As is appropriate for the first semester of my collegiate career, I decided I needed something Netflix related to both drown my sorrows in and productively procrastinate through. (Finishing a series gives you the same feeling of success that finishing a research paper does…right?) In the midst of my transition to a whole new reality, I found myself lingering on an old favorite.
Avatar: The Last Airbender originally aired from 2005 to 2008. A story told in half hour installments over the course of three seasons, the principal characters travel all over a fictionalized globe trying to help Aang, the avatar, master all four elements in order to defeat the Firelord. There’s a devilishly handsome and deliciously tortured prince, a fabulously large selection of masterful female characters, and a solid Nickelodeon base of romantic tension. #ZukoandKataradreamofeachother
I started watching this show when I must have been about eight years old and now, approximately ten years later, the show still holds up. The only real difference is that now I’m not watching it after Hebrew School in fourth grade, but at two in the morning on a Tuesday ignoring my reading on classical Islam.
Still, there are a few things that I’ve noticed that I definitely missed in my first youthful viewing. For example, the story arc and set-up of the show itself. The entire series is essentially building up to the last major battle at the end of Book Three, and even then it fakes you out and gives you another almost half season worth of episodes. This children’s cartoon turns into an epic before you realize it. Akin to Harry Potter, the trials and tribulations faced by the young, but somehow ambiguously aged, protagonists get darker and more threatening as they move forward. In the very first season, about midway through, our demonized prince’s backstory is revealed and you see a teenager’s mistake lead to an alarming display of child abuse. Not to mention how his developmental arc is essentially that of a severely traumatized boy searching for healing, and thankfully finding it.
The female leads alone make the show worth watching. Katara grows more beautiful by the episode and her body is only slightly sexualized when she, get this, wears a bathing suit. In Book One, she literally fights for her right to be taught by a waterbending master in a legendary scene in which she challenges the old man to a duel so he can see what kind of student he is turning away based on gender. She becomes Aang’s teacher in quick succession and rapidly emerges as one of the most threatening warriors of the show. There’s also Toph, the toughest twelve year old you have ever seen and Aang’s earthbending master. She’s blind, sees with her feet, and regularly destroys both her enemies and the patriarchy alike. I don’t think as a ten year old that I appreciated this show presenting me with hard core lady role models that I could admire for their skills and strength. These days, it’s both shocking and fulfilling.
Avatar: the Last Airbender is a show worth watching, on the surface and as deep as you wish to go. As an 18 year old scared of the future and the present and anything beyond the next hour of my life, I thoroughly recommend this adventure. A certain 10/10.
Image sources: Avatar.wikia.com, Whycenter.com, Wikipedia.org, Hero.wikia.com, Giphy.com