When you think of Avatar: The Last Airbender and its sequel series, "horror" isn't the first word that comes to mind. While the franchise has dealt with some frightening elements, from Koh the Face Stealer to Korra being haunted by visions of her poisoned self, it has rarely crafted an episode that delves fully into the horror genre.
The sole exception is The Last Airbender's Book 3 episode "The Puppetmaster," the show's 2007 Halloween special. Throughout the episode, The Last Airbender fashions an unsettling mystery about disappearances from a Fire Nation village during the full moon. By the episode's end, the culprit is revealed to be Hama, a waterbender who's able to manipulate people's bodies by bending the blood in their veins. The bloodbending reveal has lasting consequences, popping up again in The Legend of Korra in a major way, but it also opens the door for some genuinely frightening body horror. No Avatar fan can forget the first time they witnessed the herky-jerky movements of Katara, Aang, and Sokka as they succumbed to Hama's bloodbending. The Legend of Korra ups that body horror significantly, twisting bloodbending victims' limbs to impossible positions, but it's the sinister build-up and Hama's betrayal that keep "The Puppetmaster" standing tall as Avatar's scariest episode.
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Now, though, Avatar: Seven Havens has gifted viewers with a new addition to the Avatar Halloween canon with its sixth episode, "Night of the Afflicted."
The episode's name references George A. Romero's classic zombie movie Night of the Living Dead, and it delivers on its promise with a storyline that can only be described as "zombies by way of Avatar."
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The zombies in Seven Havens are not reanimated corpses, but rather citizens who have been "afflicted" by contact with the diamond anomaly from the show's second episode. In the case of Brigade Commander Bountan (voiced by Clyde Kusatsu), that means getting zapped by the anomaly's energy ray. In the case of Brigade members like Tala (voiced by Anjali Bhimani), that means making contact with the strange red crystals the anomaly left behind, which then embedded themselves in her skin in a case of gnarly body horror.
On top of the crystals, Seven Havens adds further disconcerting physical characteristics to its afflicted to turn them into zombie analogs. The darkened circles around their eyes give them a near-undead look. Meanwhile, their eyes themselves are downright terrifying: glowing, red, and bloodshot. What they see through these eyes is even worse. Under the anomaly's influence, twin Avatars Pavi (voiced by Saheli Khan) and Nisha (voiced by Aishu Devan) turn into downright monsters.
Possessed by fear, the sight of Pavi and Nisha sparks a fit of violent paranoia in the afflicted, resulting in a stampede akin to that of a zombie horde. What follows is a claustrophobic chase through darkened tunnels, the kind that would be right at home in a zombie film.
Threaded through it all is the moving story of Pavi learning to ask for help from Nisha. At the start of the episode, Pavi begins feeling phantom pain from her lost leg. While she waits for a new prosthetic, she uses a crutch and insists she doesn't need assistance from anyone, worrying that her limb difference will make her a lesser Avatar in the eyes of the White Lotus. By the episode's end, though, she overcomes that fear and asks Nisha for help in their fight against a newly manifested anomaly. The question doesn't just aid Pavi: It also aids Nisha, who looked terrified at the thought of facing the spooky diamond alone. Thanks to Pavi's request for help, the twins are able to lean on each other, literally and figuratively, and energybend the anomaly away. Their teamwork puts an end to the zombie story they've found themselves in and sets the stage for the next steps in their joint Avatar journey.
Between its zombie riff and its heartfelt twin story, "Night of the Afflicted" proves to be another strong entry in Seven Havens, as well as its most tonally unique. Pair it with "The Puppetmaster" for extra Avatar spookiness this Halloween season.
Avatar: Seven Havens is now streaming on Paramount+, with new episodes every Friday.