#I'm not saying that Aang should have killed Ozai

[silvermoon424]

Finally finished Avatar the Last Airbender!

I'd been putting off watching it for over a decade when my partner @joestarluxe convinced me to watch it with her, lol.

I might put all my thoughts in a bigger post later on (when I'm not tired after work lol), but needless to say I really enjoyed the show! I was most impressed with the worldbuilding; ATLA really does have incredible worldbuilding and I'm excited to watch some video essays delving deeper into that aspect.

Oh, and all forms of bending are so cool!! Going off the worldbuilding point, I really love how bending is something that's foundational and deeply enmeshed in the world of Avatar. It's not just an afterthought, you really do get the sense that benders have been around since the dawn of civilization and their unique talents have shaped the way society functions (this is especially evident in the Earth Kingdom, particularly the big cities like Ba Sing Se).

I also really appreciate how subversive a lot of the morals are, especially when you consider that this was a children's show airing on Nickelodeon during the War on Terror. The Fire Nation in particular has a lot of uncomfortable similarities to the United States (they even make their children recite a pledge of allegiance at school!).

Anyway, great show and I'm mad at myself for not giving it a chance sooner. I've heard a lot of mixed things about the Legend of Korra so I'm not really interested in watching it, although I may look into some of those spinoff comics/novels.

[aquatint-101]

They tell you that you are a god, that thousands of years of unnamed power thrums beneath your veins. Yet your lungs rise and fall as they always have, and you feel just as human as ever-

(Maybe you never have been. Maybe your only reference point is you, and that is where your error is gravest. If you have been a god all along, what would you know of being human?)

-x-

They start to fear you for the accident of your birth. You try to tell them that you are the same as you have always been. You play all the same games, throw pies off the stony balcony ledge and watch them land and burst open like overripe fruit, gooey cream exploding into the air.

But they stop smiling at your jokes. They stop listening to the songs you've learned to play on your flute. They never say we're not friends anymore, because it's not true, not exactly. Friends are people that can be trusted and you, you are not a person.

There is only one man in the world who thinks otherwise.

-x-

They want to take him away from you. They want to tear you from your home and your family and what little you have left. You have been taught not to be covetous, but this angers you.

So you run, like the wind that has been trapped between the trees. You see the wide, open sky and decide to conquer it, just like your people have for generations. But it's not the storm that swallows you; the waves claims you before the clouds can.

You sink to the ocean's depths, and your grip on the reins starts to falter.

(You are not human, and this keeps you alive. Perhaps it is the elements. Perhaps it is the magic. Perhaps it is something far older than both. Your eyes glow beneath your closed eyelids, and your tattoos burn with impossible light. You are breathing still.)

-x-

They want to ask you how you did it, want you to reach inside the depths of your murky memory and proffer your secrets to them. But you have no answers to give her when she keeps questioning how you forced the turning tides to do your bidding.

The answer is simple. You didn't, the monster did.

See, there is a monster inside of you. Not a god, because gods are never this angry, never this vindictive. The monster wants to rage and destroy everything it sees painted in red, but you will not let it. The monster eats you up when you get scared or angry, and you are never strong enough to make it go away.

She is. She calls out to you and her voice somehow lulls the monster back to sleep. She cradles you in her arms and tells you that you can let go. You think her words are lost on you, because you are not the monster.

-x-

They want to pull the monster out from inside you, and you let them. The monster has laid waste to armies while all you have done is run, run, run. Your people are gone because of you, but the monster saved you. Perhaps it can save them too.

She tells you in plain terms that she does not like this, and you can see the fear in her eyes when she talks about rage and pain and you. You do not know how to respond. Perhaps if you cut enough pieces of yourself away, the monster can finally save you both.

It's okay, you want to say. I'm scared of it too.

All you give her is cold, cold silence.

-x-

They are gone, and you are all that is left of them. They are gone, and it is you, two animals, and a monster that stubbornly claws its way out of you when you are forced to confront this fact. The monster is everything your people would have hated, because it aches for blood and vengeance in a way you never can.

(They are your people, they have to be, and you cannot be this other, this god, that they just raised like a cuckoo in the nest.)

In the desert, as the heat scorches your bare skin, you look at your shaking hands. You do not deserve to be the last of your kind, because now when anyone thinks about your culture of peaceful monks, they will think about the monster inside you.

-x-

They are right to fear the monster, and you are right in wanting to control it. You seek out someone who promises to help you tame it. He wears the saffron of your people but smiles sadly when he says he is not one of them. He tells you about your guilt and your fear, your hope and your longing, and all the things you have to confront.

And it doesn't make sense. This isn't about you, this is about excising the monster inside you.

But as you gulp down the horrible banana onion juice he insists on feeding you, the truth hits you like a falling meteor. There is no monster, no other force inside you that magically appears when you get sad or angry.

There has only ever been you.

-x-

They are disappointed that you cannot summon the monster anymore, but you are just relieved. The anger keeps building inside you, like a roaring flame or a rising tide or a towering mountain or a howling wind. Its pitch and roll keeps you up at night, the names of all you have lost black marks against the inside of your skin.

You try to be as you have always been, but your smiles never reach your eyes, and the notes of your flute always sound out in minor key. They probably notice that something is wrong, but they don't say much except to push you towards your destiny.

Your temples are in ruins, and they think you weak for trying to hold on to them. They think you weak for forgiving, not knowing that the alternative, letting the monster have at them, would have been far worse. But it's okay now, the monster can't hurt anyone ever again. You can't hurt anyone ever again.

-x-

They tell you to kill him, and you want to say no. The voices of your friends, the voices in your head, the voice of the monster, they all scream at you to just end it. But a smaller voice, one that speaks from your heart, just whispers in quiet opposition.

The monster is you, has been this whole time, but you are not a monster. You are more than a living relic or a god given flesh. You are a person, the last of your kind, and they all live on in you, so for their sakes and yours, you say no.

"I'm not going to end it like this."

[zvtara-was-never-canon]

I believe Aang was right to end the war by sparing Ozai. But the only (imho) valid reason some people say he should have done it is because they wanted Aang to realize that pacifism is flawed.

I'm gonna disagree with you here, because a lot of the flaws fans talk about pacism and how ATLA in particular handles it as a concept are 99%:

1 - People being ignorant/racist and not knowing the difference between pacifist monks and "make love, not war" hippies.

2 - People being ignorant/racist and refusing to understand that there are different kinds of pacifism, even within the same cultures/people groups.

Aang is very clearly not the type of pacifist to go "You can NEVER react with ANY kind of violence towards someone else, even if it's to defend yourself/someone else" (which does exist, both IRL and in the show, just look at the owl spirit in "The Library").

We see him fight, and even be quite aggressive in said fights, in a lot of episodes. We also see he has no issues with invading the Fire Nation. More importantly, for the longest time the Avatar State was a result of him being pissed off enough at some kind of injustice that it makes him lose control, meaning he is very clearly affected by the horrors of war to the point of RAGE.

What makes him a pacifist is the way in which he doesn't WANT to lose control, doens't WANT go from aggressive to full on cruel, and, yes, wants to defeat his enemies, but not kill them.

And as I keep repeating, the show DOES make him question that last boundary he set for himself. He gets told by a past Avatar, who was also an air-nomad before anything, that, when there is such a large threat to everyone's life, including his own, he has to put aside his own spiritual needs and take a life - provided there isn't another option. But there was, so Aang took that, even after he decided that, yes, if there was no other way, he WOULD kill Ozai.

What people don't like is that Avatar, although questioning some types of pacifism, is far more interested in questioning the way people are WAY too eager to use violence to solve their issues, and, more importantly, expect someone else to get their hands bloody.

Fire Lord Sozin starts the war because he, according to himself at least, wants what's best for everyone and would like to share the Fire Nation's glory and great life with the other nations. He tries to do by invading foreign territories, killing his best friend, and commiting genocide. The fucker even has the dragons, an obvious Fire Nation symbol, to be hunted to extintion.

When Jet is angry at the Gaang for ruining his plan to free a village from the Fire Nation's control by blowing up a dam, Sokka asks "Who would be free? Everyone would be dead."

Zuko is banished because he spoke out against a Fire Nation higher-up's plan to use soldiers as fresh meat to bait the enemy into a more vulnerable position, thus assuring the nation's victory in that battle. He openly says "These men love and defend our nation, how can you betray them?"

When Zhao wants to kill the moon spirit, Iroh tries to stop him by pointing out that the Fire Nation needs the moon too (seriously, if it wasn't for Yue's sacrifice and Zhao's death, the Fire Nation would have had to create a word for "Big-ass wave that wrecks everything and kills people" like Japan did).

When Aang is deliberately trying to trigger the Avatar State because he doesn't want anyone else to die in the war, Katara, who had her life ruined by said war, is against it because while she opposes the Fire Nation, she cares about Aang and, in her own words, seeing him in so much pain and rage hurts her too. When Aang can't force himself to go nuclear, an Earth Kingdom ruler attacks Katara and makes both her and Aang, two very traumatized child soldiers, think he is going to kill her.

More importantly, when Ozai wants to burn down Earth Kingdom cities, he says "A new world will rise from the ashes, and I'll be supreme ruler of everything", to which Zuko concludes that, if they don't save the world before his dad takes over, there won't be a world to save.

And what does he say to Aang when he is about to kill him? "You're weak, just like your people. They didn't deserve to live in world, in my world."

Avatar does questions pacifism, and is critical of it on ocasion (again, watch "The Library"). But it's biggest theme is being critical of VIOLENCE, of resorting to it immediately without considering any other option and acting like it doesn't have long-lasting negative consequences, both to the person suffering it to the person inflicting it (see Azula's breakdown, Zuko's angry outburts only making him more miserable, Jeong Jeong growing to resent being a firebender, Zhao accidentally burning his own ships, etc)

The show is constantly highlighting that, yes, sacrifices need to be made for the greater good - but that CAN'T be normalized because it inevitably leads to a never-ending cicle of cruelty, as well as suffering to the one who has to do the dirty job (because lets not forget there's a big difference in how a soldier that is constantly in battle sees the war and how a king that just gives the orders but never goes into the actual combat sees the war).

The show embraces pacifism, despite knowing some versions of it are flawed, because the narratives themes are:

1 - EVERYONE is capable of great good and great evil

2 - No group has the right to impose it's own lifestyle onto others

3 - If everyone is either dead, mentally (and physically) scarred for life, or preparing to kill someone as revenge, then being killed by someone who wants to avenge that person, who will themselves be killed for revenge later, then the "greater good" you're sacrificing everything for doesn't actually exist because NO ONE will have a good life in a world that is stuck in the cicle of violence.

[aangarchy]

Ngl if ozai killed himself while in prison that would solve the debacle

I'm assuming you're referencing the debate on whether or not Ozai should have been killed in the finale? Because no it would not, the debate within the fandom (or at least that side of the fandom) is that Aang specifically should have killed Ozai. If Ozai killed himself, those people would still not be satisfied with this ending bc they'd still call Aang a coward.

It's just funny that these people watch a kid's cartoon that's rated PG6 and aired on Nickelodeon of all places and then expect the main character to brutally murder a man on screen.

And I know what some of you are gonna say: "tHeY ShOweD jET gEt KiLLed" no they did not, they didn't show him get hit by Long Feng, they only showed the aftermath. "AaNg PrObabLy KiLLed bEFoRe dUrINg a FigHt" yeah probably, but there is a difference between dealing out potentially lethal blows during fights for self defense and going into a fight to intentionally murder someone. There's a reason there's different charges for manslaughter and murder guys. Aang potentially killing people during fights for self defense would be manslaughter, but killing Ozai would have been murder.

For all of the people with this opinion: maybe look inward a bit and think good and hard about why you want to see a 12yr old child turn into a murderer on screen. Or why you want to see that type of violence in a kid's show. Genuinely it's weird.

[sirenalpha]

I'm not gonna get into it on the actual post because I don't want to start shit after how Aang posts have gone down and it's not like I saw it cuz it was tagged wrong or something

but it is wild to see someone say Azula's downfall was well written in atla and then also say what Zuko should have done and implying he was morally obligated to do so was not fight her and instead offer her love and support so he's in the wrong for accepting the agni kai challenge and fighting her

this blatantly ignores that Azula has manipulated and abused Zuko since childhood even though they also admit that Azula tried to kill him twice recently as a defense of Zuko's actions which is definitely some cognitive dissonance, but it's another instance I've seen of someone acting as if Zuko is incorrect or blinded by his father or otherwise mistaken when he says things like 'Azula always lies' despite the show demonstrating that actually Zuko is seeing her extremely clearly as she can even successfully manipulate him using the truth

Zuko does not owe Azula love and support just because they are blood relatives anymore than he owes Ozai especially not any time before the war has ended and she is still a threat to his personal safety and also to his goal of achieving peace seeing as she tried to kill Zuko twice leading up to the finale and she also came up with the plan to raze the Earth Kingdom

Giving her a hug isn't gonna fix that situation exactly the same as it wouldn't with Aang when it comes to Ozai

except this person thought Aang v Ozai was ultimately a triumph of pacifism over imperialism whereas the love and support vs fear and isolation of Zuko vs Azula is only pure tragedy not a victory of one ideology over another and I really have to wonder how this person came to that conclusion

Aang v Ozai is also a man to man battle same as Zuko v Azula and Katara v Azula which is not exactly pacifism

Aang doesn't kill Ozai in the end, and neither does Zuko or Katara kill Azula (instead she nearly kills Zuko) so again no different on the pacifism front

The major differences between these battles are that Zuko and Katara earned their abilities to defeat Azula whereas Aang relies on two deus ex machina and Zuko and Katara leave Azula upset but a pretty physically healthy state whereas Aang spiritually mutilates Ozai by removing his bending

in order for this interpretation to work that Aang v Ozai is a triumph of one ideology over another and Zuko v Azula is not, you have to ignore the massive narrative flaws in the Aang and Ozai fight that do not exist in the Zuko v Azula fight

There is a reason people still argue about whether or not Aang should have killed Ozai but even this person who argues Zuko did the wrong thing by Azula doesn't actually disagree with the text of the show, they still seem to want this agni kai to have happened exactly as it did where Zuko did show that love and support worked better than fear and isolation as he had Katara to tag in to finish the fight as well as other concepts like continuing to improve and learn after failure which eventually gave Zuko stability working better than genius perfectionism which caused Azula to spiral

another major facet this person relied on to argue for this position that Zuko was wrong to accept the agni kai was that Zuko could not see beyond the narrow worldview his father imposed on him through the golden child/scape goat dynamic he put upon Azula and Zuko

but the whole point of the show and having Zuko confront his father and leave to join the Avatar was to show exactly that, Zuko is the one character whose horizons broaden the most over the course of the show and only because Iroh's happens pre-series, it is insane to argue that Zuko cannot see past the abuse he suffered or outside the Fire Nation worldview after he has left the Fire Nation for the gaang

This person also claims that Zuko is so single minded about his goals that he even forgets empathy for others despite in season one somehow managing not to burn off Zhao's face in an agni kai and he even tries to rescue him from the ocean spirit despite fighting him literally the moment before so what character are you talking about because it's not Zuko

and then from this, they claim he cannot understand the tragedy of having to fight his own sister

this part is obviously up to more reader interpretation but you can take Zuko suggesting to Iroh in s2 that he forgive Azula is actually stemming from his genuine desire to not have to fight Azula given how quickly and vehemently Iroh shoots this down and that he does express genuine concern for Azula's fall in the southern raiders before she gets herself to the cliffside

I personally would say between the two of them, Zuko is more aware of the tragedy and genuinely sad about it, he is not portrayed as happy or gleeful when it's over whereas Azula has only been expecting this fight so she can secure her position on the thrown because she's second born and female and outright gloats after she's shot him with lightning

I see Zuko as resigned to this fight and trying to keep Katara safely out of it when he notices that Azula is slipping and takes the agni kai

what is not reader interpretation is to claim Zuko is being unfair and cruel to Azula to accept her agni kai challenge, Azula has always been the aggressor in their relationship and Zuko always the loser until the southern raiders where they have drawn even with each other, and as it has already been pointed out, Azula has recently tried to kill him twice!!

where is Azula's moral obligation to not try to mortally wound or manipulate her older brother? how is she not cruel and unfair for treating him this way and following in the footsteps of their father?

then there's an insane bit where they claim Zuko and Katara have a more simplistic view of morality than Aang who lost his shit on Katara in southern raiders who in the end didn't forgive Yon Rha and also didn't kill him and Zuko was there supporting her for the whole thing for her emotional benefit and closure regarding her mother like he had in his confrontation against Ozai whom he also didn't kill and Aang wasn't involved, Katara even tells him he was wrong

this part is just objectively untrue, Aang has the far more simplistic view on morality 

this person also goes on to a lot of reader interpretation for Azula's motives for bringing Zuko back to the Fire Nation, and I do agree I think that on some level Azula does care for Zuko, where I don't agree is that if the result is still harm for Zuko which is what returning to the Fire Nation was for him as it puts him back under the thumb of their abuser, it's still ultiamtely not good or kind to Zuko

Azula's actions are not made better by presuming she had good intentions born out of care for Zuko

The thing that really got me though was this quote:

"he allows himself to stoop to her level, and in fact only redeems himself through his sacrifice for katara"

again, Azula is the aggressor in their relationship and the one who issues the challenge in this instance

Zuko does not stoop to her level trying to stop her via agni kai because a hug is not gonna work, and it is arguably noble of him to try to protect Katara by accepting the challenge and trying to remove her as a target

But it doesn't work because Azula breaks the agni kai by attacking Katara who is a bystander and not a combatant which is never a level Zuko stoops to, it's a rat move Azula takes when she's put on her back foot and realizes she can't win a fair fight and can't goad Zuko into an emotional outburst

But the worst part is reframing Zuko's sacrifice as redemptive in terms of his relationship to Azula or as if he has done something wrong in accepting the agni kai or while fighting it

He hasn't, the poster argues that Zuko betrayed Azula in leaving the Fire Nation which I think you can argue for, but I do not believe that the show has Azula react as if she has been harmed by this action when she is shown as far more offended by Mai and Ty Lee's betrayal and again seems gleeful to be able to attack Zuko in the boiling rock, southern raiders, and finale and therefore could reasonably be interpreted to have expected this

His redemption isn't towards Azula or anything she represents like Fire Nation imperialism, Ozai's abuse, perfectionism 

It's a heroic sacrifice for Katara as a person he harmed personally in the s2 finale and as a victim of the Fire Nation's war by the Fire Nation's prince 

It's an utter and blatant misread of the show to demonize Zuko to uplift Azula and replace Katara as a victim of Fire Nation imperialism which Azula is straightforwardly not and removes those themes from the Zuko v Azula fight which this person praised in the more flawed Aang v Ozai fight

I am with and agree with anyone claiming Azula is a victim of abuse, she is, it is the direct cause of her breakdown

but it's straight up cognitive dissonance to act as if Zuko has done something grossly wrong in terms of ending the cycle of violence by participating in the agni kai with Azula but Aang v Ozai is a narrative master stroke for pacifism and ending violence when they both use the exact same amount of violence to achieve their ends: man to man combat, and Aang actually delivers the worse punishment to Ozai

and you strip away half of Azula's character if you ignore the real and blatant harm she caused Zuko and the rest of the gaang and try to pretend they are all equally victims of the same man because they are not

[the-badger-mole]

So I’m a Zukka shipper not a Zutara shipper and I’m not as anti-Aang as you are but I love following you because you aren’t afraid to engage with the flaws in Aang and the source material. Like it’s an amazing show but it’s not as perfect as people make it out too be and several of those flaws come from how Aang’s flaws are never truly addressed

Like people claim that Aang overcomes his running away impulse to defeat Ozai and I’m like - did we watch the same show? This boy left his friends scrambling to come up with a brand new plan on the fly with mere hours to go before the genocide of the earth kingdom because he had to run away and try and come up with a solution that didn’t compromise his 12-year-old understanding of his cultural values.

Anyway - thanks for your thoughts, I don’t agree with all of them but they are always refreshing

Thank you! Glad to have you on board, differences and all.

Honestly, most of my outright hatred for Aang came in the post series when he didn't change or grow in the comics and Bryke and all the Aang stans were out not only excusing his flaws, but treating them like he was right all along! I have literally had someone come to my page and tell me that Aang didn't have to grow because he was supposed to have a flat arc, and then also defend his worst moments because he was a child who didn't know better. Which is it? Is he wise beyond his years and the only voice in the show we should trust? Or is he not responsible for his actions because he's...12 (and still should know better)?

I'm going to blow your mind a little and say him disappearing the night before his fight with Ozai wasn't completely his fault. Then I'm going to fix it by saying, it was the fault of the writers because they knew they didn't want Aang to kill Ozai, but chose not to address it until they'd literally painted themselves into a corner where killing Ozai was the only choice that made sense. Because of their refusal to make Aang grow and learn and be an active participant in ending the war, Aang looked selfish, short-sighted, and criminally, dangerously naive, and the only way to get out of it was TWO dei ex machina. Why would they not show their hero contemplating his duty and wrestling with it before the second to last episode? No idea. But it is Bryke's fault that I hate their pet character so much

[loopy777]

Is Zuko a Gary Stu? A lot more people are becoming anti-Zuko especially after the comics. Thoughts?

Well, it depends how we're defining "Gary Stu." I tend to prefer a strict definition for it and "Mary Sue," that of a self-insert wish-fulfillment character. I also don't personally consider it to necessarily be a negative; one of my favorite fictional characters is George Lucas' Flash Gordon Gary Stu, Luke Skywalker.

But the common internet usages for the term typically translates to "character favored by the narrative and/or storyteller(s) to a degree that harms the story." So I'll address both definitions.

I don't think Zuko is any kind of wish-fulfillment character in the AtLA cartoon, nor do I think the narrative shows him any favoritism. In fact, I'd say the story goes out of its way to make things harder for Zuko than the basic character arc demands. It could've had him switch sides at the end of Book Earth, and I don't think there would have been much complaining. Likewise, the story could have had gAang come around to him a lot sooner in Book Fire, rather than spending entire episodes (and in Sokka's case a two-parter) reconciling him with the gAang one-by-one. I think his character arc is improved and given more impact by the desire to cover this extra rocky ground, although I also think 'The Boiling Rock' didn't need to be a two-parter and all of early Book Fire's filler episodes with the gAang should have been relocated to after Zuko's defection so that they'd have the added interest of showcasing the expanded gAang's new dynamic.

Ah, but then we get to the comics. I'm going to assume we're talking about Gene Yang's comics specifically, since Zuko has not appeared substantially in anything written by anyone else. It's easy to harp on these comics' use and treatment of Zuko, but I want to be clear that they're poorly written on pretty much every level. The dialogue is bad. Major plot threads are abandoned without comment. Everyone is mischaracterized. The humor is more juvenile than anything in the cartoon. What stories are told spin their wheels until they get wrapped up in a rush. There's bad, racist, pro-colonialism messages baked into them all. Etc and so on.

And yes, I do think these comics favor Zuko to their detriment and his. Gene Yang has admitted that Zuko is his favorite character in the cast. But even if he hadn't, we can see in 'The Promise' that the presentation has a lopsided preference for Zuko over Aang, the other main character of the story. Zuko is not portrayed as wrong for pressuring Aang to promise to kill him, despite Aang being uncomfortable with it and the whole idea being against Aang's major beliefs; compare that to the cartoon, where Zuko was portrayed as wrong and bullying in his attitude to try to get Aang to kill Ozai. In the matter of the former Fire Nation colonies, Aang and Zuko have opposing approaches, but rather than the story taking the stance that they need to compromise and mix'n'match their ideas, Zuko gets to utter the line, "I was right all along," while Aang has to be lectured by Katara, admit to being wrong, compromise with the Air Acolytes, and break off his relationship with his ghost mentor.

In 'The Search,' Zuko goes on to find his mother and learn her backstory, something that ends up not troubling or challenging him at all. She gives up her new identity to become his doting mother again and Zuko doesn't have a single doubt about it. He gets an adoring little sister in the form of Kiyi, despite her having a real problem with her mother choosing to become Ursa instead of keeping her familiar form. And his questionable treatment of Azula is not addressed; like Aang in 'The Promise,' she's the one who has to compromise (or in this case refuses to compromise).

You can see the pattern here of Zuko's presentation. This is where we can start to question if Zuko is Gene Yang's self-insert, but to do so, we would have to assume a lot of stuff about Gene Yang. For example, he breaks up Zuko's romance with Mai and then starts hinting at something with him and Suki; does that mean Gene Yang wants to date Suki? Then why bring Mai back so prominently in 'Smoke & Shadow' and then both go easy on her mistakes and break her up from Kei Lo at the end? Maybe Gene Yang wants a harem with both Suki and Mai, but if that's the case, then it's pretty odd that he ends his run on the comics with Zuko dating neither.

We could do the same for other aspects of Zuko's presentation (Does Yang want a tiny powerful Firebender as a little sister? Does he think all colonizers are awesome? Does he advocate denying first-amendment rights in times of danger? Is his favorite food to eat at winter time extra-spicy fire noodles?) But we'd probably run into similar questions we can't answer, leaving us to either assume way too much that would likely be wrong or admit that it doesn't matter.

Which brings us back to the much simpler idea of the character being favored beyond what is warranted. That helps with examining 'Smoke & Shadow,' where Zuko is actually portrayed as making some wrong choices for once in all of Yang's run of comics, like ordering his people's homes invaded and trashed on a vague hope that he'll find some information about Azula- but before that, he's somehow enlightened enough to make rainbow fire, and afterward, he solves everything with a quick apology to his people.

Usually, the narratives ignore Zuko's flaws and twist themselves into weird shapes to justify things. It's like Gene Yang started with the intentions of having Zuko make mistakes and grow over the course of the various stories, but then chickens out, so we're left with themes that feel incomplete or outright harmful. Zuko doesn't need to grow beyond his desire to have a Fire Nation elite (and their pet Earth Kingdom spouses and servants) rule over the former colonies forever, he gets to say, "I was right all along." He starts by locking Azula away in a straight-jacket, but then doesn't find a way to reconcile with her and treat her more humanely, because she goes fully homicidal and then runs away so he doesn't need to deal with her. But in 'Smoke & Shadow,' we get one example where, probably because Yang doesn't see it as that bad in the first, Zuko is allowed to temporarily be wrong before returning to a state of grace.

I think Gene Yang is trying to tell good Avatar stories. But, among his (many, many, many) mistakes, I think he's letting his favor for Zuko influence the stories he's trying to tell. He's trying to give his favorite character juicy dramatic material that lets him grow into an even more awesome character- but then he shies away from depicting his favorite in too harsh a light, ruining the whole thing.

The stories don't feel like they're going anywhere with him, despite him being a main character.

So if that fits with your definition of "Gary Stu," then yes, Zuko has become one in the comics. But he didn't start as one in the cartoon, and I don't think Gene Yang writes stories out of a desire for his favorite to marry Suki because Sword Girlfriend > Knife Wife.

Perhaps that's why he never got Maiko back together; he likes Mai too much to make her the one in the wrong, but then that would mean Zuko needs to learn and grow, and that can't be right. ;)

[sokkastyles]

Hi,

Hope you are doing well.

I wanted to ask you a question on TSR. If you were to change Aang's role in the episode, how would you do so?

For one, I think the lines comparing Aapa's kidnapping and the Air Nomad Genocide would either not be used or if used, would probably be used in a different context. And maybe the whole "Aang is the angel on Katara's shoulder" angle would be removed.

I would like your thoughts on this.

Y'all know I'm here for zutara, but let's say for the sake of this argument that this rewrite is meant to make KA seem more cohesive. How would I rewrite it? I'd use it as an opportunity for Aang and Katara to learn more about each other. As the episode is, it doesn't even support the idea that Aang is the angel on Katara's shoulder, because Aang is wrong about what choice Katara makes.

But! That isn't a bad thing! It doesn't have to be! Conflict in a relationship is good, if it helps the characters grow. If the show really wanted to introduce this conflict between Katara and Aang, there was a HUGE missed opportunity to have Aang acknowledge that sometimes confrontation is necessary, and that ignoring conflict won't bring peace. Then segue from there into Aang making an active choice about what to do about Ozai in the finale. I've said this before, but I think energy bending should have been tied into the Air Nomads in some way, so that Aang also gets some kind of closure with his people. And maybe a flashback to that moment when Gyatso also had to experience the fact that sometimes you have to fight to keep the peace. You know the one that's alluded to in episode 3 when we see Gyatso surrounded by FN soldiers he presumably killed. Have Aang realize that Katara made a choice to keep the peace just as his old mentor did. In the process, Aang also is able to realize that his love for Katara also means letting her make her own choices and trusting her with those choices. Aang is able to develop a more healthy attachment to Katara, and a more healthy spiritual outlook overall. He can still get energy bending, but only by acknowledging the risks involved, instead of pulling it out of his back pocket in the last second as a gotcha to the audience.

When people say that energy bending is a deus ex machina, they are mostly referring to the way it's revealed to the audience only after Aang decides to use it. Aang went into the fight with Ozai still undecided about how to end the fight, which in hindsight makes absolutely no sense because he had already learned energy bending at that point. So what I would do is give him energy bending earlier, tie it into the southern raiders and Aang's journey of confronting his anxiety over how to reconcile his pacifism with his duty as the Avatar. Have some reason why Aang would be hesitant to use it, but let the audience know it's there. Have Aang make a conscious choice to use it, still not sure whether using it means he is strong or weak, but being more okay with that uncertainty because of what he learned from Katara, from Gyatso, from Zuko, from all his friends.

[atla-recluse]

Throne-Stealing Where?

It's always hilarious to me when I see/hear someone calling Azula anything along the lines of "power-hungry despot".

Hungry for power? More like hungry for family/relationship harmony and rules. If anything, she gives power away to others! She helped Zuko get back the throne and (conditional) fatherly appreciation that he so desired, with her only request being that he side with her and their nation (that's not asking for very much, from her POV, mind you)! She gave Mai a higher position than even her noble parents had and a chance to become a Fire Royal Consort through marriage to her long-time crush, Azula's brother, Prince Zuko! She (albeit after first forcefully taking her away from her preferred surroundings) gave Ty Lee another, more exciting way (based on how much fun we see Ty Lee having) to feel different/special and like "her own person"! She never used more force than was necessary when fighting her adversaries and only went "too far" when the situation seemed to call for it due to the risk to her person if she did nothing! (Which may have been a soul-destroying choice for everyone that was there [except Zuko]. Even Azula is implied to have felt like a monster for killing Aang, during that conversation they had on Ember Island!) A 14 year old felt forced to kill, people! That affects the one doing it, too! Why does next to no one ever ask what Aang was even planning on doing once in the avatar state while they were in the catacombs? Especially from the POV if one of his enemies? Play hopscotch and do super gymnastics? Doubt it!

Now, please correct me if I'm wrong but, wouldn't a despot be preoccupied with looking for ways to change the surrounding cultures that they come into contact with? Instead, after she leaves Ba Sing Se, for example, she keeps it exactly as she found it; with the only change being the new Earth Kingdom-originated ruler she places in charge. The people of the EK didn't have anything change for them for better or worse, as far as I can recall. Yes, we do see her trying to break through the wall of Ba Sing Se with that more advanced technology and she is imperialistic (which is something wrong in itself and which can be very brutal). But that's not automatically the same as being a dictator or snatching up bits of power from others in any way she can. And in the end she conquered it by instead using the true, least offensive (in multiple ways) means possible.

As for that period just before the final agni kai we see in show, where she was going to be crowned? She was granted that title by the current Fire Lord aka her father, after her back-on-the-clock brother defected (so willingly left).

u·surp

/yo͞oˈsərp/

verb

take (a position of power or importance) illegally or by force. "Richard usurped the throne"

Based on that dictionary definition, how can she be usurping Zuko's position if, again, the FL himself is giving it to her and if Zuko gave it up? She's literally getting it "legally" (the FL is the law) and without using any force!

Now of course there's a rabbit hole argument that some may try and use by saying that because Ozai himself took his brother's throne without Iroh's consent (was it without his consent? Iroh seems to never be in a rush to be FL), that Azula getting the throne is therefore usurpation. Ummm, I hate to nip that point in the bud so soon but, Zuko is Ozai's son, not Iroh's. That means that (assuming the child of the by-birth king/queen is the only one that should gain the throne next if the king/queen is unable or unwilling) based on that logic, neither teenager should be allowed to sit on the throne.

Kinda hard to usurp a title from someone who "legally" shouldn't have it either, right? Oh Iroh, if only you'd just done your damn job.

All that being said, literally all this girl was doing is finding ways to handle her job and fulfill the tasks of it that she's been given at such an inappropriate age, while amassing the least amount of damage possible. And along the way she tried to extend a hand to her family and friends too, almost as a sort of "sorry for the inconveniences/thank you for your cooperation and loyalty". (She may have even learned some things about herself and others along the way—or could have, if she had been allowed just one more minute of screen time and the writing choice of change that the other Fire Nation kids got.)

Yet somehow many people come away from this show with the idea that she's trying to purposely take control of or harm as many people as possible in every way possible without any care at all for others' wants. I know at least two characters that that partly or fully applies to, and neither of them are Azula.

[queeraang]

if i see one more "lol aang should've killed ozai" post somewhere i'm gonna mcfreaking lose it, so here we go

Why Aang Killing Ozai is a Garbage Concept and You Have Prestige TV Brainrot

Whenever people bring aang up in conversations of "protagonists who really should have killed their villains" a la batman i feel like they watched a different show than me. the whole point of his arc is that he is someone who is peaceful and avoidant being forced into the role of a decisive fighter.

He is not a warrior, when the execs tried to ask for aang in battle armor to sell as a toy bryke turned it into a bit. he doesn't like to fight, he wants to do diy extreme sports and pet animals. the airbending technique that he invents is the *air scooter* and the first thing he does with it is turn it into a game with the other monks.

He mastered the bending art that's all about indirect attacks and evasiveness and said "actually I think I could figure out a way to hit less". It would be wildly out of character for him to throw his pacifist culture (which is deeply important to him) out the window to enact "justice" for a war he was never actually a part of.

also, to bring it back to batman, the argument is usually "well the joker gets out of prison and kills again" which, fair. but aang finds a non lethal way to neutralize the threat of ozai. iroh says outright, he could kill ozai himself, no problem but that wouldn't fix things. the solution to a century of murder is not "more murder but it's good this time".

aang was even perfectly set up to kill ozai after unlocking the avatar state again. but he snaps himself out of it because he doesn't want a repeat of the north pole (aka the one time he did kill people and was fucking traumatized by the experience??). don't get me wrong, ozai stinks on fucking ice, but there's something incredible about the final conflict being resolved because aang is able to break away from a thousand lifetimes of righteous fury, look at this man who has done horrible things, who is in the middle of trying to wipe out an entire nation like his grandfather wiped out aang's... and give him mercy.

i think that people are too used to the "you've wronged me and now you will die" grimdark revenge plotlines of morally grey protags so they misunderstand what aang's actual strengths are. because he gets told "hey the entire world is literally on your shoulders, everyone you love is dead, people are dying constantly and a lot of them blame you because you didn't fulfill a job you never asked for that has only made your life worse since you got it" and then somehow not only does he do that absolute shit sandwich of a job before he hits puberty, but he manages to do it while still be kind and loving and optimistic.

tldr; if you're complaining that the 13yo sole survivor of a genocide wasn't more excited to kill a man, you're the problem dude

[bluespiritshonour]

I’m so curious what’s going on in the Revenant au!

Thanku for the ask 😊

At first I thought it would be the Blue Spirit haunting Zuko—but in true horror fashion you won't be able to get “rid of him”—anymore than you can get rid of Tui and La (we all know how that went down) or, say, Koh. They're kinda like, idk, nature spirits? Not all of them, but you get the point?

And I drew Zuko getting shot at and I put him in white so I decided I'd just kill off Ozai and he's exactly the kind of bitch that would come back to haunt his kids.

He just wants to erase his bloodline at this point and neither Zuko nor Azula have any kids so it's just the two of them. He starts with Zuko either because he's the firstborn or because he hates him that much—like, he definitely doesn't care for Azula, but he doesn't love her either and would definitely try to kill her too—but Zuko needs to be out of the way first.

And Zuko's like “this fucker can't leave well enough alone even in death.” And he knows the moment he's dead, it's Azula's turn. So he sort of—holds onto Ozai like “It can work both ways, old man.”

And he just has the sort of willpower to pull it off. He just... refuses to bite it. Despite ghost!Ozai’s best attempts. And now he can't redirect his attention to Azula either because Zuko just won't let him go.

I thought about this especially because Azula has moments when she seems to care about Zuko in the show, but Zuko reciprocating it? Not so much. So, let him be a good brother for once.

As for Mai, she's gifted in that she's always been able to see spirits and ghosts and all the other stuff. But her parents hated that and tried to hide it so she never talked to anyone about it. She's gotten used to it at this point, as if ghosts and the rest are fixtures; part of the landscape.

And then Ozai starts haunting Zuko and she's like “yeah, I can see this bitch buzzing around like flies.”

Piandao is also someone who can see the otherworldly stuff and he's just... So much better adjusted than either Zuko or Mai. Anyways, he suggests that Mai should help him help Zuko. And it's Zuko so of course Mai agrees.

And in the course of it she and Piandao strike a friendship and it's lovely. And with the war over and her parents off her back she realises that she actually enjoys this stuff and soon enough she's shaking down every non-corporeal being in existence and they hate her. She discovers Koh and it's like she's found a new hobby.

I might just give her a guardian spirit for safety reasons. I haven't thought of it yet.

She and Piandao would make for a real good pair in that they'd flip the dynamic where the apprentice is taciturn and the master is... not exactly cheerful, but Piandao strikes me as a very normal™ man. Y'know?

(I'm kinda trying to project them into Sanyeong and Prof. Yeom from Revenant; except that here, Mai's not the one who has ghost problems, Zuko is).

There's so much potential to the spirits in ATLA. I'm kinda sad I couldn't work the Blue Spirit into it; Ozai just fits better. I might try to shoe-horn him in though. Idk. I love to force things.

But I'd have loved more spirit world stuff. Aang facing Koh is one of my favourite episodes. The execution was GREAT!

P.S. I actually had the Blue Spirit’s silhouette behind Zuko and it was kinda lame. I don't like to think the dark water spirit is humanoid but I'm not creative enough for anything else so it was just... Zuko in the theatre mask. 🥴 Ozai even looks better/more sinister.

[zvtara-was-never-canon]

i'm not a zvtara shipper in any significant way, but sometimes i can't help but see aang as slightly hypocritical. i get that he managed to let go of katara in CoD, but i don't understand how exactly he let go of her but was still super into her in all of s3. what does "you need to let her go" even means? also, i get that he doesn't want to kill ozai at the end of the series, but what about the times he hurt people in ways that would result in deadly injuries? (i don't hold the end of S1 against him since he was being used as vessel by the ocean spirit, i'm mostly talking about the avalanche he caused on the northern air temple episode)

When Aang leaves the Guru, despite knowing he won't master the Avatar State at all if he left at that point, he did it because he literally ahd a vision of Katara being in danger. When he is letting go of his attachment in that season finale, he gives one last glance at Katara, who is in the middle of a battle, because he knows that the only way to truly help her would be to trust that she will be okay and focus on preventing the Fire Nation from winning.

On the episode "The Awakening", when Aang is panicking and wanting to reveal to the world that he is alive and fight the Fire Lord without a plan, he goes alone. On the day of the eclipse, he kisses Katara, but they go their separate ways in the battle, instead of him being close by in case she needs him.

The "learn to let her go" thing has NEVER been about him no longer being allowed to be in love with her, or even a close friend, and it was never a fully black and white issue either - that's why we see IROH, the guy who lost his son because he chose his quest for power over thinking as parent and thus keeping him away from the battlefield, telling Aang that he is right to choose love above everything. Why we have Katara be the one to literally bring Aang back from the dead. Why the Guru himself explicitly uses Aang's love for Katara as a way to make him strong enough to deal with the grief of losing his people, and why he says "Learn to let her go" not "Forget about her" (there's a reason the cliche of all cliche lines is "If you love someone, set them free" - attachment existing, by itself, it's not a bad thing, but holding onto it ALL the time can get toxic).

Hakoda let his children go when left to fight in the war, doesn't mean he no longer cares or shouldn't care. Iroh let Zuko go in book 3 because at that point he had understood that his nephew needed to follow his own path, doesn't mean he no longer cared or shouldn't have cared anymore. Why is Aang the only one being held to an absurd standard of "If you understood that you can't always be with the people you care about because you got other responsibilities besides just being their friend, that means you're supposed to never want them around even when that wouldn't negatively affect anything"?

As for Aang's supposed "fatal victims" - this is a cartoon that operates on cartoon physics. The Omashu slide/mail system on episode 5 should have left the heroes permanently paralyzed from waist/neck down, assuming they didn't full on die because the human body simply can't survive a fall like that. Firebenders don't burn themselves when practically holding the flame they're generating, nor when they literally breathe fire. We've seen some of the bad guys survive falling down from an airship and hitting the ocean, in full armor, and be completely unharmed.

The show had casualties - but it was always highlighted a fatal injury instead of glossing over it. There's a reason the showrunners were surprised fans ever thought there was even the slightest chance Jet had not died. In a world where people survive absurd stuff, the show suddenly changing the tune to go "Actually this one screwed over some people" is the ONE way to know there actually was a death, and these situations are still the exception, not the rule.

"Oh but Nichya, it was an avalanche!" yes, much like the one in Mulan - a cartoon that is famous for going "Ya know what, the bad guys didn't die despite being buried in the snow long enough that all the good guys left, and only after a major plot event." It's almost like animation does that kind of stuff all the time...

You can't apply real world logic/physics to a cartoon, and it's very weird that the fandom only feels like doing so in the explicit attempt to create a reason to hate on Aang because they don't like that a pacifist remained a pacifist.

[aangarchy]

Shaking my head at some Twitter comments that said Aang was like a child in ATLA... I feel like someone should have told them by now. 🙄

It's so funny bc i retweeted someone that said something along the lines of: "every criticism of Aang can be explained by the fact that he's 12 and a monk"

"Aang should have killed Ozai and he didn't" he's a child and a pacifist monk

"Aang has indirectly killed so many people with his bending why is killing Ozai such a problem" idk why y'all have such a problem seeing the difference between intention to kill and pure self defense. Asking a 12yr old to murder someone is a LOT.

"Aang ran away from home when he could have stopped the genocide so it's his fault" idk what you expect a 12 yr old airbender to do when even a master like Gyatso couldn't hold them back. The Avatar state would not have helped him.

"Aang kissed Katara without consent" he's a child, and it clearly was an important lesson to learn. He learned and didn't do it again.

"He's annoying and childish" he's a 12yr old. Have you ever met a 12yr old?

"He refuses to take responsibility." For what? Running away? He literally takes responsibility for that within the show. He literally says before the fight at the northpole i wasn't there when the Fire Nation attacked my people. I'm gonna make a difference this time

"He pushed his love onto Katara" and Katara ate that shit right up. Kisses him on the cheek, calls him a hero, says he's proud of him, kisses him in the finale. Katara knows what she wants, and she lets him know when she doesn't want it.

I don't know what more these people want from a 12yr old. He sure does behave and make decisions like a 12yr old. Gee, wonder why.

[aboutiroh]

I'm not sure if this is something that has been discussed before, but the pacing of book 3 has always bothered me a little (not enough to consider the writing as less than phenomenal, but still). There's actually a few things that I think could have been handled better and I just grouped them under 'pacing issues' as an umbrella term, even though it's not always the most fitting term. Most of these aren't even really issues, but just my personal preference.

For instance, I always thought it's a pity we didn't get more episodes with the Gaang after Zuko joined the team. I love the fieldtrip episodes, but we barely got to see team avatar travelling together (and Toph didn't even get a fieldtrip!). There's a lot of untapped potential there and we're free to explore that ourselves of course, but having more canon storylines would've been nice and I think it wasn't impossible. (This is a segue into issue nr. 1):

Book 3 spends too much time preparing for the invasion.

The Gaang spends half a season to prepare for the invasion (they mostly just travel to the meeting point). This makes no sense to me as we, the viewers, know that Azula knows all about it (as King Kuei so nicely tells her about those plans in 2x19 "The Guru"). (Which btw, he could have mentioned to the Gaang after learning that Azula was not a Kyoshi warrior, but I'll let that slide as Kuei is canonically a useless person).

They build up towards a fight that we know is doomed to fail and that on itself is okay, but that moment could've happened earlier in the season (not so early that Zuko doesn't have the time to finally understand what his destiny truly is). If the invasion failed earlier in the season, Zuko (and Suki) would have joined earlier. Many episodes in early book 3 could easily take place after the invasion (thinking of "The painted lady" or "The puppetmaster", maybe(?) "Sokka's master" and "The runaway", though some elements would have needed altering, e.g. the Sparky Sparky Boom Man subplot (I say we get rid of it entirely)).

Conversely, there's one episode, or rather conflict, that should have occurred before the invasion. (Segue to issue nr. 2!):

2. What even was the invasion plan, really?

After the invasion fails, we learn during a beach party that the Fire Lord is planning to literally burn the entire world when the comet arrives, so the Gaang's new plan of discretely hiding and training until the comet passes turns out to be pretty pointless. Aang suddenly has to face the Fire Lord much earlier and more importantly, when Ozai's at his most powerful, which is less than ideal. So the combat training recommences. It is at this point that Aang suddenly realizes he's not willing to kill Ozai. He's of course right to feel conflicted about it, and it's understandable that his friends don't completely understand just how important this is for him. It's a necessary and significant moment in the show, but it's just strange that they haven't had the discussion before.

Aang knows he has to defeat the Fire Lord pretty early on. Throughout book 1 and book 2 he's preoccupied with learning to bend the elements (when he's not riding animals or escaping imprisonment or facing whatever other problem the plot throws his way). It's too early to think about the technicalities of what that defeat exactly entails because priorities, I totally get it. But by book 3, they have a pretty elaborate plan to invade the Royal Palace. It's just never explained how they will defeat the Fire Lord. Hakoda explains the plan as follows:

The eclipse only lasts eight minutes, not enough time for the whole invasion. And the Royal Palace is heavily guarded by firebenders. So that's where we'll need the eclipse's advantage the most. When this is finished, the Avatar will have defeated the Fire Lord. We will have control of the Fire Nation capital, and this war will be over!

Assuming the plan was not to kill Ozai (because Aang would have felt conflicted about that), how exactly would Aang defeat the Fire Lord in those eight minutes? Was he just supposed to knock him unconscious and then immediately put him in a cooler cell? If that's the case, I didn't see them carry one around. Aang had thought about the possibility of not coming back from the battle (as he tells Katara just before leaving), so it would only make sense for him to consider the possibility that it could be Ozai who would not make it out alive because of him.

[spop-romanticizes-abuse]

I would like to share my perspective about Horde Prime’s dinner scene and showing colonization via food in SPOP’s final season. 

Horde Prime is further seen as evil for serving food from a planet that he colonized and destroyed, and it’s supposed to be a thoughtful and deep but subtle insight into Horde Prime as a villain who should be condemned. Catra has no problem eating this food, and I think the writers meant this to signify that she wouldn’t initially succumb to Horde Prime’s mind games like Glimmer, who starts hyperventilating in horror (You know, before Horde Prime told her that she’s not even a player in his game, but with the writers’ favoritism of character and shipping, as per usual, with Catra clawing the table and that talk about “elevated heart rate” and “dilated pupils” for Adora when she was shown on Horde Prime’s live robot feed).

It really reads to me that, like Horde Prime, Catra feels no weight of guilt from taking lives and what those lives once owned (unlike Glimmer, who actually cares about the colonization of her planet, as well as that planet that was destroyed by Horde Prime), as a fellow colonizer and destroyer. Like, it’s not because she has a better poker face than Glimmer, it’s because she literally does not care, and thus does not react to Horde Prime’s statement. 

This “sensitivity” to colonization via food is another double standard. This perspective of colonization and consequence is completely blind to Catra, despite it being highlighted via Horde Prime; I am specifically referring to when Catra joins the others in the spaceship to eat the food that Glimmer said she and Angella used to make together. Catra does not deserve to partake in anything positive pertaining to Angella’s memory: she attempted to destroy the Moonstone, colonize Bright Moon, and killed Angella. She does not deserve to eat the food that Angella used to make with Glimmer, and she does not deserve to live in Bright Moon (a disgusting implication shown in Adora’s supposed dream of the future).

That’s all for now 💞.

i never thought of this but yes, that describes catra's character perfectly. we only see her feeling mildly guilty about the way she treated adora, scorpia and entrapta. we never see her considering the weight of what she did in the horde, the lives she ruined. she never cared about the civilians and she certainly did not care about what horde prime did to them, because at their core, they were the same kind of person. controlling, apathetic and cruel.

again, we can take zuko for comparison here. zuko isn't just guilty about trying to capture aang. he is shown to be very clearly guilty about the way he harmed other innocent civilians and about what the fire nation did as a whole. even though he didn't take part in the war directly, he still takes responsibility for what the fire nation did. his confrontation with ozai says it all. he could have just been like "i'm leaving to join the avatar" but he stayed and pointed out the effects of the war and how the fire nation has brainwashed its citizens into thinking that they were doing something good.

and there's build up to this. throughout the series, zuko meets and interacts with various civilians, all with their own story of how the fire nation ruined their lives. song shows him a scar she got during an attack, jet confides in him about how his family was killed when he was little, lee (the little boy in zuko alone) is almost recruited into the army forcibly, just like his brother was. ATLA does a fantastic job of showing us how war affected everyone, not just the heroes and villains. and through this, zuko's conscience is unraveled more and more until he decides to take a stand.

meanwhile, spop has the theme of war as a pretty backdrop. they give no importance to it whatsoever and catra, who did way more damage than zuko ever did, isn't even shown to be guilty of partaking in the war. she doesn't have to answer to how she conquered salineas or how she invaded a village in s1, nothing. it really makes me wonder what the civilians in spop thought of her. is it just "oh she's she-ra's girlfriend now so i guess we can't say anything"?

[kitkatopinions]

So since you're rewatching A:TLA, do you have any problems with how Jet and Hama, victims of colonialism & genocide, were depicted?

Every time there's a 'revolutionary revolts too close to the sun' plot, I have a 'this again' exasperated reaction and on the general whole, I think that less people ought to make them. More often than not, these plotlines fail and are bad and what they're saying winds up feeling like propaganda. However, on the whole, I think that ATLA does it about as well as I've ever seen.

Please keep in mind that I haven't seen the later seasons of ATLA in a few years, so there might be things I'm not remembering specifically with the Hama episodes. I've never really analyzed this show to the extent that I've analyzed other things, as well, so... Yeah.

But, when looking at these sorts of revolutionary revolts too much plots, there are a couple of questions that I feel are worthwhile to ask:

Are the victims actually treated as victims and is their suffering given weight and understanding? Have the mains also suffered at the hands of this oppression?

Is the show itself and the main characters interested in opposing and dismantling the system of oppression?

How does the show portray violence against oppressors in general?

What is the revolutionary doing that makes them an enemy? How is that conflict articulated?

Are the antagonistic victims treated worse or better than the actual oppressors?

How much time is devoted to fighting revolutionaries who revolt too much compared to the actual oppressors?

I remember the conflict with Hama less than the conflict with Jet since I just watched the first season, so I'll be using Jet as an example, whereas I can't really speak much on Hama.

Jet's suffering at the hands of the Fire Nation is acknowledged and sympathized with, both with Katara and iirc also gone into in the episode where Jet meets Zuko. In fact, Katara compares her situation with Jet's because they've both lost parents to the Fire Nation, and Aang lost his entire people to them. This isn't a case where the main characters are less affected or not at all affected by the oppression that the revolutionary who revolts too much faced. The entire show is built around saving the world from the oppressors and colonizers and restoring peace. The very premise of the show is that Aang and his friends must help dismantle the system of oppression in place. If this was a case of these revolutionaries reacting to their oppression, but the mains and the story not really caring about ending the oppression (or even worse, fighting to maintain the system,) then it would be an instant no from me. But the story is actually about ending the oppression. The show in general doesn't portray violence against oppressors as bad. The gaang uses force when necessary even to the point of injuring people iirc, and the soldiers fighting the Fire Nation are also portrayed as heroes point blank period despite the fact that they're most likely willing to kill even though we don't actively see it (in a kid's show, this is more than fair.) Even though Aang himself wants to follow the strict 'no killing' policy of his people, the others want to kill the Fire Lord and they're never portrayed as bad or even really in the wrong for wanting it and working towards it if I remember correctly. And even then, Aang was more or less coached by other Avatars of the past to kill regardless with them talking about how they should have or did kill for the greater good, and Aang was fully set to tragically disregard his own moral code to do what had to be done until he realized there was a way for him to defeat Ozai without comprising what he believed in (also not bad in a kid's show if you ask me.) What made Jet different from the violence of the mains was that Jet wasn't only hurting the soldiers and leaders of the Fire Nation in order to free people from oppression, he was actively taking the stance that civilians and children (and I think also innocent Earth Kingdom civilians but I could be misremembering,) were a necessary causality to defeating the Fire Nation. Jet - and I believe Hama - were both portrayed as people who had been deeply hurt but who fell into the trap of dehumanizing their oppressors that resulted in them no longer caring who deserved what punishment, or what would cause the least amount of harm. Instead of being villainized for hurting the people who hurt them, they were acknowledged as having gone too far and hurting even children who had no part in the horrors that had happened to them. Jet is treated with much more sympathy and given much better treatment than Ozai. Despite the fact that Jet dies, he's given not only ample sympathy before he does, but a full 'redemption arc' for lack of a better word. He regrets the fact that he hurt innocent people, he's forgiven, and ultimately recognized as a hero. The fact that his early portrayal included him learning not to dehumanize the enemy to the point of killing children didn't mean that he wasn't still a freedom fighter who wound up doing good, it didn't mean he was unforgivable, it didn't mean the heroes wanted him to die, and in the end his actual death was a tragedy. The only reason Ozai didn't die - in contrast - was because of Aang's desire to not compromise his principles and to carry on the traditions of his people. Even Ozai's own son wanted him to die. When he was defeated, Ozai was actively made fun of. He spent the rest of his life in prison. He was treated as an evil vile man. Fighting Jet and Hama and talking about their crimes is devoted to literally two episodes out of sixty two, whereas the whole premise of the show is defeating Ozai. Not much time is expanded to talking about revolutionaries who go too far.

Again, it's been a long time since I've seen the Hama episode, so I can't speak much to that (and if Hama was more mishandled, it makes the Jet storyline feel different.) The problem with ATLA I feel is... Why did they have to have episodes focused on revolutionaries revolting too much in the first place? Why did two white men who have been criticized for their carelessness in portraying Asian cultures feel the need to write it? I don't know. A part of me is of the opinion that it's not wrong to talk about how dehumanization of the enemy isn't going to help anything and can lead to just more active harm. For another example, I don't feel like I have a problem with President Coin in the Hunger Games being a bad guy and even less of a problem with Katniss's struggles with her and Gale's different moral codes when it comes to Capitol Citizens. I do think that maybe they went a little hard on it, like they had to make Jet really bad to try and ensure that the people who get angry at anything that isn't revenge based excessive punishment wouldn't get angry at them. But those people are always going to have a problem with it no matter how it's portrayed, and it made Jet feel a little unrealistic. I can acknowledge that they should've made it something that maybe was less pre-meditated, or that it could involve citizens but not so decimating an entire town... I don't know.

But I personally do not believe in cold-blooded revenge based violent punishment - especially collective punishment - if it's at all avoidable. However, another part of me is just sick of seeing it in general and is confused about why it has to be said all the time. Writers invent these characters so they can talk about the evils of revolting too much, and it's like... Why? What value did it really have to Avatar? It didn't do much to set up the future conflict of Aang not wanting to kill the Fire Lord, and it didn't do much to establish Sokka's morals imo. So what was it doing there? Just to establish that Fire Nation citizens don't all deserve to die? They do well enough portraying that throughout the whole show. So why would they need the Jet conflict? I go back and forth. There's a conversation to be had about whether or not Jet's storyline or Hama's storyline needed to happen, and I think the end conclusion is that it didn't need to be made. But in regards to Jet in particular, I think it was done about as well as a person can do that kind of storyline. As I said, I haven't seen the Hama episode in a hot minute though, so that one could be a lot worse than the Jet one and I'm just not remembering.