Avatar 2 made me rethink how I feel about movies?!

When they said "The way of water has no beginning and no end," I felt that. Avatar 2 long.

I initially had no desire to see Avatar 2: The Way of Water. My only relationship to Avatar 1 is that when the dentist was knocking me out to remove my wisdom teeth, the last thing I remember him asking was “So..um, have you seen Avatar?” I momentarily worried that my last words would be “Nope, haven’t seen it.”

Truly, those words could sum up my relationship with movies. For loving (and sometimes working in) entertainment, I have seen frighteningly few movies.

Part of the reason for this is that my family didn’t go to the movies a whole lot growing up, and when they did, they took me to see What Dreams May Come—when I was 8. Baby Sammy could not handle the suicide graveyard. Because no 8-year-old should have to handle a suicide graveyard.

Those heads haunted my dreams for years.

During my adolescence, going to the movies was not because heartbreak felt good in a place like this, a la Nicole Kidman. It was more to beat excruciating boredom, or because a guy asked me to. Which is also the only reason I’ve seen any Avengers movies, J. Edgar or Brüno. TYSM, boys!

Another reason why I’ve seen so few movies is me. (obligatory 🎵 I’m the problem, it’s me 🎵). I truly do love (some) movies, but I’m kind of picky. This is hard for me and everyone involved.

Sitting down to watch a movie never sounds immediately fun to me. It’s a long period of time where I’m “not doing anything” which makes me anxious and distracted (I know, I should Power of Now through this, but it’s hard). The fact that movies are now regularly over 2 hours makes me physically uncomfortable just thinking about watching them. I recently rented Broadcast News on YouTube and was genuinely into it, yet could not finish it in the allotted 48 hour rental period. To be fair, it is over 2 hours, but even over multiple sittings, I just didn’t have it in me. Hope everything worked out for Holly Hunter.

Also, a lot of movies are just not for me. I know that many people watch movies to escape reality, but I am one of those weirdos that likes to see aspects of real life onscreen so I can ~feel less alone~. Ew, but true. To get me into a movie, I need a substantial relationship plot line (of any kind! Love a complex dad story!), well-written dialogue, and some levity. This seems simple, but remember, I am a lil picky.

Action movies are too much…action…and not enough “how is your relationship with your mother?” so I get sleepy during them. I have never really liked sci-fi because I don’t know the rules of what’s happening, so it makes me feel like literally anything could happen without consequences. This is also why I don’t like any franchises.

Prestige-y Oscar bait movies can also be grating to me. Often, I feel that they’re trying to tell you they’re a good movie with masturbatory long shots, special effects and pregnant pauses, yet they fail to offer realistic dialogue or complex relationships. Also, the discourse surrounding Oscar bait always makes me feel like I don’t get movies. Just because I don’t worship Tár doesn’t mean I don’t like art. Speaking of Tár, all Tár is saying is that “women can be bad, too.” That movie (and honestly so many movies) are still told through a hyper masculine lens, and if that’s not your taste, then somehow popular movies aren’t your taste. Again, TYSM, boys!

But, like I said, I do love some movies. Mostly comedies, psychological thrillers and movies that are so bad they’re good. Which brings me to why I saw Avatar 2. I will always watch movies if someone says “It’s gonna be so bad. We have to watch it” because then it’s an event. And that is what my husband, Jake, said to me, so I was in. And with all of that exposition, here’s my recap of the movie broken up into hours, because you know I deeply felt each of the 3 (!!!!) hours there were in this movie.

HOUR 1

• We are seeing the movie at Alamo Drafthouse, which sweetens the deal because I can drink a beer and eat a pretzel. Husband Jake (not to be confused with onscreen Avatar Jake) is taking an edible. That’s not offered at Alamo Drafthouse, but it should be.

• lol Sam Worthington plays Jake in this movie. That’s like me and my husband in one person.

• Avatars are so ugly. I can’t believe James Cameron wants to fuck them? Yes, they’re ripped, but face is like a 1/10.

  

• Ugh, they’re showing an exterior shot (lol is that what you call it?) of Earth. Anytime a movie is like “here’s Earth,” it’s either a really dumb comedy or a really “we are scientists, hear us roar” movie. I’m like zzzz.

• THERE ARE REAL PEOPLE IN THIS MOVIE? God, they are so much better looking than the avatars.

• Baddie Avatar has just woken up and said “2 Dog? Lyle? Ain’t that a bitch!” like he just woke up after getting knocked out at a Sublime concert.

• Avatars really remind me of the live action Cats: Butthole Edition. Now that was a good movie experience. Just me and everyone in the theater yelling “Oh god, no!” at every turn. That’s the last movie I saw before the pandemic, and I am proud to tell people that fact.

• Spider who is a white guy with dreads has just said “Sometimes it’s good to not know who your father is.” We are DEFINITELY at a Sublime concert now!

  

• EDIE FALCO IS IN THIS MOVIE?!?! Damn, they have given her 0 to do acting-wise other than go around and push buttons while explaining what they do, but I am happy to see a familiar face. (lol Edie filmed this so long ago that she thought the movie had already come out and flopped).

HOUR 2

• We are def in the water now. Two of the Avatar brothers (that’s the family name right? Jake Avatar, etc.) start fighting on the shore. Emo Avatar yells “So stupid!” at them. Damn, could not agree more about this whole thing.

• ==My first bathroom break!== I am relieved in many ways. A friend of mine DMs me on Instagram and says there’s a good part later in the movie to duck out because it’s just “James Cameron showing off the water fx.” So, I can skip the rest of the movie?

• One of the Avatar brothers is definitely falling in love with like a whale type thing. He swims around with him and they’re playing ~relationship blooming music~. I am happy for Free Willy Avatar, as I don’t think he has any other friends.

• HOLY SHIT. Back on Earth, JEMAINE CLEMENT IS IN THIS MOVIE WITHOUT A NEW ZEALAND ACCENT. I yell “WOW” in the theater. He is so good at the American accent. Wow! He looks great! He is killing it. I could not tell you his role, except like “naysayer scientist,” but he is slaying.

  

• Jemaine (WOW!! NO NEW ZEALAND ACCENT!) says they have to kill the whale because something is in it. It sounds like he says EmRata is in it. I’ll go with that. That seems like a worthy reason to kill a whale to me. Jemaine also says that the whale is more emotionally complex than humans. In this movie, that’s not hard to be.

• I am tired. At one point, Husband Jake and I both think one Avatar child says to another “Let’s go buy a gun,” and it’s honestly totally plausible, both because they keep pulling wild stunts out of nowhere and because there are a ton of guns. There has been so much gunfire. It’s so unnecessary.
  
  HOUR 3

• Husband Jake takes his 2nd edible. I order my second beer. We’ve got this.

• All of the Avatar family have a tough time breathing underwater, except for Emo Avatar. She can do it perfectly without needing to go up for air. She can also touch jellyfish type things and trip out. She hallucinates seeing her mom and stuff. This is why you should listen to emos. They can breathe underwater and they know about all of the good drugs.

  

  🖤My hopes are so high that your kiss might kill me/So won’t you kill me/So I die happy🖤

• I could use some Celine Dion right now. Why didn’t James Cameron make her do songs for all of his movies? He’s an idiot.

• ==Bathroom Break 2== I am so dizzy from the movie that I make this an extended trip. I do an Instagram story to connect with my fans and produce content.

  

• I return. Jake Avatar has just said “A father protects. That’s what gives him his meaning.” Ugh. I hope my dad doesn’t watch this movie.

• There are so many action/fight scenes that they have completely lost their meaning. It’s actually unusual when they aren’t fighting.

• The most common phrase among the Avatars is “Bro, that was insane, cuz.” They must love The Bear.

• Every woman is sad, naggy or literally yelling. Zoe Saldana-Avatar has yelled so much in this last section that her voice is hoarse.

• We are constantly edging toward an ending, but never quite getting there.

• Obviously some Avatars die.

• And we got there. AND Husband Jake NEVER took a break. Making him The Toughest Man Alive.

  

  TAKEAWAYS:

I guess it’s pretty to look at, but it is revealing that so many people rushed out to see this. It’s a lot of guns, abs, and poor communication, which I guess is a lot of America’s entertainment preferences, and that is a bummer to dwell on. Apparently there was a love story, but I missed it during bathroom break #2.

I will say that forcing myself to watch this has made me feel like I could get through anything. Like, it was so dull and uninspiring, but I (mostly) sat through 3+ hours of it. If I can sit through Avatar 2, I can make it through any piece of entertainment, I think. I feel strong.

I did not take this photo. I just pulled it from Tik Tok. I didn’t even see this part in theater because I was in the bathroom. I heard it quoted on a podcast and waited the whole movie to hear it, but babe had to pee, so I missed both the love interest scene and this. Besides Jemaine’s American accent, those were probably the best parts of the movie.

With my newfound strength, I’m currently on night 2 of watching the Elvis movie, and I am very dedicated to finishing it. Thank you, Avatar 2, for giving me the strength to power through.

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A lil note:

Speaking of powering through, I should have finished The Power of Now before I wrote about it last week, because there is a part where Eckhart says women are more present because they bleed out their generational trauma each month. He also says you can totally be gay and present, but don’t make your identity dependent “on your gayness” as he says. He really wilds out in the last quarter. Next time I write about a book, I promise to finish it first.

Stuff I’m v into this week:

I’ll make this short since this is a real Avatar 2-length post.

SONGS

Muscle by Issy Wood

Can you tell I've been building muscle?
I know I'm tough but I have to make sure
I can do things you don't have the guts for
Sometimes I worry that's all I'm good for

Such an 80s vibe. All of Issy Wood’s stuff is really good. Check it out. Also, you’ve definitely built muscle reading this post, so I thank you.