Which real-life place inspired the locale of Avatar? 

Avatar, the Walt Disney movie by James Cameron had taken the world by storm when it released in 2009. Today, 13 years later, its sequel is finally ready and all set to release in December. According to media reports, it will be known as Avatar: The Way of Water.  

The film Avatar is set on the fictional backdrop called Pandora. It happens to be one among many moons of Polyphemus, the fictional gas giant, that is said to be almost as large as the planet Saturn. According to the maker of the film, Polyphemus and its moon Pandora is part of Alpha Centauri, a fictional star system located near the Earth.  

Pandora: The world of Avatar 
The landscape of Pandora is that of a tropical rainforest having mountains with gravity weaker than that of the Earth and trees as tall as skyscrapers.  

The inhabitants on Pandora are either hexapod (six-limbed with two arms, two legs and two wings) or tetrapod (four-limbed) like the protagonist Navi. They resemble giant dragon-like flying creatures who can grow as tall as 10 feet and often have two pairs of eyes as well as two nostrils. They are also bioluminescent, that is, they can produce light within them, almost like fireflies. Above all, the creatures on Pandora are gifted with blue skin and tails and have unusual yet human-like appearances.  

Real-life inspiration behind Pandora 
Not many of us know that Pandora has been inspired by a real-life place in the Hunan province of China. It is known as Zhangjiajie National Forest Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the country’s first ever National Park.  

It has stunning features like the ones on the fictional Pandora such as mountains with pillar-like rocks made up of quartz and sandstone. In fact, the floating Hallelujah Mountains of Pandora are the direct reflection of Southern Sky Column (also known as the “Pillar of the Universe” in Mandarin), a 3544 feet high mountain located within the Chinese forest park.  

Besides these, parallels can also be drawn between the lush biodiversity of Pandora and that of Zhangjiajie, such as dense forests, unique flora and fauna (rhesus monkeys and muti-coloured salamanders), and peculiar geological structures like karst caves (caves made up of limestone and underground water).  

However, apart from Zhangjiajie, landscapes of Venezuela and another Chinese mountain range called Huangshan (literally meaning “Yellow Mountain”) have also been regarded as inspiration behind Pandora.