Why Fans are UPSET | Netflix 'Avatar the Last Airbender' SPOILER Review

water Earth fire air long ago the four nations lived in harmony then everything changed when Netflix attacked hello Hooligans we have a lot to talk about today so I'm going to keep this intro really short spoiler alert for avatar The Last Airbender Netflix edition first of all I really really wanted to like this I think unfortunately a lot of people went into this with a hater mindset already so it kind of Tainted their experience but I try to go in as open-minded as possible that being said there were a lot of problems don't worry there was also some good parts about it so let's start with one of the strongest parts of the whole series The visuals overall it looked incredible I mean I really understand why each episode was $20 million they did not waste their budget at all every single scene required some high level of VFX for them to pull off this fantasy world was it at the level of Game of Thrones visuals maybe not and we can talk about that later considering the creators wanted this to be Game of Thrones Vibe all the locations looked stunning I mean just off the top of my head omashu looked Picture Perfect the air temples looked great or sorry air Temple considering they only went to one air Temple the northern water tribe wow especially inside of the Oasis and the original show is like a very small room but this was expansive these locations were definitely to top tier also all the animals and creatures were really well done especially Opa I mean his fur just looked so fluffy I wanted to give Opa a big fat hug Moma looked great the other animals also looked great like those little chicken horse thingies the badal the shear shoe they all looked great by the way on the topic of opa he didn't really contribute as much as the original show but also I can understand considering probably every scene that Opa is in is hella expensive and then talking about Momo my jaw almost broke off my face when I thought he died I was like if they were going to kill Momo I'm going to stop watching the show sometimes they would use a 3D body double for the actors and that was like really really obvious whenever they would do that because the physics and just how the body moves it just like didn't look right so I hope they would improve upon that I understand some of the scenes you can't use a stunt double because clearly there's these characters flying and stuff so you can't really you know pull that off in real life the entire Siege of the north sequence was incredibly well done especially when Xiao killed the moon spirit and then everything became black and white but then would turn into color Whenever there was fire or light in the presence I was blown away by that like I was honestly trying to see how they transitioned the black and white into color that was really impressive Now While most of the VFX worked looked great some of the Practical costumes didn't look that impressive a lot of people are saying you know the show looks like cosplay and I kind of understand where they're coming from because a lot of the colors are super saturated which I actually think is a good thing a lot of fantasy shows these days choose to have a really desaturated dim dark color palette and sometimes it's just not visually impressive to see where my problem is is just the textures of the clothing I think why it looks so much like cosplay is because the materials clearly look like stage wear or something they're just not high quality enough for me to believe that they're real clothing that these people would wear in that time period like one very clear example is the blue spirit mask that literally looked like plastic that a cosplayer made and that's no shade on cosplayers because cosplay is super impressive right but this is a different medium this is for TV The Mask just looked too clean when in real life The Mask might have like fingerprints on her or like scratches or just more detailed texture Tes on that prop another example is the weapon that Saka used it was like a club thing that also looked really cheap and made out of plastic I thought his boomerang actually looked pretty good oh and then another atrocious prop was UA's wig what was that I cannot believe the hair in makeup Department saw that wig and was like yeah that looks fine and speaking of hair a lot of the facial hair on a bunch of the characters also just looked glued on and just did not look realistic at all so I think overall that's why contributed to this cosplay look but it was really really great to see such a diverse cast I mean it really did feel like we were in Asia I feel like I've been so conditioned to just expect to see white people that when I didn't see a white person I was like waiting for them to come on screen like I didn't even see any white actors in the background let's bring back white actors all right now let's talk about all of the characters first things first let's get this out of the way across the board I think the acting needs work you know that's okay because most of these actors are new and very young actors so of course I can't expect them to give me you know Oscar worthy performances but they definitely need a lot of Direction going forward because it kind of took me out of the scenes a lot of the times let's talk about Ang so in this version Ang is a lot more driven to actually fulfill his responsibility as the Avatar he goes to Koshi to learn about Koshi instead of wanting to play around he's not directionless as the original unfortunately dare I say that makes him boring to watch and the original is just so fun to watch Ang just goof off and be a kid but here it's like them forcing it down our throats that this 12-year-old has to grow up so fast in fact I'm pretty sure they explicitly had Ang be like oh I had to grow up so fast his whole Arc this season was talking about how he needs to make the tough choices to win a war and every single character was telling him that left and right it just made it not very fun to watch him as the lead character also another thing is he has zero chemistry between him and qara and for that matter barely any chemistry with Saka I don't mind if they're trying to save this romance Arc between him and qara for maybe future Seasons but at least establish some kind of friendship I don't feel like the three of them are friends at all it's not it's not being sold to me and I think a big part of it is because they spend so much time apart in the show we had quote unquote Filler episodes where they're just going on these missions that don't really matter but in the end we still get to see them bonding over things here because it's so driven and focused to the plot we don't actually get to see them hanging out that much in fact Ang doesn't even learn waterbending from qara at all this actually was crazy Ang did not water bend at all until he was in the Avatar state at the very end I could not believe it I think a lot of people are also annoyed that Ang had to teach qara how to water bend that part I don't really mind because Ang is just more experienced in terms of bending overall so it's okay to me that Ang guided qara in the beginning on how to just bend in general but how it should have been is that qara is training to be a become a better waterbender while also trying to train Ang and then in the process Ang is actually better than qara naturally and so then qara gets angry over that we didn't get any of that we didn't uh it was just that's so frustrating you know I wouldn't even minded if they did like a Cheesy training montage at least we could have seen Ang and qara training together bonding okay let's talk about when he actually does enter the Avatar State at the very end and merges with the ocean spirit that was awesome it was great to finally see him water bend even though that was the plot of the entire first season visually it looked super cool but I didn't understand why the whole time they were like oh there is no Avatar anymore and they kept on saying that over and over again I was like are you guys trying to convince us that Ang is like dead or like his soul is lost I just don't understand why there's such an emphasis on that cuz we know Ang is coming back he's the main character and in terms of his Avatar State we only got to see him go into it at the beginning in the southern air Temple and at the very end we missed out on him going into the Avatar state in the beginning the first time he fought Zuko which is really disappointing because that is Technically when he water bends for the first time you know he makes this giant whirlpool around him and then he floods the ship and that's when qara was like wow so that's what water bending really looks like but instead qara randomly knows how to water bend all of a sudden and creates a wall of water to protect them speaking of Katara unfortunately she is the worst character I think it's a combination of her writing and just the way the actress delivers her lines I'm I'm sorry A lot of times she's very expressionless and she comes off as super passive but originally qara has a lot of attitude she's supposed to be the younger sister but a lot of times she behaves as if she's the older sister because she's so overprotective and motherly as Saka describes I think what's so great about the original qara is that she is this girl boss right but she never loses her side of femininity her being a woman is both her strength and her weakness I think I saw glimpses of that by the last episode when you know she was fighting paku so it gives me hope that this can get better in the future but I there needs to be some kind of training for her to be more expressive and just have a bigger presence on screen I think the moment when she inspired the other female waterbenders that was great but at the same time felt a little forced to me and one more thing about her is that she levels up really quickly without us actually seeing her train and again this goes back to the thing where we could have even used a little bit of a training montage don't get me wrong her fight scene with paku and Zuko were awesome I love seeing her powerful but I just wish there was a more gradual curve of how she got to that point also small detail that I wish they kept in is how pacu finds her necklace and was like oh is that grand grand and then pacu kind of becomes her Grandpa I think that was a little bit of a missed opportunity okay let's talk about Saka obviously the elephant in the room is that his sexism is missing right I agree it's a huge part of his original Arc but I think without it it's it's still okay I think his character Arc is definitely more focused on what it means to be a hero versus just strictly a warrior and I think that's a great Arc but that doesn't necessarily had to be mutually exclusive from sexism I just think his interaction with Suki is just a little more disappointing than the original when sukii just beats his ass and speaking of Suki why did Suki give her fan away to Saka we never get to see Saka use the fan again also I'll be honest the humor is very meth I think he's like 70% serious and then only 30% funny and I get it the show wants to be more serious but then it kind of just takes away from Sak's appeal and the last thing I wanted to mention is that he just has no chemistry with UA and that felt so forced and I'll talk a little bit more about UA later all right let's talk about Zuko loved seeing him prear days when iro says you look like a prince and also when his crew calls him your highness those were great moments because it really shows what he truly has the potential of becoming and how he really is royalty under all of this trauma on the outside and the Agy Kai scene when he got his face burned that was crazy that was traumatic and I'm really glad they showed that also he came off as really bratty and I think that's actually a good thing because he is just a teenager and in the original show especially the first season Zuko did come off as like comedically bratty I do think he's missing a bit of edge though he just screams a lot but he is kind of masking the lack of edginess all right let's talk about Uncle iro he is definitely more serious like most of the characters he makes less jokes about food and tea which I really miss but I will say it makes it more compelling that he used to be this you know warlord and someone who people actually feared although I do think they did take away from his spiritual side they only threw that in at the very end the scene where it was revealed that lieen died that was really really well done in the background you could hear the leaves from the vine song and that was super emotional now let's talk about aula I really really don't want to dog pile on her because everyone on the Internet is [ __ ] on her that being said in the most delicate way possible casting her was a mistake I do not feel the intimidation from her she's supposed to be this like sharp villainous figure I just I don't get that energy from her performance and not only just about her performance but the way that she's written is crazy to me I cannot believe that she's written as not the favorite Child in the fact that she's jealous of Zuko those are literally traits that are diametrically opposed from what aula is supposed to be aula was born lucky Zuko was lucky to be born right aula has never been jealous of Zuko because she knows she's that girl oai never felt the need to take her down a notch because he was like this is my trusted daughter and I can manipulate her however I want because I'm treating her like my favorite child the fact that they made Zuko be the motivational Factor behind what she does and honestly I don't think she should have been in this first season the fact that she was The Mastermind behind jia's plans is just a total excuse to have her contribute to the plot in any kind of way I think at the very most we should have just seen her in the flashbacks and then at the very last scene when she actually takes over omashu I think we could have just seen her there we did not need to see her training and lightning bending I mean it's cool to see that but they need to save some reveals for season 2 you can't just give everything away this very first season and what's crazier than having a Zula in the season is including May entirely in the season they are literally just azula's props like the whole part about aoula recruiting May and Tye by manipulating them that was such a great introduction of who aula is in terms of a character I cannot believe they took that away from us I do think a lot of people online are being really nasty about the actors for May and tyly and I think that's very inappropriate but I do agree they should not have been in the season period and finally let's talk about oza and Xiao both of them were great casting choices I think they sell not only just being evil but they also sell the warlord side of things especially how Xiao wants to usurp oai that was a great addition and then when Xiao says Ang doesn't even matter o okay now let's talk about the changes that they made to this show because there were a lot first off the structure of the show where it was two episodes per element I like that because it thematically makes a lot of sense however I do think it was a double-edged sword because it limited them a lot in terms of what they are willing to do but because of the structure I cannot believe they didn't drop two episodes per week like why would you not release it weekly you would have had the entire month for Avatar to be trending there were just so many questionable decisions made for the show okay so another change is that the waterbending scroll episode was completely skipped but they did include it at the very beginning when grand grand and actually gave qara the scroll you know that's fine I think the waterbending scroll episode is Iconic but it's definitely one of the weaker episodes another change is Zuko's notebook that was such like a random addition and completely there just for exposition he conveniently has a notebook about all of the avatars that a could have looked at so that he knows where to go next and I'm not going to get that much into it but there's just a ton of excuses for exposition that they did not need to include and speaking of the different avatars Koshi kind of replaces Roku in terms of being Ang's main spiritual guide so I guess they did this so they replaced the Avatar Day episode in book two I just don't think it makes a lot of sense for Kyoshi to be the main one even though I love her to death Roku is just so much more important in terms of the context of the war also Koshi is like angry and yelling at Ang when she's supposed to be this very cold C calculated person and this is kind of a recurring problem with all the avatars I guess besides kurak like did they not watch the show why are they acting this way for example Roku oh hell no why why is he why is he goofy since when was Roku yuck yuck yuck like Roku acted more like Boomie than boie acted like Boomie not only did Roku not serve as the main spiritual guide but also he became a total McGuffin he was literally included in the season so that there was this mother of faces prop to give to Ang absolutely ridiculous but I guess speaking of the mother of faces they are including some lore that is outside of the main avatar the Last Arab Bender series for example the mother of faces is introduced in the comics they talk about the fog of Lost Souls which is talked about in Kora so this makes me think maybe they'll explore the lore behind what happened to Zuko's mother that would be a great addition to the show all right let's talk about the omashu episode so I've seen a lot of complaints about this episode so essentially they combined the secret tunnel plot line with the jet plot line with the Boomie plot line and also the Northern Air Temple plot line I believe listen I'm happy we got to see the secret tunnel song but the fact that they split up Ang from Saka and qara that was ridiculous because the whole point of the Secret Tunnel episode was about the cave of two lovers and creating more romance for Ang and Katara so I think they should have just scrapped the entire secret tunnel thing unless they just wanted to do a joke about the secret tunnel that was a complete waste of time it also made Bo's trial way less meaningful because Ang didn't have to go save qara and Saka also there was no fun parts of it that there was no flopsy there was no discovering who Boomie is because Ang just figured it out literally immediately also iro getting captured by the Earth Benders we didn't get to see the hot spring scene so we just missed out on a lot of the fun and Charming parts of the original show but as for the combination of the jet plot line with the Northern Air Temple plot line I actually didn't mind I think it worked well I think it definitely saved a lot of time and in the end result it was still kind of the same thing for Jet and Teo but one problem of combining these different plot lines is that everything is in the same place everything happened in omashu so there are less places traveled in the world therefore making this Avatar Universe feel smaller now let's talk about the fact that they all go into the spirit world so you have the audacity of splitting up Ang from Saga and qara but then when Ang is supposed to be the only one who the Avatar The Bridge of the human universe and the spirit world somehow in this moment when they are supposed to be split up no sakea and qara both are able to go into the spirit world when I saw that I was like okay okay I'm just going to roll with the punches even though this is ridiculous UL but then they decided to introduce every spirit that Ang meets along the three seasons in this one Spirit episode like this episode was supposed to be focused on Hey by right well guess what they also included Co the face dealer okay okay maybe we could get behind that also but then they also added wongi Tong why why so does this mean we're not going to get the very iconic and very necessary Library episode in book two and Not only was wangi Tong there his Fox helpers were also there oh wait turns out the fox helpers is UA so UA can also go into the spirit world as a fox oh my God this episode actually hurt my soul to watch what is this like amalgamation monster of an episode with like every piece of spirit lore inside of it at this point I was expecting to see rava and vatu let me bring down my blood pressure I will say besides the whole Fox Spirit thing UA's character also changes a lot she's no longer a damsel in distress and she's a lot more proactive and she's also a waterbender I didn't mind these changes it's obviously done because of a more modern lens it didn't really change the Arc of UA anyway okay now let's finally talk about these more adult changes so obviously the creators said that they want to appeal to Game of Thrones fans which I don't even know what that means well there were a lot death shown it was definitely felt more like a war uh there were less jokes and it tries to be a lot more emotional but does that mean it's appealing to Game of Thrones fans I don't think so it almost feels like they're straddling the line right in the middle of trying to be this light-hearted show versus Game of Thrones dark show but it's right in the middle where it just doesn't necessarily work I think a huge problem is they they they just need to figure out who the demographic they're trying to appeal to is are they trying trying to find a new audience to get into Avatar or are they trying to appeal to the OG audience who grew up with the show who don't necessarily need a very dark version of the show they just want to see this light-hearted beautiful fantasy show brought into live action I don't know they need to sort out their priorities there for sure all right so in terms of my score for this season I'm going to have to give it a six out of 10 I mean it is better than the movie by Leaps and Bounds however they just had too many changes that did not necessarily benefit it at all so a mediocre start but I as a fan of this universe I will definitely be watching I think it's very important in terms of representation I think you should all go watch it form your own opinions but in conclusion I need it to get better going on so I will also be making a video of how I would have structured this first season so make sure yall stay tuned for that and also I just made a live reaction to the very first episode and I also made a live reaction to the M Night Shyamalan movie so make sure you guys go check out those videos as well and I'll very much appreciate it okay bye

Channel: jimmyliuwho

Views: 164,765

Keywords: atla, aang, avatar, airbender

Id: byc5ROQLyCQ

Length: 23min 11sec (1391 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 25 2024