#anyway i'm going to rewatch the benders for sure

[trelkez]

Ah, Ted Lasso. This episode was 90% mess, but that 10% sure does know how to hook me.

I wish I could go back in time to the self who went into Ted Lasso thinking it was tightly plotted, top tier stuff and say, "this is a ridiculous show, but you should watch it anyway. You'll love the characters. You will get so much found family. Just don't get too attached to any plotlines or expect anything to make sense ever, and you'll be fine." That would be a reasonable expectation for this show! Unfortunately for me, we're down to the final three episodes, so it's a bit late for me to recalibrate at this point. I am, alas, still invested in the plotlines. 

So let's get into 3.10, because … wow, is there a lot to get into.

I'm rewatching the episode as I write this (just in case I forget any of the batshit turns it took and/or parts of it turn out to have been a fever dream), so I'm going to tackle it roughly in order. 

1. Richmond's ten game winning streak

Where are we at in the season? Does anyone know?

Remember when this show had season arcs organized around some kind of football-related goal? Avoid relegation, make it back into the Premier League. It seemed logical that the goal of this season would be to win the league, but I guess we're going to get there by putting the team on cheat mode in the background and then shoehorning in some "will they or won't they" football drama at the end, which is actually very in keeping with the overall theme of this episode.

2. Nate quit West Ham off-screen

I'm so glad the guy in the apartment on the other side of my living room wall was out for the night, because I literally shrieked "WHAT?????? WHAT???????" when that "Nate Shelley Out at West Ham" graphic went up.

I didn't get to Nate in my 3.09 writeup, and it's just as well, because anything I wrote before that graphic would have been immediately rendered pointless. Nate quit West Ham off-screen. He quit off-screen.

I am going to reach way, way back to the Nate Shelley I liked in season one and say: that Nate did not deserve this shit.

It has been obvious throughout this entire season that the writers weren't interested in telling the story that season two set up. They didn't especially want to dwell on or in the toxicity that bottomed Nate out last season; they didn't want to do the harder narrative work of actually building back an unlikeable character through a slow but steady redemption arc, even though they've spent entire seasons doing exactly that with Jamie. Instead, they said, "yeah, but Nate isn't really That Guy."

Does the show regret what it did? It sure feels that way. It feels like, in the pursuit of telling a story about a good guy on an ego-fueled descent, the show went way further than it meant to and has now decided to backtrack on that by treating the whole thing like a guy waking up from a bender and going, "I did what last night? Why did I do that?" That wasn't really Nate who did those things, that was Drunk Nate! He did five shots of narcissism and got blackout drunk on jealousy, and he woke up in the morning with a new job. What wild shenanigans will ensue? 

So, sure. The only way any of it makes sense is if none of it meant anything. Fine. Even then, what was the point of sending Nate to West Ham and throwing all of Rupert's smothering, menacing glitz at him only for NATE QUITTING HIS JOB AND WALKING AWAY FROM RUPERT AND WEST HAM to happen OFF-SCREEN so they can CATCH US UP ON IT via FAKE SPORTS NEWS INFOGRAPHIC??

If they didn't show it because they felt the real rejection was in Nate going home to his girlfriend, that is very poor storytelling in a season that started out with the most literal Rupert is Palpatine visual parallels imaginable. If they're trying to say that the real climax of Nate's story isn't in rejecting Rupert, but in the amends he makes with the people he hurt, then why did they drag the West Ham stuff out until the tenth episode??? Why is all of this being left for the end, when none of the West Ham stuff has ultimately mattered at all, and pulling the plug on it earlier on could've left a lot of room for handling Nate's healing process at a slower, more organic pace?

Ultimately, this is a story about a good guy who lost his way a little and wound up hanging out with a bad crowd, and now he has to apologize his way back into the hearts of his real friends. The storytelling along the way has been wildly incoherent and had brutally terrible pacing, but if you completely disregard how we got here and pretend season one Nate just woke up from a West Ham bender, there's still time to enjoy the endgame.

3. Isaac is team captain again!

So – Isaac went into the crowd and wasn't banned for the remainder of the season? Let's close our eyes for a moment and imagine that the football gods looked upon Isaac's actions and said, "yeah, that seems legit, let's give him the smallest possible set of consequences." He was sent off with a red card. For assault. But the football gods are treating punching a fan like having a go at an opposing player! Cool. That's still, what, three games?

So even if we assume he only got a three-game ban, and keeping in mind that Richmond isn't in the Champions or Europa leagues and the FA Cup is just – not happening, I guess? So they probably don't have a ton of midweek games, which means that it's been … weeks.

But wasn't the win streak at eight games last week? So – did Isaac just – not get a ban? At all? 

Nope. No. Self, you are a Ted Lasso Doylist now, remember? Nothing that happened last week was actually about Isaac in any way, so why would there be ongoing consequences for him from that storyline? Deep breaths.

Isaac is one of my favorite characters in this show, and I'm not particularly interested in there being ongoing consequences for him from whatever that was last week, so – this is fine. Don't question it. We float on an ocean of vibes. Everything is great.

4. Why?

Why did we just take a beat for microaggression with Ted being shocked Bumbercatch is Swiss? Is this really where we're at these days, comedy-wise?

I'm genuinely not sure that anyone involved here knows how to write Ted without making him completely exhausting to be around, anymore. Is that on purpose? Let's pretend it's on purpose.

5. Do we think Nate is capable of being involved in something like that?

"Nah." – the writers, who are pretending they haven't seen season two

6. Jade

I like her so much, but I am 99.95% sure that's because she is being written to be likable, with no other discernible qualities. Who is she? What motivates her? In a season full of long episodes, was there really no time to show her existing when Nate isn't in the room? Did no one in the writer's room stop to wonder, "hey, is it at all dicey if that woman in the restaurant who dislikes Nate suddenly falls in love with him so he can be healed by the power of love?" Did no one say that out loud and hear how it sounds?

Anyway. Jade. Big fan. Looking forward to hearing all about her hobbies and backstory in the ample time remaining.

7. Dani vs. Van Damme

I have a feeling this completely random side adventure into our purest angel having an asshole hypercompetitive side isn't going to land for everyone, but you know what? Sure. Why not. There are epic tales out there of teammates facing each other in the Olympics, the World Cup, etc. and trying to destroy each other and then going home like none of it ever happened. I'm totally onboard for this kind of plot in theory! They took it a little too far with Dani breaking Van Damme's nose, but as we've established, "they took it a little too far" is the story of this entire show. 

You know what would have improved this a lot? If it had happened near the beginning of the season and kicked off a recurring storyline in which someone else now has to face Dani on a spring international break. Shoved in at the end of the season (and probably the end of the series), it loses a lot of its potential, so the placement is … strange. Instead of being an ongoing character trait they could slowly build up and make funnier in the re-telling, it comes out of nowhere and immediately goes to 11. But otherwise, why not.

8. Beard gets it

Beard is the only one who watched season two. He gets it.

It would explain a lot about Beard and this entire season if Beard used to be a time traveler, so he's the only one in Richmond immune to changes in the timeline. Maybe somewhere just out of sight there's a genre show about time travel happening, and this football team just happens to exist in that universe – so the world of Ted Lasso is constantly being rewritten, but no one notices. Ted Lasso as a Doctor Who spin-off in which no one has ever met or heard of The Doctor. 

No one but Beard, anyway. Is Beard also the only one who remembers that Isaac went into the crowd last week?

9. Uncle's Day

10/10, no notes. Every time I think I'm out, this show uses Jamie Tartt to drag me right back in.

(Actually, no, one note: Jamie was joking about Isaac being his best friend, right? That was just to screw with Roy? I'm going to assume Isaac was the choice for that line because it's so obviously unlikely given how rarely they interact, and not because the writers think Jamie and Isaac are still BFFs. It would be very in keeping with this season for them to think Jamie and Isaac's friendship is just running on cheat mode in the background, but like – I'm going to assume. For my sanity. That it's just a joke.)

The funniest part of this scene winds up being that they accidentally made it look like Phoebe was having an "oh. oh" moment about Roy and Jamie. I had to rewind that twice to figure out that she was spelling it out in her head, and not like, catching on.

I would've understood if she had caught on. Roy stares at Jamie for 10.6 seconds before he says "I love it."

10. Super League? In this economy?

+10 points to Leslie for "I hate to break it to you, Rebecca, but those children are dead."

Unfortunately, -10 points to Leslie for "who cares why Rupert invited you?" Historically speaking, Rebecca should care. Rebecca is totally justified in wondering why Rupert invited her!

Why would Richmond be invited into talks about a Super League at all? Richmond? Recently promoted Richmond? Complete lack of international play Richmond? It's sus as hell. If I were Rebecca, I would absolutely assume this was some strange plot by my evil ex-husband.

(I'm not convinced it wasn't, in fact, a strange plot by her evil ex-husband. Something is going on there.)

Super League is about the richest teams banding together to shake off the chaff. As a Spurs fan, I fully, completely understand the concept of a team that isn't actually rich and successful trying to buy into an exclusive club – yes, Spurs were involved in Super League drama; no, you shouldn't ask me about their season or we'll still be here next week while I cry on you – and we are definitely already outside the tethers of reality when West Ham is at the table, but it, truly it makes no sense.

(And even if Rupert weren't the one extending the offer, "go check it out, what's the worst that could happen?" is naive at best. What's the worst that could happen? The media finds out that Rebecca was at a Super League meeting and now Richmond is being dragged into a shitstorm, whether Rebecca decided to buy in or not. Girl, do not go in there! If you don't want to join, don't join! Why is any of this happening! Get Keeley back in the building before someone runs into a PR problem they truly cannot back out of!)

11. Is the psychic's prophecy still a thing?

So … is the show going Tedbecca? After that weird flirty moment she had with Sam earlier, the matchbook almost calls back to Sam more than Ted, but the show did make a point of having Ted pull out that matchbook a few episodes ago, and here it's directly paired with his toy soldier. 

(Honestly, slow clap for everyone who did those green matchbook / green soldier gif sets earlier this season, I thought you guys were reaching straight into outer space with that one and apparently I was dead wrong!)

Ted and Rebecca have barely even talked to each other in the back half of the season. Every week I log on here and see shippers shriveling into dust, their crops unwatered. Is the matchbook/soldier thing a misdirect, or are they going to cram a significant relationship change into the final two episodes of the season after largely ignoring them in the lead-up?

I have no idea which way this is going to swing, and that's kind of terrible, because there are only two episodes left. There isn't time left to do any kind of meaningful build. There's only time for a sudden last-minute rush of drama.

When I put it like that, I think they probably are going to shove it into the endgame. Either that, or the houseboat guy suddenly shows back up out of nowhere. Whatever happens, it is going to have a "bet you didn't see that coming" flavor, because there isn't time for anything else.

12. Roy has an epiphany

What the fuck even is this?

Listen. It never made sense for Roy to have broken up with Keeley. It was clearly something they did as a way to inject some new drama. THAT SAID, they did it, and they committed to it for almost an entire fucking season, and TEN EPISODES ON a teacher with a crush on Roy makes a way-too-personal comment about how she hopes his mess hasn't caused any damage, and THAT'S what makes him suddenly realize he needs to apologize to Keeley? THAT? Just like. Boom. Realization sets in. Lightbulb visibly goes off overhead as he mutters "fuuuuuuck" to himself. A fully illustrated epiphany!

What the fuck does this show think it's doing having Roy suddenly realize that he probably hurt Keeley and needs to apologize? 

In episode ten?????

I don't know how much time has passed, because in Ted Lasso season three time is an illusion, but at minimum – months. Months later, he suddenly realizes he might have hurt his girlfriend when he broke up with her??? That isn't character growth. That is completely fucking absurd. They needed Roy and Keeley to get back together and pushed it too close to the last minute, so they did some schoolteacher deus ex machina. Of all the abrupt plot turns in this episode, this might be the second worst.

(There's a clear winner and this isn't it, but second place? It's a contender.)

13. What happened to the corporate pixie dream girl?

So the overall implication here, between this and Trent's rumor of West Ham workplace misbehavior, is that Rupert is probably headed for some workplace harassment trouble, right? If withholding the mystery of it all turns out to be why they didn't show Nate quitting in this episode, I'm going to scream. I will literally shriek with the frustration of a thousand bad plot decisions.

14. Nate's nostalgia journey

This is, sincerely, great stuff with the photo albums and the music and the journey into the attic. There is still time to enjoy the endgame!! Disregard how we got here!!

15. Rebecca vs. Super League

Just watching this scene made me feel like I've now put in enough time on Ted Lasso to be allowed by contract to take some PTO. Ted Lasso needs to pay me for my time while I recover on a tiny island in the Outer Banks. I've earned it.

So – they thought – having Rebecca scoldingly yell "what do you think you're doing? Just stop it!" while picturing aging rich men as little boys was, like … feminist? Someone involved in this process thought, wouldn't it be great if we empowered Rebecca by making her everyone's scolding mother, and no one along the way went, wait, what? 

But then it keeps going so that we can humanize Rupert, which – what? Why is this happening? Why do I know Rupert's humanizing backstory when to my knowledge, Jade was born inside Taste of Athens?

This is the most I have ever seen Rebecca care about football. It's a lovely speech, but where is it coming from? Since when is she this invested? The only thing that rings true about this is that Super League is an ugly money grab and many, many owners do not give a single shit about their team's fans. Someone wanted to write a speech about that, so we're getting it through Rebecca, just like we got that speech about deleting your camera roll through Isaac. 

Also – the food: I know that the food is a continuation of Edwin Akufo's whole thing with Sam, but it is a weird fucking choice to put so much emphasis on Ghanian food and then reduce it to slop thrown at Rebecca.

Beginning to end, we could've done without this entire Super League story and been just fine. It isn't like this 63-minute episode required extra filler.

16. 24

10/10, no notes. They really do pull me back in with Jamie every time. He revealed that 24 and I, like Roy Kent talking to a schoolteacher, suddenly realized that I ship it. Jamie wore Sam's number?? I'm going to vid this so hard.

17. Nate's dad

I did say there was a clear winner for the episode's worst plot turn.

Nate is sad at home for one episode and suddenly his dad does a complete turnaround after almost three entire seasons? It isn't like we heard a story one time about Nate's dad and now we're getting a reveal on what actually happened there – we've seen him a lot! Nate's entire motivation set is built on his dad and their relationship!

"I pushed you to succeed so you would have more opportunities than I did" is a completely legitimate story to tell, but this has been almost three seasons of disapproval so thick that it threw toxic sludge across the entire show. Nothing Nate has done has ever been good enough. Now we're at the end, and they want to heal it so that Nate can grow, so all of that is being retconned into, "I never cared if you were successful, I just want you to be happy," and suddenly his dad is a completely different person. Boom, fixed! Definitely not the kind of thing you have to heal from over time!

I say again: Nate's story deserved better than this. By pushing this all the way to the end, they've run out of room to take their time with it, so it's just being dropped in. What a mess this season is.

18. Rebecca, do NOT do it

This season is, in fact, such a mess that for a minute there, I believed that Rebecca might actually go for it with Rupert. 

I think, more than anything, I'm puzzled by the perceived necessity of this closure on Rebecca and Rupert. I get that they wanted to give us a taste of what brought Rupert and Rebecca together in the first place – to have Rebecca to see him in that old light again before taking a step back, so she could acknowledge the past in a way that helped her finally make a clean break. I get it. But … why? Was this really something lingering out there for her to overcome?

Rebecca's entire season-long conflict with Rupert has felt like intentional backsliding for the purposes of The Drama. If you imagine that she came into this season still very fired up and insecure about her ex-husband, the arc from "I want Zava so Rupert can't have him" to "I don't care about beating Rupert anymore" is fine. But … did she? Is that really where we left her in season two?

And why did an episode in which Nate quits West Ham spend so much time breaking up Rupert and Rebecca, who were already broken up, while Nate quit off-screen? 

19. What's left?

Two episodes to go! That's so much time in which to accomplish so many things!

I said to someone last week: you know, I thought this was headed for a "Nate takes over as Richmond's head coach" place, but there isn't enough time left in the season for them to do that, so I guess he's just going to be staying at West Ham?

Turns out they can do anything, because they're just going to drop in whatever at the last minute. Nothing means anything! We exist in a world without the constraints of plot and continuity! Everything is on the table.

So, what's left to shoehorn in?

- Manchester City has been inevitable all season (ask Arsenal how that feels), and we're probably going to get some stuff with Jamie's dad there. Jamie has been one of the only characters they've consistently done right by, so my fingers are crossed they don't screw that up at the finish line.

- Will Trent ever come out to the Diamond Dogs? Maybe being out in the workplace isn't his thing, but it feels like a missed avenue of storytelling to have Trent be right there in the coaching offices, in on all the gossip and sharing and advice, and not have whatever he has going on be a part of it. That would have been such an easy way to integrate queer identity into everyday conversation over a decent chunk of the season, instead of playing it almost exclusively for drama the way they have been.

- Still on Nate's apology list: Colin and Ted? If apologizing to Ted doesn't involve the believe sign somehow, I really don't know anything about this show anymore.

- Is Ted staying in London or going back to Kansas? A lot of people seem resigned to the idea that he's going back, and a lot of Tumblr is hoping he stays for Rebecca, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's some secret third thing. Two whole episodes! There's still plenty of time for them to drop a surprise twist on us. (If he goes back to Michelle, it won't be a surprise twist, but I will turn this car around.)

- Are we ever going to learn what was up with Baz's friend who got kicked out of the pub? I really thought we were headed for some bigger integration of Colin's story, wherein it turned out that was Baz's secret boyfriend or something, but … … …?

- Is anything going to come of Trent's book? I have $5 on there being an epilogue time skip in which we fast forward to the book release and see what the characters are up to (aka the "no seriously, this is it, the show is over" ending) and another $5 on the show ending on Ted in the airport and the book not ultimately meaning anything.

Two weeks until we find out!

#ted lasso #ted lasso meta #episode reactions #we float on an ocean of vibes #everything is fine

[accidentallyadramablog]

Review: Down With Love (2010)

I felt a little nostalgic this week and decided to rewatch Down With Love, a romcom out of Taiwan featuring Ella Chen (from Hana Kimi) and Jerry Yan (Meteor Garden).

This is more of a brain dump as opposed to a real review. More below the cut.

Let me just start with the fact I love dramas with tomboys, gender benders, and gender non-conforming women and girls in general. I'm a 40 yr old gnc bi-woman, so some of these storylines really resonate with me - despite the trend of making those female characters glaringly stupid and pitiable.

Tags: Nanny, Love Square, Tomboy, Male Chases Female First, Sismance, Rich Man/Poor Woman, Pretends To Be Gay, Single Parent, Sisterhood, Boss/Employee Relationship

Our girl Ella Chen plays tomboy Yang Guo. Yang Guo works, has friends, and a shitty boyfriend of 5 years. She acts naïve, but she actually has a lot of life experience due to a *tragic backstory*. After her mother died, her father ruined the family business. Their family plunged from riches to rags and their father abandoned them. Yang Guo is 6 when this happens and it falls on her older sister Yang Duo to raise them both while homeless, starving, and navigating the homeless camps in the parks of Taipei.

Yang Duo (Kelly Huang) has raised her little sister by herself, beginning from poverty and homelessness to having a house and making a life for themselves. They bicker good-naturedly, but Yang Duo is very protective and supportive of her sister. She's managed to earn a job at a prestigious law firm as an admin assistant with strong accounting skills. She is seen as frugal, clever, and competent. Several characters make comments throughout the series about how it was a shame that she didn't go into certain careers because she's so accomplished despite not having a formal education. It's obvious that Yang Duo has put her own dreams and happiness on hold to make sure that she and Guo have financial security. Yang Duo is my favorite character btw. She is a supporting character that is multi-faceted and has her own character arc. I really like seeing her growth in this drama, and she gets some cute side couple action later in the series. Skip the last episode.

Due to growing up in poverty and scrabbling to lower-middle-class, the two girls work nonstop. After Guo is fired from her job waiting tables, Duo gets Guo a job as a nanny for her boss Xiang Yu Ping by lying and saying Guo is a lesbian.

Xiang Yu Ping (Jerry Yan) owns his own law firm and is seen as cold and overbearing. He is raising his dead brother's kids and none of the nannies he's hired have lasted either due to being chased off by the kids (a la the Sound of Music) or by trying to seduce him because he's a rich handsome lawyer. Relieved to have found a nanny who definitely wouldn't seduce him (because he thinks she's a lesbian), he just pays an unreasonably huge salary to keep her there with the kids despite their abuse.

Supporting characters: Amanda Chu as the best friend Yan Ling with the messy dating life is also delightful, but I've enjoyed all her roles. I may rewatch Lion Pride for her, now that I'm walking down memory lane. The office of 'just some lawyer dudes being dudes' are funny. I love when they gather around to watch drama and place bets on what's happening. They're also slackers. I would love/hate to work with them.

So that's the setup.

Honestly, I hate the 'pretends to be gay' plots. It's typically really offensive and this was no exception in a lot of places. (It's not at the same level as Personal Taste, but it's bad.) One of the cases Yu Ping takes on is unlawful termination and blackmail of a gay teacher and he asks for Yang Guo's advice to help the man. Taiwan was trying in 2010, but it wasn't exactly good representation to have a fake lesbian help an actual gay man faced with employment discrimination and blackmail over his orientation. When I compare this with Love is Science (2021 twdrama) that has two out lgbt characters employed in their office with significant roles, I'm just so happy that lgbtq media representation is still progressing.

I don't care about Yu Ping's best friend Qi Ke Zhong or Yu Ping's ex-girlfriend Ding Hui Fan because they're both terrible people that don't deserve forgiveness and their only purpose was to drag out our leads getting together. Since this was a rewatch, I knew how much I hated their scenes and skipped them as much as I could. You're not missing anything. Someone on YT needs to just make a Yang Duo/Xiang Yu Ping cut, tbh. Also? Go ahead and skip the deadbeat father.

The nanny bit only lasts three episodes (the kids are adorable), but it's long enough for Yu Ping to catch feelings and think his lesbian nanny is cute. He actually is not cold and overbearing as episode 1 makes him out to be. Yu Ping is supportive and tries to be a good friend to Guo. When he thinks her 'girlfriend' is cheating on her, he absolutely flips out because he feels she deserves to be respected and loved in her relationship. He learns about her family. He learns about her friends. He knows where to look for her when she's upset. He knows how to cheer her up and later, he knows how to make the perfect date. When he finds out she lied about being a lesbian, he's not even mad. He admits it was his fault for making certain demands in the employment contract. He's just upset that he's lost chances to flirt and court her.

Listen. It's a dumb premise in this drama and the misunderstandings suck. But it's so refreshing to see male leads be decent to women that are romantically and sexually unavailable to them. The bar is so low, in RL and in dramas, that Yu Ping belongs in the top tier of male drama leads. This dude was just going to continue in a supportive friendship for an undetermined time, both when he thought she was a lesbian and later when his shitty weasel of a best friend dated her under false pretenses. He didn't burden her with a confession until her relationship was over. And whenever she asked for space, he gave it to her. And when she confronted him on instances of jealously, he apologized and gave her space.

Yu Ping never tries to change Guo. He doesn't give her a makeover. She has a makeover scene that is instigated by another character and all he does is try to make her comfortable when she's so obviously uncomfortable. Then he cheers inwardly when he sees her overcome her awkwardness and have confidence. But by the end of the drama, she is still dressing and acting the same as in act 1. It honestly reminded me a little of Coffee Prince in that the fancy male lead is still just as enamored with his gnc woman by the end and the way she presents herself doesn't have an effect on their romantic relationship. Again, this is content catered to me as a bi & gnc woman in a relationship with a cis-het man. I often am mistaken for a man when I go out with my spouse and he's still super into me so let's normalize gnc people with gc people already it's 2021.

Anyway, if you watch romances for kisses, there's really only a couple of pecks and one nice passionate kiss and they're all in basically the last 3 eps of the series.

The last episode sucks. Stop at episode 15. Seriously. Don't watch episode 16. Why oh why do you let terrible people back in your life? Qi Ke Zhong and Ding Hui Fan are toxic and should but cut out of their lives. The end of ep 15 had a happy ending with a family-style breakfast for our two sisters with their boyfriends. Ep 16 threw in some more misunderstanding, jealousy, and separations followed by a time skip for no reason and brought back my two least favorite characters.

Anyway, I will live in my little world with Yang Duo and her sweet lawyer boyfriend Liang Zhi Hao (Ian Yim/Cyran Yan/Yan Yi En yeah, this actor has three stage names) that supports her interests and self-determination while they save money on mass transit by using his motorbike. And they build her dream home that she designs. Perhaps they put aside funds for her to pursue a degree in what she's passionate about.

#down with love #twdrama #drama critical #ella chen #jerry yan #kelly huang #yang guo #xiang yu ping #yang duo

[loopy777]

Non-Review: Free Comic Book Day 2021 - The Legend of Korra (Also Featuring Avatar: The Last Airbender)

With all the hype around 'Suki Alone,' it looks to me like most of the fandom missed that an additional Avatar comic with a story from each cartoon's era was just released for Free Comic Book Day. You can read them for yourself on either Dark Horse Digital or Comixology where it's mislabeled as being for ages 17+ (free accounts are required for both), but I'm sure one of the reasons you all love me is because of my willingness to jump in between you and these comics like the deadly bullets they can be. Well, I'm happy to die (metaphorically) for the sake of (a little anonymous internet) love, so I'm doing a full snarky review for each ten-page story. Also, I'm bored, and it's more fun to make fun of mediocre stuff than to praise stuff I like.

It's time for me to review "Free Comic Book Day 2021 - The Legend of Korra (Also Featuring Avatar: The Last Airbender)" or more specifically "The Legend of Korra: Clearing the Air" and "Avatar: The Last Airbender: Matcha Makers."

CLEARING THE AIR

The cover makes this look like a story about Jinora and Ikki having a sibling conflict. That's a lie. The Air Sisters arguing is merely the inciting incident for Tenzin telling a story of his youth. I should note that, as inconsequential as the Air Sisters stuff is, it's actually written very well because it posits Ikki as a victim of circumstance and Jinora as a bully who terrorizes her little sister with threats of getting thrown in jail by Metalbenders for an accident, cementing the characterization from the cartoon. This is not sarcasm. I really do think Jinora is presented by LoK as a Holier Than Thou little snot who just so happened to be naturally gifted with magic spirit-powers, but for some reason the rest of the fandom doesn't agree with me.

Anyway, Tenzin comes in to find the arguing (and Meelo just running amok for the fun of it and so far these characterizations are perfect), and rather than telling Jinora to shut her stupid face, he delivers a tale of his youth about conflict resolution.

So the meat of the story is how, when Tenzin was "a few years older" than Jinora, a pair of vandals got onto Air Temple Island and burned some graffiti into the spinning-panel things that Korra will destroy out of frustration during her Airbending training. Literally, the vandals are depicted as scorching the wood with enough smoke to be seen across a plaza. Tenzin goes after the vandals and they flee across the bay back to Republic City proper (one of the vandals is a Waterbender with a surf-plank). Tenzin pursues, catches them, and attacks them hard enough to smash some dockside crates. They are all then arrested by Metalbenders and dragged before Chief Toph. She's going to let Tenzin go (yay Toph!) and throw the vandals in jail (YAY TOPH!) and makes this face, and this entire comic is worth it:

However, Aang arrives and instead arranges to forgo the jail-time in favor of an Air Nomad Conflict Resolution Ceremony. This is nice and in-character, but I'm totally with Tenzin that these vandals should have been thrown in jail. They literally burned insulting graffiti into antiques from a genocided culture. But instead, Aang demonstrates conflict resolution by having Tenzin explain why he's hurt and what needs to be done to redress the wrong. And so the vandals help Tenzin scrub the graffiti off the panels with water and rags and mops- how, I don't know, since they were literally burned.

They also do a ceremony thing where they each take turns bending their element into a central space between them to 'clear the air' (GET IT GET IT HA HA IT'S ALMOST LIKE A PUN BUT NOT), so it's a good thing they were all Benders because this is kinda racist. This fixes all the problems and everyone is friends. Yay!

In the present, though, things are not so nice, because Tenzin's kids are still screaming at and provoking each other. Korra comes in with Asami at the end to ask what's going on, and Asami says nothing, so I still think everyone is characterized with perfect consistency with the cartoon.

I made this sound silly, but (aside from the spinny-panels getting cleaned with a little water and elbow-grease, which doesn't matter because Korra will eventually blow them all up anyway), I actually like this one. It has Tenzin demonstrate how much he's always had to work to be the Perfect Air Monk that everyone expects him to be, and Aang acknowledges how this is unfair but that Tenzin will never let him down no matter what. It also has Katara come in at the end (for just one line, boo!) to acknowledge that this was an especially easy little conflict for Tenzin to practice on and he'll eventually face worse. I found it a nice adult moment in a story that's otherwise clearly aimed at 8-year-olds.

The art is good. It's simpler than the LoK cartoon, with flat colors, but it captures the story and has enough liveliness for everyone's character to come across in their look and body-language. The brief action-sequence where Tenzin attacks the vandals is well done, moving quickly but showing the full flow of the fight and every move Tenzin makes.

MATCHA MAKERS

Apparently, "Matcha is finely ground powder of specially grown and processed green tea leaves, traditionally consumed in East Asia" according to Wikipedia. I had to look that up. I'm curious how many people understood the full reference in the title, especially since these comics are aimed at kids too young to be allowed on the internet.

This is a very simple story about Iroh in his tea-shop in Ba Sing Se. He has an assistant/waitress named Feng, a new character who wears glasses, ruining the hopes and dreams of all the fanfic-writers who were so sure he'd rescue Jin from the Lower Ring. A frequent patron of the tea shop is an elegant, older lady (very clearly Upper Ring material) named Li-Mei, who cannot go a single panel without giving Iroh a HEY BIG BOY look. She is very clearly smitten. Also, I feel the need to clarify that she knows his name is Iroh, so apparently Ba Sing Se is okay with the Dragon of the West serving tea to their wealthy. I don't say that as a criticism, I'm just noting it.

That night, Iroh meets up with his friends- the Pokemon-style spirits that we saw in Legend of Korra. (I don't know if they're the actual spirits from LoK, or just new spirits in the same style. This is because I would sooner grind matcha into my eyes than rewatch Book Spirits.) He serves them his special blend of tea and talks about how he's totally into Li-Mei but isn't going to pursue it because he's feeling old and doesn't want to take a risk. At this point, I could stop describing the plot because between the title and what I've said so far, I'm sure you could figure out every single plot beat that will follow.

The next day, the spirits trip Feng so that she drops Li-Mei's tea and Iroh needs to bring a replacement, and they've drawn hearts on top of the replacement tea with foam or sugar or milk or whatever. I don't know because I've never bought tea in a place that will even put the bag in the hot water for me. Iroh gets out of the situation without starting any love-affairs and runs into the back to tell the spirits to knock it off, dudes, they're totally embarrassing him! The spirits respond by giving him a flyer for a romantic restaurant. I don't know how they got it, so I can only assume that some Upper Ringer had their mail diverted.

Iroh refuses, so when Li-Mei orders more tea and he brings it to her, the spirits hover just out of her sight and threaten to smash the furniture. I am not making that up. They literally threaten to smash Iroh's furniture unless he asks the lady out. He submits to their tyrannical threats, Li-Mei happily accepts the date, he happily accepts her acceptance, and the story comes to a close. Iroh thanks his spirits friends for opening him up to new experience, but hopes that next time (so I guess Iroh is signing up for Tinder after this?) they won't threaten his shop.

At best, I can describe this story as 'harmless.' But it's been a long week and I just got a bunch more extra work at my day job that I really don't want to do, so I'm going to go ahead and call this story 'dumb.' It's rote, leans towards humor without actually being funny at all, and turns the spirits of the setting into Pokemon. And not even the cool dragon kind.

The art is strangely stiff. The coloring is soft and nice, but the drawings seems more 'assembled' than actually drawn. I swear there are even a few panels that reminded me of 'How I Became Yours' with janky poses, horrifying expressions, and just enough resemblance to the original cartoon to make me think a screenshot was partially traced and then ruined. (I'm not accusing the artist of tracing, BTW. I wouldn't even condemn the artist for tracing if they did. I'm just describing that HIBY feeling I got.) It was so stiff that rather than hear Iroh's dialogue in Mako's rich tones, I instead imagined Greg Baldwin doing a stiff Mako-impression with no naturalism to the delivery.

This story is definitely worthy of its "Also Featuring" billing. I'd rate it below Gene Yang's Mai and Suki FCBD short stories, but above everything else he wrote for Avatar.

So there you go. Overall, this is very middle-of-the-pack for Avatar FCBD stuff. It's very much of the nature of the 'Team Avatar Tales' stuff, and I wouldn't be surprised if the Iroh story was a leftover from that project. On Free Comic Book Day, you often get what you pay for.