Avatar: Why Airbending Is So Deadly

it's time to face the facts airbenders have been going easy on everybody this entire time their true strength would take your breath away during the adventures of avatar aang we got a good look at airbending right from the start with this kindness and strong moral compass we never had any reason to fear the young airbender his morals and beliefs are tied fast to his training under air nomads dedicated to preserving life and avoiding causing harm at any cost we saw that with his refusal to take the life of the fire lord as he found a peaceful way to resolve such a complex situation fast forward to the time of avatar korra and we can see deadly effectiveness of the element through the power of zaheer the fire nation was really lucky that the air nomads were pacifists let's have a look at some of the reasons why air bending is the most deadly bending style [Music] the avatar universe has no lack of creativity when it comes to wielding the elements but the sheer strength of the airbenders can get overshadowed the raw power in their hands is enough to cause massive damage without even trying just a sneeze from an airbender can create the force of a jet engine no need for a full moon or special comet to enhance their abilities since their style focuses on redirecting and evading attacks it's hard to determine the true strength of a trained airbender and they certainly didn't lack the training based on what we saw in the show and later on confirmed by the creators themselves the air nomads are all benders every single one of them so that means that each one of them went through serious airbending training since they were very young it says a lot about their discipline that they can master such a deadly force in a peaceful way peaceful certainly doesn't mean ineffective in combat though their techniques of gliding and air manipulation allow for much more flexibility and movement aiding in the airbenders tactics of evasion and defense during combat their mobility can be a great asset making a variety of terrains much more accessible to them and reducing their own physical risk of falling or taking damage tenzin has demonstrated this ability using air to cushion his landing as he is thrown into a stone surface influence over air currents also allows the bearer to deflect attacks back at their opponent even projectiles as big as the flaming rocks used by the fire nation navy defensive tactics can be just as useful as offensive ones as reducing the damage they take keeps them in the fight the longer they stay in the fight the more damage they can dish out themselves so how does an airbender go on the offensive well there's no lack of options simple punches and kicks are elevated by the bender's power to add an additional gust of force to their target this effectively throws them off balance and depending on their landing can cause a good amount of additional damage creating cyclones of air can trap enemies or be used for increased movement but it also has been used to launch projectiles aang's air cannon is a great example of this when wielding the elements the sky's the limit leading to much more creative moves in combat removing people's ability to breathe is a really quick way to end a fight without oxygen your opponent doesn't stand a chance zaheer from legends of korra gave us a clear example of this in his attack on the earthqueen but more on him later air has more effects on us than we think air pressure can do a number on a person changes in air density can actually cause damage to parts of our body for example our ears if the pressure changes too rapidly it can burst your eardrum this results in not only possible hearing loss but also immediate vertigo and lack of coordination a fight when your opponent can't see or stand straight isn't gonna last very long leading to another breezy victory for the airbender more extreme versions of this concept would be in the creation of a vacuum formed by drawing an immense amount of air out of a space depressurization of the human body can lead to ruptures of the lungs swelling and bruising of the tissue and the blockage of blood vessels due to gas bubbles in the bloodstream something so gruesome might not make the cut for the avatar universe but it can't be kept out of the realm of possibility for a truly powerful airbender during the time of avatar korra we see the revitalization of the air nomads through the efforts of tenzin and his attempts to maintain and pass down the culture of the airbenders after the harmonic convergence the sudden appearance of new airbenders provides the boost that the temple needs ensuring that the ways of the nomads are saved from extinction legend of korra evolved a lot of what we know about airbending we saw the natural progression of an airbender's training from stage one seeing the growth of new benders as they learned to control their element up until they became incredibly capable fighters in their own right even witnessing genora earning her tattoos and becoming anointed as an airbending master we see their training in both physical and mental forms receiving as much information about the philosophy behind the techniques as the actual physical techniques themselves airbenders aren't exactly known for being violent people as such action would be in direct violation of their spiritual beliefs and practices that doesn't mean there are no cases of a deadly encounter with an airbender avatar yang chen has admitted to actions that directly defied her spiritual beliefs in the pursuit of the greater good and the balance that she needed to achieve as an avatar it was never specifically mentioned what those transgressions were meaning a lack of pacifism may be the only crime she had committed zahir is the prime example of lethal airbenders zahir is incredibly unique being one of the new airbenders to emerge from the harmonic convergence after gaining his new powers zaheer managed multiple complex prison breaks first freeing himself and then the other members of the red lotus from their various high security confinements sahir showed remarkable talent being both unbelievably strong and creative with the use of his new powers it's pretty easy to forget that he didn't have an ounce of bending training at the time let alone any airbending knowledge zaheer was noted as an incredibly powerful martial artist but his airbending techniques were fully self-taught at the time of the prison breaks his previous combat experience certainly gave him a head start on using his new abilities but they were not perfected wielding an element is a further extension of the body that he did not use before a weapon can make an opponent more dangerous but it can also be their downfall if they don't know how to use it zahir was talented enough that this only made him stronger and he worked to his own strengths and needs rather than to a training style as ancient and structured as that of the air nomads in this instance not having the predisposition to deflect and evade with his bending may have been to his advantage instead he uses his powers very directly and with full force zaheer is also the only confirmed airbender to have harnessed the ability of flight though he had to lose his last earthly teacher in order to achieve this feat he's the first to be shown using the asphyxiation technique on the earthqueen and the same technique he would use to try and end the avatar cycle by killing cora this brutal tactic was simple for him as he never had the moral alignment of the nomads although he may have been a fan of their teachings he had his own ideals and path to follow the pacifism of the traditional nomads was not to his taste this lack of restraint made him one of the most formidable airbenders of all time unpredictable powerful and extremely deadly shockingly the first known airbender to have dealt a fatal blow in the series is monk gyatso aang had once called him the greatest airbender in the world and there is some real strong evidence to back up that claim monkeyatso never got to showcase his abilities in combat on screen but we can find clues to his power in the ruins of the southern air temple the room where ang discovers his body is scattered with fallen fire nation soldiers this ancient battlefield tells the story of gyatso's last moments showing that he certainly did not go down without a fight not to mention that he may have had the upper hand for a portion of that battle this is further confirmed by the lack of scorch marks around the area these weren't normal firebenders either they had the increased power from the comet during the time of the invasion even when faced with those supercharged soldiers gyatso was able to defeat a surprising number of them before he was eventually overwhelmed and met his end if gyatso was that powerful in his old age who knows what he could have done in his prime as far as we can tell gyatso is the most lethal airbender to have ever lived in a world where benders exist counteracting those powers had to be considered a key example of impairing benders is the chi blocking techniques of tai li with a few precise strikes she's able to negate any form of bender's power this skill rose out of combating the power sets of benders but one acrobat can't do everything herself when large scale battles take place tactics that work on a larger scale are invented for this reason one example is the prisons used to hold earthbenders during the reign of the fire nation before the development of metal bending metal prisons on seafaring ships were an unstoppable force for earthbender captives fire and waterbenders were not exempt to these measures each having prisons designed to take away their elemental abilities whenever needed the biggest reasons for the lack of countermeasures to airbending is the fact that no one had been fighting them for over a hundred years the loss of the air nomads created a void in the world's experience and it was never seen as a threat also the only way to prevent a bender from using their power aside from avatar spirit bending to block it fully or blood bending like that of a mon is to remove their ability to wield it and the thing with air is you can't really get rid of it airs everywhere in a variety of forms and there's no direct counter for it like there is for fire or water on the other hand an airbender can work well to defend against all sorts of bending removing oxygen will prevent fire from burning knocking an earth vendor off their feet will disrupt their connection to their element water can be further scattered and dispersed making it harder to control and so on it's not a perfect solution in all cases but overall the flexibility of the airbender outclasses all the other elements by far facing no real disadvantage with any opponent the effectiveness and adaptability of an airbender is second to none when wielded by a master it's clear that the airbenders are a force to be reckoned with i certainly wouldn't want to face off against monkeyatso what do you think head on down to the comments and let us know and while you're there give us a like and subscribe to cbr for more avatar videos just like this one thanks a lot for watching [Music]

Channel: CBR

Views: 2,501,931

Keywords: Air-Bending, The Legend of Korra, Avatar: The Last Airbender, Aang, Tenzin, Avatar, Air Nomads, Monk Gyatso, Harmonic Convergence, Raava, Zaheer, Jinora, Red Lotus, Fire Nation, Korra

Id: kqlX4G0tJbo

Length: 10min 21sec (621 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 19 2020