when i first watched LOK i remember i was disappointed with asami’s character in regards to her being the only non bender cause there’s so much potential to her being an engineer but it just wasn’t explored, still one of my fav characters tho
Team Korra suffers from getting compared to Team Aang, but even removing that. The team is definitely underdeveloped and ripe with wasted potential storylines. This was a great analysis! Can't wait for the next video.
thank you!! 🥹🫶🏽 and yes - the comparison is annoying given how different the circumstances are (team Aang were kids and together all the time in the midst of a literal war) but LOK doesn’t do itself any favours by not doing nearly enough to flesh out mako, bolin, and asami
Absolutely loved this video! Super well written and you’re so eloquent 💜 Incredible job Yumna!! But to go into the specifics, I 100% agree with you! I feel like the creators wanted the show to be so action packed and so story heavy that they failed to do the most important thing, develop it’s “side characters” Also, I found your TikTok channel recently and I love love love your content!!
I don't think Asami is underdeveloped at all. Asami Sato is not only a driven inventor with a successful business, she‘s the voice of reason for Korra‘s Team Avatar. This makes her an important character who helps balance out Korra‘s impulsiveness and as a result, she helps Korra mature over the course of the series. However, she‘s not just an emotional support. Her character arc teaches us the struggle of forgiveness and how important it is. Throughout Asami‘s character arc, there are three major figures that Asami has to forgive. The first one is her father Hiroshi. Asami and Hiroshi‘s relationship was a bit rocky after she found out about his ties to Amon. This forces Asami to choose between family and justice. The most important thing to understand is that like Asami’s ability to problem-solve, her commitment to justice is based on her bigger-picture ideology. Even though spirit vines overtake Republic City, rendering an entire area unlivable, damaging pipes everywhere, and blocking roadways, Asami never expresses any sort of frustration, actually going as far as to tell Korra that she can’t take the negative feedback for these very real problems “to heart.” She then goes on to devote herself to restructuring the city’s entire infrastructure for three years to accommodate the situation. When Republic City is threatened with the world’s allegory for a WMD, Asami gets to work on technology that can help in a battle, though refuses to use that same weapon in her designs, instead utilizing biomimicry to design flying mecha suits. An interesting thing about Asami is that the second anyone challenges or seeks to stand in the way of her, well, pursuit of justice, she gets angry. She snaps at police officers and politicians when she thinks they’re profiling nonbenders, she snaps at detectives who don’t seem to be doing the best job at their investigation, any time Varrick appears again she snaps because he’s proven himself untrustworthy, and she even fights angrily. She’s actually the only person in the main group we see do this with any sort of consistency. Even though her own mother was unjustly killed by benders, she chooses justice. Her father‘s betrayal runs deep for her and forces her to become a little more distinct and closed off from her friends. She still wants to fight in the name of justice, but she becomes more passive aggressive towards people. At the end of Book 1 she goes to fight her father. Hiroshi is still full of hate for his wife‘s death while Asami is full of resentment for her father‘s betrayal to the point where she almost gets consumed by it and kills him only to be tempered by her moral judgement. Even after she manages to defeat Hiroshi, her resentment and anger remains and even carries into Book 2 where she can‘t even visit Mako in prison because it reminds her of her father. In Book 4, a long time has passed after the betrayal but Asami still resents Hiroshi for it even after his many pleads for forgiveness. She goes to see him in prison just so she can tell him off, but Hiroshi tells her how proud he is of her. This becomes a conflict within Asami as she struggles between never seeing him again and forgiving him. While she doesn‘t yet forgive him, she does at least give it a try and they play Pai Sho during one visiting hour in prison. This small gesture helps Asami release her resentment towards him and helps build up a brand new relationship between them when they make mecha-hummingbirds to use against Kuvira‘s Colossus. During that battle, Hiroshi sacrifices himself to give Team Avatar an opening. Asami is saddened by the loss but is grateful that she was able to forgive him. Hiroshi and Asami‘s relationship shows that forgiveness is easier said than done. It can take months, even years to really let go and forgive the people that hurt you the most. The next person Asami needs to forgive is Mako. These two have a complicated history. They initially hit it off really well when they started dating. However, there are two factors that cause this relationship to fall apart. The first is Korra‘s feelings for Mako. This puts a wedge between him and Asami and forces him into a corner. He has feelings for them both and doesn‘t want to hurt either of them. Which forces Asami to call him out on this and breaks up with him. However, another factor contributing to the breakup is how passive aggressive she became after her father‘s betrayal. He lied to his daughter for years, so when she finds out Korra and Mako kissed, she feels a similar sense of betrayal again. Of course, it should be noted that Asami is less upset about the kiss itself and more upset about Mako trying to conceal that it happened. In Book 2, Asami and Mako keep their distance at first and it‘s not until the sting operation when they interact one on one again. During that sting, Asami‘s resentment for Mako begins to fade because she sees his determination and passion for helping her and her family business. Earning her forgiveness and she finally understands what kind of person Mako is. The third and final person Asami has to forgive is Korra. After the fight with Zaheer and the Red Lotus, Korra was crippled physically, mentally and spiritually. After three years, Asami is excited to see Korra again, only to find out that she left to wander the world without telling anyone. This is where her sour feelings come into play. If we look back at Book 3, Korra and Asami developed a close relationship. They balanced each other out. Asami was Korra‘s voice of reason and Korra helped Asami become more spontaneous and less guarded by past hurt feelings. However, Book 4 makes these two nervous and on edge. The three year gap left Asami noticeably disappointed by Korra‘s decision. When they reunite, Asami doesn‘t know the full extent of why Korra didn‘t come back sooner. So for Korra to come swooping in and protect Asami from her father makes her very defensive and snaps at her as a result. This shows that Asami is probably the most sentimental of her team. We also see how her relationship with Korra has affected her. Asami, while still the most emotionally mature of her team, is now able to put boundaries in place so that people don‘t take her for granted. Anyway, once Asami starts listening to Korra‘s problems about her past enemies, she is able to let go of her bitterness towards Korra, and truly embrace her. Hence when Korra apologizes for being gone so long, Asami understands that she has nothing to apologize for. Her resentment is gone and is happy to have Korra back in her life.
I think Asami's characterisation is a victim of the uncertainty the show faced with regards to it's renewal and the shorter seasons... could have used a beach episode each season to give the Korra Krew relationships a bit more time to breathe. Also, from a personal bias point of view, I wish her engineering skills had played even more of a part as I'm an engineer and a female engineers are always really interesting characters to me.
i agree!! with how big the cast was i feel like each season should have ideally been 24 episodes to really give each of their stories the attention they deserved
Definitely missed opportunities, but I'm also glad we got what we did with the fact they were winging it when it came to getting greenlit for subsequent seasons. Glad to see you thriving on UA-cam. Solarpunk ❤
I prefer LOK to ATLA, and am a huge Asami, Korra, and Korrasami fan, so I admit to being biased, but the basic point of "more Asami would be better" is a good one. She is horrendously underutilized in season 2, and her grief/anger/loneliness was just barely touched upon (in season 2, her face of despair in the first episode, and how easily she fell back into Mako's arms later in the season - and that's it, I think). I would have loved more time with her, in exploration of everything she went through (there were a lot of side characters, especially in season 4, whose time could have been cut to facilitate more time spent on Asami). Having an "Asami Alone" episode to match the Korra Alone episode would have been amazing (there's a reason there are so many fanfics about Asami in the three year gap entitled exactly that). The closeness between Korra and Asami is shown, not told, in the show. In season 3, when Korra goes off with just one member of the Krew, it is Asami, every single time. She sits next to Asami the most in Zaofu, she gets taught how to drive by Asami, she fights back-to-back with Asami (battle couple for the win!), she trains with Asami, she is cared for by Asami in the three weeks after the fight with Zaheer, she is protected by Asami when she goes into the spirit world towards the end of season 3. I think it is pretty obvious why Korra feels more comfortable talking to Asami than anyone else, but again, it is shown, not told, and yes, that is at least partially Nickelodeon's fault. Also, if you see the look Asami gives her when Korra wakes up from her meditation in the Zaofu scene, Asami looks like she is falling in love. Maybe she doesn't know it yet, but that isn't the look a girl gives someone who is just a friend. I think you are incorrect in saying that Asami is the "cool girl" who eschews makeovers in favour of cars - she does both! Seriously, her makeup is impeccable. Also, in that same episode (S01E07), Korra actually tries makeup (badly) after the car race, so at least a part of her kind of wanted to try a makeover. It's both endearing, and probably a callback to the Katara and Toph bonding over makeup episode. Pet peeve - the term "girlboss." It's inherently sexist. Overall, I'll give this a Mako rating - not bad.
I know I will be hated and I don’t mean to be a rabble rouser. I simply struggle to see her beyond her wealth and surname. If it wasn’t for that, she wouldn’t even be involved in the story. She is just so uninteresting. She is an interesting concept but when others shoot elements out of their hands, being rich and traumatised isn’t of much interest. It should have been left to be one’s headcanon. The relationship doesn’t feel natural or satisfying and it is too divisive because they left it so late. Should have done it from the start or not at all. It was just not the right characters for a couple. Also, it feels like Korra sees an opportunity to marry into money because Asami is rich. Anyway, I am glad UA-cam recommended the channel, it was amazing how you actually see the other side of the argument. Great manoeuvre, you make these videos look easy.
I just think the show isn’t as well-produced as The Last Airbender. Don’t get me wrong, I liked it up until the ending but it was definitely frustrating and boring at times. I feel like perhaps they should have evolved the bending a bit, add some new attacks or something. Smoke powers or something. Asami isn’t the only character who deserved better. They didn’t have as many writers for the Legend of Korra so it sometimes felt stagnant. I don’t think the writers knew what they wanted. Because while Korra’s writers technically did work on Last Airbender, they had a lot of other people helping them. It feels weird to say but The Last Airbender has better “vibes” than Legend of Korra.
when i first watched LOK i remember i was disappointed with asami’s character in regards to her being the only non bender cause there’s so much potential to her being an engineer but it just wasn’t explored, still one of my fav characters tho
it would have been so cool to see her do more with her engineering skills 😭😭
Team Korra suffers from getting compared to Team Aang, but even removing that. The team is definitely underdeveloped and ripe with wasted potential storylines.
This was a great analysis! Can't wait for the next video.
thank you!! 🥹🫶🏽 and yes - the comparison is annoying given how different the circumstances are (team Aang were kids and together all the time in the midst of a literal war) but LOK doesn’t do itself any favours by not doing nearly enough to flesh out mako, bolin, and asami
Absolutely loved this video! Super well written and you’re so eloquent 💜 Incredible job Yumna!!
But to go into the specifics, I 100% agree with you! I feel like the creators wanted the show to be so action packed and so story heavy that they failed to do the most important thing, develop it’s “side characters”
Also, I found your TikTok channel recently and I love love love your content!!
thank you sm 🥺🥺 and i agree i think with how plot heavy the storytelling is, the characters in LOK don’t really get a chance to just breathe and exist
I don't think Asami is underdeveloped at all. Asami Sato is not only a driven inventor with a successful business, she‘s the voice of reason for Korra‘s Team Avatar. This makes her an important character who helps balance out Korra‘s impulsiveness and as a result, she helps Korra mature over the course of the series. However, she‘s not just an emotional support. Her character arc teaches us the struggle of forgiveness and how important it is. Throughout Asami‘s character arc, there are three major figures that Asami has to forgive. The first one is her father Hiroshi. Asami and Hiroshi‘s relationship was a bit rocky after she found out about his ties to Amon. This forces Asami to choose between family and justice. The most important thing to understand is that like Asami’s ability to problem-solve, her commitment to justice is based on her bigger-picture ideology. Even though spirit vines overtake Republic City, rendering an entire area unlivable, damaging pipes everywhere, and blocking roadways, Asami never expresses any sort of frustration, actually going as far as to tell Korra that she can’t take the negative feedback for these very real problems “to heart.” She then goes on to devote herself to restructuring the city’s entire infrastructure for three years to accommodate the situation. When Republic City is threatened with the world’s allegory for a WMD, Asami gets to work on technology that can help in a battle, though refuses to use that same weapon in her designs, instead utilizing biomimicry to design flying mecha suits.
An interesting thing about Asami is that the second anyone challenges or seeks to stand in the way of her, well, pursuit of justice, she gets angry. She snaps at police officers and politicians when she thinks they’re profiling nonbenders, she snaps at detectives who don’t seem to be doing the best job at their investigation, any time Varrick appears again she snaps because he’s proven himself untrustworthy, and she even fights angrily. She’s actually the only person in the main group we see do this with any sort of consistency. Even though her own mother was unjustly killed by benders, she chooses justice. Her father‘s betrayal runs deep for her and forces her to become a little more distinct and closed off from her friends. She still wants to fight in the name of justice, but she becomes more passive aggressive towards people. At the end of Book 1 she goes to fight her father. Hiroshi is still full of hate for his wife‘s death while Asami is full of resentment for her father‘s betrayal to the point where she almost gets consumed by it and kills him only to be tempered by her moral judgement. Even after she manages to defeat Hiroshi, her resentment and anger remains and even carries into Book 2 where she can‘t even visit Mako in prison because it reminds her of her father. In Book 4, a long time has passed after the betrayal but Asami still resents Hiroshi for it even after his many pleads for forgiveness. She goes to see him in prison just so she can tell him off, but Hiroshi tells her how proud he is of her. This becomes a conflict within Asami as she struggles between never seeing him again and forgiving him. While she doesn‘t yet forgive him, she does at least give it a try and they play Pai Sho during one visiting hour in prison. This small gesture helps Asami release her resentment towards him and helps build up a brand new relationship between them when they make mecha-hummingbirds to use against Kuvira‘s Colossus. During that battle, Hiroshi sacrifices himself to give Team Avatar an opening. Asami is saddened by the loss but is grateful that she was able to forgive him.
Hiroshi and Asami‘s relationship shows that forgiveness is easier said than done. It can take months, even years to really let go and forgive the people that hurt you the most.
The next person Asami needs to forgive is Mako. These two have a complicated history. They initially hit it off really well when they started dating. However, there are two factors that cause this relationship to fall apart. The first is Korra‘s feelings for Mako. This puts a wedge between him and Asami and forces him into a corner. He has feelings for them both and doesn‘t want to hurt either of them. Which forces Asami to call him out on this and breaks up with him. However, another factor contributing to the breakup is how passive aggressive she became after her father‘s betrayal. He lied to his daughter for years, so when she finds out Korra and Mako kissed, she feels a similar sense of betrayal again. Of course, it should be noted that Asami is less upset about the kiss itself and more upset about Mako trying to conceal that it happened. In Book 2, Asami and Mako keep their distance at first and it‘s not until the sting operation when they interact one on one again. During that sting, Asami‘s resentment for Mako begins to fade because she sees his determination and passion for helping her and her family business. Earning her forgiveness and she finally understands what kind of person Mako is.
The third and final person Asami has to forgive is Korra. After the fight with Zaheer and the Red Lotus, Korra was crippled physically, mentally and spiritually. After three years, Asami is excited to see Korra again, only to find out that she left to wander the world without telling anyone. This is where her sour feelings come into play. If we look back at Book 3, Korra and Asami developed a close relationship. They balanced each other out. Asami was Korra‘s voice of reason and Korra helped Asami become more spontaneous and less guarded by past hurt feelings. However, Book 4 makes these two nervous and on edge. The three year gap left Asami noticeably disappointed by Korra‘s decision. When they reunite, Asami doesn‘t know the full extent of why Korra didn‘t come back sooner. So for Korra to come swooping in and protect Asami from her father makes her very defensive and snaps at her as a result. This shows that Asami is probably the most sentimental of her team. We also see how her relationship with Korra has affected her. Asami, while still the most emotionally mature of her team, is now able to put boundaries in place so that people don‘t take her for granted. Anyway, once Asami starts listening to Korra‘s problems about her past enemies, she is able to let go of her bitterness towards Korra, and truly embrace her. Hence when Korra apologizes for being gone so long, Asami understands that she has nothing to apologize for. Her resentment is gone and is happy to have Korra back in her life.
I think Asami's characterisation is a victim of the uncertainty the show faced with regards to it's renewal and the shorter seasons... could have used a beach episode each season to give the Korra Krew relationships a bit more time to breathe. Also, from a personal bias point of view, I wish her engineering skills had played even more of a part as I'm an engineer and a female engineers are always really interesting characters to me.
i agree!! with how big the cast was i feel like each season should have ideally been 24 episodes to really give each of their stories the attention they deserved
Definitely missed opportunities, but I'm also glad we got what we did with the fact they were winging it when it came to getting greenlit for subsequent seasons.
Glad to see you thriving on UA-cam.
Solarpunk ❤
A creator said reordering the seasons: 1 4 3 2 - would build up the scale of the conflict. Amon > Kuvira > Zaheer > Unalaq
thank you!!
The goat is back
@@saz1471 ahhh stop ily 😭😭😭
tiktok just shutdown for me as american glad i subscribed to you i love that the first video is avatar like it was for me on tiktok
🥺🥺🥺 stop that makes me teary fr - so happy to have you here
girl you were talking like this video wasn't good(on tik tok)...girlllll this is top tier content
thank you sm 🥹🫶🏽
yay!! i’m so glad you decided to do a youtube i’m so happy ill still get to see your posts!!🩷 awesome video!!
so so happy to have you here!! 🥹🫶🏽
just found this channel love u also ur voice is so soothing
thank u sm!!!
I prefer LOK to ATLA, and am a huge Asami, Korra, and Korrasami fan, so I admit to being biased, but the basic point of "more Asami would be better" is a good one. She is horrendously underutilized in season 2, and her grief/anger/loneliness was just barely touched upon (in season 2, her face of despair in the first episode, and how easily she fell back into Mako's arms later in the season - and that's it, I think).
I would have loved more time with her, in exploration of everything she went through (there were a lot of side characters, especially in season 4, whose time could have been cut to facilitate more time spent on Asami). Having an "Asami Alone" episode to match the Korra Alone episode would have been amazing (there's a reason there are so many fanfics about Asami in the three year gap entitled exactly that).
The closeness between Korra and Asami is shown, not told, in the show. In season 3, when Korra goes off with just one member of the Krew, it is Asami, every single time. She sits next to Asami the most in Zaofu, she gets taught how to drive by Asami, she fights back-to-back with Asami (battle couple for the win!), she trains with Asami, she is cared for by Asami in the three weeks after the fight with Zaheer, she is protected by Asami when she goes into the spirit world towards the end of season 3. I think it is pretty obvious why Korra feels more comfortable talking to Asami than anyone else, but again, it is shown, not told, and yes, that is at least partially Nickelodeon's fault.
Also, if you see the look Asami gives her when Korra wakes up from her meditation in the Zaofu scene, Asami looks like she is falling in love. Maybe she doesn't know it yet, but that isn't the look a girl gives someone who is just a friend.
I think you are incorrect in saying that Asami is the "cool girl" who eschews makeovers in favour of cars - she does both! Seriously, her makeup is impeccable. Also, in that same episode (S01E07), Korra actually tries makeup (badly) after the car race, so at least a part of her kind of wanted to try a makeover. It's both endearing, and probably a callback to the Katara and Toph bonding over makeup episode.
Pet peeve - the term "girlboss." It's inherently sexist.
Overall, I'll give this a Mako rating - not bad.
I know I will be hated and I don’t mean to be a rabble rouser. I simply struggle to see her beyond her wealth and surname. If it wasn’t for that, she wouldn’t even be involved in the story. She is just so uninteresting. She is an interesting concept but when others shoot elements out of their hands, being rich and traumatised isn’t of much interest.
It should have been left to be one’s headcanon. The relationship doesn’t feel natural or satisfying and it is too divisive because they left it so late. Should have done it from the start or not at all. It was just not the right characters for a couple.
Also, it feels like Korra sees an opportunity to marry into money because Asami is rich.
Anyway, I am glad UA-cam recommended the channel, it was amazing how you actually see the other side of the argument. Great manoeuvre, you make these videos look easy.
I just think the show isn’t as well-produced as The Last Airbender. Don’t get me wrong, I liked it up until the ending but it was definitely frustrating and boring at times.
I feel like perhaps they should have evolved the bending a bit, add some new attacks or something. Smoke powers or something.
Asami isn’t the only character who deserved better. They didn’t have as many writers for the Legend of Korra so it sometimes felt stagnant. I don’t think the writers knew what they wanted.
Because while Korra’s writers technically did work on Last Airbender, they had a lot of other people helping them.
It feels weird to say but The Last Airbender has better “vibes” than Legend of Korra.