The Good Masculinity of Avatar: The Last Airbender
Avatar: The Last Airbender is a timeless show, to say the least. It’s a show that you can watch and rewatch over and over again, and it surprisingly holds up on each viewing. I watched it for the first time last year when it became available on Netflix, and I immediately fell in love with it. The show shined through its characters, allowing them to develop and realize their potential as the show progressed. And as the characters grew and learned from their mistakes, the show’s values emerged also.
One theme that the show discussed was the concept of masculinity. The show featured broken boys, adolescents, and men, and in so doing, showed how they flourished when they embraced a more healthy understanding of masculinity. Conversely, it also showed how holding onto a more pernicious concept of masculinity can lead to a person losing everything that they have. With that being said, in this essay, I’ll be analyzing how masculinity is portrayed in Avatar: The Last Airbender. In particular, I will analyze the characters of Sokka and Zuko, and I will specifically focus on how they grow to embrace a more healthy version of masculinity, despite the expectations of their cultures, and of themselves. Through them both, I will also analyze how fatherhood can facilitate an understanding of masculinity that can either be productive or destructive.
Sokka
Sokka is my favorite character from Avatar. He’s incredibly smart, super hilarious, and intensely brave. He also struggles with the question of how to be a man, and that largely stems from him being made to stay at home after the Southern Water Tribe’s navy leaves to play a part in the war effort. What compounds his insecurity in his masculinity is the fact that he’s left with the women and children of the tribe, while his father leaves as the leader of the navy. Because his dad is seen as a leader, and because Sokka was incredibly young when his dad left, Sokka develops an idealistic image of his father, and, in turn, determines to live up to that image himself. That causes him to overcompensate on his leadership skills at times, seeking to come up with solutions whenever he can. Hence, why Sokka drinks the cactus juice in “the desert” episode.
That overcompensation, in part, causes Sokka to start off the show as deeply sexist, sexist towards Katara, and also the Kyoshi warriors. We see that clearly at the beginning of the show, when Sokka disparages Katara after crashing into the iceberg. We also observe that during the episode “The Warriors of Kyoshi”. In that episode, Sokka underestimates the Kyoshi warriors, mostly because of their outwardly feminine dresses, and he gets frustrated when they abruptly beat the gang. Later, when Suki beats him in a fight in front of the other warriors, he does get embarrassed, but he doesn’t hold onto that feeling for long, and he doesn’t get mad. Instead, he becomes humbled, approaching Suki so that she could teach him how to fight. That’s his first major growth moment because it causes him to understand the value of the knowledge that Suki could provide him, regardless of her gender. It also makes him more appreciative of their traditions and fighting prowess, which makes his growth as a fighter much more rewarding to him. This humility followed Sokka throughout the show also, but it never undermined his unique skills as a natural leader and creative problem solver.
One thing that I like to bring up when discussing Sokka is the fact that, whenever Sokka is pushed to an unexpected situation that requires ingenuity and solutions, he’s able to rally the gang, and others, so that they’re able to escape from the impossible situation. For example, when Jet seeks to flood a fire nation town, when the erupting volcano is threatening the fortune-teller’s village, and when the battle is ensuing during the eclipse, Sokka is able to quickly think of plans, and he’s able to rally as many people to make sure those plans come into fruition. In comparison to those scenarios, when Sokka has to be a leader in a conventional sense — for example, when he has to debrief the troops, or give a speech to inspire hope — Sokka is not as adept at those things. He sees his father doing those things, and his father being confident while doing them, so he still feels inadequate. This insecurity for him also gets compounded by the fact that he is the only non-bender in a group filled with talented benders, and that all becomes evident in the “Sokka’s Master” episode. That episode also shows the healthy masculinity of Sokka, and how an encouraging male figure can facilitate a healthy relationship with masculinity in an adolescent.
When Sokka seeks to learn from Piandao, he approaches him the same way he approached Suki earlier in the show — humbly. He’s on his knees, admitting that he has a lot to learn, but that’s exactly the quality that causes Piandao to accept him as a student. Even when Sokka feels like he messed up every task that was given to him, Piandao encouraged those “follies”, and told Sokka those aspects of his personality gave him the potential to be a great swordsman. This is a notable thing because this is the first time where Sokka gets praise from an older male figure who he respected dearly. And, Piandao praised Sokka by affirming the best traits that were a part of him, traits like Sokka’s engenuity, his creativity, and his quick thinking skills. That caused Sokka to become more confident in himself, and in his abilities. One additional thing that I loved about this episode is that it showed Sokka being open and honest about his feelings, with his friends being there for him, and helping him process those feelings, and even nudging him to ask Piandao to be his master.
If we look later into the season, we see that another male figure helps to break Sokka out from his self imposed shadow and that person is, nonetheless, his own father. Much like Piandao, Hakoda encourages the best of Sokka’s traits, and meets Sokka where he’s at. To a certain extent, he knows how much Sokka idolizes him, and how much Sokka wants to be like him, which causes Hodaka to give Sokka the space to display his unique skills. He also values his son’s inputs and plans while in precarious situations, giving him the space to shine as his own individual, and as an equal to himself. All of these interactions with his father helps Sokka become even more confident and secure in himself, as a man, a friend, and as a soldier, culminating in Sokka bravely leading Suki and Toph to take down the entire fire nation fleet by themselves.
Overall, Sokka’s character changes from someone who’s pretty sexist in the beginning, to fully realizing the value and worth of the women around him as capable equals. Sokka’s yearning to be like the idealized image of his father, which could have led him on a dangerous route to prove his worth all by himself, instead gets fostered by his friends, and the respected male figures in his life, so that he becomes the best version of himself. He becomes humbled, but also confident in his unique abilities, and he communicates freely with his friends about his emotions, which paints a picture of a healthy masculinity. As his opposite, there’s another teenage boy who starts off on a much more destructive route, but who undertakes a painful journey so that he can grow to have a more healthy relationship with his masculinity. I think you all know who that person is, and it’s Zuko.
Zuko
Zuko is a character who’s very much a fan favorite. He has a tragic history, one filled with neglect and abuse, only for him to change and understand his true potential for good. At the beginning of his journey, Zuko is on a much more destructive path than Sokka, and has a much more toxic relationship with his masculinity. At almost every point, his unrelenting need to restore his honor, to make someone who was intensely abusive to him proud, causes him to dangerously seek out ways to capture Aang. For much of season one, that was his purpose, and it frequently caused him to injure himself, or put himself in harmful situations that only fueled his anger much more. This is, by and large, what is meant by the phrase toxic masculinity — a view of masculinity that’s extremely destructive and dangerous that it often leads men, especially younger men, on a spree of self harm that also hurts the people around themselves. Often, if there’s not a man who that person can look up to, someone who can show him a healthy version of masculinity, then it can lead to explosive bursts of anger that continue on until it leads to the end of himself. Thank goodness, then, that Zuko had that father figure who showed him what healthy masculinity was: Iroh.
Iroh — someone who went through the same journey as Zuko, who lost his son, causing everything to change for him — is someone who understands Zuko deeply, and also understands his potential to do good. Iroh — someone who tells Zuko to never forget who he truly is — offers Zuko an image of masculinity that’s healthy and secure. He’s someone who humbly helps people, listens to their feelings and desires, offers wisdom to those people, and that tragically stems from the fact that he wasn’t able to help his son at Ba Sing Se. He wants to help Zuko because he doesn’t want Zuko to go down the same path as his son, Lu Ten, and that’s why he’s so kind to Zuko — probably one of the only male role models that’s kind to Zuko. In comparison to Iroh, Zuko’s father, Ozai, is demanding and abusive, expecting his son to give him respect and be obedient to him, even though Ozai is not deserving of it. Ozai is a toxic man because he expects submission, expects people to not speak out of turn, and if they do, then he abuses them. Hence, the reason for Zuko’s scar, only given to him by his father because he spoke up for the entry-level soldiers of his country.
Near the beginning of the show, Zuko thinks that his scar defines him, that it marks him as the banished prince of the fire nation. He also thinks that he deserves it, that he was wrong to question his father and army chief, and that he must do everything he can to appease Ozai once more, to have his father accept him. To a point, it seems that he hates himself for what he did, and he seems to think that the fire nation uniquely hurt him. That causes him to fester in negativity, in toxicity, in anger, and it causes a shortsightedness in him that he focuses solely on one thing: capturing the avatar to restore his honor. Only when he’s alone, and a refugee, he understands the true pain that the fire nation has caused to the people all around the world. It’s also at this time that he understands that people are capable of loving and caring for him, regardless of any scars that seemingly describe him. And it’s Iroh who continues to believe in him, guiding him continuously on the right path, even when Zuko betrays him to get a taste of what he thought he wanted for so long.
I find it quite interesting that the moment of change for Zuko occurs in the same episode where Sokka finally escapes from within his father’s shadow. The contrast between the two is even more striking because Sokka’s father tells him how proud he is of Sokka, whereas it’s the episode where Zuko finally confronts his father, and realizes that the abuse he faced from his father was wrong. Zuko also realizes that Iroh had been the real father to him, and fully accepts his uncle’s influence on him. Simply put, this the episode where Zuko shakes off the toxic elements of his masculinity, and changes from being someone who was angry at himself, and thinking that a scar defined him and destined him to hurt people, to being someone who understood that he could be another person, that he can drive his purpose from helping people. This is a change that gets personified when he learns about the true meaning of firebending. The fact that he was able to face the dragons, and they taught him that meaning, shows how far he’d come in the show, and it was all because a gentle and perfect role model of a man believed he could. That person also loved him unconditionally, regardless of the scars that he carried, forgiving Zuko so readily even when he expected Iroh to punish him as his father did.
Conclusion
Avatar: The Last Airbender is one of those rare shows that can be described as a perfect show. It’s also one of those rare shows that teaches adults as much as it teaches children. Avatar is also a show that highlights how healthy masculinity can help save men’s lives, and how it can humble them to learn lessons from anywhere. It also shows how boys who are filled with toxic and destructive masculinity can learn to become better men, either from emotional support from friends, or from father figures who emanate a healthy version of masculinity that’s constructive and nurturing to themselves, and the people around them. It shows the capacity to change and get better, and also shows the consequences of refusing to relinquish more toxic forms of masculinity. Avatar: The Last Airbender shows what healthy and good masculinity looks like, and additionally, it can teach someone about what it means to be a man.
