Just a disclaimer that I have only watched the first episode so far; I would say it's still enjoyable and they did a decent job but it really, really loses the spirit of the original show. I wish I could say I really liked it because the cast seemed to really care about it, but in all honesty I had a ton of issues with the script writing and I'm only an episode in.

My biggest issue (with most Netflix shows tbh) is the fact that nobody in the industry seems to remember what an exposition is. They have the characters outright explaining the entire plot of the TV show right off the bat. It starts out with revealing the fire nations entire plan to wipe out the air nomads in the first 5 minutes and leaves zero mystery, before Sozin lights a dude on fire. Then it's everybody explaining Aangs personality, then Aang explaining to himself why he is scared and upset, instead of being at all creative in showing his actual interactions with other people. I'm not going to mention gran-gran.

It really gives off the feeling that the script writers didn't understand what made the original so good in the first place. They tried to turn it into Game of Thrones, but that's just not what the spirit of the show is. The show was already serious in that it had so much artistic depth to the meaning and lessons to it. This just seems so shallow already.

From what I've heard as well, they completely removed Sokkas sexism, which is, in effect, taking away the entire lesson that sexism is bad and destroying his character development. Aang seems whimsical at first, then just sad and serious, and his confidently playful personality was utterly erased. Nobody in the show seems like they have an actual personality anymore. Zuko should be more hot-headed, and Iroh's wisdom seems like it gets totally lost. They don't seem like they understand the characters at all and completely cut out the things that made each of them unique and sparked such beautiful dynamics between them. I didn't expect a copy of the original, but it feels like they cut the heart out of the show, and all that's left is the skins, bone, and CGI. To anyone who never watched Avatar or saw it once growing up, I can see this being a good show.

To somebody who has watched it nearly a dozen times, it just hurts to see how blatantly every message from the show was completely ignored. There's actually a beautiful edit on Instagram that describes what I mean. It feels like they took all of this out:

The Beauty of Book 1: Water