#I hate Kuvira so much. Her potential as a villain was wasted because we were forced to sympathise with her.

[harleyification]

I gotta put my frustrations somewhere, but I still cannot BELIEVE that Legend of Korra put in the fact that Kuvira made "REEDUCATION CAMPS" for water and firebender people/ethnicities, and this fucking dictator only got a smack on the hand as well as a redemption arc in the fucking comics.

They literally said she did That. And I'm supposed to sit here and think that she was worthy of being given a second chance all because she ratted out her own people.

What. The fuck.

[seyaryminamoto]

Who do you think are the most useless characters in LoK?

Ha, damn, you guys really do love making me a controversial blogger!

As with all controversial questions, this goes under a Read More

There’s different kinds of uselessness at play here, if you ask me. Most characters are skilled at one thing or another, so your typical definition of uselessness doesn’t work. Useless, though, as in “provided nothing to the plot”, is something that certainly happened in LOK. And useless as in “could have been amazing and was a huge disappointment”  is even more prominent than the previous one.

So, shall we split this question in those three sections?

Useless #1: no skills to speak of, too much screen time was wasted on them:

Wu: I actually considered having him in the third category instead, but why lie? His character only had potential because of his position in the world. When you weigh his character and his development for themselves, without focusing on his role, you realize he’s absolutely irksome and unnecessary as a character. When even Bryke asked themselves how on earth did they keep the badgermole singing scene, which is, LITERALLY, the only useful thing Wu ever did, you come to the conclusion that in order to make Wu a good character, his entire concept had to be utterly different from what it was. Ergo, yes, he earned this spot fair and square.

Unalaq: oh yes he had skills, skills to bend spirits, which was probably the biggest disservice to spirits ever done in the entire saga. Unalaq was a waste of time, and, as the entirety of Book 2 is a spit in the face of everything Avatar, it’s safe to say this entire franchise would have been better off without him. Heck, people in general seem to forget he even exists and I’m glad they do. He’s just that useless.

Useless #2: provided nothing to the plot, caused the show to drag on pointlessly:

The entire Su Beifong branch of the Beifong family: I’m not even going to apologize for being as blunt as I am about my distaste of Su Beifong and everything about her. The drama she provided the show with was seriously a waste of time. Imagine how many things could have been developed better if all of the Su Beifong family drama from both seasons 3 and 4 hadn’t happened? Her very existence was simply… so unnecessary? After two seasons, bringing in another daughter of Toph’s as they did was utterly pointless. Nobody ever made a reference to her before, zero insinuation of her very existence, let alone of the existence of her family. Why were they necessary at all? Well, they weren’t. They derailed the show and half of the FINAL SEASON was wasted on trying to unravel their ridiculous drama. Excuse me, but I would have rather had Kuvira being an independent agent, not in love with Bataar, so all the pointless melodrama could be scrapped altogether. Maybe that way Korrasami would have had enough screentime to develop properly.

Varrick in seasons 2 and 3: I will give him a pass in season 4 as that’s the only one where he did SOMETHING. But honest to gods Varrick was painful to watch for me in seasons 2 and 3. I wasn’t amused by him in the slightest. The whole matter of the civil war between tribes got shoved under such a huge rug that I literally don’t remember anything about it. Or about the Movers. And if him making a magnetic suit would have come in handy eventually, his appearance in season 3 might have served SOME purpose, but no. So yes, he goes in this list. He absolutely earned his spot.

Zaheer: oh yes, a lot of people loved/feared/revered this asshole, and indeed, perhaps he fits in the “wasted potential” category just fine. But frankly, I couldn’t bring myself to put him there. Truth be told, Zaheer was a pain in the ass for me. His character felt flat and irritating, a mere attempt to make an “intellectual” villain that backfired entirely because his literacy didn’t make him more interesting in the slightest, he legit came off as an edgy communist teenager in the body of an adult, playing at being wise while knowingly sending the world to shit. There was a story behind everything he did, yes he had motivations, yes, he had skills… and yet you have no idea how the blazes he came into acquiring those motivations and skills. He saved P’li from enslavement? Is slavery a problem in the Avatarverse now? If slavery has been happening, why hasn’t it been developed more as a seriously bad issue in the Avatar world? Well, screw that, turns out the only function for “he saved P’li” is so he looks cool and noble. Same as his interest in Air Nomad culture and knowledge, that just makes him cool! Also, ironically, his attachment to his goal of killing Korra should have kept him from flying because AMBITIONS ARE ALSO ATTACHMENTS. Basically, Zaheer is an improvement on Unalaq and yet still a failure of a character in a thousand ways where Unalaq failed, too. He wasn’t believable for me at all: in the end he was only around to play at being Korra’s worst foil. Both Amon and Kuvira get believable motivations and their villainy goes beyond playing Final Boss for Korra. This is not the case with Zaheer. Everything about him seems to revolve around Korra.

Useless #3: absolutely wasted potential, deserved better than what they got:

Bumi: I am still SO PISSED regarding how horribly this show mishandled Bumi. His first appearance was so promising, showing a character who outright looked crazy…! And suddenly turns out he’s dorky, not crazy, and his quirks are simply stupid-funny, which is what his character was all about until he becomes a rookie airbender. Did they seriously introduce a character to us as COMMANDER BUMI… just to make him a laughingstock? Just to make him funny? What military skills did he have? How did he make it so far in life when all we know of him is that he can play the flute? Someone, please, explain. And his story regarding feeling inferior for not being an airbender, just for him to end up being an airbender all the same in the next season? I HATED IT. Waste of screentime, right there. No development needed, let’s just forcibly kill his insecurities by making him an insta-airbender. Ugh.

Asami: this is even painful. We’re talking about a girl who had ten thousand skills and could do all sorts of jobs, with insanely high quality training in combat… and what did she do for this show? Provided the money for the Fire Ferrets in season 1, then the air crafts needed for every other season, and became a love interest. The majority of the stuff she did with her skills are off-screen. We HEAR about Asami, we seldom see her in action and she is CONSTANTLY, CONSISTENTLY, removed from important events in every season. She literally gets written out of Book 2′s finale as a whole. In Book 1 she faced her dad, wasn’t involved in the final, main conflict. In Book 3 she couldn’t do anything to help with Zaheer in the final fight. In Book 4 she got written out of the fight too after her dad becomes a martyr. How. Just. How?? This character HAD potential. It got squandered and thrown to waste because the biggest bigots when it came to bending and non-bendng were the show’s writers.

Bolin: this guy had a completely incoherent arc and development, mainly because his character had no clear motivations and no obvious interests throughout the entire story. No doubt, he wanted to make something of himself, but it isn’t until Book 4 where he finally channels his motivation into something productive. Otherwise, he was only ever following Korra around. Adding to this that most his presence in the first seasons was about turning him into a laughingstock, with only a handful of serious moments, and that his love life was even more messed up than his character arc, and he’s just one big pile of wasted potential.

P’li: I am singling out P’li specifically, despite Ghazan and Ming-hua also should be included here. But P’li is the one that bugs me the most because she could have provided countless answers regarding combustion bending if only the show had included her as something other than Zaheer’s explosive girlfriend. The fact remains that I was mainly interested in her character because of the expansion of lore she could offer, and in the end she provided nothing new for us. It’s beyond disappointing. As for Ming-hua and Ghazan, yes, they were underused and their storylines cheapened too. All three of them are exponents of wasted potential.

Kya II: she was cool, could’ve been a much more complex character, and yet I think she must have had less screentime than Zuko? I don’t even know, but the point is, she was around only for a couple of seasons, wasn’t particularly prominent in either one, got ZERO lines in book 4... she’s an immediate candidate for this category.

Iroh II: basically the same as above. It’s kind of sad because he was the leader of armed forces that achieved nothing at any point in the show? I’ve never seen a show that brings up armies and warfare as much as LOK did while also never allowing full-blown armed conflict to unfold. I mean, I’m not asking for Helm’s Deep, but every single time Iroh brought out his troops he was either wiped out or left to watch things unfold from the sidelines. Honestly, he was around to cater to Zuko fans and nothing more, while having the potential to BE much more. Fans used this character a thousand times more than the show ever did.

Desna and Eska: not a lot of people liked them, but the fact remained that they had potential, especially after turning against their father and becoming leaders of their tribe at such young age. The conflict Desna showed when it came to Unalaq was actually pretty nice, and for me to say such a thing about ANYTHING in Book 2 is a shocker. And yet they practically did nothing else in the other seasons, aside from a creepy joke that sounded like incest was being hinted at. Neat-o.

Senna: it’s actually embarrassing that the show did next to nothing with Korra’s MOTHER. I have no doubts she had potential, honest to gods. It’s disappointing to no end that all we know about her, by watching the show, is that she’s someone’s wife and someone’s mom. She’s cute and adorable and just... there. Cool. What a waste. 

I suppose there are more characters worth sorting in here, but if I keep going I won’t get to any other asks. So here you go :’D