Clenching is a respectable response to any announced adaptation of a beloved animated property, especially when Netflix is producing it. The company and fantasy have mixed uneasily over the years, with successes being rarer than outright failures. That’s doubly the case with anime and anime-influenced works like “Avatar: The Last Airbender,” a Nickelodeon title that has earned a passionate, multigenerational fanbase.
In 2018 Netflix dangled the promise of a live-action do-over with the original series' creators Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko taking the reins. But that didn’t last. Two years later DiMartino confirmed in an open letter posted on his blog, which has since been deleted, that he and Konietzko had parted ways with the production.
