Of all the spirits shown in The Last Airbender, Koh the Face Stealer may be one of the most terrifying entities across the entire franchise. His insectoid body and imposing demeanor aside, the entire concept of his character as a spirit that steals the faces of anyone who shows emotion before him is haunting and unexpected in a Nickelodeon show.
While he has made a big impact on fans of the series, he has only appeared a handful of times in the cartoon and most of his backstory is scattered throughout various episodes, as well as the comics centered more around the spirits.
10 He's The Child Of The Mother Of Faces
In possibly the only time in the series that it's shown that a spirit can have an offspring, Koh the Face Stealer has a mother in the form of The Mother of Faces. An entity nearly as old as time itself, her role is to grant faces to the creatures of the world, giving them a unique identity she hopes they will take pride in. The Mother of Faces can also change the face of anyone willing to make a deal with her, though she will only do so sparingly and doesn't appreciate it when people want to change their face for the sake of attraction.
9 Steals Faces To Be Close To His Mother
After their relationship became strained and the two became distanced, Koh wanted to maintain some kind of connection to his mother despite the breakdown of their familial bond. In some sick and twisted way, Koh believes that stealing faces that his mother has granted will allow him to be closer to his mother, although this tactic failed to work for hundreds of years on account of the fact that she didn't even know what his name was.
8 Koh Chose His Own Name
During the events of The Search, the Mother of Faces attacks Aang after his companions try to force the request on her, attempting to drive them from her home. In the commotion, one of the companions, Rafa, has his mask knocked from his face, revealing that it has been stolen by Koh.
When Aang comments on how it appears to have been stolen, the Mother of Faces realizes he is talking about her son, and she relays to Aang that Koh is indeed her son, but that Koh was not the name she gave him when he was born.
7 Stolen Millions Of Faces
When Aang confronts Koh to learn the mortal identities of the moon and ocean spirits, viewers see a handful of faces that he has stolen over his lifetime, including the monkey sitting outside of his cave and Ummi, a woman from the Southern Water Tribe and fiancee to Avatar Kuruk. However, according to the now-defunct lore website hosted by Nickelodeon, Koh has collected millions of faces, apparently taken every opportunity he can to add to his immense collection.
6 Kuruk Held A Lifelong Grudge Against Him
During his time as the Avatar, Kuruk was known to not take his role particularly seriously, often resulting in him getting into trouble and his companions needing to clean up his messes. After one incident, he meets his future fiancee, Ummi, and they quickly plan to get married. Koh, in an attempt to put Kuruk in his place and punish him for his previous actions, steals Ummi's face and forever traps her in the spirit world. Until the day he died, Kuruk held a lifelong grudge against the spirit and made many attempts to kill him and take revenge for killing the love of his life.
5 The Stolen Faces Can Be Replaced
As Zuko and Aang search for Ursa, Zuko's mother, they discover that she made a deal with the Mother of Faces to change her face upon banishment, giving her a new identity so she could live out her life in peace away from Ozai. On their journey to discover where she ended up settling down, they join with a man named Rafa, whose face was stolen by Koh in a similar punishment to Kuruk's, and his sister, Misu. Upon seeing the faceless man and realizing what her son had done, the Mother of Faces restored Rafa and Ursa's faces, as well as her lost memories of her life as the wife of the Fire Lord.
4 He Is Both Immeasurably Old & Relatively Young
As the child of the Mother of Faces, Koh is an immensely old spirit, nearly as old as time itself, and is renowned for knowing certain information that other spirits may not. His age is why Aang chose to seek him out during The Seige of the North when he was looking for the moon and ocean spirits, as Koh would be old enough to know their identities.
On the other hand, compared to spirits like the moon and ocean, he is quite young. In The Rise of Kyoshi, Father Glowworm, a spirit who can identify the true Avatar by their blood, mentions that Koh is a mere "upstart" compared to himself, among other insults to his character.
3 His Actions Draw Criticism From Other Spirits
Throughout the Avatar series, many spirits are shown who either hate humanity for their actions or are indifferent to their existence and just ignore their presence, but there are comparatively few who feel the same way about their own kind. When Father Glowworm is confronted by Jianzhu in The Rise of Kyoshi, the spirit takes a particularly hard stance against Koh's past actions, blaming him for humans who think they can summon the spirits for personal gain whenever they feel like it.
2 Name Is Derived From Kao
Like many of the names in Avatar, Koh's is derived from Eastern language and cultures and holds a deeper meaning than is evident at first glance. The name Koh is derivative of the Japanese word "kao", which means face, features or expression, an appropriate name for a creature that spends his days stealing the faces of others for his own amusement. He isn't the only spirit with a name associated with its appearance or powers, as Hei Bai, the spirit of the forest, means "black white" in Chinese.
1 Voiced By Erik Todd Dellums
There have been many famous and recognizable voices in the Avatar series, and some of them have also returned for other series by the creative minds of The Last Airbender. Erik Todd Dellums, who voices Koh in The Last Airbender, also voices the manipulative elf Aaravos from The Dragon Prince, a series created by one of the head writers for Avatar. For video game fans, some might recognize his voice as Nazir, a Dark Brotherhood assassin from The Elder Scrolls V: Skrim.