Review: The Legend of Korra Premiere

Avatar: The Last Airbender was easily one of my favorite television shows of the last decade. I watched every episode at least twice, something I rarely do for any show or movie, I even went to see the horribly adapted theatrical film, The Last Airbender, which was a complete let down. But when I heard that the shows creators, Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko were working on a follow up series, I was in.

The creators of the show decided to put up a little fan service in the form of KorraNation, a site that aims to provide sneak peaks, behind the scenes and even prizes for fans of the series. On March 24 2012, midnight the first two episodes of The Legend of Korra premiered on the website and you guessed it, I was all over it.

SPOILERS BEYOND THIS POINT

Welcome to Republic City and A Leaf in the Wind

In a matter of seconds any new comer to the show should feel at ease as the narrator speaks of Aang, the previous Avatar and the Fire Lord Zuko. The two characters from the first show brought together the warring nations and united them creating  The United Republic of Nations.

From left to right: Mako, Korra, Bolin

After the opening credits we’re introduced almost immediately to the new Avatar, Korra. Korra comes from a humble background as the show portrays her mother and father to live in a very small hut in the South Pole where the Water Tribe are located. From the dirty robe that her mother wears to the house decorations falling off the wall, I think the writers really wanted to give a “street rat,” or Aladdin personality to the new Avatar. That’s not to say that Korra is an orphan, she is the Avatar afterall but she’s definitely a little more  street smart than her predecessor. But where Aang was even tempered, Korra is quick and aggressive. This offers a different perspective not seen from Aang whom was always reluctant to fight and sometimes naive. The very first scene with Korra shows her breaking through a wall as a little girl which then fast-fowards to her current age where she easily knocks out numerous opponents at once in a sparring match. The character’s over aggressiveness seems to be a theme of the series as her short temper and adventurous nature has given her a reputation for being reckless. One of the first things I noticed about the premiere was that the animation was a lot smoother and richer than the previous series. The colors and lighting contrasted even better than before and the fight scenes were extremely exciting to watch. If you’ve never seen a fight scene from Avatar: The Last Airbender, you’ll know what I’m talking about when you see The Legend of Korra because the fight animations are probably the best animated action sequences ever done on television. The show takes real martial arts styles and translates them to the characters making for a truly authentic experience. Just watch the trailer above to know what I’m talking about.

This first episode focuses on setting up Korra as the eponymous hero and the fact that she cannot yet control air. The continuation from Avatar: The Last Airbender is strongest here as Korra’s teacher is Tenzin, Avatar Aang’s youngest son. To fill you in on the relationships, Aang married Katara, had three children, Bumi, Kya and Tenzin. Not much is said about the first two but Tenzin is a prominent character from the get go as he is shown to have a wife and three kids too. Katara is also featured in the first episode as an elder of the Southern Water Tribe. She gives Korra advice and approves of her leaving the South Pole to find her own path. My favorite quote from the episode comes from Katara, here’s what she had to say to the new Avatar:

Aang’s time has passed. My brother and many of my friends are gone. It’ time for you and your generation to take on the responsibility of keeping peace and balance in the world.

That scene for me symbolized the “passing of the torch” and marks the beginning of Korra’s journey as the Avatar. It creates an emotional connect from the audience to the central character and the struggles she may face in the future. Another scene shows Korra saying goodbye to her parents that reminded me of Star War: A New Hope, I’m not really sure why it reminded me of that but it did. Perhaps it was the little hut in the background though completely covered in snow and not sand. Or maybe because Korra leaving her home was the beginning of the hero’s journey. Saying that The Legend of Korra is just a mere children’s cartoon show is as good as saying the Earth is flat. It’s just not true as there is some serious emotional impact instilled in the first couple of minutes of the episode and most likely more to come. We’ll probably be visiting the Southern Water Tribe many times throughout the coming season but for now our heroin has made her way to the nation’s capital, Republic City to train with Master Tenzin.

Tenzin lives on Air Temple Island, an island off the shores of Republic City which is where Korra will be trained the art of Air bending. Tenzin is also Korra’s Air bending master whom she goes to live with when she leaves the South Pole for Republic City and even though the two have mutual respect for each other Korra is easily frustrated when she can’t grasp the concepts of Air bending, something that Tenzin’s eldest daughter, Jinora can perform flawlessly. Korra’s frustration leads her to rebel and leave for the city often especially to see Pro bending.

Korra arrives at Republic City

When Korra first arrives at Republic City with her polar bear dog, Naga, she is instantly taken aback by the bustling city which features cars, motorcycles and even large bridges that signal advancements in technology and society. There’s even a police force headed by the daughter of the great Earth bender Toph Beifong. Korra meets the head of police, Lin Beifong, a metal bender, when she ends up creating a ruckus by trying to stop a group of thugs from bullying a shopkeeper. Also, a new development in the world is the sport of “Pro Bending” where two teams of three, each consisting of a Water, Fire, and Earth bender compete to knock off the opposing team from a platform standing above a pool of water. It’s basically dodgeball with elemental bending but instead of making contact, the goal is to physically knock a player off the court. Korra of course, is a big fan of Pro Bending and sneaks off to watch a match in the city despite Tenzin’s disapproval. Korra then meets one of the players, Bolin, an Earth bender who tries to impress Korra by letting her go back stage. It’s not before long when Bolin and the rest of his team, the Fire Ferrets face off in a match against the Tigerdillos. The Fire
Ferrets lose the first of four matches and then come back to win it with the help of Mako, the Fire bending leader of the Fire Ferrets who is also Bolin’s brother. But after the match there’s heated arguments between Mako and Hasook, the Water bender on the team which causes Hasook to quit the team. This leaves the Fire Ferrets on the brink of disqualification for their next match but with a last minute decision, Korra joins the Fire Ferrets. Korra isn’t quick enough to dodge attacks from the opposing team so she becomes irritated and uses all of her bending styles at once which leads the referees to identify her as the Avatar. They let her play knowing she is the Avatar but she is only permitted to use Water bending but still she struggles. It isn’t until she finally takes into account what she was taught from Master Tenzin that she began to overcome the oncoming attacks of the other team. What Master Tenzin struggled to instill in her, a sense of patience and flow, she understood under the circumstances of a Pro Bending match. Eventually the Fire Ferrets when with the help of Korra which then initiates a dynamic relationship between her and the two brothers, Bolin and Mako. But Mako isn’t easily excited as his younger brother and seems to have bad tension between himself and Korra. This leads me to believe that the writers possibly have a special relationship in mind for the two characters but who knows at the moment.

Amon

The inclusion of Pro Bending is evidence that the bending of all styles has truly become united but the Anti-Bending Revolution exists which seems to have bigger implications than what the public of Republic City understand. Aside from technical advancements there’s also social movements such as the Anti-Bending Revolution that strives for equality with the outlawing of bending. Korra discovers this when she is ridiculed for defending herself  from an “Equalist,” a person that wants to ban bending. This is a big concern for Korra considering she’s much more open about her identity as the Avatar than Aang was. Korra even takes to a press conference where she was met with thousands of people of the city asking what she’ll do now that she’s there. The public asked if she’ll fight crime or address the Anti-Bending movement but they were all met with a big “I don’t really know” statement by Korra. The Avatar is definitely not trying to stay hidden this time around but she’s definitely not out of danger either. The Anti-Bending revolution looks to be a light campaign on the surface but audiences are introduced to a character who looks to be the series antagonist. Amon is a masked man that sort of looks like an upscale ninja or an evil Naruto character. Not much is known about him after the first two episodes but most likely he is going to cause a lot of trouble for the Avatar and stir up some civil unrest for the city.

Statue of Avatar Aang in Republic City

After watching the premiere it’s quite evident that The Legend of Korra seems to be improving on everything the last Avatar show did. The animations are smoother and facial expressions the artists have included are truly top notch. There are some hilarious scenes that portray the characters unlike anything I’ve ever seen from an animated show. Aside from the visual aspects, the music is still killer as it sounds original and authentically Avatarish. These shows are amazing because they’re light-hearted and not overly serious but also not completely goofy either where most children’s TV shows are too childish alienating the older audience. This is probably the greatest draw of the show because anybody from your five-year-old cousin to your grandpa can sit down and enjoy an episode or two. I can’t wait for the season to kick off April 15 on Nick and if you haven’t seen the premiere you can still catch it at KorraNation. If you’re somebody that loves fantasy, adventure, action or an all around epic journey, I highly recommend you check out The Legend of Korra.

Movie Review: 21 Jump Street

When I heard that 21 Jump Street, originally an 80’s TV drama was being made into a movie, no less a comedy starring Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill, I was quite skeptical. I thought it was going to be just another of those lackluster, trying too hard to be funny comedies but after the movie ended, I knew I was completely wrong and I had totally misjudged the film. Leaving the theatre with my friend, we knew this movie was something special, definitely one of the funniest movies in the past few years.

Opening with the Eminem song “The Real Slim Shady,” it flashes back to the year 2005 where Schmidt (Hill) and Jenko ( Tatum) are in high school. Schmidt is the awkward kid trying to be cool with his Eminem look, and tries to ask out the girl of his dreams, only to fail miserably and be made fun of by the jock Jenko. So when it fast forwards to seven years later, both are shocked to learn that they are in the same Police Academy class. The two eventually make a deal to help each other get through the class thus forming a brotherhood of sorts.

After graduating, they attempt to do their jobs, patrolling the park to make sure its safe for the citizens. But when trouble ensues, with Jenko screwing up an arrest that leads to the person getting free, the captain of the force decides to re-assign them to the now reopen 21 Jump Street unit, and thus the beginning of all the craziness that occurs in the film. While not spoiling too much, they end up going undercover at a high school, where a new drug is becoming quite popular, and it is up to them to find out who is supplying the drug, and who is dealing it.

The best  part of the movie in my opinion happens about a quarter in when the two of them, already undercover, find the dealer and each takes a hit of the drugs itself; what happens next is quite possibly the funniest part of the whole film. As seen near the end of the trailer, they eventually cross paths with one of the teachers (played by Rob Riggle) and the confrontation between them had me crying with laughter.

The performances in the film were all wonderful with one of my favorites being Ice Cube’s performance as Captain Dickson; and of course the best part of the movie being Korean Jesus (you will understand when you see it). I also have to say that all the other supporting actors like Dave Franco, Brie Larson, Ellie Kemper, Rob Riggle and all the others were absolutely marvelous and really helped make the film. But the chemistry between Hill and Tatum was incredible, as they played off each other as though they had been friends forever and really knew each other.

Directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller did a wonderful job of inserting the right amount of comedic touch to make the movie absolutely hilarious, while not overdoing it. Yet they can’t take all the credit as they were only directing a fantastic script written by Michael Bacall (Manic, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World), who wrote wonderful and fresh dialogue that flowed really well.

This movie is totally hilarious and I cannot recommend it enough, so I hope you all go to the theatres when it comes out this Friday and prepare to laugh so hard you start to cry (yes, I do that often when something is extremely funny). I should mention though, for those of you that loved the original series, there are a couple of surprises near the end that will have all you fan boys and fan girls squealing in excitement. Check out the trailer below and go see it on the 16th!

My favorite Windows Phone Apps

What’s up guys, it’s pretty late here but I wanted to post something anyways. I’m a huge smart phone fanatic and I’m a big fan of Windows Phone. But what’s a smart phone without apps?

In most cases, smart phone users download a ton of apps but hardly ever use all of them. Generally these users only use a small handful of apps. Here’s the apps I use the most on my Windows Phone.

 

Wordament

Wordament is simply the best game for Windows Phone. I don’t care if it’s a simple word search game, it’s amazing for many reasons. One of the coolest things about Wordament is the online functionality. Every game of Wordament takes place on a two minute timer where the player is supposed to find words using their fingers to highlight letters. For every word found players gain points and at the end of the two minutes, the player scores are thrown on a massive scoreboard featuring scores from players all around the world who just played on the same game you did. The sense of competition propels Wordament and makes it more than just an indie word game. The fact that it’s easy to pick up and play, and not overly complex makes it one of the best games in the entire Windows Phone Marketplace.

 

 

 

 

Youtube Pro

I love this app. It’s fast and smooth on every front. It’s Youtube, what more can I say? You can use it to sort through subscriptions and filter out which videos you want to see from whom you’ve subscribed to, a feature that was absent on Metrotube. Another cool feature is the ability to download videos, a feature I haven’t utilized but I know it will appeal to some people. The only gripe I have against Youtube Pro is that it doesn’t look as good as Metrotube but it’s still pretty slick.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Radio Controlled

I don’t know what Pandora Radio has against Windows Phone but who cares about not having an official app when we already have Radio Controlled, a great Pandora Radio app. Adding stations is as simple as one or two taps and it’s also just as nice to look at as it is to use. All of the Pandora features are there, you can give a thumbs up or thumbs down to a track, play, pause and skip. The app also runs in the background allowing for easy multitasking. However, one of the biggest problems, and possibly the only problem with this app is that sometimes it has trouble pulling up any music at all, as if the servers are lagging. This issue can be resolved by clearing the queues in the settings menu but it is an annoyance sometimes.

 

 

 

 

 

Facebook

Despite the People hub having integrated Facebook functionality, I still keep the dedicated Facebook app to cover all grounds. I’ll admit, I’m pretty addicted to Facebook even though I only talk to 10 people. I need it, it’s become a habit to wake up with Facebook. With that being said I only use the Facebook app to check messages or group posts while the People hub handles all the rest. As for other social networks, I don’t understand Twitter and find it extremely limiting as well as confusing. Why are there so many hashtags and @ symbols everywhere?

 

 

 

 

 

Office and E-mail

When I bought my phone I didn’t think of it as a work machine, but I find myself checking emails constantly. So the email app is great especially since you can combine multiple email accounts into one inbox. Aside from email, I also find myself jotting down quick notes, or recording lectures with the built-in Microsoft Office apps which include Word, Notes and even Excel. What’s also nice about using Office on the phone is that you can share them with Microsoft’s Skydrive so when you want to work on a bigger screen, you can grab the files easily from the cloud. Microsoft also provides a Skydrive app in the Marketplace but isn’t preinstalled on the phone itself.

 

 

 

 

Weather Channel and HTC Hub

When it comes to weather apps, I use two. I like to use the HTC Hub’s weather feature to tell me the weather of my location while I use Weather Channel app to tell me the weather of the places I often visit, like San Francisco. These apps are nice but I still wish that the Weather Channel app looked a bit nicer and that the HTC Hub wouldn’t turn off my music when I entered the app. All in all these two apps work like their supposed to and for now I’ll live with it.

 

 

 

 

Calculator and Alarm clock

I can’t live without using these apps everyday. Somehow, I always end up with a ton of complex arrangement of numbers in front of me so having the calculator pinned to the home screen is a must. The alarm clock app is pretty straight forward, it’s my ONLY alarm clock.

 

 

 

 

 

Tim’s Most Anticipated Games of 2012

In no particular order, these are the games I can’t wait for this year:

 

Mass Effect 3, release date: 3/6

Bioware does what it does best, they deliver great narrative. I had a blast playing the first 2 and I am really hoping this game puts a nice bow on the great gift that is Mass Effect.

 

Darksiders 2, release date: 6/26

Like the puzzle solving style of Zelda games? Like stylish hack n’ slash game play similar to Devil May Cry? Then here’s a game for you. Darksiders 2 puts yet another of the Four Horsemen in your hands. This time you play as Death and with the world twice as big as the one from the first game.

DMC: Devil May Cry, release date: (TBA)

I loved 1, 3, and 4; so I am incredibly psych’d for this game. You play as a younger Dante in an ever changing and twisted city, Limbo City. Though this game takes place in a non cannon universe, I am not sure how keen I am about that, but as long as the game plays great and there is a nice story then I will certainly be playing this.

 

Devil May Cry HD Collection, release date: 4/3

Simple as that, another franchise has thrown its hat into the HD Collection ring and I really hope it scores an SSS. If you don’t have these or just want to play through the game with a fresh coat of paint then totally get this.

 

Prototype 2, release date: 7/24

This time around we play as a James Heller as he tries to destroy the Black Light Virus and hunt down Alex Mercer for the death of his family. Had a ball with the first, hope this time we get to have just as much visceral combat and blood soaked rampages as the first. I mean come on, who doesn’t love drop kicking some helicopters?

 

Borderlands 2, release date: 9/2

I enjoyed the first one on my first play through. Multiplayer was lack luster but it was an overall fun game. Hope this game builds on what it did right and fixes those annoying mistakes.

 

Diablo 3, release date: (TBA)

I’ll probably be 90 by the time they release this but the beta rocked and I can’t stop dreaming of the day I get to mass murder some demons in Inferno Mode! Check out my beta impressions of Diablo 3 here.

 

Guild Wars 2, release date: 2012

Waiting for the beta in march? As am I. Had a blast watching The YogsCast play it. Super excited for this one. World v World/WvWvW/World vs World vs World looks sick, three servers battle it out for keeps and castles and the winner after 2 weeks move on to fight winners from other groups. Looks stupid fun.

 

Halo 4, release date: (TBA)

It’s Halo need I say more?

 

Mist of Pandaria, release date: (TBA)

Every expansion I come back to WoW, not sure why, if Everquest was like crack, World of Warcraft is like meth. This expansion discovers the island of Pandaria inhabited with, wait for it, pandas and Japanese-esque buildings and terrain. Add the Monk class, and this expansion looks like great fun.