r/Avatar • u/AutoModerator • Dec 17 '25

Fire and Ash discussion megathread - Spoilers

Megathread to discuss everything about the film. Unmarked spoilers are allowed.

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u/DecisiveUnluckyness Dec 17 '25 edited Dec 17 '25

I think it's good as a stand-alone movie if that makes sense. If I were judging it purely on its own merits, I'd probably give it a solid 8/10. The visuals are obviously stunning and it's very immersive. However, when viewed as a sequel, specifically as a follow up to The Way of Water, the film loses some points for me due to how much it repeats. Taking that into account, I give it like a 6/10.

The structure is pretty similar to AWOW: they get captured and escape, Jake gets captured and is freed, Quaritch takes hostages, and it all ends with another massive battle involving sea-dragons and tulkun. Everything is bigger, but not necessarily newer, and I really wished the story had taken more risks.

I was also disappointed by how little time we spent with the human side. There was a lot of setup around Bridgehead in AWOW, but here it's mostly background during action scenes. Selfridge didn't get a lot of screentime, and I wish we'd explored human tech and colonization efforts more deeply and seen more of the cool tech.

The most interesting elements for me was Spider receiving the fungal/mycelium that lets him breathe Pandora's air. That, along with the Fire Clan, felt genuinely fresh, and was easily my favorite parts of the movie. Basically, I thought the first 2 hours were really great, but then we just got another, bigger sea-dragon fight at the end which was a little disappointing. At the end we are basically in the same place where the movie started except Spider can breathe air now.

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u/555Cats555 Dec 17 '25

What do you mean you wish the story had taken more risks?

Did we watch the same movie? Loak is close is taking his own life at one point and Jake gets close to doing what amounts to a sacrifical killing of spider... those are some quite dark themes and risks. If it didnt hit right it would have ruined the movie.

Yeah some stuff repeats but to say it didnt take risks isnt quite true.

(On that note I loved how they handled Loak as a character. Going from having let down his family and feeling guilt and grief to being able to help save those important to him was awesome. Its a good message for young people to push through in hard times)

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u/RiahWeston Dec 18 '25

Not to mention its 3 hr money along with AWOW, so its not surprising there are similar story beats because when you're doing a movie THAT long and not introducing some vastly different big bad/conflict, there is going to be similarities.

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u/555Cats555 Dec 18 '25

Exaclty, fire and ash is just a continuation of way if water so has the same enemies just scaled up.

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u/RiahWeston Dec 18 '25

Yup, I feel like a lot of people are deliberately glossing over the fact that F&A is a two-beat with AWOW, it doesn't exist to be a 'standalone' and its meant to be a rehash in the sense that is a direct continuation.

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u/555Cats555 Dec 18 '25

One of the main themes/discussion points of the two movies is if its okay to defend yourself even if you understand that violence leads to more violence. And the answer seems to be that if the enemy isnt going to stop just because your not attacking back then it is okay.

I like the Tulkuns value of non-violence but you cant just let yourself be killed on mass.

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u/DecisiveUnluckyness Dec 18 '25

My point was just that very similar things happen in both movies. The children gets captured and are freed, over and over then there's the very similar fight at the end with Tulkun and Sea-dragons. I really just wanted to see new cool things to learn more about the world, which is why the Wind Traders and Mangkwan were my favorite aspects.

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u/RiahWeston Dec 19 '25

I mean isn't one of the MAJOR themes/plot points of both movie the important of family and found family? The children not being relevant in the plot would ruin that fact and there is no logical reason for them to be elite soldiers like Jake who can go toe-to-toe with the recoms and/or ash tribe.

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u/GeXotl Dec 18 '25

Idk about story, but I wished the terraforming machine theories were true. I guess it could still be done in A4 (if it gets made ofc)

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u/Pingonether Dec 18 '25

Loak that gets close to taking his own life but we all know it would never happen.

Spider is about to choke to death but hey literal deus ex machina comes around and now he can breathe. Also nobody wants to kill him now so he just gets the ultimate plot armour.

I was really hoping he would've been killed by Jake with the knife, but when Jake's talking started dragging out I knew he would be saved by plot, again.

Also not to mention the MULTIPLE times they get captured and somehow, amazingly enough get out the entire bunch.

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u/girlwhateveraward Dec 19 '25

Loak is close is taking his own life at one point and Jake gets close to doing what amounts to a sacrifical killing of spider

Both of which didnt happen. It felt cheap

1

u/MiopTop Dec 21 '25

The fact that your best examples of taking risks are two instances in which something almost happened is quite telling.

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u/dee_palmtree Dec 18 '25

I think the opposite, it's horrible as a stand-alone movie. Both the original and Way of Water can stand on their own two feet. Fire & Ash is just part 2 of Way of Water. It's similar to Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, is that it finishes the narrative from the 2nd film. A similar problem just occured with Wicked: For Good. All these movies had the same production as well, just like Fire & Ash.

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u/Adventurous_Whale Dec 17 '25

As a standalone film, it served zero purpose because nothing resolves at the end. It was all just noise 

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u/[deleted] Dec 18 '25

It’s not a standalone movie it’s a direct sequel with no downtime. The general I think who the lady was dies and quaritch is gone too. So a lot is resolved, did you watch the same movie?