Netflix's Avatar: The Flattening 

But they trust him enough to be the youngest air bending master in history?? Yeah right ☠️

I honestly read that as “They don’t even trust me to feed the baby poison.” I was super confused. But you are totally right, I watched that scene and couldn’t help but laugh at how cringey it was.

The first 2 episodes were exposition hell. SHOW US instead of just having the characters dump a whole paragraph explaining themselves and their character. Such lazy writing. I'm going back to the animated version.

Why? We don't need to see everything clown, we don't even see it in the original show.

@@Auron1Roxas2 Correct, they didn't in the animated show, but they did other things to SHOW how goofy and carefree Aang is. Penguin sledding. Riding a sea monster. Air scooter. The live action didn't show us Aang being young and irresponsible.They just kept telling us about it. Infact, I'd ssay that what they tell us about Aang is the opposite of what they show Aang doing.

and the script, like in riverdale there were just some lines that i couldnt even imagine the best actor ever being able to say well lmao

definitely, and the script is so bad no one really could pull this off

When all the directors are bad, the problem is the producers

I think everyone did really awesome, but the script for sure held it back.

Idk man I disagree with all of you I just think the actors did not really care about thier roles, seemed like they were reading a script for their character and not actually BEING the role

Agreed. It looks like Avatar and that's it

@@meowmachine9147 at least one of these days I hope we’ll get a faithful adaptation 😭

​@@Carmn07third times a charm? perhaps? hopefully...😂

exactly. it all _looks_ like avatar, but it doesnt _feel_ like avatar, so theres absolutely nothing to endear you to it. i dont recognize any of these characters (not even the side characters which is...pretty pathetic) because they feel like imitations rather than just the characters themselves, and that, to me, feels like a very clear indication youve failed as a remake/adaptation.

​@@Carmn07I hope not, they should just stop trying at this point since we never needed an adaptation in the first place

Or maybe people should stop acting like everything sucks now.

​@@sexy1018if everything didnt suck no one would have to act that way

​@@sexy1018 But so much of it does. We aren't pickier than we used to be. Stuff is just getting worse. It's not an opinion, it's a fact. Bad writing is bad writing.

​@@meowmachine9147 The Avatar series has released the same year that Shogun, X-Men 97, Baby Reindeer, and the new Fallout series have come out, shows that have gotten near universal praise. Yes bad writing is bad writing, but good writing is good writing. And for every failing, there are clearly people who still care about writing good stories.

@@Stew91 It's not that there isn't any good writing, it's that there's so much _less_ good writing. To the point that it can't be ignored. Especially, since studios keep making the same mistakes over and over again.

You want that back arch or them to practise archery?

They want back ta Avatar movie 2010 😂

Ark?

@@sk1tsurf3r28arc

Arc . . .

That makes me feel angry!

A character is allowed to say their emotion, show don't tell is about conviction. How do you convince the audience that this character is genuinely angry? So a character can say "You make me so... ANGRY!" Or "...you make me so angry..." We the audience are convinced because of the events that build up to this emotional confrontation. The journey allows us to empathize with the conflict, despite those issues not being real.

The original is so good. Me and my boyfriend, both 19, just finished it for the first time together. It is truly constructed to be timeless. I wish these studio execs would actually realize the art behind what they're making, rather than their own wallets.

@@claravaz7817out of the thousands of good reviews on the tv show I only found one that watched to the end and didn’t like it (most of the other ones only watched the first few episodes and the others we saying watch more episodes then decide)

Damn. Why’d you have to go and make me feel old by reminding me that Gen Alpha are almost teenagers now.

@@tommyl.dayandtherunaways820 she was born in 2012 its disgusting 😭

Ok thank you, you said it way better than I did. Would you to have the channel? I think that's how this works

*Zuko here 🤓

Yeah, its very much a "how do you do fellow kids" (even tho many of us are adults) type situation with media pointed towards us.

I blame focus groups.

get this guy in the writers room

Yes but you can take this lesson and use it in another conflict. The destination doesn't need to be the great divide. They could have incorporated this message in another episode. That would have taken much less time.

I don’t get why people hate the Great Divide so much, or say that the “filler” episodes are irrelevant to the plot. The journey through the earth kingdom, and towards the North Pole, *is* the plot of the first season. All these little adventures they go on add up to tell the story of their journey to the North. Not every stop had ultimate significance, but that doesn’t mean it had no significance. They all added characterization and strengthened the bond between the main trio.

@@tommyl.dayandtherunaways820 Everyone only hates The Great Divide because it was played CONSTANTLY on re-runs and is constantly just petty arguments between unlikeable characters throughout the whole episode*. Perfectly fine episode to watch once or twice, but I’m talking like; if there wasn’t a new episode out, it was probably the fucking Great Divide again 😭

Yeah Funeral is good, but why now? Why not when its revelant later on tales of ba sing se? I feel like they are rushing Zuko plot moments that should come in later episodes.

Important: Did you cry because the show had earned it, or did you cry because you'd seen the original show and Leaves on the wine made you remember the grief you felt with Iroh in Tales of Ba Sing Se?

@@madametrafficjam8347 :(((((( you right

I had the feeling the story of Zuko and Iroh was depicted best, even better than in the anime. Finally we got a lot more insight in why he acts as he does and how Iroh is helping him to grow. But anything about the team avatar felt completely bland and unnecessary.

There are good parts, like the spirit world episodes genuinely had some emotional moments and good ideas, but most of it doesn't

It’s so embarrassing that I’ve read fics by writers I can tell are teenagers that are better 😭

Come on, they probably spend thousands of dollars on this cosplays, sorry I meant "authentic" clothing, so of course they had to use it!

Just say outfits or costumes. No one's gonna be offended. Also they clearly have the budget, they just have to be smart in where.they spend it. They did have the outfit for warmer climates. Yet why they didn't choose to put them on sooner? No idea but laziness is usually the culprit.

especially when yang chen exists lmao, what the fandom thinks kyoshi is she actually was😂😂

But we have to show women being powerful fighters in lead roles in today's media for that ESG money. It's the same thing being done on Rings of Power, Marvel, etc. It's a fake attempt to elevate women in media. You can't have women being 'passive' anymore. They can't want to be mothers or wives anymore. Hell, you can't even have them fall in love anymore like Disney's Wish cutting out Starboy. There is an agenda in Hollywood right now, and it's completely skewed.

@@Vespyr_ spot on man. I mean hell I like powerful women. Like have you seen Katara and Toph? 😅 The irony is Hollywood nowadays have no idea how to write strong women. They think that being strong is being stoic and toxic. It’s even more ironic coming from a whiny organization that preaches about getting rid of toxicity. They supposedly hate toxic masculinity so much and yet end up making women toxic and masculine. 🤣 The self awareness levels are below 0.

You might wanna read the novels

@@ZeallustImmortal novels aren’t canon 😒

well that explains it. in my experience as a writer, just "winging it" doesnt tend to go down well.

Not to defend the show, but this isn't all that unusual. It's pretty normal for directors to shoot multiple versions of some scenes to see what looks better later on, or to adapt scenes in different takes. Calling that a pastiche is kind of funny given how common the practice is (and has been for a long time) and also how much of filmmaking works like that anyway. Having b-roll and cutting together shots in different ways is so normal it's more exceptional to see directors who don't do it. I highly doubt the final cuts of the episodes aren't about as true to their scripts as the average episode of television or the average movie.

@@CH4R10T_TV that's helpful to know. It just seemed odd to me that the showrunner went out of his way to explain how integral this approach was to their process. But maybe he was simply elucidating something folks like me just aren't aware of. Thanks for the info.

That's pretty normal man

to be frank, that's how most shows get made. things happen on a whim of the showrunners, total vision is very uncommon just due to how much it takes to make an entire show

Put like that, it's just so tragic that the original was the one hit by the Live Action Ray. Korra has so much potential for improvement and positive changes, and yet they blasted the OG to pieces like this.

Exactly why they didn't pick Korra. Lots of People hate it or are indifferent. There won't be as much excitement for a Korra show.

@@arnowisp6244 I hate your argument, but only because its true.

The best part of Korra was Varrick and Zhu Li, and I just know Netflix would butcher their relationship and take out all of Varrick’s eccentric humor.

Yeah, it took me a few weeks to get through it because it felt like work. I wanted to like it and kept looking for points of redemption, but overall it was a slog.

Me too! I stopped for several weeks after watching the 4th episode because I was so offended by what they did to Bumi. And Hakoda...I watched that episode with my sister who's never seen the original, and she was hating on him, and I had to stop her and defend the real Hakoda who is actually a really great father. It's such a tragedy what they did to these great characters.

Same

i wish theyd give gen alpha decent content to grow up with

That's "iconic" AF! You say "Azula", and we all heard: "Firemistress Azula of the Cold Blue Flame; The Salamander Child of Firelord Ozai; Chessmaster of Draconic Elders; Raging Tyrant to her Scorched Friends; Breaker of the Avatar's Spirit, Her-Brother Prince Zuzu's Spirit, and her Banished Mother's Spirit; The Lonely Monster Prodigy...ALL HAIL!" I saw the new trailer, and I ignored this show. #smug

Even more, it's a reflection of her perfectionism. Blue fire burns completely; it is perfect with no wasted energy.

no her fire is blue because her name is blue

Tbh, I found most of it just confusing. It's been a bit since I watched the cartoon, and the live action relies so much on already having full, chronological knowledge of the cartoon that I just ADHD'ed out for most of it. But like, if you already remember *anything* from the cartoon, ofc you're gonna nope out when you realize the live action left out everything you liked about the cartoon, in place of packing it with more action than story. But not the kind of action that tells a story.

It also undermines personal growth as an individual and bettering yourself by rendering any self-reflection as unnecessary. It's everyone else who has to in order to make it easier for you

Bro I wanted to like *that* Bumi at first, but it didn't take long before I just wanted him *gone.* I get what they were going for, but he was just plain annoying and a heavily exaggerated grade A a-hole, and his voice got really grating on my ears after dragging it out for so long. You can't convince me he *really* coulda grown as a character after that. Bro was too far gone.

I always found the original one annoying/unlikable. I kinda laughed at this new Zhao, so I was okay with him

It was a different version of Zhao, but it was a good way to have a live action counter part. He was well acted and it was so much fun seeing him be a slimy weasel.

same. his dialogue and mannerisms felt so out of place like sleazy Disney villain lmao

Because the character/actor was the only one who seemed to be genuinely enjoying himself.

​@@joshiesushi he had that quality to him in the original. However, the 'image' he presented and held was nuanced in that it's emblematic of the might the Fire Nation, on face value presented given how we see the background Fire Navy forces across their territory in the Earth Kingdom. So, it brought more than simply a one note type that's supposed to be the overarching threat in the introductory phase. To contrast what we steadily get via the main characters who are of the 'same side'.

Thanks! I had a whole section on 'flat cinematography' talking about basically what you said. Weird green screens, shallow depth of field, dissonance with the crazier looks vs realistic backgrounds yadda yadda. Took it out cause it basically came down to reiterating that live action has less energy/vibrancy than animation, and their priority was visual accuracy at all costs, so they changed nothing to account for it

@PK_a, I have seen this take multiple times, but I don't get it. In what way does the live action Avatar show that animation isn't taken seriously as a medium? The problem isn't even that it was being made in the first place. The problem is that the OG writers left. One Piece proves that live action can work.

@@Stew91 I had an entire essay written out to explain, but my browser crashed and I'm not re-writing all that shit. So, you get the short-hand version: Animation is (in American mind's, largely) associated with children -- yes, even the good shows are still just "kid's shows" (Avatar included) -- and therefore not given the proper consideration and attention it deserves to broaden it's horizon. A lot of early televised animation were just glorified toy commercials and even as time went on, selling merch was (and still is) a huge thing for a show to live and die on. Now, there's nothing wrong with this necessarily, but it has created a stigma around animation as a whole -- and as a result, we've never really gotten animation for a more adult audience that didn't wasn't a comedy first and foremost. We don't get Romance, Sci-Fi, Western, Fantasy, etc. films/shows in animation the way we get them in live-action adaptations -- which, you know, is incredibly weird because animation as a medium has a lot of benefits over live-action, especially with how fantastical you can be. Up until the late 2010's, """adult animation""" in American culture was largely "be The Simpsons" or "be South Park", and we lost a ton of good shows to that stigma (The Oblongs, Mission Hill, Baby Blues just to name a few either because they were too much or too little like the aforementioned shows). It's largely due to groups like [adult swim] and Netflix (the irony) taking chances on more experimental and not "fuck is le funny word :^)" comedy animation that this viewpoint has begun to change and we're only just now starting to see the fruits of that labor as animation companies are finally being allowed to dip their toes into non-comedy genres meant for an older audience. There's also a discussion to be had about how the anime industry (especially within the last 10 years) has influenced these decisions too, but I am not nearly well-versed enough to go there (especially after I lost my manifesto once already) so I won't even try to get into it. (I apologize if this feels super ramble-y, I lost my first, more coherent draft and I'm overdue for sleep at the time of writing.)

mbruhhh lmaooo

We’re printing and framing this comment

I both agree and disagree. I feel like the flashbacks of Ozai and Zuko helped characterized the fire lord as someone more than just The Big Bad(tm). I liked the scene where he visited Zuko in recovery, and how his banishment was, at least superficially, framed as more than just punishment. What I didn't like was the present-day parts with Azula. She absolutely comes off as someone who is trying to get her father's attention, to prove that she's better than her brother, whereas cartoon Azula was confident in her superiority up until ty Lee and Mai's betrayal in season 3.

I totally agree with this. It takes from all the revelations of those characters we had later in animated series. Ozai (for me) felt like a constant looming threat, an ominous presence that hangs above their necks (and ours) because he was anonymous: a menacing omen lurking behind the shadows. He felt big, serious and important. Showing him bickering with azula for me ruined all that. And besides that, the fact that by showing him and azula they completely changed their dynamics as characters and by that their dynamic with zuko as well; they had to make up some characterisation for ozai (because well, he had so much more screen time) so they portrayed him as a father who is seemingly making his kids compete for his attention while actually he was, what, pushing azula to be more ruthless? To actually drive her insane (before her time) by making her constantly compete with zuko (who isnt even there and was away from home 3 years already..?). I dont even know what they wanted to achieve. What a mess

But this Isn’t a stand alone show. It’s a remake. If you copy your friends homework, but change it just enough to not be a complete copy, it’s still a copy. The teacher would have every right to compare and criticize your work in relation to theirs. There’s nothing wrong comparing a live action remake, to the original animation it’s coming from. Netflix should’ve made something original if they don’t want the obvious comparisons to happen. We need to stop thinking that comparing something to the thing it’s directly copied from. If avatar needed to be done in live action so bad, then there should be no reason it can’t compete with the original one.

@@rainbowmoon1461 I'm perfectly fine with comparing it to the original. I watch and enjoy those essays as well, and compare it ALL THE TIME. I just enjoy when it's minimized because the show is actually bad as it stands without comparison. It's just shit in general and I like seeing that pointed out well.

LOWKEY BET THIS IS GONNA HAPPEN 😂

It’s hard to make that work when the first time he truly lost control, seeing his entire people and everyone he loved massacred, was something he casually resolved himself in seconds

Was thinking the same thing

Evangelion(1995 TV Edit), awaits... Shinseki Yori also awaits...