If it wasn't for the visuals and the amazing 3D, it would have been a let-down. However, it was made for the effects and I think it did justice to the 3D world and what a world it was.

I have to agree with MajorMercyFLush and stryjewski. This movie is a snorefest. The amount of acclaim it recievs saddens me when shallow drivel like this is going to be held as a blueprint of successful filmaking. It's nothing more than a set of video game like sequences sans the interactivity that makes video games appealing. So you can't interact with it, and the plot is for the lowest common denominator. Where does that leave it in my books? In the trash.

I'm not a movie buff by any stretch, I won't claim to hold knowledge in writing or rant about the scientific names of minerals. I'll just say the movie was blah. I don't even get where people claim it looked amazing visually, it just looked like a crapload of cgi to me. The story itself is so weak I found myself bored for more then half of the 2 hour plus movie. The bad guys attack and win the first battle but the good guys regroup and win the war.... Isn't that every episode of the A-Team? Not one time does the movie surprise you with a turn of events outside your expectations. Don't get me started on the cartoonishly tough military leader or the final fight scene where the bad guy tells the good guy what he's about to do. How classic. I'm sure the fanboys will flame the hell out of this as apparently some see this movie as life changing. If this movie changed your life you need to get out more.

After reading all the hate reviews surrounding this movie, I've really come to pity the Millennials and their successors, These generations have become so jaded to life, while never having any actual exposure to an environmental revolution other than what they've been indoctrinated to believe, are now so tainted that they can't simply enjoy a new experience like Avatar. Every character is shallow unless they constantly preach an agenda-driven mantra of extreme global cooling/warming man-made destruction, trans-bisexual anti-homogeneous gender nullification or some other left-wing dribble involving renewable energy, a meat-free diet or that somehow one race's life matters more than another because of the indignities they suffered centuries ago. Now, you have to deny that 4k eyecandy graphics are BORING to fit in with the new generation of beatniks and that CGI is killing the movie industry, even though all those that insist on it would never sit down and watch a standard definition B&W film from the 1950s, even if their life depended on it. Creating a self-sustaining universe is something ever so difficult. Only a few (Tolkien, Lucas, Roddenberry & Stan Lee come immediately to mind) have been able to pull it off with success. The DETAIL that you need to weave is so intense that only a few Masters have been able to pull it off and have their legacy extend beyond a single work. The world of Avatar could easily be included into that mix. Just watching how the unique creatures breathed, their interactions with the surrounding environment and how life on that planet communed with itself was enough to make me want for more. Yes, the graphics today in 2021 might not be that impressive, but for something a decade old, they truly were breathtaking. Of course, this is coming from a person who grew up during the Beta-Max - VHS war, in an era when your home phone broke, you had to get to the Ma Bell Telephone Store to get a replacement (because you only rented your home phone from the utility) and where 4-bit video game graphics were groundbreaking. There are 2 aspects of graphics that are the most difficult to program: running water and the human hand. These are the two things that the industry grades the most difficult and expects to expose the weakness of substandard work. Both of these are flawlessly done in the film and come off as exceptionally lifelike. After that, everything else is gravy and is believable to the standard eye. The amount of background activity is breathtaking and if you happen to look beyond the main protagonists on the screen, you can get lost with the environmental interaction. Unfortunately, most people won't be able to see the forest from the trees and never enjoy the graphical ballet going on in the background. While those less-versed might not see it, Avatar is a modern version of the American Western; where the white-male protagonist is adopted by the native tribe and instructed in their ways of life and existence. It has been done time and time again (Bianco Apache, The Savage, Little Big Man, The Light in the Forest), and this film follows the doctrine to the letter. Avatar is nothing more than a new-age telling of the same old story of Empire vs. Indigenous people on a planetary scale, albeit with better graphics and new age technology. Yes, it's not a new tale. But honestly, after millennia after millennia of humans telling stories, how many original tales are still untold? Besides that, everything else about the film is almost perfect. The cinematography, the editing, the graphics and even the dialog fits the movie like a glove. If you weren't impressed, then go take a peek at Cool World or Who Framed Roger Rabbit and see how far we've come in just a few short decades. While not the perfect film, it definitely entertains and leaves the viewer wanting for more. Highly recommended.

I know it’s popular to hate on this nowadays, but some of the ratings on the top reviews are quite ridiculous. I’m not a massive fan of it either, but some people rating this a 1 must be under the impression that it’ll gain them cinema snob credentials or something. In reality, it’s quite the opposite. A lot of this is saved by the production: the filmmaking is top notch, action’s well helmed, cutting edge visual effects, impressive cinematography and lighting, standout score, all that stuff’s great and memorable. In fact, I’d argue very few movies are as immersive as this one. The characters are ok (little too cartoony and cliché for my liking) but it’s the script in particular that brings a lot of the movie down. It’s way too tropey (both cinematic and literary), lots of bad dialogue, highly predictable and far too om the nose. It doesn’t have enough meat on the bones to justify the 3 hour runtime, and casting some better actors would’ve gone a long way as well (Zoe Saldana is the only person giving a legit good performance). You can hear Worthington’s Australian accent throughout the entire film, and it’s very distracting. So, it’s fine, good on Cameron for making all the money in the world with an original idea. You could honestly do a lot worse than watching this. But you could also do a lot better. 6/10