As an animated series conceived and aired primarily for the young teenager audience, Avatar: The Last Airbender (ATLA), is a seminal accomplishment of its genre. While the cartoon can be seen to relate a simple story on the surface, it is able to pack many mature themes within its episodes that can be gleaned and appreciated by adult watchers. The principal characters have satisfying journeys through the course of the show and the art, animation, voice acting and soundtrack are gorgeous.

That said, its restricted target audience does keep it from explicit portrayal of numerous aspects. It also has a slow build-up with the initial few episodes appearing quite childish. Some of the villains are given minimal to no character development, the world appears exceedingly small given the frequency with which nemeses encounter each other, and a lot of the plot progression becomes exceedingly rushed near the end of the series.

ATLA does an excellent job at what it set out to do, namely creating a beautiful and enthralling animated series primarily meant for teenagers while conveying more serious themes with appropriate gravitas that can be reflected on by adults.