ancient enemies and keep them off their backs.

[Broomstick]

THEY'RE FREAKIN' HELICOPTERS - just call them that, m'kay? And, again - with a denser atmosphere you don't need as great a rotor diameter. Also, "confining" a prop (and helicopters rotors are, in many ways, horizontal propellers) does not necessarialy reduce its effectiveness, see "ducted fan". Cripes, ducted fans are standard equipement on many aircraft even today. The Pandoran use of them is a bit different than what we do, but given the environment, not particuarly outrageous or far-fetched. Properly designed, the "ring thingies" will actually make the Pandoran rotors MORE efficient than present-day helicopters, not less.

I wasn't putting into question the efficiency or effectiveness of the Avatar helo's ducted fans. I was actually saying that, compared to modern Blackhawks, the reduced diameter of those Avatar helicopters' fans and their ducted nature actually makes them safer and more resistant to foreign objects and obstructions that might damage them.

I don't think I even thought about how the Avatar helicopter's smaller fans would've been more/less efficient than modern helicopters. I was just thinking about their vulnerability to stuff like vines, trees, birds, foreign objects, and friggin dinosaurs trying to eat them!

Actually, I didn't find anything to object to with what you were saying for the most part, I was getting annoyed at some other people who apparently can't tell the difference between an Osprey and a helicopter. Sorry if that wasn't clear.

You are correct that a smaller diameter rotordisk is less likely to hit stuff. Although helicopter rotors can tolerate a limited amount of chopping (I've known several chopper pilots, most of them have sliced a few twigs off a tree or whatever when operating in tight spaces - although hitting, say, a metal cable might not just slice the cable, it might also take off some rotor) and supposedly military pilots have deliberately used rotors for trimming growth in a landing area but it is not considered a really great idea. Hit one branch that's slightly too thick and you wind up having really, really awful problems. Both airplane props and helicopter rotors slice meat very effectively (in fact, props are sometimes actually referred to as meat slicers) but, again, if there's a flaw in the part that goes around hitting a large enough animal might take off a piece of the machine. Again, that's a bad thing. You want to minimize the amount of this sort of thing. The ducted fan design would protect the rotors to some degree as well as improving efficiency of the rotors.

A small diameter rotordisk can spin faster (rotors are limited by not wanting them to exceed the speed of sound - the longer the rotorblade the slower it usually rotates at the hub because the tips, traveling a larger circle, have to move faster) which, up to a point, produces more lift. It does, however, impose different sorts of stresses on the mechanisms involved. What size rotors a helicopter has is frequently a compromise between the structural strengths of the materials used, the power requirements, and the lengths of the rotors. A small diameter system may in fact produce more lift than a larger diameter system, but may impose other requirements on the design that increase costs or maintenance issues. Even relatively small rotor blades are under enormous strains during flight. Remember, not only is there a rotational load imposed on the rotors, they really do support the weight of the aircraft when it's off the ground, plus any g-forces imposed by maneuvers. Other factors include erosion (not only does air contain dust and moisture, but high speed travel through imposes friction that wears away at structures), air density (dense air causes more erosion), corrosion (could be quite an issue on Pandora given the local chemistry), and even exposure to daylight as UV light can cause deterioration in some materials.

But I'll shut up about now because my knowledge of rotorcraft is limited, not being a rotor pilot.

[Zor]

Because the ultramarines are intelligent, nature-loving, treehugging, preachy, moralising people in tune with their environment?

No, because they're too perfect.

I don't see it that way. I am convinced that there were violent assholes on both sides, Tsu'tey has come across to me as a violent macho asshole that probably made RDA/Na'vi relations worse when he got the justification to do so and required a living legend to put him in line. The fact that he was on the right side is more or less incidental.

Zor

[Samuel]

For the Ultramarines, they are genetically engineered supersoldiers who have been given a direct mandate from the God-Emperor (well, them and all the other chapters) to guard humanity. I don't see anything odd about them being very good at it.

Didn't stop Starways Congress from thinking the Pequinnos as a threat in the Enderverse which goes the distance to exploring how Humans would view and interact with Aliens, perception is whats important. The director views them as "biological more advance then humans" so its not stretch that Humans being the bastards we are could spin them as whatever we want them to be.

Except the aliens in that story had a superbiological weapon (it kills EVERYTHING) and access to a spaceship. So they were a threat.

I don't think the series is that good for showing alien/human interactions and xenocide. The first group was a hive mind that didn't understand that humans would be pissed that they killed some humans... except hive insect species tend to be intensely territorial. And even if you consider your enemies part of a hive mind, killing them inconviences the hive mind and is an act of aggression if you are doing so to prevent them from getting information.

The other problem (aside from the problems being resolved by literal magic- who wants to make a spacefleet using the powers of the warp?) is that the fact they have high capacity ftl coms is something you'd think would immediately be paired with computer systems to get incredibly powerful systems. I'm not talking about AIs- you'd think human society would be totally changed by the fact you can have a galaxy wide internet with insane levels of computing power. At the least you'd expect periodic purges to insure that there weren't any rogue AIs.

Did I mention overpopulation is solved by colony ships to other solar systems?

[mr friendly guy]

Oh wait. Okay. So if corporate assholes destroyed your home and killed your parents and friends and family, but you ended up kicking those assholes' asses, you'd still want to conduct negotiations as equals (after the corporate assholes destroyed your homes and killed your parents and friends and families)?

Fuck it. Those RDA assholes were lucky that they didn't have the Bear Jew killfuck them with a baseball bad, or had HUGO STIGLITZ tell them to say auf wiedersen to their Nazi balls.


The Na'vi can negotiate with the EPA or Greenpeace.

A more fitting fate for RDA personnel

[Shroom Man 777]

I'll say it again the background source material from my reading from third sources state that the maglav trains are key to Earth's economy.

Possibly, but keep in mind that they got along well before they started major mining operations on Pandora, and the "mag-lev trains" bits are only on Earth (the same source material also mentions that they have colonies off-world in the solar system in the Avatarverse).

But with unobtanium, those maglevs will be capable of INTERSTELLAR TRAVEL! The magnetic train to the stars! Space, the final frontier!

Avatar's message might have been good, but the way it beat the watcher over the head with it wasn't. Some subtlety wouldn't have been out of place.

And yet, people still try to justify the RDA's assholery. If the Na'Vi were more in line with Earthly tribal societies (which they may have been ; we don't see much of their society, really), you'd give those kind of people more ammunition for their hare-brained justifications.

If the Na'vi were more in like with Earthly Hebrew Tribes of Israel societies (which they may have been ; we don't see much of their torahs, really), you'd give those kind of people more nerve gas and ovens for their Aryan-brained justifications.

Really, it's typical of that kind of mindset that goes about justifying atrocities with "needs" and "might makes right". These would probably be the same douches who back American foreign policies that fund and arm dictators and assholes in Third World nations, just so companies like Haliburton and Exxon Mobile and whatever can make a profit for commodities that are "essential" to the functioning of their society.

Trade brown Filipino skin with blue alienoid space cat skin (or beards and Jew hats), they'd be cheering on orbital Tunguska swing-wing variable geometry turboscramramfanjet-propelled synchronized joint directed fuel air munitionized buckshot ballistic bombardments too.

I think James Cameron didn't really think it through very far.

Micheal Moore would've thought it through further.

I wonder if these assholes would've said that humanity should've offered to negotiate with the aliens from Independence Day as equals after the aliens vaporized every city in America (and killed the First Lady). I mean, Will Smith and Jake Sully were stupid for blowing up the Mothership because I'm sure the RDA would've come back with MORE city-killers and vaporized more of Earth - and this time I don't think neither Jeff Goldblum's computer virus OR Eywa could've stopped them! Then the RDA would continue to mine the unobtanium for the survival of their dying world!

PEACE. NO PEACE. NO PEACE.

We should've negotiated with the Martians. Or else the Martians would've come back, and this time RDA would orbitaly bombard Earth Tree and all the primitive human natives and then mine all the unobtanium to power their maglevs.

If you get confronted by an armed man who means to kill you, but you disarmed him and ruined his shit, you should negotiate with him as an equal or else the RDA will come back to mine all of YOUR unobtanium too after throwing a Tunguska at you!

I swear, the Allies will so regret demanding Nazi Germany's unconditional surrender when the RDA comes back with a fusion torchship and vaporizes America from orbit.

[Starglider]

They literally went to slaughter the unrealistic peaceful nature-loving noble savages

Actually no they did not. RDA is moderately monstrous but compared to many sci-fi antagonists it is pretty tame.

I wonder if these assholes would've said that humanity should've offered to negotiate with the aliens from Independence Day as equals after the aliens vaporized every city in America (and killed the First Lady).

The ID4 aliens started wiping out cities without warning. RDA sent people to try and purchase the land from the Navi, then when they refused to name a price to warn them to leave. Then, when that didn't work, they fired riot gas rounds to force the people out. Very few of the Na'vi actually died in the assault on home tree.

If the RDA had been as ruthless as the ID4 aliens, or even the Empire, they would simply have blown away the whole tribe with no warning and no chance for escape. No gas, no schools, just thermobaric rockets. All (potential) hostiles dead, mine opening tomorrow, profits all round. They lost because they were half-assed about their ethics, making enough effort that their enemy survived and became equipped to fight them, but not enough effort to avoid making the enemy in the first place.

Trade brown Filipino skin with blue alienoid space cat skin (or beards and Jew hats), they'd be cheering on orbital Tunguska swing-wing variable geometry turboscramramfanjet-propelled synchronized joint directed fuel air munitionized buckshot ballistic bombardments too.

In movies, I cheer on the cool toys no matter who is driving them. If we were just considering the biology I would prefer the Na'vi to be flying the Valkyries, because they are inherently cooler than humans, but my dislike of their luddite static holier-than-thou culture way overrules the fact they look cool.

[Guardsman Bass]

They lost because they were half-assed about their ethics, making enough effort that their enemy survived and became equipped to fight them, but not enough effort to avoid making the enemy in the first place.

They then tried to act with total ruthlessness after that with the whole "bomb their sacred site and blast a hole in their racial memory so deep that they won't come within a thousand klicks of this area ever again".

Ironically, if they had been that ruthless up front (by the way, I'm not saying they should have been ruthless - the RDA were assholes), odds are they would have come out on top. Wiping out Hometree without warning and everyone in it (presumably killing Jake's avatar body in the process) would have snuffed the Na'vi retaliation and organized defense before it could even (literally, since Jake then went and tamed Toruk) get off the ground. That's abominable from an ethical point of view, of course.

[Sarevok]

In avatar earth private companies are allowed to own planetkiller star drives. But god forbid they bring a 20th tech level weapon with them. Unleashing the energy of a minitature death star is safe and kosher but SU 25 Frogfoots are extremely dangerous in private hands and too expensive compared to stablized walkers and orbital shuttles, Avatar makes as much sense as the Lion King and like all movies targeted at small kids after 30 pages we should give up now and accept the truth Avatar is really a reimagined Smurfs sequel.

[open_sketchbook]

You are an unbelievable moron. The RDA Marines are a private security company, whose job is to provide security. They don't fit wars, they just scare off native wildlife and prevent the scary indeginous population from killing a bunch of miners and scientists. They have helicopters because the VTOL properties are useful for transporting and protecting small teams of prospectors, scientists and marines out in the jungles. They have articulated walkers because such they can double as heavy lifters and cross broken terrian. They don't have Frogfoots because the mission didn't call for them to straft formations of armour and ground troopers, and they would require bringing in specialized pilots and mechanics, and dedicating fabricator time to it instead of, say, fucking mining tools, the reason they are on the planet in the first place!

[AniThyng]

In avatar earth private companies are allowed to own planetkiller star drives. But god forbid they bring a 20th tech level weapon with them. Unleashing the energy of a minitature death star is safe and kosher but SU 25 Frogfoots are extremely dangerous in private hands and too expensive compared to stablized walkers and orbital shuttles, Avatar makes as much sense as the Lion King and like all movies targeted at small kids after 30 pages we should give up now and accept the truth Avatar is really a reimagined Smurfs sequel.

I think by this standard reality doesn't make sense. Did you watch Black Hawk Down and bitch that the "movie made no sense" because instead of nigh unstoppable M1 Abrams crushing their way down the streets backed up by A-10's and AC-130's, we instead got unarmored glorified Jeeps backed up by light VTOL gunships? Nevermind the ridiculous use of vulnerable VTOLs with absurd open crew compartments that can be taken out by an unguided rocket.

God forbid America didn't just use its citykiller nuclear weapons.

*yes, I know they are helicopters.

[Blayne]

But with unobtanium, those maglevs will be capable of INTERSTELLAR TRAVEL! The magnetic train to the stars! Space, the final frontier!

This has reached a new level of retardation the maglav trains are required for Earths economy to work period, up until they discovered Pandora they could artificially in small quantities create the superconductors they needed but it was prohibitively expensive, so expensive that importing it from a planet 6 lightyears away is actually economically viable.

Starships before the widespread importation of the shiny rock were over 400km long there is every bit of evidence in both the source material and implied in the movie that these shiny rocks are as important to Earth as oil is/was 20 years ago.

First for comparison imagine the OPEC embargo which only blockaded a whole 7% of the US's oil supply at the time, this 7% was sufficient to cause a recession, mile long lineups for fuel and severe shortages.

Now imagine what happens if 99% of the supply is gone.

And its only one country supplying it.

And they're utterly helpless to your superior military might.

Damn straight you'ld kick down the door, this is a common enough theme both in fiction and real life, the Opium wars was over gaining a supply of tea from China, sakuradite wars in Code Geass (as a fiction example), the Iraq war is over oil if word on the street is correct, trail of tears for "living space".

The government doesn't have to be "nazi's" for them to consider the use of war which as defined by Von Clauswitz is an act of force to make the enemy submit to your will and is valid as long as it is instrumental, rational and national. War is the final resort if diplomacy fails. (I can quote Sun Tzu if you object to a German source)

The Navi aren't jewish they're aliens and the Humans aren't Nazis stop trying to twist the argument into that direction, its Godwin's Law writ large just because you're trying to connect the dots doesn't invalidate the thought that the use of force will probably be inevitable if a trade standoff continues.

I misinterpreted the RDA/Humans thinking they were probably more Hawkish then they actually are based on the movie evidence, turns out the situation is alot more complex but doesn't really change the bottom line, either the Navi agree to conduct negotiations or many of them will probably die in the conflicts that would enevitably happen sooner or later, this isn't about making it GRIMDARK its about being realistic these things happen and Jake should know better.

I think if they were real their culture is interesting and worth study and preservation but it is our right to send a new "Commodore Perry" with black spaceships to open their arrogant ports to our trade, if they don't like it then they can bide their time, learn our technology and catchup and then renegotiate on more equal terms like the Japanese and the Chinese did.

[PeZook]

This has reached a new level of retardation the maglav trains are required for Earths economy to work period, up until they discovered Pandora they could artificially in small quantities create the superconductors they needed but it was prohibitively expensive, so expensive that importing it from a planet 6 lightyears away is actually economically viable.

So how did Earth survive without those magical maglev trains which somehow make its economy viable before they managed to get to Pandora, and why didn't Selfridge mention the looming Malthusian collapse to Grace? I guess one explanation is "Selfridge doesn't care about millions dying of hunger", but even then, he has to know what Grace thinks of his greedy financial motivations, and I assume he was trying to actually convince her to shut up and stop complaining, rather than being Exposition Man

[adam_grif]

stuff

See, when stuff like that came up ages back, the general consensus of the people you're arguing against was that it's better for Earth society to collapse in on itself than it is to forcibly relocate the Na'Vi.

[adam_grif]

I guess one explanation is "Selfridge doesn't care about millions dying of hunger", but even then, he has to know what Grace thinks of his greedy financial motivations, and I assume he was trying to actually convince her to shut up and stop complaining, rather than being Exposition Man

Well he clearly didn't care about being a zero dimensional mustache twirling villain, so who knows?

[PeZook]

Well he clearly didn't care about being a zero dimensional mustache twirling villain, so who knows?

Quaritch was a moustache-twirling villain. Selfridge was...well, selfish, greedy and squeamish.

[Shroom Man 777]

In avatar earth private companies are allowed to own planetkiller star drives. But god forbid they bring a 20th tech level weapon with them. Unleashing the energy of a minitature death star is safe and kosher but SU 25 Frogfoots are extremely dangerous in private hands and too expensive compared to stablized walkers and orbital shuttles, Avatar makes as much sense as the Lion King and like all movies targeted at small kids after 30 pages we should give up now and accept the truth Avatar is really a reimagined Smurfs sequel.

Why the hell is it so important for them to have Su-25 Frogfoots or orbital bombardment or anything AT ALL, anyway? Yes, according to the in-universe Avatapedia or whatever, the ship can probably BDZ the planet. So fucking what if the story ignores these "planetkiller star drives", and if the story doesn't have the RDA decked out in your choice samples of military-industrial hardware? You might as well moan and groan about there weren't an extra pair of ISDs that BDZed Yavin IV with Leia, Han, Luke and Chewie on it after the plucky Rebels blew up the Death Star and went back to the planet for debriefings and cocktails. Is the mass death and extermination of a primitive people barely capable of defending themselves so vital to your sick concept of entertainment? Is the use of your favorite choice of weapons systems and phallic symbology that vital to a good time?

Geeze. For all we know the space ship wasn't under the command of Quarritch's jurisdiction, and the only thing he could command was the Venture Star. Would you also be whining and moaning if the captain of the ship WASN"T a shit-eating atrocity-happy Nazi and actually displayed the moral resolve to say "no" to those atrocious bullshit acts you proposed?

Sarevokerritch: "Use your planet killer star drives!"

Starship captain: "no i am not a morally bankrupt asshole and you bunch of glorified security guards with your shitty Su-25 Frogfoots can go screw yourselves!"

Sarevokerritch: "O RLY?"

Starship captain: "YA RLY"

Sarevokerritch: "NO WAI!"

Shroom Sully: "MY LEGS I CAN'T FEEL MY LEGS! MEIN PEZOOK I CAN WALK!"



How the hell does "being able to make it to Pandora in 6 years" translate to "my thrusters will melt your planet"? And if it does translate to planetkilling star drive, whatever, then after the space ship melts Pandora and genocides the Na'vi to give you a hard-on, where is it exactly going to refuel its fuel back so it can fly back to Earth?

Does this bullshit obsession even factor in that these planetkiller stardrives lol might end up also vaporizing the RDA base that's not too far away from the general vicinity of the area?

Does this bullshit even realize that after the use of planetkiller star drives is found out, then Sarevokerritch and Griffridge are probably going to get their asses tried for fucking war crimes and atrocities and EPA code violations in Space Nuremburg?

This has reached a new level of retardation the maglav trains are required for Earths economy to work period, up until they discovered Pandora they could artificially in small quantities create the superconductors they needed but it was prohibitively expensive, so expensive that importing it from a planet 6 lightyears away is actually economically viable.

Starships before the widespread importation of the shiny rock were over 400km long there is every bit of evidence in both the source material and implied in the movie that these shiny rocks are as important to Earth as oil is/was 20 years ago.

First for comparison imagine the OPEC embargo which only blockaded a whole 7% of the US's oil supply at the time, this 7% was sufficient to cause a recession, mile long lineups for fuel and severe shortages.

Now imagine what happens if 99% of the supply is gone.

And its only one country supplying it.

How does this have any bearing at all to the fact that prior to Pandora's discovery, and prior to the RDA's operation on Pandora, humanity has NOT been decimated or destroyed by the unobtanium shortage?

Unobtanium is not vital to humanity's survival. It's a commodity that only makes things easier for humanity.

And they're utterly helpless to your superior military might.

Damn straight you'ld kick down the door, this is a common enough theme both in fiction and real life, the Opium wars was over gaining a supply of tea from China, sakuradite wars in Code Geass (as a fiction example), the Iraq war is over oil if word on the street is correct, trail of tears for "living space".

The government doesn't have to be "nazi's" for them to consider the use of war which as defined by Von Clauswitz is an act of force to make the enemy submit to your will and is valid as long as it is instrumental, rational and national. War is the final resort if diplomacy fails. (I can quote Sun Tzu if you object to a German source)

The Navi aren't jewish they're aliens and the Humans aren't Nazis stop trying to twist the argument into that direction, its Godwin's Law writ large just because you're trying to connect the dots doesn't invalidate the thought that the use of force will probably be inevitable if a trade standoff continues.

So, basically, you're supporting war and killing helpless natives so that you can get a commodity that makes things easier and more convenient for you?

That's morally wrong. You allude to the tea in China, the Opium Wars, and all these other acts that are morally reprehensible and bankrupt feats done by asshole imperialist colonizers that IS no different from Nazis killing Jews for Lebensraum, or from British murdering Chinamen and getting them addicted to Opium so they can buy cheap shit from the Orient, or Spaniards coming in to kill American Injuns, or whatever. These are ALL acts of violence, done by those who've got superior military might, and done against those who are helpless against their superior military might.

None of this is right. If you say that humanity can perform acts of morally bankrupt shit-eating atrocities, then, yes, they sure as hell can. But that doesn't change the fact that those acts will make them out to be morally bankrupt shit-eaters who're committing atrocities - no matter how much you spin it, or how you justify it, or how you bring up historical precedents that are ALSO morally bankrupt shit-eating atrocities.

I misinterpreted the RDA/Humans thinking they were probably more Hawkish then they actually are based on the movie evidence, turns out the situation is alot more complex but doesn't really change the bottom line, either the Navi agree to conduct negotiations or many of them will probably die in the conflicts that would enevitably happen sooner or later, this isn't about making it GRIMDARK its about being realistic these things happen and Jake should know better.

Yes, it could happen. But that just makes RDA (or whoever) out to be morally bankrupt shit-eating atrocity committers.

I think if they were real their culture is interesting and worth study and preservation but it is our right to send a new "Commodore Perry" with black spaceships to open their arrogant ports to our trade, if they don't like it then they can bide their time, learn our technology and catchup and then renegotiate on more equal terms like the Japanese and the Chinese did.

Or like the American Indians who get stuck in reservations and handed free buy-one-take-one smallpox blankets, or the aborigines who get their children kidnapped by the Apartheid Australian government, or Chinese immigrants who are sent to play with dynamite to build railroads?

oh no it is not GRIMDRAK its about being realistic

stuff

See, when stuff like that came up ages back, the general consensus of the people you're arguing against was that it's better for Earth society to collapse in on itself than it is to forcibly relocate the Na'Vi.

See, when stuff like that came up ages back, the general consesus of the people he's arguing against was that Earth's society was - prior to the use of unobtanium - doing pretty fine and that the lack of unobtanium would not be a civilization-threatening event, these claims of "Earth society collapsing in on itself" because of lol spacemaglevs are complete bullshit and do not justify the use of "planetkiller stardrives" to commit atrocities.

[adam_grif]

Well he clearly didn't care about being a zero dimensional mustache twirling villain, so who knows?

Quaritch was a moustache-twirling villain. Selfridge was...well, selfish, greedy and squeamish.

Whoops, getting my cardboard villains confused.

Do we actually have evidence that this will cause a collapse or are we still just speculating about that?

See, when stuff like that came up ages back, the general consesus of the people he's arguing against was that Earth's society was - prior to the use of unobtanium - doing pretty fine and that the lack of unobtanium would not be a civilization-threatening event, these claims of "Earth society collapsing in on itself" because of lol spacemaglevs are complete bullshit and do not justify the use of "planetkiller stardrives" to commit atrocities.

1. I haven't been reading this thread for like 15 pages so I have no idea if we have confirmation of unobtanium being vital to Earth society circa Avatar.

2. Yes, Earth was doing just fine without Unobtanium, just like it was doing just fine prior to Oil. But once society has become dependent on something, it takes a lot of effort to completely 180 the economy, does it not? Again, not sure if we know whether or not it is dependent on it or not, but if it was, claiming that they don't need it just because there was once a time when the planet didn't is not a compelling argument. It's true that 18th century Earth did just fine without petroleum products, but if you suddenly clicked your fingers and the supply unexpectedly tried up tomorrow, people would die, society would collapse and so on. Although invading another people and relocating them to get some more is not a preferred course of action, when you're contrasting it against your own people suffering and dying without it, it suddenly stops being so black and white.

This still hinges on the idea that it would be equivelant to losing our oil supply. I heard someone say that, but again, is there any official word?

3. Are people still talking about slagging the planet seriously or are you just exaggerating here? I thought the other guy was bringing up the planetkiller drives as a counterpoint to the idea that they were banned from using serious military hardware? It'd be like letting private citizens own knives, rocket launchers and nuclear weapons but forbidding them from owning handguns. I didn't see anybody actually proposing that we nuke them from orbit.

[Spoonist]

Minor nitpick here. Both in the movie and in the fringe material. It is clear that there are unobtainium at other locations on Pandora. Heck that is what the stripmine next to the RDA camp was for. The only benefit of the source under hometree was a higher concentration = lower costs = higher profit = CEO pressure.

So if it was as uniquely necessary for earth's survival then
A) it could be mined elsewhere without nazi lebensraum/british protonazis capitalraum...
B) such mines could be operated by the natives themselves if necessary, (maybe that is what the remaining humans stay for, that would be huge profits)

So there is no reason to assume that the unobtainium would cease. Instead it is likely that if the natives supported by their humans play their cards right. They could get part of the proceeds.
Or enlist a different tribe.

Remember greed has worked for thousands of years where military might have failed.

[PeZook]

Shroom, to be honest, I don't think Blayne is trying to justify the RDA, he's just claiming that genocide/war is what will inevitably happen next, because humans are fuckers and they won't give a fuck about the Na'Vi once the economy collapses.

[PeZook]

2. Yes, Earth was doing just fine without Unobtanium, just like it was doing just fine prior to Oil. But once society has become dependent on something, it takes a lot of effort to completely 180 the economy, does it not? Again, not sure if we know whether or not it is dependent on it or not, but if it was, claiming that they don't need it just because there was once a time when the planet didn't is not a compelling argument. It's true that 18th century Earth did just fine without petroleum products, but if you suddenly clicked your fingers and the supply unexpectedly tried up tomorrow, people would die, society would collapse and so on. Although invading another people and relocating them to get some more is not a preferred course of action, when you're contrasting it against your own people suffering and dying without it, it suddenly stops being so black and white.

Except Earth didn't have unobtainium just a few decades beforehand ; That's not enough time to become dependent on it, since it's not at all like oil: oil is an energy source, unobtainium at best allows more efficient energy distribution. There's no way they could've rewired the entire electrical grid with unobtainium wires within a few decades, and even if they did, it's not like it will collapse the moment unobtainium dries up. The analogy to oil is flawed.

3. Are people still talking about slagging the planet seriously or are you just exaggerating here? I thought the other guy was bringing up the planetkiller drives as a counterpoint to the idea that they were banned from using serious military hardware? It'd be like letting private citizens own knives, rocket launchers and nuclear weapons but forbidding them from owning handguns. I didn't see anybody actually proposing that we nuke them from orbit.

Many private companies today are actually allowed to operate machinery that could kill off entire cities ; Chemical plants, for example, would be able to depopulate gigantic areas with their waste products alone. A single oil tanker's load could completely wipe out local ecosystems, commercial airplanes can be used as missiles, not to mention LPG tankers and their potential use as gigantic fuel-air bombs if deliberately set up for such. How about biological research labs? Their equipment can be used to make superbugs which could wipe out millions of people.

Yet, the government allows these companies to operate all that equipment, and nobody tries to argue they should be legally allowed to own tanks, bombers and nuclear weapons, too.