#i've got to do another one of these for sokka later

[wilcze-kudly]

The Gaang being 'bad parents' didn't ruin their characters.

I've seen this argument tossed around a couple times and it's honestly one of my least favourite criticisms of lok.

Katara (and Sokka but we have no confirmed kids for him, which seems unrealistic with how much game he had) lost their mother as children and their father was forced to abandon them when they were barely starting their teens. They were raised by their grandmother with little to no peers of their own age.

Aang did not know his parents and a huge chunk of his childhood was him being groomed into taking up the mantle of the avatar and mastering airbending. He also was isolated from other kids his age. His closest parental figure was Gyatso who was more of a teacher than a father. Also the Air Nomads were literally wiped out so that adds to the trauma pile.

I really don't think i have to talk about Zuko's family life here, but at least he had relatively positive parental figures in the form of Ursa (though i do have a burning personal dislike of ursa) and Iroh. Despite this his struggle around the subject of his family and his trauma relating to his upbringing was a focal point of his character arc.

Toph was raised in isolation by her asshole abelist parents who did not listen to her, sent people to capture and bring her back and then disowned her. (If my cursory understanding of 'the rift' is correct, I need to actually read it because i am unreasonably obsessed with the Beifong family.)

Where, pray tell, were they supposed to learn proper parenting skills? On their brief stint as child soldiers? While fighting a war as literal children?

There is the argument that they must've matured later in their lives, of course. But you can only recover so much from copious amounts of childhood trauma.

Being a bad parent doesn't necessarily make you a bad person. Sure it makes you a failure in an incredibly delicate and important aspect of human life but it doesn't make you a bad person. And saying that it does takes a lot of nuance out of the conversation.

Like, do you know how easy it is to fuck up a child?

Especially that the ways the members of the Gaang 'fucked up' as parents feel mostly in character.

Bumi was going to face some struggles with self worth due to being the firstborn child of the Avatar and arguably one of the most powerful waterbenders in history, while being a nonbender himself. That much was unavoidable, no matter how his parents approached the issue.

And Aang was obviously going to be over the moon when Tenzin was born. Think about it. He's literally the last of his people. He has no one else 'like him'. No one else to pass down the traditions, the teachings that Gyatso and everyone else he cared about and who were horrifically murdered to. Aang is getting older and he feels like his culture and history and his entire life before he got trapped in that damned iceberg will die along with him. And then Tenzin is born and Tenzin can take up the mantle that had been thrust upon Aang.

I'm going to withhold my judgement on Izumi and Zuko, since we barely know anything about them. She seems well adjusted but that's all i can say right now. But Zuko has also been shown to be extremely, painfully aware of how fucked up his family is and has clearly been putting in a lot of work to unscrew what his ancestors have screwed up.

Toph situation feels very tragic to me,because it's obvious that she thought she thought she was doing better than her parents. She gave her daughters the freedom to do what they want, to not feel opressed and trapped like she had. How was she supposed to know that she was making her girls feel like she didn't love them? (Here's another post of mine about the Beifong family and how they just feel like they're cursed or something at this point.)

TLDR; I get annoyed by people saying that the Gaang being 'bad parents' ruined their characters, because to me it felt like it actually enhanced them.

Neither Aang nor Toph acted out of malice or a lack of love. On the contrary, Toph was trying not to repeat her parents mistakes, accidentally committing a bunch of her own. While Aang probably didn't even realise that he was neglecting Kya and Bumi.

But just loving your children doesn't always make you a good parent.

I think these flaws only add to them as characters. It makes them feel more real.

It's unrealistic and, frankly, just plain boring to go 'oh the Gaang were all good people so they would be good parents too.'

The Gaang were a gaggle of traumatised children forced into saving the world, because the adults around them failed them, that then grew into traumatised adults who have no idea how to be good parents.

[the-badger-mole]

In the debate between pro-aang-kill-ozai and anti-aang-kill-ozai. Which side are you on and why? If it's the anti then did you like how it was done or do you picture something else?

I think I've mentioned before, but I am not inherently against Aang not wanting to kill Ozai. Some of my favorite heroes have a no-kill policy. I don't even mind the lionturtle solution itself. What I didn't like was how it was handled. There was plenty of time to address Aang's reluctance to kill before the second to last episode. I can think of three points in particular where it would've been thematically appropriate and given Aang's bland, two-dimensional character some depth.

First, right after the siege at the Northern Tribe. Aang may not have technically been the one who killed all those Fire Nation soldiers, but it couldn't have happened without him. You would think that someone who is both committed to pacifism and also the one the entire world is relying on to end a war that people have been fighting and dying in for a century wouldn't just be able to shrug off what happened. Aang did, though. Didn't even cross his mind when he was whining about people expecting him to kill Ozai.

What should have happened was the next season should've opened with Aang grappling with what happened and his part in it. He should feel guilty about it, not because he was actually wrong, but because it should feel wrong to him. Then, Katara and Sokka should comfort him and tell him he did nothing wrong. Build it up that their word are comforting him a little, then drop the bomb when they start talking about how cool it was. How amazing it was to see all those soldiers running in fear for once. How relieved they are that so many of them died. Then have Aang snap on them about the sanctity of life. He needs to be angry and hurt, and this should be the point where he decries the powers of the Avatar. He'd call himself a monster, and maybe he would call Katara and Sokka monsters, too. Then they (probably mostly Sokka) would argue with him that they aren't monsters, they're just trying to survive, and the Fire Nation is a threat to be taken out. This would be the first time it's brought up that Katara, Sokka...the entire world expect Aang to kill Ozai. I think it would be perfect as a season 2 opener. Season 1 was light and goofy, and Zuko was their biggest immediate threat. The siege raised the stakes, and season 2 should continue on that rising. Aang should also have started looking for another solution here. In the library, Aang should've asked Wan Shi Tong if it was possible to end the war without more violence. We should've seen Aang coming to terms with the fact that the world is suffering and he is the one they are looking to to save them. One thing I think the Harry Potter movies in particular did well was that shift from goofy and whimsical to darker and more frightening (as far as kids movies go) as the story went on and the stakes got higher, and the danger felt more real to the characters. Aang never gets that realization. He has moments when the danger feels real, but he's goofy and whimsical for pretty much the entire series until the plot of an episode needs him not to be.

The second place they should have brought up his reluctance to kill was DoBS. This really should've been a no brainer. Aang was loosing sleep over facing Ozai. He had his anxiety about losing- though not really what losing would mean for his friends and the world- but he didn't even consider what winning would take. If DoBS had been successful, there's no way Ozai would've been able to be taken alive. Logistically, killing him would've been the easiest, safest option. You mean to tell me no one brought it up? No one asked Aang how he was planning to take Ozai out? No, instead we get Aang proving he knows what enthusiastic consent looks like and taking away his excuse for what happened later, but nothing about Aang weighing his personal beliefs against the needs of the world. That training montage and confrontation that he has with his friends in the second to last episode should've happened here. This should've been when his tendency to run away should've been challenged, too, because half a season before he was crying about how he abandoned the world again. Now his instinct would be to run, but his friends would challenge him, calling back to that moment. They could demand that he present an alternative to killing Ozai. I don't think any of them would object to him living to stand trial, but Ozai is a rabid dog, essentially. He needs to be put down. Aang's got nothing, but not for lack of trying. When he tells his friends about all his efforts to find a non-lethal way to defeat Ozai, they are unmoved. They are at the doors of the Fire Nation, and now is not the time to be indecisive. He has to go face Ozai. And he's probably relieved when the plan fails. This whole situation would have the added bonus of skipping that first Kataang kiss because no way would Aang want to kiss Katara after her insisting he terminate Ozai with extreme prejudice.

The third place Aang's no-kill policy should've come up is TSR when Zuko asks him what he's planning to do when he faces Ozai if he's so against killing. This should scare Aang, and it should be his focus for the rest of the season. He should be more withdrawn from his friends, because with all the training he's doing (and he would still be training on all the elements because he's not that good at any of them), talks about the most efficient way to kill would be unavoidable. Katara might actually try to teach him bloodbending. Toph would just tell him that a big rock is just as effective as some fancy bending move. Zuko would be warning him about his father's ruthlessness and cunning. This would be where Aang looses his patience with his friends and insists that he's a pacifist and Ozai doesn't deserve to die. This would piss Katara in particular off because by this point, Aang knows what happened to her mother. He would get an earful about how Ozai's plan is to do to the Earth Kingdom what his grandfather did to the Air Nomads and how he's going to let millions of people die because of his refusal to kill one. Now, Aang can take off, only instead of just running away from his friends because he doesn't want to hear them anymore, he could be making one desperate last ditch attempt to find a solution that both ends the war and keeps him from having to kill Ozai. EIP could still happen in this circumstance, but instead of getting mad that he's being played by a girl, he would focus more on how eager for his death the Fire Nation is. That would come up in the argument about killing Ozai.

Now, for the lionturtle. I'm about to blow some minds. I have been vocal about my hatred of the Lionturtle/Rock of Destiny desu-ex-double team, and I do still hate it with a passion. However, as a concept, I don't mind the lionturtle. This is a fantasy adventure. You expect a bit of magical intervention. What I wanted was Aang grappling with this problem for more than half an episode. I wanted him working on a solution the entire time, starting from right after the siege. I wanted to see him take initiative. To actually think about the problem. Maybe have him specifically looking for the lionturtle. Then when it shows it, it could be because it knew Aang was looking and decided he was worthy of a meeting. Aang could still have his meeting with his past lives, and that could still go the way it did. Then the lionturtle could speak up. Instead of poo-pooing the idea of killing Ozai, it could agree that it was the most effective way to make sure that the war would end. Then, when Aang is despairing that he'd wasted all that time trying to find a different solution, the lionturtle could offer the spirit bending. But it would have to come at a cost, and it might not work the way that Aang hoped. Now Aang has to make a choice. Sacrifice something for this spiritbending ability (I'm thinking he loses his airbending, because it seems poetic) that might not have the outcome he's hoping for, or give up his pacifism- one of his few connections to his heritage- and kill Ozai. He chooses the spiritbending. Instead of the conveniently placed rock, Aang would actually have to give up his attachment Katara. I think he would be half-way there, having finally realized how little he understood her. He "loved" her because she was pretty and took care of him, but he's come to realize there's a lot more facets to her that he hasn't gotten to see because they don't fit his narrow view of her. He also understands what Guru Pathik was trying to tell him about one person not being able to replace everything Aang has lost, and he realizes how unfair to her he had been. He still loves her, but as a friend and caretaker. This will actually lead to a deeper friendship between them. Aang defeats Ozai without killing him, but now he has to deal with the loss of his airbending, which only now does he realize was a much of a connection between him and his people as his beliefs. He still has spiritbending. He can still airbend in the Avatar State, but he's effectively cut off a limb to keep his integrity. He will go the rest of his life wondering if it was worth it, especially after Ozai goes to trial and is sentenced to execution anyway. The effects of that on his children could be explored in LoK.

TL;DR I don't have a problem with Aang not wanting to kill Ozai. I just wanted to see him deal with it before the last minute. I think the show would've been better for it, and Aang would've been a more interesting character.

[waterfire1848]

You can do an sokkla au where they, in their senior year of college, had a friends-with-benefits thing, and when they finish their senior year, one day later, Sokka suddenly traveled to another country.

Weeks later, Azula discovered she's pregnant (and she only tells the whole truth to Mei and Ty Lee).

Even with her father's protests against it, Azula didn’t want to give up the baby, even though this changed Ozai's view of her and her assuming his position. (Azula mob's queen? Yes!)

Seven years later, Sokka comes back as a federal investigator, and discovers that Azula has a two little daughters named Omoko "Momo" and Onoki "Nono".

(They're identical to Azula, but have Sokka's eyes. Omoko likes ice skating and taekwondo, and Onoki likes swimming and juitsu. They like to go everywhere with Azula. They prefer auntie Mei over uncle Zuko.)

Hello, anon!!! (I did see your additional ask by the way about the pet lemur!)

Sokka and Azula meet up in class in the start of their junior year of college. From there, they become pretty close friends and grow closer and closer which each passing year. When they become seniors, they start hanging out in one another's dorm rooms and eventually become friends with benefits. They do have some feelings for one another (something that seems to be clear to everyone but them) but don't really act on it because they don't know if the other person sees them that way. For Azula, she just thinks that Sokka sees her a fun partner and someone to debate with from time to time but nothing serious (plus some self esteem issues---because she's so sure everyone around her is terrified since her father is a mob boss---that she tries very hard not to think about). Meanwhile, Sokka thinks that Azula would downright laugh in his face if he said he liked her. This keeps them from advancing to anything more than just friends with benefits. Sokka, for most of his college life, has been working on a project overseas and, after graduating, the company says they want him to come over. (Sokka: Hey. Azula: Hey. Sokka: You doing okay? Azula: Yeah. I've just been having the weirdest cravings. Anyway, you wanted to talk? Sokka: Yes. I...ummm...I got offered a job in another country and I'll be gone for a really long time. It...I don't know if I should ask you about this but since we're....I don't know what we are, but it just felt right to ask you. Azula: Oh, well, I-I can't exactly change you mind or anything, so...I guess you're leaving and we're ending whatever this is? Sokka: I-I think so.). It kills their friends that that's how they left it. It ended so abruptly and it was clear to everyone that the two didn't want to end things but felt forced to. Sokka leaves a week later and, about four or so weeks later, Azula goes into the doctor because she hasn't been feeling well: she's pregnant.

Azula doesn't feel comfortable telling anyone about her pregnancy, especially since she knows everyone would tell Sokka and then he'd abandon his job and come home. She doesn't want to take his future away from him, so she stays quiet. She only tells Mai and Ty Lee at the start and moves into the city so the others can't see her pregnancy. Mai and Ty Lee worry about Azula being pregnant and her connection to the baby, but, in private, Azula really does love that she'll be a mom. She wants to be a good mom and she's beyond happy that her children have such an amazing dad, even if they'll never get to meet him. Speaking of fathers, her own is not happy about this. Ozai threatens to cut her out of the family all together but Azula refuses to get rid of her child. Ozai grows angry and tries to force her to get rid of the child which causes a fight between the two. The fight quickly escalates to the point that Azula kills her father because he was coming at her with so much anger and threatening her children. Azula becomes the leader of her family's mob family. A couple months later, she gives birth to two beautiful baby girls. (Mai: What are their names? Azula: This is Omoko and Onoki. Ty Lee: They're beautiful. They have Sokka's eyes. Azula: They do. Zuko: You really don't want to tell him? Nothing? Azula: I'm not ruining his job. I can raise the girls on my own. Zuko: They deserve to know their father. Azula: If Sokka returns then I will tell them who their father is, but, for now, all they'll know is their mother and aunts and uncle. That's enough. Mai: Zuko. Leave her be. Zuko: I'm never going to think that Sokka shouldn't know. These are his daughters. But I'll respect your wish, Zula, and I won't say a word. Azula: Thank you.).

Time passes, seven years actually, and Sokka returns. He comes back as a federal investigator and starts up a career back in his home city. Of course, he reunites with his family and friends but he also really wants to know what Azula’s been up to even more so when he learns that no one has learned from her in 7 years. Thankfully, Sokka is literally an investigator and knows how to find people. He tracks her down in the city in a pretty nice apartment. (Sokka: Hey, Azula. Azula: Sokka? You’re here? Sokka: I came back a few days ago and I really wanted to see you again. Azula: Oh, ummmm. I- Onoki: Mommy! Mom- *Hides behind her mother* who’s that? Sokka: Hey. My name’s Sokka. I’m a friend of your mom’s. Onoki: Hello. Azula: Sweetie, why don’t you go play with your sister. Onoki: Okay, mommy. Sokka: You have kids. Azula: I do. Sokka: Your husband at work for the day? Azula: I don’t have a husband. Their father is-was away. Sokka: Away? Azula: I think we need to talk.) Azula does finally reveal to Sokka that the girls are his and, rightfully, Sokka’s mad at Azula for keeping his girls from him. That being said, they work out an arrangement where Sokka can come and take care of them to make up for some of the time he wasn’t around.

Sokka falls in love with Onoki and Omoko. The seven year old girls that look at him with his own eyes quickly become his favorite people in the world. He takes them to their events, his work, and out for special treats from time to time. He’s also at the house a lot so he meets their pet lemur. He hasn’t forgiven Azula so his relationship with her is icy but he does respect her wishes for them to wait and find a good way to tell the girls he’s their father. Both girls love spending time with him but it also hurts him deeply that they call him uncle Sokka and when they say they want to go home. Then, one day, Azula texts Sokka that there was an incident with the family business. (Sokka: Azula, what is going on? Azula: Just keep the girls with you. You can tell them who you are, what I did, everything. Just keep them safe. Please! Sokka: I swear I will but what is going on?!? Azula: *This user’s phone has been turned off*). Sokka takes the girls as far away as he can, hiding them in his uncle’s house in another state while he figures out what’s going on with Azula. (Omoko: What’s going on? Onoki: I want mama! Sokka: I know. I’m going to get your mama right now. She was just….getting you a present and needs more time to get it. Omoko: Fine. Onoki: Okay. Sokka: Good. Stay here and be good for grand-uncle Bato. I’ll be back).

Again, Sokka is a federal investigator and he’s pretty good at his job. He returns to his work and finds out that Azula is most likely in trouble with another gang (since he knows she would never leave the girls on her own free will). He gathers as much data and people as he can then heads over to Azula’s hideout (which she gave him in case of any emergencies). That’s where they find a couple men who are able to tell them where Azula was most likely taken. Sokka is able to make a deal with his boss that, in exchange for Azula going free, he can catch him another crime boss that they’ve been having trouble getting: Long Feng. His boss agrees and that night they storm the place where Azula is supposed to be. Everyone else goes after Long Feng and his men but Sokka starts looking for Azula. (Sokka: Azula! Azula! Azula: Mmmm! Sokka: *Finds Azula chained up a gag in one of the closets* Sokka: Azula! Are you okay?!? Azula: I-I’m okay. I’m okay. Sokka: You look bad. Azula: Yeah. Long Feng wasn’t exactly kind to a long time rival. I’ll be okay. Where are the girls? Sokka: Safe. Right now, you just need to worry about yourself. Azula: Okay. I…thank you for coming for me, Sokka. I admit that I didn’t know if you would. Sokka: I was mad, Azula, but certainly not enough to let you die. Azula: It was wrong to keep your daughter from you. I- *Sokka’s kisses her and she kisses him back* It’s been too long since we did that. Sokka: I agree.) Azula finally tells her daughter’s who Sokka is, the two get back together (with Azula retaking control of her organization) and, a couple weeks later, Azula announces another pregnancy. (Sokka: Are you serious? Azula: Yup. There’s gonna be a baby! We’re having another baby! Sokka: *Faints* Azula: Can’t say I didn’t see that coming.)

[natlacentral]

'I've got to pinch myself': Paul Sun-Hyung Lee on playing Iroh in 'Avatar: The Last Airbender'

Presumably the people outside a local car dealership a couple of years ago who heard Paul Sun-Hyung Lee let out a “huge whoop” during a phone call with his agent didn't fully grasp the significance of that celebratory sound.

The Toronto actor beloved as the internet’s “Appa” thanks to “Kim’s Convenience” and a popular part of the “Star Wars” universe, too, was about to become the internet’s favourite uncle.

Lee had landed the role of Uncle Iroh in “Avatar: the Last Airbender,” Netflix’s much anticipated live-action reimagining of a well loved animated series (not to be confused with James Cameron’s “Avatar” films).

“Honestly, I have moments where I think I’ve got to pinch myself because, even as a youngster, I never would have believed that I could be a part of these things, because I never saw anybody who looked like me reflected in any of these shows,” the Korean Canadian actor said, reflecting on his roles in “Airbender” and the “Star Wars” spinoffs “The Mandalorian” and “Ahsoka,” in which he plays the popular Captain Carson Teva.

As Iroh in “Airbender,” Lee has stepped into the robes of another fan favourite character.

First, a bit of a primer: “Avatar: The Last Airbender,” which debuts Thursday, is about a 12-year-old boy, the “Avatar” of the title, on a quest to save the world from the rapacious Fire Nation, which has gone to war with the Earth, Water and Air peoples. Despite his youth, Avatar Aang (played by Vancouver actor Gordon Cormier) is a powerful “bender,” honing his ability to manipulate air, water, earth and fire.

Aang and his friends — Katara, a water bender (played by Indigenous Canadian Kiawentiio), and her brother, Sokka (American actor Ian Ousley) — are being hunted by fire bender Prince Zuko (American Dallas Liu), who’s accompanied by his wise and compassionate Uncle Iroh, himself a fire bender and a former Fire Nation general.

If that all sounds kind of geeky, well, that’s right up Lee’s alley.

The 51-year-old has well-established nerd bona fides as a fan of “Star Wars” and other science fiction (he shares his love of the genre on his Bitterasiandude Inc. YouTube channel). He caught up with the original “Avatar: The Last Airbender” (which aired on Nickelodeon from 2005 to 2008, then moved to Netflix) while he was still working on the CBC comedy “Kim’s Convenience” (2016-21), in which he played a South Korean immigrant who runs a convenience store in Toronto. 

In 2018, as new fans were discovering “Kim’s” worldwide after the series moved to Netflix, the streaming giant announced its remake of “Airbender,” setting in motion Lee's ascent into another dream role. 

“Almost immediately I got fan casted (as Iroh) by all these people on the internet,” Lee said in a Zoom interview. “I was very, very flattered, but I was doing ‘Kim’s.’”

A few years later, though, “Kim’s” had ended and Lee got an audition for what was billed as a basketball movie called “Blue Dawn,” as a coach who had come out of retirement to guide his nephew.

Although he’s “more of a baseball, hockey guy,” Lee taped the audition and then forgot about it, until a callback a couple of months later. Except now, the retired basketball coach Howard was named Iroh.

“There’s only one Iroh that I know of,” said Lee. “And so I remember thinking, ‘Oh my God, this is for “Avatar”’ … right away I got super nervous. The stakes went up and I really wanted this part.”

But, after doing a chemistry read with Liu and not hearing anything for a couple of weeks, Lee assumed he had missed out on the role, which is part of the lot of an actor … until his agent called just as Lee and his wife were about to sign a lease on a new vehicle.

“So I excused myself, leaving the salesman completely befuddled. I went outside and that’s when I learned that I landed the role. And immediately let out this huge whoop. I had forgotten that I was in a public area and there were lots of people outside, and they all suddenly looked at me and I said, ‘It’s OK. It’s good news. It’s great news.’”

There was one more hurdle to overcome, though. 

“Airbender,” which shoots in Vancouver, overlapped Lee’s schedule for “The Mandalorian,” which films in Los Angeles. And playing Iroh meant shaving off the middle part of the moustache that Lee sports as Captain Teva.

“Luckily I was able to have my cake and eat it at the same time,” said Lee. “Lucasfilm was like, ‘Oh, we’ll just build him a little fake moustache to put on while he’s shooting (“The Mandalorian”).’”

Lee isn’t certain how familiar the producers of “Airbender” were with his work on “Kim’s Convenience” — it's an established fact that “Mandalorian” producer and director Dave Filoni was a “Kim’s” fan before he cast Lee — but he considers his latest job to be another of the many blessings accruing from the CBC series.

“‘Kim’s Convenience’ was such a wonderful launching pad for my career,” Lee said. “I mean, that show was kind of my coming out party in terms of the film and TV world.”

Lee, who was born in South Korea but immigrated to Canada with his parents when still an infant, struggled to find good film and TV roles as a young actor in the 1990s and early aughts. 

After graduating from drama school at the University of Toronto, he did a lot of theatre work, but onscreen “I played a lot of doctors, a lot of store clerks, a lot of window dressing-type caricatures, not characters.”

And yet, he persisted. 

Despite not seeing himself reflected in the television he devoured as a kid and from which he developed his love of storytelling, “I thought, well, heck, if there’s nobody (else Asian) out there, maybe there’s a shot for me to get in … that was kind of foolish thinking because maybe you’re the only one because a lot of people have tried and haven’t been able to get through. But I was just too stupid and too stubborn to quit, so just kept at it.”

Now Lee hopes to provide inspiration for the young Asian actors coming up behind him.

On the set of “Airbender,” which has many Asian actors in its cast, Lee became particularly close with Liu, the 22-year-old Chinese-Indonesian-American actor playing his beloved nephew. Just as Iroh is protective of Zuko, for whom he becomes a surrogate father, Lee said he wanted to nurture Liu.

“Every chance that I got to just sort of give him little pearls of wisdom based on my experiences … I couldn’t help but want to see him succeed,” Lee said. “This kid is a superstar,” he added.

Now that Lee himself is part of two much-loved pop culture franchises, “my cup runneth over,” but he still has entries on his acting bucket list.

“Not to sound greedy, but I’d love to do ‘Star Trek’ because that's filming right in our backyard. I’d love to do a ‘Ghostbusters.’ All those geeky playgrounds I never got a chance to play in. I want to be in a rom-com. I want to be in a Western, the genres that I grew up watching …

“But I’ll take it as it comes and I’m grateful for what I have. And if this is the only thing I ever do again I will be thankful for it because a lot of people don’t get these opportunities.”

[erisenyo]

Am I currently working on several pieces of Fanart for your Burning Bright series?

Yes, yes I am

I absolutely adore the series and all you've written in the BB-verse.

Any chance you could put all of them in another series in chronological order? I know you've put the other links in the BB series description, but you've written so much in the verse I've got trouble finding all in the chronological order, given that you've written other zukka works as well ❤️

I am!! So excited!! The fingers! The bow! The hair!

As for a series order, I will admit I'm purposefully avoiding anything formal on AO3 just because the sheer scale of it all gets intimidating, and I try to write the later additions as pieces that can stand on their own but are enriched by the broader series knowledge.

That said--an order for you here, including where some upcoming WIPs/planned pieces would theoretically go :) [cribbed off my answer to a previous ask]

Burning Bright 

A Third Chance (or a First) (within the flashbacks of TOEDTNTMERS - think when Azula first leaves the palace after the whole necklace/door blasting convo)

WIP - Zukka Big Bang Fic Goes here!

Oh, The Way Your Makeup Stains My Pillowcase

That Love You’ve Been Looking For 

All I Need Is To Be Struck (By Your Electric Love) - this is probably the hardest one to anchor between Burning Bright and To Open Every Door. Going off Zuko and Sokka’s comfort with the political side of things, the fact that Zuko and Bato write each other, hints of the Toph timeline (and Zuko being taller again lol) I place it after That Love You’ve Been Looking for (if you ignore the fact that the Gaoling market is inexplicably lacking in sex shops haha)

To Open Every Door to Night, To Meet Each Rising Sun

Love Is In the Hair - fairly immediately after TOEDTNTMERS, think a few months after since Azula has just poached the Fire Lord’s hairdresser and Sokka’s skills only go so far (and in one direction haha)

Lessons in Proper Asset Management - definitely after TOEDTOTMERS, it’s when things have settled down a bit more, Sokka is still figuring out how “what to do with myself” situation but in more of an exploratory than anxious way

Tangled Up With You - this, Lessons, and the two FTH WIPs below are probably less rigorous in terms of their sequencing - but this is generally the high level order I tend to think of them as going in, though they might flip flop once I get the "mirrors" fill out of draft mode

WIP - Fandom Trumps Hate "Mirrors" fill goes here!

WIP - Fandom Trumps Hate "Crushes" fill goes here!

To Be Named, To Be Known (To Be Loved)

(As I was writing this, it occurred to me that maybe I could make my own collection for the Burning Bright 'verse fics? Would that be helpful for people...?)

[zukkaart]

zukka + Lover album!!

I am SO excited for this one because it gave meeee

"Miss Americana and the Heartbreak Prince" !!! Let's get right down to it for the prompt game!

(Sorry these prompts are taking so long for me to get through school has been crazy)

**** long post ****

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Highschool AU, Zuko is captain of the volleyball team, Sokka is the head of the drama club

"So sad we paint the town blue, voted most likely to run away with you"

Sokka sang quietly to himself as he pressed the piano keys slowly. He was becoming increasingly more frustrated. He'd been stuck on this song he was writing for weeks now. He had the middle and the end but the beginning was eluding him in the most frustrating way.

The eighteen year old boy looked up at the clock hung crookedly against the far wall of the rehearsal room. Nearly five o'clock. His last class had ended hours ago. Sokka had loaded up his classes his junior year so now, as a senior he only had half days.

He usually stayed an hour or so to take advantage of the free instruments in the practice room, but today he was biding his time until the mens homecoming volleyball game. Usually he didn't bother with sports events -maybe a soccer game here and there- but that was mainly because he enjoyed being outside.

But today, his friend Yue had practically begged him to go with her because she was supposed to be meeting someone from another school on a date and she was nervous. He reluctantly agreed to her delight. In reality, he didn't mind. He liked volleyball but he liked the captain of the team much more. It's why he typically didn't go to those games.

That might not make sense to most people, but to Sokka it made perfect sense. The further away from Zuko he stayed, the less likely he was to make a fool of himself, and the more likely it would be that his crush would pass. Although, over the course of the last two years that hadn't seemed to work.

"Sokka! You ready to go?" Yue burst through the door of the practice room wearing her favorite purple mom jeans and blue crop top, her white hair in a flowing fishtail braid that hit her lower back.

"Yeah yeah I'm ready," He closed the lid of the piano and stood.| "How do I look?" She spun in a circle with her arms out. "Perfect as always," He gave her a quick kiss on her temple, "Let's go"

~

They won the game three sets to one.

~

The next morning Sokka was shoving his books into his locker when an almost unfamiliar voice came from behind him.

"Hey Sokka," He jumped and spun around, startled. To find Zuko standing close enough to lean over him slightly, smirking the same way he did on the court.

"Hey, uh- hey me?" Sokka pointed at his own chest dumbly, "Yeah, hey you. I saw you at my game last night." "Oh! Yeah," Sokka blushed, "Homecoming you know? I went to the soccer game after too,"

Zuko's brow furrowed slightly at that, but only for a moment.

"I see. Well, did you enjoy it at least?" "What part?" Sokka flirted, with more confidence than he felt, and immediately regretted it.

"Any of it. All of it." Zuko entertained him, seemingly amused by his question. "Well, you almost missed you serve in the first set." Sokka spoke before he could think.

But Zuko didn't look insulted at all. In fact, a small but honest smile broke out across his features.

"You were watching me that closely?" He asked, leaning in closer.

Sokka said nothing, just stared at him so long that Zuko had to break the awkwards silence himself.

"Well, I've got class, but maybe you can meet me later and tell me about more of my mistakes." He said it as a statement. Not a question. As if he already knew that Sokka would say yes.

"It wasn't a mistake really I didn't mean to-" "At six. The coffee shop around the corner." Zuko interrupted, and brought his thumb up to brush Sokka's jawline. Sokka regained his nerve then.

"No," Zuko's smile dropped "No? Why? Did I do something?"

Sokka scoffed. "Are you even aware of your own reputation?" To Zuko's credit, he looked genuinely confused.

"No not really, I don't listen to gossip. What do they say?" "They call you the heartbreak prince." Sokka clarified matter-of-factly.

The taller boy let out a short but genuine laugh and covered his mouth with one hand.

"Are you being serious?" "Unfortunately," "Unfortunately?" "Yes" "Why unfortunately?" "Because it means that anyone associated with you has nothing short of a storm coming their way," Sokka closed his locker and made to turn back towards his next class, but an arm shot out in front of him blocking the way.

"Oh come on, you know that's ridiculous. I'm just a guy," Zuko didn't drop his arm even as Sokka turned to face him again, holding his books tight to his chest.

"You play stupid games, you win stupid prizes Zuko." "What's that supposed to mean?" "It means that you shouldn't start a fight you can't win,"

That easy smirk returned to the taller boys features

"Are you saying that there's someone I'll have to fight for you?" "No." Sokka said too quickly. "But I can't be the center of gossip," "Well that's my whole world. You know what they say about you?"

It was Sokka's turn to be shocked. He wasn't anyone. He composed his music and directed his plays in near anonymity. Sure he partied a lot, but it was usually because one of his friends insisted he come.

"They say you're a bad boy, that you're trouble, and that I shouldn't take a gamble on you."

Sokka's mouth dropped open slightly in shock.

"What? I've never done anything that could even remotely warrant that!" "Sokka, at Jet's party last week you basically imploded his entire clique," "He deserved it! They deserved to know the kind of person they were hanging out with," "Hey, I'm not disagreeing, but you also can't say you haven't earned it" "What about you then?" He poked Zuko in the chest sharply, "What makes you so perfect? You're on the cover of the school newspaper every week," "What can I say? They like a pageant smile, but I promise that being amazing at volleyball and smiling for a camera isn't all there is to me"

Sokka rolled his eyes at the arrogance, but couldn't help himself

"Prove it" "Let me. I'll pick you up at seven,"

"Fine. But if you're late I'm not opening the door." "Deal." A more genuine smile graced Zuko's features then. He leaned down and placed a kiss on Sokka's cheek. "See you then," And strode off in the opposite direction.

Sokka didn't bother going to his next class. He practically sprinted to the practice room

You know I adore you, I'm crazier for you Than I was at 16, lost in a film scene Waving homecoming queens, marching band playing I'm lost in the lights...

[sanrielle]

⭐️ - for the directors cut ask <3 hope you’re doing okay!!

I'm doing pretty well, thanks :D Hope you are too! Thanks for the ask :)

So this goes back a bit, but it's related to my smut fic, 'As Long As You Need Me', which was left kind of open-ended (mostly to avoid angst). I had ideas for a non-canon sequel--basically an AU--that would take place 20-25 years later. Rather than letting their issues/jobs get in the way of happiness, Toph and Sokka would end up with some accidental kids over the years and figure things out together.

I never wrote this fic, but I did write a scene. It's formatted as a diary entry from the POV of Suyin, the youngest of five. She has a twin brother named Koda, who is deaf and blind. Her other siblings are Kya (Sokka totally stole the name before Katara could use it lol), Ilia, and Lin. Suyin is meant to be ten in the fic, but she tells a story from when she was a couple years younger.

Anyway, I've dug that scene out of my dusty chest-o-abandoned-WIPs :D

~~~~~

Two years ago, we went to the Lantern Festival and Mom punched a guy in the face!! It was AWESOME.

(Since she started the police force back before Kya was born, she’s good friends with the Chief so she got off with a warning.)

But anyway, here’s what happened:

“We’re going to go find our friends,” Ilia said when we got there. She and Kya always went off on their own.

“Can I go with them??” Lin begged. 

“No way! We’re not here to babysit!”

“It’s not babysitting! I’m not a little kid!”

I just kept quiet while they argued, knowing me and Koda would be staying with Mom and Dad whatever happened.

“Mom, c’mon,” Lin said. “At least let me go find my friends.”

Mom probably would’ve let her go, but Dad interrupted.

“C’mon, Lin. It’ll be fun! Remember last year, how we snuck into the parade?”

“Ugh, that was so embarrassing!”

“Oh, give it a rest,” Mom said. “You loved it.”

I couldn’t help but laugh a little. Mom was right— She and Lin had ‘borrowed’ a dragon costume and run up and down the parade with it. Me and Koda stayed with Dad and climbed onto one of the floats. It was a lot of fun because I got to climb up to the top and wave at people like I was a princess or something.

Anyway, by the time Lin gave up arguing and agreed to come with us, Kya and Ilia were gone. I wished they’d come with us and we could’ve all gone together, but I guess they’re just too grown up to hang out with their parents and siblings :(

We walked around for a little while and played some games, then went to where there were a bunch of food carts by the park and got a little bit of everything. We sat in the grass and pigged out while listening to a band.

Koda was really happy that day. I guess he could feel the beat of the music or something because he got up and started dancing, making excited, happy noises.

He’s never said any words—how would he know them?—so the noises he makes sound a little funny, I guess. He makes different sounds if he’s sad or happy or scared or mad, but I think only people in our family can tell the difference.

Another family walked past and they had a boy about my age. I saw him point at Koda and say something to his dad. I couldn’t hear them but Mom has SUPER hearing and she must’ve heard what the dad said because she got up and stomped over to him all angry. Even though I tried SO hard to listen, I don’t know what she said, but at least I got to see her punch him right in the nose!

It was HILARIOUS! The guy fell right on his BUTT and his face was all bloody! Dad got up real quick and went over there. The guy was yelling and his wife was yelling. Koda was still dancing and making noises, not caring about anything else in the world, so I got up and danced with him. When Mom was done yelling, she and Dad came back and we all danced together—even Lin!

[ranger-kellyn]

i did end up finishing the new avatar last night, and yeah. my final thoughts are: it was fine. i think the first episode was the best, and it never really got above that. it tells the story it's setting out to tell. the bending is beautifully animated, the settings are all gorgeous, and i even actually enjoyed most of the costuming. there were times i thought some of the outfits looked out of place or cheap, but overall, for 2024, good. the backdrops made me want to spend hours exploring every nook and cranny.

beyond that, though.... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

What's Not Working: -the insistence that the past avatars are all these hardened assholes who insist the avatar must "do it alone" and I think it was Kuruk who said "there's no 'Team Avatar'!" like?????

in the fucking FORWARD OF THE RISE OF KYOSHI, the forward that was written by Michael Dante DiMartino: "And the Avatar universe has no shortage of "must-haves." ... The Avatar can't do all this alone and thus must also have a core group of teachers and friends--a Team Avatar, as we like to call it."

LIKE!!!!!!! Team Avatar is literally a must have for the avatar!!!!!!! how can you insist all the past avatars would be hounding aang to do it alone??????????????

-i'm still fuming at having fucking kyoshi of all avatar's get onto aang for "not being there"???? one of kyoshi's whole fucking things was her anger with powerful men in the world who did nothing but abuse that power. she would never get onto a 12 year old child who just had the weight of the world thrust onto their shoulders after the genocide of their people-- HELLO???? am i too much of a kyoshi stan????? am i the insane one here?????????

-apparently sokka's actor claimed to be cherokee, but he's just a member of the southern cherokee nation of kentucky. which is on the cherokee fraud list. and while i know the bullshit that comes with blood quantum and trace lineage and just how hard it is for a tribe to get federally recognized bc heaven for fucking bid we treat natives with any dignity-- s i g h glad to see the whole "my great, great grandmother was a cherokee princess who ran away during the trail of tears!!" is still alive 🙄

-the show is absolutely suffering from the whole "the original show's s1 was like 20 episodes all around 25-ish minutes that we're now having to cram into 8 1-hour episodes".

so, in some ways, i get why they took out sokka's sexism: they didn't have the time to spend actually letting him learn.

still think it was a coward's choice.

speaking as a former shitty kid who was raised by shitty people with their shitty, narrow world views, in small town with shitty, narrow views: it's so fucking important for kids like me to see that you can change your mind. that you can have your world view challenged, and changed for the better.

-all the romance so far just Does Not Land with me. i'm a hopeless romantic, sure, but it's all so...Underdeveloped, I guess. idk if i'm the best judge here. i am the kind of person who loves a slow burn bc i love seeing every note of the relationship develop.

but it's just.....idk. sokka/suki, to me, has always been a "we're only together bc you were the first person my age i've met and i think you're cute". they're not a pairing that i think would last into adulthood. at most, they would be amiable exes who still do love one another, but are just not going in the same direction.

sokka/yue...i have to be honest that never made sense to me. again, it's just a "you're my age and you're cute" and for yue "you treat me like a regular person", but even then, their interactions were so brief in this adaptation-- if they go through with the "my girlfriend turned into the moon" "that's rough buddy" thing at the boiling rock later on, it's just......not. going to land the same way, i think.

-i know it wasn't until later in the original series that we saw it, but i still hate how it just seems like "all fire nation is bad and evil and wants to destroy the world" and it's not until the gaang is hiding out in the fire nation that you see that many of the fire nation citizen's are also negatively affected by the imperial core-- i just. wish they would have some fucking guts and show that in the live action. i wish they would show that not every fire nation soldier is this heartless war machine. if they had any balls they would show just how much military bootcamps brainwash people (but considering the us gov literally has a whole section of an agency dedicated to making sure the us military looks good on screen, i guess i know why they wouldn't take that risk. can't risk making big brother angry.)

-all of this to say that like. there's just no real storytelling risks being made!!! the point of a new adaptation should be to have a chance to tell some stories the original medium wouldn't let you! it was a kids/teen's show on nickelodeon! i'm not saying go all-out grimdark tooedgy5me, but like?????? throw me a bone SOMETHING

i made the comparison early on of "nothing worse than what happened to the earth queen in korra" and yeah. it. never really even got to that level in my opinion??

like, sure, the fire lord/fire nation soldiers burning people alive-- yeah yeah bad. killing the earth queen by suffocating her with airbending???? a bending form that was generally accepted as "peaceful"?????? that shit was fucking insane. come on pull on that string some more if you really wanted a more mature telling for the viewers you're nostalgia baiting into watching.

-----

What Is Working / Could Work If They Don't Fucking FUMBLE IT

-The biggest standout for me is Azula. i think they are nailing azula's character, and if they play their cards right, could do even better than the original* of showing just how tragic of a character she is. (*i'm not including any of the comics that came after the show ended since i've never read them and have no reference) (but also i'm not gonna hold my breath lmao)

i think it was a great choice to not have her be the season ending cliffhanger reveal of "ooh the new Big Bad", but showing how ozai was using zuko to goad her into a non-stop pursuit of perfection.

like, not to be an azula apologist on main, but, she really is just a perfectly tragic character. a child born in the heart of the imperial empire. a child that stood no chance at not being brainwashed by the empire. a child that her father saw as a weapon, and her mother and uncle only saw as a monster. a child who had no guidance from someone "good". zuko got iroh, azula got......nobody. the only thing azula got was the demand of perfection from her father.

sure, she had mai and ty lee, but they were her age. they didn't have the wisdom and experience to help guide her to a better path.

i think of the final fight with zuko and katara vs azula, and i think of that final moment where she's on the ground, spitting fire and just sobbing. she knows all too well what happens to people who fail the fire lord. and she knows what's going to happen to her if/when they lose the war.

-relating to above, i really do think the casting overall was pretty good. apart from sokka, it was only here and there i thought they should have done another round of casting. the youth of all the actors really just. hits home with how these are children having to save the world. aang is so babyfaced right now i just want to protect him and fight all the prev avatars for demanding a literal baby to protect the world. the child-roundness to azula's face makes her all the more tragic to me.

and i must admit-- daddy ozai fire lord ozai.......... 👀🥵

(but i will also readily admit i didn't look into the exact nationality of every actor bc i'm just one person and i also work a full time job so like)

-again, i think the scenery was great, overall. i think the people who did all the animated backgrounds for everywhere did a fantastic job of capturing the atmosphere. 10/10 hopefully it carries through bc i can't wait to see other locations.

-i am glad they seemed to have cut the shit with the northern(?idr) air temple from the original. being native and knowing just what it's like to see the homeland of your ancestors being taken over by people who just. don't. take care of the land the way it was supposed to-- it never sat right with me.

-----

Overall

again, it's fine at best. it tells the story it's looking to tell. it's imperfect, but so was the original by plenty of margins. as emphasized with azula, an endless pursuit of the nebulous concept of perfection will only end in disaster, or in this case, the denial of any enjoyment. i've spent 9 hours of my life in worse ways.

i'm sure i'll think of other things i could have added to either side of my list here, but yeah. it's fine. i still recommend the original any day over it, and i cannot recommend the kyoshi novels enough. i think i saw netflix say on the banner that the next 2 seasons are confirmed, so i'll probably watch it to the end.

i'm just excited that my yangchen novels get here today, because at least i can trust that F. C. Yee won't disappoint me

[zalrb]

Has there ever been a case where you know a dialogue is unearned but you liked it anyways?

Hmm, interesting question!

Like, you've known her two minutes, Oz, couldn't you just really like her? You dork.

I accept it because seasons 1-3 BTVS is very teen with very teen characters so sure, you hung out and went on two dates and now you're in love, lol OK, but also because they do end up earning this as the seasons progress.

Yue and Sokka aren't exactly unearned

they go through a lot of shit in a short span of time and they're also very young which exacerbates the very high angst and they're established from the get-go as a forbidden romance

but the high drama of it all within three episodes always makes me chuckle because it's SO MUCH and SO maudlin for the one week to maybe one month they've known each other.

Like, Sokka volunteering for the dangerous mission when the Fire Nation attacks is within character since it's established from the pilot and consistently throughout the season that he is/strives to be a warrior but it's also framed as a partial response

to the back-and-forth he's got going on with Yue

and I just find it all almost comically angsty. Like, this their first meeting alone

after their initial meeting that went like this (although when he asks her out the next day he says the party wasn't as fun after she left, which could mean they got past the awkward phase and actually, you know, spoke)

so I'm like LMAO I LOVE IT BUT THIS IS SO DRAMATIC.

I've spoken about how Reaper and Sunny are earned and unearned at the same time for me. From another post of mine:

Essentially, I used Reaper and Sunny from Goblin as an example of a ship with chemistry but with what I consider subpar execution.

Essentially, in their past lives Reaper was a king – Wang Yeo – and Sunny was his queen – Kim Sun

and he murdered her because of her brother, Shin, who is the titular Goblin. After Yeo killed Sun, he then committed suicide.

Centuries later, they meet again where Yeo is reincarnated as a grim reaper and Sun is now a restaurant owner named Sunny and they have no recollection of their past lives but when Reaper sees Sunny, he immediately cries

and when he sees a portrait of Sun that his past self painted, he has a breakdown

but he doesn’t know why, and while he and Sunny are drawn toward each other in the present

they spend virtually no time together, which is a part of the comedy, because Reaper isn’t a human and therefore doesn’t have human things, he doesn’t have a name so he tells her that his name is the name a very popular Korean actor.

He doesn’t have a job he can tell her about or a business card, at first he doesn’t even have a phone, so he avoids her because he doesn’t know how to answer her questions

so basically 95% of their time in the present is apart with Sunny wondering why he isn’t calling her or contacting her (when he wears his hat he’s invisible to humans)

and Reaper very much wanting to and not knowing how.

And that would be OK because what’s happening is their history is fuelling their present so even though they don’t know much about each other, their love and their tragedy survived reincarnation and is causing all of this intensity, but the issue with that is, we don’t get their story in the past either, we get three scenes repeated over and over and over and over again, which are

1. he watches her walk with bowls on her shoulders.

2. he catches her when she falls

3. he kills her.

Near the end of the drama, we get the last argument between them and then the drama replaces the actors who play their past selves with them.

So I don’t know a lot, I don’t know why they loved each other in the past, I don’t know why they love each other now,  I don’t really know what they’re like together but what I do know is their emotional chemistry is off the charts

so I like them enough to go along with what I’m seeing because they sell it

[dickpuncher420]

do you have a particular outline strategy/process? :)

ummm not really bjfhjsk. it really varies from fic to fic. for short one-shots sometimes i won't even outline anything, i'll just get an idea and start running with it.

for more involved fics i'll usually just start with writing down any and all ideas i get. from there i'll start breaking it down into specific scenes, researching as i go. for each scene i'll write a little summary of what i want to happen. sometimes it's just a sentence or two, sometimes it's an entire paragraph.

for example, this is all i had written down for the scene in victory lap where sokka sees zuko and azula practicing:

i also like to write down any little bits of dialogue or specific narration as they come to mind, and then later on i can decide whether or not i want to actually use them in the scene or not.

i'll admit that the outline for my pacrim au is the longest outline i have ever written—my victory lap outline was only 2.6k words, and i thought that was long! this is certainly the most plot-heavy fic i've ever attempted.

i actually ended up breaking down the document into separate sections that are easy for me to jump between, because the entire document is uhhh (checks notes) 35 pages long. admittedly, the meat of it is in the chapters 1-4 sections. that's where i did my scene by scene breakdowns+descriptions, but i decided to go reeaally into detail because i wanted to make sure that all the parts of the fic mesh together/that i didn't forget anything important (it's practically a really shitty rough draft at this point).

something that i attempted for the first time for this fic, and that i definitely recommend, is using voice memos! just record yourself and let yourself ramble about any ideas that come to mind, things that you're stuck on, character motivations, etc. and then you can always come back and listen to them later, when you might have some new insight—or it can remind you of something that you forgot about and want to get down in writing.

also—cannot emphasize how fun and helpful it can be to just talk about your fic with a friend. having another perspective on things can really make a difference, and while riffing off of each other you might come up with things that you never would've come up with on your own. @dameferre had some really interesting ideas for this fic that i am definitely planning on using.

anyways. sorry this got so long. i hope some of this is helpful to you at least!

[number1villainstan]

AtLA Analysis Rewatch: S1E8: Winter Solstice Part 2, Avatar Roku

Intro: I've given up on trying to do this specific episode, at least, all in one day. I'll probably lose some of the overarching plot stuff this way but at least I'll actually do it.

Lot of spiritual, Avatar-specific stuff in the Previously section--talking about the Avatar's past lives, and how to connect with them. Also some crucial details about Crescent Island. Perfectly natural for this episode. I expect to pick out a lot of details about the Fire Sages and religion. (Did you know that Agni is a fanon deity, not a canon one?)

Opening scene is Aang trying to drag Appa into flying, without Sokka or Katara. Stubbornness and a sense of protectiveness over his friends; but also, in the same breath, a feeling of invincibility. Although he considers the possibility of his friends dying, he doesn't seem to understand that he could also die. Katara's line "The world can't afford to lose you to the Fire Nation. Neither can I." might foreshadow their later romance, but it also might be taken as purely platonic here.

Mayor (?) guy from last episode says that it's a "long journey to Crescent Island." a) How does he know that? b) How fast can Appa fly? c) How tiring would the journey be for Appa? The geography/pacing of these episodes are weird. Speed of plot and all. I also wonder exactly what's in the pack Mayor gives Aang, and why it's got a stick on top. What fabric is it using and where did they get it from? Is it just big leaves? But where did they get the leaves? Why is it tied like that?

Why was Zuko just...waiting outside Mayor guy's house? Why did he think shoving him back inside would be a good idea?? Also, he jumped straight from "Having trouble sleeping?" to "Seen the Avatar lately?" That's hardly impactful dialogue. Your mother would be so disappointed that you can't even think up proper villainous dialogue. ...Also, naked Iroh riding a Komodo rhino to the side. I had to go back to last episode's analysis to remember the context of that. :P Zuko's shove, I noticed, looks similar to a firebending move, with him drawing his arms back and placing his hands so that the palms face the 'opponent' (using that word pretty loosely here) and the fingers point up and down. Firebending training showing up here?

The sun seems to rise real quick in the Avatar world. Much quicker than in our own. It also seems to come with an already day-blue sky, rather than the red/orange/pink colors that come with sunrises and sunsets in our world. ...yet another case of astronomical inaccuracy.

Iroh actually gets mad at Zuko for daring to sail in FN waters--enough to raise his voice to a yell when he reminds Zuko that "the Fire Lord" banished him. Why is Iroh talking about his brother so impersonally? (I know why, but that's the Doylist explanation. I want the in-universe one, the Watsonian one.) I also believe that this is the first time in the series that someone has said that Zuko was outright banished, and not just dishonored. Right after Iroh yells, he softens his voice and indirectly asks about Zuko's welfare--"What if you're caught?" Zuko says he has no choice (he does, he could plan/strategize and try to predict where the Gaang would exit FN waters without actually entering them, this is just his impulsivity) and that his father will understand. (Zuko, you poor naive little boy.) (Iroh agrees with me here in this scene.) Iroh also refers to Ozai as 'my brother,' and I can't remember if this is another first time or not.

Fire Lord Ozai casts a large shadow over these two characters, even as he hasn't shown up in the show yet in any real capacity, not even as the shadowy figure of the Big Bad Villain. (I checked the wiki; apparently his first appearance is in this episode.) He casts a large shadow on the whole show. But we don't get a lot of canon characterization for him beyond Big Bad Villain, and what we do get we have to infer and debate based on tiny scenes and scraps.

So, Zuko is at the telescope himself during this talk, trying to look for the Avatar. Lack of trust in his crew? Self-initiative? A combo of both, probably, knowing both Zuko's bull-in-a-china-shop character and his royal (classist) upbringing.

So, the flaming ammo for that catapult. And the catapult itself. Are all FN ships outfitted with one? It came up from under the deck--where is it stored? How is it maintained? Who maintains it? Also, for the ammo--we know that the gray flammable gunk smells bad, thanks to Iroh (does he not know how this works, with his preference for 'something more fragrant'?) and we know that the brown fabric-tied stuff underneath is also flammable, but what's in the bundle? And what's the gray gunk supposed to be, oil or something? (Also, on another note, what sort of cultural details can we glean from Iroh using a fan, even a plain red one? I thought that was a feminine thing in Japanese or Chinese cultures, although I may be wrong.

It looks like the smell/fumes of that 'hot stinker,' as Katara calls it, are also a part of the attack. I wonder if the Gaang's eyes are watering?

What's up with the blockade? Why there? Is it specifically around Crescent Island? How much manpower is it using? I wonder what life is like for the soldiers on that blockade.

So, both the Gaang and Zuko decide to run the blockade. How late in the day is it? How far away is Crescent Island? How long would that detour to the North have taken?

And Zhao's back, in all his oily, awful glory. What is he doing on/at the blockade, though? The captain(?) he's talking to is concerned about Zuko's ship, although he doesn't seem to realize that it's Zuko's. Also, why is Zhao calling Zuko a traitor? Is it because he's about to run a FN blockade, or does it relate to The Scar Backstory? (What even was the official public explanation for that? Who even knows about that?? What kind of gossip is going around about Zuko while he's gone?)

(Okay, going to go through the blockade scene and then stop for the night.)

Zhao's ships, which look to be the blockade itself (again, what is he doing there? Inspections? Trying to guess where Aang's going? Does he know about the solstice and Avatar cycles and Crescent Island and whatnot? He does seem to mess with the spirits a lot.) seem to have more than one catapult per ship (three, it seems?); an upgrade to weaponry in the years Zuko's been gone?

Appa's real good at dodging those hot stinkers. (Also, I wonder how much of Appa's grunts Aang can understand, and how much of Aang's commands Appa can understand.)

Zuko's warned by an engineer(? Could just be an experienced crewmember, he looks pretty old) that they need to stop because the engines are damaged, and he still says "Do not stop this ship." Makes me think of Azula's "Do the tides command this ship?" Maybe it's a royal thing, being entitled jackasses even in the face of uncircumventable realities. Also, if the engines are damaged, shouldn't they be slowing down or stopping or turning?

Appa pulled off some serious speed skills to save Sokka. Also, Aang seems to be trying to 'drive' Appa the same way someone would drive a car; dude, Appa's an animal. He can see that Flaming Balls Bad. Appa can dodge on his own.

So, when Aang burst apart that flaming ball it broke into chunks. No fabric, and it looked like dirt? Dirt's not flammable. Although maybe it doesn't need to be? But where are they getting dirt in the middle of the ocean? (Unless...it's not dirt? Solid human waste isn't exactly in short supply. Gross, though.)

Okay, so Zhao's not on the blockade because he knows Aang's headed to Crescent Island.

So it did look like Zuko's engines were stalling, or his ship was slowing down. Although just cutting the engines for Zhao's ships wouldn't immediately stop the ship, would it? I can only imagine what's going through Zuko's head as he's looking up at Zhao. (Zuko's ship is a whole lot smaller than other FN ships, yet again.)

Finished blockade scene. Got 8 min 21 seconds in. Current word count, including this paragraph, is 1458 words. Jesus, this is going to be another long one.

Starting this again, a few days later. I hope I'll finish the rest of it today. That's probably not going to happen, though.

So, it seems the passage of time is being measured by the tint of the sky, not too bad of a choice, and Appa seems to grow more tired--head and legs hanging down. How many hours was that? Where was the blockade supposed to be? What the hell is AtLA geography, anyways?

"I was talking to Appa." "Well I was talking to Momo." God, they're such siblings. Also, does Momo's reaction mean that he can recognize his own name?

That's a long way up. Also, was that balcony constructed? Why? Also, if FN officials knew the Avatar was back, why didn't they put any guards at the temple?

Why specifically five fire sages? I know that Chinese(?) mythology held 5 elements, but this world has four elements and this is a temple dedicated to one element. Also, how exactly did they know that Aang was the Avatar? Did they get a drawing? Did they have some sort of vision during that scene when all of the temples lit up when Aang went into the Avatar state for the first time in the show?

Only three of the sages threw fireballs (too large a chance of hurting another sage if the two in the back fired?) and Aang is apparently so fast in escaping that neither the sages nor the viewer see him go. Impressive.

What on earth is the floor plan for the temple? Because it looks like it's a grid pattern but also a massive maze?? And the walls are made out of metal like it's a military construction?? Or is it wood/paper/actual building materials that I can't tell because the animation didn't put those details in??? Probably the second one tbh

"Firebenders aren't our friends." It's kind of an odd/simplistic way to phrase that, since potentially nonbenders from the Fire Nation/loyal to the Fire Nation cause would also not be their friends--indicative of a simplistic worldview from living in the South Pole and having little contact with the rest of the world?

Okay, the walls sound like metal. Also, how does the mechanism for that secret door work? And why does it lead into the mountain? Again, what is the floor plan here??

The sage says his grandfather knew Avatar Roku, and that he formed passages out of the magma, and that he once called the temple his home. But if Roku was a traitor to the Fire Nation, why would a temple be built on his home? Unless it wasn't? Questions for S3. Also, what was the grandfather's relationship with Roku? Because I'm not sure the timeline works if they were the same age. Also, why did Roku make those magma passages? But if 'many generations of Fire Sages' attended to the temple, that would mean that the temple was built before Roku, so it must have been that Roku lived in the temple for at least some period of time?? And then what about Sozin? There's no way this sage was alive when Sozin declared war on the Air Nomads. NOTHING ABOUT THIS MAN'S TIMELINE MAKES ANY GODDAMN SENSE. FUCK.

How long did they spend inside the temple? It feels like it has to be after sunset by now, but maybe that's just me pausing and unpausing to write this.

Is there any other way into the chamber than the secret passage (or the windows)? IIRC later in the episode Zuko and Zhao will both get into the chamber outside Roku's chamber, likely through other entrances.

Okay, so Friendly Sage's name is Shaiyu. (I think that's how it's spelled? Shy-you, if we're using words.)

"The sanctuary doors! They're closed!" Uh...duh? Why would they be open?

Ended at 12:55, through finding out the sanctuary doors are closed. Not including this paragraph, word count is 2079 words. And I'm only a little over halfway done with this episode.

What's up with those pillars in the background, with the dragons? I mean, I know what's up, they're there for structural support and probably decoration, but who put them there, how did they think up the design, etc etc.

What's the design/functionality of that firebending lock? Also, is there really no firebender powerful enough to create five separate fire blasts? Two feet, two arms and a mouth, that seems enough to me. Would hardly be a dignified move, but if you're alone and/or desperate, it could probably work. Unless a regular firebender couldn't make all five fire blasts powerful enough? (What's the trigger for the locking mechanism dependent on?)

...I bet Ozai could unlock the door alone. Or Azula, with a bit of practice/more and specific training.

The little 'ding' and the zoom out to the lantern above Sokka's head was hilarious. Loved it.

Speaking of lanterns, how did it get that red glow? Probably just through red paper, but what's inside? Is it just a candle flame? Wouldn't that snuff out after a while? Because that lantern looks pretty airtight.

Okay, so I thought Zuko was just being stupid when he decided to let Zhao follow his smoke trail, but no, apparently he's got an actual decent plan. Where did that mini boat come from? What's its capabilities? Is it supposed to be a life boat, a tug boat, a boarding boat? Probably the third, given that this is a military ship. When did the crew find the time to put in the upkeep for that ship?

Lamp oil in an animal skin. It's a good idea (and probably what the lamp shot was referencing before), but I think if they want the fire to go into the lock it's facing the wrong way--it should have the opening going into the hole. Although maybe then the fire wouldn't get enough air?

Would lamp oil really explode like that? (At least now we know how the lamps work.) Seems dangerous for a lamp to have exploding oil. Also, would the twin/rope they tied the bags with really have that sparkler effect? I know they're supposed to be bombs, but the components seem wrong for that.

"Did the definition of genius change in the last hundred years?" lol

I saw from one of the shots that Crescent Island is legit basically erupting. Lava flowing, smoke pouring out. That's...that's not how real volcanoes work, is it? I'm pretty sure we went over that in our geography unit. Generally lava is supposed to stop flowing once an eruption has stopped, since an eruption is from the buildup of pressure in the magma. Like one of Earth's pimples. Anyways.

Aang's tantrum here is...interesting. I don't think we often see Aang angry in the show, but he still reacts with yelling and throwing blasts of air at a door (although, thankfully, not at any person). Clear frustration, one of the few times we see it from Aang in the show iirc.

Sokka is the one to come up with the fake firebending idea, but Katara's the one that realizes what effect the fake firebending's effects on the lock would have. So it's not just Sokka that has ideas. But also, does this imply a difference between the way they both think? Sokka with engineering and things, Katara with people?

...Seriously, with all of those moving parts--how the hell does that lock work??

"Crawled through the pipes?" There are pipes connecting the chamber to the outside, where the doors are?

Those Sages are agile for a bunch of (presumably) old men. Also, how and where did Zuko get in? Is he familiar with the temple and its layout? He'd presumably have the right to be, but it's been three years since he was in the Fire Nation and had access to the temple, and to a sixteen-year-old three years is a long fucking time. When did he arrive on the island? He had to have had time to navigate the temple and get to the chamber.

...speaking of time, when the fuck is the sun going to set? I swear the AtLA planet is rotating at the speed of plot.

So, the Sages are helping Zuko? The banished and disgraced prince? Why? What motivation do they have for that? They're probably pretty high up, socially speaking, unless Ozai and Azulon and Sozin all started discrediting them, as part of the propaganda FN citizens are put through as part of schooling. Even so, why would they not hear about Zuko being banished and disgraced? On the surface, you could say it's because he's a royal, but like...Zhao's actively competing with him, and he gets promoted. What's going on inside their heads? Also, when did they even talk to each other?

Patience, Aang, the sun is (finally) setting. Just wait for a few seconds for the light to match up. Although--why sunset, and why on the solstice (winter, I'm guessing)? As well as the murals on the floor--where are those from, and what do they symbolize? On the other hand, there's kind of the question of why there's a temple at all, much less such a massive and ornate room dedicated specifically to Avatar Roku, when Roku was, what, declared a traitor to the FN by Sozin for not being gay back saying that he couldn't do an imperialism? Possibly it was at first to keep the Avatar sympathizers/more spiritual side of the nation calm, and then possibly it was forgotten about? God only knows.

So, Shaiyu invokes duty as a moral, as in the duty of the Fire Sages. Part of me wants to pick that morality apart and compare it to Zuko's honor. And then Zhao comes in, having somehow spotted and followed Zuko's tiny tugboat, and applauds the guy for his 'heartfelt speech' (that was two sentences long, that's not a speech!). So Zhao at least professes a plan to take Shaiyu to Fire Lord Ozai (although who really knows what's going on in that conniving head of his). Shyu, actually, I looked it up.

I remember one of the character pages a friend shared on a discord saying something about Zhao having the feel of a slimy sycophantic corporate ladder-climber, and...yea. His 'two traitors in one day, the Fire Lord will be pleased' bit really plays into that.

"Sooner or later he has to come out." a) So Zhao is patient when he wants/needs to be in order to achieve his goals. b) There are so many gay jokes you could make with this.

Why the mountainous and foggy setting for the vision? Why that specifically? Is it because it's familiar/like home to Aang?

Oh! Yes! This is the very first appearance of Ozai in the series! Shadowed face, surrounded by fire (even if the lighting would realistically let us see his face), and shirtless. Why is your waist so small, Ozai? So that other men (Zhao and also Hakoda) can grab it? Gayboy. And a drama queen with that mouth fire blast. Now we know where Zuko got it from (if it isn't like...the entire nation).

"Finish the war once and for all" is really fucking vague, my dude.

So Roku outright warns him that if Ozai succeeds (in using the comet) balance will be un-restorable, and yet I remember that at the beginning of the finale the Gaang minus Zuko decide to just wait until after the comet. So did Aang forget that warning? Did he never tell the others?

I believe this is the episode where the time limit is set (summer's end, when Sozin's Comet comes). Also, that (mastering all four elements) is a hell of a task to ask of a twelve-year-old.

I wonder what the choir-chant music is supposed to be (scene switching back to Zhao awaiting Aang outside the door). Zhao commands his soldiers to go full throttle--does he anticipate the Avatar State? More importantly, why do I ask questions that I know will be answered if I just hit play and wait a couple seconds?

Damn, Zuko got chained up too? Rip. Also, spikes on the door. Ouch. On the other hand, with the light, Zuko looks away and I think so do many others, but Zhao doesn't, and the soldiers don't. Wouldn't that hurt their eyes?

Okay, so the chamber is at the top of the temple. And the wall was fucking destroyed apparently. Also, how did Roku heat up those chains without burning anyone severely?

Katara refuses to leave without Aang. I think Aang's going to be fine...although it would be disheartening if he woke up and was alone.

Oh dang, Katara was right to be worried. Also. How the fuck is no one fainting from heat stroke? Did anyone get caught in the lava? This should have a lot more casualties than it does.

Okay, so apparently I was wrong before about the Sages having a high social status, if a commander (which is canonically lower than an admiral) can arrest all of them so easily and with such confidence.

And that's all! Final word count, including this paragraph, is 3,684 words.

[soulsintheashes]

Finally keeping my word, I'll rant on every point. FULL SPOILER. Warning, I've got quite a lot to say

I'll do it several points at a time because they're all connected.

• watering down traits, general change in main cast's characterisation

• Letting characters feel emotions

• Showing too little saying too much

•Some changes that don't sense:

seriously, just think about at least one epithet you could describe that character as. none. we don't really know who these people are.

Sokka is only a little bit funny sometimes. And in some interview Ian Ousley said that while on set *he* tried to add funny lines in... So if this is the result WITH the added lines, what would it be without it?? Ian came off more as Sokka in the interviews than he did in the actual show... Here his only trait is wanting to be a good warrior/guardian of his village and being insecure when he can't do it well. Where's the humour, where's the creative problem solving and NATURAL LEADERSHIP SKILLS?!?!?! The key with OG Sokka is that not only does he take the responsibility of being the leader of protecting his village because his father told him to, but as the show progresses we see that he's naturally good at it too. His father wasn't putting him in a role he didn't want. In the live action, on the other hand, Sokka is put in this position despite his father thinking that he doesn't have the natural talent, and it becomes sort of a test for Sokka. He now has to figure how it all works and prove himself to his father and other men from his tribe that he can do it. So what will happen in the later seasons? So his fathers decision to put Sokka in charge and put this pressure on him worked because he learned all these things and is now a good leader??? What are we saying here? Why does Sokka have to be told that he's good at engineering and creative solutions vs it just coming to him naturally and he accepts it and takes it on as a part of him. Also, we're told that Sokka is more mature than Katara, to further the idea of him taking protecting the village too seriously and in the writers' heads he can't be taking it too seriously AND being immature at the same time. (I won't talk about how taking out Sokka's sexist to feminist arc is misunderstanding the cartoon and how it harms the Live Action, watch Jessie Gender's VIDEO PATIKRINT

So Katara is supposed to be immature but I literally can't name an instance were she would be acting immature. It's fine if they chose to switch these traits but come on, SHOW US. She's sooo bland. They took away her emotions, she doesn't ever get mad and raise her voice like she does in the original. I think the new writers feared that it would make her look 'hysterical' and be misogynistic of them but I think now is worse since she doesn't ever express her emotions, she's always one tone. In the original she got angry and shouted and in such an emotional state she accidentally waterbended, it just came out of her. AND WE SAW HOW POWERFUL SHE IS. She just needed to learn how to control it. Live action Katara wants to be a Waterbender but is honestly shit at it until Aang talks to her for half a minute and then she can do the move... I know it's supposed to be a bonding moment but it looks like she couldn't bend shit before a guy showed up and helped her. Then she cannot figure out another waterbending move until she talks to ANOTHER GUY (Jet) and then she can do it.... I'm frankly speechless, this is daylight sexism and the writers couldn't see it? The OG Katara is incredibly strong willed and set on being best at waterbending. The scenes from the original where she showed her determination towards it were cut in the live actions and not exchanged: her stealing the water scroll because her morals, though strong, are second to waterbending. So we don't see Katara as being determined to learn it, we just see her as frusturated when she can't master a move. So we don't ever get to think that she's determined, we just think she can't learn and we've not seen her potential (accidental bending)

Aang. I really don't like the wise kid aangle they took (haha aang-angle, get it? lol). it's like they couldn't decide between that and the goofy and from the original, and instead, they didn't commit to either. just because he feels big, difficult emotions in the original doesn't mean he's very serious. Live Action Aang is constantly spewing motivational speeches about how serious it is to be the avatar, but like,, why? as in what changed since 100 years ago when he said he doesn't want the responsibility? that he's just a goofy kid. WE'RE NOT SHOWN THAT HE'S EVER GOOFY. Maybe that, but at Kyoshi Island, but it's such a one-off, we don't feel that that's what he truly is. And we're said that he didn't really listen to what the monks said, BUT HE HAD BECOME THE MASTER OF AIRBENDING SOMEHOW. And then he's spewing all these tips to Katara like.. are you just a kid, or are you wise old man in a 12yo's body. What the hell was up with that one scene where Aang said that what he's always struggled with was CONTAINING his power?? Isn't that taking power off the Avatar State when even outside it, he can not control himself? It's also just dumb but idk how to explain it in smarter terms. Like he's inately a danger to everyone around him. Did the writers take this from Aang burning Katara in the original because he's impatient?

A change I really didn't like is Aang being told he's the Avatar on the day of the comet. I didn't like that we didn't get to see other kid's reaction to him. Because ultimately, why he didn't like being the avatar, in the original, was that it isolated him from his friends and didn't let him be a goofy kid as much as he wanted (kids didn't play with him anymore but also he was under a strict training schedule) so when they wanted to take what's left from him he couldn't take it. (it ties in to how he wasn't willing to let go of his relationship to the gaang and esp. katara in season 3, i think, with that chakra master - being the avatar already cost his closest people 100 years ago). So in the Live Action, without the time Aang spend trying to adjust to it, it feels hot headed to lash out, he doesn't yet know what it could cost him. And i didn't like that he didn't run away but it would've been even worse if he'd just run after one conversation about it. BUT not having Aang deal with the guilt that comes from abandoning his people when they needed him most TAKES AWAY THE DEPTH FROM HIS CHARACTER. He doesn't need to deal with such difficult emotions anymore. I think I said the least about Aang but I truly don't know him enough, who is this person? Oh and Aang 'showing his care for Katara' by asking her not to fight?? Where has 'I'm saving the world with my friends' gone? That's so unlike what Live Action Aang has been about, not to mention that by agreeing with Paku he's disrespecting Katara.

• What I mean by child actor voice: it's the intonation. Especially how he raises instead of lowering his voice at the end of a sentence. I feel like that's when you think ppl talk when you're getting into acting, but it's not exactly. It's not just child actors who do that. I don't really know how to explain it.

• Making characters flawed for no reason,

•Changes that make no sense

Bumi: what the hell. Why did he suddenly hate Aang? Wasn't the point of his illogical tests in the original for Aang to guess that only Bumi could think of such stuff? And what the hell is he accomplishing by putting Aang in these situations then? (I also think they ended way too quickly, that episode was cramming in too much stuff) When they said right away that it's Bumi, I thought they won't do the trials anymore AND I WAS COMPLETELY FINE WITH IT. But i guess writers thought we would he upset without any tests from Bumi.

HAKODA (Sokka and Katara's dad): (it's been 7 years since i last watched seasons 2 and 3 but) wasn't Hakoda like the best dad? Great leader and VERY PROUD OF HIS CHILDREN??? What the hell? Why give Sokka daddy issues? Why massacre a great character?? I don't understand the point of all that thing. Why did they need to give Sokka an insecurity? It hurts to see Hakoda like this, he would never say the things Live Action Hakoda said.

• Where's the 'mastering the elements' part?:

At the end of episode 2, the gaang start heading to the North Pole because Avatar Kyoshi saw a vision that it's in danger. And then they say (paraphrasing) 'Oh yeah, there's waterbending masters there, Aang could learn to waterbend' ... like.. hello? where were you planning on heading next if you hadn't learned about the vision?? And then Aang doesn't even try to learn anything from Katara or her scroll before they get there. Probably because the show was so rushing and didn't give them calm moments where Aang could take time to learn to waterbend.

• THIS IS NOT HOW BEING PROGRESSIVE WORKS:

Sokka's sexist to feminist arc. One thing we really lack these days is a little push on CHANGE. We dub people sexist or homophobic but PEOPLE CAN LEARN AND GROW and it's really important to show that. That not every sexist and homophobe, etc etc is a lost cause. We don't gain allies by dubing people awful and not letting them change and grow.

KATARA. It's okay to have Katara not be self taught!! It's okay to have her learn from Paku. And Honestly, I don't even think she's as good as she could've been if she trained with Paku. Also, their fight scene maybe wasn't as intense as I hoped, like, her hair fell apart way too quickly, it didn't feel like it symbolized a shift from showing her skills to giving her all in this now or never, almost life and death situation.

SUKI. Why did she look like she's sort of regretful to have been too harsh ok Sokka for not letting him win? Why is the storyline of women needing to become softer so common? What the fuck? Also, it sucks that they didn't put Sokka in Kyoshi Warrior garb, I feel like it's disrespectful for a man to go into a woman's field and not do their rituals. All of them train with costumes and make up on. Why not him? (Watch Jessie Gender's vis for more on that, it's so good)

YUE. I think the writers thought they were giving her agency by having her refuse her arranged marriage and choosing to give her life back to the spirits (and not her father seeing a vision of it when she was little, implying that she had no choice in it?? their opinion, probably).

● Makes no sense:

Katara and Sokka never see Aang call on Appa to fly, so how do they know how to call on him? Why didn't they just take that scene straight from the original ab their boat breaking and appa being right there. why did Appa have to wake up later?

Zuko and Iroh didn't give June nothing to go off of to find Aang HOW DID SHE KNOW THAT BIT OF FABRIC WAS HIS?!?!

• What was okay :

I wish Zuko was shown more as a hot headed villain a bit more to make his character arc more drastic in the coming seasons, but it's fine. And whoever says Jet's actor should've played him bc he's hotter, I think y'all are just a little shocked by the hair, which is kind of the point

Iroh, too, is fine. I was thrown off at first by him having a different characterisation but in time since I've accepted that that's just what this adaptation is.

Maybe contraversial but I almost like the movie that must not be named's tattoos than these. it just felt so cartoony how blue they were

• What I liked !! :

That scene where men in some kind of a tavern share where they saw the avatar and it's all the places from the episodes they cut, that was very cute!! I didn't mind that pandering to og fans at all.

Ty Lee and Mai weren't bad, actually. Mai's actress did such a good job with the voice. And Ty Lee was as bubbly as the script let her.

Quick notes on Netflix's Avatar: The Last Airbender Live Action (No spoilers)

Watering down of character traits, leaves them strangers to the audience

Characters speak with each other too much yet say too little.

Speaking so much but showing too little

Making good characters be "flawed" for no reason

The main plot of the OG show/season - to learn how to bend the elements, takes a backseat for some reason.

In fear of being problematic and in ambition to seem progressive, they made changes that simply make the story seem lacking and dishonest. It feels so forced.

Cast: Weird age gap between Aang and Katara's actors, knowing what happens later in the original. Ian Ousley might not even be Native. Gordon Cormier suffers from child actor tone of line delivery (not bashing a child, I'm sure he'll grow out of it but for now it's a bit annoying bc I'm so aware that it's an actor saying lines)

TOO DARK. More light and saturation, pleasee

The CGI was good, The sets look reallllyyy cool, I wanna go there. And the costumes are well designed even if they look too new, right off the rack.

Yue's wig was so awful it deserves a separate point.

Can we please let characters have emotions and actually deal with them?

Sometime plain illogical changes or plot from the writers

I can give full spoiler examples for all of the points, I just wanted to make this short. Just say a word and I'll rant

[the-badger-mole]

The Volunteer: Part 2

The first day of volunteering at Hama's Haven went as well as could be expected. Zuko spent his four hour shift painting the stair wells of the building. There were only three floors, but they'd only painted about two and a half landings. The men that Zuko worked with were happy with the progress, though. They were friendly enough, despite his clear inexperience. They gave Zuko the nickname Splotch because of how messy his painting skills were.

"Good thing we have drop cloth down," said the man named Due. He gave Zuko a good natured slap on the back and offered him a can of beer.

"Um...no thanks," Zuko declined politely. "I'm underaged. And it's kind of the reason I'm here in the first place." Due and the other men laughed heartily at him, and Zuko was given another round of back slaps to seal their newfound camaraderie. They would finish the paint job, they told him, the following day. Then the next week, when he returned, they would take on the second set of stairs in the middle of the building.

"See ya, Splotch!" they called after Zuko as he went to go find Azula and the others.

It was a bit later than he realized. Without a doubt, Azula and her friends would be at the front desk or the car already, and furious with him for making them stay in that building. Zuko hurried down the stairs and through the hall towards the front desk. It was only his quick reflexes that kept him from crashing into Katara and her brother as he rounded the last corner.

"Sorry," Zuko mumbled.

"Hey! I know you," Sokka said. "You're that jerk from my physics class! The one who ruined spring break by reminding Mr. Piando that he didn't give the assignment. You volunteer here now?"

"He's with the group the judge sent over," Katara told her brother.

"What?" Sokka laughed. "Mr. Goody-Two-Shoes? What did you do to get sentenced to community service? Let me guess, public mopery? Brooding with intent to skulk? Did you scowl at the wrong cop?"

"They're in for arson," Katara supplied, eyeing Zuko with disapproval.

"That's none of your business," Zuko growled at her.

"Get out!" Sokka gaped at him. "Arson? Seriously?"

"You are literally the only one who doesn't know that." Katara rolled her eyes at her brother. Sokk, still unfazed, just shook his head and let out a low whistle.

"Dude...when you rebel, you go hard, huh?"

"It wasn't like that!" Zuko insisted. "Look, I've got to go." He took off down the hall towards the front desk.

"Alright," Sokka called after him. "But you stay out of trouble. No more arson around!" Zuko could hear him laughing at his own joke.

Idiot, Zuko thought rolling his eyes to himself. He stopped at the front desk to make sure Hakoda got his hours logged.

"You sister and friends are waiting for you outside," he told Zuko. There was a tightness in Hakoda's face that made it clear that it would be a good idea for them not to linger. Zuko thanked Hakoda quietly and hurried out.

As he anticipated, Azula was in an even fouler mood than she was when they got there. She was standing outside of the car with Mai and Ty Lee ranting about her day. Mai, who had been assigned to work with her also looked unhappy, but she at least seethed silently.

"I should sue this place!" Azula was saying as Zuko approached. "I'm covered in whatever was rotting in those bins. My shirt is ruined, and that useless, smug knuckle dragger just laughed at me! My dad with tear this place to the ground. When he is done, there won't be anyplace for the rats infesting this place to hide!" Zuko was taken aback by is sister's vitriol.

"Let's get home," Zuko said, glancing around the parking lot. Fortunately, no one was in the immediate area to hear his sister's tirade. She looked at him and scowled.

"What took you so long?" she demanded. "We've been waiting for you to leave this disgusting place for ages!"

"It's only been a few minutes, Azula," Ty Lee interjected timidly. Azula rounded on her with a sneer.

"I'm sure you wouldn't mind staying, would you?" Azula spat at her friend. "Made a lot of good friends in the kitchen? Why don't you ask if there's a spare room. I'm sure they'd be happy to let you stay." Ty Lee shrank back, biting her lips against the tears that were about to fall. Azula just rolled her eyes and huffed in disgust. She turned and got into the car, taking the front seat this time.

"Zuko's going to be cramped in the backseat," Mai said.

"He can deal with it for twenty minutes," Azula snapped. "Shut up and get us out of here." Zuko slid into the backseat without a word. Azula moved the seat up a few inches so that Zuko at least had room to get in, but that was it. Azula continued ranting the entire drive, coming up with some particularly creative and vicious names for Hakoda, the staff and the residents of Hama's Haven. Her brother and friends just let her go. Mai interjected occasionally with some snide remarks of her own, but she didn't have the energy for all out rage like her friend. Zuko did his best to tune them both out, and he politely ignored Ty Lee's subtly wiping away stray tears next to him. Not for the first time, Zuko wondered why the sensitive, bubbly girl was friends with Azula and Mai of all people, but he'd stopped searching for an answer to that years ago.

True to her word, Azula went into her father's home office and demanded that he get her out of her community service sentence. Zuko could hear her while he fixed himself a snack in the kitchen. Interestingly, he noted, she didn't mention a thing about getting him or her friends out of the mandated service. Not that it bothered Zuko. He'd already decided he didn't mind the work.

Ozai did end up calling the judge to demand that something be done for his daughter. Zuko heard it the next day. He'd forgotten to shut the door to his office completely, so Zuko was able to hear Ozai alternately threatening and cajoling Judge Jeong-Jeong to release Azula from her punishment. He offered bribes. He swore to get Jeong-Jeong removed from his bench and disbarred from practicing law anywhere. He offered to donate a ridiculous sum of money to the shelter, if Hakoda was removed from his position. Jeong-Jeong said little through the near hour-long call until the very end.

"Mr. Kaji," he began ponderously. "Firstly, I feel the need to remind you that bribing a judge is a federal offence, and this call is being recorded. Secondly, my ruling stands. It is only the generous intercession of your brother that kept your children and their friends from spending the next 8 to 13 months in a juvenile detention center. I feel I have been more than fair with my judgement, but if Azula would rather serve out her sentence in juvenile detention, I would be happy to arrange that."

Ozai swore and started to speak, but Jeong-Jeong cut him off.

"As for having Hakoda terminated," he continued. "He has been serving at that shelter since it opened, and he has never had a single complaint about how he runs it in all that time. I have no say in what happens there, but I sincerely doubt the board that oversees the operation of Hama's Haven would be willing to let him go on the say so of one disgruntled, mandated volunteer and her overly indulgent father. This is Azula's only option if she doesn't want to go to the juvenile detention center. If she refuses to honor her service hours, or if Hakoda dismisses her, that's exactly where she will end up. Am I clear, Mr. Kaji?"

"I'll find a way around this," Ozai promised.

"You are certainly welcome to try," Jeong-Jeong sounded amused. "I'm sure the additional scrutiny from the government won't affect you...much."

Ozai swore at the judge again, but again Jeong-Jeong cut him off.

"If there is nothing else, Mr. Kaji," he said. "I have better things to do than babysit your tantrum." The call ended abruptly, leaving Ozai to rage in his office to no one. Zuko took his book and crept towards the back stairs. It was better if he wasn't in his father's line of sight while he was in this mood.

He made it to his bedroom just as Ozai came out of his office and stormed up the main staircase. He shut his light out and stayed silent. Ozai, though, went straight to Azula's room. Zuko heard her door fly open and hit the door with a thud.

"What's your problem?" Azula snapped.

"You're going back to that pit and serving your hours," Ozai told her. "I don't want to hear another word out of you about it."

"But, Dad!" Azula protested.

"Not another word!" Ozai barked. Azula went silent. A moment later, Zuko heard the door slam shut and his father stomped down the stairs. Then he left the house, slamming the front door even harder than Azula's door. Zuko waited until he heard his father's car peeling out of the driveway to make his way carefully to Azula's room. He knocked at her door lightly, then poked his head in. Azula stood in the middle of the floor, absolutely seething with rage. Her dark glower got darker when she saw her brother.

"What do you want?" she hissed.

"Just checking to see if you're okay," Zuko said. He was. It was rare to see Ozai's anger aimed at Azula.

"Peachy," Azula snorted. "I just found out that Dad's connections are useless. Now I'm stuck either cleaning up after people i wouldn't let touch my rags or spending a year in jail."

"It's not that bad," Zuko said, shrugging. "Some of the people are pretty cool, once you get to know them." Azula shot her brother a disgusted look.

"I should've known you'd be fine there," she said. "What are you doing in my room, anyway? Get out!" She stormed across the room and slammed the door in Zuko's face. He just barely managed to keep his hand from being crushed. With one last scowl at Azula's door, Zuko decided he'd had enough of the house for a while. He took his car and drove off in the opposite direction of his father.

The next week of school was annoying. As Katara had implied, word of their sentencing had spread throughout the school. People stared and whispered as Zuko passed through the halls. Well, more than usual. It was annoying, but people were too intimidated by Zuko to say anything to his face, so he could ignore most of it. At lunch, Zuko headed towards his usual spot in the far corner of the cafeteria, but he was stopped half way by Sokka appearing at his side.

"Yo!" he greeted Zuko. "Come sit with us today. I'll introduce you to the rest of the Haven Crew."

"What?" Zuko's nose wrinkled in confusion. Sokka had already started walking, though. Zuko followed awkwardly to a table where Katara sat with three other people. Zuko recognized Suki, who was in the same martial arts club as him, but the other two- a boy with a tight fitting beanie and a girl Zuko was startled to realize was blind- he had no idea who they were. They looked like freshmen.

"Katara you know," Sokka said, pointing to his sister. "This is Toph and Aang. The babies of the group. And this beautiful, terrifying girl is Suki, my girlfriend of two years."

"We've met," Suki told Sokka. She smiled politely at Zuko. "Nice to see you again, Zuko."

"So," Toph drawled, leaning towards Zuko. "You're the guy who blew up a building."

"What?" Zuko sputtered. "I didn't blow anything up!"

"Whatever you say, Sparky," Toph grinned at him. "Hey! I'm not mad at you. There's a few building's I'd like to blow up. Starting with this one."

"Toph, don't say stuff like that!" Aang glanced around nervously, looking for a monitor or a lurking teacher.

"Nah, it was just arson," Sokka told his friends, grinning. "I didn't know he had it in him, though. Sit, down, Zuko. You can't eat standing up." Zuko eyed the open seat between Sokka and Aang hesitantly.

"Would you just sit down already?" Katara snapped irritably. "The seat isn't dirty." Zuko scowled at her, but sat down.

"Zuko and his accomplices are going to be working off their debt to society at the Haven," Sokka explained. "We'll be seeing a lot of him. Dad says they've got nine months of work to finish."

"Um...you all volunteer at the shelter?" Zuko asked.

"Yeah, we're all there at least a few times a month," Suki told him. "I do tutoring once a week."

"I help out in the garden." Aang grinned cheefully.

"Pottery and crap," Toph said.

"Crafts," Katara said. "You do pottery and crafts." Toph snorted at that.

"We made comb sheaths last month," she said. "I think crap is spot on."

"Toph," Katara let out a long suffering sigh and shook her head.

"So, Sparky," Toph turned back to Zuko with a smirk. "Why don't you tell us how you landed on the chain gang?"

"Toph!" Suki chided. "You can't just lead with that."

"Why not?" Toph demanded. "It's the most interesting thing to happen in this school all year!"

"Maybe he doesn't want to talk about it," Aang suggested, looking at Zuko nervously. Katara rolled her eyes, which bugged Zuko most of all for some reason.

"There isn't that much to tell," he said. "We got drunk at warehouse and my sister dropped a candle, or something into a box of tea leaves. The fire department put the fire out before there was a ton of damage." The finer details, Zuko decided, didn't matter.

"And that's why you always use a flashlight when you're drinking," Sokka said sagely.

"Or you could just not drink underage," Katara scoffed.

"Too easy." Sokka waved his sister off. And with that the topic moved onto something else. It was jarring. Zuko wasn't sure what he was expecting. An interrogation. Derision. Some sort of prank to humiliate him for daring to think they actually wanted him to sit with them. But the conversation turned to what they all had done over the weekend. Zuko had little to add there, and no one pressed. It was a pleasant lunch, all things considered. Sokka invited him to sit with them again the next day and the one after that. By the end of the week, Zuko joined them on his own, if a bit hesitantly. They welcomed him. Or rather, they didn't tell him to get lost. Zuko decided to count it as an open invitation.

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5

[waterfire1848]

What about Sokkla as olympic athletes AU? Not necessarily competing in the same sport.

Hello, anon!!

Azula is the best archer in her nation. She's been training since she was a child under her father's teachings. When she was five, she was taken to her first archery lesson and fell in love with the sport. Since then, she's gotten an archery range, new bow and arrows for her to practice with. As time went on, Azula grew stronger and stronger in the sport until, when she was twenty two, her father tells her that she will compete for a spot in the olympics. Azula always did fantasize about possibly competing but learning that she actually had a shot was insane to her. (Ozai: The email is here from the board saying if you got in or not. Azula: And? Ozai:.... Ursa: Ozai, tell the poor girl. Azula is going to have a heart attack from waiting so long. Ozai: She got in. Azula: I'M GOING TO BE IN THE OLYMPICS!)

Sokka grew up with his sister as a higher skilled swimmer. Wherever she went, Katara was the best swimmer on the team and it won her plenty of awards and praise. While she was beating swimming scores left and right, Sokka decided to go sailing for time away from his awesome sister. Now, that isn't to say Sokka dislikes his sister or is incredibly jealous, he just can't always stand everyone praising her and sometimes calling him the little brother, especially when Katara laughs at their mistake. He just needs time out on their family's little sailboat and he gets incredibly good at it. He doesn't compete himself but his father does start to notice how skilled he is and encourages him to compete. (Sokka: But dad...I...I don't even know if I want to be in the olympics. That's for the best athletes in the world. I just sail for fun. Hakoda: Don't sell yourself short. You put in the practice, time, and you have skills. I've never seen someone so confident in their skills. You should at least try. If you don't get in then at least you'll know. Sokka: Okay. I'll try.) A couple months later, Sokka gets a letter saying he's been accepted to join the USA sailing team for the summer olympics.

Azula and Sokka arrive Beijing a couple months later for the summer olympics. While they don't interact much in the first few days, only seeing one another because they're both part of the USA team, they do find one another before Sokka does not know where sailing is supposed to meet up. Basically, one day, before their events take place, Sokka accidentally wanders into the archery range and almost gets shot but Azula screams and stops the other archers. (Azula: Watch it! These arrows aren't for show! Sokka: Sorry! I'm sorry! I'm looking for the sailing crew. Azula: Look around. Does this look like sailing? Sokka: You don't have to be a jerk about it. Azula: I do when you're being an idiot and almost got yourself shot and me put in front of a judge for involuntary manslaughter. Sokka: Point taken. Sorry about that. I'm Sokka. Azula: Azula. Sokka: You're here for archery? Azula, holding up her arrows: What do you think? Sokka: Fair..... Azula: Are you going to move away from the target at any point or....? Sokka: Oh! Yeah! Yeah! *He moves behind her so she can practice* But umm...if you're not too busy would you maybe want you...get some dinner. It'll be an apology from me for almost getting shot. Azula: A dinner? Sokka: Yeah. Azula:....Sounds like fun. Come by my room later. I'm in A6 in the USA section. Sokka: You got it).

Azula and Sokka meet up that night and quickly discover that they do have a lot in common. Both of them are incredibly competitive, they have similar families, they both love anime and they both desperately want to win. They aren’t competing on the same team so they don’t get to spend too much time together. Plus, they are in the Olympics. (It’s not like there’s a lot of downtime). The most they get to do is text each other between practices but it’s enough. (Azula: I’m going to kill my partner if she doesn’t learn how to shoot straight soon. Sokka: Come on. It can’t be that bad. Azula: She flips her hair around like she’s Merida from Brave. It’s ridiculous. Sokka: Is she hitting the target? Also was that a Pixar reference? Azula: She’s hitting but she’s not hitting center which is what she needs to start doing. Sokka: She wouldn’t have made it this far without some skill. Azula: I suppose that’s fair. Although I wouldn’t be surprised if she bought her way into the games. Sokka: Good luck to you. Azula: Thank you. Sokka: Why didn’t you respond to my Pixar question? Azula: *Read*) Sokka does take the time to go to her event though and watch her win gold for the USA team. Her partner definitely isn’t as good as her, but she’s decent enough to get them a win. Sokka goes to find her after the event and they kiss. It would have been nice though if someone told them a reporter saw them.

Azula is asleep in Sokka’s room (they celebrated her win the night before and got pretty drunk) when she gets a FaceTime from her father. Disoriented, she doesn’t even try to hide Sokka’s body when she answers the call. Ozai is beyond pissed about the article when she’s supposed to be there to win. Azula tries to argue that she did win (she won freaking gold) but Ozai isn’t hearing it and tries to order her to return but Azula says she can’t and has to remain for the closing ceremonies. Ozai’s solution? He’s coming there. Whenever Sokka isn’t practicing, he’s comforting a very freaked out Azula (she can’t even enjoy the Olympic village chocolate muffins) (and Sokka does find it kind funny that Azula was less freaked out when she was performing in the literal Olympics vs hearing that her father is coming to the games. Azula doesn’t find the comparison as funny). When Ozai arrives, he argues with Azula not only about her not taking the event seriously but also being involved with someone so far below her status level. Somehow, Sokka also gets involved in the argument and it all comes to a head when Ozai says that he will leave and never say a word about Azula and Sokka’s relationship if Sokka can win gold in his competition. (Sokka: This is the weirdest thing even but I accept.) Azula, same as Sokka, is in the crowd when he performs. Since he’s out on the water he can’t see her as well but he still knows she’s there. It’s incredibly close, had Sokka been only a couple moments slower he could have come in second, but he does win. He goes back to shore where Azula is waiting for him and the two kiss again. This time not caring or checking for press.

[natlacentral]

Sokka Actor Defends Changes To Live-Action 'Avatar' Series: "You Have To Take Risks"

Sokka actor Ian Ousley opens up on creative changes to Netflix’s ‘Avatar’ series, what he fought to keep in the show, the hilarious cast group chat, and much more.

Avatar: The Last Airbender is in the pantheon of 2000s Nickelodeon shows. 

Since its debut in 2005, the animated series inspired several spinoff projects and a passionate, global fanbase—one that’s been particularly protective of the franchise following M. Night Shyamalan’s disgraceful 2010 adaptation. 

When it was announced that the series would be getting the live-action treatment at Netflix, fans were skeptical. Would this be another bomb, like the canceled Cowboy Bepop series? Or could it actually be something worthwhile for the franchise, like the recent adaptation of Eiichiro Oda’s One Piece? 

Ian Ousley, the 21-year-old actor born in College Station, Texas, who plays Sokka in the Netflix version, knew it would be a daunting task adapting one of the most beloved animated stories of the 21st Century. But he says the cast had one common goal stepping into the project. 

“We’ve got to do this thing justice,” Ousley says. “What we want is to give people a true and faithful adaptation of a show that people grew up on and still love today.”

It seems like the live-action series has resonated with fans. In its first four days in the US, it secured the No. 1 spot on Nielsen’s streaming chart and garnered nearly twice as many views as the debut of One Piece. In a sign of faith, Netflix decided to greenlight Seasons 2 and 3, ensuring the series will at least get the opportunity to tell Aang’s whole story and possibly do right by the franchise’s legacy. 

Ousley sat down with Complex to reflect on the necessary changes for live-action, what he demanded to keep in the series, bonding with the cast, and much more. 

You were 19 when you signed on to the project. We're here now, two years later. How are you feeling?

IAN OUSLEY: Feeling older [Chuckles]. I feel great. We shot this project for 13 months in Vancouver. It's been almost a year and a half since VFX and all of that stuff. So it's kind of a weird situation to go from like, “Oh, you're gonna do 12 hours of work every day for 13 months.” Then it's like, “All right, here's your life for like a year and a half.” 

Then it gets released and it's like, “Oh, by the way, you did this thing and it's awesome, and you're it's going to come out and it's going to be crazy.” So it's been a funny, kind of roller coaster situation.

It was also a massive world tour, from Tudum in Brazil to all across the globe. What’s it been like interacting with fans ever since you joined? 

I mean, great. It is a very passionate fan base. I was part of that fan base at one point, so I really understand. Since it's been released, the fan reaction has been overwhelmingly positive from what I've seen, so I'm just really grateful that the fans like it honestly. Because I was in that same spot where I was like, “Oh my gosh, I really want this to be good.” 

Everyone on the cast and the creative side of things were really fans of the project, which is rare to find, a project that everyone is so passionate about. We were like, “Okay, this has to be good because there might have been a movie at some point that maybe wasn't so good.”

We were like, “Our whole goal is: we’ve got to do this thing justice.”

What was the casting process like? I heard it was done under cover, Ken Leung thoughthe was auditioning for a different franchise. How did all that go down? 

It was under a code name, so I did a self tape under the code name “Tradewinds” and thought it was just some Netflix original because it said Netflix but didn't say anything else. I had no idea it was Avatar at all. 

I did a bunch of Zoom callbacks, chemistry reads over Zoom, which is always funny because if you've ever been on a Zoom meeting in your life, there's that subtle delay, which is kind of awkward. So acting with that was pretty interesting. 

But we were in the midst of COVID, and I got the call that I actually got the role. The first reaction was, “Oh, my God. I'm playing Sokka.” And then I was like, “Oh my God, I'm playing Sokka. What the heck?” Like, so much pressure. 

Once you landed the role, how much Avatar content did you consume to prepare for the project?

To prepare, I just watched season one because I didn't want to have in my mind too much the arc of what Sokka goes through in seasons two and three. So I was religiously watching season one, like three or four times. Throughout the process of filming the show, just reminding myself of like, “Okay, we're here. Sokka is going through this.”

The animated show is basically the heart and soul of our show, but our show is different. It's live-action. Anything's going to be different when you take it from animation and put it into real people. So just trying to add those human elements into it, finding where they really didn’t get to dive into because it’s an animated series, trying to find where we could mix those human elements in. 

What were you most excited to tackle with the project? Anything you were really looking forward to? 

I was most excited for the stunts. Dallas [Liu, who plays Zuko] is a good friend of mine, and those were my favorite days, shadowing and getting to watch him do his martial arts in costume, which is very difficult. We're basically all in leather, so doing what he's doing is insane.

The costumes, that's what really transported us into the world. The first time I got my haircut and I'd put the costume on in the fitting and stuff, I was like, “Okay, this is really cool.” Once I had the wolf tail, it was over. I was like, “Oh my gosh. This is real.” And that's kind of where I saw it through, Not just my imagination anymore, it was like, “Oh, this is real.” 

What were the action and fight scenes like for you?

Great! My job is to lose most of them [Chuckles], but it was actually a really fun experience. We did a six-week-long bootcamp where we all learned how to bend all four elements, even though I'm a non-bender. The rest of that bootcamp was focused on me re-learning my martial arts background, which isn’t very hard.

I'm a third degree black belt in taekwondo and a world champion in weapons. So that was what was fun for me because Sokka's got a lot of weapons. He's got spears, he's got his boomerang, obviously. Later on he'll master the space sword, which I'm very excited for, hopefully. I mean, that's in the animated series. We don't have any scripts yet for season two and three, but yeah, it was really fun to do those scenes.

The behind-the-scenes pictures made it look like y’all were legit family, like homies. What was the bonding experience like on and off set? 

I mean, hopefully me and Dallas didn't seem like actual homies in the show, but we were roommates. We actually knew each other in L.A. beforehand, when we were like 15. It's a very long story, but we really were not fans of each other at all. So when I found out he got cast, I was like, “Oh my God, this is gonna suck. My life is going to suck for a year.”

We were supposed to be friends and then we just bonded throughout the bootcamp and the first month of shooting. We lived a block away from each other and we would always get dropped off at one person's house, go eat, come back to that person's house, and then seven hours before we had to be on set for the next bootcamp day, which is very intense because it's like eight hours of training, we'd be like, “Oh, crap, I've got to go home.” Go sleep in separate places, and then do it all again the next day. 

So after Christmas break, we were just like, “Dude, we've got to move in together.” So we ended up doing that, which was really cool. 

Do you guys have a group chat?

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

Does it have a special nickname like “OppenHomies” or something?

You know, that sounds more like what the Oppenheimer group chat is, is that what it is? “OppenHomies”? Oh, my God. That's so lit. 

We have one, it's “Shadow Wizard Money Gang.” I think there's a music producer who has that as his producing tag that was big for a while.

One day I opened my text and it said “Shadow Wizard Money Gang” with like a ton of emojis. And I was like, “What the hell?” And it was them. I was like, “Oh, cool.”

What are your cardinal rules for adapting an animated project into live action?

I think that, for one, I'll say that we love the animated show. All of us are fans of that, which is what we are trying to embody instead of emulate, is what I would say. A shot for shot remake of an animation to me personally is unnecessary. What we want is to give people a true and faithful adaptation of a show that people grew up on and still love today. 

That's what I would say to some of the critics: “I hear you and we love the animated show and it exists and is perfect for a reason.” I think that it's necessary to bring some differences to the show so that we can have some new content. You have to take risks, and I think we took some risks. Sometimes that really, really pans out and sometimes it doesn’t. I think that most of our risks really did. 

What I’d also say to this subject in general, I know it's a little bit off topic, but I feel like the first season of the animated show is so good, but it's hopping around a lot. We're going on little side missions here and there because we're trying to get to the Northern Water Tribe, and it really finds its voice in seasons two and three.

It's like, “We know what the show is, we know what we're going after, we know what the plot points are. We have Toph now. We have the Aang Gang. We have a mission. We’ve got to save the world.” I think that our show also has that opportunity in live-action.

We've gotten so much constructive criticism, which is why we all want to make the show as good as possible. Still, not just for season one, but season two and three. I think we really have that opportunity now as well to find our voice in season two and three. 

Was there anything that you felt particularly strong about that you felt Sokka needed to keep in the live-action?

One thing that I asked to keep that was almost not there was I'm wearing the Kyoshi armor in episode two. Originally I wasn't wearing the Kyoshi armor. In the animated show, it's kind of seen as a punch line. It's a punishment, like, “Here, throw this on if you want to train with us.”

For me, I went to the people that wanted to make that change and was like, “You know, I'm a martial artist. If I'm going to a jiu jitsu gym, I'm going to wear their uniform. It can be seen as a sign of honor and respect.” I think that's totally what it is.

So I was really happy that I got to keep that. It really was not anything intense, but it was just advocating for your characters. Always. Everyone always loves that because no one had ego on our set, which is something that's so important when trying to create something that's good is like, “Oh, I'm totally down to be wrong.”

What are your hopes for deepening your portrayal of Sokka? Anything you are excited to explore in Seasons 2 and 3?

I think that he evolves through his sense of responsibility. He evolves through his relationship with his sister a lot. The reason this question is hard to answer is because I don't have scripts yet, which helps me guide where that growth will come from. I'm kind of a psycho about trying to make the performance not one noted, even in one episode or one part of a season.

I had a whole serial killer wall, theories of all like, okay, “This season he's going through this. And then the reason it changes here is because…” and then once you do all of that work, you can throw it all away once you get on set and you kind of have a sense of purpose of why.

So I think I'm going to find out more of those specifics, I will find out more about that when I get those scripts. Hopefully soon. 

[cuccoamongdragons]

"Villifying" huh? Aang was a 12 year old with god powers and trauma. He's not evil, or a terrible awful person. He did make some terrible choices though in how he treated others and I do think Katara got a large brunt of that.

As for "twisting canon"...

Book 1 Ep. 4 - "The Warriors of Kiyoshi"

Sokka tells the group they've taken too many detours and need to keep moving to make it to the North Pole (where Katara can find a Waterbending Master). Aang makes a new detour to attempt to show off. Then delays even longer to show off even more when he gets fangirls, and turns down helping to prepare supplies for the trip. Leaving Katara to do a shared responsibility by herself. Then he actively projects his feelings of jealousy over her attention by calling her jealous. (He does apologize for that last part later.)

Book 1 Ep. 14 - "The Fortune Teller"

Aang invades Katara's privacy when she has her fortune read. Same episode Meng (a younger girl) follows him around the same way he's doing to Katara and Aang is shown what it looks like to bow out gracefully when someone isn't into you.

Book 1 Ep. 15 - "Bato of the Water Tribe"

Aang hides the message about Katara & Sokka's dad so they won't leave him and go see him even though he knows that is their only living parent and there may not be another chance.

Book 1 Ep. 18 - "The Waterbending Master"

While Aang does stick up for Katara, and helps her. He's also a lil sour about her picking up waterbending faster than him. (Normal kid thing, but also not a good thing for their friendship/relationship.)

Book 2 (Ep. 15 or 16, could be a little off here) "Tales of Ba Sing Se" / "Appa's Lost Days"

After Appa is kidnapped, Aang spends days trashing everybody, especially Katara, who's the most vocal about making decisions that give them the best odds of finding him. After days of this, he goes avatar mode and Katara, the person who has routinely not had her own needs and wants met from the moment her mom died, is the one to comfort him and bring him down. (Did Aang ask her to? No. Is it narratively kinda messed up? Yea.) I could be wrong, but I don't recall him apologizing for how awful he was to them.

Book 3 Ep. 10 "Day of the Black Sun" pt.1

Aang kisses her without consent. (He thinks he might die which is rough, still doesn't make that okay.)

Book 3 Ep. 16 "The Southern Raiders"

Zuko tries to give Katara a chance at closure by telling her where her Mother's murderer is. Aang asks her what she expects to accomplish then compares her mother's murder to Appa's kidnapping and tells her she should forgive. He prods again saying he forgives her for taking Appa then gives her advice on how to manage her feelings.

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While he is right, I really don't think he set himself up to be someone she feels heard and respected by in how he approached initially and a lot of his past behavior. It just feels hypocritical that he gets to lose control and rage and put his feelings on others, but when she wants to, he says she should forgive and let go. He says I get it, you're angry. Your mother's murder is just like my emotional support animal's kidnapping. He's not evil, he means well, but that is the last thing I could imagine taking well from the kid who I've had to put my feelings aside for on a regular basis. Katara absolutely has agency, but she is regularly expected to be the bigger person by Aang and Sokka in ways other characters aren't pushed.

ATLA fandom: Aang tried to force his ideals on Katara and stop her from confronting her mother’s killer.

ATLA episode transcript:  Katara: Don’t try to stop us. Aang: I wasn’t planning to. This is a journey you need to take. You need to face this man. But when you do, please don’t choose revenge. Let your anger out, and then let it go. Forgive him.