After years of speculation, Netflix's live-action adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender (ATLA) has finally arrived to an understandably mixed response. For those who were not lucky enough watch the original animated series premiered on Nickelodeon in 2005, the superior Avatar franchise takes place in a magical world, heavily influenced by Asian and Indigenous cultures, where certain people can control the elements. Water-, earth-, fire-, and air-benders (and non-benders) used to live in harmony as four civilizations, until the Fire Nation began its quest for world domination. The Avatar, a spiritual being who can master all four elements, was meant to keep the world in balance, but he disappeared at the start of the war. Fast-forward 100 years, and Water Tribe teens Katara and Sokka discover the new Avatar, a child named Aang, who is the last living air-bender (hence the show's title).
It's a tall order to adapt a universally-beloved series considered one of the best TV shows of all time, and have it feel like anything more than a money grab, but Netflix's Avatar focuses on drawing in new audiences with the charming performances of the rising stars who make up the young cast. (There's also several Easter eggs that nod to eliminated storylines from the original show.) The live-action ATLA does feel rushed, due to condensing 20 animated episodes into just eight, but it still does a great job setting up the arcs of Aang, Katara, Sokka, and Zuko. (The animated series lasted for three seasons.) By the end of season 1, many fans were left wondering whether this remake would get the chance to bring Books 2 and 3 to life. Read on to learn everything we know about Avatar: The Last Airbender season 2.
What happened at the end of 'Avatar: The Last Airbender' season 1?
By season 1's final episodes, Aang, Katara, and Sokka have made it to the Northern Water Tribe in search of a water-bending master to teach Aang and Katara. However, the Fire Nation is on their tail, with Prince Zuko seeking to capture Aang. Meanwhile Admiral Zhao is planning to destroy the last Water Tribe stronghold and eliminate water-bending from the world for good. By the end of the fighting, Aang was able to channel the spirit of the ocean and wipe out the entire Fire Nation fleet, while Zuko and his Uncle Iroh turned against Zhao, not wanting to upset the natural order of the universe by killing the moon spirit. (Even though Zhao succeeds, Princess Yue sacrifices herself to become the next moon spirit, and everything's put back into balance.) The devious acts of Admiral Zhao leave Zuko even more conflicted about the war; though capturing the Avatar is the only way to please his father, he recognizes that the Fire Nation may not be on the right side of the conflict.
After the fighting, Aang, Katara, and Sokka have earned the respect of the Northern Water Tribe, with the misogynistic water-bending master even giving Katara his blessing for her to serve as Aang's teacher. Aang still needs to find earth-bending and fire-bending teachers to master all four elements, and his next goal is to head back to Omashu to learn from King Bumi. However, we learn in the final moments that Omashu has fallen to a Fire Nation invasion, led by Zuko's terrifying sister, Princess Azula. This means Ba Sing Se is the last stronghold of the Earth Kingdom still standing, and Fire Lord Ozai still has big plans in his continued quest for world domination.
In a mid-credits scene, Ozai is advised that a major celestial event named Sozin's Comet is set to return "soon." The live-action series keeps the history of the comet vague, only revealing that it's named after Fire Lord Sozin, who began the great war with his attack on the Air Nomads over 100 years ago. As fans of the animated series know, this scene is actually a sneak peek for the series' endgame battle between Aang and Ozai.
Has 'Avatar: The Last Airbender' been renewed for season 2?
Yip yip! Netflix has announced that the live-action Avatar: The Last Airbender has been renewed for both seasons 2 and 3, confirming that Netflix's ATLA will fully adapt the original arc of the Nickelodeon animated series. The streamer announced the happy news along with a sweet YouTube clip of Daniel Dae Lewis (who plays Fire Lord Ozai) pranking the show's central cast, threatening bad news before revealing the two-season pickup.
The early renewal is less of a surprise considering the fact that the series has not budged from the No. 1 spot on Netflix's Top 10 since its premiere. Per a press release from the streamer, season 1 is the top English TV show across the platform, with 41.1M views in just the first 11 days. Also, it reached No. 1 in 76 countries, while landing in the top 10 in 92.
When would 'Avatar: The Last Airbender' season 2 come out?
ATLA's possible return date depends on whether or not the creative team had started working on future episodes before last year's SAG-AFTRA strikes. Such a VFX heavy show has a long post-production timeline—season 1 finished filming in the summer of 2022, and the series didn't debut until February 2024. The quickest the show could return, provided they start filming ASAP, is the second half of 2025. Still, for epic shows like this, it's more likely that season 2 will get an early 2026 release date.
Ahead of the show's premiere, showrunner Albert Kim revealed during a January Entertainment Weekly interview that he had already considered one of the show's biggest challenges—what the outlet dubbed the Stranger Things problem: child actors aging faster than their characters. (Gordon Cormier signed on to play Aang at age 11 and is now 14, while Katara actress Kiawentiio has grown from age 14 to 17.) In an interview with the outlet, Kim explained that the live-action series was written to allow for a possible time jump between seasons 1 and 2.
"All three seasons of the animated series essentially take place in the course of one calendar year,” Kim said of the original show. “There was no way we could do that. So we had to design this first season, especially, to accommodate the possibility of some time elapsing between the first and the second season...because we couldn't know exactly how old our actors would be for the subsequent seasons. We definitely thought about that going into season 1 so that we can accommodate for puberty, adolescence, time passing —all of those fun things that happen to real-life human beings that don't happen to animated characters."
Which of the cast of 'Avatar: The Last Airbender' will return for season 2?
All of the main actors within the ensemble cast are expected to reprise their roles, including: Gordon Cormier as Aang; Kiawentiio as Katara; Ian Ousley as Sokka; Dallas James Liu as Zuko; Paul Sun-Hyung Lee as Uncle Iroh; Elizabeth Yu as Azula; and Daniel Dae Kim as Fire Lord Ozai. Live-action fans will be happy to know that several of the supporting characters in season 1 return as the show goes on, including Suki (Maria Zhang); Mai (Thalia Tran); Ty Lee (Momona Tamada); Jet (Sebastian Amoruso); King Bumi (Utkarsh Ambudkar); Sai the Mechanist (Danny Pudi); Teo (Lucian-River Chauhan); and Commander Zhao (Ken Leung).
As for new actors, we'll have to wait and see who will join the series to play some highly-anticipated characters, particularly earth-bending master Toph.
What will 'Avatar: The Last Airbender' season 2 be about?
The eight-episode premiere season of Netflix's ATLA covered the entire first season of the original cartoon (also known as Book 1: Water), which focused on Aang's travels between the two Water Tribes. It's likely that season 2 will be an adaptation of Book 2: Earth, which sees Aang set out to master earth-bending and visit new corners of the world (most notably, Ba Sing Se). Meanwhile, Zuko and Uncle Iroh will be traveling the Earth Kingdom as fugitives from the Fire Nation, as Zuko tries to figure out his place in the world. Season 2 of the original show also served as the intros of Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee. While they've already shown up in the live-action series, season 2 will see them take a step up as the primary Big Bads hunting Aang.
ncG1vNJzZmivp6x7rq3RopycpJGev6Z6wqikaJulocG2vsRoq69lo528uL%2BOp5ytnpyexW6t1ZqrmqpdqbWmecuaqq1lkZ6%2Fo7HNnZyrZaOarrS7zWZpaA%3D%3D