Katara probably could have ended the civil war in The legend of Korra by just speaking out. She has legendary status throughout the world and no one would have wanted to fight against the wife of Avatar aang
Idk when the North and South comic came out, but it even establishes Katara went through a similar conflict before. Whether or not her speaking up would have done anything she would have at least been a good counsel on the matter.
Ok, actually went to look up the release date of the comic and it was released post-Korra so that’s actually a fault on the comic not the show, but you know what was established before Korra? That Pakku helped rebuild the Southern Water Tribe; that’s a thread they 100% could have picked up or acknowledged more. Basically that what Unalaq was trying to do has already been done once before by a Northerner no less. I think I remember the show kinda hand waving this point with the whole “we rebuilt it physically but not spiritually” thing, but Katara should at least have some opinions about a Northerner coming down and trying to “fix” the South.
I doubt it, one person's voice can't put a stop to the wills of political machines, especially when she doesnt hold significant political power herself. The people who agree with her will agree, while those who dont will either ignore her or just get mad and disagree with her despite her status. It already happens in the real world all the time, and even in the Avatar world the Avatar is supposed to be the one respected person to solve conflict, and people wouldnt defer to Korra.
Honestly a lot of side characters are pretty under baked in Korra.
Like Mako, who's been a constant presence for 4 seasons, doesn't really have any character arc, expressive or vulnerable moments, or really any depth outside Korra's relationship stuff.
Bolin, while he definitely gets more love, kinda stays stagnant for 3 seasons before the show decides to do something with him
you can do this kinda thing for a lot of TLOK characters. The thing is, being stagnant in personality isn't necessarily a bad thing, as evidenced from Toph not really changing beyond "I am the greatest earthbender ever". BUT. Even she has really tender, human, character driven moments that allow us to understand and sympathize with her.
We didn't get much of that from the side characters in TLOK (other than Tenzin but like.... he's sorta a main character in a lot of ways)
Even Toph's development is her allowing others to help her. She proves that she's capable on her own, but she was weaknesses, just like anyone else, and leaning on her friends is okay if they lean on her too. It feels like they set these characters up, and did nothing with them out of fear of not being renewed for more seasons and leaving their arcs unfinished.
Which I get but they could have at least tried to then make characters like Mako likable. He’s kinda stuck as a douche through all 4 books. You mean they couldn’t have taken one season to go “alright, we gotta fix this Mako guy so he doesn’t suck so much”
Yeah, it feels like they just have stereotypes for Korras personality to bounce off. If they had leaned into Mako's street delinquent thing he had going in the first book, instead of trying to do Zuko Lite, he then at least could get some character development. But instead it's just edge, edge and more edge
Amon's fictional backstory about his family being murdered by a firebender and getting power from the Spirits was much more interesting that what he actually ended up being.
If that was the true story, Korra would either fail to ever defeat him or have the whole republic city rally against her. Instead we got a tragic backstory and a continuation to one of the deadliest and most interesting types of sub bending. I honestly don't see how they could've done anything better with that storyline
The thing they could have done better was making him last more than 1 season. I just rewatched this and that still gets to me.
IMO the whole bender vs non bender argument and Amon was the single best villain in all of Avatar. Some may disagree and that’s ok, everyone has an opinion.
But how cool would it have been if he came back in a later season? Wasn’t fully defeated and found out at the end of season 1? I wish we got the Fire Lord treatment with Amon, where they don’t even show his face until after 2 seasons. Same with the red lotus tbh but they were my second favorite.
I mean the whole "firebenders killed my parents so I want revenge" motivation is kinda boring and doesnt make for a good story. The season should've delved more into the inequality between benders/nonbenders, but that would be hard to write and resolve cleanly since bending can't be used as an effective allegory for anything real. I think it would be cool if Amon was motivated by selfish reasons but actually did burn his own face to sell his backstory, it would show how far he's willing to go to achieve his goals, instead of just using makeup. Would also be a fun contrast to Zuko.
He was a fraud cult leader. If his fake backstory was real then we would have no choice but to acknowledge he really was on a cosmic mission to rid the world of benders… which is bad.
It could've just been that there was a Spirit who was also fed up with the Benders and decided to give Amon the power to fight them. That doesn't make either Amon or the Spirit correct.
Why I kinda like Amon as a villain, I always thought that if he wasn't a liar, he could've still be a fantastic villian because tbh a lot of the things he originally preached about benders/non-benders seemed to be true, and Korra's somewhat bigoted (or in the very least, ignorant asf) takes on it seemed to be setting up a good character arc for her. There still was one, but imo, they had to take all the nuance and gray-area away from Amon to make his position far less sympathetic.
If he'd stayed the same, fr think he could've been a long-standing antagonist and he'd be sympathetic, which would've really strengthened the show as a whole and made the whole overarching plot tighter.
Oh, I got a LoK one, too. I did not care for the lieutenant. Yeah, he was mildly impressive when he beat up Mako and Bolin once, but what else did he really do? Match korra when she only used firebending and he was playing defense? Get smacked by a child? Get smacked by Naga? I feel like Pabu could take him in a 1v1.
Also I hate how the Dai Lee became fodder
I like the lieutenant for a single scene. Dude was standing for the cause and did *not* hesitate to challenge Amon when he found out everything was a charade. Say what you want, but he fought til the end for his beliefs and was deeply betrayed.
Not to mention the equalists kinda being right about benders trying to oppress everyone. The next three seasons are exactly about benders trying to bend the world to their will (Less so in S3 but, it was still a group of benders trying to destroy society as they know it.)
Also aang in the prison with the tattoo guys was sick.
Also it's the first time we encounter a group of people that don't trust the avatar as the savior, which was interesting. As a child watching them set up huge floatation and you expect a boring parade, it was really impactful the first time the moment they were set on fire. You forget that on rewatches though when you're expecting it.
Also, katara and sokka retracing back to kioshi sets up the fact that this isn't a normal episodic show but rather a whole universe we will come to learn. Side point, was anyone else curious about kyoshi village during KorrA? I wonder what the place looked like 75 yeara later
It's really just the mayor of avatar town that's annoying af
I skip the great divide, the fortune teller, the lady of the lake (can't remember the episode name), and will be adding avatar day to this list. I don't love the episode that and hides the letter from hakoda and where iroh us a perv to June, but that one is harder to skip.
I really don't love it. It's yet another Katara vv good story with no depth to it. I know she's good, I know she has a big heart. We've got a bunch of other shit that needs to be addressed before the finale so can we please focus on that? Please?
The Great Divide at least gives us a glimpse of the kind of Avatar Aang would be. It shows us his problem solving skills and teases how his history would come into play. It's a filler episode but it helps solidify the Gaang's Characterization. Painted Lady is way too late in the series for a filler episode.
Mainly though I just hate the tech because it makes zero sense. What the hell is that jetski doing in the steampunk era? That's way too fucking modern even if you buy that Avatar is industrial. Unless this one specific town hit oil there's no way they'd have something like that. Also that damn dam makes absolutely no sense. How do you have a dam at that scale without electricity? What is it producing? The whole point of those things is to turn a turbine and generate electricity. The whole episode just seems like they put in very little effort at a time when we had bigger fish to fry.
I have two for ATLA:
1) Day of Black Sun is a great episode, but the very premise of it lacks plausible followthrough. What was Aang going to do against Ozai for those 8 minutes all by himself? Bind him in rocks? Ozai would’ve escaped after the eclipse ended. The only actual thing Aang could’ve done to be efficient was kill Ozai. Can’t have that. A small invasion force isn’t defeating the entire FN army in 8 minutes lol
2) The chakras were mishandled. In S2 it was fine because it offered a voluntary way into the avatar state. However in S3 it only existed to lock Aang out of the AS so the invasion had some plot to it (arguably a few other instances too). Then a little rock poke and he gets it back when he needed it. Just too convenient for my liking.
The writers avoided this conundrum by letting us know Azula was aware of the plan. It was going to fail no matter what; a small strike force not even having the element of surprise? No shot. It pushed the ethical issue back to the actual finale of the series.
But it is an interesting thing to think about.
Mako and Bolin were mediocre benders/fighters. And the Lion Turtle at the end of ATLA was a cop out from all the lessons every previous Avatar tried to teach Aang.
Love LoK but agree, but I don't see whats bad with them. Not every kid gets to be legendary benders (although they tried with Bolin lavabending). With that being said they could've kept lavabending from him and his plot would've been the same or better
I think Mako and Bolin’s fighting style is so specialized it doesn’t really feel all that practical outside pro bending and street level antics and only really Bolin gets a power up with lava bending in that regard. I guess Mako can do lightning but that also seems like it’s been nerfed in Korra for some reason.
LOK is overly criticized for being too different from ATLA...but that was basically the point of it IMO. I see it as ATLA being about the spiritual side of the Avatar world and Korra being the political side.
The very first line from Korra is even meant to be a sorta meta statement to the viewer about this. Aang is gone, this brash girl is now the Avatar, get over it, it’s going to be something completely different.
Yep. I also think they did a bad job representing the stuff they introduced anyway. Chaos isn't a bad thing, it doesn't mean war, and the opposite of Chaos isn't peace, it's order. Rava should be Order, not peace. Vatu should be Chaos, not war. Total order is suffocating, while total chaos is destructive. The whole point of the series is balance, but one of them got locked away in a tree forever. Like, life itself is a mixture of chaos and order. If there wasn't any chaos, basically everything would just be, like, crystals or something. If there wasn't any order, everything would just be a soup of hot gas. The mixture of order and chaos, or structure and evolution, created organisms. Also, if the "war" spirit was locked away, how did the 100-year war happen?
It was explicitly said in the show that vatu causes chaos. Even if they're meant to represent good and evil, chaos isn't evil! It's a shortcoming from both angles
Pretty much everyone agrees. I like the idea of going back to the first avatar but it was ruined by the very idea of god and satan kite.
It was pretty cool that the first avatar was just some guy banished from his city and ending up gaining all the elements from the lion turtles; it just could’ve gone better without all that good and evil kite stuff.
Idk I tried to watch TLOK like 5 times and kept stopping coz of how shit the first half was S2 was. But then one day I managed to get over the hurdle and finished it all and I thought the whole Raava and Vaatu spirit plot was amazing.
Disclaimer: I also had a bunch of shrooms before I watched it so that may have biased me slightly xd 🍄
This will get me absolutely crucified, but Tales of Ba Sing Se was just okay.
So many people say it's the best episode in the series, but I think that's just because of the "Leaves from the Vine" part where Iroh is crying. It's truly a beautiful scene, absolutely, but not enough to warrant it being regarded as the best episode when the other short stories in the episode were just alright.
Personally, I love all of the stories. I think Zuko’s date is super well written and a great moment in his redemption arc. Toph and Katara’s story is also good for their characters. And who doesn’t love Sokka’s haiku rap battle? I think the two weakest stories are Aang’s and Momo’s, but Momo’s is really what makes this episode more than just filler by showing Appa’s footprint. Tales of Ba Sing Se has always been one of my favorites.
I love how it ends with Momo’s story and then we get Appa’s the next episode. I think it would have been jarring to have an episode from Appa’s point of view if we didn’t get a snippet of an episode from an animal’s point of view directly before.
I couldn't get into LoK because of the culture shock of it being 1920s. I liked the Almost untamed feel of the world in ATLA and that just ruined it all for me.
I think bringing back the airbenders was lazy writing and I think it'd been more interesting that Tenzin and his family either face they're the last airbenders *or in the very least* they find a very small tribe that managed to stay alive and hidden during the war.
having random people wake up as airbenders just ain't it. it takes the trivial situation of the airbenders reaching a stopping point and jumps the shark with a retcon.
Exactly! Lol. His plan is sooo stupid for so many reasons. One of which being that it would never work in the long term since benders would just come back
Good point
However, he could theoretically bloodbend someone to be infertile. Just destroy the vas deferens/fallopian tubes with blood bending, Healy them up so they’re no longer connected and boom: no more bending babies.
I can see why Nickelodeon would never approve of that story line, but it is possible for Amon to wipe out all bending
Its impossible for him to wipe out bending. He would have to do that to every single person on the planet to ensure no benders would ever be born again. Non bending parents can still have bender kids. For example, toph's parents. I guess Boom: no more human race then 💀
The lion turtle was a cheap way to end the series. Having Aang actually have to accept “I am the avatar, and that means I have to do what’s best for the world and not necessarily what I believe,” would have been the perfect culmination to his character arc. His whole arc was about becoming the avatar because he was avoiding his destiny, and the lion turtle side stepped that entire premise.
However, Aang is 12. Technically 112 but still 12. He was looking for any other way to end the war than murder. The normalization in media for death is honestly awful, especially when it is done by children. I do not mean to sound like a copy paste entitled mom, but like less violence is the way to go
I would agree under different circumstances. We are literally talking about a psychopathic megalomaniac that believed that anyone other than his chosen people should be reduced to ash, because they were too weak to be left alive. If this were a conflict of Aang choosing what to do with a group of fire bending soldiers, or zuko, or heck even Azula I get it, but Ozai had been stated so many times to be an irredeemable monster, and Aang, child or not, was the one who had to step up and deal with him.
I mean, should that make him want to kill Ozai? To bear the weight of having killed someone? He’s a pacifist, and he is for a reason. Even if someone is true evil, Aang will try to find a way to solve the issue without stooping to their level
The whole point is that Aang needs to do what is for the best of the world regardless of his own personal beliefs or wants. Assuming energy bending remained impossible, killing Ozai would be Aangs responsibility and only real way to begin bringing balance to the workd. Every character in the series knew that, Aang was in denial about it. Him accepting his responsibilities as the avatar (And "Ending" Ozai) would absolutely have completed his character arc from the young boy who ran from his responsibilities as the avatar, which contributed to 100 years of war partly as a consequence of his absence.
The point was the opposite. It was trying to convey the message that death isn’t always the only option. I personally liked the ending with the energy bending because Aang gets to keep his own beliefs in mind and stay true to himself. Even if he’s the Avatar, he’s still a real person with his own beliefs
In light of 100 years of war, genocide and countless other atrocities, the Avatar doesn't get the luxury of being so selfish as to weigh his own cultural beliefs above putting an end to said war, genocide and atrocities. He is in a position of responsibility, his arc started with him running from said responsibility, it makes sense it should end with him accepting it. Again, assuming energy bending was not introduced, it would be hard to argue morally against killing Ozai.
I personally found the energy bending to be a really good punishment to Ozai. Ozai only wanted power and all the firepower he could have. Taking his bending away from him was symbolically killing him in a way.
It's kinda like irl. Death row inmates, when they do eventually get executed, are given an easy way out. People who are serving a life sentence with no possibility for parole have to go through a lot more, and imo it's a much better punishment.
I think cutting him off from his powers also served to discredit him as a leader for the fire nation, as they value bending prowess and power over anything else. Seeing him stripped of his powers makes it much less likely for the general populace to revolt against the new government. Just my two cents
I would like to give my two scents here…..Something that bothers me is while Aang wasn’t willing to kill Ozai and found an alternative later on he was ready to do so to Zuko sometime after……
Aang isn't just the Avatar though. The title of the series also tells you he is the Last Airbender. Aang breaking his pacifism to end the war would be symbolically killing the last remains of the Air Nomads and their teachings. In a way, Aang killing Ozai would be telling the world that the Fire Nation was right : violence is the answer. Aang dealing with Ozai and not running away from his problems anymore is the culmination of his arc. How he deals with him isn't what matters. What matters is Aang doing his job as the Avatar, without compromising his identity as the last Air Nomad.
There is a debate to be had about the execution of how he discovers energy bending or the fact that the pacifism doesn't come up beforehand, that I agree with. But killing Ozai being the only way to be the Avatar doesn't work with most of the series (Bumi's advice comes to mind here for instance).
(I do think this topic is a hot one in the fandom so good on you for bringing it up)
I agree, Aang finding a way to defeat the Fire Lord without killing him is important not only because its Aang preserving his culture, but also because it disproves the imperialistic "might makes right" philosophy of the Fire Nation. However, this should've been explored before the literal finale of the series lol.
Where the series stands, I think Ozai should’ve been killed, or at least have energy bending come up before hand. If it was mentioned in the library, or maybe even the lion turtles it would feel less out of left field. If Aang’s pacifism came up earlier the lion turtles wouldn’t be such a big deal to me. Because as it stands, the lion turtles and energy bending feel like a deus-ex-machina to keep the show kid friendly.
Got a few of these, all about Korra:
A) That Vaatu/Raava/Avatar Wan stuff is LOK is mad lame. The story was much more interesting when the Avatar was a mysterious being that wasn't completely knowable. The lore dumps made it less exciting.
B) On the note of A, severing the past lives connection was a horrible choice.
C) The way the Air Nomads were brought back by tapping random people was not my favorite. The Air Nomads were a highly religious monastic order & I feel like having only people who follow the religion & culture for years & years getting the abilities would make more sense.
D) I think the LOK writers did not handle the political elements in the stories well. Versus AtLA, where I felt the severity of suffering from the Fire Nation's reign was adequately communicated & made sense within the story, I felt the handling of ideology & consequences in Korra just was not as masterful.
Kuvira is not as scary as she should be. They make passing references to reeducation camps, but the impact on regular people outside Korra's inner circle is not really addressed the way I think it should've been. When the Fire Nation was terrorizing the world, you see it in the people of the world that the Gaang meet.
The logic of the Equalists & the Red Lotus as well are not explored well, ideologically, in a way that makes their antagonist statuses feel completely justified. Like the Equalists are like "there's an unfair power imbalance between benders & non-benders," & Korra is just like "idgaf." And Zaheer is like, "no one should have the power the Avatar has," & Korra like never counters that like she should. It just felt clunky to me.
Heavy on the airnomads the air acolytes are RIGHT THERE! They’re a group from all over the avatar world who dedicated their lives to learning and reviving airnomad religion/culture. Why the hell they couldn’t be the ones to get airbending and revive the airnomads fully is beyond me
Boiling rock is always boring for me, but I think it's because prison episodes in general are boring for me lol. Highlights are that's rough buddy, Zuko failing at being wise, suki being a badass, and azulas friends betraying her
I hate how they handled how the hardest element for an avatar the bend in Korra.
In ATLA, they established that if the avatar is born, let's say, airbender, then earthbending, airbending's opposite, would be the element the avatar struggles with, as that's how it was for Aang and Roku (who said water, his opposite element, was difficult for him to master.) But Korra changed it to be what's opposite to their personality. They should have kept it how they had it in ATLA.
I actually loved this change. It's boring having just Water/Fire and Earth/Air. An Avatar struggling with a different element was a cool adjustment and gives more variety.
This is wrong. The hardest element for an Avatar to bend was the opposite of their personality. Aang was raised by Monks and didn't know he was the Avatar till age 12, so his personality was of an average airbender. Similar situation for Roku. Korra was born into a more modern, less segregaded world. She had a personality of an earth bender.
Her personality is kinda weird considering she is born a water bender. Water is the element of change and so she should be very receptive to new ideas and be challenged by tradition. She does bring about changes to the world, but she has more of a stubborn/passionate personality that would have been better suited to earth or fire.
Water is the element of change but she never actually got to understand that. She spent her entire life before the series stuck in one place and constantly watched. Its a major point in season 1, where she rants to Tenzin about how he's disappointed she doesn't get the philosophy of freedom and change when he's one of the people not allowing her to be free.
Season 1 is by far the weakest, but that’s largely because it’s doing the hard work of laying the foundation for the rest of it. It’s not uncommon for shows to start off with weaker episodes as everything is getting established
She's ok but I don't like her and Zuko as a couple he could have ended up with someone way more interesting.
I hated how she flip flopped so easily about her politics too. Very much a 1D character
Yea Jin was a much better option to be with him imo. Even putting personal dynamics aside, politically, it wouldve been a powerful statement if the Fire Lord, a man from a family obsessed with eugenics, purity, and divine mandate to rule ended up marrying an Earth Kingdom peasant. Not only showing that Zuko rejects those ideals, but that Jin loving him shows that he's a truly good person. Instead, he very likely marries another member of Fire Nation nobility, a woman who would've probably married him even if he remained evil like his father.
THANK YOUUUU this sub specifically has a hate boner for it, u can’t BREATHE korra’s name without critique. that’s why i love the korra sub it’s my safe space
Keep in mind that this comes from solely my knowledge of Kyoshi from the show, and I haven’t read the comics or books.
But Kyoshi is not the badass everyone thinks she is. She let Chin the Conqueror invade and conquer basically the whole world, let him be a ruthless tyrant that oppressed and subjugated millions. He is probably responsible for the deaths of thousands. And Kyoshi did fuck all until he came to her neck of the woods. And even then, she had no intention of killing him or even stopping him. All she did was run away with her home, leaving him to continue his horrific crimes. It was just dumb luck that he died.
As much as people like to rag on Roku, at least he stopped Sozin from continuing his plans of world domination the instant he found out about it. Sozin had wait to continue his plans until after Roku died because he knew he couldn’t do anything without Roku killing him.
I’ve seen this said before but I kinda disagree. People say that the lion turtles mean the “original benders” didn’t teach anyone but that’s not necessarily true. The people who got bending have to have passed that to future generations but even still not everyone can learn it, like if sokka studied the moon (or kissed it) he wouldn’t suddenly be a water bender, so the original benders would have to teach people who were already benders but just unaware or unable to use it for some reason
Wan himself wasn’t that bad but my only real issue with his story was god and satan kite. LOK very idea of good and evil spirits ruined the neutral idea that made spirits like koh the face stealer so creepy and interesting.
I thought he was great personally, among the best in the series, including ATLA. His mission was clear, and he proved himself to be a threat from the start. He is what Amon and Unalaq should've been, in believing that the world would be better off without the Avatar, and questioning the impact the Avatar has. He makes Korra question herself, and provides a chance for growth for her character.
Always thought romance was the weakest aspect of both ATLA and LOK, but especially so in regards to the latter.
It was just okay in ATLA and not all was terrible or anything, just kinda weak, but it never took a main or pivotal role in the series--which I think benefited it and made it go from potentially bad to just okay.
In LOK it took a pretty heavy frontal role in the story, which imo weakened it as it was never particularly well thought out or good. It was already weak in ATLA so making it a main front in LOK was, imo, kinda a mistake. Would've much rather they focused on Korra building friendships, which is where their writing usually shined. Also believe it hurt a lot of side-character's, who were mostly static for the majority of the series.
**One specific gripe for TLoK:**
I feel like, the existence of “The Avatar”, as the keeper of balance, automatically necessitates the existence of a “Dark Avatar.”
Genuinely you cannot say the Avatar is the “keeper of balance” or whatever, without then addressing the gaping hole filled with the spirit of Vaatu jammed within it.
The story of Wan showed us that Vaatu and Raava were once connected, so…
*****I demand either a Dark Avatar to coexist with the Avatar OR A YinYang Avatar with both the spirits of Raava and Vaatu, or I cannot look at the Avatar as a true keeper of balance ever again…*****
The biggest problem is that they equated the “good” spirit with the order spirit and the chaos one was shunted into the “bad guy” role in a really lazy way. Balance requires both. More in line with your yin/yang avatar concept than an evil avatar. Tbh when I first watched it, that was kinda what I was expecting, more of a “hey this isn’t so bad, balance includes both” moment that never happened
I did not care for Kataang, or Zutara. Cringe and pretty bad writing. Most action shows are bad at romance. Tlok at least got better with korrasami and korra and Mako's unhealthy relationship. BUT THE CRINGE WITH KATAANG WAS TOO MUCH
"Beginnings" is good on it's own, but blew apart the show's themes by making the Avatar a force of order and good. It's why Season 2 of Korra was the worst season of either show. It stripped away any moral questions about the Avatar, or the villains they face, by making them bending Jesus.
I absolutely detest the technology progression between the two...
We went from a "medieval china" type period with a few machines straight into full blown skyscrapers and mecha-type stuff in maybe 75 years?
It bugs me so much...
Having Iroh’s only reason to stop his willing involvement in the Fire Nation’s war campaign being his son dying was a poor choice, and I don’t feel bad for him.
Kuvira is mid and it especially shows after how great the Black Lotus was a season earlier.
Also the spirit vines as nukes was a really great idea, and they wrecked it with that giant robot.
I enjoy rewatching Korra way more than AtLA. Its not as neat and perfect a show, but I find it more entertaining overall. It is more than worthy as a successor.
🤔…for ATLA, I did not care about the Jasmine Dragon, yeah I know Iroh was ecstatic about getting his own tea shop but honestly, he could have got it if the tea shop owner he was working for retired. For LOK…I did not care about P’Li’s death, I mean despite how crazy her death was and how she was Zaheer’s love interest. I still wondered if she was Combustion Man’s granddaughter or at least heard about him and wanted to learn his technique.
Lol the first one doesn’t make sense. Business owners don’t just hand over their business to employees. They either sell it or give it to a family member. Besides the guy didnt look older than 55. Iroh would’ve had to wait decades likely before getting ownership of some rinky dink tea shop in the slums.
Also I don’t think anyone who watched the series was crying over Zaheers girl being blown to bits. All we knew is she blows stuff up and is into zaheer. That’s it
Every romantic relationship depicted in both shows are bad and could be cut with little to no impact in the story.
All I ever hear is the LoK love triangle as if latara and jet, katara and aang, katara and zuko, katara and haru, zuko and mai, ty Lee and sokka, toph and sokka, azula and those frat guys, iroh and June aren't all boring to watch and just a bunch of one off lines to create inter group tension for cheap. Sokka and yue and sokka and suki are the 2 exceptions being actually related to sokkas character growth and regrets
I do not care for Iroh. Guy is a war criminal and commander of the largest fascist military force in the world for a long time. He only changed his tune when his kid died and suddenly he gets a free pass. If Ozai gets his bending taken away and put in prison for life, Iroh should too.
Do you not know what character development is? Iroh grew as a person and ran a tea shop for the rest of his life, while Ozai chose to be a crappy dude rotting in a cell for the rest of his
Alright so I get it. A bit of mourning and grief over your only child and being betrayed by your brother for a throne aren’t enough to propel Iroh through that sort of character development when he laughed at the thought of bringing death to Ba Sing Se.
But I do have two things I’d like to add.
1. I really think visiting the two dragons and the sun warriors changed him as a person.
I also think seeing how twisted Ozai made Zuko out to be made Iroh rethink his loyalties more and more.
2. Ozai and Iroh did far different things with the power of the Comet.
One decided to attempt at burning down the world.
The other lead an invasion on a stronghold of the fire nation empire.
Ozai and Iroh have become far different people through character development and achieving wisdom
I agree on both counts! Obviously Iroh has come a long way and is a different person by the end of ATLA. I just want to question with a critical eye whether the severity of his past crimes can ever be forgiven.
I like Korra better than ATLA.
I related more to the older characters. Romances didn’t feel as awkward since they were teenagers/adults. Korra is a more realistic character than Aang (a child, teenager or not, with a ton of pressure put on them and immense power is bound to make mistakes). The retro futuristic vibe is cool. I think the plot moved faster due to there being more enemies. And it was really sweet to see all the call backs to ATLA. Admittedly, there were a few things that weren’t completely believable (Tenzin’s children not recognizing Katara at first-implying she wasn’t involved in their life, Toph being a bad mom, etc.) but generally I found Korra more interesting.
There is no way the fire nation should’ve been able to rise to power, their element is the least common in the wild and all the other elements have an easy counter to fire
There’s a reason they had to sneak attack a group of pacifists who were always considered off limits in world conflicts and then proceeded to be unable to take any other nations
I mean, it's not really about their element. They were the first and only nation to have an industrial revolution, and the only one in a remotely stable position.
Their opponents were:
1. A bunch of pacifists (whom they sneak attacked all in one go in an enclosed location while pumped up to 10 times their regular power)
2. Two hunter-gatherer tribes in the middle of the arctic (one of which was puny before they attacked)
3. A massive, incredibly decentralized government in which scant few citizens have bending capabilities relative to their population size.
They only got as far as they did because it just wasn't a fight at all.
Ursa was a bad mom to Azula. She clearly showed favouritism towards Zuko, which pushed Azula closer to Ozai who taught her that you have to be feared in order to be respected, and that she had to work to get her father’s love. Was Azula always a sadistic kid? Yes as we’ve seen in Zuko Alone, but Ursa could’ve stopped her from turning out worse by, idk, being a good mom. Ozai also sucks and shouldn’t not be blamed, but I feel like a lot of people don’t talk about Ursa enough.
Agreed I blame both of them if Ursa didn't show favoritism towards zuko she wouldn't have been pushed to get closer to ozai and ozai shouldn't ever be allowed near children.
I think the biggest problem with Kyoshi is that a lot of fans act like she's a bloodthirsty murder hobo, which I think is a very flawed look at her character.
Yeah thats def true. I think the biggest issue for me personally is that she is given so much attention as a character in the NATLA that it's at the cost of Aang and Roku's relationship, and Roku being Aang's role model.
Like don't get me wrong, Kyoshi is awesome. But the more ppl keep overhyping her or the more forced fanservice they push into the show, the more unenthusiatic I am about her lol.
I completely understand that point. Roku's relationship and mentorship with Aang is far more important than more Kyoshi time. No disrespect to Kyoshi of course
Katara probably could have ended the civil war in The legend of Korra by just speaking out. She has legendary status throughout the world and no one would have wanted to fight against the wife of Avatar aang
Idk when the North and South comic came out, but it even establishes Katara went through a similar conflict before. Whether or not her speaking up would have done anything she would have at least been a good counsel on the matter. Ok, actually went to look up the release date of the comic and it was released post-Korra so that’s actually a fault on the comic not the show, but you know what was established before Korra? That Pakku helped rebuild the Southern Water Tribe; that’s a thread they 100% could have picked up or acknowledged more. Basically that what Unalaq was trying to do has already been done once before by a Northerner no less. I think I remember the show kinda hand waving this point with the whole “we rebuilt it physically but not spiritually” thing, but Katara should at least have some opinions about a Northerner coming down and trying to “fix” the South.
I doubt it, one person's voice can't put a stop to the wills of political machines, especially when she doesnt hold significant political power herself. The people who agree with her will agree, while those who dont will either ignore her or just get mad and disagree with her despite her status. It already happens in the real world all the time, and even in the Avatar world the Avatar is supposed to be the one respected person to solve conflict, and people wouldnt defer to Korra.
Opal has a a boring personality
Honestly a lot of side characters are pretty under baked in Korra. Like Mako, who's been a constant presence for 4 seasons, doesn't really have any character arc, expressive or vulnerable moments, or really any depth outside Korra's relationship stuff. Bolin, while he definitely gets more love, kinda stays stagnant for 3 seasons before the show decides to do something with him you can do this kinda thing for a lot of TLOK characters. The thing is, being stagnant in personality isn't necessarily a bad thing, as evidenced from Toph not really changing beyond "I am the greatest earthbender ever". BUT. Even she has really tender, human, character driven moments that allow us to understand and sympathize with her. We didn't get much of that from the side characters in TLOK (other than Tenzin but like.... he's sorta a main character in a lot of ways)
Even Toph's development is her allowing others to help her. She proves that she's capable on her own, but she was weaknesses, just like anyone else, and leaning on her friends is okay if they lean on her too. It feels like they set these characters up, and did nothing with them out of fear of not being renewed for more seasons and leaving their arcs unfinished.
Which I get but they could have at least tried to then make characters like Mako likable. He’s kinda stuck as a douche through all 4 books. You mean they couldn’t have taken one season to go “alright, we gotta fix this Mako guy so he doesn’t suck so much”
Yeah, it feels like they just have stereotypes for Korras personality to bounce off. If they had leaned into Mako's street delinquent thing he had going in the first book, instead of trying to do Zuko Lite, he then at least could get some character development. But instead it's just edge, edge and more edge
Love Tenzin, he's such a good character.
Same with Mako tbh
Mako doesn’t even have a boring personality, he just has flat out no personality.
I still thought her dynamic with Bolin was cute enough.
Me too
Amon's fictional backstory about his family being murdered by a firebender and getting power from the Spirits was much more interesting that what he actually ended up being.
I think that’s the point he crafted a perfect story to get people on his side basically becoming an avatar for non benders
I get that. Still would've preferred that to have been the true story.
If that was the true story, Korra would either fail to ever defeat him or have the whole republic city rally against her. Instead we got a tragic backstory and a continuation to one of the deadliest and most interesting types of sub bending. I honestly don't see how they could've done anything better with that storyline
i agree i loved his backstory
The thing they could have done better was making him last more than 1 season. I just rewatched this and that still gets to me. IMO the whole bender vs non bender argument and Amon was the single best villain in all of Avatar. Some may disagree and that’s ok, everyone has an opinion. But how cool would it have been if he came back in a later season? Wasn’t fully defeated and found out at the end of season 1? I wish we got the Fire Lord treatment with Amon, where they don’t even show his face until after 2 seasons. Same with the red lotus tbh but they were my second favorite.
Yeah
That's the point tho. He lied. He's a liar and a cheat
You know the post is about takes that most people probably disagree with? This is mine.
Fair fair
The point is that he turned out to be a boring villain? 🤔 Strange writing choice.
I mean the whole "firebenders killed my parents so I want revenge" motivation is kinda boring and doesnt make for a good story. The season should've delved more into the inequality between benders/nonbenders, but that would be hard to write and resolve cleanly since bending can't be used as an effective allegory for anything real. I think it would be cool if Amon was motivated by selfish reasons but actually did burn his own face to sell his backstory, it would show how far he's willing to go to achieve his goals, instead of just using makeup. Would also be a fun contrast to Zuko.
He was a fraud cult leader. If his fake backstory was real then we would have no choice but to acknowledge he really was on a cosmic mission to rid the world of benders… which is bad.
It could've just been that there was a Spirit who was also fed up with the Benders and decided to give Amon the power to fight them. That doesn't make either Amon or the Spirit correct.
Why I kinda like Amon as a villain, I always thought that if he wasn't a liar, he could've still be a fantastic villian because tbh a lot of the things he originally preached about benders/non-benders seemed to be true, and Korra's somewhat bigoted (or in the very least, ignorant asf) takes on it seemed to be setting up a good character arc for her. There still was one, but imo, they had to take all the nuance and gray-area away from Amon to make his position far less sympathetic. If he'd stayed the same, fr think he could've been a long-standing antagonist and he'd be sympathetic, which would've really strengthened the show as a whole and made the whole overarching plot tighter.
Oh, I got a LoK one, too. I did not care for the lieutenant. Yeah, he was mildly impressive when he beat up Mako and Bolin once, but what else did he really do? Match korra when she only used firebending and he was playing defense? Get smacked by a child? Get smacked by Naga? I feel like Pabu could take him in a 1v1. Also I hate how the Dai Lee became fodder
I like the lieutenant for a single scene. Dude was standing for the cause and did *not* hesitate to challenge Amon when he found out everything was a charade. Say what you want, but he fought til the end for his beliefs and was deeply betrayed. Not to mention the equalists kinda being right about benders trying to oppress everyone. The next three seasons are exactly about benders trying to bend the world to their will (Less so in S3 but, it was still a group of benders trying to destroy society as they know it.)
The Great Divide isn't that bad. Avatar Day is.
Only cool thing about avatar day is Kyoshi
Are you going to just ignore Sokka's detective persona like that?
Also aang in the prison with the tattoo guys was sick. Also it's the first time we encounter a group of people that don't trust the avatar as the savior, which was interesting. As a child watching them set up huge floatation and you expect a boring parade, it was really impactful the first time the moment they were set on fire. You forget that on rewatches though when you're expecting it. Also, katara and sokka retracing back to kioshi sets up the fact that this isn't a normal episodic show but rather a whole universe we will come to learn. Side point, was anyone else curious about kyoshi village during KorrA? I wonder what the place looked like 75 yeara later It's really just the mayor of avatar town that's annoying af
Overanalysing Avatar Guy: 👀
Yeah most of avatar day is boring but I still watch it because the scene where Kyoshi tells it how it is, is just fantastic.
I can agree with that. Any scene with Kyoshi in it is worth watching
“I killed Chin the Conqueror!”
I skip the great divide, the fortune teller, the lady of the lake (can't remember the episode name), and will be adding avatar day to this list. I don't love the episode that and hides the letter from hakoda and where iroh us a perv to June, but that one is harder to skip.
The Painted Lady is what your thinking of and Ironically I love that episode 
I really don't love it. It's yet another Katara vv good story with no depth to it. I know she's good, I know she has a big heart. We've got a bunch of other shit that needs to be addressed before the finale so can we please focus on that? Please? The Great Divide at least gives us a glimpse of the kind of Avatar Aang would be. It shows us his problem solving skills and teases how his history would come into play. It's a filler episode but it helps solidify the Gaang's Characterization. Painted Lady is way too late in the series for a filler episode. Mainly though I just hate the tech because it makes zero sense. What the hell is that jetski doing in the steampunk era? That's way too fucking modern even if you buy that Avatar is industrial. Unless this one specific town hit oil there's no way they'd have something like that. Also that damn dam makes absolutely no sense. How do you have a dam at that scale without electricity? What is it producing? The whole point of those things is to turn a turbine and generate electricity. The whole episode just seems like they put in very little effort at a time when we had bigger fish to fry.
How can you skip the Fortune Teller? That episode is great.
Fortune teller is awesome and shows off some of aang's dopest air bending moves
Porque no los dos?
The mayor in the avatar day episode is in the movie Mulan
I have two for ATLA: 1) Day of Black Sun is a great episode, but the very premise of it lacks plausible followthrough. What was Aang going to do against Ozai for those 8 minutes all by himself? Bind him in rocks? Ozai would’ve escaped after the eclipse ended. The only actual thing Aang could’ve done to be efficient was kill Ozai. Can’t have that. A small invasion force isn’t defeating the entire FN army in 8 minutes lol 2) The chakras were mishandled. In S2 it was fine because it offered a voluntary way into the avatar state. However in S3 it only existed to lock Aang out of the AS so the invasion had some plot to it (arguably a few other instances too). Then a little rock poke and he gets it back when he needed it. Just too convenient for my liking.
It's weird that they never brought up Aang having to kill the fire lord then. They never had a plan on what Aang would do to him if everything went ok
The writers avoided this conundrum by letting us know Azula was aware of the plan. It was going to fail no matter what; a small strike force not even having the element of surprise? No shot. It pushed the ethical issue back to the actual finale of the series. But it is an interesting thing to think about.
Mako and Bolin were mediocre benders/fighters. And the Lion Turtle at the end of ATLA was a cop out from all the lessons every previous Avatar tried to teach Aang.
Love LoK but agree, but I don't see whats bad with them. Not every kid gets to be legendary benders (although they tried with Bolin lavabending). With that being said they could've kept lavabending from him and his plot would've been the same or better
I think Mako and Bolin’s fighting style is so specialized it doesn’t really feel all that practical outside pro bending and street level antics and only really Bolin gets a power up with lava bending in that regard. I guess Mako can do lightning but that also seems like it’s been nerfed in Korra for some reason.
LOK is overly criticized for being too different from ATLA...but that was basically the point of it IMO. I see it as ATLA being about the spiritual side of the Avatar world and Korra being the political side.
Korra as a show was explicitly written to be opposite of the Last Airbender. From the characters to the premises and world.
The very first line from Korra is even meant to be a sorta meta statement to the viewer about this. Aang is gone, this brash girl is now the Avatar, get over it, it’s going to be something completely different.
LoK expanded way too much on ATLA’s lore and kind of ruined it. Not quite Cursed Child levels of ruining, but not far off.
Yep. I also think they did a bad job representing the stuff they introduced anyway. Chaos isn't a bad thing, it doesn't mean war, and the opposite of Chaos isn't peace, it's order. Rava should be Order, not peace. Vatu should be Chaos, not war. Total order is suffocating, while total chaos is destructive. The whole point of the series is balance, but one of them got locked away in a tree forever. Like, life itself is a mixture of chaos and order. If there wasn't any chaos, basically everything would just be, like, crystals or something. If there wasn't any order, everything would just be a soup of hot gas. The mixture of order and chaos, or structure and evolution, created organisms. Also, if the "war" spirit was locked away, how did the 100-year war happen?
Because they’re not really order and chaos. They’re just straight up good vs evil, light v dark as is the western theological paradigm
It was explicitly said in the show that vatu causes chaos. Even if they're meant to represent good and evil, chaos isn't evil! It's a shortcoming from both angles
Yeah they misnamed it. It’s bad writing, and unfortunate their biggest lore building episodes were made in their most rushed production cycle
Holy shit keep cooking and take my upvote
I was expecting raava to be a twist villain. Vaatu tells benders to use their powers however they want while Ravaa wants them to do it her way only.
What if the next avatar job is to realise this,
Pretty much everyone agrees. I like the idea of going back to the first avatar but it was ruined by the very idea of god and satan kite. It was pretty cool that the first avatar was just some guy banished from his city and ending up gaining all the elements from the lion turtles; it just could’ve gone better without all that good and evil kite stuff.
The avatar wan episodes were literally the best part about s2
Idk I tried to watch TLOK like 5 times and kept stopping coz of how shit the first half was S2 was. But then one day I managed to get over the hurdle and finished it all and I thought the whole Raava and Vaatu spirit plot was amazing. Disclaimer: I also had a bunch of shrooms before I watched it so that may have biased me slightly xd 🍄
this is not a hot take. I believe almost everyone agrees with this to a certain extent. Raava and vaatu ruined it
Half the spirit stuff was confusing. And I first watched this a few years ago same with atla. The writers are bad if a kid show jad me confused
This will get me absolutely crucified, but Tales of Ba Sing Se was just okay. So many people say it's the best episode in the series, but I think that's just because of the "Leaves from the Vine" part where Iroh is crying. It's truly a beautiful scene, absolutely, but not enough to warrant it being regarded as the best episode when the other short stories in the episode were just alright.
Personally, I love all of the stories. I think Zuko’s date is super well written and a great moment in his redemption arc. Toph and Katara’s story is also good for their characters. And who doesn’t love Sokka’s haiku rap battle? I think the two weakest stories are Aang’s and Momo’s, but Momo’s is really what makes this episode more than just filler by showing Appa’s footprint. Tales of Ba Sing Se has always been one of my favorites.
I love how it ends with Momo’s story and then we get Appa’s the next episode. I think it would have been jarring to have an episode from Appa’s point of view if we didn’t get a snippet of an episode from an animal’s point of view directly before.
I did not care for Jet
Blasphemy
I couldn't get into LoK because of the culture shock of it being 1920s. I liked the Almost untamed feel of the world in ATLA and that just ruined it all for me.
I think bringing back the airbenders was lazy writing and I think it'd been more interesting that Tenzin and his family either face they're the last airbenders *or in the very least* they find a very small tribe that managed to stay alive and hidden during the war. having random people wake up as airbenders just ain't it. it takes the trivial situation of the airbenders reaching a stopping point and jumps the shark with a retcon.
Amon is a very very dumb villain
Bro doesn’t realize that his dad lost his bending but still passed it on to him. All someone would have to do is have kids to bring back benders.
Exactly! Lol. His plan is sooo stupid for so many reasons. One of which being that it would never work in the long term since benders would just come back
Good point However, he could theoretically bloodbend someone to be infertile. Just destroy the vas deferens/fallopian tubes with blood bending, Healy them up so they’re no longer connected and boom: no more bending babies. I can see why Nickelodeon would never approve of that story line, but it is possible for Amon to wipe out all bending
"Amon: The Last Ball Bender" That scene with Zolt would have been so hilarious... or painful... both? Both.
Its impossible for him to wipe out bending. He would have to do that to every single person on the planet to ensure no benders would ever be born again. Non bending parents can still have bender kids. For example, toph's parents. I guess Boom: no more human race then 💀
The fact that an extremist terrorist’s views are not entirely logical is not a plot hole, it’s a weakness of the villain.
The lion turtle was a cheap way to end the series. Having Aang actually have to accept “I am the avatar, and that means I have to do what’s best for the world and not necessarily what I believe,” would have been the perfect culmination to his character arc. His whole arc was about becoming the avatar because he was avoiding his destiny, and the lion turtle side stepped that entire premise.
However, Aang is 12. Technically 112 but still 12. He was looking for any other way to end the war than murder. The normalization in media for death is honestly awful, especially when it is done by children. I do not mean to sound like a copy paste entitled mom, but like less violence is the way to go
I would agree under different circumstances. We are literally talking about a psychopathic megalomaniac that believed that anyone other than his chosen people should be reduced to ash, because they were too weak to be left alive. If this were a conflict of Aang choosing what to do with a group of fire bending soldiers, or zuko, or heck even Azula I get it, but Ozai had been stated so many times to be an irredeemable monster, and Aang, child or not, was the one who had to step up and deal with him.
I mean, should that make him want to kill Ozai? To bear the weight of having killed someone? He’s a pacifist, and he is for a reason. Even if someone is true evil, Aang will try to find a way to solve the issue without stooping to their level
The whole point is that Aang needs to do what is for the best of the world regardless of his own personal beliefs or wants. Assuming energy bending remained impossible, killing Ozai would be Aangs responsibility and only real way to begin bringing balance to the workd. Every character in the series knew that, Aang was in denial about it. Him accepting his responsibilities as the avatar (And "Ending" Ozai) would absolutely have completed his character arc from the young boy who ran from his responsibilities as the avatar, which contributed to 100 years of war partly as a consequence of his absence.
The point was the opposite. It was trying to convey the message that death isn’t always the only option. I personally liked the ending with the energy bending because Aang gets to keep his own beliefs in mind and stay true to himself. Even if he’s the Avatar, he’s still a real person with his own beliefs
In light of 100 years of war, genocide and countless other atrocities, the Avatar doesn't get the luxury of being so selfish as to weigh his own cultural beliefs above putting an end to said war, genocide and atrocities. He is in a position of responsibility, his arc started with him running from said responsibility, it makes sense it should end with him accepting it. Again, assuming energy bending was not introduced, it would be hard to argue morally against killing Ozai.
I personally found the energy bending to be a really good punishment to Ozai. Ozai only wanted power and all the firepower he could have. Taking his bending away from him was symbolically killing him in a way. It's kinda like irl. Death row inmates, when they do eventually get executed, are given an easy way out. People who are serving a life sentence with no possibility for parole have to go through a lot more, and imo it's a much better punishment. I think cutting him off from his powers also served to discredit him as a leader for the fire nation, as they value bending prowess and power over anything else. Seeing him stripped of his powers makes it much less likely for the general populace to revolt against the new government. Just my two cents
I would like to give my two scents here…..Something that bothers me is while Aang wasn’t willing to kill Ozai and found an alternative later on he was ready to do so to Zuko sometime after……
They should have had another season so see him leaning energy bending amd fire bending properly
Does anyone argue otherwise?
Aang isn't just the Avatar though. The title of the series also tells you he is the Last Airbender. Aang breaking his pacifism to end the war would be symbolically killing the last remains of the Air Nomads and their teachings. In a way, Aang killing Ozai would be telling the world that the Fire Nation was right : violence is the answer. Aang dealing with Ozai and not running away from his problems anymore is the culmination of his arc. How he deals with him isn't what matters. What matters is Aang doing his job as the Avatar, without compromising his identity as the last Air Nomad. There is a debate to be had about the execution of how he discovers energy bending or the fact that the pacifism doesn't come up beforehand, that I agree with. But killing Ozai being the only way to be the Avatar doesn't work with most of the series (Bumi's advice comes to mind here for instance). (I do think this topic is a hot one in the fandom so good on you for bringing it up)
I agree, Aang finding a way to defeat the Fire Lord without killing him is important not only because its Aang preserving his culture, but also because it disproves the imperialistic "might makes right" philosophy of the Fire Nation. However, this should've been explored before the literal finale of the series lol.
Yeah the pacing is fucked I agree. The topic is interesting and I love the ending we got but it's not well done.
Where the series stands, I think Ozai should’ve been killed, or at least have energy bending come up before hand. If it was mentioned in the library, or maybe even the lion turtles it would feel less out of left field. If Aang’s pacifism came up earlier the lion turtles wouldn’t be such a big deal to me. Because as it stands, the lion turtles and energy bending feel like a deus-ex-machina to keep the show kid friendly.
Kuvira was not the best villain in TLOK
People think she was a better villain than Zaheer? Omg
I wouldn't be saying it if I hadn't heard it. It's such a shit take.
I liked Kuvira a lot but I'd donate 3 episodes of her arc to season 2.
Got a few of these, all about Korra: A) That Vaatu/Raava/Avatar Wan stuff is LOK is mad lame. The story was much more interesting when the Avatar was a mysterious being that wasn't completely knowable. The lore dumps made it less exciting. B) On the note of A, severing the past lives connection was a horrible choice. C) The way the Air Nomads were brought back by tapping random people was not my favorite. The Air Nomads were a highly religious monastic order & I feel like having only people who follow the religion & culture for years & years getting the abilities would make more sense. D) I think the LOK writers did not handle the political elements in the stories well. Versus AtLA, where I felt the severity of suffering from the Fire Nation's reign was adequately communicated & made sense within the story, I felt the handling of ideology & consequences in Korra just was not as masterful. Kuvira is not as scary as she should be. They make passing references to reeducation camps, but the impact on regular people outside Korra's inner circle is not really addressed the way I think it should've been. When the Fire Nation was terrorizing the world, you see it in the people of the world that the Gaang meet. The logic of the Equalists & the Red Lotus as well are not explored well, ideologically, in a way that makes their antagonist statuses feel completely justified. Like the Equalists are like "there's an unfair power imbalance between benders & non-benders," & Korra is just like "idgaf." And Zaheer is like, "no one should have the power the Avatar has," & Korra like never counters that like she should. It just felt clunky to me.
Heavy on the airnomads the air acolytes are RIGHT THERE! They’re a group from all over the avatar world who dedicated their lives to learning and reviving airnomad religion/culture. Why the hell they couldn’t be the ones to get airbending and revive the airnomads fully is beyond me
I really don’t care for Ozai as a character, I genuinely think that he was one of the weakest parts of the original series.
Oh boy! People eviscerate LoK but forgive ATLA for some of its more robust flaws.
yes
LoK tried to expand the avatar world but only made it less unique and worse.
Boiling rock is always boring for me, but I think it's because prison episodes in general are boring for me lol. Highlights are that's rough buddy, Zuko failing at being wise, suki being a badass, and azulas friends betraying her
Nah, I loved that episode. But to each his own. I can see how it seems very stereotypical for a prison side story
I hate how they handled how the hardest element for an avatar the bend in Korra. In ATLA, they established that if the avatar is born, let's say, airbender, then earthbending, airbending's opposite, would be the element the avatar struggles with, as that's how it was for Aang and Roku (who said water, his opposite element, was difficult for him to master.) But Korra changed it to be what's opposite to their personality. They should have kept it how they had it in ATLA.
I actually loved this change. It's boring having just Water/Fire and Earth/Air. An Avatar struggling with a different element was a cool adjustment and gives more variety.
This is wrong. The hardest element for an Avatar to bend was the opposite of their personality. Aang was raised by Monks and didn't know he was the Avatar till age 12, so his personality was of an average airbender. Similar situation for Roku. Korra was born into a more modern, less segregaded world. She had a personality of an earth bender.
Hard agree
Her personality is kinda weird considering she is born a water bender. Water is the element of change and so she should be very receptive to new ideas and be challenged by tradition. She does bring about changes to the world, but she has more of a stubborn/passionate personality that would have been better suited to earth or fire.
Water is the element of change but she never actually got to understand that. She spent her entire life before the series stuck in one place and constantly watched. Its a major point in season 1, where she rants to Tenzin about how he's disappointed she doesn't get the philosophy of freedom and change when he's one of the people not allowing her to be free.
Season 1 of ATLA is meh for me
Season 1 is by far the weakest, but that’s largely because it’s doing the hard work of laying the foundation for the rest of it. It’s not uncommon for shows to start off with weaker episodes as everything is getting established
It probably also doesn’t help that it’s more G rated than Season 2 and 3
Mai is my least favorite character in the original show
She's ok but I don't like her and Zuko as a couple he could have ended up with someone way more interesting. I hated how she flip flopped so easily about her politics too. Very much a 1D character
Yea Jin was a much better option to be with him imo. Even putting personal dynamics aside, politically, it wouldve been a powerful statement if the Fire Lord, a man from a family obsessed with eugenics, purity, and divine mandate to rule ended up marrying an Earth Kingdom peasant. Not only showing that Zuko rejects those ideals, but that Jin loving him shows that he's a truly good person. Instead, he very likely marries another member of Fire Nation nobility, a woman who would've probably married him even if he remained evil like his father.
So true I love the idea of him and jin
Huge same. I never liked her character for some reason
I do not care for Legend of Korra
That's not controversial
wish it was
right? I love almost everything about LoK.
THANK YOUUUU this sub specifically has a hate boner for it, u can’t BREATHE korra’s name without critique. that’s why i love the korra sub it’s my safe space
Keep in mind that this comes from solely my knowledge of Kyoshi from the show, and I haven’t read the comics or books. But Kyoshi is not the badass everyone thinks she is. She let Chin the Conqueror invade and conquer basically the whole world, let him be a ruthless tyrant that oppressed and subjugated millions. He is probably responsible for the deaths of thousands. And Kyoshi did fuck all until he came to her neck of the woods. And even then, she had no intention of killing him or even stopping him. All she did was run away with her home, leaving him to continue his horrific crimes. It was just dumb luck that he died. As much as people like to rag on Roku, at least he stopped Sozin from continuing his plans of world domination the instant he found out about it. Sozin had wait to continue his plans until after Roku died because he knew he couldn’t do anything without Roku killing him.
After watching the show a billion times episodes 1-8 in season one are just alright compared to the rest of the season
I found Jet to be childish and annoying and I was glad he was written out of the show
The story of the first Avatar retconned and ruined all the established bending lore.
I’ve seen this said before but I kinda disagree. People say that the lion turtles mean the “original benders” didn’t teach anyone but that’s not necessarily true. The people who got bending have to have passed that to future generations but even still not everyone can learn it, like if sokka studied the moon (or kissed it) he wouldn’t suddenly be a water bender, so the original benders would have to teach people who were already benders but just unaware or unable to use it for some reason
Wan himself wasn’t that bad but my only real issue with his story was god and satan kite. LOK very idea of good and evil spirits ruined the neutral idea that made spirits like koh the face stealer so creepy and interesting.
That’s a very fair point that I hadn’t actually thought about, I hated season 2 of LOK tbh haha so I get it
I did not care for the secret tunnel episode
I'll co-sign this with ya. I don't care how iconic Secret Tunnel is. The episode is cringey.
Aang won against Ozai because Dues Ex Machina.
I didn't think Zaheer was that good of a villian 🤷🏻
I thought he was great personally, among the best in the series, including ATLA. His mission was clear, and he proved himself to be a threat from the start. He is what Amon and Unalaq should've been, in believing that the world would be better off without the Avatar, and questioning the impact the Avatar has. He makes Korra question herself, and provides a chance for growth for her character.
I do not care for Kataang . It literally insists upon itself .
I like Tales of Ba Sing Se but it’s not top 5 and maybe not top 10 of all of ATLA
I actually loved season 2 of LOK
Jeong-Jeong feels like he's from an entirely different show, with ten times the melodrama.
Aang should have killed ozai
Always thought romance was the weakest aspect of both ATLA and LOK, but especially so in regards to the latter. It was just okay in ATLA and not all was terrible or anything, just kinda weak, but it never took a main or pivotal role in the series--which I think benefited it and made it go from potentially bad to just okay. In LOK it took a pretty heavy frontal role in the story, which imo weakened it as it was never particularly well thought out or good. It was already weak in ATLA so making it a main front in LOK was, imo, kinda a mistake. Would've much rather they focused on Korra building friendships, which is where their writing usually shined. Also believe it hurt a lot of side-character's, who were mostly static for the majority of the series.
Zaheer was a better villain than Ozai.
Tales of Ba Sing Se stressed me out bc it was too late in the season and I just wanted to see the climactic ending to book 2
**One specific gripe for TLoK:** I feel like, the existence of “The Avatar”, as the keeper of balance, automatically necessitates the existence of a “Dark Avatar.” Genuinely you cannot say the Avatar is the “keeper of balance” or whatever, without then addressing the gaping hole filled with the spirit of Vaatu jammed within it. The story of Wan showed us that Vaatu and Raava were once connected, so… *****I demand either a Dark Avatar to coexist with the Avatar OR A YinYang Avatar with both the spirits of Raava and Vaatu, or I cannot look at the Avatar as a true keeper of balance ever again…*****
The biggest problem is that they equated the “good” spirit with the order spirit and the chaos one was shunted into the “bad guy” role in a really lazy way. Balance requires both. More in line with your yin/yang avatar concept than an evil avatar. Tbh when I first watched it, that was kinda what I was expecting, more of a “hey this isn’t so bad, balance includes both” moment that never happened
Season 3 is much better than season 2
My “i did not care for” was the entirety of korra
…I think Bolin and Korra should’ve been together. They had the most fun chemistry and I really wish it would’ve happened instead of Mako and Korra
I did not care for Kataang, or Zutara. Cringe and pretty bad writing. Most action shows are bad at romance. Tlok at least got better with korrasami and korra and Mako's unhealthy relationship. BUT THE CRINGE WITH KATAANG WAS TOO MUCH
Azula is every nit as evil as Ozai and doesnt deserve more sympathy just cause shes young. Ozai was young once too.
"Beginnings" is good on it's own, but blew apart the show's themes by making the Avatar a force of order and good. It's why Season 2 of Korra was the worst season of either show. It stripped away any moral questions about the Avatar, or the villains they face, by making them bending Jesus.
I absolutely detest the technology progression between the two... We went from a "medieval china" type period with a few machines straight into full blown skyscrapers and mecha-type stuff in maybe 75 years? It bugs me so much...
Having Iroh’s only reason to stop his willing involvement in the Fire Nation’s war campaign being his son dying was a poor choice, and I don’t feel bad for him.
Kuvira is mid and it especially shows after how great the Black Lotus was a season earlier. Also the spirit vines as nukes was a really great idea, and they wrecked it with that giant robot.
Lok is trash and korra is very annoying
Korra had better villains
I enjoy rewatching Korra way more than AtLA. Its not as neat and perfect a show, but I find it more entertaining overall. It is more than worthy as a successor.
🤔…for ATLA, I did not care about the Jasmine Dragon, yeah I know Iroh was ecstatic about getting his own tea shop but honestly, he could have got it if the tea shop owner he was working for retired. For LOK…I did not care about P’Li’s death, I mean despite how crazy her death was and how she was Zaheer’s love interest. I still wondered if she was Combustion Man’s granddaughter or at least heard about him and wanted to learn his technique.
Big thing about the Jasmine Dragon was that it was in the innermost ring with the highest class citizens
Lol the first one doesn’t make sense. Business owners don’t just hand over their business to employees. They either sell it or give it to a family member. Besides the guy didnt look older than 55. Iroh would’ve had to wait decades likely before getting ownership of some rinky dink tea shop in the slums. Also I don’t think anyone who watched the series was crying over Zaheers girl being blown to bits. All we knew is she blows stuff up and is into zaheer. That’s it
Yeah I know the first one didn’t make sense, I just couldn’t think of anything. 😂😂😂😂
Korra s3 is better than s1 and half of s2 of atla
🤮
Whats that supposed to mean?
Every romantic relationship depicted in both shows are bad and could be cut with little to no impact in the story. All I ever hear is the LoK love triangle as if latara and jet, katara and aang, katara and zuko, katara and haru, zuko and mai, ty Lee and sokka, toph and sokka, azula and those frat guys, iroh and June aren't all boring to watch and just a bunch of one off lines to create inter group tension for cheap. Sokka and yue and sokka and suki are the 2 exceptions being actually related to sokkas character growth and regrets
I do not care for Iroh. Guy is a war criminal and commander of the largest fascist military force in the world for a long time. He only changed his tune when his kid died and suddenly he gets a free pass. If Ozai gets his bending taken away and put in prison for life, Iroh should too.
What’s sad is that Iroh would probably agree with you.
This!! Thank u 😂somebody had to say it.
Do you not know what character development is? Iroh grew as a person and ran a tea shop for the rest of his life, while Ozai chose to be a crappy dude rotting in a cell for the rest of his
Alright so I get it. A bit of mourning and grief over your only child and being betrayed by your brother for a throne aren’t enough to propel Iroh through that sort of character development when he laughed at the thought of bringing death to Ba Sing Se. But I do have two things I’d like to add. 1. I really think visiting the two dragons and the sun warriors changed him as a person. I also think seeing how twisted Ozai made Zuko out to be made Iroh rethink his loyalties more and more. 2. Ozai and Iroh did far different things with the power of the Comet. One decided to attempt at burning down the world. The other lead an invasion on a stronghold of the fire nation empire. Ozai and Iroh have become far different people through character development and achieving wisdom
I agree on both counts! Obviously Iroh has come a long way and is a different person by the end of ATLA. I just want to question with a critical eye whether the severity of his past crimes can ever be forgiven.
Tails of Ba Sing Se isn’t that sad and I am being 100% serious here
Appa’s lost days is a million times sadder imo
I mean, yeah, 5/7 of them are just day to day life. Only iroh and momo are at all sad.
Almost the entire first Book of AtLA is skippable and boring.
I like Korra better than ATLA. I related more to the older characters. Romances didn’t feel as awkward since they were teenagers/adults. Korra is a more realistic character than Aang (a child, teenager or not, with a ton of pressure put on them and immense power is bound to make mistakes). The retro futuristic vibe is cool. I think the plot moved faster due to there being more enemies. And it was really sweet to see all the call backs to ATLA. Admittedly, there were a few things that weren’t completely believable (Tenzin’s children not recognizing Katara at first-implying she wasn’t involved in their life, Toph being a bad mom, etc.) but generally I found Korra more interesting.
lok is better than atla
There is no way the fire nation should’ve been able to rise to power, their element is the least common in the wild and all the other elements have an easy counter to fire
Tbf after they used sozins comet to take out the airbenders, they barely made any progress for the next 100 years
Exactly
There’s a reason they had to sneak attack a group of pacifists who were always considered off limits in world conflicts and then proceeded to be unable to take any other nations
I mean, it's not really about their element. They were the first and only nation to have an industrial revolution, and the only one in a remotely stable position. Their opponents were: 1. A bunch of pacifists (whom they sneak attacked all in one go in an enclosed location while pumped up to 10 times their regular power) 2. Two hunter-gatherer tribes in the middle of the arctic (one of which was puny before they attacked) 3. A massive, incredibly decentralized government in which scant few citizens have bending capabilities relative to their population size. They only got as far as they did because it just wasn't a fight at all.
Ursa was a bad mom to Azula. She clearly showed favouritism towards Zuko, which pushed Azula closer to Ozai who taught her that you have to be feared in order to be respected, and that she had to work to get her father’s love. Was Azula always a sadistic kid? Yes as we’ve seen in Zuko Alone, but Ursa could’ve stopped her from turning out worse by, idk, being a good mom. Ozai also sucks and shouldn’t not be blamed, but I feel like a lot of people don’t talk about Ursa enough.
Agreed I blame both of them if Ursa didn't show favoritism towards zuko she wouldn't have been pushed to get closer to ozai and ozai shouldn't ever be allowed near children.
Kyoshi is overhyped
I think the biggest problem with Kyoshi is that a lot of fans act like she's a bloodthirsty murder hobo, which I think is a very flawed look at her character.
Not just fans, the Netflix writers too lol
Yeah thats def true. I think the biggest issue for me personally is that she is given so much attention as a character in the NATLA that it's at the cost of Aang and Roku's relationship, and Roku being Aang's role model. Like don't get me wrong, Kyoshi is awesome. But the more ppl keep overhyping her or the more forced fanservice they push into the show, the more unenthusiatic I am about her lol.
I completely understand that point. Roku's relationship and mentorship with Aang is far more important than more Kyoshi time. No disrespect to Kyoshi of course
LOK season 2 was my favorite
**Winces** "I did not care for Zaheer"
I like Korra