Avatar: The Last Airbender Star Shows Off Martial Arts Skills on The Tonight Show

Avatar: The Last Airbender’s latest live-action adaptation has hit gold for Netflix. Becoming the number one show for the streaming service once it debuted, the story of Aang and his crew had tens of millions of viewers follow the new take on the popular Nickelodeon animated series. To help promote the series, the young actor who plays the current Avatar, Gordon Cormier, showed off his martial arts skills on The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon, proving he was the right choice to play Aang in more ways than one.

Gordon Cormier hasn’t hidden his love of the source material, stating that once he was chosen to be Aang, he watched the original animated series twenty-six times. In a recent interview with Deadline, the young actor discussed how he attempted to keep the carefree nature of the Avatar in the Netflix series, “When I did this character, I mainly wanted to focus on keeping Aang’s joy, happiness, and twelve-year-old spirit in general. I feel like now that this is in live-action, I feel we can dive deeper into Aang’s emotional side because there was a genocide. All of Aang’s family and friends died, so we can visit more of the darker parts.” 

The Avatar Arrives on The Tonight Show

Netflix’s Avatar: The Last Airbender arrived with bigger numbers than One Piece’s premiere, leaving many to wonder when/if a second season will be announced. Luckily, the live-action series has plenty of source material to adapt to ensure a future should the streaming service pull the trigger. 

If you have yet to see Netflix’s latest live-action adaptation of an animated favorite, here’s how the streaming service describes its take on Avatar: The Last Airbender, “Water. Earth. Fire. Air. The four nations once lived in harmony, with the Avatar, master of all four elements, keeping peace between them. But everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked and wiped out the Air Nomads, the first step taken by the firebenders towards conquering the world. With the current incarnation of the Avatar yet to emerge, the world has lost hope. But like a light in the darkness, hope springs forth when Aang (Gordon Cormier), a young Air Nomad — and the last of his kind — reawakens to take his rightful place as the next Avatar.”  

Do you think Netflix’s Avatar will get a second season? Feel free to let us know in the comments or hit me up directly @EVComedy to talk all things comics, anime, and the world of benders.