#haha humanistic studies jumpscar wooohooo

[wilcze-kudly]

Beifong babies ask like you asked <3

I feel as if the person I’ve seen you least talk about is Huan. Do you have any thoughts on him, either in relation to Kuvira or his interest in art? I’m sorry I can’t be more specific rn, my brain is…very frazzled. as expected 😭

I actually have SO MANY thought about Huan, I just never had the time and place to file them away. I've always liked Huan, and thought he could've been an incredibly intriguing character with a lot of potential. I can confidently say he probably was concieved primarily as a gimmick character, a bit of a jab at 'edgy', modernist artists. However, Huan has a lot of potential as a character and an exploration of themes.

First of all, Huan is interesting becaus he is one of the few "pacifist" benders of the show. This is especially intriguing due to him coming from a family with such a prominent amount of bender fighters. I wonder if he ever felt pressured to be a fighter too, or if he feels inadequate due to following a different path.

I personally like to think that Su gently pushed Huan to be fighter too, when he was a child, due to her own upbringing, which I imagine had Toph valuing her daughters careying on her legacy. But Huan was too much of a tender and sensitive soul, and didn't like the idea of destroying or fighting. I like to think he spent a lot of time with Aiwei, who nurtured his individualism, talents and hobbies. I like to think Aiwei was the one to help convince Su to let Huan pursue his artistic interests.

Due to this, Huan and Aiwe were always pretty close when Huan was growing up. So I think Huan ended up absorbing some of the Red Lotus' teachings about individuality and freedom.

For some reason, I think Huan would be a good big brother to his younger siblings. He cares a lot for Opal, Wei and Wing even if he doesn't show it often. I think for most their lives he just kinda let them do their own thing and was pretty antisocial, until the shit with Kuvira happened. Huan was one of the only people to see how affected Opal and the twins were by the betrayals of Baatar Jr and Kuvira and the danger their family was put in. He also felt srather guilty when his little siblings were out there risking their lives while all he could do was evacuate.

This motivated Huan to step up as a big brother and try to 'defend' them from Suyin trying to 'fix' the family and Baatar and Kuvira.

I also like that he seems so good with kids and enjoys spending time with them. Its a sweet. And it seems like it makes sense that he would value Ikki's childish doodles, since children just playing with colours and shapes is a very pure form of creativity.

Huan's relationship with freedom of self expression and individuality is also domething that caught my attention, especially in relation to Kuvira's regime and especially his infamous "crushing my individuality" line.

Sure, this line is objectively really funny, and pretty memeable. But let's add some context that adds themes I'm 78% sure weren't intended.

I've spoken at length about how Kuvira draws heavily from the Soviet union. I've also probably mentioned how my high school had a focus on humanistics, particularly Polish literature, although what I'm about to discuss extends far beyond Poland. And one of the 'eras' of literature and art that stuck with me the most was the period of time when Poland was the Polish People's Republic, essentially under the thumb of the Soviets. For creativity, it meant what you might expect. Basically, a mandate on almost every piece of music, literature and visual arts to be essentially Soviet propaganda.

I, as you may guess, dislike the time period with a passion. But some of my favourite novels and works of art have come about as a response to the danger the Soviets posed to creativity. It's fascinating to see what creators chose to bend the knee and alter their works to go through rigorous censorship, and what creators chose to resist, often getting blacklisted if not worse.

Many wrote bleak, heartwtenching stories about the death of art in the Eastern Bloc and how it impacted society as a whole. The emptiness of the propagandised happiness, the false idols of theatre and movies, the cheapness of it all, the ridiculous censorship that often contradicted itself.

I think Huan, being an artist could've been a very good vessel for exploring these concepts and storylines, especially with how self expression and creativity is still often censored and attacked irl, most visibly by conservatives in the USA. [Damn I asked for asks on the Beifong babies and weilin to escape the shitshow across the pond yet here I am]

We are especially entering a new era of war on our rights to express ourselves as different groups begin to try to control and restrict how we create and consume content in the still relatively new medium that is the entire internet. This could be something poignat to have been touched on.

These may be concepts that would be difficult to explore in a show like tlok. But atla was able to allude to the concept of propaganda and Huan was the perfect vessel for a mini storyline like this. Exploring Huan's identity as an artist and creator would be a huge benefit to the show, judging by how many people in the fandom have their own creative inclinations and how tlok as a show encouraged us to follow in Korra's footsteps to push through diversity to achieve freedom and enlightenment. Why should self expression by seperate from that equation?

Anyway :/ those are my Huan thoughts which kinda poured out due to how much I've been stewing in them lol. Thanks for the ask I always love recieving them especially if they have something to do with the Beifong Babies. Today was a rough day and I appreciate the distraction and chance to ramble.