spoofmaster

Warning: contains spoilers for both the movie and the TV show

Went and saw The Last Airbender with Ben tonight.

It is the most amazingly bad film I have seen in a long, long time. I say that as an avid fan of the television series, which actually dealt pretty maturely with its themes of war and loss and heroism and all that jazz while still delivering a show that was fairly lighthearted and highly enjoyable. It had well-fleshed-out characters, a world built out of amalgams of things from our world (like the animals, which were mostly things like platypus bears and turtle ducks, and like the characters themselves--the Water Tribe, for instance, consists of black people with blue eyes who live more or less like Inuits), and more cool uses of elemental "bending" than you can shake a stick at. Fire benders? Let's kick it up another notch and have some lightning up in here. Water benders? Okay, let's take that a step further and have them learn blood bending and deal with the moral ramifications of that. It was a really cool show.

The movie on the other hand, is about as bland as bland can be. All the main characters are white except for Zuko, who, like the rest of the Fire Nation, is randomly Indian now. Oh, but everyone in the Water Tribe other than Katara and Sokka are Inuits. They're just the two random white offspring of a whole tribe of Native Americans. Oh, and Zuko's massive facial scar? He's got a couple little scratches now. Can't mar the pretty, after all. Don't forget, either, that the Fire Nation is suddenly a desert when it was actually a rather nice, vaguely Japanese place in the cartoon.

But that's just the look of the thing, you say. What about the characters? What about the plot?

What characters? What plot? Iroh's now a generically wise old martial arts master, Zuko's a whiny little bitch...okay, so first season Zuko was like that, but that's no excuse for making him so damned boring. Katara and Sokka have been drained of all life, Aang sort of halfheartedly goes through the motions of being in mourning for his entire race, Ozai is just some guy who shows no sign whatsoever of being impressive or intimidating, and Zhao wanders around telling everyone about how he's found some scrolls in the library that reveal the secret location of the ocean and moon spirits. Seriously, he's constantly saying that. He seems to feel that every single person he encounters goddamn needs to know that he found some scrolls in the library that reveal the secret location of the ocean and moon spirits. And yeah, he dun found those spirits in the show, but in the show I didn't end up laughing my ass off when he finally went ahead and shanked the moon spirit. It was a sad moment. Now it's just some guy blathering on about scrolls from the library and stabbing a fish in a sack.

Also, the line "Zhao has no sacredness" will never ever not be funny to me. CLEARLY HE DOES NOT. THANK YOU FOR THE CLARIFICATION THAR.

Or "We need to prove to them that we believe in our beliefs as much as they believe in their beliefs." Whaat. Yue, you are on crack.

Speaking of Yue, we only know that Sokka's supposed to be in love with her because Katara tells us so in a voiceover. Yup. Look, M. Night Shyamamamalan, I know you're crunched for time, but one stilted onscreen conversation about how her hair turned white as a baby and how Sokka hates sand--wait, that's Star Wars does not a compelling romance make. Oh, and Sokka's other love interest is not included in the film at all. The Kyoshi Warriors apparently don't exist in this version, so no Suki for Sokka. Tho thad.

Okay, I'll lay off...after I complain about one last thing. Why, oh why would you ever do something so stupid as to take a well-known show and, in the process of adapting it for the big screen, go ahead and change the pronunciation of half the characters' names? Did Shymamalamb never even watch an episode of the show? That would certainly explain a few other things.

Okay, so I requested the questions for this meme more than half a month ago. I've been busy. Seriously. And now I have time.

The meme, as a reminder: 1) Make a list of 15 characters and assign each character a number.

2) Without telling anyone who's on the list or the character's assigned number, get questions from your flist about what they'd like to know about them, i.e. "If 3 and 4 were trapped in a cave together with only a blanket and a toothpick, what would they do?"

3) Post the list of characters and answers to the questions.

( The list, the questions, and the answers )

Okay, so I was poking around Amazon.com to see if I could find a copy of the beyond awesome film adaptation of Crime and Punishment that was directed by Lev Kulidzhanov back in 1969 or 1970 (and there are copies on there...for $60), and I happened to skim the reviews.

FUNNIEST THING EVER. The original page is here. I laughed so hard that I probably sounded like a dying animal, and the best part is that it's in character! *glee*

So without further ado, I bring you ( Raskolnikov meets Dr. Phil, by 'Mark Twain' of Amazon.com )

That's all right. Can't really express how I feel about the ocean on here anyway. It's both great and terribly not great, do you know what I mean? Anyway, yanked this from gundamkiwi. Considering the fact that I don't get that many comments normally, I'm going to change the rules a little just for myself and say that if, after I've written the drabble for you, there haven't been ten comments, you can request another one, as many times as you like until there have been ten and as long as you wait for me to actually write the buggers before listing off another one.

The first 10 people to comment on this post get to request a drabble– 100 words – on a subject/character of their choosing from me. In return, they have to post this in their journal. Post all fandoms you’re willing to write for.

-Phantom of the Opera (Leroux, ALW, Schumacher, 1925 and 1943 film versions only--please specify)
-Lost
-Pirates of the Caribbean
-Secret Window
-Any Tim Burton film (excluding Cabin Boy and Batman Forever)
-Chronicles of Narnia
-Crime and Punishment
-Dracula 2000
-Beauty and the Beast (Disney version)
-Dear Frankie
-The Emporer's New Groove (disregarding the TV series because it shouldn't have been made)
-Invader Zim
-Lexx (yea, right, someone's going to request that)
-Princess Bride

ETA (what does ETA stand for, anyway?): 3/10 drabbles requested and written. Come on, folks, I need the practice. Remember, too, that you three can request a second one any time now.

ETA as of much later: the meme is closed--this post is public in order to show off the drabbles I wrote.

Yes, I made an astounding amount of icons yesterday and today, and I do mean truly astounding. There's so many I have trouble keeping them all straight, but I'mm give it a shot and try to put them all in categories for you.

Oh, and they're all Johnny Depp. This seems unhealthy, but also fun.

Please please please, tell me what you think, take some and use them, all that, just credit me.

( Icons behind the cut! )