The Last Airbender

My Rating: 2/4


Air, water, fire, and earth are the four nations in the world of "The Last Airbender". Based on the original Nickelodeon cartoon "Avatar: The Last Airbender" (which I was a big fan of and yes, I know I'm a dork). The plot is about four nations(that I already mentioned) that lived in harmony. Some people in each nation have the ability to "bend" or in other words, manipulate their native element. One day the fire nation got greedy and wanted to control all the other nations and declared war. And have been at war for over a century. As the other nations struggle under the attack(which is weird since it's three on one), their only hope lies in the "Avatar". The only one who can control all four elements. One day, brother and sister Katara and Sokka from the southern water tribe find Aang, The last airbender(all the other were wiped out)/the Avatar frozen in a block of ice. They later find out he was frozen a hundred years ago and he wakes up to the horror of the war which is new to him but old to everyone else. But, before he was frozen, he did not learn the other three elements. So, Katara and Sokka agree to help him go on a journey to learn and master the other three elements and defeat the fire nation. Now, as you can obviously tell, this is a kid's movie. Comprehensible and pretty simple. Nothing too deep. Just another cartoon shot to the big screen. But, (SAY WHAT?!) it's directed by M. Night Shyamalan. Who mainly directs horror movies and is the creator of things like "The Sixth Sense" and "The Happening". Now, all of the sudden he moves to a children's film?! But, calm down people. I didn't find it as bad as you might think in this kind of situation. He didn't scare me out of my wits so I guess you could say it's a "kid's" movie. But a major turnoff for me was how cheesy it was. The script was poorly written and cheesy, and the acting was very poorly done and cheesy. Well guess what M. Night? It's Na-cho cheese! The script could have been way better, and the acting was not that impressive. The only really good performance was by Dev Patel, who plays Prince Zuko. He is famous for his starring role in "Slumdog Millionaire". But,I could've thought of a better introduction and ending. But the main sequencing wasn't bad. It stuck to the cartoon storyline which was a wise choice because then they would've had all this weird stuff and upset the fans. Another wise choice was that the film makers knew that they would have to fit an entire season of the cartoon into each film in order to divide it into a trilogy. So, they knew they would have to cut out A LOT of things. But everything was removed perfectly. They only included the fan-pleasing and important events, removing all unnecessary implications. They just kept the essentials. The only problem was instead of it being too slow, it went too fast. The movie just seemed a little rushed. Although the pronunciations were wrong...also A LOT. Like the main character, Aang. In the show, he was pronounced "Ang". In the film, he's pronounced "ong". In the show, Sokka was pronounced "Sock-a". In the film, he's pronounced "So-ka". They DID, however, get one of the main villain's names right, Prince Zuko. Who's ultimate goal is to catch the Avatar and restore his honor. But, now guess what?! They pronounce his uncle's name wrong. In the Show, his name was pronounced "Uncle I-ro". In the film, it's pronounced "Uncle ee-ro". WHY, WHY, WHY?! After all of these negative comments, reader, I would imagine you thinking "Then what DID you like about the film?". Well, this film did the unique thing of showing me things I didn't know I wanted. Kind of like what "Iron Man" did. It gave people what they didn't know they wanted. In a strange way, I liked the senseless action, I liked the absurdity, and I liked how they developed a comprehensible issue and battled it out with top notch special effects. Which brings me to my next point, the action. Three words, "I", "LOVED", and "IT"! The special effects of element bending and swords clanging was very well done. I was completely entertained. Those scenes provide you with good action that stays in the tricky middle ground where it's a wee-bit more serious than Jackie Chan-style violence but doesn't have the blood and guts of "Ninja Assassin". In fact, since the film is clearly for the purpose of entertainment, and there's nothing really deep, (I know my grandmother is frowning upon me right now) the violence in scenes were most of my favorite parts. I would say "it was clearly just for the TRIVIAL purpose of entertainment", but if you look before T.V., waaaaaaay before, even back to things like gladiator fights, it's not so trivial. But all in all, "The Last Airbender" was a cheesy experience. Had a bad script, bad acting, but in a strange way, I ended up just having a blast watching it. It's a good movie to watch when you're in the mood for a Saturday morning type thing. But I don't think Shyamalan will have these films be good for the whole trilogy. You know who I want to direct the next one? Micheal Bay. That would be a good choice. But unlike Roger Ebert, I hope, no, I KNOW the title is not prophetic. And thankfully, it is not "The LAST Airbender".

Starring: Noah Ringer Director: M. Night Shyamalan
Nicola Peltz
Jackson Rathbone
Dev Patel