If the box office numbers are any indication, you may be one of the roughly googillion people who have spent three hours in a darkened theater watching Avatar. And you probably didn’t notice that hidden deep in the film was a subtle critique of the sedentary, stereotypical-gamer lifestyle. The New York Times reports that creator James Cameron defended the movie against anti-smoking critics, and in the process revealed the intent behind the message. Actress Sigourney Weaver’s character smokes throughout the film, but only in her human body. “She’s rude, she swears, she drinks, she smokes,” said Cameron, claiming she isn’t meant to be a role model. “From a character perspective, we were showing that Grace doesn’t care about her human body, only her avatar body, which again is a negative comment about people in our real world living too much in their avatars, meaning online and in video games.”
It seems like a fair artistic point, but Cameron runs the risk of alienating a portion of his audience by falling back on tired old stereotypes. To be fair, he mentioned online interactions in general, which implicates services like Facebook and Twitter as well. And if people are spending their time (and money) on his game, we doubt he’d be too quick to say they’re neglecting their bodies.
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