The Last Airbender Movie Review

I would like to preface this review by saying that I am an adult fan of the cartoon this movie is based on and have a greater admiration for the source material and these characters than the average movie watcher off the street does. Bear this in mind during your reading of this review.

Instead of reviewing the movie immediately, I wanted to say a few words about Avatar the Last Airbender the television show as it is near and dear to me and was not accurately portrayed in the M. Night Shyamalan film.

The creators of Avatar: The Last Airbender Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko set out to create a childrens show that set itself apart from the rest of the Saturday morning cartoon fare by creating a world rich in character and based on the myths and traditions of Central and East Asia. They did this by imagining complex and flawed characters, fantastic and exotic settings and landscapes and grounded it in the Chinese Martial Arts teachings.

The world of Avatar: TLA (I’m going to call it Avatar: TLA from now on since I can’t type “The Last Airbender” every time) is separated into 4 nations: Earth, Water, Air and Fire. Each of these nations drawing inspiration from a different Chinese fighting form that relates to their particular element. Earthbenders use Hung Gar for its powerful stance and strong attacks, Airbenders use Ba Gua or the use of quick directional changes and circular movements to generate power and so on. These decisions were not made lightly and you can tell a great deal of thought and care went into their selection.

The characters in Avatar: TLA are the crowning jewel in their creator’s crown however. Aang, Katara, Sokka, Toph, Zuko, Uncle Iroh, Azula, Bumi, Ty Lee, Mai the list of characters can stretch on for a long time, but what really impresses when you watch the show is how attached you get to all of them.

Aang is the focus of the show as the Avatar and you feel for him so much at the tremendous loss of his people that he has endured. The weight of the world is on the shoulders of a child who starts his journey spiritually and physically lost and that feeling shines through.

Zuko the exiled prince of the Fire Nation is one of the best examples of what made this show amazing. At the beginning we see him as a simple enemy for Aang to overcome. All he wants is to get his honour back, and the only way he can do that is to capture the last hope for peace in the world and he’ll go to any length to achieve that goal. As the show progresses though it’s like a curtain is slowly drawn back to reveal the true depth and mastery that the show creators have in character creation. Zuko is his mother’s son. He feels compassion and empathy in a home that see them as weakness. He admires and desperately seeks the approval of a father whose callous ambition for absolute power has dissolved any semblance of humanity he may have once had.

One of my favorite Zuko episodes is called “Zuko Alone”. We follow him as he wanders across the Earth Kingdom, trying to survive on the generosity and kindness of the people he might have to conquer and enslave someday, and it is here we see the true nature of his character. He befriends a small boy and his family and have to defend them from some seedy characters, all the while we get flashbacks of him as a child in the Fire Nation Palace and insights into the events that lead to his melancholy disposition. It is here that we learn that he was not always so, but instead was a happy and well adjusted youngster who had a loving mother. We also see the impact that losing her had on him. But Zuko would not have become the amazing character he did without help from his Uncle Iroh.

What can I say about Iroh? I’m afraid that trying to sum him up in this review would not do him justice. Simply put, Iroh is amazing. Period. Not only is he ridiculously funny with his irrational tea love and smelly bunions, but he also imparts sage wisdom to his nephew and is a firebending master that if he wanted to could settle any fight with force, but would only do so as a last resort. The episode “Tales of Ba Sing Se” showed us the Iroh that we had all grown to love and respect and made him all the more amazing by the fact that he had lost his son in the war and still felt the pain of that loss but remained the rock his nephew needed during his journey anyway. The episode was given greater significance as a tribute to the voice actor who played Iroh, Mako Iwamatsu. He had recently passed away after completion of the episode.

Avatar: TLA was an amazing show because the world was so densely packed with such wonderful and memorable characters that could make you laugh, cry and think. Whether it was Foaming Mouth Guy, or Cabbage Man, Sparky Sparky Boom Man, Yue, Chong the Hippy Song Guy or any number of small and large characters, the world of Avatar: TLA feelt like it had existed for a long time before we even knew about it.

Avatar: TLA was one of my favorite shows on television and it pains me to think that it is associated with the movie that I saw a couple days ago.

(Ok here’s where the movie review starts)

The Last Airbender directed by M. Night Shyamalan is his latest attempt at staying relevant in the movie industry after a number of flops such as “The Happening” “the Village” and “The Lady in the Water”. M. Night wrote and directed this movie and his inability to tell a story coherently and convincingly has pushed past the point of politeness. Someone’s gotta tell this guy to stop. Just stop M. Night.

Hhhhhmm. Ok. I went into this movie with expectations low, yet cautiously optimistic based on the strength of the source material. Boy oh boy was I let down. This movie was awful writing sandwiched between painfully bad acting and low rent special effects. The director attempted to cram into an hour and a half what the show took an entire season to do. It felt rushed from start to finish. We would start off with the scene in the arctic when Aang was discovered and then we would cut to another scene “Southern Air Temple” and from there some other stuff would happen, then voila, we’re in the “North Pole”. The film feels like a palsy patient on crystal meth, hop skipping and jumping around like crazy.

The entire movie is bogged down by a script that seems like it was written by a sleepy twelve year old. There were times during the movie where Katara would say a line and the audience would laugh. Outright laugh! That would be OK if the line was for comedic effect but it was supposed to be DRAMATIC! Why Shyamalan thinks he can write is beyond me. The dialogue serves only to get the story across, seemingly as quickly as possible and without the artistic and creative flare that we had come to expect from the show. Sokka, Katara’s brother is a huge sentimental favorite for the fans of the series thanks to his love of the meat and sarcasm but in the movie all we get is, “I don’t think that’s a good idea Katara” and “Katara! I’m all wet!”. At least they got the boomerang right.

The lead actor Noah Ringer who plays Aang, is just awful. Seriously did anyone bother to find out if this kid could act before they put him in this movie? His lines sound like they are being read off of cue cards, with the appropriate pauses for the cards to be switched. Personally I’ve never been in a play or movie, but I always thought that if I had to, I could pull it off. This kid made me realize that there is a lot you need to know to be an actor, things that regular people just don’t think of and that if I tried, I’d look like an idiot. That’s what he did for me in this movie. He provided that service at least. You will never have to be subjected to my terrible acting on any screen or stage anywhere. Thank you Noah Ringer.

Before the movie even came out there was quite a bit of controversy over the selection of the actors over the fact that they were casting white actors to play Asian characters and I admit I didn’t think too much of it before, but I have to admit it makes the movie somewhat preposterous when you see a village of people who look Inuit and the lead characters Sokka and Katara white as the snow beneath their feet. For me, this weird juxtaposition served only to take me out of the experience further.

The last thing that I really did not appreciate was the fact that they changed the pronunciation of the characters names: Aang was pronounced Ong and Iroh was pronounced E-roh. WHY? What possible purpose did it serve to do this? All it did was make me angry, angry at the fact that not only did they make my beloved Avatar into a shitty movie, but they couldn’t even get details like the characters names right?? Did anyone even watch the show? But the sad thing is that the show’s creators Mike and Bryan were both involved in this production, which boggles my mind. I don’t think they would have willingly or knowingly let this garbage bear the name of their baby, but if they did, well then I just gotta say WTF guys. WTF.

In closing, The Last Airbender is a horrible movie deserving of its 8% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. It translates none of the wonder and imagination of the cartoon and should be taken out behind the chemical shed and shot. M. Night you are a master at Failbending ( thanks for that one Eric)

The Last Airbender Trailer

Hi folks.

You don’t know me, and I don’t know you. But we’ll get to know each other. Oh, will we ever get to know each other. But there’s time for that. In the meantime, here’s a little something that may help break the ice. I’ve recently gotten into Avatar. I know Amrit is also a huge Avatar fan. BEHOLD!!!! M. Night Shyamalan’s The Last Airbender Trailer!

By the way, you can call me Alderman. Cheers.