Summary
Thanks to the ancient lion turtles granting humans the ability to bend the elements to protect themselves in the wild against spirits, conflicts of power have ensued for generations among the humans inAvatar: The Last Airbender. This continued inThe Legend of Korrawhich led Avatar Korra to go against the decision of the first Avatar. Due to the growing power and techniques of the elemental bending arts, this decision by Korra may not have been her wisest.
Another potential spinoff ofAvatar: The Last Airbendercould explore more unique and advanced bending techniques. With the addition of more combination, sub-elemental, and psychic bending arts, the franchise could theoretically spinoff into a number of different stories that do not necessarily have to focus on the four main elemental bending arts. Two less-known and high-level bending arts that should be explored more are energy bending and spirit bending.
How Bending Works In Avatar: The Last Air Bender
It’s common belief that benders in theAvatar: The Last Airbenderuniverse bend the elements. However, that is an oversimplification of how bending works. Bending, at its roots, is the manipulation of chi to manifest and control the element of which the bender has an affinity. All bending is essentially chi bending, also referred to as energy bending. As the ancient lion turtle explains to Aang before his fight withone of the most powerful fire benders, Fire Lord Ozai:“Since beginning-less time, darkness thrives in the void but always yields to purifying light. In the era before the Avatar, we bend not the elements, but the energy within ourselves. To bend another’s energy, your own spirit must be unbendable or, you will be corrupted and destroyed.”Because human chi is energy confined within the body, elemental bending is manifested as the bender’s capacity and capability to wield their chi beyond their body.
There are a few ways to block chi for benders. Aside from the highly difficult bending of another’s chi to take away their bending completely, there are three other ways to block chi for benders. One way is demonstrated by the fighting skills of Ty Lee,one of Azula’s former friends, who can temporarily block the flow of chi by hitting a bender’s pressure points. Second, the forbidden art of blood-bending, once thought only to be usable on a full moon, proved capable of temporarily blocking bending, evidenced by Amon’s reign of terror inThe Legend of Korra. The final method is self-afflicted. Benders lose the ability to wield their chi outside their bodies when their chakras become blocked, usually the result of trauma, fear, or disparaging thoughts; thus, disrupting their flow of chi. This was explained by Guru Pathik to Aang when he couldn’t unlock his Avatar state due to his fear of losing or hurting his loved ones as a result of doing so.
Advanced Chi Bending In Avatar: The Last Air Bender
This chi-level understanding of bending is necessary to understand how bending techniques and their range of power can grow in theAvatar: The Last Airbenderuniverse without the bender needing to possess the gift of being an Avatar. Advanced bending techniques and combined bending techniques demonstrated so far in the series are still only the beginning of what bending could become. From fire benders learning to bend lightning to air benders learning to astral project through spirit bending, these techniques open the door for new classes of benders and even more bending capabilities to display.
Water benders can blood bend due to the adaptive chi bending of the water and fluids in the body. It’s similar to how earth benders adapt their chi to bend metal. But on a scientific basis,the franchise’s most powerful earth bendersshould also be able to demonstrate to competency of blood bending because of the high mineral content in the body. Korra was able to bend liquid mercury out of her body. Though Korra was the Avatar, one capable of bending multiple elements, a highly skilled earth bender should be capable of focusing on the minerals rather than the fluids to blood bend. Korra’s mercury bending is similar to the way sand benders control grains of sand, even midair, to create sandstorms despite not being air benders.
In light of storms, only the Avatar has been seen capable of at least causing a natural disaster. It isn’t farfetched to imagine equally powerful benders, such as,the series' Fire Lord Ozai, to be able to both cause and control lightning storms by controlling atmospheric heat. Air, earth, and water benders all simulate natural disasters on a smaller scale by causing small tornadoes, splitting the earth, and using hurricane-like waterspouts, respectively. Their inability to manipulate weather or natural disasters may be due to blocked chakras or lack of skill to wield their chi in such wide-scale and powerful ways. That’s where Korra’s actions at the end ofThe Legend of Korracould change things.
Why Korra’s Actions Could Change Bending
WhenAvatar Korra, in one of her best scenes, chose to re-bridge the physical and spiritual worlds, she may have unknowingly doomed people and spirits to repeat history. The humans once lived together in the world with spirits until their desire and need for power to defend themselves in the wild against spirits led the first Avatar, Wan, to close the portals between the Spirit and Human Worlds. This was, however, before bending became more widespread among humans and well-before advanced bending techniques were developed. Korra reopening those portals not only potentially endangers the spirits but also may grant benders the opportunity to learn more advanced or ancient techniques that could continue the conflict among the nations.
In response tothe four nations, the Avatarwould most likely have to master spirit and energy bending to deter benders from becoming too reckless or causing harm at the price of losing their bending abilities. The problem is that energy bending can both take away and restore bending. It is also a bending art not necessarily exclusive to the Avatar. The series has not established any prerequisites for the ability to bend the chi of others. Therefore, anyone with chi and the capacity to bend should be able to learn it. That’s a dangerous possibility that could lead to violent anarchy for everyone. Spirit bending is another advanced technique seen associated mostly with highly skilled air benders. But spirit, like chi, is within everyone so, the ability to spirit bend may not be exclusive to the Avatar or air benders. If the human lust for power continues and the spirits likewise become more powerful, if not also becoming dark spirits, to defend themselves, then there would be a need for neutral law enforcement with either energy or spirit bending capabilities to help the Avatar restore balance.
Why The Next Avatar Spinoff Should Focus On Spirit and Energy Bending
Energy bending in theAvatar: The Last Airbender’suniverse is still a mysterious bending art. Its known techniques include granting, restoring, and taking away bending abilities, as well as transferring knowledge from one to another. Spirit bending has matured better onscreen to illustrate abilities such as astral projection, entering the spirit world, purifying dark spirits, and spirit canon blasts. The proliferation of these bending arts or a wide-scale need to learn them would be a great entry point for the conflict of a potentialAvatar: The Last Airbenderspinoff. Issues of taking away bending as a form of punishment could be framed as a human rights violation, leaving the Avatar with a moral dilemma of how to resolve conflict. In addition, if chi bending could grant benders enhanced bending powers, then natural disaster-level benders can become too much for a single Avatar to handle.
While this is all hypothetical, the problem remains thanks to Korra. Chi bending and spirit bending are two bending arts that could threaten the balance of the world if more people learn them, in the same way more people granted elemental bending capabilities proved to be a threat to peace. The Spirit World may house these lost arts only to be unearthed by humans, for better or worse. The inability to see the roots of how spirits and humans are interconnected and their need for harmony will continue the violent cycle of conflict that the Avatars have yet to resolve. As seen inThe Legend of Korra, even the presence of an Avatar itself is perceived as a threat that benders must be able to protect themselves from a rogue or dark Avatar. How an Avatar addresses this situation for good could either spell the end of bending for humans or a reclosing of the portals to the Spirit World, if not both. In the end, theAvatar: The Last Airbender’s next Avatar could very well be its last for the sake of lasting peace.
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