• Wow... insulting and Anonymous. How... juvenile. Seriously, grow up. I'll say it again, the first half of the movie had some pacing issues, but overall I thought it wasn't bad. And again, it made my wife want to watch the cartoon, so for that alone it was worth it. We all knew the movie was going to be different from the cartoon. If you didn't, and expected it to be able to have everything that the cartoon did... well, who's the dumbass now?

• You dumbass the movie did absolutly no justice to a great cartoon series and if you think it did then your to stupid to relize the beautiful complexity of the cartoon

• I saw the movie, expecting to hate it because of the terrible reviews... I actually liked it. The pacing in the first half of the movie could have used some help, but it gets better as the movie goes on, and overall I thought it was pretty good. And I've seen the cartoon series at least 3 times straight through already. And as a HUGE added bonus, it got my wife hooked on the concept, so we went home and started watching the cartoon together from the beginning. For that alone this movie was 100% worth it to me. Just more proof to me that I should never read reviews, because reviewers suck, and it's always easier to write a bad review. Honestly, I think it all started with

• I really enjoyed the movie and so did my 3 children. I really don't understand what all the hate is about. I think he did a great job of telling the story from book one. I highly anticipate the sequel. As far as I'm concerned M. Night has done a great service to the cartoon series by this live action film. I recommend seeing it, and I also recommend staying away from critics. They all seem to suck these days unless its an artsy fartsy film.

• Zim of course was Konietzko and Martino's springboard into Avatar

• Every person I know who was violently defending this movie to death before it hit theaters are now currently posting suicidal journals filled with delicious fanrage. I called it. Feels incredibly good, bro.

• I have seen the hearts of a hundred people break. People dressed up for my midnight premier, damnit they did melodrama while we were waiting! All that effort to see Shamaleymoo rape a pretty awesome cartoon. The movie had NONE of the charm of the show, it was way too serious, and what little action there was was disappointing at best. The majority of the bending was a tai chi lesson, there was no good kung fu, or any significant bending. The worst part is that somebody is going to give him the money to do the next two books. You know it's going to happen.

• Yes, I know. I read this blog too remember? But I would be very concerned about it actually getting made if this becomes the poison it looks to be.

• I can't wait for RedMediaLetter to review this. After his two Star Wars reviews, this should be a piece of cake for him . . . if he can put down those pizza rolls long enough. ><

• "show me a butchered kids scene in [American] cartoons and i'll concede defeat." OK. Here's kid-butchering in SOUTH PARK: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbKlwD3JyIM

• No, they act like Indo-Chinese people, they share similarities to hillbillies, but so do people from the Kansai region of Japan. They were a lot more like the Vietnamese and Cambodians than Americans. Not to mention that the creators specifically gave Shyamalan an ethnicity sheet for the show, and Shyamalan put "looking for Caucasians or other ethnicity for the cast." The only other people he cast in real roles were people of his own race. Is Shyamalan a Glenn Beck level racist, probably not, but was it incredibly racist to ignore the Asian people in favor of white people and his own ethnicity, hell yes it was.

• Saying this movie is shitty, is like saying rape isn't that bad. We need to invent a new swear, just to describe this film. I would rather pay $100 to kicked in the balls by every player in the World Cup, than spend $10 on this film.

• Congratulations on being a 'published reviewer'. I find it hilarious that, as a reviewer, you are basically suggesting that we should not listen to reviewers when films are almost universally reviled. The fact that you are not only clearly in the vast minority but also liked Lady in the Water, however, makes me suspect that your 'taste' is suspect. Also, the fact that you are published is not that impressive in light of the fact that paper is a hell of a lot cheaper than celluloid and we all know the garbage that gets printed on the latter.

• I have no intention of giving this film my support, nor of taking a $30 chance that this movie may be super when almost all reviewers say it's crap. In fact, I'm glad it's terrible rather than just okay, as this will hopefully distance it further from the original show. You know, I think M. Night may have actually sacrificed himself for the sake of Avatar fans - rather than just kowtow to Hollywood's demands on the film, maybe he played along but secretly sabatoged the effort by making it as bad as possible. Perhaps we should be thanking him for saving the rest of the Avatar series from live-action mediocrity, because there's just no-ass way we're going to see this shit continued (right?). Maybe it's better off being kept on ice for a 100 years, and then we can thaw it out and try all over again. Meanwhile, I think as punishment for their crimes, the parties responsible for this mess should be hauled down to the CW network and forced to create a teen drama series based on the season 3 episode, "The Beach". Or, as Mai says, "Whatever."

• Ooh, split infinitive. Sorry.

• Oh, Jet was there. He was the extremely cheerful fellow with the bendy-straw sticking out of his mouth, that everyone was calling "Jaht".

• Feel free to now call him "M. Not".

• And the acting was better. Yip! Yip!!!

• Indeed. The Ember Island Players have this catastrophe beat by a mile. Perhaps M. Night shoulda cast a bald chick as Aang, or put Zuko's scar on the wrong side of his face. Jesus, now I'm tear-bending!

• MNS also doesn't have a standing challenge to all of his critics to meet him in the boxing ring.Ask Lowtax how taking Boll up on that offer worked out. Uwe Boll is a shitty, violent person who makes shitty, violent movies.

• In case you don't believe everyone saying it's terrible (and it is), just imagine how painful it will be to hear everyone calling Aang "Ahng". They even call him the "Ahvatar". If you can't pronounce the name of the main character correctly, you have no business making that movie. Fuck you M. Night.

• I take back every thing I ever said in defense of this movie. It's as bad or possibly even worse than Transformers 2. It plays out like watching 75 minutes of "Previously on Avatar:" and you never once care about any of the characters. The exposition is the worst I've ever seen, and the voice over was painful. Everything about this movie was horrible. There is no redeeming value. I went because I couldn't believe that anything Avatar could be as bad as Rotten Tomatoes was implying. I love the series, and still stand by my claim that it's the best animated series of the last ten years. But the movie was a travesty I would never have believed had I not seen it with my own eyes. That was most likely the biggest movie let down of my life.

• I should also add that the theatre I went to was sold out, and the audience seemed to enjoy the movie (except for the two kids behind me), and even laughed at the weak attempts at humour. Now this could be because it's Canada Day and 31 celcius here (38 with the humidex), so people have the day off but are reluctant to go outside for the celebrations. It's also the first night for the movie. I'm not really sure how it's going to do financially. Then again, I'm not sure how I want it to do. As bad as the movie was, there were moments where I was reminded how good the cartoon was, and how amazing this movie could have been. I'd say my ideal scenario at this point would be for it to do well enough that they want to make the next two, but Shyamalan can't do them due to scheduling problems or something, and they end up giving them to a better director.

• I felt so bad about dragging my long time friend with me to see this. I had planned on asking him out over dinner, but this just absolutely killed the mood.

• I saw it tonight. It wasn't good. First off, I couldn't find a theatre playing it in 2D, and there isn't a single 3D effect in the damn movie. This felt like extortion to me. The 3D effect only served to make some scenes be blurry. The dialogue is awful. It exists only to relate exposition, and often without any context. There is almost no character-building done in this movie. Writing 101 says that when you start a line of dialogue with "As you know...", you are setting up for a cumbersome info dump, and this should be avoided. This happens several times in this flick. The plot is a haphazard mess. Clumsy voice-overs are used to bridge scenes that make little sense on their own, or to fill in gaps right in the middle of a scene. Flashbacks are used in the wrong places, and are usually silent. The movie is a prime example of telling instead of showing. The naration could easily be covered with visual clues and character-building dialogue, or proper flashbacks. The editing is incomprehensible. Some scenes have no setup at all, and are totally confusing (this coming from an avid fan of the cartoon, who knows the story. I can only imagine the confusion of newcomers). The acting is wooden, but is far from the worst part of the movie. I actually think it could have been serviceable in the hands of a better director. As far as the ethnicities are concerned, the Southern Water Tribe seemed to be entirely inuit, except for Sokka, Katara, and their grandma. The Northern Water Tribe was all caucasian. The Earth Kingdom was thoroughly Chinese, while the Fire Nation was Indian. The Air Nomads were a mixture. Appa and Momo are barely in the movie. Fire Lord Ozai is basically a talking piece of scenery. Visually the movie was quite good. The sets, locations, special effects, costumes -- all were well done and pretty accurate to the cartoon. The bending used the same martial arts as the cartoon. The fight scenes were solid, though kind of sparse. Ultimately, it was like they gave a 280 million dollar budget and a solid special effects team to a high-school A/V club and drama class and told them to make a movie. Since M. Night Shyamalan took credit as writer, producer, and director, I'd say it all falls squarely on his shoulders.

• The U.S. isn't at war with any countries in South Asia ("India" area, as you call it.)

• They would not have had time for all of that in a movie, unless it was going to be nearly 3 hours long.

• I just saw the film, and if there are any landmarks from our world I completely missed them.

• When you watch this movie you will be in awe at how the comedy parts fall flat, how the actor who plays the last airbender looks like he has never seriously acted in his life, how certain shots are out of place because they only exist in the movie to be used in the trailer, and on and on. Did I mention almost every character from the cartoon has been soullessly distorted by the casting? This fiasco reminds me one of the later episodes when Aang and friends see an opera about the last airbender with all the events jumbled around and the actors playing them done wrong...

• The air bending style is based on ba gua wich was invented in china in the early 1800's not Tibet. It is also important to note that even though the world of avatar is heavily influenced by Asian culture, no where in the series does it explicitly state a real world ethnicity for any of the characters. A good example is the equatorial water bender's who tend to act like the American hillbilly.

• show me a butchered kids scene in cartoons and i'll concede defeat. here's the link again for reference: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fL_ay0F5qcs

• In other news, FWIW TLA is at 51% for Community reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. Still iffy on actually seeing it in theater. Despicable Me is sitting at 100% Fresh with 5 reviews in so far. I know what the family is doing next weekend!

• Add "Where the fuck is Jet?" to that list, seeing as it was his brainwashing in the second season which uncovered the Dai Li's plots.

• I'd like to add CORALINE, CORPSE BRIDE and the Canadian ROCK & RULE to this list.

• rickicker, please give Disney artists more credit. I think they've delivered much more variety in death than falls from a great height. - gassed an unwanted dog in LADY & THE TRAMP - showed the rat's corpse on-screen in LADY & THE TRAMP - showed a father's corpse on-screen in THE LION KING - had hyenas tear Scar apart in LION KING - shot Bambi's mom - impaled Ursula in LITTLE MERMAID - incinerated Shan-Yu in MULAN - hangs Clayton in TARZAN - sucked Syndrome into a jet engine in THE INCREDIBLES - stabbed Maleficent through the heart in SLEEPING BEAUTY - had Ratigan's minion eaten alive in GREAT MOUSE DETECTIVE - shot Kocoum in POCAHONTAS - dragged Dr. Facilier off to Hell in PRINCESS AND THE FROG - skinned Oogie-Boogie in NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS

• "...But maybe I'm rationalizing merely to hope beyond hope that this thing is better than indicated so far...." It's not. The thing is, other getting the basics of the show right (and I mean the very basics, like Aang's sex) and tossing in a few nods to the fans, he didn't get anything right. All the little things that made the show what it was were pissed away or shit on. Leaving out Suki, Bumi, Teo, and/or any other recognizable Earth Kingdom character is just the start.

• The Venture Brothers is another sterling example also. Even the ones that don't depict the deaths graphically on-screen, many of them still portray them in some way to pass by the censors while still packing th' same amount of emotional gravitas. Paul Dini and Bruce Timm's various tv shows and films from 'Batman' through 'Justice League Unlimited' for one [incl. the death of Dan Turpin who was modeled on th' Superman show after the then-recently departed Jack Kirby]. 'Roughnecks the Starship Troopers chronicles' won Emmys for depicting the death of numerous human marines/pilots in episodes incl. a couple of the main characters later on. 'He-Man and the Masters of the Universe' [2002-2003 ver.] also had stuff like King Hiss devouring Zodak's brother [shown in shadows], etc... then there's that whole Smurf Civil War of 1846....

• I'm Indian... just FYI that's a load of shit. Indians are called South Asians (along with Pakistanis and Bangladeshis, who for all intents and purposes are the same race with political divisions)... hence we are Asian... and on documents and forms we write that we're "Asian Americans"... so I don't understand how the hell you can say we're not Asian.

• I'm going to take a moment to defend Ebert here, since it seems the moment he's mentioned every fucking person that reads this site jumps out to discredit or make fun of him. Firstly, a movie critic's job, in its simplest terms, is to critique a film. There are two types of critics: populist and elitist. Populist critics review with the general public in mind, watching the movie as how they assume the layperson would, and then reviewing the picture from that standpoint. Most movie critics fall into this category. Elitist critics review films in terms of stylistic choices, cinematography, etc, and they don't give a fuck what the general public thinks because because they're really not reviewing, they're critiquing. They judge films based on film history, film style, film influences, etc, etc. Roger Ebert has mostly been a populist reviewer, although he's written elitist critiques for his essay collections and books. The man can do both, and he's respected amongst his peers for his vast knowledge of film history and style, and because he's a tremendously good writer. Reviewing and critiquing are both just versions of opinion writing, and the best opinion pieces are the ones that can convince or convert the reader. Ebert was and has been always very good at this. Certainly no reviewer is right about a movie every time, and certainly not everyone will agree with a reviewer's decisions, but to discredit or call Ebert senile because his opinions on certain movies differ from others is just plain juvenile. Ebert's feelings about movies haven't changed much over the years--he's always made his decisions based more on how the movie made him feel, or how imaginative the visuals are, than on how perfectly thought out the storylines are. Nothing's changed. I'm sure he'd review The Golden Compass much the same way he did in 2007, if it came out 25 years ago. Not that Ebert hasn't been wrong about movies before. Ebert has always had a tendency to give more mediocre movies a chance. The 3-star review usually means he didn't hate the movie, but the 2-star review is generally bad news. So for a reviewer who generally gives mediocre movies a pass to review a movie and give only a half-star, there must've been something awfully bad about that film. Certainly, this means that Ebert might very often be wrong about a movie here and there. But it's refreshing to have a movie critic who doesn't hate everything that gets released (like the guys at Slant Magazine), because...well, I'll just leave this quote as the reasoning behind my views on the role of a critic. <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0382932/quotes?qt0465220 ">http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0382932/quotes?qt0465220</a>

• I just want to point it out a Cancer victim thinks the film is "an agonizing experience". That's...discouraging.

• Yep, but, she and the others were cut out of the movie though.

• Sorry bub- I'm a published critic, and that's my review above. By the way, I also really liked Lady in the Water. So there.

• That's not my point- i just found it a little absurd that there are a hundred comments condemning the film before they've actually seen it. For what it's worth, here's the review I wrote: Like a lot of American Sci-Fi/ Fantasy fans, I have something of a love/hate relationship with Japan's Anime industry. One of the first examples of this animated genre that I saw was Akira, which was mind-blowingly awesome…and unfortunately probably the best anime movie out there. The result of the sheer popularity of the genre over here has resulted in a massive number of ever-crappier movies and series purpose-built for overseas-consumption (and we're not even going to mention the whole Hentai sub-genre). Having watched a few episodes of the animated version of Avatar: The Last Airbender, I found it to be a high quality series, with good animation and cool if sporadic action scenes. I remember thinking "Not bad, if I had the time to sit through four seasons of episodes…" and going back to my daily habit of waiting for Hollywood to write a Sci-Fi or Horror film that wasn't based on a video game (actually, I do a disservice to games- many today have a far more interesting script than most movies). It was a bit of a surprise to hear that a big-budget live action version was in the works, but what the hey…until it was confirmed that the director would be M. Night "he of the twist ending that seems kind-of stupid generally" Shyamalan. As Spock would say, "fastinating…". After hacking off the "Avatar" bit of the title to avoid pissing of James Cameron, and casting Noah Ringer, a martial arts kid from Texas as the main character Aang (who is clearly Asian in the animated version), most of Japan is probably not gonna like this version (and after the abomination that was the American version of Godzilla, who can blame them). As for the intended American audience…well, the action scenes are well done, the CGI effects actually look good occasionally, and it's got a 3D version, which all the major studios seem to think equals box office bucks (it doesn't actually do that at all, but I'll talk about that later). Despite complaints that the plot is over-complicated, it's really pretty simple: in a world that is divided into four tribes (each representing one of the four elements), brother and sister Sokka and Katara find a young boy frozen in the ice. After reviving him and his giant flying Sky Bison, the two discover that the boy, Aang, is the last of the Avatars, individuals who wielded the power of all four elements and act to keep the different groups from fighting each other. Unfortunately, Aang balked at the last second before being named the Avatar, ran off and spent 100 years frozen and lost to the world. With no Avatar to stop them, the Fire Nation attacked and dominated the other tribes, forbidding them to use their "bending" powers, and destroyed the Air tribe, since the next Avatar was to have come from them. Since Aang ran away before he officially became Avatar, he can only bend air, and with the help of Sokka and his water-bending sister, he must first learn the other three bending styles before…okay, okay, maybe it IS a little convoluted, but you don't really have to know all this to enjoy the film. As for the 3D aspect, like all 3D films, it's sometimes kinda cool, and other times annoying. Also, if you happen to already wear glasses like me, don't even bother: you spend half the film trying to keep both pairs in the right spot to see anything. Over all, the action is fun but not bloody, Ringer does a good job as Aang (if you have young boys, they WILL be jumping around and karate-chopping things on your way out of the theater), and Shamalama-ding-dong even gets to throw in a little bit of a twist at the ending, which also would seem to guarantee a sequel, and soon (child actors can age rather quickly- just ask the writers of "Lost"). ( PG ) Rating: 3

• FFS, while Asia does not exist in the world of Avatar there is an obvious hint of various cultural aspects in the kingdoms. Your argument of "hurr durr you guys think that any character from an anime must be asian" is ridiculous I don't watch Hellsing and think "Well damn, I never knew the Japanese were Nazis"

• "The picture drags along the ground like a fresh corpse, treating its own myth as homework and the participants as burdens, while feeling around a fantastically wasted world of weathered environments and ornate set design." --------------------- ...The cynical symbolism in that quote makes me wonder whether or not the reviewers were just bored by the movie being overloaded with representations of all the technical aspects of the Avatar mythos, to the point where it made the story progression too tedious. ...Kind of in a similar way to how Watchmen was panned by many critics --who either weren't familiar enough with the source material or else didn't care-- because in many ways it tried to stay so close to the source, from a technical perspective, that the pacing got a bit dodgy in places. Even when you try to respect the source material as much as possible (which is always a good thing), you can't get so dogmatic about it that you sacrifice decent story pacing. It's still a movie, after all. ...But maybe I'm rationalizing merely to hope beyond hope that this thing is better than indicated so far....

• Well, this confirms what I already feared. Doesn't make it any more annoying.

• Urge to kill..... rising.....

• Sorry, I misread your post. Apparently we were saying the same thing. My bad!

• If you can honestly say you've never liked any of M. Night Shyamalan's movies, then, as I said, that's a matter of taste. You simply don't like his style, and that's fine. But he's been a more-than-qualified director for the bulk of his career, despite what you may think of the finished product (especially after Signs).

• Indians and Pakistanis are considered South Asian. Japanese, Chinese, Koreans are East Asians. Thai, Cambodia, etc. are Southeast Asians. All Asians.

• Let me add in The Maxx and Aeon Flux. Sure is great that all anime is nothing but sex, gore, and inappropriate-for-children content, and all western cartoons are animated rainbows. Once again, god damn anime fans.

• Wow. If only he had the same respect for video games. He's on record for saying "video games are not art," when there are quite a few examples to the contrary (e.g. BioShock, Portal, anything Bioware does or some of the better Final Fantasy games).

• Nick's made some really 'interesting' choices in the past too. A perfect example is Invader Zim. Don't get me wrong, it was awesome, it was glorious, it shouldn't exist. I mean seriously who thought it was a good idea to give kid show to the man who penned "Johnny the Homocidal Maniac"? It worked, but they must figure they can do no wrong now.

• Well the New York Times just ripped it to shreds so I guess I'll agree with the rest...I just wasn't going to flip out over 12 reviews, but 13 reviews? Yeah it sucks... Sorry my son, we might not go see this one...Talk about flip flopping <-----------ME

• The insanely awful Howard the Duck film has been the bane of my existence since childhood. My first name is Howard (though I've never gone by it), and I went through grade school with kids singing that terrible song at the end of that movie right in my face. That's how bad the movie is - cruel children actually hurled it as an insult. When I close my eyes I can still hear the torturous sounds...."Howard...THE DUCK" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVb2xZn2gqY

• Slides Heavy Metal and the Bashki movies towards rickicker. Sweeping generalizations, gotta love them!

• My expectations of the film were already low enough, now it's just a test in how much I can still be disappointed. And I still wouldn't have minded most of the actors being white, as long as they were the best actors for the job. But if it's true that they suck, then I don't see why they couldn't have just gotten bad actors of varying races.

• This movie is still going to make a decent amount of money because: 1) It's 3D. Even if it is just "slap it on in post" 3D, the additional income will boost the movie's earnings by turning a $7 ticket into a $10 ticket. 2) All the kids will want to see it. Try telling your kid that "Phil Villarreal panned this movie, and he's the critic that I trust. So, we ain't going." Any parent will tell you that part of parenting is watching terrible cinema, so, "you is going." 3) M. Night Shamalingus movies always make money. Except for Lady in the Water, all of his films have made their budget back, plus a little (or a lot) extra. He'll make the studio some money, and they'll give him more money. But had already has three projects on the docket, according to imdbPro.

• This is one of the few cartoons of this style that I enjoy. I have a feeling this was meant to be the first movie and that's why he spent so much time on they mythology. Personally, I enjoy that type of stuff. This will probably be one of those movies that everyone hates but I love.

• ...But Suki was on the posters?

• Mmmm...I'm not going to disagree with this. I actually think his pacing and such is pretty good. Is he Steven Spielberg? No, but he's not as bad as Michael Bay. Someone really does need to take away his pen though. His scripts are awful.

• Whelp, looks like my 'Please don't suck' mantra has failed...time for that drink. Then another...and maybe pick up a case when I go home.

• Hhmm, after seeing how serious Ahhng is in the movie trailors, I suspect perhaps he's just late for his ahhhngst class. ><

• My wushu (Chinese martial arts) club is doing a demo to promote this film at a local theater. A lot of us don't really want to support this film because we all love the original cartoon, and we practice the martial arts that inspired the series, but we all pretty much realized that this film is going to crash and burn whether we demo or not. Also, we are going to be the only people even remotely Asian in that theater. 9_9 I'm just hoping that I don't start yelling angrily in the middle of the film this weekend. If you want to see a good martial arts film with young children defying odds and where Asians actually have reading roles, I suggest watching the new Karate Kid.

• "Meeting them wasn't that important the next book is Earth, thats a whole lotta movie to meet the Kyoshi warriors." Not gonna happen. If a sequel gets made you will be lucky to see Toph, Mai, Ty Lee, and the guru. No way is he bringing in the Kiyoshi warriors on top of all that.

• Add "Where the fuck is Bumi?", to that list.

• oh, and nick cage somewhere in there. seriously, it's just about the only performance other than face/off that didn't make me cringe when he's onscreen.

• if shyamalan start doing thundercats, imma kill somebody

• The movie wasn't identical, but the plot was the same. Aang going to the Northern water temple to learn water bending. He didn't get captured at the N. Air temple but he was attacked, i didn't think it a tragedy for them to simply get him caught in that same instant. Making Katara and Sokka sick for aang to get captured going to the herbalists institute, then get the remedy woulda just dragged the movie out. I can see where they are going with the talking dragon as the dragons are the fire masters and Roku was the avatar from the fire nation. Meeting them wasn't that important the next book is Earth, thats a whole lotta movie to meet the Kyoshi warriors.

• so...it has come to this then. is it too early, or can i say now that nothing good came from tacking the name "Avatar" to your movie projects? even if you did change one to "The Last Airbender"? is this a curse? are we stuck in the twilight zone? if so, can i be that kid that kills people with his mind? i wanna kill somebody whose initials starts with "M." and ends with "Shyamalan"

• Last Airbender is terrible. Not in that "well, it IS meant for kids" sort of way either. Because even children are able to see how horrid this is and there's no excusing it. M. Night is not a joke, because jokes are funny. Visually a great movie, dialogue is terrible. Dev Patel is the only thing acting in this entire movie. Hyper pronounced names like "aah-ng" and "soh-kuh" are subject to even Chekov saying "That is just Vrong". This movie was all promise but no delivery. M. Night just didn't get the source material. It's the God of War 3 of movie adaptations. Successive fan lobs tenuously tying together a story which is only barely what we all originally saw. Ebert ... See Morewas right too, the benders in this movie are props, no soul at all. The formula of this movie was a matter of episodes in the first season. Decisions of what to cut and what not to cut. Here's something, maybe you should've cut the fire lord as he's supposed to be a somewhat ominous force throughout the series. Kiyoshi Warriors? Cut. But let's show the Kiyoshi statue for no reason. The Blue Spirit? Keep, but don't convey the personal conflict that represents for Zuko. ACTUAL FIREBENDING? CUT. Make it so that firebenders can only bend if there's actual fire present, thus rendering them the equivalent to Marvel's Pyro. Admiral Zhao? Keep, but make him a whiny brown-nosing cock bite who can't stop not only talking in an aspergers like fashion about people's shortcomings but about the spiritual war-crime he's so keen to committing. Azula? Keep, but make sure that even in the 30 seconds she's on screen, her trademark megalomaniacal sneer looks more like she's having a STROKE. This movie in the first half hour moved like a mile long trainwreck. Inaccessible to people who've never seen the series and a struggle to keep from leaving the theatre for those who have. Within this first half hour, you learn that Sokka and Kitara's mom is dead and that Aang ran from his duty as the Avatar thus rendering both of those points COMPLETELY WEIGHTLESS and POINTLESS. And Aang's personal conflict (because he HAS TO HAVE ONE NOW) is that since he abandoned his duty and left the Air nomads to die he's suffering from DENIAL, which is keeping him from bending water properly. Those familiar with the series know this conflict actually exists because when first attempting firebending, he burns Kitara due to his impatience in progressing on a set and slow path to understand the art. So what do I really have to say at the end of all this? I was in a theatre full of people my age and saw maybe a handful of kids. The creators of this series knew what they were doing after six or so episodes. They figured out what Pixar knew all along. Which was that kids don't care about dialogue and are only following the story on the fringes, therefore entertain the adults those kids are forcing to watch and in that, they succeeded. This movie however is a "WHAT IF". What if, instead of creating a compelling story that kids couldn't care less about, we keep it dumb. We forget about storytelling, make it pretty and pander to the fans to try and keep them happy? Well, this is what happens people. M. Night is officially the new Uwe Boll with this one and as sad as it makes me to say so, because such potential exists in the Avatar franchise, I hope that this movie and any potential sequels will fade quietly into the night, along with Night himself.

• Remind me which episode in which "Old Man in Temple" trapped the gaang in the Northern Air Temple in place of Teo and his hang-gliding crew? And in which episode did Aang get guided by a fucking talking dragon? Where the fuck was Roku? Where the fuck were the Kyoshi Warriors? They were pretty fucking important because Azula used their armor & makeup to infiltrate Ba Sing Se.

• Sorry; I meant to say "animation", but I was too busy listening to Imogen Heap to notice that I'd typed "anime" instead. Forgive me.

• The entire movie followed book one of Avatar...how did it not match up with the animated series? I think it skipped some things here and there but all things that weren't overly needed for the storyline, save the meeting with avatar Roku on Winter Solstice.

• you mean like doraemon? or anpanman? or maybe chibi maruko-chan? how about wonder bevil, zororin, the whole sanrio gang's fling with anime in their hello kitty shows, keroro gunso, or a plethora other i shouldn't mention because it takes up too much space? i'm quite aware of what broad range anime has, which is why i mentioned "among many other" in my reasoning. you would never see a simple coming-of-age story in american cartoons. how about massive tragedies, like "Bokurano"? or maybe a clusterfuck of just about anything goes like "Fooly Cooly"? or some romance and everyday life like in "Honey & Clover"? i'm just saying that these are the things that makes anime differs greatly from american cartoons: they are not aimed specifically for children, they cover a much broader range than a simple "O HAY LOOK AT THIS AWESOMENESS!" formula, and they are diverse because (believe it or not) most japanese couldn't read the newspaper until they're way over high school and learned the proper kanji.

• Nice strawman you got there.

• "B) It stayed true to the animated series!" We clearly did not see the same animated series, and or movie. I thought the movie was godawful, and a blight upon the animated series.

• holy crap. so dune really is on at 3:10 on one of the encore channels. fuck me, i'm gonna watch it, i know i am

• Ok, so i took a big gamble and saw The Last Airbender at midnight. It surprised me because A) OMG its sooooooooo goooooood! and B) It stayed true to the animated series! So the only reason this movie would fail is b/c its opening the same weekend as Eclipse. On another note my only complaints are the way they pronounced aang and sokka. Its not ung n suka....and also that Sokka could have almost been completely taken out as a main character, aside from his first 5 minutes on screen he wasn't really living up to his animated counterpart.

• omg this is my favorite review from the chicago trib.. Not since Kyle MacLachlan's whispered voice-overs about the worm and the spice and the worm IS the spice in Dune has a fantasy franchise tripped all over itself trying, simply, to please a fan base while creating a new one. i read all of the dune series every few years and that movie made me cry. it was one of my 1st "they fucked up a book i love" moments. its like i've come full circle to have this compared to dune. as an aside i have to say what bugged me most in dune was when piter the harkonnen mentat insisted on doing weird hand signals when he does his "go quietly" speech to feyd and raban. i have seen the movie more times than i would like to admit because i'm an insomniac and its always on at 3am but i yell at the screen every time that scene comes on.

• being as most american animation is made for children, they generally don't. however Rickicker is also wrong the japanese have cartoons(thats right cartoons) that are just as safe for children

• I like the part where you act like American cartoons never involve any kind of death and whatnot. God damn anime fans.

• instead of pronouncing it "ang" that rhymes with tang it is now ahhhng it rhymes with pong.

• while i agree with you in all of your points, i disagree on #2: aang's romp through tvland is not an anime. it's an american cartoon. now before you go "OMG STFU YOU NAZI ITS ALL CARTOON WHATS THE DIFF?!", i'll point out one, among many other, evidence on 'what's the diff': american cartoon would never have the balls to show anyone die. they just 'fall off a crevice to an uncertain fate', or some other convenient plot devices. animes, on the other hand, do. not even children are safe, as shown in "Violence Jack" right here (note: don't watch if you don't like having your soul crushed): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fL_ay0F5qcs

• they changed the pronunciation? To what?

• This is hilarious. How did people actually think that this was NOT going to fail? Let's count the flaws, shall we? 1) M. Night "Twisty McPast-his-Prime" Shyamalan hasn't made a halfway decent movie since Unbreakable and let's be honest, that's giving a lot of credit where it isn't due. I'm a giver and my mother always said, "If you can't say anything nice, lie." This guy has basically churned out a decade of crappy flicks and, by the grace of Vishnu, he is STILL making movies. Uwe Boll, move over, Shammy has usurped your throne of jackassery. 2) White actors portraying Mainland Asian character from a Japanese anime. Just...this. Flabbergasted. 3) OMGTHREEDEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!! Any movie that tacks on 3D after 2D filming has wrapped immediately renders itself as a gimmick flick with no real substance, i.e. Clash of the Titans. Holy hell, seeing Sam Worthington in the glory of the third dimension completely negated the wooden acting and complete disregard for Greek Mythology. When I saw that scorpion stinger come out of the screen, I was like "WHOA!" and then I peed a little. 4) Movie studios' complete lack of attention and disregard for the past year. Did they learn absolutely nothing from Dragon Ball? Anime and video games do not translate to the silver screen people. Stop it. I wish someone would roll up a newspaper and collectively swat Hollywood on the snout for peeing on the rug.

• m knight makes a point of calling himself Asian in every interview i've seen. merely belonging to the continent does not make him asian. his only link to the continent is genetic [yeah and he was born there but was raised in america] and even then lets face it. ASIA the continent is huge and being indian dosnt make you asian... it makes you indian. thats like saying an Israeli is asian because that country is part of asia too. AND LET ME TELL YOU, WE DONT SERVE DIM SUM AT MY PASSOVER SEDERS. the man isnt asian

• America "finally" gets a decent anime series? Where were you in the '90s?

• Apparently, you really do see destroyed landmarks from our era in this film. It's not Ebert just pulling that out of his ass, that really happens in the film. What a twist! That's been done to death a thousand fucking times....

• i watched a 30 minute "special" on nickelodeon today and what offended me the most was not the crappy acting [that was evident in every clip], the non ethnic actors, or the smugness of mr. shamalamadingdong. THEY CHANGED THE PRONUNCIATION OF AANG!!!!! they flat out said that the cartoon THE SOURCE MATERIAL had it wrong and since m knight is such a huge fan off all things asian he felt it necessary to correct the pronunciation of his name and some others. WTF??? they can cast a white kid in the role but his name has to be said authentically? i was optimistic until today. i planned on shelling out the $36 for me and the kids to go see it in 3D but now even my son says he wants watch it online so when he hates it he can stop watching and not feel guilty. we're gonna go see despicable me instead.

• Wow, I haven't seen it, but I thought that M. Night might have had a watchable movie by going totally genre. "The Sixth Sense" was great -- but only on the 1st viewing, which is weird -- but from there, I believe every one of his movies has been worse than the one before. Hard to believe he can still get funding.

• There's some redundancy in the tags, Failure and M. Night Shyamalan are the same thing.

• He doesn't commend Pattinson's acting. He said that "the actors are well-chosen," in that they look good on camera (which was all they needed to do, given the source material is crap). You didn't read his review very closely. And two-and-a-half stars is a negative review from Ebert. He didn't like Twilight, and even recommended his readers to watch other vampire movies instead. Yeah, Twilight probably deserved a lower rating, like the scores he gave Twilight's sequels, but he justifies his verdict in the review well enoug. And he was correct to give Kick-Ass a poor review; that movie sucked ass.

• God, I just want to grab you and make out with you for correcting that poster so that I didn't have to do it. Their argument gets used all the time and it's freaking stupid. *hugs*

• Actually, and you have no idea how much it pains me to admit this, Uwe Boll's Rampage was actually pretty good.

• you're right! plust their 3D effects were actual 3D

• dude, WTF are you smoking? cause it's really really really good.

• And it would still be about $15 million more than Serenity made in it's entire US release: *Domestic Total Gross: $25,514,517* My point was that box office numbers don't make a quality movie, and vice verse. Just look at Bayformers.

• Oh, well if that's M Night's twist on the story then fuck him. Because that is just balls.

• The thing that makes me laugh most is that they made the evil Fire Nation into Middle Eastern and Indians. You know, not like we're actually at war with counties in the Middle East and India area. Oh wait.. WE ARE. And no lights went off in the heads of the people making this movie that there -might- be some problems with making the Middle Easterners the bad guys again? Hell, at least 300 did it knowingly and was at least somewhat based on actual history of the story they (over stylistically) adapted.

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