# Avatar: The Last Airbender;  Save your money.



## Fauxglove (Jul 2, 2010)

M. Night  Shyamalan may need to commit seppuku to make up for this atrocity of a film adaption.

Without spoiling the plot for those of you who insist on seeing it:

The only way you're going to remotely enjoy this film is if you've never even heard of the TV series.

The combat was horrible, the use of elements in combat were weak and simplistic, the storyline was sparse and filled with pointless deviations from the original, the acting was awful...hell, the actors couldn't even get the pronunciation of their characters' names right.  Lack of emotion and acting was patched over with extreme close-ups of peoples' nostrils.   Half an hour's bonding between Sokka and Yue was summed up with the voice-over narration: "I could tell Sokka and Yue became good friends right away," and two shots of emotionless, uncomfortable faces. 

In terms of overall theme, it's like the director took the series and tried to turn it a Japanese kung fu film.

To surmise, if you have any interest in seeing a movie that reflects the spirit and content of the TV series, this film is not it.  I guarantee you're going to walk away wishing you had the last two hours of your life back. 

Consider yourselves warned!  >.<  I'm going to go back and binge on the animated series to make up for this horrible attrocity.


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## Stawks (Jul 2, 2010)

It cost 280 million dollars to make.

Let that sink in.


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## Aden (Jul 2, 2010)

I have read 30 user reviews of the film on IMDB and none of them got above a 2/10. gg, M. Night.

Shame, too. I really really like the animated series. I was extremely excited when I heard there was going to be a film adaptation, but then heard it was written by Shyamalan and therefore managed to squelch my hopes so that I wouldn't have to be disappointed.


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## Jashwa (Jul 2, 2010)

Stawks said:


> It cost 280 million dollars to make.
> 
> Let that sink in.


 You're thinking of the other Avatar. This one only cost like $75 million to make.

Edit-Wait I was wrong. Should check sources better next time.


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## Browder (Jul 2, 2010)

Jashwa said:


> You're thinking of the other Avatar. This one only cost like $75 million to make.


 
Still bad in my book. It should never have been made at all.


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## Endless Humiliation (Jul 2, 2010)

Budget $150,000,000[3]


well that's still a lot of money to spend on poop

hey tiny text


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## Asswings (Jul 2, 2010)

I'll probably go see it anyways.

/consumer whore


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## Twylyght (Jul 2, 2010)

If I still go to see this, it'll be matinee price.  I'm not seeing it in 3D either.  I learned my lesson from the half-ass attempt made with Clash of the Titans.  When they tack 3D on at the last minute to make extra money, it's going to be bad.


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## Captain Howdy (Jul 2, 2010)

When I heard about it - I was excited. I wasn't like a huge fan of the animated series, but I watched it now and then, liked it. 

Though Japanese Kung Fu confuses me.

And why are so many films not meant to be about Kung Fu, have Kung fu in them.


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## Fauxglove (Jul 2, 2010)

Ticon said:


> I'll probably go see it anyways.
> 
> /consumer whore


 
You can save yourself the time by paying someone to read you every third sentence from the synopsis of the first season off from Wikipedia.


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## lupinealchemist (Jul 2, 2010)

So does this movie end with Book 1 or all the way to Book 3 which I find very unlikely?


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## Fauxglove (Jul 2, 2010)

lupinealchemist said:


> So does this movie end with Book 1 or all the way to Book 3 which I find very unlikely?


 

They only did the first book.  I wouldn't have expected anyone to try doing all three in one film.
But he didn't even manage to cover the most important plot points of the first book in the time he had.  I don't want to think about what it would've been like if he'd tried to do all three.


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## Aden (Jul 2, 2010)

No Kyoshi warriors? What the fuck is this?


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## Fauxglove (Jul 2, 2010)

no King Boomy, either.  Then again, I kinda doubt they could've gotten anyone to act well enough to do justice to him.


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## Aden (Jul 2, 2010)

Fauxglove said:


> no King Boomy, either.  Then again, I kinda doubt they could've gotten anyone to act well enough to do justice to him.


 
Wasn't Boomy mostly in Book 2?


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## Fauxglove (Jul 2, 2010)

Possibly, it's been a long time since I saw the first book.

I was more bothered with the Avatar State scene in the battle for the Northern Water Tribe.   Compared to what was actually supposed to happen, Aang's retaliation was little more than splashing around in the washtub, and the Fire Nation General's death scene was an utter disgrace.


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## Riv (Jul 2, 2010)

It was terrible. I'm going to pay a visit to Mr Shamalamalan, and kick him right in his general genital area.

I've never even watched the show, and I _still_ noticed that they mispronounced the names.


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## Disasterfox (Jul 2, 2010)

I knew it I FUCKING KNEW IT

_I loved the tv series, but this Aang looks like a midgetfag doing interpretive dance to hurricanes and fire in the background, but not cool or anything_


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## Lobar (Jul 2, 2010)

That was the twist!


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## Disasterfox (Jul 3, 2010)

The dance or the fact of the matter it was a horrible misconception of the series lol


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## Diego117 (Jul 3, 2010)

Yep, I was afraid this would happen. After I saw the first previews of the movie, I decided to go and watch the series because I had never seen it. I'm so glad I did. I even got my parents watching it. The series kicks ass.

What I want to know is how and why is Shama-lama-ding-dong still making movies?


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## Fauxglove (Jul 3, 2010)

Take a look at Uwe Boll.  His game-to-movie adaptions are absolute shit, but he finances his own films out of pocket.


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## _Zero_ (Jul 3, 2010)

I could have told you that...M. Night Shyamalan is a pretty damn bad director and writer with the only even remotely good thing he has ever been affiliated with being The Sixth Sense.


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## Aden (Jul 3, 2010)

Fauxglove said:


> Take a look at Uwe Boll.  His game-to-movie adaptions are absolute shit, but he finances his own films out of pocket.


 
Nay. Since he is German, he gets a lot of grants from the German national film fund and wealthy private investors. The private investors that contribute know that since they're contributing money to "the arts", they can write it off of taxes somehow. Boll guarantees a certain amount of return on the investment, so basically it's free money for everyone except for the film fund and the German citizens.

Kinda disgusting, really.



_Zero_ said:


> I could have told you that...M. Night Shyamalan is a pretty damn bad director and writer with the only even remotely good thing he has ever been affiliated with being The Sixth Sense.


 
I'm now convinced that The Sixth Sense was either a fluke or a stolen idea. Same to a lesser extent with Signs.


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## Stawks (Jul 3, 2010)

Aden said:


> I'm now convinced that The Sixth Sense was either a fluke or a stolen idea. Same to a lesser extent with Signs.


 
The plot of the Sixth Sense was stolen from an episode of Are You Afraid of the Dark?

M. Night can't write dialog. It's embarrassing. It's like the guy's never spoken to another human being.


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## Jashwa (Jul 3, 2010)

Signs was a good movie.


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## Eric (Jul 3, 2010)

The series were okay, but they always screw up when making live-action-movies out of something. ALWAYS.


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## Fauxglove (Jul 3, 2010)

Series are hard to turn into films.  you take something that runs over the course of years, then take a director with a completely different artistic style and cram the whole thing into two hours.

On top of that, a film generally is as good as how much time was spent refining the plot. With series-to-film, the director doesn't _have_ to think about it, the plot is already pre-written.  But they still change things to make it fit into the two hours allotted.

Same thing goes for sequels.  A director spends a decade refining a film while trying to make it as a director, then spends maybe two years refining the sequel, because he's already famous and has the resources and contacts to do the next film faster.


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## Captain Howdy (Jul 4, 2010)

Fauxglove said:


> Series are hard to turn into films.  you take something that runs over the course of years, then take a director with a completely different artistic style and cram the whole thing into two hours.
> 
> On top of that, a film generally is as good as how much time was spent refining the plot. With series-to-film, the director doesn't _have_ to think about it, the plot is already pre-written.  But they still change things to make it fit into the two hours allotted.
> 
> Same thing goes for sequels.  A director spends a decade refining a film while trying to make it as a director, then spends maybe two years refining the sequel, because he's already famous and has the resources and contacts to do the next film faster.



Isn't pretty sad when all this comes together, and you still manage to f it up? (not YOU you, but the general 'you')


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## Isen (Jul 4, 2010)

I will still probably see it one way or another.  Lots of my friends loved the show.



Jashwa said:


> Signs was a good movie.


I liked it until the twist.  The twist was just so inexcusably dumb.


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## Jashwa (Jul 4, 2010)

Isen said:


> I liked it until the twist.  The twist was just so inexcusably dumb.


 There was a twist?


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## Fauxglove (Jul 4, 2010)

Lastdirewolf said:


> Isn't pretty sad when all this comes together, and you still manage to f it up? (not YOU you, but the general 'you')


 
In this case, it is really sad.  The most challenging thing should've been just deciding what _not_ to include, to fit the whole season.  There really wasn't any need to change the details at all.

Although even if he had nailed the plot spot-on, I think the rest of it still would've killed him.


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## Takun (Jul 4, 2010)

waitwaitwaitwaitwait they couldn't even get NAMES right?  The fuckkkk.


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## Fauxglove (Jul 4, 2010)

Nope.  they pronounced it "Ahng" and "Sohka".
If it were a book, I'd chalk it up to interpretation, but the pronunciation in the series was pretty goddamn clear.  x_x


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## Isen (Jul 4, 2010)

I read in the paper that the pronunciations of the names in the show were intentional Americanizations, so they probably just wanted to make the names sound more authentically "foreign".  Which is odd, considering that they decided to turn all of the good guys white.


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## Stargazer Bleu (Jul 4, 2010)

The Last Airbender just doesn't interest me one bit. Part could be from didn't care for the animated show much.


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## Eerie Silverfox (Jul 7, 2010)

I didn't much like it. I never saw the syndicate show. I only went to see it because my Tang Soo Do teacher is supposedly in it.


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## Aden (Jul 7, 2010)

Eerie Silverfox said:


> I didn't much like it. I never saw the syndicate show.


 
Please please PLEASE do not make any predispositions about the series based on the movie


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## Viva (Jul 7, 2010)

I watched the series from start to finish, and I loved it all the way through.

M Night tried to stuff three season's worth of happenings into two hours.  That in itself is hard to do effectively.


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## Hakawne (Jul 7, 2010)

I have to admit, I was a little turned off to seeing it when I first saw the previews, because Aang's actor had absolutely zero emotion. Just a pouty lip.
From what I recall in the show, he ALWAYS had an expression, and he wasn't even the comic relief. That guy was.


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## Viva (Jul 7, 2010)

Hakawne said:


> I have to admit, I was a little turned off to seeing it when I first saw the previews, because Aang's actor had absolutely zero emotion. Just a pouty lip.
> From what I recall in the show, he ALWAYS had an expression, and he wasn't even the comic relief. That guy was.



Sahka, or however you spell his name.


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## Pine (Jul 7, 2010)

I'm not a huge fan of the series, but the movie looked good from the previews. I had a friend that saw it and he said it was probably the cheesiest thing he saw this summer. I'm gonna spend my money on a ticket for The A Team instead.


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## Hakawne (Jul 7, 2010)

_THE_ biggest reason I'm a fan of the whole concept is how they apply fighting styles to the elements (I nerded out so hard on that the other day). Ba gua, tai chi, hung gar, and kung fu. Interested me a whooooole lot.


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## RayO_ElGatubelo (Jul 7, 2010)

Pineapple92 said:


> I'm not a huge fan of the series, but the movie looked good from the previews. I had a friend that saw it and he said it was probably the cheesiest thing he saw this summer. I'm gonna spend my money on a ticket for The A Team instead.


 
_The A-Team_ I heard isn't that good either.

I can't believe _Airbender_ made 40 fucking million though! The only thing this movie bends is shit through a straw.


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## DarkAssassinFurry (Aug 23, 2010)

I hated the acting, and the fact that the action sequences were done in one shot. But I must give them credit that they got the Chinese pronunciations correct.

I'm looking forward to seeing the second movie (if they make one)... But only because I'd like to see Toph's actress.

The person who played the Firelord should have been the person to play Commander Xao (or however you spell his name).

It was a terrible movie, but you gotta understand that it's not easy to make a live action movie from the most epic cartoon ever.


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