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Avatar: The Last Airbender, also known as Avatar: The Legend of Aang in some regions, is an American animated fantasy action television series created by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko and produced by Nickelodeon Animation Studio.
Animation Action Adventure. In a war-torn world of elemental powers, a young boy reawakens to undertake a dangerous mystic quest to fulfill his destiny as the Avatar, and bring peace to the world. Creators. Michael Dante DiMartino.
- (378K)
- 2005-02-21
- Animation, Action, Adventure
- 23
- Overview
- History
- Personality
- Abilities
- Appearances
- Trivia
Aang was an Air Nomad born in 12 BG and the Avatar during the Hundred Year War, succeeding Avatar Roku and preceding Avatar Korra. As the Avatar of his time, he was the only person capable of using all four bending arts: airbending, waterbending, earthbending, and firebending. He was also one of a select few Avatars and one of the first in many cycles to learn the ancient art of energybending as well as the first Avatar known to have actively used the technique.
Shortly before the beginning of the Hundred Year War, Aang was frozen in an iceberg for a hundred years; he later emerged, still biologically twelve years old, into a world engulfed by war. During his absence, the Fire Nation had waged war upon the other nations and managed to completely wipe out the pacifistic Air Nomads. It fell to Aang, the Avatar and the last airbender, to end the War by mastering the other three elements and defeating Fire Lord Ozai. He remained a kind and goofy kid at heart throughout his year-long struggle, despite the overwhelming loss of his people and the heavy burdens he was forced to bear. After his victory over the Phoenix King, Aang began a romantic relationship with his close friend, Katara. The couple eventually married and raised a family of three children: Bumi, the oldest, a nonbender who became an airbender later in life; Kya, a waterbender; and the youngest, Tenzin, an airbender.
Early life
Aang was born to two Air Nomads in 12 BG. After selecting the Avatar relics from among thousands of toys, thereby inadvertently confirming his identity as the Avatar, he was taken away by the monks of the Southern Air Temple, who kept his position a secret from him. As an Air Nomad, Aang traveled extensively around the world. During his childhood, Aang was housed, raised, and educated at the Southern Air Temple, under the guardianship of monk Gyatso, who served as his father figure, counselor, and tutor. After some time, he and several other young Air Nomad boys were taken to the Eastern Air Temple, where they each chose a sky bison as their lifelong companion. Aang approached his soon-to-be sky bison Appa and offered him an apple, which Appa accepted, thus marking the start of their deep and lifelong friendship. Aang was always able to excel at any new bending moves he learned; at the age of six, he was a better airbender than children twice his age, and by the age of ten, Aang had proven himself to be better than his own teachers. He earned airbending tattoos and the status of an airbending master by the age of twelve for exhibiting prodigious talent with his native element and with his invention of the air scooter, making him the youngest airbending master in Air Nomad history. In his childhood, Aang also visited the other air temples, as evidenced by his obvious familiarity with the Western Air Temple, as well as cities in the Earth Kingdom, such as Omashu, where he developed a lasting friendship with the good-natured but eccentric Bumi. He bonded closely with children in the Fire Nation, like Kuzon, with whom he went searching for a dragon in the mountains and saved a dragon egg from poachers. Due to the signs of a possible war approaching, Aang was told about his status as the Avatar at the age of twelve, four years earlier than the traditional age of sixteen. Aang felt burdened by his status as the other children refused to play with him anymore, and he came to spend more time practicing airbending with the monks. Monk Gyatso was the only one who showed an understanding of Aang's burden, having been good friends with Avatar Roku, Aang's past life, and tried to help ease Aang through the transition from childhood to adulthood by providing Aang with balance through fun during the upheaval in his life. However, Aang later discovered that he would be sent to the Eastern Air Temple in order to complete his airbending training far away from Monk Gyatso, whom the other monks thought was too soft on him. Afraid and confused, the young airbender ran away with his flying bison, Appa, though they became caught in a storm shortly after, which caused them to crash into the water. Aang saved himself and Appa from drowning by semi-consciously entering the Avatar State and freezing them both in a sphere of ice through a combination of airbending and waterbending. The Avatar State kept him alive, albeit not fully conscious, in the iceberg for about a hundred years while the war raged on.
Winter 99 AG
One hundred years later, Aang was found and freed from the iceberg by siblings Katara and Sokka of the Southern Water Tribe. He quickly befriended them and almost immediately attracted the attention of Prince Zuko, who sought to capture him on the command of his father, Fire Lord Ozai. A newly formed Team Avatar set out to find a waterbending master who could teach Katara and Aang, evading Zuko's attempts to capture them on their journey to the North Pole. While helping rid Senlin Village of Hei Bai, a spirit that was destroying their village, Aang crossed over to the Spirit World where he met Fang, the animal guide of his predecessor, Avatar Roku. He was instructed to visit the Avatar Temple on Crescent Island during the winter solstice so he could talk with Avatar Roku. Despite a confrontation with most of the Fire Sages, whose loyalty had turned from the Avatar to the Fire Lord, Aang managed to speak with Roku, who warned him about the impending arrival of Sozin's Comet, which would grant the Fire Nation enough power to win the war. Roku urged Aang to master the three remaining elements before summer's end when the comet was due to arrive, or no one would ever be able to restore balance to the world. When Aang was later captured by Admiral Zhao, Zuko came to his aid under the identity of the Blue Spirit, freeing the former so that he could capture the Avatar himself. Aang, Sokka, and Katara continued their travels to the Northern Water Tribe, while developing a tighter bond, as Aang began to develop a crush for Katara. Upon the group's arrival at the Northern Water Tribe, Aang was displeased to learn that the waterbending master, Pakku, would not teach Katara due to the law barring women learning combative waterbending, and was instead instructed to heal. However, she was able to change Pakku's mind, and they both began to learn from him. The period of calm was brief, as Zhao commanded an attack on the Northern Water Tribe with a large fleet of ships. At Princess Yue's suggestion, Aang decided to seek the guidance of the Ocean and Moon Spirits, patrons of the Northern Water Tribe. Aang learned through a spirit named Koh that the spirits existed in the mortal world, but his physical self had been captured by Zuko while he was in the Spirit World. Aang's friends managed to rescue him, but not before Zhao arrived at the Spirit Oasis and killed the Moon Spirit, who was the source of power for waterbenders. Determined not to fail the Water Tribe, Aang merged with the Ocean Spirit and proceeded to annihilate the Fire Nation ships, winning the battle and forcing them to retreat.
Spring 100 AG
Aang and his friends left the North on a ship with Pakku and several others before flying to an Earth Kingdom base, from where they were to be escorted to Omashu in order for Aang to learn earthbending from King Bumi. The trio decided to travel alone as the general commanding the fortress tried to force Aang into the Avatar State, causing chaos and destruction. Upon arriving at Omashu, they learned that the city had fallen to the Fire Nation. Seeking to save the king, Aang and his friends evacuated citizens from the city in order to aid the Omashu Resistance, but in the process, the governor's son Tom-Tom followed them out. Team Avatar was sent a messenger hawk reporting that the governor would trade the king for his son, but Princess Azula reneged on the deal, leading to a skirmish between the Avatar and princess's allies. While he managed to find Bumi, the king told Aang that he would not leave Omashu, and encouraged him to find a master who embodied the principles of neutral jing. Before leaving Omashu on this quest, the team returned Tom-Tom. While in the city of Gaoling, they heard about and attended a tournament that supposedly featured the best earthbenders in the world, hoping to find an earthbending teacher for Aang. At the end of the tournament, they witnessed the final fight between one of the popular contestants and the current champion, a blind girl. During the match, Aang realized the girl was the same one he had received a vision of while lost in the Foggy Swamp and noticed her technique of waiting and listening before attacking, easily defeating her opponent. The ringmaster offered a sack of gold pieces to anyone who dared to face the Blind Bandit. Aang accepted the challenge in order to talk to the girl, but she ignored him after he caught her off guard by deflecting her attack with airbending. The group learned that the girl belonged to the Beifong family and visited their estate, posing as a formal visit by the Avatar. However, he learned that the earthbender, a blind girl named Toph, was hiding her true abilities from her family. When she and Aang were kidnapped, Toph managed to fight off all the attackers, revealing her skill to her parents, and ran away from home in order to join Aang's group. Due to earth being the elemental opposite of air, Aang struggled to learn earthbending, but within the first day of training, he managed to stand his ground and successfully earthbend. Soon after, Team Avatar was separated during a Fire Nation ambush. As they were searching for Katara, Aang, Toph, and Sokka captured a Fire Nation soldier. Aang was left disturbed by this encounter, as the young man frantically believed the Air Nomads to be evil. Team Avatar was soon reunited with the aid of Jiang's pirates. While taking a brief vacation to Misty Palms Oasis, the group was led to Wan Shi Tong's library in the middle of the Si Wong Desert and learned valuable information on a solar eclipse that would leave the firebenders powerless. After emerging from the library, they discovered that they had lost Appa, who had been captured and sold by desert tribesmen. After meeting the kidnappers and learning of Appa's fate, an enraged Aang entered the Avatar State and destroyed the tribes' sand-sailers. In spite Appa's absence, the group aimed to travel to Ba Sing Se and inform the Earth King in order to plan an invasion of the Fire Nation. After finding their way out of the desert and crossing the Serpent's Pass, the group discovered a giant Fire Nation drill trying to penetrate the Outer Wall of Ba Sing Se. General Sung was reluctant at first to accept the group's help, but after witnessing the quick defeat of his Terra Team at the hands of Ty Lee and Mai, he gladly accepted the Avatar's assistance. In a joint effort, the group managed to defeat Azula's team and destroy the drill. Upon reaching Ba Sing Se, Aang discovered that the city was the site of a conspiracy; true power did not lie with the Earth King, but with Grand Secretariat Long Feng, who controlled the Dai Li, Ba Sing Se's secret police. The group learned of and infiltrated Long Feng's secret base in Lake Laogai, believing that he was holding Appa captive. After reuniting with the sky bison, they stormed the palace and informed Earth King Kuei of Long Feng's betrayal. After convincing the king to arrest Long Feng and plan for an invasion on the day of the eclipse, the king's men searched Long Feng's office and found a message for Aang from Guru Pathik that had been tied to Appa's horn. The message was a request for Aang to meet the guru at the Eastern Air Temple and learn to control the Avatar State. After journeying to the temple, Pathik helped Aang open all his chakras but one, the Thought Chakra, as he refused to let go of his connection to Katara after receiving a vision of her in danger. Aang reunited with Sokka and Toph on the journey back to the city, and learned that Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee had infiltrated the city. After reuniting with Katara in the Crystal Catacombs, the pair began to fight both Zuko and Katara, before the arrival of the Dai Li, who had turned to the side of the Fire Nation princess. Aang successfully entered the Avatar State, but was struck with a lightning bolt fired by Azula. The severe attack rendered his seventh chakra impossible to re-open and mortally wounded him while he was in the Avatar State, severing the connection of the Avatar Spirit to the world and threatening the end of the Avatar Cycle. Katara caught Aang while he fell to the ground, being able to escape thanks to Iroh's unexpected intervention. While escaping the city on Appa, Katara used water from the Spirit Oasis to revive him, restoring the Avatar Spirit in turn, but he still remained grievously injured.
Aang was fun-loving, somewhat naive, and adventurous with a sense of humor. He possessed deep respect for life and freedom, refused to eat meat, and was often reluctant to fight in his younger years. He craved the stimulation of new people and places. His frequent off-course detours frustrated both allies and pursuers alike. He typically wished to forget his duties as the Avatar and would long for the normality that others possessed. Yet Aang had always prided himself on a complex social network of friends extending over all four nations, and war did not stand in his way. In addition, he looked forward to playing with all the exotic fauna in each place he visited. Whether it was otter penguins, hopping llamas, hog monkeys, or giant koi fish, no fit animal Aang saw went un-ridden.
Within this carefree exterior, however, Aang hid a great deal of guilt and a heavy mental burden in his duties as Avatar. As the reluctant hero, he wished he had been there to help his people a century earlier. This initially caused him to conceal his true identity from friends, and he still had a tendency to slack off in his studies of the bending arts, even though he naturally excelled at them. He also tended to become distressed when he saw the destruction caused by the Hundred Year War, believing that as the Avatar, it was his job to prevent such events from happening. Eventually, Aang decided to stop dwelling on the past; however, on several occasions, his desire to end the War caused him to take desperate action such as attempting to induce the Avatar State or facing Fire Lord Ozai before he had fully mastered the elements.
Being the last airbender and having no living peers, with the exception of the aged King Bumi and Guru Pathik, Aang developed strong bonds with his friends, particularly Katara, explained by Guru Pathik as a reincarnation of his love for his people. His desire to protect them, however, led to violent emotional outbursts when they were threatened, and he even resorted to deceiving and hurting others to keep the group together, such as when he heard that Katara and Sokka might leave the group to visit their father; he hid the map to their father's whereabouts and lied about ever having it in the first place.
Aang preferred not to use his bending skill in battle due to his peaceful nature. He preferred to solve problems non-violently. Even when forced into combat, Aang typically held back, fighting defensively and trying to subdue opponents without seriously hurting them, even if they were not human. This attitude was apparently common among all airbenders, who were all vegetarians and taught that all living things are precious. The only exception to Aang's pacifism was when his friends were threatened, in which case, he could become angry and attack his opponents, sometimes even entering the Avatar State.
Events in the Earth Kingdom, however, began to take a toll on his carefree personality. Aang's attitude changed dramatically when Appa was captured. He became visibly enraged and hostile, particularly toward Toph, who had kept Appa company while they were gone. Despite attempts by Katara to calm Aang down, his anger continued to grow until finally, he flew off to search for Appa alone. Eventually, Aang returned to the group, but he was still visibly upset. He violated the principles of airbending when Momo was snatched by a buzzard wasp. He gave chase and rescued Momo but unnecessarily struck it down with powerful airbending. After Aang returned with Momo, the group was confronted by the sandbenders who had taken Appa. When one of the sandbenders, Ghashiun, revealed that they had sold the bison, Aang lashed out and destroyed all their sand-sailers in a matter of moments using his airbending. He turned his sights on the sandbenders and entered the Avatar State upon hearing that Ghashiun had muzzled Appa. Aang's rage was only stopped when Katara grabbed hold of him and held him in an embrace until he finally calmed down and returned to his normal state. Shortly after these events, Aang forsook all hope, choosing not to care at all in order to refrain from lashing out in anger and be hurt. The birth of the baby Hope lifted his spirits once again.
After failing in Ba Sing Se, Aang began to feel angry and upset with himself. He felt an urge to redeem himself and refused to let the others fight and be injured in the invasion due to "his mistake". Driven by a desire for redemption, he fled the ship on which the team was traveling, but the spirits of Yue and Roku allowed Aang to see that his mistakes were not his fault and encouraged him to let others help him. He returned to his lighter attitude soon after.
Bending
As a reincarnation of the entity known as the Avatar, Aang possessed the power to bend all four elements, making him the most powerful bender of his time. Though Avatar Roku said mastering the elements could take many years, Aang was able to learn all four with considerable skill in less than a year, though technically, he did not completely master all four as stated by Zuko and Toph. As a result of his unconventional training, Aang never demonstrated most of the special subsets of the bending arts. However, he did display the abilities of lightning redirection and seismic sense, making him the first Avatar known to have learned these abilities. Most Avatars were not told of their status until they were sixteen years of age, but Aang had become a fully realized Avatar while he was still only biologically twelve years old. Thus, he became the youngest known Avatar to do so. As he was chronologically 112 years old, Aang also has the distinction of taking the longest to achieve this status.
Avatar Spirit
As the Avatar, Aang was able to contact his past lives to seek advice and guidance. Being the immediate predecessor of Aang, Roku most often came to the young airbender's aid. For example, it was Roku who warned Aang about the impending return of Sozin's Comet and manifested through the young Air Nomad in order to defeat a group of firebenders awaiting the Avatar's appearance. After receiving a letter from Guru Pathik, Aang journeyed to the Eastern Air Temple to learn to control the Avatar State. Guru Pathik revealed that the secret is laid in the unlocking of seven chakras. Aang had little trouble with the first six but struggled with the seventh — earthly attachments, mainly being Aang's attachment to Katara. Aang initially abandoned his training after receiving a vision of Katara in dire need of help but later began to open the seventh and final chakra successfully and entered the Avatar State. However, moments after entering the Avatar State, the process was interrupted when he was struck with lightning from behind by Azula, killing him and the Avatar Spirit itself, though, after their escape, Katara was able to use the special water from the Spirit Oasis to revive him. Nonetheless, Aang's connection to his previous lives was severely damaged by this and, while in a coma, he undertook a journey to the Spirit World, where he met and reconnected with the four Avatars preceding him. While he succeeded in healing the Avatar Spirit, his physical injuries prevented him from accessing the Avatar State and connecting with his past lives. As his body healed, he managed to reconnect with them, though it was only when Ozai violently shoved him against a protruding rock, which unleashed the energy block in his back, that the connection was fully restored. Later, however, feeling that Roku's advice about the state of the world was no longer relevant, Aang deliberately severed his connection to his past self. This caused an unintentional severing of his connection to all his past lives before Roku, except in certain situations, such as special rituals. Later, Aang was able to restore his connection to Roku and all the past Avatars by recrafting the fire pendant on his meditation beads.
Medium
As the carrier of the Avatar Spirit, Aang also had the capacity to act as a medium, a bridge between the mortal world and the Spirit World.[101] Even while still a young child, Aang demonstrated a natural affinity to the spiritual arts. Through meditation, Aang could separate from his body and travel to the Spirit World and, with the help of a spirit, his astral form could also visit the physical world's astral plane. Once in the Spirit World, Aang could travel freely and communicate with beings such as Koh the Face Stealer. This position as an intermediary also allowed him to connect with other spirits while in the Avatar State; he combined with the Ocean Spirit to defeat the Fire Nation during the siege of the North Pole, and had also channeled his past lives, namely Roku and Kyoshi.[102]
Avatar: The Last Airbender Graphic novels
•The Promise trilogy •The Search trilogy •The Rift trilogy •Smoke and Shadow trilogy •North and South Part One (flashback, no lines) •••Imbalance trilogy •
•Chronologically, Aang has the second-longest lifespan of any known Avatar, dying 165 years after his birth; he is beaten by Kyoshi, who lived to the age of 230.
•Since Avatar Roku was the maternal great-grandfather of Zuko, Azula, and Kiyi, and was the previous Avatar, Aang, Zuko, Azula, and Kiyi were all spiritually related. Also, since Roku was Ursa's grandfather, Aang was also spiritually related to Ursa.
•Aang is written 安昂 in Chinese, meaning "peaceful soaring".
•Aang's stature and bodily proportions were inspired conceptually by the forms and Gung Fu movements of a young boy named Arjuna.[103] Photographed for reference by Bryan Konietzko at age six, Arjuna's contribution was one of the early collaborations between the Avatar team and Sifu Kisu, Arjuna being Kisu's son.[104]
•Though Bryan Konietzko did not design Aang's shaved, bald head with his fellow co-creator, Michael Dante DiMartino, in mind, he did base Aang's beard as an adult off of DiMartino's.[105]
•After Aang was shot in the back with Azula's lightning, he had two scars: one on his back where the lightning entered his body and the other on the sole of his left foot where the lightning left his body.
Avatar: The Last Airbender, also known as Avatar: The Legend of Aang in some PAL regions, is an Emmy award-winning American animated television series that aired for three seasons on Nickelodeon and the Nicktoons Network.
Avatar Aang (Chinese: 安昂; pinyin: Ān Áng), or simply Aang, is the titular protagonist of Nickelodeon's animated television series Avatar: The Last Airbender (created by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko), voiced by Zach Tyler Eisen.
With Gordon Cormier, Kiawentiio, Ian Ousley, Dallas Liu. A young boy known as the Avatar must master the four elemental powers to save the world, and fight against an enemy bent on stopping him.
Jul 1, 2010 · A film based on the animated TV show Avatar: The Last Airbender, directed by M. Night Shyamalan and starring Noah Ringer as Aang, the young Avatar who can master all four elements. The movie follows Aang's journey with his friends Katara and Sokka to stop the Fire Nation from enslaving the world.
