Why I'm Not Going To See The Last Airbender

Jul 01, 2010 17:56

The Last Airbender officially hits theaters today. But I will not be going and seeing it.

I will not see this movie, even though the series it was based on, “Avatar: The Last Airbender” is one of my favorite television series ever and it is a series that I recommend wholeheartedly and unabashedly. One important reason why I will not see the movie is ( Read more... )

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Comments 26

nbda1997 July 1 2010, 22:02:24 UTC
Besides the fact that the recent Street Fighter movie stunk something fierce, the fact that they cast a white woman as Chun Li was an immediate turn-off for me.

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namiko July 1 2010, 22:09:33 UTC
I didn't see the movie, but wasn't the actress Thai? I seem to recall hearing that somewhere.

I didn't see it because I heard it was terrible, and I love Chun Li (as many female gamers my age do) - I didn't want to see the character ruined.

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theotherbaldwin July 1 2010, 22:15:01 UTC
Man, I wish LJ let people edit comments.

Turns out according to IDMB, "Her father, Peter Kreuk, is of Dutch ancestry and her mother, Deanna Che, is of Chinese ancestry but born in Indonesia; both are landscape architects."

But yeah, the movie looked pretty bad, and everyone else whose opinion I trusted said it dropped the ball on a really cool character.

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nbda1997 July 2 2010, 00:53:23 UTC
Good movies could be made based on many of the Street Fighter II characters. If someone who actually knew (and cared about) the franchise had gotten the rights, it might have made a pretty good film.

Why can't anybody get video game movies right??

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erf_ July 1 2010, 22:18:21 UTC
Somehow I don't think this is going to be a very difficult movie to boycott. (Like the recent Dragonball film...)

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theotherbaldwin July 1 2010, 22:27:09 UTC
Well, there was a discussion last night with my every-other-Wednesday gaming group after game broke about seeing or not seeing the movie, and I wanted to articulate why I'm dead set against supporting the film or any derivatives of it with my money since Icouldn't stick around for the discussion.

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erf_ July 1 2010, 22:35:58 UTC
Fair enough.

Personally, I've never seen a more cut-and-dried example of racist casting than for this particular film. But I wouldn't see it even if all the actors' ethnicities were faithful to the original. The casting just looks to be the tip of the iceberg in "what the hell were they thinking"-level bad decisions. Live action? No involvement whatsoever from the series creators? Directed by M. Night Shyamalan? Seriously?

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theotherbaldwin July 1 2010, 22:42:56 UTC
It might give the Internet the phrase "punching the fish" though!

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ellindsey July 1 2010, 22:34:10 UTC
Laurie really, really wanted to go see this. It wasn't until the astonishingly scathing reviews started flooding in that I was able to convince her to give it a miss. I'm grateful that M. Night Shyamalan made this awful enough to make it so easy for us to miss it completely. Had it actually managed to be a good movie I might have been dragged to see it, now at worst we'll pirate it and watch it at home.

Hopefully this will flop badly enough to prevent any sequels. Avatar was one of my favorite shows, and I'd love to see a properly made movie adaption someday. That won't happen till this turd is forgotten, if ever.

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pretzelcoatl July 1 2010, 22:56:06 UTC
This comic is also really good at summing things up.

And I'm not going to lie: I want to marry this man.

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theotherbaldwin July 1 2010, 23:10:57 UTC
From the linked review:
"I hate everything about M. Night Shyamalan’s The Last Airbender. I hate that it’s racist. I hate that it takes a great, easy-to-adapt show and completely disrespects the material. I hate the performances. I hate the special effects. I hate the borderline non-existent 3D that serves only to jack up ticket prices. I hate the lack of imagination. I hate the embarrassingly bad script that would be laughed out of a Screenwriting 101 class. I hate the consequences if this movie is a success at the box office. I hate the consequences if it fails at the box office. I hate that this movie exists. And “hate” isn’t a strong enough word."

DAAAAAAAMMMNNN.

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pretzelcoatl July 1 2010, 23:13:31 UTC
"I wouldn’t let him direct me to the restroom after this movie."

One of my favorite lines. :D

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pretzelcoatl July 1 2010, 23:54:53 UTC
Additionally, Dante Basco gives his thoughts.

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hejji July 1 2010, 23:40:28 UTC
The film industry is shit and I've essentially given up on it

That's why I, even with free movie tickets given to me, refused to go to the movie theatre.

Until GOOD MOVIES come back, I'll stick to waiting for Pixar on Bluray.

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theotherbaldwin July 1 2010, 23:59:47 UTC
Yeah. This is one of the handful of movie that even being free would sitll feel like too much, cause you can't get a refund on time.

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erf_ July 2 2010, 03:46:39 UTC
I hear Toy Story 3 is really good?

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hejji July 2 2010, 04:09:38 UTC
UuU That's Pixar

I'm waiting for it to come out on Blu-Ray.

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