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No one see the Last Airbender

The Vagrance

By The Vagrance,
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Thylacine Newbie

Thylacine

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I was almost expecting the Avatar thread to be resurrected for this.

It's getting harder and harder to defend M. Night Shyamalan on these movies. Lady in the Water was okay for me because I went into it expecting something other than horror, and I have yet to see The Happening (probably won't). I knew he was more comfortable writing for kids, too, since he was one of the writers for Stuart Little and his most successful films have a child/children playing central characters.

But enough is enough. I always thought that it was M. Night's writing that was his strong point - I thought some of the writing in Stuart Little was quite good, and when compared to his movies, it was obvious what scenes he had a hand in.

It's sounding like it's the other way around here. It sounds like his writing is the problem and his direction (which should have been strong in a film that practically makes itself with the source material) got shot in the foot thanks to 3D "innovation" getting shoe-horned in. Not to mention that it's condensing a 4-season series into a 2-hour movie.

I have to ask those who have seen it: where does M. Night appear in the movie? Is he a random Fire Nation soldier like I suspected, or does he play some other role?

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Ronyn Newbie

Ronyn

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You know trouble was brewing when you started seeing Nickelodeon selling this movie out all over the place. That was mistake number one; what were they thinking? "Hmm, who should we get to help us produce a major live action anime crossover epic?" "How 'bout the guys that made Good Burger!?" "Brilliant!"

For the record, I haven't seen it, and wasn't planning to.

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SoloGamer Newbie

SoloGamer

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You know trouble was brewing when you started seeing Nickelodeon selling this movie out all over the place. That was mistake number one; what were they thinking? "Hmm, who should we get to help us produce a major live action anime crossover epic?" "How 'bout the guys that made Good Burger!?" "Brilliant!"

But it's a Nickelodeon property. Of course they're going to have a hand in it.

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Kizyr Newbie

Kizyr

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Is this about how the main character is supposed to be Asian but was played by a white kid? Even my mom heard about that one.

It might be more defensible if they got bigger-name actors to play the main characters. But, well, the fact that a lot of the no-name extras are Asian, yet the no-name actors who play the main characters are not, make it a bit more difficult to defend it as artistic license or a matter of availability.

I really want to see it because I absolutely love the series. So even if it's horrible, I figured I'd still moderately enjoy it. But it's increasingly looking like I should wait for it to air on TV and not do anything to encourage them making the other two books into movies as well. So, like, making sure the live-action foray ends here. KF

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Halt Newbie

Halt

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You know trouble was brewing when you started seeing Nickelodeon selling this movie out all over the place. That was mistake number one; what were they thinking? "Hmm, who should we get to help us produce a major live action anime crossover epic?" "How 'bout the guys that made Good Burger!?" "Brilliant!"

For the record, I haven't seen it, and wasn't planning to.

Fuck you man. Good Burger was AWESOME. WELCOME TO GOOD BURGER HOME OF THE GOOD BURGER MAY I TAKE YOUR ORDER?

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The Vagrance Newbie

The Vagrance

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I like how it's the colored people in the movie who are oppressing the defenseless white people.

First off, [spoilerS] for anyone who hasn't seen the series, specifically the first book. Also there are a few spoilers to the movie but I'm only spoiling the really dumb stuff that happens. Also, I've seen the series twice and adored it, but I also wasn't expecting it to be a word-for-word adaptation, my beef isn't really with the storyline changes that were made because a fair number of them were kid of neat.

The race thing really isn't that much of an issue, I mean it was a pretty diverse cast overall I felt like. The issues are in order: the writing, the editing, the acting, and the directing.

The writing is simply godawful. From such gems as "Airbenders should be killed. KILL HIM!" to "I'm Commander Zhao, you fell into my trap" (Said after the person was clearly trapped). Then there was the problem of M. Night saying what was happening on screen instead of assuming that people would get it, and the problem of shit being in the movie for little to no reason (Aang's talk about meditation being the most obvious and laughable one).

The editing isn't much better, either. Given that there's about 7 hours to condense he had to be strategic in what to include, but instead of doing that he just threw in a bunch of plotlines. The plotlines that I can remember are:

1. The budding friendship between the three main characters

2. Aang realizing all of his friends are dead

3. The romance subplot between Aang and Katara

4. Learning about becoming the Avatar

5. Visiting the Earth kingdom to see the current state of things

6. Zuko being banished

7. The Zuko/Zhao rivalry

8. Aang being captured and rescued

9. Aang's reasoning for being gone for 100 years

10. Sokka and the Princess's relationship

11. The moon spirits

I'm just going to stop now, but you get the point that for an hour and forty minute long movie this is a lot to fit in. Honestly he should've either lengthened the running time and cut more from the main storyline because as is things just kind of happen on screen with no real explanation. I feel bad for anyone watching this movie that HASN'T seen the series.

The acting ranges from passable to awful (Sokka and Zhao occupying the latter) but honestly I'm not sure how much of it was the writing and how much of it was the acting. I feel like the main ensemble (aside from Sokka) could work with better writing and had the series started off on a good foot it would've been interesting to see their progression as the movies came out but at the moment it was painful to watch.

Lastly, the directing, which was probably just mediocre overall. For some reason M. Night zooms way in on the actors for the dialog sequences (poor choice) and there were a couple of shots that were so bad to the point that you weren't even sure they were real (Like when the moon spirit dies the camera zooms into Iroh's eyeball and then zooms back out). That said, the fight scenes were well directed and had some neat ideas (specifically the long take action sequences) but even then they didn't really flow naturally.

[END SPOILERS]

If you have to see it, find a way to see it without paying for it. I kind of feel bad I put money towards this movie.

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Tables Newbie

Tables

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Oh my god this was one of the worst movies I've ever seen.

But oh my god, it was so much fun to make fun of with my friends who had seen the show

DON'T TOUCH THAT SPHERE!

I feel bad for anyone watching this movie that HASN'T seen the series.
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