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Author Topic: Legend of Korra  (Read 25089 times)
Kitsune
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Reply #35 on: June 25, 2012, 07:20:00 PM

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Reply #36 on: June 25, 2012, 07:45:15 PM

I thought the finale was too rushed.  Feels like the writers wanted to do a big epic story like with Last Airbender, but they couldn't quite fit all the plot threads into twelve episodes so they had to do some really hasty tying-up at the end.

Things I would have liked to have had more time for:

I'm realizing now that one of the things that made Last Airbender a great show was the huge amount of time they devoted to character development over the course of three seasons.

"I have not actually recommended many games, and I'll go on the record here saying my track record is probably best in the industry." - schild
Kitsune
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Reply #37 on: June 25, 2012, 10:51:18 PM

Khaldun
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Reply #38 on: June 26, 2012, 07:00:29 PM

It did feel a bit pat, but generally still very good. I'm keen to see what they do with the world-building they've done so far in a second season.
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Reply #39 on: June 27, 2012, 09:10:11 AM

Something else I was thinking about that bothered me in the finale (I feel like Plinkett explaining how the prequels ruined Yoda's wise sayings):


 Get off my lawn!

It's probably unfair to compare LoK to AtLA given the vastly different lengths, but I really feel a little robbed by how much potential awesomeness they set up and then copped out of delivering on.

The other thing I remember being eager to see explored (not gonna spoiler this because it's been pretty clear for a while that it wasn't going to happen) was the basic ideological conflict between "bending is awesome, we can do anything with it" and "kinda sucks for people who can't bend".  As Tarlok got increasingly douchey it looked like maybe we might see Amon become a more sympathetic character, and maybe even cause Korra to question her own role in this evolving world.  Deep stuff, like when Aang had to wrestle with the moral implications of executing Ozai (and go against what every past Avatar was telling him to do).  Ah well.
« Last Edit: June 27, 2012, 09:12:24 AM by Samwise »

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RhyssaFireheart
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Reply #40 on: June 27, 2012, 10:22:52 AM

Something else I was thinking about that bothered me in the finale (I feel like Plinkett explaining how the prequels ruined Yoda's wise sayings):


 Get off my lawn!

It's probably unfair to compare LoK to AtLA given the vastly different lengths, but I really feel a little robbed by how much potential awesomeness they set up and then copped out of delivering on.

The other thing I remember being eager to see explored (not gonna spoiler this because it's been pretty clear for a while that it wasn't going to happen) was the basic ideological conflict between "bending is awesome, we can do anything with it" and "kinda sucks for people who can't bend".  As Tarlok got increasingly douchey it looked like maybe we might see Amon become a more sympathetic character, and maybe even cause Korra to question her own role in this evolving world.  Deep stuff, like when Aang had to wrestle with the moral implications of executing Ozai (and go against what every past Avatar was telling him to do).  Ah well.
I think the length of the seasons was a real detriment to how things were allowed to play out.  Someone on another forum posted some bits from the creators that was in a 2011 WSJ blog:
Quote
Michael DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko, the creators of “Avatar: the Last Airbender” are readying the next chapter in the animated saga, titled “The Last Airbender: Legend of Korra.” The new series is due out mid-2012 on Nickelodeon.

“Avatar” and “Korra” take place in a setting that feels as richly imagined as Middle-earth, Narnia or Hogwarts. In this world, some inhabitants are “benders,” each with the power to manipulate one of the elements–air, fire, earth or water–to their will. One person, the Avatar, has the ability to master all the elements–and thus bring balance to the land.

“This one is 70 years into the future and takes all the elements of bending from the first series and evolves it and takes it one step further,” Cyma Zarghami, President of the Nickelodeon/MTVN Kids and Family Group, said of “Korra.”

Nickelodeon had picked up “Korra” for 12 episodes but recently decided to order 14 more shows. “When we first starting talking to Nickelodeon about doing a new series in the ‘Avatar’ world, they asked if we could do shorter arcs—more like a show like ‘24’where there’s a specific villain or challenge for that particular season,” Konietzko says. “We’re really happy with that number. It allows us to focus much more closely on each episode and get a lot more craft into it.”

Speakeasy talked to DiMartino and Konietzko about the follow-up series and what fans can expect.

“We have a lot of ideas for the ‘Avatar’ universe and who knows? We could be tapping into them for years to come,” Konietzko says

The Wall Street Journal: How far along are you on the new series?

Michael DiMartino: We are in the midst of the first twelve episodes. We’ve written all the episodes. Episodes have shipped to the overseas animations studios and they’re animating away as we speak. So we’re kind of in the middle of things right now…All the vocal cast has been picked and recorded and all the scripts have been recorded.
From here -> http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2011/03/08/the-last-airbender-legend-of-korra-the-creators-speak/

So timing played a lot into how the storylines came out.  When you have an entire 12 episode season written and off to the animators and halfway through get the green light for a 14 episode season 2, it's kind of hard to add in an overarching storyline.  So to that degree, I can accept things being rushed feeling.  But then again, if season 1 was all we were going to get, it still feels very rushed and some storylines weren't finished out well or done in any depth - like the bender vs. non-bender conflicts.  Amon wouldn't have been very successful if there wasn't resentment there in the first place.

Which also makes me wonder - was any of that conflict presented in ATLA?  I can't imagine it's a recent issue.  Now I think I'm going to keep an eye out since I'm about halfway through rewatching the first season of ATLA again.

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Reply #41 on: June 27, 2012, 01:32:47 PM

Which also makes me wonder - was any of that conflict presented in ATLA?  I can't imagine it's a recent issue.  Now I think I'm going to keep an eye out since I'm about halfway through rewatching the first season of ATLA again.

I don't think so.  In ATLA it seemed like all of the benders either formed communities with other benders of the same type (e.g. the monks in the air temples, the waterbenders in the swamp, the nomadic sandbenders) or devoted themselves to serving the non-bender community in some way (e.g. the earthbenders who spent all their time moving cargo or whatever, or all the firebenders who were conscripted into the military).  You didn't really see any benders operating as "private citizens", like professional athletes, gangsters, etc.  Presumably the societies of the various nations were set up with fairly rigid rules to ensure that (any child that demonstrates bending ability gets whisked away to be trained in a structured environment), and things got more complicated within the more cosmopolitan society of Republic City where you've got different kinds of benders all left free to pursue their own lives.

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Reply #42 on: June 27, 2012, 07:25:00 PM

Right. My sense is that this has been a world rather like pre-Perry Japan: relatively homogenous, internal conflicts within each 'nation' but a strong sense in each one that you belonged with  your nation more than anyone else. Aang and Zukko set out to make a cosmopolitan city in a very nationalized world as an antidote to nationalism. Rather as in the real world, that turns out to have it own problems.
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Reply #43 on: June 27, 2012, 11:46:10 PM

Right. My sense is that this has been a world rather like pre-Perry Japan: relatively homogenous, internal conflicts within each 'nation' but a strong sense in each one that you belonged with  your nation more than anyone else. Aang and Zukko set out to make a cosmopolitan city in a very nationalized world as an antidote to nationalism. Rather as in the real world, that turns out to have it own problems.

THIS!

Best summary of what happened (and is still happening) in Republic City I have read.  DRILLING AND MANLINESS  DRILLING AND WOMANLINESS

My problem with the series is that the supposed protagonist, Korra just seems to be reacting to what everyone is doing. It was pretty easy for Lin BAMF Fong to steal the show from her. Sad to say, Korra is pretty privileged and overly entitled compared to her predecessor Aang. Personality wise - rather bland.  

I'm not too impressed with her being the Avatar.   why so serious?
« Last Edit: June 28, 2012, 02:55:58 AM by Ubvman »
RhyssaFireheart
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Reply #44 on: June 28, 2012, 06:22:09 AM

Right. My sense is that this has been a world rather like pre-Perry Japan: relatively homogenous, internal conflicts within each 'nation' but a strong sense in each one that you belonged with  your nation more than anyone else. Aang and Zukko set out to make a cosmopolitan city in a very nationalized world as an antidote to nationalism. Rather as in the real world, that turns out to have it own problems.

THIS!

Best summary of what happened (and is still happening) in Republic City I have read.  DRILLING AND MANLINESS  DRILLING AND WOMANLINESS

My problem with the series is that the supposed protagonist, Korra just seems to be reacting to what everyone is doing. It was pretty easy for Lin BAMF Fong to steal the show from her. Sad to say, Korra is pretty privileged and overly entitled compared to her predecessor Aang. Personality wise - rather bland.  

I'm not too impressed with her being the Avatar.   why so serious?
Exactly.  And Korra isn't a rather scared 12 year old boy who didn't want to be the avatar.  She's a provincial 17 year old girl who's known she was the avatar since she was about 5-6 years old and has grown up surrounded by people who treated her like the avatar, not a young woman.  Coupled with her personality, heading to Republic City and finding out how backwoods she is, it's not a good mix.  She's confident in being the avatar as if that's the greatest thing EVAR! and Republic City is more or less like "Oh, that's nice, dear."

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Reply #45 on: June 28, 2012, 08:10:18 AM

It's kind of an argument against training the Avatar as a privileged, isolated princeling. It's interesting that there have been so many Avatars and yet the White Lotus and others don't really get the point even now--especially odd given that the Avatar himself/herself can consult all his previous selves. Presumably they've all found that their real effectiveness comes from learning about life and people through experience, not from being Superman.
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Reply #46 on: July 01, 2012, 07:36:02 PM

It breaks out similarly to way the jedi fell in the last days of the Republic. Cloistered monks who just knew they were the shit and then they had the rug pulled out from under them.

Tuned in, immediately get to watch cringey Ubisoft talking head offering her deepest sympathies to the families impacted by the Orlando shooting while flanked by a man in a giraffe suit and some sort of "horrifically garish neon costumes through the ages" exhibit or something.  We need to stop this fucking planet right now and sort some shit out. -Kail
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Reply #47 on: July 02, 2012, 04:55:03 AM

If you remember in A:TLA's episodes where Aang was remembering growing-up as a young airbender, this very argument happened even among the airbenders.  Aang's mentor wanted him to behave as a normal child and not be treated any differently, but a few other council members disagreed and felt that he should be treated as the Avatar and molded to that role - whatever they felt that role was.

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Reply #48 on: July 02, 2012, 11:38:04 AM

I imagine that given the importance of the Avatar in sort of preserving the general state of the world, and the fact that you don't practically speaking have any Avatar in between the old one dying and the new one completing his/her training, you want to get them up to speed as quickly as possible.  Not that that's necessarily productive, but I can understand that the people who see themselves as responsible for that feel like they're under a lot of pressure to make it happen.

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Reply #49 on: July 12, 2012, 09:07:04 AM

http://insidetv.ew.com/2012/07/11/legend-of-korra-second-season/

Quote
a second-season order of 26 episodes that presumably will be divided into two parts called Books 3 and 4, bringing the total number of episodes to 52.
The series is already set to return in 2013 with the premiere of Season 1, Book 2 (which consists of 14 previously ordered episodes)
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Reply #50 on: August 02, 2012, 12:48:58 PM

http://insidetv.ew.com/2012/07/11/legend-of-korra-second-season/

Quote
a second-season order of 26 episodes that presumably will be divided into two parts called Books 3 and 4, bringing the total number of episodes to 52.
The series is already set to return in 2013 with the premiere of Season 1, Book 2 (which consists of 14 previously ordered episodes)

yay.

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Reply #51 on: August 08, 2012, 07:52:24 AM


beer geek.
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Reply #52 on: August 08, 2012, 01:10:41 PM

He, some of those are pretty cool looking.  Now I think I want a fire ferrets shirt.

Shannow
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Reply #53 on: August 15, 2012, 06:22:18 AM

Avatar: The Next Generation.   awesome, for real

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Reply #54 on: September 02, 2012, 05:42:59 PM

So I finally got to watch the last four episodes (god damn Canadian TV) and my only real complaint was the pacing.

Shit went way to fast, especially that end. I thought there would be a lot more "so now we don't have bending, how will I go on with my life" soul searching from everyone who got the bending off switch from Amon.


That got wrapped up really damn fast instead though. They could've easily done twice as many episodes with this story arc overall.





Ready for more though!

and the gate is like I TOO AM CAPABLE OF SPEECH
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Reply #55 on: February 05, 2013, 02:38:33 PM

Right. My sense is that this has been a world rather like pre-Perry Japan: relatively homogenous, internal conflicts within each 'nation' but a strong sense in each one that you belonged with  your nation more than anyone else. Aang and Zukko set out to make a cosmopolitan city in a very nationalized world as an antidote to nationalism. Rather as in the real world, that turns out to have it own problems.

THIS!

Best summary of what happened (and is still happening) in Republic City I have read.  DRILLING AND MANLINESS  DRILLING AND WOMANLINESS

My problem with the series is that the supposed protagonist, Korra just seems to be reacting to what everyone is doing. It was pretty easy for Lin BAMF Fong to steal the show from her. Sad to say, Korra is pretty privileged and overly entitled compared to her predecessor Aang. Personality wise - rather bland.  

I'm not too impressed with her being the Avatar.   why so serious?
Exactly.  And Korra isn't a rather scared 12 year old boy who didn't want to be the avatar.  She's a provincial 17 year old girl who's known she was the avatar since she was about 5-6 years old and has grown up surrounded by people who treated her like the avatar, not a young woman.  Coupled with her personality, heading to Republic City and finding out how backwoods she is, it's not a good mix.  She's confident in being the avatar as if that's the greatest thing EVAR! and Republic City is more or less like "Oh, that's nice, dear."

Old topic, but I want to talk Korra and it might as well be here rather than a new topic.

Korra is meant to be a contrast to Aang, who is a selfless and spiritual person. Korra is more selfish and physical. As the creators even said, that was what was keeping her from tapping into her airbending and spiritual side. Saving Mako from having his bending taken away was the first time Korra did something completely selfless. So it's not really a deus ex machina, but more or less her just finally getting a clue.

As for Aang popping up and energybending her. Well if you recall ATLA, Roku was often popping up to mentor Aang. And the energybending thing kinda was a Deus ex Machina in TLA, because Aang picked it up last minute from an almost godlike ageless being as a way to not have to kill Ozai. And they didn't just make it disappear which is nice. Energybending can be used to alter the energies within a person, and using it to take away bending was Aang's idea, not the Lion turtles, so it's not surprising that he could do the opposite with it and give a person the ability to bend.

As for Amon, though it's kinda neat how he mixes bloodbending with chi blocking to take away people's bending(he seems to be using bloodbending to reach a pressure point on the brain to permanently disrupt their chi,) but I think there was potential for a much darker story with him than making him a hypocrite waterbender. Yeah it's the easiest way to turn people against him, but with the story he told, they could have went with something more interesting. Like maybe Amon lost his face to Koh the face stealer, in exchange for the power of energybending. As for him being Taarlok's brother and Yakone's son, they definitely hinted at it enough with Korra's visions of Aang fighting Yakone. But Korra misunderstood, believing Aang was trying to warn her about Taarlok, when he was trying to warn her about Amon.

As for Asami, I think she didn't have much emotion over losing Mako because she's already realized she lost him when Korra got kidnapped. She'd already been coming to terms with it. And Iroh, Dante Basco needs to deepen his voice or Iroh needs to lose the dimples, cause the look/sound are too conflicting, ones too young, other is too old. As for him being stuck, considering he does that firebending rocket technique like Ozai, I don't think he'll have any problems getting down.

Also more relevant news: Korra DVD/Blu-ray has been announced, but no release date yet. And season 2 is apparently in the planning stages. Book 2: Spirits

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Reply #56 on: September 17, 2013, 07:06:54 AM


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Khaldun
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Reply #57 on: September 17, 2013, 10:11:02 AM

I like how they're not having Korra automagically turn into a mature, serious person this season. I kind of wish the Bad Guy weren't so obviously the Bad Guy right at the start, but there's probably more to the story than it seems. Maybe he's possessed by the Face Stealer or something along those lines.
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Reply #58 on: September 21, 2013, 05:22:42 PM

To double down on my previous comment, I really love that they're not telling us that Adult Aang was a perfect guy, quite the contrary.

I feel like this is a sign that on some weird level, we really are getting better as a culture. There really were not cartoons with this kind of narrative (anime or otherwise) available to us in the 70s and 80s.
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Reply #59 on: September 23, 2013, 10:17:44 AM

I had a similar thought when watching one particular scene, I think it was Korra and Mako at the fair. Was thinking, this is a fairly mature conversation for what is supposed to be a kid's cartoon.

While some of the plot is massively telegraphed I'm intrigued by where they are taking the plot this season.



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Reply #60 on: October 20, 2013, 05:34:30 AM

Two-part origin story was well done visually and narratively. Big tonal shift for the rest of the season, though.
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Reply #61 on: November 26, 2013, 06:30:50 AM

Finale was...well I'm not 100% sure. I liked it but didn't love it?

I'm not overly fond of them wrapping up a storyline each season, feels a little rushed to me. What's going to be the big challenge now, would seem hard to top that.

I still love the show, it's almost like they get the small things so right but are hit and miss on the big things.

One other note while watching the final battle, I LOVE the music in this show (and Avatar) , it's fucking kick arse.


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Reply #62 on: November 26, 2013, 08:31:01 AM

I think one of the big issues they have with Korra's story versus Aang's (besides the number of episodes allotted to each season) is the lack of clear goal for Korra.  Aang's "purpose" besides being the Avatar was to stop the Fire Nation and bring balance back to the world.  Korra's goal is to... grow up and fight paper-thin villains apparently.  There wasn't anything distinctly wrong with the world that needed fixing.  I guess you could say her goal is to figure out how the Avatar fits into an increasingly modern world that doesn't seem to need an Avatar in it, but that's really kind of nebulous.

Season 1 had Amon who was a two-bit villain, but he had a point to what he was outwardly trying to do - non-benders were being treated as second class citizens by benders, and Amon was supposedly trying to fix that.  He was a hypocrite and doing things the wrong way, but he had a point.

Season 2 had Unalaq, who had absolutely no build-up and no reason to be the bad guy except for mustache-twirling and MWAHAHAHA!  I SHALL RULE THE WORLD IN DARKNESS!!  Yeah.  We knew nothing about him, had no reason to care about him other than the story telling us (in a patently obvious manner) that he was the bad guy. 

Compare Unalaq to Ozai from A:TLA and it becomes even more obvious how bad the villains have been and how A:TLK lacks a good, clean villain.  In A:TLA, we knew Ozai was the bad guy from the beginning, he was driving the Fire Nation to take over the world and everything Zuko did was to try to appease his father.  So we get big world bad guy and small personal issues bad guy wrapped up into one.  It gave an over-arching storyline to work towards.  We don't have that in Korra, or if there is someone like that, it's certainly been well hidden so far.

All that said, I enjoy the show.  The animation and art are terrific.  The music is just fantastic!

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Reply #63 on: November 26, 2013, 10:14:25 AM

This season definitely felt choppy, but I'm glad it didn't get drawn out into a 2-season series of FedEx quests to gather the stuff needed to Kill Foozle. It's next season that I really wonder about. Basically Korra just did a Miyazaki on her world and I hope it will be a messy, complicated thing to have done. Presumably even with Foozle/Vaatu defeated (or was he: I don't remember seeing a body, and he's not back in his prison: if Unalaq was a Dark Avatar, maybe there's a new person out there with the Dark Avatar spirit now...) not all the spirits in the world are flying bunnies and all that.
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Reply #64 on: November 26, 2013, 10:35:37 AM

Well, the next season is supposedly called "Changes" so I'm going out on a limb to guess it's about the whole spirit world and physical worlds are interacting.  Likeyou said, it's not all fun and games and if the spirits can be affected by emotions, then that's going to be a driving issue right there.

I hadn't thought about the Dark Avatar being reborn like the Light Avatar was.  That really would make things interesting, wouldn't it?  We know Vaatu is still around somewhere, or at least his essence should be, since you need darkness to see the light and vice versa.

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Reply #65 on: November 26, 2013, 11:08:18 AM

Can we get more Varrick?  He was rather awesome..:D

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Reply #66 on: November 26, 2013, 01:11:33 PM

Varrick was an entertaining character, and I like Tenzin more and more.  Having him break free of the Fog of Lost Souls was cool in that it (ironically) hammered home how much he does resemble his father -- one of my favorite things about Aang was that his goofy persona hid this core of discipline and determination that slowly became more visible over the course of the story.  Tenzin gets used as a comic foil a lot, so it's cool to see him shine as a badass now and then.

Otherwise, eh.  This season felt just as rushed as the last one in that everything got wrapped up very quickly at the end through a series of nonsensical deus ex machinas.  The whole "learn to bend your own energy" thing could have been an interesting arc for an entire season, but instead it was just, I'll go sit down here for five minutes, okay cool now I'm all charged up into a giant glowy thing and I can punch the bad guy and win.

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Reply #67 on: November 26, 2013, 05:34:41 PM

The old show did sort of the same thing though with the turtle and Ozai. It's mostly that the pacing seems off--Korra learns to powerup in such a rush, and without any real sense of spiritual depth. She got broken down some in this season in a good way, but not really built back up in a satisfying emotional sense. I get that the show needs to have a youthful protagonist, but it really feels as if she didn't have the time to become the person she needed to be for the giant glowy kaiju fighting spirit woman to feel right.

Next season really needs to be a humbled Korra who gets into trouble because she doubts too much rather than petulant teen Korra.
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Reply #68 on: November 26, 2013, 06:56:27 PM

The difference korra and last airbender is rather more summed up in three points

1. The main villain of last airbender was an overarching villain, he had three seasons to drop clues and hints at who he really is. Ultimately we didn't get "a lot" more than a "batshit crazy mustache twirler" but he was at the very least what we knew about him and the threat he posed made him a great villain. Even though he technically only confronts the hero twice.

2. Split story telling. Last airbender gave us two stories for the price of one. Managing to not only tell Aangs story but Zuko. So instead of one midly interesting stories, we had two really concise and tightly written ones. Which also leads to point 3...

3. Airbender had minibosses the hero directly interacted with during the course of the season. Whether be General Zhao of season 1 or Princess Azula of season 2. What I find hilarious is that none of the villains, main or secondary, were personal threats to Aang. They were indeed from beginning to end, Zuko's villains, Zuko's problem. With the exception of Ozai who he confronted during the day of the Eclipse, Zuko personally fought and was there to end the arc of Azula and Zhao. Again this is the benfiet of grander story telling, something I kinda hoped Korra will get back to but neither has the cast or the desire to do so...

To harp even more on Villains, what made Amon work was that he was very personal to Korra. He mind raped her, made her doubt herself, beat her, brought her to her lowest point twice, and ultimately put fear in her. In a lot of ways the affects of fighting and beating Amon "should" have shown up in Korra's character wel into season 2...and it kinda didn't. Unalaq was again suppose to be a personal villain to Korra and ultimately felt less personal even though he is responsible for making her lose faith in tenzin and her father, threatening her family, tricking her into creating a war between the north and southern tribes, and is responsible for the destruction of her home, the failure to save tenzin daughter....and yet I feel he'll be shrugged under a rug by season 3. Arg. It's like there should be more here, though I honestly had no problem liking what I saw.

 I love how korra beats the world ending villain because SHE WANTS TO (which is basically how spirit bending works. You want to win more than the other guy so you win) and that harmonic convergence happens to be mere days away (oh noez). Last avatar introduced two planetary events and both paid off an entire seasons away after being introduced....which i think counts toward the rushed feeling. They have a whole other season guaranteed and yet the world has to end now. But on the other hand we DO get an entire season to see the aftermath, so trade off?
Khaldun
Terracotta Army
Posts: 15157


Reply #69 on: November 27, 2013, 06:50:56 PM

I think the idea that Ozai is a great villain that we built up to is in the end kind of wrong. We only see him as a great villain because he did harm to the world as a whole (but we find out that it's not just him, it's at least two generations) and to his family (Zuko and Azula and their mom.) But in a way, the only really interesting villain in all those seasons of the old show is Azula.

But I do completely agree that there's no one as interesting as Zuko in Korra's world. I think Tenzin is at least as interesting as Iroh, in part because he's a very different kind of person than Iroh but an equally loveable/admirable figure with his own depth. The show is mostly weaker in the bench--Mako, Bolin, Asami are just really not very interesting people. Varrick has some potential but he's too often played for laughs.

The idea of a dark Avatar was great but Unalaq wasn't anything more than a quick sketch of a character--he really needed some of the depth of Azula to make sense.
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