I agree with you. If this was an attempt to promote the liberal Hollywood agenda, they did it under the radar enough that I took something else from it entirely. I did not see it as a knock against American military at all. I saw it as a greedy corporation that was far enough away from home that they felt they could get away with murder to get their prize and get it first. This is just a story about human nature.

I wasn't intending to be condescending, just illustrate my view. I think the writer of this article paints such a vivid picture with "kill kill kill" and bloodthirsty mental imagery, and that was simply not at all what I experienced. The avatars themselves wouldnt even exist if that was the corporations end game all along. They did attempt other means of negotiation, but as circumstances developed and greedy executives painted themselves into a corner, they made the call and escalated the conflict to devastating levels.

I think the parallels of greed were very well illustrated within the context of the story and sometimes we have real life situations where the stronger power makes decisions for the rest of us and it isn't always the right one. I would be open to alterations in the movie, but I don't see eye to eye with this assessment of it. I also totally disagree with this painting the American military as idiots and bloodthirsty killers.

If that WAS Camerons intent, he failed for me. I honor and respect the US military, regardless of who is giving them their orders. I did not even make the connection when I saw this film.

They could have gone in to much greater detail to explain this autonomy, but in the context of the story it was apparently not relevant enough to explain. You are correct, in many comic books and sci-fi future timelines, corporations are above the law because corporations appear to be more powerful in some cases than world governments. This is a staple of science fiction and I've learned to just live with it. It's fine if everyone else hasn't.

Even by current day standards we are seeing more private corporations involved in the space program than ever before, and this could be a future trend. I do not know who else has space ships or who else is travelling to Pandora, other than this corporation.

They did illustrate that the corporation has spend billions in the attempt to grow avatars to facilitate a peaceful settlement to the situation, and avoid conflict. The corporation is cognizant of the repercussions for forceful engagement of the natives but decides it is a calculated risk that it is willing to take to achieve their goal. They will obviously cover their tracks with lies and false reports. Also, they have this autonomy because they are 5 light years away and they can do whatever they want and give whatever story they want when they get home. Someone may investigate it, but will they even be able to prove anything?

We discover alien life in this time line and only one small corporation science team gets to deal with it, because perhaps they are the only corporation with the finances to do so.

You're right that this does not reflect our current political framework but the leaps of logic aren't as far fetched as most of sci-fi. It is a leap, but not something that is totally impossible.

I am also not interested in the agendas of Liberal Hollywood, so I see some of the undertones that were unnecessary, but I also think the film was good in spite of these things.

Also, they speak a lot about the insane Colonel that heads the military forces in Avatar, but never comment about the corporate executive, played by Giovanni Ribisi, who clearly has the final authority on all actions in the film. He continues to press the Colonel to carry out his company orders. The parallel that I find very realistic is that this Colonel has no ability to see past the military agenda and see the big picture. This does not make him a moronic character, or bloodthirsty. He is even given dialogue about keeping the native casualties to a minimum, but clearly we know that he is just posturing to get his way and have another notch on his belt, by using military means to pave the way for a successful mission. That kind of thinking does exist in military minds that are groomed their entire life to see only the final goal and nothing more. Clearly they did not paint the rest of the mercenaries as mindless killers, but there were a few. The majority of military soldiers appeared to simply be following orders and too afraid to question them in the moment. This doesn't alter my view of any person in the present-day armed forces at all.

There are glaring problems with this writers understanding of the landscape of the story. This was not a government driven militia that was sent to Pandora, but a corporate-based operation. The corporation has no checks and balances, and it is not a government represented by a body of people. The corporate mercenaries are given orders and if they do not carry out the orders that they are given, there is nothing preventing this corporation from simply forgetting to feed them oxygen on their 5 year hyper-sleep return trip to Earth. They comply because they are paid to comply and they have no choice. To challenge their orders, as some of the characters do, is grounds for execution. The writer doesn't understand that in the context of the story, the corporation can buy and sell the military forces that they employ, and there is no Pentagon or government agenda that is accountable to a body of people. The corporation has complete autonomy. They attempt a peaceful solution to their dilemma and then reveal to the audience that the corporation will stop at nothing for this profit, and go beyond peaceful means to obtain their goal. This is just a story setup to illustrate that this does happen in the real world and corporations operate above the law every day. This is not about painting the united states armed forces or any other countries military in a jarhead-moronic light. They completely missed the context. Disappointing.