[Ghostavo]

I loved this movie.

Like it was said by countless people before, it has its flaws, you will notice them but you just won't care because this movie is literally pornography for the eyes!

It's EYE PORN!!

[QuantumDelta]

Went in with virtually no expectations.
Considering seeing it again now.

I never watch movies at the cinema twice, ever.
The 3d was not overdone and really brought you 'into' the film quite a lot, the plot would never stand up in a book no matter how fleshed out, but it /really/ ****ing works in the film because of awesome directing.

The film kicked ass.

[TrashMan]

If it's another one of those "Ewoks pawn Empire" deals count me out. Enough is enough.

Possibly, but keep in mind these Ewoks have giant pterodactyls, massive alien horses, and are 8 feet tall with carbon fibre bones and neurotoxins that can stop your heart in under a minute.

and the marines have OBRITAL BOMBARDMENT and SPACECRAFT.
Exterminatus...exterminatus. Even a partial one. It's not like burning everythnig within 1000 miles of the excavation site will ruin the ore. No forest to hid in anymore. Clear ovewiew.

I stopped being impressed by must-see visual movies 10 years ago.
I couldn't care less for all of it's eye porn. A crap plot is still a crap plot.

[General Battuta]

If it's another one of those "Ewoks pawn Empire" deals count me out. Enough is enough.

Possibly, but keep in mind these Ewoks have giant pterodactyls, massive alien horses, and are 8 feet tall with carbon fibre bones and neurotoxins that can stop your heart in under a minute.

and the marines have OBRITAL BOMBARDMENT and SPACECRAFT.
Exterminatus...exterminatus. Even a partial one. It's not like burning everythnig within 1000 miles of the excavation site will ruin the ore. No forest to hid in anymore. Clear ovewiew.

I stopped being impressed by must-see visual movies 10 years ago.
I couldn't care less for all of it's eye porn. A crap plot is still a crap plot

blah blah blah blah

It was made quite clear that massive casualties were not politically possible. I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't have any weapons capable of such a strike - how would they justify shipping them out to Alpha Centauri? When they did need to blow something up on a really large scale they had to improvise using palettes of high explosive.

It's not like James Cameron didn't think of it, he's 'take off and nuke the site from orbit' guy.

Get over your grognard disbelief that anyone packing all that hardware could lose a fight to a bunch of Captain Planet fans and go see it. It's fantastic, and not at all Luddite. Particularly fun to see the huge alien warriors using captured human throat mics.

You lost me at the grognards disbelief, since I said nothing about that. In truth, I draw great amusement from that particular portion of the movie as technology's revenge.

But I still don't care about the packaging. I don't care what it's a parable of. The story it wants to tell is about the evils of the technology users. It's Luddite whether it wants to be or not...and frankly if it didn't want to be somebody ****ed up bigtime, because that's what a rather significant percentage of people will draw from it regardless. There are times where you can go "yeah I see how you drew that conclusion but that's still bat****" and then there's...well there's Avatar.

You didn't watch the movie, so you don't know.

It's about the power of technology and science. The main characters use technology to understand and investigate a new culture. The movie extols and elevates science as a way of understanding the natural world in a way that no science fiction movie I've seen in a long time does. The natives embrace technology as a way of enhancing their insurgency. There's nothing Luddite about it.

Gibson was fond of saying that technology on its own is valence neutral; only human action introduces a human component. The movie may be against the use of technology to pillage other cultures, but it's certainly pro-technology with respect to its use in science and understanding.

Seriously, you don't know how cheering it was to see the scientists presented as the heroes for once. Sigourney Weaver's lead scientist character is probably the best in the movie.

[jdjtcagle]

Wow! This movie was incredible! My wife wanted us to go see something heard about the Morgans, but she gave in and she loved it as much as me.  I found nothing that bothered me it was very well done.

[TrashMan]

Frankly, hte whole Avatar programs is in the Awesome but impractical territory.

[NGTM-1R]

You didn't watch the movie, so you don't know.

There is a saying about assumptions...

Yes, I agree the portrayal was refreshing, but you and I reach deeper than most who'll watch the movie. I recognize this. You, apparently, don't.

[Mongoose]

I'm  honestly genuinely surprised by the positive reactions, because I thought the whole thing looked pretty ****ing terrible from the trailers and commercials.  I probably still won't see it, as I don't even see the movies I legitimately want to, but at least it's something to think about now.

[Retsof]

I'm just gonna say the movie was AWESOME and leave it at that.
EDIT:  Scratch that.  Here's something may be a bit depressing.  You know that the end of the movie isn't the end.  Because if the humans really want something they'll just come back with bigger guns.

[Turambar]

Because if the humans really want something they'll just come back with bigger guns.

or with blankets and fire-water

[General Battuta]

You didn't watch the movie, so you don't know.

There is a saying about assumptions...

Yes, I agree the portrayal was refreshing, but you and I reach deeper than most who'll watch the movie. I recognize this. You, apparently, don't.

Yeah, maybe. It's still worth seeing!

[TrashMan]

blah blah blah blah

It was made quite clear that massive casualties were not politically possible. I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't have any weapons capable of such a strike - how would they justify shipping them out to Alpha Centauri? When they did need to blow something up on a really large scale they had to improvise using palettes of high explosive.

It's not like James Cameron didn't think of it, he's 'take off and nuke the site from orbit' guy.

So we have the tech to travel to other system, have huge starships, but we don't have heavy weaponry? I find ewoks beating the empire more likely than that.

And yea, I understand political fallout...but..It's Alpha Centauri..who's gonna know? And if the unobotanium is really as critical for the human race as the move makes it out to be, then alien rights groups won't be stopping them for long.

[General Battuta]

We have 'heavy weaponry' that we couldn't use in Iraq due to political ramifications. The project is apparently under enough scrutiny that the corporate oversight is concerned about being humanitarian.

It's also possible that they don't have any easy means of delivering orbital weapons. They have a starship which may not have magical reactionless drives (meaning it could be confined to a very conservative orbit) and some ground-to-orbit shuttles.

Of course it's perfectly possible that the humans will come back with heavier weapons.

[Liberator]

I haven't seen the film yet, but on the subject of "heavy" weapons.

Magic reactionless drive or not, it wouldn't be too hard to configure an orbit to arrange for a kinetic harpoon drop.  A 100 ton harpoon of some handwavium(they started it) doesn't seem like it would do a lot of damage, but if the shape of the harpoon and altitude of drop were right then you could have effects from earthquakes to tactical nuke detonations.

[Ghostavo]

Question, how effective are ordinary explosive under lower G's? I remember something at the start of the movie saying that Pandora had lower G's than Earth, and with it I assume it will have lower atmosphere pressure.

Anyone care to do some analysis on it?

[Turambar]

I haven't seen the film yet, but on the subject of "heavy" weapons.

Magic reactionless drive or not, it wouldn't be too hard to configure an orbit to arrange for a kinetic harpoon drop.  A 100 ton harpoon of some handwavium(they started it) doesn't seem like it would do a lot of damage, but if the shape of the harpoon and altitude of drop were right then you could have effects from earthquakes to tactical nuke detonations.

yeah that would most likely do a whole lot more damage to the human forces than to the native forces.

go see the movie.  the human plan isn't really such a bad plan, based on the intel that the humans had.

[iamzack]

Spoiler:

Exactly. The humans thought they were just fighting blue cat people with bows and arrows, not every massive beast in the forest/air.

[General Battuta]

I haven't seen the film yet, but on the subject of "heavy" weapons.

Magic reactionless drive or not, it wouldn't be too hard to configure an orbit to arrange for a kinetic harpoon drop.  A 100 ton harpoon of some handwavium(they started it) doesn't seem like it would do a lot of damage, but if the shape of the harpoon and altitude of drop were right then you could have effects from earthquakes to tactical nuke detonations.

It's actually tricky to do if you a) don't have a harpoon and b) have a ship with very limited ability to generate delta-V. Their big interstellar ship may be so limited that it can't even effectively change orbital positions (it might be a low-acceleration, long-endurance drive principle), and their little shuttles might be similarly limited. I don't think we could manage a 100-ton harpoon drop without a few year's planning today, and they're working with limited resources compared to us.

They might have been able to set it up with time, but the situation didn't demand it and it probably wouldn't be politically permissible.

[NGTM-1R]

I think we have to assume some kind of FTL here, since they don't appear to be operating under the time-and-distance constraints that non-FTL drive would impose. They want to stripmine the place and ship it elsewhere. That's just not practical without FTL.

[IronBeer]

I think we have to assume some kind of FTL here, since they don't appear to be operating under the time-and-distance constraints that non-FTL drive would impose. They want to stripmine the place and ship it elsewhere. That's just not practical without FTL.

Just saw the movie earlier today... erm, what was the line? "5 years, 7 months and 23 days in cryogenic stasis" or something like that? 5 years implies less than c on a journey to Alpha Centauri.

Otherwise... unquestionably the best movie I've seen all year, and that's counting any old films I may have seen for the first time.