Avatar: The Last Airbender

Mike and Bryan are actually involved this time, as opposed to having to stand silently by while M Night Shyamallamadingdong butchered it worse than the Ember Island Players did.

Cautious optimism mode engaged.

A series will also lack the pacing problems that a movie would have.

And probably have a much smaller budget.

This is why I sort of raise an eyebrow whenever I see people talk about the live action One Piece series in development.

There is no Live Action Avatar in Ba Sing Se

So like... why?

Has there ever been another instance of an animated series being adapted into a live action series?

A cartoon becoming a live-action show? Not...really.

I'm actually kind of curious about that. How come they didn't have any involvement or a chance to blow any whistles during production of Shymawhatsit's movie?

In any case, this is a really unexpected surprise. Reminds me of how A Series of Unfortunate Events had a live-action movie from Nick and then got a vastly different (and superior?) live-action series on Netflix.

Actually, there are several cases of anime receiving live action adaptations on Netflix, whether as TV shows or as films.

Don’t know if they’re really quality works, though.

They're generally not but they also don't typically have involvement from the original creators. The fact that this does gives me hope.

And probably have a much smaller budget.

This is why I sort of raise an eyebrow whenever I see people talk about the live action One Piece series in development.

Netflix has had some pretty expensive period piece live action series with decent effects where needed so I wouldn't go blowing any whistles quite yet.

Re: last page, Nickelodeon has the rights still but Viacom is now developing shows for their existing properties for streaming networks as the writing is on the wall for linear TV. I knew A:TLA would be a good choice because it’s still popular and anyone interested it already aged out of Nick’s demo.

So, who would you cast as Aang, Sokka, Katara, Zuko and Iroh?

I expect we'll see a lot of regular martial arts with occasional element bending. As for casting, the Air Nomads are based on Tibetan monks, so clearly Aang should be played by Finn Jones.

Assuming they go for a more racially accurate cast they'll probably be relative unknowns. I can't think of many popular Asian actors that would be young enough. I suspect they'll age them up though. 12-16 is a bit of a tough age for a live action TV show. 16-20 seems likely in my mind.

Here's a wild thought. What if they do it as a co-production with a Chinese studio and shoot it in China? This occurred to me after watching Next Gen which was a Chinese production.

Plusses are that you have a talent pool that matches the characters and lots of places to shoot that have the right architecture (both in real life and standing sets), and they can sell it to the Chinese market without having import issues.

The biggest minus is language. Either they'd have to find a cast with really good English, or get the American audience to accept a dub.

Edit: Although.... if the Air Nomads are still going to be Tibetian, that's going to be a problem as Tibet is a sore subject in China. So maybe not.

Edited by alanh on Sep 18th 2018 at 9:02:07 AM

As for the idea itself, I'm cautiously optimistic. Mike and Bryan had to deal with a ton of Executive Meddling with Korra that really hurt the show. They're going to have a lot more freedom with Netflix.

No telling yet if it will be a reboot, sequel, or "reimagining". They don't plan to start production until next year, so 2020 would probably be the earliest we would see it.

The martial arts could be done with standard stunt work, and they can probably cut costs on sets depending where they shoot (see above). The big expense will definitely be the bending effects. Water and earth are probably the hardest to get right without looking fake. (No pebble dancing!)

Personally, I would do a Last Airbender sequel, showing the early days of Republic City and Aang actually being the Avatar. Avoids the problem of child actors, and being in a city gives them an excuse to not have massive bending battles every episode because of property damage.

x3 I'd rather they give the job to some Asian American actors instead.

Harry Potter had loads of child actors too, and they did fine with it. Why couldn't this live action movie do it, too?

It's a series not a movie.

It cant ne that hard to find the Asian American version of Finn Wolfhard. I'm of the impression that Hollywoo is flush with people of all ages and ethnicities trying to prove their talent.

That's a really good point. That it would result in the people of Tibet being depicted as victims of a genocide by an imperialist conqueror is a great reason to change absolutely nothing.

...oh please Netflix, please find a great Tibetan kid actor for Aang (ang! Not ong!) and the other air nomads. Pretty pretty please.

Ong (played by Tom Holland).

Korra Kurai (played by Halle Berry). Kurai's mom (Bryce Dallas Howard) and Kurai's dad (Keanu Reeves). Tenzin (Patrick Stewart).

Joined by Asami (Dove Cameron), Mako (Lewis Tan), and Bolin (...Jim Carrey?).

Edited by Soble on Sep 19th 2018 at 7:11:39 AM

Regarding pacing- depending on how long the episodes are going to be, this TV series might not actually have the time allotment to do all of Season 1.

Edited by Gault on Sep 19th 2018 at 10:14:01 PM