AT LAST THE RANT OF THE YEAR OMFG

YES.

I AM GOING TO DO IT NOW.

OR LATER.

NO, WAIT, DEFINITELY NOW.

THE RANT OF THE YEAR.

THE RANT... ABOUT M. NIGHT SHYAMALAN'S LATEST TRAVESTY... THE LAST AIRBENDER.

DUN DUN DUUUNNNNNN.

Let me start off by saying that NICKELODEON'S "AVATAR THE LAST AIRBENDER" IS FRIKKING AMAZING. IN ONE WORD, AWESOMESAUCE. AS IN AWESOME WITH THE SAUCE.

Yes, I am a fan why do you ask. ;P

THIS SHOW HAS EVERYTHING I LOOK FOR IN A CARTOON. EVERYTHING. Okay, maybe it was a bit watered down, but considering its target age group, that's not a bad thing. I MEAN COME ON. IT'S AVATAR, MAN.

So let me give some backstory to people who may stumble upon this blog and not have a clue as to what I'm talking about. And - oh, BTW, expect a video-version of this on my new Youtube page (search TheLinneaKou) hopefully before Thanksgiving. I'm going to try and avoid the copyright gods from coming down on my ass, and instead of using footage from the movie and show like I was intending (unless I can find a videohosting site that won't rat me out to Paramount and Nick - even though I'd credit every person who worked on the stuff) I'm going to pretty much hand-draw every single image in the video.

Ooooh boy this is gonna be fun.

ANYHOODLE. (lol look there's my ADD kicking in thar hyuck)

SO. Avatar the Last Airbender did not magickally fall from the gods in heaven, as much as I claim it has (even I know its true origins!) A:TLA was created in 2002 by the creative team Bryan Konietzko and Mike Dante DiMartino, in response to a request for a cartoon that came by way of Nickelodeon Executive Producer Eric Coleman. (Shamelessly yoinked from the A:TLA series artbook, courtesy of Dark Horse and my local Borders - GO BUY IT IT'S LIKE THE BEST THIRTY BUCKS YOU COULD SPEND) Nick at the time was looking for a fantasy show that would appeal to kids who were getting bombarded with epic fantasy works such as Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings (aw shucks, no Twilight then. Those were the days...) Their requirements? A kid-friendly entry point (in other words, a character that was either a kid or a nonhuman lead) along with an action/adventure type story that didn't include violence (gotta keep the age-appropriate programming up, dudes) that also had lots and lots of magic. Bryan and Mike (or Bryke, as we Avatards like to call them) did a lot of brainstorming, and eventually Bryan came up with a sketch of a bald kid with an arrow on his head. They worked in their love of martial arts, yoga, Hong Kong cinema, and Hayao Miyazaki films to create the pitch for A:TLA. And three years later, Avatar premiered on Nick and got noticed instantly. To say that the show was a hit would be an understatement. To some (especially anime-geeks like myself) this show was a phenomenon.

Basically, Avatar is the story of a twelve-year-old kid named Aang (generally pronounced AE-ng, with an American-sounding nasal "a") who is the last of the Air Nomads, one of the four nations of the Avatar world. He is joined by Water Tribe siblings Katara and Sokka (pronounced sock-ah in the show) in his quest to restore balance to the world. Why is a twelve-year-old kid responsible for the entire world, you ask? Well, not only is he the last Airbender (a martial artist who can manipulate one of the four cardinal elements) but he is the mystical Avatar, a being that is born into each of the four nations throughout a cycle of lifetimes that can bend all four elements, not just that of his or her birth. Aang was born over a hundred years before the story's beginning, and he was accidentally frozen and trapped in an iceberg that ended up at the South Pole, where the Southern Water Tribe lived. Katara and Sokka, members of that tribe, found and freed him. In the hundred years that Aang was gone, the Fire Nation started a war against the rest of the world, wiping out the Air Nomads, occupying and colonizing the vast Earth Kingdom, and oppressing the Water Tribes. Aang must now master the other three elements and avoid being captured or killed by his pursuers from Fire Nation - one of whom is the disgraced and banished Prince Zuko, who must capture the Avatar in order to regain his honor and be allowed to return home.

Whew. Quite a concept there, eh? Well, let me just sing my praises of the series just a little bit longer, and then I'll get to my real reason for picking up the blog again.

A:TLA is one of the most beautiful American cartoons I've ever seen, beating out Danny Phantom, Ben 10, and any Spider-Man cartoons that I worshiped before. I'm serious, for a year I was totally obsessed with those cartoons. I still am, but Avatar takes priority on my "STUFF I MUST HAVE OMG" list. Now, being a self-designated "cartoon connoisseur" as I am, I view this show with the eyes of a seasoned cartoon-watcher, anime-geek, artist, and general geek. Let me say, I was impressed within seconds.

For one thing, the animation is gorgeous. The series, while produced, dubbed, music-ed, and designed in Burbank, CA, was animated across the big pond in South Korea, by several studios (Tin House being the one that they went to for the pilot, along with JM Animation, DR Movie, and Moi Animation). For all the justified hype over Japanese animation, the Koreans are just as stylish and reliable. The animation from the Korean studios was quite nearly flawless and as smooth as glass. If I ever get any of my works animated, I'm going to Korea first. (That, and I want to do a noraebang [karaoke] night, but yeah...)

For another thing, HOLY SHIT THIS STORY TAKES PLACE IN ASIA! Well, not really. I'd be hard pressed to find some of the stuff in the series in real-life China, Japan, and Korea. But still, Bryan and Mike were definitely influenced by Asian and Inuit cultures, and their love and respect for those cultures show. They hired multiple cultural consultants, such as a martial artist (Sifu Kisu!!), a calligrapher who did ALL the written Chinese calligraphy used in the show (S. L. Lee!!), and many more. Their attention to detail was amazing, and made for an even more awe-inspiring experience.

Next, the characters! Never have I seen a lead character that I wanted to hug more badly. I mean, Aang is awesome and all, but awwww~!! I just adore him, he's so huggable and funny and sweet and stuff! Oh, but the other characters of the show were just as awesome as him! Katara, one of the female leads, was totally badass and kickass, and yet motherly and sweet and feminine all at once - the perfect role model for girls! Sokka was a fantastic character as well, being much more than the self-described "meat and sarcasm guy" - not only did he provide a much-needed comic relief character (see the cactus juice scene) but he was also the brains and big-picture guy, and the very-necessary normal dude of the bunch (he's the only non-bender of the core cast up until the final few episodes of the series). Toph, who appears in the second season as Aang's earthbending teacher, is the perfect foil to Katara's feminine charms - a brash, loudmouthed, bad-mannered tough girl who gave up a rich and cushy life to travel the world and do whatever she wants. Despite her tough-girl role in the group, she also has an emotional side that, when expressed (however rare) never fails to make me want to pat her on the shoulder (if I tried hugging her or patting her head, I'm fairly certain she'd sock me). The Fire Nation gets a great cast, too! For the first season, our primary antagonists include the aforementioned banished Prince Zuko, firstborn heir to the Fire Nation throne. Disgraced publicly by his power-hungry father and pretty much kicked out of the only home he's ever known, Zuko has become bitter and harsh, but deep within him he is constantly at war with himself, for his true nature is to be not destructive and tyrannical, but fair and forgiving. Along for the ride is his jovial uncle Iroh, former general and retired old dude who just happens to be awesome. Voiced by the late Mako (RIP) he gives Zuko mentorship in more than his firebending - he provides a mature voice of reason and wisdom, acting as a more fatherly figure to Zuko than his own dad.

But it doesn't stop there! The real bad guys of the series are still to come! Commander - and later, Admiral - Zhao is pretty much the sleazy politician everyone thinks of when they think of politics. Zhao is the embodiment of political ambition, and he's not afraid to do whatever it takes to get what he wants - even if it means throwing the entire world out of balance (literally!). Princess Azula, Zuko's younger sister, appears as the second season's primary antagonist. Completely opposite of her brother, she is cold, calculating, and an absolute prodigy in firebending. I hated her at some times, which basically means she is one of my favorite villains EVER. She was such a psychological trip, I adored her. (That, and Yamino's TyZula stuff on deviantART feeds my psychotic lesbian addiction...) But the biggest baddie of them all, the Fire Lord, is probably one of the best villains EVER. Concealed until the very last moment, he's just as bad as everyone feared. He's lost all and any traces of true humanity during his climb to power, and now he's willing to massacre the world in order to rule it. DUDE. He's worse than Voldemort, and that's hard to do! At least, according to me. Ask Cracked.com, though, and you might get a different answer...

Okay, back to the show in general. The story was very very VERY well-developed, and while the filler episodes were there, and totally fillerlicious, they still added to the story in a vital way. Sometimes, nonessential sidestories and plots are even more essential to the overall plot than the core story is! Adding depth to the characters both good and bad, the fluff factor of A:TLA created a rich and vibrant world that I escaped to for hours on end.

Now, there's tons of other things that I love about this show - the music, the style, the overall message of the series - but I am of the staunch belief that one must experience such things for themselves, as they cannot be conveyed by mere words. So this three-season cartoon series has the "LII'S GO OUT AND BUY IT NOW" stamp of approval. It's entirely worth time and money spent on it, and it gives Nick an incentive to work on the next installment, Avatar: Legend of Korra (I just squee'd right now).

Now, on the eve of the third season's premiere, it was announced that M. Night Shyamalan, famed visionary responsible for bringing us "the Sixth Sense" and "Unbreakable", had gotten hooked into the series by way of his daughters. Shyamalan was so enamored of the series that he pitched a live-action film adaptation. So in 2007, it was announced that Avatar would be hitting the silver screen sometime in 2010.

Well... it happened.

The initial announcement was met with both negative and positive responses. Upon the show's end, many fans expressed a wish for an animated original movie (in anime terms, and OVA/OAV) and others flat-out said "NO. NO LIVE-ACTION. NO." Yet more fans met the news with a reaction such as this: "OMG AVATAR'S FINALLY GETTING THE ATTENTION IT DESERVES YAAAAAAY!!!" If Shyamalan really was as big a fan as he claimed, and considering his ability to make a relatively good film (in several opinions that I've heard, he's been in a decline since Lady in the Water) how bad could this movie possibly be?

...

In a word, HORRIBLE.

So basically, I'm going to give you a multi-part rant on why the movie pissed me off so. I'm going to give you a blow-by-blow critique on The Last Airbender, and I'm not going to mince words. I am capable of critiquing films, especially due to the fact that I have both filmmaking and visual art in my background. I may not be a professional, but even I can tell if a movie sucks.

This movie angered and saddened me. I didn't think it was possible to make Avatar look bad. But I was proven wrong.

So basically, the upcoming rants should look a little something like this:

Issue the first: the Racebending. I am a supporter of the Racebending.com movement, and this issue is fairly big with me.

Issue the second: the merit of the cast and the interpretation of the characters. This is also a biggie.

Issue the third: the overall writing, pacing, and editing of the film.

Issue the fourth: messing with the canon. As in the story, the plot, and the established world - i.e. the bending, mythology, and other stuff like that.

Issue the fifth: the nuts and bolts - the sets, the CGI, the visual aspect of it. Because I'm an artist, and I look for this sort of thing.

Expect a crapton of me comparing the show to the movie, and expressing the movie's failitude MULTIPLE TIMES, OVER AND OVER AGAIN. Consider this my therapy for watching this awful movie, sort of like squeezing a zit (ew) or ripping a bandaid off (ouch) - either way, it's got to be done. And I've put it off long enough.

Let's get this show on the road.