Which Avatar had better villains: The Last Airbender or Legend of Korra?

Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra are not the same show. Fans — of both or just either — have long known this to be the case; almost immediately, Korra’s delightful, brash cockiness immediately offset her from Aang’s childish wisdom. Both shows immediately bring in villains who want to snuff out the Avatar once and for all, but they play them totally differently.

[Ed. note: We’re going to start talking spoilers for both Avatar shows, so only read on if you’re fine with that.]

Ultimately, The Legend of Korra opts to not set the world on fire in the same way The Last Airbender did. Rather, Amon, the big bad of season 1 who wanted to end the Avatar line completely, gets revealed to be a fraud and dispatched at the end of the season. From there, Korra goes to bigger places, squaring off against antagonists who each bring something new to her sense of self, as the Avatar and a person.

The effort was an intentional one by series creators Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino, who saw the new villains as a way to always continue to provide shades of gray to the world of Avatar.

“The real world has taught us that no matter how noble a cause is, there will always be individuals who will exploit it,” Konietzko told Polygon in 2020. “But as with all of our villains, we’re very interested in finding out who they are and how they ended up so out of balance.”

Still, the season-long villain arc is a totally different beast from the overarching big bad. So long as we’re here to discuss and debate the world of Avatar, we may as well take a closer look at how the change in structure changed how we felt about the villains — so which show ended up with better antagonists?

Zosha: I think, to kick us off, it’d be good to define two things really clearly: First, we know that “villainy” isn’t really a straight condemnation in the world of Avatar. Rather, it’s a place in the story that exists opposed to the Avatar, in some way. So when we use that term here, we accept (as the original creators have said on this very site) that they exist in some way “as people first, then as heroes or villains second.”

Second, it’d be good for us to kick off where we stand generally on the state of villains in Avatar. For myself, I’m most drawn to Avatar: The Last Airbender’s singular focus. How about you guys?

Petrana: Ozai served a great purpose in Avatar: The Last Airbender and unified the whole overarching series, but personally, the villains in Korra absolutely fascinate me. I love how cause-and-effect they were — like, of course a non-bender supremacist would rise out of a world so disproportionately skewed toward benders for the past 60 years, and of course the neglected spirit world would mean the rise of a theocratic leader. It just makes sense with the world, and I think also takes everything Avatar laid down and evolves it to the next, natural point.

Toussaint: I have to agree with Petrana. I was a fan of Avatar: The Last Airbender and I think that Ozai is a fascinating character, but there aren’t many layers to him aside from his overwhelming ambition, rage, and jealousy of his brother Iroh. Legend of Korra has stronger villains overall, with my favorite of the four major antagonists being Zaheer. Up until the third season of Korra, the series had villains whose motivations were ultimately revealed to be self-serving, but Zaheer is different. He’s not looking for power, he’s looking for change. He truly believes in what he’s doing, that he’s working to topple a corrupt status quo and bring a sense of order to the world that the concept of the Avatar is fundamentally incompatible with. Like Petrana mentioned, there’s a cause and effect to his place in the larger universe of Avatar. Because of Unalaq’s machinations and the Harmonic Convergence, Zaheer was able to escape from his prison and resume his campaign to kill the Avatar, and because of the destruction left in the wake of him killing the Earth Kingdom queen, Kuvira was able to fill that vacuum and grow to become an autocratic leader — the very thing he was trying to prevent in the first place! That’s what makes his character so compelling to me.

Image: Nickelodeon Animation Studio

Zosha: I think these are great points; the way Avatar, as a universe, manages to build and widen its world, one challenge at a time. In so many ways, Korra feels so much stronger now than when I was watching along with it years ago. Its trick is in constantly leveling up our protagonist (and her pals) against bad guys, making that growth seem natural in so many ways — not least of which is using the “book” format for seasons without repeating a single ethos.

But what interests me about Avatar’s villainy isn’t really Ozai — as you guys say, he’s a one-note fascist who’s out to conquer the world by literally burning it to the ground. It’s Aang, and his specific response to such evil, that I find so compelling. Having a hero be a pacifist is tried and true, particularly when it comes to those tasked with saving the world. But having Aang’s whole endgame pivot entirely around this, to the consternation and confusion of those around him, fascinates me! It’s a question I can get so bored of, but that fiction really owes it to us to interrogate: What actually is the proper place of violence in the face of an enemy who won’t hesitate to use it against you? To me, that’s the real strength of Avatar’s villain arc, and what adds so much fuel to my fire over all these years.

Toussaint: That’s a great point, Zosha! When you frame it like that, the most compelling case for the villainy in Avatar is in how it forces Aang to confront the conflict between his own beliefs and his obligations and duties as the Avatar while somehow finding a way to reconcile them. By contrast, the villainy in Korra is implemented in such a way that it forces Korra to question what it means to be the Avatar at all, and what it means to bring “balance” to the world. Does the world still need an Avatar, and if so, what is the role of the Avatar in this increasingly changing world?

For me, I find the latter question more fascinating, as it offers more ways to flesh out the world-building of Avatar and positions Korra as a character whose actions will define what it means to be an Avatar in the modern era for generations to come.

Petrana: One thing I really like about the villains in Korra is that they do all fundamentally challenge the way the world works. Of course, the reason we are so intimately acquainted with how the world works is because of the original show, and having that as a foundation helps us tackle deeper questions. Like Toussaint said, Aang has to reconcile his own beliefs — beliefs from a culture completely wiped out by his enemy — with what everyone believes his duty should be. But everyone is mostly on his side, believing in the Avatar wholeheartedly. Meanwhile, because the villains in Korra threaten the very structures of the world, there is that ever-present feeling that she might not even be needed anymore. I just think that’s such a specific theme to explore, and one that not a lot of American cartoons get to do.

Image: Nickelodeon Animation Studio

Image: Nickelodeon Animation Studio

I like Aang’s arc, and I like him sticking to his beliefs, despite what everyone tells him, because in a way that’s how he lets the Air Nomads live on. But Korra’s arc, especially when it comes to the villains she faces, is just compelling to me in terms of the places it goes. Aang builds up more confidence, while Korra loses it and must figure out who she is in a world that has maybe outgrown her. It’s a subversion of the more stereotypical hero’s journey.

Zosha: OK, mostly true — not the Korra part; I think that’s all very apt!

But with regard to Aang: People are on his side to a point, and for Aang it’s a very frustrating point. In the final episode, Zuko is pushing Aang to acknowledge that he needs to either kill Ozai or have a plan for dispatching him. Aang is at a loss for both of these. And while he finds some sympathetic ears among Team Avatar, ultimately no one really can understand him. They see it as something he doesn’t want to do, not something he really genuinely feels he can’t. He won’t even hit the Melon Lord with his staff!

I definitely agree with what you guys are saying on Korra, and how the arc of fighting evil pushes her (and the show) to new heights. I think for me, I almost visualize it as them moving similarly in different directions; Korra goes up, and Aang moves out (horizontally). It’s a really deep burden to bear the weight of the world, and still feel like you have to stand up for your convictions and your limitations. To your point, Toussaint, I think those ideas are ones that resonate with me more as time marches on and our world seems more fucked and uncaring.

Toussaint: For me, what this conversation has really helped to clarify is that — whether you’re a fan of the villainy in the original Avatar or the villainy in Legend of Korra — both force their respective protagonists to break from precedent and approach their role as the Avatar on their own terms. Aang doesn’t want to kill Fire Lord Ozai and is told by everyone — including his past incarnations — that he must. Every antagonist Korra faces off against in one way or another challenges the notion of whether the Avatar has any place in the world anymore. Both Aang and Korra respond on their terms, finding a way to rise to the responsibilities of being the Avatar without betraying their sense of self.

Petrana: Yeah, I think Ozai on his own is meh. Ozai when used to challenge Aang? Wonderful.

That being said, that is still ultimately why the Korra villains are more interesting to me, because in addition to how they challenge the status quo in the world, they are also just more interesting as people.

The Fire Lord family as a whole is deliciously toxic, and I like how Ozai’s relationships with Zuko, Azula, and Iroh shape their characters. But Ozai on his own is a guy who wants to take over the world. Kuvira has a similar motive, but she’s way more interesting as a character, because we get to see how that idea sparked, how she genuinely thought she was doing the right thing, and how that sense of righteousness can get warped under delusions of grandeur. All of the Korra villains have distinct personalities, which shape their methods and motives uniquely.

Also — gotta give a shoutout to Zaheer’s gang and their customized high-security prisons, because I just think they’re neat!

Toussaint: This might be a bit controversial, but I kind of find Zaheer’s character… inspiring? Like, I don’t agree with his ideology or his methods at all, but this man literally went from being a non-bender imprisoned in an airbender prison to gaining the power to airbend through a fluke of fate to ultimately becoming the second-ever airbender in history to unlock the power of flight. He’s not like Amon, who was concealing his power to bloodbend and using populist rhetoric to further his own agenda. Zaheer manifested flight through the sheer power of his conviction and will — you can’t fake that! That’s why I find him such a compelling and truly dangerous antagonist.

Zosha: Oh, Zaheer absolutely comes out of the Killmonger School of Villainy. [Ed. note: I know he came first. Maybe the villain school rebrands with every new worthy villain; I don’t know, I didn’t go there.] He makes a compelling case! He makes sense! All he wants is what he sees as equality. I think this is the great double-edged sword of all of Korra’s villains: Contrasted with the obscene discrimination and offensiveness of the Fire Nation, all of Korra’s antagonists make good points, and it’s up to her to fish reason out of those pools of extremism for herself and the world. While I don’t think he makes as good a villain, one of the hardest things about Korra to me is how a lot of Amon’s complaints are valid, and tip at a justice the show can’t quite get to before it moves on to other things.

By contrast, I think a lot of the Avatar bad guys are different tastes of villainy on the way to Ozai’s Flavortown of Evil. There’s those that cause intentional harm and those that have unintended consequences of their actions. People like Hama, Azula, or Jet become “villains” because they don’t know anything else to do with their own power and pain. I think Avatar has a really rich tapestry of what makes people do bad things, even if on its face it’s easy to write off as all in service of a conquering state.

Image: Nickelodeon Animation Studio

Image: Nickelodeon Animation Studio

Image: Nickelodeon Animation Studio

In that way, I think Zaheer — along with Kuvira, who immediately follows him in an elegant contrast — make for really great explorations of the same themes of a lot of Avatar and Aang’s journeys (and what I appreciate most about them): to compel order and peace, and to permit yourself to feel like you are the arbiter of what is and isn’t just harm.

Petrana: Per your point about Amon, I think unfortunately where Korra suffers is not having as much breathing room to really dive into the consequences of these villains. And that also speaks to the lack of smaller villains to help really flesh out the world. We get some tastes, like Bataar Jr., the Earth Queen, Hiroshi Sato, and even Varrick initially, but they’re mostly supporting, instead of having interesting reasons of their own.

I guess, in a way, that’s an inverse to what we see in Avatar, where the big bad is kinda standard, but every other minor villain is interesting. And considering Korra is in many ways both the natural sequel and fitting antithesis to ATLA, it makes so much sense.

Zosha: Absolutely! And I think it drives home so many interesting ideas that float between the world of both shows where people are wielding the elements of nature: Like the natural world, things are rarely totally one thing, and often what seems like pure malice — your Ozais, your Amons, your Koh the Face Stealers — is often a response to something. Avatar, as a universe, is smart enough to not need to make that response always perfect or reasonable. But it’s the response itself that makes the story, and that feels like the richest part of exploring the show. It’s true for the villains, and it’s true for our respective Avatars.

Avatar: The Last Airbender and Avatar: The Legend of Korra are both streaming on Netflix.