Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Netflix/Nickelodeon
Let’s not beat around the White Jade Bush: We all knew that Netflix’s live-action take on Avatar: The Last Airbender was gonna upset some folks. The original Nickelodeon series is a beloved feat of animation that shaped countless fans’ childhoods, and on top of that, it went on to become a popular pandemic rewatch. Any time an animated classic becomes grist for the live-action adaptation mill, controversy inevitably (and often deservedly) follows. And while I can’t say that this new Avatar lives up to its previous incarnation’s legacy, I also gotta say… It’s not nearly as bad as I feared!
Remember last time someone tried to interpret this thing in live action? (Of course you don’t, because we’ve all ethered M. Night Shyamalan’s unfortunate 2010 film from our minds.) Well, this isn’t quite as bad as that. That’s partially because the casting is actually authentic—there’s no Nicola Peltz playing Katara in this version!—and also because as a series, Netflix’s take has more time to unfurl the many intersecting plot lines that made the original so compelling.
That said, this series is not a precise, one-to-one remake of the original; instead, its producers sought to “remix” elements of the original to make something new. Sometimes the results are even better than the original, but more often, they fall flat. Here’s a rundown of some of the best and worst tweaks.