{"id":641153,"date":"2026-10-09T11:38:08","date_gmt":"2026-10-09T11:38:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/641153\/"},"modified":"2026-10-09T11:38:08","modified_gmt":"2026-10-09T11:38:08","slug":"avatar-seven-havens-review-an-intriguing-new-direction","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/641153\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Avatar: Seven Havens’ Review: An Intriguing New Direction"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tThis summer, the Avatar franchise reintroduced itself<\/a> by revisiting its most iconic character: Aang, the namesake of \u201cAvatar: The Last Airbender\u201d and the original protagonist of a story now in its third decade. For its next act, the Avatar Studios imprint<\/a> \u2014 overseen by original series creators Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko and tasked with expanding the Nickelodeon children\u2019s show into a multimedia enterprise \u2014 faces the tougher task of introducing new protagonists and ideas while preserving Avatar\u2019s core appeal.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Paramount+ series \u201cAvatar: Seven Havens<\/a>\u201d quite literally brings the saga into the future. Specifically, it\u2019s been more than two centuries since the conclusion of \u201cAvatar: The Legend of Korra,\u201d the sequel series that wrapped its run in 2014. \u201cSeven Havens,\u201d also created by DiMartino and Konietzko, uses the leap forward to fundamentally alter the composition of this fictional world. (Longtime animation hand Ethan Spaulding, who executive produces, and co-executive producer Sehaj Sethi also form the creative team.) Gone are the four nations, corresponding to the elements, who coexisted in harmony that was disrupted and then, episode by episode, restored. In their place is a world reduced to a wasteland by an environmental cataclysm, supposedly caused by Korra herself. The namesake havens are city-states that offer refuge from sandstorms, bandits and other threats \u2014 and the Avatar, a quasi-messianic figure able to \u201cbend\u201d all four elements, is a stigmatized bogeyman who hasn\u2019t appeared for generations.<\/p>\n

\n\tEnter Pavi (Saheli Khan), an orphan from the haven of Ellora who spends her days scrounging for food, trying to keep her multi-element bending abilities under wraps and talking to the inanimate objects she keeps around in lieu of friends. Pavi\u2019s name is an indication of another way \u201cSeven Havens\u201d expands the Avatar mythos: by incorporating South Asian culture to the universe\u2019s pre-existing blend of Chinese, Japanese, Inuit and other influences. Pavi\u2019s favorite snack are the kachoris knowingly left out by a local shopkeeper, herself voiced by veteran actor Sakina Jaffrey. Food, in general, is an object of concern for \u201cSeven Havens\u201d: Mochi, kimchi jjigae and bitter melon are all cited by name in the first few episodes alone.<\/p>\n

\n\tBut an equally significant update \u201cSeven Havens\u201d makes to the cosmology is in how the show depicts the natural world \u2014 always a preoccupation for a story grounded in air, earth, fire and water. The \u201cHarshlands\u201d that surround Ellora are filled with rocks, sand and a strange, haunted beauty. The color palette of \u201cSeven Havens\u201d is warmer than prior Avatar series, favoring the oranges and pinks of an almost Saharan expanse. (The music, from franchise stalwart Jeremy Zuckerman, also sets \u201cSeven Havens\u201d apart aurally with a more electronic sound.) There are cats with monkey tails, and camels that roll up in a ball like armadillos! With a postapocalyptic landscape indifferent and even hostile to human needs, \u201cSeven Havens\u201d reminded me of \u201cScavengers Reign,\u201d the magnificent yet short-lived<\/a> series on HBO Max. Hopefully, having the IP tie-in will give \u201cSeven Havens\u201d more time to explore its environment.<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd \u201cSeven Havens\u201d could use some time to grow. Pavi is a younger hero than even 12-year-old Aang, perhaps an attempt to introduce Avatar to a new generation of kids where the movie was more of a service to pre-existing fans. Shy, nerdy and a pacifist by nature, Pavi has a personality, if one that\u2019s still in formation. She\u2019s mentored by Jae (Major Curda), a member of Ellora\u2019s municipal Bending Brigade, and his captain Karthik (Akshay Khanna), who has a more optimistic view of the Avatar\u2019s potential than those that blame her for ending the world. In the six episodes provided to critics, this crew hasn\u2019t quite coalesced into a unified team, but \u201cSeven Havens\u201d successfully cultivates enough curiosity about how its world works to buy some time.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cSeven Havens\u201d introduces another quirk to the Avatar legend I\u2019m forbidden from disclosing, though it takes some pressure off Pavi as Karthik explores his theory that the Avatar can help revive the dying art of bending. (There are fewer benders born to each successive generation, we\u2019re told, even as manipulating the elements is a vital defense against an onslaught of lightning and wind.) Combined with the imagery and an expanded pool of references, \u201cSeven Havens\u201d successfully makes clear that it\u2019s a new and different kind of Avatar series, while maintaining the transportive world-building that\u2019s helped the franchise endure.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe first three episodes of \u201cAvatar: Seven Havens\u201d are now streaming on Paramount+, with remaining episodes airing weekly in batches of three on Fridays.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This summer, the Avatar franchise reintroduced itself by revisiting its most iconic character: Aang, the namesake of \u201cAvatar:…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":641154,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[288927,146,85,46,411],"class_list":["post-641153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-avatar-seven-havens","tag-entertainment","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=641153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641153\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/641154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=641153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=641153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=641153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}