#baatar junior

[wishingforatypewriter]

5, 6, 11, 22 for Baatar Jr.

Hi!!! Thanks for the ask! I've actually been missing Baatar lately!

5. Best personality trait

If someone asked Baatar directly, he would probably say intelligence without giving the question much thought. Growing up in the Metal Clan as a nonbender, he was often defined by what he couldn't do, so in opposition to that, he tried to build his identity around what he could. And Baatar could study and build and calculate, so being "the smart guy" is how he tried to carve out an identity in his family and in Zaofu as a whole, though even in that, he still existed in the shadow of his father.

If you asked me, though, I think Baatar's best quality is his devotion. Whether it's his work as an engineer or his relationship with Kuvira, he gives all of himself to whatever he chooses to pursue, and I think that's a rare and wonderful way of being.

6. Worst personality trait.

I'd have to say spitefulness. This man's mean streak is a mile long and you really see it in his interactions with his parents during book 4. I think it stems from him feeling slighted and overlooked throughout his childhood, years of unspoken resentment building up until it came to a head in a really ugly way once he was in a position of relative power.

11. Faceclaim for the role

Ooh, this one is tough! The only LOK character I've fancasted is Jargala.

But maybe Suraj Sharma?

(I think Baatar is better looking than people often give him credit for, so in my opinion this could work!)

22. Best physical feature?

Baatar would probably say his height, but I think his eyes (and his eyebrows, for that matter) are lovely.

50 Random Character Asks!

[ee1stlady]

I was tagged by @beifongboars 💗

Last Song: CAFé CON RON - Bad Bunny ft. Pleneros de la Cresta. I can't stop listening to it on loop.

Favourite colour: Carmine. I love cool, dark, bright reds.

Sweet/Spicy/Savoury: It depends on the day, but in general I tend to prefer salty food.

Relationship Status: Single.

Last Book: I've been reading fragments of One Hundred Years of Solitude lately. I'd like to buy the book soon, whether it's physical or digital.

Last thing I googled: "cafe con ron bad bunny generos". Esa ortografía, uff 🚬🚬🚬

Last movie: Sonic 3. I didn't understand anything and maybe there was nothing to understand.

Current Obsession: I think they are three obsessions that fight each other and go hand in hand at the same time. One Hundred Years of Solitude (and magical realism in general). Bad Bunny's new album, DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS (and any song that mixes modern music with traditional rhythms). And my ocxcanon with Kuvira, I'm thinking of making my OC a cousin of Wu, so I'm looking for HC of him everywhere.

Looking Forward To: I want to watch the One Hundred Years of Solitude series, but I don't have Netflix 🥹

Tagging: I don't know who I tagged. So anyone who sees this!

[empirelead]

tag posts

[xdiana97x]

💚Suyin and Kesari 💚

She is a character of my rp. She's the daughter of Kuvira and Baatar Jr. She's born before season 4 and before the betray. Junior doesn't care a lot about her. Kuvira get closer with her after RotE, together with Su's help.

[beifongboars]

headcanon time: given that lin is childless, as suyin's eldest child, the title of lord beifong passes to baatar junior upon su's death

both toph and lin passed on the title so it went straight to su once lao died

unless you think there's a preference for males in earth kingdom succession, in which case it would have still passed to baatar jr. upon lao's death

[zuzus-ponytail]

broke: “suyin is sokka and toph’s daughter.”

gross. they are siblings. that’s like saying kya is katara and sokka’s daughter.

what even is the reasoning behind this claim? suyin has darker skin, therefore her dad MUST be sokka? they don’t even look alike, nor do they share any traits. suyin was made from clay, she doesn’t HAVE a father. and sokka would never be an absent father, dude’s been a father figure since he was twelve & he would never stand for toph sending su to live with her parents. also, how on earth would sokka’s genes create something so dreadful as suyin?

woke: “baatar jr. is sokka’s grandson.”

they’re identical & have similar energy. logical geniuses with a thing for more than slightly fruity women who put duty above all else. also overshadowed by their dads & younger siblings.

bespoke: “baatar is sokka and suki’s son.”

i’ve seen sokka and baatar junior’s resemblance used as an argument for why sokka is suyin’s father, and i think that’s just a very… weak point to make. he’s baatar jr. and takes after his father, bataar, in almost every way.

& that includes his looks.

if anybody is going to be sokka’s kid, it’s baatar.

anyways, that’s my stance on the subject :-)

i don’t really think that sokka and suki would have had kids, they’re the most responsible & logical members of the gaang and i reckon they would’ve gone ‘hm. let’s focus on actually fixing the world before we even think about bringing a child into this.’ also, they’re definitely the Cool Aunt & Uncle. they get to have great fun with their nieces and nephews, and can spoil them rotten & teach them all their non-bending fighting techniques that the rest of the gaang can’t, but at the end of the day, they can give them back to their parents.

[tamras-shieldmaiden]

I’m taking my shipper hat off for a moment to delve into an aspect of Kuvira’s personality that I would typically overlook since, admittedly, as common knowledge for anyone who has been following my blog for a while, I don’t care much for Kuvira’s and Bataar Jr.’s relationship beyond what pertains to the facts of her story. However, since I've been recently paying a closer look to her childhood by analyzing key moments of her upbringing that Ruins of the Empire provided, I think that the way those events shaped her personality may have led her to the choices we see her taking regarding her personal life. Given the parallels between Baatar Jr.'s parents and him and Kuvira, we can joke, saying that he might have chosen Kuvira as a romantic partner because of “mommy issues," but what about Kuvira? What if Kuvira's choice of Baatar as a partner reflects her own issues, specifically regarding her relationship with her father?  Did Kuvira choose Junior to compensate for the absence of a caring and loving father? Kuvira’s insecurities have been discussed at length before, but I think this is an angle worth exploring, so let’s see if this notion holds any water. 

So I wondered if Kuvira’s traumatic experiences with her biological father may have impacted the traits she wished for in a romantic partner and if Junior fulfilled those traits. Before getting into the specifics, you may notice that I’m avoiding the term “daddy issues” because, after a quick search, I found out that there is no such psychological term but rather what she might experience could fall under attachment disorder.

So back to the topic at hand, if Kuvira’s traumatic experiences primed her to seek a partner to compensate for the absence of a healthy relationship with her father, perhaps what Junior brought to the table coincided with what she sought. It would’ve been difficult for Kuvira not to appreciate the unwavering way (to a fault) that Junior supported and believed in her, in stark contrast to the total loss of confidence her father had in her, manifested in her abandonment. This abandonment led her to crave stability, loyalty, and trust, and we can assume Baatar Jr. supplied all of these things in abundance by the way he talked about her to others and through his behavior. She wanted someone who would support and believe in her, something he had done since they left Zaofu, when he defied his mother's wishes and de facto elected Kuvira over his family. Ironically, it was Kuvira at the warehouse who ended up doing what she feared and abandoned Baatar Jr. via spirit weapon blast for her goal of uniting the EK.

In Zaofu, despite having been taken in by Suyin and her husband Baatar Sr., Kuvira lacked proper parental figures to replace the ones she lost since she never felt truly part of the family. It’s not a stretch to believe she yearned to relive the experience of feeling she belonged to a family in the proper sense, even if it was an imperfect one. Bonding with Junior could’ve been the next best thing, especially during the formative years of their adolescence, when they began noticing what Suyin did and said more closely, leading them to analyze her ideology and her actions, realizing that her words and her actions didn’t necessarily align when it didn’t suit her interests. It cannot be a coincidence that of all of Suyin’s children, the ones who wound up ideologically radicalized in the household were Junior and Kuvira, and I have my own theory as to why this happened. As the eldest children, they were allowed access to the day-to-day ins and outs of administering the city and were entrusted with important positions within the administration. They were part of Zaofu’s circle of trusted people (this can explain how they knew and were connected to the influential people who left with them when they deserted Zaofu). Baatar Jr. worked closely with his father on everything related to the city’s infrastructure. Kuvira, as guard captain, was a key component of the security forces safeguarding the city from internal and external threats. As far as we know, none of their other siblings were involved in any capacity in running the city like they did, so they had a privileged view of Suyin, not only as their mother but also as the administrator and political leader of Zaofu. 

I've posited before that either by conscious or unconscious choice, Kuvira emulated Suyin, and one of the ways she manifested this pattern was in the choice of Baatar Jr. as her romantic partner. He brought the built-in advantages of his knowledge and skills as an inventor and engineer to her grand plan, similar to Suyin and the skills that Baatar Sr. had, which allowed Zaofu to be the city Suyin envisioned. Kuvira wanted the same unwavering support Suyin had with her husband and also the ability to wield power without questioning as Su did, and Baatar Jr. provided this to Kuvira. This is not to say she didn't love him because I think she did, or at least she believed she did, since besides their bond growing up in Zaofu and developing similar ideologies, he provided the validation to counter the insecurity borne of her parental trauma, so it made it easier for her to develop feelings for him. She loved the way he validated her and her choices, and probably it was something she reciprocated since he had his own insecurities to deal with, so they became each other’s supporters, cheerleaders, and enablers. These aren't the things she might've actually needed from a partner, because we can assume that part of the unequivocal support he provided meant shielding her from accountability and from confronting her with the harsh truths of the dictatorship they led, something that in the end became a fatal flaw that affected both their relationship and their rule over the Earth Kingdom.

So, does this answer the original question? Kuvira’s trauma left an indelible mark on her psyche, so I think this could have predisposed her to seek and develop romantic feelings and attachment to someone who could make her feel validated and secure, and to me, Baatar Jr. fulfilled these needs for her. I’m not saying she didn’t have genuine romantic feelings towards him, but I do believe these factors weighed heavily on her choice because, for once in her life, she finally had someone who made her feel loved and cared for.

[ourimpavidheroine]

Where did you come up with the idea of Ikki and Bataar Junior anyhow?

I was thinking about my answer for this and then I forgot it was in my inbox, so my apologies for the delay in answering!

I have, on occasion, set myself goals when I've been writing. I wanted to write a successful epistolary story, which is where Please Excuse My Penmanship came about. I also wanted to do a 30 day prompt collection, and I've done that more than once.

That being said, sometimes it's fun to write crack. Writing that Ginger (Bolin's co-star) was a secret assassin was nothing but crack, it was just nonsense that @scarlettfire mentioned that I thought was hilarious and immediately wrote it down. I have absolutely enjoyed reading plenty of crack in my day, including crackships.

Could I write a crackship that was just fun, that I didn't need to justify? Of course. I've already done that. Zuko's little sister Kiyi and Bumi II, for one. There are others, if you care to look for them. Why can't I have fun when writing, right?

But the challenge I set for myself with I Do Not Ask the Night for Explanations was to take what was certainly a crackship, something that had zero basis whatsoever in canon, and justify it into something readers would accept as canon (or at least canon-adjacent).

I don't think Ikki and Huan is necessarily a crackship. We do, after all, see them interact in canon. Granted, Ikki is still a child in canon, but none of us remain children forever, after all. I took their relationship forward 10 years, took their canon characters - we know a lot about Ikki, not so much about Huan, but we do know something - and aged them up in all ways. Ikki, who is the one canonically the most like her grandfather and Huan, who is in his own world, the outcast of the Beifong siblings. They were not a stretch as a couple, or at least not for me.

But Baatar Jr. He was a tricky one. For one thing, he and Ikki never interact in canon - she's there in Asami's factory with him at the end but she's in the background and I think it's safe to assume that in the moment he would not be chatting up an unknown eleven year old, and she certainly would not have been allowed to talk to him.

When I wrote IDNAtNfE, it was long before the comics came out; the last we knew of Baatar was that he had helped bring down the Colossus (despite his murder!fiance) and his mother had forgiven him. He's not at Varrick and Zhu Li's wedding (no great surprise there, ahem) and his fate was never specified in the show itself. I assumed he and Kuvira would both be imprisoned (apparently Bryke feels that military dictatorship, wholesale murder and destruction of a city means house arrest for him and parole for her, but uh, whatever). I had thought about him after the show, however, especially since I had written so much about the Beifongs. That being said, in all of my earlier work he was just The Brother In Jail That We Don't Talk About.

He clearly wasn't as culpable in canon as Kuvira (whom I would toss in a special prison that kept her from bending for the rest of her life but I guess what's good for Zaheer isn't good for Kuvira) so I thought, what would happen to him if he were released from prison? Where would he go? Republic City? Eh. No. Zaofu? GOD NO.

So I sent him to his brother, up in the Northern Air Temple. And then I just let the story unfold through a few ficlets, and how it unfolded was that he caught feelings for his brother's lover, a woman who did not like him and only put up with him being there because a)she loves his brother and wants his brother's happiness and b)is an airbender and actually believes in airbender tenets, which include peace/forgiveness/compassion.

To be clear, I absolutely pantsed those ficlets, rather than plotted them. Baatar and Ikki was never the plan. I just let it happen as I went.

On a normal basis I don't feel a great need to justify crackships. Why? That's exactly what makes them crack. Would Kiyi sleep with a man young enough to be her son, despite her position in the Fire Nation (and perhaps an expected marriage)? Who cares. Crackship.

But what if I didn't want Baatar and Ikki to be a crackship? It wouldn't be canon, for sure (I certainly never thought it would be; if Bryke weren't entrenched in gay-specific homophobia Wuko could conceivably be canon one day, but obviously not Ikki and Baatar) but I thought, could I possibly make it something real? Something that readers would buy as plausible? Something that they would actually start to ship? (None of my long-term readers did when I started. In fact, all of them were pretty up front that they were not buying it, read the comments as the IDNAtNfE goes on, they are hilarious.) That was my goal when I actually started to write IDNAtNfE, and I do think I accomplished it.

[ee1stlady]

The other day I roughly worked out Baatar Junior's height. Considering his face is elongated and Kuvira reaches about halfway up his face, he should be about 185 cm tall (6'1"). Although I've seen other people estimate his height as 6'5" or even 6'8".

I sometimes forget how short the twins are. Especially compared to Baatar jr. I feel like he had to use that to his advantage as kids lol. "Yeah I might not be able to bend but AT LEAST I'M NOT SHORT" *cue two identical offended gasps*

[empirelead-a]

a mighty need to interact with a baatar junior muse

[wishingforatypewriter]

1, 21, and 31 for Baatar Jr

Thanks for the ask! I actually really miss writing about Baatar.

Canon I outright reject

This was from the comics, but I vehemently reject the idea that Baatar became okay with people calling him junior again after he reunited with his family. It implies that he was only frustrated with living in his father's shadow because Kuvira manipulated him into feeling that way and that does his whole character a disservice. I cannot even describe how hard I cringed when Kuvira referred to him as "Baatar Junior" in the comics. I almost stopped reading then and there.

21. Drink of choice (not just alcoholic)

I'm not gonna lie, I think this man is a bit of a lightweight. Anything stronger than moonpeach wine and he's a little tipsy at least. Still, he indulges in Earth Kingdom soju every now and then.

On the nonalcoholic side, you'll always catch him with a huge thermos of chrysanthemum tea when he's going to be in his engineering workshop for long stretches of time.

31. If the had a tumblr what would it look like?

Ooh, I love this question! I think Baatar's page would be firmly on the science side of Tumblr. He'd post his designs and such every now and then, but his page would mostly be dedicated to answering asks people send in with random engineering/physics/architecture questions. He'd also reblog scientifically questionable posts with multi-paragraph explanations about how the phenomenon in question actually works.

Ask me about characters!

[ee1stlady]

I once saw someone on TikTok call Baatar Junior a "incel beta" and I was like ???

I mean every character has their stereotypes and reasons why people could hate them but why call him a slur that's explicitly fake lool

You can call him simp, but where do you see the incel in him?

[toranoya]

Wei was going to push Junior back down again, but he was already up. So much for not tearing his new wound. “Relax, you’re home. How long you’re staying may be another matter.” Wei said as he studied his older sibling. His concern seemed genuine, but then, he had lied before.

“He is breathing and almost seems to be like having a fever.” Wei explained as Wing shifted and moaned. “Which reminds me, water and fruit.” Wei said as he tossed the two items to Baatar. “And yes, Opal told her, but you’re too late. We’re surrounded. We got word out to Republic City before they cut the radio lines though.”

Baatar's revenge

.

[xdiana97x]

Her me out!

(for more head canon trash)

Becaue I have it and because I do it mostly on every show I watch, here are my opinion that besides Korra (cause everyone now she has PTSD) my both favorite characters have their mental health issues . I talking about Kuvira and Suyin.

About Suyin Beifong :

Suyin is known as a person with a lot trouble in her childhood. She hanged around with a bunch of criminals, stolen stuff and supported them doing their robberys. She already told that she and Lin fight for their mother's attention and love in their own way. Its a thing I often did as child , doing bad things to get attention, cause my biological mother didn't gave me enough. Toph was really busy being a cop and I would bet she often let Lin watch over Suyin when they was little kids. I can imagine that Lin was often overwhelmed to handel this. Cause she had to deal with her own problems, getting attention and love from Toph. I guess that both have mental issues but I will here talking about Suyin. The results of this childhood make her to a overprotective character. Yes she always supports the steps of her children but on the other hand she can't really let them go. It's a sign that she is scared to losing people she cares and loves. That fact that she lock down the whole city and her estate is for me a sign to that she is pretty scared that bad things could happen and they will happen like getting betrayed from Aiwei, Baatar Junior and Kuvira. But she is still a person who give others a second chance or more and see always the good in someone (an other behavior I have with BPD to see always the best in people and hope they will change, cause I don't want to lose them) She also have really often a scared facial expression ( in my opinion it's even more worse in RofE) that something always is their that scares here and make her feel overwhelmed . So I believe that Suyin have mental issues like PTSD, anxiety disorder and maybe a bit BPD (cause Toph wasn't their in ger younger years and we all know that especially in the years when kids are toddlers they need a lot near and love from their parents and when this isn't given that's a trigger to get mental issues)

About Kuvira:

Kuvira's life starts already with a situation I can really relate a lot. Being rejected from her biological parents, cause they couldn't deal with her anger issues. But thats not all they looked Kuvira in her room when she had done bad things and don't let her out before she saw her mistakes by herself. Well wie never saw it and its more my opinion but I bet that her parents also punish her with violence. That would explain why Kuvira is scared when Korra touch her and keep distance to her. It's a normal reaction someone gives when they don't allow that they deserve good and think they have to fight for their own, plus wearing that gloves is a since too she don't will touch others cause she have this sensitive issues (I had really long problems to hug others, cause I was on the opinion I don't deserve it) . We also saw she is growing up as "adopted" child in a othe family. Again she is the different one, the one who get raised separately and not really part of this family, try again to fight for love. (I am grown up as child in a forster family after my biological mother couldn't handle me. And it was and it still is hard to see my foster parents and their biological son's as family, cause I often don't feeling part of it and I have issues to allow me that because I learned as toddler to fight for my own after my birth mother did violence stuff with me ) Kuvira is also scared like Suyin to lose, what she loves and in the other way she push away what she loves to protect her self getting hurt (try to kill Baatar Jr). It's a typical reaction of a person (like me) have with BPD. So yes I believe that Kuvira also have BPD, PTSD cause of that what happened in her childhood. Plus she is scared like Suyin to lose everything important in her life so it is also an anxiety disorder.

As we can see again Suyin and Kuvira pretty similar to each other. A reason more why I ship them. Because they need each other more than every thing else. Or did you can tell me why Suyin allow to get Kuvira back at Zaofu (especially after Junior clearly says he won't see Kuvira again) That's enough a sign for me that Suyin can't live without Kuvira, loves her and hope again with a second chance everything will be okay.

[beifongboars]

Thanks for tagging me, @beifong-brainrot!

This is me and my unfortunate blorbo, Baatar Junior. I debated making Kuvira instead, but my boy needs more love. Also, I HC that he was left with scars on his cheek when the warehouse exploded, and these are the closest ones I found.

As this is a new blog, I have no one to tag lol

But if you come across this and wanna do it: Create yourself and your current blorbo in this picrew.

[bolinity]

"Oh, heeeeeey, Baatar Junior..."

bolin.