The Drill

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Avatar: The Last Airbender episode
"The Drill"
The drill, ready to breach through the wall of Ba Sing Se
Book	Two: Earth
Chapter	Thirteen
Episode #	Thirty-three
Prod. code	213
Airdate	September 15, 2006
Writer(s)	Michael Dante DiMartino, Bryan Konietzko
Director	Giancarlo Volpe
Guest star(s)	Crawford Wilson (Jet) Nika Futterman (Smellerbee) Kim Mai Guest (Ying) Kristoffer Tabori (War Minister Qin) Barry Dennen (General Sung) Karen Maruyama (Bureaucrat)

Previous episode
"The Serpent's Pass"
Next episode
"City of Walls and Secrets"

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The Drill

"The Drill" is an episode from the animated television series Avatar: The Last Airbender, which airs on Nickelodeon. It is the thirteenth episode of the second season of the series.

Aang discovers a secret Fire Nation invention heading straight for Ba Sing Se and must stop it before it destroys the great wall that protects the city from invasion.

[edit] Episode synopsis

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Continuing from the last episode, "The Serpent's Pass," a massive drill is approaching the wall of Ba Sing Se, flanked by Fire Nation tanks. The drill is under the command of Azula and War Minister Qin.

Aang warns the commander of Outer Wall, General Sung, but the general claims that Aang's help will not be needed. He's sent a group of elite Earthbenders, called the Terra Team, to stop the drill. Mai and Ty Lee, however, quickly disposes of them, striking their pressure points to paralyze them and shooting them with shuriken.

Now realizing the vulnerability of his position, Sung begs for Aang's help. Aang needs to figure out a way to stop the drill, and immediately looks to Sokka for ideas.

Meanwhile, Zuko and Iroh have to get past another clerk, in order to get inside the city, which Iroh accomplishes with a little buttering up. Jet, in the meantime, is looking to recruit Zuko into the group.

Later, Katara is checking out the Terra Team. After one of the paralyzed Earthbenders tells them that a girl blocked his chi channels and cartwheeled away, Katara recognized her quickly as Ty Lee. Katara's words about how Ty Lee fights gives Sokka an idea to infiltrate the machine and destroy it from the inside, by hitting its pressure points. Toph creates a dust cloud, giving them some cover, then bends them a tunnel to get under the machine. Aang, Katara, Momo and Sokka get inside, but Toph refuses, preferring to try to slow the drill from the outside.

Inside, the gang manages to steal the schematics from an engineer, and figures out an idea to cut through the supports holding the machine together.

Back in the city, Iroh buys a cup of tea from a vendor, only to find out that it's cold. Jet tries to talk Zuko into joining him, but the prince naturally refuses. Zuko turns back to Iroh and find that he used Firebending to heat up his tea. Zuko chastises his uncle for possibly blowing their cover, but it's too late, as Jet has also seen the steam rising from his cup, and starts to suspect the pair as Firebenders.

Inside the Drill, Aang and Katara use Waterbending to saw through a massive support beam, with Sokka "cheering" them on. They cut through the beam with much effort, but it's not enough. Unfortunately, the Drill has just reached the wall. Aang, remembering some of Toph's teaching, comes upon a better idea. Instead of trying to cut completely through a few beams, they only cut partially through many of them. Aang is then to deliver the final blow from above, to bring the entire machine down.

Unfortunately, their previous actions are discovered, and Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee quickly dispatch themselves to take care of them, and the group splits up to escape. Azula goes after Aang and Momo, sending Ty Lee and Mai after the other two. Sokka and Katara escape through a slurry pipeline, a pipe containing rock, sand and water from the drill. Mai refuses to jump into the "Wall-sludge juice," but Ty Lee quickly goes after them.

Katara and Sokka are carried out through the rear of the drill, Ty Lee following soon after. Katara, however, quickly Waterbends the slurry, Ty Lee included, right back up the pipe, keeping her from attacking them. Aang starts trying to cut a weak point to strike, but is hampered by the panicked efforts of General Sung, who is ordering his troops to continually drop boulders on the drill, to no effect.

At the rear of the drill, Sokka is still cheering his sister on as she Waterbends. Toph shows up, offering some help. As the mud is partially Earth, she lends her abilities to Katara's shoving the slurry (and Ty Lee) all the way back up the pipes.

Topside, Aang is confronted by Azula, who wastes no time in engaging him, even through a rain of falling boulders. Aang fights her off with both water and Earthbending, but gets knocked out by a fire blast just as the Drill breaches the Outer Wall. Azula pins Aang against the wall to finish him off, but Aang recovers, creating a stone hand around his arm to push her away. Before they can begin round two, however, the slurry, backed up by Katara and Toph, overflows the drill, sending a wave of mud over them both. Azula looses her footing and goes slipping into Aang, slamming them both against the wall. They go sliding off opposite sides, Momo helping Aang recover and get himself back up to the top. Using a rock "helpfully" dropped by Sung's men, Aang shapes it into a wedge, placing it right on top of the weak spot. He then runs at full speed up the wall, utilizing the air scooter, going as high as he can before dropping back down onto the spike of rock. Azula, in a last attempt, shoots a blast of fire towards Aang but misses as he pounds into the shaped rock. The resulting shock-wave blows Azula off of the drill, and dislodges many of the machine's weakened supports. The strain of the impact, as well as the pressure of the slurry, is too much for the drill, which collapses into a muddy pile of scrap.

Back at the city dock, Jet makes the realization that Zuko and Iroh are Firebenders, and seeks to confront them on a subway train, the same one Ying and Tahn are also riding on.

[edit] Notes

This episode won an Annie Award for Directing.
War Minister Qin, the Fire Nation emissary from "The Northern Air Temple," returns in this chapter. Also, the plans for the Fire Nation Drill had previously appeared in that episode. The Mechanist is seen drawing a diagram of the drill in the middle of the episode.
The Fire Nation Drill resembles a giant tunnel boring machine.
Toph makes a reference to "The Dragon of the West," Iroh, whom she unknowingly befriended in a previous episode, "The Chase." When General Sung loftily boasts that no one has ever breached the walls of Ba Sing Se, she reminds him that Iroh successfully did so.
Aang jokingly wishes that he were a "Metalbender". In fact, the traditional Chinese Five Elements includes the metal element, along with Earth, Fire, Water, and Wood. Air is not one of the traditional Chinese five elements.
At the arrival station where Zuko and Iroh got their passports stamped is a large sign above that says 歡迎光臨表層城 which translates as 'Welcome To Ba Sing Se.' Pronounced in Mandarin as biǎo céng chéng, Ba Sing Se (表層城) means 'outside layer city,' not inpenetrable city as General Sung stated. The opposite Na Sing Se or 'inside city' would be 內層城(nèi céng chéng).