'Avatar: The Way of Water' review: Prepare for a visually stunning return to Pandora

Thirteen years after director James Cameron's original blockbuster “Avatar,” it’s worth the long voyage back to Pandora just for the alien space whales.

The first of four planned sequels to the 2009 sci-fi epic, “Avatar: The Way of Water” (★★★ out of four; rated PG-13; in theaters Friday) bests the original film in almost every way. It’s a gorgeous and stunning thing to look at, with awesome sights of underwater fauna, and the new movie is an emotionally charged outing that again dips into themes of colonization while adding environmental issues and relatable family drama.

“Way of Water” doesn’t have the most complex plot ever, however, and not everything goes swimmingly, though most viewers probably won’t care when they’re watching big blue characters ride nifty creatures while swooping and diving in thrilling fashion. (Sorry, parents, your youngsters might now be asking for a space whale for Christmas.)

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Cameron's latest effort is set more than a decade after former Marine Jake Sully (played via motion capture by Sam Worthington), his Na’vi love Neytiri (Zoe Saldana) and their indigenous clan drove the humans off the lush moon of Pandora. In the ensuing years, Jake and Neytiri had three children – including warrior-in-training sons Neteyam (Jamie Flatters) and Lo’ak (Britain Dalton) and young daughter Tuk (Trinity Jo-Li Bliss) – and adopted teen girl Kiri (Sigourney Weaver), with feral human kid Spider (Jack Champion) also a part of their pack.

Their peaceful existence is disrupted by mankind once again when a much bigger force, led by General Frances Ardmore (a scenery-chomping Edie Falco), lands on Pandora looking to take it over as a replacement for the increasingly unlivable Earth. This time, the humans have also created their own 9-foot-tall cloned Na’vi soldiers, including one with the DNA and memories of original movie villain Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang), last seen taking two fatal arrows in the chest from Jake and Neytiri.

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Jake is No. 1 on the bad guys' most wanted list, leading him and his loved ones to seek a new home and keep their clan safe. They ultimately find sanctuary with a village of Na’vi reef people, led by Tonowari (Cliff Curtis) and the pregnant Ronal (Kate Winslet), though Quaritch’s goon squad and a legion of human-piloted machinery, from high-tech shark subs to robotic crab suits, are in hot pursuit.

Water is a huge theme this time around, inspiring some of the headier philosophical points (“The way of water connects all things” is a running mantra). The ocean is also where much of the coolest stuff happens: There are plenty of fights and flights of fantasy, but the most thrilling sequence in the film's hefty three hours and 12 minutes features troubled middle child Lo’ak befriending an outcast Tulkun, a whale-like creature that can communicate with Na’vi, in the most heartwarming way possible.

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The second “Avatar” brings back most of the first film’s main characters plus a swath of newcomers, yet it’s the youngsters, especially Kiri and Lo'ak, who really drive the sequel’s strong coming-of-age story.

They bring a sense of freshness when “Way of Water” leans familiar running the original movie’s plot points back, such as Quaritch 2.0 learning to jibe with Pandoran creatures a la Jake or humans going to extreme lengths for a precious resource. (Thankfully, this time it’s not the awkwardly named Unobtanium.)

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It’s best to not think too hard about certain things – for example, at least one immaculate conception – and just weather others, as in one long bit akin to an extremely cruel animal documentary. And while the visual effects are on the whole pretty fantastic, the film every so often resembles a video game or a theme-park ride that seems sort of wonky compared to the more sumptuous parts.

While Cameron is a master of franchise sequels, “Way of Water” doesn’t measure up to his classics, “Aliens” and “Terminator 2: Judgment Day.” But thanks to new personalities and vivid wildlife, on the whole, this latest trip does prove, perhaps surprisingly to some after such a long period between movies, that there’s still some gas in the “Avatar” tank after all.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Avatar: The Way of Water' review: James Cameron revisits Pandora