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[Daikun]

TLA Complete Series Blu-Ray coming.

It will be sold exclusively at Best Buy on May 1, then available nationally on June 5. It will retail for $45.

[Daikun]

A third series is coming.

It'll be live-action and on Netflix.

[LumRanmaYasha]

I would rather DiMartino and Konietzko make a new Avatar story than a live-action remake. I'm sure it'll be well-made, but I don't see how live-action will enhance a story that was already told perfectly in animation and tailored to the medium.

[Avaitor]

I have the same problem with the remake as I do with Disney's remakes, and to a lesser extent the Netflix anime live-action movies- these only seem to insinuate that the only way for animated works can be taken seriously is if they're made in real life. Which doesn't even make sense for a lot of these, since they're going to still be CG-heavy. I wouldn't call A:TLA perfect, but I don't see what adapting it to live-action will do to fix it.

[LumRanmaYasha]

Yeah, which makes it even more disappointing that DiMartino and Konietzko would choose to make a live-action version of their show rather than make a new animated series. I feel like live-action remakes are being seen as a prestige thing, when they're really just derivative and perpetuating this idea that stories told in comics and animation will reach a wider audience in live-action, instead of getting audiences to respect and take animation seriously in the first place.

[Dr. Insomniac]

It's not just the case with cartoons. I had non-English speaking relatives who thought Wonder Woman was a brand new character when she showed up in the DCEU.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Yeah, which makes it even more disappointing that DiMartino and Konietzko would choose to make a live-action version of their show rather than make a new animated series. I feel like live-action remakes are being seen as a prestige thing, when they're really just derivative and perpetuating this idea that stories told in comics and animation will reach a wider audience in live-action, instead of getting audiences to respect and take animation seriously in the first place.

I can sort of see the appeal of live-action adaptations of comics or animation, as it can help expose a new crowd of people to great source material. However, there is a fine line between something adapting a work out of respect for that material versus flat-out trying to replace the original material with the updated live-action version. Part of the reason stuff like the MCU movies are so successful, regardless of whether they're you're cup of tea or not, is because they really are just loose adaptations of the source material at best, caring far more about accurately portraying the characters and the spirit of those stories while telling their own unique stories that are more well-suited to live-action. A lot of bad adaptations that I see tend to try way too hard to outright carbon-copy the source material as much as possible in order to make some new kind of concrete, definitive version of that story, and in every such attempt these things always tend to fall flat on their asses. Part of the biggest problem with Zack Snyder's Watchmen for example (outside of his obvious Snyder-ism's) is that he tries to make a panel-by-panel recreation of the comic book, but doesn't even understand that a lot of the story beats that he's trying to replicate were specifically designed to work in the context of that medium, whereas they don't carry the same kind of meaning or even flow nearly as well in a narrative-sense when adapted to film. His adaptation of John's "flashback" scene is the biggest proof of his misunderstanding of the material, because that's what he presents it as, a flashback. In the comic, the whole point of that segment is that it's not a flashback, but showing that John views the concept of time very differently from normal people, as everything happening at once, which works when you can display several panels together on the same page showcasing that all of those moments in essence exist simultaneously together. The idea of a linear continuum is presented as an illusion in this case, so the fact that the film shows this as everything happening as a series of chronological events shows that Snyder believed merely lifting the words and images from panels to the movie screen would automatically yield a better (or at least equal) product, while unintentionally sending the opposite message as the source material in that particular instance (as well as several others).

Anyways, that was a long tangent for just one example, but my point being that all of these live-action remakes of fan-beloved properties seem to want to try and double-down and capitalize on the most popular aspects of their sources to make general audiences see what fans of those "silly kids cartoons and comic books" see in those works, yet very little thought is actually put into the process of translating those elements to film in regard to actually understanding why those things worked in the first place. I believe that the best kinds of adaptations would do something that makes them stand on their own to both fans and general audiences alike, while also successfully drumming up interest in much of that general audience to want to go back and check out that source material that they initially passed up in the first place. Stuff like The Dark Knight or the first few seasons of Game of Thrones managed to do this for me really well, whereas failed attempts like Ghost in the Shell or Fant4stic just leave me scratching my head.

Also, I know that this is technically a thread for Avatar, and I just kind of went way off-topic there, but the less said about The Last Airbender, the better.

[Avaitor]

Honestly, I just don't see the new series bringing in any new fans, the same way the Netflix anime adaptations are just bringing in disgruntled fans. There's only a particular sect interested in these works, and while it's not a tiny sect, I don't see much expansion.

[Dr. Insomniac]

Best case scenario would be if they did the adaptation in the style of Bryan Fuller. Something that knows the source material in and out but unravels it and turns it into something new. But that idea is such a long shot that I don't expect it to happen. At most, it will be a scene for scene version of the show that will leave viewers wondering why they spent all this money just to make something people could already watch on their Avatar DVDs. Or one that unwisely tries to shove in topical political allegories the way the Korra comics are doing right now.

[Daikun]

Viacom is suing Netflix.

Well, so much for that.

[Daxdiv]

Crisis averted!

[LumRanmaYasha]

Come to think about it, I'm surprised Netflix was able to greenlight a live-action Avatar in the first place considering Viacom's had a beef with them for a while and pulled their shows from there years ago. So I wonder if Konzietzko and DiMartino might have some creator privileges to be able to shop around and create a live-action Avatar themselves with only limited approvals needed by Viacom. Otherwise, I'd imagine they'd want to keep a live-action Avatar on a Viacom network or affiliated streaming service. Which is to say, depending on how involved Viacom actually is in the show, I'm not sure if this suit'll definitely halt its development...

[Avaitor]

Part of their problem is that Viacom are still slow adapters in streaming, so they don't really have much of an outlet to put this on yet.

[Daikun]

Part of their problem is that Viacom are still slow adapters in streaming, so they don't really have much of an outlet to put this on yet.

That's the problem, though--they HAVE streaming already readily available. Nickelodeon has their own freaking website where they can put all their content, yet they're not fully utilizing it like CN and Disney. That's what bothers me about the whole situation.

CN uploads episodes far ahead of time. Disney uploads episodes the same day as their TV premieres. Nick...you have to freaking wait.

The way they handled Korra shows that they're more than capable of setting up a streaming empire, yet they've barely budged since then.

[Daikun]

Part of their problem is that Viacom are still slow adapters in streaming, so they don't really have much of an outlet to put this on yet.

That's the problem, though--they HAVE streaming already readily available. Nickelodeon has their own freaking website where they can put all their content, yet they're not fully utilizing it like CN and Disney. That's what bothers me about the whole situation.

CN uploads episodes far ahead of time. Disney uploads episodes the same day as their TV premieres. Nick...you have to freaking wait.

The way they handled Korra shows that they're more than capable of setting up a streaming empire, yet they've barely budged since then.

Now this post is funny in hindsight. As of yesterday, Nick has effectively killed their website. You can't play games or stream episodes anymore; all the functionality is gone.