[7.6/10] Look, when you’re approaching the endgame, you are inevitably going to get a table-setting episode, one that delivers a lot of exposition, establishes the stakes of the big final battle, and kicks off both the main character arc and the threat that’s to come. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it leads to an episode that feels much more like getting all of the setup out of the way rather than actually telling the story.
That said, I like the way that it answers some real Comic Book Guy-esque questions I’ve been considering. It makes total sense for the team to decide to wait until later for Aang to fight Ozai. Katara rightly points out that the point of fighting Ozai before the comet was to prevent him from winning the war, but that with the fall of Ba Sing Se, the Fire Nation’s essentially already won the war. It also makes sense that Aang would want to become better, to truly master the four elements, before fighting Ozai. It helps mitigated some of the “Aang mastered this element in one episode” bits of the series, and while there’s thorny moral questions about waiting while people are suffering, there’s something logical about Aang summoning all his strength and power before approaching the Fire Lord.
Only he’s not the Fire Lord anymore. Ozai’s progression to becoming the titular Phoenix King a little generically evil, but I also like that the episode fills in the gaps from Zuko sitting on the war council, a deft move that not only helps explain what prompted Zuko to leave, but which creates new urgency for why Ozai needs to be defeated now, not when Aang feels he’s ready. The prospect of firebombing all of the Earth Kingdom has the scale and terror of a big bad’s plan, and it makes sense both as something to make Zuko realize he couldn’t be a part of this, and as a reason Team Avatar can’t just sit on the sidelines.
It helps, as always, to have Mark Hamill at his unctuous, power-hungry best, talking about blighting a people to raise his own empire out of the ashes. The new imagery of the Phoenix King adds an interesting and distinct visual dimension to the show’s final run, and his exchange with Azula shows cracks in the armor of the usual steely and self-assured warrior.
When the episode isn’t focused on setting the stage and unveiling new ornate, armored versions of old threats, it’s actually a lot of fun. The scenes of Team Avatar’s beach party is a nice bit of mirth before we presumably get into the heavier material of the rest of the show’s run. Sokka and Suki in particular are adorable. The episode also shows off the series’ creative visuals, with interesting shots that follow the gang’s activities on the beach with an energetic bent, which dovetails into Zuko’s test attack that features he and Aang bounding around Ember island with some cool elemental effects.
Then, of course, there is Aang’s great moral difficulty. He abhors violence, or at least the notion of taking a life, and yet has to defeat Ozai for the greater good. It’s an interesting problem for the morally steadfast young man, even if it irks my utilitarian sensibilities a bit. It leads to a nice moment where he cannot defeat the “melon lord” that Sokka’s set up for the team to practice their plan of attack (which is itself a great sequence with some particularly nice moments for Toph) and winces at the way the melon lord is scalped.
The last act of the episode, however, feels like a bit of wheel-spinning. It’s a nice touch to have Aang disappear before the big confrontation, something that ties into the “where were you?” issues that have dogged Aang since he first became the boy in the iceberg. That said, the scenes of the rest of Team Avatar looking for him felt like filler, and while I’m intrigued by Zuko approaching the badass bounty hunter with the scent-sniffing aardvark creature to find him, much of the path to get there seemed like the episode needed to pad its runtime before we got to the unveiling of the Phoenix King.
Still, even if there’s not a lot of momentum to this episode, more just a collection of setup, the setup is good and it portends interesting things for the last three episodes of the series. Overall, while the table-setting qualities can make the episode seem a bit disjointed, the material is solid.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParent2017-04-24T03:13:43Z
[7.6/10] Look, when you’re approaching the endgame, you are inevitably going to get a table-setting episode, one that delivers a lot of exposition, establishes the stakes of the big final battle, and kicks off both the main character arc and the threat that’s to come. There’s nothing wrong with that, but it leads to an episode that feels much more like getting all of the setup out of the way rather than actually telling the story.
That said, I like the way that it answers some real Comic Book Guy-esque questions I’ve been considering. It makes total sense for the team to decide to wait until later for Aang to fight Ozai. Katara rightly points out that the point of fighting Ozai before the comet was to prevent him from winning the war, but that with the fall of Ba Sing Se, the Fire Nation’s essentially already won the war. It also makes sense that Aang would want to become better, to truly master the four elements, before fighting Ozai. It helps mitigated some of the “Aang mastered this element in one episode” bits of the series, and while there’s thorny moral questions about waiting while people are suffering, there’s something logical about Aang summoning all his strength and power before approaching the Fire Lord.
Only he’s not the Fire Lord anymore. Ozai’s progression to becoming the titular Phoenix King a little generically evil, but I also like that the episode fills in the gaps from Zuko sitting on the war council, a deft move that not only helps explain what prompted Zuko to leave, but which creates new urgency for why Ozai needs to be defeated now, not when Aang feels he’s ready. The prospect of firebombing all of the Earth Kingdom has the scale and terror of a big bad’s plan, and it makes sense both as something to make Zuko realize he couldn’t be a part of this, and as a reason Team Avatar can’t just sit on the sidelines.
It helps, as always, to have Mark Hamill at his unctuous, power-hungry best, talking about blighting a people to raise his own empire out of the ashes. The new imagery of the Phoenix King adds an interesting and distinct visual dimension to the show’s final run, and his exchange with Azula shows cracks in the armor of the usual steely and self-assured warrior.
When the episode isn’t focused on setting the stage and unveiling new ornate, armored versions of old threats, it’s actually a lot of fun. The scenes of Team Avatar’s beach party is a nice bit of mirth before we presumably get into the heavier material of the rest of the show’s run. Sokka and Suki in particular are adorable. The episode also shows off the series’ creative visuals, with interesting shots that follow the gang’s activities on the beach with an energetic bent, which dovetails into Zuko’s test attack that features he and Aang bounding around Ember island with some cool elemental effects.
Then, of course, there is Aang’s great moral difficulty. He abhors violence, or at least the notion of taking a life, and yet has to defeat Ozai for the greater good. It’s an interesting problem for the morally steadfast young man, even if it irks my utilitarian sensibilities a bit. It leads to a nice moment where he cannot defeat the “melon lord” that Sokka’s set up for the team to practice their plan of attack (which is itself a great sequence with some particularly nice moments for Toph) and winces at the way the melon lord is scalped.
The last act of the episode, however, feels like a bit of wheel-spinning. It’s a nice touch to have Aang disappear before the big confrontation, something that ties into the “where were you?” issues that have dogged Aang since he first became the boy in the iceberg. That said, the scenes of the rest of Team Avatar looking for him felt like filler, and while I’m intrigued by Zuko approaching the badass bounty hunter with the scent-sniffing aardvark creature to find him, much of the path to get there seemed like the episode needed to pad its runtime before we got to the unveiling of the Phoenix King.
Still, even if there’s not a lot of momentum to this episode, more just a collection of setup, the setup is good and it portends interesting things for the last three episodes of the series. Overall, while the table-setting qualities can make the episode seem a bit disjointed, the material is solid.