-
Thankyou to everyone involved with DRB for a very wonderful year of posts. My interwebz would not be the same without it. Merry Xmas and bring on a bright new year
Read more
-
Come on Avi, tell the truth, that was you who was hanging on to the side of the house.
Read more
-
Thanks, Avi, for another fascinating year! I look forward to being impressed by what you find in 2010.
Eric
Read more
-
Thanks, that was fun.
Read more
-
Thanks for all the wonderful topics this year, even if there were not so many... But there's an enormous archive to keep me occupied :)
Best Wishes for 2010!
Read more
-
Happy New Year to you!Now how about some new stuff in the store?
Read more
-
Thanks for the fun, interesting posts. Great site!
Read more
-
Just wanted to let you know that the blue LED lights all over the ground is at Midtown in Tokyo, Japan. They do this "illumination" every year, each year a little different. It's a large lawn (not street) behind the shopping complex. The building you can see in the background is the Midtown building. It's in the Roppongi area of Tokyo.
Read more
-
Piers Anthony's "Viscous Circle" (1982) features our hero transplanting his mind into a native's body, with the plan being to help despoil their planet, but eventually he goes native and helps them resist the humans.
Read more
-
Is this a movie that an adult would want to go see?
Read more
-
Midworld by Alan Dean Foster
Read more
-
"Hunter, Come Home" by Richard McKenna. Giant alien trees connected by a network.
Though I agree with Sleestak that Midworld's home trees are a very close match.
Read more
-
Deathworld is available as a free e-book from:
http://manybooks.net
Apparently the copyright was not renewed.
Read more
-
I went and saw Avatar last night: a gorgeous visual feast and I was
impressed by how seamlessly the 3D elements cohered into the
narrative: technology that instantly becomes intuitive is usually technology that will augment one's experience immeasurably (think of
how intuitive the internet is, and how quickly we've come to
assimilate it into our daily experience!).
I think a polarised film over a television screen will be the next
step - we'll lose the hokey glasses because the screen 'wears' it forus.
As a writer, Cameron is an excellent director. 'Come to papa'. REALLY, James? Very chiched and banal dialogue. I nearly burst out laughing a few times. I support the simple plot as outlined in the post, but the dialogue borders on the ridiculous.
And army robots with combat knives?! Where's a corncob pipe for when the day's pillaging is done?
Just my 2c.
Anyhoo, cheery Christmas!
Read more
-
H. Beam Piper's "Little Fuzzy" was brought to mind. Does a native alien race have the right to control the resources of its own planet over the machinations of a greedy human corporation? ("Little Fuzzy" is available at Project Gutenberg)
Read more
-
Visually, one can see similarities between fauna, flora and terra (Pandorae?)in Yes album covers, specifically those by Roger Dean.
Read more
-
You've got something here! Well searched huh? Really love to read your thoughts.
Thanks for this wonderful insights.
Read more
-
Anne McCaffrey also wrote the Powers That Be series, about a damaged ex-soldier sent to a self-aware planet with an intricately inter-linked ecosystem, to get friendly with the residents as the military's woman-on-the-inside: she ends up going native, defending the planet from the industrial-military complex, and being healed.
Read more
-
A withdrawn forest people from whom humans want something and are prepared to take it by force, then begin transformations from humans into forest people, sacred trees, sacred shamans, exotic relationships between people and animals, clash of modern vs medieval weapons and intelligent exotic animals. Finally, a populations in tune with all nature and the trees sheltering and servicing as the source and the network of that knowledge. Andre Norton: Judgement on Janus.
Read more
-
The Themes and archetypes used in Avatar permeate literature and transcend culture and have been told countless times eg Eden lost through knowledge(technology), enlightenment through nature as apposed to the establishment, the clash of mans instincts with cold modern reality(disillusionment) and the story of the man how never dreams but at the same time dreams to much. anyone who sees something as being completely original has not done their research, and anyone who faults this movie for it's similarity to dances with wolves or any other of the countless stories, myths, and legends that employ the same premise or characters is short sighted. Any artist will tell you that everyone has an influence. some say it goes a little deeper then that. arising form our shared experiences(as we are all human this hardly seems surprising) we have a sort of collective unconsious ...Hm that sounds familare as well.
Thank you Joseph Campbell
anyone who says it is to simple a plot needs to do more thinking and less talking.
Read more
-
Formerlawyer:
Not only is Deathworld available in print for free since it is in the public domain, but you can get an audiobook version for free from LibriVox.org as well. It's a halfway decent reading too.
OP:
I disagree with the statement that Deathworld has only visual and atmospheric clue and no similarities with the overall plot. In the big picture(tm), it is quite compatible with the plot of Avatar. It is only the time scale of the overall history of Pyrrah that differs with the plot of the movie. The war between the planet and the humans has been going on for 300 years. In the end of Deathworld, the planet's natives do mount a renewed and cooperative full-spectrum counterattack on the human base aided by humans that have "gone native." The overall plot theme is the same in the end.
Read more
-
You also forgot Amy Thomson's Color of Distance about researchers going native.
Read more
-
It's not Alan dean Foster's "Midworld". The people are blue in the movie and not green!
Read more
-
Various works by Andre Norton spring immediately to mind.
Read more
-
This is hardly a suprise: not that I've seen every single one of his movies, but James Cameron is not exactly known for the originality of his plots. The broad outline of Terminator is identical with that of the 1966 Doctor Who serial "The War Machines." Titanic is history with a generic tragic love story thrown in. Et cetera.
Read more
-
Well, since people seem to be aware of Deathworld , let me weigh in and say that to characterize the humans as "space marines" is simply wrong. In fact, the colonists have rather evolved along with the native flora and fauna, adapting to heavier gravity and so forth. They aren't and never have been "space marines."
Read more
-
Manta's Gift by Zahn employs the device of a handicapped man used to get inside the body of a native (stingray-like creatures in Jupiter's atmosphere.) They aren't avatars— his brain is actually grafted into an embryo, with the permission of the natives— but it's got its similarities.
Read more
-
No one mentioned the second and third book of the "Ender's" series? I'm shocked.
Read more
-
Just goes to show how hard it is to come up with a new plotline. They have already be done.
Read more
-
carson:
A being appears in the sky,
a young woman with no sex life,
an angry 'king' sending his soldier to kill innocents, looking for the one who will overthrow 'him',
the being tries to calm the woman, telling her she will bare humanity's savior with the initials 'JC', they go on the run
the good guys win.
I'm not so sure he was ripping off dr who.
Read more
-
i cant believe not a single person mentioned the masterful Dune by Frank Herbert.
Read more
-
There were several scenes in Avatar that seemed like a ripoff of Aliens with Sigourney Weaver. And then later there was some music that seemed identical to music used in Aliens.
Read more
-
I remember the first time I encountered the "telepresence concept", it was as a kid in the 60s with the juvenile sci fi book ROBOTS OF SATURN (great memories). The three young heroes encounter a hut on a moon of Saturn, in this hut are two guys apparently sitting unconscious with electrical contacts on their foreheads. It turns out they were remotely controlling/experiencing large and powerful robot bodies elsewhere on the small moon. Cool stuff!
Read more
-
"La Planete Sauvage" Anyone.....?
Read more
-
Anne McCaffrey, mentioned a couple of times above, also has a section in the early novel "The Ship Who Sang."
The titular ship takes a crew of actors to a planet highly inhospitable to human life. Once there, they project into alien "envelopes" in order to perform Hamlet for the aliens.
Several of the actors become too wrapped up in the sensations provided by the envelopes and "go native."
Read more
-
Dune....it's much closer than the dragon riders of pern
Read more
-
Manta's Gift? the list goes on..
Read more
-
Without naming a particular title, I thought the whole film was redolent of great sci-fi/adventure Franco-Belgian bande dessinée (comic strips) of the past 50 years. Whereas Americans were fascinated by superheroes in long underwear, Enuropeans were following tha dventures of (1) "good savages" like Timour and Rohan ans (2) space explorers like the ones depicted by Moebius (and republished in the US by "Heavy Metal"). The same inspiration informs the recent movie "10,000 BC" - a flop in the US, a great success everywhere else.
Benoit Racine
Toronto
Read more
-
I second, or third, or whatever, the artistic links with Roger Dean's paintings & designs. (band Yes covers but also other stuff) I was surprised not to see him in the credits.
Read more
-
The special breathing organs on the 'dragons' immediately called to mind the 'superchargers' on the Ythrians from Poul Anderson's "Earth Book of Stormgate". I don't recall anything about it being mentioned in the dialog, but some auxiliary breathing system would be important (as Anderson made clear) for flying creatures of that size. Recent work on pterosaurs indicates that our own 'flying dragons' found a different solution to the problem.
http://scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/2009/02/pterosaur_breathing_air_sacs.php
Read more
-
I found it absolutely awesome. Simple enough. I saw many similarities to many books I have read in the past, but it was its own story.
Bravo, James Cameron.
Read more
-
I think Blish's A Case of Conscience might be another one - though I haven't yet seen the film I must confess!
Read more
-
Don't forget Roger Dean artwork on "Yes" album covers for floating rock formations
Read more
-
Nice research article. Still doesn't excuse IP infringement. Wouldn't it be nice if 20th Century Fox posted some allowed fandom guidelines?
Read more
-
In "The Stone God Awakens", a less known novel by Philip José Farmer, the main organism in a future Earth is a huge tree, that developed connections with all the other trees in the world, just like a mainframe computer with dumb terminals. It is a book from 1970.
Read more
-
I enjoyed that Cameron pulled ideas from so many sources (intentional or not) to create "Avatar". Thanks for citing so many. I haven't seen Terry Brook's "Tanequil" mentioned here for its parallel to sentient trees.
Read more
-
I noticed similarities between Avatar and an old HG Wells book I once read, I think it was called "A Dream of Armageddon", where a man was living two lives by being a soldier in the future while he was asleep and "dreaming" in the real world and vice versa. He eventually swapped over as the dreams got more real and exciting and real life became more vague and boring to him, and ended living in the world which was originally just his future dream "avatar". This was a great story, as is avatar. Loved the movie
Read more
-
The guy who mentioend Roger Dean further up is right on--those floating landmasses and arches are right off Yes album covers, and even the dragon-ish things are very similar to some of his work (I'm thinking most specifically about that bland orchestral to Pink Floyd that came out in the mid-to-late-90s).
Read more
-
What is this, TEN different sources? It's the Disney movie Pocahontas with aliens. That's it.
Read more
-
Thanks so much for this brain-jolt. I've been trying to think of "Winds of Altair" since Avatar was first mentioned!
Read more
-
You know the story. The dialogue is clunky ( i loled in the cinema ) and yet I found this film to be almost transcendental. Don't try and think while you watch it. Put your hood up and just be inside it.
Read more
-
You know, it also reminds me of the movie The Mission, only in that movie, it turns our much worse for the natives. I still can't listen to Adagio for Strings without tearing up...
Read more
-
Smurfs too! lol
But seriously it was a fun movie to watch.
Read more
-
"The Emerald Forest", a great movie by John Boorman made in 1985. The white outsider learns the ways of the natives in the beautifully shot Amazonian forest, although this was not really a choice as he was kidnapped as a kid. He learns and become a real man during a ceremony, connected to the spirit of an animal. Then bulldozers come, wreak havoc and destroy trees (to build a dam). The native chief is killed, and the outsider will lead the fight with his tribe friends, some outside knowledge and technology (such as guns), and the help of forest animals (the frogs) and Mother Nature, to push out the white invaders. And he decides to stay in the forest at the end. And he falls in love with a native girl.
It all goes back to Campbell analysis. Like one movie with a thousand faces.
Read more
-
You forgot Disney's Atlantis... Both bad guys even look the same!
Read more
-
There's nothing completely original. Even the Iliad copied bits from previous stories.
Cameron got in trouble with _Terminator_ because he talked about it being inspired by two specific _Outer Limits_ (IIRC) episodes. One of the people he was talking to was a friend of Harlan Ellison, who wrote both episodes.
Read more
-
Three more - Ray Bradbury's short stories:
- Here There Be Tygers
- And the Moon Be Still as Bright
- Dark They Were, and Golden-eyed
Read more
-
A few people have compared the movie to my connected stories BLUE WAR, DEADSTOCK and IN HIS SIGHTS (all published by Solaris Books). One blogger directed me to his posts, drawing comparisons:
BLUE DEJA VU, from 1/3/10 http://daedahl.blogspot.com/2010/01/blue-deja-vu.html
And BLUE WORLDS REVISTED, from 1/9/10 http://daedahl.blogspot.com/2010/01/blue-worlds-revisited.html
" *both stories were told from the point-of-view of a disabled veteran (Jake Sully is a paraplegic in Avatar; while Jeremy Stake suffers from metamorphic paralysis in In His Sights)
*both protagonists travel to a jungle-like world populated by blue-skinned humanoids with almond shaped eyes (the Na'vi of Pandora; the Ha Jiin of the unnamed blue world)
*the blue-skins world is invaded by humanity solely for the acquisition of a rare and exotic subterranean resource (Pandora's ridiculously named mineral: Unobtainum; the Ha Jiin's strange subterranean gasses)
*on both worlds the mining of resources involves violating sites considered sacred by the blue-skins (Pandora's sacred trees containing the souls of their ancestors; the Ha Jiin's sacred burial catacombs)
*both protagonists were selected because their unique genome allowed them to assume the form of a blue-skin, infiltrate and gain access to said exotic resource (Jake Sully - his genetically engineered Avatar; Jeremy Stake - a mutant human with mild metamorphic abilities) "
I'm not claiming Cameron read my stories...as you say in the article, it's all just jolly good fun. ;-)
Read more
-
Thank you Jeffrey, great info - and kudos to all other commenters who unearthed a whole bunch of other references. Great fun!
Read more
-
Not classic science fiction but classic anime: Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind. Great movie with a couple of ideas which found their way into Avatar. For example the tree of soul's shimmering tentacles or the way the navi'i ride the dragons.
Read more
-
Thanks for these. I just wonder how to go about getting hold of these stories. Are they at all still in print?
The similarities between all these stories are probably more than coincidental or influencial. I'm guessing there are a historical references in play as well. Maybe the colonization of America, Africa and Australia. And the Gulf war references, "The hearts and minds" tour, "Shock and Awe" campaign, were too obvious to miss.
But yes, these Science fiction sources are fantastic.
Read more
-
How about "The Jesus Incident" by Frank Herbert?
And don't say you read the synopsis and it doesn't sound familiar...I read the book and saw the movie, they are definitely linked!
Read more
-
Avatar was one of the best movies I have ever seen. James Cameron is the man when it comes to creating amazing movies!
Read more
-
Totally riped from the animated movie "Fern Gulley"...right down to the bulldozer scene!! Can anyone verify this ??? Is there not any origionality anymore??
Read more
-
My first thought was 'The Dragon riders of Pern' for the bonding between the dragons and their riders BUT, How about 'The Integral Trees' by Larry Niven?
FYI- Cameron said he drew from everything in his experience.
Abolutely beautiful-wonderful creatures and plants, esp. 'dragons'
Read more
-
@xJENOVAx uep. frank Herberts the Jesus incident/lazarus effect had a planet called PANDORA which was crawling with HOSTILE WILDLIFE, and a type of sentient kelp that had a networked COLLECTIVE CONSCIOUS
with the other creatures on the planet, just like in Cameron's movie. I think they referred to it as ¨avata¨
I think there was also genetically engineered CLONES that were adapted for the planet.
Read more
-
There are pyramids all over the world. There in the Amazon rainforest and to the poles. The sad thing is that the authorities do not reveal it.
Read more
-
There are pyramids where ever there were large societies. Anyone who wants to build a structure that is very tall will fail until they realize the pyramid structure.
... At least until they can make steel girders.
Read more
-
The pyramids are all around farms, the shape of a triangle actually funnels energy and directs it around the pyramid to help grow crops. Not much of a mystery, its just being hidden from the world.
Read more
-
Apparently, there are pyramids to be found in Bosnia, too:
http://www.bosnianpyramid.com/
Read more
-
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://gallery.nen.gov.uk/gallery_images/0602/0000/0023/Point2_mid.jpg&imgrefurl=http://gallery.nen.gov.uk/image59400-.html&usg=__uoQ3W6jLthvbk7Y4uc7Qj0llmuw=&h=480&w=640&sz=112&hl=en&start=1&tbnid=pfXLnn7ccb5gCM:&tbnh=103&tbnw=137&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dmilton%2Bkeynes%2Bthe%2Bpoint%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den%26safe%3Doff%26sa%3DG
Read more
-
Yeah, I heard someone mention that once; pyramids all around the world and in the United States that are "hills". So much we will sadly never know but interesting none the less. Thanks for the post!
Read more
-
Polar pyramids and energy funnels, all being "hidden" and/or "not revealed", eh?
...Yeah, okay. I guess it's a good thing you lot have your foil-lined hats so as to prevent this valuable knowledge from being edited out of your brains via the world shadow-government's mind-control satellites.
Read more
-
There's also pyramids on mars!
Read more
-
Who doesn't know there are pyramids on Mars? You? Go and jump three times, you've been bad.
Read more
-
Sometimes you just have to look around and find something you might be familiar with, but because of the daily routine of our boring jobs, we completely dismiss. One example of such behavior can be found in the people of countries with insufficient food and health services available. There are countries even that do not provide these services but they do provide money for the war effort, completely forgetting to develop areas for people to enjoy a nice quiet life. It's a shame that these countries can not satisfy their need to rule certain aspects.
Read more
-
Pyramids in Greece too.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyramid#Greece
Read more
-
Cahokia in Illinois is one of the largest pyramids made of dirt and in the 1200's there were more people living there than in London at the same time. The site is huge with over a hundred pyramids of varrying sizes.
Read more
-
Did you mention Luxor pyramid in Las Vegas?
Read more
-
Someone tell me what they think about this possible Chinese pyramid. If it is a pyramid, it might be a couple of kilometres wide and is covered over.
+35° 13' 17.30", +110° 38' 36.13"
http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&q=35.221472%2C+110.643369&vps=1&jsv=233a&sll=52.207808%2C9.623044&sspn=7.111392%2C13.754883&ie=UTF8&geocode=FeBvGQIdqUiYBg&split=0
Read more
-
there are pyramids in Bosnia and Herzegovna in Europe, resarch is in progress ... check it out
Read more
-
First off, pyramids weren't just crypts. Second, our governments aren't telling us what they really find in the pyramids. They are of alien origin. How can anyone say there's no mystery to pyramids when they're found all over the world and on Mars?
Read more
-
personal aircraft carrier - amazing idea!
Read more
-
Insane. In the best of ways, of course.
Read more
-
I love Stan Mott's work! It used to show up in Road & Track back in the day and I was always fascinated by the creative brilliance of his art. Thanks for posting this!
Read more
-
Damnit! Amazing! I must spread the word.
Read more
-
Where's the Cyclops??
Read more
-
this stuff is so cool! art is probably the best thing on this planet.
http://www.D9robot.com
http://www.CetraAG.com
Read more
-
Slight ripoff of Bruce McCall - Google 'Zany Afternoons'.
Read more
-
Someone find a developer so we can build these things!!!!
Read more
-
Wow, where do you find this stuff?
My fav is the sneezing elephant, who knew they even sneezed to begin with?
Learn something new every day.
Read more
-
cant find source for the top graffiti pic (girl licking ground) i want it in higher resolution
Read more
-
We as Iranian usually don't have any free access to the net and faced with difficut problems so when we see such fantastic images we really believe ourselve sthat we are not alone in this world, on the other hand English is a language full of joys and surperisings that makes us flabbergasted when we see so much words that every day enter into it. Also we can use the net with the mediate of English language to understand almost every live language that now speaks on the earth. although our goverment strictly restricts internet for mostly entertaining usage we are now feel free to state our words in any possible way and to show the world that we excist. Thanks for your grat Website.
Good Luck Guys & More Power to You.
Read more
-
Nice post.
By the way, Saltwater Crocodile can weight over 2000 pounds, not "only" 200.
Read more
-
Now humans eat crocs
Read more
-
Wow...i want to be an Explorer in Residence too!
Read more
-
the glass creatures (and plants) are amazing! I first thought I was looking at photographs, and was waiting for the glass stuff to start...
Read more
-
The Blaschka's work is truly a wonder... artistically, scientifically, and especially from a technical point of view. Contemporary glass artists are still trying to figure out how they accomplished some of the techniques they used.
Read more
-
No wine or Bach, but I was sipping coffee with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra on speakerphone while my call was on hold!
Read more
-
Fabulous stuff! Thanks for posting this and the microscopic photos also.
Read more
-
The moon buried in the wall is from the Field Museum of Natural History. The decorated doorway behind it is still there, but the Moon is long gone.
Read more
-
Thank you for this info, Mel Phistopheles... love that nick :)
Read more
-
So happy that you posted this information! I thought that I would never find the Blaschka's work again. Brilliant, wonderful stuff :D
Read more
-
Wondeful - and amazing to think it was created a hundred years ago. You mention Bach and Science and Art - he created beautiful music that was also mathematically very complicated, with all sorts of messages hidden in it. Any chance of an article on this? - it's a fascinating subject - her's a link to start with:
http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Topics/Numbers.htm
Read more
-
Read more
-
Very nice segment. Glad I stumbled upon your blog this morning.
Thanks
Read more
-
"Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of Sherlock Holmes, had a suitably grand design pasted into his book collection:
It was not he who designed and pasted that bookplate into his books, it was his son Adrian Conan Doyle in the 1950s, long after Sir Arthur's death in 1930. Adrian had notoriously exaggerated ideas of his father's and his family's greatness, paid the College of Heralds of Ireland to produce those arms, and pasted the resulting bookplate into every book of his father's that he still owned. His father would have walloped him for it.
Read more
-
Note on the Freud bookplate it Oedipus speaking with the Sphinx...
Read more
-
These are all just fabulous! I would LOVE to know what the Greek phrase is on the one belonging to Freud.
Read more
-
Best post ever! Thanks, Rosemary
Read more
-
Do any of you know about an Ex libris generator? I've been searching for one, but no one was found.
But here's a useable Ex libirs (publiced by the author):
http://jaggedsmile.wordpress.com/2007/11/06/ex-libris/
Read more
-
From Catalonia ( near Spain)I like your marvellous vlok.
Today is the first day that I'm watching it, but I'll watch it many times.
Read more
-
Wonderful works !
And for the previous comment: Actually Catalonia is IN Spain, not 'near'. I don´t remember any independence referendum till now. Sorry for you, guy.
Read more
-
King Oscar II's motto translates to "Over the depths, towards the top", or "towards greatness".
Read more
-
The naked figure on the Ex Libris of Freud is none other than Oedipus, being challenged by the Spynx.
Very Freudian!
Read more
-
Nice Collection. I'll add one more famous person (whose book-plate was very boring, however.)
A friend of mine had a book that belonged to Stan Laurel. His book-plate consisted of a small ink-stamp in sans-serif font that said "Property of Stan Laurel." He signed below that as I recall.
Read more
-
I think the bookplate bearing the name Douglas Fairbanks belongs to him and not his son. At least I cannot find a "Jr." in the signature. Great stuff, btw.
ekw
Read more
-
I'm pretty sure that Harpo's wife Susan illustrated their bookplate; she did the illustrations for "Harpo Speaks".
Read more
-
Very nice bit of time traveling.
Read more
|
4 Comments:
Where is the "Happy 2010" picture from? I think I recall seeing it without the words here before but I can't find it, now. It's a fantastic photo. Can someone point where I can find a copy without words over it?
[aol] Me too! [/aol] ;-)
Jack - the full-size image is at the end of this article - it seems to be an ad from a European agency, but we'd like to get more info as well.
it's astronaut Anna Fisher
Post a Comment
<< Home