Avatar: The Last Airbender’s Controversial New Movie Seemingly Releasing 3 Months Early

Published Jul 2, 2026, 11:04 AM EDT

Felipe Rangel is a Movie and TV Journalist ScreenRant. He has been writing about movies and TV since 2021. Felipe joined ScreenRant in 2022, working across different teams, covering everything from breaking news to features to reviews and more.

Felipe is a writer who is an avid film and TV fan, with superhero movies and series being his biggest passion. He graduated from college in 2019, having studied Journalism. Before college, he spent a month studying at the Oxford English Centre. His superhero knowledge expands to the comics, with his undergraduate thesis being "Politics Reflected In American Comics."

Avatar: The Last Airbender is one of the biggest animated series of all time. Due to that, interest in the franchise has remained high in the years since the original show concluded. After Avatar: The Last Airbender ended, the franchise was expanded with a spinoff series, Netflix's live-action Avatar: The Last Airbender, and more. Now, its next animated chapter is set to be a movie focused on older versions of the characters who made up the animated series' Gaang. After a series of controversial decisions related to the movie's release, it seems like The Legend of Aang: The Last Airbender is not far away.

Paramount+ Brazil shared a now-deleted July schedule (via ComicBook.com) that claimed The Legend of Aang: The Last Airbender would be released on the streaming service on July 25. Since then, the streaming service has yet to announce whether that date is accurate or was published as a mistake. The Legend of Aang: The Last Airbender releasing in July would be a major change for the animated movie's schedule, given how the Paramount+ exclusive movie was originally set for an October 9 release. That said, given its tumultuous journey, as well as recent Avatar franchise developments, a date change is possible.

The Legend of Aang: The Last Airbender being released three months early would not be the biggest change the animated movie has gone through in its journey to getting made. Originally, the film was set to be released in theaters. It assembled a high-profile team of voice actors, with The Legend of Aang: The Last Airbender's cast including names like Invincible's Steven Yeun as an adult Fire Lord Zuko, the Guardians of the Galaxy's Dave Bautista as Tagah, an airbender frozen on ice just like Aang was, Loki's Ke Huy Quan as Avatar Xian, Thor franchise director Taika Waititi as the spirit Gorillavark, and more.

However, Paramount ended up deciding against giving the movie a theatrical release. After that controversial decision, which was met with negative comments by fans and several artists who worked on the movie, the entire The Legend of Aang: The Last Airbender animated movie would be leaked online in April, six months before it was set to be released on Paramount+. As such, if the Paramount+ Brazil post is accurate, the studio might have decided to release the film three months earlier as a response to the leak. That said, this is not the only reasoning behind such a movie.

The summer is a great time for animated movies to become global hits, as seen by Toy Story 5, which is projected to pass the $1 billion mark at the box office, and Minions & Monsters, which is on track for a massive opening weekend. By releasing The Legend of Aang: The Last Airbender later this month, the animated movie could get a viewership boost due to the recent wave of animated hits. Additionally, Netflix's live-action Avatar: The Last Airbender series recently returned with season 2 on June 25. The Legend of Aang: The Last Airbender would arrive on Paramount+ exactly one month after it.