Avatar review thread

[mr friendly guy]

1. Home tree isn't the only location for unobtainium. Where the hell do you think corporate guy got his little grey rock which sells for 20 million a kilo? He was just interested in his profit margins which he outright states!

2. Humanity needs it wah wah. Where these guys watching the same movie?
The fact that people arguing this are even extrapolating from vague dialogue to get this conclusion (of how shitty earths economy is) shows how desperate they are to justify it. Its like a trekkie taking Harry Kim's blowing up a planet joke as an indication of Federation firepower.

I mean using inflationary figures and working out in the future unobtainium is several times the price of uranium in real terms = running low on uranium. Despite previous nuclear power threads saying that nuclear power could outlast the sun at present day usages, thus even if we increase our use of power by hundreds of time its not going to run low by 2154.

If anyone doesn't like me using real world comparisons of uranium stock thats their problem for using real world inflationary and price figures. They open the floodgates so they have no grounds to cry over spilt milk.

3. Eminent domain? WTF? Pandora isn't part of Earth's territory dumbasses. Next you will be talking about divine right.

Here's one for the military wankers. Please answer whether it was right for these following sci fi civilisations to screw earth over because as far as I can tell they have the same logic (an even more going for them) than the humans in Avatar.

1. H.G. Wells martians in war of the worlds (novel) not the Tom Cruise movie which I haven't seen. They had greater technology than 19th century earth. Their world is supposedly dying, they need ours. Chances we don't want to share.

2. The Thanagarians from the Justice League cartoon. They needed the Earth to function as a hyperspace gateway to allow them to bypass the Gordonian defense in a last desperate attack to end their war. Unfortunately Earth will be destroyed in the process. They are technologically superior to us. They even justify the use as "Earth is only one planet" which is small compared to their empire. We see first hand that after this failure they are defeated by the Gordonians, so unlike the Avatar movie they actually have a more legitimate need than what the humans in avatar need.

If a bunch of primitive apes are in the way, and the multiple planets of the Thanagarian empire are worth more than humans, so whats the dilmma here?

3. The Visitors from the 1970s show V (not the recent remake). They need our water plus they need us for food, and to brainwash a few of us to fight their wars. A war which isn't going well for them. Chances are we are not going to give all three to them, so they have to take it by force, albeit with subtlety. If they turn out to have more numbers than 1970s earth will it be ok? How about if they had less numbers, then its not ok now?

4. Every fucking alien invasion force from Doctor Who in the 20th and early 21st century. Some of them say for example the Sontarans clearly outnumber humans if they have been fighting for ages in large chunks of the galaxy. I guess they need it more than us right? Remember, we are the primitives here, so none of this "noble savage" bullshit on our part. Some of them actually desperately need our world eg the Nestene consciousness and the Sontarans in 21st century earth is also hinted at needing it because their war is no longer in their favour.

5. The aliens from invasion america. Same deal, they have a dying planet and want our resources. Oh, did I mention they actually used orbital bombardment on us as well.

What will expect is millwankers trying desperately to point out how different these situations are with stupid statements like, we actually need our water but the Na'vi don't need unobtainium. Geez, ignoring for the moment they do need their Hometree which is situated on the mine, and at the end of the day both sides are giving up something they don't want to.

Oh, how about we weren't try to kill the Na'vi only destroy their homes and force them to relocate (which totally ignores the point that people have stated in this thread that if push comes to shove its ok to use xenocide albeit not ideal). Does that mean if aliens want to relocate us to certain shitty areas of the planet while they take the resources from the good areas its ok now?

Lets face it. At the end of the day for these millwankers is that is not ok when humans are being screwed by the technologically and numerically superior aliens. Its only ok when we screw others, right. After all, might makes right? AM I rite?

You guys will point out superficial differences in a desperate attempt to dodge the point that at the end of the day their morally bankrupt position is that its ok for me to do it, but not ok for others to do it to me.

[neoolong]

Which book was that, Sylas? The Art of Avatar one?

[SylasGaunt]

Which book was that, Sylas? The Art of Avatar one?

Avatar: An activist's survival guide.

Basically gives a bunch of background info.

[Shroom Man 777]

Maybe if these milwankers get such a chubby from nuking the aliens from orbit so they can mine their precious golden oil diamond uranium rock ores for the good of humanity, they wouldn't mind it at all if an alien race drank all of the Earth's water and left the people to die of thirst - for the good of the Visitors or the ID4aliens - now, would they? It's called eminent domain, and it also includes the blood in your veins that the Martians are intent on sucking, so suck you.

I wonder how these same people would react if they were all living nicely with their extended families and relatives in a big nice old house they've lived in for all their lives, and them some assholes came from nowhere to evict them from it, and when they said no or asked "where's your warrant", those assholes started shooting gas bombs at them and suffocated them and blew up their house and caught every one of them and put them in crammed trains and shipped them to Germany so that they could get systematically executed and have their hair used as garrote wire and their teeth used for piano keys. It would be totally fine, especially if the assholes had big guns and awesome military hardware since might makes right and if the assholes can make tactical strategic orbital aerospace kinetic geosynch nuclear smart strikes, then that makes it even more okay. Especially if their house was over the biggest deposit of oil platinum gold uranium rock ores or something.

It seems obvious to me that if the Earth really is in dire trouble without the Unobtanium (I can't believe they actually called it that), that forcefully driving a people out of their homes is an acceptable thing to do. Obviously xenocide is not the preferred means to do it, but if it's going to come down to us or them, I have no moral qualms nuking them from orbit, if that's the only way to be sure (figuratively, not literally, since I assume that would destroy the deposits too)

It did not seem obvious to me. The corporate douchebag never mentioned that the fate of humanity depended on the unobtanium, or anything that drastic or desperate at all. The only thing he mentioned were "ten billion million trillion space dollars per miligram" and "quarterly stock portfolio" and "look bad".

Billions of human lives are worth far more to me than however many roid-smurfs are living on top of this mine. I haven't seen the movie, so correct me if I'm wrong, but I absolutely do not see the dilemma here. They won't clear out, we need the stuff badly.

Then fuck humanity. I wouldn't see the dilemma either if the aliens speared the humans in the face and fed their guts and corpses to their alien xeno-kittens. I'd have no moral qualms about that, and the fact that the aliens would set a precedent to discourage humanity from fucking other alien species would be actually be a good thing for all the other alien space hippies who make the milwankers so angers.

It's like Mike said in his Star Trek Insurrection review: if the stuff the natives are sitting on top of is incredibly vital and beneficial (according to the official literature I've seen, this would be a fair description of unobtanium), blasting them out of the way or just relocating them will be looked back upon as an unfortunate but necessary step taken into a new golden age.

Though I wouldn't really shed a tear if the humans/environmental rapists ended up getting stabbed in the face with a space spear.

But you are correct. Cremating the untermenschen or just relocating them to camps will be looked back upon as an unfortunate but necessary step taken into a new golden age with more lebensraum.

^__________^

Actually, the government does have that right. It's called eminent domain; all they have to do is give you fair market value for the property and, unless a state's law says something different, they can kick you out of your house to put in a country club if they think it will boost tax revenue. There's been holy hell over the court case that caused that, but my point is that land can be taken over like that for any "public purpose" up to and including economic redevelopment.

That only applies within the scope of a government's sovereignty, in its own territories. Since the movie occurs in an alien world, in alien territory, then the humans would be within the alien's jurisdiction and the aliens also have the right to exercise their sovereign "police power" by stabbing the humans in the face with a fucking space spear, and feeding their guts to those rabid xeno-kittens.

Unless you consider aliens coming in to steal all of Earth's water while leaving everyone to die of thirst as also the proper exercise of the right to "eminent domain", or the Martians coming in to suck all our blood.


See, this kind of thinking makes me want to make a more relevant and topical movie with the same ecological anti-nazi message as Avatar. In the future where global warming has made all the ice melt, the US military discovers oil in the Antarctic and sends the USMC Hooah to secure the resources. But Micheal Moore gathers all the native penguins and through tap-dancing, they overwhelm America's military might with the power of love and happy feet and after a climaxing nunchaku duel on top of The Last Glacier in Antarctica, Donald Rumsfeld or General Pretaeus can end up getting eaten by a walrus or an Antarctic hippo. With its military supremacy assfucked by a bunch of gay hippie penguins, America ends up exploding and the penguins end up performing an epic tapdancing number at the end of the movie just like Slumdog Billionaire. But with more furry yiff.

[Knobbyboy88]

A pretty "meh" movie on the whole.

The good: Spoiler

The scenery was great, the aliens looked pretty cool (Signorny Weaver's "Avatar" looked kind of creepy however), the fight scenes were INCREDIBLE, and I was even pleasantly surprised to see the stoneage aliens actually get their asses handed to them by the mech warrior future wank space marines.

The bad: Spoiler

Plot is basically an ungodly and hamfisted union of Pocahontas, Dances with Wolves, and just about every other cringeworthy, cliche "tree hugging natives good, white man bad" movie ever made with traces of Alien 2 thrown in for some inexplicable reason, and the "Gia comes down from on high and saves us all" deus ex machina ending is slightly irritating.

Some other observations:
Spoiler

The space marines seriously need to look into using stronger materials for their cockpit canopies. The one scene where the gunship got one-shoted by an arrow to the canopy had me going like "what the fuuuucck..."

Spoiler

I've really got to think that there were better solutions to the problem than simply going into the hometree and blowing it up. It would probably have been cheaper to simply work around the natives and dig at other, less plentiful "unobtanium" deposits than to mount a full scale blitz against just one. Hell! If they were really determined to get at just that one deposit, they could have simply tried to undermine or poison the tree ingonito, therefore making the natives leave of their own free will when their beloved tree started to die under them.

Spoiler

I get that blowing up the natives "spirit trees" would've been a major faux pas, but the Nav'ri were really just kind of being dicks about the hometree. They should've moved.

Spoiler

JC really just threw all subtlety to the wind with the alien "horses." I mean...Really? Could you have possibly bashed us over the head with the Native American allegory any harder?

Spoiler

Finally, I think that if the Nav'ri think they're going to have peace now that they forced the mining companies out, I think they've got another thing coming. What happens when all of the surviving miners and marines come back to Earth and start telling horror stories about Nav'ri warcrimes and brutality when all they tried to do was "offer them peace, education, and civilization." The "People" might not be so opposed to the idea of dropping space rocks on the giant blue peaceniks anymore.

[Knife]

Watched it tonight and loved it. Some of the bitches here just seem like people over thinking and over analyzing it, or perhaps expecting something else and being mad they didn't get it. Beautiful visuals, good story, good acting, and a movie that just pulls you in.

To address some of the stuff being talked about here,

Bullets v alien Rhino's. Keep in mind there were lots of foot infantry compared to the number of mecha with uber mech rifles. Firing standard infantry assualt rifles and/or sub machine gun weapons like the foot soldiers seemed to have wouldn't be good enough to get insta-kills on large animals on earth. Bear hunters don't hunt with .22 long rifles or even .30 caliber weapons. Big game takes big fucking guns, and even then you don't get an instant kill on them. You track them as they bleed out. So on Pandora, with foot soldiers being the majority of the ground force, firing small arms into a formation of charging Hammer-head rhino's, don't expect a lot of dead animals.

The larger weapons on the half dozen mechs should do something, but then again you may or may not get instant kills off of those. A hyped up, pissed off, adrenaline high animal that is mostly a giant fuck ton of muscle may keep coming even with a couple of rounds in him; lord knows plenty of people in combat keep going with holes in them.

[Shroom Man 777]

A pretty "meh" movie on the whole.

The bad: Spoiler

Plot is basically an ungodly and hamfisted union of Pocahontas, Dances with Wolves, and just about every other cringeworthy, cliche "tree hugging natives good, white man bad" movie ever made with traces of Alien 2 thrown in for some inexplicable reason, and the "Gia comes down from on high and saves us all" deus ex machina ending is slightly irritating.

How else would you have had it? Those things were unavoidable in such a story, and at least the space injuns weren't portrayed too stupidly and instead of anything lame we saw them do shit like tame pterodactyl monitor lizards and do weirdo brain-stem organic neural interface stuff - and at least they made the Gaia stuff make sense within the context. I didn't really find that stuff really offensive at all since that stuff was practically a given, it's almost like disliking a romantic movie because the guy and the girl end up falling in love again after their big fight, and then resolving their issues and living happily ever after or something.

Hey, at least James Cameron had the decency to show Gaia saving everyone after the injuns got massacred horribly. And at least this Gaia stuff was given a decent sci-fi exposition and depiction.

Some other observations:
Spoiler

The space marines seriously need to look into using stronger materials for their cockpit canopies. The one scene where the gunship got one-shoted by an arrow to the canopy had me going like "what the fuuuucck..."

To be fair, it's not like modern day fighter jets and gunships have super-armored canopies either. The fact that the alien injuns were huge, and that their bows were practically miniature ballistas and that their arrows were fucking spear-sized, kinda makes it easier to deal with.

Spoiler

I've really got to think that there were better solutions to simply going into the hometree and blowing it up. It would probably have been cheaper to simply work around the natives and dig at other, less plentiful "unobtanium" deposits than to mount a full scale blitz against just one. Hell! If they were really determined to get at just that one deposit, they could have simply tried to undermine or poison the tree ingonito, therefore making the natives leave of their own free will when their beloved tree started to die under them.

That would've taken time, time they probably didn't have. After three months, the corporates and milwankers were already frothing at the mouth to meet their quarterly stock portfolio things.

Spoiler

I get that blowing up the natives "spirit trees" would've been a major faux pas, but the Nav'ri were really just kind of being dicks about the hometree. They should've moved.

It's their fucking homes, they've lived there for ten hundred thousand million years. Why should they move their asses because some tiny little bunch of whiny greedy alien assholes from outer space ask them to? Especially if those whiny greedy alien assholes from outer space is hell bent on defiling and murdering their holy environment, which they know for a fact is in fact a living sentient organism that sustains them all? And their home-tree was conveniently near a major junction point for their planetwide neural net, those jellyfish glowing trees.

They don't have to do shit. Tough shit for the humans if these guys don't want to budge an inch.

Spoiler

JC really just threw all subtlety to the wind with the alien "horses." I mean...Really? Could you have possibly bashed us over the head with the Native American allegory any harder?

Mmm... maybe. It might've been cool to give those alien horses antlers. Riding mooses to war would be more cooler than just ponies.

Spoiler

Finally, I think that if the Nav'ri think they're going to have peace now that they forced the mining companies out, I think they've got another thing coming. What happens when all of the surviving miners and marines come back to Earth and start telling horror stories about Nav'ri warcrimes and brutality when all they tried to do was "offer them peace, education, and civilization." The "People" might not be so opposed to the idea of dropping space rocks on the giant blue peaceniks anymore.

[/quote]

Well, screw that, yeah.

But the Nav'ri at least sent them home alive, even the injured ones. Maybe not all of the corporates would lie about the Nav'ri and tell horror stories? When the asshole corporates ordered the massacre, a lot of those other civilians didn't really look so comfortable and not all of them might've agreed with what was going on. Perhaps some Nav'ri sympathizers, aside from Shaggy and that Fat Guy, could've gone home too?

For all we know, the "company" might end up going bankrupt or falling under heavy government and public scrutiny and maybe instead of a bunch of milwankers coming to strategically tactically kinetically nuclearly nuke them from orbit, we actually get diplomats to go to Pandora next time - and after the truth gets out, the milwankers end up getting court martianed on Mars. Then, like, instead of asshole corporates and milwankers the next-next guys will be scientists and the Nav'ri might teach them, or they might discover, awesome medicine that would promote socialized healthcare and the Nav'ri might show them the secrets of world peace and back on Earth, because of the awesome native Gaia secrets of the Nav'ri, the humans stop fighting each other and the military ceases to exist.

Also, the scientists were supposed to be very much independent of the milwankers or the corporate douchecocks. Hopefully not all of the scientists stayed on Pandora.

[Oskuro]

Just came back from it, it was good. The 3d was good, but a bit low key, the best scenes were at the beginning, when we see jake get out of the Cryostasis pod, and when the shuttle is approaching the base and we get to see from inside the cockpit. Really, this 3d stuff begs for a proper space-battle movie.
The story was adequate, well paced, but again, low key, there was little bang in this movie, and I fear on the long run it won't be as memorable as it could've. On the other hand, the Na'vi are very well developed, and together with their ecosystem, the best part of the movie. The human tech was also quite believable.

One thing I would have liked would have been more development regarding the duality between jake and his Avatar, namely, a scene where he gets to meet the Na'vi princess as a human, and she learns of his disability.

As for the creatures on the planet being artificial, maybe their evolution has been steered by the planetary intellect in some manner, or all of them evolved from the same base creature. Except for the Na'vi themselves, the other creatures we see share many traits, like the dual "connection ports" protuding from their heads, the multiple sets of eyes, the number of limbs, the air intakes, even the quality of their skin.


Now, on the issue of the Unobtanium, just a nitpick, if it was something vital for human survival, why send a private company? Wouldn't they send the actual military in full force? When survival of your civilization is at stake you don't fuck around.

As for Mecha vs. Rhinos, even if the bullets had been more effective, the real danger was the massive stampede going their way. Those ground forces would have had trouble with an stampede of regular earth rhinos, or even cows.


And on another note, in my eyes the Na'vi are what the Night Elves from WoW should be, in fact, they are better wood elves than pretty much any other incarnation. I even thought of Tyrande when the princess rides the tiger-beast.

[adam_grif]

2. Humanity needs it wah wah. Where these guys watching the same movie?
The fact that people arguing this are even extrapolating from vague dialogue to get this conclusion (of how shitty earths economy is) shows how desperate they are to justify it. Its like a trekkie taking Harry Kim's blowing up a planet joke as an indication of Federation firepower.

No, I explicitly stated that I have NOT seen the movie, and I can ONLY go by what I'm told in this thread. You say it's not necessary for Earth, other are. Personally I don't care which is true, but what I'm saying (and I stand by this) is:

If Earth's future is contingent on mining large quantities of the stuff, then xenocide is morally acceptable as a means to perpetuate our own survival.

Here's one for the military wankers. Please answer whether it was right for these following sci fi civilisations to screw earth over because as far as I can tell they have the same logic (an even more going for them) than the humans in Avatar.

Blah blah blah. Yes, it's morally acceptable for the invaders to invade us if they need it, because there isn't some kind of universally self consistent morality that we all have to adhere to. By the same token, they can't expect us to not resist. And shouldn't.

But the situation isn't quite the same, because whereas the Navi can just relocate to another settlement and keep their lives, the Martians in War of the Worlds didn't say "dudes, look, can you just clear out of this city? I know it's important to you, but we're going to fucking destroy you if you don't." They didn't try anything approaching a diplomatic solution before they started heat-raying us to death.

The guiding principle is "whatever is in the best interest of humanity is right from humanity's perspective". If I had to pull the trigger on every sentient being in the universe to ensure the survival of humanity, I would. And I expect that a Martian would do the same to an Earthling, if it meant that the Martians would survive. I don't want to, I rather like the idea of aliens and I'd love to befriend some. But if it's us or them, I know which side I'm on.

Lets face it. At the end of the day for these millwankers is that is not ok when humans are being screwed by the technologically and numerically superior aliens. Its only ok when we screw others, right. After all, might makes right? AM I rite?

Oh, you're so right. All I even watch SciFi for is to satisfy my xenocidal hardon for military tech stomping over the little guy. Ungh, I can picture it now. Little baby aliens getting murdered for Imperial Earth! Oh god it's making me so hot. I can't possibly just be interested in the survival of my own species, because that wouldn't conform to your narrow minded view stating that groups aren't allowed to act in their own best interest if that means fucking somebody else over.

Come on. You know damn well that if it's true that corporate profits are the only motivation for the attacks on Navi that we wouldn't support it. Our support of it is reliant on the idea that without that specific mine (and thus, the necessity of a forced relocation), we're screwed. If we can just mine anywhere else and save Earth, or if we can survive just fine without it, then of course I don't approve of the attacks on the Navi!

But if it were, would you?

Then fuck humanity. I wouldn't see the dilemma either if the aliens speared the humans in the face and fed their guts and corpses to their alien xeno-kittens. I'd have no moral qualms about that, and the fact that the aliens would set a precedent to discourage humanity from fucking other alien species would be actually be a good thing for all the other alien space hippies who make the milwankers so angers.

You don't think that IF humanity was at stake, it's morally justified to kill others to save ourselves? Even if it was killing a few thousand to save billions? Do you think it's justified for two starving men to have at each other so one can survive by eating the other, or would you rather they both died, because it wouldn't be "fair"? Would you kill a man to save the life of your mother?

You know what? I think the amount of Furry porn that this film will generate because of their goddamn cat-people is solid ground for a morally justified extermination.

[GrayAnderson]

At no point is it in any way even implied that Earth needs the unobtanium badly. Even when Augustine is blowing up in Selfridge's face he doesn't offer anything as a reply except "but we need to make out quarterly profit targets". The idea that this operation is in any way a necessity is a giant red herring to make the milwankers feel all fuzzy and self-righteous inside.

If Unobtanium was a critical resource, there'd be a bigger operation on the planet than a few hundred miners and rent-a-cop mercenaries, wouldn't there?

Why? It is insanely expensive to ship resources there and they seem to have been given the minimal necesary numbers in order to carry out their duties.

The natives however do have a use for their Hometree which just happens to sit on the biggest unobtanium deposit and needs to be cleared for the company to mine the precious mineral. Ignoring this particular point is just being dishonest. If the unobtanium was sitting on desolate region that natives don't use and don't care about there wouldn't be a conflict in the first place.

Want to bet there is a connection between the unobtanium and the home tree?

-Hadn't even thought of a connection, but given the size of the tree (I can't quite tell how big it is, but 500-1000 feet tall seems entirely within the realm of possibility), I wouldn't be surprised trees of that size had some limited amount of unobtanium pulled into the bark that allowed for the tree to stay up. Not necessary for the tree to work, but also not impossible to see happening.

-The cost point that you make is a biggie. Nothing is coming cheap here; my guess is that the $20m/kg is covering costs but the margin isn't as massive as one wants to think. It's there, but it's not huge. Right now, it usually costs $10,000/lb to send one pound of something into space. That doesn't even get you out of low earth orbit. Getting out of the sun's gravity well isn't cheap either, and we're not even touching on the cost of capital here.

Moving on to Mr. Friendly Guy's comments:

I mean using inflationary figures and working out in the future unobtainium is several times the price of uranium in real terms = running low on uranium. Despite previous nuclear power threads saying that nuclear power could outlast the sun at present day usages, thus even if we increase our use of power by hundreds of time its not going to run low by 2154.

I've seen estimates all over the chart, but I don't think I've ever seen "outlast the sun" on the list. I would greatly appreciate a source on that. As to your whining about me working on the price issue, a big number got thrown out for what the unobtanium is pulling in, cost-wise. $20m is a lot of money, but I either have to assume that the quote:
A) Is in current (i.e. 2009) terms, in which case it is a lot of money or
B) Is in movie (i.e. 2150s) terms, in which case it may or not be as much.
Cameron's intent was clearly to convey "this is expensive stuff". Ignoring his intent, that's certainly what Selfridge was trying to get across in the discussion he was having.

As to making it equal running low on uranium, I am referring to the most probable source of power absent oil and absent large-scale fusion operations. Looking at this realistically, humans are not dragging their ass four light years and change and throwing a massive amount of money into an operation that is not generating a commodity lacking demand, and people are not going to demand a new power source unless said power source is cheaper than that which is available.

If the market is yielding $20m/kg for something, then the market is saying something about the importance of that thing, and it's not saying that said thing is unimportant. It is saying that it is vital. In a crunch the US would pay a lot more for oil than we did last year, and we would pay it because we can't just flip a switch and turn the oil off. While I am willing to concede that I don't have readily available comparisons to measure that cost against, the fact that it is paying for interstellar shipping and handling, including sending some very heavy and very expensive equipment even one way, not to mention the support infrastructure needed to back up such an operation on Earth? That says that the world isn't looking at a million dollar haircut alongside that.

Alien examples 1-5, most or all of which involve killing off humanity

I would agree with you if you were making a comparable comparison. You are not. We are not attempting to exterminate them, and we're not even touching on any of the tribes hundreds of miles away, so please get off the damn genocide kick you're on. It's immaterial, and I dare say that repeatedly offering up that term does not make it any more applicable. More to the point, you omit the fact that we are willing to work with them in achieving relocation.

So let's look at the situations you've offered up and make them actually vaguely resemble what's going on in Avatar: An alien race shows up tomorrow morning. They send down representatives and say that they need the territory in the New York metro area for [insert need here]. It is vital to prevent the collapse/near collapse of their civilization, and sorry folks, but it's got to be New York. They're willing to pay us anything that we want, but if we don't negotiate, they will attack us to get at it.

I use New York purposefully, because it is the biggest city in the US (where most of the members of this board, I believe, are from), it is culturally very important to our country, and we do have an emotional attachment to it. I think it's the closest thing the US has to Hometree and offers us the most valid comparison here. One could insert another city of similar importance to another nation (Buenos Aires in Argentina, etc.) and I would accept it as a similar comparison.

I don't like the conclusion that is generated by that situation, but my view is that if such an offer were on the table then while it is not a pleasant offer, if the alternative is the collapse/near collapse of their civilization and their offer is in good faith, they are justified in forcing it forward on us while keeping casualties to a minimum. However, we also have a right to defend ourselves against such an attack. This is, at least based on what I'm hearing in the movie (I don't have the guide to it yet, but I'll be getting that before Christmas...Barnes and Noble closed early due to snow), roughly what humanity is looking at there. The humans have a right to attack, and the aliens have a right to defend themselves and their territory. The humans try to minimize casualties on the other side until they see a counter-attack massing, and then they are bent on making their attack count for something more than bopping the other side on the nose.

Do I necessarily like that result? No. But do I accept it? Yes. And there is very much a difference between a conclusion which I like and a conclusion which I am willing to accept as necessary. I don't necessarily like taxes, I don't necessarily like the idea of a military draft possibly being needed, but I accept those things as well.

Also, an additional point is relevant: It is possible, in a conflict, for both sides to be justified in their actions. Any race has a right, and arguably a responsibility, to fight for their survival. They ought to, in general, do so with minimal casualties on any opposing side, but they have a right to do fight for their survival. Note that this does not mean that a conflict does not exist, it doesn't preclude a right to self degense, and it doesn't mean that one side has to like what the other side is doing to it.

[Shroom Man 777]

I doubt a platoon of the most gung-ho marines, even those recruited from former gang members and mafiosi and Ku Klux Klanners, and a squad of space humvees with legs can stand up to a migratory stampede of binillions of wildebeest and a fuckton of elephant rhinos. Just like how I'm reasonably sure that even 1960s Nike-Zeupiter XB-70 Valkyries in all those Curtis LeMay milwank graphs would still get ruined if a seagull got into its supersonic turboscram rocket nuclear ramjet Pluto engines.

One thing I would have liked would have been more development regarding the duality between jake and his Avatar, namely, a scene where he gets to meet the Na'vi princess as a human, and she learns of his disability.

Yeah. If the movie had a few minutes more, the actual Na'vri-human interaction between Blue Girl and Cripple Wheelchair Jake would've been a tender and cute thing to see.

As for the creatures on the planet being artificial, maybe their evolution has been steered by the planetary intellect in some manner, or all of them evolved from the same base creature. Except for the Na'vi themselves, the other creatures we see share many traits, like the dual "connection ports" protuding from their heads, the multiple sets of eyes, the number of limbs, the air intakes, even the quality of their skin.

An exploration into the actual evolution, or creation, of the Pandora ecosystem and biosphere would be very intriguing. I think it would be very cool and awesome if the whole ecosystem was created not just by anyone or any natural or artificial process, but by the Na'vi's distant ancestors themselves - perhaps because in ancient times, they nearly ruined their own environment with technology but managed to save it by recreating it and artificially evolving it in such a drastic way so that all organic life - the Na'vi themselves included - would be part of some holistic greater whole, where even their "souls" (or being, or whatever) gets stored in the great world-brains.

Come on. You know damn well that if it's true that corporate profits are the only motivation for the attacks on Navi that we wouldn't support it. Our support of it is reliant on the idea that without that specific mine (and thus, the necessity of a forced relocation), we're screwed. If we can just mine anywhere else and save Earth, or if we can survive just fine without it, then of course I don't approve of the attacks on the Navi!

But if it were, would you?

Yeah. But I think you're the only one who really went "if it was necessary, if survival depended upon atrocities, then we've got to do the ugly thing to live".

The rest of "you guys" totally just seemed like "bla bla hippies tactical orbital deathstrike kills dumb blue space people, stupid ecology message, military power better than space spears, hurr! go army navy air strong power!" and I think that's a big source of the derision re: Avatar, and the pro- and anti- skubbers.

You don't think that IF humanity was at stake, it's morally justified to kill others to save ourselves? Even if it was killing a few thousand to save billions? Do you think it's justified for two starving men to have at each other so one can survive by eating the other, or would you rather they both died, because it wouldn't be "fair"? Would you kill a man to save the life of your mother?

It would be "justifiable" in a sense, but it wouldn't really be morally right. It'd be an ugly but necessary decision.

If humanity was at stake, preferably an action that wouldn't involve genocide or mass murder or a whole lot of killing, would be, uh, preferable. I am sure if the humans told the Na'vi that they needed the unobtanium to survive, the Na'vi would've been more reasonable since the only assholes in the movie were the corporate/milwank humans. But since the humans didn't need it, but only wanted it for their own profit and for their own load of decadent luxurious shit, the Na'vi really have no obligation to let the humans have any - and the humans have really no moral justification to kill people.

So, yeah. Unobtanium was never stated to be necessary or needed for humanity to survive or anything. All the (asshole) characters ever said was that it was expensive, and that they wanted to have a good quarterly stock portfolio.

Killing people for wanted, but unneeded, profit is really not moral any way you look at it.

So that ends this whole fest.

You know what? I think the amount of Furry porn that this film will generate because of their goddamn cat-people is solid ground for a morally justified extermination.

This is, by far, the best and only worthwhile argument you milguys have.

[Knobbyboy88]

I didn't really find that stuff really offensive at all since that stuff was practically a given, it's almost like disliking a romantic movie because the guy and the girl end up falling in love. again after their big fight, and then resolving their issues and living happily ever after or something.

I actually went into the movie expecting to dislike these particular aspects of it. I saw it anyway because, well, c'mon dude...It's James Cameron.

To be fair, it's not like modern day fighter jets and gunships have super-armored canopies either. The fact that the alien injuns were huge, and that their bows were practically miniature ballistas and that their arrows were fucking spear-sized, kinda makes it easier to deal with.

Yea, but it was also kind of inconsistent as well. We saw dozens of arrows harmlessly bounce off of the canopy of the Colonel's transport. However, I guess that you could possibly factor inertia in there as well when you consider the fact that the arrows which bounced off were fired from the ground, whereas the one-shot came from a flying Nav'ri in the middle of a dive bombing run iirc.

Mmm... maybe. It might've been cool to give those alien horses antlers. Riding mooses to war would be more cooler than just ponies.

Or those six legged panthers. That would've been bad ass as all hell.

It's their fucking homes, they've lived there for ten hundred thousand million years. Why should they move their asses because some tiny little bunch of whiny greedy alien assholes from outer space ask them to? Especially if those whiny greedy alien assholes from outer space is hell bent on defiling and murdering their holy environment, which they know for a fact is in fact a living sentient organism that sustains them all?

No, no, I understand that they would be reluctant to leave their homes. My problem lies more in the fact that the natives just plain didn't seem to be willing to negotiate at all, PERIOD. As far as they were concerned, humans were deserving of nothing other than contempt and it was to be the Nav'ri way or the highway. All their fruity enviro-wank just kind of struck me as being Cameron's hamfisted justification for making his "noble savage fights off the forces of modernism" motif sit well with the audience instead of coming off as what it kind of really is; fanatical, irrational, intolerant, and kind of prickish.

This fact only makes this scenario...

instead of a bunch of milwankers coming to strategically tactically kinetically nuclearly nuke them from orbit, we actually get diplomats to go to Pandora next time

Even more problematic. If "unobtainium" really is as important as they make it out to be, the government takes over negotiations pending corporate investigations, and the Nav'ri maintain their current "CONVERT TO THE CHURCH OF EHLYWA OR DIE" haughty attitude, I can't really see things ending any better than they did before.

If neither side is willing to make any concessions, things are pretty much doomed to end in bloodshed. This was my point earlier. I'm sure that there was probably some kind of deal the two sides could have worked out.

[Ghost Rider]

I would like to ask all the screaming bitches of both side.

Is said item absolutely needed? Because really the way it sounds it that this macguffin is what everybody is screaming over and is basically a problem I see of the entire film. It either is needed and mankind is protrayed as fucking retards in their imminent survival or they are just protraying greedy fucks as just that.

[Knobbyboy88]

I got the impression that we were simply greedy fucks. However, there were a few sly references thrown in here and there about "our dying world" and the like which might have implied otherwise.

"Unobtainium" might be the hot commodity it is for a reason you know.

[Knife]

No, I explicitly stated that I have NOT seen the movie, and I can ONLY go by what I'm told in this thread. You say it's not necessary for Earth, other are. Personally I don't care which is true, but what I'm saying (and I stand by this) is:

If Earth's future is contingent on mining large quantities of the stuff, then xenocide is morally acceptable as a means to perpetuate our own survival.

Even if that is true, which it doesn't appear to be in the movie; xenocide would still be unacceptable route and nothing but lazy and greedy. Nothing in the movie suggests, nor implies, that the Hometree deposit is the only deposit available to mine. It is just the easiest with in 200 kilometers of the human base. If we need it so badly, to survive as a species, then we'd be there in more force with more supplies, and even if we were not, we are coming via fucking spaceship. We can land our crap anywhere on the planet in any location with the mineral without a large concentration of aliens living on top of it.

If we get to the point where that deposit under Hometree was the last, you might have an argument; however, in the same breath, if it were the last deposit, we'd better have been looking for some other power source/super conductor thingy if it is the last.

But the situation isn't quite the same, because whereas the Navi can just relocate to another settlement and keep their lives, the Martians in War of the Worlds didn't say "dudes, look, can you just clear out of this city? I know it's important to you, but we're going to fucking destroy you if you don't." They didn't try anything approaching a diplomatic solution before they started heat-raying us to death.

Are you seriously suggesting that people telling you to fuck off when you want their house should be surprising and/or unacceptable starting position in any negotiation? Fuck North American Indians, name any culture that did that? Scot's didn't do it for the English, hell the Welsh didn't do it for the Anglo's or Saxons. Where is this precedent of one culture rolling over and saying 'ok, here's the keys and it's all yours' when someone comes in and orders you to turn over your house to them.

The guiding principle is "whatever is in the best interest of humanity is right from humanity's perspective". If I had to pull the trigger on every sentient being in the universe to ensure the survival of humanity, I would. And I expect that a Martian would do the same to an Earthling, if it meant that the Martians would survive. I don't want to, I rather like the idea of aliens and I'd love to befriend some. But if it's us or them, I know which side I'm on.

Again we're back to the point I made in the first response; you might have a point if indeed it was the only thing to save humanity. It doesn't appear to be in the movie, nor does it seem ethical to go straight to murder and theft to get the resources you want. In fact, there was a bit of dialogue in the movie about that, where Jake chides Grace about how that is how you do it; demonize them, come up with a bullshit insult they made to you, and go after them for their shit.

You don't think that IF humanity was at stake, it's morally justified to kill others to save ourselves? Even if it was killing a few thousand to save billions? Do you think it's justified for two starving men to have at each other so one can survive by eating the other, or would you rather they both died, because it wouldn't be "fair"? Would you kill a man to save the life of your mother?

Yes, but it isn't a black and white scenario either. If you are going to say that you need to kill one to save ten or kill ten to save a thousand, you have to show that there is no other way in which to be ethical about it. If it is just easier to kill ten beings than spend time and money and effort to save a thousand, then you are an unethical, greedy, son of a bitch.

You know what? I think the amount of Furry porn that this film will generate because of their goddamn cat-people is solid ground for a morally justified extermination.

The 'sex' scene was very mild. Though I have no doubt that instead of the hoards of teen girls Titanic appealed to; this movie will appeal to the teen boys with half naked blue cat-chicks and cool military shit. Too bad the plot won't appeal to them much, but oh well.

[Shroom Man 777]

I actually went into the movie expecting to dislike these particular aspects of it. I saw it anyway because, well, c'mon dude...It's James Cameron.

Thankfully he didn't pull it off in a super-dumb way. The really cool beasties, weirdo biology, and the bioluminescent-everything totally helped.

Yea, but it was also kind of inconsistent as well. We saw dozens of arrows harmlessly bounce off of the canopy of the Colonel's transport. However, I guess that you could possibly factor inertia in there as well when you consider the fact that the arrows which bounced off were fired from the ground, whereas the one-shot came from a flying Nav'ri in the middle of a dive bombing run iirc.

The Colonel's transport was a fuckoff huge ship that could carry a shitload of those knifefighting humvees-with-legs and could take on missiles exploding on it and stuff and had freaking infantry squads on top of it, with sandbags (or something) and machinegun mounts. I think that, yeah, it might've been able to fly with heavier armor.

It's their fucking homes, they've lived there for ten hundred thousand million years. Why should they move their asses because some tiny little bunch of whiny greedy alien assholes from outer space ask them to? Especially if those whiny greedy alien assholes from outer space is hell bent on defiling and murdering their holy environment, which they know for a fact is in fact a living sentient organism that sustains them all?

No, no, I understand that they would be reluctant to leave their homes. My problem lies more in the fact that the natives just plain didn't seem to be willing to negotiate at all, PERIOD. As far as they were concerned, humans were deserving of nothing other than contempt and it was to be the Nav'ri way or the highway. All their fruity enviro-wank just kind of struck me as being Cameron's hamfisted justification for making his "noble savage fights off the forces of modernism" motif sit well with the audience instead of coming off as what it kind of really is; fanatical, irrational, intolerant, and kind of prickish.

The Na'vi did not agree to have their homes stripmined and desecrated. Otherwise, it seemed that those corporate assholes were pretty much able to mine their unobtanium shit elsewhere on the planet. But they were greedy and wanted the biggest fattest unobtanium deposit, which happened to be right on top of the Na'vi's home-tree, and the corporate guys didn't seem to be able to take no for an answer.

The only fanatic irrational intolerant pricks were the guys who weren't content to just, you know, set up their mining operations on places that aren't major population centers without killing a fuckton of people.

This fact only makes this scenario...

instead of a bunch of milwankers coming to strategically tactically kinetically nuclearly nuke them from orbit, we actually get diplomats to go to Pandora next time

Even more problematic. If "unobtainium" really is as important as they make it out to be, the government takes over negotiations pending corporate investigations, and the Nav'ri maintain their current "CONVERT TO THE CHURCH OF EHLYWA OR DIE" haughty attitude, I can't see really see things ending any better than they did before.

The unobtanium wasn't as important as those guys made it out to be (survival of humanity lol). The Nav'ri's position was just "don't destroy our homes for your mining operations".

If neither side is willing to make any concessions, things are pretty much doomed to end in bloodshed. This was my point earlier. I'm sure that there was probably some kind of deal the two sides could have worked out.

The most reasonable deal would be one wherein a major population center wasn't destroyed, where a people weren't forced to relocate from their ancestral homegrounds, where a major cultural area wasn't desecrated and wrecked, and where a major part of the living and breathing planetary organ system wasn't mutilated. It is always reasonable to, you know, just ask the corporate guys to take their mining operations somewhere else because Pandora isn't a microscopic moon and they were able to obtain unobtanium elsewhere on the planet.

Of course, Pandora is also the Na'vi's own planet and their own sovereign territory. They have the right to accept or deny human mining on their planet just like how America can accept the North Koreans setting up a uranium factory in the middle of Washington D.C., or deny the North Koreans the right to mine uranium in the middle of Washington D.C. because Washington D.C. is in America and the North Korean government has no right to even be there without America's consent.

I would like to ask all the screaming bitches of both side.

Is said item absolutely needed? Because really the way it sounds it that this macguffin is what everybody is screaming over and is basically a problem I see of the entire film. It either is needed and mankind is protrayed as fucking retards in their imminent survival or they are just protraying greedy fucks as just that.

The only value of the item, as said by the corporate character who wanted the MacGuffin, was that it was worth $ xyz-amount per kilogram and that they wanted it for their quarterly stock portfolio. That was that.

I got the impression that we were simply greedy fucks. However, there were a few sly references thrown in here and there about "our dying world" and the like which might have implied otherwise.

"Unobtainium" might be the hot commodity it is for a reason you know.

It sounded like Jake Sully was talking about how the Sky People had "killed their mother", i.e. ruined their own environment.

[adam_grif]

Yes, but it isn't a black and white scenario either. If you are going to say that you need to kill one to save ten or kill ten to save a thousand, you have to show that there is no other way in which to be ethical about it. If it is just easier to kill ten beings than spend time and money and effort to save a thousand, then you are an unethical, greedy, son of a bitch.

I'm not saying that in the movie, it was justified. I'm saying that if it was us or them, it would be. IF there isn't a peaceful solution, then a violent one to save ourselves is justified. And I reiterate: I'm not saying that this IS what the movie is presenting. Any alternate solution is obviously preferable to mass murder and forced relocation, because those things are atrocities.

The 'sex' scene was very mild. Though I have no doubt that instead of the hoards of teen girls Titanic appealed to; this movie will appeal to the teen boys with half naked blue cat-chicks and cool military shit. Too bad the plot won't appeal to them much, but oh well.

Star Fox porn exists. That's all I'm going to say on this matter.

[Gil Hamilton]

I saw it today and I had some thoughts:

I liked it fr the most part. I really did. Visually stunning; an EXCELLENTLY put together movie. The dialogue was dodgy, but dialogue isn't something that James Cameron is known for having a mastery of.

I had two issues though.

1) I thought the Na'vi were WAY to humanoid and way too "noble savage". They don't really resemble the physical layout of the other indigenous fauna on Pandora. Virtually all higher order fauna had some variation of six limbs. Even the fliers had four wings and two legs. Meanwhile, the Na'vi are clearly designed to look very explicitly human; looking like a cross between panthers and runway models. They've got two arms, two legs, their women have exactly one set of breasts, interface tentacle is very intentionally disguised as a hair braid, no multiple sets of eyes, similar facial lay out, they have all the same emotions and expressions for those emotions. More than that, they are a stereotype of a fifth grade conception of what native americans are supposed to be; they revere the land and say prayers over dead killer doggies, they worship trees and spirits and are completely peaceful until the bad ole colonists move in with their guns and White Man's Burden.

This bothered us. James Cameron didn't seem to want to challenge the audience at all as to who we should be rooting for and to automatically make the Na'vi the beautiful, noble natives being exploited by the greedy white men. I think it would have made a better move to have the Na'vi be utterly inhuman. REAL aliens, not ones that you can emotionally associate with, with customs that are strange and possibly even viscerally disgusting. Science fiction writer Vernor Vinge did this same thing in "A Deepness in the Sky" except his exploited aliens were horrifying in human eyes, being ten legged insectoid creatures whom people were only insulated too because of translation barriers. Challenge us; it's EASY to associate with the Na'vi, but would people have the same reaction to giant sentient slimy arachnid things that eat by sucking the fluids out of living creatures? Ones that you can't talk to directly except by a translation AI because they've got no equivalent to a larynx and thus we can't even attempt their language or understand their ideas? Have THOSE aliens be the victims of colonialism and force the audience to consider bombing them off their land in order to exploit the resources under it. Make all viscerial emotions run against the aliens, but have the same story. I thought the movie was weak on this regard; it was Fern Gully all over. How could we NOT sympathize with the Na'vi?

2) The other issue that bothered me was the last 20 minutes. Really? The planet itself commands all the animals to kick the humans out? That's an actual LITERAL Deus Ex Machina. Yes, they put a biological origin for it, but STILL. It came across as James Cameron painting himself into a corner where it would be frankly impossible for the Na'vi to win, except by magic, so... he declared magic. Historically, the indigenous population NEVER wins when a superior society moves in and not necessarily by the superior society conquering them. However, the Na'vi getting their warriors decimated and the remander of their population getting carted off to live elsewhere, which is the logical conclusion to the movie as established by most of the film, isn't a feel good end to the movie. Cameron decided that the Na'vi had to win, so win they did by writer fiat. That's sloppy writing and frankly, the movie suffered for it. It would have been a much more powerful end to have the movie end with Na'vi refugees being escorted away from the charged remains of the Tree of Souls and wrapped it up as a moral lesson. THIS is what colonialism does to people. THIS is why colonialism is bad. THERE IS no happy ending here and this is what people should be outraged over. That would have been much more effective than "Oh well, the Na'vi win, the Humans limp back to Earth, Sully becomes a full native, and they live happy ever after because that's totally what happens when a massively more advanced civilization bumps into hunter gatherers."

It did tickle me they named the mineral "Unobtainium" though. It's good to see that particular material popping up in another science fiction story.

[Knife]

An exploration into the actual evolution, or creation, of the Pandora ecosystem and biosphere would be very intriguing. I think it would be very cool and awesome if the whole ecosystem was created not just by anyone or any natural or artificial process, but by the Na'vi's distant ancestors themselves - perhaps because in ancient times, they nearly ruined their own environment with technology but managed to save it by recreating it and artificially evolving it in such a drastic way so that all organic life - the Na'vi themselves included - would be part of some holistic greater whole, where even their "souls" (or being, or whatever) gets stored in the great world-brains.

When they first showed the Tree of Souls, I got the impression the arch-like structures were some sort of ancient structures. Since that scene, I had it in my mind that the Na'vi were less like North American natives and more like nomadic pastoralism of post Imperial Rome.

[GrayAnderson]

I would like to ask all the screaming bitches of both side.

Is said item absolutely needed? Because really the way it sounds it that this macguffin is what everybody is screaming over and is basically a problem I see of the entire film. It either is needed and mankind is protrayed as fucking retards in their imminent survival or they are just protraying greedy fucks as just that.

I got the impression that we were simply greedy fucks. However, there were a few sly references thrown in here and there about "our dying world" and the like which might have implied otherwise.

"Unobtainium" might be the hot commodity it is for a reason you know.

My interpretation is that it is vital. I base this both on the apparent market value of it (inflation or no, $20m/kg is at least implied to be a lot of cash) and the fact that an interstellar mission was launched to get it, which from what I've been able to gather from glancing around the Avatar wiki and whatnot put a major strain on the world economy. You don't do that for a non-vital resource. The mentions about the state of the Earth seem to confirm this.

This is not to say that the RDA is not acting out of interest in making money, but on the flipside:
A) The RDA's interest in making money does not preclude them from seeking out a vital resource; and
B) If the RDA were to fail (that is, they stop making money and go broke), then the vital resource in question would stop flowing.

Even if that is true, which it doesn't appear to be in the movie; xenocide would still be unacceptable route and nothing but lazy and greedy. Nothing in the movie suggests, nor implies, that the Hometree deposit is the only deposit available to mine. It is just the easiest with in 200 kilometers of the human base. If we need it so badly, to survive as a species, then we'd be there in more force with more supplies, and even if we were not, we are coming via fucking spaceship. We can land our crap anywhere on the planet in any location with the mineral without a large concentration of aliens living on top of it.

If we get to the point where that deposit under Hometree was the last, you might have an argument; however, in the same breath, if it were the last deposit, we'd better have been looking for some other power source/super conductor thingy if it is the last.

The point about 200 km is not a joke. We have a limited infrastructure net on the planet, and presumably limited fuel supplies for the vehicles. You have a limited amount of X with which to get as much Y as you can, Y being vital for keeping humanity working. You therefore use your X as efficiently as you can, particularly if you have to shepherd your X for a lengthy period of time.

Also, given the poisonous nature of the atmosphere, stretching a supply network more than 200 km may well be impossible, and it's not stated:
A) How far Hometree was away; or
B) Where the other deposits were within 200km vs. Hometree, etc. There's a lot not filled in about timescales (it apparently took three months to get the trucks out to Hometree), when stuff was needed, etc. I'd point to the fact that a resource deposit we can get at in 20 years' time does us no good if we're going to run out in 5.

[neoolong]

This bothered us. James Cameron didn't seem to want to challenge the audience at all as to who we should be rooting for and to automatically make the Na'vi the beautiful, noble natives being exploited by the greedy white men. I think it would have made a better move to have the Na'vi be utterly inhuman. REAL aliens, not ones that you can emotionally associate with, with customs that are strange and possibly even viscerally disgusting. Science fiction writer Vernor Vinge did this same thing in "A Deepness in the Sky" except his exploited aliens were horrifying in human eyes, being ten legged insectoid creatures whom people were only insulated too because of translation barriers. Challenge us; it's EASY to associate with the Na'vi, but would people have the same reaction to giant sentient slimy arachnid things that eat by sucking the fluids out of living creatures? Ones that you can't talk to directly except by a translation AI because they've got no equivalent to a larynx and thus we can't even attempt their language or understand their ideas? Have THOSE aliens be the victims of colonialism and force the audience to consider bombing them off their land in order to exploit the resources under it. Make all viscerial emotions run against the aliens, but have the same story. I thought the movie was weak on this regard; it was Fern Gully all over. How could we NOT sympathize with the Na'vi?

This movie cost something like 300M-500M dollars. There is no way that the producers on this thing are going to actually want to challenge audiences by making the aliens completely inhuman. This has to play to broad audiences.

Compare it to District 9. Blomkamp got away with a lot because it cost a tenth of Avatar. It may not serve the story very well, but them's the breaks when you want to make a movie that cost a lot.

[Shroom Man 777]

Gil:

1.) Yeah... they could've made the Na'vi look like Prawns. The Na'vi did look too human, but that's probably needed because James Cameron did want to make the Na'vi relate-able, lovable, and even sexy. Yes, he said that himself.

2.) That would've been a sad ending.

I kind of suggested something leik that in the original Avatar thread too. Yes, it would've made more sense and yeah, it would've been more "powerful". But I like my happy ending and the bad guy's gotta get what's coming to him, mang. I prefer Jake and Blue Chick living happily ever after and making lots a little blue babies, rather than Jake getting Mel Gibsoned/Bravehearted with his entrails hanging out and shouting "You might take our planet, but you'll never take our FREEDOM" as his last words.

[Knife]

The point about 200 km is not a joke. We have a limited infrastructure net on the planet, and presumably limited fuel supplies for the vehicles. You have a limited amount of X with which to get as much Y as you can, Y being vital for keeping humanity working. You therefore use your X as efficiently as you can, particularly if you have to shepherd your X for a lengthy period of time.

Mining operations were already underway. It's not like they just got there and where going for the first big deposit they found, they were already mining. They just wanted more, faster, easier, and cheaper. That's why they had the whole Avatar project going on, which couldn't have been cheap either, to communicate with and negotiate with the aliens to hopefully move.

[Knobbyboy88]

The Colonel's transport was a fuckoff huge ship that could carry a shitload of those knifefighting humvees-with-legs and could take on missiles exploding on it and stuff and had freaking infantry squads on top of it, with sandbags (or something) and machinegun mounts. I think that, yeah, it might've been able to fly with heavier armor.

Glass is still just glass though, and we didn't see any gunships fall during that engagement.

The Na'vi did not agree to have their homes stripmined and desecrated. Otherwise, it seemed that those corporate assholes were pretty much able to mine their unobtanium shit elsewhere on the planet.

Not really. I mean...We saw all the arrow heads on the wheels of the mining vehicles in the beginning, for instance; and the Kitty girl was ready to kill the hero on sight before the little "messenger of Gia" told her not to. It seems that the Nav'ri were only allowing a human presence at all under extreme duress. We also saw the kind of contempt they held us in at that first council.

They just didn't really strike me as being the type to negotiate under any circumstances. Granted, Cameron may have wrapped these attitudes up in a lot "rah, rah, noble savage lives in harmony with the environment" wankery in order to make us all forget about this fact, but it was still there.

The most reasonable deal would be one wherein a major population center wasn't destroyed, where a people weren't forced to relocate from their ancestral homegrounds, where a major cultural area wasn't desecrated and wrecked, and where a major part of the living and breathing planetary organ system wasn't mutilated.

According to the Nav'ri, anything above the level of hunter gathering basically constitutes a "mutilation" of the planetary system.

There is reasonable protest, and then there is simple stubborn obstinance. I think that the Nav'ri qualified under both.

Of course, Pandora is also the Na'vi's own planet and their own sovereign territory.

That can, of course, change. j/k

Seriously though, if they are holding something important enough, and they are just blatantly refusing to play ball, it can. "Conquest" does serve a few legitimate purposes, and I'd say that such a circumstance would be one of them.

[Shroom Man 777]

To be fair, the Na'vi at first were pretty open about things. They actually let the humans build schools and even took the time and trouble to learn freaking English. It seems like only when the humans decided to set their sights on the Home-Tree that the situation broke down.

Wouldn't you be slightly miffed if the "guest" on your planet declared that they intended to evict you from your own home, and that they won't take no for an answer, and that all the diplomatic and not-diplomatic measures they were doing were for the sole unrelenting goal of kicking you from your own house?

Did the humans ever mention the alternate of "mine somewhere else"? They never did. All their methods were directed at evicting and kicking the Na'vi from their own homes.

The only ones who were unreasonable, intolerant, and destructive were the humies. Or, at least, they were the bigger dicks. The humans only wanted to "play ball" to kick the Na'vi out of their homes. You saw what the humans intended to do if they couldn't get the Na'vi out of their homes.

I think the destruction of a major population center sorta counts more than just a few arrows on a bunch of construction machines.