Even after all this time, the simple fact still amazes me: every film James Cameron has made in the last 40 years represents some kind of evolutionary paradigm shift for blockbuster filmmaking.
“The Abyss” gave us the first “photorealistic” computer-generated character, while “Terminator 2” pioneered advanced morphing effects and the much more extensive use of CGI. “Titanic” seamlessly blended digital elements with massive practical sets to create what remains the most immersive disaster film ever made, while “Avatar” and 2022’s “Avatar: The Way of Water” took motion-capture technology to such extraordinary new heights—and depths—that the rest of Hollywood seems several generations behind. In fact, even “True Lies” could be considered a turning point for its groundbreaking compositing work and its cutting-edge approach to cartoonishly virulent anti-Arab racism (9/11 was still almost a decade away, but Big Jim has always been ahead of the curve!).
Director: James Cameron
Writers: James Cameron, Rick Jaffa, Amanda Silver
Stars: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldaña, Sigourney Weaver
All of which is to say how strange it is to see a new James Cameron film that feels like something you’ve seen before. That idea seemed like a real possibility when it was announced he would be directing four “Avatar” sequels, but it didn’t prepare me for the reality of watching one of cinema’s greatest explorers spinning his wheels for three hours, even if Cameron, being Cameron, naturally finds ways to make that journey feel fresh and exciting at times.
But “Avatar: Fire and Ash” isn’t just more of the same; it’s also significantly less.
The third installment in the “Avatar” saga not only lacks the unprecedented spectacle of its predecessors (the second of which was, somehow, even more impressive than the first), but it also lacks the relative novelty of their narratives. While the first film effectively disguised its clichés on the unexplored planet Pandora, and the second extrapolated the franchise's adopted space fantasy into a hyper-emotional aquatic fable about the destructive nature of humanity's survival instinct, "Fire and Ash" largely busies itself sifting through the ruins of a world Cameron seems half-willing to leave behind and grappling with the consequences of the series' previous battles. That wouldn't be a weakness in itself, but its archetypal characters weren't built to carry a "Lawrence of Arabia"-sized epic that hinges on the nuances of their love, grief, and neuroses. Spider doesn't even wear a shirt, let alone possess the complexities needed for us to care about his daddy issues.
At its core, "Fire and Ash" is a story about how people, in the broadest sense of the word, rebuild themselves after war and the losses it entails. In other words, the first "Avatar" film that fails to significantly advance its franchise's premise ironically focuses on our capacity for change, a tension Cameron struggles to resolve—and in fact considerably worsens—by repeating many of the same action sequences from "The Way of Water."
As expected of a film initially conceived as the second part of the previous one (and which could easily have been marketed as "The Way of Water Part II" had it been finished in time for Christmas 2023), "Fire and Ash" picks up the story where the first "Avatar" sequel left off. Jake Sully's family—or what's left of it—continues to mourn the toll of their latest and most devastating confrontation with the colonizing forces of the Resources Development Administration, in which Jake's son, Neteyam, was killed by the "sky people" colonists.
Still integrated into the Metkayina Clan on Pandora's turquoise reefs, the Sullys each cope with their grief in their own way. Jake (Sam Worthington), a former Marine whose consciousness was transferred into the body of a giant blue alien, takes refuge in a mission-focused mindset, while his wife Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña) seethes with resentment toward the white human boy with dreadlocks whom her family has raised as one of their own (Jack Champion), largely because Spider's father is the evil "recombinant" who murdered Neteyam (Stephen Lang as Colonel Miles Quaritch, both clearly relishing their roles as imposing extraterrestrials). Meanwhile, the Sullys' eldest son, Lo'ak (Britain Dalton), is brooding and tormented by survivor's guilt, while their adopted teenage daughter Kiri (Sigourney Weaver) questions her seemingly immaculate conception while deepening her connection to the all-knowing nature goddess, Eywa.
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