Avatar to be Ruined by Live-Action
Posted by shifto | Posted in Avatar, Dragon Ball, fail, Maddox, Shyamalan, Use of wiki encouraged | Posted on 22:20
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Today I was visiting The Best Page in the Universe and reading an oldy, but goody. Maddox mentions something surprising to me when he writes, "Another crappy movie getting rave reviews. Unbelievable." Yes that is unbelievable since I don't remember Signs being popular at all. So I went to wiki to read the reception and find out that it was generally liked by critics. Learn something new everyday.
From there I continued looking at other M. Night Shyamalan movie wikis and read something most disturbing. A small anecdote noted on the Lady in the Water wiki discusses how one critic panned the movie insisting that Shyamalan needs to stop wasting everyone's time and do films for Nickelodeon. Well, ironically enough he will be directing the Avatar live-action adaptation. I believe it goes without saying that this is the most upsetting entertainment news I've heard since finding out who was playing Goku in the live-action Dragon Ball movie.
Just an aside let's address this Dragonball live-action film for a second. Let's first forget that they've totally miscasted, um, every single main character. Let's also forget that they released a crappy trailer which isn't even worth watching or linking. I think that the most telling sign of this movie's failure is the fact that the big wigs at Fox are ordering some scenes to be redone due to their shoddiness. Someone needs to tell them that they're just wasting money since the entire film is probably shoddy. This movie is riding the FAILbus, on the FAILferry to FAILville and still managed to mess that up.
I know I don't have much to go on, but I feel that the live-action Avatar movie, The Last Airbender, will be on the same ride and it's due to the predictability of the director, M. Night Shyamalan. I have seen only three of Shyamalan's movies because that's how long it took me to identify his formula. In every Shyamalan film there is a "WTF moment" and there is a huge "twist." For example, in Unbreakable the "WTF moment" is Mr. Glass revealing his theory about how comic books actually hide a secret truth about our world long forgotten (that superheroes exist) and the "twist" is that Mr. Glass is a psychopathic Super Villain. In The Village the "WTF moment" is that the villagers actually live in the present day and are just descendants of hippies and the "twist" is that the crazy beast is actually some lamer in a crappy suit who happens to be a fellow villager. You can probably get away with just calling each plot device in a Shyamalan film a "twist," but there is a certain emotion that Shyamalan wants to evoke with the first device that sets the viewer up for the latter. The viewer is supposed to say "WTF" and then at the end say, "whoa," as if we didn't see it coming. The problem is that by now everyone sees it coming because he does the same thing in every movie he makes.
It's unlikely that he will do this with Avatar, but I'm not going to hold my breath. One may argue that he has several episodes of source material to work with so he can't mess it up, but seriously, tell that to the makers of the first Hulk movie, the aforementioned Fox executives, or Uwe Boll. It can be messed up and I'm afraid it will be.
So this is an interesting situation. I am criticizing the director for being too predictable in most of his films, yet saying that his best hope is staying true to the source material that I have already seen. To clarify for the inquisition, I want Mr. Shyamalan to stay true to the source; however, please leave that dreaded formula with his other work.
Will I watch it? Due to my faithfulness to the animated series I will watch the first movie. But just like Star Wars or American Pie I will not hesitate to abandon the sequels if I foresee a downward trend in quality. Unfortunately, I already know that if I'm in for one, then I'm in for at least two since the first movie will be a cliffhanger. How do I know that? If you're asking that question then you didn't comprehend a thing I wrote before this paragraph, did you?
From there I continued looking at other M. Night Shyamalan movie wikis and read something most disturbing. A small anecdote noted on the Lady in the Water wiki discusses how one critic panned the movie insisting that Shyamalan needs to stop wasting everyone's time and do films for Nickelodeon. Well, ironically enough he will be directing the Avatar live-action adaptation. I believe it goes without saying that this is the most upsetting entertainment news I've heard since finding out who was playing Goku in the live-action Dragon Ball movie.
Just an aside let's address this Dragonball live-action film for a second. Let's first forget that they've totally miscasted, um, every single main character. Let's also forget that they released a crappy trailer which isn't even worth watching or linking. I think that the most telling sign of this movie's failure is the fact that the big wigs at Fox are ordering some scenes to be redone due to their shoddiness. Someone needs to tell them that they're just wasting money since the entire film is probably shoddy. This movie is riding the FAILbus, on the FAILferry to FAILville and still managed to mess that up.
I know I don't have much to go on, but I feel that the live-action Avatar movie, The Last Airbender, will be on the same ride and it's due to the predictability of the director, M. Night Shyamalan. I have seen only three of Shyamalan's movies because that's how long it took me to identify his formula. In every Shyamalan film there is a "WTF moment" and there is a huge "twist." For example, in Unbreakable the "WTF moment" is Mr. Glass revealing his theory about how comic books actually hide a secret truth about our world long forgotten (that superheroes exist) and the "twist" is that Mr. Glass is a psychopathic Super Villain. In The Village the "WTF moment" is that the villagers actually live in the present day and are just descendants of hippies and the "twist" is that the crazy beast is actually some lamer in a crappy suit who happens to be a fellow villager. You can probably get away with just calling each plot device in a Shyamalan film a "twist," but there is a certain emotion that Shyamalan wants to evoke with the first device that sets the viewer up for the latter. The viewer is supposed to say "WTF" and then at the end say, "whoa," as if we didn't see it coming. The problem is that by now everyone sees it coming because he does the same thing in every movie he makes.
It's unlikely that he will do this with Avatar, but I'm not going to hold my breath. One may argue that he has several episodes of source material to work with so he can't mess it up, but seriously, tell that to the makers of the first Hulk movie, the aforementioned Fox executives, or Uwe Boll. It can be messed up and I'm afraid it will be.
So this is an interesting situation. I am criticizing the director for being too predictable in most of his films, yet saying that his best hope is staying true to the source material that I have already seen. To clarify for the inquisition, I want Mr. Shyamalan to stay true to the source; however, please leave that dreaded formula with his other work.
Will I watch it? Due to my faithfulness to the animated series I will watch the first movie. But just like Star Wars or American Pie I will not hesitate to abandon the sequels if I foresee a downward trend in quality. Unfortunately, I already know that if I'm in for one, then I'm in for at least two since the first movie will be a cliffhanger. How do I know that? If you're asking that question then you didn't comprehend a thing I wrote before this paragraph, did you?