Alas, it wasn't meant to be. Much like Battlestar Galactica - which was anywhere from good to mindblowing in the first season (read: episode 12 and the tail end of 13), consistently good in the second season, and became largely unwatchable in the third and fourth seasons - oh and let's not forget Lost, which took a huge hit in quality after the first season and jettisons all pretense of internal coherence (and for me watchability) after the second - the writers on Avatar apparently caved to network pressure early on and the show loses much of its appeal after the first 5-8 episodes. The why of this is very simple - the show, which borrowed much from the storytelling and character building techniques of quality, epic anime, was reduced to almost entirely self-contained filler episodes with no real impact on the story, making it essentially a children's sitcom with shades of epic. I bore through it to the season finale and even partway through the second season's first episode, but the season finale - where there was finally some story content - showed none of the promise of the early episodes. I think a turning point for the series for me was *MINOR SPOILER* when Aang leaves his staff behind in the episode where Sokka and Kitara are sick. Though the ostensible reason behind this is that the weather is too bad for him to use it as a glider, there is absolutely no reason for him to leave behind his only weapon when venturing out alone - if he needs unencumbered movement to travel faster on foot, he can strap it to his back. The only purpose to this inexplicable lapse in judgment is to serve as a device for his capture later in the episode, and thus the development of Aang and Zuko's relationship through his rescue - which, by the way *SPOILER* is made almost completely redundant by the fact that Aang saves Zuko again in the season finale and I'm pretty sure Shao and Zuko would have fought regardless of the prince's intervention. *END SPOILERS* This and many other things made me realize that the writers had stopped thinking outside their primary demographic - or more likely, were under pressure from the network to infantilize the show. Disappointing to say the least given the show's early promise.
I'm meeting with DCB this afternoon who is in town (hooray!) this weekend. We're on track for a release of the first episode of our minecraft radio show on Dec. 1st. It may be bare bones (minimal music and sound effects, voicing using a not-ideal mic setup) but it will be entertaining. I'll post a link once it's up.
-R
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