Avatar forgiveness

Some spoiler-free first thoughts on the new Avatar film. Plus the TV news of the day.

Back in 2015, in the months leading in to the release of Star Wars: The Force Awakens, I started goofing around on Facebook with posts talking about the inferiority of "Star War" compared to the true cultural king: 2009's Avatar.

It was performative silliness, positioning myself on Facebook like a heel in wrestling. But because I'm me, I can never let a …