Netflix is producing a live-action remake of Avatar: The Last Airbender, the animated series that ran on Nickelodeon in the mid-2000s. Both shows follow a 12-year-old boy named Aang, the Avatar, who has the responsibliity of bringing peace to a world at war. The original series is still beloved fans who will be watching the remake closely the new version closely for alterations and changes. And we know that several are coming, some for the better and others...not so much.
Here is every change we know that Netflix is making to the original Avatar: The Last Airbender for its remake:
1. The Fire Nation characters will get more attention
While breaking down the latest Avatar trailer for IGN, showrunner Albert Kim confirmed that the characters from the tyrannical Fire Nation characters will have a lot of focus in the initial season of the new show, whereas they mostly took a back seat in the original.
"In general, we actually spend a lot more time with the FIre Nation and the Fire Nation characters in our first season than they did in the original animated series," Kim explained. "That was a very conscious choice. I felt it was important that we needed to balance out the story that way. So you end up seeing a lot more Firelord Ozai and Princess Azula than you did in the first season of the animated show."
It wasn't until seasons 2 and 3 of the original show that Azula and Ozai received more screentime so I think it will be great to learn about our villains earlier. In the Avatar comics, a lot of emphasis was put on the fact that Ozai is one of the most skilled firebenders alive, and he went out of his way to make sure that his daughter Azula learned as much from him as possible while his son Zuko was neglected. This family dynamic seems to be a pivotal part of the Netflix adaptation according to Ozai actor Daniel Dae Kim.
"Ozai is always watching and always judging," Kim told Entertainment Weekly. "So you get a sense of how stifling this family can be. He doesn't have a lot of screen time, but you feel him whenever you see Zuko or Azula."
Even a little screen time is much more than Ozai had in season 1 of the animated series. Aside from a brief cameo at the end and a brief flashback to when he engaged in one-on-one combat with Zuko, there is very little Ozai. In fact, we don't even see his face until season 3! That one-on-one fight, a ritual known in the Fire Nation as agni kai, will apparently also be more fleshed out in the Netflix series. We'll see in detail how Ozai gave Zuko his iconic facial scar.
"This is arguably the defining moment of Zuko's life is when he goes up against his father and ends up gravely wounded," Kim said. "Again, this is a scene that was not seen in the original series. It was kind of obliquely shown, but we decided this was something that was very important for us to see. So we actually choreographed this whole fight, shot it."
There are a lot more changes ahead. Click the button below for more: