Aang's Abilities

[+Javu+]

Aang's abilities. Mmm...perhaps this should be under the Character board. But it seems more deeper than just a Character disscussion.

Throughout watching the whole show, I, like everyone else, get the feel for the different elements:

Fire~ Firebenders use stronger stances. You punch, and fire shoots out. Fire is fierce, strong, can bend your fear, and almost uncontrolable. Fire is a stricking element.
Water~ Waterbender arts are more of an original Chinese martial arts. Flowing, calmer, not a lot of energy. You don't have all of these strong stances. You direct the water with your hand. Water is a directing element.
Earth~ Earthbenders are stubborn. Like Firebenders, they have stronger stances and are very firm with their placement. With earth, you feel the earth, guide it up, and then strike with your hand/feet or whatever.

And now Air....I getting the picture that air is flexable, moveable, free, and easy to get into small places. Defensive, not aggresive.

So back to Aang's bending. When we first met Aang, we figured out that he is a Airbending Master, for he has the arrow on his head. But as we progressed in Book One...it seems that he could fight with air, but he was better with playing with it.

Moving on to his Waterbending abilities. When he was training with Master Pakku, he was rolling around in the snow with Momo making himself into a snow-man. Now, he is a good Waterbending. But still.

Earthbending. We do see him train, and suffer for not being so Earthbender-ish. But he gets it in the end. And we see him become better at that a grow.

So, now. He's mastered, I guess, three elements, soon to learn another. Good, yes? I'm not sure.

I do Tae Kwon Do myself. I've learned that you can learn all the forms and the sparring one-steps, learn how to do everything and actually be able to do, but it's all useless if you can't put it together in an actual fight. If you don't have to guts to put into practice what you've learned, your training was pointless.

So, in DoBS, we saw Aang fight Azula, one-on-one for a short time. She couldn't Firebend, so she didn't even really fight back at him. But he couldn't land a blow on her. Yeah, she's good at dodging. But still. He's the Avatar. He's mastered Air, Water, and Earth. He can't even land a blow on someone who can't bend at the moment?

In my opinion, Aang needs to be much more aggresive. He's fast. He should be able to totally knock her down just with air. But, for some reason, he can't. Maybe he's treating Water and Earth elements like Air? Free and not so powerful?

Whatever it is, it's holding him back.

Opinions?

[zukostalker]

Hitting her then wouldn't have giving them that 'ima gonna stick you to the wall now' scene.
Aang seems to like to use earthbending more than airbending for some reason...
But yeah, I'd like to see him be mister oh-so-powerful with the elements he has an no Avatar state.

[astroanna]

I don't think it's so much that Aang doesn't have the power, but that he is a pacifist by nature. His instinct is always to defend, not to attack. I agree that he needs to learn how to balance both as the Avatar; defending and attacking, yin and yang.

He doesn't need to learn to be more agressive so much as he needs to start accessing that part of himself. Learning firebending will go a long way towards achieving that, I think. As you said, fire is an aggresive, fierce element and learning to control something that powerful and raw will help him focus, attack when necesary without holding back.

Another big part of this is Aang learning how to trust himself completely. He's gone a long way towards achieving this since the end of Season 1, but he's not there yet. Hurting Katara, however unintentionally, shattered Aang's faith in his ability to firebend safely and remain in control. He needs to get past that if he is to master firebending.

Good thread topic, BTW...later!

[bongalak]

We actually had a similar thread some time ago. Take a look.

distanthorizons.proboards31.com/index.cgi?board=theories&action=display&thread=1196499792

I think most of us agreed that it was all a plot device to make sure Azula messes up the Gaang's plan.

[attonbitus]

Keep in mine that airbending by it's nature is not about direct confrontation is actually used more for evasion and misdirection. Also since the air nomads were more of a pacifist people I doubt many of them honed their skills for purely combat purposes.

[+Javu+]

attonbitus said:

Keep in mine that airbending by it's nature is not about direct confrontation is actually used more for evasion and misdirection. Also since the air nomads were more of a pacifist people I doubt many of them honed their skills for purely combat purposes.

I know. That's what I'm trying to get at. Is Aang's...concept of bending air getting in the way of how the other elements should be bended? He's not being....yeah.

[ethe]

Azula is just completely awesome THAT'S why Aang couldn't hit her 8D

Azula, a master at firebending, was brought up learning a type of art that is swift and agressive -- an art that always strives to strike first. Persons who learn firebending need to eventually have high quality agility, flexibility, speed and endurance (Yeah, I got some of this from wiki !LINK!)

While firebenders usually approach (attack) their targets, Airbenders are brought up to defend (evade) any attacks

Airbending also using swift movements... but all these movements are usually passive (this opposes the firebenders aggresive nature); Though airbenders are also agile, flexible and quick, they lack endurance (I think, I'm not sure) and avoid getting too close to their targets. So chasing and being offensive is something completely new to a person like Aang... A person who doesn't know firebending D:

I think that Aang isn't used to fighting at such a close range. He'd rather fight from far away and has never really practiced closing the distance between him and his foe.

Besides, Azula is awesome

Once he learns firebending he'll do fine against her, I'm sure :)

[ow]

As they say in order to defeat your opponent you must "know" them

[+Javu+]

True, true. He just doesn't know Firebending or Azula yet.

[spirityue]

While I know and understand that Aang's air bending is used more as a defensive stratagy, on another thread someone had wrote something about him learning a new super powerful technique, such as blood bending is to water bending, so, I thought maybe he would somehow come to the realization that he could literally suffocate a person by sucking all the air out of them or by simply collapsing their lungs. Like I said, true, it's not Aang's nature to want to do something as severe as that, but, we've all seen him in the avatar state acting and performing completely unlike his usual self, so, isn't it possible that once he attains the avatar state again, he'll be pushed to his limits and thus the ultimate air bending move will just happen?

[Alleluia]

Not if the ultimate Airbending move involves killing someone. They won't have Aang do that directly, Avatar State or no Avatar State. Even though it would be in battle and likely self defense, it would look too much like the Hero committing murder.

I think Aang has become a lot more agressive in his fighting then the beginning of the series. Toph and Earthbending have had a lot to do with that. True, he couldn't hit Azula, but neither could Toph, who was there too. So, I have to think its just cus Azula *is* that good.

[spirityue]

Good point! I hadn't thought of that actually . That could still be the super powerful technique he learns about though, but just doesn't use it.

[+Javu+]

Yeah. That could be it.

[Zenjamin]

as this thread shows, that whole scene between aand and azula was just a plot device to give aang some action during the DOBS.

if the scene had had stayed true to aangs abilities, he would have moved faster then the wind, encased azula in earth, and that would have been that.

[Alleluia]

Aang needs space and a straight, unchanging path to move faster then the wind, Zenjamin. He didn't have that here since the Dai Lee could have thrown a rock pillar into his path at any moment(as far as he knew). It wasn't safe to use that. The Dai Lee also prevented her from being encased in earth. Toph did that. The Dai Lee undid it. They could do so again.

The fact that a thread on DH came to decide it was a plot device doesn't prove anythng, really.

(Of course, it can be pointed out this is a story and therefore everything that happens is a plot device since it is all designed to lead to a specific end. But i think "plot device" here prolly was more like code for a "ghost in the machine"?)