It’s the consistently “say the line, Bart” moment of Avatar: The Last Airbender and in Netflix’s live action adaptation, it does not disappoint.
Fans of the animated series will be waiting to see how the new series adapts beloved main characters like Aang (Gordon Cormier), Katara (Kiawentiio), Sokka (Ian Ousley), and Zuko (Dallas James Liu), but may also be keen to know if one of the ultimate fan-favourites shows up: the cabbage merchant.
A long-suffering bad luck magnet and comedic cornerstone of the animated series and graphic novels, the Earth Kingdom’s travelling cabbage merchant’s only trait is that he’s consistently foiled in his attempts to earn a living through his vegetables. A friend to misfortune, he’s always peddling his spherical wares from a cart only to have them burned, eaten, trampled, or destroyed by various characters and beasts.
And every time it happens, he exclaims, “MY CABBAGES!” in despair. Reader, every single time, it lands.
The cabbage merchant is such a fan favourite, people have made various remixes of his oft-repeated line, and the character even appeared in the Adult Swim stop-motion comedy series Robot Chicken.
So of course, he turns up in the live action series, in episode 3, “Omashu”, set in the titular Earth Kingdom city. But the best part of this cameo? The cabbage merchant is played by James Sie, who voiced the perpetually doomed character in the animated series.
After Jet (Sebastian Amoruso) helps Aang, Katara, and Sokka sneak into the city of Omashu, they’re taking in the bustling marketplace. Aang spots someone zooming along the city’s transport system of slides (we later learn this is the king, Bumi) and races to get to them. With his head in the sky, Aang stumbles past a merchant selling — you got it — cabbages.
“Hey! Watch out for my—” the cabbage seller exclaims, interrupted by Sokka in pursuit of Aang. This happens once more, when the merchant comes across Katara when she’s looking for Jet, asking her, “Would you like to try one of my—” before he’s cut off. But later, when he finally gets to finish his iconic line, it’s a deeply satisfying payoff.
During the fight between Zuko and Aang in the marketplace, Zuko sets the cabbage merchant’s cart on fire, which is the last straw for our unfortunate purveyor of leafy greens. Finally, he screams:
“My…my… MY CAAABBBBAAAAAGEEEEEEEES!!!!”
Shaking a double fist at the sky in pure unlocked rage, the cabbage merchant gets his damn moment (according to Netflix, Sie actually recorded the line several times from different angles and the crew cheered after each take).
There’s actually a neat Easter egg for the cabbage merchant in the same episode. When we first meet him in the animated series, he’s trying to get into Omashu, but he’s earthbended into the air with his haul. In the live action series, the Omashu guards do exactly this to another seller, with the cabbage merchant already safely inside.
So, there you have it, the king of rotten luck and pop-up retail got his moment in the live action series of Avatar: the Last Airbender. And as is tradition, his livelihood was burned to the ground.
Avatar: The Last Airbender is now streaming on Netflix.