Avatar Recap: Book 3, Chapter 5
It's time once again for a little spoiler filled discussion of the latest episode of Avatar: The Last Airbender. We switch gears this week and focus primarily on the main antagonists: Zuko, Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee. Do we get to see them rain destruction on the Avatar and his buddies? Are they planning their next moves for world domination? Not yet! Right now, it's time for a beach party!
If one decides that the last couple of episodes did indeed go a bit beyond just typical filler, then I would say that this episode is almost primarily filler. Except for a couple of small key moments, this one was about as filler as it gets. Not that's to say it wasn't a fun episode. It wasn't my favorite of the season so far, but it wasn't a bad episode by any means. This recap may be a bit short because there isn't a whole lot to go over.
I'll get to the important obvious non-filler parts in a little bit, but there was one tiny bit of info at the beginning that could be (knowing the creators of the show) be important later on. The pretense for sending the more powerful Fire Nation kids to the beach was that the Fire Lord himself was having an important meeting with his advisers and generals. Is it possible that they're planning for the day of black sun? After all, Azula does know about it from her exploits in Ba Sing Se. Or is it possible that she hasn't even told her father about it? I could see that. She may just be evil enough to hold that information to herself to let her father be defeated only to take control of the Fire Nation for herself afterwards, when Sozin's comet arrives.
In any case, the kids are off at the beach on Ember Island for a little vacation. Everyone's natural personalities come through, with Azula being a power-hungry psycho, Zuko getting pissed at every little thing, Mai not caring about anything at all, and Ty Lee being cheerful and bubbly all the time. At first, it seems a bit over the top for each of them, but then I figured that's probably on purpose. Perhaps the creators of the show are poking some fun at themselves. Azula is completely overbearing in every little thing she does, as well as completely full of herself. Her speech after winning the volleyball game seems most to me like the show is poking fun at itself and showing that it doesn't take itself too seriously.
Anyway, the gang gets invited to a party, shenanigans ensue, and they all head down to the beach for a rousing round The Breakfast Club: The Home Game. Each of the teens ends up sharing about their past and how it makes them how they are today. For Mai and Ty Lee, it seems kinda rushed and forces and they get over it a bit too quickly. Azula's confession of being jealous of her brother because she thinks their mother loved him more hints at a slight bit of depth to her personality, but then ends up being a throwaway joke about how she knows she's a crazy monster, and she's alright with that. But the whole point of the main story of this episode seemed to be just a vehicle for Zuko to start to understand why he's not happy, despite the fact that he's been welcomed back into the Fire Nation.
He wanted to come back, he wanted to be accepted. But he's not really getting what he wanted. Ozai does accept him back and end his banishment, but as his ruler, as the Fire Lord, not as his father. His mother is gone and his sister has never been nice to him at all. He reminisces while walking through the old family beach house and not surprisingly, the happiest flashback looks to be with his Uncle Iroh. He wanted to come back to the Fire Nation because he though that was his family. And that's what he truly wants, a family. It's slowly dawning on him that he locked up the only loving part of his family he had left. The burning of the family portrait seems to indicate that he's realizing that family hasn't existed for a long time.
Meanwhile, over in the B story, our protagonists are enjoying leisurely day at a waterfront as well. They spend even less time on this part than they do for other B stories because all they're doing here is giving us a formal introduction to Zuko's assassin. He's a big, strong, scary guy with a tattooed third eye, a metal arm, and a metal leg. When he steps by the camera in one scene, there's enough detail in the couple of frames that you can see there are springs attaching the heel of the metal foot to the metal leg, indicating that it's there as a prosthetic rather than just a piece of armor. The one thing I really like about this guy is that he's still a firebender. The preview last week seemed to indicate that he was more of a telekinetic, but on closer inspection, he's just able to concentrate his firebending into such a small area that it expands quickly into a large explosion. He's around just long enough for a brief scuffle with Aang to show that he's freaking powerful and more than a match for our heroes before they are able to make an escape on Appa.
It was a short bit with Aang and the assassin, but it was fantastically animated, particularly the part where Aang makes a kind of air bubble/shield thing just in time to guard him from an explosion and leap away from the force of it. I also like how the martial arts and bending techniques in this show have a nice medium between showing new moves, but also re-using moves that are appropriate to the situation. Aang's rock suit was a good example of something that was used before and was appropriate to use again in this instance, but they don't go back and have him use it every single time he's got rocks around him.
The assassin got the drop on them, so it's also a bit difficult to tell if they're really not capable of fighting against him or if they just need to be prepared for the battle. It'll be interesting to see how they eventually deal with him.
Oh, and the Fire Nation teens feel better after letting out their stories with each other, so they go back to the party and wreck the place, giving them their own version of a happy ending.
Don't you...forget about me...
What say you?!