Latest / Project Geekology / Back to the Four Nations! | Avatar Aang: The Last Airbender (2026)

Transcript

Back to the Four Nations! | Avatar Aang: The Last Airbender (2026) · Project Geekology

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Long ago the four nations were in balance.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_01: And then one really angry air nomad decided no mas.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_01: But he had to be uh put away.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: He got put away.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_01: And guys, we're talking about the Avatar Aang The Last Airbender.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_01: It's a clunky title, I will admit.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_01: It's a clunky title, but for episode 178 of Project Ecology, we are talking about a title slash franchise that we have spoken about a lot over the years.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: And this is the first time we're actively talking spoilers for the recently released Avatar Studios movie.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: So if you have not checked that out, you want to check it out.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_01: If you haven't checked Avatar out or whatever, please give it a shot.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: Give it a shot before listening to this.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_01: But those who have listened to this, those who have watched that movie, welcome.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: We are talking everything about that movie.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_01: I'm one half of your host today.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: We are missing two of our hosts, but that's okay.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_01: I am one half of your host, Dakota, and I'm joined as always with Anthony.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: And yeah, man, we are kicking it old school today.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: It started with uh just you and I, and today it is just you and I.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: So This is how it ends.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um this is how it ends.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, but you know how we always do it.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: We always start with what we have been up to.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: Dakota, what have you been up to?
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, um, so I have been up to a couple things, not not a whole lot.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_01: Actually, for me, it's a lot.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_01: For others, it's probably not that much.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: But uh, I'll start with with this.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: I I finished reading the first Halo book, which is called The Fall of Reach, which is the prequel novel to the original Halo Combat Evolved game.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: And I've heard that there are some like early fragments of Halo that don't really exist in the franchise anymore because it was like pre-game canon a little bit, but it does heavily influence the story of the first game and um its eventual novelization, Halo the Flood, which I have picked up now, and I I think it's a funny read because it doesn't it doesn't so much come across as a novel like the first book, The Fall of Reach.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_01: This feels very much like this is what happened in the game, and then you enter this room, and this is what happened in the game, and he's missing a gun, so now he has to find a gun.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: So it follows game logic a little bit more, which is uh it's a little weird, but um, I'm getting into it, and yeah, I don't have an Xbox guys, so I this is I could probably download Halo off of Steam or something, but yeah, that that's yeah.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: The the first Halo game is available on Mac.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_01: That is it was originally a Mac game.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: That's so I that is the truth, but um yeah, so I'm enjoying it.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_01: I'm picking it up and I'm having a lot more fun.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: I don't even know why I started doing this.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: I was just one morning, I was just like, let's listen to a Halo book.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_01: And I went on Audible and I down, I looked up Halo.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: It wasn't even just like on my like recommended, I just like woke up one morning at 4 30 in the morning.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_01: I was just like, let's do something different.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_00: I'm j I'm glad that you joined the club, Dakota.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_01: Dude, um, I I I there's so many questions that I have, you know.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I don't even know where to begin.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_01: Like, I don't this isn't a Halo podcast, but do we ever meet more of the Spartans?
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: Because like the Halo the Fall of Reach.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_01: You don't have to answer this, you don't have to answer spoilers, but like Halo the Fall of Reach shows like at by the end of it, Spartan 117, John, also known as the Master Chief, realizes or believes that he is the last of the Spartans remaining, but the door is still open for potential others who were still on Reach who might have gotten off.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm curious about that.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: But anyway, you don't have to answer those questions, Amp.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: But I I have also been very busy like building the app that I've been working on.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: I talked about it a couple times over the podcasts previously.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: It's called Long Live the Timeline.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: Basically, I have been spending a lot of time finding dates in fiction.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_01: I found a lot of Halo dates, for instance, and I've been able to place them onto a calendar, you know, and I've I've been working on building a calendar app that kind of like aggregates all of fictional history.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_01: So you you'll find stuff in like the 1400s, and then you'll find stuff in the 2500s, like Halo, and everything in between.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_01: So I'm I'm having fun with that, and it's coming along pretty good.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_01: There's still a lot of work to be done on it.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_01: So I don't know when I'll ever be able to release it, but I'm happy with it right now.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm like on my lunch breaks and stuff, I'm like perusing through all the thousand plus entries that I have, and it the the actual system looks pretty cool.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_01: So you can check out my Twitter page if you want to see some updates on it.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_01: Because I posted like a five-minute video breakdown of like where I was a couple days ago on the app.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I would say that like with that, you can always have a set amount that you want to release on like the initial like release, and then find a way to implement uh in like a way of version con control, but not the where you have to not the I guess not the traditional way of version control, but like that you're able to add to that to this timeline, I guess in in an intuitive way, right?
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so I've created a database through like an Excel sheet of a whole bunch of different factors for every single entry that I've created.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: And I've been able to put it into my my computer, and I've been able to feed code into the application that I'm using to like my my Xcode application so that it reads the data appropriately and showcases the data appropriately.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_01: The actual implementation of new dates and stuff is actually really easy.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's just a matter of it's maybe like a one to one to two minute process of just like get it onto the computer, put it into the app, replace a file, and it gets populated with the new stuff.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: So what I'm talking more about is like just features and usability.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I want it to feel very easy to use.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_01: I want it to also have like ways that you can peruse by franchise, by title, by continuity, by year, stuff like that.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: There's still a lot of work to be done.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's uh not as hard as I thought it was gonna be.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: It's not as daunting as I heard it was gonna be, but it's still a lot of work, and it's still weeks away from ever seeing true light of day.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: So you'll you'll hear more about it from me.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_01: But Anthony, what have you been up to?
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: I I've actually have been doing some stuff.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: I I've done a bit of uh sheltered things, and then I've been doing a bit of touching grass.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: And then uh Wait, what sheltered things?
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: As in like inside playing video games alone, or what what do you mean?
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: So so this week I actually went to go see the movie Coyote vs.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: Acme.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, I've I've I wanted to go see that one.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: I've heard really good things about it, and I really I really liked it a lot.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: I I I think it's interesting that out of all of the Looney Tunes characters, they picked Wiley Coyote.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: Wiley Coyote is obviously he's a popular character, you know, with Roadrunner, but they picked a non-verbal character.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that only speaks really through signs and gesturing, and it just it ended up really it worked a lot, and you know, there was a lot of heartwarming aspects to it, and it was and obviously it's Looney Tunes, so there's a lot of there's a lot of fun, and you get a lot of like cameos.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: The CEO to Acme was uh Foghorn Leghorn.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: It was so it's so funny because he's like I said, I said, you know.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: So I mean I've been I so I that I really enjoyed that.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_00: I thought it was really good.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: I'm actually happy that we got a Looney Tunes movie.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like there hasn't really been much on Looney Tunes, and it was always like Disney and Looney Tunes, but then like Looney Tunes just kind of disappeared, and it's only ever been Disney, right?
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: So the fact that we got a Looney Tunes movie, and it was like one of those like you know, crossover live action with animation, but the fact that we got it and they did really well with it is really promising.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: I I hope that they do more.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: I hope that there is a revival for more Looney Tunes because I mean I grew up on Looney Tunes, at least the reruns, you know, and whatever, I guess whatever new ones that they try to come out with also.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, it's it's nice to see a part of my childhood come back, and you know, as far as uh touching grass, I don't know why I did this.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's call me insane, call it a pre-midlife crisis, but I got so I've been like online for a while now, uh, or on YouTube for a while now, and I've been seeing these like things called free line skates.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, man, you know, I you know, I used to s I used to skate, right?
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: Like throughout my life.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: I did inline and roller like quad skating when we would go to uh to super wheels during uh camp and then grew up doing uh and then in the teens doing skateboarding, and then uh as a young adult, I got more into like longboarding and like cruising, and then so I seen these like freeline skates, which are like way harder than like all of that, and I was like, you know what, I kind of want to like learn it.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: So I got a pair and it is very hard.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: Like the balance is insane on them things.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like I'm gonna like I feel like Bambi on a frozen lake trying to like use these things.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: Incredible.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_01: I'm looking it up, so it's basically for those of you listening, you you strap your foot's you strap your foot to a platform, and then the wheel mechanisms, instead of like four or five wheels that you would have for inline skates, freeline skates have looks like two fatter wheels.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_01: Am I correct in saying that?
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: Are they they're a little bit larger than regular wheels?
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, they're pretty large, and there's no strap.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_00: There's no strap.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_01: You're literally putting your there's no strap.
• 11:07
  SPEAKER_00: You are putting they they have them, they're like freeline skates, they call them uh free skates or drift skates.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: And it's literally like two boards.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: I've seen people I've seen people do that.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: Two sets of wheels.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's like you're wild.
• 11:22
  SPEAKER_00: I think they say it's like a combination of like inline skating and like skateboarding.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's interesting.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: And there's a bit of a little bit of ripstick vibes going on because there's this like pumping action that you like move your feet back and forth, like once you can actually like move in a straight line.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: But it looks really fun, and I'm like, man, I I kinda wanna like I kinda want to get really I I kinda wanna get good with these.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: It's probably good.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: That's how what I see it as also.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, you know what?
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's a way for me to shake up my cardio also, like I can kind of get out there, and then it's kind of like legs too, because you're doing a lot of like you know, you're trying to do like you're like bending, and then you're trying to um shift these wheels uh like in and out, and then while trying to move your feet like back and forth to like make a move, yeah, it's it's definitely tough.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: So I I'll I'll keep you up to date on uh the progress, please.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: So that that was uh so yeah, that that's kind of like what I what I've been up to.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I want to go back a lot more than what I've been up to.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_01: I want to go back a little bit to what you were talking about with Coyote versus Acme, because that's an interesting one for a number of reasons, and it kind of ties in with the movie that we're discussing in a roundabout way.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it kind of falls into a similar camp of media.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: So Coyote vs.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_01: Acme, like three years ago, was a finished film, was ready to be released.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_01: Warner Brothers took it off their shelves and basically dumped it for tax money.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: I heard that actually.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_01: They did, yeah.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: So they did the same thing with the movie Batgirl that that never got to see the light of day.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I think there were probably a couple others, but those were the two big ones that people were really upset about.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: Um, specifically Coyote vs.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_01: Acme, because early buzz around it was that it was actually a good movie.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas Warner Brothers was saying, you know, like they can't recoup their money if they put it in theaters, blah, blah, blah.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: Whatever.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: Finally, it's come out.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_01: People are actually seeing it.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: And the the fear was that, you know, the internet rallied behind art for art's sake, you know, like this this movie was made, it's a piece of art, it should be seen appropriately, you know, it should be shown to the world, not just like written off as a tax write-off.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: But they were worried that people weren't actually gonna go out and see it.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_01: You know, they were championing it online, but you know, when it came to actually checking it out, they weren't gonna do so.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm happy to say that people are actually enjoying the movie.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_01: People are seeing the movie, and I believe it's recouped its its uh, you know, it's it's what whatever deficit it was under.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: But uh, in a weirdly alternate route, Paramount decided that this Avatar movie that was slated for theaters was going to be uh one of their flagship like Paramount Plus films.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: And this pissed off a lot of people because first off, Avatar Studios has been saying for years that they can't wait to you know have something in theaters, you know, like this is what they've been building towards.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_01: You can see it in the movie, you can see the love that went into every frame, you could see the like kineticism and the like the the joy of the the pencil work that went into all of the action sequences.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: It was meant to be seen on a big screen.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I agree.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: It was meant to be seen on a big screen.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_00: I wholeheartedly agree.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted to see this in movie theaters, and if they release it, if they ever decide to release it to m in movie theaters, even though I've seen it, I will still go.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so a lot of people their first introduction to this movie wasn't in theaters because it hasn't been released in theaters.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: Or no, it it got a small, it got a small showing in a couple theaters in like New York and Los Angeles, which is ridiculous.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_01: Uh don't get me started.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_01: And it's it's only for like critics, you know, like that's they get like first pick of the tickets and everything.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_01: But the majority of people first got introduced to this movie, not through Paramount Plus, not through the theaters, but because it was leaked entirely online in HD without any watermarks, it was a complete film.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_01: There was no like unfinished aspects of it.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: And what's on Paramount Plus is exactly what everybody saw.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it was full 1080p, it was it was the best and worst thing that could have possibly happened, you know?
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: Like this it was a blow for the animators, obviously, because that's not how they want their work being showcased to the world.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_01: There wasn't even a trailer for them, there wasn't even a poster for the movie, and it released six months prior to anything, like prior to like when they expected it to release on Paramount Plus, which was which would have been next month, October.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_01: But it is now on Paramount Plus, so we feel like we can talk about it in and in all its glory.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_01: And now that I think about it, it's it's nothing to nothing to do with Coyote versus Acme.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_01: But in my mind, they're kind of occupy a similar like section of animated filmmaking where studio meddling messed things up.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's kind of my my sentiment uh with it.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, let's uh let's actually do anything.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_00: A pretty good segue.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's a good segue.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_01: Do you did you get the chance to watch the the leak or did you wait till now?
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: I waited.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_00: I I don't know.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: I just it because of how much Avatar like means to me, I just didn't want to.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: I I I just didn't want to.
• 17:24
  SPEAKER_00: I I also held out hopes that they would actually release into theaters, which they didn't.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: And when they they released it onto Paramount Plus, I was like, you know what?
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it's if it's not gonna come out to theaters, I'm still gonna watch it.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_00: And I was pleasantly surprised, you know.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: And it's been a long time since I've been able to say that there's been an Avatar project that I've truly liked, right?
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: The Legend of Korra is not bad, but it's different, right?
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I do feel like there was a lot that was learned during the Legend of Korra that was used in this film.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like I feel like the Legend of Korra had some beautiful animation.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: I love the way that they animated in uh the The Legend of Korra.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like they really like leveled it up, and there was a lot of aspects of the Legend of Korra that I did like.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't hate the Legend of Korra.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, for me, the way I say it is like Avatar, any Avatar is good Avatar, which I it's not always the case, but at least animation-wise, it's been good.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I mean it's been a while since we've had the Legend of Korra.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: That that live action movie that we got was, you know, and the M.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: Night Shaman one was garbage, and the Netflix show is mid for me.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's mid.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: I I just it's not what I wanted.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I feel like that goes to show you the importance of having the creators on board, like the live action one piece.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you see, you got Oda that's a part of that, and there's been changes that were made and it worked out.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, I think with something like this, having the creators involved is hugely important.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I think back to 2020, I think it was 2020, where they announced the Avatar live action show.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: And they announced that the creators were going to come back to that, and that was huge.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: Oh man, the the actual Brian and Mike are coming and they're gonna work on a live-action adaptation of Avatar The Last Airbender for Netflix.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_01: This is gonna be huge, this is gonna be like Stranger Things, huge, this is gonna be massive.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: And then shortly, maybe like six months later, a year later, they departed the project.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: Creative differences.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: There's been a lot said about like why, nobody really knows.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: But I'm happy that they did.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_01: You know, maybe maybe it would have been a better show.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know, maybe it would have been worse, I don't know.
• 20:09
  SPEAKER_01: But I'm happy that they did for one one really big reason is that they were able to take their effort and put it into something they love, which is animation, first off.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: And they created their own studio, Avatar Studios, which supposedly they have several titles in the works currently.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, you've probably seen the new trailer for Avatar Seven Havens.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: They really that one looks like they really leaned into the anime, like Japanese anime, the the art of it looks like anime.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_01: And apparently they like a lot of like the the world-building aspects of Seven Havens, like the art direction there, is based on the French artist Mobius, which uh is uh an artist from like the 70s and 60s who was just hugely influential on stuff like Nausica and a lot of there's a bunch of stuff that is influential or it was influenced by the work of Mobius, and I can kind of see it in like the the way that uh the world is built around um the the Seven Havens world.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'm losing my train of thought here.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_01: But going back to what I was trying to say is that it's cool that the creators are able to stretch their legs and expand the story.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_01: They're they don't have to retell the exact same story in live action, they don't have to waste 10 years of their life, you know, worrying about whether this is as good or better or worse than the original show.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like that let Netflix handle that.
• 21:44
  SPEAKER_01: We'll do something entirely different.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna make movies, we're gonna make TV shows, and apparently they're making more than one TV show.
• 21:50
  SPEAKER_01: Like they there's rumors of an Avatar Kurok TV show that's the waterbender before Kiyoshi.
• 21:59
  unknown: So
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: So like there's stuff in the works there, and I'm I'm really pleased about it.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I've I've read the Avatar book Anthony, you can see it in my corner here.
• 22:10
  SPEAKER_01: Right here, these are all the like omnibus editions of the Avatar comics.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_01: And over here, these are all of the Avatar novels, and I'm I love them.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_01: They're they're extremely good stories.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's amazing how unique each avatar era can be, you know, if you really like put a good story behind it.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that is what this movie is.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: This is an era between eras, for if that makes sense.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like we we see the seeds of the Legend of Korra's world building Republic City, the Air Temple in this movie.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, you see it kind of rising up out of the ground, so to speak.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_00: You get the beginnings of that like airbender island that uh Tenzin is in The Legend of Korra.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_01: You get to see how they figured out that the Air Bisons weren't extinct, you know.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_01: Like there's a bunch of stuff in in this that is truly like really beautiful and cool and just an expansion of the lore.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: And not only that, but it connects dots.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and I think some of the best tie-in stuff, not that this is tie-in, but technically it is a tie-in between Avatar the Last Airbender and Legend of Korra, even though it's a film, it ties those two stories together like a thread, you know, and we get to feel more of the story that we love, and we get to experience it with the original team Avatar.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: It may not be the original voice actors, which I still lament to a degree, but I didn't have an issue with the new voice actors.
• 23:49
  SPEAKER_01: I never felt like they don't sound like the character.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I feel like they all kind of after five minutes, I didn't matter.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't matter.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_01: You just kind of fall into it.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_01: Did you have any any issues with the voice actors?
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm kind of with you.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: I I do lament to a degree just because I know that the original voice cast absolutely love, like they love these characters, but when you kind of get into the stride of the movie, it's not entirely noticeable that they're different.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_00: Like I feel like the the replacements are you know, they're they're trying hard or they they work hard enough to sound like the original cast just aged up.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think they do a good job.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I feel like the characters are still very much themselves, you know, like they all have the same, they are more adult, they are more worldwide, they are just a little bit, a little bit more mature.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_01: They still have the immaturities that make the characters so lovable, but you still have the hopefulness and ang.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_01: You still have like the not wanting to trust everyone aspect of Katara.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_01: You have, I mean, I would say Sokka probably hasn't changed that much.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: He's he's still the same lovable like m mechanic that you know like creates crazy experiments and he's the boomerang guy.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_00: Why why does he give me Usopp vibes?
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, a little bit, a little bit.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_00: I think uh the sniper king, he's the sniper king in this this show.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he definitely is.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: And Zuko, he's still a little awkward with the group, but he he's starting to fit in really well, even though these characters are years apart at this point, you know, like Zuko's been running a country.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_01: Toph has been uh running a metal bending uh academy.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_01: Uh so like and Sokka's like training people in like the Southern Water Tribe how to like create certain things and stuff.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_01: So like the they're each doing different things in their lives, but they come back together when when Aang needs them.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I love that.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_01: I I absolutely love that.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, and we can't forget Toph, who is just now like uh she's in her Ho era.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's kind of true though.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_01: You're laughing, but it's true.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um is he hot?
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_01: Is he attractive?
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, he's attractive.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_01: It's in the bones.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, right, right when when uh when Zuko answers that.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, yeah, man.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_01: I love Zuko.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: I Zuko and Toph are are they've always been among my favorite characters ever, just in anything.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah, no, I I'm with you on Zuko.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_00: I've always loved the Iroh and Zuko pairing in the original.
• 26:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um Iro being like one of my absolute like top-tier favorites, but I love Zuko because I feel like that's the best redemption arc that I've seen for a villain in like a cartoon.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, it it's probably it probably is the best in in cartoons period, just because you know, we've we've spoken about this several times in several podcasts at this point.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_01: But what makes the first Avatar series so good, and this is actually I think something that this movie lacks a little bit, is uh a moral moral's the wrong word.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_01: Why why can't I think of what I'm talking about?
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: But there the themes of the original Avatar series are so robust and so ahead of their demographic, you know, like this is built for 10 through 15 year olds, you know, and it's teaching you stuff about, you know, like choosing the right thing over even your own blood, choosing you know, and it goes into a bunch of themes that no other TV show was teaching you.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_01: There was no SpongeBob's not gonna teach you anything about, you know, like terrorists and the the difference between terrorism and rebels, you know, like you're not gonna get that, like with what with Jet and his gang.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_01: You're you're not gonna get genocide and and the ramifications of genocide and the ramifications of running away.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_01: You it the the show was so heavy, but it treated its audience like it could take those things, and it did take those things, and that's why 20 years later we're still talking about it.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_01: They're still getting we're getting a movie now.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we have a movie now.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_00: But I know that there's people out there that aren't fans of the Avatar, but literally every person that I have talked to that I know personally that I've spoken to about the Avatar, I'll love the series.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I remember growing you know, watching it in high school, and like you know, my sisters who were like it was I would say like it was catered.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I guess I was in that demographic, the 10 to 15.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_00: I was around the age like 15 years old, but I I just like instantly like connected with it, and so did like a lot of people.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: There I I know that the the Avatar really hit its like peak popularity in COVID, but there was definitely a group of us out there that were just like this show slaps, you know, this this show's peak.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_00: And you you I've said it a thousand times.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_00: You you knew that I've been that I had been singing the praises of that cartoon for the longest time.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, I didn't I didn't get into it until 20 around 2014, 20 2013, I think, is when I got into it.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: That's when I was dating my now wife, Jen, and she she lent me her DVDs, and I I ate through them.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: They were so good.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_01: But let's talk about the movie a little bit.
• 29:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, let's talk about the movie a little bit.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_01: So Ang is on a quest to figure out what the denied are after, and the the denied are a sect of non-benders who are just butthurt, you know, like the world has not treated them kind.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_01: They feel that the benders owe them power and they they kind of just want to level the playing field, and that's not so different from you know the season one Korra group uh led by Amon.
• 29:57
  SPEAKER_01: Off the top of my head, I can't remember what they were called, but in that series, Amon was instead of actively seeking the power, you know, like he wasn't rallying the people to search for some power to bring bending to them, he was, on the other hand, you know, preaching about, you know, like you don't need benders anymore.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: We're gonna be we're this is a world that doesn't need benders anymore, you know.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_01: With the denied, they want that power and they feel denied.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, Aang is after whatever these people are after, and he finds out that something belonging to the Avatar Sonam.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_01: This is a new name for an avatar that we've never heard of.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_01: We actually get two new names for avatars.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_01: We've known the names of maybe 10 or 11 avatars up until this point, but these are two unique avatars that we have never heard of before, and one of them is played by Ki Hui Kwan named Avatar Xi'an.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_01: We can only get a little glimpse of him, such a bizarre character.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_01: I think we gotta talk about Xi'an for a little bit because uh Aang is a little bit confused by him.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_01: He has an issue with feet, he has an issue with open-toed sandals, he has an issue with uh his ex-girlfriend with weird toes.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, why did we get uh Avatar Scanlin over here?
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_01: I actually thought that this was really funny.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that that is part of the joy of Avatar is that like you're gonna have different personalities, you're gonna have different fears, you're gonna have different phobias, you know.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_01: Like this guy has uh serious pet pee about feet, and even you know, 5,000 years later, he's still asking avatars if you know sandals are still a thing, and Ang's like, yeah.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: He wants them piggies wrapped up, man.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_01: Dude, eradicate the piggies, yeah.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_01: But we eventually do get finding Sonom.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_01: The for whatever reason, Sonom broke her broke away from the chain of avatar.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_01: So even if they went all the way back to Juan, they wouldn't have been able to reach Sonom because she kind of locked herself out of the Avatar cycle.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_00: I thought that was interesting, you know.
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_00: It almost kind of reminds me of when somebody detaches themselves from the force in Star Wars.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_00: Like there's like a link that's severed.
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I thought that was interesting that like she was actually able to do that, and that was out of wanting to I guess like protect the I guess the future and the future avatars from like what happened, and I guess there might have been a bit of shame of what she did with that staff that she had.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but before Ang meets up with Sonon, before he actually communes with her, he finds a frozen airbender named Tagah, played by Dave Batista.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_01: And what an interesting character.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_01: We know that he has been around for at least, or he's been like frozen in ice for at least 5,000 years.
• 33:12
  SPEAKER_01: His his airbender tattoos are ancient.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_01: They barely look like the arrows that Aang has or some of the other airbenders that we've seen in the past.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_01: But they are very clearly airbender tattoos, you know, like they they still follow the same basic pattern around the body.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_01: And Tag's such an interesting character because he uses airbending so differently from anything we've seen before.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like it's almost he's like a Dragon Ball Z character.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: He there's like he uses it to grab things from a distance and he can like crush it.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: Which is crazy.
• 33:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so we know that airbenders can do some like crazy stuff with air.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_01: In one of the Yang Chen novels, Avatar Yang Chen uses airbending to suck the air out of a room, basically to put someone unconscious, you know, like they are no longer able to breathe.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_01: She was able to suck the air out of their lungs, literally.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_01: And that I think we actually see a moment where Tagar does this.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_01: Like he shoots air into Aang's chest, and it kind of like literally knocks the wind out of him, and he crashes somewhere.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, before all of this, there's a wonderful like reunion of airbenders and this joy of the prospect of you know Aang being able to bring airbending back.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_01: You know, that is his number one goal right now.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_01: He is, you know, he is Avatar first, or I would actually say he's airbender first and avatar second, and he's trying to bring back his culture.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_01: And we see that he's collecting relics from all over the world, he's trying to protect what exists, and he doesn't know he doesn't even at this point know if he has a child, if it would be an airbender.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: He doesn't say that in the in the film, but at this point, he literally doesn't know.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like he literally might be the last airbender.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_01: So watching this is so interesting because we know that he isn't gonna be the last airbender.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_01: We know that his son and his grandchildren are airbenders, and unfortunately, he never meets his grandchildren.
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_01: But and he we also know that by the third season of Avatar Legend of Korra, they are able to, because the spirit world comes back to the mortal realm, airbending is kind of restored to the people at random, you know, like that that's a big moment in later Legend of Korra seasons.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_01: So Aang doesn't know that this is going to happen.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_01: So for him, this is life or death for the Airbenders, you know, getting that staff, figuring out a way to work with Tagar, and he's like immediately betrayed.
• 35:54
  SPEAKER_01: But what do you think about that?
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_01: Because I I found it so heartbreaking seeing like Aang's hopes and dreams dangled in front of him, and he'll never, you know, at least in his mortal life, he'll never know what truly became of the airbenders.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm with you.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_00: That it is definitely heartbreaking, and I just immediately knew that like when they took him out, I was like, Yeah, there's something not right about this guy.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_00: I said he was I was like that he was trapped in the same type of like energy ice that that that Aang was, and I was like, I had a feeling, I was like, the Avatar had to have put him there.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_00: Like there he must have been doing something that like he was trapped there for a reason, and then sure enough, it was because he he was a radical, like he wanted to, you know, he he was I guess creating an uprising against the other benders, and essentially like he was doing what the Fire Nation did in the original series, you know, like he wanted to like uh to be just straight up airbenders everywhere, and I feel like the staff is a precursor to what we got in season three of The Legend of Korra, right?
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: Like, okay, there's a possibility that Avatar or or that airbending or other bending can be bestowed on people who are non-benders, right?
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: Because Yeah, and it has to do with the spirit world.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_00: And so I believe that this movie is a precursor to that, and you know that it that we're getting like, okay, so this is where we kind of get a little bit of a taste of bending can be given to people through the spirit world.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_01: That's a good that's a really good point.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_01: There's a bunch of little hints as to like the future and how this all ties in with the overall story, and I and that's what I love about this, and also the past, too.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_01: So like we actually I'm gonna look something up really quick.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_01: So they mention or Tagah mentions that I want to call him Tagah.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_01: I keep saying Tag, but I think it's Tagga.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_01: Tagar keeps mentioning that, you know, like the Earth Kingdom was the the culprit of so much of the genocide of airbenders in his time, as opposed to the Fire Nation in Ang's time.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_01: One thing that I found was really interesting was Sonom actually said that the Earth King the Earth tribes created an earth kingdom, you know, and that's that would be the birth of the modern earth kingdom that we have in the modern day show, which is really cool lore building.
• 38:34
  SPEAKER_01: And then she explains that I sent my people into the mountains, and that's where we would get the temples at and the four corners, you know.
• 38:41
  SPEAKER_01: They most, if you look at the map, there's only one temple in like the main continent, and it's at the very north at like the the highest mountains.
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_01: The rest of them are off the coast of the earth kingdom.
• 38:54
  SPEAKER_01: So like that does help explain how they sifted and went their separate ways.
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_01: Or not went their separate ways, but they found shelter away from the earth people, the earth kingdom.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_01: So I found that was interesting.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_01: So I forget the name of the city that was like the earth or the air nomad city.
• 39:16
  SPEAKER_01: Was it like Jahara or something like that?
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_00: Right, it was like uh like a utopia or something like that.
• 39:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it was Zootopia.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_01: But anyway, I think that must have existed in the Earth Kingdom, and it was probably just destroyed because the the Earth tribes all came together and kicked everyone else out.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_01: That's why there's no water tribe people, there's no firebenders.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_01: It's just earth people.
• 39:40
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that's pretty interesting and profound world building that I'm I'm pretty pleased about, you know, like it kind of reshapes uh my own personal history of the the Avatar world.
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna have to think about that.
• 39:53
  SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna have to watch this again and ponder that a little bit more.
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_01: What did you think of like Tagar?
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_01: I keep calling him Taga.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_01: Taga.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_01: Why do what do you think about Taga and his fighting prowess and like the style of fighting that he brought to the table?
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_00: I thought it was interesting because for the longest time we've seen Airbending use a lot more of you know just kind of dodging, almost like defensively.
• 40:21
  SPEAKER_00: Jackie Chan in his movies, like you know, where there's like a lot of dodging and using like the use of like the body against themselves, right?
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_00: Like when they do get up close.
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_00: But this one was a very aggressive style, which gets me thinking that like you know, there's there's different versions of Kung Fu, right?
• 40:45
  SPEAKER_00: And the firebenders used northern Shaolin Kung Fu.
• 40:49
  SPEAKER_00: It wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility if there were different ways of firebending that was that was broken off of that initial, right?
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like we knew that I mean we had learned that you know a lot of people used anger in firebending, but then that that there was uh an even more powerful version of firebending that didn't use anger, right?
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_00: So I could see that there being maybe an angry version of airbending, right?
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_00: A very aggressive version of airbending, which was I mean, like this dude was grabbing onto like metal objects and crushing it with air.
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_01: I've found that airbending is primarily a defensive technique, you know, like when you see airbenders fight, they're usually pushing the the attacks away and disarming, you know.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_01: I feel like that's the primary use of airbending during fights.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_01: But with Taga, we we actually see, like you said, an aggressive style.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_01: It was it was definitely not defensive, it was offense.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_01: And he was fully convinced he killed Team Avatar.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_01: And by all respects, he basically did.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if they weren't in that pool of extra spiritual water, Katara probably wouldn't have come back to life and you know saved the rest of them.
• 42:13
  SPEAKER_01: But the the fact that he basically 1v5 the team avatar, like he was a powerful bender, he knew his stuff, and he wasn't a native bender either, like he learned that.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he was a non-bender.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's why he was able to like kind of hook up and team up with the um or he teamed up with the denied.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, that's a good point.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, like he he understood their plight.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_01: He wanted he knew that back in his time he wanted power and he got it.
• 42:46
  SPEAKER_01: But that also kind of explains why he didn't have the sentimentality of the air nomads, you know, like he wasn't he wasn't spiritually air nomad, you know, like he didn't get it, and no matter how much Aang tried to like broach that divide with him, he wasn't having it.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_01: Like in his mind, it was revenge or nothing.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_01: I do like the the little bit of redemption he gets at the end as he's being like kind of lifted back into nothingness, into the spirit realm, um, where he kind of recites something it must have been some like airbender oath that they all knew, where like air airbending teaches that like we are like the mist, you know, we're we're here one day and we're gone the next.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought that was such a beautiful scene of like he knew he was dying, a Aang knew he was dying.
• 43:41
  SPEAKER_01: It was a way for him to forgive himself, and that's what Aang said he needed to do.
• 43:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I I thought that was a a cool ending for Taga, for sure.
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, a absolutely.
• 43:53
  SPEAKER_00: And it was pretty insane that he was able to take down Team Avatar.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: I think a combination of there's a lot of dodging and moving around with airbending.
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_00: So I could see him using a combination of that with his own style.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_00: That that would make that that's a tough airbender right there.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_01: That is a tough airbender.
• 44:14
  SPEAKER_01: Did you like Dave Batisa as Taga?
• 44:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, yes.
• 44:19
  SPEAKER_00: I I definitely like that we got you know just uh a non-dumb Drax.
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_00: He always is like they always animate him as these like hulking characters, which is funny.
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_00: But I mean he did he did a really good job.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um he's we've gotten him in a in a few animations, and I feel like he's done a great job in every single one that that we've you know we've watched, so or covered.
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I think he did a really good job.
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_01: Did you get Dragon Ball Z vibes from this movie?
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_00: Uh maybe that last fight, that last fight definitely had some crazy power scaling going on.
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_01: There was some power scaling.
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_01: Did you feel at any point that Taga was basically Brawly from like the DBZ movies back in the day?
• 45:08
  SPEAKER_01: Because essentially, in the so Brawly is a character, he's another Saiyan character that isn't technically part of the the television canon.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_01: He's just a he's strictly a a film character in the Dragon Ball Z universe.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_01: But he's another Saiyan just like Goku, but he's the counterpart of Goku, where he's a little bit stronger, a little bit darker, a little bit, and they there's a a brief moment where like you think that oh maybe they can work together and like do do good or like team up at some point.
• 45:42
  SPEAKER_01: But eventually Brawley is the stronger of the two, the the evil version of the two.
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_01: And I I kind of felt that was happening a little bit with Taga and Aang.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um and even like you said, the power scaling, we had some it was kind of like uh Aang 2.0, like it was a Super Saiyan Aang at some point at a certain point where he he Yeah, yeah, it's like we we we got some like like ultra instinct from both Taga and Aang.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_01: That's what yes, that's what it felt like, and it wasn't bad, you know.
• 46:15
  SPEAKER_01: Like I didn't I didn't hate that, and it works with the the universe that they've built up up until this point.
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_01: We know that people can be possessed with the power of the spirits in in like the spirit realm.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_01: So like it makes sense that there would be some sort of hybrid along the way, and yeah.
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_01: What I will say about this is that it's a beautiful movie.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_01: The animation, the love that went into it, you can see it in literally every frame.
• 46:44
  SPEAKER_01: The and you could tell they had fun too.
• 46:46
  SPEAKER_01: Like they had like when when they went back into the spirit realm, and you know, like we we saw like old Zuko as as he would look like later.
• 46:55
  SPEAKER_01: Actually, old Zuko and Katura as they look like in Legend of Korra.
• 46:59
  SPEAKER_01: You had Aang and Sokka as they looked like in Last Airbender, and you had Toph as a baby.
• 47:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that was crazy, and and I liked that it was because the like spirit realm was like kind of out of whack.
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um, or at least where they were, and then what once they got to like that city that Taga was trying to like bring back to the um Earth realm that um they became themselves again.
• 47:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, man.
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_01: There's a lot that goes into this movie, and you it's such a heartbreaking thing that like you and I didn't get to experience this in a theater.
• 47:42
  SPEAKER_01: And 99.99% of people will not get to experience this in a theater unless it goes to theaters.
• 47:48
  SPEAKER_01: And it's very popular.
• 47:50
  SPEAKER_01: It is the number one movie ever on Paramount Plus.
• 47:53
  SPEAKER_01: It is a success by all margins.
• 47:57
  SPEAKER_00: It deserves to be because it it was really good.
• 48:01
  SPEAKER_00: I felt like it was an Avatar project that I really wanted, you know, like it was I feel like it was everything, not everything, but I would say just about everything that I wanted in, you know, seeing Team Avatar again.
• 48:17
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, we haven't seen Team Avatar since the original series.
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_00: And we got them a little little older, a little wiser, but their heart was still there.
• 48:28
  SPEAKER_00: And I I think that was like one of the most important things is I was a little nervous.
• 48:33
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, you know, okay, you know, they're aging him up, but that doesn't necessarily mean that their the personalities have to completely change, right?
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_00: There's things that that will mature, but the heart will always remain, and they kept it, and I think that they did a really good job with this.
• 48:49
  SPEAKER_01: A couple little things I want to touch on.
• 48:53
  SPEAKER_01: One, before I forget, we we see a little bit of Tough Beifong's metal bending academy at the beginning of the movie, where she's like team like she's telling her entire academy to like take her on, and she's the best uh she's the best earth earthbender and metal bender in the world.
• 49:09
  SPEAKER_01: Ha ha ha ha.
• 49:10
  SPEAKER_01: But among her students are actual characters that first in are introduced in the comics.
• 49:16
  SPEAKER_01: So her first original three metal bending students are a character named Hotan, Penga, and the Dark One.
• 49:24
  SPEAKER_01: Hotun and The Dark One make it make appearances in that little montage of fighting, but Penga, for whatever reason, does not.
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know, I don't know what the rationale there was, but when I watch this movie, I love that.
• 49:36
  SPEAKER_01: I love that they the comics and the in the books, they're not written by Mike and Brian.
• 49:41
  SPEAKER_01: They're not I don't want to say licensed, because that's not that's not the right term.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_01: They're given like full blessings and stuff, and like they're considered canon, but it's nice to actually see that canon play out on screen.
• 49:52
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like this is something that the creators took from somewhere someone else and put it into their story.
• 49:58
  SPEAKER_01: So I thought that was cool.
• 50:00
  SPEAKER_00: It's a it's it's like if George Lucas had made a movie and put aspects of like the books from back in the day into that movie.
• 50:08
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and that's not to say that the prequels didn't take themes and concepts and certain items from legends and like put them into the movie canon, but this definitely That's true.
• 50:22
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, we did we got we got Thrawn, which was a book character, so and Coruscant was uh originally uh a legends creation, but anyway, I digress.
• 50:34
  SPEAKER_01: Uh another scene that I really love and I feel like we should really talk about is the scene where Team Avatar works together, which is them on the airship and they're about to crash into the water.
• 50:45
  SPEAKER_01: We have Sokka doing everything in his power to like wheel with his feet, uh still steer steal the the airship with his feet.
• 50:52
  SPEAKER_00: He was having a Looney Tunes moment.
• 50:53
  SPEAKER_01: He was having a looney moment.
• 50:54
  SPEAKER_00: It was a straight up Looney Tunes moment where he was running on that wheel.
• 50:58
  SPEAKER_01: Zuko was like throwing fire into the furnace to keep the engines running.
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_01: Toph was trying to close the metal sphere, and Katara was literally parting the water so that as the airs as the airship kept going down, they wouldn't crash into the water.
• 51:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I love the fact that when they were ready to hit the switch, Sokka needed to be the person to do it.
• 51:21
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like everyone had a role in that, save for Aang, who was somewhere else at in that moment.
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_01: But I love that they were each instrumental in their role, you know, like they couldn't have done it with just three individuals, they needed all four of them.
• 51:36
  SPEAKER_01: And even though Sokka doesn't have bending, they found a way to make him just as pivotal as everyone else in that scene.
• 51:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I I love that.
• 51:44
  SPEAKER_01: I love stuff like that.
• 51:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 51:46
  SPEAKER_01: You got any final thoughts, Ant?
• 51:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that that that scene was actually really cool.
• 51:50
  SPEAKER_00: They had like that, was it like an Everstorm?
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_00: I thought that was interesting.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_00: That very Skull Island.
• 51:57
  SPEAKER_01: Very Skull Island, yes.
• 52:00
  SPEAKER_01: Literally, literally literal Skull Skulls Island.
• 52:04
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 52:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um, lion turtles, skulls, yeah, skeletons.
• 52:08
  SPEAKER_01: I feel bad for the lion turtles.
• 52:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I thought that was really cool, and then that they took a shortcut through the spirit realm to leave.
• 52:17
  SPEAKER_01: Just a quick shortcut.
• 52:19
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, I love that.
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_01: And we often talk about things that are juicy on this show, and I I feel like we would be remiss if we missed the opportunity to talk about the cabbages.
• 52:32
  SPEAKER_01: You know, the the juicy, juicy cabbages that were trampled and thrown to the ground in the turmoil of Taga bringing that temple down on Republic City.
• 52:42
  SPEAKER_01: I thought it was really just a fun, fun moment to see Cabbage the Cabbage Merchant.
• 52:49
  SPEAKER_01: You you gotta have the cabbage merchant.
• 52:51
  SPEAKER_01: Like it is just it.
• 52:53
  SPEAKER_00: I loved it.
• 52:54
  SPEAKER_01: Of there there's a couple like characters that they bring back.
• 52:57
  SPEAKER_01: There's the guy with like the who like is like the ultra fan of Aang, who's like, oh, and he's like foams at the mouth.
• 53:04
  SPEAKER_00: Foaming at the mouth, and then like his kid is doing the same thing.
• 53:08
  SPEAKER_01: There's a couple of characters like that.
• 53:10
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, I thought that you know the the cabbage on the ground was you know an ex especially juicy one.
• 53:15
  SPEAKER_01: And it reminded me that please, listeners, give us a five-star juicy review.
• 53:21
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we prefer it juicy.
• 53:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, we will take crunchy on occasion, and cabbages are definitely crunchy, a lot of water in there.
• 53:28
  SPEAKER_01: But yeah, thanks so much for listening to us here for episode 178 of Project Geekology.
• 53:36
  SPEAKER_01: Again, we're your hosts, Dakota and Anthony, and next week we will have more hosts join us as we discuss Ghostbusters.
• 53:45
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, this week was supposed to be Ghostbusters, but it is Avatar instead.
• 53:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, some of our hosts had uh some life stuff that they had to uh deal with, some work stuff.
• 53:56
  SPEAKER_01: But we'll be back.
• 53:57
  SPEAKER_01: We always will.
• 53:58
  SPEAKER_00: Bye.
• 53:59
  SPEAKER_01: Bye guys.