Fear not.
There’s a comic for that.
There are, in fact, a lot of comics for it.
Both Avatar and Korra have generated a wealth of reading material for kids (and adults) of all ages, the vast majority of it either traditional books with pictures or heavily illustrated, interactive books (which I’m going to include here despite their not strictly fitting the usual definition because they they have more text than pictures books and also, they’re really cool). F.C. Yee’s YA novels The Rise of Kyoshi and The Shadow of Kyoshi are also in the mix but, as they’re 100% prose, all I’ll say here is that they’re extremely good and extremely bi and you should all read them immediately.
There are far too many comics to cover in a single article so I went straight to my most reliable best-of source to get some advice on which Avatar/Korra comics and illustrated titles I should highlight for you: my 8-year-old daughter, who has read each and every volume approximately eleventy billion times (what, you didn’t know eleventy billion was a number? Trust me. She sleeps with these books. It is).
Behold, her recommendations:
We’ve only skimmed the surface of the Avatar offerings here. For a full listing of available Avatar comics click here and for a full listing of available Korra comics click here. Don’t forget to check back occasionally; there’s are still new books being published in-universe (Katara and the Pirate’s Silver by Faith Erin Hicks, Peter Waltman, and Adele Matera is scheduled for release on 10/13).
In an attempt to resolve some of the conflict within his “small nation” and hoping his doing so will make him a better leader of the larger one, Zuko has Azula released from the hospital and the two of them, along with Aang, Kitara, and Sokka, go in search of Princess Ursa. As is often the case, the quest is more complicated than expected, as is the story behind Ursa’s disappearance, her relationship with Ozai, and her desperate bid to do what she thought was best for her children. Plus giant spirits. Oh, and the fact that Azula, while legitimately suffering from paranoia, also has her own agenda and doesn’t much care how her actions affect the others.
This isn’t a light, fluffy Avatar story. I’d urge you to either read through it first or read it along with your kids, because they’re going to have questions and the age group at which this particular comic is aimed also happens to be the window in which a lot of kids are simultaneously testing boundaries and re-engaging with fear of abandonment. In the end, Zuko finds what he’s looking for—from a certain point of view—but the journey to that point is rough, buddy, and more sensitive kiddos may may need a guide to help them navigate.
I’m particularly fond of this graphic novel trilogy because it gives us something the show danced around for ages and then let us glimpse for mere seconds before coming to an end: Korrasami. As few lesbian characters as there are in animation who survive to the end of the story, there are even fewer bisexual characters in important and/or major roles and fewer still who land in a permanent same-sex relationship. Watching Korra and Asami explore theirs unabashedly is an absolute joy.
