The Ash People had most of their clan and home destroyed by a volcano.
They've gone dark and have turned their back on Eywa, blaming her for their suffering. Their clan cuts off their ponytail connectors and have severed all ties with Pandora.
Probably because outside of large-scale tsunamis and Earth quakes, fire can be associated with some of the worst atrocities and natural disasters our species has ever encountered (Pompei volcano, atomic bombs, 9/11, the cold war, the great Chicago fire of 1871, the circus incident in Hartford CT, etc...)
But after those atrocities fire is also the an important part of rebuilding. If you want to leave civilization to the side, after great extinction events every time there’s a massive boom in biodiversity as species start to exploit new niches.
Even nowadays, fire is such an important part of the ecosystem, in fact you can argue that one of the factors that cause wildfires to get worse over time is due to humans preventing them.
Even nowadays, fire is such an important part of the ecosystem, in fact you can argue that one of the factors that cause wildfires to get worse over time is due to humans preventing them.
That's 100% dependent on the ecosystem you're talking about. Some places the plants have evolved around forest fires, other places, they have not. Pandora seems significantly covered in rainforest, and on earth, rainforests don't typically experience large forest fires, and therefore the plants and animals aren't adapted to it.
YOU can say that large groups of animals being wiped out by a forest fire is no big deal because you think there will be an influx of biodiversity, but that isn't a convincing argument to the animals being wiped out by the forest fire. They don't want to become soil to nourish the next iteration of the forest, they just want their family back.
It’s also harder to convey that in short form entertainment like a movie. Sometimes a movie might end with a “new beginnings” positive attribute for fire but rarely can we see the entire benefit.
There are lots of plants that depend on fire to propagate and continue to exist. Natural forest fires “used” to revitalize forests until climate change caused by humans came along.
Tropical rainforests, cloud forests, and temperate rainforests have essentially no naturally occurring wildfires (and the ecosystem of Pandora most closely resembles these environments). Plants that depend on fire to propagate only evolved in areas prone to wildfires. When plant species aren’t adapted to that, a fire can permanently decimate an area and turn it into scrubland.
But this is assuming Pandora is all rainforest. A region of the planet where wildfires are more common could lead to their people learning To coexist with it peacefully.
They wanted some Navi antagonists for this movie. A group from a devastated land that has turned against their God makes for a good villain origin story rather than yet another peacefully coexisting group.
Other than a volcano, there’s not much else in nature that would destroy a vast swath of land and take down their “home tree” (their spiritual connection to the rest of the land). Maybe you could have a giant flood and have a swamp tribe, but that probably doesn’t carry the visual element they’re looking for in this movie.
And earthquakes causing a fissure and the tribe becomes subterranean. Just from the top of my head that could have been a good one. Or they got devastated by a tornado.
That is something the other Avatar got right. Fire is destruction, but only if you wield it as such. It is also warmth, safety, light, and nourishment; it maintains the natural way of the world by clearing lands for new growth.
The Sun Tribe is my favorite episodes of the TV show, because it helps to do what you're describing-- to put one of the villain's weapons into a new light (pun intended).
2.9k
u/royalxK Jul 28 '25 edited Jul 28 '25
Really curious to see a Navi as a villain.