M. Night Shyamalan’s The last airbender is infamous for the changes it made to the setting of Avatar: The last airbender – like saying “Ahhng” instead of Aang, or “Eee-row” instead of Iroh, or like making everyone white.
But there’s one completely arbitrary and unnecessary change that’s actually interesting: making firebenders have to keep an open fire around at all times, since they can’t actually generate fire.
I can remember that fateful day, almost fifteen years ago, when I sat down in a theater and subjected myself to Shyamalan’s The last airbender, with its sleep paralysis demon Appa, its ’90s Power Rangers fight scenes, and its main character with a functionally different name. And maybe it was just the delusion of an overwhelmed mind, but I remember thinking to myself: Wait… firebenders being able to only bend fire that exists in their environment is kind of interesting.
Listen to me
Image: Nickelodeon Animation Studio
Firebending has always been the odd one out; it’s just that the Avatar: The last airbender cartoon has done a good job of making it seem interchangeable with water, earth and air. But of the four, fire is the only one that does not exist in a stable form in nature. You can’t put some fire in an oiled leather pouch and uncork it when the fight starts, like Katara does with her waterskin. Even torches only last a few hours. (Lava and magma are under the jurisdiction of earthbenders, we know this.)
One is not the other. Fire is the only element in it Avatar that is non-material: fire is not stuff, it is a chemical reaction. So, after all, firebenders are the only people in the world who have the phenomenally powerful ability to make their element appear out of thin air.
At the same time, if firebenders cannot generate fire from their environment, they are placed on the same level as the rest of the nations. And puts them at a clear disadvantage. It’s something that could give the Fire Nation a kind of ingrained inferiority complex for being the odd one out, a cultural quirk that ties in nicely with its descent into xenophobia and imperialism.
Furthermore, restrictions create tension
The key to an interesting superpower is a good counter. You can take away Batman’s belt, you can expose Superman to kryptonite, or you can control Wolverine’s cutting-through claws by aiming them at one of his friends. Limiting or removing a character’s special powers is a baked-in way to increase tension—and it makes them look even cooler when they do get through, like when Toph develops metalbending, or Katara figuring out how to bend by her own sweat, or a bunch of earthbending prisoners finally get close enough to a pile of coal.
To be clear: Shyamalan’s Airbender doesn’t execute this idea in a particularly thoughtful way. Functionally, it just seems to mean that Fire Nation soldiers are constantly carrying flaming torches or lugging around heavy braziers. It seems like a huge disadvantage compared to earthbenders and ice floe-dwelling waterbenders who hurl chunks of their own streets through the air like nails, or Aang’s ability to weaponize something as ubiquitous as air. And the presence of fire to bend it raises questions about the non-violent applications of firebending we see in the Avatar cartoon, such as warming the body in cold environments.
So it’s not like Shyamalan showed us how firebenders sneak with hooded lanterns, or how they develop steampunk solutions like automatic flintlockers or matches that can strike anywhere – or how their clothing or architecture changes because they have an open fire in every room must have a flame. always a crazy room.
Shyamalans Airbender seems to have made this change just now to squeeze out one of the climactic scenes, where it is revealed that there is sometimes a firebender can generate fire from nothing, but only if they, like, a total badass.
Fifteen years later, Shyamalan’s only moment Airbender I distinctly remember the moment when Admiral Zhao stabs the Moon Spirit, when Iroh completely lets go and flames come out of his hands. Shyamalan sells the moment in the images and in the reaction of the extras: Even seasoned Fire Nation soldiers immediately flee. The only fire inside this area is of Iroh.
It’s over the top, goofy, and a bit staid, but it gets the point across: in a world where you can hinder most firebenders by taking away their fire, those who can bend fire Anyway are terrifyingly powerful. Frankly, Azula’s beautiful blue firebending wonder flames seem tame in comparison.
Was Shyamalan secretly a genius at this? Probably not. Would this change have improved the original equipment? Avatar: The last airbender? No, it’s still a masterclass in world-building. But it shows that even a broken clock can teach a lesson in how to raise the stakes once or twice a day.