I Hated the Water, But Loved the Fire and Ash. What’s Up With That?

Concept art by Dylan Cole for Avatar: Fire and Ash

When I left the AMC Indianapolis 17 in 2022 after watching James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water, I distinctly remember turning to an old friend and telling her, “I didn’t like that.” I went on to write in my Letterboxd diary that the film was visually stunning and the action was designed appropriately, but the story was “the part where the picture truly fails.” For the past 3 years, that sentiment has only grown stronger. Any time I discussed this billion-dollar franchise at film school, I would explain how the structure, pace, formula, and lack of payoff in this digital epic really turned me against the film. This dislike festered into a light hatred over the years, and by November of 2025, the last thing I would ever want to do was watch yet another 3-hour-long trudge through Pandora. That was, until I drove back home for Thanksgiving.

On the drive home, I threw on one of my favorite film podcasts, Blank Check with Griffin and David. Griffin is Griffin Newman (Actor/Comedian), and David is David Sims (Staff culture writer and critic for The Atlantic). Together they discuss filmographies, directors who have massive success early on in their careers, and are given a series of “blank checks” to make whatever crazy, passion projects they want. Sometimes those checks clear, and sometimes they bounce, baby. Their episodes run long, so they are the perfect prescription for an over-12-hour drive from southern Georgia to Indiana. For one reason or another, the next episode in my rotation was their Avatar: The Way of Water, or as they refer to their episode, Podatar: The Cast of Water. While I was certainly not a fan of the film, I was a fan of Griffin, David, producer Ben Hosley, and social media manager Marie Bardi-Selinas, so I strapped in for the conversation about the blue people to commence. When their discussion kicked off, I could tell everyone on the episode was a fan. Marie had some reservations, but I’ve had enough conversations with The Way of Water Fans to know when people like the movie a lot more than I do, and that seemed to be the tone. I squirmed in my seat, but the bits and talk of their theatrical experience kept me locked into the episode. I became so locked in that I didn’t even notice that Griffin and David had been passionately discussing their time with the movie for over half an hour. Even more surprising, my head was nodding in an understanding manner. But how could this be? I hated this movie. Didn’t I?

I finished the episode and moved on to another (probably their episode on Michael Mann’s Ferrari, an old favorite of mine), but something about their discussion stuck. Now, did this drive cause me to have a Scrooge-like 180-degree pivot in my opinions on Avatar: The Way of Water? No. I still have my issues with the story in that film; however, it did open my eyes to some elements of the experience that I had been unable or unwilling to see before. So, as the release date for the new entry in the series, Avatar: Fire and Ash, approached, I was more than interested in seeing how Big Jim Cameron would continue, or maybe even conclude, this saga.

I had December 19th off from work, so I bought my 12:40 pm ticket to the World’s tallest IMAX in Pooler, GA (with real money, no AMC Stubs IMAX down there), arrived precisely on time, grabbed my concessions (popcorn and Cherry Coke), used the restroom (a crucial step before any Avatar picture), and settled into my recliner. I was prepared for the worst, but Griffin, David, and co had prepared me for the best. I slid the 3D glasses on my head just as the late James Horner’s Avatar theme rang out over the Hallelujah Mountains. For the next 3 hours and 17 minutes, I was transported to Pandora in a way I hadn't been before. Other than needing to use the restroom again throughout most of the third act, I could have easily forgotten that I was even in a movie theater. After running out to the nearest bathroom, I began my drive home. On my journey, I thought long and hard about what was different about my experience with Fire and Ash. Was the movie really that much better, or did something inside me change? Had my heart grown three sizes? These questions have bounced around in my head in the weeks since, and I’ve yet to find a definitive answer. Still, I have some theories.

My first thought was that this film was just better. Now, the critical consensus seems mostly against me here, but I struggle to agree. For me, the biggest issue with The Way of Water was that nothing of any meaning or consequence happened in the movie. I always said that it felt like one long Act 1 with an Act 3 climax hastily thrown onto the end of the film. I recently learned that there was some real truth to this critique of mine, as Cameron had originally designed the story of these two films as one movie, but split them apart due to the extensive amount of content they had before them. This is why the finales of both films have strikingly similar set pieces and why certain beats covered in the second entry were retreaded on in the third. Seeing this “half a story” thing as a problem with the new film is more than fair. After all, for the past three years, I had been critiquing the previous installment on similar grounds. However, I must say that I prefer this half of the story to the world-building and setup in The Way of Water. The world-building in that film is quite beautiful at times (Lo’Ak swimming with the whale creature, Payakan), and the death of a certain character who got the least development in the film is ultimately necessary groundwork for the narrative in Fire and Ash, but these moments are essentially all there is. The movie had a classic second chapter problem, where multiple (if not all) plot threads were left unresolved, leaving viewers like me feeling particularly unfulfilled. Alternatively, Fire and Ash has the benefit of all that legwork having been done in The Way of Water, so it gets to resolve plot points, explore grief (which seemed to be the reason for the character who died’s very existence), and play in the world of the Metkayina clan. While certainly the occasional retread is mildly irritating, I was willing to let it slide off of me because the journeys and plots being shown to me actually had a final destination at the end of this 3+ hour-long run time. Now, would one movie, properly paced with an edited story, have ultimately been superior? Perhaps. But in the universe where that movie exists, I bet I’d still prefer all of the content in this half of the story. 

Another theory for why I responded so positively to this movie has to do with me. As I near the end of film school, I have found myself responding to movies more positively. Out of the 48 new releases I saw this year (I know, rookie numbers), only 12 dipped below 3.5 stars on my letterboxd. Part of this might stem from anxiety about my own filmmaking abilities. After all, how can one obsess over the speck of sawdust in another's eye when he has a plank in his own? But I would also like to think that my education has made me a more well-rounded film enthusiast. I have started to look at the criticisms and flaws I see in films as just that, criticisms and flaws I see. This may not seem like some grand revelation, but I have felt that in modern film discourse, the term objective has become a catchall term that ultimately has no real meaning. I’ll be the first to admit that I have been as guilty as the next film bro of using it as shorthand. You don’t even need to look any further than my letterboxd or blog for recent proof. But by engaging in conversations with my cinema studies professors and listening/reading to a variety of other critics and film enthusiasts, I have come to the ultimate conclusion that “objective” is the worst word in any dialogue about art. After all, when you look at film movements like the French New Wave or Dogme 95 or Taiwanese New Cinema or New German Cinema or Third Wave, you see final products that feature “objective” flaws. However, you only see these quirks and detours from traditional form as “flaws” if you refuse to use anything other than the Hollywood style of film as your infallible benchmark. Hopefully, that extreme example of a film fascist has a clear moral to it. Choices made by filmmakers, studios, actors, and crew are always made, one way or another. Even the act of not choosing, or giving the choice to some other party, or just fixing it in post, is a choice. Whether it works for us as viewers must be looked at on a case-by-case basis. This revelation may have made me generous or soft, but I don’t think so. I am still happy to talk with anyone about why Morbius doesn’t work. However, I am more willing than I ever have been to concede that someone out there thinks it's a masterpiece cough Jared Leto cough. I think I’ve learned to shut up and just love movies. And as of late, I have been all the better for it.

Ultimately, it doesn’t really matter why I enjoyed Avatar: Fire and Ash so much. I just did. I was transported to a world for 197 minutes, and I left feeling quite satisfied. I so enjoyed my time with the movie that I texted my one and only Avatar-loving friend to say that I’d fully bought in on Avatar 4 and Avatar 5. Between December 2022 and December 2025, I would have never thought I’d utter such words, but I guess a little Varang goes a long way.

Varang (played by Oona Chaplin) from Avatar: Fire and Ash