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The wait goes on for fans to see Avatar: The Last Airbender sequel movie on Paramount Plus this fall. But if you believe one viral post, there's a leaked scene out in the wild – and potentially more waiting in the wings.

Over the weekend, Twitter user Imstilldissin claimed to have been "accidentally emailed" the entirety of Avatar: Aang, The Last Airbender (H/T IGN).

To prove its legitimacy, they even posted a short clip from the project, which sees older versions of Aang, Sokka, and Katara come face to face with a new Avatar.

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As fans of Brian Michael Bendis and Michael Avon Oeming's indie comic book series Powers (we've reread "Who Killed Retro Girl?" a few dozen times at this point), we respected what PlayStation Network's 2016 live-action adaptation was able to pull off with its first season. Starring Sharlto Copley as Christian Walker and pre-The Boys star Susan Heyward as Deena Pilgrim, the series was developed by Bendis and Charlie Huston, some big reasons why the show worked so well during that initial run. Unfortunately, there was a bit of a drop-off with the second season, with the series ending after two seasons. Netflix and Dark Horse Entertainment are hoping for a much better result with their just-announced adult animation adaptation of the hit comic book series. Dark Horse Entertainment's Keith Goldberg and Chris Tongue are set as executive producers, with Bendis reportedly writing the pilot and Oeming working on the show's visual development

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Proving that one is never too young to headline their own series, Fox and Hulu have given a two-season order to Stewie, a spinoff of global juggernaut Family Guy centered on the Griffins’ evil genius toddler son. The new animated comedy, which will follow Stewie in preschool and explore time and space travel, comes from Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane and 20th Television Animation. It is targeted to premiere on Fox during the 2027-28 season, streaming next day on Hulu and internationally on Disney+.

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Adult Swim‘s adult animated comedy Smiling Friends is coming to an end. Series creators Michael Cusack and Zach Hadel made the announcement in an audio message on Adult Swim’s X account.

Along with the bad news, there was some good one. While the eight-episode Season 3 of Smiling Friends ended its Adult Swim run on Nov. 30, fans have not seen the last of it. Cusack and Hadel unveiled that two extra episodes will be released on April 12 but made it clear that that they are “little stragglers, little rogue planets out there, not thematically related” and not conceived as a series finale, leaving the door open to revisit the series in the future with new episodes

My Boys.

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"Batman: The Animated Series" is one of the best DC animated TV shows, and its distinct look is a huge reason why. From the opening tones of its iconic theme song, the vibe of a dark bristling Gotham radiates across the entire series. But, one simple art trick embedded the show's look into an entire generation's imagination.

In a Vulture interview with voice director Andrea Romano, it was revealed that the choice of canvas for "Batman: The Animated Series" ended up being the secret weapon for the Kids WB favorite. Romano explained, "The backgrounds were created very differently: They were done on black paper, which gave it that very dark style. Nothing had been that dark."

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For pure physical strength, though, it's hard to beat Rogue. Thanks to some flight power and super strength stolen from Ms. Marvel (Carol Danvers), Rogue can lift a double decker bus with one hand — and then crush it with two. The 1992 "X-Men" cartoon showed off Rogue's supreme strength in its opening title sequence. A giant robot Sentinel extends metal wires from its hands to grab Rogue by her arms. Undeterred, she uses the wires to throw the Sentinel over her head, slamming it into the ground.

The revival series "X-Men '97" made this shot much more dynamic. In the original, the camera shows Rogue from behind, running, as the offscreen Sentinel grabs her. It then cuts to a wide shot of her throwing the Sentinel. In "X-Men '97," it's a single take: once the Sentinel grabs Rogue, the frame swerves around to face her. She now flies off the ground and then slams back into it, throwing the Sentinel straight towards the camera and smashing it to pieces.

According to "X-Men '97: The Art and Making of the Animated Series" by James Field, the single take in "X-Men '97" had been the intention all along. The animation came back incorrect, though. "Time and budget restraints" meant the "X-Men" team never got the chance to fix it... until "X-Men '97."

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With the tremendous success of X-Men ‘97, Marvel fans have been waiting with baited breath for more classic Marvel cartoons to get the same treatment. While the obvious show to bring back next is Spider-Man: The Animated Series, Marvel should seriously consider going in another direction. Rather than revive a show that already got to live up to its potential, the studio should instead focus its attention on a cartoon that never lived up to its promise, 1998’s Silver Surfer.

Lasting just 13 episodes, Silver Surfer debuted on Fox Kids in Feb. 1998. By mid-May, it had exhausted its episodes and was banished from Saturday mornings like Galactus banished Zenn-La to the far reaches of the universe. (I encourage you to watch the cartoon if you’d like to understand that reference.) Silver Surfer was developed by television veteran Larry Brody, who’d previously written on dozens of dramas beginning in the 1970s, as well as some cartoons, including a few episodes of the aforementioned Spider-Man: The Animated Series

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Amazon Prime Video has ordered an animated series adaptation of “Lore Olympus,” Variety has learned.

The show is based on the Webtoon webcomic of the same name created by Rachel Smythe. Julia Cooperman (“Colony,” “Willow,” “The Winchesters”) will serve as writer, showrunner, and executive producer of the series adaptation, with Webtoon Productions and The Jim Henson Company producing along with Amazon MGM Studios.

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The sci-fi genre is filled with many incredible shows and movies, from Fringe and Pluribus to iconic franchises like Star Trek. There are also many sci-fi animated sitcoms within the genre, and one of those was Netflix's Inside Job. Inside Job was a sci-fi animated sitcom that made its debut in 2021. But after many incredible episodes, the streaming service decided to cancel it.

Inside Job was a show created by Shion Takeuchi, who worked as a writer in the iconic Disney animated series, Gravity Falls. And alongside Takeuchi, Gravity Falls creator Alex Hirsch, as well as BoJack Horseman director Mike Hollingsworth, teamed up behind the scenes as executive producers. Yet even with its unique storyline, Netflix quietly decided to cancel Inside Job, erasing any plans for upcoming seasons.

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The X-Men fight against not just super-villains, but also spiritual evils like bigotry. The mutant most liable to suffer hate and fear is the blue-skinned Bavarian Kurt Wagner/Nightcrawler, who doesn't pass for human the way most of his comrades do. 

Nightcrawler's first appearance in Len Wein and Dave Cockrum's 1975 "Giant-Size X-Men" #1 saw Professor X rescue him from a pitchfork-and-torches mob. Yet, Nightcrawler is the kindest X-Man of all. As Kurt's teammate Kitty Pryde has attested, Nightcrawler had "every excuse to become as much of a demon inside and out, but he decided he'd rather learn to laugh instead!"

Though excluded from the main cast of the 1992 "X-Men" cartoon (until revival "X-Men '97"), Nightcrawler made a memorable guest appearance in an eponymous episode. "Nightcrawler" directly centered on the defining irony of Nightcrawler: his Catholicism. He's a man of God even though he looks like he was made in Satan's image. His teleportation power even leaves behind smoke that smells of hellish brimstone!

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Nowadays, it's expected that the creatives in charge of bringing beloved pop culture properties to the screen are also fans of said properties. And when they aren't, it immediately causes an uproar, like when "The Acolyte" featured non-"Star Wars" fans on its writing staff. But many times, this lack of attachment to the source material proves to be the secret ingredient behind the best adaptations. Take "Andor," for instance. Creator Tony Gilroy repeatedly confessed to not being a lifelong "Star Wars" fan, resulting in arguably the single greatest piece of "Star Wars" media of all time. Similarly, Christopher Nolan not being a huge Batman nerd led to him making some of the best comic book movies ever with his Dark Knight trilogy.

Essentially, being detached from a property frees up creatives to focus on telling the best story they can without worrying about trying to please fans with endless cameos and fan service. This is why "Andor" avoided shoehorning in well-known villains like Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine or more obscure, Glup Shitto-style characters.

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Plenty of TV shows have graced Nickelodeon over the years, although despite their greatness, many of them have become largely lost to time. From programs directed exclusively at children to those that all audiences can enjoy, Nickelodeon has seen it all, done it all, and been through it all over the past 30-something years. Although streaming services dominate the charts now, Nickelodeon still manages to hold its own. The network deserves a round of applause in its own right.

Naturally, as time continues to push forward, some television series end up falling into obscurity. This rings true for networks like Nickelodeon, which has so much in its catalog that not every title can share the spotlight. These largely forgotten TV shows don't just deserve another rewatch; they deserve recognition for how wonderful they are from start to finish.

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The upcoming feature The Legend of Aang: The Last Airbender will bypass a theatrical debut in theaters in October 2026 and premiere on Paramount+ as the streamer becomes the exclusive home of all animated content from Avatar Studios, the creative force behind the beloved and acclaimed Nickelodeon series Avatar: The Last Airbender.

Ditto for the new series Avatar: Seven Havens. Both animated projects are being produced by Avatar Studios, which was formed in 2021 under Nickelodeon as a division designed to create a new, ever-growing universe based on the worlds of Avatar and subsequent series, The Legend of Korra.

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Adult Swim’s Smiling Friends has quietly turned its Season 3 finale into a streaming victory lap, and the numbers explain why the industry is starting to treat it as something closer to a Rick & Morty successor than a niche cult cartoon. On HBO Max, the series is landing in the Top 10 across a wide spread of international markets, with especially consistent placements in Latin America, parts of Europe, and the U.S., where it’s been hovering in the #4–#8 range throughout the week.

What makes the performance more impressive is how accessible the show has become. Smiling Friends is charting simultaneously on the Apple TV Store in markets like Australia and Canada, and even appearing on WOW in Germany, where Adult Swim animation rarely sustains momentum. These are transactional and secondary platforms, meaning viewers are likely actively seeking the show out rather than stumbling across it.

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"tastes fishy."

:(

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Korra has always been one of the most divisive Avatars in the franchise’s history. For some fans, The Legend of Korra expanded the universe in incredible ways, delivering some of the best animation of its era. For others, Korra’s character arc and especially her sudden romance with Asami it felt very incomplete, rushed, and emotionally inconsistent. Even now, nearly a decade after her series concluded, Korra’s legacy splits the fandom in ways Aang’s never did.

With the announcement of Avatar: Seven Havens, the next animated project from creators Michael DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko arriving in 2027, those debates have resurfaced stronger than ever. The new series introduces a world devastated by cataclysm, a fragile Avatar cycle, and a young Earthbender named Pavi who discovers she’s the next Avatar after Korra. Immediately, the narrative turns toward Korra’s era and the flaws, gaps, and unresolved threads that defined her story.

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Adult Swim has announced the Season 3 premiere date for Genndy Tartakovsky’s (Dexter’s Laboratory, Samurai Jack) Primal, from Cartoon Network Studios. The five-time Emmy-winning series that follows a caveman at the dawn of evolution returns for its third season Sunday, Jan. 11 at 11:30 PM on Adult Swim, next day on HBO Max. You can see some first-look photos of the new season below,

The first two seasons followed Spear as he formed an unlikely bond with an almost extinct dinosaur and later made the ultimate sacrifice after a final standoff turned fatal. The third season opens with a shocking twist that resurrects Spear in a new form—stripped of memory and humanity—and forces him to roam a brutal, untamed world as a shadow of his former self. As Spear battles savage landscapes and deadly foes, faint echoes of his past begin to stir, leading him toward an emotional and explosive reunion that will test the limits of survival.

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Jelly (lemy.lol)
submitted 7 months ago by cm0002@lemy.lol to c/cartoons@lemmy.cafe
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