r/Avatarthelastairbende

I recently finished watching the second season of NATLA, and unlike most people, I didn't binge it one day. I spaced it out over multiple days because I loathe the Netflix model of dropping all episodes at once. It makes people rush through the series so they can talk about it and avoid spoilers, but at the cost of ruining any sense of pacing the series is trying to establish.

I thought the first season was mid, but was pleasantly surprised by the second. I'd probably give it a 7/10. Good, but not great, and definitely not a masterpiece.

The Positives:

Pacing:

The first thing I want to talk about is the pacing and runtime of the story. Both the cartoon and live-action series have similar runtimes for season 2; around 7 hours. And yet, I felt the live-action story was more concise and gripping in terms of pacing. So I thought back to the cartoon, and I understood what I was feeling.

Let's not kid ourselves, guys. Season 2 of the cartoon had a lot of bloat; at least in the first half. Even though every episode technically advanced the plot and the worldbuilding in some sense, most of these episodes were quite self-contained in their stories. For example:

• "The Cave of Two Lovers" was mostly a side-quest on the way to Omashu. The only plot-relevant things were the establishment of the Kataang romance and the start of Zuko's arc, but those didn't need the whole tunnel adventure to happen.

• "The Swamp" was mostly a plot device to direct Aang to finding Toph (plus retraumatizing the main cast, and the return of the blue spirit). Once again, a very "side-quest"-y vibe.

• "Avatar Day" was mostly filler. The only plot-relevant thing that happened was Zuko leaving Iroh to journey on his own.

• "The Tales of Ba Sing Se" was mostly filler as well (though it helped as a breather before the last stretch of the season).

• "Appa's Lost Days" explained how Azula's gang got the Kyoshi disguises, introduced the Guru, and explains Appa's current whereabouts. But Appa's not a character, so his horrible experiences don't come into play later.

The cartoon was written as an episodic kids show, so this structure is understandable.

But live-action series tend to have a more serious tone by comparison. This usually brings with it more tension, and thus, more serialization. If you expected the same whimsy from live-action, I don't know what to tell you.

I'm saying all this because there are advantages to tightening up a story, and people should have an open mind about this fact.

Acting:

My biggest gripe with the first season was with the acting of the main cast, especially Aang.

I hated the way Aang's lines were delivered. He had this annoyingly monotone way of speaking, and this weird up and down head movement he'd do every time he spoke. It took me out of most scenes.

But I'm happy to say that it's much better this season, although he still shows traces of this issue in the quiet and vulnerable moments.

The chemistry, charm, and comedy of the cast feels better this time around. It toes the line between the silliness of the original, and not overly serious like in a lot of live-action shows. Sokka's funny, Katara has much more personality this time around (though could still use improvement in delivery), Toph was excellent, and Zuko had great line deliveries.

Heart:

Even though the season mixed, matched, and cut a lot of plots from the show, they adapted the major beats pretty well, such as:

• Zuko Alone

• The blue spirit's return

• Wan Shi Tong's library

• The loss of Appa

• Jet's death

• Aang's fear of the avatar state

• Sokka's mourning of Yue

• Aang's "death" in the finale

• and so on

Here's a [handy article](https://mashable.com/entertainment/avatar-the-last-airbender-season-2-netflix-episode-guide) that breaks these down

But not only that, I found some of the changes they made to be compelling, such as:

• Having Katara's "Painted Lady" arc happen at the same time as Zuko's "Blue Spirit" arc. It made for excellent setup for them to collide in the finale.

• Making Long Feng not obviously evil at the start, then finding out how he's been subtly sabotaging team Avatar was pretty good.

• The fire nation district in Ba Sing Se being used to add more nuance to the fire nation's evil (while also having Katara, Zuko, Jeong Jeong, and Jet clash).

• Iroh being a lot more guilty and traumatized by his past does tug at your heartstrings, and is obviously set up for him to find the motivation to take back Ba Sing Se in season 3.

• Jet's death being a deliberate sacrifice instead of an accident was a great sendoff to his character.

• I like that Aang didn't get cheap shotted immediately by Azula. Instead, he only lost after holding back from killing her, which makes more sense for his character.

I found myself able to look past the superficial material changes, and into the heart of what this season was trying to do. And I think it did it well.

The Negatives:

Now for the things I think could be improved.

Action:

Watching this season, I felt as if Zuko's actor was the only one who could actually do martial arts, or at least pretend they can.

Watching Azula firebend filled me with apathy. It always looks like someone waving and flailing their arms without any power or skill involved. All the while, the special effects try to convince you that she's a prodigy. Similar with Katara. And Ty Lee's special ability isn't chi blocking, it's wire work.

A lot of the fights also felt cramped to me. Most of them take place in such small areas (like Earth Rumble and the final fight), and it's frustrating.

The choreography of the fights rarely impressed me, and that's a shame for an action show. I know live-action is limited compared to animation in terms of crazy stunts, but still.

Visuals:

Live-action shows have *got* to stop desaturating. Every. Scene. Everything looks so washed out, even when the tone of the scene is cheerful, and it annoys the hell out of me. Just because they're in the Earth kingdom, doesn't mean everything has to be grey, brown, and muddy.

But my biggest problem is the CGI. The bending effects, the animals (like Appa and the serpent), and many of the backgrounds just look uncanny, and made it hard for me to get immersed. Although it did make Wan Shi Tong look scary, so I guess that's a plus.

Adventure:

Most of this season takes place in Ba Sing Se, which hampers the worldbuilding and sense of adventure. I know the cartoon spent a lot of time there too, but not *this* much of the season. The adaptation doesn't do a good job of making the different parts of Ba Sing Se feel unique enough (visually). I hope they improve this in season 3 when they go to the fire nation.

Side Characters:

Way too much screen time was spent on Sai. I'm sorry, but I didn't find his romance arc (if you can even call it that) with Amita to be compelling in the slightest. I wouldn't mind if he was just a plot device for exposition and progression. Sai's arc in the first season was good enough, and I didn't find his scenes with Sokka to be all that memorable.

I wasn't feeling the fire nation general Tran either. Once again, he gets a good amount of screentime with Azula, but I don't find his contribution to the plot to be worthwhile, and he's not compelling in any way. It seemed like they set him up to be a competitor to Azula, since Ozai stole Azula's plan and give it to him. But then it turns out he's completely loyal to Azula, with no hint of betrayal.

Professor Zei was alright, but I didn't find his ending satisfying. He helps out team Avatar, then betrays them despite the friendship he had with Sokka, then dies immediately because of a technicality in Wan Shi Tong's rules. He probably didn't think Wan Shi Tong would try to kill them, but it still felt out of character for him.

The Criticisms:

Now, here's what really inspired me to write this piece.

After enjoying the second season, I was excited to see what my fellow fans thought, so I checked out my socials. I was expecting mixed reception, but mostly positive.

So imagine my surprise when I saw that the most vocal people found it to be bad, some even saying it's worse than season 1. But okay, I thought, maybe fans were seeing something I wasn't seeing, so I looked into the discussion surrounding the hatred.

And oh boy, what a dumpster fire!

Superficial Changes:

The vast majority of the criticisms are people complaining that something wasn't done exactly like in the show. That's not an inherently bad criticism, because an adaptation does need to resemble the spirit of its show. My problem is that most of these complaints are about *every* little superficial change. Here are a few examples I've seen just you can see how ridiculous it's gotten. You've got people complaining:

• That The Boulder is fat instead of muscular.

• That Toph can read braille and write using earthbending.

• That they didn't show every second of Aang breaking into Omashu to find Bumi.

• That the effects of the cactus juice weren't as extreme as in the cartoon.

• About the most *minute* of deviations in pretty much every scene that was adapted from the cartoon.

"Character Assassination":

Then you've got people complaining that the characters have been butchered compared to their cartoon counterparts, but then failing to understand why those changes were made, and why they actually *have* captured the essence of those characters. For example:

• Claiming that Zuko stealing from the pregnant lady at the beginning of episode 2 was character assassination (I'm serious). The same scene in the cartoon was already partways into his arc, whereas in the adaptation, it was at the BEGINNING. Zuko is made to feel guilty, and it comes full circle because he returns the baby rattle later in the season. In the cartoon, Zuko stole the horse-thingy from the girl whose leg got burned, after that girl showed him hospitality. This isn't out of character.

• Claiming that Iroh has been assassinated because he's not as joyful this season. But obviously, they were going for a _far_ more guilty and conflicted Iroh this time around, since he spends more time in Ba Sing Se this season. Cartoon Iroh felt guilty too; he just kept it bottled up. But he's still the same character. He still enjoys tea and opens a tea shop, he still helps out the guy who tried to mug him, he's still a good mentor to Zuko, he still has that heart-to-heart with Toph, and he still helps Aang in the finale. I think people are upset because show Iroh doesn't appear to have the same inner peace as cartoon Iroh. But I don't see why it's a problem to add more layers to a character, while maintaining their essence from the cartoon.

• Claiming that Ozai was ruined because he's not the one-note sadistic monster from the cartoon, and instead has more humanity to his character. But the thing is, he's _still_ a monster. He just doesn't want to believe it and hides his nature behind principles like "family", "strength", "prosperity", etc. He deliberately plays his kids against one another. These additions make him even more hateable, because his evil is so much more personal, in addition to being political.

• That Aang was out of character for getting mad at his friends. Except he gets mad at his friends in the cartoon as well. And they do a good job of setting it up by showing how much pressure he's under, how many secrets his friends have been keeping, and how much Aang depends on Appa for comfort.

I could go on, but I hope you see my point. It's one thing to claim that you don't like these changes. Fair enough, you're entitled to your feelings. It's another thing entirely to claim that the writers assassinated the characters, but then provide no real justification beyond "it's just different from the show", or "show [character] wouldn't do that."

Straight up not paying attention:

And finally, you've got people straight up asserting plotholes in the story that can be easily refuted with a few seconds of thought, or paying the slightest attention to the show. For example:

• People claiming that the serpent's pass was a waste of time because they could've just rode Appa. But the scene literally shows that Appa's saddle is full of people, forcing the rest to travel through the pass. And no, they couldn't just go back and forth with Appa because the fire nation was right on their heels (Aang literally says this).

• People saying that Aang didn't have to fly back and fight the serpent after they crossed the water. Except if you use your eyes, you'll see that the refugees were nowhere near far or high enough to avoid the serpent. In fact, the serpent nearly gets them right before Aang hits it away.

• That Toph shouldn't have been able to fight in the earth rumble because she was standing on sand. Except the scene literally shows people picking up ACTUAL ROCKS from under the sand. And big ones too. So it's obviously not ALL sand.

• That Toph should've been able to sense the people kidnapping Appa outside the library since it wasn't surrounded by sand. But Toph doesn't recognize faces or outfits, so she wouldn't have known it was the Dai Lee. The reason they're kept out of view is so it's a mystery to us viewers.

There's some more examples, but those are the major ones I've seen.

The fact that so many criticisms are of this fallacious kind says to me that this hatred isn't coming from a good faith attempt at understanding what the adaptation is trying to do. And that sucks, because it sets up a catch-22 where if the adaptation is different in any way, it gets hated, but if it's the same, then haters will be like, "What's the point of this adaptation!?"

Show, Don't Tell:

Another common set of criticisms is people crying "too much exposition!" and "show, don't tell!".

"Show, don't tell" is one of the worst pieces of writing advice to ever circulate. It's a thought-terminating buzzword that people bring up any time they don't like a scene where a character is explaining something to another, but don't really understand what it means.

Let me set the record straight. This kind of criticism only makes sense when the "exposition" is unnatural for the characters in that scene. For example:

• A character explaining something that the other characters should already know.

• A character explaining something completely unprompted by the context.

• A character talking in an unnatural way so that the author can explain it without having to set it up properly.

• The dialogue halts the momentum of the episode with overly wordy explanations and damages the pacing.

• Repeated explanations of the same thing to viewers, with the assumption that they have short-term memory problems.

• Important events that should be on-screen being relegated to words without enough justification.

I found that the instances of these in the second season have dropped drastically compared to the first, yet the complaints don't seem to have dissipated. The few instances that do exist are heavily exaggerated in their severity. People are parroting around this criticism, but no one does a good job of explaining where and why it's a problem. In fact, many scenes have good subtext and subtle details to them that you have to pay attention to notice, but the fact that not many are praising or even noticing them makes me wonder if Netflix is on to something with their recap mandates.

Once again, I'm disappointed.

Disappointed because the people with earnest criticisms seem to be the least vocal, whereas the haters are not only extremely vocal, but also hostile and condescending to those who feel differently. I wish I could say to ignore these people, but they're so many that I think there needs to be some pushback. That's why I wrote this, so thanks for reading.

Some highlights:

• The scene at the end of the first episode where Iroh and Zuko go their separate ways was hard to watch in a good way. And while Zuko was a jerk, it wasn't a contrived anger like a lot of shows do to cause conflict.

• "I've never said that!" - Zuko in episode 2.

• The Boulder and Toph's teacher teaching Aang to earthbend while fighting him.

• The wall of names was an amazing addition!

• The haiku battle between Sokka and Toph was really cute and wholesome.

• Zuko having the opportunity to capture Aang but choosing not to. I think this was an adaptation of him setting Appa free, and an homage to him kidnapping Aang from season 1 of the cartoon (which didn't happen in the live-action).

• I like that the Earth King isn't some buffoon, but was genuinely misled.

• The Team Avatar argument broke my heart, especially seeing Aang crumble after losing Appa. I think this was an homage to the scene from "The Chase" episode of the cartoon, where Toph leaves after their sleep-deprived argument.

• Everything with Zuko and Katara in prison

Some lowlights:

• Sokka's gag with the "Jing" in the first few episodes wasn't funny at all; it was actually annoying.

• Katara tells Toph at the party that they've been through a lot to get to Ba Sing Se, so that makes them friends. But this dialogue happens one episode after they meet her, and they really didn't go through much together besides briefly fighting Azula, and they haven't had any one-on-one screen time since. This could've been developed more.

• How on Earth did Suki solo Mai and Ty Lee in episode 4, when in episode 2 she, Sokka, and Katara struggled against them?

• Toph talking to Avatar Kyoshi felt forced. They had no reason to talk to each other besides being earthbenders, and it seemed like the only reason they spoke was so that Kyoshi could tell Toph about the eclipse. It didn't feel earned.

• I wasn't feeling Azula's "Parable of the Two Dragons" story. She monologues on and on for like 3 minutes, telling a whole story that I didn't find that interesting, just so she could say she wanted to kill Zuko. Then she doesn't kill Zuko when she has the chance.

• "I'm Toph Beifong, and I invented metalbending!"

While preparing some texts and illustrations for a chapter of my documentary-style fanfic about Southern Water Tribe, featuring the story of Sokka and Katara, I compared their book 1 journey to the North with challenges that irl inhabitants of arctic historically had to face when travelling south. And I came to a conclusion:

Sokka and Katara were so incredibly lucky to even make it to the North Pole alive.

Disclaimer: yes, I do realize that ATLA is a kids show written for Nickelodeon a therefore does not take certain things into consideration. I'm not suggesting that it should, nor I'm complaining about lack of these dark realities in a kids media. This post is NOT a rant about ATLA writing, but a mere contemplation about how things would be if this journey happened in real life. Also please excuse any spelling mistakes, english is not my first language and sometimes I keep misspelling words.

After leaving South Pole, the siblings would have to face harsh changes in their everyday life, such as:

DISEASES - In real life, arctic populations (Inuit, Iñupiat etc.) were very much protected from a lot of otherwise very common diseases thanks to both low temperatures and isolation from other societies. After European colonization, diseases such as tuberculosis, diphtheria or smallpox, carried by the Europeans, impacted native populations heavily, not just due to lack of medical care and resources, but also due to the native population being way less immune to these exotic viruses and bacterias.

Sokka and Katara even fall sick during book 1, and while this event doesn't seem to leave any long-term consequences, realistically, they should be prone to falling lethally sick with any minor infection that the other nations are immune to.

FOOD POISONING AND STARVATION - After many thousands of years of evolution, arctic populations are adapted to a very specific diet. In the arctic, Water Tribe's died consists almost solely of meat and seafood, and then perhaps kelp and berries growing during the short summer. Their diet lacks sugar, therefore they must use animal fat as their primary source of energy. Meat from arctic animals, especially pinnipeds and cetaceans, have very specific nutritional values that these people need for survival. The freezing temperatures also prevent kill from rotting away , making even raw meat safe for consumption for a long time.

After leaving South Pole, the siblings' nutrition must've totally collapsed. They're most likely allergic to various plant-based foods, such as nuts. What's safe and healthy for Aang and other people, is undigestible at best and dangerous at worst for these two. Safe foods like rice are just plain energy, as their stomach isn't built for extracting nutrients from plants. They also can't differenciate edible plants from poisonous ones.Animals they normally hunt don't live there, and the ones that do don't meet their nutritional needs. The animals are full of parasites and bacteria, and every kill starts rotting immediately in warm climate, and they don't know how to effectively preserve it. Considering that they spend a lot of time travelling on Appa, there's no much time for cooking it using open fire. Their hunting techniques liekly don't work there either. While the warm climate seems to be full of food, water tribe siblings were likely starving daily.

INSECT INFESTATION - There are no fleas and other parasites in cold arctic. But in warmer climate, their parkas start very quickly be attacked by various external parasites. Thanks to the lack of rain in freezing climate, their parkas are kept dry and in good condition, but due to the humidity in warmer climate, these parkas become dirty, heavy, permanently soaked and don't protect them from cold anymore, as the humid air finds its way under their clothing, paradoxly making them more cold and uncomfortable than they were back home.

All this while being actively hunted by Zuko and Fire Nation. Poor kids.

What do you think? Could this scenario be possible if ATLA took these conditions into consideration?

About the illustration:

Name: "Homesick". The stone structure is INUKSUK, a landmark built by Inuit in canadian arctic as a way to mark an important waypoint, to give directions to migrating hunters, or to warn travellers agains potential danger. The Inuksuk is also being featured on an official flag of Nunavut, Canada.

When far away from home, fighting a daily battle for survival, a tiny cultural artefact built from river stones provides a little bit of comfort. The only reminder of home in a foreign land.

Who would become Firelord?

I suppose Zeisan could take the throne with Roku's support but she's be pretty unpopular amongst the nobility and Fire Nation for being a nonbender woman. Especially since Sozin was fairly popular and already started propaganda against a lot of her ideals.

Then again Sozin might've already taken care of Zeisan by that point so a Fire Nation Civil War could erupt as people try to become Firelord. Would the Fire Nation want vengeance on Roku for killing Sozin or will they just see the Avatar's will as law?

I once asked people in the Avatar Discord server if each avatar was LITERALLY the same person just in a new body or if each avatar were instead a different person with just the spirit of the avatar inside of them. Someone explained it to me this way (look at the first picture); this explanation made the most sense to me, but others believe each avatar is literally the same person. But the live-action Avatar straight up just says each avatar is their own person with the same spark. which lowk just confirms the toxin explanation about each avatar being a different person, but they have the same avatar spirit (I forgot the login to my Reddit account, so I'm on my mother's account). (Also, the pictures included are only from episode 6 of season 1, so no season 2 spoilers.)

In the episode “The Storm,” we learn about Aang’s past in the episode it shows how he became the Avatar, and how he ended up frozen in ice for 100 years before Katara and Sokka found him.

While in a cave with katara Aang explains to Katara that he was chosen as the Avatar much earlier than usual 

As many avatars before him had to wait til they were 16, and aang was only 12 years old 

The monks informed him that, with the war escalating, he needed to step up immediately and bring balance to the world.

This was an overwhelming burden him. He was suddenly expected to train intensely, master all four elements, and maintain world peace. 

So basically His normal life as a carefree kid disappeared and things were never the same 

He had no time for fun anymore, and once his friends learned he was the Avatar, many of them stopped playing with him their reason they stated since he was the avatar he had any unfair advantage?(im not kidding)

The only person who still treated him like a normal child and let him enjoy his childhood was his guardian, Monk Gyatso.

 But the other monks saw this as a distraction that was holding Aang back. So They decided to send him to a different temple so he could focus solely on his Avatar training with no interruptions.

When Aang who was eavesdropping and heard their plan, he panicked and ran away on appa.

 This decision led to him getting caught in a storm and becoming trapped in ice for a century.

Now after watching this It’s completely understandable why a kid would freak out under that kind of pressure. 

Being the Avatar is an enormous responsibility that no child should have to carry 

Think of it like being a 6 year old prince and with your parents gone it’s up to you to rule your kingdom 

But tell me do u agree with aang and would have ran away too or would u pick the role of the avatar even if your life would change 

I was visiting grandma in Colorado last week and did a double take of this “Adopt-a-place” sign. I am assuming these are some ATLA fans’ dogs’ names? Kids would be a stretch right?

Here’s what I imagine our world would look like if we had the 4 nations! I chose Europe for the fire nation bc of their colonial history. The Earth Kingdom as Afro-Asia since it is the largest of the 4 and features a large desert(the Sahara desert as the Siwing desert). The water tribes are at the poles just like in the show and encompass the Inuit tribes that inspired the water tribe people. The Amazon rainforest is the foggy swamp. The air temples are scattered in different corners of the globe in areas of high altitude. The area where the Aztec, Maya, and Inca empires were is the location of the sun warrior tribe as they are heavily inspired by them. And lastly, the US is the united republic from the legend of Korra since it was once a fire nation colony and NYC is Republic City. Let me know if you agree and what nation you would be part of!

I don't like ATLA animals. None of them. I can't help it but I think most of the animal hybrids in ATLA universe are just ugly, and most important - they don't really fit into their environment. They tend to have traits that doesn't give them any evolutional advantages and are either a total joke, or are nonsensical at worst.

On one hand, I like that the creators used their own fantasy species instead of ordinary animals, since the whole planet is very much alien, but I wish they put more thought into the ecology of these hybrids, maybe take inspiration from paleoart and extinct species that look fantasy enough, but still work within their ecosystems and biology.

I tried to figure out whether at least some of these animals could be designed specifically to prove some philosophical point, but I can't think of any (other than the "spider-fly(?) caught in its own web" or something like that, and the lionturtle, which is straight up mythological divine beast). It almost feels like the animals were designed and put into the world just for fun, because they looked cool on the paper. Which is weird considering how much care was put into literally every single aspect of the world-building.

Anyway, here's my "redesign" of the sky bison into more ordinary animal (based heavily on actual bison and domestic yak).

Do you like the animal designs in ATLA? Can you imagine the fauna being more ordinary and earth-like? What animal species would you erase and what would you replace them with?

Hello team Avatar! I have a hedgehog named Zuko. His whole life has been centered around Avatar. He has even met every main voice actor (except Mei but he will meet her in November). Zuko as of a few months ago has been diagnosed with lymphoma. Cancer. There isnt much study for hedgehogs to this day and I lost his sister Mizuki To leukemia over the course of four days a few years back. I have been good about covering the expenses but am scared to start failing him. I refuse to give up. As long as he is happy and not suffering he is worth every cent and the study of this to save future hedgehogs is important to me.

I got permission to be able to share his story and ask for assistance. And if Firelord Zuko story were ever to end shortly. Everything left is to be donated to the study of hedgehogs. So other parents wouldnt ever have to worry. Thank you everyone and this amazing community.

Again I had permission to post this and hopes it doesnt receive harsh words or ban.

https://gofund.me/59621e81c