Avatar: The Last Airbender is a series that requires little introduction. As famous as the show is for its complex and mature storytelling in a children’s cartoon, its first attempt at a live-action franchise is equally notorious for the horrible product that it turned in for audiences.
The creators of the original show, Bryan Konietzko, and Micahel Dante DiMartino sat down with Nerdist on their Writer’s Panel and regaled the horrors that caused them to ultimately quit the film production. The film, which would drop the ‘Avatar’ from the title to avoid confusion with James Cameron’s then-upcoming science fiction epic, ended up displeasing fans so much, that the sequels that would cover the rest of the show were completely abandoned.
Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino had a “big falling out” with the film production
Speaking with Nerdist, Bryan Konietzko, and Michael Dante DiMartino revealed how they were initially going to function as a support system for the production, staying out of their way for the most part, but providing assistance wherever they were required. However, it turns out that the original creators of the show had little to no effect on how production went on. Konietzko said:
A: We didn’t want it to be done, at all. Before anyone was attached, and B: If it was gonna be done, we wanted to do it, they weren’t going to let us. C: When they attached Night, we just thought ‘This is what we have been dealt, we’ll just offer help when it’s asked of us, and if it’s not, we will stay out of the way.
While the live-action film was badly received by fans, the duo were open to working with Netflix on their version of The Last Airbender. However, the creators would find themselves exiting the show as well and are currently hard at work on expanding the world of Avatar: The Last Airbender in an animated form, with Avatar Studios over at Paramount.
Avatar Studios is set to expand the Avatar brand in 2025.
In what is to be a trilogy of films, Avatar Studios is set to release its first theatrical offering in 2025, which has cast Dave Bautista as the antagonist. Further, it is also heavily rumored that the next Avatar, the one after Korra, will make his debut in a brand new show in 2025 as well.
The idea is to make the Avatar IP as big as the Wizarding World or Star Wars, and thanks to the Avatar cycle and other narrative mechanisms, there will always be stories to tell in the Avatar universe.
2025 could turn out to be an instrumental year for Paramount, as it will serve as a litmus test for the new Avatar IP, which has laid dormant since the end of The Legend of Korra in 2014.
