#lowkey just wanted to make a macbeth reference

[charli3emily]

Day 30: Post Island 🚢

@lotftober2024

[thinkingisadangerouspastime]

do you think zuko treated mai fairly? i mean... why didn't he trust her to tell her his deepest thoughts when he abandoned her in the fire nation? i know he loved her but i don't understand why he didn't just tell her instead of hurting her unnecessarily. they're cute but i find it so hard to get past this, i would be so hurt if my bf didn't tell me something so important. and then mai just. forgives zuko so easily even after he locked her in a cell still not trusting her. mai deserves better :(

It’s kind of funny you ask this, because I lowkey have a lot of feelings about the phrase “x deserved better than y”. For one, I’m always cautious around it, because in the A:TLA fandom I’ve seen it thrown around in two main ways:

“Katara deserved better than Aang!” followed by the most ridiculous slander labelling Aang as abusive, toxic, manipulative, etc. (Funnily enough, though, a lot of those people will also go and ship T.aang. Like T.aang is an Excellent ship, do not get me wrong, but it’s clear they just say ‘Katara deserved better’ because they hate K.ataang and don’t necessarily care one way or the other about Aang.)

“Zuko deserved better than Mai!” followed by the most obnoxious bullshit also labelling Mai as abusive, toxic, manipulative, etc. and even - I kid you not - saying she’s “too ugly” for Zuko. At worst, racist; at best, shallow. (And again, funnily enough, a lot of them will then ship M.ailee, again proving they don’t really care one way or another about Mai, they just hate M.aiko.)

Now, I’m not getting into the K.ataang vs Z.utara vs M.aiko ship wars, lmao, but those are the two primary ways that rhetoric is used. It’s kind of embarrassing, tbh, how fandom tends to use the phrase to discredit pairings and demonize characters instead of… you know. Moving on with their lives, lol.

But your ask fascinates me, anon, because you bring up the point of Zuko not trusting Mai, thus leading to the conclusion of “Mai deserves better than Zuko.” Which is interesting, because as I just mentioned, for most people who follow the “x deserves better than y” phrase, it tends to be used the other way around!

Firstly, however, I want to say that you don’t have to ship Maiko. You can read my explanation and walk away still feeling exactly the same way about Mai and Zuko’s relationship (love it, hate it, indifferent to it, all that jazz), and that’s totally okay! But I’m going to do my best to explain what’s off with the rhetoric of “x deserves better than y,” specifically regarding Maiko. My thesis, as it were?

It’s not about “deserve.”

Disclaimer: This obviously does not refer to genuinely unhealthy/abusive relationships. I shouldn’t have to say that, but we all know how Tumblr is. I digress.

Love isn’t about “deserve.” At first glance, that’s kind of a confusing take, isn’t it? Don’t we all “deserve” someone who will respect us, appreciate us, and treat us well? Of course we do! But those are just qualities of any healthy relationship. When I say that love isn’t about “deserve,” I mean that love can’t be simplified quite so easily. Here is a definition of “deserve”:

“do something or have or show qualities worthy of (reward or punishment)”

How do we make ourselves “worthy” of love? I (an optimist) don’t think we do. Love isn’t about worthiness; I believe we are all “worthy” of love simply by existing. Instead, I argue that love is about openness. It’s not about if we “deserve” love or not, but rather if we allow ourselves to be open to it.

All of this is to say that it’s not about whether or not Mai “deserves” or “deserves better than” Zuko; it’s that she is open to receive love from him, and he from her. She wants to love and be loved by Zuko. No one else. She says it to Azula herself: “I love Zuko more than I fear you.” Mai chooses Zuko, full stop, just as Zuko chose her by a) doing everything in his power to keep her out of his betrayal of the Fire Nation (why would he risk putting a death sentence on her head, too?) and b) reuniting with her happily at the end of the show (i.e. he didn’t brush her off; he smiles his widest smile in the entire show during that scene!). So it’s not about “deserve.” It’s about these two kids loving and finding love in one another. A Shakespeare quote is particularly relevant here:

“Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.” (Twelfth Night – Act 3, Scene 1)

We are all looking for love, be it romantic or platonic or anything in-between, and there is no better feeling than we receive love even when we feel we don’t “deserve” it. Mai is willing to work with Zuko to make their relationship work despite his mistakes, because it’s not about if he “deserves” her, but because she knows he is willing to grow and improve (and she is, too).

Also, within the series of A:TLA (specifically towards the middle-end of Book 3), it can be concluded that Zuko believes that he is no longer “worthy” of Mai’s love. That he doesn’t “deserve” her love because of how he abandoned her (and she is the only thing about the Fire Nation he regrets leaving behind). Mai disagrees with him. She is open to a relationship with Zuko because she loves him for an infinite number of reasons (one being that he does what is right, including going against the Fire Nation, even if she did not at first understand). When Zuko realizes this by the time the finale comes around, they reconcile in a tender embrace.

And what reason are we ever given to doubt Mai regarding whether or not she “deserves” better than Zuko? Mai is perfectly aware of her own worth. She breaks up with Zuko in “The Beach” because his behavior is inexcusable and she knows that she doesn’t have to put up with it. Even in the comics, which are handled poorly, I don’t entirely hate the Maiko breakup because again, Mai knows that she does not have to be responsible for Zuko’s well-being. She loves him, she loves him so much, and she tries to help him, but she is not his therapist. So again, why should we doubt Mai? Going back to the A:TLA finale - Mai knows what she “deserves” and what she doesn’t. She knows what she will and what she won’t put up with. And after everything, she is still open to a relationship with Zuko. Because love isn’t about “deserve,” and it never has been.

To address your other questions:

why didn’t he trust her to tell her his deepest thoughts when he abandoned her in the fire nation? i know he loved her but i don’t understand why he didn’t just tell her instead of hurting her unnecessarily.

You almost answer your question yourself, anon. “[H]is deepest thoughts”? Who tells anyone their “deepest thoughts”? We actually talked about this in my Shakespeare class (I know, right? lmao). A very common trope in Shakespeare’s tragedies is a lack of communication. We all read Romeo and Juliet and Othello and were like “dude, if they had just talked to each other, none of those bad things would have happened!!” (and thus those tragedies might have been comedies).

My professor agreed with us. Then he asked, well, why do you think Shakespeare doesn’t have anyone communicate?

One brave soul said, “That’d be too easy.”

Which is… almost right. Perhaps, narratively, it would be too easy. The plays would definitely be resolved much faster. But the truth? It’s too hard. People don’t communicate clearly in real life. They hide certain things because they’re embarrassed, they’re ashamed, they’re afraid. Even couples who’ve been together for years will admit that they don’t tell each other everything, for whatever reason. People are imperfect, and thus their relationships are, too.

(Slightly amusing sidebar: Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are actually an example of a perfect couple, because Macbeth confides everything to Lady Macbeth in Act 1. And, well, we all know how that went down[hill], lmao.)

So why didn’t Zuko tell Mai the truth when he was leaving the Fire Nation? He was afraid! He says it himself in “The Boiling Rock”: “Everyone in the Fire Nation thinks I’m a traitor. I couldn’t drag her into it.” Zuko is afraid of what might happen to Mai! He knows the Fire Nation now has a price on his head - why would he wish that on Mai? It’s bad enough that she’s the (former) girlfriend of a traitor! How much worse might it have been for her if she’d been associated with him after he’d threatened the Fire Lord’s life*? I’m not saying this to excuse Zuko’s decision, because perhaps Mai would have agreed to join him (although we cannot conclude this with total certainty), and I certainly think breaking up by text letter was a pretty crappy way to go about it, but all the same, he was trying to protect her. When Mai realizes this, what does she do?

Saves his ass from Azula and utters one of the most iconic lines in the entire series.

*Also, a kind of interesting parallel presents itself between Zuko and Hamlet here, lmao. One interpretation of Hamlet’s “get thee to a nunnery!” scene with Ophelia is reading it as him trying to cut ties with her in the cruelest way possible so she wouldn’t try to follow him and possibly get hurt as he killed Claudius (aka regicide, the highest crime in Denmark). While it’s arguable that Zuko isn’t quite so perceptive, lmao, there is the possibility that Zuko thought breaking up with Mai in such a callous way would help prevent her from remaining attached to him and thus getting mixed up in his mess (killing the Fire Lord, aka the A:TLA equivalent of regicide, the highest crime in the Fire Nation). Just something to ponder!

and then mai just. forgives zuko so easily even after he locked her in a cell still not trusting her.

I don’t know if I’d call her forgiveness “easy.” Making the decision to betray Azula? That’s hard. Mai was signing herself up for a death sentence, because Azula doesn’t take prisoners (Aang can testify to this, lmao). If Ty Lee hadn’t been there, Mai almost certainly would have died. So yeah. I wouldn’t call her forgiveness “easy,” anon. I think it’s one of the scariest choices she ever made.

Of course, one can argue that Mai’s true forgiveness of Zuko actually came later, which I don’t necessarily disagree with. I think Mai’s initial instinct was to trust Zuko because she knows him better than perhaps anyone (thus she realizes he wouldn’t walk away from the Fire Nation without true cause), hence her betrayal of Azula. When she survived because of Ty Lee’s chi-blocking (since honestly, Mai probably didn’t think she’d get that far) and was ultimately imprisoned, I bet she had plenty of time to think about Zuko and her relationship with him. Working on that presumption, again, I don’t think I’d call her forgiveness “easy,” because she likely took several days if not weeks to process everything.

Also, you say Zuko doesn’t trust her because a) he didn’t inform her of what he was doing when he left the Fire Nation and b) he locked her in a cell at the Boiling Rock. I understand that perspective, but again, I go back to this line: “Everyone in the Fire Nation thinks I’m a traitor. I couldn’t drag her into it.” Does that sound like someone who doesn’t trust Mai? I think the better description is that Zuko feared for Mai, as I mentioned earlier. Did he lock her in a cell because he thought she’d betray him, or because he thought it was the last thing he could do to protect her when everything went to shit as he, Sokka, Suki, and etc. were all escaping from prison? Could it have been a little bit of both? We can’t say for sure, of course, but given how happy Zuko was around Mai in “Nightmares and Daydreams,” I think his love for her ultimately outweighed his worries about Mai’s ties to Azula, which leads me to conclude his locking her in a cell was less about distrust and more a final, last-ditch attempt at keeping her out of his mess.

Plus, Zuko has issues. Mai knows this. She loves him all the same for it. As I said earlier, she is open to giving love to and receiving love from Zuko. I think it’s a bit of a discredit to Mai’s character to assume she forgave him easily. And besides! She told him herself: “But don’t ever break up with me again.” Mai implicitly tells him hey, don’t pull that BS again, and Zuko gives her an embarrassed smile before they hold each other in a gentle, loving embrace. It’s not a direct statement, and maybe that puts some people off from it, but Mai is firmly implying that she wants him to trust her more, and Zuko acknowledges this (and he’s rightfully a little embarrassed that he kept her out of it, since hindsight is 20/20 and he now understands she probably would have gone with him; do remember, of course, that he had no way of knowing that initially).

do you think zuko treated mai fairly?

Well, how do we define “fairly”? I guess the short answer is no, he didn’t, but what other choice did he believe he had at the time? Answer: none. It was either keep Mai out of it and guarantee her safety or drag Mai into it (which Zuko likely saw as a selfish option, i.e. what right did he have to pull his girlfriend into treason just because he didn’t want to lose her company?) and risk losing her. As viewers, we know there’s more to the situation than that, but Zuko doesn’t have our luxury. So his decision to keep Mai out of it and thus try to protect her? I would call that a “fair” assessment, yes.

And besides, anon:

“The course of true love never did run smooth.” (A Midsummer Night’s Dream - Act 1, Scene 1)

Mai and Zuko chose each other. Who are we to deny them their happiness?

[perfectly-wasted-youthhh]

All of the slytherin asks pls

1. What did you want to be when you grew up?Like most girls I wanted to be a veterinarian, the twist is that I also wanted to be a spy at the same time

2. Where did you meet your best friend?Let’s see, I consider a few people best friends but to keep it simple I’m gonna just tell the stories I find funniest, which always involve me not liking the person at first. Kelsey and I met in 3rd grade when I realized she was best friends with the girl I was best friends with. So me and this other girl Julia teamed up and like, hated Kelsey together. Eventually I got bored of that and Kelsey and I built a sand volcano together. Best friends to this day. Amber and I met in my sophomore year of high school, and I first noticed her when both of us wanted to read for the part of Macbeth in English class. So we shared the part but I was like lowkey bitter, even more so when I realized she was annoyingly pretty. Then one day we got put into a book group for All Quiet on the Western Front and realized we had a ton in common and loved each other’s senses of humor. We went to a frozen sing a long movie showing, best friends to this day. Lizz is the most recent addition to my best friends. I had heard a ton of rumors about her and I think she had heard some things about me and I was pretty much just biased to not like her. But then we got drunk together and I kept reminding her to drink water and literally out of nowhere came a really great friendship, and I’m super blessed it happened

3. What is your greatest achievement?Real answer is probably graduating Full IB and getting admitted to what I consider an amazing university. Fun answer is that night I took 16 shots cuz it was jakes 21st birthday and didn’t even get a hangover the next day.

4. Somebody you aspire to be like?My roommate and another one of my best friends Tracy. I’ve literally never known anyone who kicks their own ass so hard to be the best person they can be.

5. Are you a birthday person?What does this mean? But also no, this most recent birthday is the last one I can remember where I wasn’t sad on the day of hahaha. As for other people’s birthdays, i SUCK at giving gifts even for people I know super well so I always feel guilty

6. What is your dream job?I’d like to be a pharmacologist and hopefully work on some clinical trials for drugs meant to treat (cure seems like an ambitious word but hopefully that too) cancer. Specifically breast cancer because that’s what my mother had, and even though she’s in remission she still lives with a lot of pain because the treatments aren’t entirely ideal.

7. What are three things you want to do before you die? 1) Go to Loch Ness and pour one out for Nessie2) See a bioluminescent shore3) Eat beignets and drink hot chocolate with my best friends in New Orleans

8. Who is your favourite antagonist?Hades from the Disney animated Hercules 💕

9. How different was your life five years ago?Let’s see, I was in my freshman year, I was EMO AS FUCK like seriously I just thought I had a lot of problems and it’s all because my crush didn’t like me back lmao. But it was a very exciting year other than that, I had 4 years of being a big shot trumpet player ahead of me haha, which is something I kinda wish I still could rely on 😂 ultimately I think I’m happier and definitely more self aware now. I still love the music I listened to back then tho

10. If you were hypothetically stranded on a desert island, how long do you think you could last?I don’t get hungry quickly so I think I could hopefully manage to feed myself often enough to stave off horrible hunger pains. Water would likely end up being my big problem, or cold. If it’s a really cold island I’d last like maybe 3 nights.

11. Any unpopular opinions?Hm. Nah not at the moment

12. Would you want to know when you’re going to die?No it would be like trying to go back to sleep when you know you’re alarm is gonna ring in 10 mins, you can’t enjoy the last stretch no matter how good it feels

13. Do you ever take things from the hotel?Nah, partially cuz I’m lazy but also cuz I think hotel stuff smells kinda funky

14. Biggest pet peeve?Chewing with your mouth open

15. Do you hold grudges?Yes, I’d like to not and I have completely functioning and loving relationships with ppl I have these grudges against, but I’ll catch myself getting mad still sometimes, especially if it was never really resolved

16. Do you like the place where you grew up?I love it. I think it’s a kinda sleepy town but like it’s got all my favorite memories

17. Would you kill someone if they were planning to kill you?Yeah dude self defense. Fun fact, I recently learned that a felony referred to a specific type of crime and wasn’t just a really strong word to use to describe anything illegal. My lawyer friend (Tracy) taught me that. (after berating me for hours)

18. Three things you’re looking forward to?1) SUMMER2) ALL THE FRIENDS I GET TO SEE ONCE IT’S SUMMER3) HAVING A JOB OVER THE SUMMER

19. What would you be the god/goddess of?I think I’d make good as the goddess of curiosity and wonder, which is really nerdy cuz I’m thinking bout science as I write this

20. Where do you normally sit in the classroom?In a large lecture hall I sit towards the front, always the center. In a smaller lecture hall I tend to hang more towards the back, still centered tho

21. Would you rather always be overdressed or always be underdressed?Always be overdressed. I’ll just make everyone else think that they’re in the wrong for being underdressed

22. Do you own anything that has been passed on to you by a family member?I wear my mother’s emerald necklace. She wore it for about 30 years and now I’ve worn it for about 6. If I have a daughter I’ll give it to her too (or a son if he really wants it)

23. What can you do today that you weren’t capable of a year ago?Draw the structures and describe the characteristics of the 20 most common amino acids. Pretty cool

24. What is something you want right now?In the mood to just talk to a friend. Not about anything at all, I just like talking haha

25. Most slytherin thing you’ve ever done?This isn’t really a singular action but recently I’ve taken to waking up early on Fridays just so I can sit in the living room while Tracy and Jake suffer and get ready for their 8ams, and then once they leave I go back to bed. I just enjoy the fact that they have to be awake and I don’t ¯\_(ツ)_/¯