Avatar Sequel Discussion (Cameron)

[number8]

The way the entire operation would be set up and the dynamic Pandora has with Earth.

Examples? Do you believe the corporations would be less callous because it's first contact, or the soldiers would be more astonished by them? I'm just trying to understand what the problem is and what should have been done differently. I actually remember it did feel like they're invading the only other planet with sentient humanoids, even if they never say it outright. I never even entertained the idea that there might be other aliens. I just figured that Earth has lived for 2-3 generations knowing that 5 years across space there's a planet with hostile natives. Kind of like when they first discovered, er, The New World.

[number8]

I think it has a bearing on these characters whether these were the first alien species they've ever seen. In Star Wars it's not surprising to see a new race because you're constantly surrounded by different races. In a world where you've never seen an alien before (even if the human race as a whole had seen them before) it changes the way you act when you finally do see one.

I think the Avatar program takes away that surprise, since Norm said he has hours logged back on Earth. So there might be those faux-Na'Vis running around on Earth.

Also, not that it matters in the final film, but I believe in the original script, bio-enhancements are common. LIke football athletes are all human-deer hybrids and shit like that.

[Qrazy]

Examples? Do you believe the corporations would be less callous because it's first contact, or the soldiers would be more astonished by them? I'm just trying to understand what the problem is and what should have been done differently. I actually remember it did feel like they're invading the only other planet with sentient humanoids, even if they never say it outright. I never even entertained the idea that there might be other aliens. I just figured that Earth has lived for 2-3 generations knowing that 5 years across space there's a planet with hostile natives. Kind of like when they first discovered, er, The New World.

I feel like more people back on earth would have a vested interest in all of this if it was first contact and that if it wasn't first contact the soldiers callousness might be more precisely defined rather than one-dimensional (in the sense that Earth is becoming pro-Earther versus extra-terrestrials). The film's approach to political movements and character motivations just felt a bit slight. I'm not asking for much more expository time with it, just more nuanced factions rather than... hippies/scientists versus military/corporations. I would agree with you though that in the film I also think this is probably the only other sentient life form we had encountered.

[Grouchy]

I dunno. I think this discussion is kind of pointless because, although it would flesh out the world for possibly sequels, it has no relevance to the story being told in the film. So what if there are other intelligent races? Maybe there aren't. Or maybe this is the only one that holds something useful to the Earth people.

I don't think there should be any sequels, so I'm not all that concerned.

[Skitch]

Maybe Avatar 2 should center around a class action law suit from all the animals on Pandora, protesting their constant inappropriate touching of naughty parts.

[Morris Schæffer]

Star Wars also ended happilly with a full circle, then Empire came and pulled the rug.

That is a good example, but I guess Lucas had it all mapped out. I wonder what Cameron has up his sleeve to justify a sequel.

[number8]

That is a good example, but I guess Lucas had it all mapped out.

Er...

[Skitch]

That is a good example, but I guess Lucas had it all mapped out. I wonder what Cameron has up his sleeve to justify a sequel.

A gazillion dollars of incentive.

[Morris Schæffer]

Er...

He didn't?

[Rowland]

He didn't?

I believe he's insinuating that Lucas and his collaborators made shit up as they went along (just read the history behind this shit), and that the only reason TESB works is likely outside of Lucas' influence.

[Spun Lepton]

I believe he's insinuating that Lucas and his collaborators made shit up as they went along (just read the history behind this shit), and that the only reason TESB works is likely outside of Lucas' influence.

WE HAVE WINNAH!!!!

[Morris Schæffer]

I believe he's insinuating that Lucas and his collaborators made shit up as they went along (just read the history behind this shit), and that the only reason TESB works is likely outside of Lucas' influence.

So the Darth is Luke's father stuff wasn't planned from the start by Lucas? I find that hard to believe.

[Dead & Messed Up]

So the Darth is Luke's father stuff wasn't planned from the start by Lucas? I find that hard to believe.

Actually, I'm not sure where 8 and Rowland got their information. To the best of my knowledge, Lucas had written a loose outline of the SW chronology about the same time he was working through his first four drafts of the original screenplay. Each draft was significantly different - the first one was about Mace Windu, a Jedi Bendu warrior, the second changed it to Anakin Starkiller - but the larger events were still threaded, including, I believe, the revelation that Darth Vader was the protagonist's father.

[Raiders]

From Wikipedia:

Later that year, Lucas hired science fiction author Leigh Brackett to write Star Wars II with him. They held story conferences and by late November 1977, Lucas had produced a handwritten treatment called The Empire Strikes Back. The treatment is very similar to the final film except that Darth Vader does not reveal he is Luke's father. In the first draft that Brackett would write from this, Luke's father appears as a ghost to instruct Luke.[28]
Brackett finished her first draft in early 1978; Lucas has said he was disappointed with it, but before he could discuss it with her, she died from cancer.[29] With no writer available, Lucas had to write his next draft himself. It was this draft in which Lucas first made use of the "Episode" numbering for the films; Empire Strikes Back was listed as Episode II.[30] As Michael Kaminski argues in The Secret History of Star Wars, the disappointment with the first draft probably made Lucas consider different directions in which to take the story.[31] He made use of a new plot twist: Darth Vader claims to be Luke's father. According to Lucas, he found this draft enjoyable to write, as opposed to the year-long struggles writing the first film, and quickly wrote two more drafts,[32] both in April 1978. He also took the script to a darker extreme by having Han Solo become imprisoned in carbonite and left in limbo.

[Barty]

Moral of the story: Lucas should only do what he enjoys, because that's the only way he will ever produce anything good.

[eternity]

So the Darth is Luke's father stuff wasn't planned from the start by Lucas? I find that hard to believe.

The name Darth Vader, according to my philosophy teacher, spelled out that it was his father from the beginning. I don't remember his explanation but it was convincing.

[Morris Schæffer]

The name Darth Vader, according to my philosophy teacher, spelled out that it was his father from the beginning. I don't remember his explanation but it was convincing.

"Vader" is literally Dutch for father.

[number8]

LUKE! IT'S ME!

[Mysterious Dude]

To the best of my knowledge, Lucas had written a loose outline of the SW chronology about the same time he was working through his first four drafts of the original screenplay.

George Lucas has claimed this, but I think George Lucas is full of shit.

[Dukefrukem]

As director James Cameron plans to film Avatar sequel seven miles below the sea's surface, we go into the deadly deep with the only two men who've been there


wut?

According to the reports, Cameron has commissioned a team of Australian engineers to design and build a submersible capable of taking him to the floor of the Challenger Deep, and capable of filming in 3D at these depths.

If Cameron succeeds in his voyage to the bottom of the sea, what will he find? In all likelihood nothing more than the etiolated crustacea and fish spotted by Piccard and Walsh. But the abyssal floor at the bottom of this trench remains by far the least explored environment on Earth. Indeed, we have better maps of the surface of Mars than we do of the bottom of the Pacific.

But it is, just about, possible that Cameron may glimpse something just as alien as the weird and wonderful beasts he imagined into being in his last movie

[number8]

Obviously he's not going to film the movie down there. It's research.

[Morris Schæffer]

I hope he finds Megalodon Carcharodon!!!

[[ETM]]

I hope he finds Megalodon Carcharodon!!!

Or Cthulhu.

[MadMan]

Or Cthulhu.

I hope he finds neither of those. I'm rooting for him to discover a rather large alien ship thousands of years old....

[Wryan]

Avatar 2: The Avataring!