The Last Airbender (film)

The Last Airbender is a 2010 American fantasy action-adventure film. It adapts the first season of the animated series Avatar: The Last Airbender (2005–2008). M. Night Shyamalan wrote and directed the movie. The cast includes Noah Ringer, Dev Patel, Nicola Peltz, Jackson Rathbone, Shaun Toub, Aasif Mandvi, and Cliff Curtis.

The story follows Aang, a young Avatar who needs to learn to control air, water, earth, and fire to restore balance and stop the Fire Nation from taking over the Water Tribes and Earth Kingdom. Development started in January 2007. Casting and pre-production happened in 2008. Principal photography ran from March to September 2009, with two weeks of shooting in Greenland and the rest in Pennsylvania.

Post-production began in August and took months because of heavy visual effects. The title dropped "Avatar" to avoid confusion with James Cameron's 2009 film Avatar. The film premiered at Alice Tully Hall in New York City on June 30, 2010, and was released in U.S. theaters the next day by Paramount Pictures. Critics, audiences, and fans of the animated series universally panned it.

Some praised Lesnie's cinematography and Howard's musical score. It is often called one of the worst films ever made, and both fans and the original series' creators have publicly disowned it. Although it made a profit at the box office—$319.7 million worldwide against a $150 million budget—it was seen as a box-office disappointment. The harsh reviews and disappointing earnings led the studio to cancel a planned trilogy.

A live-action Netflix series adaptation of the original animated show premiered fourteen years later to a better reception. A century after the Fire Nation declared war on the other three nations, Sokka and his sister Katara from the Southern Water Tribe find an unusual iceberg. Breaking it releases a beam of light and reveals a twelve-year-old boy named Aang and his flying bison, Appa. Disgraced Fire Nation prince Zuko sees the light and demands the villagers hand over the Avatar—the only person who can bend all four elements. Aang surrenders to save the village but escapes the Fire Nation ship and flies to Appa, brought by Katara and Sokka.