After five minutes with literally anyone, I’ll look up and be like, you’re Fire Nation. You’re Water. It’s almost like that’s my manual for understanding human behavior.
ATLA’s childlike ideal shows us a model for returning to our original enlightenment. It shows us that we can be less like an arrow, and more like Sokka’s boomerang — we can finally embark home, to the child hero already waiting within us.
American culture likes to identify its heroes and villains; Avatar the Last Airbender creators Koniezko and DiMartino are neither. For me, they are not “canceled.” But contrary to public worship, their work bears harm too.
