Book of Air : “The King of Omashu” & “Imprisoned”
Book of Air Episode 5: “The King of Omashu”
Best Line: “Wrong Choice”
Nothing in life is simple. That’s the basic theme of this episode of Avatar. When you try to rush at your problems head on, you’re probably going to end up with a headache. Instead, use your head from something other than bashing on walls or holding two beer cans at once. Thinking your way through a problem will get you better results every single time. That is a fantastic lesson to teach kids and every baseball manager I’ve ever watched lose on television.
The Aang Gang arrives in Omashu, an Earth Kingdom city, as the episode opens. Its the first we get to see of an alive and vibrant city in one of the major national powers. And what we see is AWESOME. The people of the Earth Kingdom use Earthbending not just as a cool kung-fu move, but in practical ways that affect their daily lives. They use it to move mail and packages around efficiently in a city. They use it to open their ENORMOUS FUCKING GATES. It shapes how they build, and therefore how they think. Or maybe the reverse. It’s complicated. HUGE FUCKING GATES.
Anyway, this episode also gives us two tropes that run throughout the rest of the series. The first is Cabbage Guy. This poor bastard is screwed every which way by the Avatar group, all unintentionally, and we all laugh at him over and over. I guarantee that you’ll find yourself yelling about your cabbages at some point, and then realize that you’re a terrible person. The second is silly disguises. A lot of kid’s show use this running gag, but none as successfully as Avatar. Just wait for Wang Fire.
And just to toss a bone out there – this episode reveals the end of the whole series. Mark it and come back after you finish up the final episode, and see how much Bumi influenced Aang’s life.
Book of Air Episode 6: “Imprisoned”
Best Line: “That lemur! It’s Earthbending!”
Episode 6 is a basic primer in why people are wage-slaves. It’s all about fear. Not gut-wrenching ‘I’m in a train car with Ozzie Osbourne and I’m dressed like a pigeon” fear. The mind numbing slow fear that erodes your will to be a human being.
The episode revolves around a prison that the Fire Nation has built for captured Earthbenders. They beat down the Benders families, imprison the old and sick, and do it all with the specific goal of quashing the spirits of the people, not just their bodies. They teach the Earth Benders that it’s better to accept life in a complete shithole than to risk being hurt again. Which pretty much describes anyone that has to work at Walmart.
Of course at the end Katara manages to rally the people and restore them to their normal brave selves, but there are some excellent moments that show just how HARD it is for people to break out of the familiar and safe, even when the familiar and safe are terrible. That’s pretty much one of the deeper truths of life. Our own worst enemy is our terror that we can’t change anything, so we just give up. Vote [Democrat/Republican]!
The most important world-building piece of information in this episode is the Earthbenders can’t bend metal, only various types of stone. This becomes quite a big deal in later seasons, as well as in the followup series, so keep it in your mind as you continue to watch.
Of special note in this episode is a fantastically delivered ham performance by George Takei. He voices the harsh to the point of insanity Fire Nation Prison Warden. He also gets all of the best lines. “Well, which is it, a buffalo or a bison?” I used his delivery of “You failed” as a wav file for when my WoW raid wiped for a while.
I’d also like to note one of the final scenes of the show. An Earthbender floats the Fire Nation troops out over the water, whereupon the Warden says that he can’t swim. The Earthbender drops them. The music playing at the time implies that the soldiers probably swam to the underside of the prison and were ok. Buuuuuuuutttttt . . . .think about it. They were in full armor. At least one of them couldn’t swim. Those guys fucking died. Episode 6 – casual murder. Go Team Avatar!
