We’ve known the young stars of Netflix’s upcoming live-action adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender for a few months, leaving fans to wonder: who would play Uncle Iroh, the kindly former Fire Nation general-turned-mentor who travels with Prince Zuko, and one of the most beloved characters in the entire franchise? We have our answer, and that’s not all.
In a spate of new casting announcements, Netflix revealed Kim’s Convenience star Paul Sun-Hyung Lee will play Uncle Iroh in the series. Lost’s Ken Leung will play Commander Zhao, the Fire Nation military officer who serves as the show’s first major antagonist, while Nightwatch’s Lim Kay Siu will play Gyatso, the wise Air Nomad monk who serves as Aang’s teacher before the young Avatar gets frozen under the ice for 100 years.
Additionally, the live-action Avatar: The Last Airbender has just started production, so it’s officially happening—and it’s happening with the incredible VFX technology used fantastically by The Mandalorian, which bodes extremely well for the series. Netflix says, “The state of the art stage, designed and operated by Pixomondo (“PXO”) Virtual Production, is 84 feet across and 28 feet high with 23,000 square feet of stage space and more than 3000 LED Panels, making it one of the biggest virtual production volumes in North America.” Pixomondo, incidentally, won several Emmys for its VFX work on Game of Thrones and an Academy Award for the Martin Scorsese film Hugo, so if nothing else this show should look extremely nice.
Lee, Leung, and Siu join Gordon Cormier (Lost in Space, The Stand) as Aang, Kiawentiio (What If, Anne With an E) as Katara, Ian Ousley (13 Reasons Why, Sorry For Your Loss) as Sokka, and Dallas Liu (PEN15) as Prince Zuko. Leung’s Lost co-star Daniel Dae Kim will play Iroh’s younger brother and Zuko’s father Ozai, the Fire Nation warlord. There’s no release date for the series, but hey, they just started filming, okay? Cut them some slack.
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