Synopsis
"Disabled Marine Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) travels to planet Pandora to become an avatar, ingratiate himself with the natives and help Americans mine lucrative unobtainium. But he finds himself in an interstellar conflict after falling for Na'vi warrior Neytiri (Zoe Saldana)." [Netflix]
"Cameron acknowledges that Avatar implicitly criticizes the United States' role in the Iraq War and the impersonal nature of mechanized warfare in general." [Wikipedia] The dark side in Star Wars is Darth Vadar and the Evil Empire. The dark side in Avatar is the military-industrial complex and all of us Westerners who support it. We are the Conquistadors come to mine Pandora. We are exploiters of pure-hearted people and not to be trusted. (To be fair, Westerners have also been the means through which warring, sovereign states have been trasnformed into a global society so that world peace is not only possible but inevitable.)