Avatar: The Last Airbender
Based on Avatar: The Last Airbender by Bryan Konietzko & Michael Dante DiMartino
Developed by Albert Kim
Starring
[Actors and roles from the Wikipedia page]
Gordon Cormier as Avatar Aang: A free-spirited and peaceful twelve-year-old airbender who was frozen in ice for a hundred years. When he wakes up, all the other airbenders have been wiped out by the Fire Nation and he embarks on a quest to end the war and become the figurehead of balance and harmony for the world as the Avatar.
Kiawentiio as Katara: A fourteen-year-old who is the last waterbender of the Southern Water Tribe after her mother was killed by the Fire Nation. Despite her personal tragedy, she joins Aang on his journey while growing to her true potential.
Meadow Kingfisher portrays young Katara in flashbacks.
Ian Ousley as Sokka: Katara’s sixteen-year-old brother who has tried to become the quasi-leader of their tribe after their father left to fight in the war. He joins Aang on his mission along with Katara, and makes up for his lack of bending abilities with his intelligence, resourcefulness and trusty boomerang.
Dallas Liu as Prince Zuko: The scarred, exiled and short-tempered seventeen-year-old crown prince of the Fire Nation, bent on capturing the Avatar to end his banishment and regain his honor.
Paul Sun-Hyung Lee as Uncle Iroh: A retired Fire Nation general and the wise and nurturing uncle and mentor to Zuko.
Ken Leung as Commander Zhao: An ambitious, yet arrogant, ruthless and dishonorable Fire Nation naval officer and Zuko’s bitter main rival in his pursuit of the Avatar.
Daniel Dae Kim as Fire Lord Ozai: The tyrannical and sadistic ruler of the Fire Nation, Iroh’s younger brother, and Zuko and Azula’s father. Kim had lent his voice to the Avatar franchise multiple times—the first time in Book 2 of The Last Airbender, where he voiced General Fong, and in The Legend of Korra, where he voiced Hiroshi Sato. Kim felt attracted at the prospect of playing a “deliciously villain he could sink his teeth into” as Ozai, being one of the things he was looking forward to do and reminding him to Darth Vader of Star Wars.
Recurring
Lim Kay Siu as Gyatso: A mischievous, chipper, kind, and caring Air Nomad monk who is Aang’s mentor and father figure.
Casey Camp-Horinek as Gran Gran: The matriarch of the Southern Water Tribe and Sokka and Katara’s paternal grandmother.
Ruy Iskandar as Lieutenant Jee: A Fire Nation officer on Zuko’s ship.
Matthew Yang King as the vocalizations of Appa, a sky bison who is Aang’s companion and Momo, a winged lemur who befriends Aang and joins him on his journey.
Ryan Mah as Lieutenant Dang: An officer in the Fire Nation Navy loyal to Zhao.
Utkarsh Ambudkar as King Bumi: The elderly king of Omashu who is Aang’s oldest friend.
Elizabeth Yu as Princess Azula: The cunning and prodigiously gifted princess of the Fire Nation and Zuko’s younger sister. Showrunner Albert Kim stated ahead of the show’s premiere that Azula is featured a lot more in the new show’s first season than she is in the original cartoon’s first season, crediting the knowledge of what Azula does later in the original show’s second and third seasons for the writers having the advantage of where to take her.
Thalia Tran as Mai: Azula’s stoic friend who is skilled in knife throwing.
Momona Tamada as Ty Lee: Azula’s acrobatic friend who is skilled in chi-blocking.
Amber Midthunder as Princess Yue: The princess of the Northern Water Tribe.
Guest
Hiro Kanagawa as Fire Lord Sozin: The Fire Lord who started the 100-year war and Zuko’s great-grandfather.
David Sakurai as an earthbender who discovers Sozin’s plan to attack the other nations.
Yvonne Chapman as Avatar Kyoshi: The legendary earthbender Avatar preceding Aang’s previous incarnation, Avatar Roku.
Maria Zhang as Suki: The leader of Kyoshi Island’s elite all-female soldiers, the Kyoshi Warriors.
Tamlyn Tomita as Yukari: Suki’s mother and the fiercely protective mayor of her small village on Kyoshi Island.
Osric Chau as Tan: The leader of a group of Fire Nation rebels who plan to assassinate Ozai.
Danny Pudi as Sai, the Mechanist: A single father and inventor from the Earth Kingdom.
Lucian-River Chauhan as Teo: The Mechanist’s wheelchair-using son.
Sebastian Amoruso as Jet: The leader of the Freedom Fighters, a group of revolutionaries who fight back against the Fire Nation.
Taylor Lam Wright as the Duke: The youngest member of the Freedom Fighters.
Vincent Huang as Pipsqueak: A physically imposing member of the Freedom Fighters.
Wes Valarao as Smellerbee: A female member of the Freedom Fighters who is often mistaken for a boy because of her looks.
Nathaniel Kong as Longshot: A silent archer and member of the Freedom Fighters.
James Sie as the Cabbage Merchant: An unfortunate merchant whose produce is continually destroyed. Sie reprises his role from the animated series.
Albert Nicholas as Captain Dixit: An earthbender captain who seeks revenge for Iroh’s role during the siege of the Earth Kingdom city Ba Sing Se.
George Takei as Koh the Face Stealer: A centipede-like spirit who uses the stolen faces of his victims. Takei also voiced the warden of a Fire Nation prison camp in Book One of The Last Airbender.
Randall Duk Kim as Wan Shi Tong: An owl spirit and collector of knowledge who is very distrustful towards humans.
Arden Cho as June: A bounty hunter who is hired by Zuko to find the Avatar.
Simon Chin as Yang: A bartender at an Earth Kingdom village who tells Zuko and Iroh about a sighting of the Avatar.
Ash Lee as Shufen: The head of an Earth Kingdom village that is being terrorized by an angry forest spirit.
Ciara Mandel as Lian: Shufen’s daughter.
Rainbow Dickerson as Kya: Sokka and Katara’s mother.
Joel Montgrand as Hakoda: Sokka and Katara’s father and the chieftain of the Southern Water Tribe who left to fight in the war.
Trevor Carroll as Bato: Hakoda’s friend and a Southern Water Tribe warrior.
C. S. Lee as Avatar Roku: The firebender Avatar who precedes Aang and mentors him in communing with the spirit world.
François Chau as the Great Sage: The leader of the Fire Sages at a fire temple dedicated to Avatar Roku.
James Rha as Shyu: A Fire Sage who guides Aang through the fire temple.
Nathaniel Arcand as Arnook: The chieftain of the Northern Water Tribe and Yue’s father.
A Martinez as Pakku: A waterbending master from the Northern Water Tribe.
Irene Bedard as Yagoda: A waterbender healer from the Northern Water Tribe.
Joel Oulette as Hahn: A Northern Water Tribe warrior formerly betrothed to Princess Yue.
Meegwun Fairbrother as Avatar Kuruk: The waterbender Avatar preceding Avatar Kyoshi.
Additionally, Justin Wong, Emily Schoen, Shastina Kumar, Jon Ray Dy Buco, and Wilson Kwok portray a group of nomadic minstrels.
Music by Takeshi Furukawa
Production
Executive producers Albert Kim. Jabbar Raisani, Dan Lin, Lindsey Liberatore, Michael Goi
Producers Bonnie Benwick, Joshua Hale Fialkov, Ubah Mohamed
Production location Vancouver, British Columbia
Cinematography Michael Goi, Michael Balfry, Stewart Whelan
Production companies Albert Kim Pictures, Rideback, Nickelodeon Productions
A few years back, someone had a bright idea. Take a classic movie, Hitchcock’s Psycho, and remake it. Nothing remarkable there; Hollywood is constantly recycling and recomposting any successful movies it makes. But this particular genius was so smart he was able to convince the studio execs that the movie should be made as an exact duplicate of the original. Same dialogue, identical sets, even similar-looking actors. And it was so made.
It was a critical and commercial flop, of course. People expect a certain degree of originality, or at least an indication of individual creativity.
Of course, you can go too far in the opposite direction, as happened with M. Night Shyamalan’s live action version of The Last Airbender. He reworked all the major characters to his own preferences, and stripped the created world of much of its power and uniqueness. The result was wildly reviled. As it so deserved. Iroh was transformed to a humorless military martinet. Gads.
So I was reserved when I heard Netflix was doing an eight part mini-series based on the first season of Avatar: The Last Airbender (Water). And when I heard that the animation creators, Bryan Konietzko & Michael Dante DiMartino, had left over “creative differences” after the first episode was shot, my heart sank.
But then I saw some of the trailers, and hope was rekindled. Only brief glimpses of Aang, Zuko, Katara, and Iroh, but they looked and sounded RIGHT. Avatar is very much an ensemble piece, with a dozen other major characters and dozens more significant characters, and all had depths and personalities rarely seen in any medium, let alone a child’s cartoon, but those four are the central characters who are the heart and soul of the storyline.
So I’ve watched the Netflix version—twice. It’s an impressive accomplishment.
Anyone familiar with the original series will feel at home here. Nearly all the characters are readily identifiable on sight, a recognition confirmed by their affected personalities and roles. And while major elements of the storyline have been reworked, melded, or even omitted, the bones of the overall plot remain fully intact, and a lot of the changes, just from a narrative viewpoint, are quite ingenious.
Some of it came from the technical issue that the original first season had twenty episodes of 23 minutes each, with the plotting paced to accommodate commercial breaks. While Albert Kim had the relative luxury of no commercial breaks, and latitude in the length of each episode (they run from 45 minutes to an hour), it made a certain amount of shuffling inevitable. Two entire episodes (The Great Divide and The Storm) vanished altogether, although admittedly they added little other than to show character development in Aang, now superfluous.
Also, a lot is added. When the cartoon ran in 2005, the target demographic was ages 8-12. They’re all nearly twenty years older now, along with the large number of older folks who noticed the depth and originality of the series during and since. For all the power and sophistication of the original, a lot was glossed over because it was made originally for children. The Netflix series is aimed at fans of the original show.
So a lot of darker and deeper elements are added. Aang’s grief and guilt over the destruction of the Southern Air Temple after he fled is examined. He blames himself for the hundred years of war that ensued. That war has darkened and poisoned the minds of nearly everyone. His one surviving friend from his childhood, Bumi, considers him a coward who ran when he was most needed, and tests him, not for mettle, but simply to see once and for all if he is nothing more an utter waste of time who needs to die.
Most of the realignments of the story elements are pretty congruous and don’t disturb the overarching story or the spirit of the tale. A lot of the sillier things in the cartoon (Momo, the “My Cabbages!” guy), get downplayed or reduced to callouts. (There was a reviewer for the Sacramento Bee in those days who used to rage about the sudden and almost effortless transition the cartoon made from childish goofiness to deadly seriousness and back, and while it was understandable in a child’s cartoon, it would have been an annoyance in the live action. But most kids shows do conceal such darkness. Did this reviewer not understand that Elmer Fudd really wanted to cook and eat Bugs Bunny?)
It’s not perfect by any means. At times, Kim commits the same mistake that other shows based on fantasy or SF have made, and try to hard to be taken seriously with leaden and portentious dialogue. Not to mention overwrought. “The world will bow before me, Fire Lord Zhao, the Moon-Slayer!” Really? Fortunately, it doesn’t end up strangling the show.
One thing that made the movie so lame was the absolutely underwhelming special effects. Benders would labor mightily and produce a mouse turd. The Netflix production has overwhelming special effects. Most of them are pretty good, but get to be something of an annoyance. Again, it reflects the different expectations between a children’s cartoon and real life. It accurately reflects the original, but is a bit less sure-footed about it.
Overall, the power of the story and the depth of the characters remain undiminished, and that is what allows this production to rise above the flaws and become superior television.
I do recommend that people watch the cartoon first (also on Netflix) before the live action version. Unlike One Piece, where the live action was great and the original anime stupid, this is a case of both being great, but the cartoon will establish the viewer more firmly in the spectacularly original world of the Avatar.