As visually ambitious as its predecessor, The Way of Water follows in its flawed footsteps as Cameron still believes that a film can solely be carried on the back of its alien realism.

I was nine when my father took me to the theatre to watch Avatar. I remember my anticipation when buying the tickets – and anxiety as I was afraid I wouldn’t be allowed in to see a PG-13 film – the awe I felt as I stared at the looping trailer while we waited in line. The showing was early on a weekday so the theatre was empty, the 3D glasses sliding off my prepubescent nose as I neurotically pushed them back into place. And then the film started, and it was ineffable.

For almost three hours, I sat there in silence as my inexperienced mind was shattered, reordered, and glued back together, unable to accept that what I was witnessing wasn’t real. It seemed more plausible that Cameron had discovered Pandora and documented their war instead of the CG alternative.

Smash cut to 2022; I am 22, have taken film from a hobby to a passion to a career, and I am sitting in a sparse theatre on an early weekday showing of Avatar: The Way of Water – minus the 3D glasses. My childlike wonder didn’t make the transition to Cameron’s sequel, but whether that is due to my jaded growth as a critic or a lack of general excitement for the sequel few asked for, I cannot say. And then the film started, and it was completely expressible.

Avatar: The Way of Water, for all intents and purposes, is a re-skin of the 2009 blockbuster that reshaped the world of computer-generated film. Where Avatar told the story of a human (Jake Sully played by Sam Worthington) learning the ways of the Na’vi, The Way of Water tells the story of Sully and his family many years on integrating themselves with a Maori-esque island tribe. Beat for beat, the sequel follows the same rugged narrative path as the original which, even at the age of nine, I knew was far from compelling. Rather, Avatar’s story was only a vehicle to show off the futuristic visuals. 

But that simply can’t cut it anymore. 2009 was a long time ago and while there had certainly been landmark films in the world of special effects (Tron, Lord of the Rings, 2001: A Space Odyssey to name a few), Cameron’s empty epic marked a new era that opened the door for cinema’s franchise scourge. Marvel has made millions off mediocre films that boast eye-candy fight scenes (despite their recent dip in manufactured quality) so Cameron’s extravagant sequel is late to the party he organised.

Making a film simply for its post-production excellence is a time long gone when films such as Dune are able to combine breathtaking and believable visuals with a truly compelling narrative. Yes, The Way of Water does reach higher in terms of consistent quality – every shot is painstakingly crafted to a higher quality than its predecessor – but it is impossible to look past the glaring hole of an immersive plot after years of doing just that.

The film's cut also gets in the way of the little story that there is. The first time Sully’s kids go to a new beach, they traverse choppy waves that make the journey look like hours yet, later in the film, it’s as if they can teleport there. Edited by four people (including Cameron), there is little coherency in the direction the edit takes as it often cuts off a shot abruptly and then cuts back to it minutes later. The cherry on the blue cake is the numerous amount of montages that interlace scenes that happen weeks apart, confusing the plot for the sake of pretty water effects.

But they are extremely pretty, and Cameron has certainly set the bar even higher in terms of what realistic visuals can look like. Yet, as mesmerising as the first half may be, I couldn’t help but feel like a prisoner in my theatre set. Avatar had its large-scale fights and unique setting to push it forward, but adding sea creatures to the mix is far from innovative, especially when the films are thematically identical; learning to adjust to a new culture yet the first had such higher stakes. 

So is this a film worth the price of admission; worth the price of a three-hour runtime; worth closing an eye to its obvious issues? Maybe, if you are nine.