Today, we at Knight Edge Media can exclusively confirm that actor & singer Utkarsh Ambudkar also joined the cast of Netflix’s Avatar: The Last Airbender TV Series. He is best known for appearing in Pitch Perfect, Free Guy, and Ghosts on CBS. Ambudkar will have a guest star appearance in the series as King Bumi, the Earth Kingdom ruler of Omashu (though the show never explains why he is called king). His casting lines up with our previous casting call breakdown report from December, that the streaming service was looking for a “South Asian actor, around their 40s, and in great physical shape with a honking laugh”. He is currently 38 and could simply be aged with prosthetics (the character is 112 years old). He even revealed on an Instagram Reel a mold of his face was made for an upcoming production. During production, the actor also followed and was followed back by the series stars Gordon Cormier, Kiawentiio, and Elizabeth Yu.
In the original series, the team travels to the Earth Kingdom city of Omashu on their way to the Northern Water Tribe. The crazy ruler of the city takes Katara and Sokka captive as he gives Aang a series of tests in exchange for their release. In the end, the ruler is revealed to be Aang’s childhood friend, Bumi, from 100 years ago. Now all grown up and ruling the city of Omashu. He wanted to trick Aang the entire time and teach him a valuable lesson on his future journey to defeat the Fire Nation.
Showrunner Albert Kim has cast several Earth Kingdom characters as actors of South Asian descent, including Danny Pudi as The Mechanist and Rohain Arora. They are furthering the show’s promise to include actors of all Asain and Indigenous descent in various lead roles. A popular fan theory is that all the citizens of Omashu will comprise of South Asian actors, as the city is much farther south than Ba Sing Se, which will have East Asian actors. Production ended in mid-June on the first season of the live-action series.
Fun Fact: Utkarsh’s son’s name is also Bhumi with a slightly different spelling which means “Earth” and he voiced Aang on Robot Chicken!
Avatar: The Last Airbender will stream exclusively on Netflix
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