The New Avatar Movie Has Leaked (Does It Torpedo the Franchise’s Future?)

Who would have thought that a traditionally animated movie based on a Nickelodeon show that ended over ten years ago would become such a headache for Paramount Skydance. The thorn in Paramount’s side involves the movie “Avatar: Aang, The Last Airbender.” Several years ago, Paramount founded Avatar Studios to focus exclusively on producing content based on the TV show “Avatar: The Last Airbender,” a franchise that was always a minor hit, but has always been critically acclaimed and maintains a loyal fanbase.

“Avatar: Aang, The Last Airbender” was the first film in this ambitious relaunch of the franchise, and a new TV series is also in production and set to be released next year. The thing to keep in mind is that all these plans were set into motion before Skydance purchased the company and became Paramount Skydance. Under new leadership, the movie found its theatrical release delayed multiple times until it was finally announced that it would skip theaters altogether and premiere exclusively on Paramount+, a move that upset both fans of the franchise as well as a film industry already on edge amid speculation about Paramount Skydance’s commitment to releasing 30 films a year in theaters should the proposed Warner Bros. acquisition go through.

The irony is, Paramount Skydance likely pulled the movie from theaters because they felt it wasn’t popular enough to justify recouping the money they’d have to put into marketing. And I’m going to be frank: I agree. Given the track record of recent 2D animated movies like “Light of the World” and “Arco” at the box office (and even the most recent SpongeBob movie), I believe this movie would have at best broken even or lost a little money. That being said, I still believe Paramount Skydance should have released it in theaters anyway, because it would have been an effective marketing tool for the upcoming show.

But…they decided to go in a different direction. It happens, and the world moves on. At least it wasn’t being shelved for tax purposes. Either way, the frustration fans felt was real, and it led one person to take matters into their own hands:

Over the weekend, an alleged hacker by the name of @ImStillDissin claimed that Paramount Skydance had accidentally emailed him the whole movie and clipped a couple of watermarked clips of the movie to prove it. He demanded that the company write him a check for the marketing of the movie, or he would leak the whole thing online. Paramount Skydance (unsurprisingly) did NOT cave to this demand (though they did issue DMCA takedown notices)! True to his word, the alleged hacker leaked the entire movie online, six months before it was scheduled to be released (and before a single trailer dropped).

Now, before we continue, I need to pause and make this clear: Just because you don’t want to pay for Paramount+ to watch this movie does NOT give you the right to pirate it! I’m not even convinced you’re in the right to pirate it with the “promise” to subscribe to the platform later on. I just want to make my stance very clear.

With that out of the way, what does Paramount Skydance do in this situation? Well, first of all, considering the millions of times it has been downloaded, you could, in theory, make the argument that this movie would have sold more tickets than what the company originally thought (I say “in theory” because there’s still a huge difference between paying customers and people who will take something for free because it’s there). Despite the fans’ general frustration with the lack of promotion, Paramount Skydance likely did have a long-term plan for “Avatar: Aang, The Last Airbender.” 

If I were a betting man, I bet they would have made a big splash at San Diego Comic Con, used it as a launching pad to get more subscribers, and help position Paramount+ as a stronger competitor before the Warner Bros. merger (potentially) closes. At least, that's what makes sense as far as I’m concerned. Now that the movie has been leaked, all those plans are out the window. As those clips gained traction, it might have given Paramount Skydance a chance to rethink streaming-only plans. With a leaked film, though, ‘Avatar: Aang, The Last Airbender’ becomes an asset whose value has gone down considerably. 

Those who have already downloaded the film are far less likely to buy a ticket, and there’s virtually no reason to subscribe to a subscription service for something that is easily available to download for free. And I know fans will be annoyed by me calling this movie an asset, but that’s what it is: A product to be sold. Whether through tickets or subscriptions, it was produced to make money. While it isn’t clear what value it had before, what is clear is that the value has become extremely unpredictable (with the smart money being that the value has likely decreased rather than increased).

While this isn’t Paramount Skydance’s fault, it’s still bad news for the company and the franchise. Who knows what the next step is? For all we know, they’ll drop the movie on Paramount+ next week and just call it a day. Maybe the delay will be more indefinite with no clear way to monetize it. Whatever the original strategy was, the leak has likely rendered it far less effective—and forced Paramount Skydance to rethink how (or even whether) this film can anchor the franchise going forward. This flies in the face of the old argument that piracy is a victimless crime.