Netflix’s ‘Avatar: The Last Airbender’ Showrunner Albert Kim to Step Down, Jabbar Raisani and Christine Boylan to Lead Final Two Seasons
Netflix’s live-action “Avatar: The Last Airbender” series is undergoing a change in leadership.
Variety has learned that Albert Kim, who developed the series and served as showrunner on Season 1, is stepping down. Christine Boylan and Jabbar Raisani will lead the show as executive producers going forward. Netflix has already announced the show has been renewed for two more seasons, concluding with Season 3.
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Boylan served as co-executive producer on Season 1 of “Last Airbender,” while Raisani was an executive producer, director, and a VFX supervisor. Kim will remain onboard as an executive producer for Seasons 2 and 3. According to an individual with knowledge of the situation, Kim wanted to explore new opportunities following the multi-year development process on “Last Airbender” and has signed a deal with Disney to work as an executive producer on the “Percy Jackson” series while also developing new projects for that company.
Boylan’s other credits include the hit Peacock series “Poker Face” as well as shows like the Netflix-Marvel series “The Punisher,” “Citadel” at Amazon, and “Cloak and Dagger” at Freeform. She is also an accomplished playwright, recently debuting her sci-fi play “Analogue” in London, as well as a comic book writer for DC, Marvel, BOOM Studios, and Tokyopop.
She is repped by WME, Art/Work Entertainment, and attorneys Erik Hyman at Paul Hastings.
In addition to his work on “Last Airbender,” Raisani has done VFX work on shows like “Lost in Space” and “Stranger Things” for Netflix as well as “Game of Thrones” and “The Flash” among many others. He has also directed episodes of “Lost in Space” in addition to episodes of “Last Airbender.”
He is repped by CAA and Myman Greenspan.
“Last Airbender” is based on the iconic Nickelodeon series of the same name. The live-action version’s first season starred Gordon Cormier, Kiawentiio, Ian Ousley, Dallas Liu, Ken Leung, with Paul Sun-Hyung Lee, and Daniel Dae Kim.
Along with Albert Kim and Raisani, Dan Lin and Lindsey Liberatore executive produce on behalf of Rideback, with Michael Goi also executive producing. Goi directed the first two episodes, while Raisiani directed episodes three and four. Roseanne Liang directed episodes five and six, with Jet Wilkinson directing the final two episodes of Season 1.
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