The Dark Avatar was first introduced in The Legend of Korra. This is the sequel to the Last Airbender series that aired on Nickelodeon.
The Dark Avatar was created when Unalaq fused with Vaatu, the dark spirit in order to become a new type of Avatar. A Dark Avatar that was meant to usher the world into a new era of darkness. As Chief Unalaq said to Avatar Korra. ” When Harmonic convergence comes, I will fuse with Vaatu and together we will become a new Avatar, a Dark Avatar.”
The Dark Avatar, also known as UnaVaatu is the result of Unalaq fusing with Vaatu. This Dark Avatar eventually gained an enlarged form as the world had never before seen something of that nature. Unalaq meant to usher the world into a new and darker era until both himself and Vaatu were defeated by Korra and Raava, the light spirit.
Unalaq And His Evil Ways
Unalaq, the Chief of the northern water tribe, a man who had great spiritual enlightenment sought to change the world by fusing with the dark spirit Vaatu. About ten thousand years prior to this era, Avatar Wan, who at that time was just known as Wan was able to defeat Vaatu.
Wan made the grave error of freeing Vaatu from Raava’s grasp when he noticed them fighting. Vaatu had told him that he had been tortured for thousands of years by his assailant, who was Raava. Wan, in an attempt to be a noble defender, fire bent at Raava, freeing Vaatu from Raava. It didn’t take long for him to realize what he had done and sought to rectify this.
He went on a journey where he acquired all the four elements and spent years mastering how to control them. At that time, Raava told him that he could not hold all the four elements in one body. He needed the physical endurance to be able to do this. He attained this and during harmonic convergence, he fused with Raava permanently in order to defeat Vaatu. He succeeded in doing this, caging Vaatu in an elemental cage, in the tree of time
Unalaq sought to recreate this occurrence by doing this with the Dark spirit Vaatu, thus, becoming a Dark Avatar.
The Dark Avatar aims to reunite the physical and spiritual realms. This is something that Avatar Wan made to be separate when he noticed that spirits and humans did not seem capable of coexisting.
The Dark Avatar as well wants to usher in a new world order of ten thousand years of darkness.
Unalaq and Vaatu were eventually defeated and killed by Korra as an astral projection. This was during the Harmonic Convergence of 171 AG] With his spirit purified, the Dark Avatar Cycle was ended before it began, although Vaatu would eventually regenerate within Raava. This is as the cycle goes, one not completely dying and springing up within the other within the course of the next ten thousand years.
History Of The Dark Avatar
How did the Dark Avatar come to be?
When Unalaq was young, he joined a rogue group, aimed at restoring the world to the natural order of things. Their idea of the natural order is chaos. They are a group called the Red Lotus. Unalaq eventually learned about the two spirits, Vaatu and Raava. He did however believe that the spirits should coexist with humans.
After learning the history of how the Avatar came into existence, Unalaq still strongly believed that humans and spirits should co-exist. He believed that despite there being an Avatar, it should be possible. This was contrary to Wan’s idea to separate the two species by closing the spirit portals.
As he grew older, Unalaq came up with a plan to achieve his goal. This was to free Vaatu during the next Harmonic Convergence and fuse with him in order to become a Dark Avatar. He created this plan that went contrary to the Red Lotus’ goals of destroying the Avatar and the Avatar Cycle altogether.
As time went by, he would later betray the organization in order to pursue his own goals. He also carefully covered his tracks and conspired with Vaatu to pursue this goal.
As time went by, he was able to manipulate Avatar Korra into opening the spirit portals in order for Vaatu to free himself. This was all part of his plan to fuse with Vaatu and become the Dark Avatar.
After Vaatu escaped from the Tree of Time, he was able to fuse with Unalaq, using the overlap of energy from the two spirit portals. This was during the harmonic convergence in 171 AG. This fusion process created the Dark Avatar.
Who is the Dark Avatar?
Dark Avatar vs Light Avatar
The resulting process created the Dark Avatar. Much soon after this, UnaVaatu began to promptly battle the Avatar for the fate of the world.
Despite the years of mastery from Korra and a strong showing from both Avatars, Unalaq, having much more bending discipline and endurance, managed to subdue Korra. At this point, Vaatu emerged from his mouth, latched onto Korra’s face, and pulled Raava out of Korra’s body.
With the use of his water bending, which had been enhanced with Vaatu’s dark energy, Unalaq was able to destroy Raava. Thus, he severed Korra’s connection to her past lives forever in that process. After he had defeated Raava and thus was no longer hindered by the influence of light in the world, the Dark Avatar, Unalaq, and Vaatu grew significantly more powerful. This was displayed by the Dark Avatar growing significantly in size to a height several feet taller than it was when it battled Korra.
After he had grown drastically, he then went ahead to declare the era of the Avatar to be over. The Dark Avatar used the spirit lights to transport himself to Republic City. Here, he promptly proceeded to begin wreaking havoc on the city’s infrastructure using vine-like projections.
Despite heavy artillery that was brought in by the United Forces, the Dark Avatar was able to use enhanced water bending to scatter the battleships as well as knock the lead police airship and a formation of biplanes from the sky, prompting President Raiko and Chief Lin Beifong to evacuate.
Korra, refusing to give up began to fight back. She later finds out that a portion of Raava is in her, although very weak. She was eventually able to defeat UnaVaatu.
