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[jareth_chong]

Has anyone heard or seen a new cartoon series Avatar: The Last Airbender? I know I am too old for cartoons, and I really do not watch them. However, I was surfing the TV channels on Saturday, and I could not force myself to change the channel when I stumbled upon Avatar. It has an awesome premise. The writing, animation, coloration, martial art scenes and soundtracks (yes, soundtracks) are all top-notch. Here is the premise:

Avatar: The Last Airbender

A long time ago, four nations live in harmony: Water Tribes, Earth Kingdom, Fire Nation, and Air Nomads. Within each nation, there is an order of "benders" who, through the mastery of their heredity talent, can manipulate their native element and bend it to their will. Bending is a combined form of martial art and elemental magic.

In every generation, only a single person is solely capable of bending all four elements. That person is the Avatar. The Avatar is the manifest of the world's spirit and essence. Every 100 years, the Avatar reincarnates into the next nation and begins a new cycle. Starting with the mastery of his or her native element, the Avatar then learns to master each of the other three elements. Throughout the ages, the Avatars have served to keep the four nations--especially the stronger, more aggressive Fire Nation--in check.

Then, one hundred years ago, the Avatar vanished. In absence of an Avatar incarnation, the ruthless Fire Nation started waging a war of conquest on other nations. The Air Nomads were conquered, the Air Temples ravished, and all Airbending monks exterminated. The Water Tribes were raided and driven to the brink of extinction. The Earth Kingdom remains and fights a hopeless war against the Fire Nation. A hundred years have passed since the Avatar mysteriously disappeared, and the Fire Nation is near a final victory. Many believe the Avatar was never reborn into the Air Nomads, and the cycle was broken forever.

In the frozen desolated South Pole, a lone Water tribe struggles to survive. It is here that the village's young and last Waterbender Katara and her warrior brother Sokka rescued a strange 12-year-old boy named Aang who had been suspended in hibernation in a cavernous iceberg. The tribe soon discovered that Aang is not only an Airbender--the elemental race no one had seen in a century--but also the long lost Avatar. Now Katara and Sokka must safeguard the child Avatar in his journey northward to master all four elements, stop the Fire Nation and save the world.

TV Tome | Animation Insider | Nickelodeon | Cineme

I found a short trailer at the official website, here.

The series is very strangely being aired on Nickelodeon, though it seems to be geared towards audiences much older than the usual Nickelodeon viewers. So far, this one seems to have strong continuity from episode to episode, and the beginning of every episode is marked with "Book X Chapter Y" (i.e., the "X" is "'Water" for this season,) which is very unusual for an episodic cartoon series. I think this series has just started about two months ago, and I have been very impressed so far.

The writing and character development (*gasp!*) are just unusually high for a cartoon series. An example: I was surpised by the multi-dimensional development of the main "bad guy", who was gradually revealed to be honorable but bitter because he had been disgraced and forced into exile, so his objective of capturing the Avatar was largely driven by an obsession to redeem his name. In an episode near the end, he was forced to choose between following the Avatar's trail (which pretty much drove his entire existence) and turning away to rescue his uncle/mentor and only friend, he pondered hard for a while and choose to save his uncle. I think I had never seen that in a cartoon villian before.

I think the series probably will not last on Nickelodeon, though.