The first season of Avatar was the show at its most basic and childish. It's evident even from the pilot, The Boy In The Iceberg, what the tone of the season would be: funny and kid-friendly, with the occassional dose of drama. That's not to say that season 1 didn't have incredibly dramatic moments - the scene in which Aang finds the rotted corpse of his old beloved mentor is particularly hard to watch - but they're relatively few and far between.

One of the weaker parts of season 1 is an overall lack of tension, with a borderline comically brooding Zuko and his silly uncle being the main antagonists. Admiral Zhao becomes a regular enemy in the later part of the season, but even he doesn't pose much of a serious threat. These "easier" conflicts are appropriate for the scope of the show, however - Aang's journey is new, and he's not even remotely trained in how to actually fight other people.

This general lack of drama and tension allows the first season to be filled to the brim with humor. While some of the jokes are child-oriented, many more are obviously written with adults in mind. Most of the humor in this season, and the show in general, is character based. There are no real "jokes", just humorous interactions between likeable characters. One thing that season 1 excels in is character establishment. By the second episode, you already completely know the personality of each character. The rest of the season expands on those personalities, which makes finding out more about the characters a major draw.

Overall, Book One is enjoyable and fun to watch, but has nowhere near the long-term appeal and intensity of the other two seasons. 7/10

Just like the previous season's pilot, even from watching the first episode of Book Two, the tone of the season can easily be discerned. Aang has mastered waterbending. Zuko and Iroh (the latter of whom is now more wise than goofy) are officially traitors. A new character is introduced. Things are changing. Moreso than that, it's darker. Zuko's sister is a scary character, from her first scene where she threatens to murder someone to the reveal that she'd been tricking Zuko the whole episode. It's obvious solely from the introduction of her character that the stakes have changed. And the Earth Kingdom general Aang meets in the episode isn't a good guy, even though he's on the "good side". While Book 1 had a few instances of this greyness, it's nothing compared to the lengths Book 2 goes to blur the morality line. From the first episode of the season alone, one can tell that it's the introduction to a more mature, gripping season.

The main change in Book 2 is the tension. No longer is Aang's main threat an angsty Team Rocket-esque villain, it's a cold and calculated machine built for destroying him. Every encounter Aang and the gang has with Azula throughout the season has them either barely escaping or barely getting the better of her. There's never a decisive victory against her, unlike when Zuko was the main antagonist. This makes the heroes look increasingly powerless against the Fire Nation. In the thick of season 2, the oppressive military regime seems more impossible to beat than ever. The fact that half of the season is spent with Aang's beloved flying bison Appa kidnapped only adds to its intensity.

While the tone of the second season may be different from the first, the overall goals of the characters remain the same. "Master this type of bending, get to location X". Soon after Aang meets his blind earthbending teacher Toph, the gang learns they must rush to Ba Sing Se in order to tell the Earth King news about a solar eclipse. Toph is, of course, a classic addition to the show. Her character lent a much needed new sense of humor to it, injecting a much more sardonic and ironic blend of comedy. Moreso than that, her character is a very interesting one, from her upbringing to how she uses her disability as an advantage.

As previously mentioned, the moral ambiguity is abound in season 2. When the gang finally reaches Ba Sing Se, the last stronghold of resistance against the Fire Nation, they find that the government of the city itself is corrupted. In the latter half of the season, Aang has to fight enemies on both sides of Ba Sing Se's walls, which adds to the realism and intrigue of the show.

But the best part about Book 2 is easily the massive development that Zuko's character gets. While he was nothing much more than a sympathizable comic foil to Aang in Book 1, Book 2 marks the start of his long-winded redemption arc. His interactions with Iroh are powerful. While sometimes sad and sometimes uplifting, the conversations the two characters have together in this season are some of the best dialogue pieces in modern television. Zuko doesn't know where his path leads after leaving the Fire Nation, but Iroh does - but he also knows that Zuko has to get there by himself.

By the time the book is over, however, the Earth Kingdom has fallen, Aang dies and comes back, and Zuko has betrayed his unconditionally-loving uncle in exchange for a seat of power between a genocidal father and a psychopathic sister. A low end for a dark season.

Book Two is when Avatar stopped becoming a high-quality kids show and starting becoming a high-quality adults show. The episodes produced in this season are almost all instant classics. The conflicts and questions that the characters face are immensely interesting. The fights are better, the dialogue is better, and the plot is better. 10/10.

An essential part of any good story is a memorable ending. The third season of Avatar brought with it even more changes to long-standing tenets of the show. Sokka and Katara see their father. Ozai's face is shown, and he has many speaking parts. Zuko is officially on Aang's side. That last one is the big one, and it's a complete 180 degree turn from episode one. But it all happens in such a natural and flowing way that it's not jarring. Zuko betrayed his uncle at the end of season 2, slicing off completely any further mentorship Iroh could give him. Even after two seasons had passed, Zuko still feels that he needs his father to restore who he was. But only after being accepted by his father, by his country, does he realize that his entire mission was for nothing. His entire life - one where he was conditioned to fervently follow the Fire Lord, one where the Avatar is the world's greatest enemy - is a lie. Season 2 was about Iroh helping his nephew find the path to light, and Season 3 is about Zuko finding that light for himself, the way it had to happen. When Zuko, the most dynamic character of the show, confronts his father at the midpoint of the season, his journey is over. He's finally who he needs to be, and he knows it. The angst is gone, the anger has subsided. One of Zuko's most enduring character traits has always been his refusal to give in, his determination to fulfill whatever mission he assigns himself. And now, that mission is to overthrow his father. It's such a fantastic moment, one that you know the entire series has been building toward as you watch it.

As for the main plot, there are quite a few episodes in this season that exist solely for filler. "The Painted Lady" is the most heinous example, but there are still a lot more. This is made up for, though, with the supply of fantastic episodes for season 3. "The Boiling Rock" two-parter is one of the best hours of television ever made, perfectly emulating a prison escape movie while retaining the classic Avatar style. In addition, the episode marks another significant change in the series with Mai and Ty Lee's betrayal of Azula. The loss of her only two friends, the only people who saw her as anything more than a cog, is what would spark Azula's mental decay. It's this inner struggle that brings the perfectionist down to the gang's level.

The four-part finale of the show has some amazing moments, including Zuko's reunion with his uncle in the "The Old Masters". Even though Zuko knows that he's changed, and that he's how his uncle would want him to be, he still cannot forgive himself for betraying Iroh in the first place. When he submits himself to his old mentor, he believes that he'll be chastised, scorned. But Iroh doesn't give a second's hesitation to embrace his nephew and tell him "I was never angry, just sad, because I thought you'd lost your way." It's an extremely emotional moment, one that confirms everything we know and love about Iroh and his relationship with Zuko. The best part of the third season is how elegantly Zuko's story is concluded.

My favorite thing about the finale, however, is the fact that Aang's main dilemma isn't in defeating the Fire Lord, it's in what to do afterward. The show reminds us that Aang is a child, and a peaceful monk at that. He's never taken a life. He tells himself that he never will have to. His people taught him that every life is sacred, from the lowest insect to the most monstrous criminal. Aang consults his past life, Avatar Yangchen, for guidance about this, and the most adult and sophisticated conversation I've ever heard on a children's show begins. She tells Aang that while every life is sacred and that the monks taught him well, this isn't about him. It's about the world. Ozai is the leader of a genocidal regime that's thrown the land out of balance for the past 100 years, and as Avatar, Aang has a duty to forsake his own personal morals and stop him. He has a duty to protect the world, not to protect his values. It's an incredibly thought-provoking scene, and it reassures us that the creators of the show take their own fiction seriously.

And if the show was even rated TV-14, it definitely would have ended with Aang, in an ultimate act of sacrifice, killing both the Fire Lord and the childish innocence he's known for. Ultimately, however, the series is resolved with a passable deus ex machina in the form of energybending, or the ability to take bending away. This simply illegitimatizes the moral problem the entire season had been building up to, and while a terrible way to end Aang's conflict over killing another human being, it was an okay way to end the conflict with the Fire Nation in general. A much better handled ending is Zuko and Katara's defeat of Azula. Azula's mental breakdown was more of her enemy than Zuko and Katara, who she would've had no problem beating if she had her season 2 level of sanity. Even though she had been looking outward for threats her whole life, Azula's fall came from within.

By the end of the finale, Aang and Katara are together, the bad guy is indisputably beaten, and all the sympathizable characters have gotten their own personal victories. It's not a bad way to end a kids show, but judging it on a fair scale, I find it a bit too clean. I wouldn't have minded if the creators had the boldness to kill off a character in a similar way they did with Jet, but I can't complain too much. The last shots of season 3 are reminiscent of the tone and style of the first season, which is appropriate. And while I didn't find the ending of Book 3 all that excellent, the rest of the season was usually great, with a few missteps. I loved seeing more of Fire Nation internal culture, and Zuko's arc is concluded in a fantastic way. It was a 8.5/10 season.