From 2005 to 2008, the Nickelodeon series “Avatar: The Last Airbender” spread an epic tale across 61 action-packed chapters, following a young man named Aang whose ability to manipulate (or “bend”) all four elements marked him as the designated savior of a war-torn world.
The show was a ratings smash and a Peabody winner, and it remains beloved by animation buffs, science-fiction and fantasy fans and others. (It landed at No. 37 in The Times’s recent reader poll of the best series of the 21st century so far.)
The “Avatar” creators, Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko, followed up “The Last Airbender” with the equally acclaimed “The Legend of Korra” (2012-14). And now, after a long break, the pair have reunited for “Avatar: Seven Havens,” set more than 200 years after “Korra.” (The first three episodes of “Seven Havens” arrive on Friday, on Paramount+.)
In the new series, the society that was healed by Aang and then protected by Korra, the next Avatar, has been devastated by an event known as “the Cataclysm,” which undid much of the technological and social progress seen in the previous shows. Survivors have resettled into seven communities known as “Havens,” where anyone with bending powers has been conscripted — sometimes involuntarily — into a security force.
In this broken world, people blame their troubles on Avatars and specifically on Korra, for reasons that remain a mystery at the start of the series. This is why an Avatar named Pavi (Saheli Khan), an orphaned, one-legged urchin, lives in a cave outside the city of Ellora and keeps her abilities hidden.
When Pavi is discovered by Jae (Major Curda), a kindly member of the city’s Bending Brigade, he connects her to a cabal that still has faith in Avatars. He also introduces her to her long-lost twin sister, Nisha (Aishu Devan). Together, this new team of benders must overcome widespread societal mistrust to fend off a series of mysterious supernatural attacks.
“Seven Havens” maintains the visual style that DiMartino and Konietzko established with the previous “Avatar” series: anime-inspired 2-D animation, with softly luminescent colors and imaginatively designed characters and locations. But what has always drawn fans to this franchise is the storytelling, which is simultaneously simple and ambitious.
Each episode of any “Avatar” show is entertaining and easy to follow, combining funny and sweet character moments with fantastical martial arts over 20 minutes or so. Strung together, they become a saga.
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