For this I decided to look at the similarities and differences between Avatar: The Last Air Bender the animated series, and Avatar: The Last Air Bender the live action film. Although I am not looking at a book and comparing it to the movie that came about because of the book, the live action film for the subject I chose to do this on did come about because of the popularity and craze that came about because of the animated series.
First allow us to explore the similarities between the animated series and the live action film. The characters names were all kept the same, although within the live action film the pronunciations of the names were horribly wrong, and the title was kept the same as well. The live action film follows the first "book," or season, from the animated series. Within this book we meet most of the characters, with the exception of just a few, four to be exact, and the development of the dire perils that their world is facing, taking the gang of heroes on little side story lines to further develop the characters. Unfortunately the film only incorporates the names, title, and one side story line and uses it as the main point throughout the whole movie.
What is unique to the movie is that they did do a pretty good job with the casting, it is very hard to find a cast that can look like animated characters, and it does do quite a good job introducing the characters and developing them as they did during the series, which is three books long each book containing four discs and four episodes per disc. Now, I do understand that this was a movie geared more towards a younger crowd, and in order to keep the attention focused of said younger crowd on the movie and not allowing it to wander aimlessly, and that the movie had to cover so much information in a short amount of time, cuts are needed, but the movie does a great job at killing the name pronunciation, the main character's name is Aang, pronounced Ang (as in the word and), the movie decided to pronounce it Ong (as in gong). All characters names were horribly pronounced, which is hard to do seeing as how the animated series came first, take the pronunciations from the series. Secondly the movie follows a very very minor story line from the series, that really has nothing to do with the plot line at all, which was very disappointing. I do understand that there had to be cuts to the massive amount of information covered in the series, but the least they could do was to follow the main story line and shorten that up. I can however see why they chose the minor story line they did to follow. It was short and gave background on the main character, and in the end they did come to the main story line to finish.
Above is a screenshot of my glog. Unfortunately it would save and publish.
For this I decided to choose the Myth Busters because I watch them all the time and really enjoy these guys go at proving or disproving common held truths that are not really ever challenged.
So, what is it really that the Myth Busters all about? There is a team of four people that find commonly held truths within society, American society not all societies, and put them to the test, to see if they really are true, or if they are false information.
What is interesting about the Myth Busters is that they do not discriminate when it comes to choosing a topic for that weeks show. Although now that I am thinking about it they do partake in some discrimination, they do not touch anything that is religious in practice, so with that in mind, the Myth Busters choose from urban legends and societal truths that have never been tested to see if they are true or not.
Each problem is basically taken on the same way within the show making almost every show the same essentially, with the only difference being the problem that is presented to them. The first part of the show is research based, researching what the problem is, where it originated, where it is found, where it originated, and then how it could be possible to achieve the story's truth. Then is the fabrication stage, where they go about fabricating and duplicating the environment that is stated within the "myth," trying to be as accurate as possible, following the smallest detail. Then comes the testing stage, where they test the theory, the research and make sure that everything is working properly, and finally followed with the true or false verdict of the "myth."
What is interesting about the Myth Busters is that they engage the audience with them, showing the audience the steps taken throughout the show and how they reached the conclusion that they did, enabling the audience to agree or disagree throughout the show. Although they do have specialized equipment that they use, many of their episodes contain items that can be found at any hardware store, which can be tested by the audience at home, and if it is a particularly dangerous "myth" they are testing, they do warn us not to attempt at home, although this does open themselves up to controversial testing results.
The question then arises, are these real, or are these staged for an audience? With the information from above, I would have to say that the Myth Busters are not using a mass media to gain money, but rather using it to educate the masses about what can be commonly held as true, may or may not be what it is all cracked up to be. The Myth Busters utilize television for the purpose of educating people and engaging the audience with critical thinking skills, rather than for mere amusement.
There has been a serious debate going on within society about video games. One side of the argument is that video games are impacting people in a negative way, whereas the other side of the argument is that video games actually improve a person's abilities within the world. So, the question is, which side is correct?
Although is has been shown that video games can improve upon ones ability to socialize, building communication skills as well as improving on a persons ability to utilize tact within a social situation, there are examples of a negative impact on ones social abilities. Within the gaming world, these people are known as "keyboard tough guys," and "trolls." Both of these individuals make it a point to irritate others around them within the gaming community, to the point of people logging off just to escape the aggressors.
The second point that is often used is that video games lead to violent behavior within developing brains. Although there are many genres to video games, the one most used within this argument is the FPS (First Person Shooter). Within the FPS, a person takes control of a single unit and plays many different mission types, last man standing, capture the flag, resource based missions, etc. But the object of all of these is to kill or be killed. It is easy to see how worrisome this can be with the perception of when a person is killed they simply wait a "respawn timer" and will come back to life, ready to go at it again. One problem is that parents do not monitor what games their children are playing, and if they are playing more aggressive and violent video games, this may lead to more aggressive behavior within their lives, more resistance towards parents, more violent towards peers and teachers, etc. This trickle down effect has been seen in numerous studies.
Another problem within video games is that it actually decreases the social skills of people over time. It has been shown that video games can lead to anti-social behavior observed in people. What is interesting to note here is that this seems to be quite controversial. Many studies have shown that video games do lead to anti-social behavior, and yet many more have shown that it improves on peoples social abilities. One anti social behaviors observed is an obsession over the game they are playing. Many players opting not to go out and interact with real people, instead staying at home playing their game, and when they are denied their video games, sometimes violence and self inflicted harm occurs.
As we can see although there are some good qualities gained from video games, there are many bad as well. I do think that video games are good for people, but as with everything in life, moderation is the key. Too much of one thing can lead to sever problems within ones life.
