A Review of Shyamalan’s ‘The Last Airbender’
On Monday afternoon, Paramount Studios invited the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL), Media Action Network for Asian Americans (MANAA) and Racebending.com to a private screening for ‘The Last Airbender,’ which will be released domestically on Thursday, July 1st. I was one of the people at this screening.

So before I get into what I thought about the film, I need to make it clear to you that over a year ago I learned that the casting call for the principal roles read “Caucasian or any other ethnicity,” even though the original animated series had Asian and Inuit heroes. The final casting reflects this, with the exception of the villain who was recasted for a person of South Asian descent. Since then I’ve been working with Racebending.com to spread awareness about the systemic practice of yellowface and ‘whitewashing’ in Hollywood, focusing on discouraging people from seeing this film.
That said, just within the past couple of weeks I began watching the original animated series for the first time. I got so hooked that I marathoned the series and finished the first two seasons in less than a week. I’ve only got a few episodes of the final season left; I’m watching it as I type this. Going into the screening I was excited to finally see the cartoon come to life, but I dreaded seeing the ‘whitewashing’ in action.
So what did I think? (more…)









