‘Avatar: The Last Airbender’ Boss Talks Top-Secret Casting Process, Stories Left Behind and Series Gameplan

The live-action series adaptation of the popular animated show Avatar: The Last Airbender has been a long time coming. And, like any great saga, hasn’t been without its share of challenges ahead of making it to the top of the mountain. Now, the eight-episode series, “Book One” is available in its entirety on Netflix. Geared to long-time fans and newcomers alike, there are hopes at Netflix that Avatar could become their next big fantasy event series. For showrunner, Albert Kim, he’s taking in the moment, hesitant to jeopardize the future with any talk of what’s to come, but more than happy to discuss the passion and process that went into creating this initial season.

The Hollywood Reporter spoke with Kim mere hours before the series launch to get his thoughts on casting, working with original series creators Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko, and the expectations from fans.

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Do you remember your first introduction to the animated series and your initial thoughts?

My daughter grew up watching it, and it was her favorite show when she was a kid. I would come home and find her sitting on the couch by herself watching it, and so I sat down to watch with her and that’s when I got totally sucked in. Pretty soon, I didn’t need her there. I just watched it on my own (laughs). I loved it, because as every fan knows, it’s just this epic storytelling and action and adventure and emotion and humanity. It was all those reasons. Plus, for me and my family, it existed in a world inspired by Asian folklore and legend which, was incredibly rare to see, even now, and much less back then, so that was also an important component of the story for us.

When the original creators of Avatar: The Last Airbender, Michael Dante DiMartino, and Bryan Konietzko, left their position as showrunners on this series over creative differences, it created a lot of discussion among fans about the validity of the Netflix adaptation. I’m curious if you had spoken to them at all, or if their experience gave you any pause on coming on board this iteration.

They were still involved when I first joined. They had been working on it for a while on their own, but then I came on board, so we overlapped for a little bit. I got the chance to talk to them a lot about the show. Everything from their vision, and what I thought should be done, to me geeking out about being able to talk to the original creators. So, we worked together for a little while, and then they decided they needed to leave and that was a personal decision on their part. It did bum me out, because I enjoyed working with them and I obviously would have loved to have kept on doing that. But they went through their own process, which started before I was part of the project. And it was a personal decision for them to leave. We just kept on going as best we could without them.  

I wanted to talk to you a little bit about the casting process, because I think it’s clear from the series that you cared about authenticity. It was great to see this Asian and Indigenous cast populating the show, and I imagine it was somewhat challenging to retain that authenticity and also find young actors who could embody the spirit of these characters and also perform the martial arts the bending moves.

Yeah, it was a tall order to fill these roles. As you said, we were committed to authenticity, not just to the cultures that inspired the characters, but to the characters themselves. In addition to looking at Asian and Indigenous communities for these actors, we also wanted people who were close in age to the characters. So that meant finding a 12-year-old, or someone close to 12 to play a 12-year-old, which limits your options more.

And the other challenge we had was the whole casting process was conducted in top secret, so they couldn’t know it was Avatar. I had to write fake scenes for them to read and audition with. A lot of times they were reading off scenes about being in math class or playing basketball, stuff like that. I often joked with my producers that I wished we just compiled all of my fake scenes and we could create a whole new pilot by itself (laughs). A lot of times we weren’t, or at least I wasn’t, even listening to the lines being spoken, because they had nothing to do with Avatar. It was more about trying to envision these actors as the characters. And with every single one that we landed on, that’s the case.

So, we looked at Gordon [Cormier] and there was just something about him as a person, beyond what he puts the table as a performer, that felt like Aang. Even though we met with lots and lots of talented actors, after every session huddle, we kept saying “But what about Gordon?” We came back to him every time, and that turned out to be the case with everyone in the cast.

You’ve mentioned Game of Thrones as an example of the expanded audience you’re hoping for with The Last Airbender. I think part of that wide demographic in terms of Game of Thrones’ popularity is the fact that the actors in that show were very quickly made into bigger names, thanks to movie opportunities and other engagements. I’m sure you know that, despite some recent changes, there’s still a struggle in Hollywood in terms of studios making good on the potential star power and versatility of Asian American and Indigenous actors. I feel this show is a really good opportunity to showcase that versatility, even beyond Avatar, so I’m wondering if that was something that was also on your mind when casting?

Well, you can only hope that’s what happens. I mean, giving these incredibly talented and gifted performers a platform was great, and we were aware that we were doing that. You don’t want to ever change things by predicting the success of the show or where it will take their careers, but I would certainly hope the world gets to see all of them and sees how incredible they are, and that launches their careers into the stratosphere. That would be ideal. But to be honest when we’re making the show, those thoughts are kind of far away and what we really had to focus on was actually doing the show itself. So, we were really just laser-focused on the nitty-gritty of the production and getting through each day, and making sure we did the best job. And then hopefully, it’s like with everything else you do your best, and as much as you can, and you hope for the best.

In terms of coming up with the structure for the series, did you rewatch the first season of the animated series, look at the A and B plots, and decide from there what episodes you wanted to pull from and which you wanted to cut?

Yes. The first thing I did was lay out all the episodes of the first season on a big whiteboard. We [the writer’s room] wrote them all out and what each was about, and then took a look at them, and sort of unraveled all of them. Then we looked at which of these threads go together where we find some thematic parallel between characters and storylines and scenarios, and how we could weave them back together to create something that felt more serialized. Sometimes that involved taking a character like Jet, who is good at heart but turns to an extreme place by the war, and then take a character like The Mechanist, who you can say the same thing about, and connect their storylines, even though the two appear in completely different episodes in different locations in the animation. That was really intriguing to us, so that’s the process we took in shaping the structure and bringing characters together to create new turns in the story.

You’re probably still catching your breath from this first season, but while planning the structure of season one, did you think about future seasons in terms of “if we use this storyline here, we can move this one to season two”?

Nothing as directly as that. We pulled certain elements from season two into season one, say like a Zula and a couple of understory elements that fans will recognize. So, we were borrowing a little bit there, and there’s nothing to say that that process can’t go both ways. There’s nothing to say that we can’t use things that we left out of season one in later seasons. But there was no deliberate plan to do that, there was no, “well, we’ll leave this story out of season one and use it in a later season.” We left the door open for that possibility, because we have the benefit of hindsight where we know the overall gameplan of Avatar, so we can use the elements as we see fit.

When you think about the show as a whole, do you see it in terms of the three-season arc that the animated show went with?

Honestly, I didn’t focus beyond season one. It was enough without the additional hurdle and challenge to get season one to the finish line, that’s been the focus. And again, having the benefit of hindsight, you can look back and see in the animated series each of the seasons feel slightly different. I think fans will recognize that the later seasons of the animated series are a little more serialized than the first season, so the process might vary a little bit in that regard. But we really don’t want to look ahead, I mean for nothing else if not to change its success so, that’s why the focus has just been getting to this finish line.

In terms of bringing animation to live-action, what was the biggest challenge in your eyes?

Well, there’s certain things you can draw that when you’re trying to translate in live-action are incredibly complicated, both practically and financially. There are so many epic sequences in the original series that I wish we could have done, but it would have just broken the bank many times over. The Northern Air Temple episode of the first season is a finale in itself, and if we had tried to do that we would be blowing all the resources right there. So, we had to pick and the toughest part of this process was deciding what to leave behind — and I’m sure there will be fans who are not happy that they didn’t get their favorite episodes and their favorite characters, and all I can say is it pains me too.

I wish we could have done all of them, but there’s the reality of creating eight-hour-long episodes for a serialized drama and also expanding the world in places and telling new parts of the story that hadn’t been told before. That takes up time. I think people think it’s as easy as saying, “Well there are 20 half-hour episodes of the original. That’s 10 hours. And there are eight one-hour episodes of the new show, so they only needed to make two more episodes.” But it’s not exactly one-to-one there, so that was the process we went through.

Lastly, taking on such a beloved property with such a passionate fandom can always be an interesting experience. In terms of both fans coming in off the animated series and new fans who are going into this world for the first time, what do you hope that they come into the show with and what do you hope that they leave with?

Fan expectation is a consequence that goes both ways. It is a burden at times because you know that there are so many people counting on you to deliver certain things, and at the same time, it’s a bit of a privilege to have such a devoted and passionate fanbase out there who were eagerly waiting to see what you do. I mean I would much rather have that than the opposite, and no one talks about it.

So, for fans, I just hope that when they come and see the show, they recognize that, even though this isn’t a note-for-note translation of the original, we stay true to the spirit of the original. Because just like them we are fans first and foremost. And that’s how I approached the whole show: as a fan first, and then I sort of put on my producer cap and went about making the show. I hope they realize that none of these decisions were made haphazardly and they were all very carefully considered, and the ultimate test was whether or not it stayed true to what we felt was the spirit of Avatar.

For new viewers, I’m hoping they get introduced to this incredible world that so many people have already fallen in love with, and they see why everyone has fallen in love with it. And they can see a story filled with humor and heart and adventure and excitement and emotion, and I hope they just get it. I hope they get this is why Avatar: The Last Airbender has resonated with so many people over all these years.

Avatar: The Last Airbender is now streaming on Netflix.