The worldbuilding in Avatar: The Last Airbender is so intricate and well thought out that it's hard to believe there were important details the creators glossed over. The finale's reveal of the Order of the White Lotus secretly uniting many of the older allies Team Avatar came across during their globetrotting seemed like a perfect example of the series' worldbuilding. Still, it turns out that may have been one of its biggest oversights.
If the White Lotus were Aang's allies all along with such a vast network of resources, why weren't they a more significant help earlier?
Throughout much of the series, Aang and his friends journey the world searching for masters to aid Aang in his quest to become powerful enough to end the Hundred Year War. There are three additional elements Aang needs to master in the course of his journey. His search for teachers is made all the more difficult because he is continuously hunted, severely restricted in the resources he has available and very often outclassed by the sheer amount of power he is up against. And the White Lotus could have helped far more with virtually every problem he faced throughout his journey.
The knowledge that many of the older mentors Aang met along his journey were part of a secret order of peacekeepers known as the Order of the White Lotus confounds the fact that most of them were of so little help to him. However, Iroh could be excused for tending to the historically significant task of overseeing Zuko's redemption. As early as Season 1, Episode 5, Aang came across Bumi -- the titular King of Omashu of the episode -- and leaves with nothing more than a lesson on the usefulness of creative problem-solving.
Is that all Bumi had to offer? After all, it's only four episodes later in "The Waterbending Scroll" that it becomes a plot point of how little money the Gaang has. Plus, not long after that, Aang is so desperate to master firebending he disregards the Avatar Cycle he is supposed to learn the elements in to start his training with Jeong Jeong. Bumi offers virtually nothing in the way of material wealth, earthbending training or valuable information. Though Jeong Jeong briefly tutors Aang in firebending, he completely vanished after that without another word.
The same pattern holds true in the Gaang's goodbye to Pakku at the start of the second season. Pakku assures Aang that Katara will be a capable teacher from then on out, offering some scrolls before parting ways so that they could make their way back to Bumi. Much like with Bumi and Jeong Jeong, the moment isn't explored almost at all, and since all three are leaders to their people, it's assumed that they all have more important things matters to attend to. But what could be more important than aiding the Avatar on his quest to restore balance to the world? Gran-Gran can wait!
While there are brief explanations of the importance of learning the elements according to the Avatar Cycle, fans can undoubtedly retroactively justify everything in the series. After all, the heroes ultimately win in the end. Still, it almost seems absurd how little explanation is given for these world-class benders shirking their Order's centuries-long dedication to aiding the Avatar.
The White Lotus retook Ba Sing Se from an army of Fire Nation soldiers empowered a thousand times over by Sozin's Comet. Bumi singlehandedly liberated Omashu by tossing factories into the air, and Pakku fought off battalions himself while defending the north. Any of these masters could have been crucial in stopping Azula or Appa's capture or indeed letting Ba Sing Se fall into the Fire Nation's hands in the first place.
There is no questioning that The Order of the White Lotus' reappearance made for an epic finale, and the story would have been different without Aang's journey going as it did. Still, as Netflix and Paramount look toward reexamining the world of Avatar, this may be one area where fans deserve some answers.
