this post was submitted on 22 Feb 2024
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Television

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Netflix’s live-action Avatar has its heart in the right place, but its pacing and uneven performances leave a lot to be desired.

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[–] themeatbridge@lemmy.world 84 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Please let's all remember that these are child actors, and they are no responsible for the poor writing or direction in the show. We can be sure they have worked extremely hard and poured their lives into this show, and the ones we should be disappointed with are the showrunners.

[–] I_Has_A_Hat@lemmy.world 19 points 8 months ago (3 children)

If the acting is bad, we can be mad at the casting director as well. It doesn't really matter if they're child actors, that doesn't make them immune from being called bad actors. They don't deserve to get dunked on or solely blamed for the show, but let's not pretend they don't play a part in its quality. If they were amazing actors, I'd assume you'd have no issue giving them praise? Why is the opposite not true?

[–] teft@lemmy.world 40 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

The problem is people tend to go way the hell overboard when it comes to criticism and some child actors can't handle it. Look at what happened with Jake Lloyd as an example. Best to just leave the children out of the criticism and make it about the adults who made the decisions.

[–] CerealKiller01@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago

People tent to go way the hell overboard on a lot of things. Best to focus on constructive criticism, while keeping in mind the actors are children, rather than to blindly self-censor based on the subject.

[–] Blueberrydreamer@lemmynsfw.com 38 points 8 months ago (2 children)

If they were amazing actors, I'd assume you'd have no issue giving them praise? Why is the opposite not true?

Because they're children dude. Praise does not have harmful psychological consequences. There is no downside to giving a child credit for doing something well. There is tremendous harm in attacking a child over something they did objectively correctly, but inevitably not to the impossible standards of armchair critics whose entire presence on the Internet is built on giving exaggerated and heartless criticism.

[–] wrath_of_grunge@kbin.social 19 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

like the kid that played Anakin in Star Wars. he caught so much shit over it, that he gave up acting all together.

In 2012, Lloyd explained that his decision to retire from acting in 2001 was due to bullying at school and harassment by the press, both in response to his role in The Phantom Menace.

[–] scarilog@lemmy.world 3 points 8 months ago

Damn that's sad. Haven't seen the phantom menace in a while but I thought he was pretty good.

[–] Jakeroxs@sh.itjust.works 1 points 8 months ago

He also has Paranoid Schizophrenia...

[–] Lmaydev@programming.dev 9 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Complete false equivalency. Do you think positive and negative are the same thing?

[–] blargerer@kbin.social 12 points 8 months ago (2 children)

I've only watched the first 2 episodes, and yeah some of the performances come off quite bad, but I think the editing is at least partially to blame. They hold on characters too long and at odd moments completely destroying any sense of natural tempo in conversations.

[–] Microw@lemm.ee 2 points 8 months ago

yeah there was at least one scene where I was like "what the hell, the actors are awkwardly looking at something that isn't there, you clearly could have cut away from that take!"

Btw we have some discussions for the first few episodes on !avatar@lemmy.world if you want to weigh in there

[–] nachtigall@feddit.de 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

I think it was fine overall. But this is one of the few shows where I actually prefer the dub of my native language because the voice acting was rather underwhelming. To be fair the German voice cast is the same as the original show so they have more than 20 years of experience and nostalgia might play a role too 😁