You know what John and Paul said about the end, right?
That thing about the love you take and the love you get?
So here’s the part where I gather finally gather my thoughts and discuss the end of Avatar. Sorry
nebroadwe! I hope you come back in September to read this when you get the boxset…
So I’ve been generally pretty… not dissatisfied, exactly, with season 3, but I guess anything would have a hard time living up to the omg!ILOVEYOU!Season 2, which is my favorite season of pretty much any tv show ever created. But going into Season 3, I had several basic goals that I had expected to see:
- The breakup (and maybe reconciliation?) of Azula and her cronies.
- The search for Zuko’s mother (which I SWEAR we were told was going to happen? Like at a ComicCon panel or something? I could have dreamed it, but I had assumed Ursa was dead before, and then we get some interview claiming Zuko will search for her? Did I make it up?)
- Resolution re: Bumi in Omashu
- Iroh’s spirit journey (which we were told near the end of the season that we wouldn’t be getting after all, but which I’ll also get into later)
- Resolution between Iroh and Zuko
So… not an unreasonable list, correct? It’s just plot threads that we’ve been hinted at or blatantly told we were getting through the majority of the first two seasons.
So then season 3 started and… meh. I know I’ve covered it before in a couple previous entries, but I think I figured out where the problem started with me, for Season 3. Seasons 1 and 2 both had the plot thread of “Aang learning [insert element]” for the season sort of tying the whole season together. However, when we got into Season 3, Aang had no interest in leaning firebending. Instead, the plot turned into “Prepare for the Day of Black Sun,” which in turn led to (in my honest opinion) the repeated beating of dead horses (Sokka feeling inferior to benders? Katara has parental issues? NUUH) and what I feel to be rather scattered story telling.
Not to mention the “Prepare for Day of Black Sun” thing only covered half of the season. Then Day of Black Sun happened, and THEN we got into the “Aang learns firebending” portion of the season and at the very least things started to tie together a little bit better then.
That sort of leads into my opinion of The Southern Raiders and the Ember Island Players, which specifically is that I think that if they could have somehow combined the two episodes we would have had a real episode of Avatar? I get that combining Katara’s parental issues with the Zuko issues helped tie it up nicely, but I’m sort of bugged by the fact that Zuko is basically so desperate for Katara to like him that he spends an entire episode egging her on towards vengeance when the reason he specifically joined up with Aang is because… he knew violence wasn’t the way to go. (I’m simplifying it, naturally, but not by much). I missed the first half of the episode, and when I asked Josie how it was she replied “It was… serious.”
(Although kudos to the Southern Raiders for finding a way to deal with those annoying awkward hang arounders in the form of Teo and Haru and Pipsqueak. Kinda makes me wanna write fic with them all hanging around all awkward like: “…They’re not coming back, are they? Those jerks.”)
I give the Ember Island Players credit: it serves as a brilliant recap of the entire series so far along with a brilliant “I love you no I hate you” to fandom, and for as hilarious as it was (Toph’s sonic scream KILLED me dead, along with Sokka begging Suki to get him back stage, and also “Katara’s” weeping about how Jet gives her hope) I also just… couldn’t break myself away from the “WHO wrote this thing and HOW did they get these intimate details about the Gaang’s travels?” That is to say, they attempted to knock away the fourth wall, but I still felt boxed in.
So, like I said yesterday, I was feeling rather apprehensive going into the finale - for what I felt has been a flawed narrative all season, and I badly did not want them to screw up this finale, especially considering how long we’d waited for it.
It was amazing. It was literally everything I could have ever wanted out of the finale, and resolutions of items one and three and five on my list where absolutely pitch perfect and ailfkjasfhshf I love you Avatar forever and ever and ever. I think I wet myself when I saw Bumi show up on screen, because he is easily my favorite minor character in the entire series and his “WHERE is MOMO?” all dramatically and also the way he basically wrecked his own kingdom and took on all those firebenders and OMG BUMI. YOU ARE MY FAVORITE. FOREVER. THE END.
The Iroh/Zuko reunion? Perfect. The way Dante Basco cracked his voice and the way Iroh grabbed him for the second all “MAYBE ILL PUNCH YOU no wait I’ll hug you actually” just… I could not breathe for a minute. I don’t agree with the minor role Iroh has played in season 3: I understand why it had to be that way, to force Zuko to grow up, but I still never liked it. The replacement for Mako who’s name I can never remember is not too bad after all. There is still a purr-like quality to his voice where Mako’s was more gravelly, but it’s barely noticeable.
Grey DeLisle as Azula? THERE ARE NO WORDS. Just… from the very beginning when she says “…What?” very slowly when Ozai won’t let her go to the Earth Kingdom to the way she so slowly and utterly loses her shit to the way she’s screaming and sobbing after Katara has tied her up… omg Azula. You were truly the more damaged of the Ozai’s two children. Azula is like one of my favorite characters ever and just… omg. What’s going to happen to her now? Is she all locked up like Daddy? Eeeeek.
And while we’re on the Fire Nation siblings, how amazing was the Zuko and Azula fight? WAY AMAZING YES? The way the music swelled and just… Wow. Although I did remark to Josie that when Azula challenged him to an Agni Kai, it would have been hilarious if Zuko had been all “*snerk* No thanks!” Like Azula did to him in Ba Sing Se.
Giant World LionTurtle? Begs for a Discworld crossover.
The thump Sokka makes when he lands on that metal bridge thingy and breaks his leg and he’s clinging Toph? Makes me cringe every single time. I have to admit, I’m vaguely… impressed with Nick, for letting Mike and Bryan go there with the balloons. They sorta left it ambiguous, as to what was happening to the crew members of those balloons, and if Sokka and Toph and Suki hadn’t gotten lucky, well, it was pretty clearly a suicide mission. (I also LOL’d at Toph’s blindlike “Did boomerang come back?!” bafflement when Suki saved them, btw.)
That whole last battle… man. I admit that I hadn’t expected them to reopen that last chakra, and of course, now that it’s happened, I’m all “Duh”. But I’m also really glad that Aang in the Avatar State didn’t kill Ozai. Actually, to be even more specific, I’m glad Aang didn’t kill Ozai period. Not that I particularly expected he would (The other day I asked Josie if she thought Ozai was going to die, and when she replied all pragmatically “Well yeah,” I had to take a few seconds there and be like “Buh… wuh…”) Even if Avatar wasn’t a kids show, I didn’t think Ozai would die, and I have to say I’m satisfied with what Mike and Bryan came up with.
I’m also amused because for a long time fandom (before seasons 2 and 3) would rail against bad fanfic authors who were making things up: “There’s no such thing as metalbending or energybending or bloodbending!” and then the show ended using them anyway.
And also, on a much more shallower and pettier and pervier note: I’M SORRY BUT AANG IS HOT WHEN HES BENDING. I know he’s 12 and I know I’m NOT twelve BUT HE IS. And when the boy finally hits puberty I swear to god he’s going to be downright hunky. (Glowing tattoos rrrrrawr)
(And I won’t even get into how I’m debating an open petition to show Sokka in his underwear more often. At least HE’S 15, so it’s slightly less creepy that I’m into him.)
So really, the things I found dissatisfaction in where items two and four. I KNOW for a FACT I’ve read in an interview somewhere that Mike and Bryan had said if they continued the show beyond three seasons it would be a whole new arc - that they wouldn’t drag the Fire Lord thing out. I also recall them saying in a separate interview that they WERE working on something new with Nick, which makes me wonder if Iroh’s spirit journey and the search for Ursa are going to be a whole new arc? I mean, for two things we’ve been teased with so badly (In the very beginning of Season 1 we were getting hints re: Iroh and Lu Ten and his spirit journey) those plots ended up being badly mismanaged, so I’m wondering if maybe they were put aside in order to devote proper time to them? Or maybe I’m speaking out of naïve, foolish hope. If that’s where they’re leaving those two things, however, I am going to be slightly ticked. And not just because I TOTALLY expected Ursa to be hanging out with the White Lotus Society, all drinking tea and bitching with Iroh about what a dumbass Zuko is.
And I also admit that I spent Zuko’s entire “NOW is the time of LOVE and JUSTICE and TRUTHINESS” speech demanding to know why Aang and Katara hadn’t been resolved. That last shot of the series = total hearts. Forever.
Finally, in conclusion, I am openly stating for the record that I am deeply disappointed and upset that I did not, in fact, invent the sentence, "Sokka, get out of the bison's mouth."
I’m actually tearing up just thinking about it all over again…