The Stupidest Things In Netflix's Avatar The Last Airbender: A List
a.k.a.
a whiny rant from someone who has dedicated far too many of their already limited number of braincells to atla i know it's just a tv show but come on this is what tumblr is for let me whine
For your consideration, with many spoilers:
5. Katara Being Smug After Kicking Jet's Ass
In the original, Katara is betrayed by Jet. You can feel the raw emotion in the words "I trusted you! You're sick, and I trusted you!" immediately followed by her concern for the innocent people Jet has seemingly murdered. It's not a triumph, it's a wound, and the next time she sees Jet, her first reaction is "kill on sight".
This is great. It's heartwrenching, it's humanizing, and Katara using violence against Jet isn't a victory for her. It's just pain.
In the live action, Katara very mildly chastises Jet for trying to kill innocent people, which is... an interesting characterization for her, to say the least. Jet then tries to grab her, immediately followed by Katara throwing him and freezing him. She then just tells him goodbye. Her tone is placid, almost unaffected.
And then Jet says "Look at the power you have. That's because of me!"
Katara: "That wasn't you. That was me."
And then she strides off with a small smile, and that's the end of that. Sokka and Aang are not present. It's an incredibly hokey moment that's meant to emulate the style of feminine empowerment, but it has none of the substance. It glosses over any human feelings of hurt and betrayal. All that the it ends up doing is removing a story beat for Katara.
4. The Badgermoles
"They're blind! They sense feelings and react to them! Anger, fear... but mostly love."
Katara and Sokka hold hands in a cave and it makes the badgermole stop attacking them.
The blind badgermoles. Navigate by... love.
Yeah.
Do I need to say anything? Can we all see (pun intended) how stupid that is?
3. Bumi Makes Aang Choose Between Killing Him Or Letting Himself Die To Make The Dumbest Point Imaginable
Remember Bumi? Aang's old friend, a fun, kooky king? Well, here he's an actual fucking psychopath.
He collapses part of the roof onto Aang, and Aang holds it up with airbending. Another part of the roof collapses on Bumi, and Bumi just... shrugs his shoulders, fully intending to die. Aang holds that one up as well, and Bumi, instead of helping, makes the dumbest fucking point I've ever heard about "making tough choices", and urges Aang to let the boulder crush him.
Again. Bumi, the fun, wise king, wants Aang to kill him.
The situation is defused by Katara freezing a little strip on the floor so that Sokka can very slowly slide on it and tackle Bumi to safety. I can not emphasize how slow his slide is. Running would have been faster. Bumi has time to look at him and say "Huh?" as Sokka slowly slides across the floor. Oh, yeah, they were led onto the scene by the love-sensing badgermoles.
Then it's Aang's turn to be dumb. He says "you CAN rely on your friends" and hands Bumi a friendship rock. Bumi is pacified for now, but there is no telling when his next Saw trap will activate.
This made me actually feel bad. I just. I kept expecting for it to turn into a secret lesson, like Bumi in the original show, but it never did. Bumi's just a spiteful psychopath who is easily swayed by the gifting of rocks.
2. Koh The Face-Stealer Has A Backstory Now
Why? Mother of Faces? What? No.
No.
Iroh Is Intimidated By Zhao, And Then He Kills Zhao
Ah, Live Action Iroh. The most ineffectual man on the planet.
So, Zhao has the Moon Koi in a bag, and is ready to stab it with his special stabbing implement. Iroh is standing right behind him. RIGHT BEHIND HIM. Iroh has been there the whole time. Iroh does not want Zhao to kill the fish.
Iroh says: "Whatever you do to that spirit, I'll unleash on you tenfold!"
Remember how in the original, where that was like a big, shocking moment that he got angry? And how Zhao immediately let go of the fish, only to then have his anger get the best of him? How Zhao attacked the spirit by surprise?
Well, here it's a little different. For one, like I already said, Iroh doesn't come in suddenly, he sort of gets bullied into looking for the spirit by Zhao. Then he looks for the spirit, and after Zhao finds it, then he decides that he really has a problem with killing the spirit. He did protest before, but then he kind of just caved and helped anyways.
He threatens Zhao, and Zhao just... brushes him off. "Spare me your empty threats." Then the firebenders next to Iroh sort of... glower at him menacingly, and Iroh looks worried.
Zhao offers Iroh a place at his side once he becomes Fire Lord, which, uh? Okay. Fine. I actually don't have a problem with Zhao wanting to be Fire Lord, that seems to be entirely on brand for him, but everything he does to get to that goal is just stupid.
Aang arrives, they talk, Aang says "I don't matter", and then Iroh, who has sidled past the Glowering Firebenders Who Do Nothing Else, shoots the fish out of Zhao's hands. And then, as Zhao is on the ground, reaching for the fish with his special stabbing implement, Iroh forgets that he can shoot fire out of his hands, and lets Zhao stab the fish.
AND THEN Iroh, who literally stood by two different times and let Zhao kill the fish, decides to kick everyone's ass. And the Glowering Firebenders do nothing. One of them just stands in the background. Iroh doesn't even attack that guy.
In the original, Iroh immediately leaps into action after Zhao kills the spirit by means of surprise attack, takes out Zhao's guards in about a second, and Zhao escapes.
Here, he doesn't do anything at first except help Zhao find the spirit he doesn't want to see killed, then back down, then do something, then back down again, then do something again, then forget that he can do anything, and then he does something again.
It's just... so dumb. (So dumb it's brilliant!) No! It's just dumb!
And then, fifteen minutes later, after Zuko has dueled Zhao, Iroh kills him. Iroh just barbecues him by striking him from behind. Gee, Iroh, if you were willing to do that, why not just do it when Zhao was holding the fish?
Dishonorable mentions:
The fact that all of the actors fit their characters so well and have some great moments, but the show just doesn't support their performances at all. I feel so bad for all of them, being robbed of a chance to shine by some truly awful writing, editing and direction
The Ocean Spirit making Godzilla noises
June flirting with Iroh (didn't they say that they wanted to remove iffy stuff from the original? Well, that whole thing was iffy in the original. Why didn't you cut it entirely?)
Zuko doing the jazz hands to charge an attack
All the clunky and unnecessary exposition (for example: after Aang turns into the Ocean Spirit, Yue immediately turns to Sokka and narrates that Aang has turned into the Ocean Spirit, for almost 30 seconds)
The fact that Aang can only communicate with each Avatar at their shrines
The Ice Moon
The Cabbage Man literally turning to shout his line to the heavens while fire rages around him
The Secret Tunnel song being shoehorned in for no reason
Iroh's entire backstory being shoehorned in for no reason
Ozai being a caring dad actually
Zuko being shocked that Ozai prefers Azula
Gran Gran's speech
The fact that they showed Gyatso being killed by Sozin (literally nobody needed a big action scene, because that's what it was, predicated entirely on the genocide of the Air Nomads)
And finally, the fact that Sokka and Yue's reason for going to the Spirit Oasis is that Momo was fatally injured.
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