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Imo, the reason why there isn't that much fan theories about ATLA is because it is so well done. There isn't much fans can add to it since the serie in itself is so complete, even without taking the comics into account.
@@ShinyPunkSam and the fact that they are means you really have to make them contrived to make sense. Fan theories usually are only good if they explain an inconsistency and there just isn't any. Like OK, Yue being a stillbirth or near-stillbirth for example meaning she was supposed to be the avatar makes a lot of sense and is one of the few decent theories. But stillbirths happen anyway and you don't really need to explain it. Personally I think it makes more sense that given the raging war the moon spirit decided that they need a horcrux so they orchestrated somehow Yue being born either dead or in near-death.
To add to Monk Gyatso going absolutely crazy, he did this during Sozin's comet. This means it took dozens if not hundreds of comen enhanced firebenders just to bring this absolute unit down. If not for the comet, Gyatso could probably have defended the temple from the entire fire bending army by himself.
@zephyr1331 he probably made a last stand in his house but the fight didn't start there, and it would've been way easier to fight in open space as an airbender
The theory that Katara saw her mother's charred remains would also explain why she was so much more hurt and angry about it than her brother, Sokka. For Sokka, his mother merely disappeared from his life. He probably was never allowed to see her body in that condition. But for Katara, her mother left in a very gruesome way that would be difficult for any child to comprehend why anyone would do that to another.
Ok on the "Toph can see" theory. I feel like she is not darkness blind. No one is really darkness blind. She has advanced cataracts that are basically opaque, which makes her eyes white. She cannot see things in focus at all, but can probably, under good lighting, see figures and shapes with no real resolution. She is still blind, and without seismic sense she would be completely helpless. I dont think they wrote her in to lie about her blindness, more so that being blind is a lot more complex than people believe it to be. *source, I was a caretaker for blind family.
@@sleepyninjarin7971 not accurately, all though, she did make fun of Sokka in lake lougia when the when underground. Sokka" it's so dark down here, I can barely see". Toph" ohh no what a nightmare" sarcastically. So you're probably right, maybe she can't sense light
hi! i work in ophthalmology! even an advanced cataract wouldnt make your irises white. the lense sits behind the iris, you can only see it through the pupils. a very clouded lense might be visible through the dilated pupil in good lighting. i agree with the last part, eye conditions are more complex than what is usually taught to people. ive actually seen patients who had a completely white covered eye but those are usually lux negative (i.e. everything is dark on that eye). i think its also possible that tophs vision got worse over time. plenty of eye conditions lead to blindness if untreated. we know toph has been blind as a child already, so it could be an inherited condition (or perhaps trauma at an early age).
God the running gag of Cabbage Man was always one of my favorite bits of ATLA, but the running gag of "there is no cabbage man"/only acknowledging him while he's directly on screen with a "too bad he's never shown again" of this channel just always brings a smile to my face. It's so silly and stupid but I just fucking love it.
So it was confirmed by the creators that her rock suit in the Bitter Work episode was supposed to have a robo cop inspired helmet (everything covered but the mouth) and it was drawn that way in the story boarding. But when it was sent overseas to be animated, the animators messed up and drew it with an eye opening, and the creators missed it when doing retakes.
I mean, Aang having the "best airbender" medallion makes sense. He was an Airbending Master at 12. If i remember correctly, there's 115 airbending techniques, but he only mastered 114 and created a new airbending technique which was his Air Scooter, which earned him his tattoos
@@davidtran9455 indeed. He was the youngest in history at that time. Till Jinora became the youngest master. But yeah, Aang is a legit prodigy. Avatar Yangchen who was a prodigy in her own right got her tattoos at 16.
I think the Gyatso thing comes more from Korra than “fans wanting their show to be cool.” It is shown, canonically, that Zaheer can create a vacuum and suffocate someone. Who’s to say the best airbender in the world couldn’t do that in a room full of people as a last resort?
Plus if a bunch of fire bending corpses are found someone had to kill them all and we see no other air bending corpses so it’s really just putting two plus two that he killed them all
Plus he wouldn't even need to pull the air from their lungs, like Zaheer does. It's war. War is violent. There's the chance that he PUSHED air into their lungs and burst them. Or heck, just tossed them around a ton like Aang does to Zuko in the ship and just slams them against one another until they are bludgeoned to death. So many ways he could have killed them with air-bending.
Actually for the “cabbage man” entry, it may be referring to how that man in appas lost days wouldn’t feed appa cabbages, no idea who else it could be so I hope this helps
It might have something to do with a guy you see in the background who looks suspiciously similar to the man who ran cabbage corp in LOK, it doesn’t make much sense as it’s just a guy you see one time for like five seconds in LOK.
I swear to god, is overanalyzing avatar screwing with us? I mean isn't it obviously the cabbage seller in ba sing se whose cart gets mauled multiple times by the gang and other people?
@@tommynator247 Who the hell are you talking about? Cabbage man is clearly some reference to the lack of cabbages in the series as a whole. Probably some cabbage thief.
I don’t know if anyones ever talked about it, but the “Azula Ding” in music is called a tritone, which is commonly referred to as the “devils interval/chord”. Very fitting for her character
Not trying to be that guy, but the devils note has been debunked a million times in recent years! The tritone was never really banned or representative of the devil.
@@antoniomarcello9872 yeah but they only said that it is “commonly referred to as the devil’s interval” which is true, they never said it was banned. (And in recent years, it is commonly thought of as representative of the devil… even if it wasn’t in the Middle Ages)
One note: a tritone is an interval, meaning two notes playing simultaneously. I didn't notice that there were always two notes playing together a tritone apart until this comment, and I've been a musician for 15 years. Nice catch!
Bumi having seismic sense makes COMPLETE sense, especially since he's a member of the White Lotus, and like Iroh probably knows the full history of earth bending, so he definitely also knows how badger moles became earth benders themselves. If not, his pure love and joy for earth bending would inevitably lead him to subconsciously learning how to see with earth bending, and would use it second hand just because of how in his nature it is
i think it would make perfect sense if he used a lower level of seismic sense, subconsciously. it would fit perfectly in the character, since he is a great earthbender, but never had to rely on seismic sense to see the world
I don't like the idea of anyone else having Seismic Sense as it takes away from Toph's uniqueness, but I don't mind so much if it's explicitly a lesser, inferior version of the ability.
For the record: The dragons refused to cooperate with the firenation to destroy the air nomads - they were deemed traitors and that's how the practice of hunting them got started.
The white lotus tile given to Sokka is most likely a token that Sokka isn’t meant to understand, but which would identify Sokka as Pien Dao’s pupil if any other member of the White Lotus found the tile in Sokka’s possession and asked him about it
I thought this was just well known I mean it’s obvious he doesn’t understand what it was but exactly it can be an identifier for other members and then how he joins
I thought it was something in case he got into a place he shouldn't be looking for things It feels like a 'just in case, hold onto this' type of thing and i do definitely headcanon sokka as being a member in his elder years at least
More things. The hair was not only a symbol for Zuko, but also Azula. She begins being "perfect" and without a single strand of hair out of the way. On one scene where she's training with the old twins, they told her that her perfonce was "nearly perfect" and we get a close up to her head, where a single hair strand it's out of place, and she puts it in its place while saying that "nearly perfect" wasn enough. Also, at the end of the series, when she loses her mind the first thing she does is cutting her own hair, leaving it all messed up. And aaalso, another theory is that when the camera focuses on Zuko's profile, dependson the side of his face it symbolizes one thing or another. Like, depends on if it's the scar's side or the other side. The scar symbolizes the fire nation, and it appears when Zuko is making a decission and he decides for his nation, or when he represents his nation. On the other hand, when the side is his non scar side of the face, it's usually Zuko making decissions based on his own morals, or that he's just being his own person with own ideals. English is not my first language, so maybe it's a bit confusing, but I wanted so bad to write this when he mentioned Zuko's hair and its symbolism in the video. I just love these theories
I think one of the reasons the earth kingdom dont have a huge navy is cause they’re earth benders so they’re at a massive disadvantage at sea, they’d rather fight a defensive battle on land than an offensive battle at sea.
Also the fire nation had clearly established a massive naval dominance. I would guess that whatever the earth kingdom has left is highly secured and valued
That and also the world was at peace before so there was no reason for navy ships and anything water based was left to the Water tribes. The southern water tribe was almost completely destroyed while the northern just gave up and left everyone to fend for themselves.
They definitely do have ships though! In one of the earlier episodes when we first see Zhao, Zuko gives the flimsy excuse that his ship was damaged when they accidentally collided with an Earth Kingdom ship. Zhao doesn’t question it. Clearly they do have ships, they’re just not shown, like, at all throughout the series
The times Toph "can see" are clearly small errors. Also, for her rock armor, it can be argued that she didn't want dirt so close to her eyes. She might be blind, but dirt in your eyes still hurts.
Also, didn't she completely cover her face when she wore a metal suit? And what if she wanted Aang to still be able to see her stare at him? I might be reaching a bit for the second question though...
Sokka being a white lotus initiate could still make a degree of sense. It could be that him being gifted the tile is a subtle way to start him down the trail to discovering the white lotus for himself by making the symbol important to him (perhaps intended as some form of test, that happened to get screwed up by a pretty extenuating circumstance) and/or "marking" him as someone a master has found to be possibly worthy to other members (perhaps for further judging by other masters or as a way of saying "this guy seems cool but let's keep him in the dark for now"). Either way, I think the theory is pretty solid.
my favourite one would definitely be Ty-Lee being an Airbender descendant. besides what was mentioned in the vid (physical appearance, abilities & character), she's also the only one from the Fire Nation - that i've noticed - who often mentions auras as well as chakras
I think that theory was made popular by the SuperCarlinBrothers on here on RU-vid. Check out their theory in it if you want to know more. Don’t quote me on it but I do believe they are the ones that came up with it as well.
I like the idea; and I mean their ancestors could have gotten together BEFORE the genocide. Maybe the airbender side of the couple was living in the fire nation when it started, like maybe in the country side? and when they heard about it, they just hid. Maybe that's even how her family's circus got started.
@@Caffeinated_Firefly Yeah, that's actually the best version of that Theory, and makes the most sense. A couple from before the Genocide makes more sense than after
@@Caffeinated_Firefly It could still work even after the genocide. The show goes to great lengths to show that not all the Fire Nation were bad people, many of them just being regular guys who just happen to be living in a country where terrible people are in control. So I could totally see a fleeing Air nomad accidentally stumbling into a good Fire Nation citizen, the two getting together, and living life peacefully with the Air nomad's identity hidden.
Imagine fighting a water bender and they cut you and then just proceed to bloodbend all of the blood out of your body through that cut. When you start to think about it, each bending ability is fucking terrifying.
Sozin killing his own dragon is actually a really good theory and just cements how horrible he was. But I also like the idea that he only started the tradition of hunting Dragons because his got old and died naturally and instead of letting it be he told everyone he killed his dragon and gained the power of the dragon to bolster his ego and firebending power so to speak.
A thing to note about Gyatso being the best airbender in the world, his corpse has numerous fire nation corpses, meaning Gyatso managed to defeat numerous comet enhanced firebenders at the same time by himself, Gyatso probably was the best of his time just from that feat alone.
A note on the "earthbending bloodbending" thing: Metalbending isn't actually bending metal, but rather earthen impurities in the metal. metal with no such impurities wouldn't be bendable at all. And what is the metal in your blood? Elemental iron, individual iron atoms bound to hemoglobin. there's no earth there to bend, just iron atoms bound to organic molecules.
Bone bending seems far more reasonable. Sure, you've iron in your blood and other trace elements, but you'd probably need most of a person's blood to get a quantity of material worth bending. If that makes any sense.
Adding on to Katara's Burned Mom, Sokka remembers the day his mom died but she never actually appeared in his memory, this ties in to the scene where Sokka tells Toph he can't remember his mom's face.
@@fireflymiesumae Not actually a thing that happens frequently despite what pop-psychology would have you believe. People tend to remember the bad parts of something more actually
i think zuko's hair not being perfect at the end is still meaningful in the sense that he still isn't "complete" he still wants to know what happened to his mom and that's apparent when he visits his dad in jail.
Yue being the next Avatar is definitely my favorite one. It just fits perfectly and makes so much sense. She needed help from the Moon Spirit since she was born without her link to the spirit world, the Avatar spirit.
@@Aisha_Luv hmm, if we belive in avatar cycle destiny thing for the argument, so it makes sense, Aang supposed to die of naturally/or any different causes at 84(at least in the universe mind schedule), if the iceberg and war didn't happend. Seems reasonable
The “and if you pause here you can barely see it” had me laughing out loud. I like the idea of Momo being Monk Gyatso, even Roku hints friendships can transcend lifetimes and it’s Gyatso in that instance too.
Personally I had theory that the Spirit that was wan friend in korra is mono but it could be interesting if he fused himself with human or animals to support his friend
I think toph can tell that the old-guys are old by how they walk and that they're wrinkly. A more horrifying theory is that seismic sense potentially means Toph sees how everyone would look naked under their clothes. The eye-gap in her rock armor is one of two things - an animation error that's quite easy to make even if you know she's blind (which would make sense given how easy it is to forget it and how the characters forget it) or Toph still being somewhat light sensitive and wanting to keep that in fights since it's another piece of sensory data telling you where things are relative to an obvious object in the sky. I'm pretty sure she has no eye holes in her metal armor in the final battle tho. Toph can simply know as a trivia fact that master airbenders have tattoos. She's one of the few characters with formal schooling (being rich and all) and it would easily come up in off-screen conversations between Aang and the others.
Yeah I'm fairly certain it has been confirmed that Toph's eye holes in her armor fighting Aang were a mistake and that it was supposed to be like a mouth/nose hole so she could breathe
If we want to really explain the "eyeholes" it was doing the training with Aang and we even see Aang use it in his final battle with Osai so could also just be wrapped up as "Oh, she was teaching Aang this technique and made the eyeholes for his sake"
I doubt toph would be horrified knowing what people looked like under their clothes. If anything, it would be normal for her, and probably not something noteworthy enough to bring up on conversation with others.
There is one set of theories that interconnect nicely. Gyatso nuking all the fire nations soldiers near him, and the Mimi is Gyatso theory. Reincarnation usually is tied to how one acts in life, in the Buddhist sense it’s in fact the pursuit of escape from the reincarnation cycle that they act so strictly. However taking life is a strong breach from that religious conviction, and usually results in someone going back down the reincarnation chain to a simpler form of life, rather than as a human who is close to escape from the cycle. So by killing all those people, and breaking his religious beliefs, Gyatso reincarnated as Milo.
Azula's blue flames were definitely written in as a way to distinguish her fire from Zuko's/to make her character seem more uniquely threatening, but her having blue flames also works in a narrative sense. Blue fire is hotter than red/orange fire. And as Azula is meant to be a firebending prodigy, her having fire that burns hotter than the average firebender is a good visual way of indicating her superior skill and perfectionism. There is also evidence that supports this in the show, such as Azula having red/orange fire in flashbacks when she was younger and more inexperienced. Also her fire is shown on a few occasions to turn red as it 'cools down' such as in 'The Chase' when she tries to trap Aang in a room in the ghost town by lining the walls with blue flames that quickly turn red.
In the Avatar Legends role-playing game it's revealed that before the air nomad genocide, the fire Nation nobility was getting into air nomad spiritually and that Sozins sister was going to marry an air nomad. It's very possible that many noble families married air benders, meaning ty Lee probably does have air nomad heritage
@@halorocksaz42 This is a raw idea off the top of my head, but maybe he executed or imprisoned anyone who had a spouse from the air nation, and then such families had to go into hiding and become anonymous?
It’s likely he got the nobles weakened by hunting dragons, dragon hunting was encouraged by nobles but the sheer power of them might need a dozen to kill and not all of them will make it home. My theory is the dragon hunts served two purposes to distract the nobles from his policies and weaken them as well
I feel like it needs to be said. We literally saw the small scale of this "Gyatso air nuke" when Zahir suffocates the Earth queen. Gyatso, being a master and the best airbender globally could potentially remove all the air from a room. It might not even be that hard.
I'm not a chemistry expert, but I do know that sodium (and by extension salt) burns yellow (cf. the ghastly yellow street lamps that are slowly being phased out), so no, Azula isn't salty 😅 One theory that fits better is that blue fire is a clean, hot burn, so Azula's pure talent makes her fire purer and hotter
Random note: On a civilization level, Earthbenders are the most OP benders. All the benders can fight good, but none of them could BUILD good. Civilizations spend decades building monuments, infrastructure, and mining projects, but for earthbenders those things are like a weekend project. Imagine how history would've gone if people were able to build dams and irrigation by just waving their arms, or if they could mine out all the minerals and ore they need with barely any effort. Forget the Fire Nation, the Earth Kingdom would be the most industrialized nation in the world. Even outside of practical stuff, imagine how easy it'd be to make cities and temples and such. Militarily this is OP as hell too. You could tunnel through mountains, or build a castle in just a couple hours. I don't see how the fire nation even stood a chance. And that's WITHOUT metal bending.
It is worth noting that earthbending as a skill is, relatively speaking, pretty rare. Obviously there are still a lot about, but not as many in relation to the whole population of the Earth Kingdom. After all, we see plenty of wooden buildings all across the Earth Kingdom, indicating demand for buildings that is not being supplied by earthbending which would be easier. I imagine though this could lead to interesting situations outside of war time where skilled earthbenders would be heavily prized for large scale civil engineering.
Housing always was, and amazingly still is, the most expensive a ordinary citizen will buy (or at least is expected to) in the course of his life. High skill earth bender can constructed multiple houses in one move. Would also diminish land scarcity, one would be able to reclaim land from the sea. Or easily replace a couple of houses with multi apartments buildings. Definitely the Architecture and Engendering side of Earth benders has to lot to be explored.
Theres a reason they get the lowest rate of benders per capita... Earthworks were hugely important in historical warfare and with the existence of blasting jelly there is no way even only a couple earthbenders could lose a 1600s style tunneling fight(a staple of siege warfare).
I think the reason why the fire nation stood a chance is because, Militarily they had more technology, war ships, and long range capabilities, where at Earth Benders really don't have those, at least not a very accurate way of launching a ball of rock MILES. We see toph do it, but thats pretty close range, during the siege of the north pole, they were bombing the Northern Water Tribe effortlessly from miles away where not even water benders could hit. Secondly, Earth compared to Fire, Earth is scary yeah, but needs to be accurate. Whatever your throwing needs to be accurate and undodgeable, and yeah you might break their bones but probably won't kill them, at least not instantly. Fire however, is HOT very HOT, you literally can't fight being on fire, nor can you combat an enemy whilst they are flame throwering and charring your body in seconds.
I've always assumed that Wan Shi Tong's library is a physical extension of himself. That's really the only way to explain him being able to sink it at a moment's notice, and it also explains why he seemingly knows where everything and everybody is at all times. If you want to think of it this way, the library is basically his brain, and every time a book gets added to it, it's a new piece of information that he learns and can access them anytime. The only problem with this is that it's kind of gross cuz they were inside an owl
Well it desn't have to be his real 'brain'. But yes I also think it's the best describe for the thing. He gets stronger and stronger every time he gets more knowledge. So he might be soo mad that Zhao destroyed the fire stuffs because now he knows nothing about them... Maybe... But it makes some sense
Or Wan Shi Tong can earthbend. He did mention waterbending would do no good against him since he studied it, maybe he studied earthbending too. (I also always assumed the library was just an extension of him though)
Azula also used a very basic form of flight during the boiling rock finale (without the comet) pretty effortlessly so it wouldn’t be unreasonable to say that Sozin and other firebending masters could’ve learned this technique in preparation for the air temple raids
We literally see Ozai flying in the finale. A comet-enhanced master can clearly fly with immense control, so an army of fairly skilled firebenders should be able to propel themselves upward when similarly empowered.
I don't know if anyone already pointed this out, but I just now noticed this. At 3:19 when Katara is walking up to Zuko, she doesn't have a glove on, but then when she stops, she has a glove on. I guess the whole "suddenly having/not having a glove on" thing runs in the family.
So, with Toph's sight its worth nothing that she has some pretty hardcore cataracts, not that she has no ability to process visual stimuli. Blindness is a spectrum, ranging from visual impairment to full on inability to percieve using your eyes. Basically, Toph probably is genuinely blind, but due to her cataracts she's probably still able to percieve light and dark, vague silhouettes, and maybe even color. As for identifying the white lotus as old, well, old people do tend to have a certain smell to them thanks to the build up of bilirubin in their skin. Shot in the dark, she smelt them and guessed they were old.
I'm fairly certain Toph can distinguish old people from young people. She's literally able to locate ants within a 20m radius, it's stupid how sensitive she is.
@@agsilverradio2225 it's explained in the official art book for the series that Toph's eyes being visible was an animation error. It was supposed to be her mouth showing, but by the time they noticed it was too late to correct it
Toph doesn't have to be 100% blind; a lot of blind people have some vision, enough for her to still leave her eyes open in the stone armour and tell apart large shapes. This would also explain why she can "see" things flying in the air
this comment REQUIRES more attention, so many people forget, or simply never knew that blindness is a gradient, and you can be anywhere from slightly impaired, to fully blind. if Toph can only see blurry blobs of vague color, then she could still tell if anything large and obvious was happening nearby.
The issue there is, there's many times where she CAN'T see things flying in the air. Although if I recall, some if not all of those instances, the object may not be coming from in front of her.
I think one thing left off that extremely deep cut is Iroh being a knowledge seeker. We know that he can see spirits and no one else can. We then see in korra that he went to the spirit world instead of just dying. My theory is he went to Won Shi Tong's(Sorry for name) library, the owl requested him to become a knowledge seeker or die. Then Iroh lived the rest of his life as part spirit. When it was time for his mortal body to die. He left and went to the spirit world. IDK, just a fun theory
Maybe, but when they're chasing Aamg with the Mole-thing in Season 1, Iroh talks to the Fortune Teller and says "at my age there's only one surprise left and I'd rather leave it a mystery" clearly referring to death. I think Iroh's ability to see spirits comes from him achieving whatever form of Enlightenment firebenders can. He clearly is the wisest character in the show and has adapted techniques from his antithetical element, water, to create the Redirection technique.
I think that Azula’s fire being blue is a representation of her perfectionist attitude. When a fire is blue it is because the combustion reaction being created is more pure and therefore hotter. It is quite literally a more ‘perfect’ combustion reaction which also is likely why Azula’s the only one who has blue flames. I also think that Azula is more or less the embodiment of energy in fire bending (the blue dragon) while Zuko is life from fire bending (the red dragon). You can also notice this parallel with Sozin and Roku’s dragons as well as their story. That said I enjoy the salt theory too 😂
that actually makes more sense because well most salts don’t burn blue, i only know copper salts do, normal kitchen salt would burn yellow cause sodium ions make fire yellow
@@VagrantDune Lore reasons aside, the clear reason Azula uses blue fire is so that she stands out when fighting other fire benders (ie Zuko). It's much easier to quickly determine who's who in a fight full of fire when the fire from each side is a different color. Imagine how visually different, and hard to follow, the last Angi Kai would have been if Azula had regularly colored fire.
I mean I think the best answer is that Azula is a combination of all of these things. Whether perfectionism, being salty, showmakers wanting to outline her or her name literally meaning “Blue” in another language, they all work towards the character that she is
I like to think that the white lotus tile given to Sokka was kind of a "get out of jail almost free card", maybe not in every single situation but I could see Sokka pulling it out as a last resort against some gatekeeping show element and it working
I’d love to see an avatar prequel depicting what took place during the genocide. Seeing the last days of the air nation, getting a peep at what really went on while Aang was in cryo.
The "Zucest" entry is likely a reference to a convention panel Azula's voice actor had where someone asked her (or really asked Azula) "what would you do on a life changing adventure with zuko" and she joking replied "I'd get pregnant." You can look it up on youtube there's several videos of it.
She has also said multiple times that with her lines with Zuko, she Made Azulas voice as seductive as possible (especially the scene where they're alone in the fire nation palace)
@@maguc5906 totally jives with her being a bit nutso boingo, if she doesn't even hestitate to kill people to get her way then why would she hestiate to other taboo stuff?
17:01 Actually, burning table salt usually produces a bright yellow flame because of the electronic resonance of the sodium ions. I think Azula's fire is shown as blue because blue flames indicate complete combustion, which is a subtle way of showing that Azula is a natural, highly skilled firebender. This is a narrative device that is especially clear when she is fighting other firebenders.
I feel like the "Hurdle" of a Air Nomad and a Firebender boinking isn't that hard when even Aang, having seen his father figure died, still somehow asked Zuko to be his friend after multiple attempts to capture and kill him
I think the "waterbenders can redirect lightning" might refer more to being able to use water theyre actively bending to catch/redirect the lightning and not do what Iroh teaches and redirect it through their body
I mean they'd have to be using completely pure water to do so otherwise impurities would allow currents to run through the water. it most likely is just a misunderstanding of Iroh's lesson about balance and understanding between the elements
Tai Lee as air nomad is easy to explain, in my opinion. We see non-bending members of every nation except the air nomads. And there is a big deal made that it is very hard to reach the at temples without bending. So where did the non-bending air nomads go? They got absorbed into the nearby nations.
I might be wrong but *all* nomads born into the nation are airbenders. The only reason why a bender would lose their ability is by becoming attached to earthly tethers. Kyoshi’s mom became a weak airbender because she fell in love with an earthbender and became a greedy thief. She let go of air nomad ideology, changed her tattoos to snakes and used fans that are later inherited to Kyoshi to be able to bend better. There were some survivors of the genocide as seen in a short comic where Aang got caught in a trap used to lure leftover airbenders. It would make sense that some fully let go of their ways and joined other nations for safety.
@@TheMutantCreeper then why do other nations have non-benders? What makes air nomads special that they always breed true? The idea that air nomads would flee to hide in other nations also feels weak, because why would none of the other nations try to capitalize, or at least help, the airbenders in exile?
@@celestiallions4050 Their bending is tightly woven into their spirituality. Once they deviate from it, they’re bending becomes weaker. I think other nation maybe tried to help the nomads but the Fire Nation would be so hard set on killing them that they would probably kill whoever helped.
well the elemts are counter parts , obvious is fire and water. Earth has a near to 5% of benders in the populatoion whilst air nomads are about 95-100% benders
@@celestiallions4050 The air benders didn't know they were getting attacked. If they knew that, they would of prepared. Hell, Katara didn't even know for sure that air benders were all gone. They just theorized that they were extinct. So if the water nation didn't know they were extinct and have never visited the air temples, it might have been the same with most earth nations. After the other nations found out that the air temples were attacked, it was probably too late to help. Also if air benders did escape, they couldn't be seem air bending. They probably thought it would be best to hide in other nations and play the part of that nation. Get a job, get married, have kids, grandchildren. All just in hopes that the avatar would come back and help. A hundred years passed and all the air benders were all dead. Their children didn't practice any air nomad cultures so never got air bending.
Water Boiling would be a lot harder than Water Freezing, so maybe it's possible, it's just never been done before, kind of like Metal Bending was. If you want water to freeze, all you have to do is force it to stop moving entirely, if you want water to boil, you need to bend it very slightly, as very quick speeds.
it never made sense to me that they couldn't. like, I guess you could say firebenders can heat...bend but then waterbenders can coldbend? never worked for me. it's just very difficult for them to go in the opposite direction of what is natural for their ability.
Enthalpy of vaporization (amount of heat required to boil water) is also significantly higher than enthalpy of fusion (amount of heat required to melt water), so yeah would be harder
I always figured nobody mist-bended outside of the painted lady because it was just useless. For water benders to freeze or evaporate water, I also assumed they were controlling the density of the water, not it's temperature
If we assume an average temperature of 20C for the water in non-polar places, the energy you need to take out of the water to freeze it is definitely way more than the energy you need to add to boil it, about 4 times more. so yeah, probably possible, just way harder, so no one ever tried, probably.
Earth kingdom not having a substantial navy could be a nod to the fact China (the clear inspiration for the earth kingdom) had a historically weak navy in the late renaissance early industrial era that roughly corresponds to the Avatar world's tech level. At one point the Ming dynasty had an entire fleet of ships get trashed by pirates with next to no resources!
Why would the people who bend earth want to be on water with no earth? I like your historical nod but also why would earth benders go where no earth is?
We actually get a good explanation for the mutant animals in Avatar. In Legend of Korra, we see that spirits are able to possess humans, and when they do it mutates the humans. I think these hybrid animals are just descendants of animals that got possessed by spirits.
I have a theory that not only did koh steal the blue spirit’s face but that this is actually part of love amongst the dragons because the mask hanging next to the blue spirit mask in the comic kinda looks like koh’s main face so it seems like koh would’ve been in the play as well.
The “Azula Chime” could be referred to as a “leitmotif”, a compositional technique found in opera where a certain musical theme or melody is associated with a character for storytelling purposes. Much like in the show, it could indicate the entrance of a character in a scene and even sets a particular atmosphere or tone.
@@knotationmusic her entire bell motif, actually, is the same as the one in the Blu Spirit's leitmotif. While the peculiar, distinct "ding" chime is much more subtle and not as ubiquitous, but can be found in some blue spirit scenes when he's scheming (it's usually much less loud and it's difficult to hear). At least, iirc.
My theory is that the blue Spirit is Zuko's repressed feelings, basically, and some of those are the desire to be like Azula, and that's why there are similarities between their themes (the blue colour, the bells, the scheming that being a dragon ninja requires...even the subconscious aspect of themselves that they both repress)
Very cool video, also the Toph is a liar one I really thought you were going to say that Toph just lies about being able to tell if others are lying, given how often she just doesn't call out some pretty important shit. And let's be honest, most of the lies she's "detected" were pretty obvious even without lie detection ability.
I know blindness is a bit of a spectrum so it's possible that because she keeps her eyes open she can see the presence of light and extremely blurry silhouettes if they have a bright light behind them. Enough to definitely be classified as totally blind, but just enough with seismic sense to function.
The "koh crossing over" theory is actually explained in the Kyoshi novels. There is a very old and powerful spirit named Father Glowworm that is able to bore holes between the worlds. Most of Kuruk's life was spent fighting dark spirits that came through those temporary spirit portals.
@@halorocksaz42 The avatar that (I think) came before Kiyoshi. He's in the show briefly when Aang communicates with previous avatars near the end of the show
@@halorocksaz42e water avatar who lost his loved one to Koh. You can briefly see him when Aang talks to him on the lionturtle in the second to last episode.
I love the retcon of Kuruk actually doing something useful that nobody knew about so in the eyes of the public he continues to be a "useless" Avatar like how he is remembered during the show's time
@@shinyagumon7015 the fact yangchen was venerated and he was deemed "useless" when it was yangchen's fault that the dark spirits went rough in the first place will always seem crazy to me, he even died young fixing her mess
20:40 Also Magneto didn't actually remove the iron from his blood, liquid metal was injected into the guard previously by Mystique specifically to give Magneto some metal to use to break out
Yeah wtf is "liquid metal". The only irl metals that melt anywhere close to a normal body temperature are either mercury, cesium(which blows up when in contact with water), or radioactive so that guard wouldn't be having a good time.
@@xtensioncordtv1969 Mystique seduced "Magneto's prison guard Mitchell Laurio and injected him with a suspension of iron particles. When Laurio returned for work the next day, the scanner did not pick up the metal inside his body and he was allowed to give Magneto his food. Magneto forcibly extracted the iron from Laurio's body, which killed him." A quote from the wiki. No idea what it is, probably doesn't exist, but that's comic book logic for you lol.
@@shimari5107 iron particles are 100% real they just couldn't be liquid when they were injected in the guard because the melting point of iron is 1500°C.
18:45 Another idea is that with dancing being very frowned upon alongside music in schools so few people pursue the arts that they didn't have someone who fit the role.
I remember the Ding very vividly, and always thinking it sounded super ominous, but I never connected that it was a sound directly tied to azula, probably helped to enhance her scenes
My take on Wan Shi Tong and his Library. Wan Shi Tong is able to travel between the Physical World and the spirit world. He probably saw that the humans were amassing knowledge, and though that he should do that too. so he built the Library in the spirit world with help from other spirits. He then moved the Library to the Physical World, which he can seemingly do since he brought it from the physical world to the spirit world. Another thing to back this theory up is he says: "I am taking my Knowledge back" as he is moving the Library back to the Spirit world. At one point, the library was probably sitting above ground since there is a picture/ blueprint of it, and he sunk it into the desert after humans abused his knowledge.
If anything, I would like to think it was Wan Shi Tong who inspired the humans to collect knowledge, not the other way around. It gives him more of that "ancient god of wisdom" vibes that I like about him. But my favorite theory about spirits is that they are embodiments of things and concepts- the Koy fishes and the moon/ocean, hay-bei and his forest, maybe Koh is the embodiment of losing one's identity- and they are born when whatever it is they embody comes to existence. So by that logic, Wan Shi Tong, who embody the concept of knowledge collecting, came to be as a result of humans collecting and hoarding knowledge. I do like the theory that Wan Shi Tong had a cult of followers who worked for him, maybe at some point they turn into the foxes spirits who serve him now, and the reason we only see 3 of them can be either because there are many of them around the world on some knowledge collecting expeditions, or that at some point a disaster wiped out most of the cult.
Btw he collecting the knowledge from the humans... so he might be an evil god like thing that he shows that he giving the knowledge to everyone however he is stealing it from people. The other question: he is the spirit of wisdom. What was he before the split of the 2 wordls? He might be a simple spirit, then when the humans spreaded on the earth, he come back to be a godlike thing to be praised by his knowledge and then they built the temple. Actually, if you want to share your knowledge, wouldn't you build a city around it or a university? He was hiding in the desert. And when he said he taking back the knowledge, he bring the knowledge what he collected from the humans... so it was a lie anyway And he did it because he is getting stronger and stronger by the knowledge. He literally said he knows all the waterbending styles because he learned it. And it also explains why he got soo mad when Zhao destroyed the fire stuffs. The other way is that he might be really a good boy and he moved to the desert because the people were doing the same as Zhao before as well. He moved to protect the humans from the knowledge. But there might be still some people who really want to learn so he left a little door open for those who sheeking for knowledge.
I've said this before, but the Pu On Tin being an Avatar sympathizer 100% make sense. In ancient times some roman emporers ordered the best play writes of the time to write epics glorifying them, but the poets secretly hated them so they created works just passable enough to be shown to them but still very negative for their image. The best example of this is probably the Anied, look up Overlysarcastic's vid on that it's good.
For the boiling water theory, what about the scene in book 3 where Katara creates a bunch of steam to cloud their ship? Wouldn't that be through boiling water ?
I think another point supporting Gyatso and the "best airbender in the world medallion" is that he mentored Aang. The other elders knew Aang was the avatar from a very young age and specifically chose Gyatso to mentor the young avatar more than likely knowing that he'd be insanely talented with airbending and need someone equally great to learn from.
17:01 Blue fire is what happens when enough oxygen is available for complete combustion, which creates enough energy to excite and ionize the gas molecules in the flame. So azula’s blue flame is to signify the fact that her bending has more energy than other fire benders. Yes, burning different chemicals causes different color flames, but that doesn’t make sense in this context. A prodigy having worked so hard to perfect their bending that their energy output is leagues higher than their peers makes more sense for this.
It's just a play on words. Her being "salty" is the slang term for being irrationally angry and sour over things. My only gripe with the theory is that salt causes more of a greenish glow, not a blue one.
That makes sense to me kind of but we don’t see anyone else using blue fire. Don’t get my wrong azula is very powerful but I don’t think her fire is the most energetic out of any bender ever. Especially during sozins comet I feel like some other firebenders like ozai would get blue fire if this is true
@@persephonehades7547 The 'salt' in salty is just table salt aka sodium chloride. Which burns an intense yellow color. Green flames would be from boric acid or copper sulphate (among others).
@@nickhenry7899 Depends. Maybe her strategy involves more heat based flames instead of making bigger flames if that makes sense. More quality over quantity techniques (smaller flames but more powerful)
I was surprised that you didn't include the one where the actress who played Aang in "The Ember Island Players" is supposed to be one of Ty Lee's 6 siblings.
No they’re identical to her. You can see in the comic titled sisters and she also says it on the beach. I guess it’s plausible she has other siblings who aren’t the septuplets though
I like the theory that extremely advanced bending grants some weird boosts to the body. air you can fly, water you can blood and spirit bend. some people theories earthbending can extend your own lifespan, many of the oldest characters we meet are earthbenders and Avatar Kyoshi is the avatar with the longest known lifespan at like 200 something years
I mean. Couldn't Tye lee's family be decentents from airnomads way before the war even started? As you stated, they are Nomats. Perhaps a few ended up setteling down in the firenation or had a fling or two before the war started. It doesn't have to have been after the war could have just as easily been before...though I do love the idea that one of the strongest families in the firenation had a history of protecting a people that was bein eraticated by their own country.
One thing I like about toph is that despite being blind, without fail almost every time she's the one who points out the obvious or is the one to find something important. So her tattoo comment felt perfectly in character to me, even if she can't see aang she has to at least know that his tattoos exist despite being blind either from people mentioning them or maybe they had a conversation about it at some point. So it's perfectly in character for her to be the one giving that bit of insight.
Yeah, I don't know where in the timeline everything lays, but I know they had to hide his tattoos a couple of times and made a big deal about it, toph would have remembered that.
The whole cabbage man gag is based on multiple vendors of such fruits and vegetables. The most that had some story was a man who sold vegetables and cabbage happen to be his best seller. And good cash crop, and thus the cabbage man is born.
12:32 well in Legend of Korra, Zaheer is able to use airbending to straight-up kill the Earth Queen via this method, so yes I'd say this is definitely possible.
Hi, chemistry major here! About that “Flame is blue because Azula is salty”. Different ions can colour the flame differently. For example: sodium makes yellow flame (try to burn some table salt. Actually on the second thought don’t try, just google it). The closest to Azula’s flame colour I know would be produced by burning some indium or selenium salts. The latter seems more probable to me as it is much easier to obtain. But what do I know? Overanalyzing Chemistry is starting soon, be sure to like and subscri… I am just kidding.
that and temperature, and what exactly is being burnt because ions are the easiest way, but there are other ways to achieve flame colours that are far less practical
The "Toph can see" might be true if you consider her "blindess" as her seeing everything extremely blurry, she can see Aang as a white blur with some blue spots and thats how she deduced he had tattoos. She saw the old men having white spots as white hair and beards. She never really closes her eyes because she can still perceive light. She can still perceive the world through her eyes but her impediment is so strong that she might as well be consdered blind.
@@reagansmith9509 Oh she knew Azula didn't look like that. The point is that Azula could tell a major lie without a change in her heartbeat, which meant she could fool Toph's lie detector.
Regarding the old men: Toph has had to rely on her sense of hearing for her entire life, so she probably has a good understanding of how old people' voices sound like. Still have no clue why she leaves eye holes in her earth armour, though.
@@RedNiel100 The eye hole was a miss during animation. This has been addressed in some interview/documentary I have watched. It was a few years ago and it was a small part of the whole so I have no idea how to find it again. The eye hole should have been a breathing hole. The instructions for the artists were along the lines of "a full body rock armour with a facehole".
I’ve used avatar as white noise to fall asleep for years now, after I found you a year or two ago I’ve used your videos as white noise for falling asleep. I’m not a patron subscriber but I guarantee I’ve given you more views than any other person😂 probably at least 100 per video by now
I think it’s perfectly reasonable that gyatso could suffocate all of the soldiers. We saw a similar feat on a smaller scale done to the earth queen in korra, and it feels like the simplest way that he could kill all of the soldiers with air bending
That was the weirdest thing with the video. Did the creator make it only strictly Avatar feats and actions only and just ignore Korra? Korra seems to make the Gyatso theory incredibly plausible.
One of my favorite theories is that heating yourself by breathing is actually an airbending technique that most firebenders straight up can't do. I think you've mentioned it at some point. Basically, on the Boiling Rock episode they use a fridge to punish firebenders that Zuko counters by heating himself up. Why would they design such a punishment if they knew firebenders could do that? Plus, Aang always seems unfazed by low temperatures. Maybe Iroh found some old Airbender scrolls and developed a firebending version of this technique, just like he was inspired by waterbending to create lightning redirection and taught it to Zuko
@@GiveMeTheRice yes and no. when zuko was infiltrating the north pole iroh said “don’t forget your breath” before zuko went swimming in freezing temperatures. the other thing is iroh said “did you wonder why they called me the dragon of the west?” and proceeded to bend fire with his mouth. captured firebenders never got gagged and most soldiers wore full face masks. the only time i can recall anyone firebending with their mouth is when azula got chained. you may be correct in the sense that they can’t bend in a freezer like that but zuko being able to breathe like that was definitely a more unique thing
I think that's because the Fridge is specifically designed to Sap a firebenders strength and everyone is dressed in light shirts and pants whereas at the North Pole Zuko was dressed warmly and probably had enough internal fire left over to keep himself going that way. You also see Zuko try to use his breath of fire to keep himself warm in the Fridge but it's very weak.
16:00 it might just be they were waiting for the avatar to grow up so they could actually tell if they were a water bender. I feel like it would be a lot easier to notice "oh hey, that person's water bending. They might be the avatar" rather than going "oh hey look, a kid. I'm going to kidnap them just to be safe"
For Gyatsu with the air nuke thing, what I think happened was, he formed a massive air bubble vacuum similar to what Zaheer did to the earth queen but on a more massive scale, and since it was so large it also killed Gyatsu, but it had to do had could encapsulate as many invaders as he could. And I think Gyatsu would be capable of doing it on a mass scale if we take into consideration him being the assumed best Airbender of the time, if the shared air sigil pendant between him and those Air Nomad Avatars mentioned is indicative of that.
My biggest gripe with the earth blood bending, and something I do wish you talked about, is the fact that Toph *isn't bending the metal*. She is bending the earth *inside* the metal. It is shown that she specifically, with seismic sense, saw the impurities left from metal working that were bendable. The metal in your body does not contain earth, as it is by and large *atomic*. There isn't just clumps of impure metal in people. Even the metal we do put in people today is usually very refined, and would be hardly bendable, if at all. We even see in Korra that there is metal that metalbenders can't affect because it is too purified. If earth blood bending fans can find clumps of dirt strewn throughout their body naturally, then I will change my stance.
My second best theory for earth body destruction is not through blood, but bone due to calcium. Calcium is a common mineral that could be bended and thus a earth bender might be able to snap bones...
On Gyatso's air nuke, his clothing is unburnt and, as you know, fire can't exist without an oxidizer. Also, maybe he bent air physically out of the room instead of destroying it, seems possible given the Earth Queen's death
As for people not being able to suffocate themself, vacuum is more fatal than just suffocation. It destroys your lungs if you hold your breath, and otherwise blinds you.
Love the videos! About the water benders and steam… what about when Katara makes that shelter a sauna? Wouldn’t you need decently warm steam for that to work not just moisture?
My little theory (warning involves a little bit of Korra)- lionturtles can move freely between realms. Aang WAS in the spirit world when he was with the lionturtle. He had his bending because the lionturtle could travel between the spirit and physical world while retaining a physical body, just like in Legend of Korra when they travel to the spirit world through the portal. This would explain why Nyla couldn't find Aang despite being able to smell something a continent away. Also in Legend of Korra it appears that the lionturtles are above spirits even Rava and Vatu considering Rava addressed the air lion turtle as "ancient one".
@@vaelophisnyx9873 they most likely formed the first bridge or even created the physical world but I’m pretty sure spirits and the spirit world is intemporal
@@luisandrade2254 Drawing on some of Avatar's real-world inspirations, it's highly likely that the lion-turtles were the first spirits and created both worlds, first as one unified plane like in Avatar Wan's time before the two were split from each other. The largest lion-turtle essentially IS the world, as all existence takes place upon its back.
I totally believe this can be true. Since the LionTurtles are depicted not only on Avatar but on Star Wars and other series (Digimon and Pokemon too, the list goes on and on). They are always depicted as overpower/gods or alikes.
However, the scent thing just doesn't make sense anyways there. Nyla should've been able to at least locate Aang's last location in the physical realm, especially because of how scent works. But then, of course, we are talking about a giant star-nosed mole who is able to run extremely quickly and who is able to smell a person from hundreds of miles away. Which that scent part would be physically impossible in and of itself.
Imagine every time an Airbender makes that orb of air around them that we see Aang make a million times. Now imagine instead of pulling air from around to make it, he pushes the air from inside the sphere out. That’s how you nuke a room with air bending, and is pretty much what Zaheer does in Korra but to a single person
That's what I was gonna say. If Zaheer can do something like that when he barely got airbending, an airbending master (and possibly the best Airbender of his time) should have no problem doing something of that caliber
@@maguc5906 while I do agree, zaheer could also fly which only one Airbender of legend supposedly ever achieved. He was already a master of airbending because he had mastered their meditation, martial arts, and philosophies before he received the ability. I mean dude wasn't even a bender and was considered a bigger physical threat than his combustion bending girlfriend, and lava bending/master water bender compatriots. He may have been a better Airbender than gyatsu the moment he became a bender.
@@imaferretmaster Zaheer only made a small vacuum, but that's more due to the fact that he only needed a small one to kill one person. There's no indication that size was his limit. Maybe he could vacuum a room if he wanted to. The gap between him and Gyatsu doesn't necessarily have to be huge for Gyatsu to pull an aoe vacuum off.
@@cmck362 oh no, im 100% sure that gyatsu could also do it, I just mean that to say, "if zaheer could do it, assumedly gyatsu could too" is not the best of arguments, as zaheer could do things gyatsu couldnt.
@@cmck362 either way, gyatsu took down hundreds of firebenders, and his body was I a meditative position, theres really no other explanation other than he was mortally wounded in the fight and just sat and waited to die.
Some of the logical hurdles OA presented in the Ty Lee is an airbender descendant theory are confirmed fact in the avatar universe. For instance, we don't have to theorize if some air nomads escaped the attack during Sozin's comet or not, since in the canon lost adventures comic: relics, Zhao confirms that some air nomads had to be hunted down and lured into traps later on. We also don't have to theorize whether or not the air nomads and the fire nation were close enough to each other for a half fire nation and half air nomad child or not, since in the canon legends rpg lorebook it details how the two nations became closer than ever before and constructed the fire and air center of learning, and how princess Zeisan and other fire nation nobles married air nomads, so it's not outside the real of possibility at all.
All nomads were born benders because of spiritual they were but then again the spiritual discipline could have been lost especially seeing how bumi (Aang's son) was born a non bender
The Ty Lee being descended from air nomads idea makes a lot of sense. The Fire Nation army attacks the air temples, okay. And none of them committed [ahem] war crimes? With such a massive army and a goal of complete and total genocide of the Air Nomads... Highly unlikely. It's likely that any Air Nomad descendants were in hiding before the Avatar returned... and forgot entirely about their heritage, possibly having no way of learning of any of it. Or, babies that could bend were put to death--after all, the Fire Nation was not above murdering infants.
@@onorebakasama all nomads were born benders due to their spirituality and connection to the spiritual although tenzin was never on his own daughters level but then again he was full of doubts and felt shackled by responsible ever since childhood tezin preached freedom but never felt truly free himself
@@dekeking9416 I know that. But if they aren't spiritual or the Air Nomad ethnicity is diluted enough, is it possible that they would not be benders? Hell, it doesn't even need to go too far down the line. Aang's [edit] *eldest* child, Bumi, wasn't a bender, after all.
@@onorebakasama bumi might of taken mostly off his mother remember katara was the only water bender within the southern tribe after decades and southerners lost a good deal of their spirituality and culture after fire nation raids and like sokka, bumi is the eldest and kaya was the middle child, tenzins actually the baby of the family but I see why you think he's the oldest he had a lot of responsibilities and was the most serious off the 3 like I said Aang put a lot of responsibility on tezins shoulders and spiritually and mentally
For the voidbending ability, it's implied it's a higher-level technique of what Zaheer used. The lei thing: Suki was carrying a flower that night when she bumped into Zuko and wasn't in the morning, hence she was "deflowered" i.e. lost virginity
