Continuing The Avatar Legacy: An Interview With Avatar Co-Creator Mike Dante DiMartino at SDCC19

This past weekend at SDCC, I had the honor of interviewing Mike Dante DiMartino, also known as the co-creator of Avatar: The Last Airbender, and The Legend of Korra. This was huge for me, as Avatar was a staple of my childhood. Hell, it’s been a staple of my entire life. It’s a huge reason why I wanted to get into storytelling and writing. We talked a little bit about Ruins of the Empire, the second and current Korra comic published through Dark Horse that ties up some loose ends from Kuvira’s story arc from the end of season 4. We also touched on what it’s like to write your characters in different mediums, and the best ways to tackle world-building. So, with that being said, don’t expect any questions about what happened to Jet, how quick Aang’s hair can grow or how fast the spirit of the Avatar is reincarnated. Mike gave some really insightful answers to the deeper questions and if you’re a writer like myself, you’ll find them pretty invaluable. Black Nerd Problems: Animation and comics are similar in a lot of respects. And comics are in a way a part of the animation process. How does your approach to writing these comics differ from your approach to the writing the show? Mike Dante DiMartino: Yeah, that’s a good question. In some ways, it’s similar. Like figuring out plot and character arcs and emotions and all that stuff is totally the same. But the storytelling medium is quite different because you can’t rely on movement. You can’t rely on sound effects or music or acto…