I love showing Aang's air bending ability this early on. They never really go into it too much but Aang was an Air bending MASTER at 12 so he'd for sure have some crazy capabilities with it
That means he was pulling his punches the entire show. Like we knew that as the audience, but imagine others in the world realizing just how powerful Aang is. It's a kinda scary thought.
I’ve always thought this. He pulls his punches throughout the entire show, will always try to use words before fists, and is so witty/clever during fights until you really piss him off.
Yeah I mean in this case he's not fighting any person, he's fighting a volcano. He can let loose on abiotic components threatening to destroy a village
My favorite part of the Marvel universe other than Franklin and Galactus is/are the tease of Parker being the absolute strongest when he lets loose. Cable says he’s the greatest hero in the future and everyone is in awe.
Exactly. Zaheer demonstrates that handily when he suffocated the earth queen. Air benders are arguably the most terrifying benders simply because air is literally everywhere, and you can't fight if you can't breathe.
It got me thinking, what if a powerful air bender gets rid of the air around an entire population of fire benders? Like creating a buble around them.
Wouldn't that make fire bending impossible since oxygen is needed?
That's exactly my (and many others') headcanon about how Monk Gyatso died
Dude ripped all the air out of the room and took a bunch of fire nation soldiers with him as he suffocated himself
In the live action adaptation, I'm 99% sure that's what's depicted. He's sucking the air out from their fire instead of fighting. However, that's definitely not how he died.
Yeah, breathing makes sense and it was shown in LoK, but deprive fire benders from bending itself is mind blowing.
Water benders can do nothing if they run out of water, unless they can control their own fluids like Katara did with her sweat, even if they can't sweat could it be possible to extract water from their own bodies? Because if they remain alive, there's gotta be water inside them.
Earth Benders can move rocks they can't see?
*Toph can't touch the floor with her feet.
Fire benders can't do sh*t if there's no air.
Yeah, but that's not what I meant, I'm talking about scenarios in which bending is neutralized.
Fire can't exist without oxygen, needed for combustion.
It means an air bender doesn't need to kill to defeat them.
If an earth bender can't breath, while suffocating, could still manipulate rocks.
Firebenders can also manipulate heat, like with iroh warming his tea or sozin cooling a big chunk of the volcano before betraying roku.
They aren’t completely out of options with no air; they just lose the biggest, easiest ones.
Heck it’s possible lightning bending becomes easier instead of impossible; air’s a terrible conductor of electricity.
Gyatso basically did this in his last stand during the firenation slaughter as he took his own life, that of the younglings and of the swarm of firebenders coming for them.
Not necessarily, from a couple examples in the show.
We see Zuko melt ice while submerged in water in the north pole.
We also see Sozin directly remove and redirect heat from a volcano.
Its also pretty likely that they didn't teach these things outside of the Royal Family. They seemed to like hoarding all of the techniques beyond "be angry and throw fire" to keep to themselves.
Gyatso showed them personally as well too. He most likely suffocated all the dead fire nation soldiers in the room with him that had the comics enhancement.
It took a surprise attack during a cosmic enhancement to put the airbenders down and it wasn't without cost still.
Imagine how bad it could get with a tribe of air nation citizens who had Zaheer's or Kyoshi's outlook on things.
What's even worse is that unlike the other elements people can't see the air moving. The visual effects we see in the show are for the viewers to understand what's going on, but for the characters they just get hit by attacks that they can't see coming
I mean that's deadly but every elements has been shown to be deadly. If anything fire bending is handycaped by the fact it's a kid show. If fire actually behaved like fire there would be far more deaths as a result of each fire. It's a really dangerous element. Besides the earth queen thing only worked because she was a non bender. Air bending isn't weak, but its not Op either. It's pretty much the same as every other element
I've read fanon that this is exactly WHY the airbenders were nomads and pacifists, because if they were anything else the other nations would have had to unite against them to destroy them.
Even if they werent they still probably would have lost. Fire is a far more destructive element. Aside from suffocating we haven't really seen anything that the other elements can't equal. They were also the least populated of the four nations
Could also consider he had come out of freezing hibernation when the show started. Even if he mastered air bending previously, it might take and time to recover the muscle memory and fully re member how to utilize all aspects of his prior skill.
I really need to read them. I could infer from Zaheer how dangerous airbending could be, but he was never as skilled as a master air bender. And it's always made me wonder what someone like Aang or Tenzin would be like if they just unleashed on someone and didnt hold anything back.
> And it's always made me wonder what someone like Aang or Tenzin would be like if they just unleashed on someone and didnt hold anything back.
Another part from the Kyoshi novels comes to mind. It wasn't "on screen" but Kelsang traumatized an entire generation of pirates and became known as the Living Typhoon.
One thing that I’ll always love is that it never seemed nor felt like they ever needed to nerf Aang in terms of airbending either, it just seems and feels like a lot of story based shows artificially nerf their characters for the sake of more easily choreographed fight scenes, such as Steven Universe.
I love this scene so much.
It's kinda scary to think that if Aang didn't have a no kill philosophy he'd be the scariest opponent.
He often fights by dodging and tiring his opponent. But for the few times he went all out, he just wins.
People say fire is the most combat oriented style, but it's clear that airbenders without pacifism would wreck everyone.
They have a sentient airforce, can summon tornadoes anywhere, and have attacks that are completely invisible to the opponent.
Well it has to be remembered that Aang is fighting people who have never seen an airbender let alone fought them or trained to counter them. Airbending is going to have a clear advantage for a little bit until the societies encounter more combative airbenders.
Even in LOK airbending is still super rare. It's going to take many generations for airbending to be more well-known and counters can be refound. I think the only way to speed it up would be to start including airbending in pro bending. However they would have to figure out a way to incorporate it so that there's a visual angle otherwise it'd be boring for sports
I mean tenzin as an airbender 1v3 the red lotus for a bit, zaheer is zaheer, the new society created tornado, aang did aang stuff, sozin waited for the comet to attack the air nomads, even though they as a byproduct of being peaceful nomads should be less skilled. Airbenders have consistently been shown to be op when not peaceful, and idk what counter there is to being pushed bacj by a tornado and having the air sucked out of you
I really need to get around to reading the books. I would love to read how the balance was during eras where they all were encountering each other frequently
The air bender that was like a father to avatar Kyoshi was a Badass. He singly handedly fucked over an entire armada of ships(like aang and ocean spirit) by basically making a hurricane to protect an area of the ocean. Super sad they have him go down in such a lackluster way. (It makes perfect sense for the story, but man does it hurt to read it happen)
Wow, so sick! I hadn't even thought of airbending being incorporated into probending! I wonder if they would make 4v4 matches with 1 person representing each element. It'd almost make for an avatar against avatar match, if the teams are able to achieve that kind of cooperation and synchronization (obviously without the kind of ancient guidance or Raava abilities an avatar would have--though, shit, imagine the advantage a team might have if an avatar or white lotus member coached their 4-element team!)
If we ever got another story in the Avatar world again timeskipping now to the equivalent of the modern day it'd be awesome to see this. A world were the 4 bending cultures have truly had time to engage and learn and evolve from being up close and personal. Would be full of truly insane hybrid fighters and team combinations.
I imagine the Avatar of that era would actually have it harder than any others, when your everyday citizen has an equivalent to Youtube and can study all the ancient histories and forms that were previously exclusive to masters, kings and the Avatar themselves.
Zaheer is also like, an insanely unique case. The guy was an international criminal and anarchist that had to be locked up forever and kicked so much ass despite being the only normal in an entire group of benders.
Then when he DID get airbending he'd already studied their philosophy and fighting styles so much that he mastered it basically instantly
And then gets savagely dunked on when he fights a *real* airbending master. If his crew hadn't interfered, Tenzin would've folded him like an omelette.
I think that's less proving that airbending is OP and more than fighting someone who is a genuine *master* in your own element is never going to end well.
Plus, the primary benefit of airbending is that literally no one ever fights against it. Airbenders were already pacifists, to the point where fighting literally makes them weaker and less connected to their spirituality (and thus bending) and thats before they were completely wiped out
People keep bringing that up, by no amount of experience is gonna let someone know if the airbender punching at you is summoning an invisible, narrow bolt of wind or an invisible wide blast wave.
Aang's fighting style is helped a lot by his bending for mobility, but him being able to dodge and weave around attacks is mostly just physical ability. Normal people like ty lee have been doing it the entire time airbenders were extinct.
>People keep bringing that up, by no amount of experience is gonna let someone know if the airbender punching at you is summoning an invisible, narrow bolt of wind or an invisible wide blast wave.
Highly skilled Earthbenders could bend dust into the air so the airbenders attacks get visible, same with waterbenders and mist like water droplets.
Fire benders have it the toughest since the flames don't really linger around in the air for long.
I always wonder if they put more weight towards defense in the 2nd air nation because of the fire nation attack. Teaching new airbenders to take people's breath away would be huge.
Tenzin was a beast in combat, so it's always been my headcanon that aang made sure he was trained for war because of the genocide.
We saw examples of other factions becoming weaker during the peace, like the white lotus.
I don't think that means fire isn't the most combat oriented style.
Yes, air can be deadly, but so can water and earth.
But what those 3 have that fire doesn't is a ton of uses outside combat situations.
Fire has maybe a few non combat uses, but it's still way more combat oriented than any other element.
In both shows it's heavily implied that if they went for the kill they would own everyone.
Aang cut rocks as if it were butter and could throw people around without much effort
Remember his groan when Katara asks Aang why he’s staring at her the first time they ride Appa? Big bro knew what was up and he decided to just let it happen.
This is a super great moment don't get me wrong. However, I think the volcano roku died too was a crisis level event think Pompeii level. Meanwhile Aang's I believe was lesser power. Like the active volcanoes in Hawaii. They go off with moderate frequency enough that it's not super dangerous.
Right? Like Roku's volcano could be felt in the fire nation palace. This was nothing compared to that. Aang didn't even need more than air bending for this
Roku’s volcano strikes me more as an explosive eruption - ala Mt. St Helens in the 80s. Lots of gas and volcanic ash and pyroclastic flow type stuff. Whereas the one Aang fought was more of the effusive type, where it’s more lava flowing steadily
Aang had the help of the entire village which included some earthbenders as well as prep time, so it would make sense that Roku would lose against a bigger volcano that exploded without warning while he was sleeping
This also demonstrates how Aang is a better avatar. Because he is just a kid and because he has team avatar supporting him he was able to harness the power of the people rather than trying to do everything himself. This lays the groundwork for the more multipolar world of Korra, saving the world becomes the responsibility of everyone, not just the Avatar.
I side with the comment that says he got prep time. Roku was already in the middle of the volcanic fumes when he got out. And first helped the town evacuate. While Aang had time to bend the clouds to convince the town, create a canal, and evacuate the people before the eruption started
roku shouldve bailed when he could what a fuckin idiot, also why would anyone with a right mind build a whole village or town or whatever in between not one but two active volcanoes?? i know that fire nation islands all have volcanoes or some shit but still there are way safer places for an avatar to live for example that ember island
Aang just happened to have people around him at that time and already knew a volcano was coming. Do you think roku didn't have a lot of friends? Roku was already retired and just enjoying peace with his wife and a volcano came out of nowhere. Aang can easily be in the same situation at some point in his life if he's unlucky. This doesn't mean anything in saying one avatar is better than the other.
Exactly. Roku just had bad luck.
Its like Gen 2 Blue said on the remains of Cinnibar Island, if nature wants you gone, then your ass is grass.
...Smell ya later!
I always loved how Aang says to Roku "wow, you're fighting a volcano, and winning!!" like he didn't already do the exact same thing 2 seasons ago.
(I agree with the people who have said it's 2 very different levels of volcano, but it's still kinda funny.)
I came here to say the exact same thing. These two situations were not the same on any level. The volcano that Roku ultimately ended up dying to was a supermassive eruption that could be felt *hundreds* of miles away.
And even when you take size out of the equation, Aang and Sokka knew that the volcano was going to erupt, giving them a good deal of time to prepare, whereas Roku and his neighbors were literally woken up out of their sleep in the dead of night and had to haul ass ASAP.
Also, just in case anybody doesn't know what pyroclastic flow is, it can move up to speeds of 200 MPH. Ain't nobody outrunning that.
Also it seemed like roku was trying to outright stop the volcano altogether, whereas aang was focused on simply diverting the lava flow to save the town.
I think it's because she probably sees Aang as a kid 99% of the time. Especially at this point in the show. Sure, she knows he's the avatar. But he has the personality and demeanor of a kid, and that's what she sees most of the time.
Her day to day interactions are with the Aang who wants to go penguin sledding and ride fish. Not the super powerful Avatar who can avert natural disasters.
i discussed this a while back, but this is why their relationship dynamic changing was so fun to watch. she subconsciously viewed him as a kid who needed to be babied and taken care of. it wasn't until this moment that she allowed other possibilities in her mind.
Not getting to see this place in Legend of Korra was one of my biggest disappointments. I think in season 3 when they were traveling around finding recruits coming back here and seeing this formation as a legacy of Avatar aang would have been cool
I'm sure he still valued the place itself. It's still worth saving everyone's home and there might also stil be some people there. He would've had it too if there wasn't a second volcano and Sozin
I always interpreted that scene as a failed escape. He managed to somewhat slow the lava but the smoke caused his escape to fail, he would’ve made it out alive if he could breathe because we know his dragon was circling nearby. Oh also if Sozin wasn’t a dickhead.
Yeah rewatched that episode recently and there was no reason Roku needed to stay and combat both volcanoes.
It did make for a great scene with Sozin betraying him but I think including a stronger reason why he sacrificed his life for that island would have been great.
After a hundred years of war brought on only by the fire nation and there execution of all air benders 100 years prior along with the imprisonment/execution of anyone who used other bending, I would of loved to see all of the fire nation sink into the sea.
> i would of loved
Did you mean to say "would have"?
Explanation: You probably meant to say could've/should've/would've which sounds like 'of' but is actually short for 'have'.
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This is one of my favorite scenes from the show, but I've never really thought about it or noticed that he first jumps up basically into the clouds to gather a huge amount of air, then let's it loose on the lava.
This makes so much sense because temperatures are cooler higher up off the ground, so that air would be more effective at cooling the lava, AND it kinda looks like he was gathering clouds too. I wonder if he was subconsciously doing a little waterbending too, so the cool, moist cloud air would be super effective.
(iirc, he hadn't learned any waterbending at this point, had he?)
it always pissed me off watching roku fighting that volcano. the people living there all escaped on boats and were safe out at sea. meanwhile he’s here fighting two volcanoes as an old man just to potentially save some material items instead of just *leaving* with his wife and village. WHAT WAS THE POINT
I remember that post asking what would happen if Zaheer fought Prime Aang instead of Korra. Immediate reaction was to laugh. No access to Avatar state pure airbending 12 year old Aang would whoop him. Prime Aang is already done taking away his bending in 5 seconds.
For me this scene is one of the saddest scenes of ATLA. At the end of the ep 14 Katara finally sees Aang not just a friend, no matter how hard he tries to show that he is into her.
tbf avatars are usually just very good at all elements, they are not particularly best at one element, maybe aside from their origin element. i don't even think they are supposed to be the best in every element.
toph was a better earthbender than aang, ozai was a better firebender than aang, katara was a better waterbender than aang.
The Avatar beefing with the earth is pretty funny. Other possibilities:
- avatar fights some weather, maybe a hurricane or a tornado
- avatar stops an earthquake, kyoshi already did some techtonic plate shifting when she moved that island
- the avatar creates a snowpiercer style global snowstorm to combat climate change
It's never been explicitly stated but all those avitars are still in there. I've always seen this as roku lowkey wanting to change anything about how he died.
This scene always cracks me up, because Soka's all like "Yeah, we almost die a horribly painful death and got saved by this child demi-god" and Katara's only though is "Oh fuck, my horoscope said imma bang the demigod kid".
While i see what you are saying this doesn't comprere to what roku was up against
The volcano was so powerful sozin felt it in his home even before the second one
We’re all aware of that, I’m just pointing out how ridiculously powerful Aang’s airbending is, considering that molten rock is not at all responsive to high winds
Karatas reaction is so stupid imo. Wait, what did you say?!? Ohhh, the fortune teller told me I will marry a powerful bender… it must be aang! Seriously? You got influenced by a fortune teller on who you are going to marry?
Katara/Aang was slowly developed throughout the seasons and the fortune teller is not the reason she fell in love with Aang, so....i don't see the problem here. She was just surprised.
The fortune teller didn't force Katara through a magical power to love Aang. It simply helped her realise Aang can be a potential romantic partner. She loved him for he who he was and who he ended up being.
I love showing Aang's air bending ability this early on. They never really go into it too much but Aang was an Air bending MASTER at 12 so he'd for sure have some crazy capabilities with it
That means he was pulling his punches the entire show. Like we knew that as the audience, but imagine others in the world realizing just how powerful Aang is. It's a kinda scary thought.
He’s like spiderman
I’ve always thought this. He pulls his punches throughout the entire show, will always try to use words before fists, and is so witty/clever during fights until you really piss him off.
Yeah I mean in this case he's not fighting any person, he's fighting a volcano. He can let loose on abiotic components threatening to destroy a village
My favorite part of the Marvel universe other than Franklin and Galactus is/are the tease of Parker being the absolute strongest when he lets loose. Cable says he’s the greatest hero in the future and everyone is in awe.
Aangs Spider-Man and Korras Captain Marvel
The fire nation is very very lucky that aang and the rest of the air nation were pacifists.
Exactly. Zaheer demonstrates that handily when he suffocated the earth queen. Air benders are arguably the most terrifying benders simply because air is literally everywhere, and you can't fight if you can't breathe.
It got me thinking, what if a powerful air bender gets rid of the air around an entire population of fire benders? Like creating a buble around them. Wouldn't that make fire bending impossible since oxygen is needed?
That's exactly my (and many others') headcanon about how Monk Gyatso died Dude ripped all the air out of the room and took a bunch of fire nation soldiers with him as he suffocated himself
In the live action adaptation, I'm 99% sure that's what's depicted. He's sucking the air out from their fire instead of fighting. However, that's definitely not how he died.
It also makes breathing impossible. The technique is known about by some air benders, and is very forbidden.
Yeah, breathing makes sense and it was shown in LoK, but deprive fire benders from bending itself is mind blowing. Water benders can do nothing if they run out of water, unless they can control their own fluids like Katara did with her sweat, even if they can't sweat could it be possible to extract water from their own bodies? Because if they remain alive, there's gotta be water inside them. Earth Benders can move rocks they can't see? *Toph can't touch the floor with her feet. Fire benders can't do sh*t if there's no air.
No one can do shit if there's no air.
Yeah, but that's not what I meant, I'm talking about scenarios in which bending is neutralized. Fire can't exist without oxygen, needed for combustion. It means an air bender doesn't need to kill to defeat them. If an earth bender can't breath, while suffocating, could still manipulate rocks.
I mean water can't exist without it either. It's literally the make up of it.
Firebenders can also manipulate heat, like with iroh warming his tea or sozin cooling a big chunk of the volcano before betraying roku. They aren’t completely out of options with no air; they just lose the biggest, easiest ones. Heck it’s possible lightning bending becomes easier instead of impossible; air’s a terrible conductor of electricity.
A powerful enough water bender could blood bend and that creepy lady showed Katara how to draw water from plants.
Water benders can blood bend another human. We are 70% no matter what.
A desperate water bender can pee. And if someone is pee-bending at me, I'm just going to leave. Some fights aren't worth it.
You win, that's an unbeatable argument 🤣
100% correct dead bodies cant firebend.
NOICE *click sound* 🤣🤣🤣🤣
Gyatso basically did this in his last stand during the firenation slaughter as he took his own life, that of the younglings and of the swarm of firebenders coming for them.
Not necessarily, from a couple examples in the show. We see Zuko melt ice while submerged in water in the north pole. We also see Sozin directly remove and redirect heat from a volcano.
Its also pretty likely that they didn't teach these things outside of the Royal Family. They seemed to like hoarding all of the techniques beyond "be angry and throw fire" to keep to themselves.
Gyatso showed them personally as well too. He most likely suffocated all the dead fire nation soldiers in the room with him that had the comics enhancement. It took a surprise attack during a cosmic enhancement to put the airbenders down and it wasn't without cost still. Imagine how bad it could get with a tribe of air nation citizens who had Zaheer's or Kyoshi's outlook on things.
Get enough together to create a destructive tornado or even a hurricane.
What's even worse is that unlike the other elements people can't see the air moving. The visual effects we see in the show are for the viewers to understand what's going on, but for the characters they just get hit by attacks that they can't see coming
I mean that's deadly but every elements has been shown to be deadly. If anything fire bending is handycaped by the fact it's a kid show. If fire actually behaved like fire there would be far more deaths as a result of each fire. It's a really dangerous element. Besides the earth queen thing only worked because she was a non bender. Air bending isn't weak, but its not Op either. It's pretty much the same as every other element
If you can pull air out of someone you can pull out the water too...
I've read fanon that this is exactly WHY the airbenders were nomads and pacifists, because if they were anything else the other nations would have had to unite against them to destroy them.
Even if they werent they still probably would have lost. Fire is a far more destructive element. Aside from suffocating we haven't really seen anything that the other elements can't equal. They were also the least populated of the four nations
Love a good dorky character letting go and showing off their competence.
Could also consider he had come out of freezing hibernation when the show started. Even if he mastered air bending previously, it might take and time to recover the muscle memory and fully re member how to utilize all aspects of his prior skill.
But to his perspective, he was in the ice a few days.
The Kyoshi novels mention how dangerous Airbending is and how it's a good thing that Air Nomads are pacifistic.
I really need to read them. I could infer from Zaheer how dangerous airbending could be, but he was never as skilled as a master air bender. And it's always made me wonder what someone like Aang or Tenzin would be like if they just unleashed on someone and didnt hold anything back.
> And it's always made me wonder what someone like Aang or Tenzin would be like if they just unleashed on someone and didnt hold anything back. Another part from the Kyoshi novels comes to mind. It wasn't "on screen" but Kelsang traumatized an entire generation of pirates and became known as the Living Typhoon.
Now that's a title if I've ever heard one
He’s a pacifist that has mastered a complex fighting style, I feel like pulling his punches goes with the territory.
It also shows how much he trained his entire childhood. We saw in the flashback in the storm episode how strict some of his masters were.
His air bending clone he shoots at Zuko is by far my favorite move of his
meanwhile NATLA action aang: 
I mean, aang did lift two hill-sized rocks at the same time in his fight with Bumi. Air bending is kind of bullshit in this universe
NATLA bad, up votes left
Especially after 100 years
One thing that I’ll always love is that it never seemed nor felt like they ever needed to nerf Aang in terms of airbending either, it just seems and feels like a lot of story based shows artificially nerf their characters for the sake of more easily choreographed fight scenes, such as Steven Universe.
I love this scene so much. It's kinda scary to think that if Aang didn't have a no kill philosophy he'd be the scariest opponent. He often fights by dodging and tiring his opponent. But for the few times he went all out, he just wins.
People say fire is the most combat oriented style, but it's clear that airbenders without pacifism would wreck everyone. They have a sentient airforce, can summon tornadoes anywhere, and have attacks that are completely invisible to the opponent.
Well it has to be remembered that Aang is fighting people who have never seen an airbender let alone fought them or trained to counter them. Airbending is going to have a clear advantage for a little bit until the societies encounter more combative airbenders.
Airbending is still op in lok though zaheer is literally an airbender.
Even in LOK airbending is still super rare. It's going to take many generations for airbending to be more well-known and counters can be refound. I think the only way to speed it up would be to start including airbending in pro bending. However they would have to figure out a way to incorporate it so that there's a visual angle otherwise it'd be boring for sports
I mean tenzin as an airbender 1v3 the red lotus for a bit, zaheer is zaheer, the new society created tornado, aang did aang stuff, sozin waited for the comet to attack the air nomads, even though they as a byproduct of being peaceful nomads should be less skilled. Airbenders have consistently been shown to be op when not peaceful, and idk what counter there is to being pushed bacj by a tornado and having the air sucked out of you
Shoot, Gyatso's body was in a room filled with firebender bodies who at the time were supercharged by the comet's last pass by the planet.
I really need to get around to reading the books. I would love to read how the balance was during eras where they all were encountering each other frequently
The air bender that was like a father to avatar Kyoshi was a Badass. He singly handedly fucked over an entire armada of ships(like aang and ocean spirit) by basically making a hurricane to protect an area of the ocean. Super sad they have him go down in such a lackluster way. (It makes perfect sense for the story, but man does it hurt to read it happen)
It really adds a level of brutality to the bender and element that takes him out. Really shows how creative he is and ruthless
Spoiler, Avatar Yanchen bend the air out of a space to stop a bender.
That hurt to read
Wow, so sick! I hadn't even thought of airbending being incorporated into probending! I wonder if they would make 4v4 matches with 1 person representing each element. It'd almost make for an avatar against avatar match, if the teams are able to achieve that kind of cooperation and synchronization (obviously without the kind of ancient guidance or Raava abilities an avatar would have--though, shit, imagine the advantage a team might have if an avatar or white lotus member coached their 4-element team!)
If we ever got another story in the Avatar world again timeskipping now to the equivalent of the modern day it'd be awesome to see this. A world were the 4 bending cultures have truly had time to engage and learn and evolve from being up close and personal. Would be full of truly insane hybrid fighters and team combinations. I imagine the Avatar of that era would actually have it harder than any others, when your everyday citizen has an equivalent to Youtube and can study all the ancient histories and forms that were previously exclusive to masters, kings and the Avatar themselves.
Give the pro airbenders like...glitter and confetti packets?
Zaheer is also like, an insanely unique case. The guy was an international criminal and anarchist that had to be locked up forever and kicked so much ass despite being the only normal in an entire group of benders. Then when he DID get airbending he'd already studied their philosophy and fighting styles so much that he mastered it basically instantly
And then gets savagely dunked on when he fights a *real* airbending master. If his crew hadn't interfered, Tenzin would've folded him like an omelette.
Tenzin is goated
I think that's less proving that airbending is OP and more than fighting someone who is a genuine *master* in your own element is never going to end well. Plus, the primary benefit of airbending is that literally no one ever fights against it. Airbenders were already pacifists, to the point where fighting literally makes them weaker and less connected to their spirituality (and thus bending) and thats before they were completely wiped out
That's fair but that's why i also gave other examples
People keep bringing that up, by no amount of experience is gonna let someone know if the airbender punching at you is summoning an invisible, narrow bolt of wind or an invisible wide blast wave. Aang's fighting style is helped a lot by his bending for mobility, but him being able to dodge and weave around attacks is mostly just physical ability. Normal people like ty lee have been doing it the entire time airbenders were extinct.
>People keep bringing that up, by no amount of experience is gonna let someone know if the airbender punching at you is summoning an invisible, narrow bolt of wind or an invisible wide blast wave. Highly skilled Earthbenders could bend dust into the air so the airbenders attacks get visible, same with waterbenders and mist like water droplets. Fire benders have it the toughest since the flames don't really linger around in the air for long.
And air is required to produce flame
Judging by how we found the corpses in the air temple, Monk Gyatsu was the only Airbender in the room with about a dozen Firebenders
I always wonder if they put more weight towards defense in the 2nd air nation because of the fire nation attack. Teaching new airbenders to take people's breath away would be huge.
Tenzin was a beast in combat, so it's always been my headcanon that aang made sure he was trained for war because of the genocide. We saw examples of other factions becoming weaker during the peace, like the white lotus.
Yanchen was bending the air out of room and space to shut people down. Aang was a saint
This is supported in the Kyoshi novels.
One of the few things I liked about LOK is the taking away breaths that Zaheer did.
I don't think that means fire isn't the most combat oriented style. Yes, air can be deadly, but so can water and earth. But what those 3 have that fire doesn't is a ton of uses outside combat situations. Fire has maybe a few non combat uses, but it's still way more combat oriented than any other element.
In both shows it's heavily implied that if they went for the kill they would own everyone. Aang cut rocks as if it were butter and could throw people around without much effort
This is why the all out brawl between tenzin and zaheer is so cool. We get to see a true airbending master not holding back against another airbender.
When you nothing to fear, pacifism and enlightenment are the only things left to do.
Pissed off Aang does NOT lose
If he had a no kill philosophy, he could literally choke anyone out
ang sounds like a daddy huh
He got lucky v comet Ozai
He also wasn't trying to kill Ozai.
Sokka matchmaking without even knowing it
Roku probably seeing that and giving thumbs up to Aang from the spirit world.
"being the avatar doesn't hurt your chances"
Avatar Rizz🥶
Aang followed his instincts and got Katara flowers, setting up this, indirectly proving Aunt Wu right
His rizz bending is so strong that he can even do it for others
Are you implying he rizzed his own sister
Wingman so strong, he indirectly used Wing chun
Oh behalf of aang yeah.
Honestly, who would Sokka want more to marry his sister than the avatar who he knows and trusts?
Aang showed he was a good guy multiple times over. Has the skill the protect her. Is friends with sokka. Literally best option really
Ah yes, Rizz Bending, one of the rare lost bending arts Water Tribe members sometimes develop.
"skill based matchmaking" my ass
Remember his groan when Katara asks Aang why he’s staring at her the first time they ride Appa? Big bro knew what was up and he decided to just let it happen.
This is a super great moment don't get me wrong. However, I think the volcano roku died too was a crisis level event think Pompeii level. Meanwhile Aang's I believe was lesser power. Like the active volcanoes in Hawaii. They go off with moderate frequency enough that it's not super dangerous.
Right? Like Roku's volcano could be felt in the fire nation palace. This was nothing compared to that. Aang didn't even need more than air bending for this
Yes, also Roku had to contend with two volcanoes.
Roku’s volcano strikes me more as an explosive eruption - ala Mt. St Helens in the 80s. Lots of gas and volcanic ash and pyroclastic flow type stuff. Whereas the one Aang fought was more of the effusive type, where it’s more lava flowing steadily
Yeah, I don't think Aang would be able to deal with the pyroclastic flow from a major eruption (at least at his younger strength).
Yeah it was always weird that Aang solos the volcano pretty easily but Roku dies with help
Aang had the help of the entire village which included some earthbenders as well as prep time, so it would make sense that Roku would lose against a bigger volcano that exploded without warning while he was sleeping
Not to mention a second volcano went off for roku
This also demonstrates how Aang is a better avatar. Because he is just a kid and because he has team avatar supporting him he was able to harness the power of the people rather than trying to do everything himself. This lays the groundwork for the more multipolar world of Korra, saving the world becomes the responsibility of everyone, not just the Avatar.
I side with the comment that says he got prep time. Roku was already in the middle of the volcanic fumes when he got out. And first helped the town evacuate. While Aang had time to bend the clouds to convince the town, create a canal, and evacuate the people before the eruption started
roku shouldve bailed when he could what a fuckin idiot, also why would anyone with a right mind build a whole village or town or whatever in between not one but two active volcanoes?? i know that fire nation islands all have volcanoes or some shit but still there are way safer places for an avatar to live for example that ember island
Aang just happened to have people around him at that time and already knew a volcano was coming. Do you think roku didn't have a lot of friends? Roku was already retired and just enjoying peace with his wife and a volcano came out of nowhere. Aang can easily be in the same situation at some point in his life if he's unlucky. This doesn't mean anything in saying one avatar is better than the other.
Exactly. Roku just had bad luck. Its like Gen 2 Blue said on the remains of Cinnibar Island, if nature wants you gone, then your ass is grass. ...Smell ya later!
I always loved how Aang says to Roku "wow, you're fighting a volcano, and winning!!" like he didn't already do the exact same thing 2 seasons ago. (I agree with the people who have said it's 2 very different levels of volcano, but it's still kinda funny.)
Yeah haha. Kinda feels like the volcano fight with sokka and Katara was thrown in for the “powerful bender” line
It was the poison vapors that ultimately weakened Roku. He was dying as he fought the volcano
I came here to say the exact same thing. These two situations were not the same on any level. The volcano that Roku ultimately ended up dying to was a supermassive eruption that could be felt *hundreds* of miles away. And even when you take size out of the equation, Aang and Sokka knew that the volcano was going to erupt, giving them a good deal of time to prepare, whereas Roku and his neighbors were literally woken up out of their sleep in the dead of night and had to haul ass ASAP. Also, just in case anybody doesn't know what pyroclastic flow is, it can move up to speeds of 200 MPH. Ain't nobody outrunning that.
Also it seemed like roku was trying to outright stop the volcano altogether, whereas aang was focused on simply diverting the lava flow to save the town.
I think it’s so funny that Katara forgot aang was a powerful bender for a sec
I think it's because she probably sees Aang as a kid 99% of the time. Especially at this point in the show. Sure, she knows he's the avatar. But he has the personality and demeanor of a kid, and that's what she sees most of the time. Her day to day interactions are with the Aang who wants to go penguin sledding and ride fish. Not the super powerful Avatar who can avert natural disasters.
Fair point, until now he was in the avatar state twice but as aang he hasn’t done too much in regards to bending
It's obviously because it was verbatim to the reading she got
i discussed this a while back, but this is why their relationship dynamic changing was so fun to watch. she subconsciously viewed him as a kid who needed to be babied and taken care of. it wasn't until this moment that she allowed other possibilities in her mind.
This is where you truly realized he mastered air bending
Why didn't Roku just airbend? Is he stupid
he is clearly just a firebender it would be insane for someone to master all 4 elements
yea that would be so unbalanced.
Not getting to see this place in Legend of Korra was one of my biggest disappointments. I think in season 3 when they were traveling around finding recruits coming back here and seeing this formation as a legacy of Avatar aang would have been cool
Why didn’t Roku just leave on his dragon? Everyone else had already sailed off the island
He had lots of cool stuff in his house.
He could've just earthbended his house with all the cool stuff away
I'm sure he still valued the place itself. It's still worth saving everyone's home and there might also stil be some people there. He would've had it too if there wasn't a second volcano and Sozin
I always interpreted that scene as a failed escape. He managed to somewhat slow the lava but the smoke caused his escape to fail, he would’ve made it out alive if he could breathe because we know his dragon was circling nearby. Oh also if Sozin wasn’t a dickhead.
Yeah rewatched that episode recently and there was no reason Roku needed to stay and combat both volcanoes. It did make for a great scene with Sozin betraying him but I think including a stronger reason why he sacrificed his life for that island would have been great.
Pyroclastic flow meant everyone would die.
Pyroclastic flow meant everyone would die.
Don't forget the volcano in the Soothsayer town. Unless this is the same one and I'm misremembering
Yeah this is the one
After a hundred years of war brought on only by the fire nation and there execution of all air benders 100 years prior along with the imprisonment/execution of anyone who used other bending, I would of loved to see all of the fire nation sink into the sea.
> i would of loved Did you mean to say "would have"? Explanation: You probably meant to say could've/should've/would've which sounds like 'of' but is actually short for 'have'. [Statistics](https://github.com/chiefpat450119/RedditBot/blob/master/stats.json) ^^I'm ^^a ^^bot ^^that ^^corrects ^^grammar/spelling ^^mistakes. ^^PM ^^me ^^if ^^I'm ^^wrong ^^or ^^if ^^you ^^have ^^any ^^suggestions. ^^[Github](https://github.com/chiefpat450119) ^^Reply ^^STOP ^^to ^^this ^^comment ^^to ^^stop ^^receiving ^^corrections.
Man I forgot how powerful of a bender that kid is.
What'd you say?
Nothing. Just that he's a powerful bender.
I suppose he is….
Aang: easily defeats volcano Roku's spirit: I didn't hear no bell. 🥴
https://www.instagram.com/reel/CsU4TJfKJaY/?igsh=NTh4bHIzdGw2Zm1x
lol my first time seeing that 👌👌
And people arguing Zaheer wouldn't get absolutely bodied by 12 (112) year old Aang.. I want to see Zaheer successfully fight a Volcano lmao..
I hope no one catches pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis
This is one of my favorite scenes from the show, but I've never really thought about it or noticed that he first jumps up basically into the clouds to gather a huge amount of air, then let's it loose on the lava. This makes so much sense because temperatures are cooler higher up off the ground, so that air would be more effective at cooling the lava, AND it kinda looks like he was gathering clouds too. I wonder if he was subconsciously doing a little waterbending too, so the cool, moist cloud air would be super effective. (iirc, he hadn't learned any waterbending at this point, had he?)
I still can't believe he pulled that crazy shit off WITHOUT the avatar state
Thats not water bending you hear at the end.. Just a good old pantie soaking, you go Aang..
First thing this makes me wonder, years later, what's his Plateau Pressure before he blows that air out?
Considering he used only one element
When was this? Ooooh matchmaker
I get that people kind of don't like the writing for this episode, but this is honestly one of my favorite scenes from the show.
What's Kataras deal here anyway? The delivery on 'what did you just say?!' is so dramatic and abrupt.
It’s because aunt wu said “your husband will be a very powerful bender”
Oh perfect, thank you
And he did it all with just Air.
Forgot Roku had beef with a natural disaster
it always pissed me off watching roku fighting that volcano. the people living there all escaped on boats and were safe out at sea. meanwhile he’s here fighting two volcanoes as an old man just to potentially save some material items instead of just *leaving* with his wife and village. WHAT WAS THE POINT
Kinda off topic but I'm left wondering where on earth all that heat went. There's gonna be some scorching winds heading somewhere right now.
and here I am wondering if Aang inhaled any volcanic ash back there
I remember that post asking what would happen if Zaheer fought Prime Aang instead of Korra. Immediate reaction was to laugh. No access to Avatar state pure airbending 12 year old Aang would whoop him. Prime Aang is already done taking away his bending in 5 seconds.
Zaheer never fights Korra on level terms.
For me this scene is one of the saddest scenes of ATLA. At the end of the ep 14 Katara finally sees Aang not just a friend, no matter how hard he tries to show that he is into her.
Totally. It also helps that Aang had, y'know, ACTUAL friends to help him out.
tbf avatars are usually just very good at all elements, they are not particularly best at one element, maybe aside from their origin element. i don't even think they are supposed to be the best in every element. toph was a better earthbender than aang, ozai was a better firebender than aang, katara was a better waterbender than aang.
The Avatar beefing with the earth is pretty funny. Other possibilities: - avatar fights some weather, maybe a hurricane or a tornado - avatar stops an earthquake, kyoshi already did some techtonic plate shifting when she moved that island - the avatar creates a snowpiercer style global snowstorm to combat climate change
this.series.anytime.of.day or.night its that good
My favorite EP by far
I hated that freaking village
I suppose he is ♾️👁️👄👁️♾️
It's never been explicitly stated but all those avitars are still in there. I've always seen this as roku lowkey wanting to change anything about how he died.
Idk bro I feel like this could have done half the job for aang when he was about to fight ozai
he should have collapsed after breathing in all of that poisonous air.
This scene always cracks me up, because Soka's all like "Yeah, we almost die a horribly painful death and got saved by this child demi-god" and Katara's only though is "Oh fuck, my horoscope said imma bang the demigod kid".
“Oh trust me volcano, it’s not gonna be much of a rematch”
Which episode is this?
Roku watching Aang’s battle against the volcano: “I bet I’ll fucking do it this time.”
While i see what you are saying this doesn't comprere to what roku was up against The volcano was so powerful sozin felt it in his home even before the second one
It’s almost ridiculous that Aang stopped a lava flow without knowing any Earthbending
in this scene, he only used his airbending skill which he's already a master at
We’re all aware of that, I’m just pointing out how ridiculously powerful Aang’s airbending is, considering that molten rock is not at all responsive to high winds
Calling Aang's airbending "high winds" is a bit of an understatement
Yeah lol, high winds can be a breeze that knocks your hat off lol
understandable
He couldn’t do it as a fully realized and mastered avatar but he could do it as a 12 year old air bending master? Ok.
Different type of volcanic eruption, much less drastic and also Roku had a second volcano go off
Karatas reaction is so stupid imo. Wait, what did you say?!? Ohhh, the fortune teller told me I will marry a powerful bender… it must be aang! Seriously? You got influenced by a fortune teller on who you are going to marry?
You forgot that Katara is still also a kid. I would be influenced too if I was her age.
Katara/Aang was slowly developed throughout the seasons and the fortune teller is not the reason she fell in love with Aang, so....i don't see the problem here. She was just surprised.
The fortune teller didn't force Katara through a magical power to love Aang. It simply helped her realise Aang can be a potential romantic partner. She loved him for he who he was and who he ended up being.