Though it grossed something to the tune of $3 billion, one of the most enduring traits of James Cameron’s $237 million passion project, Avatar (2009), is how much it hasn’t. Much has been said about how the movie — an anti-imperialist sci-fi epic that, through intense, innovative CGI, effectively immersed us in the lushly green world of Pandora and its blue-skinned people — left behind no cultural imprint once it left theaters. Rewatching it the other day for the first time since it premiered, I was reminded why. With its dramatically facile storytelling and aggressively stocky characters, Avatar isn’t much without its state-of-the-art visuals and towering action sequences. Its magic is headiest when it’s right in front of you, assisted by a freshly unwrapped pair of 3D glasses. But the spell breaks as soon as the frames are shed.
Avatar’s long-delayed follow-up, The Way of Water, is allegedly the first of four sequels. (It was shot concurrently with Avatar 3, which is set for a 2024 release.) It also replicates its predecessor’s biggest problem: being, consistently pleasurable visuals aside, largely dramatically uninteresting until its grand-scale, action-centric last act sets in. That feels more punishing this time, though. Avatar’s novelty loaned a charge to scenes otherwise without one. But in The Way of Water, that novelty’s inevitable wearing off underscores how much of this more-than-three-hour-long movie’s first two or so hours feel more akin to time killing than anything particularly vital or compelling. It’s mostly just pretty — and in its several stretches of ideologically loaded ecological and faunal terrorization, harrowing — to look at.
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