It's not that bad.

What a surprise. People on the Internet were wrong about The Last Airbender.

A couple of important things before I proceed: a) I am, by no means, an M. Night Shyamalan apologist, nor am I a fan. I've seen bits and pieces of all of his films. His filmmaking craft is impressive even when the stories themselves are less so. In fact, more often than not, I end up thinking of the mockery he gets on "Robot Chicken" ("What a tweest!"). Also, b) I know of the show, but, except for a brief recap, I have never seen an episode of "Avatar: the Last Airbender". To this day, I find it rather incongruous that this show even aired on Nickelodeon, and, as such, I've avoided it. Don't get me wrong: the show doesn't look bad. It's just...well, take a look at what airs on the network on any given day and tell me that "Avatar" fits in there somewhere. I dare you.

Then I heard about the backlash developing against the film because of the casting. People were up in arms about White actors playing the young protagonists. When I stated my opinion on the matter in the comments section of a Cinematical story - that people were conveniently ignoring the fact that the majority of the cartoon's voice cast was White - people blasted me, with one disturbed soul stating that I was the worst person in the world. I'm sure that, for all the murderers, pedophiles, dictators and rapists out there, that was a real load off.

As the release date approached, there seemed to be a brand-new backlash brewing: that this film allegedly sucks. People love to kick a guy when he's down. Don't believe me? Ask O.J. Simpson. Given the response to Shyamalan's last couple of films, I couldn't help but think that people already had their reviews of The Last Airbender written before they even entered the theater ("Killer plants?! Fuck your mother, M. Night Shyamalan!"). The A.V. Club graded it an 'F'. The reviewer of my local paper gave it one star out of four (bear in mind, he also gave that Hulk movie where he fought the dogs four stars). Roger Ebert gave it half-a-star, but we all know how unimpeachable his tastes are.

I went to see the film today, believing that I had seen far worse movies and that this one would be of little consequence.

For the most part, I was right.

The film has its problems: too much narration communicating what could easily be seen on screen, awkward staging and framing (like those shots of Aang taking up part of the screen with other characters in the background; this kind of thing can work in animation, but looks kind of silly in live-action) and a bit too much expository dialogue. Also, a minor complaint, but I thought that Aasif Mandvi and Cliff Curtis looked too similar, to the point that it looked like Zuko's father was trying to kill him in some scenes.

Still, there are moments where one can see the film that "Avatar" fans were hoping for, mainly in the fight scenes. The effects for the element bending were impressive, as one would expect from ILM. I've heard complaints about the acting from the younger principals, but I didn't notice anything too objectionable. The standouts for me were Dev Patel as Zuko and Shaun Toub (Yinsen in Iron Man) as Iroh. As per usual for a Shyamalan film, James Newton Howard's score was terrific, shining in the action scenes.

Overall, there are way worse films out there. For people to single out this one is more than a little ridiculous. As if it needed to be said enough...grow up, Internet.