TV Retrospective: Avatar: The Last Airbender Book 1: Water

With my review of the Last Airbender coming later this month, it seemed like a useful time to look back at the series that inspired the greatness of Korra, as well as the sh*t that is the movie

I will do the review in 3 stages, each looking at a particular book, classifying the episodes and ranking the best and the worst of them (although sometimes the worst are by no means bad episodes, just not particularly interesting)

So, let’s start with book 1

Book 1 - Water

This is the series that started it all. We start in the Southern Water Tribe with our heroine Katara and our hero Sokka who discover our titular character, Aang in a ball of ice, and rescue him. Discovering that he is the Avatar, a man destined to master all 4 elements, they realise much of their hope for victory in the Hundred Year War against the Fire Nation is with him. When Aang accidentally alerts the Fire Nation to the village’s location, he gives himself up to protect them. (I’m giving a brief synopsis of the series, for the sake of comparison with the movie) Sokka and Katara feel indebted to someone they’d formed a unique bond with and set out to rescue him.

At the Northern Air Temple Aang finds his old friend and teacher, Monk Gyatso murdered by the Fire Nation. He is forced into a rage which alerts other nations to his presence, until he is calmed down by Katara. He learns a hard lesson of staying in one place too long as the Island of Kyoshi, and its brave warriors, led by Suki is nearly burned to the ground. He is challenged to think above himself by a former friend in Omashu, he helps Katara rescue a group of earthbenders caught aboard a metal ship by the Fire Nation, including Haru and his father, then helps a village being attacked by the angry Hei Bai Spirit, whilst finding a message from his previous incarnation, Avatar Roku.

At the Winter Solstice, Roku provides a message that Sozin’s comet, the comet the Fire Nation used to wipe out the Air Nation will return at summer’s end, and Fire Lord Ozai will use it to end the war. The pressure leads to them stealing a waterbending scroll from pirates to start teaching Aang, but when he proves to be better than Katara, she is not pleased. They meet up with jet, a freedom fighter willing to go to extremes to defeat the Fire Nation, no matter the cost to the Earth Kingdom citizens, when they find out what he's up to, they manage to stop him. They help 2 tribes that dislike each other cross the Great Divide and settle their feuds.

In need of money, Sokka agrees to help a fisherman in a storm. The fisherman tells Aang that he turned his back on the world, Aang is upset and reveals to Katara that the pressure of being the Avatar at such a young age, and being separated from friends resorted to him running away, and being caught in a storm. Aang braves his fear by going out into the storm once again, saving the fishermen and Sokka’s life.

Fire-nation Admiral Zhao uses a group called the Yu-Yang archers to capture the Avatar as he searches for a cure for his sick friends. He is rescued by the Blue Spirit, who happens to be the banished prince Zuko. (I will overview his journey separately) they save a village whose belief in a fortune teller could’ve spelt their end from a volcanic eruption, they meet one of the men from the Southern Water Tribe, Bato, who plans to meet his men, but Aang, not wanting to lose Katara and Sokka sabotages the plan until he can take the guilt no longer.

They enter a Fire Nation town hoping to discover some firebending tricks only to be discovered and rescued by an rogue fire-bender, he takes him to Jeong Jeong, who eventually agrees to teach Aang firebending, but when he accidentally burns Katara, he vows never to firebend again, and Katara discovers her healing abilities. At the Northern Air-temple Aang discovers that people, lead by the mechanist and his paraplegic son Teo have changed it, so they can live. But when these people have promised munitions to the Fire Nation. Aang vows to stop that. The Fire Nation are defeated but discover the latest invention: the war balloon

At the Northern Water Tribe Katara is originally not allowed to be taught waterbending, but after the master discovers the truth about who Katara is, he begrudgingly agrees. Sokka makes friends with Princess Yue, however she tries to halt his advances as she’s already arranged to marry someone else. The Fire Nation invade and Aang does what he can to stop them, but Zhao has amassed a massive attack force. Desperate he enters the spirit world and finds a spirit named Ko, who reveals that the spirits he seeks are under attack in the mortal world. When Zhao kills the Moon Spirit, stopping all waterbending, and throwing the world out of balance, Aang bonds with the Ocean Spirit to fend back the Fire Nation, as Yue sacrifices her life to restore the spirit of the moon and balance to the world.

Prince Zuko is the commander of the ship that discovers the Avatar, desperate to seek him and reclaim his honour, he underestimates the Avatar, and heavy damage is done to his ship. Adding to his complications he finds Zhao waiting as his ship is repaired. Zhao interrogates his crew and discovers that the Avatar is alive, meaning they have to race to capture him. Zuko discovers Katara’s necklace on the prison ship Katara liberated, but before he can catch up with them he is forced to help rescue his uncle Iroh who had been captured by earthbenders.

He teams up with a group of pirates, but when the pirates discover who he’s hunting they betray him, and both end up losing the Avatar (and their ships). Iroh reveals to the crew, who were getting bored of Zuko’s uptight attitude that Zuko spoke out against a plan involving the death of new recruits that would essentially be sacrificed in a battle, he is forced to fight an agni-kai duel, but realises too late that it was against his father. He refuses to fight and is burnt, then banished for refusing to fight.

Feeling desperate as Zhao closes in on the Avatar, he uses an identity as the Blue Spirit to capture the Avatar for himself, he is knocked out but Aang rescues him from Zhao, before getting away. He enlists the help of a tracker named June and her Shirshu, using the necklace to track Katara. Aang recovers the necklace. Zhao discovers Zuko’s swords and draws the conclusion that Zuko is the Blue Spirit. He enlists the pirates to blow up Zuko’s ship, but Zuko survives and, with the help of Iroh, infiltrates Zhao’s attack fleet. After a fight with Katara that he barely wins, he captures Aang but is forced into shelter because of a storm. Team Avatar tracks him down and rescues him, and he is forced into combat with Zhao. The Ocean Spirit drags Zhao away, after Zhao refuses to take Zuko’s hand. 

And that’s season 1 in a nutshell, it’s a great season and a great start to the Avatar franchise. There are a few misses. The great divide is… meh honestly (they could've ended 2 minutes earlier and it would’ve been better) but there really are no major misses for the series. It’s nice that they explore the story from the POV of the villains (Zuko and Iroh particularly), something which, thanks to a lack of time and a larger hero cast, is really not explored in Korra

Animation is really good, aside from the tunnel scenes in episode one which look sh*t.

But seriously, this series, whilst not flawless is a fantastic series, with a tone that agrees with both children and adults alive, humour that works, and a score that’s pretty damn good.

Classification

With the Last Airbender, it’s difficult to classify these stories, plot is given away in small details with each passing episode, whether as part of the protagonist’s (Team Avatar) or antagonist’s (Team Zuko) so I’ve placed the episodes into 3 categories. If an episode is important in the book, it gives away something important in the plot, or introduces characters that are revisited within the same book. Important in books 2/3 are those that introduce characters/ideas revisited in books 2 and/or 3. Filler episodes, while they can be entertaining in themselves (although I can’t say much for any from this season) don’t add anything to the overall tale.

Important in this book: The Boy in the Iceberg, The Avatar Returns, The Southern Air Temple, The Spirit World, Avatar Roku, The Waterbending scroll, The Storm, The Blue Spirit, The Waterbending Master, The Siege of the North (parts 1 and 2)

Important in books 2/3: The Warriors of Kyoshi, The King of Omashu, Imprisoned, Jet, Bato of the Water Tribe, The Deserter, The Northern Air Temple

Filler: The Great Divide, The Fortune-teller

Best Episode: The Storm

Worst Episode: The Great Divide

For more reviews click here

Images used in this review are from Avatar: The Last Airbender and belong to their respective owners. All images in this review are subject to fair use.