Avatar: Fire and Ash review: "Still a technical marvel, with some of the year's best action filmmaking"

The brilliance of Avatar is that it offers a window into a new world. But, for the first time in Fire and Ash, you might start to feel like you've seen this view before. The third chapter in James Cameron's proposed 5-film saga, Fire and Ash remains a technical marvel, with some of the year's best action filmmaking. But repetitive storytelling beats and one too many familiar locations mean this is the least effective entry in the box-office-conquering series so far.

This makes sense when you learn that The Way of Water and Fire and Ash were originally conceived as one film, only to be split into two installments. Picking up shortly after the RDA's temporary defeat at the flipper-shaped hands of the aquatic Metkayina clan, and the death of eldest Sully son, Neteyam (Jamie Flatters), the status quo remains largely unchanged. The recombinant Quaritch (Stephen Lang) is still doggedly pursuing Jake Sully (Sam Worthington), the RDA suits want to hunt space whales for their invaluable brain juice, and the typically peaceful Na'vi are prepared to fight, so that spiritual and ecological harmony can return to Pandora.

There is at least one significant new spark of excitement: the fearsome Ash People. Led by Oona Chaplin's sinister Varang, these war-mongering Na'vi live in the charred husk of an incinerated mother tree and have turned their back on Eywa, putting stock in Varang's bloodthirsty mysticism instead. They're as much of a threat as the RDA, in their own way, particularly when a desperate Quaritch joins forces with the Mangkwan…

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Fight or flight

To its credit, Fire and Ash doesn't waste any time getting to the action. The introduction of the nomadic Wind Traders – who the Sullys stow away with to move Spider (Jack Champion) to a safer location – sets up a first-act aerial setpiece that's better than the climactic action sequences of pretty much every blockbuster movie released this year. Whether you see it in Cameron's preferred format (high frame rate 3D) or not, the clarity, impact, and storytelling of the action filmmaking here is world-class.

And then Cameron does it again, at least two or three times over the course of Fire and Ash. A mini prison break from inside the smoke-belching RDA city is a vertiginous showcase for Neytiri's (Zoe Saldaña's) sharpshooting prowess, while a mano-a-mano showdown between Jake and Quaritch takes place in the kind of physics-defying environment only Avatar could imagine and execute to this standard. And – praise Eywa – there's plenty more of the Tulkun, including renegade outcast Payakan sticking it to the RDA once more.

It's a shame, then, that the film's climactic battle is simply a less-successful re-run of The Way of Water's aquatic centerpiece, with slightly remixed elements – a massive strategic error when the entire planet of Pandora is at your disposal. In isolation, it's a sequence as well-staged as any Cameron has put on screen across all three Avatar movies, but it's a rare case of Avatar not living up to its implicit promise to take you somewhere you've never been before.

Flame on

There's something of a cyclical quality to the story structure here, too, as various members of the Sully tribe are captured and rescued, captured and rescued over the course of the film. Much more dramatically compelling is Fire and Ash's thoughtful and moving reckoning with Neteyam's death. Youngest son, Lo'ak (Britain Dalton), is hit hard – wracked with guilt for taking his brother back into the fray that cost his life. While Saldaña does some of her best work yet as Neytiri, as she faces up to her hatred of the human invaders that have blighted her homeworld, including her own, partially human family.

If this is any one character's movie, however, it's Spider's. As the biological son of Quaritch and the surrogate son of the Sullys, Spider was already at the center of a tug-of-war between mortal frenemies. But Fire and Ash complicates an already messy situation even further by revealing that Spider can now breathe the poisonous Pandoran air, making him of vital importance to the RDA's future interests. The divisive Spider's centrality to the story will undoubtedly frustrate some, but Fire and Ash makes a compelling case for it, and gives Champion the opportunity to rise above the character's more grating characterization in The Way of Water.

By contrast, Jake is somewhat sidelined here. Instead, it's Quaritch and Varang who practically run away with the movie. Their enemy-of-my-enemy alliance results in some of the film's wackiest and wildest scenes, as the very odd couple bond over hallucinogenic space hookah and Varang's fetishization of fire. Lang is clearly having a blast, while Chaplin is a major value-add as Varang, bringing a dangerous sensuality to a character who just wants to eat some hearts. Who had the two evil space cats on their bingo card as the sexiest couple of the year?

Bright Eyes

As a visual effects showcase, Avatar remains the industry trailblazer. Pointing out how far ahead of the field Wētā FX's work is in rendering almost every aspect of Pandora feels like stating the obvious at this stage, but Fire and Ash is a consistently dazzling glimpse at what blockbuster visual effects can and should look like when rushed post-production schedules and slashed budgets aren't a limiting factor. That the most unreal elements of the film are the human actors says everything.

But all the technical bells and whistles can't fully mask over the cracks in a script with a near-fatal flaw. As the middle installment of five planned chapters, there's a lack of resolution to almost all of the film's major plot threads here that can't help but disappoint. That's not to say there aren't some major developments – Kiri's (Sigourney Weaver's) mysterious connection to Eywa is further explored – but, unlike The Way of Water, Fire and Ash feels like a film beholden to the fact that there's much more story to tell in a way that ultimately harms this chapter as a standalone experience.

And yet, despite all its flaws, Avatar is a spectacle like no other and a must-see as a result. The imagination and craft on display throughout remain unmatched. Let's just hope that future sequels find fresher places to take the series.

Avatar: Fire and Ash releases in theaters on Dec 19. For more dive into our guide to the biggest movie release dates of this year and beyond, or catch up on the previous film with the lowdown on the Avatar: The Way of Water ending explained.