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| Monday, February 9, 2009 08:17 PM |
| On the Viewer - Avatar: The Last Airbender (Book 2, Chapters 6-10) |
 by Fëanor |
"The Blind Bandit"
This may be my favorite episode of the show yet. We open right up with the funny as Sokka tries to decide whether to buy himself a new bag or not. He ends up getting it, but later is disappointed when he realized it doesn't go with his outfit. Hee hee. Aang, on the lookout for a new earthbender teacher, hears about a big competition between earthbenders called Earth Rumble Six and goes to check it out (after Katara beats the time and place out of a couple of annoying local kids). Turns out it's a professional wrestling-style show, where big burly guys with ridiculous nicknames scream out arrogant challenges before beating the snot out of each other with earthbending. One of them even looks like a Mexican wrestler! Sokka loves it, especially the biggest, toughest, loudest-mouthed guy, The Boulder. But The Boulder is not the reigning champ: the Blind Bandit is. And the Blind Bandit turns out to be a little girl who is literally blind. But she wipes the floor with The Boulder. Aang immediately realizes she's the teacher for him because she waited and listened to the Earth, the way Bumi said a master would. He gets off on the wrong foot with her right away, however, by accepting her open challenge and defeating her (illegally) with airbending. She storms off, but as she does, he realizes she's also the girl he had a vision of in the swamp a few episodes ago, so now he knows he has to track her down. The flying pig he saw with her ends up leading him to her, as it turns out that a flying boar is the crest of her family - information that Katara beats out of those same two local kids. As they're leaving the kids, Katara throws back a final threat at them ("I've got my eye on you!") and Sokka just whispers, "Water Tribe." So hilarious.
The Blind Bandit's real name is Toph, and her parents have no idea how expert an earthbender she is. In fact, they keep her hidden behind the walls of their estate and try to protect her from anything the least bit dangerous, treating her like a delicate, sweet little girl, which she most decidedly is not. She takes Aang aside and explains that she uses earthbending to "see." She wants to go with Aang, but feels obligated to stay with her family. Just then, the two of them are ambushed and kidnapped by Xin Fu, the guy who runs Earth Rumble. He feels that Toph lost on purpose and scammed him out of the championship money, and now he's going to get the money back through a ransom. Toph's father pays the ransom for his daughter, but Xin Fu plans to keep Aang and sell him to the Fire Nation. Toph isn't having it and steps in to save Aang, defeating all the Earth Bash contenders singlehandedly. Unfortunately, this display does not convince Toph's father to stop treating her like a china doll; rather, the opposite! He decides to redouble his efforts to protect her and keep her sealed away. But she's not having it anymore and runs off to join Aang and friends. Unfortunately, her father guesses where she's gone and pays Xin Fu and Toph's earthbending teacher to go find her and bring her back using whatever means necessary. So Aang got a new teacher and a new ally, but also acquired new enemies! D'oh!
Like I said, brilliant episode. Very funny, very exciting, and it introduces Toph, who is rapidly becoming one of my favorite characters on the show. Hooray!
"Zuko Alone"
This is a very interesting episode, and the title pretty much explains why: it focuses on Zuko, and Zuko only; none of the other major characters make an appearance. You'd think that'd make it a pretty lame episode, but it's actually quite good. We get to see more of Zuko's backstory, and see further into his heart. Plus, the poor bastard gets rejected by even more people. I don't think he's had a good day in his entire life.
Zuko protects a young Earth Nation kid from some bullying Earth Nation soldiers (who are really just thieving thugs), and the kid sort of adopts him and brings him home, where his parents offer Zuko something to eat and a place to sleep (in fact, they practically have to force him to accept their help). Zuko starts to become a kind of older brother to the kid. Meanwhile, a flashback shows us a young Zuko, Ty Lee, Azula, and Mai. Turns out Zuko was a real mama's boy; Mai had a crush on him even back then; and Azula was always a bitch who tortured her brother, her friends, and cute little animals whenever she found the opportunity. The flashback takes place during the time that Uncle Iroh was at the siege of Ba-Sing-Se. Azula points out that if Iroh (whom she clearly dislikes and does not respect) doesn't return from the war, her father, Ozai, will be next in line to be Fire Lord. In fact it's Iroh's son who doesn't return from the war, and the boy's death is what causes Iroh to give up the siege and return home.
Later, Ozai presents his children to his father and is pleased at Azula's flawless firebending demonstration, but angered when Zuko steps forward and tries to one-up her, but fails utterly. His mother comforts him by pointing out: "No Zuko, that's who you are: someone who never stops fighting even though it's hard." Huh. That does pretty much nail him as a character. Azula and Zuko hide in the room after being dismissed and overhear Ozai asking Azulon to revoke Iroh's birthright and let him become Fire Lord instead. Azulon is angered by this request and says he's going to punish Ozai, but Zuko freaks out and runs off before he hears what the punishment is. Later, Azula claims to Zuko that the punishment will be that Ozai must sacrifice his own firstborn son (Zuko) to understand what such a loss is like. Zuko is starting to buy it when his mother intervenes and takes Azula away. Zuko repeats to himself over and over, "Azula always lies." Unfortunately, that's a lesson he never learned.
Meanwhile, back in the present, the young boy has been kidnapped by the bullying soldiers. Zuko tries to fight them without using bending, but eventually is forced to do so, thus revealing his true identity. He succeeds in saving the boy, but now everyone in the town hates him, even the boy himself, who used to look up to him. It's a typical ending for Zuko!
Meanwhile, back in the flashback, we get some mysterious and fascinating glimpses of palace intrigue. Zuko's mother has to leave secretly in the night for some reason, telling him as she's going that everything she's done has been to protect him, and asking him to never forget who he is. Then it comes out that Fire Lord Azulon is dead, and that his last wish was that Ozai succeed him. Yeeaaah, okay. That's not suspicious at all!
It's really interesting getting a look back at Zuko's past, and seeing more of the story of the legendary siege of Ba-Sing-Se, and how Ozai came to be Fire Lord. I'm really curious what actually happened to Zuko's mother, and if she's going to pop up again later (perhaps as a member of some kind of Fire Nation resistance movement?). This episode also further develops Zuko's character, and the gimmick of focusing on him and him alone works quite well. Impressive!
"The Chase"
Katara is at first pleased to have another girl in the group, because boys are so immature, but it turns out Toph's a bit of an immature slob, too. Also, Katara is frustrated by the fact that Toph won't help with setting up camp. Toph's so used to being solitary and relying only on herself that she just takes care of her own needs and then lays down to watch the others toil. Things get worse as they realize they're being tracked by a giant Fire Nation tank which is being driven by Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee. Every time Aang and friends fly off and set up camp somewhere else, somehow the tank finds them again. (It turns out Appa is shedding, and the tank is following the trail of his discarded fur.) They're not getting any sleep, tempers are rising, and they all end up pissed at each other. Meanwhile, Zuko is further behind, following the tank. Appa finally collapses from exhaustion; they can go no further. After another angry confrontation, Toph storms off. She ends up meeting Iroh and, without knowing each other, the two of them become pals and have an interesting conversation which convinces Toph to seek out her friends and rejoin them. Meanwhile, Aang has gone off in one direction and Sokka, Appa, Momo, and Katara have gone off in another direction, in the hopes of throwing off their pursuers, but Azula is too clever for them. She follows Aang's trail and sends Ty Lee and Mai after Sokka and Katara. Aang, Zuko, and Azula end up in an insane three-way fight, while Sokka, Katara, and Appa manage to defeat Ty Lee and Mai. Then everybody shows up in the same place, and Iroh, Toph, Aang, Zuko, Katara, and Sokka all face off against Azula. It looks like they've got her cornered, but when Iroh recognizes Toph, he's distracted for just long enough for Azula to strike him and escape in the ensuing chaos. Katara offers to help heal Iroh, but Zuko screams at them all to leave.
This is a really tense, action-packed episode with some really powerful character moments, and some very funny comic moments. Another triumph!
"Bitter Work"
Aang is excited to begin his instruction under Toph, until he discovers that Toph's teaching technique is quite a bit different from Katara's. Katara is sweet and helpful and gives lots of positive reinforcement, while Toph is more like a classic kung fu teacher, putting Aang through brutal exercises of discipline. Katara watches anxiously and keeps trying to interfere, explaining how she teaches, but Toph just blows her off. Aang is having a really hard time getting the hang of earthbending, and Katara explains this might be because Earth is the opposite of Air, just as Fire is the opposite of Water. Meanwhile, as a parallel to this storyline, as Zuko is trying to nurse Uncle Iroh back to health, Iroh is trying to teach him new firebending techniques, including his cool lightning redirection trick (something Iroh reveals he invented himself after watching waterbenders). But Zuko also is having serious trouble getting it, because he's so frustrated and angry all the time. (Oh, and it turns out there's something else he sucks at: making tea!) Sokka has meanwhile gotten himself stuck in a crack in the rock. Aang finds him, but a huge animal attacks and inevitably the only way to save Sokka is to successfully earthbend. Finally, with his friend's life on the line, Aang is able to do it. Meanwhile, Iroh refuses to shoot lightning at Zuko so he can try redirecting it, saying it's too dangerous, so Zuko stubbornly heads up to the top of a mountain in the middle of a storm, daring the lightning to strike him. It's a very powerful and intense scene.
Another great episode wherein all of our characters are developed further, and we learn more of the secrets of bending. Plus there are some very funny scenes with Sokka. I never realized what a pushy bitch Katara could be until she was placed opposite Toph!
"The Library"
This episode opens with a really cute scene wherein Aang calls little singing groundhogs out of a field with a flute. It turns out each of them is selecting a mini-vacation to go on. Sokka's not happy about the idea, and insists they need to gather intelligence about the Fire Nation.
I wasn't expecting the secret library that Admiral Zhao discovered, where he learned the mortal identities of the Moon and Ocean Spirits, would come back into the story again, but in this episode, it does! The gang runs across a professor from Ba-Sing-Se who's searching for the library, and Sokka demands that his mini-vacation be helping the professor find said library, in the hopes that inside will be a detailed map of the Fire Nation. They find the library pretty quickly, and Appa and Toph wait outside while the others go inside to investigate. There they meet the library's custodian, a giant talking owl who's actually a knowledge spirit named Wan Shi Tong. Wan Shi Tong doesn't want humans in his library, because they always come looking for knowledge so they can use it for evil. Sokka lies that they're not going to do that, and Wan Shi Tong reluctantly agrees to let them look around. Sokka does a lot of really stupid things in this episode, stealing items from the library, and finally making it so clear what his real purpose is that Wan Shi Tong returns in a rage and decides to sink the library underground, with the gang inside, to keep his knowledge from humans forever. But Sokka has discovered that the firebenders will be powerless during an eclipse, and stays to determine when the next eclipse will be. Meanwhile, outside, Toph is slowing the library from sinking into the sand using earthbending. But just then some sandbenders (who are earthbenders that specialize in bending sand, and who seem to be a kind of combination of Sandpeople and Jawas) arrive to kidnap Appa. Toph cannot hold the library up and save Appa at the same time, so she's forced to let them take him. Oh no!
So the gang escapes with an important piece of information that might help them beat the Fire Nation, but they lose Appa in the process. Appa is our favorite character, so poppy and I took this pretty hard, but I've seen a couple of future episodes, so I know he'll be back. Whew. The point is, another powerful and exciting episode with more secrets of this world, and in particular of bending, revealed. The scene in which the professor refuses to leave the library is also pretty moving, even if it was a little predictable.
I seriously love this show. I could just watch it and keep watching it for hours. It's so brilliant and inventive, and does so many things so very well. I can't wait to check out the rest of the series! |
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