humanist + humorist

Still good!

I’m still trying to rewatch the original cartoon in tandem…which might be screwing up my ability to appreciate the pacing of both versions, oops.

I continue to really like how they’re condensing things. The city of Omashu takes up 1 episode of the cartoon, and it focuses on Aang facing a challenge while Sokka and Katara mostly hang out in the background. In the live-action, the whole of episodes 3-4 are set in Omashu…where Aang gets a similar plot, but Katara gets to explore the plotline from a second episode, Sokka investigates a third episode, and Iroh+Zuko get their subplot from a fourth.

Favorite change: Instead of King Bumi holding back the reveal of his past friendship with Aang until the end of the episode, they reconnect basically right away! And then they still go through a challenge/fight sequence, but it’s not about teaching Aang a general lesson in Avatar-ing, it’s about Bumi wrangling all his personal feelings over being stuck as a wartime leader his entire adult life while the Avatar was MIA.

The writers are also good at anticipating what long-time fans will expect, and using that to their advantage. There’s a character you’re not expecting to show up until a couple arcs later, so their surprise early appearance is A Twist. And the poor beleaguered Cabbage Guy makes his big debut!…but it’s a running gag that he keeps getting cut off before he can finish his iconic line.

Episodes 5-6 are a remix of the spirit-world plot from Winter Solstice parts 1-2, and “characters from a bunch of future episodes live in Omashu now” gets followed up with “spirits from a bunch of future episodes live in this spirit-world forest now.” With a side of “backstory reveals from a bunch of future episodes are experienced as spirit-world visions now.”

It also feeds into the sequence where Zhao captures Aang. After watching the poor movie, one of my thoughts was that it might’ve helped the pacing to cut that whole bit completely? In a full season of TV, you have time for Zuko to go through some conflicted back-and-forth — catching sympathy for the Gaang and helping them, then getting mad at himself and doubling down on being a bad guy for the next few episodes, then oops, having feelings again. In a 2-hour movie, you’ve gotta compact that into a more linear arc. Zuko’s supposed to be back in ominous bad-guy mode during the Siege of the North, but the emotion/suspense doesn’t land when the timing is “the arc where you saved Aang’s bacon was literally 10 minutes ago.”

In the new TV series, it plays so much better. You get more of Zuko’s ups-and-downs. After the rescue, Aang tries to have a heart-to-heart with him, all “you’re not so bad, couldn’t we have been friends?”, and we can really feel Zuko struggling against the “what if you joined the good guys, tho” impulses. When he’s back to digging in his heels in the next couple episodes, it’ll feel earned. Convincing, even!

It even makes me think, maybe the movie could’ve pulled this off in a single 2-hour showing, if they had played it more like this.

Bonus note 1: both versions of the show work in a visit to Avatar Roku’s shrine, and this is one case where I think I like the cartoon better. It has time for the characters to be more clever and strategic about it, instead of hustling Aang inside and then back out again as fast as possible. Also, after Remake Kyoshi got some cool expanded scenes a few episodes ago, I’d say Remake Roku got shortchanged.

Bonus note 2: there’s been almost no Zuko-Katara interaction in the remake so far. I have no dog in the shipping fights here, but I do kinda think it’ll be doing the Zutara fans dirty if they don’t get something juicy in the finale.