“Avatar: The Last Airbender” is a beloved franchise that has been brought back by Netflix on Feb. 22 with an eight-episode live series adaptation. While the fluid action sequences and the great casting matched the original series with a massive following, the slow pace of the story, unnecessary revisions to certain plot points and excessive green screen use made it a tough watch for original fans.
“Avatar: The Last Airbender” is a story about four nations: Water Nation, Earth Kingdom, Fire Nation, and Air Nomads. The Fire Nation wants to conquer the world, and the only hope to stop them is an airbending kid named Aang, who also turns out to be the avatar, the chosen one. The Netflix adaptation covers many of the events that take place in the original show such as the Kyoshi warriors, the blue spirit arc, and the battle between the Fire Nation and the Northern Water tribe.
While watching the first episode, all I could think about is how I hoped that this would be better than the 2010 live action movie (which scored a whopping 5% on Rotten Tomatoes). After bingeing all eight episodes this weekend, it’s clear that this version of “Avatar” is an improvement and can be passable to new fans, but old fans will still be disappointed.
With eight episodes, clocking in at 1 hour each, it would have been hard for the show to depict everything that happens in the original cartoon version which had three seaons with around 20 episodes per season. Everything feels rushed, and a lot of the plot points have been taken away due to the time constraints. For example, in the city of Omashu, the main character we see at first is King Bumi. But the show integrates characters into Omashu’s story arc that the original cartoon waited to unveil much later. Doing this felt unnecessary and confusing, forcing me to take a break and go rewatch the original show.
The action is also nonstop, which takes away from the world building and what the stakes are for each plot line. For example, fans do not get to see the Northern Air Temple, which is one of the more intereseting places that was shown in the original show.
Though the series looks pretty, it’s also very obvious the actors are performing on a set, surrounded by green screens. In the original show, everything was animated which made the scenes more believable and aesthetically pleasing. In the new series, the amount of scenes that use green screens is very noticeable and overused. For example, when the characters are riding on Appa (a giant flying bison), the CGI is so poor it’s distracting.
There are some aspects that the new live adaptation got right. Although I do appreciate the humor and funny scenes depicted in the original, the live adaptation takes a different approach to the tone that is set. While there are some humorous scenes, the overall tone of the show is dark and violent. This was a good change. We get to see how the world fell into darkness after the Fire Nation began its campaign, and it puts the severity of the war into perspective.
A standout performance was Ian Ousley’s depiction of Sokka, one of Aang’s closest friends. In the original show, Sokka was charismatic, funny, and portrayed certain body movements that made the character unique. Ousley managed to capture all the facial expressions that made fans like Sokka in the first place. I am looking forward to what he will do if Netflix goes on with a second season.
Overall, the Netflix live action adaptation comes up short of living up to the original animated series, but this is a step forward in the right direction. If Netflix fixes the errors, then maybe more fans will be on board with continuing the series.
