The Waterbending Scroll
Anyone who has read my books can probably guess that I like this episode. Hell, I would have loved to hear Jack Angel narrating those if he was still around.
Aang is stressing out because of what Roku told him last episode, so Katara offers to teach him the few waterbending techniques she knows. Unfortunately, she grows frustrated when Aang learns techniques in a day that she took months to learn. After their training accidentally washes away their supplies, they visit a nearby port town to restock and Katara discovers a scroll with waterbending techniques at a storefront operated by "high risk traders". Eager to learn the secrets, she steals the scroll. Meanwhile, Iroh orders a course change for the most trivial reason (a lost Lotus tile used in the strategy game Pai Sho), and they visit the same storefront. Learning that the pirates encountered Aang, Zuko enters an uneasy alliance with them. Katara gets captured by Zuko, while the pirates capture Aang and Sokka.
This episode has some great action sequences. We have a harrowing chase scene after the pirates discover that Katara has stolen their scroll, with some great moments like Katara using the contents of a water butt to make ice, or Aang launching a cabbage merchant's cart at their pursuers. This is topped by the climax of the episode when Sokka turns the pirates against Zuko by playing to their greed. They escape in the ensuing melee and steal the pirates' ship in a moment which even Zuko finds hilarious. Serioulsy, this might be the only time we see him laugh.
Beyond the action, there's also an interesting message about how not everything is a competition. Katara's obsession with the scroll not only makes enemies out of the pirates, but her determination to learn the techniques makes her snap at Aang until she comes to her senses. In the end, they have to waterbend toegether to escape.
All in all, this one's pretty good.
Jet
This has some interesting themes about xenophobia and casualties of war, but falls a little short in the execution.
While travelling through a forest, the party stumble across a Fire Nation camp where they're saved by Jet, the leader of a band of war orphans who are carrying out a guerrilla campaign against the Fire Nation. Katara becomes enamoured with him, but Sokka is more doubtful and soon realises that he's an extremist, willing to destroy a dam to flood an Earth Kingdom village occupied by the Fire Nation.
Jet is presented as a charismatic leader, but is later revealed to be ruthless and manipulative. One notable scene has him inviting Sokka to join him on an ambush, only for Sokka to learn that he's ambushing an old man. He later claims to Aang and Katara that the old man was an assassin, and tricks them into filling a reservoir as part of his scheme. While there's an important message about not hurting those who come from a group that harmed you, it also makes Jet a little one-dimensional. Yes, he talks about how he lost his parents to the Fire Nation, but I think they could have given him a little more nuance.
Nevertheless, there's still a great theme to the episode along with some great action sequences. At the beginning, we have Jet and his freedom fighters battling Fire Nation soldiers. And at the end, there's a cool fight between Aang and Jet as the former tries to recover his glider from the latter.
Out of these two episodes, I definitely enjoyed the first one more. The next episode has a rather notorious reputation, but it'll be worth it for the one after.
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