From the South Pole Iceberg to the Republic City Portal: A Critical Study of the Avatar Franchise: Part Eleven

ATLA Book One: Water

Chapter Twelve: The Storm

In which Katara browses for fruit, Sokka goes fishing, and Iroh offers noodles for dinner.

In many ways, this is just as much a filler episode as “The Great Divide”, but unlike “The Great Divide”, this episode introduces many elements that are crucial to the series’ DNA, and in many ways feels more significant than anything that has come before. This paradox stems from the fact that the episode does nothing to move the overall narrative forward, but does much to deepen our understanding of the story, and the characters within it. Also, it’s really good. At the show’s best, the episodes of Avatar we’ve had so far are good, surprisingly thoughtful television set in a fascinating world. This is the episode where it becomes apparent that ATLA is a show capable of giving us great television

The chapter is a pause for breath in the middle of Book One: we stop and take stock with the characters, learning more about where they’ve come from in a story filled with literary foils and parallels between characters. The storm allows for this pause, as the episode creates the sense of nature trapping Aang and Zuko, to make them confront their own past.

The episode is wonderfully clear in the way it is written, with one of the most distinct three act structures of any story so far. As a result, it feels like the best way to analyse it is to break it down and comment on the story one act at a time.

Act One – The Calm Before the Storm

The episode opens with Aang’s Nightmare, with Aang seemingly contently as he dreams of flying with Katara, Sokka, Appa, and Momo. He hears them say “We need you Aang”, and responds happily with “I need you too”: he loves them, and needs the friendship and companionship they provide. But then he sees a storm ahead, a reminder of his greatest shame, and an image of Gyatzo appears, saying “We needed you”, and melting away at Aang’s touch, a reminder of his loss and guilt. The “We need you” gets louder, with Katara, Sokka, and Gyatzo’s voices merging together: while Aang needs companionship, he is weighed down by the world needing him to be the Avatar, a thing Aang feels denies him love and friendship. Katara notices he is upset, asking about his nightmares, but he rejects her help, currently unable to talk about his complex emotions.

Just as Aang rejects Katara’s help, Zuko pushes away Iroh and his crew. His claim that “No Man’s life is more important than finding the Avatar” shows him rejecting human needs just as Aang does, of both himself and the crew: it is quite probable that Zuko includes his own life in that statement. The suggestion he doesn’t care for his crew and is just a spoiled prince brings him into tension with his crewmembers, until Iroh defuses the situation.

As they reject their human needs in search of a higher goal, both Aang and Zuko are brought back to earth with food. Just he distracts Zuko from training with roast duck in “The Boy in the Iceberg”, Iroh once again tries to relieve Zuko, and the crew’s, stress with the offer of noodles to eat. Iroh reminds his nephew of his human needs so he doesn’t become consumed by his perceived duty of capturing the Avatar. Katara inadvertently does a similar thing for Aang, making him focus on his material need for food by pointing out the Gaang have run out of supplies, the first of many such parallels between Iroh and Katara in this episode. The importance of food is a motif that recurs many times in the Avatar world, with mealtimes repeatedly being a source of bonding and togetherness, and in moments like this, a reminder of the basic needs of the characters.

The act ends on a significant moment in Aang’s character arc, as for the first time he is greeted with hostility for being the Avatar, not by a Fire Nation Soldier, but by an ordinary citizen. The old fisherman becomes the first person to blame Aang for vanishing from the world, and the world descending into war. While the words “When the world needed him most, he vanished”, are Katara’s, from her narration in the title sequence, she defends Aang, only for, in one of the most deft pieces of character animation in the series so far, Aang’s shoulders to slump, and his eyes to cast down, before he backs away, and flies off on his glider. The act ends on Aang’s sense of shame, as he runs away instead of confronting that shame, and the audience are left to realise that he does, unfairly, blame himself for the huge weight of the hundred year war.

Act Two – Two Campfires, Two Tales

This section makes up the bulk of the episode, with Aang and Katara, and Iroh and the crew, gathering around two campfires, telling two interwoven tales that flashback to Zuko and Aang’s backstories, as the parallels between the two boys become increasingly clear.

The nature of the flashbacks is an instructive demonstration of the differences in Aang and Zuko’s stories. Aang’s story is told through his own flashback, Zuko’s story is told through Iroh’s flashback, reflecting the fact that Aang is learning to open up about his problems, whereas Zuko is still not ready to discuss his past. But we see the similarities too, as the two stories show how both boys are forced to grow up too quickly, and shouldered with impossible burdens.

Particularly interesting is the way Ozai is framed in these flashbacks: the show’s depiction of Ozai reflects how Zuko sees him, in this episode depicting him as a shadowy, barely remembered monster, wreathed in fire. Tellingly, we only see Ozai’s face when Zuko meets him again at the start of Book Three. Ozai is framed that way even when Zuko isn’t in the scene (consider his commandment for Azula in the finale of Book one an example of this). In this case the memories are Iroh’s, but the shots of the scene where Zuko realises he is fighting his father are directed from his POV, or focus on his facial reactions and expressions as he begs his father not to fight him, with the camera angled up to show Ozai towering over him, reflecting how small Zuko’s father makes him feel. As a result, the audience’s perception of Ozai is one that directly mirrors Zuko’s.

The flashbacks also both link Aang and Zuko burdens to their father figures, Gyatzo and Ozai. Aang’s relationship is a positive one, with Gyatzo providing him with the fun and childhood he so needs, but his burden comes from the Monks deciding to tear that relationship away from him, and force him to grow up too quickly to end the war. His anger about this leads to him almost burning Katara with the embers of the fire, a subtle moment of foreshadowing for “The Deserter”, a moment that also sets up that episode’s linking of fire to uncontrollable rage. Separation from Gyatzo also threatens to remove the only remaining companionship Aang has, as the other boys no longer want to play with him after he is told he is the Avatar, and as we know from Aang’s dream, it is friendship and companionship he desperately needs. In contrast to the threat of Aang losing a positive relationship with his father figure, Zuko’s burden comes from Ozai’s abuse. Just as we get a glimpse of burden free Aang when he teaches the other boys the air scooter, we see a burden free Zuko, idealistic and hopeful as he wants to learn how to be a good fire lord. And his defence of the worth of the new recruits’ lives shows he is, beneath the damaged exterior, a good person at heart. But his idealism is something his father has corrupted with abuse: we get confirmation Zuko’s scar came from an Agni Kai with his father, something that has been carefully set up and alluded to, but is only made explicit now.

The Campfire sequence also deepens the parallels between Katara and Iroh. Both are carers for Aang and Zuko, the people looking after them in the wake of their trauma. However, the differences between their methods reflects the differing needs of Aang and Zuko, and the different things Katara and Iroh are able to do for them. Katara listens to Aang’s stories, offering Aang support through his trauma, whereas Iroh explains Zuko’s faults, being a buffer between Zuko and the crew. Katara encourages Aang to talk, learning about his past so she can understand what he’s been through, whereas Iroh speaks for Zuko, teaching the crew about his nephew. In this Act, we deepen the understanding of our two boys, seeing that in spite of being on opposite sides of the war, they share a past of pain and loss.

Act Three – Riding Out the Storm

The final act sees the Storm pass, with Aang and Zuko both saving the lives of people endangered by the storm, and as the do so, taking tentative but positive steps towards moving on from their trauma and burdens.

Zuko’s conclusion completes the episode’s task of making him a more sympathetic character. By saving his helmsman, he does easily the most selfless thing he has done so far in the show, showing the respect for his crew after the questioning of said respect at the start of the episode. This respect contrasts with the way Ozai treated him, a sign that Zuko is ultimately a better man than his father. It is also confirmation that the goodness he showed in his protest in the war room, which came from concern for the well-being of new troops and a desire to be just in deployment of military tactics, is still a part of his character. Between this and his rescue of Iroh in “The Spirit World” Zuko is being positioned as a character on a redemption arc because he is shown as being capable of selflessness, as well as being framed in opposition to most other villains.

Similarly, Aang’s rescue of Sokka and the fisherman sees him reconcile with the shame of falling out of the world: he saves them with a version of the technique he used to freeze himself in the glacier, this time using the technique to return to the world and his duties, instead of running away from them and cutting himself off.

And then we come to the ending, which for me is probably the best final scene of any episode so far. 

Aang and Zuko catch a glimpse of each other in the eye of the storm, and drift away from each other, not fighting for once, not knowing the similarities between the two of them. Then, Aang reconciles with the fisherman, and makes peace with his past as the storm ends.

From the South Pole Iceberg to the Republic City Portal: A Critical Study of the Avatar Franchise: Part Ten

ATLA Book One: Water

Chapter Eleven: The Great Divide

In Which… Gah. Let’s just keep flying.

It’s not that this episode is unbearable to watch. Because it isn’t. It’s a cute morality play, 25 minutes of television that breeze by easily enough. It’s quite fair that this episode is usually at the bottom of people’s lists, however, and that it’s usually a story people skip on a rewatch. I talked in my post on “The Spirit World” about filler episodes, but the truth is, this is the one story that just adds nothing to the show. It doesn’t expand on the characters, or introduce an element that affects the overall narrative of the show in an appreciable way. And that is a nightmare of an episode to try and write an analysis of.

It is, however, helpfully placed in the middle of the season. It is a useful point at which to stop, breathe, and consider what we’ve learned on this blog so far. So let’s do that. As Aang, Katara, and Sokka guide two squabbling villages across a vast chasm, let’s look back at the previous ten episodes, and look at what our now fully-formed show is, and look ahead a little to the kind of show it might become.

ATLA, first and foremost, is a show that follows the hero’s journey narrative, with Aang on a classic “chosen one” journey as he seeks to become a fully-fledged hero capable of ending the war that has ravaged his world. He is, however, an unusual protagonist to place in this familiar story, embracing familiar archetypes such as the reluctant hero and the “goofy kid” character moulds, but he is also a pacifist Buddist monk, trying to maintain the traditions of a long dead culture. The tension between his role as a fun loving child and a reluctant hero interacts in an unusual way throughout the series, and this interaction is in fact in evidence in “The Great Divide”, as he struggles to find a peaceful solution to the conflict between the tribes, and does so by making use of the fact he was alive over one hundred years ago. The trouble is, this never quite synthesises: Aang has not saved the day by meshing together the different parts of his identity, but by lying and making up an origin story for the conflict.

Katara and Zuko are also on hero’s journeys that parallel Aang’s, with Katara working as the narrator and main point of view for the tale, and Zuko as the banished prince seeking a return from exile as he follows a redemption arc he has yet to fully understand. In roles just behind the three lead characters, we have Sokka and Iroh, both of whom offer subtle and nuanced variations on their initial appearance of being comedy sidekicks. “The Great Divide” is also frustrating because it removes the nuance from the characters, as they almost become parodies of themselves: Sokka is a wisecracking, meat eating slob, and Katara is fussy and overly prepared. The morality play genre warps their characterisation, as they revert to types instead of the fleshed out they always have been.   

On the subject of Katara, it is worth discussing the show’s treatment of its female characters. So far Katara has been the main female character, with the show seeming somewhat stuck in the “one girl” model of fantasy universes, as the only other female roles of note go to Suki, Gran Gran, and, in fact, the unnamed Gan Jin leader in this episode. But in spite of this, the show has demonstrated plenty of refreshing approaches to gender politics, treating the female characers present with respect, critiquing sexism and toxic masculinity with a great deal of nuance, and giving complexity and depth to Katara, female lead. This refreshing take on gender politics will continue to grow, as the franchise becomes increasingly female centric, with a vast array of female characters driving the narrative.

ATLA is also a show that subverts or exceeds expectations, examples including the handling of Sokka, which treats an apparent comedy sidekick with a surprising amount of nuance and respect, “Jet”, which is a subtle variation on a tired and harmful love triangle narrative, and “The Warriors of Kyoshi”, a story that is far more complex than it initially appears. Arguably the most frustrating thing about “The Great Divide” is that it’s a story that doesn’t subvert expectations or offer surprising depth: it’s reasonably well made morality play, and that’s it.

And it is a show that sides with the marginalised, offering a new storytelling lens through its point of view characters: Southern peasants Katara and Sokka, Aang, the last remaining citizen of nation wiped out by genocide, and Zuko, a prince who was banished, scarred and abused by his own father. To quote highlyclassifiedshit’s wonderful comment on Katara: “We’re seeing the world through the eyes of a 14-year-old living in a dwindling village on the underbelly of the world, whose mother was killed in a genocidal raid, and whose father is at war”. There are hints of class conflict in the divide between the two tribes, with the Gan Jins claiming Wei Jin was a petty thief, and the Zhangs claiming he was wrongfully imprisoned, but this reading is cut off by the morality tale structure, and the idea of the tribes being exact opposites, and just as bad as one another.  

The different perspective of The Last Airbender also stems from the different kind of fantasy world it portrays, drawing on Eastern cultures, as opposed to European feudalistic culture, which is still the go-to model for fantasy worlds. It is still clearly a world created by two white men living in America, but that does not mean the perspective it offers to genre fiction isn’t incredibly fresh, different and exciting.

It is also very much a show about the world it is set in, about the different places and spaces the cast encounter and discover as they travel around this world into female-dominated spaces like Kysohi Island, a mad and skewed cave of riddles in Bumi’s palace, and spaces haunted by grief and loss in the Southern Water Tribe and the Northern Air Temple. We hints of this in “The Great Divide”, which attemts to establish the titular Canyon as a vast and hostile space, but this feeling never comes across particularly strongly: a similar sense is built up much stronger almost exactly a season from now in “The Desert”.

In spite of my harsh judgement of “The Great Divide”, it is worth noting that it is a story with interesting ideas and themes: in some ways, the morality play structure works as a one off, and its characterisation of the Gaang as types instead of fully fleshed out characters gives an interesting read as to how they operate as characters in this genre of story. It creates simplistic but interesting parallels between the tribes and the siblings, creating an interesting implication that all conflict, large or small scale, ultimately ends up looking the same. But the show has handled more complex themes handled with greater respect and care: stories of War, grief, family, and maintaining culture and identity in the face of conflict have run throughout the first ten episodes. “The Great Divide” is a step back from these themes and ideas. However, there is no need to despair.

The show is many, very good things, and the depth it has demonstrated before now means it has earned the chance to get away with a slightly duff episode. Besides, I think one of its very best episodes may be just around the corner.  

End of Part Ten.

From the South Pole Iceberg to the Republic City Portal: A Critical Study of the Avatar Franchise: Part Nine

ATLA Book One: Water

Chapter Ten: Jet

In which Momo eats a berry, Longshot is stoic and silent, and some cabbages are destroyed.

“Jet” is the second big Katara episode in a row, as the story focuses heavily on her crush on the titular freedom fighter. However, unlike “The Waterbending Scroll”, it is an episode that gives plenty of material for all of the Gaang, being just as much Sokka’s episode as it is his sister’s, while throwing some interesting character notes for Aang into the mix.

As with Haru, Katara bonds with Jet over family lost in the war, but the focus on their relationship isn’t really on the way that they bond: their losses are really the only connection between the two characters that the episode establishes, and that connection is only touched on with one brief exchange of dialogue. Technically, Sokka and Jet talk just as much about losing their loved ones, though that exchange is part of a moral debate about hurting and robbing the old Fire Nation man, rather than a way of establishing a romantic connection. Really, “Imprisoned” explored Katara’s connection with her love interest in a far deeper way than “Jet”.

What’s really important for Katara and Jet’s relationship in this episode is the way Jet’s betrayal of Katara’s trust is presented. It is a romance largely told through Katara’s point of view: with the scene where Jet carries Katara to the hideout being a prime example: the romantic lighting for that scene is clearly framed as Katara’s view of the situation. That isn’t to say Jet doesn’t genuinely like Katara, as he seems to want her to side with him, and seems to admire her skills, but the episode does frame the romance through Katara’s perspective, as this is a story about her being let down by a boy she likes. The way Jet tricks her into aiding his attempted destruction of the village is particularly cruel, but also an important character note: he appeals to Katara’s idealism, which Aang sides with, by claiming innocent lives are at risk. And not for the first time, this idealism is placed in opposition to Sokka’s pragmatism, with Sokka wanting to leave Jet and the freedom fighters before getting caught up in their mess, even though he has seen the harm Jet will do to innocent people. The climactic confrontation between Katara and Jet sees her trust in Jet broken Jet down, as she is left unable to believe he would flood a village of innocents, before she symbolically freezes Jet, rejecting him with the powers that are crucial to her, and that she has grown more confident in over the course of the episode.

Also significant is the way the episode ignores any potential love triangle between Katara, Jet, and Aang, even though Aang’s crush on Katara has been evident since the first episode, and this sort of story would usually be the kind where his feelings for Katara are made explicit. There are, incidentally, some cute bonding moments for Katara and Aang, such as the two of them waterbending together, but Aang is, for this episode, not shown as being even slightly jealous of Jet.  He is given some moments of jealously when Jet returns in season two, yet even that jealousy is pointedly underplayed. Instead of fighting Jet over his love interest, Aang repeatedly compliments and admires Jet, admiring his fighting skills and hideout, until the true horror of Jet’s plans are revealed. Even then, Aang refuses to fight Jet for his glider, trying to take the glider back without hurting Jet, an approach to fighting a morally grey antagonist that highlights Aang’s pacifistic nature.   

The portrayal of Jet is also an example of the show once again adding nuance to hundred year war. Jet’s Earth Kingdom based freedom fighters attack innocent civilians from the Earth Kingdom and the Fire Nation, showing villainous and innocent characters can exist on all sides of the conflict. Ultimately Jet’s black and white approach to the war is what leads to his downfall: Aang’s lack of desire to hurt him and Jet’s heroic rescue of the Gaang help frame Jet as a person with good intentions, only for his past loss at the hands of the Fire Nation to cloud his ability to judge a situation correctly. As the audience is taken further into the story, the hundred year war becomes an increasingly complex and morally grey conflict, in spite of what Jet thinks.

As Aang doesn’t come into conflict with Jet, that role is left open for someone else, and the person given that role is Sokka. As well as being a Katara story, “Jet” is a Sokka episode, a story about Sokka trying to be a leader, and clashing with Jet, who is, superficially, far better suited to leading. At this point, it is worth pointing out that there is no clear leader in the Gaang: even though he’s the Avatar, Aang is not in charge in the way Korra clearly leads the Krew, for example. Instead, key decisions and organisation of various important missions are consistently shared out equally among the Gaang. However, by trying to be a better leader Sokka takes on the narrative position Aang would usually be placed in for this kind of episode: he is undermined by Jet in the fight, is suspicious of and hostile towards Jet from the moment they meet, and is accused (fairly) of being jealous of Jet’s leadership qualities. He even ends the episode flying Appa.

However, ultimately the episode show’s Sokka’s leadership qualities winning through over Jet’s: he learns at the start of the episode that you cannot lead by making decisions without listening to those beneath you, a thing he tells the Duke and Pipsqueak Jet still has to learn. And ultimately, the resolution demonstrates Sokka’s cleverness and intuition: the episode is, after all, about “Sokka’s Instincts” in a big way. It also demonstrates his empathy a side of Sokka that is not often explored, as he is usually portrayed as the pragmatist when there is a moral dilemma (and as I mentioned before, that pragmatism is once again in evidence here, forming a part of his clash with Katara). His pity for the man from the Fire Nation is the key to the episode’s resolution, and at the end of the episode, he condemns Jet for not protecting innocent people. Not for the first time, Sokka’s strength as a character lies in the fact that he is a far more capable and complex character than both the other characters and the audience initially assume.

“Jet”, then, is an episode that is notable for the kind of story it isn’t, the kind of story it rejects. Switching the usual narrative roles of Sokka and Aang key to how this episode works, as it stops the story from being a stereotypical sexist narrative about two boys competing over a girl, with the “nice guy” hero being shown to be in the right and the girl being shown to be a silly fool for falling for the asshole, because in this kind of story, all girls love jerks. Instead, it becomes a story about the clash of ideals between Jet and Sokka, a clash that adds welcome nuance and complexity to the show’s portrayal of war, a story that fleshes out the show’s “comedy sidekick” character with some excellent material, and about Katara’s first relationship going wrong, and her coming out of that situation more confident in herself. It replaces a bad, clichéd narrative with something far more interesting and valuable.

End of Part Nine.