Team Avatar returns to save the world (again)

Back before Netflix got into the streaming business, they were a disc rental service. I can’t tell you much about what I rented from them, except for the animated series “Avatar: The Last Airbender.” It was a magical experience. The show is set in a world where some people can “bend” the elements (fire, water, earth, air). There is one, called the Avatar, who can master all four elements and serves as a leader in this world. When the Fire Nation attacked the other nations, the Avatar, a young boy named Aang, vanished. Katara and Sokka find him in the ice 100 years later. Now Aang must master the elements and bring peace back to the world. The series is incredible and a must-watch (it's on Netflix and Paramount+). The show ended in 2008 and was followed by “Legend of Korra” in 2012 (also great). There was a movie we don’t talk about. The live-action Netflix show is in its second season (which I have not watched). But nothing, and I mean nothing, will ever come close to the perfection of the original series.

“Avatar Aang” picks up years after the series ends, when the world has been rebuilt and united. Aang (voiced by Eric Nam) learns of a power that could save his culture (he is the last of the airbenders). With the help of Team Avatar, he sets out to find and restore the Air Nation.

Given that the series is still so beloved, the pressure was on for this to be good. You do not need to have seen the show to enjoy the movie, but it definitely helps. In the show, Team Avatar becomes very close, and the group dynamics are a big part of what makes the show great. The movie manages to recapture that dynamic, while showing how it has evolved in the years between the show and movie. Sokka (Román Zaragoza) is the only non-bender in the group, but can hold his own in the big battles. My favorite character, the blind earth bender, Toph (Dionne Quan), is as sarcastic and quick as ever. The now Firelord Zuko (Stephen Yen) has to balance his duties as leader of the Fire Nation and to his friend Aang. Katara (Jessica Matten) and Aang's relationship continues to grow beyond the childhood crush of the series. To see these five together again feels right. The bickering, quips, and jokes are even woven into them working together to fight the bad guys. Many times these days, nostalgia becomes weaponized to boost engagement. All that tends to be given to us are the same characters doing the same thing we saw they do a decade or more ago. While "Avatar Aang" uses nostalgia, it also grows its characters beyond who they were when they were younger.

My one real issue is that the group of bad guys, called The Denied, are not well developed. This group, made up of non-benders, is angry that they do not have powers. They hope to use the power to give themselves and others the ability to bend the elements. That is all we know about them. I would have liked to see more of what motivates them. We are not given a backstory about why they feel this way, and it is not something touched on in the series, with the movie being barely over 90 minutes. I would have been fine with it being longer if we had some background in this group.

This should have been a theatrical release, but that idea got nixed by the higher-ups at Paramount-Skydance. It became a Paramount+ release and received very little fanfare. That is a shame because this movie deserves as much love as the series it continues. The show is still incredibly popular, and its audience continues to grow. I would love to see more stories told with grown-up Aang and his friends. It would be interesting to fill in the gaps between Aang's time as Avatar and the events of "The Legend of Korra."

8/10

Rated PG for sequences of violence/action.

1h 39m