Avatar S2E17: "Lake Laogai"
A tearful reunion at last | Grade: A
Thanks for tuning in to my thirty-seventh of 61 daily reviews of Avatar: The Last Airbender! Yesterday, we watched S2E16: Appa’s Lost Days.
Lake Laogai finally returns to the regular serialized drama of Avatar, after the past two episodes that brilliantly departed from it. Uncle Iroh has a stroke of good fortune when his tea-brewing talents get recognized by a wealthy entrepreneur, who offers him his own tea shop in the Upper Ring with full creative control, and a swanky new apartment to boot. Iroh’s old boss can’t stop his best employee from getting poached, even with an offer to promote him to “senior executive assistant manager.” It’s a dream come true for Iroh, who settles on a name: The Jasmine Dragon.
But his nephew isn’t as thrilled. He storms out only to catch a falling “lost bison” flyer, one of many that Aang has been dropping over the city. It awakens an old fire in Zuko, who’s still gripped by a compulsive need to capture the Avatar, with everything he thinks that entails. I mean, can we take a moment to acknowledge how crazy Zuko is? He’s like a man possessed as he literally climbs on top of someone’s roof, desperately trying to catch a glimpse of Aang. That night, he dons his Blue Spirit mask and blackmails a Dai Li agent to take him to where Appa is hidden.
He’s not the only one possessed. As the Gaang goes around putting up flyers, Katara runs into an old crush: Jet. She’s still raw from his betrayal in Season 1 and pummels him with water, while it’s actually Sokka who’s more ready to trust him this time. They run into Smellerbee and Longshot, who are shocked to see that Jet is free after being dragged away by the Dai Li in City of Walls and Secrets. But the renegade can’t remember any of it.
Toph reveals that she has the power to detect when people are lying by observing their breathing and heart rate with her seismic sense. But neither Jet nor Smellerbee are lying. Sokka figures it out: Jet’s been brainwashed! Circling around Jet, Team Avatar and the remaining freedom fighters advance on him menacingly as his brainwashing theme plays. Did that last bit really happen, or is it all in Jet’s head?
With Katara’s healing powers, they’re able to jog Jet’s memory just enough for him to recall a gorgeously composed vision, drawing from the style of Inception and The Matrix, of where Long Feng took him: Lake Laogai. They go there and sneak into the gloomily-lit underground Dai Li compound, where they find a whole room of Joo Dees undergoing training. Who are these women, and how many lives have been destroyed to create a “peaceful, orderly utopia”?
In a cavernous room, Long Feng and his team of Dai Li are lying in wait. The voyeuristic shot of them all hanging from the ceiling is chilling, and the battle that follows is unbelievable. Nearly the whole ensemble gets something to do, even Longshot. Toph really shines in a glorious earthbending battle against multiple Dai Li, who seem much more ruthless and powerful than the wrestlers she fought in her introduction.
But when Aang and Jet chase a fleeing Long Feng into a different room, the Grand Secretariat plays the ace up his sleeve.
Jet, the Earth King has invited you to Lake Laogai.
Jet freezes and his pupils grow huge. “I am honored to accept his invitation,” he replies, and turns on the Avatar. Long Feng’s control over the renegade’s mind, blocking his memory and his free will, is a tragic irony for the character. In many ways, Jet is defined by his inability to forget. In my review of his eponymous episode, I noted that Jet lives in the past — he can’t let go of it, desperately seeking retribution for the death of his parents. But it’s this flaw that allows him to break free of the minister’s grip when Aang reminds him:
He can’t make you do this. You’re a freedom fighter!
It’s a long-awaited moment of redemption for Jet, his old life flashing before his eyes, as he turns on Long Feng and throws his hook sword. But redemption comes at the ultimate price. The minister hits Jet with a brutal earth strike that knocks him down, motionless. It doesn’t fully work in the Avatar universe, given how much impact characters can usually take, but the offending rock is pointier than usual. Katara rushes in and tries to heal him, but to no avail. “Don't worry, Katara. I'll be fine,” he assures her. But Toph knows the truth. “He’s lying…”
While this is going on, Zuko has reached Appa first and prepares to take the bison for himself. But Uncle Iroh has followed him there, and in a powerful scene lays into his nephew about what he plans do with Appa once he has him. Earlier in the episode, Iroh tells him gently:
There is nothing wrong with a life of peace and prosperity. I suggest you think about what it is that you want from your life and why.
But here, at Lake Laogai, Iroh understands the gravity of the moment and pushes his nephew harder than he ever has before, ultimately convincing him to free Appa and leave his Blue Spirit identity behind.
Zuko: I know my own destiny, Uncle!
Iroh: Is it your own destiny, or is it a destiny someone else has tried to force on you?
Zuko: Stop it, Uncle! I have to do this!
Iroh: I'm begging you, Prince Zuko! It's time for you to look inward and begin asking yourself the big questions. Who are you, and what do you want?
Mako delivers these lines so damn perfectly! You can really hear the concern, frustration, and urgency in Iroh’s voice. It’s the most explicit and the most forceful Avatar has ever been about its core philosophy. Destiny is something you create for yourself. Zuko has spent so much time desperately seeking the approval of his father, but he’s never stopped to consider that there might be alternatives to the path he’s followed blindly for his entire life. It’s such an important message, one that bears repeating as we each chart our own course.
As Team Avatar run out of the compound, they’re surrounded by a large squadron of Dai Li who pen them in with giant walls of rock for a final stand. But Appa finally returns, following Momo out of the sun in an aesthetically and symbolically great shot. He cathartically smashes through both walls, sending the Dai Li flying into the ocean. The tension dissolves into sentimentality, and it feels completely earned.
See you tomorrow for Episode 18: The Earth King! Share your own thoughts on this episode in the comments.
Spare observations
“Sokka, the arrow is on Appa’s head.” “This is his head!” There’s a pretty good “Toph is blind“ joke in there, too.
Wait — Jet has a job?
The Gaang says it will take “weeks” to get to Whaletail Island, but in the last episode, Suki says she returned to Kyoshi Island only a few days after The Serpent’s Pass. Kyoshi Island and Whaletail island are about the same distance away on the map. My geographic continuity!!!
When they’re trying to jog Jet’s memory, Sokka suggests maybe Katara should kiss him. “Just an idea!” Aang gets salty at that, and he doesn’t hide his jealousy well. “A bad one.”
In Jet’s vision of the Fire Nation raid that killed his parents, he sees Colonel Mongke of the Rough Rhinos.
Laogai (劳改) roughly means “reform through labor” in Chinese and references a real system of prison labor in Communist China.
“What do you plan to do now that you've found the Avatar's bison? Keep him locked in our new apartment? Should I go put on a pot of tea for him?”
For the first and only time, Longshot speaks. “Just go. We'll take care of him. He's our leader.”
In my review of The Chase, I mentioned the two animation studios, DR Movie and JM Animation who (mostly) alternated episodes in Seasons 1 and 2. This episode has several of the highly distorted facial expressions that mark a DR Movie episode. In particular, pay attention tot Aang’s big red head when he yells at Joo Dee, and Jet’s contorted face as he remembers his visit to Lake Laogai.
Friends of the White Lotus [SPOILERS]
The old janitor who says Appa was taken to Whaletail Island is lying. He’s actually a plant from the Dai Li to lead the Gaang off the trail, and Jet was brainwashed to take them to that warehouse. Or at least, that’s the official explanation. But it might make more sense for the guy to just be a janitor who the Dai Li lied to, because Toph didn’t catch his lie. But maybe she wasn’t paying attention, or the guy is an Azula-tier liar?
Did Jet just… die? You know, it was really unclear. (But yes, that scene was meant as his death.) Avatar is still a series for kids, so this is how they chose to work around Nickelodeon’s constraints on what they could show.
Zuko freeing Appa will come back to benefit him later, when he tries to curry the Gaang’s favor in The Western Air Temple.