Avatar: The Way of Water (Collector’s Edition 4K UHD Blu-ray Review)
Joining the original Avatar film in its own deluxe Collector’s Edition is Avatar: The Way of Water. The hotly anticipated sequel became the undisputed box office phenom of 2022 and was released in standard and steelbook editions earlier this year. Now available for the physical media collector just in time for the holidays and sporting a new Dolby Vision HDR sheen and some expansive new special features. This 4-disc set is available now and you can secure your copy at the end of the review by clicking the Amazon Associates link you’ll find there.
Film 
When Avatar was released in 2009, there were skeptics and detractors as there usually are. The cost of the film was balked at, as was the storyline that many claimed was a regurgitation of Dances with Wolves, only this time with a Sci-fi bent to it. Expectations started out considerably low for that film and then it came out and managed to blow people away. In what is truly a visual feast and an undeniable technical feat, Avatarearns and currently keeps its place at the top of the list of highest grossing films of all time. The same skepticism came back around when The Way of Water finally came about for release in 2022. It took 13 years, a Disney theme park world-built attraction, and a ton of marketing before we saw the film hit theaters. We read about it, and we balked at the timeline for the film’s release and that the second film would be preceded by not one but 3 sequels. That’s a lot to think about.
Then the film actually came out. I was not one of the skeptics. Despite whatever shortcomings I noticed and accepted in the first film, I was still totally taken with and loved the first. I had tickets ready for a Dolby Cinema screening as soon as I could! As my husband and I sat back, watched Nicole Kidman’s spiel and then donned our 3D glasses, we knew we were in for a treat. The second film opens very much the way the first one does, and catches us up on Jake and Neytiri’s lives as they grow their family and live without the interference of the RDA and the evil Colonel Quaritch. But of course, that incredible easy life becomes further from the reality when that greedy RDA comes back and begins to invade, destroying the territory that is native to Neytiri’s Omatikaya clan of which Jake is now the chief of, and forcing the clan to move on to other territories. In this case, our heroes go to the water and learn to cohabitate with the Metkayina who have lived in and with the water as much as the Omatikaya lived with the mountains and trees.
So if you can guess from the last lengthy paragraph, the main premise of The Way of Water is one of survival, adaptation and conflict. Conflict is in the escape and eventual battle with the RDA and also with learning to live with a clan that is at once your equal and just like you, yet also so very different. The resurgence of Quaritch and some of his cohorts in Avatar form was a big surprise. The Way of Water additionally gives you some great character evolution and the new characters of Jake and Neytiri’s children, The Metkayina overall, and Colonel Ardmore further flesh out the world we were dropped into in 2009. The writing of The Way of Water also comes across as more original and less sentimental this time. There is no way of finishing the critical portion of the review without mentioning the character of Spider. Spider… How do I put this… What started out with potential as a human ally to the Na’vi, we get a switch-siding, whiny brat of a character that bogs down the movie a few times. One hopes that something monumental happens to Spider in a forthcoming installment.
After the shortcomings I’ve mentioned, I still can’t help but be completely beguiled by The Way of Water and its new frontiers. The CGI is better than ever, making it easy to put yourself into the world of Pandora, its CGI characters seeming more realistic and earthlier than before. We again care deeply for them and their fight to live and be free in their own world. And when things move from catch-up to huge set pieces, action galore and new world building moments (once the Omatikaya hit the water, you’ll be hard pressed to find fault with the story slowing down to put on a visual show…) you’ll be sucked in a riding the wave. (No pun intended.)
Video
Disclaimer: Screen captures used in the review are promotional images, not the 4K UHD Blu-ray disc.
Encoding: HEVC / H.265
Resolution: 4K (2160p)
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Layers: BD-100
HDR: Dolby Vision/HDR10
Clarity/Detail: What looked spectacular in HDR10 is now even further jaw-dropping in Dolby Vision! Wow – Colors, clarity, depth and more all benefit from the new upgrade, and when I say the CGI has come a long way, filmmakers making effects heavy movies really ought to take notes. This is a flawless presentation, fusing the real with the CG elements for a flawless viewing experience. The HEVC encode sports a healthy bitrate throughout, hovering around 60 Mbps and sometimes spiking past 100 Mbps. Impressive is the best way to explain it. This is a full demo disc in every way visually.
Depth: I saw this theatrically in 3D/Dolby Vision and my experience at home in 2D is every bit as Depth-defying (ha-ha-ha!) as it was in the theater. Labs and interrogation rooms have just as much going on as the nature of Pandora. Spacing is excellent and adds to the visual feast!
Black Levels: Black levels serve the transfer just as well as the rest of its visual technical merits. Flawless, deep, inky…perfect.
Color Reproduction: Blue as a rule is a force in these films and each shade is varied and represented here. The two different Na’vi, are either darker blue or more turquoise, and you know how the trees look – SO colorful. The balance of sharp, eye-popping color here is something any 4K enthusiast would love to show off.
Flesh Tones: Human or Na’vi, the flesh tones are spot on. The CGI Na’vi look as close to real as an animated character can get. Human characters are just as flawless and stunning.
Noise/Artifacts: Spotless just as it should be.
Audio
Audio Format(s): English Dolby Atmos, English 2.0 DTS-HD MA, English 2.0 Descriptive Audio, English Family Audio Track, French 5.1 Dolby Digital, Spanish 7.1 Dolby Digital Plus, Japanese 7.1 Dolby Digital Plus
Subtitles: English SDH, French, Spanish, Japanese
Dynamics: The Way Of Water carries over the Atmos track that was available theatrically and then on the first 4K disc issued earlier in the year. Dynamics are perfect and this is not a typical Disney mix. It sounds fabulous at reference volume. The world of the Na’vi surrounds you and there’s no way you can’t be placed in the middle of everything when you watch this disc.
Height: Height channels are used frequently, any time action beats happen. Flight and moments underwater benefit from these channels the most, with ambience filling them and other louder effects taking over when it’s their time.
Low Frequency Extension: Ah, my favorite part of any film mix – Bass here is exquisite! You feel every aircraft, spacecraft, underwater creature slamming the waves, gun blasts, and more here. Powerful doesn’t even begin to explain the LFE output!
Surround Sound Presentation: Surround channels bring out the best of Pandora, further initiating a world of sound around you, encompassing not just rear channel movement, but what feels like it’s coming from you from the sides as well. How’d they do it? Who knows, but I wish all new films sounded this fantastic.
Dialogue Reproduction: Dialogue is the perfect icing on the audio cake.
Extras
Features were great on the intial release of The Way of Water. What was great is now exemplary as we get some insightful new features along with ports from the earlier release:
- NEW Behind-the-Scenes Presentation Hosted by Jon Landau – Join Jon Landau as he takes you behind the scenes of the making of Avatar: The Way of Water and discover the groundbreaking techniques used to bring audiences back to Pandora.
- NEW Memories from Avatar: The Way of Water – Producer Jon Landau joins Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldaña, Sigourney Weaver and Stephen Lang in a conversation about their experiences and insights coming back to Pandora 13 years later in Avatar: The Way of Water.
- NEW Production Design Panel Hosted by Jon Landau – Uncover the inspiration behind the new designs of Avatar: The Way of Water with the award-winning Production Design team in this conversation hosted by Jon Landau.
- NEW Deleted/Extended Scenes – Check out these scenes that didn’t make the final cut.
- User’s Guide for Viewing Avatar: The Way of Water Deleted Scenes and Extended Cuts with Unfinished Shots
- Date Night (Extended Cut)
- Crashed Samson Tiltrotor (Extended Cut)
- Goodbye Mo’at
- Neytiri Rides an Ilu
- Spider Mocks the Recoms
- Neytiri Spearfishes
- Learning Montage
- Ardmore and Quaritch Discuss Jake (Extended Cut)
- Ta’unui Village (Extended Cut)
- The Tulkun Hunt (Extended Cut)
- Scoresby and Garvin Rescued
- Parents from Hell and Standoff (Extended Cut)
- NEW Scene Deconstruction – View these scenes in various production stages: final with picture-in-picture reference, template and performance capture.
- Quaritch Wakes Up in His New Body
- The Return to High Camp
- High Camp Biolab
- Quaritch and Ardmore Discuss Their Mission
- Jake and Neytiri Argue
- First Swim
- Lo’ak Meets Payakan
- Jake and Kiri Dock Talk
- Death Rock
- Spider Finds Quaritch Underwater and Saves Him
- Spider Drags Quaritch to Land but Leaves Him
- NEW Production Materials
- “One Meal a Day” – James Cameron discusses the on-set initiative to eat one vegan meal a day.
- Editing – Learn, step by step, how the editing team transformed reference camera footage into the compelling narrative of Avatar: The Way of Water.
- 3D Technology – Learn how the production team pushed 3D technology to new depths in this behind-the-scenes featurette.
- Virtual Camera – Join Richard Baneham, Oscar®-winning visual effects supervisor, and the visual effects team as they discuss the virtual camera’s role in the production process.
- Bringing the RDA to Life – Join James Cameron, Jon Landau, David Vickery and the ILM team for a look at the visual effects created for the opening sequences of the film.
- Tank Timelapse – Watch the building of the underwater performance capture tank in this timelapse video.
- Wētā Reel – VFX breakdown of shots by Wētā Effects.
- ILM Reel – VFX breakdown of shots by ILM.
- CJ Jones Sign Language Guide – Learn the basics of the Metkayina sign language from creator CJ Jones.
- JackCam – Join Jack Champion (“Spider”) as he interviews cast and crew on the set of Avatar: The Way of Water.
- Shaman Blessing – A Brazilian shaman blesses the production of Avatar: The Way of Water.
- Cliff Curtis Blessings – Actor Cliff Curtis gives Maori blessings for the cast and crew of Avatar: The Way of Water.
- NEW Beyond the Big Screen
- Pandora: The World of Avatar – Discover the story behind the artistry and imagination of Pandora – the World of Avatar at Disney’s Animal Kingdom.
- Crew Movie – Avatar: The Way of the Jimverse – Join producer Jon Landau on an animated adventure across the Jimverse to restore order and save the world of Pandora.
- James Cameron and Jon Landau Hand and Footprint Ceremony – See James Cameron and Jon Landau honored with a hand and footprint ceremony in front of the world-famous Chinese Theater in Hollywood, CA.
- “Scene at the Academy” – Check out this Academy featurette for Avatar: The Way of Water, diving into a key moment from the film.
- NEW Archives: Script, Artwork, Marketing
- Monday Night Football TV Spot – Watch the TV spot broadcast exclusively during ESPN’s Monday Night Football.
- NEW Archives: Script, Artwork, Marketing – Dive into the Avatar Archives with these exclusive behind-the- scenes production assets.
- Inside Pandora’s Box – A series of featurettes on the challenges facing cast and crew as filmmakers devise new technologies to push the limits of cinema.
- Building the World of Pandora – James Cameron and a team of talented artists combine years of research with their design skills to build the world of Pandora with new characters, creatures, indigenous clans, underwater environments and the take-no-prisoners hard-tech world of the RDA.
- Capturing Pandora – James Cameron’s approach to performance capture has the cast performing in a volume rigged with infrared cameras to capture their movement, and head rig cameras to capture emotion on their faces with only the boundaries of imagination to limit them.
- The Undersea World of Pandora – Co-production designer Dylan Cole and his team conceive of the marine creatures required for Avatar: The Way of Water while James Cameron and his stunt team devise extraordinary means to bring those creatures to life in a performance capture tank.
- The Challenges of Pandora’s Waters – James Cameron tackles the “non-trivial challenge” of performance capture above and below the water’s surface, utilizing a wave machine and current generator to reproduce ocean conditions, and underwater vehicles to replicate creature movement.
- Pandora’s Returning Characters – James Cameron reunites with his returning cast – Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldaña, Sigourney Weaver and Stephen Lang. Together they discuss the amazing evolution of their characters in Avatar: The Way of Water.
- Pandora’s Next Generation – Meet the talented young newcomers who have been cast as the next generation of Na’vi and follow them through the adventure of making Avatar: The Way of Water.
- Spider’s Web – James Cameron introduced the human character of Spider into the fabric of Pandora – thus creating a host of technological challenges on set…and an incredible journey for the young actor, Jack Champion.
- Becoming Na’vi – The Avatar cast is immersed in the culture of the indigenous Na’vi, living off the land in the Hawaiian rainforest and training in a multitude of disciplines in preparation for their roles.
- The Reef People of Pandora – In true James Cameron-style, the Metkayina reef clan has been developed with great attention to detail, bearing unique evolutionary traits and a culture – with new dwellings, new clothes and different way of life – all a result of living off the ocean.
- Bringing Pandora to Life – Once James Cameron completes his virtual production process, every sequence is turned over to Wētā FX to bring Pandora to life – with unprecedented advancements in facial performance, environments and making CG water look real.
- The RDA Returns to Pandora – Co-production designer Ben Procter and his team present an armada of new vehicles and human technologies that the RDA brings to Pandora – in concept design and with practical builds.
- The New Characters of Pandora – Meet the important new characters of the Avatar saga played by Kate Winslet, Cliff Curtis, Edie Falco, Brendan Cowell and Jemaine Clement.
- The Sounds of Pandora – Hear how James Cameron worked with composer Simon Franglen to create the distinctive music of The Way of Water while building on James Horner’s brilliant score for Avatar, and learn how Chris Boyes created the immersive sounds of Pandora.
- New Zealand – Pandora’s Home – The production of the Avatar sequels is so thoroughly ensconced in New Zealand that James Cameron considers The Way of Water a “New Zealand film.” Hear reflections from the cast and crew, including the remarkable New Zealand crew, on making the film.
- More from Pandora’s Box – Additional featurettes that highlight special teams within the production
- Casting – Discover the screen tests that won the talented young cast their roles in Avatar: The Way of Water.
- Stunts – The Avatar stunt team isn’t just creating breathtaking action, they’re driving the story. From racing underwater on ilus, flying the skies on ikrans, to maneuvering RDA speed boats, the stunt team leaves you breathless and wanting more.
- The Lab – Explore the Lightstorm Lab, the backbone of virtual production for the Avatar films. Comprised of specialized teams, the Lab builds & supports every aspect of the production – environments, motion edit, Kabuki, sequence, post-viz and software development.
- The Troupe – Avatar’s Troupe is the Swiss Army Knife of acting, while playing dozens of roles on set, in the performance capture volume and on live-action sets, they bring life to Na’vi clans and RDA Recoms. They also play Na’vi-scale puppets on the live-action sets.
- Marketing Materials & Music Video – Marketing materials used to build audience awareness of the film
- Nothing Is Lost (You Give Me Strength) Music Video – Multi Grammy-winning, music superstar, The Weeknd, performs his emotionally packed end title song in the official music video for the smash hit “Nothing Is Lost (You Give Me Strength).”
- Theatrical Trailers 1 & 2 – Avatar: The Way of Water used two theatrical trailers to engage the audience. The first was a teaser trailer released 7 months before the film. The second was a standard trailer that premiered 5 weeks before the film’s release.
My thoughts on the new features:
The best of the bunch feature wise is the ever-enthusiastic Jon Landau and his fantastic Behind the Scenes presentation. One hopes he gets the chance to do more of these and seeing a great chunk of Cameron’s films arriving in March (hopefully for me to review, ) I hope to see Landau pop up on those as well. His passion is so infectious and seeing him so excited to discuss the film is a joy for a movie fanatic like me.
Deleted Scenes are interesting even when we see the reasoning for their removal. The surprise is that many of the scenes are more or less extended cuts of scenes in the film already, so it isn’t like we were missing too much.
Jon Landau returns for a production design panel which holds your attention as you deep dive with the people responsible for the seamless CGI in the film. Totally kept my attention and gave me a stronger belief in the idea of movie magic for good.
Scene Deconstructions really break down the process of making a film that is so immersive in it’s CGI. There’s a reason this film took so long to arrive, and it’ll make for even more interesting watching as the sequels come about. How things can change over the course of years, right?
Production Materials take you right into the filmmaking process, giving you a video diary of sorts on the years of hard work the filmmakers endured to bring the finished product to screens in theaters and at home.
Beyond the Big Screen explores the impact of the film in the filmmaking process, but also as the film was brought out for release. Of special note is Avatar: The Way of Jimverse, which is a fun little animated bit with our Avatar liaison Jon Landau. Pretty cutesy, but worth a view or two.
The other new features are more archival bits included just for this release.
Overall the new and ported bonus features amount to a little over 8 hours of your time. Worth it!
I repeat this from my review of Avatar: Collector’s Edition:
Finally, this definitive edition of The Way of Water comes with some very luxe packaging. The discs are housed in a glossy hardbound slipcase that has embossed lettering and illustrations. When you remove the slipcase from the outer case, the discs housing has a hidden magnet clasp to keep things in place. When you open the set out, you are treated to more beautiful artwork and the 4 discs side by side. There is where the problem starts. The artwork is so prominent, we have to risk scratching the disc or tearing the box to get the disc out if we aren’t explicitly careful when removing them. If you are gentle and patience as I was working to get the disc out to review its contents, you’ll be fine, but don’t expect and easy removal. Even with this shortcoming, the set is beautiful, and photos just don’t do it justice.
Summary
Avatar: The Way of Water found a way to expand and improve upon its predecessor. I was and continue to be enamored of Pandora and the Na’vi, using my imagination to take me to that world and get lost in it. This new set, just like that of the first film is a stunning way to collect the film, and it definitive for the collectors of the world. If you’re like me and you love not just films but the time, effort and trials and tribulations of filmmaking, this Collector’s Edition is like a toybox treasure to savor for years to come. Highly recommended!
