Avatar - 'borrowed' by James Cameron?

[Reinart der Fuchs]

Berry,

Are you really suggesting that Cameron mined Mike's work?
--Thus Dances with Wolves, and Pocahontas are also derivatives of Mike's work?

I assume you refer to The Eternal Champion and not "The Eternal Champion". In The Eternal Champion a king summons an ancient hero who eventually turncoats against humanity. Readers of that book know what happens at the end. However, "We are the bad guys?" stories have become very popular. Apparently the Russians wrote the story in The Sixties and Mike's book came out in the The Seventies. I made no suggestions. I don't know that Mike read the books written by the Russian (can't find his name at the moment), and if he was aware of the formula, he definitely added to the pot. Avatar isn't the only one out in 2010 where "We are the bad guys?" theme is in play. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_...gon_%28film%29

Do you think Cameron mined Mike's work?

[Kyrinn S. Eis]

I assume you refer to The Eternal Champion and not "The Eternal Champion". In The Eternal Champion a king summons an ancient hero who eventually turncoats against humanity. Readers of that book know what happens at the end. However, "We are the bad guys?" stories have become very popular. Apparently the Russians wrote the story in The Sixties and Mike's book came out in the The Seventies. I made no suggestions. I don't know that Mike read the books written by the Russian (can't find his name at the moment), and if he was aware of the formula, he definitely added to the pot. Avatar isn't the only one out in 2010 where "We are the bad guys?" theme is in play. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_...gon_%28film%29

I'm pretty certain it is a much older theme than the 1960's.

Do you think Cameron mined Mike's work?

May I ask why would you post what you did if you aren't intimating that?
--For all I know Cameron has mined everything and there isn't an original /story/ in him.

I politely ask again, are you saying that you think Cameron mined Mike for AVATAR?

[Reinart der Fuchs]

I assume you refer to The Eternal Champion and not "The Eternal Champion". In The Eternal Champion a king summons an ancient hero who eventually turncoats against humanity. Readers of that book know what happens at the end. However, "We are the bad guys?" stories have become very popular. Apparently the Russians wrote the story in The Sixties and Mike's book came out in the The Seventies. I made no suggestions. I don't know that Mike read the books written by the Russian (can't find his name at the moment), and if he was aware of the formula, he definitely added to the pot. Avatar isn't the only one out in 2010 where "We are the bad guys?" theme is in play. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_...gon_%28film%29

I'm pretty certain it is a much older theme than the 1960's.

I'll bite. Please cite an example.

Do you think Cameron mined Mike's work?

May I ask why would you post what you did if you aren't intimating that?

Because I am exploring the idea? If I didn't say Cameron lifted Mike's work, wouldn't it follow that's not my opinion? In my original post I say,

Then I remember where I saw this story first.

Notice I didn't say something along the lines of "The first instance of the story was The Eternal Champion." Why would someone suggest I am saying more than I said?

[opaloka]

The earliest 'travel to an alternate world' story that I can think of is Through the Looking Glass (as opposed to the travel to a strange place story, like John Carter or Dune, which is a different thing). Out of all the alternate world stories, which were pretty hip in the 60's, the protagonist turning against his own kind/side trope is pretty rare and the first one I can think of is Mike's EC.

[Kyrinn S. Eis]

I'll bite. Please cite an example.

Arminius, who had been a Roman citizen and soldier, secretly gathered a great allied force and ambushed Publius Quintilius Varus in the Teutoburg Forest in a.d. 9. In the ensuing battle Varus' army was utterly destroyed, and Varus, in disgrace, committed suicide.

[devilchicken]

I think if anything, Avatar shares more similarities to Edgar Rice Burroughs Mars stories than anything else. And Burroughs has been ripped off for 70-odd years anyway and far more blatantly than Avatar. Noone seems terribly bothered by that, so why it should be an outrage for Cameron to do it...

These sorts of stories only come up because Avatar is topical and it has made a lot of money. Its not because there is any real merit to the claims - but people get a kick out of tearing things down or seeing them torn down - while others make a good deal of money from that too.

[opaloka]

He might have at least Googled the name of his planet and it's race, to find he stole it, if he didn't know already. That's not sour grapes, that's Cameron being lame.

[Papi]

Apparently, Avatar is also a pretty straight retelling of Disney's Pocahontas.

[Image of changes to Pocahontas script]

Which is fine really, but when you don't even think up your own names for fictional races and planets you're crossing a line...

Great, wonderful !

[Rothgo]

Borrowed by Chinese industrialists too perchance?

"All the forced removal of old neighbourhoods in China makes us the only earthlings today who can really feel the pain of the Na'vi," she wrote.

Hmm... She's never mentioned the word "clearances" to a Scot then... We have very long memories!

[In_Loos_Ptokai]

I'll bite. Please cite an example.

Arminius, who had been a Roman citizen and soldier, secretly gathered a great allied force and ambushed Publius Quintilius Varus in the Teutoburg Forest in a.d. 9. In the ensuing battle Varus' army was utterly destroyed, and Varus, in disgrace, committed suicide.

And for what it's worth:
Coriolanus, by one William Shakespeare. Lifted from Livy, of course, though since Livy was long since dead, and the RIAA and the MPAA hadn't been invented yet, his lawyers weren't able to screw Willy for every cent they could get out of him. Now that is a totally new theme for an entire series of stories, plays, films, songs, whathaveyou - ghosts whose only desire is to get the money the living are earning from performing their "Intellectual Property". And you read it first here!

[opaloka]

He'd have a pretty hard time in court, under current US law his copyright would have run out somewhere around the time the Gospels were being written down. If I were William I'd be more worried about Geoffrey of Monmouth, he was a little more recent, but even if the Sonny Bono copyright extension had been in place it would still have been over for about three hundred fifty years. And also, like Holy Blood, Holy Grail, it purported to be fact.

[UncleDes]

Coriolanus, by one William Shakespeare. Lifted from Livy, of course, though since Livy was long since dead, and the RIAA and the MPAA hadn't been invented yet, his lawyers weren't able to screw Willy for every cent they could get out of him. Now that is a totally new theme for an entire series of stories, plays, films, songs, whathaveyou - ghosts whose only desire is to get the money the living are earning from performing their "Intellectual Property". And you read it first here!

He also stole King Lear from a previous play "King Leir", but I don't think Shakespeare will be remembered for his great plots or where he got them from - it's his use of language that makes him immortal. I don't think anyone has mentioned rich, emotive, quotable dialog in Avatar...

Des

[Pebble]

I think there was a lot of chatter about Shakespeare in Love having similarities in its story.