#I just love Zutara's connection and relationship | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

wilcze-kudly · 6 months ago

Text

I do find it annoying how a lot of Zutara fans tweak the character's stories, personalities and even the timelines to suit their own needs.

Once again, there's nothing wrong with fanon and headcanons, however if looking through the lense of canon, you're objectively wrong.

I ended up stumbling on a post from a Zutara shipper. (At this point I'm regretfully considering not following the tags for Zuko or Katara because I get way too much Zutara content lol) I'm not replying directly to her because I don't want this to turn into an argument, and I know she doesn't take criticism very well.

Ok, So let's break this down.

The character who was first out of the group to trust Zuko?

I'm quite sure this is referring to the scene in Ba Sing Se's caves. And yes, that is a very important scene. I think it's a very important scene preceeding Zuko's 'relapse'. It shows how he's matured during his time in Ba Sing Se and therefore it serves to add to our dismay when he joins Azula. I adore the fact that Zuko's journey to redemption is not linear, it certainly adds a lot to the character and shows us how his trauma affected him.

It's also a horrific moment for Katara. To have her worldview on Zuko and firebenders as a whole challenged, and then for it to go blowing up in her face. It rips open old wounds of her childhood. It refreshes her resentment of Zuko and the Fire Nation as a whole. It parallels the death of her mother when Aang dies due to Azula's lighting and she is unable to do anything about it. It places her back in that spot of helplessness. Even though she's grown up, even though she's a master waterbender, she still comes a hair's breadth to losing one of the most important people in her life.

No wonder she hated Zuko so much after this.

It's an important moment for both characters, but I wouldn't say it is that in a romantic sense. It's a sweet, hopeful moment that then turns absolutely horrific and visceral for both parties.

I could argue that there are other characters who could be given the title of 'first to trust Zuko'. Funnily, Appa being one of them lol.

But other characters trusting Zuko dovetails nicely into the next point.

The character who emotionally connects to Zuko?

Well, technically, I'd argue that most members of the Gaang connect emotionally on one level or another with him?

But I'd argue that Aang is the person Zuko connected with the most. Aang is Zuko's parallel. Aang is the first person to reach out to Zuko. Aang is the person who showed mercy to Zuko, multiple times. Aang is the person who valued Zuko's life, the life of someone whose whole life goal is to capture him.

This was also an incredibly important moment to Zuko. This is the thing he brings up when trying to convince the Gaang to let him join.

Zuko: Why aren't you saying anything? You once said you thought we could be friends. You know I have good in me.

The character Zuko feels safest letting his guard down around?

It's Mai. Love her or hate her, her relationship with Zuko is incredibly important to him. Maiko isn't my favourite Zuko ship, in full honesty. But even platonically, Mai and Zuko are one another's reprieve from their respective shitty lives.

People often talk about Katara touching Zuko's scar while discussing healing his scar, however one could argue that she did so as a medical examination. Mai touching Zuko's scar is a casual thing, neither of them really make a big deal of it and that's the beauty of it.

I'm mainly talking out of my own personal experience, as someone with a huge amount of burn scars, but there is a world of difference between someone inspecting my scars like Katara did and simply accepting them as a part of me, like Mai does for Zuko.

With Mai, Zuko isn't the scarred banished prince, Ozai's son or Azula's brother. He's just Zuko. And they speak freely with one another, arguing like real people do. Often, being comfortable having arguments is actually a sign of being comfortable with one another.

The character who helps Zuko heal from his trauma?

Once again, this is a bit of a flawed question. By the end of the show, Zuko isn't even fully healed, in my opinion. He has made leaps and bounds on the road to recovery, but when he will truly heal if ever is yet to be seen.

Zuko's journey to recovery includes plenty of people. This includes Iroh, Aang, Song and Jin. People who show him the error of his coping mechanism. Who challenge his worldview, who coax him out of the his shell of pain and anger.

The character known for showing most compassion to others?

Yes, Katara's compassion is a huge part of her character. Her need to help and protect those who cannot do that for themselves cannot be understated.

But Aang's compassion for others and all beings is just as great, if not greater than Katara's. Compassion and nonviolence are huge parts of his culture and his own philosophy.

Aang: Wait, we can't just leave him here. Sokka: Sure we can. Let's go. Aang :No, if we leave him he'll die. Aang airbends himself off Appa and retrieves Zuko, bringing him to Appa. Sokka: [Sarcastically.] Yeah, this makes a lot of sense. Let's bring the guy who's constantly trying to kill us.

Friendly reminder that Aang could've absolutely wrecked Ozai, but held back because his own moral compass was so powerful. Hell, he was friendly and nice to Azula, the woman who literally killed him.

This is why Aang and Katara work so well together. They're both incredibly compassionate people who will immediately jump in to help others in need. Like they did during the Painted Lady, destroying the factiry together.

The character who primarily bears the burden of having to step up into a parental role?

I think "parental role" is an incredibly vague term. There's a lot of things that go into a "parental role". Katara plays a stereotypically "maternal" role, while someone who plays a "paternal" one would probably be Sokka.

Katara deals with very "homemaking" tasks like sewing and cooking, etc. And Sokka often takes on the role of leader, hunter, gatherer and also protector, despite being a nonbender.

This coincides nicely with their core childhood traumas. The loss of Katara's mother impacted her greatly, leading her to have to step up into a motherly role. While Sokka was clearly heavily traumatised by his father departing and the crushing responsibility of having to care for his entire village.

Sexism also probably played a part in this dichotomy.

The character who represses their emotions to be strong for others?

I'd argue that this could apply to all the members of the Gaang in some capacity.

Aang's pain is something most of us will never experience and cannot hope to understand. The complete horrific destruction of his culture and home followed him through the entire show. He was entitled to his grief and rage, yet he supressed it. We see during Appa's kidnapping, how easy it would be for Aang to rage, to let himself be destructive. And yet, he wakes up every day and chooses to smile and goof off, because his friends need someone to remind them how to be children.

Sokka puts on a very impressive bravado, despite having a lot of insecurities. However, as the oldest member of the Gaang (pre Zuko) he puts on a facade of the confident and unbothered older brother. Even if he's the butt of almost every joke, he still keeps that demeanour up, letting it slip only a few times.

I'd actually argue that Toph is the person whom this label fits best. While we know Toph as witty, callous and strong, we have to remember that she kept up the facade of her parents' good, helpless little blind girl for no reason other than her mother and father's comfort. She actually hides a lot of her hurt, covering it up with a prickly exterior.

I want to do longer think pieces about Toph and Katara so apologies if this isn't complete.

I'm actually baffled by the idea of Katara repressing her emotions. She's actually quite straightforward and open about her feelings. She yells and feels a lot of emotions and lets them be heard. She gets angry and sad. She's actually kinda bitchy sometimes and that's honestly why I love her so much.

The whole inciting incident of the show was her getting so pissed off she somehow pulls a giant iceberg from the bottom of the sea.

She is anything but repressed.

She is angry.

She's angry at the fire nation, at Sokka, at her father, at men, and with good right to be so.

This is what makes her an amazing character and one who broke the mould of a lot of female characters at the time. Her anger and unrestrained emotions rang true with a lot of watchers at the time. I'm not sure why this is being taken away from her rather than celebrated.

I reiterate the point I made at the beginning of this post: there is nothing wrong with headcanons and fanon interpretations for one's enjoyment. I do find it a bit odd when it changes a character too much (because then, why not just create an oc?) but it's all in good fun. However, you shouldn't push that onto other people and how they perceive canon and you certainly shouldn't use it to take away from other characters. It's a very unfair way of entering discourse.

455 notes · View notes

firelxdykatara · 9 months ago

Note

I too ship Zutara and think they should have been canon. Although for me it's important to know how such a rewrite would go down. I tried to think, and I'm lost.

After Mai betrayed Azula for him, will he just go "sorry, not interested"? He isn't obligated to date her because of this, but her redemption hinges on Zuko and I don't see it being satisfying if he ends up rejecting her after this.

I thought the solution would be to rewrite her arc in boiling rock to make her have a moral realization, but then the problem with Maiko is practically solved. Their relationship wasn't salvaged by her redemption because last time they talked, Mai still didn't understand what's wrong with the Fire Nation and only changed because she loved Zuko. So how do you make it both satisfying & logical?

With Kataang the problem is the Chakras. The problem with the original (in my opinion) is that after he opened his chakra, letting go of his attachment to Katara, he's still attached (forcing a kiss on eip). Should TCoD get rewritten so that Azula shoots him before he opens it? Then why wouldn't he just open it later? Maybe the chakra would be locked so he feels as though he doesn't need to overcome his attachment just yet. In that situation, how would his chakra even unlock? The stone thing felt like nonsense, so how would I do it?

So yeah I have no idea how to approach this. How would you? (Thanks)

I've been rotating this ask in the back of my head like a rotisserie chicken for a few days--it's interesting because I don't generally stop to think like, how would I write them out of these relationships, I either ignore the relationships completely (which isn't hard, they were barely footnotes in the cartoon) or play a little bit with jealous exes or something. Thinking about like, In A Perfect World where Bryke wasn't in charge of ATLA post-canon (because if zutara had been canon, you can be sure they would've made us regret it) is interesting, and I do have thoughts on how I'd handle their relationships in a rewrite.

(this got long, so the rest is beneath the cut)

Assuming you mostly want to keep canon intact, I think maiko would be the easiest to work around, given how little relevance their relationship has in canon. The problem with maiko as an endgame ship is that it was not set up that way--if it had been, it would not have begun entirely off-screen and their whole relationship would not have been a study in misery and utter inability to connect emotionally. His relationship with Mai was there to showcase just how much he had changed and how little he fit into the life he had been so sure he wanted more than anything since his banishment. It worked very well to highlight Zuko's growth--how that contrasted to Mai's lack of it and why she could not understand him even at his most open and vulnerable--and did not work nearly so well when she was shoved back with him in the epilogue, after he'd quite literally forgotten her existence (he never mentions her again after Boiling Rock, not even to say a word of mourning, considering he'd have every reason to believe she was killed for defying his sister).

I don't think you can fix this by giving Mai some moral realization, because there simply is no room for it. As @araeph says in the essay I linked:

As a character, Mai is very useful to the story during Zuko’s return, because she represents everything that Zuko gains by sticking by his father. A girl who cares about him; the ability to indulge her; the authority he has over others at the palace; we see it all in his interactions with Mai. But this makes Mai a tether to a life he has long outgrown. Her function is not to advance Zuko’s character development, but to obstruct it, which also unfortunately means that Mai gaining a full understanding of Zuko’s trials would be disadvantageous to the story. If she knew everything about him and still wanted him to stay, it would give Zuko more cause than he should have to remain in the Fire Nation, but if she knew and encouraged him to leave and join the Avatar, it would rob Zuko of the triumph of making this decision on his own. In other words, there are good narrative reasons for keeping Mai in the dark; it just doesn’t make their relationship any stronger.

The seeds of a genuine redemption arc (one that includes some sort of moral realization and change to her moral framework) for Mai would have to have been planted far earlier than five episodes from the end of the series, but doing so would have of necessity detracted from Zuko's own character arc and the realizations that he makes despite his attachment to Mai (or more specifically to their relationship, which I feel like he was clinging to more out of a sense of abject loneliness he couldn't shake rather than genuine feelings and emotional connection).

So, in my mind, since we're tackling this with an eye towards getting rid of maiko with the fewest ripples to the overall story anyway, the easiest way to do this would be make one slight change to the end of the Boiling Rock two-parter--have Ty Lee (who had always been the least gung-ho of the trio about bowing to Azula's whims and had to be textually threatened into joining her in the first place) save Zuko's life, and then have Mai (who showed the most genuine affection for Ty Lee anyway) save Ty Lee. I love Zuko more than I fear you always fell flat for me as some epic declaration of love, anyway, since a) Zuko is not around to hear it, and b) unlike Ty Lee, she never showed much fear of Azula to begin with, so it wasn't a very high bar to clear. It was a cool line that was entirely unearned, and I don't think it would be missed, there would be some cute mailee crumbs this way, and a throwaway line of getting them released from the prison after the war ended could wrap up their presence in the story pretty nicely.

Now, kataang is a little trickier, if only because the last leg of Aang's character arc is almost completely derailed by his refusal to let go of his possessive attachment to Katara, to the point where he never naturally reopens his chakras, he has to have the Rock of Destiny hit him in just the right place, and the deus ex lionturtle there to give him a way out of having to make a hard moral choice. (I've maintained for years that if you work the final act of your main character's overall arc in such a way that it could have been solved by one good session with a chiropractor, something got fucked along the way.)

The thing about Aang's chakras is that, narratively, his whole thing with Guru Pathik and leaving his training early to save his friends was basically his version of Luke running away from his training with Yoda on Degobah because of his Force vision, only to find out that his friends were in the process of rescuing themselves and then losing his hand because he hadn't completed the most crucial part of his training. What's missing, therefore, from the last act of Aang's character arc, is the return.

See, in Star Wars, Luke pretty explicitly makes the wrong choice when he chooses to prioritize saving his friends over attaining enlightenment and fully mastering the Force. It was the only choice he could have made, but it was still the wrong one--because, like Aang, his friends did not actually need him to save them, he actually almost makes it harder for them to get away by requiring them to save him because, like Aang, he loses a battle in a very critical way. This was a lesson he desperately needed to learn, and it is clear he has learned it by the time he makes it back to Degobah and witnesses the end of Yoda's life, his own enlightenment having already been reached.

But Aang never goes back to the Guru.

And the text refuses to allow us to sit with the fact that he made the wrong choice in prioritizing his attachment to Katara over his ability to master the Avatar State. He is actually narratively vindicated about it, because the plot bends itself into a pretzel so that he doesn't have to spend any time during the last book trying to reopen his chakras and regain access to the Avatar State, handed both in the final battle with no excess effort on his part, and handed the girl into the bargain. (The girl who never even wanted him, so far as we can tell from all the lack of cues she gave him that she actually returned his feelings.)

And I think this could have been solved with a few scattered scenes. Let Katara actually have some agency in her own romantic relationship (or lack thereof), insofar as noticing Aang's advances and clueing the audience in to how she actually feels. Let Aang struggle with the fact that he can't reach the Avatar State, that his mastery of the elements is in limbo because he can't access his full power, rather than ignoring all of this until the end of the show. If we're trying to keep the shape of the last season roughly the same, let Katara confront Aang about the invasion kiss.

This would have been the perfect time to establish that Katara actually does feel some type of way about Aang prior to the epilogue, and it could have saved us from the exceedingly cringey EIP kiss that Aang never apologized for. How it comes across now, of course, is that Katara basically pretends it never even happened, to the point where she doesn't even know what Aang is talking about during EIP until he reminds her--the death knell for any shot their relationship had at looking requited, because I can tell you, as someone who's been a teenage girl, if someone I had conflicted but burgeoning romantic feelings for had kissed me, I would not have completely forgotten about it only a few weeks later--and we never get any indication as to what she actually felt about the kiss (which was not mutual, despite what Aang's dialogue in the EIP scene implies) except for the fact that she looked away and frowned afterwards. (A change mandated by Bryke, who wanted to leave her feelings completely ambiguous; the original storyboards had her smiling to herself.)

So, with an eye towards wrapping up Aang's puppy love crush and establishing Katara's distinct lack of romantic feelings for him, have her talk to him about the kiss. A good frame of reference for this would be Meng's conversation with Aang in "The Fortuneteller", where she finally realizes that he doesn't like her in the same way she likes him. Katara and Aang's conversation about the invasion kiss could be a callback to this, with Aang having some important realizations--that just because Katara doesn't share his feelings doesn't mean she loves him any less, and just because he can't have her the way he wanted doesn't mean he has to love her any less, that she doesn't belong to him but that's ok, because she's still his family and they'll always have each other's backs. Which could have functioned well in helping him take another step towards unblocking his chakras. Going back to the Guru directly may not have worked, since by this point in the story we're hurtling towards the final confrontation and Sozin's Comet, but let Aang reflect on what the Guru told him with new understanding granted him by his experiences throughout the first half of the season.

To keep the stakes high and up the suspense, obviously, he shouldn't have fully unlocked his chakras and the AS before the final fight, but the seeds could be planted--little moments like a talk with Katara about the invasion kiss, maybe a little more empathy and understanding from him about why Katara needs closure in TSR, etc--and then, during the final fight, rather than hand him all the answers on a silver platter, have him almost lose. He still can't go full Avatar, he's out of time, he still doesn't know exactly what to do about Ozai given his own pacifism and desire to preserve that part of his culture--he tries to fight but he's pretty quickly overpowered. Idk how I would've animated this, and maybe it wouldn't have looked as cool for the final fight, but the true climax of the finale was the Zuko and Azula agni kai anyway, so it hardly matters--I'm picturing him doing the rock-shield thing and going into a brief meditative state, where he finally achieves the enlightenment necessary to unlock the AS on his own, no rock of chiropracty necessary. And at this point, I'd give Ozai a Disney Death, since leaving him alive causes more problems than it solves and it's not necessary for Aang to kill him for him to die--they're fighting on a mountain ffs--but if you don't want to change that part then him figuring out energy bending as part of becoming a fully realized Avatar would at least feel more earned than the lionturtle just handing it to him. (And that could've been foreshadowed better by seeding the idea for it earlier in the season.)

After all of that, particularly if you up the emotions during the agni kai and have Zuko and Katara kiss there (or something less explicitly romantic but still tender, like a brief forehead touch), it'd feel pretty natural to have a just friends ending for Aang and Katara. Maybe a brief, slightly awkward but ultimately amiable conversation if Zuko and Katara had a ~thing at their final fight, and then the final shot of the series could be the gaang all together, maybe zutara holding hands or Katara resting her head on his shoulder or something, but since they already kissed there wouldn't feel like a need to end the whole show on romance, something which I've always felt missed the point of the series.

And then, y'know, after that, the world's your oyster! This is how I'd do it if I were trying to keep the bulk of the final season intact. Of course, breaking it all down to its component pieces and rebuilding from the ground up is also an option, but that'd probably be a longer post lol.

#zutara #atla #m.aiko salt #k.ataang salt #atla canon rewrite #hey albert kim if you're taking notes on how to do season 3 of the LA................#Anonymous #asked

176 notes · View notes

longing-for-rain · 3 months ago

Note

Out of curiosity, what makes you feel drawn to Zutara as a lesbian. Is it still relatable to you?

It does feel relatable to me. Obviously it’s a heterosexual relationship, but given the lack of good and complete representation of lesbian relationships in the media, I still gravitate towards certain aspects of romances like this.

There are many reasons why, but before I get into it, I want to preface this by saying that the point of this is not to say that Zutara is “lesbian coded” or anything like that so please don’t construe it that way. It’s a heterosexual relationship, period. All I’m saying here is what I, personally, enjoy about it as a lesbian.

The biggest reason I like it is because it represents female desire to me. I know the BoyMom and Pick-Me brigade hates that I’ve described Zutara that way in the past—but it’s true and I stand by it. That is the reason why Zutara became so popular and why its fanon narrative is almost entirely driven by female fans. It directly reflects their desire in a romance and what Katara’s canon one was lacking.

I honestly didn’t have strong feelings about Zutara until I saw the backlash it received. The narrative and the fans both treat Katara as if getting with anyone besides Aang makes her selfish, or that she’s neglecting some kind of duty by doing so. Katara’s voice and desire is fundamentally unimportant to the writers, because they always focused on Aang’s feelings over hers, and even though fans try to pretend otherwise, the dominant narrative surrounding this relationship has always been about Aang. How he needs airbending children, how his heart would be broken if she left, how he needs her to rebuild, etc.

And from Katara’s side, even though she never shows that she shares Aang’s level of interest, fans insist on reading in signs that aren’t really there. They also focus on logical reasons why they’d work. Aang is nice, he’s fun, he’s a prodigy like Katara, both have suffered in the war, etc. At first glance, it seems like a good match…but we never actually see the writing demonstrate how they actually connect over any of these things.

Good in theory, but bland and passionless in reality.

That narrative resonated with me in a bad way, because it’s exactly how I’ve felt as a lesbian. It reflects the pressures I’ve felt to put aside my desire for love to date a man instead. I’ve been told to my face that it’s selfish for me to “choose” another woman—a person I actually desire—over a man.

“What about children?”

“This is going to make your life so much more difficult!”

“Think of your family!”

“Jakey is such a nice guy, can’t you just give him a chance?”

“You have so many interests in common with Jakey and he has a good job! Why won’t you go out with him? It makes so much sense!”

“You’re so shallow, being fixated on looks. What if your perfect match comes along, but he’s male? Would you really say no?”

“You only want that because you’re a pervert. You need to stop being so obsessed with sex and think about the person instead.”

It’s eerily familiar, that’s all I’m saying. A lot of these ideas are used to attack Zutara and its fans nearly verbatim.

Katara isn’t a lesbian, but like a lesbian, Katara in the context of Zutara commits the crime of marrying for love and desire over duty. Some people see that as an evil act of selfishness, but to me, it’s just love.

We can’t control who we love, and I like to see the narrative of a female character breaking free from the social expectations placed on her to pursue it. No; Zuko isn’t the “safe” option, their relationship would be heavily criticized, and it could even endanger them. But that relationship is one they both feel passion for, and together, they would draw power from one another and use it for good. Their love and connection is powerful, and they would have fought hard for it. Because love is worth fighting for.

That’s deeply admirable to me, and an empowering narrative when I think about how I’m inevitably going to have to fight hard for any love of mine. But it’s worth it to me—it’s always worth it.

#zutara #atla #avatar the last airbender #katara #zuko #canon critical #lesbian #ask #anon #fandom salt #anti kataang

83 notes · View notes

theweeklydiscourse · 5 months ago

Note

The idea that Katara should have ended up with Zuko instead of Aang for feminist reasons overlooks their strong connection. Katara and Aang both survived genocide and are the last of their kinds—she's the last Southern Water Tribe waterbender and he's the last airbender. Their bond isn't just about their backgrounds but also about fighting together against oppression. Their love story during war shows that hope and unity can triumph, challenging the idea that feminist stories must avoid traditional relationships. Katara and Aang in "Avatar: The Last Airbender" prove that shared experiences and understanding can be a powerful part of feminist storytelling.

Nice ask anon, did chat gpt write it for you?

Sorry I just can’t get over how this is phrased, especially the part where you write the show’s legal name for some reason. It sounds like AI wrote it, down to the bizarre structure of your point and the incoherent message you’re trying to get across.

But hey, I’ll bite. I’m having some difficulty understanding how that constitutes as feminist storytelling. If only you could be a bit more specific about what specifically makes their relationship “feminist” rather than gesturing at vague notions of how their shared values automatically correlate to feminist storytelling. The premise of your argument is also laughably vague, you never quite explain how shipping Zutara for “feminist reasons” overlooks the strong connection that Katara and Aang share. What are these “feminist reasons” that Zutara shippers are espousing? Could you explain what their conclusions are? Do you even know what arguments they’re making?

Don't make me laugh, "challenging the idea that feminist stories must avoid traditional relationships" as if traditional heterosexual relationships are somehow endangered by the evil influence of feminism. It's always laughable to watch Kataang shippers engage in these mental gymnastics to find any flimsy shred of evidence that their ship is "feminist" and avoiding the obvious reality that the ship overwhelmingly prioritizes Aang. The "love story" in question is Aang pining after Katara while her feelings remain unknown until the final minutes of the finale. Where Katara's perspective is absent while Aang's is reiterated many times throughout the show, ultimately neglecting her agency in this "love story". The cherry on top is Katara being reduced to being Aang’s dutiful wife and then widow, ultimately fading into the background and being neglected even further post-atla.

Yeah...that doesn't seem indicative of "feminist storytelling" to me.

#atla fandom discourse #anti kataang #atla #avatar the last airbender #zutara #pro katara #pro zutara #feminism #atla critical

117 notes · View notes

zvtara-was-never-canon · 4 months ago

Note

I saw this one post tagged under Aang deserved better and Katara deserved better. As someone who loves both characters. I hate how people mischaracterize them while saying they supposedly deserved better, when really they’re just salty about shipping when it comes down to it.

Here’s the post:

https://www.tumblr.com/empressofthesunslittlecorner/748486832898048000/a-rant-about-aang-and-byrke?source=share

"What does a 14-year-old want with a 12-year-old?" Same thing a 16-year-old wants with a 14-year-old, aka maybe a romantic relationship, maybe just a hook up, maybe just friendship, maybe nothing at all. You can't put people in a box like that. When I was 14 I wouldn't have cared if the person who had a crush on me was too years younger, two years older, or the exact same, all that would matter would be "Do I like them back or not?" Plenty of girls my age were the same, others would be caught dead with someone younger, and others thought that it was weird to date anyone older.

"It's just creepy, no matter the gender" *proceeds to ship Zutara, that has the same age gap, but the guy is older*

"It would have been better if they got together at like 22 and 20" Why? It's a two year agep gap, not twenty - why age them up to adulthood? 12-years-old is right around the time most people either start having crushes, or already have been having crushes for a while, it's not weird. And again, why it Zutara acceptable with Karata being fourteen, but Aang needs to be at least twenty for it to not be creepy, even though the only thing that changed was the gender of the younger character?

"I haven't read the comics" good for you, don't do it, they're terrible, every character was ruined and Yang should be as hated by the fandom as Shyamalan.

"But what I saw on tumblr" Ah yes, because you can always trust that people online are not biased, mistaken, or full on lying. Just ask the leader writer, Aaron Ehasz, about all the times he had to say "No, zutara was never going to be a thing, please stop sharing that fake interview in which people claim I said otherwise"

"Legend of Korra" Korra is also terrible, that's why the audience for it got so bad that Nick just dumped the final season online without a care.

"He kissed her TWICE, TWICE, without her consent and never said sorry for this" Nope, it was ONE poorly timed kiss that he immediately felt sorry for. Katara is seen blushing and thinking on that kiss during The Invasion because she enjoyed that kiss.

"He thinks he deserves her love because he is the Avatar (the hero) and that's how it be" He thinks the girl that got offended when he said he didn't want to kiss her, that has flirted with constantly, and has consensually kissed twice already is at the very least a potential girlfriend. When he is made to question if that's really the case, he full on ASKS HER if she only thinks of him as a brother and he simply misinterpreted her signs, to which she openly says THAT WAS NOT THE CASE. He explicitly mentions "After we kissed, I thought that meant we were together." He never, ever, ever said "I'm the Avatar, therefore you have to like me." Just because AN ACTOR in a play about THE AVATAR called her "the Avatar's girl" instead of "Aang's girl" doesn't mean he thinks his role means more than her feelings - again, he literally went to talk with her to clear things out. This is not how an entitled person behaves.

"He replaced the love for his people with Katara" No, he did not. The Guru explicitly said "Your love for them lives on the form of new love." When he saw Gyatso's dead body, Katara saying she and Sokka were his new family was what made Aang calm down. Yes, Aang is in love with her, but that moment was much more about general, familial love than romantic love. Honoring the people you lost by valluing your connection to the ones that are still in your life is not placing a burden on them, or being obsessed with them, or thinking that being loved by them will fix your trauma.

"He needed to let go of her" He did. Twice. First in Ba Sing Se, which led to him being killed and KATARA bringing back to life, then again in "The Awakening", in which he just up and leaves to focus on his mission and Katara is heartbroken because SHE DOES NOT WANT TO BE LET GO OF!

"Aang could still love Katara, he just needed to stop to put her on a pestal!" He never put her on a pedestal. He knew she was flawed and would openly disagree and even argue with her at times. Cherishing someone is not the same as idealizing them.

"Book three was... bad, and so was the finale" No, it wasn't. It had it's issues and it is the weakest season, but it is still good. Most of the problems were caused by poor pacing due to them sticking to three seasons instead of four. Aang's feelings for Katara were not a problem to be fixed, because the "entitlement" you complain about doesn't exist.

"Aang is a self-insert of Bryke" Bryan and Mike have repeatedly said that they're like Aang AND ZUKO, in the sense that one is goofy and the other is grumpy. By that logic, Zuko is also a self-insert, therefore shipping him with Katara would also be "bad."

"They act like Zuko is a bad boy instead of a dork" Zuko is a dork with social anxiety, who spent two and half seasons SUPPORTING GENOCIDE. "Bad boy" doesn't even BEGIN to describe him.

"No normal 14-year-old girl would date a 12-year-old and if she did call the police on her ass!" Go touch grass, you're insane, two children having feelings for each other is not pedophilia.

"Avatar was only amazing because of writers like Aaron Ehasz" Ehasz himself disagrees with you, and a lot of the "good changes" you made were decided by/along with Bryke.

"A lot of writer wanted also Zutara to happen and not Kataang" Ah, I see you DID read that fake interview. The writers were all on board with Kataang, even though some of them did like Zutara AS WELL. They're not mutually exclusive, you know?

"If I remember right season 3 was so rushed and lacking because the movie-who-shall-not-be-named was in production" You're remembering made up bullshit just right. Fans keep repeating that, and even I once wrongfully believed that in the past, but it's not true. The movie was going to happen regardless of when the show ended, and Bryke genuinely only wanted three seasons instead of four. Bad idea? Yes, but nothing to do with Shyamalan.

"Aang would find other airbenders" If that's true, I'm glad it was scrapped, THE LAST AIRBENDER needs to be THE LAST AIRBENDER for the show's premise and name to make any sense. Korra was also heavily criticized for a later seasons plot point of random people just magically becoming airbenders because it cheapens the gravity of the genocide by going "Lol, fooled ya! They're still running around!"

"Broodmare to repopulate" Three children is not exactly repopulating a nation, you should have paid more attention in math class.

"I'm a big fan of the theoretical season four" You being a fan of a thing that doesn't exist is surely on brand for a zutarian.

"Also, people who make fun of their own fans because they ship a pairing themselves not like are the worst!" Scream the zutarian that is doing exactly that. If you can complain about ships and call people creeps for it, you can take people pointing out your ship is just a figment of your imagination. Either suck it up or change your behavior so you're no longer a hypocrite.

#anti zutara #pro kataang #pro aang

37 notes · View notes

atla-confessions · 1 month ago

Note

The pick-me misogyny on display when it comes to discussions of Mai is so clear. I see zutara shippers say Mai has no emotions outside of being unable to "let go of her childhood crush" and it's so clear that's only a take you can have if you hate women and see every female character as either "the good woman I project into" and "the dumb b*tches who want to steal my man"

Mai had this complex relationship with Azula where there was genuine affection and genuine connection as well as genuine fear, Mai has this distant relationship with her mother Michi who Mai pitied on some level but who Mai still chaffed against all the rules enforced from her but who are slowly coming to understand each other after her parents' divorce, Mai has this warm friendship with Ty Lee and Aang who make her smile and who she's happy to accept affection from (and especially Ty Lee, Mai's wide-eyed open shock when Mai had just accepted she was going to die for acting out for the first time in her life but Ty Lee loved her enough to step in for her and sacrifice everything to try to save her, how are we going to pretend that's not emotion?), Mai despises and resents her father for all the misogyny and repression he's forced on her but has felt powerless to do anything about it and didn't think she was worth the effort herself to go against him anyway, Mai loves her little brother Tom-Tom so much that she found the strength to go against her father because he was trying to groom Tom-Tom into his image.

To say her only emotion is "not letting go of Zuko," (which is already wild because Zuko's more hung up on her) really shows that the only character they're interested in Zuko, and they see everyone else, especially female characters, as "what can you be for my perfect Zuko".

#Mai #Zuko #Ty lee #Azula #atla fandom problems #atla confessions #pro Mai #anti zutara #anti zutara shippers #Maiko

22 notes · View notes

sokkastyles · 9 months ago

Note

I feel like one of the reasons Kataang kind of lands weirdly in canon and one of the reasons some people did not connect with it as much is because the Kataang romance mostly happens from Aang's point of view. We get a lot of moments where we see what Aang thinks of her romantically, but we don't really see Katara's point of view up until season 3 episode 2 where she looks visibly jealous of Aang dancing with another girl. That moment did feel like it came out of nowhere though, because we don't see her feel like that in any of the previous episodes (Cave of two lovers doesn't count, because Katara was enamored with the idea of Oma and Shu's romance, she liked the idea of love but it didn't necessarily have anything to do with Aang). Compare that to Zuko and Katara, who also aren't romantically linked in the show, but we do get a lot of interactions between them and we get to see what they both think of each other and how that changes in each season. The mutualness in their dynamic made me think that Zuko and Katara were supposed to end up together, I mean they literally have a pivotal moment together at the climax of each season finale. I really wonder what we would have gotten if Aaron Ehasz and his wife Elizabeth got to write Zutara as a fully realized pairing. I'm not even against the idea of Kataang, but I would have written it differently. And also Zutara appeals to me more.

Yeah, the reason why Katara's jealousy feels like it came out of nowhere is because it's another example of the romance not being written with Katara's feelings in mind. Katara idealizing the Oma and Shu story or being jealous of Aang flirting with other girls still doesn't tell us how Katara feels about Aang as a person or how her relationship with him would be. It just tells us that she's a fourteen year old girl who is interested in romance and Aang happens to be there in front of her at the moment. When she actually talks to Aang about her feelings, they often argue. See also the Cave of Two Lovers when Katara got angry when Aang didn't live up to her romantic ideal, or when Katara got upset at Aang flirting with his fanclub because again, he did not live up to her romantic ideal.

Katara and Zuko's relationship feels much more grounded because when they actually talk about how they feel about each other, they are able to work out an understanding and end up closer. And if romance were to happen, it would come after friendship and mutual understanding.

Which is in stark contrast to Aang and Katara idealizing each other but having fundamental disagreements when they actually talk about their feelings.

#zutara #antikataang

106 notes · View notes

katko-archive · 3 days ago

Text

Zutaraang/Kataangko? is such an under-rated relationship.

You get the best elements of Zutara *plus* the powerful connection between Zuko and Aang *and* the sweetness and devotion of Kataang.

Plus, as with Zukki, it’s always nice to see a way to get two people you live together (Zuko and Sokka, or Zuko and Katara) without having to break them up with their canon partner. The love just grows.

And there’s something so sweet and tender about Katara and Aang being the first couple Zuko sees that work well together, his model for what a good relationship can be, and then they teach him. They show him how to be a good partner, how to touch and be touched, how to be loved. And I wish we had so many more stories about that.

#atla #katara #zuko #aang #kataang #katko

19 notes · View notes

lilbagdermole · 1 year ago

Note

Hey adri! do you think we'll be seeing any taang or zutara moments in the new film with them as adults?

Hi anon!! Thanks for sending me an ask 😊

In regards to your ask, well...

I wouldn't get my hopes up, anon.

Not because I don't want to... I would pay good money to see adult Toph and Aang just kicking ass and serving look; or any Zutara interaction that isn't OOC or hostile at this point.

But considering that the main producers for the upcoming film are non-other than Bryke themselves, I really can't help but prepare myself for the inevitable disappointment. ATLA isn't a romance-centric story, nor should it ever be praised for it's romantic themes given how poorly the canon couples are built and written. I'm certain the film won't be focused solely on Aang and Katara's relationship, but, Bryke are very biased for the ship and have proven, time and time again, that they do not hold any respect for the fan favorite non-canonical couples, especially Zutara.

What I'm most concerned for is how they'll depict these characters. In the post-ATLA comics, all of the cast are horrendously OOC; Zutara's chemistry and history are erased and forgotten; characters become one-dimensional and distinct from the characters we grew to love; K@taang is forcibly shoved down our throats in an attempt to prove to us, the audience, that they are, in fact, perfect from one another and are in a 100% secure, perfect and happy relationship. It's bad. So, I'm preparing myself for what's to come.

I don't expect much and I'm not going into the theaters in 2025 with the expectations of seeing Taang or Zutara interact at all. Bryke, quite literally, forgot about Toph and Aang's supposed connection and sublot (foreshadowed in 'The Swamp') and shipbaited Zutara during the final season of ATLA just to spite shippers.

It should also be important to keep in mind that Aang and Katara are the confirmed main leads and protagonists of the film whilst Sokka was downgraded into a side character. If Sokka (one of the main characters in the animated series) is reduced to a side character, I can only imagine what Toph and Zuko's roles will become. Hopefully they'll given more than a one-time appearance or cameo... I NEED to see adult Toph in her prime (I would also like to see her stand beside Aang just so we can get their canonical height difference as adults, it'd be glorious).

But hey, anon, listen, whatever happens it shouldn't erase your love for the series and ships. We've survived this long off off what was gifted and hinted at throughout the show. Luckily for us, our fanbase is filled with a plethora of talented artists, fanfic authors, editors, theorists, etc. that I'm certain we'll be well fed and thriving!

#anti bryke #anti kataang #anti atla ending #toph beifong #atla aang #zuko #katara #zutara #taang #lilbadgermoleask

156 notes · View notes

rifari2037 · 5 months ago

Note

Are , There parallels and symbolism between Zuko and Katara in the cave of Two lovers and the disguises,s they have as the blue spirit and the painted lady .

I'm sorry for my late response. Cave of two lovers and Blue Spirit/Painted Lady were parallels with Zutara in different way. Here the analysis.

Omashu/Zutara

In The Cave of Two Lovers, Zutara were parallels with Omashu that shows Zuko was reincarnation of Oma, while Katara was reincarnation of Shu.

The main story

The main story of Omashu was two lovers who being apart because their villages in a war. The couldn't be together because of the circumstances, not because of their own decision.

The Fire Nation and Water Tribe in a war for a hundred years. Long before Zuko and Katara were born. The war of their people forced them to hate each other, it was never their own decision.

Omashu met on the top of the mountain that divides the two villages, in a neutral place where there was no war.

Zuko and Katara met in crystal catacomb that looks like the Cave of Two Lovers, in Ba Sing Se with motto 'no war in Ba Sing Se'. Zuko and Katara build a connection and trust each other despite they were enemies.

Shu died in the war, leaving devastated Oma who unleashed a terrible display of earthbending power.

Zuko as the reincarnation of Oma protected Katara as the reincarnation of Shu with all his strength and didn't let her die in battle (again).

Oma declared the war over, she built a new city with both villages and lived together in peace.

Zuko as the new Fire Lord declared the war over. Fire Lord Zuko and the avatar started a new era with love and peace, also building a new city called Republic City.

Katara didn't have a role in new city, she didn't have statue, she didn't even attend the bloodbending trial. She didn't literally die like Shu, but her absence represented that.

2. The symbolism

I just realised, when Oma was waiting for Shu who never came, the clouds behind her formed like the shape of a crescent moon even though it wasn't perfect form.

Moon was symbol and source power of waterbender.

Oma unleashed a terrible display of earthbending power, the background was red colour and red sun.

Sun is symbol and source power of firebender. Meanwhile in final battle, Sozin comet was the source power of firebender that turned the sky red.

When Oma declared the war over, the background was the sun. There were also people of two villages in front of her.

The sun in the background showed more that Zuko was reincarnation of Oma, because the sun is a symbol and the power source of firebender.

When Fire Lord Zuko declared the war over, there were people representing all places (fire nation people, water tribe, earth kingdom people, and foggy swamp tribe) in front of him.

Even though Oma and Shu were first earthbenders, but they wore red and blue instead of green or brown. Oma/Zuko wore red, then wore green in neutral place. Shu/Katara wore blue.

Oma/Zuko and Shu/Katara also consistently have the same position. Oma always on the left, while Shu always on the right. In every Zutara relationship development moments, Zuko always on the left while Katara always on the right.

The Blue Spirit and The Painted Lady

Blue Spirit was Zuko's alter ego, while Painted Lady was Katara's alter ego. In their disguise, they switch their roots.

Zuko, the firebender, first appeared as Blue Spirit in Book : WATER. He wore a blue mask, colour that was a symbol of water.

Blue spirit was an evil water spirit.

Katara, the waterbender, appeared as Painted Lady in Book : FIRE. She used red paint, colour that was a symbol of fire.

Painted Lady was a good Fire Nation spirit.

Also, they appear in chapters with the titles The Blue Spirit and The Painted Lady, the names of their alter egos.

The avatar is a bridge between the spirit world and the physical world. In parallel, Aang was the first person who discovering the identities of the Blue Spirit and Painted Lady.

Unlike Omashu/Zutara, The Blue Spirit and The Painted Lady weren't about romance, but the parallels could be the basis of their chemistry.

#zutara #pro zutara #zuko x katara #zuko and katara #anti anti zutara #zutara analysis

85 notes · View notes

wilcze-kudly · 4 months ago

Text

Hey so can we like stop with the "Zutara is for the girls and Kataang is for the boys" thing. It's silly and it's breakdancing just on the edge of gender essentialism.

The assumption that there is something inherent to Zutara that appeals predominantly to women and Kataang that appeals predominantly to men is dishonest because every ship can have appeal to all genders.

The discussion of the "female gaze" in Zutara and the "male gaze" in Kataang is also redundant. I enjoy dissecting the concept of "the gaze", however it is important to note that the "female gaze" doesn't have a set definition or grouping of conventions it adheres to. Lisa French, Dean of RMIT University’s School of Media and Communication says:

“The female gaze is not homogeneous, singular or monolithic, and it will necessarily take many forms... The aesthetic approaches, experiences and films of women directors are as diverse as their individual life situations and the cultures in which they live. The "female' gaze” is not intended here'to denote a singular concept. There' are many gazes."

Now excuse me as I put on my pretentious humanistics student hat.

Kataang's appeal to women and the female gaze

Before I start, I want to note that the female gaze is still a developing concept

There are very few female film directors and writers, and most of them are white. The wants and desires of women of colour, the demographic Katara falls into, are still wildly underepresented. Additionally, the concept of the female gaze had many facets, due to it being more focused on emotional connections rather than physical appearance as the male gaze usually is. Which means that multiple male archetypes fall into the category of "for the female gaze".

The "female gaze" can be best described as a response to the "male gaze", which was first introduced by Laura Mulvey in her paper: "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" , however the term "male gaze" itself was not used in the paper.

Mulvey brought up the concept of the female character and form as the passive, objectified subject to the active voyeuristic male gaze, which the audience is encouraged to identify, usually through the male character.

To quote her:

"In a world ordered by sexual imbalance', pleasure' in looking has been split between active'/male' and passive/female'. The determining male gaze' projects its fantasy onto the female' figure', which is styled accordingly."

Mulvey also brings up the concept of scopopfillia (the term being introduced by Freud), the concept of deriving sexual gratification from both looking and being looked at. This concept has strong overtones of voyeurism, exhibitionism and narcissism, placing forth the idea that these overtones are what keeps the male viewer invested. That he is able to project onto the male character, therefore being also able to possess the passive female love interest.

However, it's important to note that Mulvey's essay is very much a product of its times, focused on the white, heterosexual and cisgender cinema of her time. She also drew a lot of inspiration from Freud's questionable work, including ye ole penis envy. Mulvey's paper was groundbreaking at the time, but we can't ignore how it reinforces the gender binary and of course doesn't touch on the way POC, particularly women of colour are represented in film.

In her paper, Mulvey fails to consider anyone who isn't a white, cis, heterosexual man or woman. With how underrepresented voices of minorities already are both in media and everyday life, this is something that we need to remember and strive to correct.

Additionally Mulvey often falls into gender essentialism, which I previously mentioned at the beginning of this post. Funny how that keeps coming up

"Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" started a very interesting and important conversation, and I will still be drawing from certain parts of it, however huge swathes of this text have already become near archaic, as our culture and relationship with media evolves at an incredible pace.

And as filmaking evolves, so does our definition of the male and female gaze. So let's see what contemporary filmakers say of it.

In 2016, in her speech during the Toronto International Film Festival , producer of the TV series Transparent, Jill Soloway says:

“Numero uno, I think the Female Gaze is a way of “feeling seeing”. It could be thought of as a subjective camera that attempts to get inside the protagonist, especially when the protagonist is not a Chismale. It uses the frame to share and evoke a feeling of being in feeling, rather than seeing – the characters. I take the camera and I say, hey, audience, I’m not just showing you this thing, I want you to really feel with me.

[Chismale is Soloway's nickname for cis males btw]

So the term "female gaze" is a bit of a misnomer, since it aims to focus on capturing the feelings of characters of all genders. It's becoming more of a new way of telling stories in film, rather than a way to cater to what white, cisgender, heterosexual women might find attractive in a man.

Now, Aang is the decided protagonist of the show, however, Atla having somewhat of an ensemble cast leads to the perspective shifting between different characters.

In the first episode of atla, we very much see Katara's perspective of Aang. She sees him trapped in the iceberg, and we immediately see her altruism and headstrong nature. After she frees Aang, we are very much first subjected to Katara's first impressions of him, as we are introduced to his character. We only see a sliver of Aang's perspective of her, Katara being the first thing he sees upon waking up.

We see that she is intrigued and curious of him, and very excited about his presence. She is endeared and amused by his antics. She is rediscovering her childish side with his help. She is confiding in him about her own trauma surrounding the Fire Nation's genocide of the Southern Waterbenders. She is willing to go against her family and tribe ans leave them behind to go to the Northern Water Tribe with Aang. We also see her determination to save him when he is captured.

As the show moves on and the plot kicks into gear, we do shift more into Aang's perspective. We see his physical attraction to her, and while we don't see Katara's attraction quite as blatantly, there are hints of her interest in his appearance.

This is where we get deeper into the concept of Aang and Katara's mutual interest and attraction for one another. While her perspective is more subtle than most would like, Katara is not purely an object of Aang's desire, no more than he is purely an object of her desire.

When analysing this aspect of Katara and Aang's relationship, I couldn't help but be reminded of how Célene Sciamma's Portrait of a lady on fire (in my personal opinion, one of the best studies of the female gaze ever created) builds up its romance, and how it places a strong emphasis on the mutuality of the female gaze.

Portrait of a lady on fire's cinematography is very important to the film. We see the world through the perspective of our protagonist, a painter named Marianne. We also see her love interest, Héloïse, the woman whom she is hired to paint a portrait of, through Marianne's lense.

We see Marianne analyse Héloïse's appearance, her beauty. We look purely through Marianne's eyes at Héloïse for a good part of the movie, but then, something unexpected happens. Héloïse looks back. At Marianne, therefore, in some way, also at the audience. While Marianne was studying Héloïse, Héloïse was studying Marianne.

We never shift into Héloïse's perspective, but we see and understand that she is looking back at us. Not only through her words, when she for example comments on Marianne's mannerisms or behaviours, but also hugely through cinematography and acting of the two amazing leads. (Noémie Merlant as Marianne and Adèle Haenel as Héloïse. They truly went above and beyond with their performances.)

This is a huge aspect of the female gaze's implementation in the film. The camera focuses on facial expressions, eyes and body language, seeking to convey the characters' emotions and feelings. There's a focus on intense, longing and reciprocated eye contact (I have dubbed this the Female Gays Gaze.). The characters stand, sit or lay facing each other, and the camera rarely frames one of them as taller than the other, which would cause a sense of power imbalance.

The best way to describe this method of flimaking is wanting the audience to see the characters, rather than to simply look at them. Sciamma wants us to empathise, wants us to feel what they are feeling, rather than view them from a distance. They are to be people, characters, rather than objects.

Avatar, of course, doesn't display the stunning and thoughtful cinematography of Portrait of a Lady on Fire, and Katara and Aang's relationship, while incredibly important, is only a part of the story rather than the focus of it.

However, the 'Kataang moments' we are privy to often follow a similar convention to the ones between Marianne and Héloïse that I mentioned prior.

Theres a lot of shots of Katara and Aang facing each other, close ups on their faces, particularly eyes, as they gaze at one another.

Katara and Aang are often posited as on equal grounds, the camera not framing either of them as much taller and therefore more powerful or important than the other. Aang is actually physically shorter than Katara, which flies in the face in usual conventions of the male fantasy. (I will get to Aang under the male gaze later in this essay)

And even in scenes when Aang is physically shown as above Katara, particularly when he's in the Avatar state, Katara is the one to pull him down, maintaining their relationships as equals.

Despite most of the show being portrayed through Aang's eyes, Katara is not a passive object for his gaze, and therefore our gaze, to rest upon. Katara is expressive, and animated. As an audience, we are made aware that Katara has her own perspective. We are invited to take part in it and try to understand it.

Not unlike to Portrait of a Lady on Fire, there is a lot of focus placed on mannerisms and body language, an obvious example being Katara often playing with her hair around Aang, telegraphing a shy or flustered state. We also see her express jealousy over Aang, her face becoming sour, brows furrowed. On one occasion she even blew a raspberry, very clearly showing us, the audience, her displeasure with the idea of Aang getting attention from other girls.

Once again, this proves that Katara is not a passive participant in her own relationship, we are very clealry shown her perspective of Aang. Most of the scenes that hint at her and Aang's focus on their shared emotions, rather than, for example, Katara's beauty.

Even when a scene does highlight her physical appearance, it is not devoid of her own thoughts and emotions. The best example of this being the scene before the party in Ba Sing Se where we see Katara's looking snazzy in her outfit. Aang compliments her and Katara doesn't react passively, we see the unabashed joy light up her face, we can tell what she thinks of Aang's comment.

In fact, the first moment between Katara and Aang sets this tone of mutual gaze almost perfectly. Aang opens his eyes, and looks at Katara. Katara looks back.

There is, once again, huge focus on their eyes in this scene, the movement of Aang's eyelids right before they open draws out attention to that part of his face. When the camera shows us Katara, is zooms in onto her expression as it changes, her blinking also drawing attention to her wide and expressive eyes.

This will not be the first time emphasis is placed on Katara and Aang's mutual gaze during a pivotal moment in the show. Two examples off the top of my head would be the Ends of B2 and B3 respevtively. When Katara brings Aang back to life, paralleling the first time they laid eyes on one another. And at the end of the show, where their gaze has a different meaning behind it.

We see Katara's emotions and her intent telegraphed clearly in these instances.

In Book 1, we see her worry for this strange bald boy who fell out of an iceberg, which melts away to relief and a hint of curiosity once she ascertains that he isn't dead.

In B2 we once again see worry, but this time it's more frantic. Her relationship with Aang is much dearer to her heart now, and he is in much worse shape. When we see the relief on her face this time, it manifests in a broad smile, rather than a small grin. We can clearly grasp that her feelings for Aang have evolved.

In B3, we step away from the rule because Aang isn't on the verge of death or unconsciousness for the first time. It is also the first time in a situation like this that Aang isn't seeing Katara from below, but they are on equal footing. I attribute this to symbolising change of pace for their relationship.

The biggest obstacle in the development of Katara and Aang's romance was the war, which endangered both their lives. Due to this, there was a hesitance to start their relationship. In previous scenes that focused this much on Aang and Katara's mutual gaze, Aang was always in a near dead, or at least 'dead adjacent' position. This is is a very harsh reminder that he may very well die in the war, and the reason Katara, who has already endured great loss, is hesitant to allow her love for him to be made... corporeal.

However, now Aang is standing, portraying that the possibily of Katara losing him has been reduced greatly with the coming of peace, the greatest obstacle has been removed, and Katara is the one to initiate this kiss.

Concurrently, Katara's expression here does not portray worry or relief at all, because she has no need to be worried or relieved. No, Katara is blushing, looking directly at Aang with an expression that can be described as a knowing smile. I'd argue that this description is accurate, because Katara knows that she is about to finally kiss the boy she loves.

Ultimately, Katara is the one who initiates the kiss that actually begins her and Aang's romantic relationship.

Kataang's appeal to women is reflected in how Katara is almost always the one to initiate physical affection with Aang. With only 3 exceptions, one of which, the Ember Island kiss being immediately shown by the narrative as wrong, and another being a daydream due to Aang's sleep deptivation. The first moment of outwardly romantic affection between Aang and Katara is her kissing his cheek. And their last kiss in the show is also initiated by Katara.

I won't falsely state that Kataang is the perfect representation of the female gaze. Not only because the storyline has its imperfections, as every piece of media has. But also because I simply belive that the concept of the female gaze is too varied and nebulous to be fully expressed. With this essay, I simply wanted to prove that Kataang is most certainly not the embodiment of catering to the male gaze either. In fact it is quite far from that.

The aspects of Kataang that fall more towards embodying the female gaze don't just appeal to women. There's a reason a lot of vocal Kataang shippers you find are queer. The mutual emotional connection between Katara and Aang is something we don't have to identify with, but something we are still able to emphasise with. It's a profound mutual connection that we watch unfold from both perspectives that sort of tracends more physical, gendered aspects of many onscreen romances. You just need to see instead of simply look.

✨️Bonus round✨️

Aang under the gaze

This started off as a simple part of the previous essay, however I decided I wanted to give it it's own focus, due to the whole discourse around Aang being a wish-fullfilling self insert for Bryke or for men in genral. I always found this baffling considering how utterly... unappealing Aang is to the male gaze.

It may surprise some of you that men are also subjected to the male gaze. Now sadly, this has nothing to do with the male gaze of the male gays. No, when male characters, usually the male protagonist, are created to cater to the male gaze, they aren't portrayed as sexually desirable passive objects, but they embody the active/masculine aide of the binary Laura Mulvey spoke of in the quote I shared at the beginning of this essay.

The protagonist under the male gaze is not the object of desire but rather a character men and boys would desire to be.

They're usually the pinnacle of traditional, stereotypical masculinity.

Appearance wise: muscular but too broad, chiseled facial features, smouldering eyes, depending on the genre wearing something classy or some manner of armour.

Personalitywise they may vary from the cool, suave James Bond type, or a more hotblooded forceful "Alpha male" type. However these are minor differences in the grand scheme of things. The basis is that this protagonist embodies some manner of idealised man. He's strong, decisive, domineering, in control, intimidating... you get the gist. Watch nearly any action movie. There's also a strong focus placed on having sway or power over others. Often men for the male gaze are presented as wealthy, having power and status. Studies (that were proved to be flawed in the way the data was gathered, I believe) say that womem value resources in potential male partners, so it's not surprising that the ideal man has something many believe would attract "mates". [Ew I hated saying that].

Alright, now let's see how Aang holds up to these standards.

Well... um...

Aang does have power, he is the Avatar. However, he is often actually ignored, blown off and otherwise dismissed, either due to his age or his personality and ideals being seen as unrealistic and foolish. Additionally, Aang, as a member of a culture lost a century ago, is also often posited as an outsider, singled out as weak, his beliefs touted as the reason his people died out and.

Physically, Aang doesn't look like the male protagonist archetype, either. He isn't your average late teens to brushing up against middle aged. Aang is very much a child and this is reflected in his soft round features, large eyes and short, less built body. This is not a build most men would aspire to. Now, he still has incredible physical prowess, due to his bending. But I'm not sure how many men are desperate to achieve the "pacifist 12 year old" build to attract women.

Hailing from a nation that had quite an egalitarian system, Aang wouldn't have conventional ideas surrounding leadership, even if he does step up into it later. He also has little in the way of possessions, by choice.

As for Aang's personality, well...

I mean I wouldn't exactly call him your average James Bond or superhero. Aang is mainly characterised through his kindness, empathy, cheerful nature and occasional childishness (which slowly is drained as the trauma intesifies. yay.)

Aang is very unwilling to initiate violence, which sets him aside from many other male protagonists of his era, who were champing at the bit to kick some ass. He values nature, art, dance and fun. He's in tune with his emotions. He tries to desecalate situations before he starts a fight.

Some would say many of Aang's qualities could be classified as feminine. While the other main male characters, Zuko and Sokka try to embody their respective concepts of the ideal man (tied to their fathers), Aang seems content with how he presents and acts. He feels no need to perform masculinity as many men do, choosing to be true to his emotions and feelings.

These "feminine" qualities often attract ridicule from other within the show. He is emasculated or infantiliased as a form of mockery multiple times, the most notable examples being the Ember Island play and Ozai tauntingly referring to him as a "little boy". Hell, even certain Aang haters have participated in this, for example saying that he looks like a bald lesbian.

I'd even argue that, in his relationships with other characters, Aang often represents the passive/feminine. Especially towards Zuko, Aang takes on an almost objectified role of a trophy that can be used to purchase Ozai's love. [Zuko's dehumanisation of others needs to be discussed later, but it isn't surprising with how he was raised and a huge part of his arc is steerring away from that way of thinking.]

Aang and Zuko almost embody certain streotypes about relationships, the forceful, more masculine being a literal pursuer, and the gentler, more feminine being pusued.

We often see Aang framed from Zuko's perspective, creating something akin to the mutual gaze of Katara and Aang, hinting at the potential of Zuko and Aang becoming friends, a concept that is then voiced explicitly in The Blue Spirit.

However, unlike Katara, Zuko is unable to empathise with Aang at first, still seeing Aang as more of an object than a person. We have here an interesting imbalance of Aang seeing Zuko but Zuko meerly looking at Aang.

There is a certain aspect of queer metaphor to Zuko's pursuit of Aang, but I fear I've gotten off topic.

Wrapping this long essay up, I want to reiterate that I'm not saying that Zutara isn't popular with women. Most Zutara shippers I've encountered are women. And most Kataang shippers I've encountered are... also women. Because fandom spaces are occupied predominantly by women.

I'm not exactly making a moral judgement on any shippers either, or to point at Kataang and go: "oh, look girls can like this too. Stop shipping Zutara and come ship this instead."

I want to point out that the juxtaposition of Zutara and Kataang as respectively appealing to the feminine and masculine, is a flawed endeavour because neither ship does this fully.

The concept of Kataang being a purely male fantasy is also flawed due to the points I've outlied in this post.

Are there going to be male Kataang shippers who self insert onto Aang and use it for wish fulfilment? Probably. Are there going to be male Zutara shippers who do the same? Also probably.

In the end, our interpretation of media, particularly visual mediums like film are heavily influenced by our own biases, interests, beliefs andmost importantly our... well, our gaze. The creators can try to steer us with meaningful shots and voiced thought, directing actors or animating a scene to be a certain way, but ultimately we all inevitably draw our own conclusions.

A fan of Zutara can argue that Kataang is the epitome of catering to the male gaze, while Zutara is the answer to women everywhere's wishes.

While I can just as easily argue the exact opposite.

It really is just a matter of interpretation. What is really interesting, is what our gaze says about us. What we can see of ourselves when the subject gazes back at us.

I may want to analyse how Zutara caters to the male gaze in some instances, if those of you who manage to slog through this essay enjoy the subject matter.

#ok getting off my soapbox #i forgot how much i love to write these long sprawling essays...#kataang #pro kataang #aang #pro aang #aanglove #aang defense squad #pro katara #katara defense squad #kataang love #zuko #avatar #atla #avatar: the last airbender #the last airbender #avatar the last airbender #aang the last airbender #anti zutara

396 notes · View notes

burst-of-iridescent · 1 year ago

Text

i’ve gone back and forth a lot on whether to respond to this because the last thing i want is more discourse, but since you seem absolutely determined to put me on some sort of trial, anon, i might as well get my two cents in.

so let's talk.

one, i have said over and over again that i am more than willing to talk to anyone i may have unwittingly hurt or offended, if they came to me directly and off-anon. despite the fact that you surely knew that, since you evidently stalk my blog, you did not do so. instead, you continued to yell at me and accuse me of racism anonymously, rather than actually engaging with me. what this tells me right off the bat is you're not interested in a productive conversation. you're interested in harassing me.

two, i've talked to indigenous zutara shippers. i'm friends with indigenous zutara shippers. i've read what many native and indigenous shippers in this fandom have to say. i know shippers who like the fire lady katara trope, shippers who are indifferent, shippers who dislike it. what makes your opinion any more important than any of theirs? and conversely, what makes their opinion any more important than yours? no singular person can ever claim to speak for their entire community, because people of colour aren't one monolithic entity.

as a desi girl, katara's relationship with aang makes me uncomfortable because it is characterized by patterns of imbalanced emotional labour and misogyny that i frequently see within my own community. and it is my prerogative to dislike the ship because of that, just as it is for any other woc. but it is not my prerogative to say that no one else is allowed to ship kat.aang, or is racist or misogynistic just for shipping kat.aang (and indeed i know women of colour who do ship kat.aang! because our cultural background doesn't mean that we're automatically going to have the same experiences and perspectives, and that's valid).

so am i really supposed to listen to indigenous voices, anon, or am i simply supposed to listen to those that agree with you?

three, i won't deny that the fire lady katara trope can be racist. i've seen it executed in ways that make me profoundly uncomfortable, and which i will never support. but more often than not in zutara fandom and content, "fire lady" is simply the name chosen for the fire lord's female consort, one that denotes katara as zuko's equal and a powerful world leader in her own right with her own title. if the trope is executed problematically, that fault lies with the person who wrote it and their own ignorance/malice/racism - not with the trope itself.

personally, as someone whose people were colonized by the british, and whose home was subjected to japanese imperialism, i completely understand why it can feel extremely empowering and wish fulfilling to have woc in positions of power within the systems that oppressed them. if i saw a desi girl on the throne of england, you can bet i'd be the first to celebrate.

but of course that's just my opinion, so if any indigenous or native shippers have thoughts on the trope, i would love to hear what you have to say, and discuss further.

four, despite your alleged care for katara and indigenous women, anon, you have never once engaged with my criticisms of the show for its depiction of kat.aang: a relationship where katara's partner is visibly disgusted at her cultural food, acts disrespectfully towards her cultural artifacts, attempts to dissuade her from finding justice for her mother (a victim of imperialist aggression), and tries to impose his own cultural/religious beliefs upon her without considering that she a) has no obligation to follow those beliefs and b) her own culture's beliefs are vastly different. all of which, by the way, he is never shown to apologize for or learn from. add to that the fact that 2/3 of katara's children show absolutely no connection to her culture and, in fact, seem to heavily prioritize their father's instead - to the extent that all of her grandchildren seem solely air nomad instead of paying respect to both sides of their heritage - and a very troubling picture is painted.

keep in mind that this isn't some fanon trope or problematic fic created by a small subset of shippers within the fandom on an internet space meant primarily for adults; it's a canonical depiction of a romantic relationship with a woc on a show written by two white men and broadcasted to an audience of millions, targeted primarily at young, impressionable children. what are the messages being sent here, and to whom, about interracial relationships featuring indigenous women, and the role said women are expected to fulfil within those relationships?

but instead of criticizing the white creators who did that, you chose to take out your anger on me, a fellow poc descended from colonized peoples, because... i'm an easier target? because i'm accessible, and they're not? because maybe, just maybe, this isn't actually about indigenous people at all?

five, being a shipper (or an anti) isn't the same as being an activist. it just isn't. people can read and write and enjoy things in fiction that they would never support in real life (though ofc sometimes people just suck and that bleeds through into what they consume and create - but my point is that you absolutely cannot decide by their taste in fiction alone whether they are bigoted or not) because if our fictional takes translated to real life, most of us would probably be mass murderers by now. the only thing you can really judge anyone on is what they say and do and how they treat others in real life.

and you made that abundantly clear with this ask you sent me after i reblogged posts spreading awareness of the fires in hawai'i and sharing links to donate:

so just to clarify here, you would prefer that i don't use my platform to try and help actual indigenous people, people who have lost their homes and families, who are actually suffering, who actually require assistance and money and resources... because you don't like my headcanon for a fictional indigenous-coded person?

(yeah, i'm sure you'll understand why i'm skeptical about this entire crusade being in any way about the welfare of indigenous people.)

ultimately, i know none of this is going to change your mind. if you ever intended to genuinely speak out for indigenous issues, or make me see what i was doing wrong, you would have messaged me personally and stood by what you had to say. but that was never your real aim, and you know that as well as i do, so i'm certain i'll see you in my inbox again tomorrow talking about my racism or lack of accountability or whatever else you can find to disparage me.

i wish you the best. have a good day.

#the discourse #again #anti kataang

105 notes · View notes