THE LAST AIRBENDER
2010 | M. Night Shyamalan
I “was” happy that one of my most favorite animations Avatar: The Last Airbender, has finally become a Live-Action film. Unfortunately M. Night Shyamalan has ruined it almost completely.
There are two good things left on The Last Airbender Live-Action film; its movie trailers and special visual effects which were magically created by Industrial Light and Magic.
I have no idea whether the director actually watched the animated series or may be he did, but perhaps his perception has distorted subconsciously so he developed such a silly screenplay filled with sloppy dialogue.
The cast are all wrong. The four nations (Fire, Air, Water, Earth) are not diverse as the original series. Fire Nation is definitely not Indian! Fire Lord would never talk face to face at the same level with anyone, especially with his general! Katara is not a weakling creepy girl, Sokka is supposed to be funny. And most of all, The Avatar, oh-my-god “Why So Serious?” I don’t know if he needs to go to the restroom or something.
Well the cast ain’t entirely wrong, at least they made Appa, the flying bison and Momo, the winged lemur as close to original. Wait, ain’t they visual effects? Yes they are.
The story is moving too fast. I know that it is difficult to shrink 480 minutes (20 episodes 24 minutes each) into 103 minutes. But for the goodness sake M. Night Shyamalan, if you can’t do it, why not let someone else who can? The characters are not just poorly introduced, the relationship between them ain’t believable. There is almost no connectivity that I could be able to trust in any of them. Their performances are just unconvincing. I cannot believe that I am saying this, the cartoon characters can actually perform better than human.
Lastly I hate that he changed the introduction of the story!
This is the introduction that people and all fans of the series want to hear;
Water. Earth. Fire. Air. Long ago, the four nations lived together in harmony. Then everything changed when the fire nation attacked. Only the Avatar, master of all four elements could stop them. But when the world needed him most, he vanished…
