Avatar: The Last Airbender WTFery

I don't remember if I've written about this on the LJ yet... probably not.

M.Night Shyamalan and Frank Marshall have been producing/filming the Last Airbender movie (not to be confused with the James Cameron Avatar movie...), filming for which has finished this week (or will be soon). The Asian community has been in an uproar over the white-washing (and potential yellowfacing) of the characters.

See: History of Yellowface

(I was talking to someone recently and mentioned the Airbender issue and when I used the term "yellowface" she said she'd never heard it before. I explained what it was and she was pretty shocked and offended.)

Before I get into it, I have to say I generally don't care because people always dismiss the Asians and they're always yellowfacing (because apparently that's still okay to do) and mostly I just can't be bothered. I grew up in an area where my family and one other were the only Asians in probably 20 miles. I didn't get mad at the Asian kids being recast as white kids for 21. I didn't care about Dragonball because, honestly, wtf-ever - they're aliens. The whitewashing of Earthsea (whitewashing Native Americans, in that case) was... well, I never read the books and I didn't know.

My huge problem with the destruction of Airbender by M.Night and Marshall is that the creators of Avatar: The Last Airbender, Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko, spent a lot of time researching the East & South Asian cultures they built into the show. Basically - they didn't pull that stuff out of a hat. If Peter Jackson cast only Pacific Islanders and non-Caucasians in Lord of the Rings, I'd expect people to be upset since it's based strongly in Anglo-Saxon tradition.

Jeff Yang of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote this article:

One reason Asian Americans such as Yang and Kim have been drawn into the show's orbit is that it has hit it big despite - many would say because of - its richly Asian-inspired setting. The core ideas are drawn from Hindu, Taoist and Buddhist philosophy; its character names - Aang, Katara, Toph Bei Fong - incorporate Chinese, Japanese and Southeast Asian phonemes; and its visual identity is modeled on traditional Asian iconography.

Read: MANAA's Response to a Letter from Paramount on the Last Airbender (and its lack of Asians).

And now read this post on the language of casting and how the casting directors of Avatar screwed us Asians over. HI. OFFENSIVE.

Jackson Rathbone (Jasper in Twilight) had this to say about his casting/character in an MTV interview (emphasis mine):

Due in theaters in summer 2010, "Airbender" has already begun to face a bit of controversy over the casting of white actors like Rathbone, Ringer and McCartney to play Asian characters -- a concern the actor was quick to dismiss. "I think it's one of those things where I pull my hair up, shave the sides, and I definitely need a tan," he said of the transformation he'll go through to look more like Sokka. "It's one of those things where, hopefully, the audience will suspend disbelief a little bit."

HI. I'm sorry. WHAT?

Dev Patel has replaced Jesse McCartney as Zuko. That's great. You know what the means now? The dark skinned South Asians are genocidal villains who are trying to destroy the peace-loving white heroes. Further information here.

The trailer for the movie came out today and over at Facebook I had another spew due to the awfulness of this film. Below the cut, links, video, and the stuff I posted on my facebook.

( Apparently it's still okay to overlook Asians (media heavy) )

Daily Twitter Spew

( cut for easier skippage )