The 10 Best 'Legend of Korra' Episodes, Ranked

Image via Nickelodeon Published Nov 15, 2026, 6:46 AM EST Eddie Possehl is a dynamic and driven writer/director with a passion for the written word and all things film, television, comics, and games. His passion for storytelling led him to establish his own production company in hopes of achieving his dreams. His dedication to his craft has attracted renowned talent like Yuri Lowenthal to collaborate with him on his projects. As he grows and improves, Eddie is a shining example of a self-starter. Sign in to your Collider account There's no question that Avatar: The Last Airbender is one of the most popular animated television shows ever made. With a reception like this, one would think that following that up would be extremely difficult. It most definitely was, but the series that came after, The Legend of Korra, still wound up being an incredible ride that is far better than some give it credit for. While The Legend Korra isn't perfect, it's still an excellent series that is iconic across the board. Korra (Janet Varney) is a wonderful protagonist that is exciting, emotionally compelling, and worth watching for all four seasons. Watching her from episode-to-episode is a journey that people love, but which episodes are the best of the best? 10 "Skeletons in the Closet" Season 1, Episode 11 Image via Nickelodeon Ask anyone, and they'll tell you that The Legend of Korra has a very strong start. The first season is so much fun—introducing audiences to the new world that's come about since Aang (Zach Tyler Eisen) passed on and Korra became the Avatar. The second-to-last episode of this first season is one of the best episodes in the catalog, by far, thanks to the way it raises the stakes for the finale to come after. The Legend of Korra Season 1, Episode 11, "Skeletons in the Closet" is a great penultimate episode that sets the stakes, and reveals the big secret behind the villain of the season, Amon (Steve Blum). Turns out, Korra's first season-long foe is actually the brother of Tarrlok (Dee Bradley Baker), and son of Yakone (Clancy Brown). This changes everything moving into the final episode and sets things up perfectly for what Korra is to face. 9 "Day of the Colossus" Season 4, Episode 12 Image via Nickelodeon Another incredible penultimate episode from The Legend of Korra is the penultimate episode of the series as a whole, The Legend of Korra Season 4, Episode 12, "Day of the Colossus". Said Colossus is a massive mecha, piloted by the likes of the season's villain, General Kuvira (Zelda Williams), and wreaks havoc all across Republic City. Seeing the collective cast come together to fight this behemoth of a foe is so thrilling. It's unlike anything audiences have seen an Avatar face in the past. Buildings are being destroyed, and it takes the entirety of the cast to come together to fight it. It truly unites the team in a way they haven't been united before, making for a great final group battle together. 8 "The Last Stand" Season 4, Episode 13 Image via Nickelodeon If there's one thing that The Legend of Korra is really good at, though, it's the way they execute their finale episodes across all four seasons. Almost every single finale episode is among the best—besides Season 2—and The Legend of Korra Season 4, Episode 13, "The Last Stand" is the first true example of just how good they can get. The action, dialogue, and animation are all top-tier here. What this series finale does the best, though, is showcase how far Korra has come in her journey as the Avatar, depicting the conclusion to her series-long character arc. Starting the fourth season off with her in such a low place, struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder meant that she had a long way to go to get back to her old self by the end of the season. She doesn't just get back to her old self, however. Korra grows and becomes the best Avatar and person she has ever been. 7 "Endgame" Season 1, Episode 12 Image via Nickelodeon The finale of The Legend of Korra Season 1 is one that helped set the standards for every season finale to come after. This episode deals heavily in actions resulting in consequences. The biggest consequence of them all comes in the form of Korra losing her bending completely after Amon takes it from her. The battle with Amon—physical and mental/emotional—proves exactly why he is such a great foe. He truly challenges Korra in new ways, and that's proven with how he overcomes her, forcing her to turn to her friends and see that even the Avatar can't do things alone. This was truly the perfect way to conclude the great first season of this wonderful show. 6 "Korra Alone" Season 4, Episode 2 Image via Nickelodeon Taking title inspiration from the episode of the previous series, Avatar: The Last Airbender Season 2, Episode 7, "Zuko Alone", this second episode of the final series depicts as the title suggests: Korra, alone. After the haunting battle at the end of the third season, she's thrown into a terrible spot in her life, and The Legend of Korra Season 4, Episode 2, "Korra Alone" depicts where she's been since. It's here that audiences get to see that she's not just alone, but struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder after being healed from her paralyzation. This is most definitely the worst place audiences have seen an Avatar in. Korra is in complete shambles, and is so clearly lost, it's hard not to feel terrible for her when watching. This is easily one of the most emotional episodes in the franchise. There's no real action here, it's a character study of Korra at her lowest, and is all-around heartbreaking. The audience simply has to sit and watch her suffer before she can get better. It does wonders for her season-long character arc, but it is heart-wrenching to watch nonetheless. Collider Exclusive · 8 Questions · 2 Minutes What Fantasy World Do You Belong To? Middle-earth · Grand Line · The Continent · Camp Half-Blood Pick your magic, your crew, where you want to wake up and who you would rather be fighting, and we will tell you which world you actually belong in. Four are open to you: an ancient kingdom living through its last good age, an endless sea full of pirates, a continent that pays people to kill monsters, and a summer camp where the Greek gods are extremely real and mostly a nuisance. 💍Middle-earth(Rings of Power) 👒Grand Line(One Piece) 🐺The Continent(The Witcher) 🔱Camp Half-Blood(Percy Jackson) FIND YOUR WORLD → 01 What kind of power do you want? Every one of these worlds runs on a completely different sort of magic. ASomething ancient and half forgotten that came down through my family. BSomething completely ridiculous that works in a fight and gets a laugh. CNo magic at all, just training, potions and a very sharp sword. DSomething I inherited from a parent I have barely met. NEXT QUESTION → 02 Who is travelling with you? Nobody gets through any of these stories entirely on their own. AA fellowship drawn from every corner of the world who barely trust each other. BA crew I picked up one at a time, all of whom would die for me. CTwo or three people I would never describe out loud as friends. DTwo mates from school who are exactly as out of their depth as I am. NEXT QUESTION → 03 Where do you want to wake up tomorrow? The best fantasy is usually just somewhere you would genuinely like to live. AA high city of white stone with the sea somewhere far below. BA ship under sail, with an island ahead that nobody has mapped. CA rented room over a tavern, in a town I am leaving in the morning. DA cabin at a summer camp with everybody else already awake outside. NEXT QUESTION → 04 How are you making a living out there? Even in fantasy somebody has to pay for the horse. AI am not, because somebody far older than me decided this was my duty. BTreasure, and I am not always careful about whose it used to be. CI take contracts, since people will pay well for what they will not touch. DI am fifteen and this is all technically a school trip. NEXT QUESTION → 05 There is something in the woods. What do you do about it? All four of these worlds keep something unpleasant out there in the dark. ASend word to somebody who has seen this before, then hold the line. BWalk straight in, because it is interesting and possibly edible. CAsk what it has been eating and what the village is willing to pay. DWork out which myth it escaped from, then improvise very badly. NEXT QUESTION → 06 Who is the villain of your story? The enemy tells you far more about a world than the hero ever does. AAn ancient evil that has been patient for several thousand years. BA government that has spent a long time calling itself the good guys. CA man who turns out to be far worse than anything I hunt for money. DA god, or possibly my own family, and quite likely both at once. NEXT QUESTION → 07 What do you actually believe in out there? Every world hands its heroes one rule and asks them to hold onto it. ASome things are worth defending even when the odds are hopeless. BNobody gets to tell me where I can go or what I am allowed to want. CPick the lesser evil, and never pretend afterwards that it was not evil. DMy friends come before anything a prophecy has to say about it. NEXT QUESTION → 08 A thousand years from now, how are you remembered? Eight questions in, this is the one that decides your world. AIn a song, in a language hardly anybody still speaks. BAs the one who got there first and proved the whole thing was possible. CBarely, and mostly wrongly, in ballads I would absolutely hate. DOn a plaque at a camp, read by kids about to do the same thing. REVEAL MY WORLD → The Map Is Drawn Your World Is…Four worlds and four completely different ideas of what a good life looks like. This is where you belong, what it would ask of you, and what you would get back in return. Middle-earthYou belong somewhere old enough that the mountains have names and somebody can still tell you who gave them. Middle-earth is for people who think the right thing is worth doing even when it will not be finished in their lifetime. This is the only world on the list where doing good is understood as a very long defeat, fought anyway, by people who will never see how it ends. You are drawn to grandeur, to white cities and deep forges and the sense that almost everything you touch is older than your entire family line. The Rings of Power is set in the last good age before it all goes wrong, which gives every quiet scene in it a slightly unbearable weight. You would take the hard road, and you would take it on foot. The Grand LineYou want the sea, a crew, and absolutely nobody telling you where you are allowed to go. The Grand Line is the world for people whose main ambition in life is finding out what is over there. One Piece has run for decades on one very simple engine, which is a group of people who each want something impossible and have decided to go and get it together. You collect people. Your ideal crew is a set of misfits who were each written off somewhere else before you turned up and offered them a better idea. The world is enormous and deliberately ridiculous, and the emotional gut punches land harder because of that rather than in spite of it. You would set sail knowing the map runs out, which is more or less the entire point of it. The ContinentYou would rather be feared and useful than liked and useless. The Continent is a world where the monsters are the straightforward part of the job and the people are where it all gets complicated. Witchers get paid to do what nobody else will and resented for existing at all, which is a trade most people would refuse and you would probably accept. You have no real illusions about which side is the good one, largely because on the Continent that question tends to have a disappointing answer. The best of these stories are not about the fighting. They are about somebody with a rigid code being repeatedly cornered into caring about people. You would take the coin, finish the job properly, and be out of town before the story got told wrong. Camp Half-BloodYou want the myths to be real and loose in the actual world, and you want to find out at about thirteen that you were never anywhere near as ordinary as everybody kept telling you. Percy Jackson takes the oldest stories we have and drops them into car parks and diners, which makes the gods considerably funnier and a great deal worse. You would be the kid every school gave up on, who turns out to have been built for something nobody thought to test for. The series is genuinely about friendship rather than destiny, and it says so out loud every time a prophecy tries to get in the way. Camp Half-Blood is the real fantasy here: a place where the thing that made you difficult everywhere else is the thing that makes you belong. ↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ 5 "The Ultimatum" Season 3, Episode 11 Image via Nickelodeon It is profoundly difficult to find someone who doesn't think that the best season of The Legend of Korra is Season 3. The third entry in the series is the pinnacle of everything the show can be on every single front. The animation is phenomenal, the acting is compelling, and the story is written with prowess. The final three episodes of Season 3 are where these facts are the most prominent, and it all starts with The Legend of Korra Season 3, Episode 11, "The Ultimatum". One of the best fights in The Legend of Korra is, without a doubt, the battle between the one and only Tenzin (J.K. Simmons) and the main villain of the third season, Zaheer (Henry Rollins). These two airbenders going at each other is iconic and hailed by fans everywhere, especially when it comes down to Zaheer's goons joining him and Tenzin taking them all on by himself. Not to mention, Lord Zuko (Bruce Davison) makes an appearance, which was sure to make many fans happy. 4 "Enter the Void" Season 3, Episode 12 Image via Nickelodeon The next episode in Season 3, after Tenzin's ultimate fight with Zaheer depicts some huge moments not just for the plot of the season, but the Avatar universe as a whole. After the love of his life is lost in the battle, Zaheer finally accomplishes his enlightenment—now freed of all Earthly tethers—and gains the ancient lost airbending ability of flight. The action in The Legend of Korra Season 3, Episode 12, "Enter the Void" is superb and some of the best in the show as a whole. The fight scene in which P'Li (Kristy Wu)—Zaheer's love-interest—dies while facing Suyin Beifong (Anne Heche) is exceptional. Not to mention, the death of P'Li is one of the coldest, most hardcore scenes in the entire franchise. It's clear that with this penultimate episode, they were not planning on holding back in the slightest. 3 "Beginnings, Part 1" Season 2, Episode 7 Image via Nickelodeon The Avatar universe of productions has always been very good at worldbuilding, so whenever the audience gets a chance to experience more of the Avatar world, it's a welcome one. Many, for quite some time, wondered who the first Avatar was, and how all of this came to be. Well, The Legend of Korra Season 2, Episode 7, "Beginnings, Part 1" answers just that. Following the story of the first Avatar—as Korra looks back to learn truths about herself and her power—viewers get to see the origins not just of the Avatar cycle, but the connection between the spirit world and natural realm, as well. Steven Yeun joins the cast to bring Avatar Wan to life, and the animation style completely changes to represent the previous era of the Avatar. 2 "Venom of the Red Lotus" Season 3, Episode 13 Image via Nickelodeon The finale of the third season is, without a doubt, the best finale in the entire series—among the best of the entire franchise, too. The fights that take up the first two and a half acts of this episode are, without a doubt, some of the best in the entire franchise. The stakes are abundantly high, the animation is the best in the series, and the pacing is exemplary. The Legend of Korra Season 3, Episode 13, "Venom of the Red Lotus" is the perfect example of how to make a good finale. The conclusions of the character arcs at play are fulfilling, the action is well-choreographed, and the character work is the best of the best. It does not get much better when it comes to finales than the finale of Season 3. 1 "Beginnnings, Part 2" Season 2, Episode 8 Image via Nickelodeon While The Legend of Korra Season 2, Episode 7, "Beginnings, Part 1" is amazing and a great start to the origin of the Avatar, it's the follow-up episode, The Legend of Korra Season 2, Episode 8, "Beginnings, Part 2", where the Avatar Wan story truly shines. The origins of the Avatar are thrilling, interesting, and engaging. Avatar Wan's melding with Raava (April Stewart) is the perfect lead-in to what is to come with Korra in the rest of Season 2. Most importantly, though, Wan and Raava are genuinely interesting characters and very compelling to watch. So, not only is this episode abundantly important, but exceptionally well-written. The Legend of Korra Release Date 2012 - 2014-00-00 Network Nickelodeon Cast David Faustino Mako (voice) Seychelle Gabriel Asami Sato (voice) Showrunner Bryan Konietzko, Michael Dante DiMartino