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Its not korra false but the writer, from dc marvel superhero, james bond, star wars, anime etc they continue with the character only change the actor that played it
Believing the that Aang is some sort of "Avatar archetype" is stupid, since in AtLA, we saw the four Avatars that came before Aang (Roku, Kyoshi, Kuruk, and Yangchen), and all had different personalities. Creating a clone of Aang wouldn't make even sense by the laws of the mythos, much less the laws of general storytelling. To borrow from other epics, Dick Grayson Batman (Grant Morrison's run) is not the same as Bruce Wayne Batman, and Wally West Flash is not the same as Barry Allen Flash.
@@naomi7918 The importance of the Avatar definitely dimnished in Korra's time and I would argue that she will probably be that last Avatar of true importance. I think it kinda reflects how the monarchies in Europe lost their importance or or were even wiped out in some cases. You see it now with the Earth Kingdom transitioning into a democracy, Republic city already is democratic, how long will it take until Fire Nation and Water Tribes will follow suit, when elected officialls call the shots how many are really going to listen to someone born into power?
@@naomi7918 Korra made a difference wherever she went and whoever she faced, true. The difference between Aang and Korra is that he was the last hope of his world, a lot of people have died in the senseless violence of war, and their only hope was Aang. Korra's era is different, she was indeed needed, especially with the menace of Zaheer and the Red Lotus, but her journey is not preparing a super-powerful warrior to face this bad guy. Her journey is to make her learn how to approach every situation, making her gain wisdom, so much wisdom that she went to Zaheer to help her overcome her spiritual block. She couldn't resolve the civil war issues between North and South but she could stop Vaatu
I don’t agree that Aang was a deadbeat dad. That term is woefully abused as is. He was training Tenzin but didn’t realize how left out Bumi and Kya felt about it. He was a good dad but not a perfect one.
@@kennethsatria6607 And also he's a human being, and human beings make mistake. Sometimes parents make some really dumb shit even though they deeply care about their children.
the real truth is, our information about EVERYTHING he did in the course of his parentage is woefully lacking. We know TWO major details, which are more an overarching trend.....that he was busy helping Zuko (and the world) transition the war torn Earth Kingdom into the place we see by LOK, and that he gave Tenzin extra attention with regards to teaching him about Air Nomad culture (bending included). All three kids turned out pretty amazing, honestly. Katara never expresses any poor sentiments about the man. The existence of this information gets stretched in the heads of fans to some negative extreme, when really it's just a commentary on normal family dynamics with multiple children. All the children get love and care, but some get more attention for various reasons or have some resentment about some roles in the family. Probably the biggest foil to the "deadbeat dad" term is the conclusion they all come to by the end of the episode that explains much of this. Katara gives Kya that photo to take with her and share with her brothers, and they all agree they had a happy family. And Katara is also a part of this conclusion because she GIVES Kya the photo for this express purpose! Deadbeat dad....jesus. Do you know what deadbeat dads are LIKE? How their children are and how bitter they are about their fathers?! They're horrible! Good for nothing! They're not heroes....who try to instill as much into their children as possible before their untimely demise! Here's the crazy part....I bet Aang suspected he'd die young. We know, in the lore, that his time in the iceberg stretched his life thin. You don't just come into your 40s and not sense some impending biological issue....the man was in peak physical, mental and spiritual condition....as the Avatar, he must have known he wouldn't be around for a full lifetime as he got older. Sounds like he tried to cram as much fathering as he could into his remaining years WHILE ALSO trying to guide and police the world. Not really deadbeat dad material.....
@@no1guy825 Agree Aang is not a deadbeat dad, When I think of dead beat dad I think more of people like Ozai, actually Ozai is probably worse than a deadbeat dad, he is straight up abusive.
@@no1guy825 Absolutely true. I think I can count myself among the children that got less attention from their parents because my brother simply needed it more than me. I never resented my parents for it and I'd never call them bad parents for it. They admitted to spending less time with me and talked to me about it. It never bothered me much, but it did feel good to have the difference in attention acknowledged. It was never about calling Aang out for his behaviour, it was about making Tenzin aware that he was favored as a kid and therefore had a different childhood than Bumi and Kaya. There was nothing resentful about it, just a difference in perspective.
Always felt Korra was too rushed. The whole thing with Amon was such an interesting idea, not just the Bender vs Non-Bender thing but the idea that the world was so out of balance the Spirits themselves bestowed on Amon the ability to take bending away. There was a lot that could've been done with that.
The reason it was rushed is because the creators didn’t know they were gonna make another season. The producers told them that each season was the last so the creators had to wrap everything up by the end of each season. They couldn’t plan for several seasons because they didn’t think they’d have another season
@@goodgaminggirl_2861 I'm aware of that but even so, its kind of ridiculous the creators didn't think that hey, maybe the sequel to the biggest animated show in history would probably be popular enough to merit multiple seasons. They should've just knuckled down and said how long they needed the story to be to tell it properly and Nick probably would've complied.
@@thefanwithoutaface8105 really, they fought hard to even get one season. Nick kept telling them they would only give 1 season, so they had to rush the storylines of each season
@@thefanwithoutaface8105 who knows man. The creators had to make each season feel like they did because Nick never approved more than one season at a time. It was an unfortunate situation and had Nick approved more than one season at first, Korra might have felt more complete.
What makes both shows so good is that Aang was a pacifist in a world that needed a fearless warrior and Korra was a fighter in a world that needed diplomats
I didn't really have an issue with Korra being so different from Aang. Each Avatar is different from eachother. For example Yangchen vs Aang. While both are air nomads who were raised to be more peaceful and pacifist she was more comfortable becoming violent. Not only recommending Aang kill the fire lord but, according to her wiki, "Yangchen was feared for her fierce willingness to do whatever was required to maintain balance and peace throughout the world in her duty as the Avatar".
I don’t have a problem with how different Korra was from Aang. I personally actually LOVE that she was so different from him. And I actually think most people don’t have a problem with that, they just can’t properly articulate what they didn’t like about her. The problem is she’s a person who always wants to punch her way through her problems and always gets away with it because it either works, or she pouts and gets rescued by someone else. She never actually learns how to do things differently, how to be more clever, to think outside the box, to utilize the tools and people around her or delegate properly. She never seems to actually learn from the plethora of mistakes she makes and wallows about in self-pity and trauma. I personally believe to some extent, this is the true quality in Korra that most people who either don’t like her or the show, dislike.
@@apmanda Well said! It definitely would have helped her character if she learned from her mistakes and tried different methods to improve her strategies.
@@apmanda perfectly put, i hated Korra because she was basically a child throwing a tantrum throughout, and as you said never seems to learn even by the end of the show. It felt very unsatisfying but also much less realistic as Aang had to grow up and face reality in the original show, but Korra kind of just lives in ignorance the whole show.
@@danycashking I mean, Korra was Rapunzel'd and taught absolutely nothing but fighting, of course she's going to come out as a feisty meathead, but I agree it was annoying regardless since that was never treated as her flaw, she was just 'quirky.' Also, nobody ever called out the White Lotus (or Tonraq) on it either. If anything, they disappeared from the show completely after Korra ran away.
Season 3 of Korra is precisely my favorite because of the juxtaposition of happiness and sorrow that you mention. Korra goes from cocky and wanting to confront the Red Lotus to mentally destroyed and traumatized. Meanwhile, you have the Air Nation going from a ragtag group bound by tradition to moving beyond its historical roots to acknowledge a younger prodigy. It's a beautiful moment.
@@mites7 season 4 is pretty neat tbh, there is not as many bad things as season 2, only bad thing for me is that the writters weren't trying to do something new or interesting as an end game.
I mean, the Air Nomads being a more traditionalist group makes sense, and of the 4 nations, I'd have expected them to of course remain at least close to their roots, even if not the same as it was. I feel everything that happened to the Air Benders was too quick. From the restoration of their people to the sudden switch and change of their traditionalism. I mean, for one it's clear that Tenzin just needed another teacher for the Air Benders other than just himself, hence Jinora's sudden ascension. But for them to basically just lessen the affect of Genocide by just randomly allowing Air Bending to come back the way it did and so nonchalantly was... I dunno, all too sudden.
@@mites7 Yeah, with a few tweaks season 3 could have been a good place to end the show. Here’s a crazy idea, what if Korra found out about Zaheer’s plan to end the avatar cycle before she turned herself in? Seeing her grapple with wether preserving the avatar cycle is more important than saving the air nation could have been very interesting. And having her be a little more accepting of Tenzin telling her they’ll take care of things without her now that she’s injured would be an admission that maybe the world doesn’t need to revolve around the avatar as much as she thought. As long as you guys will be okay, then I’ll be okay too Korra can say.
Another subversion I enjoyed: Aang's journey goes as follows: He must face the real word (violence and use of such, responsibility, etc), but, truthfully, he isn't ready and doesn't want to. The rest of his journey is going through a legendary adventure that seems as though just that: a legend. We see these two moods and story telling formats: reality vs fiction (all fiction, but I mean that in terms of the sort of trope-heavy good vs evil type things with happy endings. Again, not without sorrow. Not undermining Aang, just giving contrast). Aang finally wins a happy ending by facing reality and finds himself happy in reality as well: enjoying life and the mundane responsibility and everyday worries of love and politics and parenthood. Korra's story goes the opposite direction: She starts off wanting to be a hero, wanting to be in a sort of story with insurmountable odds, but odds that she can at least fight against. Instead, she mus journey through harsh reality and trauma. She loses often, victory is hard won, and she makes mistake after mistake. The errors of the past are brought to front and center. Things are hardly ever fair. No villain simply is just bad. She earns her happy ending by not fighting for it, but through acceptance for circumstance and compassion won through trauma. Her ending is magical and fantastical: going to the spirit world, quite literally a magical place, hand-in-hand with the one she loves. As you can tell, that video made me think. A lot.
Perfectly stated. Whenever I think of LoK, I think of her last conversation with Tenzin which I think touches on the foundation of her entire journey. She says she knows she was in a dark place but knew why she had to go through that. She continues, ""I Needed To Understand What Real Suffering Was, So I Could Become More Compassionate To Others Even To People Like Kuvira." This journey isn't as dramatic as Aangs and I think that's why some people find her a bit distasteful. She was flawed and boastful at the start with grandiose ideas towards herself. She basically had to be broken down and built up to become the Avatar the world needed
I disagree with the ‘no villain is simply just bad’. The villain from the second season is literally just a power hungry maniac who wants to cover the world in 10,000 years of darkness. Zaheer is a madman whose only goal is bringing chaos to the world because he believes it will make people free, even though that involves just killing people in power, and obviously results in people getting killed and robbed in the resulting chaos. Kuvira starts with sympathetic goals and is actually a good villain imo, but then it switches to taking over the world in a giant mech suit and blowing up cities with a laser cannon. I think those all count as objectively bad people.
I agree to an extent but in LOK they give her an out in each one. They all go from having a decent cause or morals to just straight up pure evil so she never must truly confront the moral dilemma. And in the case of the first one he Ahman just ends up being a charlatan and runs away.
As much as I love korra and all the amazing things that happened in the show I will never get over the fact that she lost her connection to all previous avatars, having the knowledge and experience of the past avatars, that’s what made the avatar so powerful in the first place.. I can only wonder how powerful the next avatar will be if there will be any.
yeah, that's one scene i can never watch again, watching season two was already painful enough. the first time i watched that scene i felt numb. i couldn't believe my eyes.
Personally I think that moment was a good (but painful) moment particularly because it happened to Korra. That scene made sense in LOK because the main theme of the series is Change and the trauma that comes with it, a time to deconstruct the past. It’s no wonder that in that period of time we see unparalleled technological progress, the rise, civil war and independence of a city state, rise and independence of the southern water nation, rebirth of the isolationist air nomads as a interventionist air nation, the fall of the earth kingdom and reconnection to the spirit world. Imo it just wouldn’t make sense thematically for Korra to check on people whose world barely change from one to the next when Korea’s world looks nothing like it did a year ago and next year won’t look anything like the current one. It’s a shame that it happened in a terrible season, if they had known from the start that they would be doing 4 seasons they probably would have built up to it a lot better.
Yeah I dislike what they did with the avatar cycle, I feel by dropping the previous avatars you abandon the imagery or themes of building off what came before. Maybe it's the whole going against the hero's journey thing but they seemed to tear down the mystery and complexity of the spirit world in LOK and I feel that cheapens the experience in ways
Wasn't the whole point of the show that the powers of the Avatar isn't their true strength? That the most important part of the Avatar isn't their bending, their spiritual abilities, or how desired they are by the public? Besides I'm sure the next Avatar will be able to contact Korra, which they usually talk to the previous avatar the most anyway so it won't be too much of a difference.
The idea that Aang was a "deadbeat dad" is a bit strange to be upset about when he was THE AVATAR. I don't think it is an understatement to say that most Avatars are doomed to a life torn between their duties to the world and their personal needs and wants, and Aang has always been the type of person to put the world above his own personal goals. The only time he has ever put his personal needs and wants above the world is when he had to let go of his love for Katara to willingly control the Avatar state, and Katara ended up being the love of his life. It's not surprising he neglected his family to do the things the Avatar is rather unrealistically expected to do, especially since he has trauma related to him abandoning the world after being frozen for a century and assumed dead after that.
@FanOf Dueling The fact Aang, with all his responsabilities (that were FORCED into him and he had no said in the matter) as the Avatar, in a post-war world and trauma (Including being the only survivor of a genocide), still had time for his family shows he did care a lot, but sadly "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few". He may have not been the perfect father, but calling him a "deadbeat dad" is not only wrong but also insulting
Aang put himself over the world alot actually 1. He ran away when he found out he was the avatar 2. He refused to kill ozai even though he needed too (that worked out well) 3. He kept the fact he was the avatar secret and got the watertribe village attacked.
The fact is shown that aang was different from a lot of the avatars simply due to the fact that he still found ways to cover his own personal needs. He stuck to his air nomad traditions He didnt deteach himself from his love for katara He didnt kill ozai even though the only thing stopping him was his own beliefs and it technically but the world at risk
Korra doesnt exist to me, they made every ATLA character a terrible parent just so thwey could have something to write about, such a cheap useless show@@LtAlguien
I've always cherished this scene. Only scene in avatar to make me teary every time. Korra's reaction to the amazing things happening around her after recently beginning one of her hardest trials ever is so touching
I think with a few tweaks this would have been a good place to end the show. like instead of Korra being as heartbroken about her situation as she was she also would feel a sense of relief knowing that everyone is gonna be find because of her. She could even say something like as long as you guys will be okay then I’ll be okay too. It would give a sense that Korra is learning to compartmentalize her need to be needed as the avatar.
@@jdsjigglypuff9419 Yeah, because by the end of the show I don’t know for sure if Korra would better handle being in a situation where everything carries on without her should something like that ever happen again. Would she still be as hung up about not being needed?
@@jdsjigglypuff9419 Also, here’s something else to chew on. What if Korra discovered ahead of time Zaheer’s plan to end the avatar cycle? The weight of wether or not to turn herself in would be way more monumental because now it’s between future generations of avatars or the new fledgling air nation. Which is more important? I can’t really decide myself.
I would not say a father showing some favoritism is the same as being a deadbeat lol, I also feel Aang's faults as a parent are sometimes not considered with full context for his motivations, while a person is ultimately responsible for their actions I think it's worth acknowledging Aang's extenuating circumstances as the last airbender especially after already having two non-airbender children and katara ain't getting any younger. It's not that surprising that when the last child Aang is probably ever going to have finally ends up being an airbender that Aang would get tunnel vision on teaching Tenzin everything he can because he's also not going to live forever and once he goes that's it, there's literally no one left of the original airbenders the genocide committed by sozin is basically complete once Aang dies so it makes sense he would want to pass the torch in as complete and thorough a way as possible with his one airbending child. Is that fair to Kya and Bumi? no, of course not, but I think there's way more nuance considering he is literally the last of an extinct group of people, he literally has his entire culture resting on his shoulders and only has so much time to ensure the world remembers his people and their culture. I mean it's literally generational trauma, without the air nomad genocide Aang probably had the capacity to be an amazing father to ALL of his children, regardless of whether they were benders or not or what kind of benders they were.
I don't think it's understandable at all because to teach Tenzin what he needs to know never meant they couldn't take Boomi and Kaya with them along the way. being an air nomad is much more than airbending, it's culture and a mindset. but aang just ditched his kids and left them while he only took Tenzin
@@Sarah001994 my interpretation of it has never been Kya and Bumi were literally doing nothing, I mean different family members have different obligations, Kya clearly spent time learning waterbending from katara or someone else too and Bumi surely had his own things going on. Have you ever tried to plan a trip around other people's schedule's? I would imagine just having to worry about tenzin makes things easier, so I always interpreted it as more Aang was kind of impatient and over eager to teach Tenzin, he wouldn't have wanted to wait until it was convenient for everyone else. If the intended interpretation though is that Kya and Bumi were both freely available and willing to go on these trips at the time then honestly I think that's just terrible writing on a similar tier as the last season of GoT. That just seems so incredibly out of character to the point that it literally breaks my immersion and just makes me think the writers are terrible.
@@Sarah001994 Also Bumi could have become an air acolyte essentially but it seems for the most part even in mixed bending families people stick with the culture of what type of bending they have, I mean mako and bolin both dress like firebenders and earthbenders respectively, kya and tenzin dress like waterbenders and airbenders respectively. Bending seems to be a significant enough cultural marker, that being one type of bender precludes you from being anything else, and part of it comes down to the naming of the nations and how culturally significant bending is to each one. Airbending in particular was a significant part of being an air nomad, moreso than being an earth bender is important to being an earth kingdom citizen. Like you just aren't going to have an air nomad monk who's a waterbender, or someone who is culturally from the water tribe just randomly be an earthbender. Even Kyoshi's mother who was an airbender ended up having her bending weakened just by abandoning the air nomad teachings. So bending is pretty deeply tied to culture and the main examples we see of people adopting different cultures are either nonbenders, or if they are benders we even see their bending weaken as a result.
My big issue with Korra was that each season felt like it was beginning to touch on some interesting ideas, but those ideas don't really get followed through. I really liked season 1 for the way it introduced Korra as a character and how it developed the world into a modern setting that still felt like it made sense. The discovery of metal bending by Toph in TLA single handedly makes the stark leap from the very "old" world of TLA to the distinctly modern one in Korra feel natural and like it makes sense. The Equalists are a really interesting group of villains to lead into the new show with, and they start a pattern of each season throwing into doubt the role of the avatar in this new world. My big issue with this is that each season asks a different question of what the avatar is supposed to be, none of which feel necessarily connected to the last philosophically. The spirit world stuff in season 2 is kind of interesting but I found this season to be by far the weakest both narratively and in terms of tone. The final battle of a giant glowing Korra against a giant glowing Unalaq felt more akin to the climax of a Dragon Ball Z arc than it did a battle between an avatar and her evil foil. Every other avatar being effectively destroyed by Vaatu also didn't sit well with me. I appreciate the concept of "out with the old, in with the new" which as you cover in this video via Tenzin, but connecting to past lives is a core tenet to the concept of the avatar. Getting rid of all those past lives just kind of unilaterally and unceremoniously I don't think does anything for the story, and I think we subsequently miss out on what could have been insightful interactions between Korra who for all intents and purposes is the first "modern" avatar. Aang helped usher in this new world, but Korra was the first to exist in it and be moulded by it, and have her role as the avatar questioned both directly by people and indirectly by circumstance. Seeing the spirits and the two primordial forces behind why the avatar is so powerful, was kind of cool, but it definitely de-mystified the concept (which isn't necessarily a bad thing). Zaheer in the follow up season was sort of cool even though some of his ideals and speeches were reminiscent of some 4chan threads. His idea that disorder is order is a little infantile and the kind of thing you might stumble upon and think is deep in high school, but the avatar being the ultimate figurehead of established order and being the final obstacle to what he would describe as his ideal world is interesting, although it once again brings yet another question about what the role of the avatar in this new world is. Asking these questions isn't inherently a problem, but each season following a different thread I think makes it feel jumbled. All of the story beats could have been mostly the same, but the motives of the different antagonists could have been changed to all be more in line with each other or more directly connected which would feel more impactful over time as Korra continues to see the same themes popping up from each of these seemingly unconnected antagonists. A lot of the show seems to be focused around Korra's own doubts about her ability to be an effective avatar and her ability, when I think a very similar and more poignant focus could have been her doubting the role of the avatar at all.
A lot of the political themes and reading were “guy who remembers reading it in a textbook years ago” tbh. Anarchism is a lot more complex than “rules bad” and they butchered communism worse than McCarthy lol
Legend of Korra creators were only allowed to work on one season at a time. They thought that each season was the last season until the producers told them to do another. That’s why it’s so choppy
The only real problem I personally have with The Legend of Korra, is how they butchered the spirits. In AtLA the spirits were strange, sometimes creepy looking beings, and like Ko (or Co) that 'play' according to their rules no matter what with motives unbeknownst to "mere humans". Ko could've easily forced Aang into making an expression by poking/attacking him, and yet left it all to Aang himself. Why? We don't know. Those are his strange, possibly unknowable motives. In Korra, the spirits were mostly just a mess. Butchered to a point where there were good and bad spirits, and all seemingly behaving like mere beasts. They took out all depth of them, and now we're left with spirits that are there but 99% of the time don't leave a lasting impression if any at all.
There’s a video uploaded somewhere on here that discusses in great detail how the purpose of spirits in Korra plays heavily into how the series as a whole is received. Some spirits exist to just… exist. At least when we encounter the spirits without a discernible purpose in ATLA, their design and behavior preserved the mysticism and could leave us wondering why they exist. In LOK, we start seeing spirits being treated like props. I get that the spirits themselves are complex and sentient beings, but seeing so many of them behave like humans took away from what made the spirits unique in the series. LOK only managed to pull it off once with the fog spirit, IMO
Didn’t unalaq literally state that there aren’t just good spirits and bad spirits, just angry spirits that ravage when they’ve been upset? I for one thought the difference was made pretty clear but that’s just me
They threw away Eastern philospohy that was one of the major pilars of the Avatars worlds and replaced it with boring and frankly stupid idea of pure evil and pure good of Christianity.
@@crazydragy4233 Actually, they didn't. Raava and Vaatu are most likely based on Ahura Mazda and Angra Mainyu of Zoroastrianism (ancient Iran); Good and Evil Gods, respectively. They're exact polar opposites of each other; fighting a constant battle because they are the other's equal. What Ahura creates, Angra destroys. Raava and Vaatu aren't anything like God and Satan, like most would believe. And pure good and pure evil don't just exist in Abrahamic faiths; it also exists in Buddhism, Ancient Egyptian, Mesopotmians, and Gnositicism (basically a precursor to modern Abrahamic faiths)
@@crazydragy4233for the love of god this has been disproven on so many occasions. Many cultures have this idea of yin and yang. Prime example being korra finding a small piece of Raava in Vaatu during their fight.
To get it out of the way at the start: I actually really like Korra as a character- but dislike the sequel (not hate) due to a different array of issues that I personally didn’t like. So take this with a grain of salt~ To start, I originally had a really sour opinion on Aang as a father as I bought into the idea that he was a deadbeat dad- that Bumi and Kya were in the right and Tenzin was in the wrong for not acknowledging what they were insinuating. But, I had to deconstruct this opinion over time as I myself have a really, really bad relationship with my own father. Specifically that in my own life, he would bring me places but it was always in attempt to meet women and play on the idea of a single father (when in reality I mostly lived with my mom who never did these things since she worked most of the time and spent her free time with my sister, grandmother, and I) but I didn’t really think of what it meant as a kid as I do now. That experience 110% warps my world views more often than I care to admit. And so I now just see Aang as someone that went from having to save the world from an immediate threat, and losing his childhood and the years that are supposed to shape us into who we are before trauma or tragedy have a chance to change that growth; to someone that had to find a new purpose. After all, where do you go after saving the world? Do you find a new enemy? Do you try to settle? Personally I don’t see an Avatar after wartime just sitting down and stopping… especially one that is basically still a child even if he’s well over 100. As to why I don’t like the sequel- the start really, really still grates on me. Like I said, I like Korra as a character. I also believe that she’s a good Avatar. My issues stem from how she was presented (being a child prodigy of all but one element) and instead of just aging her up and showing that she had already *learned* one or more elements by having the privilege that Aang lacked- being able to travel and find teachers without having to fear being kidnapped, tortured or at worst- executed. Instead she was shown as a child bending three elements at once- and that just absolutely did not do the sequel any favors in my personal opinion. This being led by the Equalists did not really help since they most of the time felt rushed into me. I mean, Korra gets to what amounts as an international capital/hub and immediately gets arrested for fighting criminals as a vigilante and meets the daughter of Toph. It was a lot to take in; though I do have an appreciation of the Pro-Bending scenes that follow. From there it’s just a large swath of things that would make my already essay-length comment become a short-story. In short: hated the destruction of the Avatar Cycle, didn't like the wasted potential of Kuvira, and I loathe the love-triangle stuff in just about any and all stories. All this said- I like Korra. She’s strong, smart, and being bull-headed isn’t always a bad thing. Heck, look at Toph. She got jailed and in return learned how to bend metal AND then escape after laying a trap. The other option would have been getting shipped back to her parents without anyone knowing. And as for Aang- nobody's perfect. Literally no one. That doesn’t make him a bad man or a bad father. Anyway… thanks for reading if anyone actually did? lol
I liked the Legend of Korra. I watched both ATLA and the sequel while they were being aired. I tend not to judge sequels too harshly but that's just me. Great video btw
for me i love atla but i appreciate lok, especially seasons 3&4 for expanding and exploring themes of what it means to be the avatar and what can happen after an avatar's fall from grace.
@@imani7979 And what happens when a world starts to outgrow the need for an avatar. Imagine if one day the avatar get's to actually chose for him/herself the life it want's to live. Like, the avatar could be among the crowd and no one would even know it.
Tenzin is my favorite character in the entire franchise and you brought out so many of the reasons why I feel that. Despite me not being the biggest fan of LoK (I personally think the show would have massively benefited from being greenlight for 4 seasons from the start) I find his character so compelling and rich. Not to mention that JK Simmons does an excellent job in the role.
I still think the issue of making Aang a bad parent is too big. I mean can anyone really picture Katara just sitting back while Aang ignores his non air bending children? If he did accidentally do this should would have stopped it pretty early on. They could have done the same thing by making it a conflict between what Aang said and taught and what Aang did. Aang in reality was a pretty radical air nomad. He got married and had kids, something we are never shown air nomads doing before the war. He is very in tune with his emotions where most seem to act like monks. He enjoys showing off and getting attention. He constantly looks for connections in the world be It new friends romantic or just ways to help people. plus he is trained by a less traditional teacher as a kid. On the other hand he is the last of the air nomads so feels he needs to pass on all o the traditions and keep the air nation alive in some way.
@@silvertongue.242_99 me too! it really turned me off of the sequel. Im convinced for some reason they wanted to knock Aang down a peg or two. The friend group we saw in avatar would never have allowed Aang to make these mistakes.
@@mike-mz6yz the series doesn’t actually describe him as a bad parent, just an imperfect one. Because there is no such thing, even for Aang. The particular episode where Kya, Bumi and Tenzin are discussing this they all come to the conclusion that, although Aang had to give Tenzin a certain amount of attention due to him being the only air nomad at the time, they had a great childhood because he did the best he could with what he knew how to do and what little time had with them. And Katara helps them realize this. And I believe it adds more depth to Aang as an adult. Coming from a family with several children, I can you that not all your siblings will share your perspective on everything.
@@Idontwannaknowu23 Yup, the thing is that while he was a father for his three children, he also had to be Tenzin's teacher and that carries another set of emotions Kya and Bumi might not have known about or even wanted to feel about their father. Think about it, had Tenzin been a different man, we could've had a scene of him feeling bitter about being railroaded into being a monk by his father, if Kya were an airbender, she probably wouldn't be the childfree person she is at the show, not without a lot of conflict, and Bumi wouldn't have his military career.
Air nomads did get married. How else would the population be replaced? They were a nomadic and peaceful culture, but they weren't celibate. They were an order of monks who didn't necessarily have to be celibate. Both marriage and celibacy were individual choices. They may have been nomads but they still needed to biologically reproduce.
My one major problem with Korra is how much it - the show itself, as in the actual camera - seems to revel in watching her suffer. Every season. It loves having people lecture her about how bad she is as they physically torment her, with disturbing lingering shots and scenes of her in pain or being humiliated or just getting the snot beaten out of her. Then some contrivance comes along to pull her out of the fire, though still leaving her thoroughly damaged one way or another in the aftermath. As cool as your reading of this scene is, and as much as I like Jinora, to me it’s just one more scene reveling in Korra’s weakness and pain. I get that there’s catharsis in survival for those who’ve been through trauma. But I feel like the show goes past that, and too far.
Good point, I can actually see what you’re saying and I never thought about it like that. One reason I always liked Korra less than Aang is because she looses almost every battle. Now that you mentioned it, she’s always losing her battles but also being tortured mentally AND physically. I find it weird how Aang had a fair share amount of W’s and L’s but Korra has more L’s then W’s. I don’t want to bring gender into this but I think she was written this way because she is a girl. The only other character(s) that take a butt load of L’s is Bolin and Mako. I don’t think they ever one a fight especially Mako. Back to my thing with Korra, I still don’t like TLOK as much as ATLA but TLOK was done super dirty and could’ve been better if they weren’t greenlit. However, I still find it weird as to prove to us that Korra is strong she had to go through unfair fights, CONSTANTLY lose, and be traumatized and hurt throughout the entire series. Not only that, but characters in the show have to keep stating that Korra is strong and the writers had her to do impressive feats that feels so unearned because of her L’s imo. I’m not trying to put down Korra when I say this but Aang did these cool feats that helped him to win, Korra did the same but looses. Like I can get into how I felt the villains were written to be op, but in short each villian had this random power boost that shouldn’t really affect the fight (minus Unalaq and Kuvira; Kuvira wasn’t stronger than Korra, and Unalaq had Vaatu in the second half of the fight.) I mean you can argue that Amon was stronger than Korra, but the fact Korra washed him once she realized Amon’s ability says a lot, also Korra being able to wash Zaheer in Avatar state says a lot too (at least until the poison kicked in.) To this day I still wish for a TLOK remake with better pacing, developments, and the talk of mental health without it being heavily placed on Korra when tormented tbh.
@@ningmushii Thanks for writing this. The last paragraph you wrote nails it. I like a lot about LoK, but I’m glad at least some other people can see some of the same problems.
@@muddlewait8844 Yess!! I’m glad I watched the show again because the hate Korra is honestly bootycheeks and the show is good. It would probably be better received if it was a stand alone series. I just wish Korra was done better and that people can RESPECTFULLY dislike and point out flaws in the show without mentioning the fact she’s bi and a female lead.
I feel like it’s the complete opposit, every time anyone tells her the stuff she did wrong it’s focused on to make you mad at the teacher or authority and side with her but like, she deserves to get scolded she makes super stupid decisions and is generally a pretty bad person
@@Abysalss I don’t necessarily think the show makes you “hate” her teachers/mentor but definitely makes her “right.” Her best character development that should’ve happened in a progressive way throughout the series was in season 4. By then she was at her lowest (I consider this her lowest since she wasn’t even able to bend or anything) and was willing to listen to what others was telling her (Toph.) Not only that, but she got to see how she used to be (Kuvira) and had no choice but change for the better at least. I think another big issue with Korra is that she didn’t really have a good teacher. Tenzin was stressed, and too busy with doing other things; not only that but he was a hothead that blew up at Korra for not understanding his teaching ways. I do think it’s more of a Tenzin issue though as Bumi had the same issue with Tenzin in season 3, and Meelo barely paid attention to Tenzin whenever he was on screen training. I also would’ve love for Zaheer to become a mentor to her, I think had he been an earlier villian he could’ve trained her to work with her spirituality and airbending. Or, he could’ve played both sides during the entirety of his season, that would’ve been a great point for Korra’s character as she would become more patient, willing to listen to others, and learning fighting strategies. After all of her moments with Zaheer, she would have to go back and think of a way to defeat him.
I feel like Aang would've definitely loved the new Air Nation, while it might've taken him a little time to come to that conclusion I believe he would've loved it
Honestly I find Legend of Korra frustrating because I *almost* love it. Legend of Aang had its own flaws, but they're more like chips around the edges. With Legend of Korra, I find the little niggles too numerous and disruptive to what could have been. I think you make good points here and I definitely agree that season 3 was some of the best storytelling in the show. I also love Korra and her squad as characters. Yet I don't rewatch her story the way I do Aang (and Zuko).
I like the way the avatar kids discussion about their dad concludes. Tenzin apolgizes and admits their father was not perfect and let his responsibilities consume him too much. Kya and Bumi apologize and admit that their jealousy and hurt did not leave room to acknowledge Aang had a responsibility as the last Airbender and they love their dad. And of course Aang would go overboard with passing on his culture. He lost his first family and his entire people and culture. Imagine the shock he felt when his first born was the first nonbender born to an Airbender that he felt, imagine the mix of fear and joy he felt when his daughter started water bending and he wondered if airbending would die with him.
Honestly it never sat right with me that Aang would be a neglectful father. I think he might initially attach to the air ending child a bit more but Katara definitely wouldn’t have let him neglect if his two other children for very long. They kept eachother grounded in the show so well, I felt like they just disrespected those characters
I think most of us understand that humanizing your heroes by giving him certain undesirable traits is a good thing, so portraying him as a neglectful parent already made sense considering he had no parents of his own, no rolemodel to live up to. But more than that, for Korra to become the emotianal core of the story, for her to be as human as Zuko was in ATLA, her predecessor had to be shown as human aswell. So Aangs retroactive character development in season 2 was one of the most important things they could've done IMO.
But Ang was not perfect in the first series, neither was he depected as such. The problem here is the depection of a character that is dissonent with his caracter as established in the first show. Ang is depicted as a very sensitive and copassionate intdividual, in touch with the feelings of others. The idea that this would stop with his childern just rings false. Moreover, he was not parenting alone, and the idea that this would go unnoticed and uncorrected by Kitara or that he would ignore her if she broght this up to him also rings false. It seemed more to be the choice of tarnishing an established hero so the one one could shire brighter.
@@SubjectNate ofcourse he wasnt perfect. But it's not bad to give him more flaws. Besides, they show never suggests that he wasn't compassiate towards his children. Neglectful and non-compassionate are very different things. He had too many things on his mind that he was dealing with at the same time, it wasn't some purposeful ignorance of his kids.
@mathies3598 the big issue is the idea that he wouldn't involve the other kids, talking about air nomad culture was one of his favorite things! He could still show favoritism but there's no way he wouldn't bring the others with him!
@mathies3598 It's bad to give him flaws that LITERALLY contradict him, his personality, and his ideals. As OP said, he was a very kind and compassionate soul, and he literally sacrificed himself for those that needed him. He would NOT stop doing that if it involved his own kids, he would give everything he had to ensure his kids needs were met. Physically AND emotionally. LoK Aang isn't Aang. It's an Aang mimic, poorly imitating the real Aang.
This, right here, the style of story that is Korra and, as you said, how it deconstructs The Last Airbender is why I say DON'T WATCH KORRA RIGHT AFTER THE LAST AIRBENDER. Both really good, and really worth the time, but if you go into Korra off the back of Aang's journey then you are going to have the wrong expectations, and it is going to feel bad. That isn't to say don't watch the first before Korra, just put some time between them. because Korra deconstructs like it does it helps to know where it is coming from, what it is deconstructing, but with some time between I think it becomes easier to appreciate the story that is Korra.
Well, that doesn't work because so many people grew up with ATLA and saw Korra as a sequel, a continuation of the avatar cycle and story. So, you can't fault people for disliking LOK when it deconstructed their favorite childhood show, and told them to "deal with it".
@@lisaleyendekker8305 technically a deconstruction isnt a bad idea moreso than the execution and presentation. Most of the gripes I had with LoK is focused LoK storyline and characters rather than what it does with its predecessor.
@@lisaleyendekker8305 even with the executive meddling, the end result product is still open for criticism. Such as how the systemic classism topic it posed just disappears after Amon is dealt with. Or how Unalaq was too cartoony of a villain when he couldve been much more like a misguided spiritualist. The Red Lotus too was left as if there were still more out there but nothing was done with it after Zaheer and his gang were gone. And Kuvira didnt have enough propped up development to be the stepped in final villain as well as having this correlation between her and Korra. Book 3 could've planted a connection with Korra and Kuvira back at the Zaofu mini arc given bits of interactions and making her be the one to combat spare with Korra in metalbending and showing how she is a bit better at while training her giving it a sense of tension when she becomes a villain cuz we know she can school the Avatar with her skills alone.
@@lisaleyendekker8305 yeah, I did to and there was a while where I strongly disliked Korra. It took time for me to get over that. When Korra started coming out I binged AtLA them started into Korra. That is how I know that is a mistake.
It will never be okay to tear down a beloved protagonist to build up a sequel, just like it's never okay to tear down a person to build up your self-esteem.
@@manuba_ We didn't need LOK to do that though. ATLA did that multiple times. In ATLA we got to see Aang run away as a child due to the increasing responsibilities of becoming the Avatar. We see him burn Katara due to his haste and recklessness to learn Firebending. We see him lie to both Sokka and Katara about the map that would lead them to their father because of how isolating it would feel to be left behind by the only two friends you still have in this world. ATLA characterizes and humanizes Aang constantly. LOK pulling an off-screen "deadbeat father" characterization after he dies is so disingenuous and wack.
Mistakes he made as a child don't negate the mistakes Aang would make as an adult. They didn't completely destroy Aang, they made him a father. They made him a husband. They made him a man, and men make mistakes. Aang was a great Avatar but a mediocre father, and that's ok. The only reason Aang and Katara work is because Katara was there for everything Aang went through and she understands Aangs duties as the Avatar better than anyone. If Aang had gotten with any other suitor she would have left him because he was likely so busy with his duties he hardly had time for his wife. Add kids into the mix and I'd be surprised if Katara got much attention especially after Tenzin was born. I love that we get to explore Aang as a man and not the child that we see in ATLA. It shows how he has changed and how he has remained similar. Until his dying day he never killed a single enemy he fought. He continued his path of pacifism by choosing to only take bending away. He continued the teachings of the nomads and became a wise monk. None of those things means that hes gonna be a good dad or make perfect decisions. In fact, Aang didn't deal with Yakone until his 2nd or 3rd offense even though he knew what Yakone was doing. After watching Korra again within the last couple of months, there are a lot of very good story points and development that Korra goes through that are the result of someone who was sheltered from the world and had to learn all of her lessons the hard way, something Aang didn't have to do because he was able to travel to see Kuzon & Bumi and ride elephant Koi even before he was told he was the Avatar. They locked Korra away in the South Pole and basically trained her in secret without telling her or showing her anything. How else do you expect a sheltered person with legendary power to behave? Cause they will be entitled until they are humbled. Korra had no idea what was in store for her and unfortunately she had to pay the consequences at every step of the way. @@MrDraygoX
@MrDraygoX ikr, like after the ending of atla we expected a different aang than the aang they talked about in tlok, especially after what aang did for katara at the guru it showed that aang gave the people he loved a prime importance but in TLOK him partially ignoring them ruined how we expected aang's life to be like
Another thing to kind of add to the whole defacing of Aang’s legacy is that the things that “deface” him are very real, and very reasonable things to come from Aang. The big one is that he favors Tenzin far more than his other kids, and was very distant from them. This makes sense when you remember one of the biggest traumas Aang has is that he’s the last survivor of a genocide, and that to him Tenzin was the one thing that kept his culture (that he held dearly) alive. It’s not an excuse for being a shitty father, but it makes sense Aang would make this mistake.
There's also the fact that Air Nomad parents weren't necessarily solely responsible for their own children; they were communally raised. It probably didn't occur to Aang that his culture's parenting style wouldn't work well this time around, given that no one else around him shared that particular ideal or responsibility to his kids. For all we know, he might have never had a real relationship with or even _knew_ who his biological parents were. Considering all this, _plus_ his status as the Avatar, it's really no wonder that he wasn't an active parent with _all_ _three_ of his children. He never learned how to be.
Considering we never seen or heard him talk about his parents, and how young he was when we meet him, it seems quite likely he didn't even know his parents. Let's not forget that one episode where he nearly kept the info about location of Katara and Sokka's father a secret because he didn't want to be abandoned. It's probably not that surprising his parental experience is horribly lacking. Not to mention being the literal last of his kind *and* being an Avatar
It's interesting to hear you say that the old ways and traditions of the Airbenders are no longer relevant because that made me think about how in Book 4, just three years later, they wear these flying squirrel jumpsuit things, instead of the classic robes. They no longer use glider staffs because they have become their own gliders, just another thing that has changed for the Air Nomads. Even Tenzin adopts this new change in his warddrobe, which admittedly, looks really weird on him because he looks like an absolute boss in his cloak and robes, but it's just another representation of just how far he has come since Book 1, too.
Very late, but although I’m happy that the airbenders are back, I really don’t like the wing suits. They feel more reminiscent of something from the fire national, with the gray being ash and the red and orange being flames… I don’t know. I just always preferred the robes. I hope the airbenders either go back to the traditional clothing or they change the designs to look more airbender-esque
Personally, I can't really compare Korra's arc to Zuko's. Whereas I could excuse some Zuko's behaviors because of his abusive background, Korra did not face even slightly similar upbringing and her making the same mistakes over and over again cannot really be excused in the same way. Because of this her ark is received so differently by many fans, including me. Also, yes I LOVE Tenzin and hate it when Korra constantly dismisses him. And yes sacrificing Aang did feel like a great betrayal. I don't hate Korra as a show but I do feel scarred by it because it changed a part of my childhood that I considered sacred.
@@vetarlittorf1807 she's been dismissive of him for the entirety of the first two seasons. Going back behind his back to fight in those bending matches, using the avatar state to race with Tenzin's kids, etc etc. She starts to change a bit in season 3 but by that point I couldn't care less for her. Just my opinion.
@@GalicianGranddaughter666 In neither of those cases did she dismiss him. She simply became a pro-bender because it had a positive influence on her and Tenzin didn't realize it at first. As for the race thing, Tenzin never said anything about the Avatar State prior to that. The only time she dismissed him was when she wanted to learn from Unalaq, a decision that she later regretted and apologized to Tenzin. Also, where are you getting the idea that she made the same mistakes over and over? The series doesn't seem to support that claim.
See, my big issue here isn't that Aang ended up being a poor father to two of his children- I really don't like that, granted, it doesn't feel at all like how he'd act, but at least I can follow the thought process. No, what gets me is that Aang _is_ still technically around- Korra could talk to him, there's the manifestation technique that Kiyoshi and Roku employed, spirits can bleed into the physical world during the solstices, etc. There was ample opportunity, not just on-camera but before the series even started, for Aang to explain his viewpoint and actually have a dialogue with his children. And you don't even need to fully exonerate him for his actions, ultimately he could still have been seen as flawed and wrongdoing, but at least he could be allowed to articulate why he acted the way he did and have an actual heart-to-heart with his kids about it. We didn't get that. Instead, Bumi and Kaya just essentially drop into our laps that "Yeah, no, dad sucked," and ultimately the siblings reconcile and Tenzin comes into his own, but we're still left with this new version of Aang and just expected to roll with it, and not long after Aang is literally scrubbed from existence with all but one of the rest of the Avatars. "Yeah, that character you liked and watched grow and develop for three seasons and change? He was a dick and he's gone now, have fun with that." I don't care what kind of thematic message they were going for, that was shoddily done and didn't do enough to balance out the sour taste it left, so the impact ultimately doesn't land. (And this is just one of a multitude of such issues I have with Korra. I'm happy so many people like and enjoy the series, truly I am, but I just can't count myself among them.)
I think u are absolutely right they definitely should have made it so aang could tell his side of the story cause he still can, and could have made the siblings be in peace with their conflict with him and have all of them come to an understanding, that sounds better in my eyes and i would have loved to see an execution like that
Buddy, Aang wasn't some horrible deadbeat father. He just showed favoritism and never resolved it with his kids. What would you like him to say to exonerate himself? It was clear why he did it: he wanted to revive the Airbenders and realized it was likely only Tenzin could do so. Plus, how is this a "new" version of Aang? The original Aang in TLA was flawed too, just like every Avatar before him. Not to mention it's a pretty common thing for people who are considered as "perfect" by strangers to have issues within their families, which are never resolved many times and often only mentioned after their passing.
you GOTTA stop bastardizing dialogue....things that are ACTUALLY said vs...YOUR skewed version of it. "Dad wasn't perfect" vs "Dad sucked"....be conscious of this not just for this show, but all media and literature. Do you see the weird line you're setting up here.....either Aang is PERFECT........or he sucks. If he's not perfect than...he sucks. Perfect man and father OR....bad dad. The actual CONVERSATION the characters, and the story of Tenzin, are communicating is that Tenzin only sees his dad as this infallible perfect man. Much of the world agrees because...the man's a hero, a holy man....a fun, Dalai Lama type guy who helped overthrow a dictator, end a war and rebuilt a stable society. Kya and Bumi are just trying to get Tenzin to cut through the fog of all this mysticism and see THEIR side of it. He was a great man and a loving dad, but he was busy...and spent excess time with Tenzin. They are hammering the point because Tenzin is lording his views and ego over them, and they're trying to get him to STOP....so they need to really illustrate the flaws Aang had to him so he wakes up! Flaws....that's all. Normal shit.
Not being a perfect father doesnt make Aang "suck" as a person. You just invented that because you have a prejudice for LOK so you used that narrative to justify your hatred with the show. Just say that you dont like LOK because you wanted things your way.
Everything in Korra feels like a deliberate effort to erase ATLA. Revealing random flaws in ATLA's main character that are never explored, changing the rules of bending, changing the origin of bending, changing the nature of the Avatar State.
Ikr like TLOK ruined atla only season 1 of TLOK didn't ruin atla but all other seasons destroyed atla and one of the frustrating things imo is the fact they made the northern water tribe seem like a nation of tyrants and also kinda ruining the adult aang character we expected
i could have sworn they said they had the second season confirmed before they even started making the first one, leading to both seasons being made simultaneously
@@pikminman13 No, season 2 was ordered by Nickaloead either shorty before, or shorty after the first season of Korra ended. During the Book 2's production, seasons 3&4 we're ordered. This is also why the writing for book 3&4 were much tighter and how they were able to make the events of book 2 flow more easily into Book 3.
LOK did not dismantle Aang’s legacy as much as it dismantled our *idealized perceptions* of Aang and the Gaang’s legacy. LoK added new but consistent depths to Toph and Aang that challenged us to love them in spite of their imperfections and failings. The writers never shied away from showing how trauma affects kids in ATLA, but now in LOK we see those traumatized and abused kids we loved and related to become damaged adults who leave behind complicated legacies and estranged families. Like Tenzin, the idea of Aang being a deadbeat dad shocks us at first, but it also asks us take a second look at Aang’s story and try to find the details we may have missed. And like Tenzin, by letting go of what we thought and expected out of Aang we gain an even stronger appreciation for everything that he worked for and everything he lost to achieve it, just as we learn to love Korra for both her shortcomings, her success, and her journey.
I think people forget that in real life, great figures are never perfect. Aang had to do a ton of things before he died, it would naturally show up somewhere as a downside. He had a role in creating a new city/nation/government. He had to recreate the Air Nation which likely included teaching a ton of spiritual and cultural information in hopes that it could be passed on. He also still had his duties to the world. There is an upper limit to human flexibility, he absolutely had to have failing points.
The thing tho, is that they destroyed aang's character, in atla, it showed aang cared most about the people close to him and especially katara when he was at the guru and would sacrifice anything for them like when bro sacrificed having and controlling the avatar state so he wouldnt lose his love for katara which meant if he was in grave danger he couldn't enter the avatar state so he technically risked his life for katar, showing that aang cared most about the people he loved but they kinda ruined that part of aang's personality in tlok
I always thought that Aangs favoritism for Tenzin made sense, not that I believe that Aang didn't care about his other kids, but he finally felt like he had someone to give his culture to. He lost his culture and now got to bring it back. I love Korra and I think it's a great show
Whilst I don’t hate LOK; I have plenty of problems with it that have nothing to do with the characters The world was what I hated the most; went from an eastern-fantasy setting to an english-steampunk setting in 2 generations for example I also hated how with Korra they ended the Avatar’s lineage which I definitely dislike The biggest problems with a character in LOK is Bolin that definitely doesn’t have Sokka’s smartness and instead is just lucky I also dislike how rare bending forms became so common; lighting and metal-bending were unique powers that now everyone has; it diminishes Zuko’s jurney to learn and fail to use lightings if now that orphan dude who fights in the arena can do that too and everyone works on lighting-bender based machines
I think that the reason why rare bending forms became normal is because of constant progress. It actually mirrored our current generation a bit. Painting or arts, in general, is an example. Back then like earlier 2000s and 2010s painting, drawing, or making art is a difficult process and is hard to master. Currently, due to technology and availability of materials and teachings (through watchng yt vids or etc) it has became so common these days. I am not saying that the traditional way of making art is uncommon back then, but the progress of doing and learning it has been really efficient these days. Maybe just like what I had given example, teaching lightning and metal bending has been more common. And many people realized their potential in learning these new bending forms, just because of how available the teaching of these are. Toph actually had a school to teach aspiring metal benders the skill of metal bending so that they could pass it into other generations.
Honestly it makes sense that Korra is so different from aang. They established that each avatar is different and aang grew up not wanting to be the avatar as a nomad while korra grew up hearing stories of aang and wanted to be avatar and was also a teenage girl vs aangs young boy. Plus water tribe is very different from air nomads.
I can live with what happened with The Change-Up between Aang and Korra what I cannot deal with is the absolute drastic spiritual change of the show and that is what ruined it for me. In Avatar The Last Airbender we see multiple different cultures we see lots of traditional things and it has a real spiritual feel about it which the show is supposed to have. It's supposed to be a mystical like journey and whilst they did not want to make them exactly the same and I get that turning it into Republic city which is like I said a drastic change it was too overwhelming for me and a lot of other fans. There were just too many technological advancements that happened way too fast I understand that they are benders and they have different kinds of advantages than us nonbenders would have but it still seems highly unlikely when you think of real-world mechanics as well as adding the world of avatars mechanics it still doesn't seem like it would be that fast. Just after a couple of decades should not be enough to create cars and other advancements like the flying machines. Hot air balloons I can understand because we already had that in after the last airbender and yes they had machines like tanks but they were powered by bending and they were all more naturalistic kind of Machinery whereas in Legend of Korra it's more electronic and more scientific it had a totally different feel and it didn't bring back any of the Nostalgia that was needed for the show to become an absolute hit. The only redeeming quality that I saw in Legend of Korra were the villains they were very different they were a lot darker and I kind of like that however they were too easy to defeat and the last Baddie that we get is basically just a woman who wants to take Republic City because she thinks it's a territory of the earth Kingdom and the Earth Queens already dead so her War really feels meaningless it just kind of seems like a bad Arc to use for the finale of the show the one prior to it was so devastatingly it dramatic and it brought back that little piece of spirituality Unilock becoming one with vaatu was horrifyingly pleasing because we lost Rava and we also saw that there is a Dark Avatar now and it let up for more questions of are we going to see more dark avatars what's going to happen afterwards that was a good point to stop but instead it continued and it didn't add anything further to it. One can argue that the spirit portals added something to it but it really didn't and whilst I will say I love the lgbtq representation of Asami and Korra getting together that's again another Arc that just seems random I get where they could have the connection but it just doesn't feel like it would flow correctly and I'm not saying that because it's an lgbtq relationship I'm a transgender woman and I'm all about lgbtq relationships but this one just like I said it feels random and I feel like korra would need more time to reflect on her own kind of thoughts and feelings after breakup after break-up sometimes you just need time to reflect on your own s*** and Korra never seems to really have time to do that strong independent woman that's had a lot of hardships and I feel like a great ending would have been she's better off on her own because she unlike other avatars feels like I can be happy on my own so I can protect those that matter to me whilst protecting the world and not fearing for them but then again that's just my opinion I love your video it was very well-thought-out
I liked the evolution of the air nation. It felt natural considering the people who joined were not airbenders by birth and were not raised as peaceful nomadic monks, but your average modern citizen. I think it would also only be natural for them to discontinue their Pacifist ways considering the last air nomads were literally wiped out.
I like the idea of Kora being more hardheaded, but I felt that the first thing that alienated me from the series was her bending 3 elements first thing rather than just water and going on an adventure to learn which could have gone well with some of the villains anyways
Thank you for analyzing this scene and the series as a whole. I was never able to see Avatar after season 1 on TV due to scheduling conflicts, and had issues watching Korra after season 1 too. But I absolutely love the series except for season 2. The story was well written in seasons 1, 3, and 4, and certain aspects of season 2 were good. I thoroughly enjoyed watching it because of how different it was from the first season of Avatar.
a personal thing which peeved me about korra was the setting, avatar takes place in very asian inspired areas and the way the different cultures of the world of avatar is portrayed, so while the idea of a city made from the 4 nations coming together sounded like a cool idea, its actual execution left a lot to be desired, specifically how, despite the asian cultures of the 4 nations the writers decided to make it... new york this always annoyed me as someone who lives in south east asia, a place which is generally a massive culture mixing pot seeing them take the idea of an asian culture mixing pot and making new york always just annoyed me, there was a lot that one could do with the setting but it ended up being... bland
I feel the exact same although i come from a European country. The Aesthetics of the original nations was so cool and then instead of actually mixing and modernizing them we just got fucking 1920s America. For me it no longer felt like a mystical or distant world with its own history and culture. Instead it was just our own but with bending
What killed this show for me is the end of season 2, spoiler warnings Korra defeats unalaaq or whatever his name is but is forced to RE-START THE WHOLE AVATAR CYCLE it was my favorite segment of the original show where you learn about the previous avatars struggle and their story and wisdom now wiped forever, what really made me like these segments was the avatar wasn't perfect he's still human still flawed and in need of advice from previous avatars who have gone through the same struggle and learned, that was what made avatar so dear to me
I am biased since i dislike Legend of Korra, and I feel that whole thing was a slap to the original show. It's also terrible for future avatars that will only have Korra as a spirit guide "Dunno man, did you try it punching it very hard?"
@@LtAlguien imagine that aang as a spirit was kind and compassionate, kyoshi is cold and calculated, and roku is cultured and caring, then we have korra who's just like: lol git gud
It's really unfortunate because we barely saw Aang as a spiritual guide for Korra, and now we'll never see him be a spiritual guide again. I like the idea of out with the old and in with the new to an EXTENT, this was just too far. While things need to adapt and change, it's still important to remember and hold on to the wisdom of the past
@@katieburkman3981 Hence Korra's speech at the end of Book 2 is important where she essentially said that we should learn from the past without being too attached to it.
Perfectly stated. Whenever I think of LoK, I think of her last conversation with Tenzin which I think touches on the foundation of her entire journey. She says she knows she was in a dark place but knew why she had to go through that. She continues, ""I Needed To Understand What Real Suffering Was, So I Could Become More Compassionate To Others Even To People Like Kuvira." This journey isn't as dramatic as Aangs and I think that's why some people find her a bit distasteful. She was flawed and boastful at the start with grandiose ideas towards herself. She basically had to be broken down and built up to become the Avatar the world needed.
Korra's a more compelling character than Aang BECAUSE she was broken down. Even in the first season, she was already more interesting because she was scared shitless of fighting Amon but constantly felt like she needed to prove that he didn't terrify her. The moment where she burst into tears when Tenzin found her after Amon allowed her to keep her bending was basically a soft warmup for when she suffered from PTSD in Season 4. I don't think the writers planned for her fall that far in the first season because they didn't know for sure that they would be allowed to do any more but fortunately, it worked out in the long term. In the Season 4 finale, Korra no longer needed, or even wanted, to beat the shit out of Kuvira to get her to stop. In the end, she simply talked to her, which is something that Season 1 Korra wouldn't have done. Aang was only compelling on two occasions in ATLA. The first was when he showed a selfish side by hiding Hakoda's letter and the second was when he became borderline Zuko levels of angsty when Appa disappeared. Outside of those two occasions though, Aang wasn't interesting enough to carry ATLA so he needed characters like Zuko, Katara, Azula and Toph to carry it for him.
@@tomnorton4277 I think the part where she talks Kuvira down is overrated. One heart to heart talk was apparently all it took to get her to surrender everything to the people she deemed would run the earth kingdom into the ground after an entire season of thinking it needed to be in better hands. It’s honestly one of the most rushed character shifts I’ve seen in anything.
I agree. But what I don't like is that they took the opportunity and the time to actually dissect and build Korra while they didn't really go further into Aang's character. Korra actually got a better character development arc, but all they showed us in ATLV is that Aang learnt how to cope with the harsh reality of being Avatar and eventually accepting that role. It's almost like although Aang and Korra are opposites and were brought up in different circumstances, Aang had it harder and they didn't go deeper with his character
I don't disagree that this deconstruction is what some fans got hung up on. I think the reason the series gets so much criticism is twofold. One part is this, the contrast with and deconstruction of the previous series. The other part is the way they failed really explore the conflicts that they presented. It's been a while since I've watched the later seasons, but I think they do a better job in later seasons. Season one they fail to really explore the bender nonbender conflict, making the equalist cause seem like it has no merit. Season two has the baffling choice of explaining the avatar with a "good" spirit in opposition to a "bad" spirit. I liked the world building of avatar wan, but also it managed to completely undercut the cultural stories of the origin of bending and undercut the idea of the avatar maintaining balance. It's frustrating not because the show was bad, but because you can see the ways it could have been great.
This is where I'm at too and it's so frustrating! They had the building blokes of a great sequal; the world, a great and variable cast (mostly), new and old themes to explore, and real comentary on how a rapidly modernising world holds on to what is important. And what did they do, they overreached. They became so focused on supasing the scope of the old show; bigger conflicts and battles, over explaining the Avatar, add unneeded elements to the world for impact; that their themes got lost in translation.
Thing with season 2 they had a better story in the beginning the conflict with the water tribes and potential gang wars in Republic city but just slam into that spirit world and avatar wan, dark avatar none sense that took front and center
@@silvertongue.242_99 Oh, 100% on this, it was the perfect setting for a truely morally grey conflict and they just threw it away. I could even get behind Korra interacting with the first Avatar (though I would have preferred it as a spritual quest to find herself and connect with her past) but the whole good verse evil thing was just cringy! Order verse chaos would have been better, with early humans and more wild spirits standing is proxies, and in the end the Avatar should not have merged with the "spirit of good" (away with that carebear shite) he should have merged with both. Or better yet, taken the place of both as the keeper of balance. (Sorry if I started ranting there, I have alot of opinions about season 2)
Yeah I feel like the dropped the ball when it came to spiritual themes they took away the mystery and other world rules of the face stealer and the librarian for generic bad guy monsters and glorified settings. And the ying yang sprits cheapens the humanity and effort of the previous avatars to build on what came before. Then they just scrap the cycle to make kora better than aang and be the last avatar 🙄
@@alexburns43 Don't get me started on how they messed up the ying yang alagory. It is not enough to mention five times that their is light in the darknesss and then have a lightshow to prove it. You have to demonstraight it through actions. This is why I think the whole first avatar deal should have been just a backdrop for the water tribe civil war. Korra learning about how the Avatar became the keeper of balance showing her how she can't solve all the worlds problems. And I still think the avatar makes more sense if the two spirits had represented chaos and order! If the avatar had taken the place of both of them, ie humanity taking the reigns of the world, then that could have been a brilliant message.
The thing that really bothered me about korra is that they made the avatar state super nerfed. I hated how she went into the avatar state and then moments later she would be getting her butt kicked
I don't think they really needed to deconstruct Aang as a person. He wasn't perfect by any means. The stuff about him favoring Tenzin over his other kids honestly could have been written better because I honestly don't believe Aang wouldn't at least try to find some way of spending time with all of his kids at once. I could see the frustration of Aangs other kids given he had to spend a lot of time with Tenzin and a lot of attention because he was the only other Airbender in the family. But it was the fact he brought Tenzin to places and didn't bring his other kids that bothered me. Also, I feel the scene itself isn't really meant to deconstruct Aang but to deconstruct the culture he lived in. A person isn't defined by their culture. I mean in ATLA Aang had to go out into the world and see the types of changes that went on in it. His past lives even told him. "As the avatar your duty is to the world." So even back then they knew that the way of the nomads wasn't good in a world that's always changing and growing. The scene is still marvelous though and I like your comments on it.
My biggest issue with Korra that she always gets her way. No matter how many people, tenzin especially, she randomly picks fights with anyone for no reason. In episode 1, I’ve thought the whole purpose she ran away from home this to meet up with tenzin to master air bending since it’s the only element she has hard time bending. But instead she rather do probending and blames tenzin for teaching her the wrong way. To her pro ending is improving her skills. I was like how?? What about airbending?? That’s what the whole f**king premise of why you’re there in republic city.
I like how you ignore that Tenzin had to changed his way of thinking to teach her. Because she did try lots of times but couldn't get it. Pro bending did help her quickly learn airbending skills. Also if korra got what she wanted she wouldn't be getting beat up by Amon and be manipulated by his little brother and proceed to lose to him. Many things don't go her way
It is like you literally refuse to watch actually the show besides episode 1 and the later seasons, for something called character development or the the situations where she is humbled and is literally poisoned which literally makes her paralyzed for three years but yeah she always gets her way and is a Mary Sue.
I know this video is a year old but I remember waiting atla to come on every week. What sucks is there were so many plot holes at the end of atla (yes I’m aware of the comics) however there were so many things viewers wanted to see animated with voice acting. Like zuko finding his mom that was probably the biggest plot hole. Or seeing the after effects of the 100 year war and yeah it’s talked about in LOK But just seems to be overlooked almost as if it’s not important
It sounds like the creators tried to do something they themselves didn’t understand. It’s probably a big reason why TLOK felt so convoluted as well as everyone’s takes on it.
I think Zaheer was right at least about one thing. The avatar shouldn’t exist it’s way too much power for a single person to have especially when that person is chosen at birth. I don’t really like legend of Korra because of Korra’s blatant abuse of her power in the early seasons which makes Zaheers point extremely clear. I understand she undergoes a lot of character growth throughout the series but the underlying problem of the unchecked power of the avatar is never addressed.
I think that's another way the show differs itself from ATLA. Aang was reluctant to be the Avatar in a world that desperately needed him while Korra was someone who pretty much built her whole identity around being the Avatar in a world that arguably might not need one anymore
You could say the same thing about Superman. Superman shouldn’t exist it’s way too much power for a single person to have especially when that person is chosen at birth. That's why Bruce Wayne and Lex Luthor hated Superman. The thing is, Superman has all that power, yet no one expects him to do things like singlehandedly stop world wars, but somehow people expect the Avatar to be able to stop world wars. The level of expectations people place on the Avatar is insane, and it doesn't make sense.
Nope, Korra started out on a bad foot for me with her bursting through a wall, knowing 3 of the 4 elements from birth, and shouting "I'm the air bender deal with it!", but she did eventually and painstakingly win me over. The shows depiction of Aang as a bad dad, however, will never be forgiven because it just doesn't work, more so given what a stiff Tenzin turned out to be despite being Aang's supposed favorite.
I've heard a lot that Aang was a human who had to learn to be the avatar where Korra was an avatar who had to learn to be human. Tenzin being stiff made sense because of the huge weight of responsibility he felt to uphold Aang's legacy and rebuild the air nation, something he spoke about in the show. He didn't have time to be a fun regular kid like his siblings because of the expectations Aang had for him
@jillsorise3722 just doesn't work for me, first because Korra was painstakingly human she just knew all but one element, and second because Aang always valued freedom and fun above all else, they made a point to show a photo of him still playing with airbending as an adult, not to mention his personal knowledge of how damaging having those responsibilities shoved on you at a young age is. Just everything we know about him says he wouldn't have raised Tenzin to be so stiff, Katara could have, and if his attention was split evenly among the kids, their personalities make more sense, but by making Tenzin the "favorite" it makes it Aang's influence that made him that way, and that ship just doesn't float.
Everyone calls Aang a dead beat dad but he literally had no exposure to fathers until he traveled the world. Aang spent time with tenzin because in his culture, a father is a teacher. His idea of growing older would be to take care of the temple and mentor all the younger airbenders like the monks. Since bumi couldnt bend and kya was a water bender, he figured they would be raised with their own mentors.
I think the fact they were on the threat of cancellation every season is the biggest problem with Korra, each season they had to be ok with it being the last.... That is hard to do when telling a story that crossed multiple seasons. All your other points are great I just felt this needed to be said.... I do like Korra as a whole by the way.
I didn't actually see it as Aang's legacy being abandoned at first, but now that you explain it this way, it makes a lot of sense. Thing is, that wasn't the reason I disliked LoK. I'm not gonna be some contrarian and say nothing of value came from the series, and if anything this video only makes me love my favorite scenes from it even more. LoK just... has a _lot_ more things to dislike than the abandonment of Aang lmao. Mako, Book 2, Raava and Vaatu, bad romance conflict, _giant robot,_ etc. But that's just my perspective
If I am being honest, I loved the deconstructive approach, though they did go a bit far. I love the idea that the avatar is just a person and that anyone with that much power can make mistakes. Though I wish they went with Kyoshi for that. Her story does NOT make her seem like a good person if you really think about what she did. In fact, you could argue that there are a few times when if she had done nothing, everything would have been better. But because she has this power, she feels like even kings need to bow to her. If they wanted to question the Avatar, they could have used that as a starting place. Plus, you could argue that by opening the spirit portals, Korra was undoing the biggest and worst thing the Avatar ever did. The avatar Broke the world and decided what counted as "balance" just because they had too much power for people to fight against. I mean, is there even such thing as the "spirit world," or is it just a world humans equally belong in, and the avatar just locked us and the lion turtles on this side. I mean, the spirits flooded into the "human world" when the portal was open, so they don't see any reason not to go in. What reason do humans not have to start building in the spirit world? The comics go into this, but they act like the spirit world is sacred. Yet we know it is just a world that the avatar decided the spirits get to keep while taking the entire world full of "spirit wilds" for humans. It was an arbitrary decision, that the spirits clearly never saw a reason to honor with how any forest spirit can seemingly pop into the real world and even take prisoners.
@@Spherrum That's not what the episodes showed. Humans only lived on the back of Lion turtles and the rest of the world was known as "Spirit wilds." Then the avatar just decided to kick every spirit out of the world and into the other one. Also the avatar didn't make the spirit portals, they always existed and Korra was the only avatar that accidentally made one. So no, everyone didn't live in there own worlds. Spirits controlled 90% of both worlds and the avatar decided that the 4 human cities should take over the entire world. Then he kicked out the spirits from there own world.
@@rolay7730 There were dozens of human cities, they were forced to live on the lion turtles because spirits were killing them in the spirit wilds, and Vaatu literally says that he himself created the portals and tore through the veil between worlds. After that the spirits flooded into the human world and conquered it, because without bending people were helpless against them.
@@Spherrum I was not able to find a source for any human villages before the lion turtles. Thought, Raava and Vaatu did burst into the human world, but they mention doing that early in history before humans existed. Even then, a "few dozen villages" is no reason to steal an entire world from another population. At that point humans could have fit on any small nation. But they took the world. So are spirits in the human world sacred, or ore they just bad spirits that refuse to move off of land the avatar kicked them out of? Was Hai Bai in the wrong and Aang should have kicked him back to the spirit world just for being in the human world at all?
@@rolay7730 No one said anything about villages. Humans lived in cities, and the cities were on lion turtles, and it's been mentioned that there are dozens of such lion turtle cities. No one stole the world from spirits. They have their own world, and they occupied the human world as well. They didn't have a small nation, they had only their cities. Without even fields for agriculture. They could only feed themselves by hunting animals in the spirit wilds, which was very dangerous because of the spirits. The spirits are considered sacred during Aang's time. Wan returned them back to their world. Hei Bai was definitely wrong for punishing an innocent village for actions of the firenation. And the spirits are not forbidden to appear in the human world, just like humans are not forbidden from meditating into the spirit world. Not many can do that on either side.
I remember watching the avatar growing up and bits of Korra. So when I got older I rewatched the avatar and fell in love with it and tried to watch Korra but I just couldn’t no matter how much I wanted to I couldn’t. This video isn’t gonna make me watch it but I can appreciate its existence. Change is something many people fail to accept. This video describes the beauty and growth that comes with change. So thank you.
Season 3 was alright, but I hated season 2, and here's why. In TLA, the spirits were consistently neutral, with a blue/orange morality compared to the material world, where it was pretty clear that the Fire Nation was (at least being lead by) evil. Korra's story dismantled that too, which was honestly not necessary for every important thing you mentioned in this video. And while it was interesting to see how the first avatar came to be, I don't think that story was executed well. The panda/forest spirit from TLA wasn't a villain; it was just hopeless and angry, and full of misplaced blame. At the same time, the owl spirit from the library was not a villain either. The one thing all the spirits from TLA have in common is that they only become upset and rampage when the seemingly arbitrary thing they care about has been damaged, disrespected, or destroyed; and that thing usually being something that they represent or are closely associated with. Season 2 of Korra... oh, you can calm spirits down with a little waterbending magic? That would've been good to know in the Library. Then, Aang and Sokka could've browsed all they liked while Katarra kept the spirits calm. Did anyone who used that stupid trick in Korra's day ever take responsibility and deal with the thing that was making the spirits upset? No, not that I can recall. Certainly not in the way Aang had to deal with spirits. I think avatar Wan's story could've been made more interesting, and believable relative to the per-established world building, if in order to preserve the world, he had to absorb *both* the spirits of light an dark. The avatar becomes the ultimate symbol of perfect balance between light and dark, order and entropy, civilization and anarchy. If you think about it, something else they should've done was talk about how even the elements themselves respond more to one side or the other. I would go so far as to suggest that everyone's favorite element, the element of freedom, responds better to entropy, and that's why Jinorra was a better airbender than her father.
I think the thing that people seem to forget, is that people aren’t perfect, including the avatar. Aang was kind and idealistic, but even in his own series, he had several moments of flawed thinking, beliefs, and actions (think Bato of the Water Tribe, and The Desert). Him being a bad father isn’t necessarily out of character either. It should be noted just how much pressure he would’ve been under, not just as the avatar, but as the last of his people. Tenzin being born an Airbender must have been such a monumental event for Aang. He finally had a chance to rebuild his people’s culture and way of life. Of course he’d want to be sure he instilled every last ounce of the air nomad’s cultures into his son who, after he passed, would also have that burden until more Airbenders could be born. In fact, you could even argue, that his duty to pass on the teachings of his people, was the most crucial duty of his entire life. Someone else could have theoretically taken out Ozai or helped rebuild the world after the war. But only Aang could properly pass on his culture alongside air bending, as the act of air bending, works very much in tandem with their beliefs and practices. Had he not, the next avatars would, by his knowledge, never be able to properly learn the way of the nomads as the temples, books, scrolls, etc are lost to time.
This is a very good take on the subject. Even though I've seen so many videos from people who bash the series to no end, I can see the value in letting go of the past and pursuing an unknown and unfamiliar but promising future. Granted those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it but disregarding the future entirely can be just as detrimental.
I hated The Legend of Korra because this show felt like Disney Star Wars were heroes from past movies and tv shows had great character development only to get it stripped out with deconstruction order to make the new hero look good. I HATE THIS TREND SO MUCH!!!!
I generally like Korra (the character and the show), but I don’t see how them trying to intentionally undermine atla is a positive for the show. There are ways to contrast it without trying to tarnish the original show. Things like how Korra always wanted to be the Avatar but the world rejecting her is great, as it’s the opposite of Aang, who didn’t want to be the Avatar but the world desperately needed him. I really like this contrast, since it’s showing how the world has changed without painting Aang or the previous show in a negative light. I also like the attempt to make all the villains more nuanced and sympathetic, rather than just a power hungry monster like Ozai (they failed here but at least they tried).
loved the video! I think that if you could play the scene you were talking about at the end after your last speech but before the outro it would be a wonderful addition
Despite my complicated feelings toward Korra as a series and my distaste for her as a character, Jinora's tattoo ceremony is the most beautiful scene in the entire show IMHO. It's the only part of this "leaving the past behind" trajectory (which overall I hate) that feels respectful. Rather than Jinora dethroning her Grandfather as the youngest Airbender in history, it feels more like a passing of the mantle, of her assuming her place as Aang's rightful successor, a task which Tenzin tried to take on even though he was ill prepared because he had to, because at the time there was no one else, but Jinora is not only knowledgeable of the traditions and teachings of her heritage but has internalized their meaning, ensuring that the best of it will survive into the coming generations without Tenzin's rigidity. What I read into that moment is not casting Aang aside, but Jinora growing into the roles and responsibilities he once held as leader of their Air Nomads, something more important now than ever since there's an actual nation again with no connection to their prewar predecessors.
One thing I don't entirely think you emphasized in this video that is present in the scene is that, not only is the air nation's progress an abandonment of Aang, it's also in a way a rejection of the Avatar as a concept. In the past, the avatar was a force to bring balance to the world and between nations and by taking up that mantle in Korra's absense, it calls into question the need for an avatar at all. This is why I believe Korra sheds a tear in the end of the scene. The hardship and pain she just endured at the hands of Zaheer was with intent to bring an end to the avatar, and in a way by the air nation taking up her responsibilies Zaheer got exactly what he wanted: a world where the world no longer needs an avatar.
I always appreciated that Korra didn’t try to just be another version of Aang. And the more I watch it the better I think it is. I just recently binged both series again (I do this at least once a year, often more) and I enjoyed it more this time than in the past. Korra’s an entirely different person than Aang, living in a much different world than the one he was born to and then woke up in 100 years later. I’m nearly 40 and these shows remain the best and my most favorite.
Korra was a subversive version of the story of Aangs, but the meta story doesnt just end there. After many years of pondering why i love Aangs story (and Korea season 1) and dislike the majority of Korras story, i've come to the conclusion that Korras story lacked an end vision. Since Aangs story revolved around a direct villain, firelord Ozai, the story naturally funnels towards a single goal, Ozai's defeat. Its a complex story that allows villain charactere like the fire nation and Zuko to become more than evil. Korra's story lacks a clear single enemy and thus the writing team were able to explore many different facets of human sociology, but not enough time to fully develop each character, culture, emotional detail. As your video concludes, the main (if not only) goal was to deconstruct Aang as a character. Korra foes thru so much throughout her story, that we as an audience cannot bebfully confident that she has recovered and conquered her demons. If anything, she became worse for wear. Aang's struggle to fight Ozai and his own destiny as the Avatar is a light of Hope that shows people they have a responsibility to the world, yet their desitines are their own to manifest. Unfortunately Korras story shows time and time again, sometimes self inflicted by Korra, that the world is a non-ended cycle which we have no control of our destinies. In Korras time, we witness at least 3 major wars back to back hinting that the Avatar's job is endless and will always precede your own wishes. But Aang's story works hard to shift the dynamic of his own personal, and albeit somewhat selfish, idea of pacifism that eventually works out in his favor. I think metastory of the merch sales, the comic spinoffs, new netflix adaptation, and other media show that on the grander marketing and wide viewing audience scale, Aang has the superior story. And i dont think that is all be accident. I honestly dont think even the producers or original creators fully inderstand what made the Last Airbender so successful. If you consider that the original creators of Avatar are no longer working with Netflix to develop the series due to "creative differences" we can surmise there are definitely a lot of conflicting actions being made by producer powered influences. I've seen a lot of arguments for and against Korra's story (not saying that your video is in defence of the story but), i have to side against her portrayal of the responsibility of the avatar and the Avatar's world. I think Korras story is another sliver of proof that it takes a quite a bit of time to reboot a series while the originals still have a great impact during their lifetime and trying to dethrone your predecessor does not mean a writer needs to vandalize the legacy of the original hero to do so. I think the Ending of Korra shows us that removing Aang was bittersweet, but the Korra's show had no other message to give us. It wasnt just necessary change, but rather a forceful dose of reality and there are roles that people can and cannot make changes to. It enforces that Legacy is more important than manifesting your own destiny. Your birth is more important than what you do with you life. And that sucks bro.
My problem with Korra is just one, the death of all other reincarnation of Avatars, that was one great concept that was forgotten and unexplored, if wasn't for that, she would just have passed as one more avatar on the line, doesent like it go to the next, but that classifies her as the worst avatar in history...
Great video, I always have found this scene both incredibly gorgeous and moving. In fact I think Korra should have ended in season 3, It would have been the perfect ending. Korra looks at Jinora but sees Aang and realizes she can’t live up to his legacy. Much like how the legend of Korra couldnt live up to Avatar. That said not many shows can. When it comes to my thoughts on Korra, I think similiar to you. I respect some of the risks and different paths the creators took however they clearly didn’t all payoff. Although I don’t love Korra the animation is gorgeous and Season 1 and 3 are genuinely solid. Korra haters start putting a little respect on its name!
I always would just imagine that Aang "favouritism" towards Tenzin wasn't because he was a bad dad I felt it was more of the desire to continue a tradition that was entirely wiped out and imagine not having seen anyone else like you for over a hundred years, wouldn't you pass down as much knowledge as you can
Korra did a lot of things in a different way: Asami should have been part of the Equalists and in charge of the company, rather than just a convenient background character the authors wrote into representation belief at the end to pander to fan fiction. Korra being able to bend 3 of the 4 elements at such a young age canonically makes no sense since it was typical to wait until the avatar was older before announcing that they were the avatar, and we see the results of that early on in ATLA, Aang runs away because he cannot face the reality of the situation and the monks were conflicted about Aang having a childhood. Airbending is all about removing attachments to the soil as it holds you down, but Korra discovers her airbending potential in the middle of a conflict while having a ridiculous amount of attachment, its why Zaher is a better villain and air bender, its why he can fly. With a soft magic system like in ATLA, the single most important thing about it is: DO NOT EXPLAIN HOW THE MAGIC WORKS!! A hard magic system like in FMA, can be used as a plot point and tension constantly can revolve around the limits of the rules of the magic system. A flexible soft magic system should constantly adapt with its environment, but this just doesn’t happen. We never actually see the conflict between benders and non-benders, there is no discrimination, just some triad thugs. We’re just told that its a thing that’s happening, and that’s just terrible writing. It would have been great for Korra to ground herself and find a place for herself in the world, and through that peace to discover her own airbending and by extension, the avatar state. And then we don’t see any of the struggles that Korra went through after all of her trauma, we just fastforward to the end, just, no. That removes the progress of adding depth to a character, we are supposed to see them struggle. The giant laser beams and the forced subjugation of the earth kingdom is just stuff going around in the background. There is so much in this show that we the audience are just told but never shown that it comes off as terribly lazy writing. And the authors of the show should not have to retroactively go back and explain things to the audience as it suits their needs just to pander to a minority of people; when that happens, it means that they did not see the story through to the end and did a bad job.
The thing is, the show started losing me at "The Chosen Avatar". By default, The Avatar is a chosen one, a new one chosen with each generation. It was so simple, and yet, they couldn't go there. Everything that she was short of was just there for the sake of keeping her naive, rather than show a fully trained Avatar who is in full control from the outset. She has trouble with Spirit side so that she can't commune with the past Avatars like Aang did, so she won't have any extra wisdom to go on. She's trained exclusively in the Northern Water Tribe so she can be naive to outside cultures. She's bad at airbending so that she can not-understand airbending. They put a hat on a hat because they didn't want to have to put in the writing work for something better. Aang caught onto waterbending fairly quickly, along with its philosophies, but then, it wasn't too different from his own. Then he gets to Earthbending, and its difficult. His entire philosophy is the oppositional to the philosophy of Earth. And with firebending he has two issues: For one, Zuko is a major trust issue, he's been in conflict with Aang this whole time, and he's not really willing to trust him out of the gate. As well, he's afraid of becoming a firebender after his prior attempt at it, in arrogance, injured Katara. Even when it came to controlling the Avatar state, Aang struggled, because it meant throwing off his attachments to the world.
I didn't mind Aang getting retrospective yet very human and understandable flaws. I did mind the awful redcons, clashing changes in lore and writing that didn't make any sense.
And this video reminds me of why I love TLoK. Season 3 was the peak of it's story telling and the final scene, even just in screencaps and a verbal description by Kato is enough to make me tear up x.x
Honestly I feel like most of your praise is towards the concept and idea of LoK, while most of people's criticism towards the series is about the execution. Personally, I find nothing wrong with the ideas behind Korra. A nonbender uprising, civil war, airbender villain, totalitarian regime and the processing of trauma. All amazing stuff. The problem is not in how they challenged viewers, the problem is in the rushed execution and lack of cohesion , especially season 2. ATLA's story feels well thought out mostly from start to finish while LoK lacks this type of cohesion which hurts its overall quality severely. If that hadn't been the case it could've been great rather than good, like it's predecessor .
Hmm, I get what they were going for, buuut.... Korra messed up waaay too much to be likable. She messed up a ton in the first season (which, ok, she was just getting started), but then she caused the main conflict of the second season. Then, she cut off her connection with Ang as a result of her initial screw up. I believe viewers can relate easily with an anti-hero like Zuko because even though his actions are evil, they get where he's coming from, and he's acting towards his goals. Yes, he failed to capture the avatar, but not due to his own incompetence. On the other hand, Korra is an incompetent avatar. There is little to no excuse for her screw-ups after season 1 (after she got some experience). Even in season 4 after she went through more crap shows than Ang probably did in his entire life, her solution to "Kuvira is invading" was "I should fight her in a 1 on 1 in front of her entire army." Like, where's the progression? How is that a smart idea indicative of her growth as a character? She started out as a hot headed dumbass, and by season 4 she's exactly the same. All that talk about what she learned and her speech to Kuvira is pointless when she's still acting like a dumbass. This wouldn't have been a problem if while being a hot headed dumbass, Korra had wise counselors who she actually listened to to guide her through stuff. But, she dismisses Tenzen, and the rest are useless. If Katara would have stuck with her throughout her journey and tamed her stupidness, then this would've been a whole different story and a much better one. As things went down, it's really, really hard to sympathize and root for an idiot who keeps screwing up again and again and again for 4 seasons straight.
"Incompetent Avatar" Riiight. Because all she did was saving the entire bending population of Republic City, saving both worlds from eternal darkness, reuniting spirits and humans, killing Hundun, saving airbending from the brink of extinction, sacrificing herself to save the new airbenders and saving an entire continent from Kuvira's iron fist. What a terrible Avatar... Have fun coping.
@@vetarlittorf1807 Saving the beders - good, Saving both worlds from eternal darkness? I think the sun worked just fine. Reuniting the spirits and humans? That's neither good nor bad; it's just different (and even caused problems in the following seasons), Killing Hundun, sure, sacrificing herself to save the airbenders (a more competent avatar would've made it out in 1 piece), saving the continent from Kuvira (1. she didn't do it alone. 2. she tried to fight her 1 on 1. 3. Because of her loss at the end of season 3 she was out of commission for the beginning of season 4. Yea, she did some good, but she messed up waaaaaaaaaay more than any avatar before and after, waaaaay more than is acceptable/likable for a main character. The problem isn't that she did evil stuff (cause she didn't). The problem is that she genuinely screwed up again and again which is super unlikable for any character
@@danidsds Slight correction to what you said is she made the same mistakes over and over again. Ontop of all of the conflict in the show besides the 1st season being her fault.
@@bobbooby2994 Oh yea, I just remembered the bad guys from season 3 were her fault too leading to the death of the earth kingdom queen and the rise of Kuvira. Like, how can you root for someone whose actions just screw everything up:)) Even if she fixed the situation, she's the one who caused it in the first place, lol
@@danidsds How the fuck were those her faults? she didn't gave zaheer airbending. Also Roku literally caused 100 year war because he was buddy-buddy i won't kill you because we used to be friends. Avatar Szeto literally said "fuck the avatar duty", joined fire nation bureaucracy which allowed for fire nation to become militaristic, Avatar Kuruk was so immature for an avatar that he slayed spirit after spirit because his fiancee got kidnapped by one after he neglected spirits (which were caused by Yangchang not caring for them enough during her lifetime. Korra literally saved the world so many times, got attacked by villains much stronger and compelling then Aang ever did (minus Azula), stopped Unalaq from starting the dark age of humanity, united spirits and human which in turns literally revived air-nomads. Yes she made mistake, Aang did too. He ran away after all. Its literally canon that every next avatar has bigger threats and higher stakes to take. Its literally canon that mistakes of previous avatars are problems for the next avatar. You can't go around blaming Korra while not blaming other avatars, including Aang for doing the same fucking shit.
Honestly, I don't see why the avatar has to be the protagnist of any sequel series in the verse. This would completely resolve any of the "legacy" issues that arise when giving the new protagnists great faults. If, for instance, Korra was a villain in the series and / or the protagnist of the series was another character, I feel like some of the events that fans hate (like the cycle being broken, the connection to past lives being severed, etc) would be more easily accepted by fans because the show wouldn't have to work so hard to justify Korra's actions or make the audience accept her after those mistakes. This wouldn't fix everything wrong with the series since some changes like the entire "Beginnings" debacle completely ruin the atmosphere, world building, and mechanics that ATLA established. Alternatively, better writing could have made these events feel more tragic and less like the awkward stumblings of an unworthy successor but I digress.
I loved Korra. The biggest and only criticism I’ve heard of it was the annoying high school love triangle and Korra’s immaturity. But these are completely the person misunderstanding the show. Korra was basically raised on a commune away from other kids and so she is gonna be socially immature, and on top of her natural heard-headedness, which usually rubs people wrong, so she is going to be criticized harshly, especially after Aang. The love triangle wasnt too bad. Drama doesnt get in the way of the bigger, more meaningful situation at hand, it’s just the backdrop and the way she grows socially. I dont remember a moment when i was like “SHUTUP! You are literally fighting bad guys, your social problems are meaningless.” This is because i think they stopped the bickering when they needed to. Also the hot Asami, who got treated the worst, was very cool about the whole thing and knew that aiding the avatar was more important than the love triangle.
Bad take. The criticisms of what makes the show inferior are many and wholly justified. There are several videos essays that explain in very good detail why the show fails, from multiple creative angles. It’s starting to look like the “divided” fan base of those that like korra are just young children that don’t understand the reasons why lok is not a cohesive and compelling story compared to atla. The fact you’re justifying the teenage drama love triangle is proof enough.
god i hated korra, she refused to learn any kinda lesson basically ever and she made it so any avatar that came after her would ONLY have her to rely on
Holding a mirror up to a person might make them feel more relatable to a character but it won't make that character more epic or long-lasting. Aang's story, like Luke Skywalker's story, is an epic one that causes legends. Korra's story is a self-insert by the very quote of the author. Self-inserts feel more relatable by nature but they are never as inspiring. We aspire to things greater than ourselves, not to things that remind of us ourselves.
This is a really wonderful profound point I hadn’t considered. Not only fors Aang have a hero’s journey we aspire to follow, but he still remains his relatability with moral struggles and external expectations. If we are meant to mirror Korra’s qualities more than admire them, of course it’ll be hard to make her a great symbol along with everything else in LoK that just falls a little flat in most of the character’s arc
While I can definitely see your point, this is assuming you want or need to either find the MC of a story relatable or inspiring. I would argue they just have to be entertaining. There are shows where you can relate or aspire to that character at moment but not as a whole, a good example would be Death Note or Overlord. These two series follow characters that kill often with no remorse. I don't aspire to be like them nor can I really relate but damn it's interesting to see their perspective, why they think this is right and how they get out of certain situations.
Aang defeated one baddy, and his daughter by proxy. This basically saved 2 nations, avenged a third, and liberated the fourth. Korra defeated four big bads. The first directly liberated a nation - but would have affected the entire world in a way. The second one was a literal, capital G, God. She basically fought for every single person *and spirit* in the world. The third one really didn't threaten many people at large - largely just Korra herself. The fourth was in the process of subjugating 3 nations, as she did with the first one. And yet, most people overwhelmingly like Season 3 the most, and Season 2 the least. And the stakes were the smallest in #2, and the biggest ever - *much* more "epic" than Aang's fight - was #3. The issue wasn't scale or scope in any way Hell, the most legendary thing Aang himself did was founding Republic City. Something that we didn't even know about in ATLA...
@@hundvd_7 Scope and scale are things that only matter when WE the audience have a reason to care. How do authors do that? By making the characters care which in turn should make the audience care if everything was done right. This is like step one of writing, make your cast likable.
I kind of want to make an edit of legend of Korra that has all of kora's events happen simultaneously. So that the story is told as one long story, similar to ATLA, and take out all the weird parts.
Can I also say jinora getting her mastery in air bending was cool but it always seem too quick like she learned a new air bending and spiritual tuned with spirit world but did she master all air bending techniques and styles? It doesn't seem so to me, tenzin and aang being masters I can see that in their bending and movements. Just my hot take
to me she wasn't ready at all yes she was spiritually aware but airbeding wise she was not as good as meelo or kai. as for leadership kai showed more of that even as he had new air bending skills. ikki showed more problem solving skills. to me as they were all the new generation all 4 should have all been granted the title. the show even made a whole character arc for the "we are stronger when we work together."
@@silvertongue.242_99 well no it would only be to those 4 if not only the 3 kids. No one was ready . And instead of doing it at the end of season 3 i would have done it at the end of season 4.
I'll never get behind the neglectful/absent parent trope in animation sequels. It seems contrived purely to give the new characters a reason to be angsty, so that they can then tell a story about resolving that conflict. It just comes off as lazy, STILL relying on the previous characters to give the new characters an impetus for an emotional growth journey. Is it just a thing that all sequel writers feel trapped in the shadow of the original and can't resist making the characters go through the same thing? I get that it's daunting to write characters that you know aren't going to be a well received as the last ones, but I'd rather see them shine or suck on their own.
The difference between Zuko and Korra is that Zuko was living up to an expectation that was impossible to fill. the awful things he did weren't who he wanted to be, it was who he thought he had to be. Korra is just an obnoxious jerk a lot of the time. She's irresponsable and she has so many qualities that specifically make her unlikable. I don't want to belabor the point in ranting about Korra, I'm genuinely glad people enjoy it, and I have no issue with that. I respect your opinions, I just honestly can't get behind it myself and wanted to at least explain some of the deficiencies that seperate the pro Korra fans and the anti ones. I see a lot of pointless arguing online, so I want to make sure it's clear I don't mean to be aggressively rude.
Personally, I think it was a good choice for her to be that way. A bit of a foil to Aang in Atla. Aang was happy in his little world before it was crashed down on him, being told that he was the avatar. Versus Korra who was spoiled and cultivated to be this big strong hero. Aang had the face the fact that it was up to him to fix things and Korra had to face the fact that the world didn't really need her.
@@ManiacalBlueberry And I completely agree with that aspect of her characterization. I just think she's intentionally made to be unlikable in a lot of scenes.
6:25 He never came off as a deadbeat to me, simply flawed. It seems their family was still largely a happy one. But I guess for some people, Aang being imperfect in any way tarnishes his legacy.
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Its not korra false but the writer, from dc marvel superhero, james bond, star wars, anime etc they continue with the character only change the actor that played it
Believing the that Aang is some sort of "Avatar archetype" is stupid, since in AtLA, we saw the four Avatars that came before Aang (Roku, Kyoshi, Kuruk, and Yangchen), and all had different personalities. Creating a clone of Aang wouldn't make even sense by the laws of the mythos, much less the laws of general storytelling. To borrow from other epics, Dick Grayson Batman (Grant Morrison's run) is not the same as Bruce Wayne Batman, and Wally West Flash is not the same as Barry Allen Flash.
Aang didn't want to be the avatar in a world that needed him the most.
Korra was eager to be the avatar in a world that didn't need her
I wonder how it'll change if they were swapped
@@solierix for starters, I’m sure Korra would’ve definitely killed Ozai
I disagree with that statement, I do think Koreas world needed an avatar
@@naomi7918 The importance of the Avatar definitely dimnished in Korra's time and I would argue that she will probably be that last Avatar of true importance. I think it kinda reflects how the monarchies in Europe lost their importance or or were even wiped out in some cases. You see it now with the Earth Kingdom transitioning into a democracy, Republic city already is democratic, how long will it take until Fire Nation and Water Tribes will follow suit, when elected officialls call the shots how many are really going to listen to someone born into power?
@@naomi7918 Korra made a difference wherever she went and whoever she faced, true. The difference between Aang and Korra is that he was the last hope of his world, a lot of people have died in the senseless violence of war, and their only hope was Aang. Korra's era is different, she was indeed needed, especially with the menace of Zaheer and the Red Lotus, but her journey is not preparing a super-powerful warrior to face this bad guy. Her journey is to make her learn how to approach every situation, making her gain wisdom, so much wisdom that she went to Zaheer to help her overcome her spiritual block. She couldn't resolve the civil war issues between North and South but she could stop Vaatu
I don’t agree that Aang was a deadbeat dad. That term is woefully abused as is. He was training Tenzin but didn’t realize how left out Bumi and Kya felt about it. He was a good dad but not a perfect one.
Agreed nothing about him reads that way, he was just concerned for his culture after it was literally wiped out.
@@kennethsatria6607 And also he's a human being, and human beings make mistake. Sometimes parents make some really dumb shit even though they deeply care about their children.
the real truth is, our information about EVERYTHING he did in the course of his parentage is woefully lacking. We know TWO major details, which are more an overarching trend.....that he was busy helping Zuko (and the world) transition the war torn Earth Kingdom into the place we see by LOK, and that he gave Tenzin extra attention with regards to teaching him about Air Nomad culture (bending included). All three kids turned out pretty amazing, honestly. Katara never expresses any poor sentiments about the man. The existence of this information gets stretched in the heads of fans to some negative extreme, when really it's just a commentary on normal family dynamics with multiple children. All the children get love and care, but some get more attention for various reasons or have some resentment about some roles in the family. Probably the biggest foil to the "deadbeat dad" term is the conclusion they all come to by the end of the episode that explains much of this. Katara gives Kya that photo to take with her and share with her brothers, and they all agree they had a happy family. And Katara is also a part of this conclusion because she GIVES Kya the photo for this express purpose! Deadbeat dad....jesus. Do you know what deadbeat dads are LIKE? How their children are and how bitter they are about their fathers?! They're horrible! Good for nothing! They're not heroes....who try to instill as much into their children as possible before their untimely demise! Here's the crazy part....I bet Aang suspected he'd die young. We know, in the lore, that his time in the iceberg stretched his life thin. You don't just come into your 40s and not sense some impending biological issue....the man was in peak physical, mental and spiritual condition....as the Avatar, he must have known he wouldn't be around for a full lifetime as he got older. Sounds like he tried to cram as much fathering as he could into his remaining years WHILE ALSO trying to guide and police the world. Not really deadbeat dad material.....
@@no1guy825 Agree Aang is not a deadbeat dad, When I think of dead beat dad I think more of people like Ozai, actually Ozai is probably worse than a deadbeat dad, he is straight up abusive.
@@no1guy825 Absolutely true. I think I can count myself among the children that got less attention from their parents because my brother simply needed it more than me. I never resented my parents for it and I'd never call them bad parents for it. They admitted to spending less time with me and talked to me about it. It never bothered me much, but it did feel good to have the difference in attention acknowledged. It was never about calling Aang out for his behaviour, it was about making Tenzin aware that he was favored as a kid and therefore had a different childhood than Bumi and Kaya. There was nothing resentful about it, just a difference in perspective.
Always felt Korra was too rushed. The whole thing with Amon was such an interesting idea, not just the Bender vs Non-Bender thing but the idea that the world was so out of balance the Spirits themselves bestowed on Amon the ability to take bending away. There was a lot that could've been done with that.
The reason it was rushed is because the creators didn’t know they were gonna make another season. The producers told them that each season was the last so the creators had to wrap everything up by the end of each season. They couldn’t plan for several seasons because they didn’t think they’d have another season
@@goodgaminggirl_2861 I'm aware of that but even so, its kind of ridiculous the creators didn't think that hey, maybe the sequel to the biggest animated show in history would probably be popular enough to merit multiple seasons. They should've just knuckled down and said how long they needed the story to be to tell it properly and Nick probably would've complied.
@@thefanwithoutaface8105 really, they fought hard to even get one season. Nick kept telling them they would only give 1 season, so they had to rush the storylines of each season
@@sheevpalpatine6139 Then I don't get it. Why would Nick be so against another series based around Avatar
@@thefanwithoutaface8105 who knows man. The creators had to make each season feel like they did because Nick never approved more than one season at a time. It was an unfortunate situation and had Nick approved more than one season at first, Korra might have felt more complete.
What makes both shows so good is that Aang was a pacifist in a world that needed a fearless warrior and Korra was a fighter in a world that needed diplomats
Facts
imagine how much Korra would have messed up the situation in the fire nation lol. Aang was exactly what was needed
Except Korra isn’t a good show.
yeah because Amon wanted to talk, The red lotus just needed a different pov and kuvira was just doing it for fun
@@Booster_Gold115 except it is and I'm sick of the bandwagon undermining everything it does well
I didn't really have an issue with Korra being so different from Aang. Each Avatar is different from eachother. For example Yangchen vs Aang. While both are air nomads who were raised to be more peaceful and pacifist she was more comfortable becoming violent. Not only recommending Aang kill the fire lord but, according to her wiki, "Yangchen was feared for her fierce willingness to do whatever was required to maintain balance and peace throughout the world in her duty as the Avatar".
I don’t have a problem with how different Korra was from Aang. I personally actually LOVE that she was so different from him. And I actually think most people don’t have a problem with that, they just can’t properly articulate what they didn’t like about her. The problem is she’s a person who always wants to punch her way through her problems and always gets away with it because it either works, or she pouts and gets rescued by someone else. She never actually learns how to do things differently, how to be more clever, to think outside the box, to utilize the tools and people around her or delegate properly. She never seems to actually learn from the plethora of mistakes she makes and wallows about in self-pity and trauma. I personally believe to some extent, this is the true quality in Korra that most people who either don’t like her or the show, dislike.
@@apmanda Well said! It definitely would have helped her character if she learned from her mistakes and tried different methods to improve her strategies.
@@apmanda perfectly put, i hated Korra because she was basically a child throwing a tantrum throughout, and as you said never seems to learn even by the end of the show. It felt very unsatisfying but also much less realistic as Aang had to grow up and face reality in the original show, but Korra kind of just lives in ignorance the whole show.
And if you've read the book that follows Yangchens journey yeah she is very different from Aang.
@@danycashking I mean, Korra was Rapunzel'd and taught absolutely nothing but fighting, of course she's going to come out as a feisty meathead, but I agree it was annoying regardless since that was never treated as her flaw, she was just 'quirky.' Also, nobody ever called out the White Lotus (or Tonraq) on it either. If anything, they disappeared from the show completely after Korra ran away.
Season 3 of Korra is precisely my favorite because of the juxtaposition of happiness and sorrow that you mention. Korra goes from cocky and wanting to confront the Red Lotus to mentally destroyed and traumatized. Meanwhile, you have the Air Nation going from a ragtag group bound by tradition to moving beyond its historical roots to acknowledge a younger prodigy. It's a beautiful moment.
If they ended it at season 3, honestly would have been happy with it
@@mites7 season 4 is pretty neat tbh, there is not as many bad things as season 2, only bad thing for me is that the writters weren't trying to do something new or interesting as an end game.
@@HiAgainTheNameIsStillAyle oh yeah season two was a train wreck
Season 4 started out ok but I really hated it by the ending
I mean, the Air Nomads being a more traditionalist group makes sense, and of the 4 nations, I'd have expected them to of course remain at least close to their roots, even if not the same as it was.
I feel everything that happened to the Air Benders was too quick. From the restoration of their people to the sudden switch and change of their traditionalism.
I mean, for one it's clear that Tenzin just needed another teacher for the Air Benders other than just himself, hence Jinora's sudden ascension. But for them to basically just lessen the affect of Genocide by just randomly allowing Air Bending to come back the way it did and so nonchalantly was... I dunno, all too sudden.
@@mites7 Yeah, with a few tweaks season 3 could have been a good place to end the show. Here’s a crazy idea, what if Korra found out about Zaheer’s plan to end the avatar cycle before she turned herself in? Seeing her grapple with wether preserving the avatar cycle is more important than saving the air nation could have been very interesting. And having her be a little more accepting of Tenzin telling her they’ll take care of things without her now that she’s injured would be an admission that maybe the world doesn’t need to revolve around the avatar as much as she thought. As long as you guys will be okay, then I’ll be okay too Korra can say.
Another subversion I enjoyed: Aang's journey goes as follows: He must face the real word (violence and use of such, responsibility, etc), but, truthfully, he isn't ready and doesn't want to. The rest of his journey is going through a legendary adventure that seems as though just that: a legend. We see these two moods and story telling formats: reality vs fiction (all fiction, but I mean that in terms of the sort of trope-heavy good vs evil type things with happy endings. Again, not without sorrow. Not undermining Aang, just giving contrast). Aang finally wins a happy ending by facing reality and finds himself happy in reality as well: enjoying life and the mundane responsibility and everyday worries of love and politics and parenthood. Korra's story goes the opposite direction: She starts off wanting to be a hero, wanting to be in a sort of story with insurmountable odds, but odds that she can at least fight against. Instead, she mus journey through harsh reality and trauma. She loses often, victory is hard won, and she makes mistake after mistake. The errors of the past are brought to front and center. Things are hardly ever fair. No villain simply is just bad. She earns her happy ending by not fighting for it, but through acceptance for circumstance and compassion won through trauma. Her ending is magical and fantastical: going to the spirit world, quite literally a magical place, hand-in-hand with the one she loves. As you can tell, that video made me think. A lot.
Very well said. 👏
Perfectly stated. Whenever I think of LoK, I think of her last conversation with Tenzin which I think touches on the foundation of her entire journey.
She says she knows she was in a dark place but knew why she had to go through that. She continues, ""I Needed To Understand What Real Suffering Was, So I Could Become More Compassionate To Others Even To People Like Kuvira."
This journey isn't as dramatic as Aangs and I think that's why some people find her a bit distasteful. She was flawed and boastful at the start with grandiose ideas towards herself. She basically had to be broken down and built up to become the Avatar the world needed
I disagree with the ‘no villain is simply just bad’. The villain from the second season is literally just a power hungry maniac who wants to cover the world in 10,000 years of darkness. Zaheer is a madman whose only goal is bringing chaos to the world because he believes it will make people free, even though that involves just killing people in power, and obviously results in people getting killed and robbed in the resulting chaos. Kuvira starts with sympathetic goals and is actually a good villain imo, but then it switches to taking over the world in a giant mech suit and blowing up cities with a laser cannon. I think those all count as objectively bad people.
>victory is hard earned
lmao, wait, you serious?
I agree to an extent but in LOK they give her an out in each one. They all go from having a decent cause or morals to just straight up pure evil so she never must truly confront the moral dilemma. And in the case of the first one he Ahman just ends up being a charlatan and runs away.
As much as I love korra and all the amazing things that happened in the show I will never get over the fact that she lost her connection to all previous avatars, having the knowledge and experience of the past avatars, that’s what made the avatar so powerful in the first place.. I can only wonder how powerful the next avatar will be if there will be any.
yeah, that's one scene i can never watch again, watching season two was already painful enough. the first time i watched that scene i felt numb. i couldn't believe my eyes.
You have Father Glowworm’s Avatar Curse to thank for that
Personally I think that moment was a good (but painful) moment particularly because it happened to Korra. That scene made sense in LOK because the main theme of the series is Change and the trauma that comes with it, a time to deconstruct the past. It’s no wonder that in that period of time we see unparalleled technological progress, the rise, civil war and independence of a city state, rise and independence of the southern water nation, rebirth of the isolationist air nomads as a interventionist air nation, the fall of the earth kingdom and reconnection to the spirit world. Imo it just wouldn’t make sense thematically for Korra to check on people whose world barely change from one to the next when Korea’s world looks nothing like it did a year ago and next year won’t look anything like the current one.
It’s a shame that it happened in a terrible season, if they had known from the start that they would be doing 4 seasons they probably would have built up to it a lot better.
Yeah I dislike what they did with the avatar cycle, I feel by dropping the previous avatars you abandon the imagery or themes of building off what came before.
Maybe it's the whole going against the hero's journey thing but they seemed to tear down the mystery and complexity of the spirit world in LOK and I feel that cheapens the experience in ways
Wasn't the whole point of the show that the powers of the Avatar isn't their true strength? That the most important part of the Avatar isn't their bending, their spiritual abilities, or how desired they are by the public?
Besides I'm sure the next Avatar will be able to contact Korra, which they usually talk to the previous avatar the most anyway so it won't be too much of a difference.
Thank you for participating in this collaborative project! Your webcomics looks legit good!
May i ask if you saw Professor Dave Explain's
newest videio?
It was quite Something.
Youre the man
The idea that Aang was a "deadbeat dad" is a bit strange to be upset about when he was THE AVATAR. I don't think it is an understatement to say that most Avatars are doomed to a life torn between their duties to the world and their personal needs and wants, and Aang has always been the type of person to put the world above his own personal goals. The only time he has ever put his personal needs and wants above the world is when he had to let go of his love for Katara to willingly control the Avatar state, and Katara ended up being the love of his life. It's not surprising he neglected his family to do the things the Avatar is rather unrealistically expected to do, especially since he has trauma related to him abandoning the world after being frozen for a century and assumed dead after that.
@FanOf Dueling The fact Aang, with all his responsabilities (that were FORCED into him and he had no said in the matter) as the Avatar, in a post-war world and trauma (Including being the only survivor of a genocide), still had time for his family shows he did care a lot, but sadly "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few".
He may have not been the perfect father, but calling him a "deadbeat dad" is not only wrong but also insulting
Aang put himself over the world alot actually
1. He ran away when he found out he was the avatar
2. He refused to kill ozai even though he needed too (that worked out well)
3. He kept the fact he was the avatar secret and got the watertribe village attacked.
@@HINOBI2047He didn't NEED to kill Ozai,as evidenced by the ending
The fact is shown that aang was different from a lot of the avatars simply due to the fact that he still found ways to cover his own personal needs.
He stuck to his air nomad traditions
He didnt deteach himself from his love for katara
He didnt kill ozai even though the only thing stopping him was his own beliefs and it technically but the world at risk
Korra doesnt exist to me, they made every ATLA character a terrible parent just so thwey could have something to write about, such a cheap useless show@@LtAlguien
I've always cherished this scene. Only scene in avatar to make me teary every time. Korra's reaction to the amazing things happening around her after recently beginning one of her hardest trials ever is so touching
I think with a few tweaks this would have been a good place to end the show. like instead of Korra being as heartbroken about her situation as she was she also would feel a sense of relief knowing that everyone is gonna be find because of her. She could even say something like as long as you guys will be okay then I’ll be okay too. It would give a sense that Korra is learning to compartmentalize her need to be needed as the avatar.
@@solarking952 it definitely brings everything together in a beautiful way
@@jdsjigglypuff9419 Yeah, because by the end of the show I don’t know for sure if Korra would better handle being in a situation where everything carries on without her should something like that ever happen again. Would she still be as hung up about not being needed?
@@jdsjigglypuff9419 Also, here’s something else to chew on. What if Korra discovered ahead of time Zaheer’s plan to end the avatar cycle? The weight of wether or not to turn herself in would be way more monumental because now it’s between future generations of avatars or the new fledgling air nation. Which is more important? I can’t really decide myself.
I would not say a father showing some favoritism is the same as being a deadbeat lol, I also feel Aang's faults as a parent are sometimes not considered with full context for his motivations, while a person is ultimately responsible for their actions I think it's worth acknowledging Aang's extenuating circumstances as the last airbender especially after already having two non-airbender children and katara ain't getting any younger. It's not that surprising that when the last child Aang is probably ever going to have finally ends up being an airbender that Aang would get tunnel vision on teaching Tenzin everything he can because he's also not going to live forever and once he goes that's it, there's literally no one left of the original airbenders the genocide committed by sozin is basically complete once Aang dies so it makes sense he would want to pass the torch in as complete and thorough a way as possible with his one airbending child. Is that fair to Kya and Bumi? no, of course not, but I think there's way more nuance considering he is literally the last of an extinct group of people, he literally has his entire culture resting on his shoulders and only has so much time to ensure the world remembers his people and their culture. I mean it's literally generational trauma, without the air nomad genocide Aang probably had the capacity to be an amazing father to ALL of his children, regardless of whether they were benders or not or what kind of benders they were.
fully agree
I don't think it's understandable at all because to teach Tenzin what he needs to know never meant they couldn't take Boomi and Kaya with them along the way. being an air nomad is much more than airbending, it's culture and a mindset. but aang just ditched his kids and left them while he only took Tenzin
@@Sarah001994 exactly!!! No need to exclude his other kids they could've learned airbender traditions as well.
@@Sarah001994 my interpretation of it has never been Kya and Bumi were literally doing nothing, I mean different family members have different obligations, Kya clearly spent time learning waterbending from katara or someone else too and Bumi surely had his own things going on. Have you ever tried to plan a trip around other people's schedule's? I would imagine just having to worry about tenzin makes things easier, so I always interpreted it as more Aang was kind of impatient and over eager to teach Tenzin, he wouldn't have wanted to wait until it was convenient for everyone else. If the intended interpretation though is that Kya and Bumi were both freely available and willing to go on these trips at the time then honestly I think that's just terrible writing on a similar tier as the last season of GoT. That just seems so incredibly out of character to the point that it literally breaks my immersion and just makes me think the writers are terrible.
@@Sarah001994 Also Bumi could have become an air acolyte essentially but it seems for the most part even in mixed bending families people stick with the culture of what type of bending they have, I mean mako and bolin both dress like firebenders and earthbenders respectively, kya and tenzin dress like waterbenders and airbenders respectively. Bending seems to be a significant enough cultural marker, that being one type of bender precludes you from being anything else, and part of it comes down to the naming of the nations and how culturally significant bending is to each one. Airbending in particular was a significant part of being an air nomad, moreso than being an earth bender is important to being an earth kingdom citizen. Like you just aren't going to have an air nomad monk who's a waterbender, or someone who is culturally from the water tribe just randomly be an earthbender. Even Kyoshi's mother who was an airbender ended up having her bending weakened just by abandoning the air nomad teachings. So bending is pretty deeply tied to culture and the main examples we see of people adopting different cultures are either nonbenders, or if they are benders we even see their bending weaken as a result.
My big issue with Korra was that each season felt like it was beginning to touch on some interesting ideas, but those ideas don't really get followed through. I really liked season 1 for the way it introduced Korra as a character and how it developed the world into a modern setting that still felt like it made sense. The discovery of metal bending by Toph in TLA single handedly makes the stark leap from the very "old" world of TLA to the distinctly modern one in Korra feel natural and like it makes sense. The Equalists are a really interesting group of villains to lead into the new show with, and they start a pattern of each season throwing into doubt the role of the avatar in this new world.
My big issue with this is that each season asks a different question of what the avatar is supposed to be, none of which feel necessarily connected to the last philosophically. The spirit world stuff in season 2 is kind of interesting but I found this season to be by far the weakest both narratively and in terms of tone. The final battle of a giant glowing Korra against a giant glowing Unalaq felt more akin to the climax of a Dragon Ball Z arc than it did a battle between an avatar and her evil foil. Every other avatar being effectively destroyed by Vaatu also didn't sit well with me. I appreciate the concept of "out with the old, in with the new" which as you cover in this video via Tenzin, but connecting to past lives is a core tenet to the concept of the avatar. Getting rid of all those past lives just kind of unilaterally and unceremoniously I don't think does anything for the story, and I think we subsequently miss out on what could have been insightful interactions between Korra who for all intents and purposes is the first "modern" avatar.
Aang helped usher in this new world, but Korra was the first to exist in it and be moulded by it, and have her role as the avatar questioned both directly by people and indirectly by circumstance. Seeing the spirits and the two primordial forces behind why the avatar is so powerful, was kind of cool, but it definitely de-mystified the concept (which isn't necessarily a bad thing). Zaheer in the follow up season was sort of cool even though some of his ideals and speeches were reminiscent of some 4chan threads. His idea that disorder is order is a little infantile and the kind of thing you might stumble upon and think is deep in high school, but the avatar being the ultimate figurehead of established order and being the final obstacle to what he would describe as his ideal world is interesting, although it once again brings yet another question about what the role of the avatar in this new world is.
Asking these questions isn't inherently a problem, but each season following a different thread I think makes it feel jumbled. All of the story beats could have been mostly the same, but the motives of the different antagonists could have been changed to all be more in line with each other or more directly connected which would feel more impactful over time as Korra continues to see the same themes popping up from each of these seemingly unconnected antagonists. A lot of the show seems to be focused around Korra's own doubts about her ability to be an effective avatar and her ability, when I think a very similar and more poignant focus could have been her doubting the role of the avatar at all.
precisely
A lot of the political themes and reading were “guy who remembers reading it in a textbook years ago” tbh. Anarchism is a lot more complex than “rules bad” and they butchered communism worse than McCarthy lol
Legend of Korra creators were only allowed to work on one season at a time. They thought that each season was the last season until the producers told them to do another. That’s why it’s so choppy
@@user-pl9yq3fc8u May i ask if you saw Professor Dave Explain's
newest videio?
It was quite Something.
Also man, some of this just doesn't work
It gets better by season 3, but I'm not making anyone watch 1 and 2 to watch 3 or 4
The only real problem I personally have with The Legend of Korra, is how they butchered the spirits. In AtLA the spirits were strange, sometimes creepy looking beings, and like Ko (or Co) that 'play' according to their rules no matter what with motives unbeknownst to "mere humans". Ko could've easily forced Aang into making an expression by poking/attacking him, and yet left it all to Aang himself. Why? We don't know. Those are his strange, possibly unknowable motives. In Korra, the spirits were mostly just a mess. Butchered to a point where there were good and bad spirits, and all seemingly behaving like mere beasts. They took out all depth of them, and now we're left with spirits that are there but 99% of the time don't leave a lasting impression if any at all.
There’s a video uploaded somewhere on here that discusses in great detail how the purpose of spirits in Korra plays heavily into how the series as a whole is received. Some spirits exist to just… exist. At least when we encounter the spirits without a discernible purpose in ATLA, their design and behavior preserved the mysticism and could leave us wondering why they exist. In LOK, we start seeing spirits being treated like props. I get that the spirits themselves are complex and sentient beings, but seeing so many of them behave like humans took away from what made the spirits unique in the series. LOK only managed to pull it off once with the fog spirit, IMO
Didn’t unalaq literally state that there aren’t just good spirits and bad spirits, just angry spirits that ravage when they’ve been upset? I for one thought the difference was made pretty clear but that’s just me
They threw away Eastern philospohy that was one of the major pilars of the Avatars worlds and replaced it with boring and frankly stupid idea of pure evil and pure good of Christianity.
@@crazydragy4233 Actually, they didn't. Raava and Vaatu are most likely based on Ahura Mazda and Angra Mainyu of Zoroastrianism (ancient Iran); Good and Evil Gods, respectively. They're exact polar opposites of each other; fighting a constant battle because they are the other's equal. What Ahura creates, Angra destroys.
Raava and Vaatu aren't anything like God and Satan, like most would believe. And pure good and pure evil don't just exist in Abrahamic faiths; it also exists in Buddhism, Ancient Egyptian, Mesopotmians, and Gnositicism (basically a precursor to modern Abrahamic faiths)
@@crazydragy4233for the love of god this has been disproven on so many occasions.
Many cultures have this idea of yin and yang. Prime example being korra finding a small piece of Raava in Vaatu during their fight.
To get it out of the way at the start: I actually really like Korra as a character- but dislike the sequel (not hate) due to a different array of issues that I personally didn’t like. So take this with a grain of salt~
To start, I originally had a really sour opinion on Aang as a father as I bought into the idea that he was a deadbeat dad- that Bumi and Kya were in the right and Tenzin was in the wrong for not acknowledging what they were insinuating. But, I had to deconstruct this opinion over time as I myself have a really, really bad relationship with my own father. Specifically that in my own life, he would bring me places but it was always in attempt to meet women and play on the idea of a single father (when in reality I mostly lived with my mom who never did these things since she worked most of the time and spent her free time with my sister, grandmother, and I) but I didn’t really think of what it meant as a kid as I do now.
That experience 110% warps my world views more often than I care to admit. And so I now just see Aang as someone that went from having to save the world from an immediate threat, and losing his childhood and the years that are supposed to shape us into who we are before trauma or tragedy have a chance to change that growth; to someone that had to find a new purpose. After all, where do you go after saving the world? Do you find a new enemy? Do you try to settle? Personally I don’t see an Avatar after wartime just sitting down and stopping… especially one that is basically still a child even if he’s well over 100.
As to why I don’t like the sequel- the start really, really still grates on me. Like I said, I like Korra as a character. I also believe that she’s a good Avatar. My issues stem from how she was presented (being a child prodigy of all but one element) and instead of just aging her up and showing that she had already *learned* one or more elements by having the privilege that Aang lacked- being able to travel and find teachers without having to fear being kidnapped, tortured or at worst- executed. Instead she was shown as a child bending three elements at once- and that just absolutely did not do the sequel any favors in my personal opinion.
This being led by the Equalists did not really help since they most of the time felt rushed into me. I mean, Korra gets to what amounts as an international capital/hub and immediately gets arrested for fighting criminals as a vigilante and meets the daughter of Toph. It was a lot to take in; though I do have an appreciation of the Pro-Bending scenes that follow.
From there it’s just a large swath of things that would make my already essay-length comment become a short-story. In short: hated the destruction of the Avatar Cycle, didn't like the wasted potential of Kuvira, and I loathe the love-triangle stuff in just about any and all stories.
All this said- I like Korra. She’s strong, smart, and being bull-headed isn’t always a bad thing. Heck, look at Toph. She got jailed and in return learned how to bend metal AND then escape after laying a trap. The other option would have been getting shipped back to her parents without anyone knowing.
And as for Aang- nobody's perfect. Literally no one. That doesn’t make him a bad man or a bad father.
Anyway… thanks for reading if anyone actually did? lol
I liked the Legend of Korra. I watched both ATLA and the sequel while they were being aired. I tend not to judge sequels too harshly but that's just me. Great video btw
Me too.
for me i love atla but i appreciate lok, especially seasons 3&4 for expanding and exploring themes of what it means to be the avatar and what can happen after an avatar's fall from grace.
@@imani7979 And what happens when a world starts to outgrow the need for an avatar. Imagine if one day the avatar get's to actually chose for him/herself the life it want's to live. Like, the avatar could be among the crowd and no one would even know it.
Tenzin is my favorite character in the entire franchise and you brought out so many of the reasons why I feel that.
Despite me not being the biggest fan of LoK (I personally think the show would have massively benefited from being greenlight for 4 seasons from the start) I find his character so compelling and rich. Not to mention that JK Simmons does an excellent job in the role.
They brought in J Jonah Jameson to voice Tenzin! What's not to love?
I still think the issue of making Aang a bad parent is too big. I mean can anyone really picture Katara just sitting back while Aang ignores his non air bending children? If he did accidentally do this should would have stopped it pretty early on.
They could have done the same thing by making it a conflict between what Aang said and taught and what Aang did. Aang in reality was a pretty radical air nomad. He got married and had kids, something we are never shown air nomads doing before the war. He is very in tune with his emotions where most seem to act like monks. He enjoys showing off and getting attention. He constantly looks for connections in the world be It new friends romantic or just ways to help people. plus he is trained by a less traditional teacher as a kid.
On the other hand he is the last of the air nomads so feels he needs to pass on all o the traditions and keep the air nation alive in some way.
I been saying this from r so long like I am glad someone thinking the same way
@@silvertongue.242_99 me too! it really turned me off of the sequel. Im convinced for some reason they wanted to knock Aang down a peg or two. The friend group we saw in avatar would never have allowed Aang to make these mistakes.
@@mike-mz6yz the series doesn’t actually describe him as a bad parent, just an imperfect one. Because there is no such thing, even for Aang. The particular episode where Kya, Bumi and Tenzin are discussing this they all come to the conclusion that, although Aang had to give Tenzin a certain amount of attention due to him being the only air nomad at the time, they had a great childhood because he did the best he could with what he knew how to do and what little time had with them. And Katara helps them realize this. And I believe it adds more depth to Aang as an adult. Coming from a family with several children, I can you that not all your siblings will share your perspective on everything.
@@Idontwannaknowu23 Yup, the thing is that while he was a father for his three children, he also had to be Tenzin's teacher and that carries another set of emotions Kya and Bumi might not have known about or even wanted to feel about their father. Think about it, had Tenzin been a different man, we could've had a scene of him feeling bitter about being railroaded into being a monk by his father, if Kya were an airbender, she probably wouldn't be the childfree person she is at the show, not without a lot of conflict, and Bumi wouldn't have his military career.
Air nomads did get married. How else would the population be replaced? They were a nomadic and peaceful culture, but they weren't celibate. They were an order of monks who didn't necessarily have to be celibate. Both marriage and celibacy were individual choices. They may have been nomads but they still needed to biologically reproduce.
My one major problem with Korra is how much it - the show itself, as in the actual camera - seems to revel in watching her suffer. Every season. It loves having people lecture her about how bad she is as they physically torment her, with disturbing lingering shots and scenes of her in pain or being humiliated or just getting the snot beaten out of her. Then some contrivance comes along to pull her out of the fire, though still leaving her thoroughly damaged one way or another in the aftermath. As cool as your reading of this scene is, and as much as I like Jinora, to me it’s just one more scene reveling in Korra’s weakness and pain.
I get that there’s catharsis in survival for those who’ve been through trauma. But I feel like the show goes past that, and too far.
Good point, I can actually see what you’re saying and I never thought about it like that. One reason I always liked Korra less than Aang is because she looses almost every battle. Now that you mentioned it, she’s always losing her battles but also being tortured mentally AND physically.
I find it weird how Aang had a fair share amount of W’s and L’s but Korra has more L’s then W’s. I don’t want to bring gender into this but I think she was written this way because she is a girl. The only other character(s) that take a butt load of L’s is Bolin and Mako. I don’t think they ever one a fight especially Mako.
Back to my thing with Korra, I still don’t like TLOK as much as ATLA but TLOK was done super dirty and could’ve been better if they weren’t greenlit. However, I still find it weird as to prove to us that Korra is strong she had to go through unfair fights, CONSTANTLY lose, and be traumatized and hurt throughout the entire series. Not only that, but characters in the show have to keep stating that Korra is strong and the writers had her to do impressive feats that feels so unearned because of her L’s imo.
I’m not trying to put down Korra when I say this but Aang did these cool feats that helped him to win, Korra did the same but looses. Like I can get into how I felt the villains were written to be op, but in short each villian had this random power boost that shouldn’t really affect the fight (minus Unalaq and Kuvira; Kuvira wasn’t stronger than Korra, and Unalaq had Vaatu in the second half of the fight.) I mean you can argue that Amon was stronger than Korra, but the fact Korra washed him once she realized Amon’s ability says a lot, also Korra being able to wash Zaheer in Avatar state says a lot too (at least until the poison kicked in.)
To this day I still wish for a TLOK remake with better pacing, developments, and the talk of mental health without it being heavily placed on Korra when tormented tbh.
@@ningmushii Thanks for writing this. The last paragraph you wrote nails it. I like a lot about LoK, but I’m glad at least some other people can see some of the same problems.
@@muddlewait8844 Yess!! I’m glad I watched the show again because the hate Korra is honestly bootycheeks and the show is good. It would probably be better received if it was a stand alone series. I just wish Korra was done better and that people can RESPECTFULLY dislike and point out flaws in the show without mentioning the fact she’s bi and a female lead.
I feel like it’s the complete opposit, every time anyone tells her the stuff she did wrong it’s focused on to make you mad at the teacher or authority and side with her but like, she deserves to get scolded she makes super stupid decisions and is generally a pretty bad person
@@Abysalss I don’t necessarily think the show makes you “hate” her teachers/mentor but definitely makes her “right.” Her best character development that should’ve happened in a progressive way throughout the series was in season 4. By then she was at her lowest (I consider this her lowest since she wasn’t even able to bend or anything) and was willing to listen to what others was telling her (Toph.) Not only that, but she got to see how she used to be (Kuvira) and had no choice but change for the better at least.
I think another big issue with Korra is that she didn’t really have a good teacher. Tenzin was stressed, and too busy with doing other things; not only that but he was a hothead that blew up at Korra for not understanding his teaching ways. I do think it’s more of a Tenzin issue though as Bumi had the same issue with Tenzin in season 3, and Meelo barely paid attention to Tenzin whenever he was on screen training. I also would’ve love for Zaheer to become a mentor to her, I think had he been an earlier villian he could’ve trained her to work with her spirituality and airbending. Or, he could’ve played both sides during the entirety of his season, that would’ve been a great point for Korra’s character as she would become more patient, willing to listen to others, and learning fighting strategies. After all of her moments with Zaheer, she would have to go back and think of a way to defeat him.
I feel like Aang would've definitely loved the new Air Nation, while it might've taken him a little time to come to that conclusion I believe he would've loved it
Honestly I find Legend of Korra frustrating because I *almost* love it. Legend of Aang had its own flaws, but they're more like chips around the edges. With Legend of Korra, I find the little niggles too numerous and disruptive to what could have been. I think you make good points here and I definitely agree that season 3 was some of the best storytelling in the show. I also love Korra and her squad as characters. Yet I don't rewatch her story the way I do Aang (and Zuko).
i actually saw legend of korra BEFORE i ever saw last airbender. legend of korra is what got me INTO avatar in the first place, and i love it dearly.
Which is why your own bias toward Korra blinds you from what makes it such a bad show.
@@KevinOnEarth_ ok thats like, your opinion man. i can still like it
@@BlackReshiram Of course you still can ❤️
I can’t keep you from consuming shit, all I can do is point it out.
@@KevinOnEarth_ thank you for accepting that
@@BlackReshiram Nah, LoK is shit. How do you like it?
I like the way the avatar kids discussion about their dad concludes. Tenzin apolgizes and admits their father was not perfect and let his responsibilities consume him too much. Kya and Bumi apologize and admit that their jealousy and hurt did not leave room to acknowledge Aang had a responsibility as the last Airbender and they love their dad.
And of course Aang would go overboard with passing on his culture. He lost his first family and his entire people and culture. Imagine the shock he felt when his first born was the first nonbender born to an Airbender that he felt, imagine the mix of fear and joy he felt when his daughter started water bending and he wondered if airbending would die with him.
Honestly it never sat right with me that Aang would be a neglectful father. I think he might initially attach to the air ending child a bit more but Katara definitely wouldn’t have let him neglect if his two other children for very long. They kept eachother grounded in the show so well, I felt like they just disrespected those characters
He didn't neglect his children. He just favored Tenzin.
Jinora was such an amazing piece of the series. I think the ceremony made me tear up as much as the actual ending of ATLA.
I think most of us understand that humanizing your heroes by giving him certain undesirable traits is a good thing, so portraying him as a neglectful parent already made sense considering he had no parents of his own, no rolemodel to live up to. But more than that, for Korra to become the emotianal core of the story, for her to be as human as Zuko was in ATLA, her predecessor had to be shown as human aswell. So Aangs retroactive character development in season 2 was one of the most important things they could've done IMO.
But Ang was not perfect in the first series, neither was he depected as such.
The problem here is the depection of a character that is dissonent with his caracter as established in the first show.
Ang is depicted as a very sensitive and copassionate intdividual, in touch with the feelings of others. The idea that this would stop with his childern just rings false.
Moreover, he was not parenting alone, and the idea that this would go unnoticed and uncorrected by Kitara or that he would ignore her if she broght this up to him also rings false.
It seemed more to be the choice of tarnishing an established hero so the one one could shire brighter.
@@SubjectNate ofcourse he wasnt perfect. But it's not bad to give him more flaws. Besides, they show never suggests that he wasn't compassiate towards his children. Neglectful and non-compassionate are very different things. He had too many things on his mind that he was dealing with at the same time, it wasn't some purposeful ignorance of his kids.
Plus it's real life... Our hero's have flaws
@mathies3598 the big issue is the idea that he wouldn't involve the other kids, talking about air nomad culture was one of his favorite things! He could still show favoritism but there's no way he wouldn't bring the others with him!
@mathies3598
It's bad to give him flaws that LITERALLY contradict him, his personality, and his ideals. As OP said, he was a very kind and compassionate soul, and he literally sacrificed himself for those that needed him. He would NOT stop doing that if it involved his own kids, he would give everything he had to ensure his kids needs were met. Physically AND emotionally. LoK Aang isn't Aang. It's an Aang mimic, poorly imitating the real Aang.
This, right here, the style of story that is Korra and, as you said, how it deconstructs The Last Airbender is why I say DON'T WATCH KORRA RIGHT AFTER THE LAST AIRBENDER. Both really good, and really worth the time, but if you go into Korra off the back of Aang's journey then you are going to have the wrong expectations, and it is going to feel bad. That isn't to say don't watch the first before Korra, just put some time between them. because Korra deconstructs like it does it helps to know where it is coming from, what it is deconstructing, but with some time between I think it becomes easier to appreciate the story that is Korra.
Eeeeeeh even without it there are still hiccups that I'm not fond of.
Well, that doesn't work because so many people grew up with ATLA and saw Korra as a sequel, a continuation of the avatar cycle and story. So, you can't fault people for disliking LOK when it deconstructed their favorite childhood show, and told them to "deal with it".
@@lisaleyendekker8305 technically a deconstruction isnt a bad idea moreso than the execution and presentation. Most of the gripes I had with LoK is focused LoK storyline and characters rather than what it does with its predecessor.
@@lisaleyendekker8305 even with the executive meddling, the end result product is still open for criticism. Such as how the systemic classism topic it posed just disappears after Amon is dealt with. Or how Unalaq was too cartoony of a villain when he couldve been much more like a misguided spiritualist. The Red Lotus too was left as if there were still more out there but nothing was done with it after Zaheer and his gang were gone. And Kuvira didnt have enough propped up development to be the stepped in final villain as well as having this correlation between her and Korra. Book 3 could've planted a connection with Korra and Kuvira back at the Zaofu mini arc given bits of interactions and making her be the one to combat spare with Korra in metalbending and showing how she is a bit better at while training her giving it a sense of tension when she becomes a villain cuz we know she can school the Avatar with her skills alone.
@@lisaleyendekker8305 yeah, I did to and there was a while where I strongly disliked Korra. It took time for me to get over that. When Korra started coming out I binged AtLA them started into Korra. That is how I know that is a mistake.
It’s been 10 years since this show came out? Damn I feel old
It will never be okay to tear down a beloved protagonist to build up a sequel, just like it's never okay to tear down a person to build up your self-esteem.
they didn't tear Aang down imo they just made him a human who makes mistakes
@@manuba_ We didn't need LOK to do that though. ATLA did that multiple times. In ATLA we got to see Aang run away as a child due to the increasing responsibilities of becoming the Avatar. We see him burn Katara due to his haste and recklessness to learn Firebending. We see him lie to both Sokka and Katara about the map that would lead them to their father because of how isolating it would feel to be left behind by the only two friends you still have in this world. ATLA characterizes and humanizes Aang constantly. LOK pulling an off-screen "deadbeat father" characterization after he dies is so disingenuous and wack.
@manuba_
They LITERALLY tore him down to make the sequel... You can't argue they didn't, because they DID.
Mistakes he made as a child don't negate the mistakes Aang would make as an adult. They didn't completely destroy Aang, they made him a father. They made him a husband. They made him a man, and men make mistakes. Aang was a great Avatar but a mediocre father, and that's ok. The only reason Aang and Katara work is because Katara was there for everything Aang went through and she understands Aangs duties as the Avatar better than anyone. If Aang had gotten with any other suitor she would have left him because he was likely so busy with his duties he hardly had time for his wife. Add kids into the mix and I'd be surprised if Katara got much attention especially after Tenzin was born.
I love that we get to explore Aang as a man and not the child that we see in ATLA. It shows how he has changed and how he has remained similar. Until his dying day he never killed a single enemy he fought. He continued his path of pacifism by choosing to only take bending away. He continued the teachings of the nomads and became a wise monk. None of those things means that hes gonna be a good dad or make perfect decisions. In fact, Aang didn't deal with Yakone until his 2nd or 3rd offense even though he knew what Yakone was doing.
After watching Korra again within the last couple of months, there are a lot of very good story points and development that Korra goes through that are the result of someone who was sheltered from the world and had to learn all of her lessons the hard way, something Aang didn't have to do because he was able to travel to see Kuzon & Bumi and ride elephant Koi even before he was told he was the Avatar. They locked Korra away in the South Pole and basically trained her in secret without telling her or showing her anything. How else do you expect a sheltered person with legendary power to behave? Cause they will be entitled until they are humbled. Korra had no idea what was in store for her and unfortunately she had to pay the consequences at every step of the way. @@MrDraygoX
@MrDraygoX ikr, like after the ending of atla we expected a different aang than the aang they talked about in tlok, especially after what aang did for katara at the guru it showed that aang gave the people he loved a prime importance but in TLOK him partially ignoring them ruined how we expected aang's life to be like
Another thing to kind of add to the whole defacing of Aang’s legacy is that the things that “deface” him are very real, and very reasonable things to come from Aang. The big one is that he favors Tenzin far more than his other kids, and was very distant from them. This makes sense when you remember one of the biggest traumas Aang has is that he’s the last survivor of a genocide, and that to him Tenzin was the one thing that kept his culture (that he held dearly) alive. It’s not an excuse for being a shitty father, but it makes sense Aang would make this mistake.
And that's not even considering the fact that he also has his Avatar duties as well
There's also the fact that Air Nomad parents weren't necessarily solely responsible for their own children; they were communally raised. It probably didn't occur to Aang that his culture's parenting style wouldn't work well this time around, given that no one else around him shared that particular ideal or responsibility to his kids. For all we know, he might have never had a real relationship with or even _knew_ who his biological parents were. Considering all this, _plus_ his status as the Avatar, it's really no wonder that he wasn't an active parent with _all_ _three_ of his children. He never learned how to be.
Considering we never seen or heard him talk about his parents, and how young he was when we meet him, it seems quite likely he didn't even know his parents.
Let's not forget that one episode where he nearly kept the info about location of Katara and Sokka's father a secret because he didn't want to be abandoned. It's probably not that surprising his parental experience is horribly lacking.
Not to mention being the literal last of his kind *and* being an Avatar
It's interesting to hear you say that the old ways and traditions of the Airbenders are no longer relevant because that made me think about how in Book 4, just three years later, they wear these flying squirrel jumpsuit things, instead of the classic robes. They no longer use glider staffs because they have become their own gliders, just another thing that has changed for the Air Nomads. Even Tenzin adopts this new change in his warddrobe, which admittedly, looks really weird on him because he looks like an absolute boss in his cloak and robes, but it's just another representation of just how far he has come since Book 1, too.
Very late, but although I’m happy that the airbenders are back, I really don’t like the wing suits. They feel more reminiscent of something from the fire national, with the gray being ash and the red and orange being flames… I don’t know. I just always preferred the robes. I hope the airbenders either go back to the traditional clothing or they change the designs to look more airbender-esque
Personally, I can't really compare Korra's arc to Zuko's. Whereas I could excuse some Zuko's behaviors because of his abusive background, Korra did not face even slightly similar upbringing and her making the same mistakes over and over again cannot really be excused in the same way. Because of this her ark is received so differently by many fans, including me. Also, yes I LOVE Tenzin and hate it when Korra constantly dismisses him. And yes sacrificing Aang did feel like a great betrayal. I don't hate Korra as a show but I do feel scarred by it because it changed a part of my childhood that I considered sacred.
Perfectly described!
Constantly? She only dismissed him once.
@@vetarlittorf1807 she's been dismissive of him for the entirety of the first two seasons. Going back behind his back to fight in those bending matches, using the avatar state to race with Tenzin's kids, etc etc. She starts to change a bit in season 3 but by that point I couldn't care less for her. Just my opinion.
@@GalicianGranddaughter666 In neither of those cases did she dismiss him. She simply became a pro-bender because it had a positive influence on her and Tenzin didn't realize it at first. As for the race thing, Tenzin never said anything about the Avatar State prior to that. The only time she dismissed him was when she wanted to learn from Unalaq, a decision that she later regretted and apologized to Tenzin.
Also, where are you getting the idea that she made the same mistakes over and over? The series doesn't seem to support that claim.
@@vetarlittorf1807 people just be hating on Korra for little reason I swear lmao
See, my big issue here isn't that Aang ended up being a poor father to two of his children- I really don't like that, granted, it doesn't feel at all like how he'd act, but at least I can follow the thought process. No, what gets me is that Aang _is_ still technically around- Korra could talk to him, there's the manifestation technique that Kiyoshi and Roku employed, spirits can bleed into the physical world during the solstices, etc. There was ample opportunity, not just on-camera but before the series even started, for Aang to explain his viewpoint and actually have a dialogue with his children. And you don't even need to fully exonerate him for his actions, ultimately he could still have been seen as flawed and wrongdoing, but at least he could be allowed to articulate why he acted the way he did and have an actual heart-to-heart with his kids about it.
We didn't get that. Instead, Bumi and Kaya just essentially drop into our laps that "Yeah, no, dad sucked," and ultimately the siblings reconcile and Tenzin comes into his own, but we're still left with this new version of Aang and just expected to roll with it, and not long after Aang is literally scrubbed from existence with all but one of the rest of the Avatars. "Yeah, that character you liked and watched grow and develop for three seasons and change? He was a dick and he's gone now, have fun with that."
I don't care what kind of thematic message they were going for, that was shoddily done and didn't do enough to balance out the sour taste it left, so the impact ultimately doesn't land. (And this is just one of a multitude of such issues I have with Korra. I'm happy so many people like and enjoy the series, truly I am, but I just can't count myself among them.)
I think u are absolutely right they definitely should have made it so aang could tell his side of the story cause he still can, and could have made the siblings be in peace with their conflict with him and have all of them come to an understanding, that sounds better in my eyes and i would have loved to see an execution like that
Well the traditions and spiritual practices of the old world were pretty dead in this new industrialized world so that’s one problem.
Buddy, Aang wasn't some horrible deadbeat father. He just showed favoritism and never resolved it with his kids. What would you like him to say to exonerate himself? It was clear why he did it: he wanted to revive the Airbenders and realized it was likely only Tenzin could do so.
Plus, how is this a "new" version of Aang? The original Aang in TLA was flawed too, just like every Avatar before him. Not to mention it's a pretty common thing for people who are considered as "perfect" by strangers to have issues within their families, which are never resolved many times and often only mentioned after their passing.
you GOTTA stop bastardizing dialogue....things that are ACTUALLY said vs...YOUR skewed version of it. "Dad wasn't perfect" vs "Dad sucked"....be conscious of this not just for this show, but all media and literature. Do you see the weird line you're setting up here.....either Aang is PERFECT........or he sucks. If he's not perfect than...he sucks. Perfect man and father OR....bad dad. The actual CONVERSATION the characters, and the story of Tenzin, are communicating is that Tenzin only sees his dad as this infallible perfect man. Much of the world agrees because...the man's a hero, a holy man....a fun, Dalai Lama type guy who helped overthrow a dictator, end a war and rebuilt a stable society. Kya and Bumi are just trying to get Tenzin to cut through the fog of all this mysticism and see THEIR side of it. He was a great man and a loving dad, but he was busy...and spent excess time with Tenzin. They are hammering the point because Tenzin is lording his views and ego over them, and they're trying to get him to STOP....so they need to really illustrate the flaws Aang had to him so he wakes up! Flaws....that's all. Normal shit.
Not being a perfect father doesnt make Aang "suck" as a person. You just invented that because you have a prejudice for LOK so you used that narrative to justify your hatred with the show. Just say that you dont like LOK because you wanted things your way.
She destroyed the avatar cycle, thus erasing a main theme of the universe, because she was too bratty to listen to her teacher.
Everything in Korra feels like a deliberate effort to erase ATLA. Revealing random flaws in ATLA's main character that are never explored, changing the rules of bending, changing the origin of bending, changing the nature of the Avatar State.
Ikr like TLOK ruined atla only season 1 of TLOK didn't ruin atla but all other seasons destroyed atla and one of the frustrating things imo is the fact they made the northern water tribe seem like a nation of tyrants and also kinda ruining the adult aang character we expected
It sucks that Korra didn't have the time to slowburn anything, cause they didn't think they'd get more than 1 season in the first place.
💜⚡️
i could have sworn they said they had the second season confirmed before they even started making the first one, leading to both seasons being made simultaneously
True
@@pikminman13 No, season 2 was ordered by Nickaloead either shorty before, or shorty after the first season of Korra ended. During the Book 2's production, seasons 3&4 we're ordered. This is also why the writing for book 3&4 were much tighter and how they were able to make the events of book 2 flow more easily into Book 3.
Yeah, and the seasons they did get had so few episodes they barely had the time to flesh out anything.
@@costelinha1867 Also true, unfortunately. 12eps is not enough to tell a story as big as they could have.
LOK did not dismantle Aang’s legacy as much as it dismantled our *idealized perceptions* of Aang and the Gaang’s legacy. LoK added new but consistent depths to Toph and Aang that challenged us to love them in spite of their imperfections and failings.
The writers never shied away from showing how trauma affects kids in ATLA, but now in LOK we see those traumatized and abused kids we loved and related to become damaged adults who leave behind complicated legacies and estranged families.
Like Tenzin, the idea of Aang being a deadbeat dad shocks us at first, but it also asks us take a second look at Aang’s story and try to find the details we may have missed. And like Tenzin, by letting go of what we thought and expected out of Aang we gain an even stronger appreciation for everything that he worked for and everything he lost to achieve it, just as we learn to love Korra for both her shortcomings, her success, and her journey.
I think people forget that in real life, great figures are never perfect. Aang had to do a ton of things before he died, it would naturally show up somewhere as a downside. He had a role in creating a new city/nation/government. He had to recreate the Air Nation which likely included teaching a ton of spiritual and cultural information in hopes that it could be passed on. He also still had his duties to the world. There is an upper limit to human flexibility, he absolutely had to have failing points.
The thing tho, is that they destroyed aang's character, in atla, it showed aang cared most about the people close to him and especially katara when he was at the guru and would sacrifice anything for them like when bro sacrificed having and controlling the avatar state so he wouldnt lose his love for katara which meant if he was in grave danger he couldn't enter the avatar state so he technically risked his life for katar, showing that aang cared most about the people he loved but they kinda ruined that part of aang's personality in tlok
I always thought that Aangs favoritism for Tenzin made sense, not that I believe that Aang didn't care about his other kids, but he finally felt like he had someone to give his culture to. He lost his culture and now got to bring it back. I love Korra and I think it's a great show
Whilst I don’t hate LOK; I have plenty of problems with it that have nothing to do with the characters
The world was what I hated the most; went from an eastern-fantasy setting to an english-steampunk setting in 2 generations for example
I also hated how with Korra they ended the Avatar’s lineage which I definitely dislike
The biggest problems with a character in LOK is Bolin that definitely doesn’t have Sokka’s smartness and instead is just lucky
I also dislike how rare bending forms became so common; lighting and metal-bending were unique powers that now everyone has; it diminishes Zuko’s jurney to learn and fail to use lightings if now that orphan dude who fights in the arena can do that too and everyone works on lighting-bender based machines
I think that the reason why rare bending forms became normal is because of constant progress. It actually mirrored our current generation a bit. Painting or arts, in general, is an example. Back then like earlier 2000s and 2010s painting, drawing, or making art is a difficult process and is hard to master. Currently, due to technology and availability of materials and teachings (through watchng yt vids or etc) it has became so common these days. I am not saying that the traditional way of making art is uncommon back then, but the progress of doing and learning it has been really efficient these days. Maybe just like what I had given example, teaching lightning and metal bending has been more common. And many people realized their potential in learning these new bending forms, just because of how available the teaching of these are. Toph actually had a school to teach aspiring metal benders the skill of metal bending so that they could pass it into other generations.
I agree with you fully. Everything about LOK destroyed what made ATLA great.
The eastern setting was a lot better yeah…
Honestly it makes sense that Korra is so different from aang. They established that each avatar is different and aang grew up not wanting to be the avatar as a nomad while korra grew up hearing stories of aang and wanted to be avatar and was also a teenage girl vs aangs young boy. Plus water tribe is very different from air nomads.
I can live with what happened with The Change-Up between Aang and Korra what I cannot deal with is the absolute drastic spiritual change of the show and that is what ruined it for me. In Avatar The Last Airbender we see multiple different cultures we see lots of traditional things and it has a real spiritual feel about it which the show is supposed to have. It's supposed to be a mystical like journey and whilst they did not want to make them exactly the same and I get that turning it into Republic city which is like I said a drastic change it was too overwhelming for me and a lot of other fans. There were just too many technological advancements that happened way too fast I understand that they are benders and they have different kinds of advantages than us nonbenders would have but it still seems highly unlikely when you think of real-world mechanics as well as adding the world of avatars mechanics it still doesn't seem like it would be that fast. Just after a couple of decades should not be enough to create cars and other advancements like the flying machines. Hot air balloons I can understand because we already had that in after the last airbender and yes they had machines like tanks but they were powered by bending and they were all more naturalistic kind of Machinery whereas in Legend of Korra it's more electronic and more scientific it had a totally different feel and it didn't bring back any of the Nostalgia that was needed for the show to become an absolute hit. The only redeeming quality that I saw in Legend of Korra were the villains they were very different they were a lot darker and I kind of like that however they were too easy to defeat and the last Baddie that we get is basically just a woman who wants to take Republic City because she thinks it's a territory of the earth Kingdom and the Earth Queens already dead so her War really feels meaningless it just kind of seems like a bad Arc to use for the finale of the show the one prior to it was so devastatingly it dramatic and it brought back that little piece of spirituality Unilock becoming one with vaatu was horrifyingly pleasing because we lost Rava and we also saw that there is a Dark Avatar now and it let up for more questions of are we going to see more dark avatars what's going to happen afterwards that was a good point to stop but instead it continued and it didn't add anything further to it. One can argue that the spirit portals added something to it but it really didn't and whilst I will say I love the lgbtq representation of Asami and Korra getting together that's again another Arc that just seems random I get where they could have the connection but it just doesn't feel like it would flow correctly and I'm not saying that because it's an lgbtq relationship I'm a transgender woman and I'm all about lgbtq relationships but this one just like I said it feels random and I feel like korra would need more time to reflect on her own kind of thoughts and feelings after breakup after break-up sometimes you just need time to reflect on your own s*** and Korra never seems to really have time to do that strong independent woman that's had a lot of hardships and I feel like a great ending would have been she's better off on her own because she unlike other avatars feels like I can be happy on my own so I can protect those that matter to me whilst protecting the world and not fearing for them but then again that's just my opinion I love your video it was very well-thought-out
I liked the evolution of the air nation. It felt natural considering the people who joined were not airbenders by birth and were not raised as peaceful nomadic monks, but your average modern citizen. I think it would also only be natural for them to discontinue their Pacifist ways considering the last air nomads were literally wiped out.
I like the idea of Kora being more hardheaded, but I felt that the first thing that alienated me from the series was her bending 3 elements first thing rather than just water and going on an adventure to learn which could have gone well with some of the villains anyways
Thank you for analyzing this scene and the series as a whole. I was never able to see Avatar after season 1 on TV due to scheduling conflicts, and had issues watching Korra after season 1 too. But I absolutely love the series except for season 2. The story was well written in seasons 1, 3, and 4, and certain aspects of season 2 were good. I thoroughly enjoyed watching it because of how different it was from the first season of Avatar.
a personal thing which peeved me about korra was the setting, avatar takes place in very asian inspired areas and the way the different cultures of the world of avatar is portrayed, so while the idea of a city made from the 4 nations coming together sounded like a cool idea, its actual execution left a lot to be desired, specifically how, despite the asian cultures of the 4 nations the writers decided to make it... new york
this always annoyed me as someone who lives in south east asia, a place which is generally a massive culture mixing pot seeing them take the idea of an asian culture mixing pot and making new york always just annoyed me, there was a lot that one could do with the setting but it ended up being... bland
I feel the exact same although i come from a European country. The Aesthetics of the original nations was so cool and then instead of actually mixing and modernizing them we just got fucking 1920s America. For me it no longer felt like a mystical or distant world with its own history and culture. Instead it was just our own but with bending
Legend of Korra had pacing issues and the abysmal love triangle and relationship progression hurt the first two seasons. And Unalaq was terrible.
What killed this show for me is the end of season 2, spoiler warnings
Korra defeats unalaaq or whatever his name is but is forced to RE-START THE WHOLE AVATAR CYCLE it was my favorite segment of the original show where you learn about the previous avatars struggle and their story and wisdom now wiped forever, what really made me like these segments was the avatar wasn't perfect he's still human still flawed and in need of advice from previous avatars who have gone through the same struggle and learned, that was what made avatar so dear to me
I am biased since i dislike Legend of Korra, and I feel that whole thing was a slap to the original show.
It's also terrible for future avatars that will only have Korra as a spirit guide
"Dunno man, did you try it punching it very hard?"
@@LtAlguien imagine that aang as a spirit was kind and compassionate, kyoshi is cold and calculated, and roku is cultured and caring, then we have korra who's just like: lol git gud
@@LtAlguien Korra grows to become a wise and spiritually enlightened Avatar. So she'll have plenty of wisdom to offer.
It's really unfortunate because we barely saw Aang as a spiritual guide for Korra, and now we'll never see him be a spiritual guide again. I like the idea of out with the old and in with the new to an EXTENT, this was just too far. While things need to adapt and change, it's still important to remember and hold on to the wisdom of the past
@@katieburkman3981 Hence Korra's speech at the end of Book 2 is important where she essentially said that we should learn from the past without being too attached to it.
Perfectly stated. Whenever I think of LoK, I think of her last conversation with Tenzin which I think touches on the foundation of her entire journey.
She says she knows she was in a dark place but knew why she had to go through that. She continues, ""I Needed To Understand What Real Suffering Was, So I Could Become More Compassionate To Others Even To People Like Kuvira."
This journey isn't as dramatic as Aangs and I think that's why some people find her a bit distasteful. She was flawed and boastful at the start with grandiose ideas towards herself. She basically had to be broken down and built up to become the Avatar the world needed.
Korra's a more compelling character than Aang BECAUSE she was broken down. Even in the first season, she was already more interesting because she was scared shitless of fighting Amon but constantly felt like she needed to prove that he didn't terrify her. The moment where she burst into tears when Tenzin found her after Amon allowed her to keep her bending was basically a soft warmup for when she suffered from PTSD in Season 4. I don't think the writers planned for her fall that far in the first season because they didn't know for sure that they would be allowed to do any more but fortunately, it worked out in the long term. In the Season 4 finale, Korra no longer needed, or even wanted, to beat the shit out of Kuvira to get her to stop. In the end, she simply talked to her, which is something that Season 1 Korra wouldn't have done.
Aang was only compelling on two occasions in ATLA. The first was when he showed a selfish side by hiding Hakoda's letter and the second was when he became borderline Zuko levels of angsty when Appa disappeared. Outside of those two occasions though, Aang wasn't interesting enough to carry ATLA so he needed characters like Zuko, Katara, Azula and Toph to carry it for him.
@@tomnorton4277 I think the part where she talks Kuvira down is overrated. One heart to heart talk was apparently all it took to get her to surrender everything to the people she deemed would run the earth kingdom into the ground after an entire season of thinking it needed to be in better hands. It’s honestly one of the most rushed character shifts I’ve seen in anything.
I agree. But what I don't like is that they took the opportunity and the time to actually dissect and build Korra while they didn't really go further into Aang's character. Korra actually got a better character development arc, but all they showed us in ATLV is that Aang learnt how to cope with the harsh reality of being Avatar and eventually accepting that role. It's almost like although Aang and Korra are opposites and were brought up in different circumstances, Aang had it harder and they didn't go deeper with his character
I don't disagree that this deconstruction is what some fans got hung up on. I think the reason the series gets so much criticism is twofold. One part is this, the contrast with and deconstruction of the previous series. The other part is the way they failed really explore the conflicts that they presented. It's been a while since I've watched the later seasons, but I think they do a better job in later seasons.
Season one they fail to really explore the bender nonbender conflict, making the equalist cause seem like it has no merit. Season two has the baffling choice of explaining the avatar with a "good" spirit in opposition to a "bad" spirit. I liked the world building of avatar wan, but also it managed to completely undercut the cultural stories of the origin of bending and undercut the idea of the avatar maintaining balance.
It's frustrating not because the show was bad, but because you can see the ways it could have been great.
This is where I'm at too and it's so frustrating! They had the building blokes of a great sequal; the world, a great and variable cast (mostly), new and old themes to explore, and real comentary on how a rapidly modernising world holds on to what is important. And what did they do, they overreached. They became so focused on supasing the scope of the old show; bigger conflicts and battles, over explaining the Avatar, add unneeded elements to the world for impact; that their themes got lost in translation.
Thing with season 2 they had a better story in the beginning the conflict with the water tribes and potential gang wars in Republic city but just slam into that spirit world and avatar wan, dark avatar none sense that took front and center
@@silvertongue.242_99 Oh, 100% on this, it was the perfect setting for a truely morally grey conflict and they just threw it away. I could even get behind Korra interacting with the first Avatar (though I would have preferred it as a spritual quest to find herself and connect with her past) but the whole good verse evil thing was just cringy! Order verse chaos would have been better, with early humans and more wild spirits standing is proxies, and in the end the Avatar should not have merged with the "spirit of good" (away with that carebear shite) he should have merged with both. Or better yet, taken the place of both as the keeper of balance.
(Sorry if I started ranting there, I have alot of opinions about season 2)
Yeah I feel like the dropped the ball when it came to spiritual themes they took away the mystery and other world rules of the face stealer and the librarian for generic bad guy monsters and glorified settings.
And the ying yang sprits cheapens the humanity and effort of the previous avatars to build on what came before. Then they just scrap the cycle to make kora better than aang and be the last avatar 🙄
@@alexburns43 Don't get me started on how they messed up the ying yang alagory. It is not enough to mention five times that their is light in the darknesss and then have a lightshow to prove it. You have to demonstraight it through actions.
This is why I think the whole first avatar deal should have been just a backdrop for the water tribe civil war. Korra learning about how the Avatar became the keeper of balance showing her how she can't solve all the worlds problems.
And I still think the avatar makes more sense if the two spirits had represented chaos and order! If the avatar had taken the place of both of them, ie humanity taking the reigns of the world, then that could have been a brilliant message.
TLoK didn't live up to the legacy that TLAB left. However nothing ever would have. I think Korra was fine as a story, I liked it quite a bit.
The thing that really bothered me about korra is that they made the avatar state super nerfed. I hated how she went into the avatar state and then moments later she would be getting her butt kicked
I liked how Korra used Avatar State in Book 1
I don't think they really needed to deconstruct Aang as a person. He wasn't perfect by any means. The stuff about him favoring Tenzin over his other kids honestly could have been written better because I honestly don't believe Aang wouldn't at least try to find some way of spending time with all of his kids at once. I could see the frustration of Aangs other kids given he had to spend a lot of time with Tenzin and a lot of attention because he was the only other Airbender in the family. But it was the fact he brought Tenzin to places and didn't bring his other kids that bothered me. Also, I feel the scene itself isn't really meant to deconstruct Aang but to deconstruct the culture he lived in. A person isn't defined by their culture. I mean in ATLA Aang had to go out into the world and see the types of changes that went on in it. His past lives even told him. "As the avatar your duty is to the world." So even back then they knew that the way of the nomads wasn't good in a world that's always changing and growing. The scene is still marvelous though and I like your comments on it.
My biggest issue with Korra that she always gets her way. No matter how many people, tenzin especially, she randomly picks fights with anyone for no reason. In episode 1, I’ve thought the whole purpose she ran away from home this to meet up with tenzin to master air bending since it’s the only element she has hard time bending. But instead she rather do probending and blames tenzin for teaching her the wrong way. To her pro ending is improving her skills. I was like how?? What about airbending?? That’s what the whole f**king premise of why you’re there in republic city.
I like how you ignore that Tenzin had to changed his way of thinking to teach her. Because she did try lots of times but couldn't get it. Pro bending did help her quickly learn airbending skills. Also if korra got what she wanted she wouldn't be getting beat up by Amon and be manipulated by his little brother and proceed to lose to him. Many things don't go her way
It is like you literally refuse to watch actually the show besides episode 1 and the later seasons, for something called character development or the the situations where she is humbled and is literally poisoned which literally makes her paralyzed for three years but yeah she always gets her way and is a Mary Sue.
@@kafukwamekemeh As someone who loves Korra Calm TF down lmao
I know this video is a year old but I remember waiting atla to come on every week.
What sucks is there were so many plot holes at the end of atla (yes I’m aware of the comics) however there were so many things viewers wanted to see animated with voice acting.
Like zuko finding his mom that was probably the biggest plot hole. Or seeing the after effects of the 100 year war and yeah it’s talked about in LOK
But just seems to be overlooked almost as if it’s not important
It sounds like the creators tried to do something they themselves didn’t understand.
It’s probably a big reason why TLOK felt so convoluted as well as everyone’s takes on it.
I think Zaheer was right at least about one thing. The avatar shouldn’t exist it’s way too much power for a single person to have especially when that person is chosen at birth.
I don’t really like legend of Korra because of Korra’s blatant abuse of her power in the early seasons which makes Zaheers point extremely clear. I understand she undergoes a lot of character growth throughout the series but the underlying problem of the unchecked power of the avatar is never addressed.
I think that's another way the show differs itself from ATLA. Aang was reluctant to be the Avatar in a world that desperately needed him while Korra was someone who pretty much built her whole identity around being the Avatar in a world that arguably might not need one anymore
You could say the same thing about Superman. Superman shouldn’t exist it’s way too much power for a single person to have especially when that person is chosen at birth. That's why Bruce Wayne and Lex Luthor hated Superman. The thing is, Superman has all that power, yet no one expects him to do things like singlehandedly stop world wars, but somehow people expect the Avatar to be able to stop world wars. The level of expectations people place on the Avatar is insane, and it doesn't make sense.
@@williamfinch9858 I agree super man shouldn’t exist either.
but it is addressed: Raava. Because the spirit of light and justice guides every avatar, that is the ultimately the check on the power.
@@nothisispatrick6528 I don’t remember Raava being called the spirit of justice. Why is it so hard to admit that Avatar makes no sense?
Janora getting airbender tatoos at a younger age than Aang is ridiculous...the only reason Aang got his so young is because he was the Avatar
Nope, Korra started out on a bad foot for me with her bursting through a wall, knowing 3 of the 4 elements from birth, and shouting "I'm the air bender deal with it!", but she did eventually and painstakingly win me over. The shows depiction of Aang as a bad dad, however, will never be forgiven because it just doesn't work, more so given what a stiff Tenzin turned out to be despite being Aang's supposed favorite.
I've heard a lot that Aang was a human who had to learn to be the avatar where Korra was an avatar who had to learn to be human. Tenzin being stiff made sense because of the huge weight of responsibility he felt to uphold Aang's legacy and rebuild the air nation, something he spoke about in the show. He didn't have time to be a fun regular kid like his siblings because of the expectations Aang had for him
@jillsorise3722 just doesn't work for me, first because Korra was painstakingly human she just knew all but one element, and second because Aang always valued freedom and fun above all else, they made a point to show a photo of him still playing with airbending as an adult, not to mention his personal knowledge of how damaging having those responsibilities shoved on you at a young age is.
Just everything we know about him says he wouldn't have raised Tenzin to be so stiff, Katara could have, and if his attention was split evenly among the kids, their personalities make more sense, but by making Tenzin the "favorite" it makes it Aang's influence that made him that way, and that ship just doesn't float.
Everyone calls Aang a dead beat dad but he literally had no exposure to fathers until he traveled the world.
Aang spent time with tenzin because in his culture, a father is a teacher. His idea of growing older would be to take care of the temple and mentor all the younger airbenders like the monks.
Since bumi couldnt bend and kya was a water bender, he figured they would be raised with their own mentors.
I think the fact they were on the threat of cancellation every season is the biggest problem with Korra, each season they had to be ok with it being the last.... That is hard to do when telling a story that crossed multiple seasons.
All your other points are great I just felt this needed to be said.... I do like Korra as a whole by the way.
LoK actually ruined Aang's legacy by killing off the avatar link
And by changing the spirits themselves too.
I didn't actually see it as Aang's legacy being abandoned at first, but now that you explain it this way, it makes a lot of sense. Thing is, that wasn't the reason I disliked LoK. I'm not gonna be some contrarian and say nothing of value came from the series, and if anything this video only makes me love my favorite scenes from it even more.
LoK just... has a _lot_ more things to dislike than the abandonment of Aang lmao. Mako, Book 2, Raava and Vaatu, bad romance conflict, _giant robot,_ etc. But that's just my perspective
If I am being honest, I loved the deconstructive approach, though they did go a bit far. I love the idea that the avatar is just a person and that anyone with that much power can make mistakes. Though I wish they went with Kyoshi for that. Her story does NOT make her seem like a good person if you really think about what she did. In fact, you could argue that there are a few times when if she had done nothing, everything would have been better. But because she has this power, she feels like even kings need to bow to her. If they wanted to question the Avatar, they could have used that as a starting place.
Plus, you could argue that by opening the spirit portals, Korra was undoing the biggest and worst thing the Avatar ever did. The avatar Broke the world and decided what counted as "balance" just because they had too much power for people to fight against. I mean, is there even such thing as the "spirit world," or is it just a world humans equally belong in, and the avatar just locked us and the lion turtles on this side. I mean, the spirits flooded into the "human world" when the portal was open, so they don't see any reason not to go in. What reason do humans not have to start building in the spirit world?
The comics go into this, but they act like the spirit world is sacred. Yet we know it is just a world that the avatar decided the spirits get to keep while taking the entire world full of "spirit wilds" for humans. It was an arbitrary decision, that the spirits clearly never saw a reason to honor with how any forest spirit can seemingly pop into the real world and even take prisoners.
The worlds were separated originally, there were no portals and everyone lived in their own world.
@@Spherrum
That's not what the episodes showed. Humans only lived on the back of Lion turtles and the rest of the world was known as "Spirit wilds." Then the avatar just decided to kick every spirit out of the world and into the other one. Also the avatar didn't make the spirit portals, they always existed and Korra was the only avatar that accidentally made one.
So no, everyone didn't live in there own worlds. Spirits controlled 90% of both worlds and the avatar decided that the 4 human cities should take over the entire world. Then he kicked out the spirits from there own world.
@@rolay7730 There were dozens of human cities, they were forced to live on the lion turtles because spirits were killing them in the spirit wilds, and Vaatu literally says that he himself created the portals and tore through the veil between worlds. After that the spirits flooded into the human world and conquered it, because without bending people were helpless against them.
@@Spherrum
I was not able to find a source for any human villages before the lion turtles. Thought, Raava and Vaatu did burst into the human world, but they mention doing that early in history before humans existed.
Even then, a "few dozen villages" is no reason to steal an entire world from another population. At that point humans could have fit on any small nation. But they took the world.
So are spirits in the human world sacred, or ore they just bad spirits that refuse to move off of land the avatar kicked them out of?
Was Hai Bai in the wrong and Aang should have kicked him back to the spirit world just for being in the human world at all?
@@rolay7730 No one said anything about villages. Humans lived in cities, and the cities were on lion turtles, and it's been mentioned that there are dozens of such lion turtle cities.
No one stole the world from spirits. They have their own world, and they occupied the human world as well.
They didn't have a small nation, they had only their cities. Without even fields for agriculture. They could only feed themselves by hunting animals in the spirit wilds, which was very dangerous because of the spirits.
The spirits are considered sacred during Aang's time. Wan returned them back to their world.
Hei Bai was definitely wrong for punishing an innocent village for actions of the firenation. And the spirits are not forbidden to appear in the human world, just like humans are not forbidden from meditating into the spirit world. Not many can do that on either side.
Great video essay, as always.
Could you briefly elaborate how Star Wars was an inspiration and what aspects were influenced? I really cannot see much.
I remember watching the avatar growing up and bits of Korra. So when I got older I rewatched the avatar and fell in love with it and tried to watch Korra but I just couldn’t no matter how much I wanted to I couldn’t. This video isn’t gonna make me watch it but I can appreciate its existence. Change is something many people fail to accept. This video describes the beauty and growth that comes with change. So thank you.
Season 3 was alright, but I hated season 2, and here's why.
In TLA, the spirits were consistently neutral, with a blue/orange morality compared to the material world, where it was pretty clear that the Fire Nation was (at least being lead by) evil. Korra's story dismantled that too, which was honestly not necessary for every important thing you mentioned in this video. And while it was interesting to see how the first avatar came to be, I don't think that story was executed well.
The panda/forest spirit from TLA wasn't a villain; it was just hopeless and angry, and full of misplaced blame. At the same time, the owl spirit from the library was not a villain either. The one thing all the spirits from TLA have in common is that they only become upset and rampage when the seemingly arbitrary thing they care about has been damaged, disrespected, or destroyed; and that thing usually being something that they represent or are closely associated with. Season 2 of Korra... oh, you can calm spirits down with a little waterbending magic? That would've been good to know in the Library. Then, Aang and Sokka could've browsed all they liked while Katarra kept the spirits calm. Did anyone who used that stupid trick in Korra's day ever take responsibility and deal with the thing that was making the spirits upset? No, not that I can recall. Certainly not in the way Aang had to deal with spirits.
I think avatar Wan's story could've been made more interesting, and believable relative to the per-established world building, if in order to preserve the world, he had to absorb *both* the spirits of light an dark. The avatar becomes the ultimate symbol of perfect balance between light and dark, order and entropy, civilization and anarchy. If you think about it, something else they should've done was talk about how even the elements themselves respond more to one side or the other. I would go so far as to suggest that everyone's favorite element, the element of freedom, responds better to entropy, and that's why Jinorra was a better airbender than her father.
I think the thing that people seem to forget, is that people aren’t perfect, including the avatar. Aang was kind and idealistic, but even in his own series, he had several moments of flawed thinking, beliefs, and actions (think Bato of the Water Tribe, and The Desert). Him being a bad father isn’t necessarily out of character either. It should be noted just how much pressure he would’ve been under, not just as the avatar, but as the last of his people. Tenzin being born an Airbender must have been such a monumental event for Aang. He finally had a chance to rebuild his people’s culture and way of life. Of course he’d want to be sure he instilled every last ounce of the air nomad’s cultures into his son who, after he passed, would also have that burden until more Airbenders could be born. In fact, you could even argue, that his duty to pass on the teachings of his people, was the most crucial duty of his entire life. Someone else could have theoretically taken out Ozai or helped rebuild the world after the war. But only Aang could properly pass on his culture alongside air bending, as the act of air bending, works very much in tandem with their beliefs and practices. Had he not, the next avatars would, by his knowledge, never be able to properly learn the way of the nomads as the temples, books, scrolls, etc are lost to time.
This is a very good take on the subject. Even though I've seen so many videos from people who bash the series to no end, I can see the value in letting go of the past and pursuing an unknown and unfamiliar but promising future. Granted those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it but disregarding the future entirely can be just as detrimental.
I'm glad to see some love for Korra! I personally related so much more with Korra than with Aang.
Me too
Same here.
Me too^^
same!
This is incredible and wonderful analysis of Korra! I couldn’t agree more and more people who disregard LoK’s depth need to watch this.
I hated The Legend of Korra because this show felt like Disney Star Wars were heroes from past movies and tv shows had great character development only to get it stripped out with deconstruction order to make the new hero look good. I HATE THIS TREND SO MUCH!!!!
Great video on both a writing perspective and how a sequel works. Such a great writing advice.
I generally like Korra (the character and the show), but I don’t see how them trying to intentionally undermine atla is a positive for the show. There are ways to contrast it without trying to tarnish the original show. Things like how Korra always wanted to be the Avatar but the world rejecting her is great, as it’s the opposite of Aang, who didn’t want to be the Avatar but the world desperately needed him. I really like this contrast, since it’s showing how the world has changed without painting Aang or the previous show in a negative light. I also like the attempt to make all the villains more nuanced and sympathetic, rather than just a power hungry monster like Ozai (they failed here but at least they tried).
I still hate the legend of Korra and it will never change my mind it ruined the prequel Lore
loved the video! I think that if you could play the scene you were talking about at the end after your last speech but before the outro it would be a wonderful addition
Despite my complicated feelings toward Korra as a series and my distaste for her as a character, Jinora's tattoo ceremony is the most beautiful scene in the entire show IMHO. It's the only part of this "leaving the past behind" trajectory (which overall I hate) that feels respectful. Rather than Jinora dethroning her Grandfather as the youngest Airbender in history, it feels more like a passing of the mantle, of her assuming her place as Aang's rightful successor, a task which Tenzin tried to take on even though he was ill prepared because he had to, because at the time there was no one else, but Jinora is not only knowledgeable of the traditions and teachings of her heritage but has internalized their meaning, ensuring that the best of it will survive into the coming generations without Tenzin's rigidity. What I read into that moment is not casting Aang aside, but Jinora growing into the roles and responsibilities he once held as leader of their Air Nomads, something more important now than ever since there's an actual nation again with no connection to their prewar predecessors.
One thing I don't entirely think you emphasized in this video that is present in the scene is that, not only is the air nation's progress an abandonment of Aang, it's also in a way a rejection of the Avatar as a concept. In the past, the avatar was a force to bring balance to the world and between nations and by taking up that mantle in Korra's absense, it calls into question the need for an avatar at all.
This is why I believe Korra sheds a tear in the end of the scene. The hardship and pain she just endured at the hands of Zaheer was with intent to bring an end to the avatar, and in a way by the air nation taking up her responsibilies Zaheer got exactly what he wanted: a world where the world no longer needs an avatar.
Yeah, careful with the title and thumbnail there.
Happy 10th Anniversary Legend of Korra!!
I always appreciated that Korra didn’t try to just be another version of Aang. And the more I watch it the better I think it is. I just recently binged both series again (I do this at least once a year, often more) and I enjoyed it more this time than in the past. Korra’s an entirely different person than Aang, living in a much different world than the one he was born to and then woke up in 100 years later. I’m nearly 40 and these shows remain the best and my most favorite.
Korra was a subversive version of the story of Aangs, but the meta story doesnt just end there. After many years of pondering why i love Aangs story (and Korea season 1) and dislike the majority of Korras story, i've come to the conclusion that Korras story lacked an end vision. Since Aangs story revolved around a direct villain, firelord Ozai, the story naturally funnels towards a single goal, Ozai's defeat. Its a complex story that allows villain charactere like the fire nation and Zuko to become more than evil. Korra's story lacks a clear single enemy and thus the writing team were able to explore many different facets of human sociology, but not enough time to fully develop each character, culture, emotional detail. As your video concludes, the main (if not only) goal was to deconstruct Aang as a character. Korra foes thru so much throughout her story, that we as an audience cannot bebfully confident that she has recovered and conquered her demons. If anything, she became worse for wear. Aang's struggle to fight Ozai and his own destiny as the Avatar is a light of Hope that shows people they have a responsibility to the world, yet their desitines are their own to manifest. Unfortunately Korras story shows time and time again, sometimes self inflicted by Korra, that the world is a non-ended cycle which we have no control of our destinies. In Korras time, we witness at least 3 major wars back to back hinting that the Avatar's job is endless and will always precede your own wishes. But Aang's story works hard to shift the dynamic of his own personal, and albeit somewhat selfish, idea of pacifism that eventually works out in his favor.
I think metastory of the merch sales, the comic spinoffs, new netflix adaptation, and other media show that on the grander marketing and wide viewing audience scale, Aang has the superior story. And i dont think that is all be accident. I honestly dont think even the producers or original creators fully inderstand what made the Last Airbender so successful. If you consider that the original creators of Avatar are no longer working with Netflix to develop the series due to "creative differences" we can surmise there are definitely a lot of conflicting actions being made by producer powered influences. I've seen a lot of arguments for and against Korra's story (not saying that your video is in defence of the story but), i have to side against her portrayal of the responsibility of the avatar and the Avatar's world. I think Korras story is another sliver of proof that it takes a quite a bit of time to reboot a series while the originals still have a great impact during their lifetime and trying to dethrone your predecessor does not mean a writer needs to vandalize the legacy of the original hero to do so. I think the Ending of Korra shows us that removing Aang was bittersweet, but the Korra's show had no other message to give us. It wasnt just necessary change, but rather a forceful dose of reality and there are roles that people can and cannot make changes to. It enforces that Legacy is more important than manifesting your own destiny. Your birth is more important than what you do with you life. And that sucks bro.
I think ultimately both shows bring out the incredible struggle that is maintaining balance...
That's a very interesting way to put things! Thanks for this!
My problem with Korra is just one, the death of all other reincarnation of Avatars, that was one great concept that was forgotten and unexplored, if wasn't for that, she would just have passed as one more avatar on the line, doesent like it go to the next, but that classifies her as the worst avatar in history...
Great video, I always have found this scene both incredibly gorgeous and moving. In fact I think Korra should have ended in season 3, It would have been the perfect ending. Korra looks at Jinora but sees Aang and realizes she can’t live up to his legacy. Much like how the legend of Korra couldnt live up to Avatar. That said not many shows can.
When it comes to my thoughts on Korra, I think similiar to you. I respect some of the risks and different paths the creators took however they clearly didn’t all payoff. Although I don’t love Korra the animation is gorgeous and Season 1 and 3 are genuinely solid. Korra haters start putting a little respect on its name!
I always would just imagine that Aang "favouritism" towards Tenzin wasn't because he was a bad dad I felt it was more of the desire to continue a tradition that was entirely wiped out and imagine not having seen anyone else like you for over a hundred years, wouldn't you pass down as much knowledge as you can
Korra did a lot of things in a different way: Asami should have been part of the Equalists and in charge of the company, rather than just a convenient background character the authors wrote into representation belief at the end to pander to fan fiction. Korra being able to bend 3 of the 4 elements at such a young age canonically makes no sense since it was typical to wait until the avatar was older before announcing that they were the avatar, and we see the results of that early on in ATLA, Aang runs away because he cannot face the reality of the situation and the monks were conflicted about Aang having a childhood. Airbending is all about removing attachments to the soil as it holds you down, but Korra discovers her airbending potential in the middle of a conflict while having a ridiculous amount of attachment, its why Zaher is a better villain and air bender, its why he can fly. With a soft magic system like in ATLA, the single most important thing about it is: DO NOT EXPLAIN HOW THE MAGIC WORKS!! A hard magic system like in FMA, can be used as a plot point and tension constantly can revolve around the limits of the rules of the magic system. A flexible soft magic system should constantly adapt with its environment, but this just doesn’t happen. We never actually see the conflict between benders and non-benders, there is no discrimination, just some triad thugs. We’re just told that its a thing that’s happening, and that’s just terrible writing. It would have been great for Korra to ground herself and find a place for herself in the world, and through that peace to discover her own airbending and by extension, the avatar state. And then we don’t see any of the struggles that Korra went through after all of her trauma, we just fastforward to the end, just, no. That removes the progress of adding depth to a character, we are supposed to see them struggle. The giant laser beams and the forced subjugation of the earth kingdom is just stuff going around in the background. There is so much in this show that we the audience are just told but never shown that it comes off as terribly lazy writing. And the authors of the show should not have to retroactively go back and explain things to the audience as it suits their needs just to pander to a minority of people; when that happens, it means that they did not see the story through to the end and did a bad job.
The thing is, the show started losing me at "The Chosen Avatar". By default, The Avatar is a chosen one, a new one chosen with each generation. It was so simple, and yet, they couldn't go there. Everything that she was short of was just there for the sake of keeping her naive, rather than show a fully trained Avatar who is in full control from the outset. She has trouble with Spirit side so that she can't commune with the past Avatars like Aang did, so she won't have any extra wisdom to go on. She's trained exclusively in the Northern Water Tribe so she can be naive to outside cultures. She's bad at airbending so that she can not-understand airbending. They put a hat on a hat because they didn't want to have to put in the writing work for something better.
Aang caught onto waterbending fairly quickly, along with its philosophies, but then, it wasn't too different from his own. Then he gets to Earthbending, and its difficult. His entire philosophy is the oppositional to the philosophy of Earth. And with firebending he has two issues: For one, Zuko is a major trust issue, he's been in conflict with Aang this whole time, and he's not really willing to trust him out of the gate. As well, he's afraid of becoming a firebender after his prior attempt at it, in arrogance, injured Katara.
Even when it came to controlling the Avatar state, Aang struggled, because it meant throwing off his attachments to the world.
I didn't mind Aang getting retrospective yet very human and understandable flaws. I did mind the awful redcons, clashing changes in lore and writing that didn't make any sense.
And this video reminds me of why I love TLoK. Season 3 was the peak of it's story telling and the final scene, even just in screencaps and a verbal description by Kato is enough to make me tear up x.x
Honestly I feel like most of your praise is towards the concept and idea of LoK, while most of people's criticism towards the series is about the execution. Personally, I find nothing wrong with the ideas behind Korra. A nonbender uprising, civil war, airbender villain, totalitarian regime and the processing of trauma. All amazing stuff. The problem is not in how they challenged viewers, the problem is in the rushed execution and lack of cohesion , especially season 2. ATLA's story feels well thought out mostly from start to finish while LoK lacks this type of cohesion which hurts its overall quality severely. If that hadn't been the case it could've been great rather than good, like it's predecessor .
Hmm, I get what they were going for, buuut.... Korra messed up waaay too much to be likable. She messed up a ton in the first season (which, ok, she was just getting started), but then she caused the main conflict of the second season. Then, she cut off her connection with Ang as a result of her initial screw up.
I believe viewers can relate easily with an anti-hero like Zuko because even though his actions are evil, they get where he's coming from, and he's acting towards his goals. Yes, he failed to capture the avatar, but not due to his own incompetence.
On the other hand, Korra is an incompetent avatar. There is little to no excuse for her screw-ups after season 1 (after she got some experience). Even in season 4 after she went through more crap shows than Ang probably did in his entire life, her solution to "Kuvira is invading" was "I should fight her in a 1 on 1 in front of her entire army." Like, where's the progression? How is that a smart idea indicative of her growth as a character?
She started out as a hot headed dumbass, and by season 4 she's exactly the same. All that talk about what she learned and her speech to Kuvira is pointless when she's still acting like a dumbass.
This wouldn't have been a problem if while being a hot headed dumbass, Korra had wise counselors who she actually listened to to guide her through stuff. But, she dismisses Tenzen, and the rest are useless. If Katara would have stuck with her throughout her journey and tamed her stupidness, then this would've been a whole different story and a much better one.
As things went down, it's really, really hard to sympathize and root for an idiot who keeps screwing up again and again and again for 4 seasons straight.
"Incompetent Avatar"
Riiight. Because all she did was saving the entire bending population of Republic City, saving both worlds from eternal darkness, reuniting spirits and humans, killing Hundun, saving airbending from the brink of extinction, sacrificing herself to save the new airbenders and saving an entire continent from Kuvira's iron fist. What a terrible Avatar...
Have fun coping.
@@vetarlittorf1807 Saving the beders - good, Saving both worlds from eternal darkness? I think the sun worked just fine. Reuniting the spirits and humans? That's neither good nor bad; it's just different (and even caused problems in the following seasons), Killing Hundun, sure, sacrificing herself to save the airbenders (a more competent avatar would've made it out in 1 piece), saving the continent from Kuvira (1. she didn't do it alone. 2. she tried to fight her 1 on 1. 3. Because of her loss at the end of season 3 she was out of commission for the beginning of season 4. Yea, she did some good, but she messed up waaaaaaaaaay more than any avatar before and after, waaaaay more than is acceptable/likable for a main character. The problem isn't that she did evil stuff (cause she didn't). The problem is that she genuinely screwed up again and again which is super unlikable for any character
@@danidsds Slight correction to what you said is she made the same mistakes over and over again. Ontop of all of the conflict in the show besides the 1st season being her fault.
@@bobbooby2994 Oh yea, I just remembered the bad guys from season 3 were her fault too leading to the death of the earth kingdom queen and the rise of Kuvira. Like, how can you root for someone whose actions just screw everything up:)) Even if she fixed the situation, she's the one who caused it in the first place, lol
@@danidsds How the fuck were those her faults? she didn't gave zaheer airbending. Also Roku literally caused 100 year war because he was buddy-buddy i won't kill you because we used to be friends. Avatar Szeto literally said "fuck the avatar duty", joined fire nation bureaucracy which allowed for fire nation to become militaristic, Avatar Kuruk was so immature for an avatar that he slayed spirit after spirit because his fiancee got kidnapped by one after he neglected spirits (which were caused by Yangchang not caring for them enough during her lifetime.
Korra literally saved the world so many times, got attacked by villains much stronger and compelling then Aang ever did (minus Azula), stopped Unalaq from starting the dark age of humanity, united spirits and human which in turns literally revived air-nomads. Yes she made mistake, Aang did too. He ran away after all. Its literally canon that every next avatar has bigger threats and higher stakes to take. Its literally canon that mistakes of previous avatars are problems for the next avatar. You can't go around blaming Korra while not blaming other avatars, including Aang for doing the same fucking shit.
Honestly, I don't see why the avatar has to be the protagnist of any sequel series in the verse. This would completely resolve any of the "legacy" issues that arise when giving the new protagnists great faults. If, for instance, Korra was a villain in the series and / or the protagnist of the series was another character, I feel like some of the events that fans hate (like the cycle being broken, the connection to past lives being severed, etc) would be more easily accepted by fans because the show wouldn't have to work so hard to justify Korra's actions or make the audience accept her after those mistakes. This wouldn't fix everything wrong with the series since some changes like the entire "Beginnings" debacle completely ruin the atmosphere, world building, and mechanics that ATLA established. Alternatively, better writing could have made these events feel more tragic and less like the awkward stumblings of an unworthy successor but I digress.
I loved Korra. The biggest and only criticism I’ve heard of it was the annoying high school love triangle and Korra’s immaturity. But these are completely the person misunderstanding the show. Korra was basically raised on a commune away from other kids and so she is gonna be socially immature, and on top of her natural heard-headedness, which usually rubs people wrong, so she is going to be criticized harshly, especially after Aang.
The love triangle wasnt too bad. Drama doesnt get in the way of the bigger, more meaningful situation at hand, it’s just the backdrop and the way she grows socially. I dont remember a moment when i was like “SHUTUP! You are literally fighting bad guys, your social problems are meaningless.” This is because i think they stopped the bickering when they needed to. Also the hot Asami, who got treated the worst, was very cool about the whole thing and knew that aiding the avatar was more important than the love triangle.
Bad take. The criticisms of what makes the show inferior are many and wholly justified.
There are several videos essays that explain in very good detail why the show fails, from multiple creative angles.
It’s starting to look like the “divided” fan base of those that like korra are just young children that don’t understand the reasons why lok is not a cohesive and compelling story compared to atla.
The fact you’re justifying the teenage drama love triangle is proof enough.
god i hated korra, she refused to learn any kinda lesson basically ever and she made it so any avatar that came after her would ONLY have her to rely on
That is one of the worst paths to take a story down imo. You can’t just kill all the avatars. Awful move imo.
Holding a mirror up to a person might make them feel more relatable to a character but it won't make that character more epic or long-lasting. Aang's story, like Luke Skywalker's story, is an epic one that causes legends. Korra's story is a self-insert by the very quote of the author. Self-inserts feel more relatable by nature but they are never as inspiring. We aspire to things greater than ourselves, not to things that remind of us ourselves.
This is a really wonderful profound point I hadn’t considered. Not only fors Aang have a hero’s journey we aspire to follow, but he still remains his relatability with moral struggles and external expectations. If we are meant to mirror Korra’s qualities more than admire them, of course it’ll be hard to make her a great symbol along with everything else in LoK that just falls a little flat in most of the character’s arc
While I can definitely see your point, this is assuming you want or need to either find the MC of a story relatable or inspiring. I would argue they just have to be entertaining. There are shows where you can relate or aspire to that character at moment but not as a whole, a good example would be Death Note or Overlord. These two series follow characters that kill often with no remorse. I don't aspire to be like them nor can I really relate but damn it's interesting to see their perspective, why they think this is right and how they get out of certain situations.
Actually Aang was the self-insert. Korra was the deconstruction.
Aang defeated one baddy, and his daughter by proxy.
This basically saved 2 nations, avenged a third, and liberated the fourth.
Korra defeated four big bads.
The first directly liberated a nation - but would have affected the entire world in a way.
The second one was a literal, capital G, God.
She basically fought for every single person *and spirit* in the world.
The third one really didn't threaten many people at large - largely just Korra herself.
The fourth was in the process of subjugating 3 nations, as she did with the first one.
And yet, most people overwhelmingly like Season 3 the most, and Season 2 the least.
And the stakes were the smallest in #2, and the biggest ever - *much* more "epic" than Aang's fight - was #3.
The issue wasn't scale or scope in any way
Hell, the most legendary thing Aang himself did was founding Republic City.
Something that we didn't even know about in ATLA...
@@hundvd_7 Scope and scale are things that only matter when WE the audience have a reason to care. How do authors do that? By making the characters care which in turn should make the audience care if everything was done right. This is like step one of writing, make your cast likable.
I kind of want to make an edit of legend of Korra that has all of kora's events happen simultaneously. So that the story is told as one long story, similar to ATLA, and take out all the weird parts.
Can I also say jinora getting her mastery in air bending was cool but it always seem too quick like she learned a new air bending and spiritual tuned with spirit world but did she master all air bending techniques and styles? It doesn't seem so to me, tenzin and aang being masters I can see that in their bending and movements. Just my hot take
I mean, she had also been training since childhood so it didn't seem that farfetched to me
@@lunasperidot8760 seeing what she did bending wise in the sereis it does to me
to me she wasn't ready at all yes she was spiritually aware but airbeding wise she was not as good as meelo or kai. as for leadership kai showed more of that even as he had new air bending skills. ikki showed more problem solving skills. to me as they were all the new generation all 4 should have all been granted the title. the show even made a whole character arc for the "we are stronger when we work together."
@@2xXhunterXx well you can't just be giving mastery out willy nillh
@@silvertongue.242_99 well no it would only be to those 4 if not only the 3 kids. No one was ready . And instead of doing it at the end of season 3 i would have done it at the end of season 4.
I'll never get behind the neglectful/absent parent trope in animation sequels. It seems contrived purely to give the new characters a reason to be angsty, so that they can then tell a story about resolving that conflict. It just comes off as lazy, STILL relying on the previous characters to give the new characters an impetus for an emotional growth journey. Is it just a thing that all sequel writers feel trapped in the shadow of the original and can't resist making the characters go through the same thing? I get that it's daunting to write characters that you know aren't going to be a well received as the last ones, but I'd rather see them shine or suck on their own.
The difference between Zuko and Korra is that Zuko was living up to an expectation that was impossible to fill. the awful things he did weren't who he wanted to be, it was who he thought he had to be.
Korra is just an obnoxious jerk a lot of the time. She's irresponsable and she has so many qualities that specifically make her unlikable.
I don't want to belabor the point in ranting about Korra, I'm genuinely glad people enjoy it, and I have no issue with that. I respect your opinions, I just honestly can't get behind it myself and wanted to at least explain some of the deficiencies that seperate the pro Korra fans and the anti ones. I see a lot of pointless arguing online, so I want to make sure it's clear I don't mean to be aggressively rude.
Personally, I think it was a good choice for her to be that way. A bit of a foil to Aang in Atla. Aang was happy in his little world before it was crashed down on him, being told that he was the avatar. Versus Korra who was spoiled and cultivated to be this big strong hero. Aang had the face the fact that it was up to him to fix things and Korra had to face the fact that the world didn't really need her.
@@ManiacalBlueberry And I completely agree with that aspect of her characterization. I just think she's intentionally made to be unlikable in a lot of scenes.
Lol. Cope
@@vetarlittorf1807 Cope? In what sense?
6:25 He never came off as a deadbeat to me, simply flawed. It seems their family was still largely a happy one. But I guess for some people, Aang being imperfect in any way tarnishes his legacy.