Avatar: The Last Airbender (Season 1: Water)

I can't really explain what my thought process for why I wanted to start this show. I have some friends that are more into anime than I am and they absolutely raved about this show but they've been doing that for a while. I've heard a lot of good things about the show, but I don't think I ever really understood why. I think I can better explain how this show ended up winning me over.

Avatar: The Last Airbender aired in 2005 on Nickelodeon. Right there explains a lot on my end. I didn't have Nickelodeon as a kid and didn't latch onto the same shows a lot of people my age did at the time. It takes place in a world where four tribes that are based on the four elements, Water, Fire, Earth, and Wind are at war. The show centers around a boy named Aang who is a reincarnation of the legendary Avatar, a master of all four elements that bring peace to the land.

Aang (voiced by Zach Tyler Eisen) is initially found by a brother and sister pair named Katara (voiced by Mae Whitman) and Sokka (voiced by Jack DeSena) who are members of a Water Tribe. Katara is a water bender and is working to develop her own water bending abilities along with Aang.

With Sokka and Katara, a flying Bison named Appa, and a winged lemur named Momo, the small group travels throughout the world in a quest to train Aang to master all the elemental bending and save the world.

The first season focuses on the group coming together and heading towards the North Pole where the Northern Water Tribe is and where Aang can find a master to teach him water bending.

And boy does it take them a long time to get there.

I need to preface this "criticism" with the fact that this was not the show's fault. It's a kids show that is meant to keep kids entertained for multiple weeks at a time with a new adventure. Therefore, if the main goal is getting to the North Pole, it's going to take 20 episodes for them to get there and there are going to be a lot of side adventures on their way.

This actually didn't bother me as much later in the season as some of the episodes get really interesting. However, it is a kids show and while it is paired with awesome fantastical elements and story telling, there is still the moral of the week formula and a couple of episodes that were the typical filler episodes.

I think part of it is I've just been spoiled with shows that are short and to the point. Going back to a show, especially one that was at the height of its powers in the mid 2000's is going to be 20 episodes long, it's just more of a preference and noting that some episodes were more intriguing than others.

- The mythology and world design is really fascinating. Especially when they go to cities that are specifically designed to house people who can bend certain elements. Water tribes bending water to enter their gates, earth benders bending earth to create and destroy, then recreate familiar paths.

There were a lot of things that left me pleasantly surprised with this show. Relating to the previous point was how the show was able to communicate themes and characters that far surpassed what you'd expect from a kids show.

There are times where it feels like the show is very much for kids, and yet at other times, especially in the latter part of the season, it feels very grown up and mature within reason. There's no blood, sex, or immensely mature topics, but the show does discuss some interesting issues and questions.

These themes and questions only work because the show is able to utilize two aspects very, VERY well.

The first is the characters.

I don't think the first few episodes do the show justice because you really get to know Aang, Sokka, Katara really well. Yes, they're simplistic because its a kids show, but they're utilized really well and you identify with them in different ways. Aang is immature but has insecurities, about his destiny, his relationships, and his abilities. Katara is a matronly kind character but she gets angry and annoyed. She's has things that matter to her and it matters to the audience. And Sokka could easily just be regulated to the dumb comic relief but he's also brave and

And the really interesting part is that they're able to do it with the villains as well. They're able to bring really interesting dynamics to characters that could easily just be one dimensional. They're also able to create intrigue around both the villains that you're supposed to find sympathetic and the ones that are not.

I don't love Prince Zuko because he's kind of annoying at times. But he is a great example of how the show is able to take a character like his and make him relatable even though he's the villain. Furthermore, there are other characters from the Fire Nation that are more one dimensional evil villains, but they still manage to make them interesting.

And in both cases, the comedy is actually well done. I had some moments that I legitimately laugh and even if I wasn't, I was having a good time throughout.

The one issue that I have with the characters is that they are kind of slaves to what the story needs at the moment of the episode. They need to do an episode about two tribes that don't get along so they create some drama out of no where between Sokka and Katara. I get that that's storytelling, but there were times where the drama felt a little out of character and forced.I think even as the show gets better in later episodes, there are still contrived plot points that I wasn't a fan of and things characters do that don't make a whole lot of sense. The show goes a little overboard sometimes breaching into melodrama. Sometimes it works in order to get some much needed depth in tandem with the silliness and kid friendly elements, but there are other times where it breaches into over drama and feels contrived to fit the story.

The other part that kind of got me was the arbitrary nature of people's powers. Aang's abilities are super vague at times. Sometimes he's able to do incredibly powerful things and at other times he

can't. Katara goes from knowing very little about water bending to almost being a water bending master over the course of the season. They don't really give firm boundaries on how one learns to master these bending skills. So at the end of the season when Katara is fighting a master and doesn't get her shit totally wrecked in two minutes, it feels a little out of place.

But that's a good transition into the other part that really made the story work and that was the world this show builds.

Sure bending the elements sounds cool on paper, but when you see it in action, there are a lot of moments that are much cooler than you'd ever imagine. Yeah the boundaries are confusing as young benders don't have firm limits or guidelines to their growth, but its super cool regardless.

Furthermore, there's just a really rich world that was created and if nothing else, I just wanted to get more and more in depth with this world.

Flying Bison, elemental tribes with their own unique political structures, an intriguing connection to the real world and the spirit world, the list goes on and on of how cool this world is.

A great example is the front gates of these elemental tribal cities. It could be easy to just give the Water Tribe a gate that they go through to get to the city, but instead they bend ice to open and then raise a dam to let their boats go through, its just a lot of creativity went into it and I love it.

Furthermore, I think I enjoyed getting a little bit of a different cultural inspiration. I think people often get bogged down by the Medieval asthetic of Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings that we don't really think about the cultural inspiration of Japan and China and Avatar is able to take that inspiration while making it accessible to fantasy fans who may be more comfortable in the traditional fantasy worlds. It creates a bridge between those worlds without pandering.

And this is helped by the animation.

I think it took me a little bit to really appreciate the animation, partly because I'm willing to wager (and I could be wrong) that it improved as the show went along. Regardless, again its an accessible Westernize introduction to anime. I am by no means the anime expert and have very little experience with it but I see the inspiration here and understand how this could be an access point for a lot of people (maybe even me, we'll see).

But the show is just accessible, beautiful to look at, and captures the magnitude and emotions of the story and characters almost perfectly. I'm not a great judge of animation, but I know when the animation is unique and different than what I'm used to and Avatar is really good in that department.

I guess the simplest way to describe my sudden interest in the show was just to be in the know of pop culture zeitgeist. People can point to Avatar as an interesting show that shaped their creative flow and how they view fiction, especially high fantasy. Not that there's anything wrong with Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings, those stories are beloved for a reason, but I think the thing that really got me on board was unique and yet accessible it is.

One piece of advice I'd say with this show is that it does take a little bit to get going. The first few episodes, while not bad are mostly forgettable in my opinion. If I'm being honest, I didn't really get fully invested until episode 7 when they really started leaning into the lore and took the mission a little more seriously. However, the show does pick up and I really enjoyed the latter half of the show, especially when the mythology, magic, and characters became more interesting and utilized better. Even the child-focused morals become more interesting and more complex than you'd expect for a kids television show.

Is it perfect? I can't honestly say that. I think there is an aspect of this show that won't be accessible to me because I didn't grow up with it. I call this the Goonies Effect. People love The Goonies because its a movie they grew up with and there was a magical element about it when you were a kid. However, unlike the Goonies which does not hold up today and in my opinion is not a good movie (fight me), Avatar remains a really great fantasy television show that people of all ages will enjoy. I think if you grew up with it, it will resonate more than it did with me, but I will give it credit to being accessible over a decade later to a 20 something jackass like myself.

But those are my thoughts on the first season of Avatar: The Last Airbender. What did you think? Did you grow up with the show? How does it hold up in your mind? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @MovieSymposium as well as send me your requests for films and TV shows I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

Thanks for reading!