I was a bit disappointed with the whole Azula thing. Her whole descent into madness was ridiculously fast for a character who’s spent the whole series being in control and in charge. It might have worked had she been descending to it last time we saw her, after Mai and Ty Lee betrayed her, but she’s too smart to snap like that without provocation. Given a bit more time, sure, absolutely I can see her unravelling, but in this form, it just seemed an excuse to not have Zuko and Katara land in the middle of an army (and of course, reverse the usual anger/calmness dynamic). Also, a shame that Zuko never got to prove he could beat her.
The soul-bending stuff, yeah, I’d agree on that one, it seemed a pretty desperate way to let Aang avoid killing Ozai. Still, probably better than the lame Disney Death I was expecting. I largely read the chakra thing as him just being utterly cornered though.
(The one big annoyance for me? We get to see Bumi kicking ass in Ba Sing Se, but dammit, where’s the flashback of Iroh’s escape? Aaargh! I hope they resist the urge to continue though. I think they’ve ended a great series really well, and to the point where trying to milk it would just be counter-productive.)
Re: Azula I think she was starting to slip a little bit when she caught up to them in the southern raiders episode and shouted she was celebrating becoming an only child. I do agree that it did feel too fast. Having finally watched the beach episode I thought it was interesting that she said that she was the only one who didn’t have any emotional problems and that came back to haunt her. I think I would have liked to see her end by having her lightning power literally blow up in her face, having lost the control she had thanks to the support of Ty Lee and Mai.
I wish they expanded on the master fight in Ba Sing Se, as it was awesome to watch them go. One lore question, in the series we learned that water benders are strongest during the full moon, fire benders during the comet. Did they ever show a time when earth and air are at their strongest?
Did anyone else feel that the play episode (last episode before the movie) was the weakest of the new ones? I did like the somewhat twist of the ending, but I think they could have done a bit more of getting everything ready for the finale, such as the above mention developing of Azula’s madness.
My guess is that they wanted a light, fun episode to break the tension and seriousness of the last four shows. I agree with you that Azula’s madness needed more development.
What shocked me more was that the entire series took place in a single year.
I think the episode with Katara tracking down the person who killed her Mom was the weakest of the new episodes. Iroh’s escape and Azula becoming more paranoid would have been good there.
Saw bits of the episodes as my kids were watching them this week, and recorded the whole finale. I thought it was a great way to end the series, strong story, strong writing and every character gets some closure. Remember, this is a kid’s cartoon, not adult anime, so it’s going to be heavy on the deus-ex-machina and light on the exposition.
A strong ending for a great series. Certainly one of the best cartoons for children on TV in the past several years.
I agree, I think this is the most successful cartoon(not counting nick jr) developed by Nick, and the only one that comes to mind that actually had an end episode instead of just disappearing off the network.
I absolutely loved all of the Avatar, but the ending is the weakest part imo. It felt forced at points, rushed at others. I’m glad they gave it an ending and I’ll buy it all up on DVD, but the end wasn’t as charming and well thought out as the rest of it.
So I recently saw a couple of episodes of this show for the first time and I must say I was rather impressed. So is this series good enough for grown-ups to watch, or is it aimed mostly at kids? Mind you I am not referring to the kind of grown-ups that wear monocles or anything like that, but rather the kind that post on game forums.
It is the best dual for-kids/for-adults cartoon I’ve seen outside of Pixar stuff. I agree that the finale seemed rushed. They did a decent job of tying everything up, but it really looked like someone said “okay, we’re tired of paying for this. Wrap it up”. Especially given that they blasted the last 5-6 episodes out back-to-back during a single week.
I have huge respect for the Ehaz writers (appeared to be a husband/wife team?) They had some of the most powerful episodes in the series (if you can forgive the beach and play episodes). Two ‘weak’ episodes out of 3 seasons though is quite good.
