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0:38

Hello friends, benders, and non-benders alike.

0:40

Welcome to Braving the Elements Nickelodeon's

0:42

podcast about all things Avatarverse. I'm

0:45

Janet Varney. And I'm Dansi Bosco. And Varney,

0:47

we're down to our last episodes of the

0:49

whole show. The last airbender. I can't believe

0:51

it feels crazy. It feels crazy. I

0:54

can't believe it myself. But we still

0:56

have a few episodes, personally. That's true. That's

0:58

true. The first episode of the show is

1:00

the one that we're doing today. We're doing

1:02

Into the Inferno, which is the part three

1:04

of Sozin's Comet. Yes, and of course we

1:06

covered the first two parts, the Phoenix

1:08

King and the old masters with

1:10

the wonderful Ivana Lynch. So the

1:12

question was, who do

1:15

we have on the show to take

1:17

us home? And the answer to that

1:19

question is it wasn't really a question because we knew

1:21

there was only one answer. It's Brian

1:24

Kanetsko and Mike DiMartino. That's right,

1:26

Cabbages. Mike is in the house. What's up? Good

1:28

to see you guys again. Good to see

1:30

you. Hey. We're now in our best behavior

1:32

because our dad's in here. I know. So

1:34

I'm sitting up a little bit straighter, adjusts

1:36

the mic, sweat immediate, flops, sweat

1:38

breaks out. No, we are like

1:41

that with Andrea Romano, not you guys. I

1:43

did feel that way. Remember, we immediately were like, are we people?

1:45

We were like, Andrea, what do you want us to do? Yeah.

1:50

What do we do now? Direct us, help us, help us.

1:53

No, thank you guys so much for being here.

1:56

So this is one of the things we try not to do with

1:58

our two dads, even though I know we fully. do it

2:00

because we also want to be like

2:02

the keeper of the lore. But in

2:04

2018, that marked the 10-year anniversary of

2:06

when the Sozin's Comets episodes

2:09

aired. I just put so many S's on the

2:11

end of everything. It was like Sozin's Comets episodes,

2:13

Nickelodeons. Don't put years into this situation. And that

2:16

was back in 2020. And let me repeat myself.

2:18

That was in 2018. But

2:21

Newsweek did a great interview where they talked

2:23

to not just Mike and Brian, but also

2:25

Ethan and Joaquin, who all played a very

2:28

big hand along with the whole rest of

2:30

the gang in making these episodes happen. So

2:32

that is a great resource. It's on the

2:34

web. You can read about it. I

2:37

pulled a couple of quotes just in case we want to dig

2:39

in further. But let's see where we get

2:41

with everything. But I don't want to make you

2:43

guys like, I like finding stuff like that because

2:45

then I'm like, aha. They've already answered this question.

2:47

It's good that you find that. We get sent

2:49

people to that. Because I don't always remember

2:51

what we talked about. Varnie's a reporter. You didn't

2:53

know that. She's a investigative reporter.

2:55

Yeah, a little bit. Rave the Elements,

2:58

the investigative reporting team. A little bit.

3:00

Well, you know, sometimes it's fun not to get

3:02

asked the same questions over and over again. But

3:05

OK, so the last question that I think we

3:07

maybe have talked about before, but we just want

3:09

to pin it down for these two episodes that

3:11

we're doing with you is just to refresh everyone.

3:13

I think this is a question that comes up

3:15

a lot for the fans. And the answer is

3:17

out there. But was

3:19

there ever a time when Aang was going

3:21

to take O's Eyes Life? I

3:24

don't believe so. Yeah. I mean, even though I

3:26

think in our original Bible, we had that he

3:28

didn't know exactly how he was going to

3:30

do it, but we knew he was going to

3:33

figure out a way to stay

3:35

true to his values while defeating the

3:37

bad guy. Great. Yeah. You heard

3:39

it here? We just possibly heard it elsewhere. On Nickelodeon,

3:42

the middle of Nickelodeon. And finally, I was like, bam,

3:44

we just killed him. Bye. Mic

3:47

drop, and we out of here. Now on

3:49

Cora. No, bye. Cora got darker. Cora got darker

3:51

for sure. And they were allowed to get rough. Shout

3:54

out to the scope of the fights.

3:56

I'm sure we'll talk more about it,

3:58

but the fights in these episodes. are

4:00

intense, we're seeing types of bending

4:02

that we've never, we're seeing the

4:04

use of bending with all the

4:06

elements in ways that maybe we

4:08

haven't necessarily seen before, some new

4:10

moves, some new applications of stuff.

4:14

And there's also like CG

4:16

happening with 2D. Was

4:19

that happening in other episodes or was

4:21

that really like culminating here? Yeah, I

4:23

mean we generally covered vehicles with

4:26

CG. So the airships,

4:28

the tanks and stuff. So

4:31

we already had a lot of those assets. So

4:33

yeah, I think that was most of the CG. But this

4:35

one had a lot of airships in it. Which

4:38

I think Joaquin was like, I never want to see one ever again.

4:41

They'll haunt me in my dreams

4:43

forever. Do they, because it's the

4:45

finale, do they give you guys more money?

4:48

Is there a bigger budget or

4:50

no? How does this work? Usually

4:52

no, but in a way yes.

4:54

Because again, we've covered this a

4:57

lot, but back then

4:59

we would do the storyboards on paper and

5:02

we would pin them up in

5:04

a conference room. And if

5:07

the boards were a little long, they

5:09

would bring in some kind of pushpin

5:12

boards. And

5:14

we had these extension boards like wrapping

5:16

around like a labyrinth. And Eric Coleman

5:18

was just like, guys, this

5:21

is not one episode. And

5:23

we were still fooling ourselves. No, no, no, no, we can fit

5:25

it in. And

5:27

he's like, this is not one episode. And so

5:30

somehow the 60 episode order

5:32

turned into 61. We

5:35

never heard how. So in a way we got more

5:37

money. It wasn't more money for one episode. It

5:39

was like a sell my, you know, it

5:43

just split into two. Next thing you

5:45

know. I think Jeremy did get

5:47

a bit of a budget increase

5:50

to actually record live players for the

5:52

score. For

5:54

which he was doing, you know, so this,

5:56

you know, we've been doing this process. where

6:00

he's been plussing the original score. We

6:02

released book one water with

6:04

actual live players, replacing

6:06

all the MIDI library stuff.

6:11

But in these last four episodes,

6:13

it's actually strings, live strings. So we

6:15

already- You can feel it. He already got to do

6:18

that. It was cinematic. It was cinematic. Watching

6:20

it in a new era in time,

6:23

right? Like last night, I was

6:25

moved to a different, I mean, the Zuko

6:27

Zula fight. Well, he was doing- It

6:30

was like a somber sadness to

6:32

the music when they were fighting. And I was

6:35

like sad about it, you know? Yeah,

6:37

he did all sorts. He really took advantage of

6:39

having the live players and being Jeremy. He was

6:41

doing microtonal,

6:44

like note clusters, tonal

6:46

clusters, and all sorts

6:48

of coming up with his

6:50

own types of notation for extended techniques.

6:52

Jeremy, what are you doing, Jeremy? Mad scientist.

6:54

Mad scientist. I know. You love

6:56

our Jeremy Zuko man. Okay, let's get into

6:58

it. All right. So I'm sure everybody remembers

7:00

where we were when we left off in

7:02

part to the old masters. We had a

7:04

reunion for Iroh and Zuko and we found

7:06

out Azula would be crowned Fire Lord, which

7:10

whatever. And then we know

7:12

Ozai is getting ready to take over the world

7:14

and Aang has just ended his experience with the

7:16

Lion Turtle. And we also have had a bunch

7:18

of stuff set up for these episodes. We know

7:20

from the group that the plan is for Katara

7:22

and Zuko to go face Azula. We know that

7:24

Sokka and Suki and Toph are going to try

7:26

to intercept that airship fleet to help save Ba

7:28

Sing Se, which is also going to be protected

7:30

on the ground by the Order of the White

7:32

Lotus. So let's see how it

7:34

all plays out. Sozin's Comet Into the

7:36

Inferno was written by Mike and Brian

7:38

and directed by Joaquin Dos Santos. All

7:41

right. We opened this episode with a

7:43

very red skies. They're Blade Runner skies,

7:45

boy. Very red, very moody skies. Amazing.

7:48

And we close the view on Sozin's Comet

7:50

and then quickly find out that we're joining

7:52

Katara and Zuko, who are writing Appa to

7:54

find and defeat Azula. But Azuko is more

7:57

preoccupied with weather. Aang is going to be

7:59

able to handle... Ozai Katara reassures him

8:01

that angle triumph because he has

8:03

to yeah elsewhere Azula shows us

8:05

the meaning and the phrase of the royal

8:07

treatment as many servants give her the

8:10

ultimate small day to make her first day as Fire

8:12

Lord until she finds a Cherry pit

8:14

in one of her cherries as great. Tell

8:16

us when we had her last time. That's her

8:18

doing the service Yeah, she did the service voice

8:20

and is right. So she's banishing herself She's

8:23

been yeah, she banishes herself a mate the

8:25

perfect circle. It's great allow

8:27

This takes us to checking with Sokka Toph

8:30

and Suki who approached the airship fleet by

8:32

sea on an eelhound When

8:34

they arrived they're too late to stop the airships from

8:36

taking off. So Toph uses an

8:38

earthbending Propel way to get

8:40

him in the air and then they

8:43

get onto one of the airships and they

8:45

sneak aboard and then the scene ends with

8:47

a very intimidating shot of Ozai

8:50

smirking evilly Mm-hmm on that airship very

8:53

good at that such a great shot

8:55

to end it with hair was flowing

8:58

All the world I realize my fists are

9:00

clenching every time I see Ozai in these

9:02

episodes I'm like, oh loosen up Janet. Like

9:04

this is not real. It's not really happening.

9:07

He was having a good hair day great hair day I

9:10

mean Zuko's hair was flowing to with him a guitar

9:12

like wow This is his main is really going and then

9:14

you see his father's hair and you're like, that's

9:16

what he gets it pops once again

9:19

Pops his hair is flowing and I was when

9:21

I was watching it I was like, what's he

9:23

doing? Just standing there from a ship on missing

9:25

like that and then we see

9:28

what uh-huh Yeah, what are

9:30

you doing now? I just want to take a second

9:32

but there is so much to cover but for me

9:34

This is just a moment that I love in this

9:36

episode and I don't know that anyone pays attention to

9:38

it But I really love first of all the idea

9:40

that you could take cherry pits out and still have

9:42

an intact cherry Because that is

9:45

what Azula would make sure happen She would be like,

9:47

I don't care how you do that do that And

9:49

then the fact that she crunches down on the

9:51

pit fully you hear it crunch down on her

9:53

teeth But when she's telling the servant she says

9:55

I sense that pit just in time It's

10:00

like, no, you didn't. Shut

10:02

up, you absolutely did not. You crunched down on it

10:04

with your teeth. It's a great line. I like how

10:06

you smally do great. Even just saying that, you do

10:08

Grey's voice just a little bit. I know, I love

10:10

that. You know that I love that Azula. Okay,

10:13

so hopefully you all

10:15

enjoy Blue Fire because that is definitely what the throne

10:17

room looks like. It's a little different with Azula in

10:20

charge. We have all this Blue Flame. And then when

10:22

the Dai Li show up, she's

10:24

very quick to point out, there's no reason for

10:26

me to trust you. You turned on Long Fang,

10:28

so I don't see any reason why

10:30

you wouldn't betray me. Good point, good point. And she

10:32

probably just vanishes them. Good point though, actually. So we've

10:34

seen a couple of banishments happen. I'm hoping that the

10:37

Dai Li are gonna keep that poor little cherry pit

10:39

girl company because it seems like it's lonely out there.

10:41

And then, you know, I guess

10:43

this is the moment where you go, oh,

10:45

like the Dai

10:47

Li Mei thing has extremely messed

10:49

up. Broker. Azula. It

10:52

broke her. She broke her brain on a fundamental level. Because I

10:54

was like, why is she so messed up right now? And then

10:56

when she brought up the Dai Li Mei thing and I'm like,

10:58

oh, if your best friends turn on you in like that one

11:00

moment, it can break any of us. Like, I

11:03

thought I knew people. I think it was, I think

11:06

that wasn't the cause, but I think that was the

11:09

final straw. I

11:11

think she had some deep seated

11:14

underlying issues that

11:18

stemmed from her strange

11:22

parentage. Parentage or whatever

11:24

the word is. And

11:27

yeah, the,

11:30

as she perceives it, betrayal by her

11:32

friends, who she sort of forced into

11:34

her. Oh yeah, oh yeah. She was

11:37

forced into her service. Yeah,

11:40

that ultimately kind

11:43

of puts her over the edge, but she was already close

11:45

to the edge. She was definitely close to the edge. But

11:47

when your rider dies, turn on you. Yeah. It's

11:49

done. You're done. That's sort of the little,

11:51

the point that just kind of goes, and

11:53

then you just sort of tumble into the open air. Avatar,

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your first website or domain. So

13:03

back on the airship, Toph politely gives the old shave

13:05

and a haircut knock. I enjoy that that's in there.

13:07

Not going to go off on the tangent that that

13:09

took me when I was like, where did that come

13:12

from? Look it up. You

13:14

know what I mean? That's what the internet's for.

13:16

But it's out there. And

13:21

Sokka seems to tell Toph to take the wheel. People

13:23

love this moment. She

13:26

of course reminds him that she's blind. And

13:28

he very expertly kind of raises an eyebrow

13:30

and was like, actually, I was talking to

13:32

Suki. That's a question I think that fans

13:34

have, which is, was he talking

13:36

to Suki? Or is this just another cover

13:38

moment of Sokka being like, yes, you are

13:40

blind. Moving on. I was talking

13:43

to Suki. Do you remember if there's like

13:45

intent behind like whether or not Sokka is

13:47

telling Toph like take the wheel? And

13:50

or the third answer, you don't remember at

13:52

all. And that's also OK. I don't remember.

13:54

But I don't. I Sokka

13:57

is not that dense. I

13:59

think he knows. he's talking to. That's

14:01

a great answer. It's a confident answer.

14:04

Yeah. It's a clear confident answer.

14:06

Um, no, but that's a, that's a, that's a

14:08

fun moment for people. Um, and then now

14:10

we have one of my favorite scenes in

14:13

this four-part finale. Again, you guys know I'm

14:15

a sucker for the comedy. Attention

14:17

crew. This is your captain

14:20

speaking. Everyone please report to

14:22

the Bombay immediately for hotcakes

14:25

and sweet treats. We

14:27

have a very special birthday to celebrate.

14:30

Hey, I'm queen Lee. I

14:32

work up in communications. Oh,

14:34

hi. I worked down in the engineering.

14:37

That's probably why we never met before. Big

14:40

airship, you know, huh? Yep. So

14:43

do you know whose birthday it is? I

14:46

can't believe the captain remembered my

14:48

birthday. He really does care. It's

14:55

birthday time. Do you know who does the voices

14:57

of Quindly and the engine? The two guys? Yeah.

15:00

The two guys talking to each other. I

15:03

do not know. I mean, should I take a guess? I don't

15:05

know. I can't, I can hear their voices. Hey, it's my

15:07

birthday. I didn't know Boston to my birthday. It's

15:11

like watching it all over. Oh,

15:13

and then, oh, well, happy birthday. Well,

15:16

I, no idea. Okay. I mean, it's, it's

15:18

two of the greatest voice actors of this

15:20

generation. Is it? I think the two greatest.

15:23

Is it these

15:26

two guys? I

15:28

remember the lines are very memorable. So much.

15:30

I love that scene. So I thought about

15:32

that scene too. Cause I was like, cause

15:35

I was like, okay, even as a writer, you're like, yeah, they gotta

15:37

get, we gotta get the crew off the ship. Right. I'm like,

15:39

okay. They get the crew how they can do it. And then like, Oh,

15:42

like that's like, that's so simple

15:44

and silly, but it works. I do. I

15:46

do recall that joke kind of came out of like

15:50

actual work. Yeah.

15:53

Every other week there was, you know, everyone gather

15:55

in the kitchen for so and so's birthday. And

15:57

I was like, they might find it. For

26:00

the most part, obviously there are some exceptions. I

26:03

can't imagine an Azula that has

26:06

the sort of maturity to

26:08

understand that this person

26:10

meant that to her and that this

26:12

person saw, you know, I don't know.

26:14

I just love it, I love it. I think you

26:16

can keep excusing someone's behavior

26:19

separate from understanding it. Absolutely. And

26:21

I think it's just more of

26:24

an examination of

26:27

what makes her tick and that it's

26:29

more than just, oh, she's evil because

26:31

we need an evil antagonist. I

26:34

think that's why I said earlier, these

26:36

episodes are cinematic and a lot of times people

26:38

are just talking about the visuals, which there's obviously

26:40

a lot of cinema with the

26:43

beauty, but cinematic because the scene, like

26:46

the cues in the scene, what's going on,

26:48

the acting, the dimensions in the scene by

26:50

the artists and the writing and then of

26:52

course, great in Lyle's performance, it's

26:54

cinematic. You're like, oh, this is a

26:56

scene from a movie. This is a real,

26:59

which blows my mind because again, I go

27:01

back to like, wow, this was like some

27:03

kid's cartoon, you know? And I'm like, we're

27:05

watching the kids. You guys are putting these

27:07

kids on cinematic themes and

27:10

things that are like, we don't really,

27:12

I didn't grow up watching cartoons. That's

27:14

heavy, yeah. Speaking of cinematic, the

27:16

person who storyboarded this scene is the

27:19

director of our first animated feature. It's

27:21

Lauren Montgomery. Oh, Lauren. Lauren

27:23

taught us how to draw a

27:25

flawless Aang. She taught, yeah, mine

27:28

was not that great. Again,

27:30

mine did have a five o'clock shadow. Mine absolutely

27:32

has a five o'clock shadow because I was erasing

27:34

so much. I was trying

27:37

to erase his chin line and I was like, and

27:39

now he's like a burly man. That was a fun

27:41

episode. He's 112. He is 112, he is

27:43

112. Yeah, okay, anyway,

27:45

so thanks for sort of dissecting that

27:47

with me, but. Okay, let's check in

27:50

on the airship fleet as it nears

27:52

Ba Sing Se. Sokka has just realized

27:54

they're not gonna catch up fast enough

27:56

as Ozai begins to scorch the earth

27:59

below, sending animals. to flee for their lives.

28:02

And watching all of this is Aang, who

28:04

sends Momo to safety as he begins to

28:06

earthbend huge disks of stone at the airships,

28:08

and then follows up with some pretty powerful

28:10

firebending of his own, because he, too, has

28:12

a firebender. So, as it's coming, yeah, he's

28:14

also, yeah. Zach kept my mind in saying,

28:17

oh, he, too, has a firebender. Oh, he's

28:19

impressive. It's nice to see Ozai experience

28:21

a moment of surprise and dismay when

28:23

he realizes what's happening. As

28:25

his airship crashes, Ozai firebends himself

28:27

towards Aang for their confrontation. The

28:30

great news about all of this for

28:32

Sokka, Toph, and Suki is finding out

28:34

the Avatar is back. I mean,

28:37

we've been with Aang the whole time, so we

28:39

knew, but there's that moment where you're like, oh,

28:41

yeah, this is the first time they're seeing like,

28:43

oh, he is here. Which is a nice moment

28:45

to realize. It's always impressive. Oh, he did show

28:47

up. We're not alone in this. He could do

28:49

everything. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Oh,

28:52

wow. Are

28:56

you frustrated by how hard it is to find

28:58

a good hairdresser or manicurist or really just any

29:00

decent servants at all? Well, now you can stop looking

29:02

because we've got the perfect solution for those times when

29:04

all you want is a nice blowout with some body

29:06

and shine. But you can't have that because your

29:08

servants are probably all traitors who will turn around

29:10

and stab you in the back just like your friends

29:12

do when all you're trying to do is a little

29:15

harmless thing like kill your brother or take over the

29:17

world. You

29:20

know, I can't actually remember what product I

29:22

was advertising, so you're

29:24

all banished. But

29:26

now Ozai's found a way to spin this development like

29:28

it's a good thing. After generations

29:31

of Fire Lords failed to find

29:33

you, now the

29:35

universe delivers you to

29:37

me as an act

29:39

of providence. Please

29:42

listen to me. We don't have to fight.

29:45

You have the power to end it here and stop

29:47

what you're doing. You are right. I

29:50

do have the power. I

29:52

have all the power in the

29:54

world. begins

30:00

to battle with Ozai. They have to

30:02

come up with a plan to stop the airship fleet

30:04

apparently involving an airship slice.

30:06

I don't know what this is yet. They

30:09

suddenly change course of their ship, doubling back

30:11

as the rest of the fleet begins to

30:13

burn everything in its path, which

30:15

is horrible. That is horrible.

30:18

Watching the animals flee for their safety in

30:20

any context of any entertainment is always like,

30:22

well this is grim. This

30:25

is a lot of power going on. That's

30:27

what they're doing standing in front of the ship

30:29

on that plane. No thank you. And now their

30:31

ship is coming like 90 degrees, cutting

30:33

through each of the ship as it passes. It's

30:36

a really great move. As long as Sokka, Toph,

30:38

and Suki don't get killed in the process. So

30:41

they're all still alive, but Suki's been separated

30:43

from the other two and we cut away

30:45

as my sister, I mean Azula, coronation

30:48

ceremony begins, but before she can

30:50

be crowned, I mean, Zuko

30:53

arrives with Katara and Appa to save

30:55

the day. Now it's brother against sister

30:57

in what is guaranteed to be an

30:59

epic Agni Kai, just like we saw

31:02

in M. Brian players. Which

31:04

I mean, Zuko died in that one. Yeah,

31:07

I mean, I'm just saying that you wanna refer

31:09

back to that. It doesn't end well. That was

31:11

not a great- For him. That's propaganda.

31:13

So that's why, Dante, we have to make

31:15

our own destinies. Yes. Right? Not just follow

31:17

some story we're all being fed. Yes. Come

31:19

on, you know this. So

31:21

besides, when Katara questions Zuko's willingness to

31:23

take on his sister alone, he

31:26

points out that something is definitely off

31:29

about Azula. A batter. He's like, maybe this will give

31:31

me an edge. Something's happening here. He senses it. He

31:33

knows something's going on. And even

31:35

though this is a super stressful moment that gets even

31:37

more stressful when the fight begins, it

31:40

is so beautifully animated. We're seeing just

31:42

orange and blue fire meeting at what

31:44

does feel like equal levels of power,

31:46

which is a good sign. And of

31:48

course, we've talked about it before. We

31:51

talked about it earlier, the music that Jeremy

31:54

supplies, it just takes it to the next

31:56

level. It takes it to the next level.

31:58

It's gorgeous scene. It's not,

32:00

again, because of that scene, I mean, for many

32:03

other reasons, but because I think as

32:05

fed by the scene of Azula by

32:07

herself, talking to her mom, suddenly this

32:09

fight feels more sad than you expect.

32:11

And his brother and sister fighting and

32:13

it's like, they're gonna fight to the

32:16

death and it's like, this is horrible.

32:18

It's a great tragedy, it's one of those

32:20

great tragedies. And Zook, I mean, we all

32:23

know how OP Azula is, but can I

32:25

just say Zuko's holding his

32:27

own. He's showing up for it. He's fighting for

32:29

that other thing. Especially since he was fighting, yeah,

32:31

like you said. He met the masters and now

32:34

he understands and now his firebending has like gone

32:36

to another level. And it's not coming from rage.

32:38

And it's not coming from rage, it's not coming

32:40

from rage. So good. Speaking

32:42

of next level, Aang and Ozai are

32:45

also in a crazy battle, one that

32:47

is moving across these towers of stone,

32:49

pushing Aang to his limit as he

32:51

uses every tool in his arsenal from

32:53

air to earth to water to fire.

32:56

And Ozai has a dang blue lightning that literally

32:58

changes the color of the landscape as he goes

33:01

full throttle on his attack on Aang. I keep

33:03

feeling I'm gonna hit you in the face. I

33:05

have to stop gesticulating so wildly, I get way

33:07

too into it. I'm into it too. This is

33:09

the finale, get into it. It's horrible. And

33:13

he hits him. I

33:15

mean, Aang backs into, so

33:19

he's pushing Aang back into a rock. There's

33:21

a sort of protrusion in the rock and

33:24

it hits Aang right where the lightning went

33:26

in where Azul was lightning hit him. That

33:28

was a fascinating moment. How did you

33:30

guys talk to me about that? Because I'm still trying

33:32

to figure it out. Well, one

33:34

thing I will say is I keep seeing

33:37

that clip being edited into skateboarding. No!

33:40

There's this clip where someone, they

33:43

go for a rail slide or something. What?

33:45

They miss it and they land on

33:48

the top of a fire hydrant, right

33:50

on the spine. And then they edit

33:52

straight to Aang, the lightning flash and

33:54

seeing all of his past lives. So

33:58

all of my friends send me these. over

34:00

and over. That's all my goodness. But yeah,

34:02

I mean, I remember talking with Aaron and

34:04

the writers about hitting that point, and

34:08

I felt like, oh, we had to do

34:10

this little nub sticking out of the rock.

34:13

I guess we should have just had a corner or a

34:15

fire hydrant. I don't know. ["The

34:18

Star-Spangled Banner"] I

34:28

mean, I had to be clear that that's what was happening, because

34:30

otherwise you would just think, oh, he's gotten electrocuted by Ozai.

34:32

That's it. I guess it's over. But

34:35

it was a color connected, because it was

34:37

something they had. He has a scar. It's like you

34:39

never really talk about, we see the scars, he walks

34:41

around other times, and then it kind

34:44

of comes back. Yeah, I mean, we had talked about, he's

34:46

got a lot of blocked energy in there. Oh yeah. For

34:49

going into this final battle to somehow kind

34:51

of unlock all that chi inside. Absolutely,

34:54

and that's kind of what we're seeing, right?

34:57

We're seeing it unblock. As

34:59

this time is sort of slowing down,

35:01

we're actually seeing that opening happen. Yeah,

35:04

I mean that. If it was Tony Hawk that

35:06

did it, then you could see him being the

35:08

Avatar, and he'd see his past lives. It's just

35:10

a random kid, like, nah, you're not the Avatar

35:12

guy. It's just everyone unlocking

35:14

their own past lives through pain. Yeah,

35:16

I mean, I think there's always that

35:18

idea of pain and

35:21

trauma, traumatic experiences with body

35:23

work. You

35:26

can kind of get a

35:28

really deep massage, but find, like, I

35:30

have this knot, I just call it

35:33

my Avatar monster, when we were animating

35:35

the test pilot. Not even like the

35:38

test pilot, like we just did this

35:40

little test animation sequence to help the

35:42

green light or something, and I was

35:44

like holding my, I was really stressed out, and I was holding

35:46

my arm in a weird way, and I got this knot,

35:49

I felt it form in my

35:52

left scapula area, and I've had

35:54

it ever since. Still? Yeah,

35:56

and so it's like, or

35:58

you can have like a really traumatic. and

36:00

if someone works on it, it brings

36:02

you back to that and you might

36:05

start crying. And more. Yeah, so

36:07

it was that idea of just this

36:09

sort of unlocking that, like

36:11

Mike said, that kind of bottled up chakra flow, but

36:16

through a very painful way

36:18

of kick-starting it. I

36:21

think we all just stood up watching it. I know,

36:23

oh no, it's very, yeah. But

36:26

it's good, ultimately it is good

36:28

news. It unblocks him,

36:31

now Aang redirects Ozai's lightning. He has

36:33

this opportunity. This is the moment that

36:35

Zuko, we could say, was afraid of

36:37

because here we have this

36:40

opportunity where he has the chance, he

36:42

could redirect that lightning right back to Ozai

36:44

and instead he chooses to direct it

36:47

towards the sky. And so we're

36:49

left with this question like, oh no, is

36:51

this what we're gonna be dealing with? Like,

36:53

are we proving Zuko's fear right now? Is

36:55

this gonna be like, oh, he's just gonna

36:57

keep doing that until Ozai eventually gets the

36:59

upper hand fully enough that it's over-frying? Yeah.

37:02

Because Aang can't finish it. We don't

37:04

know. We don't know, we don't know. We know. We

37:07

do know, but we don't know. We don't know, yeah. So

37:10

that was his chance. He's barely able to

37:12

waterbend in time to save himself from this

37:15

really horrible fall that we see him having

37:17

and Ozai's salt. Well, very cool the way he did

37:19

that too, because he tripped the waterbend and he waterbend him

37:22

up. Like the motion of it, you're like, oh, look

37:24

at that. Like a half-pipe? I'm sorry, we'll let go

37:26

of his skateboarding. It was like instead of just

37:28

dropping in, someone's like, oh, they do that. He

37:30

kept the motion going in the flow. He

37:32

knew what to do. He knew what to

37:34

do. But Ozai is far from done. And

37:37

then we go back to Zuko and

37:39

Azula and their Agni Kai seems

37:41

pretty evenly matched so far. And

37:44

in fact, Zuko might even have a leg up. But

37:47

so far, no blue lightning. You

37:50

can do it, Zuko. I believe in you. Zuko

37:52

firebends from an awesome backspin at one point and

37:54

that brilliant move completely knocks Azula off her feet

37:57

and sends her sprawling across the ground. Unfortunately,

38:00

Zuko decides this is the moment to taunt his

38:02

sister about the No Lightning thing. No

38:05

Lightning today? What's the matter? Afraid I'll

38:07

redirect it? I'll show you lightning. What

38:09

if you just hadn't said

38:11

anything, you know what I mean? I

38:15

know. I've written that

38:17

on several, uh, several Funko

38:19

Pops. And

38:23

that gives Azula the bright idea to use it on

38:25

Katara. Zuko realizes what's

38:28

happening and he jumps in front of

38:30

it, absorbing the full force without redirecting

38:32

it. And it seems like Azula has

38:34

more in store for Katara. That

38:37

was a hot moment, you guys. You guys,

38:39

that was a hot moment. Sacrifice for his friend.

38:41

Sacrifice for his friend. Couldn't keep his mouth shut.

38:43

You definitely put a little, little, a little fire

38:45

for the Zutarians out there on that moment. But

38:48

it was like a very cool way, you know,

38:50

like, oh, that was cool. No, but I think

38:52

the thing that troubles me the most about that,

38:54

not to just keep ragging on Zuko, because it's

38:56

very tempting to do that, is like she's sort

38:59

of coming unglued, but it's almost

39:01

like the thing she feeds off is negativity

39:03

and is this sort of like, you

39:06

know what I mean? Her need to be perfect.

39:08

So to have her older brother be taunting

39:10

her, to me, you know, there are some

39:12

people for whom that is the fuel they

39:14

need. So it's, it's only, it

39:16

only gives her the opportunity to check in with

39:18

herself and go, oh yeah, wait a minute. Like

39:21

I can do better than this. Not great. I

39:24

mean, you can't, she's in an Agni Kai. We're

39:26

in a one on one. She's looking for people's

39:28

weaknesses. She found one. Yeah, that's true.

39:31

But I think we gotta check the rules in

39:33

Agni Kai. You can't kill random people. There's

39:36

no ref on this one. Watch out. One

39:38

on one fight. You just can't go kill random

39:41

people on the side. That's a good point. But

39:43

it was, these are like WWE rules. Like,

39:46

it's just like no holds barred. It doesn't

39:48

matter. I was like, oh, I'm going to

39:50

throw some lightning at Katara. Messy. Back

39:52

with Aang as he has to run

39:55

across the water to avoid Ozai's onslaught.

39:57

Trying to buy more time by enveloping

39:59

himself in a. huge sphere of stone

40:01

as Ozai laughs at him. You're weak,

40:04

just like the rest of your people.

40:06

They did not deserve to exist in

40:08

this world, in my world. Prepare

40:11

to join them. Prepare

40:13

to die. One

40:17

cool thing about that moment was

40:20

like years after we

40:22

had finished the series, I went back

40:24

and looked at the original development Bible that

40:26

Mike and I put together and there was

40:29

a lot in there that I had completely

40:31

forgotten about some wacky ideas that I'm like,

40:33

okay, there's a reason we left these. But

40:36

we had to write that pretty quickly. But

40:38

then there was, there was a lot,

40:40

there were a lot of very specific

40:42

things from the original development Bible from

40:44

2002 that made it into the finale.

40:49

And that was one of them. We had

40:51

that idea that Aang cocooned himself in stone.

40:54

I think there's just something, I don't know,

40:56

there was just something kind of primal about it. Absolutely. Just

40:58

like sealing himself off and sort

41:01

of needing to be reborn. It's kind of monkish

41:03

too. It feels right for an airbender, for a

41:05

monk to be like, I need to sit with

41:07

this for a moment. That makes a lot of

41:09

sense. Yeah. So yeah, it

41:11

was interesting. That was one of

41:14

those like really specific details that

41:17

just had popped into our heads in the very early

41:19

days. That works. That's good. Because I was like, if

41:21

I was able to try and be like, pretend I'm

41:23

in that rock, but that would actually earth

41:25

bend into the ground. Get out of there. Because this guy's going

41:27

to be way out of there. For a second, I thought you

41:29

were going to say, if I was the Avatar, I would just

41:31

freeze. Would that make me invisible?

41:33

I mean, I know as I'm watching the show now, I

41:36

know I'm just like one of the kids watching and the

41:38

time we're all thinking like, hold on a second, maybe if

41:40

I can earth bend out of this, he's probably going to

41:42

be like, you're doing all this stuff in your mind. What

41:44

would I do? How would I? You could all get the

41:46

crazy stuff in the episode. When

41:48

Toph did the Iron Man thing, the

41:51

Fireman was like, oh, that's wild.

41:53

That's amazing. That's like all these.

41:55

The armor is fantastic. You guys

41:57

start unlocking people's minds about. what

42:01

you can actually do if you can actually bend all

42:03

these elements, different things, other than just like the

42:05

direct thing that we know you can do, and he starts

42:07

doing different things, which is very cool. But

42:10

that's what you leave us with. You leave us with, he's

42:13

just in, now he's just in this room. Well, hold

42:15

on a second, when it aired, when it did a

42:17

back-to-back episode, it was back-to-back. It was back-to-back. Yeah, yeah,

42:19

yeah. Thank goodness. How cruel. Oh,

42:21

there was one of the super fans from

42:24

a previous episode, he said, when this episode

42:26

came out, I had to do my

42:28

chores during that time, and

42:30

I had told my parents, like, look, this is the

42:33

deal, this is the finale, and I know I'm supposed

42:35

to do my chores, but there's less commercial time. They

42:37

had told it's gonna be less commercial time, so can

42:39

I do my chores after the finale, remember?

42:41

Yes, yeah, I was joking. I was like, you knew there was

42:43

gonna be less commercial time, and I was like, yeah, I knew

42:45

there was gonna be less commercial time. Oh, so good, it was

42:47

so good. I hope his parents let him do his chores. His

42:50

parents let him. Yeah, he was very diplomatic

42:52

about it, it was very cool. So

42:54

I don't, I mean, yes, we had other, undoubtedly

42:57

had other hybrid animals show up, because a

43:00

lot of animals, again, were fleeing for their

43:02

very lives. We

43:04

don't see necessarily what they all are, because we're

43:06

seeing them in silhouette and shadow, but I don't

43:08

think we see anybody really besides, like, we might

43:11

glimpse the eelhound, but I don't think there's anybody,

43:13

other than our usual favorites, that show up. So

43:15

that's it for Animal Crossing. But the eelhound in

43:17

the water was pretty cool looking. I like to

43:20

think each animal that way. I always liked it,

43:22

because he was on the land, I

43:24

was like, oh, he's in the water, this guy can.

43:26

I love that eelhound. I'm a fan. He's cute. Yeah,

43:28

he's great. All right, so let's talk about who had

43:30

the most valuable bending and non-bending. These

43:32

are very hard questions to answer in some

43:34

ways, when you're getting on to the finale

43:36

of the entire series. I

43:39

know everyone has so many important things that happen.

43:41

Yeah, I mean, we see, Ang Sko-kun is obviously,

43:43

but that's, so I mean, that's, it's

43:47

more defensive bending than maybe, you

43:49

know, Toph arming herself with this

43:51

amazing metal armor. What's the most

43:54

valuable bending in this episode? What

43:56

do you guys think? I

43:58

mean, maybe Zuko. Zuko, you know,

44:01

saved Katara's life. That

44:03

could be a non-bending. That's more of a non-bending. It's

44:05

the darting in front. Yeah. But

44:08

he did redir- Oh no, he got hit. But

44:10

earlier he was redirected. He was redirected earlier. I

44:14

think the non-bending for sure, cause he saved Katara's life

44:16

for sure. I mean like- Because Aang's gonna

44:18

save the day and the next one. I

44:23

gotta give it to Zuko for going

44:25

toe to toe with his sister. Yeah,

44:27

I'm into it. And actually making

44:30

it so evenly matched that she did need to

44:32

break the rules. Sure. And she did

44:34

need to fight dirty in order to beat him. I'll

44:37

give him those valuable non-bending and non-bending.

44:39

Or how about most improved bender?

44:41

Most improved bender. It was

44:43

most improved. He learned from the masters. He learned from

44:45

the masters. I got, when I was

44:47

about Zuko's age, I was like

44:49

co-captain of the rowing team in high

44:52

school, but I got most improved rower,

44:54

you know. I think my senior year,

44:56

so. And with

44:58

your feeling about like, it always feels good

45:00

to know you can do better, did that

45:02

feel like an achievement or did it feel

45:04

like, huh? No, I appreciated it. Good.

45:07

Cause I, yeah, I wasn't one of the more like, naturally

45:10

athletic people.

45:13

Yeah. But I had worked really hard, so. No,

45:15

I- That's a perfect trophy. Yeah, I love it.

45:17

I think, I had put in the hard work

45:20

and it was nice that it was recognized, so.

45:22

Absolutely. Most improved bender, Zuko, I

45:24

love it. Maybe as he falls, Katara should

45:26

have just given him a little trophy. Yeah,

45:31

I had a bit of fun touch, little Easter egg.

45:36

Okay, so I'm comfortable. I'm kind of comfortable. I'm comfortable

45:38

giving it to Zuko across the board, to be honest

45:40

with you. Let's get to Zuko, why not? Let's do

45:42

it. Improved bending, but also like getting out in front

45:44

of that lightning, sacrificing himself for Katara, cause he knew

45:46

he wasn't gonna have time to redirect it. You know

45:48

what I mean? He knew exactly what he was doing.

45:50

I mean, he took him by surprise. Very kind, I

45:52

love it. He took him by surprise. He only had

45:54

like a split second, like, she's gonna shoot Katara. Oh,

45:56

yeah. No time to do

45:59

the whole, Yeah. the

46:01

belly thing and out. And no time for that.

46:03

Give him all the trophies. We'll give him trophies.

46:05

Give him all the trophies. That's it. We just

46:07

have one episode of Avatar Last Airbender to go.

46:10

We will of course be joined again by Mike

46:12

and Brian and we're gonna dive into Sozin's Comet

46:14

part four. Avatar Aang. Can't wait.

46:16

Thank you so much for spending some time with

46:18

us today. Thank you. See you

46:20

back here in a week with different

46:23

clothes on. Bye guys. All

46:29

right friends, thanks for tuning into this

46:31

episode of Avatar Braving the Elements. Now,

46:33

want more Avatar? You can follow the

46:36

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46:38

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46:40

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46:43

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46:45

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46:47

Avatar friends to listen, rate, and follow

46:49

the podcast on Apple Podcasts. This

46:52

podcast is hosted by Janet Varney and Dante

46:54

Bosco. The theme song was composed and produced

46:56

by Jeremy Zugerman. Audio production and

46:58

editing was provided by Zee Krodigas Thomas and

47:00

Mindjam Media. Avatar Braving the

47:02

Elements was executive produced by Lynne Kestin Sessler,

47:04

produced by Lisa Summerscale-Steeler with consulting producer Janet

47:07

Varney with production support from Kira Chow and

47:09

special thanks to Avatar Studios, Garrett Beltes and

47:11

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47:13

and phone record, 2023 Viacom International

47:16

Incorporated, all rights reserved. This

47:18

has been a Nickelodeon original podcast.