During the course of three seasons of Avatar the Last Airbender, one question rears its head from time to time. “What is the target age group of Avatar the Last Airbender?” Or more specifically, “Is Avatar the Last Airbender for kids?”
Many watch animated shows and assume the stories are for children. But fans of Avatar know that even though Avatar has its fair share of slapstick humor (especially from Sokka), Avatar the Last Airbender has a very grown up story. Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino created Avatar with a very specific Japanese Anime flavor.
After watching “The Puppetmaster,” it’s clear that Avatar has made a strong step outside of the kids realm and into the arena of teenage/adult entertainment.
The episode starts out with Sokka and Kitara telling ghost stories by a campfire. Kitara’s story spooks the gang, and Toph begins to hear sounds beneath the earth. Suddenly, a mysterious woman, named Hama, finds Team Avatar camping in the cave and invites the group to stay at her inn.
After a night in the inn, Kitara befriends Hama. They learn that people have been disappearing from the village, and that the full moon has meant danger. Sokka has his own apprehensions about Hama and decides to search her house. What he finds is a comb.
Hama reveals that she is a water bender who was kidnapped from Kitara’s village over 60 years ago during the first fire nation invasions. She decides to take on Kitara as her pupil, teaching her that water can be taken from anything including flowers and the air. Kitara is thrilled to gain this knowledge, she had already learned that she could use her own sweat to bend in “The Runaway.”
Meanwhile, Toph, Sokka and Aang investigate the town’s disappearances. Toph follows the sounds of the human cries below ground and discover a prison camp of captured fire nation villagers.
It is then that Hama reveals that she freed herself from prison by learning that she could not only water bend, but she could also blood bend. In prison she trained on the rats, until finally she was strong enough to use her blood bending on her captors and escape.
Blood bending? This may be the darkest concept heard to date on Avatar. Yes, Avatar has had its fair share of slaves, and fire warlords that would love the genocide of non-fire benders. But these things have been around before. Blood bending is a destinctively new Avatar specific concept.
Toph frees the Hama’s prisoners, and Aang and Sokka go to help Kitara. Unfortunately, Hama uses blood bending to turn Aang and Sokka on Kitara, then Hama turns the two on each other. Kitara is forced to learn how to blood bend in order to save her friends lives.
Hama is lead away by the fire nation, once again a prisoner. She leaves with these parting words, also the Buzzfocus Moment of the Week, “Congratulations Kitara. You’re a blood bender.”
If you had any doubts before, you most assuredly know now that Avatar is no Spongebob. But hey, that’s why we love it at Buzzfocus.com.
thanks for summing it up iv been trying to find this episode
It’s Katara not Kitara! Jeez actually listen to the show once in a while.