#Live Action Avatar the Last Airbender

[wilcze-kudly]

So um. I genuinely don't have many thoughts on the live action atla. It looks fine.. i guess

Except. Zuko's scar.

It's so... underwhelming. Like yeah it's there. It's red and it has a little bit of texture. But I guess i was hoping the live action would make it a little more prominent.

Like I'm a burn victim myself, who very much went through a similar struggle Zuko did. Where i felt like my scars define me. This. This feels not like what i hoped for. They even let him keep his eyebrow 😤

And I'm hoping that it's just because it wasn't practical to go all out with it. Like it was too expensive to put full prosthetics and special effects on such a young actor for every shoot.

But i have this sinking feeling in my gut that its because he's 'meant to be attractive'. Or even more heartbreakingly, that making it bigger would be considered too 'gory' or 'body horror'.

And im just tired of seeing scars and other 'deformities' as being seen as something to only be shown in full capacity in horror movies. That it would be too visceral or too 'gross' to fully show. It reinforces the idea that people like Zuko, people like me have something inherently disgusting and ugly about us. That our features have to be toned down in order to be palatable to a wider audience.

I remember seeing Zuko for the first time as a kid and seeing a part of myself that was rarely represented. I was bullied for my skin grafts as a child. Of course i was, kids are cruel. But seeing Zuko go through the struggles i went through and to have him find people who didn't treat him differently was so important to me. Like to me, that part of his story was arguably more important than his redemption arc.

And seeing Zuko seen as attractive by people in the fandom was also a profound experience. Because it felt like i could too exist in my full burnt chicken nugget glory and still be treated as a full person. Not looked at with pity or disgust.

So that's why live action Zuko's scar is such a disappointment to me.

I have other thoughts on the atla remake but really, they don't matter that much, since i don't think ill be watching it

[prideprejudce]

one thing I will say is that I like the costumes and how they are sourced faithfully off the cartoons costumes

i mean let’s just remember where we started

to how its going now

[doyouevenshipbr0]

examples of atla live action’s attempts to be more feminist and how they actually had the opposite effect and/or hurt the integrity of the show

already talked about katara and pakku. does not make sense that she did not have a master. point blank. just because something sounds empowering (ie katara saying “yes. and ur looking at her.” after zuko asked if she found a master) doesn’t mean it automatically is. there still needs to be logic and katara “being her own master” defies logic imo im sorry!

katara in general. she has no ferocity here which to be very honest i dont think is fully the writers’ fault. some of the blame goes on them but the actress for katara just delivered alllllll of her lines w the same exact mild tone. katara is overly motherly. she is bossy. she is passionate. she is nurturing. she is emotional. THERE IS POWER IN THESE THINGS!!!!! why would we take away her spark?!?!?!

i loved live action suki. however, i LOVE the line in the original when her and sokka part ways and sokka says “i treated u like a girl when i should’ve treated u like a warrior.” and suki says “i am a warrior” *kisses sokka on the cheek* “but im a girl too.” THAT LINE WAS SO PERFECT like lemme say it again there is POWER IN FEMININITY! there is no shame in that!!!!! why does this show wanna take that away so badly. at one point live action suki says something like “im not just a warrior, im a kiyoshi warrior” and before she parts ways w sokka she thanks him for showing her some of the world or something like that. which was fine but i just love the simplicity of the original. a girl can be a warrior and have a crush. why do we have to change that?

this is a small one and it doesnt REALLY matter, but i cant help but think they changed this to be more “feminist” which is just dumb. yue isnt betrothed? well she was but she broke it off? and hahn (her ex) isnt a huge dick? i mean it wasn’t the worst thing and i didnt really mind it but i was just kinda like ?????. feel like yue being betrothed tied into her sense of responsibility and foreshadowed the sacrifices she will make for her people. so. feels rly weird that they changed it. i think it was to show more women agency which is always cool. but in the original, yue finally gets her agency by becoming the moon spirit. that should be the end of her character arc. idk. a weird change that seemed unnecessary.

sokka not being sexist. honestly i think the live action did a good job at omitting this while not REALLY making it feel like something was missing. with that being said, something was still missing lol. once again, its apart of sokka’s character. i feel like everyone has already expressed their hate for this so ill just leave it at that.

i am a TAD indifferent on the women of the northern tribe joining the forces during the fight. on one hand i cant lie i smiled bc obviously i love water bending and i love women so there was definitely apart of me that was happy to see that moment. however. it was kind of giving like in endgame when theres that random shot of all the women superheroes in one frame so the movie could have a “slay queen. we are girlbosses:)” moment. like it just felt a little empty and it wasnt the feminist battlecry they thought it was. these women have been healing their whole lives. why would they be any good on the frontlines of a fight? they never learned combat skills! HOWEVER, when we see them, its mainly just them reinforcing the walls so like. that makes enough sense. im cool w that.

i know im dwelling but as we know i hold atla in the highest regards. it does a lot of things perfectly imo. and one of the things i think it does PERFECTLY is its treatment of female characters. literally the only thing i can think of that i dont like is when team azula beats the kiyoshi warriors and ty lee says something like “u are NOT prettier than us” NDBSKSJDJ like ok that was weird. but anyways. it irritates me how the live action kind of seems to have this pov that says “the original was good, but there were some ideas and plots that were outdated so we changed them to keep with the times” like they’re fixing something that was broken if that makes sense. when in actuality, i think atla’s representation of women is perfect and timeless. it was relevant and powerful in 2005, and it is equally as relevant and powerful in 2024. there was nothing about its feminist themes that needed to be “fixed” or “updated”.

[waterfire1848]

Azula gets her two finger thing!!!!!!! So she’s definitely getting her bending in the show.

Just in case anyone is confused I do mean this. She typically uses two fingers when lightningbending or firebending.

[rulesofdisorder]

natla renewed for a second (and third!!) season

jetko nation gather, gather we got this 🤝🤝🤝

🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️

🕯️ a kiss on the ferry boat to ba sing se 🕯️

🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️

[newfangledsoul]

I think the thing with Sokka’s early sexism being removed is less about his character arc (tho that’s important from a character standpoint), and more about the audience seeing that character arc.

Of course Sokka says iffy and sexist things, he’s acting like an entitled teenage boy. Many entitled teenage boys exist. I’m sure many of them watched Avatar growing up. The point is that these boys see Sokka doing what they do, and that they see Sokka is wrong to do so.

The purpose of an arc like Sokka’s isn’t to create a character who is sexist and who the audience shouldn’t like, who says iffy things and needs to be censored now that we’re in a more “civilized” age, it’s to be a teaching tool to the young target audience of the show. To show little boys that acting like this is wrong, and that girls can be just as strong as boys (this is where the Kyoshi warriors come in). Sokka is a great character because he goes through a genuinely hopeful sort of growth; his arc is something we hope teenage boys with his attitude go through in their own lives.

Taking away this arc deprives the story of one of its core ideals: teaching children what’s good and what’s bad. If they never see Sokka behaving badly, if they never see him being proven wrong, if they never see their hero who acts like them growing and changing for the better, you deprive them of a phenomenal role model who they might genuinely be inclined to base their behavior off of.

Shows like Avatar were so great because they showed growth. Sokka learns to overcome his biases, Zuko learns to overcome his pride and comes to understand what honor truly is, Katara learns to channel her temper into drive and not let anger overtake her, and Aang learns to uphold his principles even in the face of more convenient—if morally questionable—methods.

I think nowadays people (Hollywood) tend to forget that shows for children are often meant to be teaching tools, and not just entertainment. They forget that people—even kids—are flawed and so characters must be too if the audience is to learn anything from watching them on screen. It’s not enough to take an animated show and make it pretty and expensive, you have to translate the substance of the show, too. Otherwise you lose any purpose or power it might have had.

[the-power-of-stuff]

[katy-l-wood]

Okay, finished the whole season. Thoughts on the new ATLA under the cut. (They're positive, so if that's not your jam that's fine. But I'd like to keep this post positive. Discussion is welcome, bashing is not.)

I fucking loved it. This is easily the best adaption of something I have ever seen. They got the tone so well, and the way they mixed in 1 to 1 stuff from the original show with their new stuff worked so, so well. That addition of the division Zuko saved being assigned as his crew? Chef's kiss. Chef's fucking kiss.

I think the biggest marker of success for me, though, is that I didn't have to do anything else while I was watching and I didn't WANT to. My attention was fully, 100% on the show 95% of the time, which is so, so fucking rare for me as someone with ADHD. I don't even remember the last time I watched a show and didn't have to also be drawing or doing a puzzle or playing a game on my phone to stay engaged. But with this I didn't.

Also, the COLORS. It was such a fucking pretty show. And IT WASN'T FUCKING BLACK. There was LIGHT. I watched 80% of it during the day in my relatively bright livingroom and I could always see everything clearly, even during the night scenes. And the siege of the North with the limited hues and blasts of fire? Perfect.

And Azula! The way they added her to this season was so damn good. Sets up her character so fucking well. Just. Ugh. Yes.

They also aged it up just right. It really feels like a WAR is going on in a way it didn't in the original (which is not a critique of the original at all, just what worked for telling the story that way). But it also doesn't revel in that darkness constantly, which is refreshing.

As for the changes they made to Sokka, I think the warrior narrative works really well, and they rounded it out nicely. I can't wait to see his eventually reunion with his dad now. Would it have been more true to his character to include the sexism as well? Yeah. But I think, with the way they streamlined the narrative overall, having him go on a journey of learning better about his sexism AND struggling with being a warrior would've made things feel bloated. Focusing on just the warrior narrative, to me, just works better with everything else they did in the live action.

Can't wait to see what they do in season 2! (And we better get a season 2. And 3.)

Also.

Queer ladies Oma and Shu FTW.

[darklinaforever]

My only real criticism of the live action being that for Sokka, I liked both of his romantic relationships. However in the live action... Ok. I always preferred Sokka with Suki, but the fact is that in the live action they kiss on the mouth ?! And we have fucking great chemistry. But the thing is, it makes it weird that Sokka then kissed Yue. Also, he has less chemistry with this actress than Suki's for me. So basically, I like that Suki is the first love, but ultimately it feels strange with Yue. Conclusion ? They shouldn't have made Sokka and Suki kiss each other on the lips and just left the tension between them unresolved. Because otherwise wtf ?! Sokka was the type of guy who had a hard time kissing Suki because Yue had walked by right before, even though she was dead by then. And you tell me that Sokka in love with Suki is going to go with Yue, but wtf ?

[fandomestuff]

I've seen many people shit on the live action atla ((as we should this is such a bad adaptation and honestly a mid show in itself)) but I haven't really seen people talk stuff about Sokka and Suki

And I want to point out a couple of things that I absolutely hated about what they did to them in live action.

1. The kiss

I hate that they made them kiss at the end of the episode. I hate it so much. Like yes, in the original they both clearly had feelings for each other (especially that later Suki talks about losing sb very important to her, who we know was Sokka), but they weren't rushed like that.

In the original they both grow so much between their meetings. Sokka finally gets together with a girl (not the first girl he meets that's his age, like Suki), kisses sb for the first time, travels the world, meets new people and in general matures.

We don't know much about what Suki is doing during that time, but we know she finally does sth that helps people during war, sth that she said was important to her. She can finally put her skills in leadership to greater use and she feels great about it. She also matures during that time and we know that she still thinks about Sokka and misses him.

Them kissing immediately makes their relationship so much more bland and just... flat.

2. If they make all three seasons, we will probably not get the most iconic line of the show...

Because now Sokka's first girlfriend is technically Suki...

3. The whole scene with Suki teaching Sokka

I cannot empathise enough how important Sokka's sexism is in their relationship. It's something that Suki fixes in him, something she manages to show him... by absolutely kicking his ass. In live action... the fight scene next to those melons was a joke not a fight scene if I can be honest. Idk if it's the writing or the choreography or the actors but it looks so fake and just so bad 💀 And she attacked him while he was still "stretching"??? Suki would never.

What is this 💀💀

But the most important scene, and the one I hate the most in live action, is the one where Suki teaches him a very sacred and traditional and important to Suki and to her culture way of fighting.

In the original, Suki highlights that no man should learn their art and only after Sokka begs Suki to teach him does she agree.

But not without a very important piece that was fully missing from live action which baffles me so much.

The entire armor, the dress and make up.

Not only is it incredibly important to upholding the traditions and keeping the cultural aspect important, but the beautiful, might I add, outfit gives us the depth of Kyoshi Warriors that is just missing from the live action.

"The silk thread symbolizes the brave blood that flows through our veins. The gold insignia represents the honor of the warrior's heart."

It's beautiful. It's meaningful for both of them. It's important. And it's also a way for Suki to mess with Sokka which we love and stan.

I ALSO DON'T UNDERSTAND WHY SUKI TOOK OFF HER MAKE UP FOR THE ALMOST KISS AND THE KISS. It's not like being a Kyoshi Warrior is sth that's bothering her. NO. She's incredibly proud of it!! So. why. take. an. important. part. of. it. away. for. some. stupid. kiss.

WHY NOT GO THE OPPOSITE DIRECTION?? Instead of her taking off her make up for the romantic scene why not just... put make up on Sokka... honestly what's more romantic than putting make up on your crush.

They could have made such a beautiful and intimate scene between these two.

Them sitting in front of each other. Suki putting on Sokka's make up, while either talking about herself or about how important this whole set up is for her and her culture. I wouldn't mind it then because it would give their relationship some depth instead of "omg he's so pretty" "omg she's so pretty." *kiss*

But no. Instead they kissed right next to a group of people (including Suki's mother which just makes is so much more weird) after Suki said sth about Sokka showing her a bit of the world.

And I hate it so much.

It takes away the part where Suki teaches Sokka something very important, something that changes his personality, helps with his arc to Sokka "showing her a bit of the world". How?? With what?? It's not like he took her away from the Island itself or introduced her to his culture. No. He just... showed up and kissed her.

Great writing.

And don't get me starter on the "I'm not just a warrior. I'm a Kyoshi Warrior" line. It's a good line. It really is. But it would be better if the producers actually focused on Suki being a Kyoshi Warrior and not just a girl that has a crush on Sokka.

And while it's compared to "I'm a warrior. But I'm a girl too"... gods I... ughhhhhhh

So yeah. I hated it. I hated the show. All I have to say is:

They ruined my favourite couple. They ruined many great characters. They completely missed the point of the original story.

[oceanview15]

[sugawara--san]

just realized NATLA stands for "netflix atla" which is probably super obvious but i've been thinking it was "not atla" in my head this whole time

[firelord-zuko]

Finished Netflix's ATLA. Generally, I was entertained. The changes/omissions were confusing at times due to what they set up down the line, but so many of the additions were just wonderful and I loved them. The highs were high and the lows were low, which all in all im putting the show around 6/10.

I didn't hate it, which is what I was worried about. It's not a disaster like the movie was. Like I said before, I'm happy to get more ATLA, because the cartoon will Always be there for me when I want it. Netflix's ATLA is just a retelling of the story. It's not the animated series and no one should expect it to be.

Did we need a live action retelling of ATLA? No, but we didn't need three different live action versions of Spider-Man either, but all three of them are good and have their own merits.

I'm just happy to have more ATLA content while we wait for everything at Avatar Studios to start coming out! Even if the characterizations are. Off. and the delivery of lines isn't great at times. But I've read worse character butchering fanfics before lmao

[momos-servants]

One minute live from Ian Ousley (Sokka) and guest star Dallas Liu (Zuko)

[minuky]

I’m like 99% sure the new Live Action ATLA is gonna go Zutara route

[ladyelainehilfur]

SOKKA SAID ASS EVERYONE CHEERED!!!!!!!!!! 🎉🎉