The Last Airbender
M. Night Shyamalan’sThe Last Airbenderis a horrifying adaptation of Nickelodeon’sAvatar : The Last Airbender , but how much responsibleness for that really belongs to Shyamalan himself ? Landing in theatre of operations in the summer of 2010,The Last Airbenderwas pan off by practically anyone who laid eyes on it , with fan ofAvatarleft both shocked and heartbroken that the first big - screen take on the serial publication crashed and burned in such an abyssal way . Even a decade removed from its initial firing , The Last Airbenderremains highly derided byAvatarfans , general viewers , andAvatarcreators Bryan Konietzko and Michael DiMartino likewise .
Memories of the picture show ’s stupendous dashing hopes have of late been dredged up following the tidings of thedeparture of Konietzko and DiMartino from Netflix ’s in - growth live - action reboot ofAvatar . For the meter being , it remains to be seen exactly what led Konietzko and DiMartino to walk away from theAvatarreboot apart from canonical creative disagreement . However , with their antecedently much - hype interest in the project , much consternation has go up that the reboot could be repeating the very error that lead to the demise ofThe Last Airbender .
M. Night Shyamalan ’s reputation as a film producer deal an enormous hit from the disastrous reception toThe Last Airbender , and was further compound by the later failure of 2013’sAfter Earth . Nevertheless , Shyamalan ’s more recent employment , if not returning him to his glory daylight ofThe Sixth Sense , has at least been much more positively receive overall , with 2017’sSplitespecially marking a major comeback for him . Bearing Shyamalan ’s overall resurgence in mind , while the blame forThe Last Airbender ’s many failing tend to be placed at his feet as author and film director , a flavor back on how the motion picture was made offer much to argue that surprisingly small of what went wrong may have come out of decisions made by Shyamalan himself .
The Last Airbender Movie’s Biggest Problems
The Last Airbenderis as much of an embodiment of Murphy ’s Law as any moving-picture show has ever been , something made far more distressing by the fact that most of its biggest payoff were evitable . Long before it hit theaters , the flick was subject to a major backlash due to itswhite - washedprincipal cast , which was a problem that it patently could have well side - stepped . Beyond that , The Last Airbenderwas fell by a combining of a terrible script and natural action scenes that were a misfortunate reflexion of the element bending hear on the show .
In assay to capture the tarradiddle of the entire 20 sequence first season in 103 minute ( with credit ) , the tale , dialogue , and character development ofThe Last Airbenderall suffer , with the movie itself completely unable to register the kind of emotional encroachment and engaging humor that madeAvatarso democratic . To top it off , the picture utterly go wrong in play the bendingbased in various correction of martial artsseen in the show , lay out activeness scenes that are a downright laughable demarcation to those of the show . However , while the weakness ofThe Last Airbenderare absolved as day , it is deserving look back at the production itself to see just how the movie so catastrophically went off the rail .
What We Know About The Last Airbender’s Production
While the relative transience ofThe Last Airbender ’s runtime has been raised as a source of many of its proceeds , the motion-picture show also apparently had a gravid deal of footage trimmed prior to its release . By the same token , Shyamalan also apparently agreed to cut back down the much lengthy screenplay before yield . These would do enough damage to the film on their own , but then there ’s the infamous cast issues .
Since the release ofThe Last Airbender , rumors have come forth that Nicola Peltz ' throw asKataracame out of a folk favor from the producers , in twist head to Jackson Rathbone being cast as her sidekick Sokka , while Dev Patel ’s notoriety afterSlumdog Millionairebrought about his casting as Zuko , along with Indian actors for the quietus of the Fire Nation . Much less information is available as to how the bending of the movie end up being so frightening , though one adjustment from the show ’s canon could part explicate this . Specifically , in contrast to their portrayal onAvatar , firebenders in the movie largely can not demonstrate flames from their chi , requiring the reaching of Sozin ’s Comet for this ability to be available to all of them beyond the " gamey firebenders " , as explain byFire Lord Ozaiin the last panorama . In the end , with the soldiers of the Fire Nation only capable to rely on ambient flames while in battle , this did the movie ’s bending - based legal action scenes no favors .
Was Shyamalan Really Responsible For Last Airbender Being Bad?
While many of the reason behindThe Last Airbender ’s loser are shrouded in hearsay and rumour , it does seem to boil down to much more than Shyamalan ’s script and focal point . endeavor to distill the entire first time of year ’s story into such a short running time was foolhardy and likely born out of the studio apartment ’s desire to maximize the identification number of daily showings . While Shyamalan could theoretically have restructured the story to accommodate the unforesightful runtime , there ’s really no good way of life to grind away as much stuff as the first season hold into the time skeletal frame he had to figure out with .
That being said , there ’s only no apology for thebendingitself being as unsound as it is , peculiarly withAvatarproviding a perfect blueprint for the movements behind each element , and while this does n’t have as clear a video as the movie ’s other problems , limiting the capableness of firebenders undoubtedly contributed to it . When it derive to the clean - washed casting , this also could be an area where the inculpation falls to the producers rather than Shyamalan if the rumors behind it are lawful .
The Last Airbender ’s failure really come down to a perfect violent storm of factors in its penning , casting , visual essence , action scenes , and its all - around production . M. Night Shyamalanhas shouldered the bulk of the rap for the motion-picture show ’s innumerous issues since its doomed debut , and as author and director , he was surely behind plenty of originative decision . However , when see the train wreck ofThe Last Airbenderfrom begin to terminate , it ’s fair to say that there ’s plenty of blame to go around , and it is on the face of it an instance where the majority of it should not be give to the humans who posture in the director ’s chair .
NEXT : Why Netflix ’s Last Airbender Losing Avatar Creatives Is Such a Disaster
