Damn you Nickelodeon!

[ríomhaire]

I'm a big Avatar: The Legend of Aang (or The Last Airbender in the US/AUS) fan but it really suffers from being a Nickelodeon cartoon sometimes because they won't let anyone die! It's usually not a huge problem due to the fact that most main characters don't actually want to kill anyone but when you're doing a show entirely based around a war with only a handful of character deaths (not counting people that are said to have died a hundred years ago)

Spoiler

Zhao, Jet and possibly Combustion Man

can seem a bit silly. A good example is an episode where a group of freedom fighters are planning on bursting a dam in order to kill a soldiers garrisoned in the town. This will also kill all the townspeople, but they see this as a nessisary evil (their plan, of course, fails). Earlier in this episode they fight a group of these same soldiers but do not attempt to harm a single one, they merely disarm them. These same people are willing to kill a load of innocent civilians in order to drive out the soldiers. It doesn't make any sense.

In the UK on the other hand there is Doctor Who. Doctor Who was made as a kids show and is still marketed at children. It is unusual to have an episode in this show where people don't die. If fact, in one episode the Doctor starts making a huge deal out of the fact that no one has died, shouting "EVERYBODY LIVES!" at top of lungs. Why is there such a difference? Why is the American show so unwilling to show death? The only time they even ever used the word kill is refering to a fish. But it wasn't even always like that. In the original Tranformers they often talked about death and killing (even if little actually occured) but now it seems that American kids shows can't even talk about death these days. It's damn annoying.

/rant

 

[Cpt Tenacious]

I don't really see what the big deal is with Avatar I don't really care for it.

 

[Darkside55]

You can blame soccer moms, the FCC and "won't somebody PLEASE think of the children?!" You remember Gargoyles? Remember how, during City of Stone, Demona was outright killing people? And not just injuring them or temporarily incapacitating them until the spell wore off, she was KILLING them. Breaking off limbs and so forth. During the flashback sequences you can even see a bunch of people die some pretty gruesome deaths (mace to the face!). And those people weren't stone, they were flesh and blood, getting killed in battle. Can't do that any more, man.

Nickelodeon's always been shy about that sort of thing anyway. So while the characters are dying, they show them in ambiguous ways. It's just something that I guess parents aren't ready for, despite the fact that, y'know, I saw a bunch of parents dragging their under 10-years-old children to showings of Aliens vs. Predator Requiem. But death in a cartoon, good heavens.

This is one of those things you can go back and say, "It was better back in the day." People used to die all the time in cartoons. Remember Swat Kats?! Somebody died EVERY SINGLE EPISODE. Go back and watch.

I will say though that Chowder has been using the word "kill" a LOT, and they did televise the death of the Third Hokage on Naruto, so...but I still don't think we'll see any concrete deaths in Avatar. You can certainly go on believing that there have been, though, like at the end of Book 1. You know there were heavy casualties when Aang went all sea monster.




Oh, edit! DAN TURPIN. Remember him? "Remember, Superman...victory has its price."

"That was for Dan Turpin!"
"Who?"
"The good man you murdered."
"Had I known one human's death would pain you so, Kal-El, I would have killed more. And kill more I shall. Carry that agony with you to oblivion, Superman."

F*ck, talk about epic. That's the kind of shit they can't show any more.

 

[Direwolf]

Roughnecks had some pretty heavy stuff for a children's series too, and caught a lot of flack for it. By the end of the series there's multiple major characters dead, one has a psychotic breakdown, and another is in a wheelchair.

 

[Jintor]

That was awesome.

Avatar really ****ing suffers from it. Case in point: Day of Black Sun.

 

[Darkside55]

Exosquad too. People used to die in Exosquad. What else...well, JLU had death scenes. Grundy's soul. Superman, Batman, JLU.

I'm trying to think of non-movies, televised series where people died. Does David the Gnome count? Turned into a tree; he dead. Real Adventures of Johnny Quest, there were some deaths. Dinobot's death in Beast Wars. Mighty Max (lol timeline reset). Galaxy Rangers, which, unrelated to the discussion, has a GOD TIER themesong. The Legend of Prince Valiant. Phantom 2040. They showed the deaths of Beryl's generals in Sailor Moon, on UPN no less. Nephrite's death was pretty savage. Wing Commander Academy, also on USA like Exosquad. Terra "died" in Teen Titans. Shadow Raiders.

Oh, Oban, one of my favorite cartoons of all time. You see Molly's mother die in an a racing accident and that's a main theme of the show. And some other people die throughout...

Hrm, it was retconned in like the fifth season (I believe), but Morph died in the X-Men. THAT was a savage death. I hella remember that scene. That was a big plot point too, Wolverine going berserker on every sentinel he saw after that because he kept remembering Morph getting blasted in the back. "This one's for you, Morph!"

Not exactly a human death, but in the Aladdin series there was a character named Arbutus in the episode "Garden of Evil" who died. He was a plant-man. He was a seriously tragic character ("Is it an accident when you rip and pluck my flowers, condemning them to a slow death in a vase?") and Aladdin killed him. They replanted his rose in the end, though.

That's all I can think of right now. Always feels like I'm forgetting something when I do lists like these.

 

[Direwolf]

I think the distinction is really just between what shows they believe they're making for teens and preteens, and which are for kids.

 

[Darkside55]

Doubtful. I'm sure Nickelodeon isn't ignorant of the fanbase of Avatar. Avatar mainly appeals to the older market, not young kids. If you were to sample how many fans of Avatar are actually kids, vs. teens and adults, the latter would be vastly higher.

Friend of mine who works in retail once remarked that he was talking to some kids about Avatar, and they didn't even watch the show. They'd seen it but they didn't get it, it was over their heads.

It's more along the lines of Nick imposing strict standards on what they will and will not show.

 

[Jintor]

Which is horrible.

A lot of the third season begins to drag horribly on suspension of disbelief when the Evil Empire begins imprisoning all their enemies and everybody treats it as bad as killing them.

This when there was all this angst about people's parent's dying, entire villages being wiped out etc in the earlier seasons.

 

[ríomhaire]

But the Fire Nation isn't an evil empire out to kill everyone. They don't want to kill everyone; they want to bring them prosperity. Unnecessary killing is against Fire Nation doctrine (although I doubt people like Zhao or Azula care too much). They even refuse to kill the most dangerous of people; the benders. And that's didn't start with book 3. Remember all the earthbenders on the metal rig prison?

Oh, and Darkside, I used to love Gargoyles!

 

[Jintor]

If they're not out to kill everyone, then what was all this crap about the Freedom Fighters in book 1? They didn't show mercy then. Why are they showing mercy now?

 

[Adrik_Senturu]

Holy shit Gargoyles that show was awesome. I totally had the VHS of the first episode that came with this retarded board game thing and everything. Oh jeez.

And yeah TV kind of sucks now, we have to get used to it D:

 

[ríomhaire]

If they're not out to kill everyone, then what was all this crap about the Freedom Fighters in book 1? They didn't show mercy then. Why are they showing mercy now?

The only Freedom Fighters I can think of are Jet's lot, and they were more merciless than the Fire Nation soldiers.

 

[Jintor]

The only Freedom Fighters I can think of are Jet's lot, and they were more merciless than the Fire Nation soldiers.

I was referring to their backstory of their villages being burnt down and them being orphans, etc, etc.

 

[ríomhaire]

Ah, I see. Well, things of that nature will happen in any war. Sozin's ideals and vision has been corrupted by Ozai though, and Azula follows after him. The idea of bringing the prosperity of the Fire Nation to the other nations has been twisted into the belief that fire is superior and has the divine right to rule all other elements.

 

[Naph]

More like, God damn Australian Cartoon Network.
Why would they agree on giving Comedy Channel adult swim?!
WHY!?

THE REASON IS BEYOND ME!

 

[Jintor]

More like, God damn Australian Cartoon Network.
Why would they agree on giving Comedy Channel adult swim?!
WHY!?

THE REASON IS BEYOND ME!

WAIT WHAT?

SERIOUS?

****.

**** SHIT.

 

[ríomhaire]

Adult Swin isn't on Cartoon Network here either; it's on Bravo.

 

[Shoes_Buttback03]

Really? wierd. It's on Cartoon Network in the US. Were I am. btw I loved Gargoyles!

Perhaps we should email Nick and let them know our ages and that we love Avatar? Oh did you hear M. Night Shamalan sp* is making the live action movie? I really am not looking forward to that crap.

 

[Jintor]

Hah.

They get ****ing truckloads of fanmail, man. No point. None at all.

 

[Shoes_Buttback03]

Yeah your right. If I was insanely rich I would.

Buy Adult Swim form Cartoon Network and make it a channel in it's own.
I would buy the right's to Samurai Jack and Megas XLR and have them on my channel.
And I would buy the rights to Avatar and step up the maturity.

Im starting donations.

 

[Naph]

But do they get RED envelopes? ?

 

[Jintor]

...you're going to red packet them?

 

[ríomhaire]

Really? wierd. It's on Cartoon Network in the US. Were I am. btw I loved Gargoyles!

Perhaps we should email Nick and let them know our ages and that we love Avatar? Oh did you hear M. Night Shamalan sp* is making the live action movie? I really am not looking forward to that crap.

A live-Action Avatar film? **** it. Why? There is no way it won't suck.

 

[Shoes_Buttback03]

I don't have confidence in M. Night. I don't like the fact it's going to be live action. And I really don't like that it's not the actors that voice the character's.

All of this makes me doubt the film's cred.

 

[ríomhaire]

I have no doubt in the film's cred. It's going to suck, fact.

 

[Shoes_Buttback03]

Factoid... I like that word.

If it was animated and directed buy the Wachouski sp* Bros then I would be hyped.

 

[Jintor]

Ah. So what you're saying is, you're a moron.

 

[Sam]

Ah. So what you're saying is, you're a moron.

I chuckled.

I agree with most of what has been posted in this thread: live action film will most likely be wank, and Avatar should embrace it's more mature themes. Having said that, I don't really want any of the characters to die.