Paramount+ has ordered Avatar Kuruk: Wave of Chaos, a new animated series about the Water Tribe Avatar who came three generations before Aang. Going by the announcement, the young man approaches the four elements much as a sixth-former approaches a first InterRail pass. Rather than sit through thousands of years of tradition and formal tuition, the teenage Kuruk learns his bending through globetrotting adventure. He stays one step ahead of an angry teacher, rowdy pirates and chaotic spirits, all while helping the world “in his own unique ways”. That phrase has covered a multitude of sins since the first studio press release was typed.
Co-creators Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko unveiled the show on Friday 9 October at New York Comic Con. Konietzko will be showrunner, and Avatar Studios and Nickelodeon Animation are producing. Beyond the eternal streaming promise of “coming soon” there’s no premiere date. Panel-goers did get a first look at Kuruk and his pet, Nikik, whose pictures have been doing brisk business online ever since. The Avatar world has always been the natural habitat of the portmanteau beast: turtle-ducks, platypus-bears, koala-otters. A new animal sidekick was about as likely as Uncle Iroh turning down a pot of jasmine.
The fun, and the chill, is that anyone who sat through the original knows how Kuruk’s story ends, and it isn’t with a jolly sea shanty. In Book One of The Last Airbender, Koh the Face Stealer told Aang, with relish, that he had taken the face of Kuruk’s beloved, Ummi. Koh remains the most unnerving thing Nickelodeon ever put in front of children, and that includes Ren & Stimpy. F.C. Yee’s Kyoshi novels later filled in the rest. Kuruk’s reputation as a feckless pleasure-seeker masked a secret, soul-corroding war against the dark spirits his predecessor Yangchen had left loose, and he died at 33. So Wave of Chaos is a rowdy teen romp with a tragedy pacing in the wings. We have been here before, with a cheerful lad podracing on Tatooine. The trick will be making the carefree years matter for themselves, rather than serving as a long, sunny run-up to the cliff edge.
Alongside the new order, Paramount+ renewed Avatar: Seven Havens for Books 3 and 4, on the same day its first three episodes premiered. The rest of Book 1’s 13 episodes arrive weekly until 30 October, and the new books will carry on the story of Avatar Pavi and her twin sister Nisha. Streamers have lately cancelled shows somewhere between the opening titles and the first ad break. Ordering two more books before the first has finished airing is either supreme confidence or a sign that someone in the analytics department has been at the cactus juice.
Either way, Avatar Studios is now running the franchise like a Time Lord with a crowded diary. One hand pushes the timeline on past Korra; the other rummages three Avatars back into the family attic. That’s before you count this summer’s grown-up Gaang film and a fighting game. Whether Kuruk keeps his girl, his face and his dignity is already settled. The open question is whether the journey can be as good as the destination is grim. On the Bryke track record, I’d back the wild child.
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