Avatar: How the Na'vi Bond With Pandora's Wildlife
In James Cameron’s Avatar, the bond between the Na’vi and the wildlife of Pandora is one of the movie’s most fascinating themes, but how the Na’vi form these bonds is even more interesting. Avatar has been hailed for its groundbreaking visual effects. However, thanks to good old-fashioned storytelling, it’s the movie’s lore that seems to have made the longest-lasting impression. From how his creations worship to how they structure their society, to how they eat, sleep, and mate, James Cameron leaves no stone unturned in his efforts to bring the Na’vi to life. So while some have criticized James Cameron for being unoriginal, calling Avatar a ripoff of movies like Princess Mononoke, it's hard to fault the filmmaker when it comes to world-building. Perhaps the most illuminating of all Avatar's world-building details, though, is the Na’vis’ relationship with nature.
On Pandora, everything in nature is connected. The Na’vi worship this connection as a personified deity called Eywa, but it’s more than just a matter of religious faith. Eywa represents a real neural network connecting all the plant and animal life of Pandora. The network forms a collective consciousness the Na’vi and Pandora's wildlife can tap into via “Tsaheylu,” a process involving specialized appendages called neural queues, which all Pandora's lifeforms possess. The neural queues of Avatar's Na'vi are sheathed in a ponytail, a detail the forthcoming Avatar 2 will explore further. As well as the collective consciousness, the Na’vi can connect one-on-one with animals, letting them think, feel, and communicate with the animal. This includes mounts like the direhorse and mountain banshee which, under the direct control of their riders, become formidable hunting
Read more on screenrant.com
