The Gaming Den

As I've mentioned in the "kid safe anime" topic, my family watched all of Avatar. I've got to say, it's probably one of the best shows out there, period. Not just as an animated show but as an action piece of storytelling.

It was done in such an awesome way. The fluidity of the plot and character interactions and character growth was awesome.

I loved the fight scenes and the speed they took place at. It wasn't fast but brisk, watchable, enjoyable, and absolutely beautiful.

The use of wushu, taekwondo, tai chi, and all the other martial arts as tied to cultural standpoints and showing how a culture shapes the practices and principles within it was a pretty cool thing to show.

The entire show was pretty awesome. Well, I'll take that back. All of it was awesome except Sozin's comet. This was still a great finale but the plot devices and deux ex machina that were used to find a conclusion was kinda sad. I mean I didn't even understand a lick of what the dragon turtle was saying. It kinda ruined a lot of it. But I can take that.

But the fights and the inventing uses of all the bending styles and powers was awesome. Watching Toph bend metal into an armor, or watching Jeong Jeong repel fire, or Ozai or Azula use fire bending as jet propulsion to move around was outright extraordinary.

THat's the end of my fanboy rant about this awesome show.

~
Cynic

You double-posted this thread.

I've seen people double-post a reply, but a thread is a new one.

I have to agree with you about the show. It IS one of the better television shows I've seen.

The Lion Turtle's rant was that before there was bending of elements, they used to bend chi itself, changing the essential nature of stuff. But it was really dangerous, because when you're bending chi your own chi also bends and you can get corrupted and transformed by the things you are bending if you aren't really dedicated to being what you are. Then there was a battle of wills between Ozai and the Avatar, and the Avatar won.

But yeah, seriously, pretty Deus Ex Machina stuff. Because while they established Lion Turtles several times throughout the story, the Energy Bending discipline came right out of left field.

-Username17

Still, as far as tension-destroying Deus ex Machinas go it wasn't as bad as other shows, even other good shows. At least they telegraphed what they were going to do well in advance and also made the DeM important to the character development of someone.

There are only two episodes I really did not like and those were Ferris Zuko's Day Off and Two Whiny Tribes Whine Like Little Kids. I didn't care much for The Storm, but it doesn't inspire me to get up and do something else like the previous two episodes.

One of the great aspects of this show is that it doesn't demean its audience.

Often shows that are targetted at children are designed in such a way that the plot doesn't make sense. This is probably done to not hurt the kid in whatever way. Say, the reduction of violence or not showing realistic events.

in A:tL, people actually behave like they do in real life.

Warning: show spoiler.

The mei turnaround at the fire nation prison is awesome. She goes with her lover rather than the one who is both her friend and also a quasi-master. It shows the tension and the love-hate relationship that Zuko and mei have. Even at the end of the fight, when Azula & mei start to fight, the third girl sides with Mei as she's shown in previous episodes that she doesn't actually like violence.

The Deus Ex of the finale was really just a result of it being a "children's show" and the main character not being allowed to kill anyone.

It's way less insulting than the way violence was sanitized in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and X-Men cartoons ("Everything's a robot!").

The worst, of course, are the old JLA cartoons, where everyone hugs because nobody's allowed to throw a punch.

Sashi wrote:The Deus Ex of the finale was really just a result of it being a "children's show" and the main character not being allowed to kill anyone.

It's way less insulting than the way violence was sanitized in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and X-Men cartoons ("Everything's a robot!").

The worst, of course, are the old JLA cartoons, where everyone hugs because nobody's allowed to throw a punch.

To be fair to TMNT, Avatar is sanitized to the extent that people people being crushed by giant boulders rarely results in serious injury, let alone sticky puddles of gore. You never see limbs getting severed by water whips, people being burned alive, or the messy results of being dropped by an angry high-altitude airbender. The worst that you'll see are occasional minor cuts (which are usually immediately healed via water bending), and Zuko's scar. Everything else is either off-screen or nonexistent.

And that's totally fine, because it is a kids' show, and that degree of realism would freak parents out.

CatharzGodfoot wrote:Avatar is sanitized to the extent that people people being crushed by giant boulders rarely results in serious injury, let alone sticky puddles of gore. You never see limbs getting severed by water whips, people being burned alive, or the messy results of being dropped by an angry high-altitude airbender.

As much as I enjoyed the regular series, and am looking forward to the next series, a mature series with that sort of gore (similar to G.I. Joe Resolute perhaps) sounds fantastic.

I would honestly rather prefer rocks falling on people and them not being particularly hurt over horrible violence being done to humanoids but it being okay because they emit sparks and gears instead of blood and guts.

Wait, actually, I don't know which of those is worse.

I do know that the JLA method is a travesty, though.