Avatar: No the other one (Zuko is my boyfriend)

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Sci-Fi Wi-Fi > Avatar: No the other one (Zuko is my boyfriend)

Sanguinia: Jan 1, 2012; ~Everybody wants to be a cat~
~Because a cat's the only cat~
~Who knows where its at~

Having now completed Korra S2, I can say that I am sympathetic to those who find it to be the worst season of anything Avatar on TV. I don't think I've ever seen a season of TV where I felt like almost (this being a key word) every idea on display was a good one, and yet was executed completely terribly until now. It was like a gymnastics routine where every landing was botched.

Except the climatic battle, that was pretty sweet. When Unalaq ripped the Light Spirit out of Kora and starting beating it to death with the past Avatar lives being snuffed out one by one, I got surprisingly emotional about it. An extremely well-done crash down into the lowest point, and the followup of Tenzin relaying the lesson he learned in the fog, Korra embracing the Cosmic Energy complete with magic space road and cosmic sillouette and then doing a Kaiju battle against a foe who was basically Evil Aang At The North Pole x 10 was awesome.

A very few of the ideas on display were just... kind of bad, like shoving Mako briefly hooking back up with Asami into the breakup storyline when it wasn't needed and a bunch more were under-developed, but at the end of the day its the elements that got fully played out in just an awkward and poor way that stand out. Its helpful to know that Korra's development was a total car-crash, because what's on screen LOOKS like it was developed in a car crash. Other than the absolutely amazing animation of course, this show is such a knockout visually even compared to original Avatar.

Its a drat shame, because I honestly believe it would take only a very small amount of script doctoring to turn Korra S2 into the BEST season of the show I'd seen rather than the worst. And now I get to look foreward to Season 3, which I have heard extremely high praise about for years.

Sanguinia fucked around with this message at 02:07 on Jul 3, 2021

# ? Jul 3, 2021 01:35

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# ? Apr 24, 2024 02:08

Sgt. Politeness: Sep 29, 2003; I've seen shit you people wouldn't believe. Cop cars on fire off the shoulder of I-94. I watched search lights glitter in the dark near the Ambassador Bridge. All those moments will be lost in time, like piss in the drain. Time to retch.

Sanguinia posted:

A Its a drat shame, because I honestly believe it would take only a very small amount of script doctoring to turn Korra S2 into the BEST season of the show I'd seen rather than the worst.

I agree and stakeswise it probably should have been the 4th season instead of the 2nd but they really didn't know how long they had.

# ? Jul 3, 2021 02:53

CainFortea: Oct 15, 2004

As much as I dislike season 2, the 2 episodes about how the avatar cycle started are some of the best in Korra.

Also: Buckle up, it basically just gets better from here. The whole "have to fit everything into one season" never goes away, but they handle it a lot better. And who doesn't like Henry Rollins being loving weird?

# ? Jul 3, 2021 08:05

Gravitas Shortfall: Jul 17, 2007; Utility is seven-eighths Proximity.

Season 3 owns, the Red Lotus are like badass inversions of the Aang Gang, and it naturally leads into season 4 since anarchy without a post-collapse plan leads to totalitarian takeover.

Also, the Equalists were right and it's always going to annoy me that their valid concerns were magically solved by electing a non-bending President.

# ? Jul 3, 2021 09:24

Sanguinia: Jan 1, 2012; ~Everybody wants to be a cat~
~Because a cat's the only cat~
~Who knows where its at~

CainFortea posted:

As much as I dislike season 2, the 2 episodes about how the avatar cycle started are some of the best in Korra.

I really liked the art style in those, but the actual story was really not my favorite honestly. The tonal clash between the mythological feel of the setting and events and the hyper "normality," of the characters, their casual modes of speech and whatnot, was a real turnoff, especially for the spirit character. It really felt like it lacked a sense of gravity and alien-ness among the spirit characters that it needed. Its another example of "incredible idea, bad execution," which ran all the way through S2.

Gravitas Shortfall posted:

Also, the Equalists were right and it's always going to annoy me that their valid concerns were magically solved by electing a non-bending President.

Its hard to lament their movement's collapse when they were an astroturfed fascist movement exploiting societal tensions regarding inequity and scapegoating it onto Benders, like some kind of Anti-Bending Tea Party Movement. "Benders have been responsible for every war in history!" and referring to it as an "impurity," were some pretty big yikes.

The show does a pretty effective job of showing us that Amon is full of poo poo. Just the most obvious example, bending doesn't keep Mako and Bolin from living on the streets and needing to fall in with the criminal element of society just to survive until they "get out," through sports. Mako even specifically says that his job with the Triads was numbers. Despite all three gangs using Benders as their main form of muscle and being led by benders, Mako's status as a bender wasn't what made him valuable to them. Bender or non-bender, he was exploited by them because he was vulnerable, and it wasn't because THEY were Benders, it was because they had power over him because they could offer him protection and the means to survive. This is why I like Season 1's writing so much, its surprisingly subtle.

Its fair to say that Benders have unique opportunities in society, and often enjoy positions of privilege as a result, its ground the Avatar series traveled several times. One of my favorites is from one of the comics, where Katara's objections to the industrialization of the Southern Water Tribe leading to a degradation of their unique culture is countered by a non-bender saying that machines can put people on the same footing as Benders, and how meaningful that is to him. Katara lamely counters that she never saw Benders and Non-Benders as unequal, revealing how her own privilege blinds her to this issue, and Sokka doesn't even a miss a beat agreeing with the guy, making it clear that the events of Sokka's Master hardly undid his own problems with being bend-less. Korra S2 also had that excellent scene of Bumi talking to Aang's statue, expressing the angst he's carried his entire life that his dad hoped he'd be an Air Bender and he wasn't, resulting in a life-long complex that drove him to become a Military General, but also kind of a bitter showboat who's constantly out to prove his own worth to himself.

That being said, being a bender clearly does not guarantee you elite status, wealth or power regardless of what doors it might open for you in theory. I mean, heck, some of the first Earthbenders we see in Ba Sing Se in the original series were schlubs pushing the rock train, which the main characters were riding to see the Earth King, who was not a Bender and yet was (at least theoretically) the most powerful monarch in the entire Earth Kingdom, if not the world. Now that I think about it, we never see the Chief of the Northern Water Tribe bend either, and Yue certainly wasn't a Bender, and Hakota wasn't a bender despite being High Chief of the Southern tribes! The Fire Lords all being Benders is the exception, and even the Fire Nation there are powerful non-bending political figures like Mai's family.

What unique opportunity does Mako's bending provide him in Season 1? Clearly being a Pro Bending athlete isn't making him rich even though its making the league owner rich (who might be a bender but just as easily might not be considering every Captain Of Industry we see in the show is not one). He's living hand-to-mouth and can't even afford to pay into the tournament pot. The only thing Mako gets out of his bending in Season 1 is the opportunity to sell his labor to an electric plant for scratch wages. Truly, an oppressor born and bred who must be cleansed so the pretty posh-looking rally attendees can be sure that nobody is Taking Our Jobs.

# ? Jul 3, 2021 10:52

Gravitas Shortfall: Jul 17, 2007; Utility is seven-eighths Proximity.

"having privilege doesn't stop you from being poor" isn't the argument you think it is, though this is a show about magic kung fu so it's best not to examine it too hard.

# ? Jul 3, 2021 11:13

Sanguinia: Jan 1, 2012; ~Everybody wants to be a cat~
~Because a cat's the only cat~
~Who knows where its at~

Gravitas Shortfall posted:

"having privilege doesn't stop you from being poor" isn't the argument you think it is, though this is a show about magic kung fu so it's best not to examine it too hard.

I think you'll find what I actually said was "Having privilege based on birth doesn't stop you from being exploited in a society which is rife with inequities, such as societies based on feudalism, colonialism or capitalism, and arguing that being part of that group inherently makes you an exploiter regardless of your actual socio-economic status in the hierarchy and then Otherizing that group is indeed fascism and should be opposed." You know, a riff on some of the core themes of both series.

# ? Jul 3, 2021 11:26

Ghost Leviathan: Mar 2, 2017; Exploration is ill-advised.

You can ask some folks from India about privilege via social caste and how that works out in the long run, especially in a capitalist society; as my old history teacher summarised to me, there's plenty of poor Brahmins. (though there's a lot more going on there to say the least)

A huge missed opportunity might be Benders who join the Equalists; the abovementioned Earthbender who'd rather make watches, or a lightningbender who's sick of being seen as basically a generator on legs. Or if the setting is closer to the war, maybe veterans like the deserter who've come to hate their own abilities for how they've been used as weapons.

# ? Jul 3, 2021 14:24

SlothfulCobra: Mar 27, 2011

The Equalists borrow heavily from real-world ideological rhetoric, but that borrowing isn't really well thought out, and I think the general implication is that their general grievance isn't valid, although that's neither confirmed or denied. The social implications of bending aren't really demonstrated in the show, although Henry Ford being one of the lead non-benders raging against benders such as the orphan street rats Mako and Bolin seems to imply that the Equalist grievances aren't actually tied to any real-world social institutions.

The only bender who gets special status because of his bending is Tenzin, although that's just as much because he is the last inheritor of an entire race/culture/geopolitical state/religion, and if he and his family kick the bucket that completes Firelord Azulon's genocide. (Aang apparently deemed his non-airbender kids to not be worthy of being raised in the air nomad ways, so they don't really count) There are bender gangs for a couple minutes of the show's runtime, but if you blink, you'll miss them. And of course, in the real world, street gangs can also be easily composed of minorities that are generally in an oppressed position in society.

# ? Jul 3, 2021 17:45

Sanguinia: Jan 1, 2012; ~Everybody wants to be a cat~
~Because a cat's the only cat~
~Who knows where its at~

SlothfulCobra posted:

The Equalists borrow heavily from real-world ideological rhetoric, but that borrowing isn't really well thought out, and I think the general implication is that their general grievance isn't valid, although that's neither confirmed or denied. The social implications of bending aren't really demonstrated in the show, although Henry Ford being one of the lead non-benders raging against benders such as the orphan street rats Mako and Bolin seems to imply that the Equalist grievances aren't actually tied to any real-world social institutions.

On the contrary, I think the Equalists rhetoric borrowing was really carefully thought out. Portraying a violent reactionary autocratic political movement focused around Otherizing a minority, even a super-powered minority, as wrapping itself in a cloak of making a more fair and just society and using a combination of inaccurate framing of facts and outright lies about that minority to inflame prejudices was extremely on point in terms of both historical and modern parallels.

Like, you mention the Bender Gangs, and there's a really good reason that Amon makes them the first targets when he decides to start openly employing violence. They're the Benders that most further his narrative of what Benders are, those who are wealthy and powerful only because of their bending an using it to exploit non-benders, and are most despised by the city's populace because of their criminal victimization of their communities. Then he escalates to the Pro Bending Champs who very publicly cheat to win their championship, and gives a speech about how their behavior is typical of ALL benders when we, the audience, know its not. And finally he moves on to the Ruling Council who CURRENTLY happens to be All Benders, but that the show goes out of its way to show us at least once in history included Sokka, a non-bender.

First they came for the Bending Gangsters...

The show could have done a BETTER job of both giving some creedence to Amon and his movement maybe having a point, as it could have done a better job of showing that no, that apparent point is an illusion conjured by a strongman bending the truth, but that's largely because Season 1 should have been 5 episodes longer and had slower pacing.

# ? Jul 3, 2021 18:59

Gravitas Shortfall: Jul 17, 2007; Utility is seven-eighths Proximity.

Mako and Bolin are only able to live the life they do because of their bending. It affords them multiple direct ways out of poverty (pro sports and organised crime) as well as guaranteed steady income (power generation). If they were non benders they'd be much worse off. Also, while there are probably non-benders on the police force, we never see any, and it's implied that the elite of the force are all metal benders. The police chief is the daughter of the woman who invented it (imagine how that looks to the average citizen). Just because there are non-benders with financial power doesn't mean that benders aren't a privileged class.

# ? Jul 3, 2021 19:34

SlothfulCobra: Mar 27, 2011

Benders cheating other benders isn't indicative of benders cheating nonbenders. Bending gangsters does not imply that benders are the dominant faction of society any more than italian or hispanic or black gangs would imply those ethnic groups are dominant in those cities. I also don't think there's even any indication of bending gangsters targeting supposedly defenseless nonbenders. Chi-blocking is already apparently common, and anyone can be trained to be able to defend themselves.

And probably more importantly, if there was any real importance to Amon's claims, they wouldn't be dropped like a bad habit after his season. If that was such an important issue, it wouldn't just dissolve after the writers ran out of ideas. When season 2 rolls around, you have a nonbender character as some kind of ex-high-ranking military officer and then another big businessman who isn't a bender. The original Last Airbender might've been occasionally aware that Sokka didn't have as much to work with in the fighting scenes as the bending cast, but there was no conscious indication that he had any kind of lesser social status (and in fact, he was often higher status from being the planner, and even before he came into his own, he was the oldest man in the village and the son of the warleader), and there's no real indicators in Legend of Korra that nonbenders are in any sort of worse overall societal position.

# ? Jul 3, 2021 19:47

OutsideAngel: May 4, 2008

The named Equalists are only in it for purely personal reasons instead of being driven by material circumstances or even ideology, yet there are also somehow hundreds of faceless goons absolutely willing to kill and die for the cause who do a complete 180 the moment they learn their leader is also a bender, and its never addressed who these people are and what they want and why they're willing to go to such extremes.

Also lol their little snorkel top helmets look so loving stupid.

# ? Jul 3, 2021 19:59

Sanguinia: Jan 1, 2012; ~Everybody wants to be a cat~
~Because a cat's the only cat~
~Who knows where its at~

Gravitas Shortfall posted:

Mako and Bolin are only able to live the life they do because of their bending. It affords them multiple direct ways out of poverty (pro sports and organised crime) as well as guaranteed steady income (power generation). If they were non benders they'd be much worse off.

Again, Mako tells us directly that he wasn't a bending enforcers for the Triads, he was a book keeper. And Pro Sports does not take him out of poverty, if anything it become a poverty trap for him since all his wages go directly to training facilities, equipment, fees, etc, leaving him with almost nothing. As for the guaranteed steady income that he can access only because he's a Lightning Bender, not every Firebender can Lightning Bend just like not every Earthbender can Metalbend, which means you can't apply his privilege to all benders in general in this analysis and doing so is a dishonest analysis. Which is what Amon is all about after all.

Not to mention that in Season 2 Bolin's bending affords him jack squat in terms of financial or social status as his Pro Bending team falls off the rails without Korra and Mako, and when he does rise into the rarified air its because of acting, for which his bending is irrelevant.

Sanguinia fucked around with this message at 20:14 on Jul 3, 2021

# ? Jul 3, 2021 20:10

ONE YEAR LATER: Apr 13, 2004; Fry old buddy, it's me, Bender!; Oven Wrangler

There is a new podcast about Avatar cohosted by Janet Varney and Dante Basco called Avatar Braving the Elements. I know Nickelodeon just established a whole studio dedicated to producing Avatar content so I expect the podcast to eventually start breaking news about upcoming projects so it's pretty cool to be an Avatar fan after 16 years and have things to anticipate.

# ? Jul 4, 2021 02:04

indigi: Jul 20, 2004; ^{how can we not talk about family

when family's all that we got?}

the liberalism is strong in this thread

# ? Jul 4, 2021 05:47

Ghost Leviathan: Mar 2, 2017; Exploration is ill-advised.

It really comes down to how they didn't think through the Equalists very much aside from being a poor imitation of X-Men villains. And goes pretty well with that they ultimately couldn't think it through without ending up with critiques of capitalism; yeah, if a random segment of the population has reliable superpowers, of course capital is going to use them as resources and enforcers, including against people who don't have those powers.

# ? Jul 4, 2021 09:49

Sanguinia: Jan 1, 2012; ~Everybody wants to be a cat~
~Because a cat's the only cat~
~Who knows where its at~

Ghost Leviathan posted:

It really comes down to how they didn't think through the Equalists very much aside from being a poor imitation of X-Men villains. And goes pretty well with that they ultimately couldn't think it through without ending up with critiques of capitalism; yeah, if a random segment of the population has reliable superpowers, of course capital is going to use them as resources and enforcers, including against people who don't have those powers.

I just don't see how the writers failed to "think through," the Equalists. Showing that Republic City is beset by economic inequity leading to stark class differences, widespread organized crime and aggressive militarized policing is literally the first thing the show does. In that environment Amon and his followers then take leftist-sounding rhetoric and more or less do a find-replace of "banker," and "bender," so they can harness societal tensions over that inequity to destroy a group they hate and/or seize political power by force under the guise of fixing it.

I'll grant that the show doesn't turn around and then say "The underlying issues that the anti-benders were upset about were real but the culprit was Capitalism and not Benders," and in fact doesn't even IMPLY that given that the return of the prior status quo from before the Equalists acted, homeless people eating dumpster gruel and all, is considered a victory even by those very homeless people. The story simply delegitimizes the anti-bender sentiment and leaves its connection to class struggle unaddressed.

But I don't think I agree that qualifies as not thinking the Equalists through. It simply qualifies at the show not giving legitimacy to a fascist villain by spotlighting the grains of truth his movement incorporated to help sell itself, especially since a core part of the villain's identity is not even believing his own stated ideology and the entire thing being a scam to get reactionary people to help him take power through faux populism.

...I'm just gonna say it, Amon is Trump. Korra predicted the future in 2012. Good on it.

# ? Jul 4, 2021 10:59

CainFortea: Oct 15, 2004

Sanguinia posted:

...I'm just gonna say it, Amon is Trump. Korra predicted the future in 2012. Good on it.

Amon is far too competent for that comparison.

# ? Jul 4, 2021 15:20

Ghost Leviathan: Mar 2, 2017; Exploration is ill-advised.

Also, the actual fascist villain is by far the one the show humanises the most, Amon just becomes yet another supervillain who uses leftist rhetoric and is revealed to be a hollow hypocrite whose rhetoric is instantly abandoned and never thought of again once the protector of the status quo beats them up.

# ? Jul 4, 2021 15:40

grassy gnoll: Aug 27, 2006; The pawsting business is tough work.

I dunno, I don�t feel they did a very good job with humanizing Lin.

# ? Jul 4, 2021 21:47

Irony Be My Shield: Jul 29, 2012

Regardless of what message the show was trying to convey I didn't find the political allegory villains in Korra very compelling. I preferred the more character-driven approach that TLA took.

# ? Jul 4, 2021 23:09

Mameluke: Aug 2, 2013; by Fluffdaddy

Ghost Leviathan posted:

Also, the actual fascist villain is by far the one the show humanises the most, Amon just becomes yet another supervillain who uses leftist rhetoric and is revealed to be a hollow hypocrite whose rhetoric is instantly abandoned and never thought of again once the protector of the status quo beats them up.

yeah, i hated rich get-out-of-jail-free Varrick too

# ? Jul 5, 2021 02:30

AlternateNu: May 5, 2005; ドーナツダメ！

Ghost Leviathan posted:

Also, the actual fascist villain is by far the one the show humanises the most, Amon just becomes yet another supervillain who uses leftist rhetoric and is revealed to be a hollow hypocrite whose rhetoric is instantly abandoned and never thought of again once the protector of the status quo beats them up.

Zaheer wasn't a fascist. :raise:

# ? Jul 5, 2021 12:58

CainFortea: Oct 15, 2004

AlternateNu posted:

Zaheer wasn't a fascist.

Well, his rhetoric isn't abandoned.

# ? Jul 5, 2021 13:22

Edgar Allen Ho: Apr 3, 2017; by sebmojo

I can't stand the sparky sparky boom eye, man or lady, so Zaheer had to go down for letting that abomination be his girlfriend

Yes, I'm racist against weird third eyes and I'm not sorry.

# ? Jul 5, 2021 14:11

McCloud: Oct 27, 2005

Korra is peak centrist libbrain philosophy, but by far the biggest crime was making Toph a cop.

# ? Jul 6, 2021 02:32

Horizon Burning: Oct 23, 2019

i loved avatar and i've just run through korra season 1, and amon certainly made enough of an impression that they could've easily done more than one season about him and his movement. by the end of season 1, i was wondering all sorts of questions about benders, non-benders, demographics, classes, castes, and all the stuff that people have been talking about. i feel like the show was using a lot of shorthand (our cast are all benders -> benders good -> amon bad) when i wanted more detail. i love korra as a character though and i find her status as the opposite of aang very interesting. i feel like the show could easily have done more with the idea of this divine chosen one needing to intervene in this structural issues of capital and class and caste and everything, but given that nickelodeon didn't seem keen on her and asami or whatever, it's entirely possible that it was just a pipe dream.

general iroh being voiced by dante basco was insanely distracting, though.

# ? Jul 20, 2021 07:47