#my asks are always open for anonymous threats and insults btw

[thearvariblues]

"Be a good girl, don't engage, just block, don't-"

Oh, screw it.

"It's clear that Build always hAtED Bible!"

Yeah, you're totally right.

so much hatred!

so much mutual discomfort!

they could barely stand each other!

Listen to me now, cunts, and listen well. You're free to think whatever you want about the way it ended, you're free to think whatever you want about Build as he is now, or Bible as he is now - god knows I have opinions about him and his choices.

You know what you don't get to do? You don't get to rewrite history just to fit your current worldview. You don't get to create an "oh it aLWaYs sucked!" narrative only to justify your opinions. You don't get to build (no pun intended) an entire different universe where those two men were somehow always uncomfortable with each other. You just fucking don't.

You don't need to, you know. You can just accept that it was nice and that the way it ended fucking sucked. You don't need to shit on what once was to make yourself feel better now. You can be as mad and bitter and petty as you want, but that's it.

Don't attempt to change the past just to somehow feel better about the present. You know you're fucking lying to yourself.

If you want to shit on something, shit on the present. Shit on the present as much as you want. Let the hatred flow through you! I know I do, and guess what, sometimes it even helps. But don't shit on what was once good and try to twist it into a dark parody of itself just so you don't have to feel like a cunt because you hate Build or something.

You are a cunt. Stop looking for excuses and embrace it!

[loopy777]

Non-Review: Free Comic Book Day 2021 - The Legend of Korra (Also Featuring Avatar: The Last Airbender)

With all the hype around 'Suki Alone,' it looks to me like most of the fandom missed that an additional Avatar comic with a story from each cartoon's era was just released for Free Comic Book Day. You can read them for yourself on either Dark Horse Digital or Comixology where it's mislabeled as being for ages 17+ (free accounts are required for both), but I'm sure one of the reasons you all love me is because of my willingness to jump in between you and these comics like the deadly bullets they can be. Well, I'm happy to die (metaphorically) for the sake of (a little anonymous internet) love, so I'm doing a full snarky review for each ten-page story. Also, I'm bored, and it's more fun to make fun of mediocre stuff than to praise stuff I like.

It's time for me to review "Free Comic Book Day 2021 - The Legend of Korra (Also Featuring Avatar: The Last Airbender)" or more specifically "The Legend of Korra: Clearing the Air" and "Avatar: The Last Airbender: Matcha Makers."

CLEARING THE AIR

The cover makes this look like a story about Jinora and Ikki having a sibling conflict. That's a lie. The Air Sisters arguing is merely the inciting incident for Tenzin telling a story of his youth. I should note that, as inconsequential as the Air Sisters stuff is, it's actually written very well because it posits Ikki as a victim of circumstance and Jinora as a bully who terrorizes her little sister with threats of getting thrown in jail by Metalbenders for an accident, cementing the characterization from the cartoon. This is not sarcasm. I really do think Jinora is presented by LoK as a Holier Than Thou little snot who just so happened to be naturally gifted with magic spirit-powers, but for some reason the rest of the fandom doesn't agree with me.

Anyway, Tenzin comes in to find the arguing (and Meelo just running amok for the fun of it and so far these characterizations are perfect), and rather than telling Jinora to shut her stupid face, he delivers a tale of his youth about conflict resolution.

So the meat of the story is how, when Tenzin was "a few years older" than Jinora, a pair of vandals got onto Air Temple Island and burned some graffiti into the spinning-panel things that Korra will destroy out of frustration during her Airbending training. Literally, the vandals are depicted as scorching the wood with enough smoke to be seen across a plaza. Tenzin goes after the vandals and they flee across the bay back to Republic City proper (one of the vandals is a Waterbender with a surf-plank). Tenzin pursues, catches them, and attacks them hard enough to smash some dockside crates. They are all then arrested by Metalbenders and dragged before Chief Toph. She's going to let Tenzin go (yay Toph!) and throw the vandals in jail (YAY TOPH!) and makes this face, and this entire comic is worth it:

However, Aang arrives and instead arranges to forgo the jail-time in favor of an Air Nomad Conflict Resolution Ceremony. This is nice and in-character, but I'm totally with Tenzin that these vandals should have been thrown in jail. They literally burned insulting graffiti into antiques from a genocided culture. But instead, Aang demonstrates conflict resolution by having Tenzin explain why he's hurt and what needs to be done to redress the wrong. And so the vandals help Tenzin scrub the graffiti off the panels with water and rags and mops- how, I don't know, since they were literally burned.

They also do a ceremony thing where they each take turns bending their element into a central space between them to 'clear the air' (GET IT GET IT HA HA IT'S ALMOST LIKE A PUN BUT NOT), so it's a good thing they were all Benders because this is kinda racist. This fixes all the problems and everyone is friends. Yay!

In the present, though, things are not so nice, because Tenzin's kids are still screaming at and provoking each other. Korra comes in with Asami at the end to ask what's going on, and Asami says nothing, so I still think everyone is characterized with perfect consistency with the cartoon.

I made this sound silly, but (aside from the spinny-panels getting cleaned with a little water and elbow-grease, which doesn't matter because Korra will eventually blow them all up anyway), I actually like this one. It has Tenzin demonstrate how much he's always had to work to be the Perfect Air Monk that everyone expects him to be, and Aang acknowledges how this is unfair but that Tenzin will never let him down no matter what. It also has Katara come in at the end (for just one line, boo!) to acknowledge that this was an especially easy little conflict for Tenzin to practice on and he'll eventually face worse. I found it a nice adult moment in a story that's otherwise clearly aimed at 8-year-olds.

The art is good. It's simpler than the LoK cartoon, with flat colors, but it captures the story and has enough liveliness for everyone's character to come across in their look and body-language. The brief action-sequence where Tenzin attacks the vandals is well done, moving quickly but showing the full flow of the fight and every move Tenzin makes.

MATCHA MAKERS

Apparently, "Matcha is finely ground powder of specially grown and processed green tea leaves, traditionally consumed in East Asia" according to Wikipedia. I had to look that up. I'm curious how many people understood the full reference in the title, especially since these comics are aimed at kids too young to be allowed on the internet.

This is a very simple story about Iroh in his tea-shop in Ba Sing Se. He has an assistant/waitress named Feng, a new character who wears glasses, ruining the hopes and dreams of all the fanfic-writers who were so sure he'd rescue Jin from the Lower Ring. A frequent patron of the tea shop is an elegant, older lady (very clearly Upper Ring material) named Li-Mei, who cannot go a single panel without giving Iroh a HEY BIG BOY look. She is very clearly smitten. Also, I feel the need to clarify that she knows his name is Iroh, so apparently Ba Sing Se is okay with the Dragon of the West serving tea to their wealthy. I don't say that as a criticism, I'm just noting it.

That night, Iroh meets up with his friends- the Pokemon-style spirits that we saw in Legend of Korra. (I don't know if they're the actual spirits from LoK, or just new spirits in the same style. This is because I would sooner grind matcha into my eyes than rewatch Book Spirits.) He serves them his special blend of tea and talks about how he's totally into Li-Mei but isn't going to pursue it because he's feeling old and doesn't want to take a risk. At this point, I could stop describing the plot because between the title and what I've said so far, I'm sure you could figure out every single plot beat that will follow.

The next day, the spirits trip Feng so that she drops Li-Mei's tea and Iroh needs to bring a replacement, and they've drawn hearts on top of the replacement tea with foam or sugar or milk or whatever. I don't know because I've never bought tea in a place that will even put the bag in the hot water for me. Iroh gets out of the situation without starting any love-affairs and runs into the back to tell the spirits to knock it off, dudes, they're totally embarrassing him! The spirits respond by giving him a flyer for a romantic restaurant. I don't know how they got it, so I can only assume that some Upper Ringer had their mail diverted.

Iroh refuses, so when Li-Mei orders more tea and he brings it to her, the spirits hover just out of her sight and threaten to smash the furniture. I am not making that up. They literally threaten to smash Iroh's furniture unless he asks the lady out. He submits to their tyrannical threats, Li-Mei happily accepts the date, he happily accepts her acceptance, and the story comes to a close. Iroh thanks his spirits friends for opening him up to new experience, but hopes that next time (so I guess Iroh is signing up for Tinder after this?) they won't threaten his shop.

At best, I can describe this story as 'harmless.' But it's been a long week and I just got a bunch more extra work at my day job that I really don't want to do, so I'm going to go ahead and call this story 'dumb.' It's rote, leans towards humor without actually being funny at all, and turns the spirits of the setting into Pokemon. And not even the cool dragon kind.

The art is strangely stiff. The coloring is soft and nice, but the drawings seems more 'assembled' than actually drawn. I swear there are even a few panels that reminded me of 'How I Became Yours' with janky poses, horrifying expressions, and just enough resemblance to the original cartoon to make me think a screenshot was partially traced and then ruined. (I'm not accusing the artist of tracing, BTW. I wouldn't even condemn the artist for tracing if they did. I'm just describing that HIBY feeling I got.) It was so stiff that rather than hear Iroh's dialogue in Mako's rich tones, I instead imagined Greg Baldwin doing a stiff Mako-impression with no naturalism to the delivery.

This story is definitely worthy of its "Also Featuring" billing. I'd rate it below Gene Yang's Mai and Suki FCBD short stories, but above everything else he wrote for Avatar.

So there you go. Overall, this is very middle-of-the-pack for Avatar FCBD stuff. It's very much of the nature of the 'Team Avatar Tales' stuff, and I wouldn't be surprised if the Iroh story was a leftover from that project. On Free Comic Book Day, you often get what you pay for.

[firelordazulaaaa]

if, hypothetically, someone had just finished verbally abusing you, what's your next move? hypothetically of course. asking for a friend btw

hypothetically and depending on the person ik my next move would probably be to fight back by belittling what they’ve said to me DON’T DO THAT - thats basically what they want

i'm answering this genuinely, usually i respond jokey to inbox stuff but i've been in this situation and if your friend is in this situation tell them to please keep safe and to tell someone they trust - my dm and inbox (to be anonymous) is always open for anything! please keep safe

i understand that depending on the person, the people around you and how severe the comments are you have to respond differently so this is the best i've got - please remember this isn't factual this is my opinion and some research i'm not sure how much this will help, it's best if you google about it

Remain calm and disengage psychologically - Take deep breaths and calm yourself. Depersonalise yourself from the insults thrown. Pause for a brief moment until you can recollect yourself. Remember that said person is acting out of insecurity, jealousy, or any other personal issues that have nothing to do with you. Whatever they're saying don't let it affect you, that's what they want to happen.

Don’t take the bait - A verbal attacker will often expect you to respond in predictable ways to continue escalating the situation. For example, they might ask “why are you so stupid?” As long as you don’t get defensive or show that you’ve been offended, the verbal attacks won’t be effective. I know verbal abuse is more specific and it might be harder to not take the bait but trust me if you do it's them winning.

Keep your distance - If you let someone too close, you’re vulnerable to a physical attack. Back away when need be. Remember verbal abuse can turn physical.

Mirror your verbal attacker’s stance - If you’re sitting and your verbal attacker’s standing, stand up. If you stay seated, you’re vulnerable to attack.

Remain neutral - Be neither confrontational nor submissive. Let your attacker know you aren’t a threat via. body language, tone of voice, and verbal communication. Don’t let your attacker know that their words are affecting you.

Seek understanding - Assume that what your attacker is saying is true then figure out the truth of the insults. Acknowledge your attacker’s honesty to take the sting out of the insult before doing so. Ask questions to make sure that you understand. Just remember if they're picking on you usually it's because they're insecure of it.

Honestly though just walk away, silently. Don’t engage, don’t respond, do not bring yourself down to their level.

verbal abuse is NEVER ok.

remember you, your friend, all of us we are bad bitches and we don't give a fuck about what they have to say. not to be a narcissist a just plain vain but we are better than them if they have to stoop to verbal abuse they are scum.