Avatar: The Last Airbender – The Promise Part 1

Avatar: The Last Airbender – The Promise Part 1
by Gene Luen Yang (and others)
Publisher: Dark Horse
Publication Date: February 7, 2012
ISBN: 978-1595828118
80 Pages
Fiction: Graphic Novel

If you hang out with my family it won’t take long to discover that we love the Avatar cartoon series. I am someone who is both annoyed and bored by most children’s cartoons, so a cartoon has to be very special, intelligent, funny and entertaining to grab my attention – and Avatar succeeds at all of those. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again – the movie Avatar was mediocre at best. Don’t pre-judge the cartoons by the movie. The cartoons have an epic storyline that the whole family can watch and enjoy.

This book, Avatar: The Last Airbender – The Promise Part 1, is the continuation of the story of Aang from the point where the cartoon series ended. You don’t have to watch the cartoons in order to understand what’s going on though; the plot of all three seasons is summarized quickly in the first few pages.

It has the same trademark humor that I’d come to expect in the cartoons, and Sokka’s discomfort with Aang and Katara’s affection for each other is sure to please the kids. Their happy banter doesn’t last long though, because they are faced with a serious mission: help relocate the Fire Nation citizens who settled in the Earth Nation during the war. There are some obvious parallels with the Israeli/Palestinian conflict – about who has true ownership of lands, especially since some of the Fire Nation citizens have lived on Earth Nation lands for generations.

Since Aang is a peacemaker in his role as Avatar, he volunteers to help with the resettlement process; Sokka and Katara accompanying him as his loyal sidekicks. It doesn’t take long for them to begin to doubt the new Fire Lord’s loyalties and as tensions rise, the specter of war looms once again on the horizon.

There is a dramatic cliffhanger ending which is to be expected since, as it says in the title, this is only part one of the story. At 80 pages it is a quick read and it will leave fans waiting impatiently for more. Part two is set to release June 12th. These stories are supposed to bridge the gap between the original Avatar cartoons about Aang, and the new Avatar cartoon which should release sometime later in 2012 (I haven’t been able to find a date for the release). It is called The Last Airbender: Legend of Korra (click on the link to see the trailer).

Rating: 4/5

I received a free electronic copy of this book for review.

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