Do you ever think about how 1 of the 1st waterbending moves that Katara learns, that she doesn’t come up with herself, is the water whip that she learns from that waterbending scroll, which also happens to be 1 of the final moves that she uses against Azula, using that move to manoeuvre Azula into a place more favourable for Katara??
Do you ever think about how in that same episode that Katara learns that, Sokka tries to steer a boat, and laments how he doesn’t know how, because that boat wasn’t made by The Southern Water Tribe, and then, later, steers an entire Fire Nation war balloon with precision and intent, and knows how to destroy them effectively and efficiently, while also being a co-inventor of the inspiration invention of those Fire Nation war balloons??
Do you ever think about how, when face-to-face with The Avatar in the Avatar State, after repeatedly threatening to imminently kill that Avatar like the other Air Nomads, Ozai’s 1st move is to firebend directly towards Aang’s left side of his face, the exact same spot that Zuko has his scar on??
Do you ever think about how Zuko was challenged to his 1st Angi Kai due to his desire to protect people being unnecessarily put in harms way, and his final Angi Kai was ended due to the same reason??
i just can't get over zuko and aang's dynamic. these two tragic foils, these boys who both wear their history on their faces, who both lost their homes to the fire, these born enemies, both bound by big, grand, lonely destinies, the prince and the avatar,,,,,,,, and who, the moment they're able to interact with each other for more than two seconds, both immediately devolve into the pettiest assholes alive
Rewatched Sokka’s Master today and while I’ve always known that episode was impeccable, what stood out to me this time was the subplot about Aang, Katara, and Toph missing Sokka, which I find absolutely wonderful because it has nothing to do with how “useful” he is in terms of his skill set. It’s not that they go on a mission and realize they’re lost without Sokka’s tactical abilities. It’s not that they’re in a situation where none of them can bend and they need Sokka to teach them how to fight in other ways. It’s genuinely just them being lost without Sokka because he’s funny. It’s not showing that Sokka’s indispensable as a warrior, but that he’s indispensable as the friend they can count on to lighten the mood, and that that’s just as important
Aang getting so, uncharacteristically angry when Appa was taken by the sandbenders wasn’t just because of his love for his sky bison. Of course, that was a big part of it. Appa is more than just a pet to him, he’s his best friend and soulmate, someone who’s been around since Aang was very young and is meant to be a “companion for life”.
But, Aang ran away on a random Tuesday, got caught in a storm and it changed the whole trajectory of his life. He ran away because he was upset his life was changing so rapidly, he suddenly had all this responsibility at 12 years old that he wasn’t ready for but that doesn’t mean he wouldn’t have gone back. We don’t know what would have happened; he could have needed a few days to cool off, he could have seen the start of the war and stepped up (from what we know of Aang, there’s no way he would have ignored it for his own needs), but that didn’t happen.
He got caught in the ice for 100 years and when he woke up he discovered that not only was everyone he knew and loved were dead, but brutally murdered in an act of power. That everyone from his teachers, friends (children, like him) and animals, were gone. Not only that but his whole culture; traditions, foods, clothing, music… everything important was eradicated and possibly most of the documentation of the culture, too. He’s suddenly handed this new responsibility on top of being the Avatar, trying to uphold this culture (as literally the last airbender alive) and grieve at the same time.
And Aang grieves very privately, in fact, does he even give himself a chance? He discovered the horrible truth and his immediate response it so go have some fun, maybe because he knows if he thinks too hard about it and gives into the pain, he’ll turn into something he’s not, he’ll forget what the monks taught him and he can’t let that happen.
So he tries to channel all his grief and anger into being the Avatar, even if he still has his reservations, and by his side is Appa. The only thing keeping him tethered to his life 100 years ago and his culture. He’s been with him through everything, and will continue to be, like I said “companion for life”.
And then he’s gone, he’s taken, and all of a sudden Aang cannot keep the crushing weight of his loss at bay anymore and he… snaps, he loses control. He gives into the avatar state because not only is everything he knew and loved gone, taken from him for nothing more than political gain, but now his soulmate that represented everything he lost is gone, too and he doesn’t know what happened to him. Is he dead? Is he scared? Is he fed? Who knows.
Aang losing Appa with the final straw and his grief, something he was ignoring and refusing to deal with, was brought to the forefront when he lost Appa, making it impossible to ignore and if it wasn’t for us friends trying to ground him and remind him of who he was, who knows what would have happened.
Aang: All life is sacred. I cannot, and will not, compromise my values. I mustn't take even just one life. Even if it's a monster's life, my philosophy – my culture's philosophy – is to avoid taking life at all costs. As much as you'll try to drill it in me, it's not who I am. I'm not going to kill the a single living creature, not even the Fire Lord.
I’m so sad that I don’t live anywhere near the east or west coast because I wanna go to one of these concerts so badly 😭 I hope they at least record one of them and post it to YouTube!!
Happy CNY from @joishuhu and I!! We collaborated on speeding this since I recently finished watching ATLA for the first time and I'm really happy with how it came out!!!
We did each other's background ^^ Speedpaint under the cut!
what I mean: in Avatar: The Last Airbender, the ending theme is a sort of positive foreshadowing that follows you throughout the whole show until, in S3E13 The Firebending Masters, you find out that it’s the rythm to the dancing dragon which Aang and Zuko work through together. In that moment, the show makes you fully realize just how much Zuko was destined from the start to be part of Aang’s support and so much more than what he seemed early on in the show. The ending/dancing dragon theme was there from the beginning to hint that the show was not only about Good vs Bad, but that it was also a story about redemption and about how Zuko would have his own part to play but only after he’d gone through his own journey separate from that of a classic villain character chasing after the main protagonist. In this essay I will-