After wowing fans with the Day of Black Sun two-part special event, Avatar: The Last Airbender disappeared from TV screens for a while. The show has finally returned with new episodes. Will fans, hungry to learn about the fallout from the failed attack on the Fire Nation, be satisfied? Hell yes. Particularly fans of Prince Zuko.

I mentioned in my last review that Zuko confronting his father felt rather anticlimactic. Not only was it past due, but in a way, it just seemed too easy for Zuko. One of his trademarks since the beginning of the series has been his arrogance, and it was out in full force when he was speaking to Ozai. While he may have been right on both counts, it takes a healthy ego to tell a tyrant how he should really be running things and to declare that he knows the true destiny of the savior of the world.

However, once he catches up to Aang and the gang, his arrogance is all but gone (and quite frankly, Zuko stripped of his arrogance makes for possibly the most entertaining character on the show). He hesitates in offering himself to the heroes, rehearsing an awkward speech in a scene that one would expect from Aang or Sokka, not Zuko. It’s one thing to confront someone else with their crimes, but it’s another thing entirely to own up to those that you committed. And that’s exactly what Zuko does here, both in his admission of guilt to Team Avatar and his disgust at his memories of himself shortly after his exile. It’s the Western Air Temple that’s the true site of Zuko’s climactic conversion, not Ozai’s chamber. And while he’s clearly frustrated at his inability to smooth things over right away, the rage that has driven him for so long is finally gone.

Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for Katara. Usually the warmest and most open of the group, her hostility towards Zuko is chilling, especially when compared to the attitude of the normally standoffish Toph. Although it’s true that the Earthbender has far less history with Zuko than the others, she’s still remarkably quick to forgive him for his accidental attack on her and is the first of Aang’s friends to truly accept him at his word. Katara on the other hand seems loathe to forgive and forget, having already been burned (figuratively) by him once. Beyond Zuko, however, Katara has had her trust broken more than any other character on the show, her recent encounter with Hama being a particularly devastating experience. While her threatening of Zuko at the end may have been done with Aang’s well being in mind, it’s clear that Katara is heading towards a dark place, the worst of which we likely have yet to see.

I have to say that I’m happy to see the likely end of Combustion Man. While he certainly made for some fantastic fight scenes, he just wasn’t a very interesting character. And after realizing one day that, were Avatar an anime series, he’d probably yell something like “FOREHEAD BEAM!” every time he attacked, I just couldn’t watch him without laughing.

Unfortunately, the addition of the new members to the party other than Zuko hasn’t worked very well so far. The whole “we’ll go explore somewhere very far away so you main characters can do important stuff without us getting in the way” bit was too obvious, but not so obvious that it was clearly meant to be funny. Hopefully, they will be better integrated into the team in upcoming episodes.