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Avatar: the way of water presents a visual spectacle that takes us deep into the world of Pandora. In this video we break down the new cultures of the world and Easter Eggs that connect to Vietnam War cinema, Titanic, Predator, and james cameron's wider body of work.

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Written and Hosted by Ryan Arey (http://twitter.com/ryanarey)
Edited by Harriet Lengel-Enright, Randolf Nombrado, Srinidhi Rao, and Brianna McLarty

#Avatar #WatOfWater #EasterEggs

So let’s start with the title, the Way of Water. The meaning of this is described in a monologue to Lo’ak. Basically, water is the source of all life on pandora and on Earth, it’s called the womb of the world, the beginning, and end of all things. All life shares the need for water, therefore water is what we all have in common.

And this movie is about people learning to look past what makes them different and to truly see one another for what we all have in common.

The first Avatar was about seeing the world through literal new eyes–as Jake had to enter a new body to see another perspective on the world. This movie asks the characters to look through the eyes of one another, so they can see opposing points of view and truly see outside themselves.

In the first movie, the Na’vi often repeated the phrase [I see you]. And this phrase keeps coming up in this movie. Spider teaches it to Miles, and Jake ends the movie by finally empathizing with his son, and telling him [I see you].

And this means, “I see the real you, I see you as you truly are. It’s a way of saying that, like life on Pandora, we are connected to one another and share the same mind and vision.

Doug: Just like how the way of water connects us all.

Exactly. [high five]

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So basically, the movie is a 3-hour exercise in empathy. Many characters learn to see the world through each others’ eyes, and take on attributes of their opponents. For instance, the Na’vi now use guns, like the humans.

When the Sullys arrive at the reef, the water tribe says the kids are demon blood because of their four fingers. But throughout the movie, the metakayina kids come to respect, understand, and even love the tree people.

Lo’ak, the younger brother of the family, has a hard time relating to others. He’s an outcast in his family, which attracts him to another outcast–Pie-a-khan, the toe-coon.

Doug: What the what now?

The space whale.

Doug: Gotcha, yeah space whale. Just keep saying space hale.

Okay. So Lo’ak literally sees the world through pie-a-khan’s eyes, as a flashback. And there is also a literal POV shot showing what the space whale sees. Lo’ak teaches the rest of the tribe to empathize with the space whale.

But the best example of a character learning empathy is Quaritch. I love what they did with Quaritch in this movie. They could have just introduced a new villain, but they specifically brought back Quaritch to build on the experiences he had in the first movie.

Throughout the Way of Water, he relives Jake’s experiences from the first movie. He wakes up in a new body and causes a ruckus. He reluctantly recorded a video blog [Jake, do I have to do this?]. When he discovers his corpse, he watches the final battle of the first movie through a body cam shot. Bascially, this is a way of showing that he can no longer see the world through this same point of view. He’s watching this event from the outside, as someone who can choose to take on a new perspective.

When he leads his commandoes into the jungle, they say they have to go Na’vi, think and track like a Na’vi.

Yes, and like Colonel Willard in Apocalypse Now. One of many nods to the classic Vietnam cinema that I’ll talk about later. Quaritch even hisses like a Navi. [navi hiss]. Quaritch learns to ride a Banshee–and he even insists on taming it the same way jake did in the first movie. This scene is even intercut with jake learning to ride a flying eel.