Avatar: The Last Airbender

The Chinese characters 降卋(世)神通 (pinyin:Jiàngshì Shéntōng) that appear with the English logo translate to "The divine medium who has descended upon the mortal world."

Also known as Avatar: The Legend of Aang
Genre Adventure, Fantasy
Created by Michael Dante DiMartino, Bryan Konietzko
Written by Michael Dante DiMartino
Bryan Konietzko
John O'Bryan
Nick Malis
Matthew Hubbard
Aaron Ehasz
Elizabeth Welch Ehasz
Josh Hamilton
Ian Wilcox
Tim Hedrick
Directed by Lauren MacMullan
Anthony Lioi
Dave Filoni
Giancarlo Volpe
Ethan Spaulding
Joaquim Dos Santos
Voices of Zach Tyler Eisen
Mae Whitman
Jack DeSena
Jessie Flower
Dante Basco
Mako (Season 1-2)
Greg Baldwin (Season 3)
Dee Bradley Baker
Grey DeLisle
Olivia Hack
Cricket Leigh
Clancy Brown
Mark Hamill
Jennie Kwan
Jason Isaacs
Theme music composer The Track Team
Composer(s) The Track Team
Country of origin Flag of the United States United States
Language(s) English
No. of seasons 3
No. of episodes 61 (List of episodes)
Production
Executive
producer(s) Michael Dante DiMartino, Bryan Konietzko, Aaron Ehasz
Running time 24 minutes
Broadcast
Original channel Nickelodeon
(2005-2008)
Nicktoons Network
(2005-present)
Picture format NTSC (480i)
Original run February 21, 2005 – July 19, 2008
External links
Official website
IMDb profile
TV.com summary

Avatar: The Last Airbender (also known in some countries as Avatar: The Legend of Aang) is an Emmy award-winning American animated television series that aired for three seasons on the Nickelodeon television network and on Nicktoons Network. The show is set in an Asian-influenced world of martial arts and elemental manipulation; the series follows the adventures of the main protagonist Aang and his friends, who must save the world by defeating the Fire Lord and ending the destructive war with the Fire Nation. In the series' terminology, each episode is referred to as a "chapter", and each season as a "book".

The show made its debut on February 21, 2005, and the last episodes were screened on July 19, 2008; it is now available on DVD, the iTunes Store, and the Xbox Live Marketplace, as well as its home on Nickelodeon. Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko co-created the series, and serve as executive producers alongside Aaron Ehasz.

Avatar: The Last Airbender was popular with both audiences and critics, garnering 5.6 million viewers on its best-rated showing and receiving high ratings in the Nicktoons lineup, even outside its 6–11-year-old demographic. The first series' success prompted Nickelodeon to order second and third seasons. Merchandise based on the series include scaled action figures, a trading card game, three video games based on the first, second, and third seasons, stuffed animals distributed by Paramount Parks, and two LEGO sets.

Background
Avatar: The Last Airbender was co-created and produced by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko at Nickelodeon Animation Studios in Burbank, California. According to Bryan Konietzko, the concept of the program was conceived in Spring 2001, when he took an old sketch of a balding, middle-aged man; he re-imagined the character as a child, and the show began to develop. Konietzko drew the character herding bison in the sky, and showed the sketch to Mike DiMartino. At the time, DiMartino was studying a documentary about explorers trapped in the South Pole.

Konietzko described their early development of the concept:
“ We thought, "There's an air guy along with these water people trapped in a snowy wasteland... and maybe some fire people are pressing down on them..." ”

The co-creators proceeded to successfully pitch the idea to Nickelodeon VP and executive producer Eric Coleman just two weeks later.

The show was first revealed to the public in a teaser reel at Comic-Con 2004, and aired February 21, 2005. In the United States, the first two episodes of the series were shown together in a one-hour premiere event. At the conclusion of the first season, Nickelodeon ordered a second twenty-episode season that premiered on March 17, 2006, and concluded on December 1. The series maintained its success during the second season, causing Nickelodeon to order a third and final season, which began on September 21, 2007 and featured twenty-one episodes rather than the usual twenty. The final four episodes were packaged as a two-hour movie.

Premise
A map of the four nations. The characters at the top, 群雄四分, mean "the heroes divide [the world or the country or the land] in four." The characters of the four lands are 水善 (Water Peaceful), 土強 (Earth Strong), 火烈 (Fire Fierce), and 气和 (Air Harmony). The phrase at the bottom, 天下一匡, reads "correct all things under heaven." The "correct things" phrase, with roots of the Confucian analect phrase 一匡天下, refers to reunification.[citation needed]

Avatar: The Last Airbender takes place in a fantasy world that is home to humans, fantastic animals, and supernatural spirits. Human civilization is divided into four nations: the Water Tribes, the Earth Kingdom, the Air Nomads, and the Fire Nation. Each nation has its own natural element, on which it bases its society. Within each nation exists an order called "Benders," who have the ability to manipulate the element of their nation. The show’s creators assigned each Bending art its own style of martial arts; inheriting both the advantages and weakness of the martial arts it was assigned. The Bending types are Waterbending, Earthbending, Firebending, and Airbending.

Each generation yields one person who is capable of Bending all four elements. This being is referred to as the Avatar, the spirit of the planet manifested in human form. When an Avatar dies, he is reincarnated into the next nation in the Avatar Cycle. The Avatar Cycle parallels the seasons: autumn for the Air Nomads, winter for the Water Tribe, spring for the Earth Kingdom and summer for the Fire Nation. Legend holds the Avatar must master each bending art in order, starting with his native element. This can sometimes be compromised when the situation requires it, as Aang demonstrates in the show. For the Avatar, learning to bend the element opposite his native element can be extremely difficult. This is because opposing Bending arts are based on opposing fighting styles and disciplines. Firebending and Waterbending are opposites, as are Earthbending and Airbending.

The Avatar possesses a unique power called the Avatar State. It endows the Avatar with the knowledge and abilities of all past Avatars and acts as a self-triggering defense mechanism, though by learning how to unlock one's own chakras, it can be entered into at will. If an Avatar is killed in the Avatar State, the reincarnation cycle will be broken, and the Avatar will cease to exist.

Through the ages, countless incarnations of Avatar have served to keep the four nations in harmony, and maintain world order. The Avatar serves as the bridge between the physical world and the Spirit World, allowing him or her to solve problems that normal benders cannot.

Plot summary
One hundred years before the start of the series, the Airbender Aang learned he was the new Avatar. Faced with the heavy responsibilities of stopping an impending world war, Aang fled from home on his flying bison Appa. Encountering a fierce storm, they crashed into the ocean, triggering Aang's Avatar State, which froze them in a state of suspended animation.

They are awoken by two siblings of Southern Water Tribe, Katara and Sokka. Aang learns that the Fire Nation had indeed ravaged the world with decades of war, he realizes that he must fulfill his destiny of becoming the Avatar and return balance to the world by defeating the Fire Nation. Along with Katara and Sokka, Aang sets out to master the four elements of Air, Water, Earth, and Fire (in that order); as he is already an Airbender, he heads to the North Pole to find a Waterbending master.

Aang soon discovers that Sozin's Comet, which Firelord Sozin used to spark off the war, will return in the summer, giving the Fire Nation enough power to win the war for good. Aang must therefore master all the elements and as the Avatar, end the war before then. For most of their journey to the North Pole, the group is pursued by Zuko (along with his uncle Iroh) - banished Fire Nation prince and son of Fire Lord Ozai, obsessed with capturing Aang to restore his lost honor.

Aang travels to the Earth Kingdom to master Earthbending. The team meets Toph, a blind girl who is nevertheless an Earthbending prodigy and becomes Aang's second teacher. The heroes go on to discover information about a solar eclipse, which would leave the Fire Nation powerless and open to invasion; they struggle to reach the Earth King with this vital information. Opposing them are enemies old and new: the conflicted Zuko, his sister Azula and her two friends Mai and Ty Lee. Azula engineers a coup from within that topples the Earth Kingdom and destroys any hope of a large-scale invasion of the Fire Nation.

On the day of the eclipse, Aang, Sokka, Katara, Toph and a small, determined group of allied warriors go ahead and launch a smaller invasion, which although brave ultimately fails thanks to Azula's cunning. Zuko finally learns the true side of himself and confronts his father. He later manages to gain the trust of the protagonists and becomes Aang's Firebending teacher.

Sozin's Comet arrives and Fire Lord Ozai is on the brink of total victory in the war. Now, having finally mastered all four elements, Aang and his friends face Fire Lord Ozai and defeat him, finally restoring harmony to the world.