Television Without ... Permission

So now the fireballs are going over the ice wall and into the city to hit private residences. Oops, kids' show, lets pan away from that and back to the (looked this up) Spirit Oasis. Katara is still being miserable that she lost Aang in that very-fair fight earlier; Sokka seems to think that 'you did everything you could' is a comforting thing to hear in this circumstance. Well, he gets better - points out that Zuko can't have made it so far they won't be able to catch him - you know, phenomenon of flight? Cool. So the Water Tribe trio take off - leaving Momo, perhaps unwisely, to wait for Aang with those tasty, tasty fish. Oh, those poor fishes.

Zuko's trudging is leaving a seriously obvious path; Aang, on his back, is in the Orange Spirit State or whatever, and runs up to the first being-entity he sees - a meditating monkey of some sort. It wants him to leave him alone so it can meditate - hey, Aang, remind you of anything? - so it takes advantage of his ADD and points out a glowy thing (Tinkerbelle?!) as it passes. Aang chases it to a pond, where he falls ... and then sees Roku in lieu of his reflection. Weird, but useful.

Meanwhile, Zuko's trudging has apparently taken him onto a frozen-over lake (hey, yeah, remember all those water-filled caverns you were swimming through?) and he tries to outrun the breakage.Success also brings him to a more rock-type cave; he takes this opportunity to warm up, and to tie up the Avatar. You know, can't be too careful ... heh.

Aang cuts to the chase with Roku - he wants the water and moon spirits now! Roku hints at some metaphysics here - spirits with an active presence in the physical world have, er, imported themselves at various times in history, apparently; the moon and the ocean were early adopters, and the Avatar is not old enough to remember it. Ooh, AtlA world can has evolutionary history? But he does know someone who is old enough - guy named Koh. Really dangerous. Likes to steal ... faces. (Hey, everybody needs a hobby.) He can only do that if you show emotion, though - no problem, I'm sure, for our stoic young hero!

The WTT are in the middle of nowhere - what, stopping for a snack? - no, checking out a mini-canyon, maybe where Zuko & unconscious Aang busted up the ice. Does not look promising to a crew who wanted to find the latter of the two alive, does it?

At least Zuko has a captive audience for his complaints. There's always something in the way of his success - in this case, a blizzard - while people like the Avatar get to skate through life on innate talent and/or luck. Also, his dad says he was lucky to be born - I thought this might be a reference to The Old Man and the Sea, but if Zuko'd been unlucky enough to have that assigned in high school I imagine we'd be hearing about that, too. Well, anyway, what hasn't killed him made him stronger, and now that he's found the bright side - oh, no. This really could be the end of the fictional world!

Does look a bit like that outside - fighting in the streets, more catapulting of fire, guys on cool beasts of burden, water attacks from the inner walls, tanks that shoot grappling-hook chains into said walls - no, through said walls. They tug, and down it goes...

Iroh just wants to remind Zhao of the moon problem (exacerbated when it's full, by the way) - they'd better wrap this baby up before it rises. Zhao tells him not to worry his pretty little head - today, he says, he will 'remove the moon' from its ::ahem:: established system of equilibrium with the earth? Oh Zhao, you so crazy.

Iroh's remonstrations on this point are interrupted by a shouting mook - no, wait, a shout of 'Admiral Choi' - yep, it's Hahn. Storming in to heroic trumpets, he runs to attack Zhao, Zhao just kicks him overboard. And ... that's that? Didn't Hahn bring any of the Lipstick Foreheads with him? Oh, Hahn. You'll be in our hearts.

Anyway, Zhao says, the moon spirit has a mortal form - and he knows who it is. (In fact, he knows who the ocean is, too - New Mars, here we come!) He knows where the moon lives - and it's goin' dowwwn. Iroh, uh, thinks this is a very bad idea; Zhao retorts that this is another case of Iroh's bad experiences not having anything to do with his destiny as a character - and besides, if the spirits didn't want to die, they shouldn't have taken mortal forms in the first place. Yeah, he basically says it: bitches had it coming. Oh Zhao, you so malevolent.

Aang apparently got some directions to where Koh lives, so he's prowling around a very barren mountain. Looks like Moab, let's say. He gets a little spooked by a .. baboon? Chimp? not up on my primates, here, but he seems to recognise it as a 'curly-tailed bluenose' and feel better about the situation. Until .. it turns around to show that Aang's comment about its nose was really, really unapplicable. Spooky. He remembers Roku's words, and repeats them back - with their voices layered - so that this viewer at least is a little creeped out despite being told to 'show no fear.' Show's creeped out, too; commercial break steals its face!

Koh lives in a giant, hollowed-out tree - a termite spirit? Hmm, nope - I think not, anyway - looks more like a geisha-centipede. Wow. Koh is very welcoming at first, until he gets insulted that Aang doesn't remember their past together (ooh la la). One of the past avatars tried to kill Koh, I guess - and by the way, Koh is changing faces pretty much every other line. The attempted murder thing was revenge (?), because Koh stole that avatar's lover's face. (Iif I had come to this episode with no information on later seasons, I wouldn't be able to say anything about who the face Koh wears at that point looks like. Sigh. For now, let's keep the lie going, but I have to remember to mention this later.)

Koh cackles, and shows off his latest blue-nosed acquisition. (You know what they say about the colour of a face-stealer's nose...) But he plays nice for a bit, in his creepy way. At the cave, this seems to startle Aang's de-spirited body; wakes Zuko up from a nap, possibly saving his life (boo, Aang's body!)

Back on the bison (never say die), Yue tries to be reassuring - 'they can't have gotten far in this weather.' Katara calls her on how blizzards sometimes restrict people's movement by, yo, killing them. Pshaw, Sokka says - Zuko's determination is like a life preserver for both of them. Uh, let's move on.

Back to negotiations with Koh (who would, by the way, be a fine announcer for any smooth jazz station if he ever gets tired of stealing faces); he smooothly reports that the spirits Aang is looking for are called Tui and La ('Push and Pull' - thanks, Automatic Translator Koh!) because that's how they roll, kid. Aang says he wants them to help him save a culture - Koh jumps back in his face to shout that they're the ones in danger, not him. And .. is that the Blue Spirit he's wearing there? Totally clashes with your neck, Koh.

Anyway, Koh goes on, Aang has already met the spirits he needs - and he doesn't want to be too quick or helpful about it, but he throws a bunch of opposing forces and duality metaphors Aang's way until he hits on the winner - yin and yang. Clang, clang, went Aang's brain - it's like the fish! (The ones they left alone with Momo. Nooo!) In his excitement, he almost loses his face to Koh - back in B.S. face - but calms down in time to say goodbye. Koh looks slightly sad; also, he puts on a new face which has ... mutton chops. My god, they're everywhere.

Aang runs outside, and pitches a report to ... another Roku-reflection, this one on the ground. (In the mist?) While he was risking his face, Roku found him some transport - Hei-bai, the formerly mutant panda. Uh, weird.

Chaos (tank-based chaos!) continues to reign in the streets of the NWT, but it's getting a little dusk-y out there... you might say the waterbenders are about to turn the tide of the invasion. They might then do to you what Pakku does to some of the tanks - throw you around, slice you up with ice, the like. Snow tornadoes, snow-waves - these are the perils Zhao faces for not dealing with the moon problem earlier. He tells his companion-mook they're off to a 'special location' to 'go fishing.' Were I that mook, I would be a little nervous.

Hei-bai has returned Aang to the torii gate in the Spirit World that I freekin failed to notice again parallels the one in the oasis. Hei-bai blows light at him to help him through the Portal to the Mortal... world, then takes on his Eva-panda form to dose the cranky ape when it makes a cranky comment.

So Aang's spirit is back - to where his body isn't. Whoops. He takes to the air to find it; the WTT spot his glowy soul en route, and take off after it. So Aang gets back to being the embodiment of tied-up-good; has a bit of ironic dialogue, then blows Zuko into a wall (do not think about that sentence) and propels himself out of the shelter. Push and pull ... he tries to caterpillar his way across the snow, but Zuko runs out and grabs him (again with the collar, dude), telling him his ploy wasn't enough.

Zuko has not learned about tempting fate yet, has he? Along come the WTT on Appa, ready for a joyful reunion (and in one case, another duel lightly sprinkled with overblown dialogue). Er, make that attempt at a duel - moon good for waterbending and all of that, it takes Katara all of three moves to knock Zuko unconscous. (Yes, I counted. It wasn't that hard.) Now they need to get back to the Spirit Oasis - but, wait. Aang can't just leave Zuko for dead in all that snow. (One other character questions this reasoning; the other two, I'm pretty sure, are just thinking it.) So he jumps off of Appa, drags Zuko out of the snow, and brings the antagonist along. Sokka knows that pointing out the madness of this hoary heroic trope ('let's bring the guy who's constantly trying to kill us!') won't save any lives, but at least his spleen is happier.

The happy fish are happily swimming - okay, Momo fans, I'm sorry for what I said - and Zhao reaches in and bags them up with a smile. They'll be such great prizes at his kid's school carnival!

Um, apparently the moon's light turns red when it's in danger. Let's call that artistic license, and move on to the pathetic failure waterbending has turned into now that the moon is .. uh, in the bag. Seeing them fail at least gives heart/spiritual energy/whatever to the invading firebenders; boom, boom.

The red light is also aggravating Yue - she gettin' dizzy up there. Aang, too - it's a spirits thing. I ... am again wondering about Yue's socialisation here, because rather than asking for elaboration on that she launches into the story of how the moon spirit saved her life when she was a baby. It's, uh, sad, and I-the-viewer can be rather sure it's relevant, but ... wouldn't this be an odd time to bring it up?

So now that that's cleared up (or spilled out), it's back to Zhao's little team so that we can hear - guess - Zhao talking about how he will make history! He'll be a legend! He darkened the moon - one small step for Zhao, one giant trauma for astronomy! Think I'm overstating this? NO. 'They will call me Zhao the moon-slayer!' Zhao, you are SO over-the-top. But not in a good way.

Momo won't put up with this bragging from the ass who stole his dinner, and latches on to Zhao's mutton-chops. Just a little distraction so Appa and the kids can land; wow, Momo may have been useful. Unintentionally useful, but still... anyway, they're on the ground and poised to attack. Before it comes to blows, though, Aang does the Avatar thing and tries pleading. (Dignified enough pleading, but that's what it is.) Zhao's on about how destroying the moon is his destiny (has he really been thinking about it so long?), and Aang's countering with the Very Good Fact that destroying the moon will cause a lot of problems. It'll throw things out of balance (quite literally) and unleash chaos (probably of the kills-all-humans sort).

At this point, I would like to direct everyone to a very important book. It's called What If the Moon Didn't Exist?, and it's very good. Also worth taking into consideration should you ever find yourself believing that your destiny involves dramatic renovation of the Earth's celestial neighbourhood.

So Aang may have been catching Zhao's interest with his 'the moon is necessary' spiel, but we'll never know - because at this point, Iroh shows up to to make the same point. Zhao decides that his saying so is treason - and Iroh doesn't really try to change his mind before he flips out and threatens Zhao with ten times the punishment the fish gets.

Though... Zhao looks thoughtful for a moment. He falls to his knees by the water of the oasis; in the bloody red light, he opens the bag and releases the moon-fish (Tui? I think) into the water. As the moon regains its peach glow, Zhao loses his shit again and blasts the fish (both? Nah, probably just Tui; he is a navy officer) into boiled fillets.

Yeah, peach glow is totally gone, this time. Oh Zhao, you so crazy. Did anyone ever mention that?

So the world turns black and white, except - in spurts - for the part of it around Iroh. He starts on his tenfold punishment, and gets about 30% before Zhao's mookbuddies try to hold him off. Zhao, being the bold legend he is, takes this opportunity to slip out of the oasis. By the time the mooks are defeated lumps around Iroh, he's not the only one: Zuko's bashed-up self is no longer unconscious on Appa's saddle.

Nobody notices, what with the dead moon-spirit-fish and the threat of darkness and gravitational irregularities and a future of hyper-rotation ... ahem. La is trying to keep the roundswim going around Tui's omega-3-filled corpse, until Iroh pulls out of the water. Yue states the obvious, if vaguely - 'It's all over' - and apparently these are some kind of magic words, inspiring Aang to jump into the Avatar state. He walks into the little fish pond, looks La in the eyes - kinda - and sinks into the water, sending a blue light out into the water and the water, in turn, out to the city. Aang reemgerges as La - Bigger and Glowier!

As random tribesmen genuflect and prostrate, Giant Laang begins a watery vengeance. He sweeps FN minions to their possible deaths (but he couldn't leave Zuko to die... sorry), and when they try to fire back, he raises the ante and hits their tanks, too. They start running in very, very earnest earnestness.

Zhao is waay ahead of them - but not of everyone, apparently, as fire flies at him out of nowhere. He turns on his assailant, and - hey, Aang did have to leave Zuko alive. After all, Zhao kinda tried to kill him - and loyalty to nation or not, that's kinda hard to forgive. Or so I hear. Zhao's playin' the treason card again - and also the 'you're not me, so you're not supposed to pursue your ambitions! Disgraceful!' card. And they fight fire with fire. I hope this doesn't happen too much in the future - that pun isn't even funny in its badness - fortunately, we're cutting back to the corpse-of-Tui story now.

Sad, that. Iroh looks up from said fillet, though, long enough to see Yue and ... somehow know that the moon spirit touched her life? Um, okay, show? We need to have a little talk. That random flashback-story she presented earlier? Should go here. Thematically, and logically (if the absence of the moon hasn't triggered gravitational catastrophe yet, you can get away with a few more minutes!), and ... also to avoid making Iroh that improbably all-knowing. Okay? Do better next time.

Yue gets the point, though - the moon spirit saved her life, so maybe she can return the favour. Uh, it's spirit rules!

So Yue puts her hands on the dead fish in Iroh's hands and ... commits glowy suicide to resurrect the moon.

Can I just repeat here? Cartoon teenager commits glowy suicide. To save the moon.

I mean, it's a cool story element, but ... hello.

And now Sokka will go off to cry and write 'How To Save a Life,' but first we need to get back to Laang. He's swept the city now, and starts attacking the fleet in the harbour. Apparently his glowyness has laser-like properties - it cuts through the metal ships' towers like they're nothing. (Well, the sound effect is more sword-meeting-sword than laser-cutting-anything ... though now that I think about it, high-speed water can be quite cutting, too, can't it?) Whatever. He pitches them all out on a final glowy wave, and approaches menacingly to END them.

Meanwhile, in Sokka's arms: Yue's body disappears. Next thing, Tui's corpse starts glowing in Iroh's hands. He releases it into the pond; and a less-opaque version of Yue slithers out to say goodbye and kiss Sokka (a: just seems like that would feel weird as hell. b: I guess it's not so wrong if you're not corporeal), takes to the sky, and restores a certain degree of colour to the animation by becoming the new physical moon.

Laang, surveying his victory, appears to be tired. The glowy outer shell dissolves, and the little kid that remains looks tired enough to fall from the cliff he's standing of. well, if anyone's to have no fear of heights...

In the midst of the firefight, it takes Zhao a while to notice that the moon is back - and he's gonna be in trouble, ey La, ey Tui? It can't be! he cries. Yeah, and the water can't be sweeping onto the bridge they were fighting on to grab him and drown his moonslaying ass. Zuko - mostly seems surprised that it didn't get him, at first, but when he cottons on he jumps up to offer a hand to Zhao.

Please allow me to bang my forehead.

He's a little too slow, though - oh, and remember Zhao's ego? Yeah, he won't accept that kind of charity - and so he's sucked down into the cool, soothing water as Zuko watches helplessly (unhelpfully?) from the bridge.

Oh Zhao, he thinks. You so dead.

Dawn breaks over the massive devastation so we can close out this episode. Pakku - who probably felt a bit neglected in this episode - announces his intention to take a group to the South Pole to help them rebuild. Uh, all of this said in front of a rather busted-up icewall ... sure, I imagine repairs to that architecture could go fast, but it's still an odd, odd statement right now. Huh. Katara's more concerned with who'll continue Aang's waterbending instruction - but hey, remember how he was lazy in lessons and she wasn't? She's good enough to teach him herself, now.

Continuing the theme of cross-generational bonding, I guess, we cut to the Chief and Sokka, staring at the moon - wait! Still up, in the daytime! Thank you, show, I should have trusted you all along - er, right, they're looking mournful. Chief apparently knew this was coming all along - had a vision and whatnot. Hmm, I guess it would have been a bit grim to warn Yue about her own destiny, eh daddy?

Iroh and Zuko have non-important conversation to call back to the first episode - I think - whatever. Looks like they won't have a boat now...

Katara and Aang hug, then let Momo jump in - good job not eating the moon! - and then Sokka comes along, and they stand there looking appropriately contemplative as Appa rises up, presumably soon to take them on to new adventures in the new season. P.S. The moon is back! Yay!

Ooh, this is new. A silhouette surrounded by fire - perhaps some sort of fiery lord? - is here to tell us that Iroh is considered (by him) to be a traitor; with great efficiency, he conveys that he's talking to Zuko's sister here - you know, the one of his fiery kids who isn't a failure. Because she's not-a-failure, in fact, he has an assignment for her - and ooh, there it is, that face! When Koh was talking about stealing the Avatar's lover's face? Make all the features a little reddish, and somewhat younger - that's Zuko's sister. Seriously.

It could just be a coincidence, or an accident of lazy character design, but .. where's the fun in believing that, huh?