Review of Avatar: The Way of Water (2022) by Deralac — 25 Mar 2023

Like most sequels, Way of Water is not nearly as good as the original. Although it is better than many movies and shows produced in recent years. By current standards, it's a watchable movie, but by a standard of quality storytelling, it's way below average. Had this movie come out at a different time, it would be barely passable. But modern entertainment writers are arrogant, incompetent buffoons who have significantly lowered the standards by which movies/shows are judged.

The characters are uninteresting and generic. The heavy focus on children makes it worse. They were know-it-all little brats who constantly caused problems by never doing what they were told. All the characters lacked the depth and nuance of the first movie, not that it had a lot, but this one has almost none. The writing for the main female sea people character, I didn't learn her name, was wholly inconsistent. It's like she was a different character in every scene.

The dialogue was absurd. It was right out of a modern teen drama. Yo, bro, why do children on Pandora speak like they are from any generic American high school. I was expecting them to start singing hip-hop songs and posting videos on TicTok.

The plot was atrocious. The sky people (i.e. evil white people) harvesting an anti-agathic is exactly the same plot as mining unobtanium in Avatar. The same type of MacGuffin. It's amazing how Pandora has so many important resources. While I understand the theme and the critique of human civilization, it would be better if they were not racist in the process. Note how the sky people are white. If the woketainment industry was really about diversity and representation, then the sky people would be mixed. Also, there is no way children are going to save the world. They are far too narcissistic and ignorant. Compared to Avatar, the action sequences were significantly less entertaining. In Avatar the hunter/prey aspect and novel setting helped make the action sequences interesting. In Way of Water I didn't care when the children were being hunted. The story had done very little to make me care about the characters other than point out who their parents were. Otherwise, they were generic and boring. I didn't care when the one boy died. On the contrary, one fewer little brat made the movie slightly better.

The CGI was passable, but even TV commercial have CGI. At this point CGI is no different than moving pictures and sound. CGI is expected, not special. That a modern movie has CGI is meaningless.

Overall, Way of Water is a barely passable, somewhat boring, sequel of a popular movie that fails to capture the allure of the first or create any appeal of it's on. Avatar left me wanting to see more, while I was glad when Way Too Long was over.