Still is quite remarkable how small the pop culture impact of the other Avatar is
That depends entirely on the "people" you're talking to... There's plenty of people who would think of the Avatar films.
I only think of the blue people.
I watched the last airbender movie. It wasnt that good... haha
Have you seen the last airbender show? The movie was a soulless mockery of it with absolutely no sense or real inspiration from its source material. If you haven't seen the show, trust me, it's more than more than worth the watch.
I haven't seen the second Bluvatar movie because the first one was just scifi trope: the movie. He actually named the macguffin "unobtanium" ffs. Not even close to what I've come to expect from the person that gave us The Abyss, Aliens, and T2.
Meanwhile, The Last Airbender is the only cartoon to ever make me cry.
The second one felt like an extended visual demo.
I can name 2 characters from the entire movie. And one of them was a side character. Jake Sully and Spider.
The story was inconsequential (meaning everything that happened progressed nothing) and forgettable.
i maintain that cameron should just have gotten david attenburough and made a kickass scifi documentary about pandora, much like how apple did with prehistoric planet
Dude, that would actually be really cool.
Are there scifi documentaries like that? Ones that explore fake worlds as if they're real to basically just show off creativity and the possibilities of life on other worlds?
Check out The Future is Wild. I don't know if it's streaming anywhere online, but it's a classic
There's the classic "alien planet" inspired by the wayne barlowe book, which i absolutely adore: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvaCH8OKdjQ
Then there's also a series of modern alien documentaries that i cannot recall the name of, but they were also kind of eeeh so..
Shit, the only one I really remember is Neytiri (the costar). Was Loak one of the kids?
Anyway, I came out of the theater impressed by the visuals, but feeling like I couldn't remember one important story beat. I mean, what was even the point if literally nothing changed from the beginning to end except for the locale?
Maybe it'll make more sense as part of the series, like a music album with songs that work better when the album is played straight through.
I think the "unobtanium" was just lampshading. It would come off better if the rest of the plot was more innovative or self-aware, but I think they knew what they were doing for that bit at least.
I would agree if they had actually lampshaded it. They had a couple of sassy characters that could've thrown in a line about how the name is stupid since it means something that can't be obtained in Latin, or how it's ironic given their mission on Pandora. Or how lazy the scientist were they couldn't come up with something new or original (unobtanium is used everywhere on engineering). But no, they never address it at all. It was just there, no one reacted or called attention to it.
Or maybe they did and I don't remember because it has a boring AF script and it is a completely unremarkable and forgettable film altogether.
FYI since you appear to be stuck on this point. Unobtainium is used in science and engineering for a material that can meet requirements but is too expensive, yet to be discovered or inaccessible by any means. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unobtainium
That being said bluvatar was a cookie cutter adventure story. Nothing special but it has mass appeal. For those of us who enjoy movies and television typically acknowledge that ATLA has a rich story, tons of depth and conveyed meanings and somehow doesn't take itself to seriously. ATLA is a work of art, bluvatar was a cash grab.
Unobtainium is used in science and engineering for a material that can meet requirements but is too expensive, yet to be discovered or inaccessible by any means.
That was their point. It's a sci-fi trope, a stand-in term that describes a thing that doesn't exist, and Cameron decided nah, it's not a stand-in term anymore, that's just what this blue stuff is called. Most fictional media names it Adamantine, or Vibranium, or Stellarium, or something.
I thought that was the joke? Someone with a sense of humour names it that and there's people unironically calling it unobtanium.
I think that's part of the problem. It's not a joke, it's played completely straight. That is the name in universe of the substance. If this was a comedy named SpaceBalls 2: Pocahontas in Space, sure, that would be a cute and funny detail. But it is an action adventure drama. It's completely out of place and displays a complete lack of sci-fi creativity.
Haven't seen the second one, but honestly the first one was just fine. Like, it's not in my top ten or anything, but it not bad by any stretch. And there's nothing wrong with calling something "unobtanium," have you seen what we've named actual elements in real life? Or what some place names are like?
I used that as an example of how tropey it was. "Unobtanium" is literally the name of the nigh impossible fetch quest trope and has been for decades.
Avatar is one of the greatest animated shows to have been released in at least the last 30 years
Avatar is great but I don't think it's the greatest animated kids show. For instance I would put Bluey above Avatar.
I'll bite. What is the deal with Bluey? I watched the first episode to see what all the fuzz is about and it looks like a fine show for smaller children, but what else is it? There doesn't seem to be anything wrong with it, but I was expecting something different for all the hype.
Bluey is a show that tries to, and also successfully does, appeal to children and to parents. It doesn't try to be anything more. It's lighthearted and fun and that's all it's supposed to be.
Avatar on the other hand is a kids show that also wants to appeal to pre-teens and teenagers. Some of the themes of Avatar are not really kid friendly: the genocide of air benders, Zukos father mutilating him to make an example, Sokka losing someone he loved. Those are examples from the first season that I remembered. Avatar has a lot of mature subjects. There's a reason the legend of Korra targeted late teens and young adults, because the more mature subjects of Avatar were what made the show great and the audience grew up.
Overall Avatar is the better show, but Bluey is the better kids show.
The only episodes of Bluey that I’ve seen are the cricket one and the State of Origin one, so I don’t think I’m best-placed to answer, but I would say it’s slightly more than @GoodEye8@lemm.ee gives it credit for. It helps role model good parent-child relationships, engages with adults emotionally. But unlike Avatar, which engages you emotionally entirely on its own merits, Bluey engages with your inner child or your parental instinct in an amazingly effective (but quite different and difficult to compare to Avatar) way.
I think they’re difficult to compare.
Bluey is a young kids’ show which adults can enjoy because of how it engages their inner child and their parental instinct.
Avatar is a show for older kids which adults can enjoy because of the deep themes, excellent character development, and sensitive world building. Adults enjoy Avatar in entirely the same way they enjoy Lord of the Rings or Star Wars.
I disagree.
Many of the manga-based anime were produced in parallel with the manga, so they would need those filler episodes to kill time. They were also adapting a fixed media with iconic images, so frozen poses of each character reacting to something "needed" to be included. Same thing with freeze-frame fight sequences, or extended power-up poses. That sort of filler could stretch a single chapter into three or four episodes. And then sometimes they would just make up some crazy shit for a few episodes. Oh no, the heroes have to fight a dinosaur somewhy.
With Avatar, there was no manga, and no need to fill time. The episodes were planned as part of the series, written and storyboarded for television.
Maybe the pacing wasn't always great, and there are some less exciting episodes. Appa was lost for way too long. But that's not the same sort of filler problem that anime struggles with.
It has an amount of filler, sure, but far from your typical anime. As someone that just finished rewatching it while separately watching through Naruto, A:TLA is miles better in terms of less filler.
If you are saying this without ever having finished a full watch through, I would highly recommend giving it another try.
There's a little bit I suppose.
But it does have an end. One Piece has almost 20 times the number of episodes, and is in no danger of reaching any kind of conclusion. It's Coronation Street with pirates.
I can understand why you would say this, but I don’t really agree. There are a couple of complete filler episodes, but for the most part I think every episode is important. Avatar thrives on how good not only its main story is (I think the main story is good, but honestly is weak in comparison to the other things it does so well), but also on the strength of its worldbuilding and character development. Episodes like The Storm, Zuko Alone, and The Beach are amazing for how they teach us more about the characters and show us how they are changing. Avatar Day, The Headband, and The Avatar and the Firelord give us insight into the history of the world, explaining the background of how it came to be how it is, and how the world outside of our main heroes currently function.
It’s a show with just 61 22 minute episodes, telling one unified story. It’s very much not the anime that keeps stretching out plot lines to fill up its seasons, or that stalls for time while waiting for the manga to catch up.
The biggest cultural impact from the Avatar movies is on the technology developed that will be used for other movies. The stories, characters and even world-building are not all that great, however the film-making is astounding and will reverberate through the industry for decades.
It was weird how some of the sequences just looked like game renders. Especially when they're in the forest.
This is because the tech is no longer revolutionary. Everything used and displayed on the first Avatar was a first time or completely new and bespoke piece of tech that had some visual impact apparent for the audience. Everything on the second one is been done on better films before or if it's brand new equipment or technique, is something that is not discernible by the audience through the screen. Also, nothing of importance or substance regarding the plot happens in any of the 3 hours of script. Perhaps the most boring film I watched in 2023.
It's amazing how this meme/whinging was going on for a decade on the internet, only for James Cameron to make a second movie and even that made 2 billion dollars (and could have surpassed the first one had there not been an outbreak in China).
And even after all of that, you guys actually think that people don't care or remember about the films?
I think that people know and care about the films, but I've never seen anyone make a reference to it outside of discussions that are explicitly about it
Because it's not a franchise that's 50 years old like star wars or based off any existing material.
Once you have a generation that grew up on these films, you'd see more of the references.
That's his point though. We grew up with both Avatars and when talking about it by name, many people think of the animation.
The very thing you are saying won't happen for 50 years is happening with that show.
Yeah ATLA was primarily aimed at kids and teens, so obviously today it'd be talked by them more.
Avatar is the antithesis to every "popular" movie. The hero isn't a single man-child who quips all the time, he's a crippled guy with a family, serious and sincere.
The same is true of John Wick, and by my estimate, that has had a significantly bigger impact on pop culture.
Also, Avatar is only like 5 years newer than A:TLA, but even ten years ago the cultural impact of TLA was monumental compared to the impact of Cameron's Avatar today
How do you measure it? Pandora theme park rides are insanely packed all the time. The first movie led to everyone getting 3DTVs, there were people who got depressed since they couldn't live on Pandora.
Sure the terminally online crowd doesn't gush about it, but you'd be lying if it didn't have any impact.
Another reminder that we all share the same internet, but we live in different universes. Ain't no one I know wasted money on a 3DTV or regular theme park rides. I guess among the folk that can afford obscenely expensive toys and even more expensive vacations, it might have had a bigger impact, but of the 5 figure income folks I know, not one really cares about the movies. I don't even know of anyone who bought a 3DTV, let alone bought one specifically for Avatar
I never said nobody watched it. The whole point of this discussion is that it's surprising how little cultural impact it has despite the insane viewer numbers
The films are super popular but again after the sequel it was like everyone immediately went back to literally never mentioning the Na’avi or Pantera.
It's because they look incredible on the big screen so people go to see them at the theater but the story and characters aren't anything we haven't seen a dozen times before so there's nothing to really talk about long term.
Yes, lots of people watched it, but it never made the cultural impact that The Last Airbender had on society at large. A lot of people remember the movie for it's stunning visuals, and remember the general themes in the movie, but not the actual characters because they weren't particularly memorable.
The Last Airbender had a very compelling story, loveable characters with phenomenal development and it stuck with people.
How many times have you heard someone make a reference to the movie other than talking about it's visual mastery? People use The Last Airbender in everyday conversations.
To demonstrate how many people engage with the fandoms: James Cameron's Avatar has 5,127 fanfiction stories on AO3, and 1678 stories on FFN, and The Last Airbender has 41,627 fanfics on AO3, and 47,680 on FFN.
Guarantee this dude responds saying that those are just your circles, and that among people that aren't "terminally online," blue man group avatar is sooo much more popular, source: trust me bro
I disagree: for most of my country, whenever the term 'Avatar' was mentioned before WotW was announced, it was always that movie with the blue aliens that blew away their minds back in 2009; most of the adults, whenever we discussed the latest hollywood flicks always asked me if there was any news about the second movie. the visuals of Avatar was something that stuck deeply with them
The movies seem to be something for the cinema. I think they lose a lot of magic at home, mostly because they were designed 100% for the 3d tech which is now dead.
You could show it in VR, but wearing a headset for 3 hours is not going to be a particularly enjoyable experience, and nobody really seems interested in bringing them all to VR anyway. Apparently Disney are planning on having it on the ludicrously expensive Apple VR thing, so hopefully somebody will rip it in it's variable framerate 3D glory so I can watch it on my lesser peasant VR headset.
It really wasn't all of that on the Cinema either. I watched the first Avatar on 3D when it premiered and was bored out of my mind 40 minutes in. I admit the tech involved, the CGI and the 3D stuff was super cool and interesting, I'm a nerd for high tech, but the script is so mid, the cinematography so cliche, the characters are cardboard cutouts and the subject matter so pedestrian that I just lost interest. When I heard the Way of the water was 3+ hours long I knew I would never watch it on theaters. Saw it at home in 45 minutes chunks as a mini-series and it confirmed it to me, the script is somehow even worse and even more forgettable, I'm glad I didn't spend a dime on going to the movie theater for that one. The CGI is impressive but nothing new or unique that we haven't seen before a dozen times already, there have even been better CGI movies than Avatar before.
The thing about the entire franchise being based on how good the CGI looks is if you wait 5-10 years the CGI will look dated and all you're left with is a mediocre script.
It’s been more than 10 years since the original blue people movie, and I don’t think I heard people say it looked dated when it was re-released?
Not really. Avatar 1 revolutionised motion capture, which actually allowed Marvel's entire MCU to exist the way it did.
Avatar 2 improved that yet again, which we'll likely see in future superhero and scifi movies.
I don't know, it is a bit more like a scifi version of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe
This is a much better comparison considering Aslan is actually Jesus Christ. Although while in the Matrix you can say that Neo is an allegory for Christ, in C.S Lewis's world, Aslan is literally the manifestation of Jesus Christ in Narnia. So it'd not a perfect comparison. But much better than Star Wars.
Meh, I've always got to ask because while it's certainly only every going to be the first thing in my mind I know way more people that have watched the movie with blue people and not the show.
I've neverwatched the show. Still I think of the show rather than the movie (which I have seen) when someone says Avatar
An avatar is a profile picture in old phpbb forums for me.
Don't know anything about the last airbender apart from its existence, and Space Pocahontas was a meh movie with great effects.
When I saw Avatar in the theater in 2009, it was a family outing while visiting relatives. I thought it was an Avatar: The Last Airbender movie and wondered why everyone had chosen it. I knew very little about Airbender (still don't), but must have seen previews or something for the actual Airbender movie that came out in July the next year, while I somehow missed seeing anything about Avatar. It was maybe five minutes into the movie when I realized this wasn't a preview for some sci-fi flick, it was the actual movie I was there to see.
Movie is shit, the more recent one is ok but still nothing does justice to the show XD
for millions of people, avatar has nothing to do with either movies or shows. it means incarnation of god in human form.
more accurate term would perhaps be western people.
Which is also a definition that aligns more with the show because the Avatar is essentially the current in a long line of reincarnations of a god-like being who can bend all four elements. The blue avatar refers to using technology to allow humans to inhabit/control a digital or physical being.
Though I think a lot of people in the West wouldn't automatically think of either show or movie if "avatar" is used in the context of "an avatar of x" or "my avatar jumps when I hit spacebar". Some might not know what you mean, but it's probably enough context that they don't think it's the show or movie (or movie about the show).
I always had the opposite reaction. I'd say avatar and people would think I meant Xbox or the movie.