10 TV Shows That Were Unrecognisable When They Finished

8. Avatar: The Last Airbender's Look And Characters Changed Completely

Baywatch Nights
Nickelodeon

With the best shows out there, you never realize how much better the production quality is until you've seen the first and last season side by side with each other. If any show is proof of that, it has to be Avatar: The Last Airbender.

It helps that the show always looked really good, even ignoring the standards for early 2000's Nickelodeon animation. But as the show went on, the animation got smoother, the colors more vibrant, the characters more expressive, and generally a show that oozed atmosphere from the start turned into one that drowned you in the feel of its world.

But more than that, the characters changed remarkably. We all knew from the start that Aang was gonna become the avatar he was always meant to be, and by episode 3 we all hoped against hope that Zuko would choose the right path, but who could have predicted meek and sweet Katara becoming the tank of the group? Or sarcastic, kinda wimpy Sokka becoming a master swordsman and tactical genius?

Despite how the show constantly reminded us where its endgame was gonna be, the show was hardly recognizable when it got there. And god bless it for that.

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John Tibbetts is a novelist in theory, a Whatculture contributor in practice, and a nerd all around who loves talking about movies, TV, anime, and video games more than he loves breathing. Which might be a problem in the long term, but eh, who can think that far ahead?