The more I've thought about Avatar, the more it shared parallels to Dune- and the more that made me uncomfortable about liking Dune. While Dune has a longer narrative arc and some extra political factions to contend with most of it is really the same- majority male from off-world comes in, has to depend on the natives to survive, has to fight some of them for his place in the order, falls in love with the spiritual girl (which is convenient because she's the one that will help him secure his leadership, because the spiritual girl is also the one who will become the spiritual leader when the current spiritual leader dies) and eventually becomes so much better at all the current native customs than any of the other natives who have been doing those things all their lives that he uses those customs to defeat his own people. Even Jessica was more or less Dr. Grace.
I'd never interpreted Dune as a white-guilt fantasy and now I have to.
I have a lot of mixed feelings on the whole innate potential/"really i'm special but no one sees it yet" theme. Everyone wants to have a talent that hasn't been discovered yet- I mean, that's the theme of every action movie as well as every teenage girl makeover rom-com. I just wish there was a gratifying way to do it without making everyone else look the weaker for it. There are ways to have talents that aren't "and i'm instantly better than everyone else who has been doing this their whole lives because I'm special!" That was the part that ruined Avatar for me, really, that he had to be the best to be useful. I guess he'd trained as a Marine for a long time, but the whole spiritual connection with nature that he had as well as a native in two months- it just seemed wrong to me.
The only character I really liked was the pilot chick. She had a better balance- she got to learn new skills (navigating in the earthmotes) but mostly was useful based on her moral compass and her prior learning.
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Date: 2010-01-08 08:04 pm (UTC)I'd never interpreted Dune as a white-guilt fantasy and now I have to.
I have a lot of mixed feelings on the whole innate potential/"really i'm special but no one sees it yet" theme. Everyone wants to have a talent that hasn't been discovered yet- I mean, that's the theme of every action movie as well as every teenage girl makeover rom-com. I just wish there was a gratifying way to do it without making everyone else look the weaker for it. There are ways to have talents that aren't "and i'm instantly better than everyone else who has been doing this their whole lives because I'm special!" That was the part that ruined Avatar for me, really, that he had to be the best to be useful. I guess he'd trained as a Marine for a long time, but the whole spiritual connection with nature that he had as well as a native in two months- it just seemed wrong to me.
The only character I really liked was the pilot chick. She had a better balance- she got to learn new skills (navigating in the earthmotes) but mostly was useful based on her moral compass and her prior learning.