Zuko’s sister Azula, prominently featured in Nickelodeon’s anime-influenced animated television series Avatar: The Last Airbender — and one of the series fan-favorite characters — was both a gifted firebender and a troubled soul. Best known for her incredible fire-bending skills and strategic prowess, Azula was last seen in the series losing at the hands of her brother during a decisive Agni Kai, a centuries-old traditional firebender duel.
In the showdown between her, her brother Zuko, and Katara, the audience witnessed not only Azula’s defeat but also the painful collapse of her sanity. Her presence within the series then fades out. While many of the original series’ characters made an appearance or at least were referenced in the sequel series, Avatar: The Legend of Korra, Azula was nowhere to be found or even mentioned, prompting series fans to wonder what happened to her after the original Avatar had ended.
Well, Azula’s story didn’t simply end with her being on the losing end of an Agni Kai. But, to better understand what happened to her after Avatar, we have to briefly explore Azula’s relationship with her mother, Ursa. Azula was a firebending prodigy convinced of her superiority since childhood. She was favored by her father over Zuko, but she was often scolded by her mother for being uncompassionate and disrespectful towards others, giving Azula the impression that Ursa thought of her as a monster and thus loved “ZuZu,” Azula’s pet name for her older brother, more.
The circumstances under which Ursa disappeared during Azula’s and Zuko’s childhoods remain a mystery. However, near the end of the series, leading to the events of the Agni Kai, Azula’s growing paranoia and narcissism evolved into a full mental breakdown after her father named her Fire Lord. It’s this instability that Zuko and Katara used to their advantage to overpower Azula, who was known for her usually calm, calculating, and cunning nature.
This is where the Avatar: The Last Airbender animated series ended, but the narrative continued in the Avatar: The Last Airbender — The Search graphic novel, where we learn that Zuko placed Azula in a mental institution out of pity for her fractured mental state, instead of outright imprisoning her as he had their father. About a year later, after the events of Sozin’s Comet, while investigating what happened to their mother and hitting a dead end, Zuko released Azula from the mental institution to help him and Team Avatar find out what happened to Ursa.
Unbeknownst to Zuko, Azula, who was now a necessitated part of the “Gaang,” is still being haunted by hallucinations of Ursa, and her mental state only deteriorates further. But even with her mind slipping, Azula is still capable of demonstrating her remarkable strategic prowess and proves to be a valuable addition to the crew. Together, they find Ursa, who had changed her face and name and had remarried and had a daughter. This enrages Azula, who accuses Ursa of replacing her with a new daughter.
After the attempted murder of her mother and a confrontation with Zuko, Azula stops fighting and runs away in tears, despite Zuko begging her to stay. After that, her whereabouts remain a mystery for the remainder of The Search and the subsequent The Rift comic book trilogy. However, she reappeared in Avatar: The Last Airbender — Smoke and Shadow, which was a comic book trilogy, as the leader of the New Ozai Society, whose goal was to overthrow Zuko from the Fire Nation’s throne and reinstate her father, Ozai.
In this appearance, Azula seems more mentally collected and once again shows unmatched skill at manipulation and tactical planning, resorting to all sorts of subterfuge to challenge Zuko’s rule. The whole chain of events in Smoke and Shadow shook Zuko to his core, and in his pursuit to right his father’s wrongs and capture Azula, he took to drastic measures, nearly becoming no different than Azula herself — something she told him to his face.
By the end of the graphic novel, Zuko apologized to his people for his poor leadership and drastic measures, while Azula watched from afar, pleased with his speech. As it turns out, her plan wasn’t to overthrow Zuko and reinstate Ozai but to use reverse psychology on Zuko and forge him into becoming a better, just, and humble Fire Lord — something she and Ozai could never be. She finally confronts her brother again, accepts him as the true Fire Lord, and embraces her role as his shadowy advisor.
The events following the arrival of Sozin’s comet and the conclusion of Avatar: The Last Airbender animated series revealed a different, more complex perspective of Azula, showing her to be much more than the brash antagonist she was often portrayed as in the series. Her journey after the events of the series is a deep dive into her mental health issues, her strength, and her profound complexities.
Through the continuation and the conclusion of her story in the comics, Azula maintains her role as an irreplaceable part of the Avatar universe, and her actions end up shaping the future of not just the Fire Nation but the United Republic of Nations we saw in Avatar: The Legend of Korra.