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snafu-maniac1 · 2 years

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Who was the real bad guy in Avatar: The Last Airbender?

Yep, it’s me again. Here with another possible controversial post that might get a lot of people on my ass but I love to suffer don’t I?

You may recall my last post titled Zuko deserved better where I psychologically analyzed his character and the flaws of his so called “redemption”. If you do not then feel free to take a look at that first. If you don’t feel like it that’s fine. I don’t think you’ll really need it for this one but eh just thought I should put that out there.

Since that post I’ve had some time to think even more on this topic and boy do I have a lot of shit to say.

The same disclaimer applies here. This is not for the purpose of starting fan wars or insulting anyone, this is just my personal take. I am by no means an expert and everything I list is just from my thinking point and experience in some of the psychology classes I have taken or real psychology shows I’ve watched where professional psychologists did their analysis so...yeah. Just putting that out there.

Alright so to start off, what I mean by the title of who was the real bad guy in Avatar is that I want to take a look at all of the characters more...questionable viewpoints and moral decisions and compare it to other characters. I will be analyzing every episode that I can think of from the first to the last season that has these types of moments. And just to be clear this is regarding the main characters, those of which include: Team Avatar, Zuko(classified separately because this will also be his choices prior to joining the team), Iroh, Azula, Mai and Ty Lee, and also including some of team Avatar’s allies.

To start off with, we have the very first episode where Aang instantly causes trouble for Sokka and Katara’s Tribe by taking Katara on to a forbidden Fire Navy vessel despite being warned against it. Sokka is rightfully angered by this because Aang ended up putting the entire Tribe in danger so he throws him out. Meanwhile Katara, who knows absolutely nothing about Aang, sides with a complete and total stranger over her own home and is quite literally ready to desert her family because of it. Then Aang, not wanting to cause the rift, willingly leaves. A smart move on his part. And then...we have Zuko’s entrance.

Where do I even start? First of all, we have that first scene where Zuko’s ship docks and it destroys Sokka’s watchtower which was displayed in a way that was, I don’t know supposed to be comedic? But is all in all just sault to the wound in my opinion. Then Zuko makes his entrance. And Sokka’s first reaction is to attack him. Nope, that is exactly what happens. Zuko, who is completely unarmed, hasn’t even started yelling yet, his arms are spread out, hasn’t even set foot off his ship and Sokka lunges for him with a battle cry. Hostility and precaution is understandable. Refusing to answer is understandable and acceptable. But Sokka has outright attacked Zuko, completely and utterly unprovoked. Meanwhile Zuko is not even hurting Sokka and just keeps throwing him on to the ground to make him stop. He heel kicks him in the head but even that is with restraint considering not even eight to nine episodes later he without any problem at all heel kicks the metal chains on his uncle’s wrists off. Zuko could have very easily, in the first moment he arrived, killed Sokka on the spot. He did not. Which shows his capable restraint considering any other Fire Nation soldier like Zhao or Ozai or even Iroh while he was still the Dragon Of The West would’ve burned the village to a puddle for even trying to fight them. Then Zuko grabs Sokka’s grandmother to get him to stop attacking and starts yelling and asking where the Avatar is. Then Aang shows up much to his astonishment at the fact that the Avatar is twelve. He attacks Aang with firebending, and as a result of their constant moving, the fire almost hits everyone else. And then Aang proceeds to baselessly assume Zuko who hadn’t shot fire at anyone but him this entire time would try to hurt the village in his favor and promises to go with him if he leaves peacefully before proceeding to break said promise. Before anyone starts on asking how was Zuko not attacking the village?! When did he do that before Aang’s arrival? Who was he hurting aside from Sokka who attacked first? Who did he burn? Who did he threaten to burn if Aang didn’t come with him? Whose life did he threaten? You see something odd there? Yeah...

And then when Aang does come with him, he(as I’ve already said) breaks his promise to Zuko which paints him in a really bad light because it shows that Aang’s word can’t be trusted. Everyone would think of course he’s going to escape! Why wouldn’t he? Well if you stop to consider this you might also realize that Aang breaking his promise means Zuko has every right to go back to Sokka and Katara’s village and punish their family for their dishonesty. And considering Sokka and Katara’s role in it, he very easily could’ve gone back and exacted revenge by burning their home down but he didn’t. And before anyone starts asking how I would even reach this conclusion the answer is this: I didn’t. I read it on someone’s fanfiction. Multiple people actually wrote about this possible scenario. Meaning in conclusion: Sokka struck first, Zuko retaliated, Aang arrived, they fought, Aang lied and escaped and Zuko still did not hurt anyone for his deceit.

Then we have the Kyoshi Island debacle. Which mind you, never even would’ve happened if team Avatar actually bothered to keep a low profile instead of galavanting around in obvious water tribe and air nomad clothing, like they’re at a festival and not in the middle of a war. The second Aang announced his title, the gossip spread like wildfire right to Zuko. And again instead of leaving for safety precaution, they stayed put, putting the entire island in danger until Zuko actually arrived. And then Zuko came on his komodo-rhino, asked the Kyoshi Warriors questions about the Avatar and then they proceeded to attack him on the spot when he realized they were lying to him and Aang was right there. Nope, I’m pretty sure that tail whip from his rhino was done after they ganged up on him. He shot fire in retaliation and the village suffered as collateral damage. It may seem heartless to say but that is what happened. Zuko didn’t start burning buildings or threatening people’s lives if Aang didn’t reveal himself. The only burning he did was when he was shooting at the attacking Kyoshi Warriors and defending himself. And even after everything ended he still did not go back to Kyoshi and burn them to the ground as punishment for lying and attacking him since they were supposed to be “neutral” like many other soldiers would’ve done.

After Kyoshi we have team Avatar’s complete and utter disregard for public property, people’s safety and their demonization of the Fire Nation. Frist we have the Omashu episode where they destroy part of the city and then get mad at King Bumi for punishing them for their crimes. Then we have the Prisoner episode where they stand by and cheer with happy smiles on their faces as a man who can’t swim is thrown into the middle of the ocean by the people they broke out of prison. Yes, the Warden was an ass but they might’ve just signed his death certificate with that. And no one sees anything wrong with that. And Zuko finds Katara’s necklace which they proceed to hold against him in book 3 because it is oh so wrong for him to take the necklace that was on the destroyed property of his home country and use it to track down the number one most wanted criminals in the Fire Nation who may or may not have just killed one of his people. So, so horrible...

Then we have the Avatar Roku episode where team Avatar proceed to start showing their obvious prejudice towards the Fire Nation. Shyuu offers to help them and Sokka instantly replies with “Fire Nation aren’t our friends” which they very well prove the truth of through out the entire series. They’re reluctant to work with him even though he is risking his life to help Aang and ends up getting imprisoned and when they don’t know where he is don’t even try to locate him, at least to verify if he’s even still alive considering they’d been in the middle of a volcanic eruption, despite all the sacrifices he made for them.

Then we have the waterbending scroll episode, where Katara proceeds to steal from pirates with no regard for the risk she just put all of them in, out of jealousy and insecurity towards Aang catching up to her quickly in waterbending, lashes out at him for it, then apologizes while also lying to his face which pretty much negates any sincerity she was trying to display. Which brings us to more proof of just how much Zuko was holding back on team Avatar this entire time. Her little theft comes back to bite her in the butt and Zuko and Iroh capture her along with the pirates and Zuko offers her her necklace back in exchange for Aang’s location. Then we have the fight where Zuko again does not physically injure anyone. In fact, with Katara at his mercy he could’ve just threatened to burn her or even kill her if Aang didn’t come with him. He didn’t. And both him and Iroh were standing next to her. They were literally right there. The entire time they’ve been fighting each other Zuko never once injured them. He only shot fire at Aang but even then he never burned them, broke their bones, drew blood or even left bruises on their skin. And considering the instant Zhao came in, he immediately burned Aang on the spot in the Deserter episode, it shows the other Fire Nation soldiers aren’t as nice. Meanwhile Team Avatar has almost killed Zuko on several occasions and Sokka and Katara even debated on leaving him to freeze to death in the middle of a snowstorm during the Siege of the North.

After that we have Jet where we see more proof of the demonization of the Fire Nation people and team Avatar’s disregard for human lives. The very instant Jet tells Katara the old man they attacked was Fire Nation, she is sold. It doesn’t matter that the person is an elderly man who could very well be her grandmother’s age, which Sokka already told her, if he is Fire Nation then he suddenly means absolutely nothing to her. She disregards her older brother completely, again, and Aang remains complacent and helps Katara because he thinks Jet is fun and doesn’t want to argue with anyone which is again, not a good thing because avoiding this type of conflict resulted in a giant mess that cost a lot of people their homes and could’ve cost them their lives if Sokka hadn’t of warned them. And Katara gets sympathy and understanding because a man in the Fire Nation killed her mother. It is horrible, no child should lose their parent but this is not a one time “mistake”. The entire group proceeds to be prejudiced towards the Fire Nation through out the remainder of the show and conveniently forgets they’re human quite often. And Zuko, who lost his cousin, who he loved very dearly and admired, to the Earth Kingdom and has every right to hate them just as much, still does not label all of them as monsters which can be seen in book 2 which I will delve into further in this post. (it is a very long post. I apologize but I’ve got a lot I would like to say.)

Then we have the Storm where Zuko proceeds to act like a jerk to his crew and disregard their safety but in the end still protects them and puts their lives first and gives up on going after Aang to make sure they make it out of the storm.

Then we have the Pohuai Stronghold where Zuko breaks Aang out of prison(for his own goals yes, this is not the part of the episode I am using for context) and gets himself knocked out. Aang is unsure but then still saves Zuko from getting captured by Zhao. And then when Zuko wakes up, the child who lied to him within the first moments of meeting him, destroyed his ship, is out to kill one of the few remaining family members he has left and is the biggest threat to his home, just casually asks him to be friends as if none of that has ever happened and Zuko shoots fire at him but then still looks hesitant when Aang leaves.

After that in the Bato episode we see again, that Zuko is not a horrible person because he had Sokka and Katara paralyzed by Jun’s shirshu and could’ve again, very easily threatened their lives if Aang didn’t come with him but instead chose to fight him one on one. Which again shows that he is at least fair in his fights and proves that Zuko very well could’ve killed everyone of team Avatar long before they even reached the North Pole but chose not to.

Then after that in the Deserter episode Team Avatar go to learn the cultural aspects of the Fire Nation and Sokka and Katara look disgusted at kids cheering for the Fire Lord despite the fact that to them the Fire Lord is a good guy which again demonizes the Fire Nation since they are immediately on the offensive towards anyone that supports the Fire Lord despite them maybe not knowing how wrong the war actually is. And then they again make a scene and get themselves into trouble. And because Jeong Jeong is a complete and total idiot he makes them hate and fear firebenders even more with his stupid savagery comment.

And then we have the Northern Air Temple.

Where Sokka proceeds to bomb an entire division of Fire Nation soldiers....

Yeah....

Yes, he is defending the settlers but couldn’t they have oh I don’t know....

Have Aang make a giant wind current to shake the tanks off? Or have him make like a miniature tornado to make the rocks the tanks were connected to weaken and maybe use waterbending to freeze then break the chains so they can’t use them or used the gliders themselves and some of the inventor’s other technology to make the mountain unclimbable? Did ya really have to have them blown up? And no one sees anything wrong with this? Yeah, Aang commented that the visible soldiers were retreating but what about the ones who’d been piloting the tanks? Where did they go? I’m pretty sure Zuko isn’t the one with blood on his hands considering the only time we’ve ever seen him severely harm anyone they could still be heard grunting on the ground, meaning they were still alive.

Then we have their last fight in book 1 in the North Pole. Where Katara freezes Zuko to the wall. Zuko then knocks Katara out and again, does not kill her to keep her from following after him to get Aang back at all. When he very well could’ve slit her throat and ended all of their fights for good. And then Katara proceeds to bury him in the snow and her and Sokka complain about Aang not leaving Zuko to die in the snowstorm... Yeah, I’m not even gonna say anything more on this. If you don’t see anything wrong with this...I don’t even know what to say to you. Oh and then we have Zuko offering his hand to save the life of the man who tried to have him killed. Yeah...

And then we have Aang merging with La and slaughtering the entirety of the Fire Navy. And he feels guilty about that. For all of one episode. Not even one episode. Half an episode. He doesn’t want to hurt the people he cares about with the Avatar State yes, but then he also gets over it and it doesn’t seem to bother him at all in the remainder of the series. The only thing he seems to care about is mastering the Avatar State but he forgets why he needs to do it in the first place. Not because of Katara or protecting his friends. But to keep what happened in the North Pole from happening ever again. He has that one nightmare for maybe like a month cannon wise but then doesn’t suffer any real repercussions meanwhile Zuko spends the rest of his life atoning for his mistakes.

Then in book 2 we see more questionable behavior. For one, from team Avatar’s allies. General Fong has absolutely no problem with burying Katara alive and trying to murder a group of teenagers and a child to force Aang into the Avatar State and doesn’t even stop his madness until Sokka knocks him out. Then Return to Omashu! First we have Sokka instantly assuming that a new born TomTom is dangerous which again shows the demonization of the Fire Nation with the way that they instantly assume that even their babies are monsters. It’s supposed to be funny. It’s not. Then we have Mai and Azula. Yep we got to team Azula finally. Azula proceeds to, without any problem at all, put Mai’s younger brother’s life in danger and Mai herself is completely and utterly fine with TomTom possibly losing his life to unknown enemies and is shown to be unresponsive to her parents worries for her brother.

In the Blind Bandit Katara gets mad at two kids for making fun of Aang and what does she do? Do her and Sokka step in and help Aang out? Do they talk to the two and get them to answer or maybe bribe them with sweets? Something that would have kids singing in an instant? Nope. Katara corners them in an alley like a mugger and then freezes them together before interrogating them and then leaving them to possibly get hypothermia. The ice very well could’ve melted but being incased in ice at all considering the Earth Kingdom weather could’ve very well badly hurt them. And then she proceeds to use intimidation on them to get information again to find out about the Earth Rumble.

While team Avatar is doing all of that we have Zuko and Iroh. They have washed up and instantly got targeted by Azula in the first episode. Azula tries to manipulate Zuko into coming back to the Fire Nation with her and he instantly falls for it but then the cover gets blown when the guards call them prisoners. And then Zuko angrily attacks Azula instead of fleeing after she keeps riling him up and making him angry with verbal abuse. He aims fire daggers at her and Azula retaliates and taunts him before almost shooting him with lightning if it weren’t for Iroh defending him. When they end up alone together Iroh of course gets himself sick and they get help from two women. That’s the first time Zuko sees someone in the Earth Kingdom who has a burn like his and begins to see how much they’re suffering because of the war. And then he proceeds to repay her kindness by stealing her family’s ostrich-horse. Yeah...not your best move there Zuko. After that he ends up separated from Iroh and finds himself in a village oppressed by the Earth King’s own soldiers. He meets a little kid, proceeds to teach him how to defend himself and give him his uncle’s dagger. Something deeply precious to him. And then when the village finds out who he is, they kick him out and he doesn’t even complain. We also get a glimpse of him about to attack an Earth Kingdom man but instantly change his mind because he sees he is traveling with a pregnant woman, again proving Zuko's more empathetic side.

And then in the chase episode Zuko finally actually shoots fire at all of team Avatar and still doesn’t hurt them! Iroh gets hurt with a cheap trick by Azula and Zuko doesn’t want the people who’ve lied to him, almost killed him more times than he could count and highly possibly murdered his own people anywhere near Iroh so he shoots fire and yells at them to leave. And then after that we have this monstrosity.

Zuko: She’s my sister and I should be trying to get along with her.

Here we have Zuko genuinely wanting to try and build a relationship with Azula.

Meanwhile Iroh...

Iroh: No, she’s crazy and she needs to go down.

....

While simultaneously disregarding the fact that Azula is a fourteen year old girl who was brainwashed and made into a child soldier by her father and the same propaganda Iroh himself believed in for several decades before losing his son while he committed murder, slaughter, thievery and assault. Not to mention that she’s a pubescent child who was forbidden from expressing her emotions that were labeled as weakness and highly likely severely imbalanced her hormones and left her more vulnerable to losing her sanity. And people see this as a joke.

And then we have the Library where Sokka deceives a spirit and lies to it’s face while going into it’s library after Wan Shi Tong had already been deceived by humans showing his and Aang’s favoritism towards humanity over the spirits. The reason I am mentioning Aang is because as the Avatar he is supposed to be the bridge between both worlds but he blatantly disregards the spirits which is even mentioned in Legend Of Korra. He feels bad but he does in no way stop any of his friends from hurting the spirits despite the fact that it could be severe, i.e. Sokka with the library and Toph when her and her father’s factory were destroying the environment that was incredibly precious to an armor spirit. Then in the desert after Appa is taken, Aang is distraught but also unfairly lashes out at his friends and blames Toph who he doesn’t even apologize to and that is seen as water under the bridge.

Then when team Avatar, that is Katara, reunite with Jet that does not end well. Jet, who is(still an asshole) unarmed, relaxed, spread out, gets instantly attacked by Katara who sends a tidal wave on him and pincers him to the wall with icicles. He is an asshole and deserves a slap to the face for his stunt with the damn but Katara seemed as if she’d actually been about to kill him on the spot, even though he did absolutely nothing to provoke her. Which is apparently her first reaction to anyone she doesn’t like or anyone who doesn’t agree with her. Instantly attack them, either verbally or physically. Which is pretty much always shown with the way she easily gets annoyed before actually turning aggressive. Then Jet (unclear? Okay Avatar series...) loses his life in Lake Laogai and while that is happening Iroh finally decides to actually try to stop Zuko and Zuko gets mad because he’s suddenly getting in his way despite not having a problem with keeping quiet about everything for the past three years of his banishment. And then he passes out, has a fever dream and calms down. And then Katara instantly outs him when she sees him, again unprovoked. With him being quite obvious with his uniform and serving tea. She then gets both of them captured by Azula and proceeds to blame Zuko for it while simultaneously throwing every insult she can find in the book at him. Calls him a terrible person, says he’s the Fire Lord’s son and spreading war and hatred is in his blood. He just takes it until he can’t anymore and then tells her she doesn’t know what she’s talking about. No insults. No jibes. No bringing her family into it. He just says she doesn’t know what she’s talking about.

Because she doesn’t.

She doesn’t know him. She doesn’t know anything about him as a person(she doesn’t even see him as one which her comment about the enemy’s face being his and her prejudice towards the Fire Nation make very clear) or his reasons for chasing Aang and she doesn’t even bother to try asking but instead she instantly gets even more furious at him and proceeds to manipulate him by blaming him for everything and saying how she lost her mother and Zuko is the one who apologizes and lets himself be vulnerable enough to tell her about his own mother. And then she expects Zuko to help her fight and possibly kill his younger sister after trying to bribe him with her spirit water.

He just told her he lost a family member.

And she expects him to willingly fight and possibly kill another family member.

And yet Zuko is the one who crossed a line.

Iroh lied to him and manipulated him for over three years and he expected him to choose enemies of his entire country, who he witnessed murdering his people, over his younger sister.

Katara barely spoke to him for half an hour to two hours maximum and then manipulated that as the basis for some sort of trust and expected him to help kill his little sister and then held that against him for the entirety of his time with them in book 3. And yet Zuko’s the bad guy. Azula then manipulates him into coming back to the Fire Nation with her by using Mai’s crush on him which doesn’t even work because the only reason he comes back is because he sees Iroh in chains.

And then we have book 3 where everyone proceeds to gaslight and manipulate Zuko.

We have Azula who manipulates him into coming with her despite the fact that he doesn’t know if the Avatar is alive or not and then proceeds to pin everything on him so their dad kills him if he finds out and not her. Then we have Iroh who is in prison for betraying the Fire Nation who gives Zuko the silent treatment and blames him for believing the propaganda that he, again, believed in himself and committed decades worth of crimes over and Zuko still tries to be nice by bringing him food and tea which he could get in big trouble with his abusive father for and Zuko finally loses his temper and throws insults at him. Then we have Mai who continues to use this very famous method of abuse that I cannot for the life of me remember the name of but have seen countless times and yet he’s the abuser in the relationship(Is it the carrot and stick? Or am I mistaken?). This is a method where the abuser acts cold or aggressive before suddenly becoming affectionate to confuse the abuse victim. For example insulting someone before giving them a hug to soften the blow that will still be there and still hurt afterwards. The first time she does this is when they’re coming back to the Fire Nation and she says she’s not interested in his life story when he opens up to her about how worried he is about going back home then proceeds to soften the blow by saying to stop worrying and gives him a kiss. Then she acts cold again when she brushes off every one of his attempts to try and get close to her with his seashells and his ice cream then she completely dismisses his insecurity when he asks if she likes Ruonjon(Dunno how his name is spelled, feel free to comment if you do) and then Zuko blows up when he sees them talking and she ends the relationship instantly. Then she keeps brushing him off at the campfire, gets angry at Zuko and slaps his hand away from her when he tries to reach out, then he explodes and she doesn’t even try to talk out their problems but just gives him a kiss and then says she cares about him before again brushing off his worries in Nightmares and Daydreams when she quite obviously shows that she doesn’t even get why he’s upset with not being invited to his father’s meeting and even feels annoyed at him for being upset about it. Then she yells at him for breaking up with her over a letter despite the fact that she very likely would’ve told Azula what he was doing if he tried to do it in person considering she was willing to put her own younger brother’s life in danger the second Azula ordered it. Then we have her displaying care by saying she kind of likes him and then instantly switches back to abusive by threatening him to never break up with her again in the last episode of the series. And it is again, portrayed as a joke. And we have Zuko’s own role in their toxic relationship with the way he quite easily forgets her whole entire existence after she saves him from the boiling rock and possibly gets herself killed by Azula and doesn’t even send for anyone to release her after the war is over. (Honestly, can’t say I blame him...)

Then we have team Avatar who are completely and utterly hostile towards him and baselessly calling him evil just cause he doesn’t think the Avatar is a glorified representation of all that is good in the world and Aang conveniently forgets the Air Nation Army he learned about in the literal second episode of the third season. And speaking of that episode we have them casually stealing, lying and conning people and again destroying public property. Toph and Sokka con the villagers, they steal the clothes they’re using for disguises. We have one episode where Katara tries to help a Fire Nation village, but considering how much they have and continue to demonize the Fire Nation even after the end of the war, it seems a little redundant. There is also the episode where they stop a forest from burning down, but even then it was more so cause of the forest not the people living in the Fire Nation considering how they were instantly on guard when they arrived in the first village and were shocked that Fire Nation people could actually be normal. Going back to the Western Air Temple, Zuko arrives, gets down on his knees for them and Katara throws water in his face and they kick him out. And then Zuko accidently burns Toph. Yes. Accidentally. Toph thinks that sneaking up on a sleeping firebender in the middle of a war, without giving him any indication of who she is, is completely and utterly fine and safe. She realizes her mistake but the rest of team Avatar does not and instantly goes on the attack like always and then Zuko manages to stop Combustion Man from killing them, who he sent himself cause he was scared of his father murdering him for Azula lying about the Avatar and then they finally let him join them and Katara proceeds to threaten his life as if that’s anything new. With how unsurprised he looked, I honestly expected him to just go ’You’re saying that as if you haven’t tried to kill me before?’

And then the field trips and the bonding and then Katara continues to blame him for everything and act like he’s the worst person in the world and holds the moment where she barely had a half hour to two hour long conversation with him over his head as if she didn’t blatantly expect him to help her possibly murder his sister for the person trying to murder his father. And Zuko’s response is him letting out a heavy breath through his nose, which to me looks more like he’s upset that she would bring that up meaning he himself sees how absurd it is and yet he still asks how he can make it up to her and he still has to earn her forgiveness just because Katara feels that everyone in the Fire Nation owes her everything despite not even having a clue who she is.

Then we have the end of the series where Iroh gaslights Zuko into taking the throne despite having decades more crimes than him and way more things to atone for and yet everyone thinks him losing his son is all the punishment he needs. It may sound heartless but how many children and parents and relatives did Iroh murder as the Dragon Of The West? Why in the world does Iroh get a pass after maybe even forty to fifty years worth of crimes and Zuko is unforgivable for not realizing in a month? And Iroh gets to open a teashop in the city he tried to destroy while Zuko suffers the consequences of all his family members actions. Then we have Azula who is gaslighted by Ozai who puts her on the Fire Lord throne so he could rule the whole world and convinces her that she is nothing without him just like he does to Zuko. Then Azula starts to hallucinate because of the betrayal of Mai and Ty Lee and is confronted with the abandonment she felt from her mother and then she breaks down and is chained to the ground by Katara and ends up locked away for it by Zuko instead of getting the help that she needs and then goes crazy in the comics and disappears while Zuko almost starts another Hundred Year War over Yu Dao during his first week as Fire Lord because he was thrown into a position he wasn’t ready for and Iroh abandoned him the moment he didn’t have to deal with him anymore to enjoy his life in his teashop and didn’t even bother to properly train him on how to run a country.

Phew.

Yeah. Lot of things to unpack there.

And if you made it to the end of the post then props to you and please tell me who you think actually needs to fix their behavior and choices and who is the real villain and victim of this story. Cause I think I made my point pretty clear.

Goodbye and have a nice read and a nice crisis if you end up agreeing with this and reevaluating the way you watched this show.

#Zuko #zuko deserved better #Azula #Azula deserved better #Iroh criticism #Team Avatar Criticism #avatar: the last airbender #Zuko needs therapy #Azula needs therapy #justice for Zuko #justice for Azula #really long

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snafu-maniac1 · 3 years

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Zuko deserved better

So I rewatched Avatar the Last Airbender recently and let me tell you......

I wanna murder several people.

Looking back on this entire series I’ve come to notice something. I watched the show just like any other audience member and only saw the good and the bad characters. One of these prime examples is Zuko. Zuko’s redemption arc has been praised as one of the greatest in history, succeeding where others have failed. But watching it all again......it wasn’t redemption. Not to me personally.

Before everyone gets angry and defensive at me, please finish reading my post and hear what I have to say. I do not wish to start any fandom wars or discredit or disrespect anyone’s opinion, this is just my personal psychological analysis of Zuko’s character....Sigh and let me give you a warning.

It’s gonna be LONG.

So if you’re not interested or don’t want to hear it or don’t feel like reading something this long that’s fine, you can go ahead and just click away and ignore this post.

Starting from book 2.

Now you may be wondering why I’m starting here and not from the start of Zuko’s childhood but I first want to address the one question everyone had been wondering since the series 2 finale. What would have happened if Zuko hadn’t sided with Azula?

My answer is.....that wouldn’t have happened.

Everyone’s been focusing on the entire arc where Zuko was struggling to accept that the war was wrong and how Iroh was trying to get through to him when he tried to capture Appa and afterwards, but here’s something everyone tends to ignore.

Why didn’t Iroh try sooner?

Why didn’t he try to stop Zuko before Aang came, before he’d gotten so deep and desperate to the point that he continuously committed heinous acts to capture the Avatar? People would justify it by saying Iroh wanted Zuko to realize the wrongs of his father and Nation by himself to shape him into his own person. But that is in no way the appropriate way to approach a physically, psychologically and mentally unstable and abused child. Zuko was a thirteen year old boy when he was burned and banished. This is where we go into his childhood. Zuko was raised like any other Fire Nation citizen. As we’ve seen in book 3 and in the Pirate comic book, The Fire Nation citizens were led to believe that the other Nations were ‘savages’ and ‘barbarians’. It villainizes the Fire Nation even more. The very fact that they would spread heinous lies against other people when they themselves were responsible for the war that ruined so many lives. But when you realize, what Sozin and the other Fire Lords did was a solid battle tactic. Making the opposing side out to be these horrendous monsters. Making lies or accentuating every one of their worst traits to dehumanize their enemies so that the people would not have any qualms about fighting them. All of the Fire Nation schools were taught these lies. And Zuko was no exception.

Zuko was a member of the Royal family. And from what was shown in the Avatar series, the Royal family was isolated from the rest of Fire Nation society. Zuko had no way of knowing what the other Nations were really like, no way of knowing the truth about the war and no one had bothered to explain it to him. The one person that could have, did NOT. And yet people had expected him to just automatically know that he was being lied to and that his people were the villains. Zuko’s only social exposure was with Fire Lord Azulon, Fire Lord Ozai, Dragon Of The West General and Crown Prince Iroh, his cousin Prince Lu Ten, his mother Princess Ursa and his younger sister Princess Azula and her friends Mai and Ty Lee. All of whom believed in the Fire Nation propaganda and all of whom had no problem in participating in the war and making jokes about burning Ba Sing Se to the ground. Zuko was under scrutiny and aggression from Ozai. Ozai was Zuko’s ‘handler’, his ‘groomer’. He groomed Zuko into a certain type of submissive and obedient behavior. Zuko was not allowed to show any type of emotion otherwise he would suffer severe repercussions. Ozai and Azula taunted Zuko for having a sense of compassion and with how he was ostracized in a war loving family, he began to believe his behavior and way of thinking was unusual. It was like Azula said to Mai, “Your mother had certain expectations of you and when you strayed from them you were shot down.” In Zuko’s case, the expectations he strayed from resulted in severe punishment. Ozai was willing to permanently disfigure and traumatize Zuko when he was a thirteen year old boy. It’s not unusual to think that his punishments towards Zuko would sometimes very likely be physical and many people even write alternate universes of the Avatar series where Ozai was even more abusive than he already was. He was a manipulative man who brainwashed his daughter into being his perfect, obedient little slave and manipulated his son into questioning his own sense of reality. He would tell him that Azula was born lucky and he was lucky to be born, cementing Azula’s view of herself of receiving everything she wanted and turning her personality toxic while he made Zuko feel inferior and faulty. If there was something wrong with him, his father would tell him and he needed to fix it. But he never could. He strayed towards his mother, who like Iroh, abandoned Azula because of Ozai’s manipulation and did nothing to help her like they ‘helped’ Zuko.

When Zuko was thirteen he wanted to ‘prove’ himself to his father by attending one of his war meetings. Zuko very likely only wished to do what his father wanted because by then, Iroh had abandoned him when he left after the Siege of Ba Sing Se, his mother disappeared and his grandfather and cousin were both dead. The only ones he had left of his family were his father and sister who both abused him and he only wished for their approval and their affection. Humans need mutual affection. Children who do not receive affection from their parents, tend to not take that type of neglect well. Because people need affection to properly function. Our parents love us from when we are young and that emotional connection is something very important to every human being’s mental state. However, Zuko’s only source of affection, his mother, was taken away from him. Azula herself, had no source of affection. Not from her mother, who thought she was demented from her father’s brainwashing, nor from her brother who feared her, nor from her father who used her as a tool. Returning to the day of the Agni Kai, Zuko wished to be of use to his father, he craved his affection because that is what the abuser does. They make you believe they are the only ones who can validate you and if you do not abide by their rules or follow their orders then you mean nothing. Zuko for the most part from what I could see in the flashback, held his promise and did not speak. But when he refused to back down when his people were in danger, Ozai was not pleased. This is because he is an abuser. He is Zuko’s ‘handler’ and when someone who is abusing another person witnesses this type of behavior, they have a feeling of loss of control. They desire control, they crave it, over the abusee especially. So when Zuko showed empathy towards the Fire Nation citizens and did not do as Ozai wished, he decided to ‘rectify’ that. In the most BRUTAL way possible. An Agni Kai. A public spectacle where he would establish dominance over his son, over his pawn and he would make a show of it. He would show everyone that HE was the one in control and NO ONE could defy him. When Zuko refused to fight Ozai, because of his love for his father, Ozai only saw that as a weakness. Ozai is a psychotic man. The fact that he did not have any problem in burning his son so cruelly shows that he does not have any sense of morals. Going back to Zuko, a thirteen year old child at the time, he had just been punished for disobedience, for straying from his father’s expectations, in the worst way possible.

Zuko did what many people would say is the right thing to do. He tried to defend his people from a cruel man intent on sending them to their deaths. But in doing so, he had defied his father and was punished for it. He was punished....for trying to HELP people. His life was essentially DESTROYED and he was thrown out of his home...for trying to help people. For showing empathy towards others. He was punished in the worst way possible for defying his father. His entire perception of right and wrong was thrown out of balance. He was taught that the war was right and that the Fire Lord, his father, was all knowing. And his mother tried to teach him kindness and her lessons of kindness got him punished. The amount of physical and mental damage he had sustained from such a punishment would in some cases be irreversible. Iroh was right there with Zuko and he did nothing. I CAN understand why he did not step in during the Agni Kai. He had been gone from the Fire Nation, his brother had taken the throne and he could have very well himself been punished severely for intervening. However, why did he allow Zuko to continue to believe he was the one at fault? Everyone of us has seen Zhao, has seen the way he treated Zuko during his banishment. Zuko very likely spent those entire two years before Aang’s arrival, being subjected to that type of behavior from everyone around him. All of them blamed him, all of them very likely said that he’d deserved what had happened to him. No one was on his side. He ended up turning aggressive and cruel towards others, because that was the way his father behaved and it was his empathy towards others that got him punished in the first place. He said in The Storm ‘the safety of the crew doesn’t matter’, just like the general that called the 41st division ‘fresh meat’. It was easier for Zuko to lash out at others and be aggressive than to let them see his vulnerabilities and hurt him for them again. It was the same with Song and her mother. Ozai tried to force him to be cruel, he tried to groom him the same way he did Azula. They dehumanized the other Nations and Zuko behaved the exact same way he was expected to. ‘Their compassion would cost them’. It was exactly the way his father wanted him to be. It was what Iroh did not wish for him, and yet despite claiming he thought of Zuko as a son, he did not in any way try to convince Zuko to give up his quest during the two years he had been searching for something that at the time was believed did not exist. The only instance we were shown of Iroh saying anything against his search, and even that is a stretch, was in the Western Air Temple episode where Zuko has a flashback of Iroh telling him that ‘destiny was a funny thing’ when Zuko said it was his destiny to capture the Avatar. Iroh had time to run the White Lotus, an antiwar organization for two YEARS maybe even longer and he did not think of taking two MINUTES to talk to Zuko, to ease him into realizing the wrongs of the war. Okay, yes he could have passed it off as character growth. But how do you expect a person, surrounded by people telling him he was at fault, he had no choice, either obey or never come back, to realize something like that? How do you expect an abuse victim to accept help all by themselves when their abuser forces them to depend on them? Did Iroh take him to some Earth Kingdom villages to see that they aren’t the vicious savages the Fire Nation portrays them to be? Did he take Zuko to the Southern Water Tribe to see the damage done to them at the hands of his own country? No. Instead he acted like an oblivious old man who had no interest other than Pai Sho and speaking proverbs that Zuko could not hope to understand.

Two years Zuko spent looking and looking and he turned desperate to the point that he was willing to do anything to go home. And then The Avatar finally returned. And then the people that Zuko was raised to perceive as brutal savages continued to stand in his way. And did Iroh intervene? No. He still did nothing. He allowed Zuko to continue his pursuit and turn into the worst possible version of himself. People say that Zuko should own up to the consequences of his actions. And he should. But would he have done those actions had Iroh stopped him earlier? Would he have done any of the things he did when the only remaining adult figure in his life had told him otherwise? Would he have listened to Iroh? The answer is yes. He was willing to do what Ozai had expected of him so why would he not listen to Iroh with time and patience instead of waiting till the last possible moment to do so? Children don’t automatically know right from wrong from the moment of their birth. They are taught by their parents, by the adults in their lives and Zuko had Ozai as his parental influence. And Iroh knew that. He knew the type of man his brother was and he did not try to overwrite his brother’s abuse to help his nephew until Zuko was already on the path of no return. When they became refugees Iroh still did nothing until they got to Ba Sing Se and until Zuko, again in an act of desperation, tried to capture Appa. That was when he FINALLY decided to step in. Three years since Zuko’s banishment, sixteen years of his father’s influence and abuse and he decides the very moment his nephew is close to the brink of insanity is the perfect opportunity to DESTROY his entire world view. He had worked day in and day out for two years before Aang appeared, only for his uncle, someone he TRUSTED, to tell him it was all for NOTHING. Two years of TORTURING himself. A year of fighting against his Nation’s enemies and SUDDENLY he’s being told it was all for nothing. When Iroh and Zuko reunited, Iroh told him he found his way again ‘on his own’ like how Zuko told Ozai he had to learn everything ‘on his own’. And they were both right. Zuko had no one to help him. He had to suffer through so much on his own, without anyone’s help and they’re SURPRISED he acted the way he did. When everything came to ahead in Ba Sing Se with Katara, people thought ‘Oh Zuko has changed he’s going to help Katara.’ And when he did not they HATED him for it.

The reason for this is because Katara was the ‘good guy’ and Zuko was the ‘bad guy’. Black and white. Katara and Zuko shared a moment of understanding from both losing their mothers and Katara offered to heal his scar and he chose to side with Azula and both Katara and the viewers saw this as a betrayal on Zuko’s part. This assumption however is completely unjustified and unfounded. Everyone sees Zuko and the Fire Nation as the bad guys. The villains of the story. But Katara and the Water Tribes and Earth Kingdom were the bad guys in the Fire Nation’s eyes. Katara was the ‘savage’ standing in the way of Zuko going home. The Avatar was his home’s greatest ENEMY and THREAT. Had the situation been reversed and Katara had to choose between Zuko and the Water Tribe and her brother and father, people would have supported her choice because they were the good guys. Zuko’s people were the bad guys so it had to be the wrong decision and a betrayal to Katara and Iroh. But Zuko was an unstable, traumatized child who did not wish to believe his people were bad, who did not want to fight his home after he spent so long trying to capture Aang, his home’s greatest THREAT and ENEMY. Katara hated Zuko because he represented everything that the Fire Nation did to her family. And Zuko hated her because she was the ‘savage’ keeping him from his one way home. To Zuko, Katara was the bad guy. And looking back at their moment of sympathy where Katara said he betrayed her trust I can only ask one thing....how could Zuko have known that Katara wasn’t trying to trick him? Now, the viewers would automatically respond ‘Katara’s not like that! She wouldn’t do that!’ but the fact is, we the viewers KNOW Katara. We know she’s not that type of person because we got to know her through out the series. Zuko does NOT know her. To Zuko, she’s just another faceless enemy out to KILL his father. He chose Azula’s side because he could not accept what Iroh was saying to him because why hadn’t Iroh said so sooner? He did not want to join Aang’s side cause this was the AVATAR. The one out to KILL his FATHER and take down his HOME. When Zuko returned, he was conflicted about what he had done because he had begun to see how wrong his father and sister’s behavior and The Fire Nation’s war truly was. And Iroh cemented that further by proclaiming Zuko’s struggle was because of Roku and Sozin’s conflict when that was clearly not the case. Zuko was groomed and brainwashed by the Fire Nation propaganda like every other citizen but he was not dispelled from that belief by anyone. No one tried to make him question that belief. Iroh did not try to ‘help Zuko’ until the very last moment in Ba Sing Se. People believe Zuko betrayed Iroh because that’s how it’s supposed to be when Zuko was the ‘bad guy’ and Iroh was the ‘caring’ Uncle and ‘voice of reason’. And yet he did not think to ‘reason’ with Zuko before this entire mess even started. He did not in any way try to disrupt Zuko’s view of the other Nations or his father. In my opinion, IROH was the one who betrayed ZUKO. Iroh KNEW the entire time that what Zuko was doing was wrong. Zuko was a child who was not allowed to think for himself and Iroh KNEW Zuko was brainwashed by the exact same propaganda he himself had believed before he lost his son. If Iroh, who had believed in the Fire Nation for so many years, was unable to realize the wrongs of the war until his ADULTHOOD when he lost his son, how in the world did he expect a 13 year old child to do so? And Zuko became even more unstable and then he chose the Fire Nation.

When he realized it was wrong and went to join team Avatar, they were reasonably mistrusting.

Zuko’s redemption arc from a simple perspective, from team Avatar’s perspective was very well done. Team Avatar did not know what Zuko had been through. To them he was just another Fire Nation monster who had hurt them. To the audience, he was just another Fire Nation monster who had hurt the good guys. No one would think that deep into a fictional character’s perspective or psychological and mental state. No one would think past the ‘good guy’ and the ‘bad guy’. But one thing I cannot justify is Katara’s accusation of betrayal towards Zuko. As we have mentioned, Zuko and Katara were enemies who had a mutual hatred towards each other before his ‘redemption’. They had one single moment of shared empathy and understanding and that is NOT the basis for earned trust. What would Katara have done had she been in Zuko’s shoes? Fighting her enemies, fighting people she sees as nothing more than monsters and she has to choose between her long time enemy and her sibling and her home and her family. If she was in that position, she would choose Sokka and Hakoda and Aang and the Water Tribe over Zuko in a heartbeat because those are her FAMILY members and her FRIENDS and people would justify her because she’s the ‘good guy’. The hero. But Zuko is the villain so his actions automatically AREN’T justifiable. I understand Katara’s mistrust towards Zuko because of their history and because again, she doesn’t know anything about him or what he went through. But she cannot expect him to just automatically leave behind everything he’s ever known and ever believed in because of one single moment of understanding. Zuko should have done everything he could to make it up to the group because he owed it to them and they again, did not know any of his reasons for hunting them. But Zuko does not deserve to be labeled simply as ‘a bad guy turned good’ when he was NEVER a bad guy to begin with. When he was never even mentally stable enough to make that type of decision for himself. In today’s day and age Zuko and Azula would have BOTH ended up in a mental institution. And after all of the things he went through, Zuko was the one who ended up going back to Iroh and apologizing when Iroh was the one who abandoned him and then Zuko at 16 years old ended up as the leader of a nearly fallen apart country. He had to suffer through insomnia, assassination attempts and mental instability and abandonment. Iroh left to Ba Sing Se and only made two appearances in a total of SIX comic books after the end of the War and one of those was entirely brief. So while Iroh gets to enjoy the rest of his life selling tea, Zuko has to suffer the consequences for what his family did. He was also abandoned by Mai which brings me to another point.

Zuko’s toxic relationships.

Some people say they dislike Mai because she is emotionally abusive towards Zuko. It never occurred to me before but looking at it now, I have to say that I agree. In the comics after book 2 had ended it was shown that Azula used Mai’s childhood crush on Zuko to manipulate him into going back to the Fire Nation with her. And Mai.....I don’t even know how to get started on the entire mess that is their relationship. Mai is a person who does not like emotion. She doesn’t like to express herself and immediately shuts down anything even close to emotion. The same applies to Zuko. Zuko is a very emotionally unstable and insecure person. And instead of reassuring and calming him, Mai immediately cuts him off whenever he loses a handle of his emotions and just flat out ends their relationship on the spot. She gives Zuko no explanation, just gets angry at him and then all of a sudden when Zuko can’t take anymore and explodes she suddenly says she cares about him. Their relationship is toxic. Mai demeans his problems and things that trouble him. Quote “I just asked if you were cold, I didn’t ask for your whole life story.” when Zuko was nervous about going back home. She demeans his guilt towards Iroh and tries to make him feel better by ordering servants around. And then in the Boiling Rock episode she attacks him for his letter which is reasonable on her part, but there is the problem that despite being Zuko’s girlfriend, up until that point she was Azula’s subordinate first and foremost and she could have tried to let Azula know. Still was a shitty way of ending their relationship, I’m not gonna act like it wasn’t but I still wanted to put that perspective out there just for thought. Not to mention how she ended things in the comic books. The trust issue I understand. But I don’t understand how ONE single mistake would lead to her just immediately ending things instead of at least TRYING to work it out. She could have listened to him and seen why he was so upset and scared of messing up that he went to Ozai of all people for help. She did not stick by him when he needed her and that was what forever ruined their relationship for me.

In simple terms, Zuko was a bad guy who became a good guy and redeemed himself.

In psychological terms, Zuko was an abuse victim who was brainwashed since his childhood, blamed for it and made into a scapegoat while his sister ended up in a mental institution because of her father’s influence and because the same people who ‘helped’ Zuko didn’t think she deserved it too.

So from what I’ve seen while rewatching the series....

Zuko never needed redeeming. Zuko needed help.

And he didn’t get it.

#avatar the last airbender #zuko #zuko deserved better #azula #azula deserved better #zuko needs therapy #azula needs therapy

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