starlady: Aang with fire (aang can be asian & still save the world)
Electra ([personal profile] starlady) wrote2011-06-21 05:51 pm

Brief thoughts on A:TLA Book One: Water

# One of the little things I love is all the fauna and how they're remixed rather than copied straight from our world. Turtle-seals FTW!

# Star Trek actors doing voices so far: George Takei, Rene Auberjonois (twice!). Did I miss anyone?

# I don't think it's possible to get any more Daoist than the Ocean and Moon spirits giving up their immortality to become fish. Zhuangzi would be pleased.

# Can we all take a minute to appreciate the flying Cat Bus homage of awesomeness that is Appa? Also, in the last episode of this season, the Mononoke-hime shoutout that is Aang in his "Avenging the Moon spirit" form? I have to say, I enjoy these Ghibli homages, they show that the A:TLA showrunners have done their homework (obviously).

# On the other hand, apparently whoever directed the voice actors was incapable of teaching them the proper way to pronounce characters' names. Case in point: everyone's favorite villain, Zhao. Even his own voice actor can't say his name correctly! Yes, this is me in my corner being pedantic, I am getting hung up on a tree, but it niggles.

# However, I am not missing the forest of awesome that is this show for that tree. This show is the best! ♥ ♥ ♥

torachan: (Default)

[personal profile] torachan 2011-06-21 09:00 am (UTC)(link)
Well, all the names are very Americanised. The Japanese-y ones are super cringeworthy, so I can only imagine the other-language-based ones must be as well.
lilacsigil: 12 Apostles rocks, text "Rock On" (12 Apostles)

[personal profile] lilacsigil 2011-06-21 09:56 am (UTC)(link)
I decided to fanwank that everyone has strong regional accents, so the different pronunciation is all just part of the rich tapestry of a fantasy world that really does have a lot of different cultures.

[personal profile] noldo 2011-06-21 10:05 am (UTC)(link)
It seems terribly meet to link you to the following: um --!

Also, the name pronunciation issue reminds that there's perhaps some interesting meta to be had re. why all of the Avatar-verse speaks the same language with approximately the same accent, and I really must prevent myself from working through it if I want to do useful things ever again.
rushthatspeaks: (Default)

[personal profile] rushthatspeaks 2011-06-21 02:05 pm (UTC)(link)
As far as I can tell, Appa is what happens when the Catbus has a fling with that one thing from Where The Wild Things Are, you know, the one with the horns.

I love this show so much and season two is even better.
holyschist: Image of a medieval crocodile from Herodotus, eating a person, with the caption "om nom nom" (Default)

[personal profile] holyschist 2011-06-21 02:34 pm (UTC)(link)
Appa is the BEST. That is all.
glass_icarus: (avatar: aang momo grinny)

[personal profile] glass_icarus 2011-06-21 05:16 pm (UTC)(link)
YAY A:TLA!! *\o/* &hearts

Also, YES re: Ghibli homages, ahahaha! I didn't think Appa looked that much like the Cat Bus, but it has been a while since I've watched Totoro...
epershand: An ampersand (Default)

[personal profile] epershand 2011-06-22 07:32 am (UTC)(link)
Yay Avatar!

They aren't Star Trek actors, but General Zhao is Jason Isaacs (aka Lucius Malfoy from the HP movies and Captain Hook from the Peter Pan remake that happened about six years ago) and Fire Lord Ozai is Mark Hamill. :)

[identity profile] aliettedb.livejournal.com 2011-06-21 09:59 am (UTC)(link)
I loooove that show to bits (and yes, there are problems with pronunciations, but the awesomeness far outweighs the missed bits). The little details regularly made me go "oooohhh", and that doesn't happen very often.