Steering Through the Challenges of Anime Adaptations on Screen

Embark on a voyage through the treacherous realm of live-action anime adaptations with me, Dj, as your captain. This week, we're putting a spotlight on the fresh take of "Avatar: The Last Airbender" and its unique position in the anime universe, despite its Western origins. We'll unravel the threads that make an adaptation triumph or flop, including the fidelity to the original series, and the tightrope walk of character design that steers clear of turning actors into mere cosplayers. As we navigate these waters, I'll be sharing my unfiltered opinions on the live-action portrayal of iconic characters from "One Piece" to "Avatar: The Last Airbender," examining the creative choices that have sparked both admiration and uproar among fans.

Strap in for a ride that doesn't shy away from the gritty details, as we unpack how early character introductions can shape a narrative, drawing from "One Piece" as a prime example. We'll dissect the missteps in "Avatar: The Last Airbender's" adaptation, from Aang's waterbending saga to the rushed evolution of Katara and Jet, all while comparing notes with adaptations that have rocked our screens or left us wanting. Closing out, I'll tease an exclusive sneak peek at my upcoming guest appearance on another podcast, where we'll dive even deeper into these conversations. So, stay with us as we explore the art of bringing animated worlds to life and the delicate craftsmanship it demands.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hey there and welcome back to Rival Reviews. As always, I'm your host, cj, and let's just get into it. So this episode I want to preface with a message that, yes, I am fully aware that Avatar the Last Airbender is technically not an anime. I am fully aware of that. Going into this conversation, however, I just watched that, as you, as probably the entire world knows, the live action Avatar the Last Airbender just got released last week. My wife and I basically just binged it on the weekend and it kind of made me think that the next episodes content could be about live action adaptations. So, yeah, so, like I said, I'm fully aware that it's not, but you know what, in my personal opinion, I think it should have, like, it's like an honorary mention to being an anime. Like, I feel, as if, that if you're an anime fan, you also enjoyed Avatar, and it pretty much has every aspect of like a regular shonen anime, except for the fact that it wasn't created in Japan. Apart from that, there really is no big difference. It even also, you know, has, like you know, inspirations from like, like Asian heritage and stuff like that, and so you know what, it might as well be an honorary mention in terms of anime.

Speaker 1: 1:41

But yeah, that being said, I think the one thing that I want to preface by talking about the live actions is that you can do it in a good way, and I have seen good adaptations and, as we all know, we have seen terrible adaptations. And I think the one source that I think I can see from all of this is, as you try, you should try not to stray away from the source material too much, but at the same time, you also can't make assumptions on your audience. The best example that I can give to this is the Netflix's version of the Full Metal Alchemist live adaptation. As I have not made it a secret on this podcast, that is definitely my favorite anime. So when I heard that it was getting live adaptation, I was actually kind of excited because I was like hey, you know more Full Metal Alchemist, I'm always down for that.

Speaker 1: 2:51

But the problem that I had with it was is that I find, like a whole bunch of other adaptations, it makes assumptions on its viewership, like I am under the impression and maybe I could be wrong but if I had gone into that blind, not knowing anything about the anime at all, I wouldn't have understood anything that was going on, like it was made in a way that instead of like take one piece, for example, I feel that the live adaptation, even if you had not watched one piece, it was a solid story and it made sense from start to finish. And I can even like looking at reviews online, everything else like that it has brought in a whole new wave of fans to the fan base. Where, going back to Full Metal Alchemist, I feel like if I didn't have the knowledge of the anime, I wouldn't have understood half the things that were going on. Like it didn't really touch on like the origins of the original story, as to why they got there, the almost like the stakes of why they were doing things. It was kind of fun to you know, see like a live action version of Alchemy being done on screen and everything else. But really, apart from that, if you didn't know anything about the anime, you would have been completely confused because, like all of a sudden, like it just jumps to like the fighting that they did in Ishbal and no preamble, no questioning as to why they're there or reasoning behind it or anything else like that, and I just found that, like all of the characters, the best way that I can describe it and which brings me to, I think, my second big issue with adaptations is the.

Speaker 1: 4:54

It looks like you're watching cost players Doing a movie. It's pretty much the best way that I can describe it is that, like you know, you look at the characters like Hair and even like the coat that he was wearing, as Edward Elric and everything else, and it's almost as if he walked into like a what are those called of the Halloween stores that pop up every Halloween, or like the party Zones where you can get like costumes. It looks like he walked out of there with an Edward Elric. Like you know, you paid $40 for the For the whole ensemble, and then you threw it on, but I will say that certain, like I said, kind of going back to one piece, I Didn't get that feeling like what?

Speaker 1: 5:45

Like I feel as if that they, they paid homage to what the characters should be dressed as, but did it in a natural way To not make it look like they're wearing exactly what should be translated from like the pages of the manga to on-screen, because they're not gonna look the same, you know, as we all know for mongas or even anise or anything else like that Especially this is incident. This is definitely Illustrated in the way that women look and everything else. Like that, the proportions of bodies and everything like they don't exist. So you can't go from one to the other, which is why, like, like, even if you look at like kind of some like older adaptations to like you know, like I've seen that they made like live actions of like Sailor Moon and you know they even tried like doing like a CGI version of Scarlett Johansson's get up in Ghost in the Shell and it all just looked like that they were just wearing a costume in in instead of like you know, that's just what the character War as, like a shirt, and I Think that that that's like one big thing that always, through that, always throws me out of it. Like, as soon as I, as soon as I saw the, the wig that the actor was wearing or what they had done to the hair I'm not entirely sure what they did for Edwards character in the live adaptation, but he looked like he was in costume and that right there already takes me out of it. So I think that that's another thing that I feel, as if they need to kind of get over and like again some you can get away with, like you know, like, for instance, like the adaptations of, like Attack on Titan again awful CGI and everything else like that but at the same time it's a uniform that they wear. So you can argue that yes, it does look cosplay-ish, but it is a uniform, so everybody is supposed to wear that. So you can kind of get away with it. But, like I said, the best, the worst example is like the, the L Rick, like when you're looking at like the, the army clothes and everything else like that, like it, it just it looked like that they walked out of a party zone and I think it really really threw me off. But again, that's not to say like, obviously you can be negative about adaptations but, like I said before, I feel like one piece did a phenomenal job.

Speaker 1: 8:23

I know there was a little bit of Complaint about bringing in certain characters early, like bringing garpin early and things like that into the story. People were kind of thrown off by that, but I feel like it actually strengthened it and I also feel as if it didn't. I don't know, a lot of people's argument was that they belittled the, the interaction that Luffy and garp have for the first time after a long time seeing each other. But I didn't feel that and if anything, it made me feel more for what's his name for Kill it glasses, colby. I felt more. I felt Like more into him as a character because, like in the anime, he's definitely for sure like not a main character, but I would say that he's a very important character to Luffy's beginning and for them to kind of an incentive like Like to extend on that and actually almost kind of create like dual storylines where you're cheering for Luffy, obviously because he's the main character, where you're also kind of cheering for Colby in the sense. And I find that it's a really it was a really interesting way for them to also like be able to have to have the inside look in the Navy instead of like kind of like the outside look that we would normally get like. Instead of All this and panning to the conversation, you're actually panning to the conversation that Colby is overhearing. So it's almost as if Colby becomes the I Guess narrator in that sense to the Navy's narrative, which I, like I said, I feel they did really well. But again, on the flip side, if I go back to the original reason why I was feeling that I wanted to kind of go off about this.

Speaker 1: 10:16

My biggest pet peeve that I think out of everything and people can disagree with me all they want, but the live-action Avatar, the last airbender, the whole point of the entire first book is Like he is supposed to be learning waterbending. That is the whole concept of him going to the north to find a master to teach him and anything else like that, and Not once in the entire arc of that Did he do, did he not even attempt waterbending. Basically, the only waterbending we technically got is when he kind of did that fusion with the ocean fish spirit and Went kind of cuckoo and avatar state, which, not to say like obviously that did happen and it did look really cool On screen, but it kind of like I said so I Think, yeah, so I think that that that's the part that kind of bothers me the most about that one. Because Is that going to be the pattern? Because the whole point of the avatar as a whole is the cool aspect that they are able to bend more than what. Then one element and and like the story that they used for the entire first season of this, if they're gonna get a second season like the Book one is done, so now we're supposed to move on to book two and he hasn't bent any water. The other thing was kind of like the character growth. So, and I think this is another thing that I kind of want to preface about the live Action, I love the fact that this was also a live action series versus a live action movie, because I find that Movies can be rushed.

Speaker 1: 12:08

But my biggest pet peeve with this is that they announced that they were making a series. They had the time to take their time to kind of get more character development to you know, show some waterbending, to you know, have some of that coo kiness that we all love from avatar, the last airbender, and, and instead they kind of just tried to touch on the most valuable, I guess, story parts. In their opinion, like to just preface the stories, to move on, to get closer and closer to Pososin's comic comment, but sacrificed a lot to get there. And I feel as if, honestly, if we could have just instead of an eight Episode which again I don't really understand when the they grabbed the number out of the air, I guess, to make how many episodes they wanted, I think they could have honestly, would have it like it honestly would have done a better job for me if you give, if you had given me 12, as We've talked about and actually as we talked about last week. You know a lot of our seasonal animes and everything else like that. They have this formula of 12 see 12 seasons for the core. They look to see how it does and then, if it works, they move on and they make a second season. Maybe some were down the line and 12 episodes seems to work. And again, granted, I understand that those are normally half an hour and To an hour and we had about anywhere between kind of 45 to 55 minutes per episode for avatar, but I Just I feel as if they needed to take their time.

Speaker 1: 13:53

And then there are certain other kind of like, like. Why introduce jet that early if you're not going to utilize him all the way to the end? Was that just for Katara's growth? And Speaking of Katara's growth, why did we rush that? And why, all of a sudden, is she like a crazy master, where the first book we were also trying to kind of show the struggle of her trying to learn and almost being overshadowed for the fact that and Can do better than her due to the fact that he's the avatar. Like we missed all of that, which I think is a very lost opportunity, especially if later down the road you're gonna try and you know, build their relationship and everything else like that, like you need, like you need the, the, the, the conflicts to get to the resolution, right, and if you're gonna skip that, I feel like you're doing yourself a disservice for the future.

Speaker 1: 14:58

Well, yeah, like I said, like there are definitely positive outcomes and differences between doing the series and the movies. Like you know, you can look at Dragon Ball Evolution Terrible adaptation but then you could like bounce back and go look at lead, a battle angel, and that was a phenomenal adaptation, especially From using like kind of old content. And you can even like go even further to, like you know, silly Situations like speed racer, like if you look back to the old speed racer and the, the animation style and everything else like that, like it's silly. But the nice part is is that they actually were able to translate that silliness into the adaptation and it was just as enjoyable. And I guess there is also somebody we said that you know you can also, you know, have a harder time translating. You know, action versus, I guess, more story driven Animes, like, for instance, best example that I can give. What's the one that I'm thinking of?

Speaker 1: 16:12

Like, again, I thought that I thought that one piece was going to have a Hard time with the adaptation because of the silliness and, like you know, the stretchiness and how is it gonna translate on screen, and I was pleasantly surprised. But then you look at something, like you know, he was in Dragon Ball Evolution for a chance where they could have. You know, cgi is a magical thing. The Kamehameha did not have to look that terrible and I was sad to see that it did. And Again, it's also interesting to see that, you know, they kind of nailed it with one piece, but you, you, hakusho, as well as Cowboy Beep-Op adaptations that Netflix did did not hit nearly the same amount of of Popularity that the others did. Now, granted, I don't know, I could argue that the the same kind of fan base that one piece has would kind of coincide with how much you, you Hakusho, would have. But even still, like you, can only Adapt to a certain extent when it comes to that. But if you think about, like Alice in Borderland, you know a kind of like Death game that's meant to happen in a real life kind of backdrop. It translated a lot better due to the fact that it's actually meant to happen in real life, where, you know, they attempted for some reason to try to incorporate the Dragon Ball Z into a modern high school Life, for whatever reason, and it just it completely missed the mark. Yeah, that's kind of all I wanted to say.

Speaker 1: 18:05

I know this is a bit of a shorter episode and I do apologize for that, but I just wanted to get your thoughts on what you guys thought about the live adaptation. I kind of want to put my two cents out there. If I had to kind of sum up how I felt about the Avatar one, I would give it, you know, maybe a six out of ten, because I, granted I watched the old Avatar last airbender movie that they attempted long ago and If I, if I had to pick a fit, if I had to pick, which would I prefer? Obviously the series trumps it 100%. There is no argument there.

Speaker 1: 18:44

But I will not lie and say that I wasn't disappointed by a couple different aspects, as I've kind of highlighted in the episode. What did you guys think? I'd love to hear your opinion, rival, extra views on all your platforms Next week. Obviously I will talk about it a bit more, but I will be having a guest spot on Another podcast. I will obviously highlight that once the episode comes out and talk more about that next week. So Look forward to that. I don't want to give too many spoilers on that sense, um, but yeah, I guess I'll see you guys in the next one. Bye, bye.