Avatar: The Last Airbender Episode 42 (The Headband) ReviewEpisode 42 I think broke the idea that book 3 would just be a bunch of hard hitting story, and really epic upon epicness. Which for better or worse, I think helped. It didn’t lose its heart in trying to be serious, which happens sometimes. But instead, this was probably the most enjoyable and funny episode in a long time. Plus on Zuko’s side, there was that more serious storytelling. And more of Azula being awesome, so that was nice. Zuko’s side can be told pretty quickly. Uncle isn’t talking to him when he visits him in jail, and Zuko is indecisive. Pretty much it. As for Aang and the others, it’s pretty simple. They land on enemy territory, blend in by getting new costumes (all of which look awesome by the way) and then Aang somehow gets thrown into fire nation school. And it shows Fire Nation culture. And the fire nation adults are assholes, creating future assholes. And there is that Breaking Bad theme of evil people are created, not born. And it shows that by showing these nice kids. They’re all really forced to be controlled, and communist like, and Aang is just trying to show them a new light. And there are also really funny moments of Aang in school. Especially when he needs two parents to show up, and Sokka and Katara dress up to play the part. Sorry, I found that hilarious. Sokka’s voice and look, it made that scene. Aang gets into a fight with this kid. And a lot of the time a character’s actions tell more about the character than what they say, or their obvious character traits. And usually for kids I think putting them in front of a bully is a good way to show the character through actions. And Aang just dodges his hits, and might as well pat him on the back and tell him to have a nice day. Then after that there’s the dance part scene, and it’s cheesy. But they pulled it off, and it’s not bad or anything. But it’s a little kids show like, which Avatar a lot of the time isn’t like that. But anyway, I love this episode, mostly for showing the kids of the fire nation. Normally every kid in the fire nation would have been a little asshole, but not in this. They showed so much depth by doing this. Anyway, on Zuko’s side, he hired Sparky Sparky Boom Man, but for now all we know is he’s a scary looking guy. Have to have some kind of cliff hanger, right? Anyway, the silent treatment with Iroh thing before, I thought that was a smart move. There was Mako’s death, and I don’t want to get into that that much, but for the story, Iroh being silent to Zuko is perfect for the character. I feel like that’s something he would do, and we also are unfocusing on Mako’s voice episode per episode. And you feel a lot of emotion that had been hidden before Zuko and Iroh’s scenes in this episode. Anyway, great episode, really nailed it on the head again, and added once again to the characters and the world.
Avatar: The Last Airbender Episode 42 (The Headband) gets a 4/5
