The selling point of James Cameron’s Avatar films is that they allegedly invite us into a world of wonder, a universe that’s fanciful yet artfully constructed to feel more real than our own. Avatar: Fire and Ash is the third Avatar film, and if you enjoyed the first two, you’re in luck, because this one offers much more of the same. More sky battles, more reef dwellers riding the waves on the backs of sleek sea creatures, more white Earthlings seeking to colonize new worlds because they’ve destroyed their own, more plugging of ponytails into cosmic sources, more ’90s craft-fair necklaces. If you’ve found yourself pining for the world of the Na’vi—and for dialogue like “The fire of hate is only the ash of grief” and “We do not suck on the breast of weakness!”—Avatar: Fire and Ash is for you.
Fire and Ash picks up where 2022’s Avatar: The Way of Water left off. Or at least, I think so—essentially, it feels like the same movie with a hazily different plot. Over on the planet Pandora, Lo’ak (Britain Dalton) is mourning the death of his brother, killed in the previous movie. Lo’ak’s mother, Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña), is understandably also in mourning; she sits quietly, in a moony state, fingering a strand of beads. Jake (Sam Worthington) is sad too, but in a more stalwart, manly way. Meanwhile, Jake and Neytiri’s adopted daughter, Kiri (Sigourney Weaver), re-enacts The Blue Lagoon with her possible potential sweetheart, Jake and Netytiri’s adopted son Spike (Jack Champion), the white kid with locs who needs special breathing apparatus to survive in Pandora’s atmosphere.
Elsewhere, there is treachery afoot: White Earthlings scheme to take over Pandora, with the help of macho soldier, and sworn enemy of Jake, Colonel Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang), who also happens to be Spike’s biological dad. A bossy general lady…
