Oh I remember the explanation, but why even bother with the natives if all they're going to do is screw with them? Why not pick a desert patch where they aren't any? Or why not do off shore mining on some rig, again where the natives can't reach and don't live int he first place?
A lot of scifi have these psychiatric formulas (not all scifi) to create emotional subplots. In this case it was to hook the marine up with the native hottie (another scifi trope you probably won't see Traveller wise because of its difficulty in translation).
I think a more plausible approach would have been to have it as a rescue mission instead of a scifi version of "A Man Called Horse" (anyone remember that one with Richard Harris?).
To me the message of the movie was that loving someone not of your social circle was more important than duty. Eh, well ... it depends on what that duty is, and what your love interest is all about. And I think people are smart enough to know that, and I think that's why Avatar didn't succeed like a Star Wars or the Spiderman film in the early 2000s.
Back on topic; I really liked Ghost in the Shell anime-wise, but it's like ... I don't know ... since the film is readily available world wide, then why do a live action "remake" of the same material? Will the non-anime fan go see the live action version and suddenly run out and buy the anime on bluray? I'm thinking not.
I shrug my shoulders at the whole thing. It's their money. Let's see what happens.
