The Border Between Our Two Worlds Grows into a Rift

SPOILER ALERT
This review is for those who have read or are familiar with the previous books in the Avatar: The Last Airbender series, specifically The Promise & The Search, or don't mind knowing spoilers for them.
SPOILER ALERT

Avatar: The Last Airbender
The Rift
By Gene Luen Yang & Gurihiru
in collaboration with Bryan Konietzko & Michael Dante DiMartino
Amazon ~ Powell's

Avatar Aang asks his friends to help him honor Yangchen's Festival—one of the highest Air Nomad holidays, which hasn't been celebrated in over one hundred years. But cryptic visits from the spirit of Avatar Yangchen herself lead Aang to discover a jointly owned Fire Nation and Earth Kingdom refinery—operating on land sacred to the Airbenders! Is this simply a case of corporate greed or is something more mysterious happening?


Tackling my unfinished series this year, and juggling a new job on top of all that, I decided to go a little out-of-order and jump back into the Avatar comics/graphic novels. I went ahead and re-read through the first two again, then jumped straight into this one. But after reading through it, I think I actually may have read it before. Well, I knew I'd read at least the first part, but I think I recognized enough in it that I'd actually read the whole thing through. Well, better late than never, right?

Since the last story focused almost exclusively on Zuko and his family's baggage, it was nice to see the series return to some of the topics introduced in The Promise. Obviously I can't fault the series for wanting to explore the dangling threads of Zuko's family, but I also appreciate the series moving forward from where it set up in its first installment. Not only do we have Toph back in the spotlight, after being sidelined in The Search, but we also see more of fire/earth alliances, the newly-established Air Acolytes, and Toph's metalbending students.

I guess Toph is as good a place to start as any. I really enjoyed her arc in this story. She starts out with a bit of a chip on her shoulder, hearing Aang use a phrase often repeated by her father in order to keep her in line, and quickly tries to distance herself from the painful memory. She lashes out at not just the memory, but all things traditional or ritual. The reason of "that's just how it's done" isn't good enough. She wants facts, logic, and progress. So when the Earthen Fire Refinery offers not only a place of collaboration and new technology, but of progress as a whole, she is ready to fight even the Avatar for its right to exist.

But the history of the land isn't the only thing at stake as—of course—Toph's own past comes back to confront her. I honestly would have loved more focus on Toph and her baggage this time around. There are some good conversations had, some heartfelt and some more action-packed, but I felt her issues were solved all too quickly on the whole. There were some good parallels with her asking people to put faith in her when she refused to put her own faith in the traditions around her, but I don't feel like that was highlighted or resolved as well as it could have been. I mean, on reflection I guess it works okay, but I guess I just wanted more of her and less of Katara and Sokka's weird little sideplots.

Sokka, ever the comic relief, has an ongoing joke of trying to get the vegetarian Air Acolytes to eat meat, and then another one involving a forklift. Meanwhile, Katara is confronted with some Southern Water Tribe members blaming her for abandoning them after the war. And, yeah, that could be a really intriguing storyline with her wondering if she's abandoned her roots, her traditions in seeking her relationship with Aang and overseeing the progress of these new Fire/Earthen alliances. But instead she's given about 2 seconds to think about it before other plot intrudes and the other Water Tribe girls forgive her. Maybe it'll get more focus later, but here it just felt like it ate up space that could/should have been used for more involving Toph or Aang.

Which brings us to the Avatar, himself. Aang's story has the most continuity from the previous stories, with his severed connection to Roku from The Promise affecting his abilities to contact previous Avatars, and his supposed impartiality towards Spirits and Humans being called into question, which mirrors his actions in The Search. The first issue really does have a touching resolution, which brought tears to my eyes. The second issue, though, didn't really have any resolution here.

A Spirit essentially calls him a hypocrite, that the Avatar claims to maintain balance between Spirits and Humans, yet will always side with Humans because he is one. And isn't that what we just saw in The Search? He tried to convince the Mother of Faces to break her rules to benefit a human. Granted, everything worked out, but that wasn't guaranteed when the encounter started. Aang and his companions just so happened to luck out. This time, seemingly the same thing happens. A Spirit gets mad that the Avatar is siding with humans, then a Spirit (a different one this time) tells him he was okay, that the Spirit was being unruly. Happy ending?

To be fair, the ending is less happy and more bittersweet. It's less a solid happily-ever-after than a hopeful glance forward. I think Aang will continue to evolve his views on his place in the worlds, and the worlds' place with each other in future stories, and when that's done, we'll pick back up with the next generation and continue from there. It's kinda poetic that way, seeing the traditions of old reshaping themselves into new forms that the next generations carry forward.

But lest you think the series is growing too much, there's still plenty of humor woven throughout. I mentioned Sokka's bits here and there, but more than him were the Metalbenders and the youngest Air Acolyte. They worked fine for the most part, none overstaying their welcome, and each building off of what came before without being too repetitive. I probably won't remember their antics down the road, but they were fine in the moment and provided some welcome levity. And we even get a throwback to the Cabbage Vendor!

The art was as great as ever, hearkening back to the show we know and love. Obviously I'd love to see it fully animated, but there was still plenty of action displayed in the comic panels. And the full-page battle scenes were gorgeous. Even looking at them on my tablet or phone screen, I was still blown away. Plus, readers of the omnibus get the added bonus of the Sketchbook section, which features some drafts of artwork, comic panels, and even notes about the new character designs. I'm really interested to know more about the Chinese legends who inspired the designs of the Spirits.

Overall, The Rift was more of what Avatar fans love, expanded into a heartfelt and nuanced story about the conflict of tradition and progress. Today's society may not be in the midst of an industrial revolution, but it never hurts to show the importance of compromise between opposing ideologies, especially with the overarching theme of hope towards a better future. And with this stellar story in the books, I'm excited to see what the next installment has in store!