Sci-Fi Wire Set Visit Report

[star_bolt08]

Hey guys, I happened to come across this last night, and thought I'd share.

http://scifiwire.com/2009/06/what-shyamalan-showed-us.php

It's an article from Sci-Fi Wire about "The Last Airbender." Basically, there's a lot of undeserved praise being given to Shyamalan for his decision to work on this project, which is expected, I suppose. Frank Marshall

Comments

[dkwrkm]

Yeah, I'm a little disappointed they aren't sticking it to the production team. :-/

I'm glad the people making comments for our POV are doing it intelligently. The report from EW ('Will fans forgive M. Night for the casting after seeing this trailer?' they ask), last I checked, was also peppered with thoughtful comments.

Good job, I think guys. Even though the actual media... leaves something to be desired, still.

[star_bolt08]

Oh, Entertainment Weekly had an article on this too? *opens up new window and checks* Oh, wow, you're right. There actually seems to be a relatively tame and intelligent discussion between both sides at this point. (With added comments from the usual squealing tween types.) It got really ugly the last time they had an article about this movie. And I mean REALLY ugly. *shudder* I'm glad to see that they haven't left us hanging, and that there are people at EW who sympathize with us, so hopefully there will be more articles addressing the controversy in the future. *crosses fingers* At the very least, they'll be sure to rip them a new one about all of this in their review if The Last Airbender bombs. ;)

[opal_skies]

My only problem with the EW article is that they don't mention how M. Night has effectively turned the story into one of Bad Brown People vs. Good White People. :-/ The author seemed to express that casting Dev Patel and Aasif Mandvi was a balm, which it isn't, entirely.

[dkwrkm]

I do however think that casting Dev Patel and Aasif Mandvi was intended to be some kind of balm... a really messed up one, but you know...

The EW article overall made me feel like they do not have the backbone to just say it straight up. =____= Oh, economics/business... *econ student*

[sidepocket_pro]

I guess all of our bickering at ET payed off, think Sci-Fi Wire will do the same if we do the same thing to them?

[star_bolt08]

As much as I hated how ugly it got over at Entertainment Weekly when that article about the casting first came out...it seemed to end up working in our favor, since they mentioned it several times in their magazine and on their website, and seemed to side with us for the most part. So yeah, I'm thinking that if we want Sci-Fi Wire to address it, we probably need to make as many comments about it on the article as we can. Even the ugly, pro-casting ones seemed to end up benefiting us in the long run in that respect. I guess we should try to hit as many online sites with articles about the movie trailer or any thing else related to it as we can, especially any that hint that they may sympathize with us. And if the comments from people who are against the film and who are discussing the issue in a reasonable, intelligent and respectful manner outnumber some of the more rude, disrespectful pro-casters, they've got to say something. ;)

[sidesmile]

I'm looking at some of the arguments on EW. "Sounding American" does NOT equal white :/ It drives me nut that someone pulls that argument considering it's not a very good one (and I don't want to go with the voice actors vs. on-screen actors argument again). Being produced by Americans does not necessarily make the main cast white either or you would say that Chrno Crusade and Red Garden are Japanese despite the fact that they take place in America and the characters are American (non Asian ones). /rant

[aikaterini]

Someone actually said that?! *headdesk*

Either those people are really stupid or they really need to get out more. Seriously? They've never heard Asian-Americans talk before? They think that anybody who looks Asian must automatically have a Chinese/Korean/Japanese/etc. accent?

Katie Leung, who's played Cho Chang in "Harry Potter," has a Scottish accent because she was born and raised in Scotland. When Lucy Liu played O-Ren Ishii in "Kill Bill, Vol. 1" she had a slight American accent when speaking Japanese. Whenever she's had an English-speaking role (which is almost always), she "sounds American." Because she IS American and Asian-Americans have American accents just like any other insert-ethnicity-American does! Why is that so hard for some people to understand?

[himhilien]

I'd ask these people if they've noticed how different Daniel Dae Kim and Yunjin Kim's accents are when they're speaking in Korean on Lost. I don't know how good Daniel's accent is on the show now, but I occasionally cringed when Daniel spoke in Korean in the first season because he is obviously not a native speaker like Yunjin is. I guess it really helps that I'm Korean American, but even for people who don't know how the language is spoken, they should be able to tell the difference between the actors' accents.

I loved Katie's accent. Then again, I love Scottish accents in general.

[erikonil]

I take solace in the fact that everyone was so hyped about The Happening when it was still in production. I remember everyone was all thinking that now that he could go with an R rating he would break out of mediocrity.

I'm going to be interested to see what things get said when we see more, although M Night is irritatingly closed and controlling of what's getting out. I think once we see the rest of the characters and the total lack of cohesion with the TV show, you're going to see more people kinda waver on it. Casting Rathbone as Sokka may sound good to some people who say that his smile makes him look just like Sokka, but when you see the real visual of a white dude playing a Native, the absurdity really hits home. Visuals are going to be so important in the coming months.

On the other hand, I love the fact that I can see that we're making dents.

[star_bolt08]

Ah, The Happening...I haven't see it, but my high school filmmaking teacher, who showed us Unbreakable, Signs and a some of The Village, and was actually a fan of Shyamalan was so upset about that one that I doubt she'll ever be able to bring herself to see one of his films again. I'm kind of hoping that a lot of other people out there will feel the same. Not only that, I'm sure there are bound to be some parents (who are unfamiliar with Avatar) out there who'll be a bit wary of taking their kids to see the film because of his reputation for making darker/disturbing films, especially since the last one he made was an R-rated one.

[fadedelegance]

That's very irritating that they don't have anything to lose by discussing the white-washing, yet they don't bother to bring it up. Well, why the hell not?

And I'm thankful for EW for mentioning white-washing without being total douchebags about it (calling it reverse racism, mere fan complaining, etc, all the usual bullshit counter-arguments).