Mystical Aang (Noah Ringer) prepares to stop the Fire Nation in M. Night Shyamalan’s epic fantasy “The Last Airbender.”

The main characters in this special-effects stuffed epic don’t just bend air.

They bend fire, water, earth, plus logic, humor, acting and storytelling so far they almost reach the breaking point.

Two months ago, M. Night Shyamalan’s 2-D, silver screen remake of an old Nickelodeon animated TV series was reprocessed as a 3-D feature at an estimated cost of around $10,000 a minute.

That might have made the marketing of “Last Airbender” a little easier during Hollywood’s current mad rush to join the 3-D fad, but the extra-dimensional transfer didn’t do the movie’s visual quality many favors.

In fact, the polarized lenses necessary to create the 3-D effect actually turn the already dark images even darker, so the experience of watching “Airbender” is a lot like seeing a regular movie through sunglasses.

That’s a shame, especially because “The Last Airbender” is one big, blubbery whale of a special effects movie imbued with cheesy Saturday morning cartoon dialogue, some embarrassingly awkward performances, and tired, passionless direction from a filmmaker who has lost his knack for flicks, at least temporarily.

The Nick TV series “Avatar: The Last Airbender” was something of a critical milestone for animated shows.

Highly influenced by Asian anime, the series divided the world into the Air Nation, Water Nation and Earth Nation, all under attack from the Fire Nation, led by the young Prince Zuko (no apparent relation to Danny Zuko of “Grease Sing-A-Long” opening next week).

Shyamalan’s “Airbender” – the “Avatar” part of the title had to be dropped because some other movie already used it – follows the TV premise.

A young waterbender named Katara (Nicola Peltz) and her brother Sokka (Jackson Rathbone) see something under the ice. We know, because Sokka says, “There’s something down there!” (Read more…)