Metalbending

"earth"

- If you open your mind, you will see that all the elements are one. Four parts of the same whole. Even metal is just a part of Earth, that has been purified and refined.



Metalbending is a special subset of techniques within Earthbending that allows an Earthbender to ferrokinetically bend processed metals much as they would bend regular earth. It was developed by Toph Bei Fong in the episode "The Guru". As of the end of the series, Toph remains as the only known individual capable of Metalbending.

In the episode "The Guru", during a lecture on chakras, Guru Pathik explained to Aang that metal is merely earth that has been purified and refined. Using her unique ability to "see" through Earthbending, Toph is able to perceive the trace amount of earth still present in the metal, target it, and utilize it to "bend" the metal itself.

The idea of Metalbending was first hinted at by Aang in the episode "The Drill" when he sarcastically states "What I'd give to be a Metalbender," as he tries to carve a notch in the hull of a giant drill with Waterbending.

History


Most Earthbenders are unable to manipulate processed metals with their bending. This inability was first demonstrated in "Imprisoned", in which Earthbender prisoners, taken captive by the Fire Nation, were brought to a completely metal rig in the middle of the ocean to exploit this weakness. The Earthbenders' helplessness due to their situation was stressed several times in the episode. Earthbenders' inabilty to bend metal is also expressed in "The Blind Bandit", where Xin Fu and the other Earth Rumble VI fighters capture Toph and Aang in metal cages suspended in the air. Toph only escapes this cage by means of a ransom, and Aang is released when his cage falls to the ground and Sokka and Katara break it open.

In the episode "The Earth King", Toph was captured in a metal cage by Xin Fu and her former teacher, Master Yu. During the next episode, "The Guru", she tries desperately to break the cage until the latter chided that, even if she was the best Earthbender alive, it was impossible to bend the metal. At this point, Toph realized that metal was only purified earth, just as Guru Pathik was explaining this to Aang many miles away at the Eastern Air Temple. Toph started to meditate on her cage until she was able to feel the vibrations of the trace amounts of earth in the metal. By using these remaining fragments, Toph used Metalbending for the first time, tearing a hole in her cage so that she could escape.

Limits
Toph's Metalbending seems to be restricted to close-range manipulation; in almost all cases she has had to be standing close to or in direct contact with the metal she intends to bend. Toph has "scrunched" and otherwise deformed sheets of metal, but has never caused it to levitate or freely reshape itself the way she has with earth. This was also shown in "The Runaway" when Toph could not escape from a wooden prison cell, despite there being a metal cell directly adjacent to it. In addition, she appeared unable to bend her and Katara's gold jewelery to escape their wooden cage, so it may be that not all metals can be manipulated by Metalbending, as precious metals like gold naturally contain less impurities, although it's possible they just didn't think about it at the time. However, in "The Crossroads of Destiny", when she was able to make direct contact with a metal cell door, she was able to blast it off its hinges with such force that it ricocheted four times around the inside of the prison corridor before coming to rest. In "Sokka's Master", Sokka gives Toph a small piece of meteorite, composed of an earth and metal hybrid, which she can easily mold into a myriad of shapes and subsequently transforms it into an arm bracelet she now wears.



In "The Awakening", she was seen to be able to greatly increase the range of her Metalbending, as seen when she knocked Fire Nation guards off the group's ship from several meters away, simply by grabbing a piece of her ship and crunching the metal with her hands to produce the effect (this technique is similar to the Earth Fissure). Also in that episode, it seems that she can "see" through metal just the same as on regular earth, possibly even with greater clarity as metal would conduct vibrations far better.

Other moments when Toph was shown using Metalbending include blasting another door in "The Puppetmaster" to free Hama's prisoners, opening a big hole in the Fire Lord's secret underground bunker, granting them passage, and trapping a Dai Li agent in a metal column, the last two in "The Day of Black Sun, Part 2: The Eclipse".

Toph seems to have furthered her ability to control metal in "Sozin's Comet, Part 3: Into The Inferno" now controlling it more fluidly. She uses the metal of a destroyed Fire Nation airship door to make a suit of armor in the same manner as the more traditional Earth Armor technique, though it is worth noting that a sighted Metalbender may have had difficulty doing so as anyone else but Toph would be unable to see through the metal armor. She also is able to manipulate the metal plating in the command bay of the airship from a short distance (as opposed to direct contact needed previously) to pin her opponents to the walls. Furthermore, she also was able to metalbend the ship's floor upward to block a comet-charged fire blast just as a traditional earthbender would block attacks through earthbending up a rock barrier, despite lacking direct contact because of her metal armor. (The barrier was rather crude, however, probably indicating diminishing bending ability). She then climbs upside-down across a pipe in the airship, probably by achieving a magnetic effect.

(A less likely possibility is that she bonded the metals together, which would require constant bonding and rebonding in order to allow her to move.)



In the next episode, "Sozin's Comet, Part 4: Avatar Aang" Toph bends the rudder of an airship causing it to spiral and hit the other ships. Even with this, she takes more time and concentration than she would if she had been required to do so with the more easily attainable forms of Earthbending.