The Last Airbender's Cabbage Merchant

While the reference during "The Ember Island Players" is, perhaps, a fitting valediction for the cabbage merchant, we do get some additional clues as to how his story ends. Since his wares have been repeatedly destroyed, one might assume that he finds himself destitute by the end of Avatar season 3. If that were the case, poverty might also serve as a secondary explanation for his conspicuous absence during the series' final arc. Fortunately, we have reason to believe that the merchant's business no only survived its four encounters with the Avatar, but went on to thrive.

In the successor series, The Legend of Korra, we get a quick glimpse of much more industrious cabbage seller in Republic City. Since Legend of Korra takes place a full generation after Avatar: The Last Airbender, this vendor can't possibly be the same merchant, but he is very likely one of his descendants. After Korra lays waste to his own commercial operation, he emits a familiar exclamation, "My Cabbage Corp!" This one line suggests that the cabbage merchant from Avatar rebuilt his entire business, industrialized, and incorporated, leaving a thriving commercial cabbage operation behind for his heirs to operate in perpetuity. We like to think he used his consulting fees from the Ember Island play as seed capital to set up shop in the Fire Nation colony that would eventually become Republic City. 

One can only hope we'll get some confirmation of this theory in Netflix's upcoming live-action adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender.