The Biology of Avatar 2

You just wanted to show off your Na'vi-sona. Admit it Trey

Man imagine what prehistoric Pandoran life would be like. I’d love to see art of them, even if they never appear in a movie

You forgot to mention the big planetary sized elephant in the room, and that is Eywa. We could speculate based on the info given by Grace in the movies and through what ways the Navi connect with Eywa that the giant super organism is one of the earliest liforms of the moon, most likely the first. Plantlike or fungal in nature, it kept its billions of years network by integrating itself with other evolving wildlife (which possibly evolved from them), who came to depend on the neural network system for survival. Interesting enough, not all plantlife is able to directly link with animal life (though they still keep connections with each other and other surrounding plantlife through the roots while they feel the animals through sensory ways), mostly select few species such as the Tree of Souls and Voices, including the underwater Tree of Souls have the ability to directly link with Animalia of Pandora. This can also mean that this giant super organism is able to guide, instruct, and influence evolutionary destinies of all organisms on the moon, as seen with the immune response in both movies and how certain seeds guide the Navi (which are in tune with Eywa´s will) at specific critical moments. It is also interesting that Eywa would instruct the Navi not to dig up the rocks from the ground, not make wheels, or make metal tools, as all three of these laws are there to protect Eywa´s neural network from being destroyed, as well as keep the Unobtainium where it is, indicating that the element is critical for the neural network to function. In areas where the flux vortex is the strongest (likely the largest concentration of unobtanium), we see those specially evolved plantlife where Navi directly link with Eywa. A deleted scene even showed Jake´s initiation into the Omatikaya and Eywa neural network in its fractal spiritual glory, indicating its a higher form of intelligent life above the humans, Navi and Tulkun. A bit of a story theory on where the series will go. I believe that the plant or fungal species that makes Eywa will be transferred to Earth (which had most of its natural wildlife destroyed, aka they killed their mother) to reignite/reincarnate its natural ecosystem and prevent the ecological disaster humanity is facing. Seeing how Eywa stores all the knowledge of all the life that existed on the moon Pandora, it could be used as a form of Noah´s ark of immense biological data that will speed up the evolutionary processes and adaptations needed to jumpstart the wildlife on Earth. Humans could also aid in this venture, since they have shown advanced knowledge and capabilities in the fields of biology along with mass replication tech as seen in the second movie´s base being made so quickly. Plus humans dont need Pandoran Unobtanium to make their own, RDA just squashed anyone who attempted in making artificial sources of the element in the past to keep their monopoly over the resource, so the artificial unobtanium humans make could be used to aid this new Earth Eywa neural network. They could also incorporate spiritualism into it and have both Earth and Pandora connect through the vast distances through a cosmic consciousness, which takes inspiration from eastern religions such as Hinduism and Buddhism from which we got the concept of an Avatar that this movie is heavily based on (through the forms of the hybrid Avatar/recom projects, along with individuals like Kiri).

It is kind of wild that the different navii populations remained isolated enough to evolve so differently considering they always had access to what are basically just biological planes

I kept thinking about your classification system when I watched this movie. I saw the Ilu and Tulkun and was like “hey those look like hexapods that took to the water.” This video made me feel like my theories were supported by the top expert in the field. Amazing stuff as always!

The Tulkuns are by far my new favorite creature in the Avatar franchise. A species that, while not really able to develop technology due to their environment, has nonetheless developed sentience and culture. I'm no biologist so I don't know if that's realistic but the idea is very intriguing, and something I feel we should keep in mind if we ever do discover life on other worlds. We're used to thinking of civilization and intelligence is going hand-in-hand with one another but that may not be the case.

Great video! I would like to just add a point to the Reef Na'vi's biology. They seem to have a bigger torax, which could mean 3 things: 1. They have bigger muscles from swimming. If you've ever seen a swimmer's torso area, you will notice they have very wide torax and shoulders, more than their bottom areas. 2. They may have evolved bigger lungs to hold more breath (I haven't watched the movie yet, so idk if they can breathe underwater), therefore, their torax grew to accommodate them 3. And lastly, all of the above. Maybe their wide torax it's a combination of the 2 hypothesis. (EDIT) I ALMOST FORGOT. Are the creatures of Pandora cold blooded or warm blooded? As far as we could see, none of them other than the Na'vi have any fur or hair on them, what could this mean on the evolutionary family tree?

Pandoran Otters being cut from the Movie is a Crime against Na'vity

The long-awaited sequel we needed

I loved this film primarily from a xenobiology perspective. There are rumours the next one will have "fire Na'vi", which I suspect may be S.America based, probably Aztec or Inca in their cultural style, and I can't wait for more creature designs.

I think Tolkun might be related to hammerhead titanotheres because of the head shape. It would also mirror the fact that just like how whales on earth evolved from ungulates as whales are closest related to hippos, the whale-like tolkun from pandora evolved from ungulate-like hexapods

"The possibly-sapient Tulkun" Treyyy, Payakan and Ro'a have entire lines in the script and it's stated explicitly that they're both smarter and have deeper emotions than humans and Na'vi. There's no "possibly" about it dhsjfjgj

I think that the parallels between Pandora’s life and our planet’s was intentional and is one of the things that make this series great: giving us a world that’s both very familiar and very alien.

Your original Avatar video made me make mental notes and appreciate all the new designs when I saw the newest Avatar film.

I believe that the Ilu are part of the Xenopterosauira group like the banshee, leonopteryx, and stingbats. this is due to them having long necks and their flippers looking like wings. I think they took a similar evolutionary rout as penguins in that they had a flying ancestor that took to the water and their wings became flippers.

You forgot to mention a neat little detail in the visual dictionary: The skimwings are closely related to ikran, most likely to a closely related ancestor. I really love the wildlife of pandora :)

Welcome back Trey! Glad to hear you're ready to take on the world!

I literally just watched The Way of Water in theaters an hour ago. And multiple times throughout it I was thinking about how I can’t wait for you to make a video about all the new species. I was even counting the limbs of all the sea creatures. Perfect timing lol

congratulations on Graduating! I Just entered college studying paleobiology last fall, and i can't overstate how big a role your channel has played in keeping that passion for prehistory alive over the half decade i've watched your channel. thanks so much for everything!

The creature design in Avatar has been incredible but holy shit the mechanical designs are perfection, those crab mechs might be the most beautiful small real robots I’ve ever seen in a western film. All the near future tech is great for the most part except for those spindly power suits, they look goofy and feel pointless. They should’ve just shown more AMP suit variations instead. I don’t think any other franchise besides Patlabor and some of Gundam has done this much to please my brains endless hunger for more practical and realistic mini mecha.