#and you all can continue to interpret zuko and azula's relationship

[xwonderlandresidentx]

For me the idea of Zuko and Azula reconciling is very personal, because I grew up in a similar (albeit, far less severe) family situation, as the screw up scapegoat older sibling with the obviously favored golden child little brother who bullied me, and we were able to work things out, and became very close.

As a kid, the way things ended between Zuko and Azula was incredibly cathartic, but now as an adult, it's deeply saddening to me, and just... doesn't feel right.

Now, I think it's important to note that in the situation with my brother, he was the one who took the initiative to patch things up with me. He apologized, corrected his behavior, and never put any pressure on me to forgive him because he recognized that he was in the wrong (and that our parents spoiled him, and pitted us against each other). And in an Azula redemption scenario I absolutely believe that it should be the same way. It would not be Zuko's responsibility to try and work things out with and/or "fix" his sister, it should be all on her. Part of the reason I haven't read any Azula redemption fics in years is because so many of them don't make Azula really take responsibility, and have Zuko do all the emotional leg work, or blame him for their relationship being bad in the first place.

But, while the ending we got with them is narratively satisfying, and a victory in it's own right, to me personally it feels incomplete. Not just because I want Azula to be redeemed, but just as much, if not more so because I want Zuko to get what I got. He's outgrown his need for his family's validation, but he deserves it. He deserves an apology, and he deserves the relief, satisfaction, and joy of seeing Azula follow his example by putting in the work to grow.

it’s time for me to admit that i find a post-canon in which azula and zuko don’t reconcile just as (and maybe more) cathartic than what seems like a large fandom consensus that the only happy/cathartic ending is for them to be on good terms down the road. 🤷🏻‍♀️

[supremechancellorrex]

Avatar in my head and I was thinking about Maiko and Mai.

Now, Mai's character arc in Avatar, from my interpretation, is rediscovering herself and her wants and personhood that has been stripped from her as a noblewoman part of a family that submitted to the Fire Nation Imperialist structure and Ozai. We see in Book 2 set up for this. Mai in early Book 2 does not resist Azula's will aside from brief sparks of rebellion where she isn't present. "Of course not, Princess Azula" she notes formally and apathetically when Azula asks if she "minds", knowing she has no choice as Azula 'just' ponders if Mai's hostage brother is worth an Earth King like Bumi. Mai is always aware that Azula, as Princess in an authoritarian nation where the Fire Lord is God, can have her executed and her family punished. The unequal power dynamic is surprisingly consistent in the show.

Mai can't even insult Azula back in Zuko Alone as a child. She just lets Azula put an apple on her head (as Ty Lee loyally sniggers along), set it on fire, and when Zuko pushes her into the fountain to put it out, Mai, drenched, glares and says "You two are such… ugh". We know Mai can have an acid tongue, yet her fear of Azula prevents her from using it. Her most rebellious act in Book 2 is when she says "She can shoot all the lightning she wants at me. I am not getting in that wall sludge juice". Mai actually has self-respect, but she can't express it in the presence of greater threats, meanwhile Ty Lee merely says "Come on! Azula said we have to follow them", because Ty Lee follows Azula's will even when she isn't there.

Even when Mai gets with Zuko, she falls into a subservient role. When Azula interrupts Maiko's smooching, lazily dismissing Mai with "Oh Mai, Ty Lee needs help untangling her braid" Mai responds quickly "Sounds pretty serious" with only a touch of dryness and leaves, only able to muster throwing Azula a dirty look a split second after passing her. However, this little ember of rebellion will grow.

Mai has continued difficulty understanding Zuko's anger and reactiveness, or how to even function in a relationship. She initially tries to joke in a dismissive fashion, as if saying 'ugh, feelings are lame, right?', but that would only work with Azula logically. The Beach episode is a key Mai episode. She continues to be emotionally repressed, to the point Zuko, Ty Lee and Azula comment on it. However, Zuko's insecurity at her talking to Ruon-Jian to the point he physically removes him from her presence, and his accusative comments like "You like him, don't you?", also makes Mai feel a little boxed in, controlled, and that does irritated her given her history. However, at the Beach's emotional narrative climax, Mai is able to finally express herself at the rest of the group (Azula included) for the first time, telling them to "Leave her alone" and that she's "still mad". After Zuko explosively reveals the extent of his pain and confusion, we see a 'smoothing' effect on her attitude. She realises her and Zuko are dealing with pain in different ways and his way is understandable.

Mai says softly, "I know one thing I care about, I care about you". This is the one thing Mai can grasp in the confusion. This is where Mai betraying Azula becomes inevitable. We see Mai continue to be more supportive with Zuko, more actively trying to cheer him up in Nightmares and Daydreams with big smiles and jokes while Zuko remains shut down over the War meeting and is acting irritated and repressed due to his family trauma. When Zuko later leaves and joins the Avatar, Mai is hurt and angry, which shows in the Boiling Rock, saying "All I get is a letter? You could have at least looked me in the eye when you ripped out my heart". They have a tense conversation, but it's their most honest one. I actually think Mai already made up her mind in this scene to support Zuko over Azula, and she doesn't quite realise it. "Save it? You're betraying your country" she accuses, to which Zuko replies, resolute, "That's not how I see it", and in response Mai just folds her arms and turns her head away in an almost defeat.

I find it very telling she doesn't respond. It's because she realises Zuko is more passionate and resolute about his mission than she is hers. It's because she knows the Fire Nation under its current authority is not exactly great. Sometimes in life we fall into a box and we need someone to give us that little push so we can realise we can climb out of it, that the toxic space we're in isn't normal, and we don't have to tolerate it. I like to think Mai was thinking in that moment where Zuko locked her in the cell and he and she gazed into each others' eyes, what she was really thinking about was what life she actually wanted to live. She was thinking of Azula and being under her thumb, and she was thinking of all those moments with Zuko, like when they were lounging on the sofa together, smiling and joking in Nightmares & Daydreams, and she realised how ridiculous it was to be afraid of Azula killing her when the real fear should be being Azula's servant until her dying days, decades of repression and misery.

After all, what does Mai have left to fight for? Fear of Azula? Hah, what a joke. She remembers "I know one thing I care about. I care about you" and when she sees Zuko about to die she has to intervene.

"I guess you just don't know people as well as you think you do. You miscalculated. I love Zuko more than I fear you" Mai says to an increasingly-enraged Azula's speak of 'consequences', because Mai did fear Azula, but now in her love for Zuko she has found a purpose she has been lacking, her feelings and wants over Azula's will. Zuko being true to himself is contagious. Iroh's love for Zuko puts him on the right path, and in turn the love Mai has for Zuko saves her. As a consequence Ty Lee chooses Mai and their friendship over Azula's toxic, fear-based one and even later bonds with former enemies like the Kyoshi Warriors. Like Zuko says to Ozai, "an era of peace and kindness" will replace an "era of fear". In the face of fear, love and empathy win.

[sokkastyles]

So about that post we're both included in...the good thing about being at work when I saw that come through was that I wasn't able to respond. lol

I've decided not to respond but something they said that really irked me and wanted to get your thoughts on was this: In all that time between his return and Zuko's exile, there's no evidence that he (Iroh) ever tried to reach out to Azula

This comment and other's like it always irritate me because they always seem to leave out the idea that Azula has to be receptive to Iroh's help. They act like that all Iroh had to do was extend a hand to Azula and she wouldn't turned out the way she did. As if we haven't been shown that Azula has been dismissive of Iroh from a very young age. The idea that Iroh was ignoring her that whole time between when he moved back into the palace and leaving with Zuko, is just another way of blaming Iroh for not loving her enough. I highly doubt Azula was eager to spend time with Iroh around then and tried to avoid it as much as possible. Zuko was trapped on a boat. 😆 You cannot tell me that whatever short time they had together, that Iroh never left the door open for her. At some point, doesn't Azula need to reach out as well?

I'm not sure what I'm asking, I think I just wanted to vent instead of responding to that person. But if you have any thoughts on this, I would love to hear them.

P.S. Sorry for spamming your inbox while going through your old posts. 😁

No problem! Sorry that person reblogged your post to try and continue the argument with me.

You are right that Azula has to be receptive to any attempts Iroh would make to try and reach her, and what we know from canon is that she wasn't. That's why these people always say the doll doesn't matter, because it's evidence of Iroh doing something kind for his niece and her violently rejecting it because she thinks her uncle is a weak fool and her father taught her that people like that deserve to be treated cruelly.

But secondly, lack of being shown him reaching out to her doesn't mean that it never happened. Especially considering Iroh's character and the way he is consistently portrayed, it would be bizarre to interpret him as uncaring towards his niece just because we are not shown it onscreen. The writers expect you to fill in the gaps based on what we are shown onscreen, and what we are shown onscreen is that Iroh, even before his redemption, cares about his family and gets his niece and nephew a gift. We are also shown onscreen that Azula, even as a young child, is cruel towards everyone who is not Ozai, including Iroh, and burns the gift he gives her. Since these characterizations are consistent - Iroh being kind to others, Azula being cruel to others - we can interpret that the reason Iroh and Azula do not have a good relationship is because of what we already know, and that Azula is the reason they do not have a good relationship, and that she would reject whatever attempts Iroh might make to reach out. If the writers wanted to establish that Iroh was uncaring to Azula, it would need to be shown onscreen, since it contradicts everything else we know about his character, and everything we know about Azula and Azula's relationship with Iroh.

It'd be like me trying to argue that Ursa hated Lu Ten, since we never see them interact or get an indication that Ursa feels anything about him one way or the other, except for seeming sad about his death. But that's enough, because we know through everything else we know about Ursa that she is a kind person who cares about her family. Just because we don't see Ursa talking about or interacting with Lu Ten is not evidence of a negative relationship.

I agree that from what we know of Azula as a child, she did not want to spend time with Iroh and probably avoided it. Given how she talks about his reaction to Lu Ten's death, I also think even if Iroh did reach out, he would find it both difficult and extremely painful to be around someone who gleefully made fun of his trauma over his son's death.

Not only does Azula have to be receptive of Iroh, but there is a certain point where Iroh does not need to submit himself to cruelty just because Azula is a child. Azula is also a child with fire powers who is the princess of her nation, and her cruelty towards Iroh is approved by Ozai, who is now the firelord. Can you imagine what it was like for Iroh coming back to that after his son's death, in a world where he was widely seen as a disgrace? How much power does he really have in that situation?

Also imagine that Iroh also has to protect Zuko, who has newly lost his mother, from both his father and his sister.

Imagine, if you will, him inviting both of the children to play pai sho with him one day shortly after his arrival home, aware that he needs to get his niece and nephew away from their father, who now is their only sole parental figure, but also the most powerful man in the country, while he, Iroh, has been reduced overnight to the kooky, disgraced uncle. Even if Azula had accepted that invitation, I imagine that she does not respond well if she were to lose a game to the uncle she thinks is not a real general or the brother she thinks is weak and deserves to be abused. Imagine Iroh trying to problem solve between Zuko and Azula while Azula is shouting at him that he's just a loser who cries all the time because his son died. Meanwhile, Azula is also trying to burn Zuko for taking her piece in the game, and eventually Iroh just has to seperate them both.

And that's sad. It's so sad. I imagine it breaks Iroh's heart to see what is happening to his niece, what his brother is turning her into, just as every cruel jab she aims at him tears open his wounds over the loss of his son, his regret that he might have done something to help her, just as he might have done something to help his brother as he saw Ozai grow into the kind of person he became. We know these are things that are built into Iroh's character, but we also know that he's also not going to allow an abusive person to continue to be enabled, and there's a certain point where what Azula stans seem to want from Iroh is exactly that. They hate him because Azula hates him, and need an excuse for it other than the truth, that Azula was learning to be hateful from her father. They also hate him because he committed the sin of trying to protect Zuko from her and not allowing her to continue the behavior Ozai enabled.

We're also shown this dynamic between Iroh and Azula in the show, from the moment Azula shows up to try and trap Zuko and Iroh immediately susses out her intent and she resents him for it, tries to prevent him from helping Zuko think about what she is saying, and identifies that she needs to seperare Iroh from Zuko. Abusive people are really good at picking out vulnerable people, and also are good at recognizing the people who are less vulnerable and alienating their chosen victims from anyone who is going to be an obstacle, like a protector or guardian. That also increases her hatred of Iroh, that he sees right through her and knows what she's trying to do, and won't allow it. She's not going to respond to an attempt from him to help her because she wouldn't see any benefit to it, because he isn't someone she can manipulate or exploit like Zuko. And she hates that. She hates that she can't control Iroh the way she is used to controlling people, the way she thought she had even her mother under control. Until she learns to let go of that need to control, she is not going to respond to Iroh. Further, he is an obstacle in her continuing to have access to and control Zuko, which increases her hatred of him.

[lucky-clover-gazette]

The Big Picture

Vio & Shadow-focused Four Swords Manga Adaptation | Rated G

Chapter 4: Quest Updated

“Can you hear me?” asks the voice of Ganon, projected from some kind of unreachable void. Shadow isn’t exactly sure how Ganon’s remote oversight works. All he knows is that Ganon created him, Ganon’s will is truth, and Ganon will appear to him only when the time is right.

Not that Shadow cares, or anything.

“We can hear you,” sighs Vaati.

“I can’t hear you.”

Read the chapter (and very informative author's note!!) on ao3 or under the cut:

Author's Note: Finally, I’m working on this project again! I encourage you to re-read the previous chapters, because I just did a pretty significant amount of revision. The most notable change is the decision to not use manga dialogue verbatim—I’m still heavily referencing the transcription, but changing some language and phrasing to blend with my own style. Also important to note is the change of Vio, Shadow, Green, Blue, Red, Zelda, and Link Prime’s age, which is now 16 instead of 19. Working so closely with the manga, I’ve concluded that it makes the most sense for them to be around that age—mature enough to resonate with adults and potentially develop complex feelings, but young enough where it’s still believable that they would speak/act in line with the manga. To me, the True Manga Canon Links are 14-16 in the same way that, like, Katara, Sokka, Princess Azula, and Prince Zuko are ages 14-16. They’re not living in a world like ours, attending high school or something equivalent; they have very adult responsibilities, while simultaneously coping with teenage angst and the challenge of developing their own identities. And while Vio and Shadow stand out as the characters least believable as any age younger than 14, I do think the others—while silly in an cartoonish way—are not as a whole believable as preteens either. Like, Mabel and Dipper Pines are written as unusually clever preteens, and even they still seem younger than Red. Side note: cartoons are not my only frame of reference for media interpretation, but I am writing this specific thing like it’s a cartoon. Ultimately, I think that while I personally prefer writing a more mature interpretation, these characters can only be teenagers in something meant to complement and supplement canon. That said, I still fully intend to expand on the queer subtext between Vio and Shadow. Their canon arc reminds me a lot of the confusing, codependent, and ultimately life-altering relationships queer teenagers often find themselves in. This adaptation will explore Vio and Shadow’s journeys of queer discovery, both literally and allegorically, because that’s how I personally interpret the manga. Even if you’re not big on shipping these specific characters, I sincerely hope you can respect my interpretation and still find something that resonates. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this very belated update :)

Pure light transports the heroes to a chamber beneath Hyrule Castle. Link has been here before—very recently, in fact—but to Vio it somehow feels new.

“Are you well, heroes?” asks a soft female voice. Vio looks towards the center of the chamber, where a young woman floats trapped inside a magically crystal. She clasps her hands in front of her chest as if to pray.

“The Blue Maiden!” Red exclaims, his eyes wide.

“Did you save us?” asks Green.

“Link,” says the maiden, “something awful has begun. A terrible ordeal. Darkness once again covers Hyrule, just as in times of legend.”

Tell me something I don’t know, Vio wants to mutter, but decides not to antagonize the minor deity who probably just saved his life. .

“The shadow that took us was a phantom hero,” the maiden continues, “created by an evil demon.”

Vio perks up at that. The more he learns about that freak, the easier it will be to defeat him.

“It is a ‘Shadow Link. A dark reflection of you, but more powerful than any mere shadow.”

Vio attempts to process this. How exactly had Shadow Link been created? It couldn’t have been a similar process to himself. Vio is a fractured piece of a person, while Shadow Link is a dark reflection of a whole. No wonder he’s more powerful than the four of them—although combined, maybe the heroes could still stand a chance.

The maiden sighs, recapturing Vio’s attention. “It took all my might to send even that small light through the barrier. His power is not yet at its peak. You must stop him before that happens.”

“We’re no match for him now,” says Red in a defeated slump. “How can we ever beat him?”

Blue draws his sword. “We’ve gotta smash that barrier first!”

“That isn’t possible right now,” says the Blue Maiden. “The Four Sword has been cursed by Vaati. You must re-energize it, fill it with Life Force and the curse will be lifted. Then you can defeat the darkness for good.”

The four exchange uneasy glances. Finally, Green speaks up.

“Blue Maiden,” he says, “where is Princess Zelda?”

“I don’t know,” admits the maiden. “Weak as I am, I can’t sense clearly. But I can faintly sense her spirit… far, far away.”

Green nods, determined. “She’s alive. That’s enough.” It brings Vio relief, too, that this could all still be undone.

“Hold on, Blue Maiden,” says Green. “We’ll be back to save you soon.”

“Be careful, my four heroes.” The maiden closes her eyes tight, as if channeling the little power she has left. “Travel towards the Eastern Sea. I sense another Maiden within the Eastern Temple.”

Vio finds himself nodding, too.

They exit the castle through the dungeons, careful to remain undetected by Shadow Link’s army of monsters. Eventually they reach a path, which according to the sign leads directly from Castle Town to the Eastern Sea. Vio assumes that it’s meant to be followed by traveling merchants, over the course of days.

Red sighs loudly.

“Losing confidence?” Vio asks, almost playfully,.

“Yeah,” says Red, “how’d you know?”

“Because I am you.”

Green stares into the distance, filled with determination. “If Dark Link is our shadow,” he says, “we need to be better to beat him. Be more like father.”

“Yeah,” Vio smirks. “Right now, I’d give us a 50/50 chance.”

“But if we restore the sword we’ll get stronger!” says Red. “And if we can learn some teamwork—”

Blue scoffs, cutting him off. “I don’t care what it takes, we’re doing it.”

Green’s eyes sparkle in the daylight as he addresses his teammates. Vio can’t help but feel a little inspired. “Then it’s decided,” their leader announces. “Let’s go!”

─────────────────

“You’re late,” Vaati tells Shadow as he shuts the door behind him. The one-eyed demon waits at the far end of the conference table, as usual, scrutinizing the shade as he plops down into his own seat.

Steadying his heart, Shadow rolls his eyes. Reclines slightly, enough to slam his boots onto the table. Shoots Vaati a self-satisfied grin. “Sorry, I was busy. Doing things, in my body.”

Vaati’s eye narrows. The Wind Mage may now be free in the world of light, but he still lacks a corporeal form.

“You’re welcome, by the way,” Shadow adds. “For breaking the seal.”

“Don’t congratulate yourself just yet.”

The air in the dark room begins to crackle, an occurrence Shadow immediately recognizes. He removes his boots from the table and stiffens his posture.

“Can you hear me?” asks the voice of Ganon, projected from some kind of unreachable void. Shadow isn’t exactly sure how Ganon’s remote oversight works. All he knows is that Ganon created him, Ganon’s will is truth, and Ganon will appear to him only when the time is right.

Not that Shadow cares, or anything.

“We can hear you,” sighs Vaati.

“I can’t hear you.”

“Do you have us on mute?” Shadow asks, helpfully.

Vaati scoffs. “He just said he can’t hear you.” Shadow just shrugs.

“I think I have you on mute,” says Ganon. “Hold on, this is—ah. Yes, I see.”

Vaati and Shadow lock eyes, unsure who should speak first.

“I still can’t hear you,” Ganon repeats, frustrated.

“Lord Ganon,” Vaati finally says, “we are both here.”

“There you are. Excellent.”

Shadow preens under his approval. “My Lord, I have good news. The Wind Mage has been successfully freed, and the Four Sword drawn. Princess Zelda is in our clutches. Hyrule Castle has been overtaken by our forces.”

“Our clutches? Our forces?”

Shadow winces. “Yours, My Lord.”

Ganon pauses for a moment. Shadow grips the edge of the table. “It seems you are serving your purpose, Shadow Link.”

Shadow grins. “You should have seen it, Link’s father was so fooled. And the four heroes—”

“Are dead?” interrupts Ganon, and Shadow’s heart falls.

“Not… as such.”

“Explain yourself, Shadow Link.”

Shadow deliberates each word before it leaves his mouth. “They had assistance, my Lord. The Blue Maiden, while contained, used her remaining light magic to repel my presence and transport them to safety.”

“I see.”

Shadow braces himself for his creator’s disapproval.

“Because the heroes survive,” Ganon says, “they pose a great danger to you.”

Shadow hangs his head. “I’m sorry, I can’t control how I—”

“You are not the perfect being I sought to create, Shadow Link. You are inherently flawed, weak to the light.”

And now the heroes know it too, Shadow realizes, ashamed. Despite all of his prior gleeful theatrics, he hadn’t even considered acting unbothered by the light. Not when it scared him so much, not when it caught his so off-guard. Pathetic.

“However,” continues Ganon, “your failure is not in your weakness.”

Shadow’s breath hitches. “It isn’t?”

“Your failure is in your admittance of defeat. You have the power of darkness at your disposal—use it wisely.”

Shadow takes a deep breath and nods. “Yes, my Lord.”

“You will need to travel in darkness to defeat them,” Ganon instructs. “Do not attempt to approach the heroes during the daytime.”

“But then how am I supposed to—”

“Have patience. Observe. Prevent the four heroes from gaining power, but do not make yourself vulnerable again.”

Shadow’s palms itch. He’s not a delegator, and patience is not one of his virtues. There’s no place for theatricality in this mission. It doesn’t sound fun.

“I won’t disappoint you,” Shadow reassures his creator, already plotting ways to disrupt the heroes’ journey. He could still make this fun. He could succeed, despite his weakness. He isn’t a perfect creation, but he can still be the next best thing.

Or would he be the next worst thing, considering the evil of it all?

“Your supervision is appreciated,” Ganon tells Vaati. “And Shadow Link—”

“Yes?”

“I am… proud of what you have accomplished. I look forward to your future successes.”

Shadow breaks out into an almost childish smile. “Thank you, my Lord!”

Ganon doesn’t respond, but his presence still lingers. Vaati and Shadow exchange a tired glance.

“You have to end the call,” sighs the Wind Mage. “Sir.”

“Right,” says Ganon, admitting no fault of his own. “Meeting adjourned.”

[burst-of-iridescent]

hi! do you have a meta against that interpretation that in the final agni kai, the plot was such that katara was meant to be taken as zuko's new sister?

hi anon! boy, do i have a meta for you.

this interpretation usually comes from the argument that katara and azula are narrative foils and so katara is a replacement for azula, which rankles me for a couple of reasons.

firstly, being a narrative foil has absolutely nothing to do with determining an individual character's relationships to other characters in the story. azula and katara being paralleled doesn't mean that katara now occupies azula's role as zuko's sister, any more than this makes azula sokka's sister. azula and katara's narrative relationship reflects on their individual character traits and qualities, not on their role in relation to other characters.

secondly, i personally think (and this might be a hot take) that azula and katara being "narrative foils" tends to be a bit overstated by the fandom. while they do share parallels, i generally see most people go "14 year old bending prodigies who lost their mothers" and end the argument there.

but this ignores the fact that katara isn't a bending prodigy in the way azula is. she's certainly incredibly talented, but in book 1 it's evident that unless she's emotionally volatile, she has to really work to be good at waterbending. you can see this in the waterbending scroll, when aang - who is a genuine prodigy - easily gets moves that took her months to learn, and picks up the water whip instantly, where she does not.

katara does have natural talent and power, but she only gets as far as she does because she goes above and beyond to put in the effort. as pakku himself tells her, "you have proven that with fierce determination, passion and hard work, you can achieve anything". note that he doesn't credit her talent or skill, though she undeniably has both, but her determination and her work ethic for her success. she is not azula, naturally gifted and "born lucky". katara is constantly practicing, constantly eager to learn, constantly working, and that is what makes her the powerful bender she is, more than her talent.

additionally, azula and katara's loss of their mothers really cannot be compared in the same way. katara is reckoning with her mother's death; azula is reckoning with her mother's love (or the lack of it). for azula, her struggle (at least as presented in the show canon) is never about losing her mother at all; it is about her mother's perception of her and her preference for zuko, something which began long before ursa ever left. they are entirely different issues, and although this can be a parallel about motherly love and legacy, it is never really expanded on within the show.

but you know whose losses are explicitly paralleled? who both love their mothers and are the reasons their mothers are gone? who share a moment of connection over this exact subject?

katara and zuko.

more than azula and katara, zuko and katara are narrative foils to one another in ways that are explicitly and continually referenced in the show. they are both determined, hardworking benders who get where they are through effort. they are both deeply empathetic, compassionate people. they both take on alternate egos in each other's colours, from each other's nations, one used for good, the other used for evil. they both undergo parallel journeys, with zuko unlearning fire nation indoctrination and ideals of fire nation supremacy, while katara learns that good exists in the fire nation just as evil exists outside of it. i won't go on to list every parallel between them, but you get the point.

(interestingly, since zuko and katara are narrative foils, following the sibling logic should also make zuko sokka's brother but you don't see anyone using that to discredit zu/kka.)

additionally, the show makes a point of marking zuko and katara as equals, to the extent that zuko has a line referencing it even when they're still enemies. they are evenly matched in both of their big fights, which also mark the end of each season, and when zuko finally joins team avatar, there is special emphasis placed on how efficiently and flawlessly zuko and katara work together (their fights in the southern raiders and sozin's comet). the fact that zuko instantly asks katara to accompany him to the final agni kai alone is proof that he sees her as his equal.

this isn't to say that siblings shouldn't see each other as equals, but stories usually don't put this much emphasis on developing a sibling relationship in this way. but you know what kind of relationship absolutely does necessitate both partners being equals, and seeing each other as such?

a romantic one.

[thinkingisadangerouspastime]

Hi, first off I ship Zutara and I come in peace. I was pointed your way by a friend when I asked for people who ship kataang who are nevertheless willing to hear different views. I have lurked on blog a week and finally got up my nerve to ask how you or any other Kataang can deny that the last part of book 3 was completely Zutara but then stopped abruptly with no buildup? You can finesse tone on text so I'm not being sarcastic or bitchy, it is a serious question (1/5)

In The Southern Raiders, Katara realizes she has been wrong about Zuko. In Ember Island Players, she realizes Aang is not as mature as she thought he was, and in the finale, Katara does not care a whit that Aang is gone. I am serious and as someone who is no Aang stan but likes him, I’m actually annoyed by how little anyone cared about his disappearance. It went from “Aang’s gone!” to “Okay whatever, let’s find Iroh so he can kill Ozai.” (2/5)

Katara was all over Zuko (honestly, again not being a jerk) in the finale until for whatever reason, she wasn’t. She was giving him a pep talk about Iroh, she was going with him to Azula, she was healing him and saying he saved her not the other way around. I genuinely don’t get why this isn’t seen as romantic. I will grant you that Zuko would not have allowed Azula to kill anyone but I feel the point here was Zuko realizing his life was pointless if Katara was killed. (4/5)

And then literally at the end, Mai shows up after Zuko not talking about her at all for six episodes and declares herself Zuko’s girlfriend. And Katara kisses Aang after being annoyed with and by him arguably since The Southern Raiders. I get that Kataang “won” and I’ve made peace with that, but ... I can’t understand why Kataang shippers are okay with such a crap story. I swear on my gmom [sic] if they’d done this for [Zvtara], I’d be mad as hell. So I don’t understand, I really don’t. (5/5)

As always, I shall begin with a disclaimer: anon, you do not have to agree with this post. No one has to agree with this post, as it is strictly my own thoughts on the subject matter raised here! As per usual, I will not be putting this in the main tags - much less the Zvtara tag! - because I have basic fandom decency, lmao. If you (the general you, not anon specifically) do disagree with this post, that is totally fine, I simply ask that you are polite in expressing your disagreement (if you choose to do so at all! no one is expected to, lmao. i promise).

Alright. Formalities are out of the way!

I’ll admit I giggled a little bit when you say you lurked on my blog for a week, because I’ve actually talked about this subject numerous times in the past! I just found it funny you hadn’t stumbled across any posts about it yet, lol. So, as a heads up, know that I will be providing several links in this post since - again - this subject and related subjects have been analyzed a multitude of times before. I highly recommend reading them all! Mostly because I don’t intend to spend forever restating what’s been said over and over and over lmaooo. I will provide the resources, but it is up to each individual to take advantage of them.

To begin: your ask actually contains a few logical fallacies, anon! I do not mean this as shade or to belittle you - I fall victim to this issue all the time myself. Anyone who writes analyses or participates in debates does! Humans are imperfect and often like to cut corners to reach a conclusion. It is nothing to be embarrassed or ashamed about because - as the existence of your ask in inbox indicates - you are willing to learn more. So kudos to you, my friend!

Alright. So what logical fallacies am I talking about here? (For the record: specific definitions of logical fallacies were taken from here.)

1. Hasty Generalization.

“A hasty generalization is a general statement without sufficient evidence to support it.” Numerous claims are made in this ask that I have absolutely no doubt you believe to be true, anon, but there really isn’t any concrete evidence to support it! I will go into more detail later, of course, but let’s quickly look at one example:

“In Ember Island Players, [Katara] realizes Aang is not as mature as she thought he was…”

For the time being, I will ask but one question: from the show itself, not fanon, how do you know this?

2. Causal Fallacy

Ah, this guy. My own worst enemy, tbh! “A causal fallacy is any logical breakdown when identifying a cause,” of which there are several types. “One causal fallacy is the false cause or non causa pro causa (‘not the-cause for a cause’) fallacy, which is when you conclude about a cause without enough evidence to do so.” In your ask, you claim:

“I will grant you that Zuko would not have allowed Azula to kill anyone but I feel the point here was Zuko realizing his life was pointless if Katara was killed.”

Again, for the time being, I will ask only one question: from the show itself, not fanon, what led you to believe this statement?

“Another kind of causal fallacy is the correlational fallacy also known as cum hoc ergo propter hoc (Lat., ‘with this therefore because of this’). This fallacy happens when you mistakenly interpret two things found together as being causally related.” In your ask, you claim:

“Katara was all over Zuko (honestly, again not being a jerk) in the finale until for whatever reason, she wasn’t. She was giving him a pep talk about Iroh, she was going with him to Azula, she was healing him and saying he saved her not the other way around. I genuinely don’t get why this isn’t seen as romantic.”

I will ask one question: from the show itself, not fanon, why would you believe these are indicative of romance? (Consider the context the show is situated in, too - e.g. the war, Katara being Azula’s only available match in skill, etc.)

The reason I bring up the issue of logical fallacies is again not at all to make you feel bad, anon!! You were simply trying to express your point to me and I greatly appreciate you taking the time to do so. See, your ask actually presents a larger fandom trend:

Misconstruing fanon as canon.

What you have offered to me, anon, are fanon conclusions. To clarify: there is absolutely nothing wrong with fanon. I adore fanon interpretations (an example I have used in the past is Kuzaang - like, I don’t care that there’s no canon basis! I do what I want lmao!), but a line has to be drawn between exploring fanon interpretations and expecting everyone to take that fanon as canon. Again, anon, this is not your fault! It is not any one person’s fault, lmao. It is an issue of fandom as a whole, and all of us fall victim to it.

With that in mind, I will break down the different components of your ask. I will also do my best to be brief - as aforementioned, I and others have analyzed this issue numerous times before, lmao. To avoid confusion, it would be best to read through each or at least most links as they are provided!

Firstly, there are two posts I have made in the past that almost directly answer your overarching question here in this ask. Please read them prior to continuing, as I will occasionally reference them:

This post explains how Zvtara was not built up from TSR/EIP-onwards, and how their supposed “canon enemies to lovers arc” is a completely fanon construction.

This post explains the issue of the “canon Zvtara” rhetoric from rabid zkers (and you, anon, are absolutely NOT one, in case you were worried).

Alrighty. With that out the way, let’s get into it!

“In The Southern Raiders, Katara realizes she has been wrong about Zuko.”

Gotta start by saying that TSR is not about Zuko. TSR is, first and foremost, about Katara. Katara does not realize she was wrong about Zuko, because here’s the truth - she wasn’t wrong about him. Zuko did horrible things to the Gaang. Katara was not wrong to hold him accountable for that. What Katara does realize is that holding such rage so close to her chest is bad for her. This rage was not solely anger against Zuko, either; it was of course about Yon Rha, too, but it was also anger towards Kya and Katara herself. Essentially, TSR is where Katara realizes she has to forgive herself. Zuko is only one part of her journey (similar to Aang’s role in the episode, if a different end of the spectrum).

This post explains how TSR was fundamentally about Katara.

Additional resources about TSR:

This post explains Aang’s comments to Katara in TSR and how Katara herself recognized their validity.

This post explains why both Aang and Zuko were important to Katara in TSR.

This post is an extensive breakdown of Aang and Katara’s relationship within TSR.

“In Ember Island Players, [Katara] realizes Aang is not as mature as she thought he was…”

You provide no context for this claim, so I’m going to work with the assumption this is about their reactions to the play itself and the infamous kiss!

There is something important we must keep in mind when discussing EIP: the play they watch is literally imperialist propaganda. It is meant to demean the entire Gaang, and indeed it does exactly that. You mention Katara and Aang specifically, so I will recap what I have explained before about their depictions in EIP: Katara, an indigenous woman, is hypersexualized and portrayed as overly emotional (and thus “irrational”). This reinforces the Fire Nation sentiment that women of the Water Tribes are less intelligent and less suited for “responsibility” than Fire Nation women. Aang, a pacifist and the sole survivor of genocide who is also canonly the male character most comfortable with femininity and spirituality, is portrayed as a flighty, airheaded woman (this is a well-known imperialist tactic meant to emasculate the target, seeing as masculinity was often equated with power in fascist regimes; thus, they effectively belittled Aang before the FN audience). This reinforces the Fire Nation sentiment that the Air Nomads were foolish, weak people who deserved to die.

In other words, of course Aang and Katara were upset about how they portrayed in the play. It is understandable that tensions would be running high and consequently that mistakes (we all know the one) would be made.

This post explains how EIP belittles each member of the Gaang (and why the play is not indicative of Zvtara).

This post talks specifically about EIP and their portrayal of Aang and Katara.

Now onto the kiss. As everyone knows and no one has ever disagreed with, Aang was wrong to kiss Katara. Point blank!

But what people do misunderstand is Katara and Aang’s feelings regarding the kiss. Given your above quote, I assume you believe Aang kissing Katara supposedly made her realize that Aang wasn’t as mature as she once thought. On the surface, this seems like a logical conclusion! But digging deeper reveals… well, there’s nothing that indicates this conclusion at all. Even jumping ahead to the finale, when Zuko has doubts over Aang’s return, Katara demonstrates her faith in Aang (although of course she’s nervous - I won’t deny the obvious, lmao) as she says, “Aang won’t lose. He’s gonna come back. He has to.”

In other words, nothing in canon suggests that Katara believes Aang is immature because of what happened in EIP. She still trusts in his return, as she did even before she knew him (and arguably is more confident in him now, given the 60~ episodes of them growing closer). Furthermore, when Aang does disappear, Katara doesn’t have an outburst about how “immature” it was for him to “run away again.” The viewers know Aang didn’t run away, of course (fans who insist he did are not worth arguing with, anon - they don’t understand the show, rip), but that is a luxury the rest of the Gaang is not afforded. And yet even though Aang has vanished off the face of the planet, Katara still believes he will save the world. If anything, that signifies the utmost confidence in his skill and maturity!

To go back to the kiss itself, this post explains the true source of Katara’s conflict in turning down Aang (hint: she says it herself in the episode! you know, the whole war going on) and why the EIP kiss did not sink Kataang’s relationship.

Additional sources about EIP:

This post explains how the EIP kiss was resolved through narrative parallels.

This post explains how the EIP kiss is so often blown out of proportion.

“… and in the finale, Katara does not care a whit that Aang is gone. I am serious and as someone who is no Aang stan but likes him, I’m actually annoyed by how little anyone cared about his disappearance. It went from ‘Aang’s gone!’ to ‘Okay whatever, let’s find Iroh so he can kill Ozai.’”

As I already touched upon, Katara didn’t need a soliloquy to emphasize her connection to Aang once he disappeared. She trusts that he will return. She says so herself. I guess I just don’t understand how you got from Point A, Katara has consistent faith in Aang, to Point B, Katara and the rest of the Gaang didn’t care about Aang’s disappearance. It’s honestly a bit more like Point A to Point Z, lmao! If you would like to expand on your logic here, I would love to hear more!!

There are a few specific aspects I want to note about your rationale, though. You argue the Gaang moves from ‘Aang disappeared’ to ‘let’s find Iroh,’ but the Gaang actually went from:

1. Aang disappeared!

2. They search the entire island for him.

3. Okay, they couldn’t find him, so they track down June and have her try to find Aang.

4. June says to them, “No, I mean he’s gone gone. He doesn’t exist.” (And she clarifies to Sokka that she doesn’t mean dead, either - she means Aang has totally blinked out of their world.)

5. Only after all of this do they decide to track down Iroh.

The Gaang cares immensely about the fact that Aang is gone, and you could actually argue they waste time by trying to track him down. They don’t give up until June essentially tells them that some Spirit World shenanigans were involved. Even if you don’t think they reached that specific conclusion, I have to ask: What else were they supposed to do? They were told Aang didn’t exist! How are they supposed to fix that?

Well, they can’t. So they do the next best thing: they find Iroh, the man who knows Ozai better than anyone and is also one of the most talented firebenders in the world. In my opinion, that’s a very logical step to take.

“Katara was all over Zuko (honestly, again not being a jerk) in the finale until for whatever reason, she wasn’t. She was giving him a pep talk about Iroh, she was going with him to Azula, she was healing him and saying he saved her not the other way around. I genuinely don’t get why this isn’t seen as romantic.”

I’ll be blunt here, lol: in my opinion, nothing of what you listed in your ask is inherently romantic.

Okay. I am going to assume you’ve read the first two posts I linked earlier (“Zvtara did not have an E-L arc” and “the ‘canon’ Zvtara of rabid zkers has issues”), because I do not intend to rehash everything they contain, lol. Consequently, I presume you realize by now that there was no canon romantic interest between Zuko and Katara.

And as I always say, just because there wasn’t a canon romance doesn’t mean people can’t take fanon routes! Of course they can! That’s the entire point of fanon! But fanon is not canon, and I am strictly referring to canon in my discussions.

You claim Katara was all over Zuko, which in itself I don’t think is an accurate assessment, because she doesn’t really do anything with Zuko outside the three points you bring up (other than the June gag, which I addressed in one of the aforementioned linked posts). So I’ll go ahead and break down each instance you provide!

1. “[Katara] was giving [Zuko] a pep talk about Iroh”

Katara asked Zuko if he was okay. She asked him if he was genuinely sorry. She reassures him that Iroh will forgive him. That’s… all. Not to diminish the significance of this conversation, but it’s not exactly an intimate, romantically-charged discussion (unless fanon-ized). But on that note, let’s tackle the canon significance of this moment!

Katara knows firsthand the challenge of forgiving Zuko. And she knows that Zuko understands how hard it was for her to forgive him (note: Katara’s anger was totally justified, and anyone who disagrees is probably a rabid Zuko stan lmao). She also recognizes that Zuko is terrified it will take Iroh the same struggle to forgive him that Katara went through. This scene is not related to romance at all. It’s about compassion. It’s about Katara and Zuko’s friendship having progressed, slowly but surely, to the point where she’s not afraid to extend empathy to him anymore (seeing as the first time, beneath Ba Sing Se, did not go so well; you know - Aang died and all). It’s about Zuko recognizing his own fallibility (and the audience recognizing how much he’s grown). He questions how he can even face his uncle after all he’s done to the man, which is a far cry from his entitled attitude in TSR, where he demanded to know why Katara didn’t trust him when everyone else had forgiven him.

To make this moment, this moment about Zuko’s relationship with his uncle who is all but a literal father to him, this moment of vulnerability, of guilt, of remorse, of growth, to claim this powerful moment is about a nonexistent romantic relationship? In my opinion, that is incredibly reductive to what this scene is supposed to signify. And again, there is nothing wrong with people exploring such a possibility in fanon, but in canon? Nah. It doesn’t track.

2. “[Katara] was going with [Zuko] to Azula”

Don’t forget that at first, Zuko planned to take on Azula alone. He doesn’t request Katara to accompany him until Iroh tells him that he’ll need help. As such, Zuko’s immediate agreement with Iroh is reflective of his personal growth (Book 1 and 2 Zuko would have argued and insisted he didn’t need any help). It also demonstrates, however, that Katara was not obsessively on Zuko’s mind. He doesn’t choose Katara until Iroh points out that Zuko will need assistance in taking Azula down. This means that Zuko’s choice of Katara to join him is a tactical decision, not an emotional one. And by all accounts, it’s a damn good decision! Zuko witnessed firsthand beneath Ba Sing Se a) how powerful Katara was (e.g. that wave after Aang died) and b) how Katara was the only one who could take on Azula*.

Of course, besides the fact that Katara was the only match for Azula, who else was Zuko going to choose? Sokka and Suki, while talented in their own right, were no competition for Azula. Toph, while the greatest earthbender in the world, was needed to metalbend the airships. Katara was the only (and the best!) option.

Also, on their trip to face Azula, the only thing they talk about within their three lines of canon conversation are Azula and Aang. Not exactly a romantic flight, lmao.

*Zuko never saw Aang fight Azula on the drill.

3. “[Katara] was healing [Zuko] and saying he saved her not the other way around”

Actually, this is what the transcript says:

Zuko: Thank you, Katara.

Katara: I think I’m the one who should be thanking you.

You’re right about how their lines refer to them saving each other, but you posit it as a romantic moment, when the lines are actually pretty straightforward. Zuko thanks Katara as she heals him from the partially-redirected lightning strike, and Katara thanks him for trying to redirect the lightning away from her and in doing so saving her life. In terms of canon, there’s nothing romantic about this, lol! (Which I talked about extensively in the E-L post, if you need to reference it again.) The reason being is that you have to take the show itself into context when you do analysis. If there was no canon romantic buildup between Zuko and Katara, why would these lines in canon (not fanon! fanon is free rein, lmao) be interpreted through a romantic lens?

Well, they wouldn’t be interpreted as such. Plain and simple.

“I genuinely don’t get why this isn’t seen as romantic.”

Because looking through a canon lens, they aren’t romantic. That’s all. You are of course welcome to view them as such through a fanon lens!! It’s just about recognizing the line between canon and fanon.

“I will grant you that Zuko would not have allowed Azula to kill anyone but I feel the point here was Zuko realizing his life was pointless if Katara was killed.”

I asked earlier what content in the show itself led you to believe. I have wracked my own mind, and I cannot think of anything that would point to this conclusion. Zuko was in Katara’s good graces for 5 episodes. That’s 8% of the show. Not exactly a lot of time for Zuko to start believing his life would be pointless if Katara was killed, is it?

This post explains the improbability of Zuko having a crush on Katara within canon.

This post explains how Zuko’s racism towards the Air Nomads in TSR and the finale is, well, exactly that - racism (and not a sign of a crush on Katara).

And, of course, as has been said a million times, Zuko taking the lightning for Katara out of romantic interest would completely undermine his redemption arc. Since it has been said over and over and over, I will be brief: Zuko taking the lightning is significant because it is a selfless act (one of his only in the series), and it directly parallels his selfish act of choosing not to intervene when Azula killed Aang with lightning beneath Ba Sing Se. This moment demonstrates Zuko’s growth, how he has learned to accept unconditional love from Iroh and the Gaang and Mai and even Ty Lee and sure, even from Appa and Momo, too. To make this moment of pure selflessness about a nonexistent romance? To force a fanon romance in replacement of canon redemption and canon platonic significance?

Such a decision speaks wonders about a person’s priorities, in my opinion, as well as how amatonormativity impacts them.

Furthermore, Zuko’s choice cements Katara’s position as his surrogate sibling, as she is Azula’s primary foil. Zuko chooses the sister who heals over the sister who harms. I won’t go too much into it here, because it has already been talked about extensively before! Thus, I offer you this post that explains how Zuko and Katara - in canon - are positioned as surrogate siblings as well as Azula’s role in this matter. I also offer this post that lays out through screencaps how Zuko and Katara - in canon - treat each other like family.

Additional sources about the final Agni Kai:

This post in part discusses fanon misinterpretation of the final Agni Kai and why such a lens is not true to canon relationships.

This post explains why the final Agni Kai is not intended to be romantic.

This post explains how the final Agni Kai is primarily about Azula and how reducing it to be a big Zvtara moment is detrimental to both her and to Zuko and Katara themselves.

“And then literally at the end, Mai shows up after Zuko not talking about her at all for six episodes and declares herself Zuko’s girlfriend.”

This point could probably get a post of its own, lol, but fortunately I and others have already written a few! I will link them below - first, however, I question your choice of “declares.” Technically, yes, Mai does say outright that it doesn’t hurt how the new Fire Lord is her boyfriend, but your phrasing implies Zuko resisted her proclamation. When… he doesn’t. In fact, he embraces it, asking if that means she doesn’t hate him anymore (read: he asks if they’re back on good terms again). Zuko clearly doesn’t have a problem with the girl he loves wanting to be with him again - so why do some parts of fandom so adamantly insist he does? (Not you, anon - I am referring to the rabid fanoners, lol.)

Also, regarding how Zuko hasn’t talked about Mai for six episodes, we’ve gotta be realistic with this assessment in terms of canon:

1. It was the crux of the war. They were either going to live or die. There was no time for romance at this point! Sokka and Suki weren’t professing their love on the battlefield, lmao, so it’s not exactly strange that Zuko didn’t bust into a monologue about how he missed Mai. I think they were just a little bit distracted by the possible end of the world, lol, and all that jazz.

2. Zuko probably thought Mai was dead. He knows what Azula is like. He knows his sister doesn’t have time for people who get in her way (Aang can testify to this, lmao). So can you blame him for not wanting to think about how the girl he loved had died (to his knowledge) to save him?

You gotta cut the kid some slack, lol. Anyways! Additional sources about Maiko:

This post breaks down the notion of Maiko and “deserve.”

This post rationalizes through a canon lens why Mai’s arrival at the palace surprised Zuko.

This post is the mother of Maiko metas, explaining in tremendous detail why their relationships works, is relevant to canon, and was well-implemented for what its role was.

“And Katara kisses Aang after being annoyed with and by him arguably since The Southern Raiders.”

What in canon has led you to the conclusion that Katara was annoyed with Aang? What specific moments from TSR to the finale made you think Katara was annoyed with Aang and remained annoyed with Aang? Are there any, or are you thinking about fanon interpretation? (Canon vs fanon strikes again!)

In TSR, Katara explicitly thanks Aang for understanding her perspective. Nothing there is indicative of annoyance (and as in the links provided earlier, she was not angry at Aang/Zuko/etc. so much as she was at herself. well, she was a little bit angry with Zuko, lmao). In EIP, Katara is understandably angry at Aang’s decision to kiss her, but Aang completely backs off, and we see in the part 1 of the finale that there are no hard feelings or weird tension between them. Katara in fact actively expresses concern for Aang after Zuko sporadically attacked him when she demands of the firebender, “What’s wrong with you? You could have hurt Aang!” Even when Aang and Katara do butt heads later in the episode as Aang tries to think of a way to defeat Ozai without killing him, Katara doesn’t stay frustrated. Like I said - when she and Zuko are flying to Azula, she demonstrates her unwavering faith in Aang through her belief that he will return. So… where is the annoyance that you feel was present?

With all this mind, i.e. looking strictly at canon, Katara wasn’t annoyed with Aang during this time. Thus, Katara kisses Aang because she loved him. Because he backed off and gave her the space she needed to make a decision about if she wanted to be with him (hence Katara being the one to initiate the kiss). Because the issue was never about if she reciprocated his feelings (they both knew they loved each other) but rather it had to do with the war. At the end of the finale, the war is over, and there is nothing that prevents them from being together. Simple.

This post explains how Katara’s feelings for Aang develop throughout the series (and were not neglected, as rabid zkers like to claim, for some reason? again - you are not one of them, anon).

This post also covers Katara’s interest in Aang throughout the series.

“I can’t understand why Kataang shippers are okay with such a crap story.”

I mean, you definitely don’t have to ship Kataang. It may not be your cup of tea, and that’s totally okay! But as the above links demonstrate, Kataang was a fantastic story. It was well-implemented into the narrative from Day 1. The soulmateism is unparalleled!

Also, it’s worth noting that A:TLA itself was essentially pre-written. The writers knew how the story would end from the get-go, including that the show would end with Kataang. A few Zvtara gags were thrown in to add a sense of “who will Katara choose?” drama as the show aired, but Zuko and Katara were never planned to end up together. One reason so many newer fans are fine with Kataang from the start is that there’s no tension of waiting a week for a new episode when you can watch all 61 episodes straight through on Netflix, lmao. It’s even more obvious now than when A:TLA was airing that Aang and Katara will end up together, if that makes sense. (Although I talked about this in the E-L post linked earlier, so you probably understand this point already, as it was explained in detail there!)

All of this is to say that Kataang is not a “crap story” in terms of writing (again, personal taste is a different matter) because it was woven in from the beginning and had powerful narrative significance! (Kataang represented numerous complementary components of the series, such as yin and yang, push and pull, air and water, Oma and Shu, etc.)

Now. If you really and truly want to understand why Kataang shippers like Kataang, anon, consider reading some Kataang fanfics or exploring some Kataang headcanons. I read fics involving Zvtara more regularly than you might think, lol, because… well, it’s just a ship. I understand the appeal of romantic Zvtara and I can actually appreciate it when it’s well-written! I’m sure if you’re willing to put in just a little legwork (you don’t need to go the whole mile, lmao - ‘tis just fandom), you’ll realize why people like Kataang, even if it isn’t exactly your thing. You have the range, anon!! You got this!

I hope I managed to answer your questions, my friend! As always, you do not have to agree with anything I have said here. It is totally fine if you and anyone else disagrees! Everything above is simply my own perspective on the matter. Thank you for taking the time to read my response and all the different links I provided! I hope it has expanded your understanding of the subject at hand!

[whentheynameyoujoy]

Yup, Sure Was a Finale

I had an epiphany. The reason why I never re-watched the final two parts of Sozin’s Comet even though I’ve popped in episodes at random many times over the years isn’t that I can’t bear the sadness of seeing one of the best, most engaging narratives out there come to an end.

It’s simply that the finale isn’t all that good.

Some honorable mentions of what was enjoyable.

(+) This

Just this.

(+) The Church of Zutara has another convert

“Are you sure they don’t get together?” Hubster, 2020

(+) The tragedy of Azula

And the fact that it’s acknowledged as such. I hope Zuko will do his best to get her help and have a relationship with her…

(+) Sokka being a big bro

And the whole airship sequence in general. It’s wonderfully paced and plotted, with moments of humor, real stakes, Toph being both badass and a scared crying kid, Sokka strategizing and protecting, Suki saving the day, and non-benders being instrumental in thwarting the bad guy firebender’s plans. Would be shame if Bryke never portrayed them this capable ever again…

And now for the main course.

(-) Blink and its over

The wrap-up feels too quick (hashtag Needs More ROtK-style False Endings). A part of this is due to how fast the story goes from the thick of the action to hastily tying up a bunch of loose ends, but the larger issue is how Book 3’s uneven pacing comes home to roost. After spending half a season on filler episodes that at best subtly flesh out established characters while dancing around a huge lionturtle-shaped hole, and at worst contradict the theme of “no one is born bad” with “you’re a hot mess because your great-grandfathers didn’t get along too well”, the frantic “go go go” rush of the second half screeches to a halt with “they won and everyone was happy because now the right people have power and it will be all good from now on yup nothing more to deal with baiiiii”.

Yes, I know, it’s a kids’ show. But goddamn, this particular kids’ show has proven so many times it can do better than the expected tropiness. Showing the characters in their roles as builders of a new world was the least that could have been done.

Oh well!

(-) Ursa

We’ll never know. There will never be a story that delves into this. Yup. Shall forever remain but an intriguing mystery. Is good, though. Mystery is better than a story where Ursa shares her son’s penchant for forgetfulness. Imagine how embarrassing that would be. Speaking of which…

(-) What does Mai see in this jerkbender?

Look, I like to harp a lot on the mess of inconsistent writing that’s Mai but let’s unpack this scene from her perspective, shall we?

Zuko forgot about her! It totally slipped his mind that the one person who prioritized the safety of his dumb ass was rotting in the worst prison in the Fire Nation—because of him! And she was rotting there long enough after the final Agni Kai for the news of Zuko’s upcoming coronation to spread and her uncle to feel sufficiently secure to release her. But then the coronation scene is attended by every single member of Gaang & Friends that was imprisoned?

So what this tells me is that either a) the invasion force had the ability to break themselves out the whole time and for some reason decided not to exercise it until after the war was over, b) Zuko forgot about them as well and no one thought to remind him there were prisons full of POWs until Mai arrived, or, and that’s even better, c) Zuko took care to free every single resistance fighter while making sure Mai would be the one to stay behind bars.

Never thought I’d say this but Mai? Honey? You deserve so much better.

(-) “What does Katara want?”

Asked no one in the writers’ room ever, apparently.

This is not so much anti Cataang as anti romance stories that pay attention to the needs, opinions, and wants of only one partner in general. Over the previous 60 episodes, Katara actively expressed romantic interest in Aang exactly, wait for it,

Once.

And it got retconned out of relevance by the following two interactions where the possibility of a romantic relationship came up, making the Headband dance pretty easy to reclassify as just one of those examples where Aang “teaches” Katara to have fun (as if one of the main obstacles to her having fun wasn’t him constantly fooling around and offloading his duties). And because the writers not only didn’t succeed in portraying Katara’s internal state of mind, but also failed to root her reluctance to pursue a relationship in outside circumstances that could change, her sudden state of unconfused once Aang steps into the spotlight has a single canonical explanation that as much as approaches coherency.

The fact is, though, that trying to interpret canon Cataang from a Watsonian perspective is an exercise in foolishness. Because there is no Watsonian justification for the ship and never has been. Bryke simply conceived of Katara as nothing but a tropey prize for Aang, never saw her as anything beyond that, and were perfectly happy to go on and immortalize her as a passive broodmare for the rest of her life.

And I fully intend to die mad about it.

(-) Iroh dips

OK, it’s been long apparent that the show doesn’t intend to do anything about Iroh’s complicity in AzulOzai’s regime in any meaningful way, and that his sole motivation for doing anything whatsoever is Zuko whom he views as a replacement son which is supposed to be good for some reason. But the finale has him abandon even that, and instead turns him full-on YOLO, idgaf anymore. It really throws Iroh’s supposed love for Zuko into doubt when his last act in the entire show is to take a half-educated 16-year old with no political savvy or an heir to secure a dynastic continuity and plomp him on the throne of a war-mongering imperialist regime where the entirety of the militarist and ruling class is guaranteed to fight him tooth and nail for power.

(I sure hope Mai’s ready to start popping out babies by tea-time otherwise the whole country is fukd in about a week)

Christ, how hard would it be to have Iroh keep the throne warm for a few years while Zuko is getting ready to succeed him? Not only would it make the whole FN reformation bit quite likelier to occur, it would require Iroh’s hedonistic ass to actually sacrifice something for once. And not having Zuko ascend to power, instead spending some time bettering and educating himself first, would be a wonderful message that no matter what you endured and overcame, you never stop growing. A kids’ show, remember?

(-) The conquering of Ba Sing Se

Gee, I feel so blessed to have my attention diverted from battlefields which actually matter to an old dude vanity project I would have been perfectly happy to assume resolved itself off-screen.

The White Lotus in general just bugs me. I was fine with the individual characters and their overall passivity when they were portrayed as lone dissenters living under circumstances where it wasn’t really possible for any single person to mount a meaningful resistance. But as members of a far-reaching shadowy organization that’s left the real fight to a bunch of kids for 59 episodes straight and didn’t turn up until a perfect opportunity presented itself to take control of the largest city in the world and bask in the spotlight?

Yeah, no.

Similarly to the lionturtle-ex-machina, the White Lotus represents a huge missed opportunity for a season-long storytelling. Here’s just a brief list of what they could have been doing throughout Book 3:

orchestrating a Fire Nation uprising;

gathering those directly persecuted by AzulOzai’s regime to help Zuko keep his hold on power once he’s crowned;

establishing themselves as a viable alternative to Ozai;

sabotaging Fire Nation’s war efforts from the inside;

countering Fire Nation propaganda (Asha Greyjoy’s pinecones, anyone?);

running a supply network to alleviate the suffering of Earth Kingdom citizens.

Instead, they sit on their asses until the time comes to claim personal glory.

You know what, good on Bryke for making me conclude that in comparison, the Freedom Fighters were perfectly unproblematic, actually.

(-) Fire Lord Dead-by-Dawn

Yes, a kids’ show, I know! But ffs, this is the same kids’ show that came up with Long Feng and portrayed courtly intrigue, kingly puppets, secret police, spy networks, and information wars. Was it really too much of me to expect something other than “enlightened despot solves everything”? Especially if said enlightened despot has persisting anger issues, no personal support system, no base of followers, and no political experience whatsoever?

If Zuko’s actually serious about regaining the Fire Nation’s honor (i.e. by dismantling the country’s military machine, decolonizing the Earth Kingdom, paying reparations to everyone and their lemur, and funding any and all cultural restoration projects Aang and the SWT come up with), then there is no way, no way in the universe that he doesn’t face a civil war, deposing, and execution within a month.

One reason why his future as a Fire Lord seems rather bleak is that little’s been shown about the actual subjects of AzulOzai’s regime. While we get a vague reassurance that “no Toph, they’re not born bad” (le shockings), they largely remain a voiceless uniform mass of brainwashed clapping seals. What is their view on the Fire Nation’s crimes? Do they associate their condition with their country’s war-mongering? How will they react when Zuko starts dismantling the country piece by piece to rebuild it, bringing it to economic ruin? What will they do when noble Ozai loyalists come out of the woodwork and begin rounding them up under the banner of “Make the Fire Nation Great Again?”

I have no idea, and Zuko doesn’t either because he’s unironically more qualified to rule the Earth Kingdom than his own people.

You know what would have been better? Fire Lord Iroh, White Lotus pulling the strings to maintain the regime, and Crown Prince/People’s Champion Zuko travelling the Fire Nation with Aang and an army of tutors to promote the new boss, only to realize that absolute monarchy is kinda crap for the people he’s one day supposed to rule and gaining their support by ceding some power to them.

I’d laser holes into my TV due to how much I’d enjoy watching that.

(-) All hail Avatar Rock

Literally and metaphorically. Aang doesn’t sacrifice anything, gets everything, and the clever solution of going about getting said everything is handed to him on a silver platter, requiring no active participation on his part whatsoever.

He doesn’t work to unblock his chakras, spiritually or physically.

He only speaks to his past lives to get a pat on the back and a bow-tied solution he could mindlessly follow.

Energy-bending doesn’t require any sacrifice from him, leaves no lasting marks, and only serves for the narrative to praise him as the rare individual that’s unbendable and thus so very very special.

The most infuriating thing is, however, that Aang is clearly shown as being able to beat Ozai without either the Avatar state, or energy-bending.

And he chooses not to. From this moment on, Aang no longer fights to save the world. He fights to preserve his beliefs, going directly against the instructions of his past lives and effectively reneging on his duties as the Avatar.

Again.

It’s not like you can’t portray Aang’s faithfulness to his spiritual beliefs as the key to beating Ozai and saving the world. But that’s not what the show did. There is no link between Aang sparing Ozai and securing a better future, quite to the contrary—Ozai’s survival ends up being a massive problem for the continuation of Zuko’s rule, and consequently a threat to the world at large. His survival benefits Aang and no one else.

Aang’s spiritual purity and his status as a savior of the world are allowed to coexist only due to a deliberate stroke of a writer’s pen.

And I hate it.

Welp, nothing to do about it now except to bury myself up to my tits in fix-it fics I guess.

[helioleti]

I've been rewatching ATLA several times lately and this time I especially ended up wondering a lot about Iroh and Ozai's past and characters in general. I just can't help but think it weird that Ozai is the ultimate trashbag of a humanbeing while Iroh ended up preaching harmony and peace. It just doesn't make any sense. These guys are brothers. They were brought up by the same parents, in the same fascist imperialistic nation, they were taught the same values growing up. You're trying to tell me the difference is that Iroh was destined to be the person he eventually came to be, but Ozai was just born evil? No, I don't think so.

I have two hot takes that I'm gonna elaborate:

1. Iroh had a guidance Ozai lacked

2. Ozai was the less favored son

(Disclaimer: I haven't read the comics yet so I don't know how deep they've already gone into this subject at some point. I'm trying to interpret and analyze the stuff that I got from the animated series only. If anything I say contradicts what has already been confirmed in the comics, feel free to correct me.)

Hear me out. Iroh wasn't born a saint. Everyone is aware of this, especially Iroh himself. He laid siege to Ba Sing Se for 2 years, costing the Fire Nation and Earth Kingdom thousands of lives. Everyone knew that if the Fire Nation took over the capital, it meant almost ultimate victory for the Fire Nation. He even went as far as making a offhand sadistic jokes about burning the city to the ground in that letter to Zuko and Azula.

Iroh acknowledges it himself; He was a different man.

So what changed?

Yes, his son died. It broke and shattered him from the inside, making him drop all efforts to continue fighting in the war. To continue what had been his lifelong ambition, what he believed to be his destiny. He had a literal vision about taking over Ba Sing Se when he was a child, and that had been what he'd been pursuing ever since. But the death of his son managed to crumble all of that into nothingness. How is that possible?

Don't get me wrong. I think it's completely valid. I just don't understand how Lu Ten and Iroh could've had such a loving and caring relationship in the first place, when that's clearly something unusual among the royal family. Ozai burned and banished Zuko without a second thought, not to mention all the other shit he did to him growing up. Ozai didn't give two shits about Azula either, he only ever intended to use her as his weapon. Doesn't seem too surprising, if you ask me. Azulon didn't hesitate to demand that Ozai kill his own son if he wanted the throne. That's the man that raised Ozai, so it's just logical that Ozai learned that behavior and those values from his own father.

Even 9 year old Azula thinks it laughable that Iroh would fall apart at the death of his son. She is a child and this is how she thinks. The reason Zuko doesn't think like this is because he's had the guidance of his mother, unlike Azula. This is the kind of mentality these kids grow up with. They grew up with war and so did Iroh and Ozai.

So why was Iroh's relationship with Lu Ten so different? Where did Iroh experience the kind of compassion and love he passed on to his own son, that Ozai definitely didn't? People act on how they've come to learn, so where did Iroh learn to care about his son to a point that it made him give up on his lifelong ambition?

Let's review a very crucial information we have on Iroh and Ozai as siblings: They have a huge age gap.

Frankly, I'm guessing about 10-20 years. Looks more like 20 to me, but that could also be Iroh's greater amount of endured pain and war making him look older than he actually is. But no one can deny that an age gap is definitely there. Which can also indicate they had different upbringings, despite having grown up in the same family as brothers.

What does this mean? Well, that's just me theorizing now, but I can definitely imagine that Iroh had someone, a family member maybe, there for him who wasn't around or didn't care to be when Ozai grew up. There must've been someone there who gave Iroh emotional security and guidance throughout his upbringing. Who? That's up to imagination. A friend of the family? A friendly uncle? His own mother ((or father))? (The last two things worked out for Zuko in the end, didn't they?) Otherwise I can't really explain myself why Iroh had enough values to love the way he loved Lu Ten, while Ozai clearly didn't give two fucks about his children at any point in his life.

Iroh was the firstborn son, the one who had a vision very early in his life that his destiny was to take over Ba Sing Se. Probably the one who got to have a family member care about him enough to show him how to love.

(I like to point this out a lot because I find it very interesting, and very significant. Please A:TLA give us more info on Iroh's past!!)

Which brings me to my second take: Ozai was the less favored son.

Iroh was clearly a son to be proud of. He was a master firebender, the "Dragon of the West", if you will. He apparently had a vision as a boy that he'd conquer the most "impenetrable city" in the world. He probably lived up to his parent's expectations for his whole life, especially having no sibling to be compared to for a significant part of his life. He broke through the outter wall of Ba Sing Se during his siege. Yada yada yada, you get my point. He's the best son they could've wished for.

And Ozai? As far as I know, he barely even has any military achievements. Taking over Ba Sing Se was Azula's doing. While Iroh laid siege to the capital, he was at home chilling in the palace. He's the younger brother to an established hero and was never meant to be firelord. Now, I haven't read the comics for more info on Ozai's biography, but this man barely had a chance to live up to his parent's standards with Iroh as an older brother. If my theory is correct, Ozai also didn't have any person to provide him emotional guidance throughout his life. (*cough* like Azula)

The logical outcome is: infinite jealousy.

And when Ozai suggests to Azulon that he revoke Iroh's birthright to become firelord, this is Azulon's answer:

Azulon doesn't even hesitate to call Ozai out on his bullshit. He doesn't hesitate to take offense at the suggestion of betraying Iroh, and he even seems to care about Iroh's suffering. Not to mention that Azulon is overall annoyed with Ozai's request for an audience and sends the rest of Ozai's family away as soon as he can, to get whatever it is Ozai wants over with.

I could also mention the fact that Ozai tried to impress Azulon with his daughter's skills (Azula, even named after him) and the overall strained relationship these two seem to exhibit. It's obviously very different from Azulon's relationship with Iroh, if the way he talks about said man is anything to show for.

What if Azulon treated Ozai the same way Ozai treated Zuko? (Probably without the physical abuse, but you get my point.) What if this is where Ozai learned to treat a "useless" kid like shit, maybe also in a way to cope with how he was treated himself?

Getting deeper into the fact that Ozai is rather a loser compared to Iroh, without any big military achievements and without value for anything beyond that, this also explains a lot about Ozai's constant need to establish his dominance.

First; Becoming Firelord through radical manners (you know, killing his own son or killing his own father)

Second; Publicly burning and banishing his own son whom he considers a weakling, who dared to speak up in his war room. Doing this to have everyone know that he doesn't associate himself with weakness and that he will not ever tolerate any form of disrespect.

Third; The whole Phoenix King act. No one can tell me this isn't a madman's doing. This is literally to show off that he is the most powerful person in the world.

Ozai is so obsessed with proving himself and his superiority to everyone, including himself and probably Iroh too. This makes most sense if we consider that he probably lived in his brother's shadow for his whole life, ignored by probably every guiding figure he's ever had in his life, maybe even considered a laughingstock by his own father.

Perhaps this is also the reason Ozai didn't have any problem with Iroh accompanying Zuko in banishment. His brother, the hero in whose shadow he grew up, and his son, the failure he'd wanted out of the way for a long time already. It would erase Iroh's image that made him superior to him, once and for all. For himself and the world. I believe that branding him a traitor was the biggest satisfaction Ozai had ever experienced in his life.

I absolutely despise Ozai with every fibre of my heart, but it amazes me how ATLA continues to leave so much room for interpretation and explanation for a character as despicable as him. Writing this, even had me feel sympathy for him at some point. Feel free to disagree with me or add anything, I'm eager to hear everyone's thoughts about Ozai and Iroh's backstories because I'm geniuinely very curious.

[ultranos]

Frontier psychiatry plz, i need more about katara just seeing azula in the swt

Okay, so when we last left events, Katara discovers exactly who is the official head of the medical team sent to alleviate the SWT’s mental health crisis.

Azula, while calmly writing a report at a makeshift desk: "Can you please not freeze me again? I don't want to waste our limited supplies on treating my own hypothermia and unfortunately my team will insist on doing so."

Katara absolutely has water at the ready almost instantly. But Azula is not even focusing on her, and certainly isn’t making any threatening moves. Unless you count writing a medical report as threatening

Before anything else has a chance to happen, Sokka bursts in, takes in the situation, and breathes a sigh of relief. “Oh good, no one is dead.”

Katara’s going to have A Time getting used to this world that just flipped on it’s head. Because the last she saw Azula, she was in the middle of her nervous breakdown. And the last she heard of Azula, from Zuko no less, was that she’d turned into a recluse who never really left her suite in the Palace.

Zuko: "...yes, that is exactly what is happening."

See, Zuko learned a little thing called “lying”. And when Azula was better, she ended up going to medical school under a pseudonym. (the placeholder name is “Dr. Azula Roku”, which if I keep it, Zuko will take great joy in turning into a real legal person. Also, yes, she could keep her personal name, since she’s likely not the only person named after a long-reigning Fire Lord) And since her license is under that name, she continues to use it .

There’s nothing really tying the pseudonym to “Princess of the Fire Nation”, so Katara spends some time tripping over the fact that means Azula’s not doing this for political gain. Or really any kind of gain that Katara can determine. So it’s almost like....Azula is enjoying helping people? Especially the so-called hopeless cases?

(This relationship between Katara and Azula goes from suspicion to respect to actual friendship. Depending on how it goes, I may even leave it open to interpretation as pre-ship. Mostly because I want to see if I could make that actually work in canon while being fair to all characters. No small task.)

[thebluesunflower44]

Hey, Blue! Hope some prompts help you out of your funk. 💜💜

Pairing: Zutara

Prompt: Westward

Angst or fluff? I can’t choose! Whichever works for you!

tysm ever🥺 I chose angst!

“The sun is setting on the Fire Nation,” nobles whisper in the streets.

“Indeed, the Fire Lord’s glory has gone westward,” husbands whisper to their wives over dinner.

“Our nation will be ruined,” children who lack true understanding whisper to their friends.

And in the Fire Lord’s bedroom, a twenty-two-year-old woman whispers, “I’m sorry.”

Zuko turns his back to her and punches his dresser, sending a tremor through Katara. “What could you possibly have to be sorry for?” His voice is quiet too, but it carries a rage that threatens to burn the world.

“Out there, all those people - all your people see me as unfit to even stand in this palace. And while that doesn’t faze me, they’re not just badmouthing me. They say you’re a bad ruler and that you’re singlehandedly-”

“Stop.” He holds up a hand and on any other day, Katara would have reprimanded him for trying to command her. But today, she listens to him - it’s not as if she wants to tell him all the awful things she’s heard. “If anyone needs to apologize, it’s me.”

“That’s not true.” 

Zuko spins around to face her. “Had I never begged you to be the Ambassador, none of this would have been happening. Had I never gotten in between you and Aang, none of this would have been happening. Had I never kissed you, none of this would have been happening!”

If there exists a universe where none of that happened, she must be miserable in it. “Shut up, Zuko. You’re not allowed to even think that. I’ll gladly handle every problem the world throws our way, as long as I know…” she trails off, wanting to say ‘I have you’, but knowing that she can’t. Not right now, not today. She came here for a reason.

From the way he’s pacing, the young monarch doesn’t seem to have heard her, still caught up in villainizing himself. “It is my fault. It was extremely selfish of me to ask you to be by my side. Ridiculously selfish. The only thing I’m ruining is your life!” he nearly shouts, pointing a finger at her.

Katara’s heart clenches. He’s making this so much harder than it has to be. “You’re not.” And when he looks at her disbelievingly, she steels herself and continues. “You aren’t. But I can’t...we can’t keep doing this. I refuse to be the reason people lose faith in you. I won’t be the reason even more people turn against you. There is so much we can do, we are so powerful together - but I think we were naive to believe we could completely break down the hateful walls that war constructs in just a few years.”

In two long strides, he crosses the room and grabs her forearms. “Not this, Katara. Say anything but this. You are the only thing on this planet keeping me from going under. If you’re going to leave, at least do it because you’ve decided you hate me. Don’t do it for selfless reasons, please. What happened to being the two people in the world who never give up, no matter what?” He touches his forehead to hers so he can search for the answers in her eyes, but she can’t meet his gaze.

“I couldn’t hate you if I tried. I won’t lie to you, Zuko. I want nothing more than to hold your hand for the rest of our lives, but I think the time has come for us to be pragmatic about this. So many people in your nation are just waiting for you to mess up, and me becoming the Royal Consort will be their cue to tear you down. I will not be complicit in that.” Still not looking at him, she pries herself out of his warm hold and hugs herself. “I’ve already packed my things and the resignation letter is on your desk. I’ve talked to Azula too and she sees the necessity behind my decision.”

When she does glance up, she has to dig her toes into the carpet so she doesn’t rush to him and wipe the tears away. She can’t remember the last time she saw Zuko cry.

They maintain eye contact for a few seemingly never-ending moments, and with him looking at her like that, she feels like a murderer. Which is fitting, she supposes, since she has killed something here today.

His voice is brimming with venom that she knows veils pain. “Fine. Since you had the time to ask my sister about this and not me, fine. Did you also ask some of my councilmen while you were at it? How about some random people on the streets? Just let everyone help you in making this decision about our relationship, except for me!”

“Zuko-”

“Leave then! Why even bother telling me? The resignation letter would have been indicative enough!” There are sparks spinning around his fingertips. “Just go.”

“Zuko,” she hesitates, and when he doesn’t interrupt her she chokes out, “I’ll- I’ll leave. I’m sorry. I do still love you.” He collapses onto his bed, head in hands and she exhales shakily. “Maybe there is a world where the sun rises in the west. A world where our love signals the start of something new, instead of the end of your reign. I’m sorry we don’t live in that world.”

“Please, Katara.” His quiet sobs fill the room and she’s not sure if he’s pleading with her to stay or leave. Her hands come up to cover her mouth and tears she didn’t know were falling wet her sleeves.

Before anything can change her mind, she runs out of the room.

fun. I’d actually like to expand this at some point but also I have way too many stories rn, so we’ll see. again, thank you for the prompt :) I know it was a pretty loose interpretation but it’s what came to mind!

send me a ship and a prompt/story summary and i’ll write a short piece!

[my-bated-breath]

Hello! I love your blog and was wondering something: what do you think about "zuko and katara were written narratively to be siblings." I was reading somewhere that the agni kai is supposed to be about zuko saving the sister who can heal (katara) from the one cannot be salvaged (azula). It doesn't really make sense to me, but I wanted your input. Thank you!!

Thank you so much for your ask, anon! It means the world to me that you would like my input on this subject :)

(Now for me to recede into my meta-analysis persona-)

There are several fallacies to this argument that exist due to a misreading of the subtext in Zuko and Katara’s relationship and the narrative implications of the Final Agni Kai.

To begin with, out of all the canon Zutara interactions we see in the show, none explicitly frame Zuko and Katara as siblings. At most, we see a few scenes that are framed ambiguously - and ambiguous is the keyword here because ambiguous subtext does not contradict romantic subtext. In particular, the necklace-capture scene from The Waterbending Scrolls, the Crystal Catacombs from The Crossroads of Destiny, and a large portion of The Southern Raiders allude to intimacy often seen in romantic relationships.

Then, on paper, most of the Zutara interactions after the Southern Raiders can be read as platonic, but we have to remember that framing/subtext is everything. In their meta here, @royaltealovingkookiness analyzes which Zutara scenes can be interpreted as sibling-coded and which ones cannot. To summarize, there are a few post-TSR interactions that are strictly platonic (though there is no such thing as “strictly” in fandom), but many scenes - not my boyfriend/girlfriend in response to Jun, Zuko taking the lightning for Katara, POV shots of their hands reaching out for each other during the Final Agni Kai, just to name a few - extend into romantic setup. So no, Zuko and Katara do not work well enough as a sibling dynamic to justify the “saving the sister who can heal from the one who cannot be salvaged” argument.

Moreover, although the Final Agni Kai’s themes are centered around the divide between the Fire Nation’s legacy of war and hope for peace, Azula’s vicious nature and Katara’s healing abilities are not framed as juxtapositions within the narrative. Instead, it’s Azula and Zuko’s Agni Kai that embodies the juxtaposition between destruction and reconstruction, revealing a brother and sister torn apart by childhood, one fighting to continue her ancestors’ war, the other one fighting to bring peace to his descendants. Later, when Zuko jumps in front of the lightning meant for Katara, it’s not him “saving one sister from another,” but him acting out a fear stemming from love. Because Azula’s psychology can be captured by her two lines: “You should have feared me more!” and “Trust is for fools! Fear is the only reliable way.” So by aiming the lightning at Katara, Azula pinpoints Katara - love - as Zuko’s weakness. And it is his weakness - he collapses to the ground, lightning only partially redirected, electricity flickering through his body as he groans in pain. Except that’s not the end, because Katara defeats Azula and heals Zuko. Her bond with him is what saves him, proving that love (either platonic or romantic, though at this point it’s mostly platonic) is a strength, not a weakness.

The lightning scene could never be about Katara as a sister, but perhaps more importantly, it never was about the difference between Zuko’s “sisters.” Instead, Zuko, Katara, and Azula’s roles all reflect another set of differences - war and peace, fear and love.

[alrightzuko]

Literally can't stop thinking about "You have indeed felt a great loss. But love is a form of energy, and it swirls all around us. The Air Nomads' love for you has not left this world. It is still inside of your heart, and is reborn in the form of new love" and how much the concept of this quote pretty much applies to the main characters within atla, especially in regards to their development and central arcs throughout the series and how it plays a big role in their journey, either on a large scale or a more subtle one.

Aang's is the most obvious and is the original context of this quote. His love for the Air Nomads and their love for him is reborn in his love for Katara and vice versa. These two develop an instinctual bond as soon as they meet and get along very well, providing each other with support in overcoming the trauma, a listening ear when things are rough or standing up for the other when they encounter obstacles, especially ones related to their bending. They supply each other with the home and understanding that has been lost as a result of the war. Aang's love for Sokka can be interpreted in the same way, who forms one of the first bases for Aang's second family after the loss of his entire culture. It's not just that though, there's also the gradual trust in each other's leadership skills, reaching its zenith in their preparations for the invasion of the Fire Nation capital.

Katara's reborn love is likewise Aang's as well, and I think the best way to demonstrate this example is paralleling Aang's actions in the second episode of book one when Zuko and his crew attacked the South Pole and Kya's in the flashbacks of the Southern Raiders. Both are people who meant a lot for Katara and who at that point helped in shaping her view of the world, since Kya raised her and Aang even in the short span they interacted reminded her of the joy of enjoying her adolescence and having fun. Both did not hesitate to offer themselves up for the Fire Nation when it became clear that Katara and the village was in danger and both made a conscious effort to reassure Katara during those sequence of events. Of course, Aang and Kya didn't have the same outcome but that's not the point.

Zuko's is Ursa's and Iroh's. It's not a reborn love in the literal sense but for all intents and purposes, the result is largely similar. While we know from flashbacks that Zuko was very close to his uncle even prior to Iroh losing his son and events leading up to Zuko's banishment, the fact of the matter is that Ursa is shown to be his primary caregiver, the person who works to do whatever they can to shield him from Ozai's abuse and someone who inspires a lot of his conceptions about his self image, particularly his persistence in the face of adversity and failure. Once Ursa is no longer in a position to continue doing so, that role is then taken up by Iroh who continuously makes every effort he can to support Zuko through the worst period of his life, providing the love and care he needs in order to heal, standing against the harm Azula and Ozai attempt to inflict against him (often literally) as well as teaching him the tools he needs in order to continue building his separate identity outside of the toxic ideals of his family. Whether that is in relation to Zuko's bending and the way he's been branded as the less talented and therefore a disappointment or in relation to the imperialist mindset of their country and the royal family by passing on the ideals that Iroh himself learned through his journey of self-reflection.

Sokka actually has two forms of reborn loves, which I realised upon some extensive thinking. The first is by far the more obvious, which is Yue and Suki. Yes, Sokka met Suki first but the order of events lend my argument some weight. It's not just that both are his primary love interests (which they are) but they are ones who influenced Sokka's relationship to his role as a protector and to another extent they were people who he could enjoy himself around on more equal terms since he more often than not is the 'plan guy' within the gaang. Yue's death and his inability to do anything that prevents it enhances his overprotective tendencies and it's no coincidence that he faces this particular issue with Suki on the serpent's pass by his own admission. He's later able to overcome it and start a relationship with Suki without the shadow of that incident hanging down on them (pardon the pun). The other one, which is more subtler and might puzzle some, is Hakoda and Piandao. Hakoda as Sokka's father is his role model, the ideal of the warrior that he strives to live up to and who reassures him of his worth and his pride in him. This guidance is also, to a degree, the part that Piandao plays as his mentor; he helps Sokka gain the confidence needed in himself and imparts lessons that tie in to skills as a warrior. In each of the episodes "Sokka's Master" and "The Guru", Sokka experiences low faith in his abilities and is reassured by Piandao and Hakoda respectively (although Piandao's was much more... confrontational). In the end, the purpose is served. Hakoda cannot be present with the amount that Sokka needs but the love he has for him is found in a new shape in Piandao's mentorship.

Toph experiences her first unconditional love during her childhood with the badger-moles, they are the creatures who accept her and her blindness and they're the ones with whom she gains faith in her earthbending. That love is carried over when she meets Team Avatar, Aang challenges the double identity she built in her life that is in conflict of the image her parents have of her, "the obedient little helpless blind girl", and she decides later to leave her home behind and take a leap of faith so to speak. This decision leads her to be able to build healthy relationships where she's comfortable and secure. Katara teaches her that expressions of femininity and her tough persona don't have to be at odds with each other, and that she can enjoy being pampered and still at the end of the day resume acting herself. And we have many instances where Sokka leads Toph around in places where she needs someone to help her to and Toph is comfortable doing so. It's a development from the Toph we first meet, who rejects aid because she needs to establish her own personhood. She grows to be okay with relying on others in a way that doesn't lessen her own independence.

Suki admittedly gave me a bit of a brain scratcher until I drew upon her biggest relationships, the Kyoshi Warriors and Sokka. Suki is the leader of the group, she's someone who believes in herself and knows her capabilities very well and it's not hard to understand that it's because of her position as Kyoshi Warrior. But more importantly, her fellow comrades offer her a support net. She can rely on them to have her back, just as they did during the attack on Kyoshi Island and in the Earth Kingdom. And after the run in with Azula, Mai and Ty Lee and getting separated in imprisonment, she lost that. Her confinement was isolated from any familiar faces and probably very traumatic. Until Sokka finds her in the Boiling Rock, and she regains the lost sense of partnership. From there until the finale, Sokka and Suki are shown to interact romantically, socially and on the battlefield. They joke and have ridiculous fun together while enjoying the Boy in the Iceberg play and they fight together seamlessly on the gondola, during training on Ember Island and in the Airship battle. This is a testament to the incredible trust they built and the camaraderie they share.

Note that when I say reborn, I don't necessarily mean in strict terms of life and death, which can be applied to more than one character anyway, or in the literal sense of reincarnation. I mean it more as a metaphor, it's a love that has been lost or can not present right now, either temporarily or in a more permanent sense. And I think that is one of the most profound messages the show can impart to such a wide audience. That love is a form of energy around us and even though the person who provided us with that specific kind of love isn't or can't be around anymore to give it to us, their love is so strong that it changes and comes back in a new love. It's not gone, not forever, it's just... different.

[aspoonofsugar]

I was happy to discover you are in ATLA fandom too. Could you please share your thoughts on Azula? I like your analyses

Hello anon!

Thank you very much for the nice words and for this ask! I love Azula!

I think Azula’s character explores the idea of control:

In The Avatar State, she is shown training to master “lightening”. There, it is shown how losing control of even a small detail, like a lock of hair, is enough to make Azula angry.

It is not by chance that such a scene occurs in an episode focused on the Avatar State. As a matter of fact the Avatar State and the lightening can (partially) be compared when it comes to Aang and Zuko’s stories in book two. This book opens up with Aang trying to enter the Avatar State and with the lightening being introduced thanks to Azula’s character. What is more, both Aang and Zuko try to get a hold of the two different techniques throughout the season. Finally, both skills need for the user to “let go” of their feelings.

In particular, when it comes to the lightening, there are two different ways to interpret this:

Iroh: There is energy all around us. The energy is both Ying and Yang. Positive energy and negative energy. Only a select few firebenders can separate these energies. This creates an imbalance. The energy wants to restore balance and, in the moment the positive and negative energy come pressing back together, you provide release and guidance...creating lightening. (...) Remember, once you separate the energy you do not command it. You are simply its humble guide.”

Iroh: “Lightening is a pure expression of fire-bending without aggression. It is not fueled by rage or emotion the way other firebending is. Some call lightening the cold blooded fire. It is precise precise and deadly, like Azula. To perform the technique requires peace of mind.”

On one hand Iroh’s description is interesting because it is as if creating lightening is a process of synthesis. You separate opposites and have them come back together, so that they can gain a new form. So it makes sense that, thematically, this new synthesis can happen only if the character overcomes their inner turmoil. This is also why Zuko is not able to learn the skill:

Iroh: “You will not be able to master lightening until you have dealt with the turmoil inside you.”

Zuko: “What turmoil!?”

Iroh: “Zuko, you must let go of your feelings of shame if you want your anger to go away.”

In order to acquire it, he should let go of his shame, but he can’t do it. The fact that “shame” is what stops Zuko from making progress is interesting. As explained by Guru Pathick, thus, the fire chakra is the chakra of will and it is polluted by shame.

On the other hand the lightening is called cold-blooded firebending because it can be realized only by benders whose emotions are kept in check. I would argue that this is the reason why Azula is able to use this skill. It is not that she has reached a level of emotional maturity which lets her become a  “humble guide” to the energy. It is just that she constantly represses her feelings. This repression gives the idea that she is in perfect control, but this impression is a superficial one and it is proven wrong towards the end of the story.

In short, Zuko is not able to use lightening because of his explosive emotions, while Azula is able to because she restricts her feelings. Let’s highlight that this difference between the two siblings comes up again in a key episode aka The Beach:

Once again Zuko’s emotions are in full display. He is angry and nervous. He might not know why, but he is. Moreover he is finally able to express himself thanks to a confrontation with the other members of the group. Finally he does so while a giant fire erupts to highlight the catharsis of the moment. When it comes to Azula, she too opens up a little. In particular, she lets this slip:

Azula: I don't have sob stories like all of you. I could sit here and complain how our mom like Zuko more than me. But I don't really care. My own mother... thought I was a monster... She was right of course, but it still hurt.

Azula thinks that Ursa saw her as a monster. It is clear that the unsolved issues with her mother have left a sign on her. However, when she has the chance to truly let it all out, she does not. She changes the tone of the conversation and immediately leaves the topic. However, this does not mean that she is not troubled. If anything, her emotions keep burning behind a cold exterior, exactly like the fire, which burns under the ashes. Almost invisible, but still there.

About this, let’s consider two things.

1) In The Beach episode, Azula does something similar here:

Azula: “Come down to the beach with me. Come on! This place is depressing.”

Zuko starts talking about their past and their family, but Azula does not engage in the conversation and tells him to leave.

2) When Azula opens up, the others do not challenge her. They do not ask her what she meant nor they try to contradict what she said. This is different from what they have just done with each other. All in all, Zuko openly provokes Ty Lee and Ty Lee, Zuko and Azula all provoke May, until she shouts. Finally, all the girls keep asking Zuko who he is really angry with, until he is finally able to answer.

These two considerations can be linked to more general ideas.

a) Azula is a person who needs to always be in control. This has two consequences. The first is that she never lets herself be vulnerable. She is always on guard and closed up to others. The second is that she is like a fish out of water when there is nothing to control.

This is made clear in the episode The Beach:

Zuko: “Doing nothing is a waste of time. We are being sent a way in a force vacation. I feel like a child.”

In this episode, Azula and the others are given a break. However, Azula, just like Zuko, is not really able to take a break.

She is on an island and should relax, but the only way she manages to do so is by finding new enemies:

She must continually challenge herself and must change everything in a competition (and win it) in order not to face how empty she feels. This is why, in the end, her solution to the insecurities the beach re-awakens in her is to trash a party. She can’t fit in a group of pampered teenagers, so she ruins their evening. However, what Azula should really do is to try to understand why she does not fit.

The episode shows that Azula is ignorant when it comes to casual relationships:

Azula: “I am so used to people worshipping us”.

Ty Lee: “They should!”

Azula: “I know and I love it. But for once I just wanna see how people would react to us if they did not know who we were.”

She says so directly. She has been worshipped all her life. However, this means she does not know how people react to her outside of her role as a princess and a military leader.

The military aspect is especially interesting because, even if she does not disclose her identity as a royal, her attempts to bond are all centered around military topics:

Azula: “That's a sharp outfit, Chan. Careful, you could puncture the hull of an empire-class Fire Nation battle ship, leaving thousands to drown at sea. Because... it's so sharp.”

Azula: “Together you and I will be... THE STRONGEST COUPLE IN THE WHOLE WORLD! We will dominate the Earth!”

Her life has been a long training session for war, so she does not really know anything else. This is obvious both in how she can’t talk about other things and in how she sees others not like people, but like enemies/rivals.

This is also why the vacation in Amber Island could have been very important if Azula had been able to properly capitalize on it. All in all, The Beach is the episode where Azula is shown the most vulnerable (not counting the finale where she has a complete break-down).

She tries to change her approach to go along with others:

Azula: “Well that sounds really shallow and stupid...Let’s try it!

She openly apologizes and shows her insecurities:

“Look...maybe I just said it because I was a little...jealous.”

However, all of this is not enough to change the trajectory of her arc. Why is that so? This has to do with another aspect of Azula’s controlling tendencies. As a matter of fact not only does she controls herself, but also others.

b) Azula is presented since the beginning as a highly manipulative character. Manipulation is at the root of all her major relationships:

Zuko:You lied to me!

Azula: Like I've never done that before.

She lies to Zuko to catch him and forces Ty Lee to join her through manipulation. Moreover most of her plans rely on manipulation and lies. However, if you try to control and manipulate others you are unable to build healthy relationships.

This is what happens to Azula. As stated above, nobody replies to Azula when she opens up. Zuko could have very easily told her Ursa loved them both. May and Ty Lee could have tried to comfort her somehow. However, nobody does. And nobody does because they are all scared of Azula. In her attempt to control everybody, Azula has negated herself the chance to have  a relationship among equals.

What is more, it is clear that it is impossible to fully control others. The Beach starts to show this through Azula’s attempts to flirt. Without her status as a princess, her peers do not behave like she wants. She might be able to hook up with a guy by rehearsing and applying a strategy. However, building a relationship is not a military operation. It is not something that can be done through control, but only through respect and trust.

Azula fails to do so and this is why she is left behind by others. She is left behind by Zuko who breaks free from their father. She is left behind by Mai and Ty Lee who choose healthier relationships over the one they have with her. After she loses them, Azula starts spiralling out of control and burns everything around her.

In short, I would say that Azula’s main flaw is “control”. She wants to control everyone, herself included. So in the end she is betrayed and left behind by people and she herself loses control:

Ursa: I think you're confused. All your life you've used fear to control people. Like your friends Mai and Ty Lee.

Azula:Well what choice do I have? Trust is for fools! Fear is the only reliable way. Even you fear me.

This is especially tragic because it is clear that Azula’s behaviour is her answer to an environment where a clear line was drawn between winners and losers. Azula has always been Ozai’s favourite, but Ozai has never loved her. He loves Azula’s talent, so Azula cultivates those qualities which make her accepted by her father. What is more, Ozai is not a character who values feelings or emotions, so Azula represses these aspects of herself.

In conclusion, I think Azula is a very tragic character and that her spiral was very well written and realistic. I also think that in the series itself she has shown the potential to change for the better, but this possibility has not been explored. I mean, if she had no guilt nor regrets about her behaviour, she would not have seen the hallucination of her mother calling her out.

These are more or less my major thoughts on Azula. There are probably many other things to add, but as far as my generic impressions of her go, this is what I have to say. Feel free to make more specific questions! I love her!

Thank you for the ask!

[chipsahoecookies27]

Okay now let’s get to what I would have done with their characters, let it be know I’m not a writer this is just my take. I’m going to focus on season three because it’s where I have most of my problems but there is a little preface. In season 2 I think there should be more of a romance between Ty lee and Azula with a little bit of jealousy from Mai but like make it subtle. Like when every Azula is angry show Ty lee comforting her and Mai rolling her eyes so that it can be interpreted as her being annoyed by them. Also insert some looks of longing from Mai to Ty lee but again subtlety. Anyway, let’s get to season 3. I want season 3 to start with Zuko on the boat with him feeling weird about going back to the fire nation. Insert Ty lee coming and asking Zuko what’s up and he talks about how so much as changed since he has been back. Ty lee being her usual hopeful self calms his worries by saying something along the lines of yeah we have changed but at least we are together and we can do it together. And he smiles and thanks her. (Like give them a sibling/friends dynamic not a romantic one.

You know in the flashback to Zuko’s childhood you can keep Mai having a crush on him but show Ty lee as a bridge between Azula and Zuko like yes she is really close to Azula but she also has a nice relationship with Zuko). Basically instead of Maiko I want it build a friendship between Ty lee and Zuko but also Mai and Zuko. Like let’s see moments where Zuko and Ty lee talk about stuff and like play games with Azula in the background not wuite liking because she is a bit jealous and possesive. I also want Mai and Zuko to talk with a scene where Zuko is like embarrassed by all these girls that are flirting and praising him and like Mai saying like I get it I though you were cute and all but I am way over my crush on you now and Zuko is like you had a crush on me. They just laugh a bit and reminisce about their childhood and Zuko really feels his internal conflict increase. I think I want a scene where Zuko rants to Mai about how he feels unsatisfied but his fathers praise and Mai can relate with her parent’s high expectations. Like I want to see them bond as friends and stuff. When Zuko leaves I want him to leave a letter for Mai and Ty lee.

Before I continue I want to write in is like Ty lee having a slightly unhealthy amount of loyalty like. I want to show that she is slightly blinded by her love for Azula and like Mai and Zuko notice it.

Anyway boiling rock is where it really comes to a climax. I want the same story except Mai’s confrontation is going to be very different. Like Mai is like your an idiot like why the hell did you run away and Zuko is like I’m tired of trying to live up to my fathers expectations and is like I know you are too and is like come with me join the gaang leave behind the fire nation and her a-hole parents. She is conflicted but says she can’t leave Ty lee then Zuko has to go and Mai let’s him go but doesn’t really help him yet. I want Mai to save Zuko but instead of it being romantic I want her to help him for friendship. During the Azula confrontation instead of Ty lee straight up blocking Azula I want Mai and Azula to fight a bit and Ty lee being conflicted between her best friend and girl friend. During the fight I want Mai to start painting out Azula’s Shiite behavior like how she treats the people close to her and how she manipulates them and her slightly shitty treatment of Ty lee. Ty lee is shocked to see Mai talk so emotional (as emotional as Mai can be like no tears and stuff just a slight raised voice) and decided enough is enough and chi blocks Azula. Azula is enraged and asks your choosing her over me. And Ty lee says something like yes I’m choosing to protect my friend over being your little trophy I am sick and tired of it. She grabs Mai and runs. They escape don’t ask me how lesbian powers I guess. Anyway after they escape I want them to like travel together and tak a bit. It goes like Ty lee asking Mai if she has feelings for her and Mai confesses that she does. Ty lee says something like I like you too Mai but after everything with Azula I need a little time. Mai is like I waited for you for this long I can wait for you a bit longer. So have them travel a bit and maybe meet up with the gaang and help in taking down the Firelord. During the Agni Kai I want Mailee to be their as well. The main fight should still be with Zuko and Azula but just with a Mai and Ty lee confrontation before hand. During the Agni Kai they can help fight guards and have Mai confront her parents here and Ty lee by her side. After the Agni Kai and Katara saves Zuko I want The four of them standing side by side looking at Azula. After words Zuko and Mailee all talk and you know reunite as friends and stuff. Zuko and Katara go to heal him and to talk with the fire sages. Mai lee are kinda awkward and like so that just happens. Mailee kiss here (Zuko smiling and Katara cheering them. Zuko looks at Katara confused and she says I may not have liked them but I was still rooting for them to get together. ). After the coronation and everything I want Mai and Ty lee to confront Azula together. Azula is still insane at this point so not much happens buts it gives them closure.

The end

(Well not really I want Azula to get better and really work on herself and the have a reunion between the three where they make up. Ty lee would forgive her first then Mai but in the end the would be friends. Also the three of them would be Izumi’s badass aunts.)

[schmokschmok]

live forever in the stars

As authors for the @avatar-rarepair-exchange-2021 have been revealed, I’m three hundred exlamation marks in a trenchcoat to share the fic I wrote for @zukkaclawthorne!

Fandom: Avatar: The Last Airbender

Relationships: Suki x Yue, Suki & Ty Lee (minor: Zuko x Sokka, Ty Lee x Mai)

Characters: Suki, Yue, Ty Lee, Sokka, Zuko (and a few more)

Wordcount: 9099 (3 x 3033)

Tags:

No Archives Warnings Apply

Alternate Universe - Modern

Weddings

Fake/Pretend Relationship (emphasis on fake)

Queerplatonic Relationships

Summary:

Then Yue leans close into Suki’s personal space (Suki catches her breath) and continues in a conspiratorial whisper: “This is actually Sokka’s second wedding. We were married in kindergarten for like half a day before I decided boys were icky and he found out girls have cooties.” She laughs, and Suki falls a little in love with her right then and there.

Read on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29060613

CN: alcohol, food (mentioned); briefly discussed acemisia (not graphic)

#1

Before opening the door of the car she’s sitting in, Suki casts a glance towards the small group of people waiting in front of the karaoke bar. Katara, Azula, Aang, Toph, and, of course, Zuko and Sokka are standing close together, their hands shoved into their pockets and already leaning towards going in.

Ty Lee has exited the car and, before Suki can get a chance to reach for the handle, Ty Lee is pulling it open for her, taking a step back to make room for Suki to get up and extending her hand for Suki to grab. She asks with a giggle: “What are you waiting for?”

“I wasn’t waiting for anything,” Suki replies while letting Ty Lee help her out of the car and onto her two feet, and it’s kind of true. It’s not like she’s been expecting anything to happen, really, it’s more that she was hit unexpected and hard by a sudden dread of getting back to the others which doesn’t really make sense considering the fact that she knows and loves most of the people attending the afterparty.

Ty Lee lets go of her and closes the door before locking the car and turning towards their friends with a little twirl of her dress. The heels of her shoes come down hard onto the asphalt of the parking lot and echoes between the cars, and for a moment Suki is incapable of doing anything other than admire the outfit Ty Lee put together and the poise she’s pulling it off with. Everyone, Suki thinks, put so much effort into their appearance and they look like the feature section of a fashion magazine.

Self-consciously, Suki’s fingers start tugging at her obi and she tries to sneak a peek at the orange obi-jime wrapped around her waist, fearing that the car ride might have distraught her outfit. It’s not very likely but seeing them all in their post wedding glory makes her worry, nonetheless.

“You look a-ma-zing,” Ty Lee says, emphasising her words by grabbing Suki’s hand again to keep her from fussing over her appearance. “Like, why wouldn’t you?” The palm of her hand is dry and warm in Suki’s, and Suki immediately feels a whole lot better.

“I’m just a little,” Suki pauses to think of a neutral word to describe what she’s feeling, “self-conscious, I guess. I forgot they would change into tuxes.” While her head nods in the direction of Sokka and Zuko, her voice is as low as possible to avoid letting the others hear the uncertainty in her words. “The only other one wearing traditional clothing is Azula, and I never thought I would have anything in common with Azula, you know?”

“Oh, hun, it’s okay,” Ty Lee replies and she’s really one to talk in her bubble-gum pink cocktail dress and matching cardigan, “Mai’s, like, going to wear furisode, too.”

“Mai’s not here and she’s conveniently skipping the first party as well,” Suki says, slightly disgruntled.

“It’s totally not her fault, her plane’s, like, delayed,” Ty Lee says softly. “She’s not mad about missing karaoke, though, you’re right.” She giggles. “Whatever, you still got me, seriously, I’m your plus one, right?”

There’s no such thing as a plus one, they both had to show their invitations – names printed neatly in small capital letters on the bottom half – to enter the reception while handing over their wedding gifts – Suki’s in an elaborately decorated envelope with her name written on it, Ty Lee’s in a plain red envelope with her and Mai’s names on it. But the thought of a plus one is nice, and as long as Mai is absent, Suki can at least bask in the thought of Ty Lee as her partner in crime tonight.

“Yeah, you are,” Suki says and tightens her grip on Ty Lee’s hand. “Too bad you’ll leave me as soon as Mai gets here.”

“You’ll survive, for sure,” Ty Lee retorts, giggling, and pulls Suki into the karaoke bar. The twilit, cold street is exchanged for the warmth and clean-cut light of the interior. Azula has fallen back a few steps as if she were waiting for Ty Lee and Suki, but Suki’s not at all sure if Azula would ever do such a thing, and the unhappy line of Azula’s mouth is no help at all.

“Azula!” Ty Lee exclaims cheerfully, the glee in her voice only surpassed by the joyousness of her smile. She even steps up a notch to reach Azula faster.

“Ty Lee,” Azula greets, then her gaze falls onto Suki as if now were the first time she noticed Suki at all. “Suki.” The movement of her head could almost pass for a nod in greeting and Suki chooses to interpret it as such. (She’s a little reminded of Mai – stoic faced and hard to read Mai. Suki’s not sure why and how Ty Lee keeps on being friends with people obviously emanating the absolute antithesis of herself, but it’s something Suki’s trying to adjust to ever since she came to know Ty Lee.)

“It’s, like, totally bitchin’, right?” Ty Lee asks, throwing her free arm over Azula’s shoulder and forcing her to duck. “Our first wedding is like: done, done, done!” She’s accentuating every done with a punch into the air, forcing Suki to do it too, their hands still clasped together.

Even though Suki doesn’t always believe Ty Lee’s claims that she holds a special place in Azula’s heart, it’s moments like this, moments in which Azula lets Ty Lee rope her into soft embraces and excited hugs, that almost convince Suki that underneath Azula’s unaffectionate and rough exterior lies something akin to a friend. It’s nice to witness, seldom as it is.

“Very,” Suki agrees when Azula only rolls her eyes at Ty Lee’s antics.

“It’s hardly our wedding,” Azula states bluntly, but the dry tone of her voice is betrayed by the way she’s still willingly trapped underneath Ty Lee’s arm.

Ty Lee pouts ostentatiously, before pulling Azula closer and quickly pecking her on the cheek. Then she lets go of Azula and retorts cheerily: “The first wedding of our squad, whatever!”

Already opening her mouth, probably to say something rude, Azula takes a step back to put some distance between herself and Ty Lee and Suki. But Suki beats her to it and asks: “The others are waiting inside?”

“Very,” Azula replies, obviously mimicking the tone of voice Suki used a few seconds ago to answer Ty Lee. It remains unclear if it’s a friendly attempt at homage or a mean-spirited comment to rile Suki up.

“Awesome, let’s go!”

Ty Lee grabs Azula’s hand, too, and pulls both her and Suki towards the hallway leading to the different booths. Already past three doors on each side, she stops dead in her tracks, causing Azula and Suki to bump into her.

“Gals, I totally don’t know where to go,” Ty Lee admits sheepishly. “Which booth is ours?”

Sighing, Azula walks around Ty Lee and beelines further down the hallway until she reaches the right door, Suki and Ty Lee trailing right behind her. When they enter the booth, their friends have already started rafting through the song selection. Chatter fills the room, and nobody really pays them any mind.

Suki didn’t expect many more people to be in the room, but it’s not only the small group that attended the reception after the wedding with the grooms’ family, but also a few people Suki has never met before. It’s still a fairly small wedding party, Suki thinks, sitting down beside Ty Lee who is still holding onto her hand and chose a seat next to a beautiful woman in a red dress that Suki has never seen before.

“June!” Ty Lee throws her arm over June’s shoulders, and Suki experiences the weirdest kind of déjà vu. It could be either the way June ducks her head and draws her shoulders up under Ty Lee’s excited embrace or the way her mouth forms an unhappy line akin to Azula’s. (Suki makes a mental note to ask Ty Lee if being emotionally unavailable is a requirement to become friends with her and if so, why Ty Lee decided to befriend Suki anyways.) “It’s, like, so good to see you!”

Either Ty Lee wore them down over the time of their friendship or every single one of her stoic friends is severely touch-deprived, there’s no other way Suki can explain the fact that all of them just take Ty Lee’s willingness to touch everyone at any given time with such stride. June looks like someone who could and would break the arm of someone touching her unsolicited.

While June and Ty Lee start to catch up on their lives (or rather: while Ty Lee catches June up on her life and June provides a few strategically placed quips), Suki lazily starts to inspect the other people in the room. Sokka and Zuko are squeezed in between Katara and Azula at the head of the table, in perfect view of the TV mounted to the wall. The only person separating Azula and Ty Lee is June who is either not acquainted with Azula or demonstratively turning her back to her.

Katara and Aang lean over the tablet, punching in the first drink orders while Sokka tries to tap on the screen, apparently to support a point he’s making – whatever that may be.

Leaning back in boredom, Toph chews on a chocolate bar as if they hadn’t been dining less than an hour ago. Almost sitting directly opposite of Suki and softly talking to Toph is a not-quite-stranger that Suki has seen at the reception but has never talked to. Taking the few uninterrupted seconds she gets before Katara is going to ask either her or the stranger for their order, Suki looks as discreet as possible at them.

Now that Suki is actually sitting somewhat close to them, she can see the white, fan-shaped dangling earrings and the little silver studs above them, a crescent moon on the left ear and three tiny stars on the right. A smile gentle as low tide plays around their lips and makes the skin next to their brown eyes crinkle. Their hair, bleached to a silvery white, is pulled towards the crown of their head, held together by a hairpiece in the same shade of blue as their dress and separated into two braids. Another two braids frame her face, also adorned with blue hair pieces. Somewhere between leaving the reception and sitting down at the table in the booth, they lost the shawl that had been draped over their shoulders.

In short: They are absolutely beautiful.

(The thing is that Suki is already cleaning up her act as best as she can because if she’s perfectly honest with herself, the first time she laid eyes upon the ethereal being on the other side of the table [or in the prior case, two tables over], the only thing she could think about was that this is fucking ridiculous. No one has any right to be this beautiful, especially when Suki’s heart is so desperately trying to get lost. – Suki didn’t have, no, still doesn’t have words to describe the visceral feeling evoked by them.)

When they turn their head and it becomes apparent that they could meet Suki’s eyes any moment, she lets her head fall onto Ty Lee’s shoulder, lifting their still intertwined hands up towards her lips so she can whisper in Ty Lee’s ear as inconspicuous as possible (she’s not at all sure if this makes as much sense as she thinks it does, probably not): “Ty Lee …?”

“Su-ki?” Ty Lee splits Suki’s name in two and stresses the last syllable, a soft singsong in her voice. Her head drops on top of Suki’s and she’s talking almost as lowly as Suki.

Still hiding behind their raised hands, manoeuvred in front of Suki’s lips as if she were only moments from kissing Ty Lee’s knuckles, Suki groans as quiet as possible without losing the implications of her sever sufferings: “I’m very gay, did you know that? Just, uhm, very gay.”

Ty Lee giggles. “And this great revelation came to you because of, like, what?” Her nose brushes Suki’s hairline, and Suki can feel Ty Lee’s breath on her forehead. It tickles.

“Next to Toph,” Suki answers with an almost imperceptible nod towards the stranger. “Saw them at the reception, too. I think I am in love.”

Ty Lee retorts: “Big words coming from you.” And Suki’s not entirely sure if Ty Lee is poking fun at her or if she’s actually amazed at Suki’s pash. “The last time I heard you talking like that you were, like, totally smitten with Sokka.”

“Don’t remind me,” Suki groans. “I still can’t believe that was a thing that happened.”

“As if!” Ty Lee says heatedly as if she were required by law to defend Sokka because she never quite overcame her crush on him. “You seriously can’t say something like that at his wedding!”

With the back of her free hand, she gently slaps Suki’s thigh, and Suki can’t hold back a chuckle. In reconciliation, Suki backpedals hastily: “I didn’t mean it like that.” Now, she lifts their intertwined hands to her lips and presses a soft kiss on Ty Lee’s fingers. “Sometimes I kind of forget that Sokka and I used to date.” Then she realises the way her words could come off as. “Not in a bad way! Just … it’s been so long, and we’re really close friends. You know what I mean?”

Ty Lee makes a contemplating motion with her head and hums. Then, after a moment, she says light-heartedly: “Totally! To be honest, sometimes I’m, like, forgetting it, too. Like, it’s more like I can’t think of a time when Sokka and Zuko weren’t, like, dating and stuff, right?” Her face lights up. “They’re so married!”

Her last words overlap with Katara asking them for their order, dutifully typing in Suki’s beer and Ty Lee’s oolongcha.

“No Mugicha?” Katara asks distractedly.

Waving her free hand dismissively, Ty Lee replies: “DD for now, seriously, I totally need the caffeine, right.” A smile makes its way onto her face and Suki thinks it may be caused by a combination of two things: Firstly, that Ty Lee is only driving until Mai gets here and releases her from her sober duties, and secondly, that Ty Lee cannot wait anymore to see her girlfriend again who has been gone for almost a week. (Which, admittedly, is not a long time for most people. But Ty Lee is not most people and she almost started wailing half a day after Mai’s departure. Naturally, she had to do it in Suki’s flat, starfished across Suki’s living room floor, a couch pillow in hand to sob dramatically into every once in a while.)

The door opens, revealing the last two people awaited: Smellerbee and Pipsqueak. They sit down next to Suki and the stranger who briefly meets Suki’s eyes while scooting closer to Toph, a gentle smile on their lips. Suki can’t take it and averts her eyes. (She wants to talk to them, to know their name, what brought them here – besides, you know, the wedding –, if they are single and maybe even interested in girls – interested in Suki, by any chance.)

“Where did you leave Longshot and The Duke?” Aang asks, leaning over the table to face both Pipsqueak and Smellerbee.

“Longshot doesn’t sing,” Smellerbee says, shedding her jacket and draping it over the back of the bench seat.

Pipsqueak says: “The Duke’s gonna be at the club.” He grins, throwing a hello and the desire for a green tea into the room. Katara nods and punches his order into the tablet.

“What about Jet?” Aang asks, evoking laughter from both Pipsqueak and Smellerbee.

“Not invited,” Smellerbee cackles. “Jet says it’s because Sokka and Zuko would rethink getting married if he were present.”

A shocked gasp draws everyone’s attention to Sokka who’s hand is pressed against his chest in mock offence. He exclaims: “I would never rethink marrying Zuko!”

“I might,” Zuko pipes in, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Didn’t want to take any risks. And Sokka thought it’d be weird to have that many exes present.”

“It would be weird. The quota has been met,” Sokka says. “I’m gonna file for divorce right now if you could do with another ex in this room.”

Suki laughs quietly while assessing the people in the room. Either the grooms are referring to Mai and Suki or there is another ex present Suki has never heard of. And if Zuko didn’t magically date Katara without Suki noticing, it must be the gorgeous person in front of her. (Which, okay, on one hand opens up the possibility of them being hetero, but on the other hand clearly shows that they would date someone like Sokka or Zuko – which could mean that Suki has a chance.)

“Please don’t,” Zuko says, pulling Sokka closer to him, “divorce is too expensive. We don’t have that kind of money.”

When Sokka gasps again, Ty Lee hides her face in Suki’s hair, laughing about their antics. The grip on Suki’s hand tightens for a moment and Suki can’t suppress the warmth coiling in her abdomen because she loves Ty Lee with all her heart and soul.

Suki doesn’t know anymore why she was dreading coming here because with Ty Lee’s hand in hers, and the people she’s known for years surrounding her, this evening can’t be anything other than perfect. (Even if her singing skills are more subpar than sublime, she’s here to have fun. And the way Aang practically throws himself into the small space in front of the table after their drinks arrived and they clinked glasses with Sokka and Zuko, and performs like he’s trying to impress the jury of a talent show, she’s sure that fun will be the last thing missing in this room.)

“We’re, like, totally gonna duet the shit of them,” Ty Lee whispers and Suki barks out a laugh.

  #2

“Zlint!” Ty Lee exclaims right after stepping through the door of the karaoke bar, pulling Suki through with her. “We were totally bitchin’ it!”

“You did,” Suki agrees, not sure if her contribution to their duets is as major as Ty Lee’s. “But I think I lost every ability to can when you-know-who stepped up.”

The group spilling out of the karaoke bar behind them also includes Sokka who drapes his arm over Suki’s shoulders and singsongs: “I could still divorce Zuko, just say a word. I didn’t think my singing would convince you to get back together with me.”

“We’re not divorcing!” Zuko calls from where he’s standing with Toph and Azula, and Toph says something to Zuko and Azula that actually manages to make Azula smirk.

Before turning back to Suki and Ty Lee, Sokka yells back: “Let me live!” Then he continues in a moderated voice and a grin: “Sorry to disappoint, but apparently I am stuck with my husband. Forever! Oh, no!” His grin widens if that’s even possible.

At this point (not that it hadn’t been obvious from the start), they all know that Sokka just really, really likes to say that Zuko and he are married. (Suki remembers the days leading up to the wedding when Katara, Sokka and Hakoda made akutaq and invited Suki over to eat with them; the nervousness that Sokka wasn’t comfortable revealing to anyone other than Suki; the late-night talks on the kitchen floor after Katara and Hakoda had already gone to bed; the way Sokka had held her hand and asked lowly what if he doesn’t want to marry me anymore, what if he changed his mind? and the way she couldn’t hold back a chuckle, telling him that she has never ever met anyone who’s as smitten with someone as Zuko and that there is no way Zuko could have changed his mind.)

“What a waste,” Ty Lee giggles at the same time that Suki says: “We weren’t even talking about you, dork!”

Sokka blinks in astonishment. “Huh, you weren’t talking about me? How come, I mean, why?”

Ducking her head in an attempt to come off as inconspicuous, Suki replies: “Not everything’s revolving around you, you know.”

“It should,” Sokka retorts, feigning offence, and buries his head in Suki’s hair to demonstrate the severity of her invidiousness.

Ty Lee leans towards Sokka and stage whispers: “Suki has a crush.” Then she nods to the group of their remaining friends. Suki wishes the earth would open up and swallow her whole, this is not Sokka-relevant information material.

“Do not!” Suki gasps, right before Sokka yanks his head up to look in the direction Ty Lee has nodded. He searches the faces of their friends, apparently trying to sus out which of them Suki could find attractive. (As if any of them would play in the same league as Yue whose name Suki learnt right after she tentatively took hold of the microphone and a chorus proclaiming her name to cheer her on erupted. – Not that there’s anything wrong with the others, Suki’s just not interested in the little sister of her ex-boyfriend, or people like Aang or Smellerbee who are so much younger than her.)

Sokka doesn’t seem to have run through the same equation as her, because he grips her shoulders, making her face him, and whispers scandalised: “You’ve got a crush on my sister? Suki!”

“Oh, please,” Suki forces over her lips, “I don’t. I … Sokka, eww. What the fuck.”

He lets go of her shoulders, his own relaxed once again. Then he scratches his neck with an awkward grin plastered on his face and says: “Sorry?” But it sounds more like a question than an actual apology.

“Katara is like my little sister,” Suki continues, and Sokka holds up his palms in a display of defeat.

Ty Lee, the absolute traitor, waves her hand dismissively and chimes in: “No, no, Yue. Suki couldn’t take her eyes off of her, right, like at all.”

“Ty Lee!” Indignation in her voice, Suki lets go of Ty Lee’s hand and crosses her arms in front of her chest. “What is wrong with you?”

“Nothing, I just think you should, like, so do something to prevent you from, like, totally wallowing in self-pity the next few weeks because you didn’t even try to, like, chat her up,” Ty Lee replies light-heartedly. “She’s either with Sokka or Zuko, so you can at least check if you’ve got, like, a chance or whatever.”

Even though it almost sounds reasonable when Ty Lee says it like that, Suki doesn’t want help from Sokka or Zuko. She wants to quietly marvel at Yue’s beauty – from afar. Maybe test the waters and introduce herself. The least she wants is Sokka inserting himself and trying to matchmake; actually, she doesn’t even want him knowing because the probability that he gets way too excited at the prospect that Suki could be dating again, puts way too much pressure on Suki. In the end, he’s going to annoy her relentlessly if she already talked to Yue and if Yue is as nice as he made her out to be (because Suki knows that Sokka is going to oversell Yue, and Suki is going to end up disappointed – either because Yue can’t live up to the picture Sokka painted or because Yue’s not interested in Suki at all).

“Oh,” Sokka says, surprising both Suki and Ty Lee with his lack of enthusiasm. “Yeah, I don’t know. Yue doesn’t really do the whole dating thing. Most of the time, at least.”

“Normally, Suki, like, doesn’t do it either,” Ty Lee reminds Sokka (as if it were necessary) before Suki has the chance to say something. (She’s not even sure what she could have said. Maybe that she’s glad. Maybe that this is terrible.) “They don’t even have to, like, date. This is a party; today is totally about getting people together. Guys, don’t be like that!” Ty Lee extends her arms and twirls, her bubble-gum pink skirt lazily fanning out. “Live a little!”

“Yeah, Sokka, live a little,” Aang exclaims and jumps onto Sokka’s back like a spider monkey, the popped collar of his decorated kuspuk hitting Sokka’s ear. (Suki desperately prays that nobody listened to their full exchange. This is humiliating.)

Instinctively, Sokka grabs the hollows of Aang’s knees and laughs. He yells: “I’m living, okay, I am absolutely living my best life!”

Aang wraps his arms around Sokka’s neck and chortles: “Good! Now, go on, o my majestic horse, carry me towards the party!” His heels dig into Sokka’s hips and Sokka attempts to throw Aang off his back, but he’s not serious about it and starts to walk towards Aang’s van.

“Did you just call me a stud?” Sokka asks smugly, adjusting his grip again.

“Well, I didn’t call you a dobbin,” Aang concedes, startling a laugh out of Zuko, Toph, Ty Lee and Suki. “Now, go! Come on, let’s get this party started!”

But instead of going on, Sokka comes to a halt and turns back to them. After an accessing look over their group, he says: “We didn’t think this through, gentlepeople.”

“Why?” Katara asks, also taking a look at everyone as if she were able to find out what Sokka’s on about.

“The Mystery Machine doesn’t have space for so many people,” Sokka says, furrowing his brow.

Ty Lee shakes her head chidingly and chimes in: “Oh, whatever, Yue can, like, totally ride with us!” Suki almost loses it at the sight of Ty Lee’s shit-eating grin, but she reigns herself in because she doesn’t want Yue to think that she’s dissatisfied with Yue. Literally biting her tongue, Suki can see the winks Ty Lee and Sokka exchange before Sokka turns back to walking to Aang’s van, the rest of their group except for Suki, Yue and Ty Lee trailing after him.

You’re on thin fucking ice, Suki tries to convey through a hard gaze in Ty Lee’s direction, but Ty Lee just smiles at her as if she weren’t aware of her treachery.

When Yue opens her mouth to say something, Ty Lee exclaims: “I’m gonna go get the car, seriously, don’t move!” And then she’s gone.

“That was … weird,” Yue says, both eyebrows raised, but with the same smile she displayed on various occasions this evening.

Suki chuckles nervously and replies: “Yeah, she’s a weird one, our Ty Lee.” She has absolutely no idea why she said this; something that makes her sound like an elderly lady talking about the ‘special interests’ of her grandchildren. But Ty Lee is already too far away for Suki to find safety in following her without looking like a fool, so Suki remains rooted to the spot, averting her eyes before remembering that it’s kind of rude to ignore Yue.

“So,” Yue says unexpectedly, taking two or three steps to get into Suki’s general vicinity, “you’re Suki?”

“Yeah, I must be,” Suki replies but the uptilt of her voice at the end implies a question, so she corrects herself: “I mean, yes, I’m Suki. And you’re Yue.” At least she didn’t say something like and who might you be? Maybe there is mercy somewhere in the universe.

Yue, however, doesn’t seem to be bothered about Suki’s inability to talk to her. Instead, she pulls her shawl tighter around her shoulders and crosses her arms in front of her chest, and confirms: “Yes, that’s true.”

For a moment, they stand a mere metre apart, awkward silence encompassing them. Suki shifts her weight from one foot to the other and throws a glance towards their car, but there is no trace of Ty Lee even though their car is clearly in Suki’s line of vision. The traitor.

Yue drags one of her feet over the asphalt and a group of strangers walks past them. Suddenly, Yue’s much closer than before, probably because she got out of the way of the group. They look at each other and Yue breaks their silence with a question: “So … how did Ty Lee and you meet?”

This is not something Suki anticipated or expected. Normally, the first thing people ask of her is not … Ty Lee of all things. It’s not even that Suki can’t talk about Ty Lee – oh, she definitively could for hours – but when the first thing a beautiful woman asks is about the person you’re with, then the message is pretty clear, isn’t it? Yue is much more interested in Ty Lee than Suki. (This somewhat eases the tension in Suki’s abdomen because the focus shifts from her onto Ty Lee. But Suki also realises that she wouldn’t be interested in herself right now. She didn’t even manage to form one measly, coherent sentence since she’s been left alone with Yue. Why would Yue think of her as an acceptable conversationalist?)

“A few friends of mine and I founded a tessenjutsu group,” Suki says, longing for the wide pockets of her pants to bury her hands in. “After a couple of months, Ty Lee stumbled upon one of our flyers and joined our group.” The story is much less exciting than most people think. “Sokka and Zuko actually met at one of our show fights.”

“Oh! Sokka told me about that,” Yue replies, even though she doesn’t seem quite satisfied with Suki’s answer. “We used to talk much more, but sometimes life gets in the way.”

Her gaze turns melancholic and for a moment she averts her eyes, lost in thought. Then she blinks deliberately and changes the topic: “I only knew Katara and Aang before coming here. I hadn’t even met Zuko before which is pretty awkward if you ask me. This is the first wedding I’ve been to where I didn’t know both spouses to be.”

“Where did you meet them before?” Suki asks and it’s not the best phrasing because the wedding is so small (as is custom, but nonetheless), but she’s confident that Yue’s going to know what she means.

“Katara, Sokka, Aang, and I grew up in the same neighbourhood,” Yue answers, then she leans close into Suki’s personal space (Suki catches her breath) and continues in a conspiratorial whisper: “This is actually Sokka’s second wedding. We were married in kindergarten for like half a day before I decided boys were icky and he found out girls have cooties.” She laughs, and Suki falls a little in love with her right then and there. “But right before elementary school my family moved away. We corresponded until we were old enough to get phones.”

Yue doesn’t move out of Suki’s space again and Suki takes this as a sign and decides: She won’t be the embodiment of the useless wlw trope, she’s going to be a functional bi. She can do this. Just flirt with the pretty lady, Suki, come on!

“It’s a real shame that we didn’t attend the same kindergarten,” Suki says and in the very moment she continues, she thinks that this is probably not the right way to flirt, this is probably the worst way to flirt with someone who’s technically a stranger, but she can’t stop herself from talking, “you could have married me to get back at him.”

Suki’s not sure where she’s taking the courage from but she’s reaching for Yue’s elbow and touches it briefly to emphasise her point. (Maybe Ty Lee’s already rubbing off on her, terrible.)

“Emily Chen proposed to me a week later and I think we never filed for divorce,” Yue says, voice full of mischief. “I’m a married woman, it seems.”

“Scandalous,” Suki gasps in fake outrage. “If I had a nickel for every time I was rejected by a married person, I’d have two nickels. Which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird that it happened twice.”

Yue hides her mouth behind her hand, but Suki can still see the way her eyes crinkle at the corners. “Who could have rejected you?” An almost imperceptible blush spreads over her cheeks and Suki thinks that maybe she does have a chance with Yue.

“Sokka,” Suki jokes. “Or rather: Zuko did the rejecting for him. – Now that I think about it, it’s even weirder that it happened twice in one day, in like a really, really short amount of time.”

They laugh, and Suki catches sight of Ty Lee’s head that pops up behind a car right next to theirs. Redirecting her gaze onto Yue’s face, she says: “It seems like Ty Lee has finally remembered where we parked the car.”

As if on cue, Yue takes a step back, right out of Suki’s personal space into her own. As if she remembered that they’re not entirely alone; that they’re still out in the open on some street, Ty Lee only a few metres away.

“That’s good,” Yue says, the tone of her voice rather detached and distanced, and the line of her shoulders less relaxed than before. The engine of the car starts up and Yue turns towards the street. The awkward silence embraces them once again, and Suki wonders when, where and in what way she could have offended the universe to deserve such discomfort.

When Ty Lee pulls the car over, Suki reaches for the handle of the pillion seat because she thinks it could come off as flirty if she holds open the door for Yue. But when she opens the door, the seat is already taken: Apparently, Ty Lee thought it would be rather clever to move every little thing the car contains onto the front passenger’s seat to keep Suki and Yue from sitting in the front. The smile she displays would seem apologetic to most people, but Suki knows that Ty Lee is absolutely incapable of feeling remorse. (Well, okay, not entirely.)

“Sorry!” Ty Lee exclaims, motioning towards the backseat. “There’s still, like, plenty of room in the back, right?”

“Is that so?” Sukis asks at the same moment that Yue says: “No problem!”

Ty Lee sends a prompting gaze Suki’s way, and Suki closes the car door, already reaching for the backdoor without looking for it. Her hand brushes Yue’s and for a second her heart and head short-circuit. They let go of the handle, and Suki takes a step back to make room for Yue. Both utter an apology, and Suki can see out of the corner of her eye that Ty Lee suppresses laughter, only semi-successful.

Risking a second attempt, Suki reaches for the handle again and pulls the door open, outlandishly sweeping a curtsey (or rather: trying and failing at a curtsey and flapping her arm in a hopefully graceful manner). She adds: “After you!”

Yue smiles and shakes her head but climbs into the car without further ado. Suki slides in after her, catching sight again of Ty Lee’s shit-eating grin. (Now is not the time to think about it in great detail but she will definitely get back at Ty Lee for this stunt. If she’s persistent enough, she might even rope Mai into it. The probability of the latter happening is … not too high, but Suki likes to shoot for galaxies hoping that she hits a few stars on the way.)

“Your sense of orientation must be pretty bad,” Yue says. Then she gasps at her own words, clapping her hands in front of her mouth. “I’m sorry, I just mean: We could have walked to the car together, then you wouldn’t have gotten lost.”

Not trusting herself to keep it together and from straight up calling Ty Lee out in front of Yue or melt at the naïve sweetness that Yue emanates, Suki bites her tongue.

“I totally didn’t think of that, like, at all,” Ty Lee responds, sugary innocence resonating in her words. “That would have been such a help. I got totally lost in the parking lot.”

You did not!, Suki mouths and she’s pretty sure that Ty Lee has seen her, because she starts to giggle on the front seat again. Leaning her head against the headrest, Suki says: “We’re gonna take a photo of the parking spot, so we don’t magically lose the car again.”

 #3

 Suki is really doing her best, okay. She held open the car door for Yue and tripped Ty Lee on their way into the club; she asked Yue what she would like to drink and then went to the bar to buy her that very drink; she stood next to Yue and talked about their occupations and the way they spend their weekends, things they liked growing up, stuff you don’t usually talk about in a club with a stranger; she peeled Ty Lee off her shoulder (multiple times) to signal her availability; she initiated soft, gentle physical contact throughout their conversation to indicate her interest; she was genuinely funny, causing Yue to throw her head back in laughter, baring her teeth and revealing the column of her neck. At least seven of those actions could be considered aggressive flirting; if Suki were generous, she could even count tripping Ty Lee because it definitely counts as an act for the good of humanity.

Now she’s draining the last of her drink and thinks that she doesn’t want to go home, so she can as well go big.

“Would you like to dance?” She asks with more confidence in her voice than in her soul, breaking their contemporary pop-song remix filled silence. “I think I know this song.” In reality, Suki’s not sure if she knows the song or if the countless remixes have started to blur into each other so neatly that she can’t differentiate between them anymore. But it doesn’t matter, does it? She doesn’t need to know a song to dance to it with a beautiful woman.

Yue doesn’t look too enthralled at the prospect, and Suki feels her heart sinking. Maybe she’s been reading this absolutely wrong. Maybe she just thought that Yue seemed as interested in her. Oh, no, maybe she’s just being nice, and Suki is exactly the disaster bi she didn’t want to be, reading friendly banter as tentative dalliance.

Swallowing down her disappointment, she smiles at Yue and says: “Well, you know what? I think I’m gonna go and get some fresh air, now that I think of it.”

“Mind if I tag along?” Yue asks to Suki’s surprise. Because she had been sure that she overstepped Yue’s boundaries, alienating her in the process. “Fresh air would do me some good, I think.”

Suki nods and, without thinking about it, she extends her hand for Yue to hold, like she would do if Ty Lee or Sokka would stand before her. But Yue only spares a glance and doesn’t take hold of Suki’s hand, and even though it’s completely understandable and valid that Yue doesn’t take her hand, it still feels awkward. Suki's empty hand falls to her side, and she turns around to head for the exit and to avoid that Yue sees the look on her face. 

Once they get stamps on the back of their hands, they step out into the cool air, and it hits them right in the face. Suki feels a whole lot better underneath the streetlamp lit sky. Yue is right behind her when they swerve a group of smoking people in showy dresses and ten-inch heels, and Suki can almost forget what happened a few minutes ago.

The front court isn't too big, and a few benches are standing around, waiting for drunk and tired clubbers and hushed late-night conversations. Suki walks to one further away from the other people to catch a break from loud voices and close contact to strangers. Sitting down on the cold wood, she watches Yue out of the corner of her eye standing for a moment longer, until she’s sitting down as well.

The distant chatter and laughter of the other group is carried by the wind into the other direction, and they’re sitting in something almost resembling quiescence. From their bench, Suki can oversee most of the parking lot and she can even make out their car underneath a streetlamp at the far end.

Somewhat sobering up from the heated atmosphere in the club, Suki starts to wonder again what kind of signals Yue is sending her. When they finally reached the club and reunited with the rest of their group, Yue could have easily sat at Zuko’s, Azula’s, June’s and Toph’s table, or joined Aang, Sokka, Ty Lee and Katara on the dancefloor, or followed The Duke, Longshot, Smellerbee and Pipsqueak upstairs to the second dancefloor. But she didn’t. Yue waited for Suki to come back and stood with her offside, watching the people on the dancefloor, waving at their friends whenever they emerged from the crowd. – At any given time, she could have walked away. But she didn’t. She chose to spend her entire evening with Suki and that must mean something. – Yes, Yue hadn’t been interested in dancing with Suki, true, but it could also mean that Yue’s not interested in dancing, Suki or no Suki.

Yue had been receptive to her flirting, Suki feels confident. Would Yue be sitting next to her if she weren’t?

So, Suki draws a few deep and discreet breaths, and breaks the silence: “I don’t know if it’s bad luck, but there has been someone tonight really outshining the grooms.” Her eyes flicker to Yue’s face to gauge her reaction, before she can force her gaze on the parking lot again. Casual, Suki, just one damn time! “You know who’s the prettiest tonight?”

Her fists lying on her knees, Suki waits for anything. She’s a bit proud of herself because this is going to be the smoothest pick-up line she has ever used. There is literally no way this can go wrong. (Well, there is the possibility that Yue is deeply and utterly hetero and won’t take it as a compliment, but even if she’s not romantically interested in Suki, it’s still likely that she’s going to react in a respectful manner. – Suki doesn’t think that Sokka would be friends with someone that couldn’t handle being mistaken for gay.)

“Ty Lee?” Yue says. (Or asks? Suki doesn’t have the foggiest if the uptilt of her voice is meant as a question or just caused by embarrassment. – Either way, this is not what Suki envisioned. At all.)

Mai is supposed to arrive at any given moment and maybe it’s time that someone explains to Yue that Ty Lee is already in loving, monogamous hands, so Suki retorts, feigning an amused chuckle: “Don’t let her girlfriend hear you talk like that.”

The way Yue furrows her brow makes her seem more contemplating than surprised. The fingers of her right hand tap an unsteady rhythm on the back of her other hand, and her voice sounds uncertain when she says: “I think it's already too late for that.”

And Suki doesn't know how to take Yue's soft confession because as far as Suki is concerned, Yue and Mai have never met. Suki is at a loss for words, and they fall back into the awkward silence Suki was desperate to leave behind.

A few minutes go by, then a cab pulls into the parking lot and Suki looks without much interest at the shadowy figure inside paying the driver and rummaging around. When the door is opened, however, Suki perks up because it’s none other than Mai who exits the cab. And if Mai is here, it means that Suki is officially released from her role as Ty Lee’s chaperone. (Not that Suki had been dutifully chaperoning Ty Lee in the first place. Or that Ty Lee actually needed someone chaperoning her.)

With poise in her every step, Mai makes her way over to Suki and Yue, calmly stepping around suspicious puddles and radiating serenity.

“Mai,” Suki calls out as if Mai wasn’t already on her way to them. “What took you so long?”

Wrinkling her nose, Mai returns her greeting and says: “Hit a traffic jam after a massive departure delay.” Her left hand is wrapped around the strap of her pochette and she throws a glance towards the entrance. “Suki, I need to know something before I go in there.”

Suki nods and shifts involuntarily closer to the edge of the bench. Mai and her, they don’t usually interact too much even though Ty Lee is something like Suki’s best friend. They don’t really have as much in common as Suki sometimes wishes. So, if Mai needs her opinion on some matter or another, Suki thinks it must be vital.

“What do you think is more important,” Mai starts, her expression flickering between deadpan and concerned, “looking for Ty Lee or Zuko and Sokka?”

Suki snorts with laughter and asks: “Is this really something you should be asking?”

“I think,” Mai replies, and she seems peeved, “I want to act in the best interests of all parties concerned. I also think I could offend one of them by going to the other one first. And I am too tired to fall victim to their antics.”

Now Suki realises that Mai is serious, but she still can’t hold back teasing her a little: “You think Zuko could be offended if you look for Ty Lee first? Seems out of character to me.”

“Very funny,” Mai says, rolling her eyes at Suki. “You know better than me that Sokka’s a theatre kid at heart.” Which is true, unfortunately. “So, opinions?”

Suki shrugs and finally answers Mai’s question: “Last time we saw them, Sokka and Ty Lee were painting the dancefloor red. Best bet is walking straight into the crowd and taking potluck who’s the first one spotting you.”

Mai nods absentmindedly, then she turns away and heads for the entrance. She doesn’t make it that far before Suki calls after her: “Hurry up, Ty Lee’s been crying so much since you left.”

“Ty Lee cries crocodile tears every time we’re on the phone,” Mai retorts over her shoulder without turning back. “She’s going to live.”

When Mai enters the building while opening her pochette to retrieve her portemonnaie, Suki finally gives her attention back to Yue who looks positively alienated, so Suki attempts to explain Mai’s behaviour: “Don’t be fooled, Mai’s just as eager to see Ty Lee. You can’t pry them away from each other, even if you tried. Mai’s just … Mai’s not big on PDA, I guess. But you probably know that already.”

Yue blinks at her. “I,” she hesitates, “do not.”

Leaning into Yue’s space, Suki asks excitedly: “You wanna tell me she’s more public with her affection when I’m not around? This is outrageous. I think I deserve to see Mai all soppy and corny!”

“No,” Yue intercepts. It still looks like she’s trying to make sense of the situation. “I mean, I have never met Mai.”

Now it’s Suki’s turn to frown. “Didn’t you say that, you know, you told Mai Ty Lee is the prettiest?”

“I said I think I told Ty Lee’s girlfriend that Ty Lee is the prettiest,” Yue replies slowly. Which doesn’t make sense because Mai is Ty Lee’s girlfriend and Yue said those words to Suki.

Suki blinks. And she blinks. And she blinks. Then the realisation hits her, and she points to the entrance door of the club and then to herself. Her hand makes a weird circular motion, and she ascertains beyond doubt: “Mai is Ty Lee’s girlfriend.”

And when Yue’s only reaction consists of closing her eyes and throwing back her head, Suki declares: “Ty Lee is my best friend. Ty Lee is not my girlfriend.” (Her words may be tinged with the slightest bit of hysteria.)

“Oh,” is everything that slips past the smile growing on Yue’s face. She’s lifting her head, and when their eyes meet, Suki asks not without agitation: “Wait, let me get this straight: You thought I was dating Ty Lee? Because I’ve been flirting with you the whole night long and already began to think you just weren’t interested.” She snickers. “You can tell me if you’re not interested but if it’s because of Ty Lee I can assure you that she’s not my girlfriend. Never was, never will be.”

“Well, I must confess,” Yue replies, also snickering, “I was irritated because it seemed like you were trying to hit on me, but I also thought: Why would she try to hit on you, Yue, she’s got a gorgeous girlfriend. So, I didn’t try to dwell too long on the thought?”

“Oh, wow, you asked about Ty Lee’s and my meet cute, didn’t you?” Without thinking about, Suki reaches out and rests her hand on Yue’s elbow. “I thought you were really, really into Ty Lee. I felt kind of bad because I didn’t know if you knew that she’s in a committed relationship.” Suki hesitates but then she decides to throw all caution overboard. “And Sokka kind of said that you didn’t do the whole dating thing? So, I didn’t know if you were just trying to reject me as gently as possible.”

Yue splutters which shouldn’t make her more endearing, but it does. “Sokka is an overprotective dork.” She sighs deeply. “I don’t usually date, he’s not wrong. But I’m not not doing the whole dating thing.” Like an afterthought, she leans into Suki’s touch and Suki almost forgets to actually listen to the words coming out of Yue’s mouth.

(Concentrating is hard, okay, she’s so close to Yue. She can see the cut glass embedded into the tiny stars on her earlobe and the texture of the ivory, almost fan-shaped earring that Suki now knows is an uluaq-earring that Katara gave to her. She can see the moles dotted across Yue’s neck and cheek, and her dark roots. Suki sees her own distorted reflection in Yue’s eyes and the faint wrinkles around the corner of her eyes. She can make out a single freckle on the bridge of Yue’s nose. – It’s not that Suki doesn’t want to listen to Yue, but her beauty is truly distracting.)

“So,” Suki says softly, tearing away her gaze from Yue’s lips, “you do want to dance with me?”

Grabbing Suki’s free hand and enclosing it with both her own, Yue retorts: “Well, I want to dance with you but Sokka’s not entirely wrong? Dating is pretty exhausting, and I don’t often think someone’s interesting enough to try?”

“You know I’ve heard that everything that comes before but can be omitted,” Suki replies because she doesn’t know how to take Yue’s words. Yue’s either turning her down or asking her out. Which one it is? Fuck if Suki knows.

“Okay.” Yue starts drawing nonsensical shapes on the back of Suki’s hand, apparently turning over words on her tongue. (Suki’s about to melt. Just straight up dissolve into a puddle of confused contentment.) “I usually don’t date because people aren’t interesting to me, romantically speaking. This explanation, however, kind of ignores the fact that in the past some people didn’t want to date me because I’m … ace.” The hesitancy of Yue’s words hits Suki right in the heart (and elicits a rage that Suki can barely force down her throat).

But Suki doesn’t tell her some platitude about the validity of asexuality (because one must be a self-entitled twat to think that this is necessary in any kind of way; as if her asexuality were any less real without verbal confirmation) and Suki doesn’t tell her some truism about how it’s their loss that they didn’t keep her close (because duh). Instead, Suki says: “My last boyfriend broke up with me because, in his opinion, Ty Lee and I shouldn’t be touching so much.”

Her hand jerks up slightly to make air quotes but Yue’s hands are still holding it firmly between them. So, she shrugs her shoulders to make up for it.

“I think it’s nice,” Yue says. “You know, when I’m not currently obsessing over the fact that you’re touching my arm even though you’re clearly taken.” She smiles apologetically.

“Most people think it’s nice. At first.” Suki tilts her head. “But I think I would like to give it a shot. See how you like it a few weeks from now.”

Something in the back of Suki’s head rings out. Something about we grew up in the same neighbourhood but right before elementary school my family moved away. Something about I only knew Katara and Aang before coming here. But she doesn’t want to concentrate on the obstacles that lie before them, she wants to grab Yue’s hand and drag her indoors. She wants to dance underneath the neon lights. She wants to cup Yue’s face in her hands, brush her cheek with her thumb and take in the way her lashes cast a shadow on her skin. She wants to sink her fingers into Yue’s hairline. She wants to pull her impossibly close, and even closer still. She wants to drown in Yue’s laughter and drink in her every expression. She wants to listen to everything Yue is willing to tell. (She even wants Ty Lee’s triumphant cheers and her Seriously, I, like, totally called it!, and Sokka’s flummoxed expression.)

“Ask me again.” Yue’s grip on Suki’s hand tightens and Suki is positively overwhelmed.

Suki takes her hand off of Yue’s elbow and brings it down to their clasped hands. Cupping Yue’s hand in turn, she asks as desired: “Do you want to dance with me?”

Suddenly getting to her feet, Yue holds onto Suki’s hands and pulls her right up with her. They almost crash into each other, unable to catch themselves or the other, and laughter spills out of them into the eternal twilit night.

“Yes, I do want to dance with you,” Yue breathes out into the small space between them, and Suki almost lets go of her hands in excited surprise. “We should do it now.”

Yue turns around and pulls Suki with her, beelining to the entrance of the club and straight into the waiting mouth of a soft teethed beast. (Suki is ready. If she can turn a whole day from anxious apprehension to absolute perfection, then she can do this to. It’s just a dance with a pretty lady, Suki, come on, you got this! And she will.)

[callioope]

Continuing my reactions to Avatar: The Last Airbender

This post is about Book 3. See my overall impressions and thoughts on Book 1 here. See my thoughts on Book 2 here.

ETA: crap i forgot the keep reading line initially SORRY if anyone saw this before i edited. anyways. please see the tags as a disclaimer before reading. gosh it’s late i need to go to bed.

General

Starting S3 now and dang Katara & Toph have gotten so powerful!!!!!

I literally recorded ZERO reactions from Chapter One through Chapter Twelve. And my first reaction is basically my excitement that Zuko is finally with the Aang crew! But let me try to skim through an episode list to recall my reactions.

You may have already seen my post expressing shock that MARK HAMILL voiced the Fire Lord. Still not over that revelation.

So, ultimately, I binged this show in less than a week. I think I started on Monday? And finished Saturday afternoon. That alone should speak to how much I enjoyed it! 

Aang

Okay, a bit weird to have barely any thoughts under Aang when he’s literally the protagonist, but I think (since I wrote other sections before this) that I touch on some of my thoughts on him under other characters. 

I will say, his journey really intensifies in this season. First, when he awakens after being unconscious for several days and has no idea what’s going on, and is still healing and more helpless than he’s probably ever felt in his life. I did really like his arc in this season, but what a stark contrast to the Aang of Book 1. He has to grow up so fast. I gotta say, a lot of Aang’s journey reminded me just a little of Ender in Ender’s Game. 

I do say this later, but his final decision about how to handle Ozai was amazing. I loved every second of his journey to get there, and I was rooting for him to find a path that felt true to him — and not what everyone else kept telling him he had to do. 

There was one small thing that bothered me, which was that his eventual regaining of the Avatar state did not really seem to come about through intentional action of his own. After he goes down at the end of Book 2, sorta feels like they never even talk about him going into the Avatar state again and he doesn’t until the final moment. That moment doesn’t seem a conscious choice on his part; the scar on his back collides with a rock jutting out and seems to jolt him into the Avatar state. I would have liked to see a little more agency on his part in regards to the Avatar state. 

Sokka

My boy! My boy Sokka! Truly the mother of the group. IDK why they pretended in the beginning that Katara was the mom because it’s definitely Sokka. His maps! His scheduling! He is ridiculous and I love him for it. 

I adored that he got his own training master episode! He got to learn some sword stuff and even got to make a fancy space sword! Everyone else got super powerful with their bending and I’m glad Sokka got his own arc of self-improvement. He has come a LONG way from episode 1. He couldn’t really hold his own at all that early, and now look at him! Planning battle strategies! Taking down the Fire Lord’s air fleet! He’s come so far and I’m so proud!

Oh, you know, I just realized that I didn’t really talk about ships with Sokka in Book 2 but he did continue to have the most active romance arc. It was nice to see Suki return in Book 2, and I am glad we found out what happened to her. I liked Sokka and Suki, I have nothing against it. I was very surprised that so little happened with Toph and Sokka. There did seem to be moments where it seemed like Toph might actually harbor a crush on Sokka, but nothing came of it and she certainly didn’t say anything about it. That felt a little odd to me. Why hint at something but then make nothing of it? 

Katara

Sigh. This is early in the post, but probably one of the last parts of it that I’m actually writing. I’ve definitely been putting it off. Unfortunately most of what I have to say about Katara is about shipping, and I’m really not happy about that, but then it’s what comes to mind over anything else. Which is sort of ironic considering some of her lines in the theater episode...

So in the theatre episode, Aang confronts Katara about how nothing has happened in their relationship after they kissed. She responds by saying she is “confused.” I had some issues with the script here, to be honest. It seems to imply that she’s confused about her feelings for Aang. But she also says that she’s been more focused on the war, and that totally makes sense. I really would support this moment if that’s where they left it: “I don’t have time to think about romance, my mind is preoccupied with the war.” 

But no, they say she is “confused.”

This is pretty baffling to me, and honestly seems to come out of nowhere. Book 1 it was very obvious that both Katara and Aang have feelings for each other, and Book 2 might have backed off a little from that but then we get moments where Katara is so keyed in to Aang’s struggles with the Avatar state and also the only one who can bring him out of it. Now, all of a sudden, she is saying she is confused? Where is this coming from? 

I could definitely see people argue that it’s because she has feelings for Zuko. If I shipped them (I don’t, but I also Get It), I could point to numerous moments in the series as ‘clues/support’ for this ship. Zuko and Katara have a moment at the end of Book 2 where they talk about the loss of their mothers. (“We’re both sad about what happened to our mothers!” not really a foundation for a relationship, but Katara is the most betrayed and distrustful of Zuko when it comes to the idea of letting him join their crew and it is because of this moment. She obviously begins to feel some kind of connection — I’d argue platonic but ship and let ship.) 

And yeah, Zuko and Katara have their bonding adventure, but again I don’t think this has to be read as romantic. Clearly the idea here is that Zuko “understands” a part of Katara that Aang doesn’t — except that in the end, Aang is the one who is right about her. She cannot give in to revenge. It’s not her, and Aang knows that. I mean, they’re both right — Katara had go to on the journey to learn that about herself, and it was important that Zuko was the one who helped her. But still. 

Finally Zuko and Katara go together to face Azula. Again seems like plot is pushing them together for Tension. They definitely work together here and Katara heals him and all that but she’d have healed anyone. (Like yeah if you ship it of course you’re gonna be excited over those moments.)

But.

Like. The thing is. When the dust settles? Zuko and Mai return to each other like moths to a flame. I could believe that Katara might have had feelings for Zuko, but I don’t think he ever returned them. I think it was always Mai for him. 

I don’t really want to fan the flames of ship wars — I’m trying to walk a fine line of “I totally understand why people ship this, but I don’t,” and hopefully I’m succeeding, but I’m sorry if I’m not. 

My main gripe is how the show handled this dynamic. It seemed like they half-heartedly thought about creating a love triangle, but then they didn’t follow through. I don’t particularly like love triangles, so I’m not actually mad that there wasn’t one. But what bothers me is that the Aang and Katara moments are so heavy handed in the beginning, that a sudden subtle take on how Katara feels in Book 3 feels strange. It feels like if she was having feelings for Zuko, it should have been more blatant. The depictions are inconsistent — if the writers were even ever intending for Katara to have feelings for Zuko in the first place.

Like, I really can’t tell if those moments implying Zuko and Katara were intentionally trying to start a love triangle OR if it was just sort of a mistake OR if it was maybe creators trying to address and then negate Zuko and Katara as a ship? I mean it’s weird because the play episode really emphasizes Zuko and Katara but then that play is really supposed to be all levels of inaccurate and get under the characters’ skins. 

So, I don’t know. Obviously we all bring different interpretations to a piece of media and I am by no means saying anything here is a “correct opinion” (because I hate that attitude when it comes to story interpretations). Sorry if you don’t agree, hope I didn’t make anyone mad. Ship what you like! You do you, man. 

On that note, please see further disclaimers about shipping and canon at the end of the “Zuko and Mai” section below.

Toph

Loved how Toph was the first to warm up to Zuko. It made a lot of sense. I mean obviously they were looking for a fire bender to teach Aang and it was like “Hello, powerful fire bender on a silver platter!” but also, Toph is someone who joined the crew later on. The group had to adjust to her, and she probably knows what it feels like to be an outsider. Now, granted, she was never alienated from the group in the same way that Zuko (rightfully) was. But she can also understand Zuko’s position as someone who comes from a wealthy family, the sort of pressure that comes from that. None of this was really addressed explicitly, and it might not have really fit then and there, but it was what I was thinking as she was standing up for Zuko.

Um, and also, on that note? Huge bummer Toph did not get her special bonding adventure with Zuko. Toph, I’m with you on that one! Why did Sokka get two episodes for his? 

Zuko

No “& Iroh” on this post because — Iroh spent much of this season in jail, and then the next half just ??? who knows where. 

So, I believe I stated in the last post how shocked I was at Zuko’s betrayal. Knowing he eventually joins Aang’s crew, it seemed like his time in the prison with Katara would ultimately lead to that, and then NOPE! He has this nice heart to heart about his mother, and then… it really shocked me.

But.

As I watched this season, it became clear that this has to be Zuko’s journey. He has to go back to the Fire Nation. He has to win the approval of his father. He has to get everything he wants in order to realize that it really isn’t what he wants. This is integral to his ultimate revelation and redemption and he couldn’t have stayed truly good without verifying and knowing how empty the win of his father’s approval is.

Realizing this, I loved it and appreciated the moments we get. Zuko’s visits to Iroh. Even when Zuko is being cruel, you can see how hurt and lost he is. And Iroh gives him the cold shoulder he deserves, even though of course this is breaking Iroh’s heart, too. 

Now, I absolutely must discuss the Fire Kids Beach Party episode! Because as ridiculous as parts of it are, it provides such an important and necessary insight to all four characters (Zuko, Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee). You see the privilege that they’re all used to, it’s good that no one knows who they all are. (although maybe a little surprising because Zuko’s scar certainly reveals who he is but anyways.) 

and it’s funny how you almost end up rooting for them before you’re like “no no no. they are bad people doing some bad things.” I mean, almost rooting for them. And sure, the campfire scene is a bit Breakfast Club-y but I do think it’s important. And I just loved the moment Zuko admits he’s angry at himself, how his burst of fire as he says it almost covers it up, it’s so hard for him to say. Fabulous character development going on here, fabulous. 

[Uh, side note, so apparently Zuko is descended from Avatar Roku! This is ridiculous but can we get Zuko calling Aang great-grandfather, mainly to get on his nerves?! O:-) this would amuse me greatly]

And GOSH the catharsis when Zuko finally realizes his father’s approval is not what he wants and not worth it! It’s so well earned. It’s so satisfying. I was so excited and just like, so anticipating Zuko going to meet up with the crew. Zuko practicing his speech in the woods to the frog? Amazing. Endearing. I love him so much. 

And despite that and because of it, I also loved how difficult it was for him to earn their trust. It had to be difficult. It would not be believable if it wasn’t. Every character regarded him exactly as you would expect them to, exactly as he deserved. And Zuko tried so hard to be sincere and contrite, and it was hard for him, but he was doing pretty well all things considered! And still, they distrusted him. Yes. This was good and right. And I loved it. 

AND ANOTHER THING I LOVED was that once that initial barrier was surpassed, Aang actually warmed up to Zuko pretty quickly. This is not surprising; he’d reached out to Zuko in the past. First when Zuko (masked) rescues him, and Aang says they could have been friends. Later, at the end of Book 1 when Zuko again kidnaps him, there’s just a moment… I think when Aang spares him. It’s like, my impression is that Aang can sense that their destinies are connected, and he’s not really sure how but he knows that Zuko is important. Also, I mean, Aang just doesn’t kill people and revenge is not his way. 

Each character getting their own side story with Zuko was also integral to his arc — perhaps moreso, theirs, though. Because it was necessary for them to overcome their distrust and forge the bonds necessary for the Avatar’s crew to function. Bummed he didn’t get one with Toph. Toph was robbed.

And side note, but I really would have like an Aang and Sokka bonding episode? Like, Book 1 is all Aang and Katara and Sokka, but some 1:1 time would have been nice. There was almost a chance when Aang flew Sokka to his father and the water tribe (and at the time I was like, “Oh? Aang and Sokka bonding?!”) But then it was really only a few minutes. But yeah, that said, it does make sense to focus on carving out 1:1 time for Zuko and each member of the crew to ease him into the group.

Sokka: You happy now?

Zuko: I’m never happy.

This made me sad. And also made me go “classic Zuko.”

Every time Zuko was like, “What would uncle say?” And then say the most ridiculous thing? Fantastic. Amazing. Fuel for the fire that was my love for this show.

Zuko and Mai

Mainly the Beach Party episode was important in helping me warm up to Mai. Once Zuko is back in the Fire Nation and they’re together, I was of the mindset that Mai would have to do something pretty big in order for me to enjoy seeing their relationship become canon. This episode is not that episode, but it is an important insight into Mai’s character that explains some of her actions. The fact that she’s basically internalized apathy because she’s been forced to repress her emotions. It wasn’t enough for me but we get more later, this is an important stepping stone. 

It’s also important in establishing just what Zuko and Mai’s dynamic is. It’s a bit shaky in this and they end up breaking up but then they just get back together like immediately (moths to a flame…) In hindsight, I just think they’re behaving like normal teens who care about each other but are still navigating what it means to be in a relationship. At this moment in time, their relationship is not good, but by the end of the show I can believe as they mature that it could be a good relationship.

So the actual moment that I was like, “Okay, officially supporting Mai and Zuko now” was when she helps them escape Boiling Rock. I don’t think we’re ever told the full contents of Zuko’s letter to her, but considering what she says to Zuko earlier in this episode, it doesn’t seem likely he explains himself very well. At least not for Mai to understand. And he still isn’t able to explain himself well to her as they talk face to face. Then he locks in a cell and flees! He leaves her again. 

You wouldn’t blame Mai for hating Zuko. You wouldn’t blame her for actively working against him. But is this what happens? No. Not at all. She helps them get away. She betrays Azula for Zuko. Azula!!! Azula who is very powerful and very scary! This is a clear and distinct line in the sand, and … it almost comes out of nowhere, but what it demonstrates is how she really feels about him. She’s decided to trust him and put her faith in him when she really would have been justified in not doing so. 

I’m also going to say that despite some rather odd implications of Zuko and Katara in parts of the series (namely with other characters who really don’t know them), I never feel like Zuko is interested in Katara. I would buy interpretations that Katara might have considered Zuko, the way some parts of her story are portrayed, but I don’t get anything on Zuko’s side and that is all the more reinforced by how he acts around Mai, especially in the end of the series when they’re reunited. 

(Now, that said — because I don’t abide ship wars, ship and let ship, and power to multi-shippers — I can totally 100% see the appeal of shipping Zuko and Katara, and I would contend there is even some canonical implication of it. And I can’t blame people for not totally loving Zuko and Mai. Now, I do think the canonical implications are sort of muddied and confusing, but though I have actually not written it yet, you’ll have read my thoughts there in the Katara section already. OH, and OF COURSE, MORE IMPORTANTLY — ships being canon should not matter! Ship what you love! Who cares if it’s canon! Finding canon justification for ships should not be necessary for shipping! It can be a fun exercise but should never ever be a reason for approving or disapproving of a ship, it’s just a cherry on top!)

Azula

We get some pretty interesting insights into her character this season. I’ve already mentioned the Beach Party episode, and there was some good stuff in there for her. I particularly appreciated the moment that she admitted she knew her mother thought she was a monster, that she even admitted to being a monster, and then admitted that it still hurt anyways. Honestly that’s probably her best moment.

I also thought her breakdown at the end was well done. Mai and Ty Lee’s betrayal just broke her. She probably knows her attitude puts people off, but those two were the only ones she ever really got on with. And it turns out, she really didn’t get on with them, they’d only ever been intimidated and manipulated into being her friends. She has no one, she pushes everyone away. Literally — and it is ultimately her downfall. 

It’s an interesting contrast to her brother. We literally get an episode “Zuko Alone,” and then it turns out the theme of “Azula Alone” is such an integral part of her arc, as well. The last person she has is her father, and he leaves her, too. Sure, he tells her it’s because she’s to stay behind as the new Fire Lord, but honestly Ozai was never truly close to anyone, either. But yeah. Iroh spends a lot of time and effort trying to help Zuko redeem himself. He never tries with Azula? I think, maybe it would have been nice to see him try with her, and be just utterly rebuffed. Now, Zuko also rebuffed him a lot, too. So Azula’s rejection of Iroh would really have to be something. This is the kind of stuff I’d look for in fic. Speaking of fic: I mean, I’d really love Zuko to find his mom, mom to come back, and then maybe some kind of attempt at reparations between mom and Azula. It doesn’t have to work, I just want to see the effort, you know?

Final Thoughts: Ending & Denouement

I loved Aang finding a different way to defeat the Fire Lord. I loved how every past Avatar he talked to was like “no dude just kill him.” And I loved that that was not enough for Aang. He’s pushing himself and ultimately the spirit of the Avatar to think harder, to try harder, to seek a different way. And that mercy was so integral to Aang’s character, and important to his arc that he struggled so much with it. And he’s just a kid! Oh, Aang. And I loved that he was able to find the answer he needed, the fact that it was taking away Ozai’s fire bending. Yes. Perfection.

I was a little disappointed by how little we got post-Ozai’s defeat. I was hoping the epilogue might have shown a little more in the years and decades following. It would have been nice to see glimpses of everyone prospering as they got older. 

Also, as I was watching Zuko’s coronation, I was sorta like, “uhh wait that’s a little too easy.” Now we don’t know when that happens so it’s possible some bit of time has lapsed and I’ll take that. But I thought there would have still been some trouble with some of the Fire Nation troops. Some of them would have remained loyal to Ozai. Many of those general had probably committed war crimes and would have needed to be rounded up and put on trial and put in prison. There’d be so much work to do!

That said, I do understand that we want to see our heroes with a happy ending, ultimately. I guess just a simple like “X years later” before the ending scenes would have sufficed for me to be satisfied that enough time had passed for those things to have been dealt with. IDK, I can probably suspend disbelief enough to headcanon that myself. I’m just saying. Some acknowledgement of resolution and reconstruction as a *process over time*, albeit unnecessary, would have been nice to have!

On that note, we don’t actually find out what happens to Azula. Presumably she is also in prison with her father. 

More importantly, we were Robbed of a Zuko and Ursa reunion scene!