Back in 2005 when the world was introduced to the concept of “bending” the elements in the hit animated series, Avatar: The Last Airbender, they had no idea what they were getting into. A decade and a half later and audiences are still in awe of the martial-art-influenced ability that harnesses a perfect combination of beauty and deadliness.
While not everybody in the Avatar universe could bend the elements as they pleased, and only one person could bend them all, there were certainly some benders that stood out more than others in terms of what they were able to do with their respected element. That said, take a look at our list of the top 10 waterbenders from Avatar: The Last Airbender.
Yugoda
Believe it or not, we could barely scrape together enough waterbenders from Avatar to make a list of ten. Think about it - despite exploring the entire globe, Team Avatar very rarely runs into another person with the ability to manipulate water. Because of that reason, Yugoda, the top-healer from the Northern Water-Tribe takes the first spot on our list. Healing is a rare ability, so the fact that Yugoda was responsible for teaching the ability to all of the young waterbenders of the tribe has to say something about her powers as a bender.
Due & Tho (Swamp Benders)
Make fun of their outfits all you want, but the ability to bend vines is cool. In season 2, Team Avatar finds themselves in the middle of a gigantic swamp (that turns out to be just one massive tree) and encounter a few benders that are a little-less-than-normal - and not just in their bending style. The aptly named ‘swamp-benders’ were waterbenders that would bend the water in the vines of the swamp that they called home. Despite the awesome ability, Due & Tho land a low spot on our list because they tried to eat Appa and Momo and had no idea other waterbenders existed anywhere else.
Roku, Kyoshi (All Former Avatars)
The moments were so brief that you may have forgotten them, but there were points during the series that the former Avatars showed off their bending abilities within flashbacks or memories Aang had from his past-lives (Roku more than most). While they might not have technically been around during the series, they’re also technically the same as Aang since every Avatar is just a reincarnated spirit, which we think grants them the right to be a part of our list as notable waterbenders (especially since they were all pretty darn good at it).
Huu (Swamp Monster)
We’re not including Huu with the rest of the swamp-benders because he was the most advanced out of all of them, having the ability to bend so many vines at once that he presented himself as Swamp Thing-on-steroids. The swamp-creature was an admirable foe when he attacked Team Avatar in season 2, and he became a worthy ally when the rebels tried to invade the fire-nation on the Day of Black Sun. There was a scary moment during the battle where it seemed like Huu had been killed by a bomb, but he turned out just fine thanks to his trusty vines.
Yue
As we said, there weren’t that many waterbenders throughout the Avatar series, which is why Yue gets a spot on the list. Now, don’t get us wrong, the fact that Yue became the literal moon spirit isn’t something to ignore. However, when Yue was a walking, talking person she had never bent water in her life because she wasn’t actually a waterbender. While the moon might be one of the most important sources for all waterbenders (making Yue pretty darn powerful) the fact that her situation was entirely circumstantial is why she gets a middle-ranking.
Tui & La (Moon & Ocean Spirits)
Hard to believe that a koi fish is what helped the Northern Water-Tribe defeat the Fire-Nation army, but that’s what happens when said koi fish is the ocean spirit and just watched it’s eternal partner get sliced in half with a fire-blast. Commander Zhao pulled the cheapest-shot in the history of cheap-shots when he decided to kill the moon spirit’s living form. However, he didn’t expect the ocean spirit to retaliate by fusing with the Avatar’s spirit or that said fused-spirit would take out his entire army. He learned, just as audiences did, not to mess with the ocean and moon.
Aang
He may have never gotten a grip on waterbending the way that he did with air, but it’s conclusive to say that as the Avatar, Aang was a fairly sufficient waterbender. The first element that he learned after mastering air, water came the easiest to Aang as earth and fire both gave him a degree of difficulty. However, with teachers like Katara and Pakku to help him hone his craft, Aang quickly became a master of the soothing blue-liquid. Also, he was the only person in the entire series to ever snowbend themselves into a snowman, so we feel that deserves a decent amount of credit.
Hama
The inventor of bloodbending - need we say more? The terrifying old-woman who originated from the Southern Water-Tribe was one of the most formidable foes that Team Avatar faced as she could manipulate the blood within her enemies and control them with her bending. The entire episode where Hama was introduced was spine-tingling and left audiences shaking as it was easily the scariest of the series. It wasn’t just the fact that she tried to make Sokka kill Aang and that Katara had to use bloodbending to stop her - the entire concept of bloodbending was just horrifying from the beginning.
Pakku
Pakku was the O.G. waterbender and audiences knew the second he stepped on-screen that he was going to be the top-dog when it came to bending the blue liquid. He made it clear that Aang was nothing special when it came to his students and he wasn’t going to take it easy on him during training. He might have had a stick-up-his-butt during the episode that audiences were introduced to him when he refused to teach Katara waterbending and then proceeded to duel a child, but he turned out to be a member of the White Lotus and Sokka and Katara’s eventual Gramp-Gramp. He was also one of the most skilled waterbenders in the entire series.
Katara
Who couldn’t have seen this one coming? Katara was always going to take the number one spot on this list as she’s always been the number one waterbender in the entire Avatar universe (and we’re including characters from the Korra spin-off). The sole waterbender from her Southern Water-tribe, Katara made it clear that all she ever wanted to be was a waterbender. She had no aspirations of becoming the greatest one to ever walk the earth, but having the Avatar as her best friend and a stubborn, old man who refused to teach her probably prompted her to show the world exactly what she was capable of. We bow to you, Sifu Katara.
