The Last Airbender on RTE now...... Sweet Jebus

TheIrishGrover

I put off watching this as I had heard all the shocking reviews of it. Avatar is one of my favourite shows. An animated show full of nuance, humour and surprisingly three-dimensional characters: Sokka was the "Comic Relief" but he was also their strategist. Katara was the heart but her moralising could be overbearing and was often quite self centered. Aang was this powerful being full of self doubt but he was still a kid who liked to have fun and be goofy. The show was not afraid of showing the ramifications of war: Aang killing Zhao (Later deemed to have been banished to eternal damnation on Korra. Hardly better). Jet. Iroh's son. In the movie Zhao's death has been taken off Aang's shoulders.

The movie:Oh so bad.... REALLY bad. Dull, morally black and white and unidimensional characters. Shockingly racist casting (White guys good, Asian guys bad). Reams of exposition voiceover from Katara: "Soh-ka and the princess liked each other immediately (Where was "Yip..... YIP"?). NO fun at all.

But, here's the thing: This was an adaptation of a show, with everything being pronounced. This was not adapted from a book where you may be inadvertently mispronouncing a word. When you hear it being pronounced correctly it can be jarring.

This show was adapted from a show which pronounced every term and yet the movie STILL mispronounces so many things. I said I would give the movie a decent chance but EVERY time they pronounced something from the show they mispronounced it..... EVERY time:

Aang: Awng
Avatar Awvatar
Agni-Kai: Agni-Kee
Sokka: Soh-ka
Jesus, I mean: Iroh: Eeroh! !!!!!EE-ROH???!!!!

I know the creators weren't involved at all but had the movie-makers even SEEN the series. One episode: ONE would have shown them how to pronounce every single term.

Mark Hamill

The thing that really irritated me about the movie, after being irritated by the bad acting, bad dialogue, the inability to pronounce the names, was how bad the bending was in it (the manipulation of the elements). It was praised by many reviews as the one thing the movie did ok/well. For me it was probably the most insulting part of the movie. E.g.:
This is a fairly bog standard bit of earthbending in the show:

Every movement does something, either manipulates the element or puts the bender in the next position to manipulate the element. And a load of big rocks arer launched at somebody

This is how the movie does it:

What the hell was that?! What were those six guys doing? Were they altogether moving that one little stone? That one little stone, about 15 feet to their right? They're not even looking at it. Who choreographed that? Who ok'd it? How could they get every aspect of the show so wrong?

I have not watched a Shyamalan film since.

TheIrishGrover

Mark Hamill wrote: »

The thing that really irritated me about the movie, after being irritated by the bad acting, bad dialogue, the inability to pronounce the names, was how bad the bending was in it (the manipulation of the elements). It was praised by many reviews as the one thing the movie did ok/well. For me it was probably the most insulting part of the movie. E.g.:
This is a fairly bog standard bit of earthbending in the show:

Every movement does something, either manipulates the element or puts the bender in the next position to manipulate the element. And a load of big rocks arer launched at somebody

This is how the movie does it:

What the hell was that?! What were those six guys doing? Were they altogether moving that one little stone? That one little stone, about 15 feet to their right? They're not even looking at it. Who choreographed that? Who ok'd it? How could they get every aspect of the show so wrong?

I have not watched a Shyamalan film since.

Yep. I was watching that scene in particular (Nevermind the fact that they had Earthbenders in a campsite surrounded by..... earth instead of a metal platform in the sea like the series: Holy cr*p guys. He's right. This is EARTH!!!")

No, I remember that scene in particular and it reminded me of this funny scene in the series:



Every movement had a purpose: Stomp, loosen earth. Drag arms up, raise loosened earth. Thrust/kick, Throw earth.

I remember that awesome detail in Korra where Toph's daughter was fighting on a metal airship or something and there was a deadly little movement of her twisting her heel to get a grip and to bend the metal around her ankle. Was a fantastic little detail. Point it: The movement had a purpose.