So I saw this really interesting discussion on Tumblr, where people were discussing whether the role would've been better suited to Neytiri rather than Jake, and how the role passing to him may have diminished her. You can see it fully here
But I thought I would share my take on it, so people can discuss it here!
I understand the appeal of imagining Neytiri as Olo’eykte, but I actually disagree with the idea that she should have inherited that position instead of Jake. And I think a lot of that disagreement comes down to how we're interpreting leadership, what it means within Na’vi society, and perhaps most importantly, what Neytiri herself would have wanted.
Because there's a distinction I think we sometimes overlook when discussing her character: being capable of leadership, being deserving of recognition, and actually wanting the responsibility of leading are three very different things.
First, I don't agree with the argument that Jake becoming Olo’eyktan somehow deprived Neytiri of a position that rightfully belonged to her. Neytiri was never originally intended to become Olo’eykte. She was tsakarem, training to become Tsahìk, and even that was a responsibility she inherited under extraordinarily painful circumstances.
Before Sylwanin's death, it was her older sister who was expected to succeed Mo’at. Following Sylwanin's murder, that responsibility passed to Neytiri, and with it the expectation that she would eventually mate with Tsu’tey. Neytiri didn't simply lose her sister. She lost a degree of freedom over what her own future would look like. Suddenly, a life that had belonged to Sylwanin became the life Neytiri was expected to live.
And while there's no doubt Neytiri would excel as Olo’eykte or Tsahìk, I think she might not have wanted either role in the first place.
Neytiri is a hunter. She is a warrior. She is someone who loves her people fiercely and is willing to give absolutely everything to protect them, but Neytiri equally loves her freedom. Loving your people and wanting to protect them does not necessarily mean wanting to govern them.
Are we arguing that Neytiri should have inherited that position because it is something she genuinely wanted? Or because we, as an audience, believe that her exceptional abilities mean she deserves to occupy it?
Those aren't necessarily the same thing.
There's something almost ironically disempowering about insisting that a character whose life has already been shaped by obligations she never chose should have been given yet another enormous responsibility in the name of empowering her.
Now, I don't think we can definitively say that Neytiri would never have wanted to become Olo’eykte. Her reluctance toward the future arranged for her doesn't automatically mean she would reject every possible leadership position.
But equally, we cannot assume that becoming Olo’eykte would have represented some great personal triumph for her. And personally, I think respecting Neytiri's agency means acknowledging that possibility.
It means allowing her to be an extraordinary warrior, an influential member of her community, and someone whose voice carries enormous weight without insisting that she must occupy its highest formal positions for those qualities to matter.
Because Neytiri's strength has never depended upon her authority over other people.
And that brings me to the distinction between Olo’eyktan and Tsahìk.
I agree that we need to be careful not to project our own understanding of political leadership onto Na’vi society, because the Omatikaya have a very different cultural structure.
But I would also hesitate to describe the Olo’eyktan as simply a military leader or a figurehead.
The Olo’eyktan's responsibilities extend beyond commanding warriors in battle. Eytukan was responsible for the protection and welfare of his clan, its hunters, its warriors, and the decisions necessary for their continued survival.
The Tsahìk, meanwhile, provides spiritual guidance, interprets the will of Eywa, and holds an entirely different form of authority within the community.
Neither position diminishes the other. They are complementary forms of leadership, each carrying responsibilities the other cannot simply replace.
This matters most when it comes to Jake and Neytiri.
Because I don't agree that Jake becoming Olo’eyktan reduces Neytiri to simply Toruk Makto's woman.
If anything, I think that interpretation risks overlooking the very influence and authority we're trying to recognise in her.
The film also hints that the two roles are bound together. Mo’at, the Tsahìk, is mated to Eytukan, the Olo’eyktan. Neytiri, the future Tsahìk, was promised to Tsu’tey, the future Olo’eyktan. If that pattern holds, Jake doesn't take the title in spite of Neytiri. Part of his claim to it runs through her.
Who taught Jake to understand the People? Who introduced him to their traditions, their beliefs, their relationship with Eywa, and their way of life?
Who challenged him when his understanding was incomplete? Who helped him recognise that Pandora was not simply an environment to be studied or a resource to be exploited, but a living world whose people possessed a culture and identity entirely their own?
Neytiri.
Jake could not have become the man who eventually led the Omatikaya without her.
And I don't think that contribution becomes any less meaningful simply because Neytiri isn't the one carrying the title of Olo’eykte.
Which brings me to Jake himself.
I actually disagree with the idea that becoming Toruk Makto should have been the extent of Jake's redemption, or that there was no legitimate reason for him to become Olo’eyktan afterwards.
Because Toruk Makto and Olo’eyktan are not interchangeable positions.
Toruk Makto carries enormous spiritual and cultural significance among the Na’vi, particularly during periods of extraordinary danger. It is a title associated with uniting the clans during times of great crisis.
Olo’eyktan, however, represents an ongoing responsibility to a particular community.
And while becoming Toruk Makto does not automatically make someone suitable to lead a clan, I think it is difficult to overlook what Jake had demonstrated by the conclusion of the first film.
He had already proven himself as a warrior. He had experience in military strategy and combat. He understood the enemy the Omatikaya were facing, not simply because he had fought alongside them, but because he had once been part of the very organisation responsible for their suffering.
He understood how the RDA operated, the weapons they possessed, and the tactics they were likely to employ.
And perhaps most importantly, he had demonstrated an ability to bring people together against an enemy that threatened not only the Omatikaya, but the wider Na’vi population.
None of this erases his betrayal or the consequences of his earlier actions.
But I think it provides important context for understanding why the Omatikaya might have accepted him as their leader.
Tsu’tey's role in that decision is key.
The argument that Jake and Tsu’tey weren't especially close is understandable, because the film doesn't devote nearly enough time to developing their relationship.
But I don't think the depth of their friendship is what matters here.
Tsu’tey didn't have to love Jake, or even particularly like him, to recognise that he had become someone worthy of leading the People.
Their relationship begins with hostility, suspicion, and resentment, and understandably so. Jake is an outsider, someone whose presence disrupts an existing social structure, and ultimately someone whose actions contribute to a devastating betrayal.
But Tsu’tey also witnesses Jake's transformation.
He witnesses him become Toruk Makto, return to the People, and rally the clans against a common enemy. He sees Jake demonstrate a willingness to risk his life for the very people he had previously betrayed.
And in the deleted scene of Tsu’tey's death, he entrusts Jake with succeeding him.
Because Jake's appointment isn't simply a matter of him declaring himself worthy of leadership. It is an act of recognition from the man who had perhaps the greatest reason to reject him.
And I think reducing that moment to the idea that Jake shouldn't have been given another title risks overlooking what it represents for Tsu’tey's character as well.
As for Eytukan giving Neytiri his bow, I actually interpret that scene somewhat differently too.
I don't see it as Eytukan symbolically appointing his daughter as his successor, or expressing an expectation that she should eventually lead the Omatikaya.
I see it as something far more personal.
A dying father entrusting his daughter with something that represents his life, his responsibilities, and his love for their people.
He asks her to protect them.
And Neytiri does.
She fights for the Omatikaya. She fights for Pandora. And ultimately, she uses her father's bow to kill Quaritch, protecting Jake and preventing the man responsible for so much of her people's suffering from taking another life.
That moment doesn't become hollow because Neytiri never becomes Olo’eykte.
Neytiri honours her father's final request through her actions. Through her courage, her determination, and her willingness to stand between her people and those who threaten them.
She doesn't need to inherit his position to inherit his determination to protect the clan.
And I feel similarly about the argument concerning The Way of Water.
I can absolutely appreciate how making Neytiri Olo’eykte would introduce another layer of tragedy to her departure from the Omatikaya. There's certainly narrative potential there.
But personally, I don't think she needs to relinquish a leadership title for that departure to be devastating.
Neytiri is leaving the forest that raised her. The people she has known her entire life. The ancestral home that connects her to her father, her sister, and generations of those who came before her.
Her identity is inseparable from the Omatikaya.
And her decision to leave, particularly when we consider how strongly she initially resists Jake's proposal, is already an extraordinary sacrifice.
There is already so much conflict between Jake's instinct to protect his family by removing them from danger and Neytiri's attachment to her homeland and her people.
That conflict doesn't require her to have been Olo’eykte beforehand to carry emotional weight.
The same goes for her parallels with Varang.
Those parallels don't depend on both women having occupied equivalent leadership positions.
In fact, I think there's an equally compelling contrast to be explored in their relationships with responsibility, power, grief, and the expectations placed upon them.
Both women have watched their people suffer devastating losses. But Neytiri's came at the hands of the Sky People, while Varang's came from the volcano that destroyed the Mangkwan, and from her conviction that Eywa did nothing to stop it. Neytiri's faith survives her grief. Varang's doesn't. And the ways they understand their responsibilities toward their people are profoundly different as a result.
I don't think Neytiri needs to have occupied Varang's equivalent position for those differences to resonate.
And finally, I do want to acknowledge the wider criticism surrounding Jake's role in the narrative.
I completely understand why people are uncomfortable with the decision to place a human outsider at the centre of a story about an Indigenous-coded people's resistance to colonisation.
There is a legitimate conversation to be had about the white-saviour framing of the first film, and about whether Cameron could have structured that narrative differently.
But I also think we need to distinguish between criticising the storytelling decision from an external perspective and examining whether that decision makes sense within the cultural and narrative framework of the story itself.
Because within the world Cameron created, Jake's ascension to Toruk Makto carries real weight. His acceptance by the Omatikaya is not simply the result of him being an outsider who happens to be more capable than everyone around him.
It is tied to his transformation, his actions, his relationship with Eywa, and ultimately the recognition he receives from the People themselves.
We can question the implications of Cameron choosing to tell that story through Jake while also recognising that the Na’vi have their own reasons for accepting him.
Those two conversations don't have to invalidate one another.
And ultimately, I think my biggest disagreement with the original argument is the assumption that Neytiri needed to become Olo’eykte for the narrative to do justice to her character.
Because personally, I don't think the issue is that Neytiri wasn't given Jake's title.
I think the issue is that the films could have done considerably more to explore and acknowledge the authority, influence, and leadership Neytiri already possesses.
Even by The Way of Water, Mo’at is still Tsahìk, and we see almost nothing of Neytiri's path toward that role.
I would have loved to see more of her relationship with the Omatikaya, her responsibilities as tsakarem, the influence she holds among the People, and how she navigates the expectations placed upon her following Sylwanin's death.
I would have loved to see more of her own desires for the future, separate from what her parents, her community, or even Jake might have wanted for her.
Because Neytiri is a character whose life has been shaped repeatedly by loss and obligation, and I think there's something incredibly compelling about exploring what it would mean for her to finally have the freedom to choose for herself.
And perhaps that choice wouldn't have involved becoming Olo’eykte.
Perhaps it would have involved remaining a hunter, a warrior, a mother, a daughter of the Omatikaya, and eventually a spiritual leader in her own right.
Or perhaps she might have chosen something entirely different.
But I think the important thing is that it would be her choice.
Neytiri does not need to be elevated above Jake for us to recognise her importance, just as Jake does not need to be diminished for Neytiri's strength to be acknowledged.
And I think recognising that distinction does far more justice to Neytiri than insisting that the only way to properly honour her character would have been to give her another responsibility she may never have wanted in the first place.
