Avatar: The Last Airbender's Smoke and Shadow, Explained With Every Spoiler
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Spoiler warning. This breakdown covers all three parts of Smoke and Shadow, ending included.
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The Rift belonged to Toph, and Smoke and Shadow brings the spotlight right back to the Fire Nation. It's the fourth installment on our list of Avatar comics set between the show and Korra, and it picks up after The Rift with Zuko bringing his mother home to the palace for the first time since she disappeared.
Dark Horse released Smoke and Shadow in three parts, starting on September 23, 2015, and wrapping up on March 16, 2016 (Avatar Wiki). Gene Luen Yang wrote it, the art team Gurihiru drew it, and Part Three went to number one on the New York Times bestseller list for paperback graphic books (Dark Horse).
What are the Kemurikage?
The story opens with a genuinely creepy scene. In the middle of the night, smoky masked figures called the Kemurikage visit Ukano, Mai's father, who used to govern Omashu back when the Fire Nation renamed it New Ozai. In Fire Nation legend, the Kemurikage are spirits who snatch misbehaving kids, the kind of story parents tell to scare children into bed (Ukano always assumed it was a fable).
The spirits tell him that Zuko has to be removed from the throne, or Ukano's family and the whole Fire Nation will suffer. They promise him a chance at redemption, and that's all it takes to push him into dangerous action.
Who is trying to take Zuko's throne?
Ukano leads the New Ozai Society, a secret group of loyalists who want Ozai back in charge. After the Kemurikage visit, he orders them to assassinate Zuko on his way home from the harbor. Zuko is sailing back with Ursa, her new husband Noren and their daughter Kiyi, his half-sister from The Search.
Mai finds out about the plan through Kei Lo, a young member of the society who has been seeing her. She has secretly been using him to keep tabs on her father (Mai's dating style is basically espionage). Zuko and Suki set up a decoy caravan with Iroh waving from the window, but the society ambushes the real route anyway. Kei Lo turns on his own group to save Zuko's family, and Zuko scares off the attackers with a huge spiral of multicolored fire. Ukano manages to escape in the confusion.
Why is Ursa so nervous at the palace?
This is the emotional center of the first part. Ursa hasn't set foot in the palace since Ozai forced her out, and Noren notices her hands go cold whenever she's scared. She clings to Kiyi so hard that her daughter pushes her away, and walking past Ozai's portrait in the Royal Gallery nearly breaks her.
Gene Yang has said he drew from his own anxiety as a parent to write Ursa's scenes, and it shows (Avatar Wiki). Kiyi, meanwhile, starts calling Zuko "Zuzu," the same nickname Azula used to mock him, and somehow it sounds sweet coming from her.
What happens when the children start disappearing?
A month later, the Kemurikage strike again and take Tom-Tom, Mai's little brother, right off the roof of her aunt's flower shop. Zuko decides that if they're fighting spirits, he needs the Avatar, so Aang leaves a family trip at the South Pole to help.
In Part Two, more children vanish, including the son of the police constable. Zuko, Aang, Mai and Kei Lo explore the Dragonbone Catacombs and find an old scroll about Toz, a warlord who kidnapped children before the Kemurikage came for him. Aang then talks to the real spirits, who tell him they haven't crossed into the human world since the first Fire Lord united the islands (Avatar Wiki). That means whoever is kidnapping the children is completely human.
Meanwhile, Ukano forms a volunteer militia called the Safe Nation Society, and the capital starts turning on itself. Part Two ends with the worst possible cliffhanger. Kiyi is taken, and the lightning-throwing figure who grabs her turns out to be Azula.
Who is behind the Kemurikage?
Azula, with a group of young women she broke out of an institution who now owe her their freedom. She dressed them up as the Kemurikage, used them to manipulate Ukano, and kidnapped children to make the people afraid (Avatar Wiki).
Her goal is the scariest part. She wants to turn Zuko into the kind of ruler she tried to be, one who rules through fear, so that in a way she'll be Fire Lord through him. She even says the voice in her head went quiet once she found that destiny.
How does Smoke and Shadow end?
Zuko almost plays right into her hands. He locks down the capital to find Azula and Ukano, and the fear turns into riots. Ty Lee recognizes a secret passage in Kiyi's room from her childhood games with Azula, which is a huge clue about who's really behind the masks. Kiyi saves herself first, melting a hole in the metal door with firebending she copied from watching Zuko practice. She frees every captured child (Kiyi is the real MVP of this book).
Zuko catches up with Azula in the Royal Family Graveyard, and their fight is the grittiest one yet, with fire daggers and Azula redirecting lightning. She gets the upper hand, then slips away, promising he'll become like her one day. Ukano finally comes around, says goodbye to his kids and is arrested. Mai ends things with Kei Lo, who leaves the flower shop in tears.
Then comes the moment that defines the entire book. Zuko goes in front of his people and admits he acted out of fear instead of reason, asks for their forgiveness and promises to be a Fire Lord worthy of them. Azula watches from a distance and vanishes in a puff of smoke. In the last scene, Ursa visits Ozai in prison, ignores his insults and sees him for what he is, a small man trying to look big.
Is Smoke and Shadow worth reading?
My read is yes, and it's the most grown-up Zuko story in the comics. The Search was about his past, while Smoke and Shadow is about what kind of leader he wants to be, and the fear theme ties every storyline together. Yang has said fear became the main theme as he wrote it, and you can feel it in everything from Ursa's cold hands to the citywide curfew (Avatar Wiki).
Azula's return is the big hook, and it's handled better than you'd expect. She isn't redeemed, and she isn't just a cackling villain either. The Kei Lo and Mai storyline drags a little, and the catacomb detour feels like filler. Still, Gurihiru's art is gorgeous, the scary scenes actually feel scary, and Zuko's speech at the end is one of his best moments outside the show.
If you want to read it, the Smoke and Shadow Omnibus collects all three parts in one paperback. If you're reading in order, The Rift comes right before it and North and South comes next.
- Avatar: The Last Airbender, Smoke and Shadow Omnibus
- Avatar: The Last Airbender, The Rift Omnibus (the one before)
- Avatar: The Last Airbender, North and South Omnibus (next in the series)
Next up on our list is North and South, where Katara and Sokka head home to a Southern Water Tribe that's changing fast.
More Avatar coverage is right here.
Header image shows the covers of Smoke and Shadow Parts 1 to 3 from Dark Horse Comics, art by Gurihiru. In-article panels are from Dark Horse's official previews.
