{"id":341,"date":"2011-05-12T13:00:10","date_gmt":"2011-05-12T20:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/?p=341"},"modified":"2011-05-11T15:13:42","modified_gmt":"2011-05-11T22:13:42","slug":"mark-watches-avatar-s01e18-the-waterbending-master","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/2011\/05\/mark-watches-avatar-s01e18-the-waterbending-master\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Watches ‘Avatar’: S01E18 – The Waterbending Master"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the eighteenth episode of the first season of Avatar: The Last Airbender<\/em>, Team Avatar finally arrives at the North Pole and discovers the Northern Water Tribe, where both Aang and Katara find difficulty in learning under the water bending master there. While Sokka begins to fall in love, the Fire Nation prepares for an invasion to capture the Avatar once and for all. Intrigued? Then it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s time for Mark to watch Avatar<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I have to say this first because I almost peed myself due to how excited I was:<\/p>\n

WE FINALLY GOT TO SEE MUSIC NIGHT ON PRINCE ZUKO\u00e2\u20ac\u2122S SHIP<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Oh my god, could Uncle Iroh sing songs to me forever<\/em>. I think that because I constantly demanded to see such a thing, this scene sent me into a euphoric state of happiness. And strangely? Still not the best scene in this episode<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m starting to see the grander scope for season one, now that I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m just short of the ending. I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t really think about the fact that Team Avatar have been traveling a really<\/em> long time, so it was about time that they came upon the Northern Water Tribe. A lot of this first season now feels like an extended game of chess, where we get background on the characters and the writers assemble the pawns into their places for the final confrontation. So, on top of being the ultimate set-up for this showdown, the writers also give us a powerful story about Katara\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fight against gender discrimination. AND IT IS BEAUTIFUL.<\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Waterbending Master\u00e2\u20ac\u009d gives us our first look at the Northern Air Temple, which is not disappointing in the slightest. Despite being localized in only one small spot on the globe, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s here that we see (and later hear about) how powerful the water benders are at the north pole. We get a glimpse at first as they attack Appa and Team Avatar, believing them to be enemies, but it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not long before they realize who their travelers are.<\/p>\n

I was slack-jawed as Appa slowly swam into the temple, guided by the Water Tribe ships, and we saw just how magnificent and elaborate this water temple is. Saying it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s gorgeous would deny both the function and practicality of the design, and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m short on words to describe the place. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s massive and seems so all-encompassing. There are so many simply unbelievable entrances that require water bending to work and…holy shit, THIS IS AMAZING. THIS IS WORTH WAITING AN ENTIRE SEASON FOR.<\/p>\n

Like \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Bato of the Water Tribe,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d it was great seeing Sokka and Katara get a chance to feel at home among their people, despite that everyone in the water tribe is a stranger to them. I liked that they all wore very similar jackets, suggesting that despite the two tribes have such varying cultures in specific terms, there are things that they do share. In that sense, though, a large part of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Waterbending Master\u00e2\u20ac\u009d deals with how Katara\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s water tribe differentiates on a particular point: what gender role she should abide by.<\/p>\n

I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t want to comment too much in a personal way on that specific plot point, since I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m a dude and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d much rather read the thoughts of women on this, but I just imagined\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6.if I was watching this as a young girl and this episode just showed me that you could be a girl and be aggressive and tough and that did not make you any less of a girl\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6.my god. My god<\/em>. This was on Nickelodeon!!! Millions of people watched this, and Katara is SUCH A BAD ASS for refusing to accept that she is not worthy of being taught.<\/p>\n

In the same breath, I rather enjoyed that Aang stuck up for Katara, refusing to be taught himself, but then he stepped aside and let her fight the battle herself when it came down to it. I was initially a tad worried that he might step in and that might have sent the message that a girl needs<\/em> a boy to finish her battles, but Katara does this all by herself.<\/p>\n

Just amazing.<\/p>\n

But, as usual, I can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t resist jumping ahead in order to freak out about this show. I PROMISE I WILL GET BETTER AT THIS SOME DAY. For now, though, I just couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t help feeling so excited and amazed that a mainstream television show so explicitly carried a message as powerful as this.<\/p>\n

Anyway, this is also the first episode that is also blatantly serial in nature, as only one real plot is resolved at all. Simultaneous to Katara\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fight against Master Pakku, we have Sokka\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s growing crush on a local princess, Princess Yue. (I LOVE HER HAIR BY THE WAY.) Sokka has this adorable sense of self-worth that causes him to stumble (literally and figuratively) as he tries to win the affection of the gorgeous princess. I think he imagines<\/em> that he is a suave ladies man, but we see here that he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s much clumsy about it. Of course, my heart instantly relates to such things because I am that stereotypical awkward dude when I have a crush on someone. Suddenly, my humor or wit and my coordination decides to take a vacation at the mere hope that I might be physically or emotionally attracted to someone. Why does that happen, by the way? Science has explained virtually everything ever<\/em> already, so is there a reason why some of us become bumbling fools when we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re faced with the prospect of an awesome person?<\/p>\n

It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just really awesome to me that this plot, while it has a serious ending, is not as heavy or deep as the other two stories in \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Waterbending Master.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d I commented before that I actually enjoy all this relationship stuff that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s popping up on the show, because we can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t forget that these people have entire lives and personalities that have much more depth than beating the Fire Nation. It suggests that these things are not<\/em> mutually exclusive. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an important message to me! I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t like when people imply (or outright state) the idea that our lives only should have one<\/em> real focus in them. And maybe this is only something a few of us experience, but their can be this bizarre prescriptivism online about what we should be doing with our lives, that we should be focusing on only one passion and everything else needs to take a backseat or else we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re too \u00e2\u20ac\u0153distracted\u00e2\u20ac\u009d or \u00e2\u20ac\u0153unfocused\u00e2\u20ac\u009d or \u00e2\u20ac\u0153not committed enough.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

I mean, even on a personal level, I had someone send me a message on my Tumblr (anonymously, of course, ARE YOU SURPRISED) that I ended up deleting because the anger it inspired in me was not worth my time. But someone said they didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t like how silly<\/em> I was on Tumblr, that they came to that site in the hopes it would just be a continuation of what I do on Mark Reads and Mark Watches. I mean…first of all, I am pretty fucking silly on this site<\/em>. Shit, I opened this review praising Uncle Iroh\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s singing over everything else<\/strong>. But it speaks to a larger issue that I sometimes have with fandom, where any story that deviates from the main mythology is useless and pointless and a waste of time. While I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m perfectly fine with people who dislike those kind of turns (as I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m not partial to them all the time myself), I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t like the weird shaming that comes along with it.<\/p>\n

That goes along with the Tumblr thing I brought up. I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have a space to talk about all of the far-less-serious things in my life or to tell stories that weren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t about the TRULY AWFUL SHIT that has happened to me and…well, I needed<\/em> that. It was a chance to let my guard down or not over-analyze things. And why should I have<\/em> to focus on only one thing? Why can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t I do both?<\/p>\n

It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a fun thing to see Avatar<\/em> do, to be serious and silly in almost the same breath, to show us that serious issues are not cancelled out by having fun or experiencing a crush or falling in love or eating bugs while flying because haters gonna hate<\/em>. (I expect a GIF of this soon.)<\/p>\n

Of everything in \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Waterbending Master,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d though, I was most fascinated by where Iroh and Zuko\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s story is heading. Having figured out that Aang is in the North Pole, Admiral Zhao decides that it is best not to rush into the Northern Water Temple to attack, instead choosing to make a more calculated effort. In doing so, he assembles as many Fire Nation soldiers as possible, which includes stealing all<\/em> of Prince Zuko\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s crew aside from Uncle Iroh. Man, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m sorry, there is literally nothing<\/em> to like about Zhao. Which I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m perfectly fine with, as there needs to be some sort of identifiable villain amongst this bunch, and he suits that role fine. But I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m at a point, especially<\/em> after this episode, where I hope the earth benders open up the earth and it eats him sometime. It probably won\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t be until season three, but still. CHRIST, JUST STOP EXISTING.<\/em><\/p>\n

I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think that there was even the most remote chance that Prince Zuko had actually<\/em> perished when Zhao had the pirates from \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Waterbending Scroll\u00e2\u20ac\u009d torch the entire ship with Zuko on board. Still, this was our sign that Zhao means business, a huge moment of SHIT IS GOING TO BE ABSOLUTELY REAL FROM HERE ON OUT. Like…this was an attempted assassination plot and the show did not try to sugarcoat it at all. Zhao tried to have Zuko killed!<\/p>\n

I haven\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t quite figured it out yet, but I was completely shocked that not only did Zuko survive, but his uncle organized him to be aboard the same ship as him so that they can take the Avatar away from Zhao.<\/p>\n

Oh god, I am seriously unprepared.<\/p>\n

Now, about the finale: I know that it was all aired at once, but I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m going to be evil and split them into separate reviews. I have not seen them at the time I am writing this, but I kind of want to give them a proper amount of attention and NO ONE WANTS TO READ SIX THOUSAND WORDS IN ONE REVIEW. Which I would probably do, so…oh gosh, I just realized that, yet again, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve split up a finale over the weekend. HOW DOES THIS KEEP HAPPENING.<\/p>\n

Either way, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s more Avatar<\/em> reviews for all of you? That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a good thing AMIRITE<\/em>.<\/p>\n

THOUGHTS<\/strong><\/p>\n