It looks like Avatar is here to stay. I can’t say I’m sorry for that, either. There’s something so heart-warming about listening to coworkers discuss Banshees, alien relations and colonialism. People who have never given science fiction or fantasy a fair shake suddenly have a perfect introduction to the genres.
Anything that big, and that successful, will breed some controversy, of course. It’s healthy for the community! However, whether or not the F/SF community, as a whole, agrees with James Cameron doesn’t really matter to this discussion. World-building, story, characterization, we know how to do all of those things.
What excites me about Avatar is two particular issues: Avatar as a gateway to F/SF, and Avatar as a precursor to a whole new world of speculative-fiction awesomeness.
And, for the purposes of this blog, we shall focus on that latter one.
Hollywood has done a phenomenal job of embarrassing the genres since the dawn of the theater. Cliched plots, clunky animation, cardboard characters, we’ve done it all. Ended up with a lot of people automatically laughing every time a new fantasy movies was announced, too.
Three blockbusters, in particular, started to change that. Lord of the Rings, The Matrix and now Avatar. There were others before hand, certainly, but these three brought speculative fiction to the forefront of people’s minds. Ironically, they couldn’t be much more different in theme and setting.
Lord of the Rings was the first movie where the monsters had a chilling reality. The Ringwraith’s mounts, serpentine and ugly, were the first dragons (At least, so far as I’ve seen) to look authentic. Trolls, Mumakil, all the panache and beasts that Jackson could conjure, the CGI held up to standards far higher than anything we’d seen so far.
The Matrix, until the sequels, made science fiction cool again. It stuck its head up and went “Hey, you, look here. I’m genre, and I can compete with the big boys!” As for the sequels, yeah, we won’t talk about those.
Avatar blew Lord of the Rings and The Matrix out of the water. In money, controversy and media attention, Avatar is the most noticeable film of the last decade.
‘Best Creature‘ lists are already popping up on the internet, raving over movement, composition and sound. The Banshees have to be near the top of my personal ‘Best of’ list, and not just because I am partial to dragons. A recent article by CNN focused on the withdrawal symptoms of people who became too invested in the 3-D, bringing forward a well-trammeled issue a lot sooner than expected. (If people can’t handle 3-D NOW without going suicidal, what’s going to happen in ten years, as technology gets more immersive?)
Avatar opens up new possibilities for us as speculative fiction readers, fans and writers. We don’t have to worry so much about Claymation dragons or wooden trolls. The technology is there to show any beast we can come up with.
Personally, I’m already plotting which books I’d like to see on the big screen. Michael Stackpole’s DragonCrown Cycle, with its monsters, dragons and warrior elves. James Blaylock’s Elfin Ship. Jeff VanderMeer’s Finch, or anything set in Ambergris. Jonathan Carroll’s, well, anything!
Start dreaming, it could well be the golden age for Hollywood speculative fiction. Maybe we’ll actually get some good stories out of it too, and not just effects and splash?
What books, short stories or worlds would you like to see transferred into the full visual experience?
Jaym is an intern for Fantasy Magazine, an administrator at Fifthwind Forums, and is in school majoring in Folklore and Psychology.
You can follow Jaym via @jaymgates or visit her website at jaymgates.moonfruit.com
Related posts:
APEXOLOGY: Horror
What’s wrong with Claymation trolls? Jason and the Argonauts and the Golden Voyage of Sinbad were great films which really inspired me as a child. Indiana Jones raided the lost arc without CGI. The Last Starfighter managed to save the universe without rendering and texture mapping.
I mean, I get your point. They probably look tacky to other people and they definitly do to anyone over eight years old. The stop-motion effects and wonderful models that used to make F/SF special effects possible have always been a part of the genre for me, though. I’m sad to see them going.
(And, of course, bad CGI looks far, far worse than bad stop motion…)
As much as I disliked Avatar’s clunky rhetoric I agree it has kick-started a much needed debate about speculative science fiction.
>>The Ringwraith’s mounts, serpentine and ugly, were the first dragons (At least, so far as I’ve seen) to look authentic.
The Vermithrax Pejorative in Dragonslayer is definately the first, predating LOTR’s by some twenty years or so.
As a film Avatar was OK but you’re right to get excited about dragons. I’d love to see a big movie version of Anne Mccaffreys Pern books. Or how about Dragoncharm by Graham Edwards where all the main characters are dragons?