Someone once said Aang and Katara’s romantic interactions have no impact on their relationship. Which I find a ridiculous notion, given how
One: The Series genuinely wasn’t built around romance.
Two: We do gradually see the characters develop feelings for each other more across the show.
https://www.tumblr.com/melu-lis/762094698681745408/one-of-the-most-baffling-thing-about-kataang-to-me?source=share
Honestly, the fact that Katara and Aang's relationship has that strong aspect of friendship is one of my fave parts of it.
Like, maybe this is an unpopular opinion and I'm just a degenerate little dyke but I'm so so tired of romances having to follow the typical usually heterosexual conventions that have been set ib place both irl and in media.
And not to sound like an old man shaking my fist at a cloud, but in an era where romance is very standardised (look at the plethora of YA romance books selling basically the same plotline but in different aesthetics). It's nice to find a relationship that doesn't fully fit that mold.
Like people have joked about this but Aang and Katara really do follow the famously memed lesbian relationship stereotype of "we've been besties for ages and we've kissed a few times and she's said she loves me and I'm starting to think she's into me but idk". And I love that for them.
Also OP's examples aren't really saying much. They mention that "sokka learns that aang has a crush on katara in the fortuneteller, but we never see aang trying to get advice from sokka after he learns about it" while disregarding the fact that Aang did try to get advice from Sokka, and it backfired. Did we all forget "Soooo... papaya?" (also Sokka didn't realise that Aang had a crush on Katara? He thought Aang had a crush on Meng.)
Another argument from OP is that: "aang and katara kiss in the cave of two lovers but we never see katara's perception of aang change at all" which I find a bit of a flawed idea because there's not really anything in Katara's perception of Aang to change? Like she was already seeing him as a viable romantic partner from at least the Fortune Teller, she was blushing when considering kissing him and offended when he didn't immediately agree to it.
(I actually think this is the moment where Sokka realises there's something between Katara and Aang man look athis face.)
We do not see Katara's pov, but we can pick up her thoughts from how she's animated and other clues because atla makes it quite easy to emphasise with its characters. I talk more about it in the Kaatang and female gaze post.
OP using the description of "natural development of a platonic relationship becoming a romantic one" is also mildy annoting because just because a romance doesn't follow established conventions and timelines, doesn't mean that it's not natural or badly written. We study tropes and aechetypes usually in order to subvert them.
The concept that romance has to be a series of events followed by switches flipping automatically in response is incredibly limiting and, frankly, overdone. I can see the appeal of romantic stories being a series of actions and reactions between two people, but I personally find a slow, budding development even more compelling. But once again, thsi is up to preference. If OP doesn't like this style of romance, than that's fine. Though I will stress the golden rule: your preference doesn't mean that everything else is bad/unnatural/unethical etc.
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okay. i feel like theres still Some People who may check the land of stories tag on here the way i occasionally do i know theres some fans of the series here at least. since a while back i wrote out an entire paragraph to briefly explain why im insane about lloyd bailey to my friends who dont know tlos, i figure, WHY NOT POST IT ON HERE where people who also know the series (and therefore this character) might see it <3 its at least a little funny to see how i try to explain things in tlos like the hall of dreams briefly with little to no details. this is also kind of like a brief summation of everything we know about lloyd AND JOHNS childhood which is interesting. see below.
sits down. let me set the scene. lloyd bailey is the younger son in a set of two. his mother is a very powerful fairy (#fairygodmother) who’s kind of like the chancellor of an entire kingdom. lloyd and his older brother john both very much have magic in their blood because of this. lloyd’s father dies when he is very young. he is “not the same” afterwards. he thinks his older brother john, who handles his fathers passing arguably “better”, is the favorite child. john is happy and cheerful and everyone loves him. lloyd sits in his dark room and reads books like the iron mask all day. lloyd’s mother does not know how to get to him. she figures out how to make a potion that can bring books to life, since he likes to read so much. she offers it to him. he turns her down. she goes into this magic little hallway (infinite space) where she can see what people truly desire. lloyd the 11 year olds desire (i don’t know how old he is.) is to take over the world. hm. a bit concerning. his mother takes him out into the forest on a nice walk, chains him to a tree, and drains his magic from him. lloyd is not a fan of his mother for this. he tells her that she never would’ve done this to john. his mother considers her action stopping him before he wreaks havoc on everything. lloyd considers this having his “birthright” stripped from him for “a crime [he] never committed” (direct quote). lloyd despises his mother. he runs away from home not long after. he considers the potion his mother made his. he only comes back home to try and steal it. he fails. he is sentenced to life in prison. his mother gives him a mask to wear so no one knows he’s her son. john moves to the otherworld and starts a family. lloyd rots in prison. lloyd’s son who he doesn’t know about is born. lloyd rots in prison. john dies. lloyd rots in prison. his mother loves john’s children and starts to train one of them in being her successor. this could’ve been lloyd. lloyd rots in prison. he doesn’t escape until his niece and nephew are teenagers and his niece is about ten times more powerful than him. because she has the gift that was ripped out of his hands. lloyd hates the world he lives in and its people and seeks to destroy it as soon as he’s out. i wonder why. in conclusion. im normal about him.
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One of the main things I dislike about book 2 Lestat vs book 1 Lestat is it just takes away a lot of the interesting mystery about his character in the first book to have him definitively answer everything like: "oh actually I WAS hiding a bunch of secrets of the vampire universe and rules and hierarchy and history from you the entire time, and actually I WAS also filthy rich secretly the entire time due to a treasure left to me by my maker and didn't actually need you for your money at all, and also I wasn't a bit insecure about my lower class upbringing and poorer education and trying to compensate for that by being both showy and secretive about myself I was actually a noble, and also I CAN do a bunch of other vampire things that I never taught you to do or did in front of you even though we lived together in the same house as a family for like 70 years, and yes I DO hate following rules and doing what I'm told and keeping secrets but I did it because Marius said your fragile minds couldn't handle the truth if I DID tell you anything else, and also I DIDN'T want any revenge on Claudia or blame her for attempting to murder me or think I maybe should undo what I did by making her one bit, I was just being forced by the even EVILLER vampire to have her condemned to death, and also almost everything questionable or problematic or cruel that I did within the first book was either a lie told by Louis or secretly actually a kind and heroic thing I did because I cared about someone other than myself, IN FACT I SECRETLY THE ENTIRE TIME HAD A STRICT MORAL CODE I WAS FOLLOWING every time I casually killed an innocent npc in the first book, and whenever you watched on in horror at my cruelty and toying with my victims I was actually only killing scummy evildoers and Louis was just too dumb and romanticizing of humans to ever see it etc..." like FINE WHATEVER, I GUESS hahaha but I actually kind of liked you better when you were a bit meaner and a bit petty and a bit imperfect and a bit lame
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