#pris rewatches tlok

[hachibe]

Ok, if anyone haven't noticed before, due to the amount of atla stuff i've been rebloging recently, I was rewatching atla after a long time. And now I'm on to tlok. Except for season 1, I haven't rewatched anything from tlok ever. Especially s2, which i hate.

So, I'm gonna live blog. I'm sorry for all my followers that couldn't give a shit about it. But i’m tagging it as #pris rewatches tlok so feel free to block

some thoughts on The Legend of Korra season 1:

- first thought: i love all the ways that Korra is so different than Aang

- I know I learned to love Tenzin with time, and I think is because it took me a while to realised how everything we know about him is what the narrative (and also him, I guess) wants us to think, not exactly how he actually is. We are constantly told how Tenzin is calm and patient and wise but we keep seeing him being nervous and impatient and making wrong decisions ( some of them completely biased and stiffed). And I learned to love him when I realised that he has (and us as an extension) this idea of what a airbender should be, and he tries to be that, he tries really hard to be that, but is not who he is. And I think this is more explored in s2 and s3 (I love his contrast with Zaheer)  but I'm getting ahead of myself. So... to cut things short, I appreciate how the narrative keeps telling us how calm and collected Tenzin is and then keep showing us how he is not.

- Mako, my boy Mako. On the first episode when he appeared I was like "why do I hate him, again?" and then 2 episodes later I'm like "oh jesus Christ will you shut your mouth!!!?"

- Lin, is a perfect human being, never done anything wrong ever in her life. (And I must confess, her voice is so sexy)

- the whole thing with Pema is so 😬

- i recently read a fic where in different occasions Sokka and Toph (or was it 2 different fics? Who knows?) complains that pro-bending is lame, is not truth to the real spirit of fighting or bending or whatever, and that earth ramble was the real thing. And although I agree that pro-bending brought something new to the styles of bending (you can see by the way the characters moves that there is not that clear distinction between the bending elements in their style of bending anymore, not like there was in atla. And I don't know if it was proposital or a mistake/laziness by the team), I must say so that is so cool to watch!!! I would definitely be a fan of pro-bending if I lived in that world.

- Lin sacrificing herself to save Tenzin's family? That's the shit! That scene haunts me in my dreams till this day.

- knowing how this romance plot is going to end is what's keep me going, honestly. Every time I have to see Mako and Korra interact in a scene I just get this nervous laugh.

- we haven't gone through the other seasons yet but I feel like Amon was the dude who had the best plan. The guy thought and planned his moves and I admire that in a villian.

- not to compare tlok to atla but...... I feel like the new avatar team misses a guy like Sokka. The plan guy, the guy with the ideas. And not just a person to have ideas but a person who think things and how to do things. I feel like this new team avatar just reacts to stuff. That's why their opponents are always ahead of them, because they never think things through. And I know that this is particular to Korra's nature, she's impulsive and always tries to strike first. (Alot like Zuko in s1). But they needed someone like Sokka in the group to balance things out. And I don't think any of the new avatar team is like that. Not even Tenzin.

- general Iroh was kind of the idea guy, and a good one, but he also only appeared for 3 episodes and never again. So... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

- btw, he deserves the name he was given. That dude never stopped even when the odds were all against him. I never checked for the tlok comics but I think I should. I would love some spin offs of the United Nations forces. Would love some stories with Bumi and him, please and thank you.

- to be honest I don't like how Korra got to airbend in the end. She couldn't airbend because she was never in the face of danger or because someone/something she cared about was in danger. It was always because she never listen, she never had patience. Or whatever it was necessary to airbend. Like Aang, when he couldn't earthbend, he couldn't do it because he was never willing to stand his ground and face things head first. And he was only able to do it when he finally stood his ground. But Korra, Korra only did it because the narrative needed her to.

- not gonna lie, that ending with Tarrlok and Noatak? The saddest thing ever.

[hachibe]

thoughts on The Legend Of Korra season 3:

for the amount of ranting in this you wouldn’t believe this to be my favourite season ^.^

- oh look! it’s almost as if Korra decided to keep the portals open without thinking of the consequences.

- i’m gonna be upfront and say that i hate that 1) people now just can airbend 2) Bumi can airbend. about #1 i think is kind of stupid, there was no need for more people to be able to airbend (if you disregard Zaheer). and i have this whole rant about the air nomads being reduced to airBENDERS in tlok. and i’ll rant about it when the time comes. what really bothers me is #2. because the whole essence of Bumi’s story is that he thinks he is not good enough because he can’t bend, because he is a regular guy, so instead of giving him a story where he learns his value they decided to just give him bending! like, srly!!!? because people only have value if they can bend? and it’s almost like, did s1 even happened? yes, Amon was a hypocrite but the issue with the non benders were/is still real. but the narrative refuses to acknowledge this! they are all like “what, no! i don’t know her” to this whole issue.

- and i still don’t understand how the spirits prowling the world should fit (or not) with this modern world. that’s a freaking awesome story right there to be tell but the narrative just refuses to deal with it because look! there’s airbenders now so let’s focus all the season on that. and like we did with s1 let’s forget that whatever happened that season had any consequences whatsoever! Korra was just like “fuck this, let’s search more airbenders because fuck this city, who cares anyway?”

- (me from the future: yes, i agree that tlok did a disservice to the portrayal of spirits that we had in atla. instead of unknowable creatures beyond our comprehension we got fluffy cute little creatures who could be good or evil. in a very black and white christian reductionist take. and i should have talked about this in the s2 notes. BUT the spirits are still here, this is something that is happening in the time of s3 but the narrative refuses to deal with it. it shows the audience that the spirits are there, they did caused some disturbance, there are vines in the city and people’s lives are getting disturbed by it. but this is the maximum of what we get from this. (i haven’t started s4 yet, i think there is some talk about it there, i’ll revisit the subject if it’s necessary.) and not once the narrative spends time exploring the implications of living in this modern world, that is constantly changing, that sees technologies and innovations as monoliths of good. we don’t get to see the spirits having to deal with this world. nor the humans having to deal with the spirits and reconciling it with their new modern life. and we never see the consequences in the lives of these people, or of this nation as a whole; or the contrast of the life in this nation as opposed to the other ones. and atla did such an amazing job of showing the world entrenched in colonialism and it’s consequences, not only to one nation but every nation. we saw what colonialism did to the southern water tribe, but we also saw what it did the fire nation. but tlok just drops a bunch of ideas and story lines and then just go focus on other things)

- should i talk about Zaheer? I love Zaheer. s3 is my favourite one because of him. I know, i just spend 2 paragraphs complaining about it. But i think Zaheer is fascinating. To me, with all the writings shortcomings he is still the best villain tlok had. his potential, ma man? i live for that. 

- i want Mako’s job btw, i want to just call my boss and say “hey, so, i’m gonna go on a trip with ma friends, idk when i’ll be back, see ya. don’t forget to mail me the paychecks!!!” ALSO, Mako is such a COP™! Let’s threaten this 13 yo orphan kid that had to rely on a life of petty crime in order to survive. it’s not like Mako himself isn’t an orphan and hadn’t gone through basically the same thing.

- the writers might not have given the red lotus a deep and meaningful story  and a rewarding narrative arch but they look COOL AS FUCK! SRLY, all 4 of them are the coolest looking characters in this whole series.

- the kid runs away in BA SING fucking SE and they send 2 people to look for him. yes!, i’m wasting a comment on this.

- (i saw someone implying that Mako and Bolin’s grandma is that girl Zuko went on a date once. do we know that for sure? note to self: remember to check that later)

- ok, so before we meet Suyin i think i need to talk about why i don’t like this “you’re an airbender, you’re an airbender, everybody is an airbender now” story line. the only real reason for it that i see is that the narrative needs Zaheer to be a airbender. and i get it, they really need it. i guess you can’t explain why only one guy can now suddenly airbend, so a bunch of other people now can too. so i think my issue is not that opening the portals brought back airbending to the world. is more on the fact that so far the narrative acts like airbending is the essence of being an air nomad. Tenzin has lived his whole life with this HUGE burden, trying to hold the single torch of an entire culture, god knows if he only ditched Lin to be with Pema because Pema could get him kids so he had a chance of passing his blood and bending skills to a next generation.  but this is kind of stupid, man! Tenzin is the only of Aang’s kids who can airbend but Kya and Bumi still carry airbending (and air nomads) genes! Idk how genetics in the avatar world works but i think is not that different from our world. Kya and Bumi’s kids could still be air benders. Kya and Bumi are still half air nomads, in the same way that Tenzin is half air nomad. and in tlok is like the whole air nomad culture is reduced to air bending.

- like, take the water tribes for example. Sokka didn’t bend, his parents and the rest of his family aside from Katara didn’t bend. that didn’t make them less water tribe. being a water tribe was not only about water bending. Toph’s parents couldn’t earthbend either, that didn’t made them less influential citizens of the earth kingdom. Mai’s parents all normal people, still powerful fire nation politicians. each nation had their own culture and that wasn’t reduced to their specific bending. so why it is not the same with the air nomads?

- Aang had being collecting “fans” since one of the first comics (i don’t remember which one). actually, i might say he’s being collecting those fans (that later became the air acolytes) since Kyoshi’s Island episode back in atla s1. and we see in the comics how he had being teaching them the air nomads philosophies and life style. and i understand that bending is important and that air bending is in a brink of extinction but i don’t understand how all these other people (the air acolytes) can’t be considered air nomads. let’s say, i move to australia, learn the local language, eat the local food, have kids and raise them in australia, we all have the same costumes as any other australians, why can’t i be consider australian as well?

- and sure, they are not the “real” air nomads, but i wouldn’t be picky if you are all facing extinction. and to be honest Tenzin is not “real” air nomad either because he is MIXED! he is still half water tribe, he didn’t born out of Aang’s forehead! Tenzin’s kids? All not “real” air nomads either, if we are going to ignore Tenzin if half air nomad, we still need to assume Pema is earth kingdom (or is she fire nation? since her eyes are golden. her eyes are golden, right?) And not only Aang could have had his two other kids be good leaders for the air nomads, could have taught them their history, life style, culture. instead of leaving all the burden on Tenzin’s shoulder. why couldn’t Aang have choose good leaders from the air acolytes? instead all we get from them is stupid servants. Pema included. i refuse to believe that anyone who was ever interested in air nomad culture and seeked Air Temple Island (and whatever other places) were all simpletons who never had any critical thoughts on their heads. they were all taught in air nomad culture and history (we see one of them answering all of Tenzin’s questions) but they are treated as servants. as a matter of fact we see Tenzin treat them as inferiors. and i guess this is the whole non benders issue from s1 back again. 

- (me from the future here: i just watched a video essay on youtube about genetics and bending in the avatar world and they said that is mentioned that all air nomads were air benders, the reason being that they were all more connected to their spiritual side. and OKAY, but i still think that most of my points still stand. if you are breeding sky bisons for a while now and you have a bunch of people willing to connect to their spiritual side and follow air nomad culture and life style, why can’t you have them learn air bending from the original air benders, the sky bisons, again? why did it have to be given for free like that? it’s so reducing! and poor! and if you wanted Zaheer to be able to air bend have him learn from the sky bisons! have him be an air acolyte who took the teachings of a air bender Guru to an extreme)

- idk what to say man. I will admit that all this don't piss me off as much as Suyin's story line, that’s for sure.

- so let's focus on Zaheer pretending to be an innocent new airbender seeking knowledge. He is a natural! And why it is that? Because that's a guy who is interested, who learned, who likes and admires and tries to live by air nomad philosophy. a lot of people critique this season because they thought it was stupid to have this guy who never bended before be so good ans skilled in airbending. and okay sure, but it always made so much sense to me because he is a guy who admires the life and teachings of the air nomads. that’s a guy who studied, and not just studied but lives his life according to those teachings. and that makes him a beautiful foil to Tenzin, who is this nerd bookish man, who is a scholar, who knows the teachings but don’t really live by them. ii don’t want to minimize Tenzin or call him a bad air bender (or air nomad. at this point what’s the difference?). but i love to see this contrast of this guy who struggles every step of the way and this other guy, who is a natural but will never be consider a master. their fight gives me the chills.

- I can't even talk about this because Suyin is getting in the way and this whole story just makes me. 

- i don’t resent her existence. in my head she is Sokka’s child, no one can convince me otherwise. but the way they wrote her is just awful. 

- did she just said that the idea of having an Earth Queen is outdated? While she rules a city of her own? AS THEIR QUEEN? and she's harbouring Varrick! "Sure he made a few mistakes in the past but that doesn't mean he should pay for it the rest of his life" sure let's not address the fact that he is only in her house doing business with her because he has business to do (if Varrick was a poor fellow who committed a crime and escaped prison he for sure wouldn’t have the same treatment. and i’m flabbergasted that Lin didn’t arrested him right there). Let's bring in the maglev and forgive the crimes he committed and lives that were lost because of him. Capitalism don't exist in the world of Avatar. Who da fack wrote this? (Oh this particular episode was Michael Dante DiMartino, so there's that)

- i’m not even gonna talk about the disrespect that this whole story does to Lin. This woman don't deserve this . FOR REAL!

- look, I get it, I agree people shouldn't be paying for mistakes or crimes they committed and have being repenting for 30 years. But the thing is, instead of apologising to Lin for what she did she just says "oh you should get over yourself, it's been 30 years, that's why you're an old bitter lady, no wonder Tenzin broke up with you!" and everyone treats Lin like she’s in the wrong. BITCH WTF!!!!????? (Suyin later apologises but not for the right things, she says “sorry i gave you grief when we were young” and honey, that’s not it!)

- and then Lin is like "cured" having kale juice and wearing those silly Zaofu clothes. Honestly! WHO DA FACK WROTE THIS?

- the fight scenes are all bloody impressive tho. the red lotus knows how to work together and they are all amazing.

- and P'Li? I would die for that woman.

- Ming-hua and Ghazan naming the constellations and coming up with stories about the guards ❤️ Also, 2 out of 3! so which one we think is the wrong one? Of course the unspoken attraction between the two is true. So that leaves us with ‘raised by sister’ and ‘had moustache by age of 10′. Place your bets fellas!

- that thing with the Earth Queen? That thing shook people. We were shooked™️ with the s1 finale and we were unearthed when she died. I still can't hardly believe.

- wait a minute, are you telling me that Tonraq, Korra's father, fought together with Zuko and Sokka and managed to imprison all 4 members of the red lotus but never learned what they were called? You are telling me that Guru Laghima fanboy Zaheer that can't shut up about it never dropped his spiel about caos is the natural order of the world? He never mentioned to every single guard who went to feed him that they are called the red lotus? And that this never reached the ears of Tonraq?

- fuck Zaheer but I'm different

- I find it very homophobic that even uncle Iroh we get to see several times, but Sokka only once in a flashback :(

- this fight with the cloudbabies and the red lotus? I get chills every single time. And Tenzin never stopping? Never giving up? 😭

- let go of your earthly tether, enter the void, empty and become wind.

- did you think that the Earth Queen's death was horrible? I present to you P'Li’s.

- i do love the fight scene at the end. i love and it breaks my heart that Korra fights every single second of it, with the poison and with Zaheer. and in the end she remains broken. 

- i love the moment when Tenzin decides that the new air nomads will be roaming the earth trying to bring balance. even if we can later debate the morality of it, i love that he takes this decision out of his own desire to help. he finds a meaning for his people based on the needs of the world right now and not trough a guideline he learned from his father. i really love Tenzin in that moment, and Jinora’s ceremony may or may not have brought tears to my eyes.

- overall i do love this season, mostly because of Zaheer and the red lotus. the writers made a huge mistake in making Zaheer and his philosophy so hypocritical. the same happened with Amon. in order to make them the villains the writers wrote them so hypocritical that it invalidates what they were fighting for. the non benders and benders issue is still big and present, the story just refuses to talk about it. the tirany and the corruption of the systems of government are still very real and still very there in Korra’s world, but the narrative don’t discuss it, or when it does it gives the most bland simplistic take. I do love Zaheer tho, as a character, and what he represents to air nomads and air benders culture, and the role he plays in Tenzin’s arch (even if it’s in a more covert way). i also think that by the standdars of his philosophy he was justified in trying to it makes sense for him to try and kill Korra, she is somehow a world leader and afterall an authority figure. i do resent that the writers made him a bad anarchist. for all the talk he had of freeing the earth kingdom people of their tiranic ruler he did fail in giving the people the means of taking over the government. you don’t simply dismantle a system by killing a monarch. that is a very simplistic view of anarchism and social revolutions for that matter.

- (little note in the finale, that i just realised now: wasn’t the poison made of platinum or something? a metal metalbenders can’t bend? how come Suyin can just bend it out of Korra’s body? is this going on the list of countless things Suyin can do because she is PeRfEcT ? also, the guy putting the poison in Korra’s body, wasn’t him bending the poison? is he just a nameless dude who miraculously can bend a metal no one else can? or is he a waterbender and was only able to bend the poison on Korra’s body because it’s a liquid? if so, why was it Suyin the one to take the poison out and not Kya, a waterbender AND someone versed in healing bending? make it make sense tlok!!!)

[hachibe]

Thoughts on The Legend of Korra season 2:

- I forgot to say in s1: i appreciate how they used the past avatars bending their elements in the opening. We get to see Kyoshi-earth, Roku-fire, Aang-air and Korra-water. In atla it was so random, we got Pakku-water, some dude for earth (I think it was Roku’s earthbending master, i don’t remember his name), Azula-fire, Aang for air and Roku in the end when Katara starts talking about the Avatar.

- srly! episode one didn’t even started yet and i’m nervous laughing because i remember Mako started dating Korra without ever breaking up with Asami. Maybe he thought that by saying to Asami that he did care for her it would be clear that they were breaking up.

- i need to confess, I LOVE BUMI, i really do. you are not gonna see me say a bad word about him ever.

- i don’t like Korra’s dad. i don’t know/remember why yet. but i’ll elaborate later.

- ok, i think now i know why i don’t like him. everyone in tlok is a remarkable bender. that’s why. Mako and Bolin? they are so good they are fighting in pro-bending matches at the age of 16 (or whatever it was their ages in s1, i think Mako was 18 or something). Korra is a prodigy, bending 3 elements at the age of 3. Tenzin? Masterbender. Lin? Perfect, never done anything wrong in her life. Tenzin’s kids? all good benders. Korra’s dad? Not only he is a great bender (we see him doing more cool stuff as the seasons progresses) he is also the leader of all of the Southern Water Tribe (and he is an immigrant, he isn’t even southern tribe). With the major characters we have here, only Asami and Bumi are non benders and even that don’t last long. While in atla every other character was a non bender (Sokka, Suki, all of the Kyoshi warriors, Jet and all of the freedom fighters, Ty Lee, Mai, the Mechanist and all of the people who where living there with them, Hakoda and Bantou, basically every single character the Gaang met in their travels) and not just that, but we see all of the major characters start small and grow with time. Zuko, even being amazing the way he is, is constantly called a failure and is highly poor skilled in comparison to his sister. He is constantly training to be better. Katara we see struggle through all of season 1. Aang has to learn every single one of the elements , and he is a genius, but we see him train and try to improve himself. Sokka sucks at first but he learns from all types of sources and improves himself with time. The only ones that can never fail are Toph and Azula. What’s my point? Well, idk, my point is, why did Korra’s dad had to be this flawless powerful guy? 

- and hey, this whole rant is not me saying that Korra ruined the avatar legacy or that Korra is a Mary Sue (if anyone is a Mary Sue is Suyin), like a lot of people do. I really don’t believe that. Korra may not struggle with her bending like Aang did but she struggles in every other aspect of being an avatar. And i find it fascinating to see that. I think it was a really clever choice to make her so different of Aang. However, i don’t see how every other character has to be a powerful bender as well.  (me at some point in the end of the season: maybe this is the consequece of the end of the 100 years war. after the fire nation stopped targeting and killing every bender, there was finally room and appropriate enviroment for benders to prosper)

- oh look at me, comparing atla and tlok again

- i had written a whole thing about the cloudbabies and Aang being a shit parent but then i had to reassess my thoughts on it. the way the accusations flow from Kya’s and Bumi’s mouth make it seems like Aang didn’t even look at his older kids. and i can be kind and say that is only because Kya and Bumi are hurt and resentful, they paint the situation a little worst than it actually was. in my mind Aang didn’t straight up neglect his kids, he loved them all, he just made mistakes along his life, bad parenting choices in his eager pursuit of populating the world with airbenders. and i can go on with that, mostly because i really like this story line of Bumi never thinking he was good enough. but i can also admit that this whole story goes well in line with all the other disregards to atla that tlok does, like forgetting about Suki, don’t caring about Katara, making Toph a cop, etc. so  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

- LMAO Mako telling Bolin “just break up with her” WTF!

- I'm only on episode 4 and this season biggest flaw is clearly the lack of Lin Beifong. (me at the end of the season: too little Lin, and the little we saw of her was her being a shit cop)

- ok, so Varrick is the plan guy (coming back here a couple of episodes later: totally forgot Varrick was a villian)

- tears in my eyes with this photo. look at them!!!

- first words out of Lin's mouth this season are "Welcome home Avatar, thanks for starting a war" whsjwjsjsjsjsjsnanshahajahajajajajajsjsjshshs how you do not love this woman?

- was this thing with Bolin and women supposed to be funny? Because, it wasn't funny when I first watched and still isn't funny.

- one thing s2 has for itself is the Wann's episodes ❤️

- interesting to notice that Wann's firebending is very firebending-y. And I mean is clearly Shaolin kung fu style. Zuko and Azula’s style, not Mako’s style.

- thinking again and like, before i thought that one of the biggest flaw of tlok was that Korra never learn, that we never see Korra grow and change and improve herself. She keeps making the same mistakes over and over again. but now idk, i’m starting to think that the narrative just has no mercy for her. it just drops shit after shit over her for the sake of idk grim dark plotlines because that’s all that people know how to write these days. like srly, the girl already has problem learning shit, because she can never listen, so instead of writing a story where she learns and grow from this we cut her connection to her past lives, whom before always were there for their reincarnations and thaught them things. let’s just eliminate that since she hardly ever talks to them anyways! 

- i don’t mean that like “oh look at Korra, the worst avatar ever! she destroyed the avatar legacy blablabla”. But i mean, was it really necessary? did we really need this plotline (matter of fact, this whole season)? what’s the whole message here? that you are not your past lives? that you’re your own person and you can fight on your own? idk maybe. (me after the end of the season: is exactly that) because if the answer is just to pave way for s3 and whatever happens with airbenders i’m gonna call bullshit because that story line is even worst.

- i don’t care for Bolin being turned into a dumbhead but i do love this brotherly friendship he has with Asami, i’m all here for this.

- Asami, still a saint

- I FACKING LOVE Bumi charming the shit out of the spirits by playing music to them. And then destroying the whole camp kind of by accident. This is the Aangiest thing ever. Bumi, in the end, is the most like his father from all of his siblings.

- the music is beautiful tho. and i mean, the soundtrack, not specifically the one Bumi plays to the spirits.

- i don’t understand exactly what happened with Jinora there but i think i’m gonna let this past because is too much to unpack.

 - and i don’t know what to think about leaving the portals to the spirit world opened. like, WHY? it feels a little like, once again, Korra not thinking things through