#I just live for vibing nomad characters

[yourhighness6]

NATLA Episode 1 Debrief (by yours truly)

Hello my lovlies! There are so many opinions swirling around right now in the fandom and I wanted to give my own opinions a quick (this is not going to be quick but whatever) post of their own. I'm probably going to do this with all of the episodes, just an fyi

First of all, Sozin can fuck all the way off. I don't think I really have to explain that one but goddammit they really made me hate him (and I love to hate the villain)

I LOVE the detail of seeing the flames reflected in his eyes whenever he kills someone, as a symbol of fire's natural brutality consuming him from within. Kudos to whoever added that detail because it is absolutely perfect. I look forward to seeing more of this monster in future flashbacks.

The firebending itself was absolutely brutal. Watching the cartoon, you don't really think about how painful and horrific being burned alive is, and the live action explored that element in a way the previous show could not.

I know this is controversial, but actually really like how they devoted a good ten minutes to establishing some background with the Air Nomads before we dove in. In my opinion, it gave more depth to the Air Nomads besides just what we see through Aang's eyes, which I think helps the viewer connect with him more and sympathize in ways the cartoon didn't. One detail from this part that was absolutely heartbreaking was the Comet Festival.

Something about the way a time of joy was turned into a time of pain and misery was absolutely awful (this was the first time I cried [I cried three times]). The fact that all of the Air Nomads were in one place kind of filled in why there was no evidence of the FN ever having been to the Western Air Temple in s3 of the cartoon. It also adds another layer of awfulness to the whole thing. I can't really put into words why I feel that way, it's just a sort of vibe.

I also liked the way they established Aang's character flaws right off the bat:

The episode was named after him, so it only makes sense to show all aspects of his character almost immediately. This also gives me hope that they might address these flaws later a little more than the cartoon did.

Super glad they included a female Airbender on the counsel (or whatever that was). She was also fighting later and she looked super badass.

Now, onto the Water Tribe.

I can't express how glad I am that they included both boys and girls in Sokka's little warrior pack. People have talked about this before, but the gender roles in the SWT didn't make a lot of sense. Perfect little detail to fill a plot hole.

I am also over the moon that they decided to expand on the differences between the Water Tribe sibling's outlooks on the world. Katara was raised as both a beacon of hope and a liability, whereas Sokka was raised as a warrior and a protector. It gives insight into their characters and also symbolizes the way the war shaped them. The pressure within a society to adapt to the times even as traditional values are abandoned and culture is devastated is something that the original show laid the groundwork for, so I really hope we see the live action build on it further. There's also this:

Gives the perfect insight into the ways their parents leaving affected them both differently and expands on their different mindsets. 10/10 for the sibling dynamic.

I'm not sure if I liked the changes to this scene. Katara was characterized pretty well, in my opinion, and it does make sense with the "toning down" of Sokka's sexism that she didn't explode on him, but it's still an iconic moment I would have liked to see translated to the live action. I also found the fact that Appa wasn't included at all just plain weird. He should have been there, and even if he was established differently later, again, I'm not sure I liked the way Aang was introduced to the siblings. (At least they didn't include any romantic Kat@ang moments. Platonic besties for the win)

Zuko's introduction was just kind of... there, in my opinion, but I did love the detail of the icons on the shelf glowing. There were several homages made to Zuko's search for the avatar that I really appreciated, from the early establishment of his antagonism towards Lieutenant Jee to his pages of research, which I really appreciated. There were also several moments that implied that Zuko had a more spiritual journey throughout his banishment to find the avatar, which was partially a little bit of worldbuilding and partially a play into the idea that he will legitimately try everything possible to find the avatar that was another nice detail. Sadly, Dallas didn't really make a huge impression on me. This might be because of lack of screentime or the fact that this is THE Zuko, but I was kind of expecting more. Still, I don't think it was an irredeemable portrayal by any means, and I look forward to seeing more.

This is sort of random, but I just need to say that I'm glad they included more evidence of Katara's PTSD. It was already pretty established in the cartoon that she did have PTSD, but the live action allows exploration of that in a more mature way, which I appreciate. It made the kat@ang conversation hit that much harder, and gives more depth to Katara's character.

The fight at the gates was also just perfect. Zuko acting on impulse out of a need to prove himself:

Katara's speech and Sokka's change of heart:

And this line:

Sokka kind of fell flat to me a bit in this episode, and I feel like Katara was the MVP in all of their interactions, but I loved this line. I just have a feeling he really needed to hear this.

There's also this moment that I thought was really significant where it looked like Zuko was actually going to kill Sokka:

My heart legit stopped at this part. Like, I knew it made no logical sense for it to happen, but I still got scared for a moment. I know it was just another one of those moments to show how Zuko's anger gets the best of him, ect, ect. but this was overkill. I don't think they took it too far by any means, but it was still just so unexpected.

I also noticed they removed the zukka parallel of the two of them getting ready for battle at the same time, which I really disliked. It plays more into the warrior mindset for the both of them, and even though we had that established in other ways, I would have still liked to see it.

Aang's sacrifice is the same, but I appreciated his little conversation with Iroh. When Iroh showed up, I half expected him to just let Aang go, but I guess that wouldn't really be in character for season 1 Iroh. Either way, that was some good stuff.

The framing also sort of reminds me of the season 3 conversation between Zuko and Iroh when Iroh is in prison back in the FN. Both shots give the impression that it is not actually the one behind bars who is in prison. This makes me think that they might give Iroh more of an arc in season 1, which I would kind of like to see, but at the same time, I'm not sure about. I think it was important in the cartoon that Iroh had already completed his journey and was doing his best to guide Zuko through a similar one.

I am disappointed that they removed the fight scene between Zuko and Aang inside the ship, but there was another huge moment this allowed for that I REALLY LOVED:

I LOVE that they let Katara have her hero moment I LOVE that they let her discover her bending a bit more in this episode I LOVE that Aang helped her I LOVE IT ALL. Katara gaining more confidence in her abilities is the season 1 Katara arc I want to see and they legit made me fangirl over this moment so much I squealed. There's also something about her blocking a fire blast from Zuko after being powerless to stop him from killing/seriously hurting her brother in the earlier fight that's just... chefs kiss. (also maybe establishing that ZK yin and yang concept early... I'm reading way too much into this but the way Katara's arms are positioned kind of looks like the yin symbol a little bit...)

And finally, we have the air temple scene. The whole thing was so incredibly sad, and I actually didn't mind that it was part of the first episode. It makes everything go full circle, in my opinion.

I also thought that Gyatso's voice instead of Katara's being the one to calm Aang down was a really good choice. Aang coming to terms with his death should be about his memories with his past mentor, not about Katara comforting him. I loved the hug though. Perfectly devastating:

Also, the last parallel at the end was just SO perfect:

Something about how tradgedies in their lives forced them both to become dedicated and adapt to a new world beyond their control. Aang and Zuko parallels always wonderful.

Overall, I really enjoyed it! I would give this episode an 8.5/10. Not perfect, but definitely not bad. It surpassed my expectations and I'm so excited to see more!

#thank you for sticking with me to the end #I know this was long but I wanted to put all my thoughts in one place #natla #atla #avatar the last airbender #atla live action #aang #zuko #katara #sokka #iroh #just a pinch of zutara and some platonic KA #meta #ish #atla meta #natla debrief #emmie babbles

[topbanana-art]

Finally making an OC info post- by no means is this all of them, just ones that are most active and/or live in my head rent free.

First up- Rhys (DnD 5e - Rime of the Frostmaiden)

20 years Old, Half Orc, Half Elf (sweet baby angel) , He/Him

Fighter- Echo Knight

Absolute Ray of Sunshine; Rhys is from Icewind Dale; more specifically the Nomadic Reghed Tribe of the Elk.

He's unfamiliar with the outside world and even includes settlements in his own country

He's a Himbo basically a big dog.

This campaign lead him to leaving his tribe for the first time after an unfortunate accident which turned him into a small 'painted child' and searching for his missing sister. (both these are sorted now!)

*Rhys found an old oil painting of this child, blacked out and next thing he knew he was that small elf child. Her skin and clothing having the texture of painted canvas, and bleeds paint.

For a good chunk of the campaign he was just a totally normal elf- whose shadow didn't match with the body

---

Dhalas (DnD 5e Annalor)

36 Years Old, They/Him, Triton

Drunken Master Monk

Chill surfer dude vibes

Part of a travelling circus, They're a balancing act

Extremely laid back, Dhalas talks like they fight- dancing around, seemingly without rhyme or reason and occasionally clumsy.

---

Foxglove (BG3)

138 Years old (tweaked her age a lil), She/They, Drow

Arcane Trickster Rogue

Guild Artisan Background- Locksmith & Apprentice Finesmith

Chill and sassy, that Tav who talks their way out of shit.

Skews Towards Chaotic Good

Presents Androgynous most of the time

Must lockpick everything- she's not actually super interested what's inside, she just wants to see the workmanship of the locks and trashtalk how bad they are.

Yeah she's smooching the vampire. (and Halsin)

Naturally cares for others, even at the cost of her own wellbeing.

Has a Phobia of anything touching/going near her eyes- so the start of the game is A Time for Fox.

---

Arslan Dhoro (FFXIV)

21 Years Old (as of ARR), He/Them

Xaela AuRa

Dragoon - White Mage Main (All healer classes tbh)

Stoic, Resting Angry Face Himbo

He struggles to show emotion but he's just pretty shy and cautious about opening up to others.

From the Azim Steppe, he left in his early teens with his father after the death of his mother, to explore the world beyond the Steppe.

His Father Died in his late teens, attacked in Coerthas thinking he and Arslan were Dravanians.

He's extremely soft and protective for the Scions/his friends

---

Shiv (DnD 5e Saltmarsh- campaign completed)

Awful, terrible lesbian

68 years old, She/Her, Halfling

Celestial Warlock - Unicorn Patron w/ a Baby Phoenix familiar, Toby

A piece of shit. Is an absolute asshole and wont let you know she cares.

Lowkey magical girl

Ex-smuggler, who's patron is literally 'I can fix her', 'she can be a better person'. Part of the 'Beyond Skeletons' Pirate crew, she's the medic of the crew.

---

Pymmyr Tathnel (DnD 5e)

Pym

85 Years Old, He/They, Drow

Gloomstalker Ranger

Emotional Support Blink Dog, Princess Liquorice

This boy is scared all the time

Doesn't talk much, but speaks in a soft voice

Has disordered 'Sleeping' and Eating :)

His plague mask has tinted lenses to help ease the strain with how bright the surface is

I wont tell too much about them as a lot of their info is spoilers to other players. But this sad Drow just rocks up in my head on the regular.

---

Erebus (Anima Beyond Fantasy)

AKA- My first TTRPG character! circa 2011-2 I think???

Real name Sho Yoshimitsu

22 Years Old, He/Him

Duk'Zarist Nephilim

Assassin

Textbook 'strong silent and intimidating hot man'

But basically a big soft boy if you break past the mile thick ice

Tragic backstory™ , used to using his body for the job

He really enjoys cooking!

Also hopelessly in love with a small soft summoner, Caelum (the one hugging him), They're RedxBlue gays

---

I think I'll leave it there for now!

I may add more later, I hope it was interesting?? and I'm still pretty shy with yelling this much about my characters haha.

Thanks for reading if you made it this far! 💜

#gees ocs #oc info #oc art #my ocs #bg3 tav #ffxiv warrior of light #dnd character #sketchbook #my characters #art

[seeingteacupsindragons]

So…several…weeks ago…now, I was talking with a friend (@user-needs-new-hyperfixation) about creating characters. Because while she wants to try original fiction, all her ideas for characters start feeling too close to her Favorite Blorbos, and that’s not what she wants from original fiction characters.

And I get that. But if you can’t get your blorbos out of your head but you want to write an OC, here’s what you do:

Make a few intentional choices to take them away from that character. Oh, I know that sounds like it wouldn’t work. I promise you it can and does. You just gotta commit.

Here’s an example. The example I used with Hyper was Liam, but he’s sort of niche, so I wanted to think of a more Popular character to use as an example that still had the depth I needed to explore this.

(Very sorry to everyone who wants the Liam example. You can request it if you want, I guess)

I’ve settled on Dean Winchester. Very sorry about this. But he’s a character from a very well-known and well-watched show and frankly he’s around for long enough to have a lot going on with him.

Dean Winchester is, among other things, a very protective family man, a silly geek who wasn’t very academic in school and makes corny jokes, a sex-motivated man, a nomad, a Mama’s Boy, a devoted mechanic, a guy trying maybe a little too hard to espouse the 80s vibe.

And if you change just one of those things, his whole character can shift. Let’s take one that gets changed a lot in fanfic for Supernatural: Dean is no longer nomadic. He lives somewhere reliably and regularly.

If you’ve seen the show (I’m very sorry), you know that Dean is deeply protective of his car. But he’s protective of his car because it’s the closest thing to a home he’s ever had. If you actually give him a home and make him a kid who didn’t have to move every week or so growing up, he has a whole community, neighborhood, and city to project all that protective obsession onto.

Which means: he's not obsessed with his car. Or any car. He never learned how to to put it back together over and over and isn't a mechanic or a restoration specialist. And if he doesn’t want to preserve that car and his home so bad, maybe he’s not obsessed with classic rock and leather jackets and outdated references, either.

(And once you’ve done that with him, very few people would probably even mistake them, lol)

And maybe that protective nature led him to becoming a cop. And maybe once he realized they don’t really Protect or Serve, he becomes deeply disillusioned by them entirely. Canon Dean has problems with the cops, too, but that’s because he’s an actual criminal, not because he’s just disillusioned about what they’re doing (the series is really pretty pro-cop with characters like Jodie).

And if our “Dean” is no longer a drifter, then he’s not just going to leave when he’s solved one problem extremely messily. He’s going to have to stick around, attend school board meetings or something. Bail protesters out of jail, IDK.

And once you’ve gotten to that point, you might have a Mama’s Boy who loves his family too much and makes silly jokes while playing silly games with his friends, but you don’t really have Dean Winchester. You have your fun blorbo vibes, and you have some of your favorite traits about them. But the longer you write this character on this entirely new path and give them new experiences and see them react in ways Dean never would…

Well, now you have an OC.

You’re probably going to have to go back to the beginning and edit the first part of the character to keep them in character with what you realize about them later. But that’s honestly not a big deal and you’ll probably have to do that no matter how you write it anyway.

#writing #writing advice #writing help

[snorlaxlovesme]

this is called giving Live Action Avatar a fair chance

the Netflix live action Avatar has always been a strange beast. it's a thing no one wanted after the disastrous 2010 movie. public perception of it was extremely low after Bryke walked out on it because of creative differences (disheartening as well as concerning). people tore apart the teaser stills and completely thrashed the early trailers. the news that Sokka's sexism plot was being altered had fans frothing at the mouth. the show seemed to be caught in this limbo where it had an incredibly low bar to rise above, in terms of trouncing The Last Airbender Movie, and infinitely high bar it would be impossible to reach, in terms of the original A:TLA.

now. if i can't go into a live action adaptation with an open mind, i will not watch it. live action Yu Yu Hakusho came out several months ago, and the vibes I got from trailer were not what I wanted, so I shelved it. if I'm going to sit down and watch a re-telling of one of my favorite pieces of media, I'm going to do my damnedest to go in with as open of a mind as a I can bear, because I like to have a good time and I can't do that constantly dogging on something.

so. my rule of thumb is generally this: treat any live action adaptation as fanfiction. if i can recognize the characters and recognize the plot, that's fine. i'm not looking for anything crazy, just interesting fanfiction. that's the level of closeness to canon i'm expecting. bar is on the floor.

and in terms of Good Television, my expectations are also incredibly low. good TV has 1. good writing 2. good acting 3. good action/SFX. for adaptations the best i'm looking for is ONE out of three. the lower my expectations, the more fun i get to have.

i'm explaining all of this because, while I have not seen reviews of Netlix Avatar yet, I know just how brainless the masses can be and i need you to know that THESEEE are the expectations you should be having when going into these things. Avatar: The Last Airbender is hailed as an example of a nearly PERFECT show. if you are expecting that kind of excellence from an adaptation you are simply deranged and I will not be reading your bad faith interpretations of the show.

with these expectations in mind, it's easy to see why i'm loving Netflix Avatar so much. why? because it cleared one of my very low expectations. the bending in the show looks pretty good! the writing of the show is average! some of the actors are quite charming! i am pleased!

i have seen 3 episodes so far ("Aang" through "Omashu", and yes these episode titles DO suck, I'll concede to that)

so, now that i've gotten that little manifesto out of the way, let's get into some actual Thoughts So Far:

-the way the first episode was structured was very cool. i like that they didn't throw us in at the same spot we started in A:TLA. and to avoid the horrible exposition dump the movie gave us, instead they just showed us the start of the war. i like the tactical inclusion that Sozin let word get out that the Fire Nation would attack the Earth Kingdom first to throw the Air Nomads off his scent. i also thought it was cool so show us a day in the life at the Easter Air Temple. the setting was gorgeous and I loved seeing all the monks doing their own thing. it made you feel so attached to the Air Nomads and their kindness and gentleness, so when they were attacked you truly felt for them.

-Monk Giatso's actor was fantastic. i was gagged that they had my crying less than 20 min into the first episode, what the fuck

-Gran Gran reciting Katara's opening speech line by line was funny, hokey, and exactly what I wanted. loved that for her and loved that for ME

-i like the change that Katara has to waterbend in secret for her own safety, not simply because she doesn't have a master

-it felt appropriate that they made Sokka take his warrior/protector role more seriously. the "i gotta go potty" bit from that like 6 year old in the original is hilarious but I don't think that sort of humor would have translated well to live action. i like that Sokka really was a leader to the ragtag group of kiddos and like one teenage boy. and him asking Zuko to duel with him one and one!! a very sweet early act of bravery

-in general i'm just really liking how they're approaching Sokka's character. all the fuss over "they're taking out Sokka's sexism" arc felt idiotic to me for weeks because like of course they did?? let's be SO real here, if you have never seen the original and are watching Netflix Avatar blind for the first time, are you going to rock with the protagonist who makes "girls' only jobs are cooking and sewing" jokes? in 2024? in this sociopolitical climate that shit would NOT fly and people would drop the show for stuff like that. no one would wait to see his character growth, people's attention spans aren't long enough for that these days. plus, for all the naysayers boohooing because that's Sokka's whole character arc, it's literally not! that nasty personality trait sticks with Sokka for FOUR episodes. having his character arc revolve around his identity as a warrior is much more in-line with Sokka's ACTUAL arc. he can skip the "sew my pants" jokes so we can get to his real root of his conflict, being a non-bender and a novice warrior in a world of extreme violence and feeling inferior because of it

-i don't mind that they made Zuko less aggressive. again, with the bar of the original A:TLA being SO fucking high, ESPECIALLY because of Zuko, Netflix was never going to reach that level of excellence. so I'm okay with this Zuko being a little more level-headed and more of a mindless Fire Nation Greatness truther because it's a decent interpretation of his character, for fanfiction. consider everybody on planet earth know that Zuko will eventually be a Good Guy, we don't have to go out of our way to show that he's a giant asshole. we already know he's a good boy.

-on that note I love the bait and switch with the Jet introduction. seeing a cute boy flirting with Katara, I couldn't immediately tell if that merchant boy was just a one-off kind character, or maybe Haru because of his clothing and the way his hair was styled. to have him turn out to be Jet was FUN because it showed me that despite knowing the original canon forwards and backwards, this show can still find ways to surprise me. i had been talking with my sister about whether or not they were going to include Bumi (and his shenanigans) because that's a plot twist that worked when the show originally aired, but wouldn't hit at all in an adaptation where we all know who Bumi is already. where I'm currently at in the show I'm still not sure if we'll see his inclusion or not, but i still appreciated that new bait and switches are possible.

-this meant basically all the Omashu episode was very fun. they way they wove the Freedom Fighters and Mechanist's stories together was very interesting and i liked how fresh it felt

-Suki's actor is incredibly gorgeous. with and without the make-up. that needed to be it's own point because oh my god

-i love that she gave Sokka and fan and i'm DYINGGG to see him use it in a battle

-THEY INCLUDED KYOSHI NOVEL LORE AND I SCREAMED

-they included AVATAR KYOSHI FIGHT SEQUENCES AND I SCREAMED

-i probably should have mentioned this way sooner but Aang's actor is such a little cutie. he's doing such a great job capturing Aang's energy. both wise and playful and so so sweet. i love him

-i found it hilarious that they waited three episodes for Katara to bring up her dead mom. we all know that the super generic and boring critiques of Katara are 1. too much dead mom talk 2. too much hope talk 3. too motherly. i feel like the show intentionally waited two and a half episodes for Katara to bring up Kya and that's so funny to me. they also have only let her mention hope like twice lol. my girl is being STIFLED

-special effects are honestly really good? some of aang's flying is a little wonky but the firebending and waterbending so far as looked fantastic. i haven't seen much earthbending so far besides that opening sequence but i was impressed by that too. and Aang and Zuko fighting in Omashu with Zuko not using his bending? SO much fun. the choreo was awesome, i loved the set piece of fighting amongst all those scarves.

-building off that, Appa and Momo are very cute. the creatures al look pretty good too. ostrich horses look great

all in all, lots of really good stuff so far. i only have minor criticisms, and they're mostly things I can deal with. Iroh's acting is weird to me. it sounds like it's putting on a silly voice instead of speaking how he normally would, so it scans as off-putting. also in terms of costuming, Iroh's wig is WIGGING so much more than other cast members. it looks so glued on and shaped with hairspray. Mai and Ty Lee (one seen them for a moment so far) also just look like random cosplayers who wandered on set. and i guess both Monk Giatso's reveal of Aang being the avatar, as well as Gran-Gran's immediate understanding that Aang is the avatar, both happened extremely fast.

but yeah! those are my thoughts so far. again, I have no idea what public perception of this show is. i'm trying to avoid reviews and probably won't be back on tumblr until i've at least made it to episode 6. then maybe i'll come back and write more if my opinion drastically changes or I think the world will need another stern talking to about what to expect from an adaptation

#oh fuck i should probably tag this for spoilers but idk what tags ppl are using #live action avatar #netflix atla #avatar live action #ehh? i guess? don't read this if you haven watched episodes one through three yet #netflix avatar

[bohemiandeer]

Lifeweaver Headcanons Part 1: This man's fricking Home and living conditions.

Just, a couple o' headcanons I have on how this man lives. Don't mind me. I'm bored and going through brainrot rn, ANYWAY: ❧ At the Atlantic Arcology he actually lives in a modified greenhouse he more or less converted into an apartment where he usually does a majority of his research and biolight experimentation or just, hides out in periods when he needs to. But is usually very nomadic by nature, being prone to travelling out, usually on humanitarian aid runs on/off in between research periods when he starts feeling stifled from being confined to his residence for a long term period of time. Almost no one knows where on earth he even lives. He either never discloses his resident's location whatsoever or always gives false locations that change every single time he answers, if not a combination of both. For him to actually disclose the actual location to you is a MAJOR sign of trust in you on his part.

❧ Likes to collect and cultivate a variety of different plants and especially flowers that he regularly and religiously cares for, studies and documents down. To where a good chunk of his greenhouse's space is just, purely dedicated to his plants. Not to mention, he grows a majority of his own food. Also has one of the very few people he trusts enough at the Arcology come in to care for them in his absence.

❧Has a very strong penchant for collecting souveniers, souveniers from his travels pretty much everywhere, basically strewn around like shiny things in a Magpie nest. If they're not organized out on the bookshelf. He thinks it adds even more character to his living space. ❧ Detests Minimalist/Sleek Modern Day aesthetics with a passion, is very much a Maximalist in how he decorates his place. Not to mention since he doesn't really have much to spend on furniture to begin with, almost all his stuff is second hand or handmade.

❧ The actual living space of his residence looks like organized chaos in the most colourful way possible. He isn't so much of a slop as to end up on a TLC show but his living space is VERY, very disorganized. I'm talking Howl's Room from Howl's Moving Castle, but spread out all over the house as opposed to being contained to just one room. I'm talking about a place with the most random objects misplaced in the most out of pocket of places, especially his work tools. To where when someone visited him the one time they found his cordless soldering iron, in the fricking bathroom, and a misplaced spatula just, vibing in the fridge among his leftovers. More books OUT of his bookshelf and piled up on whatever nearest coffee table or surface area he just randomly put it down after he finished reading it, than IN the actual dang bookshelf. If anything the bookshelf's slowly getting repurposed as a souvenier display. Random piles of blankets and clothing piled up on the one side of the couch and the armchair he never really even uses. Unwashed dishes just, randomly left where he placed them and forgot about. ❧Also has a habit of leaving half finished projects everywhere including incomplete blueprints, WIP sculpting projects and half painted pottery he made for the plants just, all over the dang place. Not to mention, in regards to his actual research, a good chunk of his equipment everywhere.

❧Has a wooden board in his bedroom pinned up with photographs of friends, found family and places he visited, drawings and various little trinkets like pamphlets, travelling maps, postcards, letters, tickets, restaurant receipts, etc. That he has since dubbed his "wall of sentimentality". Namely because every single thing on that board is a piece of memorabilia of a memory and/or experience to him for him to look back to when he wants to remember moments that made him feel happy and are worth remembering. Has little to none in the way of photographs or any memorabilia whatsoever of his actual family, especially his parents. Pretty much no one both inside and outside of his house even knows what his family even looks like, that's how little in the way of a footprint he has on them. ❧The kitchen is the worst place in the house, largely because, growing up in a household where the kitchen was always tended to by house staff, he has no idea how on earth to properly tend to a kitchen, even as an adult. He tries to keep the actual part he cooks in as clean as possible because he's enough of a stickler for hygiene to know a unclean cooking space is where he doesn't want to make his food. But the rest is best described as a place of nightmares to most people who know how to tend to a kitchen just fine. A lot of people think he doesn't know dishwashers exists because the sink's the worst part of his house. It can't even be said that he presumably thinks the sink's just there for decoration because the sink itself is already partially a health hazard. Assuming a good chunk of his dish pantry isn't strewn all over the dang place in the rest of the house to begin with. ❧ Alot of people think he doesn't know how to use a laundry basket either and that the laundry basket is a decoration because he has more clothing dumped in the corner of his room, his bedroom chair and the aforementioned side of the couch and armchair, than he has in the laundry basket. ❧ Rarely makes his bed. Unless people come/stay over then he'd just, pull the blankets and covers over the thing. Doesn't see the point in it because he thinks it's gonna be reduced to a pile of blankets/covers either way.

❧Doesn't typically clean his place in the same way other people do for a variety of reasons. One being that he doesn't typically have the time, nor does he have the habit out of once again, having grown up in a house hold that routinely already did that FOR him. To where he just simply, forgets to clean up after himself, even in adulthood. But the main reason is simply that he just works best in a "disorganized" space, it gives him a sense of comfort to a degree and makes it feel like the space he inhabits is actually lived in.

❧ On a related note, is the kind of person who, where others see chaos, he sees an exact mental layout on where he put what and what he usually puts where. Even if they're not in the place they're actually supposed to be. To the point that if one were to move like, one object from where he placed it to where they think it's supposed to go, he'd immediately notice. God forbid someone cleans up his space and puts everything away because he will turn it into a cesspit of chaos again just trying to look for the thing he is looking for. Had this thing at the Academy too. He used to drive Satya NUTS in this regard.

❧ He keeps his biolight gear, including the petals, in a repurposed lab cabinet with a wooden stand in it that's security protected alongside the rest of his most vulnerable/important work. Anyway stay tuned for Part 2 of me rambling about my favourite gorgeous ass Pansexual Plant Pot of a Husbando.

#lifeweaver #overwatch #overwatch 2 #overwatch lifeweaver #overwatch 2 lifeweaver #niran pruksamanee #overwatch niran #ow2 #ow2 lifeweaver #ow #ow lifeweaver #overwatch niran pruksamanee #lifeweaver headcanons #lifeweaver hcs #overwatch headcanons #niran headcanons #my headcanons #headcanons #home headcanons

[nono-bunny]

Thoughts from watching the ATLA live action!

I initially wanted this to all be one post but. It got too long and also Tumblr accidentally posted it once instead of just drafting as I asked while I was writing it and I had to reconstruct the whole thing so I'm just going to make one post per episode I think.

So, episode 1!

Oh my god the show really opens on just showing the letters "Capital City", genuinely that's kind of hilarious?? I kinda always thought of it as Caldera City collectively because Capital City sounds dumb (very The Hunger Games of them, ngl) but like... I do recognize that it's only technically the rich district- even so I feel like maybe they should've reimagined that one in particular because honestly it's always been confusing for the capital to have two cities in it (Harbor City is the other one, basically the poor people district). Anyway not a big deal overall, just... Kind of funny to not change this

Truly a weird way to start the show with just some random Earth Kingdom revolutionaries, but based on the fact that I've heard they're not in it I'm just headcanoning it to be Haru and Tyro lmao otherwise it's just. A truly bizarre choice

Oh never mind they're??? Opening before the war??? They literally have Ozai in the first season, why wouldn't they just have a menacing Sozin in a war room, with like maybe some very subtle hints to him grieving someone who died disagreeing with him, and him going forward with it anyway? Idk it's genuinely very strange to open a show with such iconic and recognizable characters by focusing on some random mostly irrelevant people you're never gonna see again because the story takes place a hunder years in the future. I mean, it was a cool fight scene (when I could see it lmao, I wish it wasn't so dark- would've looked great in a cinema but this should have been made for people watching on home screens) but?? Why should I care about these people or what they're doing, either as a veteran who knows they don't matter or as someone new to the story who DOESN'T know that they're never going to see them again?

Oh shit wait, AGAIN??? They keep zagging on me lmao this is like. Exactly what I wanted!! I read they started things off with a lot of fighting and showing the war so I thoght this was what it was but no!! The random guy meets non other than Sozin... Who genuinely looks incredible and does a fantastic job at portraying exactly what I wanted!! I think there's something in the eyes specifically? Like, there's a certain sadness mixed with idealism there, which works really well with how determined, calculating and cold he otherwise is. He feels 100% like the sort of guy who'd reasonably be the ancestor to the mess that is the Royal Family we see during the rest of the show, and I'm genuinely really happy about it! Sozin feels like the sort of madman who believes in his own just and it's perfect, like, the exact vibe I got from him in the original!

Is Gyatso talking to Bryke rn or...?? Lmao fr Aang never learned any of the things he mentions which is why he was a bad Avatar, and why in the end I don't like canon OG Aang. Addressing it in the first episode is extremely bold of the LA tbh, but you know I love to see it! Also everyone was talking about how Aang wasn't silly enough, but literally in the OG he was too silly and never learned to take responsibility or work with others so?? This Aang that is already blending a whimsical air with what seems like a degree of emotional intelligence the original lacked is!! Such an improvement in my eyes, actually! I'm hoping they manage to properly resolve these things this time around, but already their direction with him just within minutes of meeting him feels a lot more palatable to me. Also they rewrote that scene in a way that makes Gyatso infinitely more likeable because now he actually GETS it, OG Gyatso was a kind man but in the end... He was wrong, he coddled Aang too much. Here, in a universe where the Air nomads want to help defend the rest of the world, he recognizes that while Aang is needed, he genuinely isn't capable of helping yet which!! Also feels like an improvement in terms of co-nation relations, it feels like there actually used to be a harmony of sorts before! It will help make the Air Nomads feel less out of place and "out of sight out of mind" in the bad way they were in the original. The Air Nomads already planning to get involved also feels like a way to rid Aang of his idealistic and childhish views of his own culture in a much more direct way than the more subtle approach just showing Gyatso surrounded by skeletons of people he likely killed. Also, again, saw people complain aboit the Air Nomads wanting to get involved being ooc and?? Okay, so? Have you maybe considered that them being so insular that their loss was barely felt in the original whenever they didn't need to make Aang have an emotional moment was a bad thing??? Like, I get that it isn't in line with their characterization, but personally? Them choosing not to get involved in an attempted genocide was always a bad look tbh, and as far as I'm concerned, this is a fix and a way to make them look much better than just like. Hermits unconcerned with the world- they care, they want to help! Honestly overall everyone in the Air Nomads looks so much better here, this feels like a net good in terms of like... Idk Air Nomad publicity lmao. Also, showing the different temples coming together to celebrate is!! Incredible, I wholeheartedly love that addition to the lore!

Ngl tbh so far this feels like a fanfic I'd read, in like. Literally the best possible way

Yo the "Gyatso and Roku were friends" theory looking realll possible rn with that "you will always be my friend" line 👀

Ah so I see what people meant about Aang's characterization in this episode being a bit tell-y rather than show-y, that's fair. That said, it was a really nice scene that established the bond between him and Appa quite well imo! Also now I'm genuinely curious as to whether they'll have him get a bit drunk with power like in the original considering the focus they're putting on how much he needs to NOT do that!

To everyone saying Aang running away was important and should not have been cut- no, it fucking wasn't, it was one of his biggest unresolved character flaws that got ignored when the destroyed his character arc in season 3 and I'm fucking glad it's gone. I do find it interesting that here Aang basically only just finds out about being the Avatar before getting frozen rather than having a bit more time to get used to the idea and see how it changes things for him- it makes it that in a way, this Aang has both a lot more and a lot less baggage! Essentially his entire journey of discovery of what it means to be pronounced the Avatar will happen alongside people who never knew him as anything but, it's an extremely finite and dramatic closing of the chapter of his life where he wasn't the Avatar- it kinda shows he has no room for confusion anymore, he must now become The Avatar because that's essentially his people's last request of him. It's a very different sort of vibe from "I wasn't willing", it's "I wasn't ready", and that is much more easily fixable in a shorter show! Also the og literally just "solved" the willingness issue by having him enjoy the benefits and refuse to do any of the work so. Not sad to see it go at all

Battlefield Sozin?! Firebending rockets?! Wilhelm scream?! Cool battle scene all around tbh, really heartbreakin and difficult to watch, which means they did a good job with it! I do still wish it was brighter though lmao

Uhh forgot to type anything for a while because I was crying but. Yeah I generally really liked the portrayal of life on Wolf Cove! There are definitely some very noticeable changes with our two leads here, and I actually don't think they're necessarily bad, they just feel very strange and might take a bit to get used to. Katara actually isn't passive, which is weird considering that's how a lot of people described her? She's just extremely cautious. All of her defining traits feel like they're still there, but some of them do feel like they're lying a bit under the surface due to her situation which! Makes sense as an alternative way of writing her! Sokka genuinely feels like such a big brother here, I like the emphasis on his sense of responsibility and how he doesn't quite know how to be a real leader yet- it goes very well with a Katara who desperately wants to be a fighter but can't and has to try and blend in. Both of them have very clear aspirations and the traits that will eventually allow them to get to where they want to be, but they're very far from reaching them at the start. A lot of the scenes do feels kinda awkward tbh, but idk, I think they do a fine enough job at what they attempt to.

Now, hearing that Katara wasn't the one to break Aang out in a fit of anger wasn't a deal breaker for me actually, but? Honestly the way he gets out is just needlessly confusing here, genuinely unclear if Katara did it or he just... Idk somehow reacted to another bender's presence or whatever. Idk, it felt extremely weird and I think just like? A bit of clarification here as to what happened could've saved this scene without it having to happen via anger if that's the way they wanna go with Katara, and specifically her relationship with Sokka (which, again, does really feel authentic and well done here imo!)

Aang saying that Katara is the only one who tried to fight for him is fucking wild, but I guess that's the impression he got given that Gyatso told him he had to go away and he didn't hear the meeting about him here. Still a wild thing for him to say, felt really weird right alongside Sokka being the bravest person he ever met. Idk that whole exchange was off and awkward and just... Strange

Iroh doing his best to help and teach Aang when he can is very sweet. Idk how to feel about how hard he's already going in on the whole "your daddy doesn't love you" thing with Zuko tbh, because it does make Zuko appear much less lost when he's got someone who's giving him the answers rather than leading him to them, it's kinda a book 2 vibe from them? It's strange. Also a straight talking Iroh feels so strange in general, literally his only "eccentric" quality so far is loving Jasmine tea and very clearly not being down with the war, it's... Certainly A Choice, but not one I'm really enjoying so far tbh

There's something really interesting about Katara immediately relaxing and allowing herself to be silly and mischievous around Sokka here, it's kind of a flip from their dynamic in the original but there's something really fun and sweet about seeing those hidden aspects of her come out around the one person she knows and trusts to accept and protect her just as fiercely as she would him. It's definitely different, but I'm genuinely really enjoying the unique spin they put on their relationship and how it correlates with their own individual personalities and how they perceive and present themselves.

Taking the burden of always being the only one who can bring Aang out of the Avatar State away from Katara feels like a big relief. Also in general I like the way they still kept Aang's attachment to Gyatso and his parallels with Katara, while also solidifying Sokka and Aang friendship which wasn't really... A thing in the original? Having Sokka protect and reach out to Aang feels much more personal here in a way than it did originally, I think maybe the weird scene where Aang praises them kinda worked to serve that? Idk I've read people saying they don't feel like a family but more like friends here but. They never did in the original in season 1 either tbh. If anything there's a sense of everyone being equal here which the original lacked in places, I like how both Sokka and Katara support and save Aang in equal measure here and how they look out for each other as well. Aang is kinda naturally a mess this whole episode but here's hoping he returns the favor for them for once in the future!

Edit: dammit Tumblr literally just did it again I didn't mean to post this yet, but I'm kind of at the end of the episode so fuck it, it stays I don't wanna reconstruct it in the drafts again. If I have anything to add it'll go after this.

#avatar the last airbender #atla #atla live action #avatar the last airbender live action #natla

[rotten-carcass]

This could possibly be a drawing prompt, not too sure though, but I was scrolling on Twitter and found someone's take on a tundra yautja, and figured I'd ask, what your idea of a tundra sub-species of yautja would look like?

P.S. I absolutely love your characters, the river clan, and Gahntha-tce most of all..I'm a sucker for edgy badbloods! 😌😏

I really have to thank you for this prompt. I had such a blast with it (might even went a bit overboard but we gonna ignore that)

lot of oc lore stuff under the cut

So let's take a look.

First of all, I think the concept of a tundra themed Yautja is really cool, however with this rose some problems with their biology so I had to headcannon and stretch out some stuff. Even though Yautja appear rather reptilian they also seem to be somewhat mammals aswell( maybe we should classify them as space platypus). Yautja Prime seems like a very hot planet and since the mesh "fish net suits"( the correct word slipped my mind so pls excuse) which simulates the hot temperatures from it, so they don't seem to mind cold climate (AVP where they straight up chilled in Antarctica pun intended ), at least not for a short time. However, the tundra yautja would constantly live in arctic climate zones with little to no summertime, so some evolutionary adaptation would be necessary to have happend.

So I took a look on real life animals and indigenous cultures living in said climate zones and came up with some possible ideas.

Physiology

Like real life animals, the tundra yautja would have a large and sturdy build with relatively short limbs and body appendages. Their mandibles and dreads would be really short compared to common Yautjas, but their bodys would hold way more muscles and fat to keep them warm (they basically all have dadbods and I am here for it). I also like the idea of them growing fluffy feathers to have an extra build of isolation. So basically they are chubby fluffy space platypuses.

They still have sexual dimorphism but more with weight than height, like the males with 8'2" -8'9" and 500-600lbs while females stand at 8'8" to 9'5" and 700lbs to 880lbs

For their colouration I took my main inspiration from the woodfrog, who is the only amphibian found in arctic climate zones. Their blood is also an antifreeze, which means they survive being absolutely frozen.

I also like the idea of them having a summer and winter look

Culture/life

I think the Clans would have more of a tradition tribe vibe to them. Like males and females living together for most of the year, while moving after their prey in a nomadic lifestyle, while hunting groups are always a bit more far off to get food for the whole tribe. Hunting for survival would be much more ingrained in their lives than hunting for sports, which is a rather large difference to common Yautjas (which might get them viewed as a bit more primitive by the others which isn't the truth at all). For me, I like to imagine them as more "friendly " Yautjas with a way more strict honor code, that is focused more on the treatment of other individuals in their tribe. They have to stick together to survive.

Who is in a hunting party is more a question of skill than of gender. Just as any other chore that is necessary to their community

I also really want them to have bear like mounts and a shit ton of dogs

#Yautja #yautja art #Yautja of #Avp #alien vs predator #Predator #Predator of #Concept art #species concept #my art #Tundra yautja #yautja oc #This is all my take #If you have ideas please tell me #I am way to invested #Please feel free to hc and get creative yourself #clip studio paint

[articulately-composed]

Thoughts on the ATLA live action

I may not post about it a ton, but ATLA was what brought me into fandom culture over a decade ago, so as you may assume, I have some Thoughts about the live action netflix series. Now, I'm gonna preface this by saying I didn't hate it. Surprisingly enough. I came into it thinking the whole series was gonna be a hate watch, but they actually did some interesting stuff with it.

Let's start with the positives.

Sokka - When I heard that they were removing Sokka's sexism, I thought his character was doomed. That's so much of his season 1 arc, I had no idea what was gonna be left. Turns out, they didn't take away his preoccupation with being a manly warrior, they just made it less overt, and honestly, that brand of "girls suck!" sexism that exists to get refuted in early 2000s kids tv probably would have sounded out of place and preachy in a 2024 show geared towards adults. In the end, Sokka felt like one of the most fleshed out characters. His original arc was left in tact, with the bonus of him being a simpy bottom for Suki in a way that kinda fits.

Zuko - I really liked that they added some extra backstory between Zuko and Iroh sooner. The bit with the funeral was honestly really nice. I saw some critiques saying that zuko was made out to be sympathetic far too soon, but honestly, I think it worked. The show is so well known that I don't know if gaining sympathy for zuko later on would have the same effect as it did 20 years ago. I thought the Zuko and Iroh moments really helped solidify their bond on Zuko's part, and tbh, that's gonna make his season 2 betrayal that much stronger (if they pull it off well). I also like the stuff they added with Zuko's journal. Of course he's a fuckin nerd who takes detailed notes with sketches about the stuff he's researching. If Zuko existed irl he'd have a bullet journal youtube channel.

The structure - I hate that no tv series gets more than 8 episodes anymore. it's ruined so much when it comes to pacing in literally everything. That being said, I like what they did when it comes to combining plots. It really made the show feel like it's own thing and not a 1-to-1 adaptation. They stuck Jet and the Mechanist in Omashu, and it worked. Roku's temple and The Blue Spirit were the same episode. Obviously, there was a lot of picking and choosing when it came to what plot points they kept and what they scrapped, and it did do a number on some of the characters' development, but the episodes they chose to keep were important ones, and they managed to weave them together surprisingly well.

And now, the negatives...

Episode 1 - The setup is dreadful. The show starts with a solid 20 minutes of backstory. Before you even meet Sokka and Katara, you know literally all the details about the air nomad genocide. And because they show you the entire genocide on screen before Aang is released from the iceberg, you don't get the experience of having it revealed to you as Aang is experiencing learning about it. His avatar state reaction to seeing Monk Gyatso's corpse just doesn't feel warranted when there's not that slow buildup to finding out about the war and Aang's denial of the whole thing. Episode 1 in general felt messy, rushed, and missing a whole lot of vital character growth.

Aang - Honestly, Aang's character in general felt flat. He gives me ipad kid vibes. He feels like a prodigy kid who just doesn't care, instead of a fun-loving goofball who 's scared of responsibility. He makes so many quips about not paying attention to the monks or falling asleep during meditations, and while it's not like he was super studious in the original, the thing he's doing to avoid studying is goofing around. Playing pranks with Monk Gyatso instead of paying attention to the monks. goofing off in a river with Sokka instead of learning waterbending. He's so un-silly in the live action and it's to his detriment. I guess this is just a part of the 8-episode curse, but because those filler moments have to be erased, you really lose out on all of Aang's stupid kid shenanigans.

Katara - Katara fell so damn flat, which is such a tragedy. I saw someone else on here talking about how the lack of Aang helping her be a kid again in episode 1 took away a lot from her, and they are totally right! Specifically, it took a ton away from the bond the two of them have. Really, there's no reason why Katara should have traveled with Aang in the first place. She didn't bond with him over riding animals, or help him understand what happened in the last hundred years (Gran Gran takes care of all that exposition...), and they don't even head towards the northern water tribe to find a waterbending master until after Kyoshi Island, so that's not why she chose to come either. Katara is also missing her whole "had to become the mom after her mom died" schtick. Not that she should be reduced to group mom, but that's still a part of her original character. She got plenty of backstory regarding her mom, but it was mostly grief. There was a little sprinkling of her sense of justice in there, but that's another one of those "victim of the 8-episode curse" things. So much of her character got lost when the filler was cut that there's not that much left over.

The spirit world - I know I just said I liked what they did combining episodes together, but honestly I think they tried to do too much with the spirit world episode. They use the Hei Bai episode to get into the spirit world, but the whole burned forest plot from the original is pretty much scrapped for a Koh plot, which combines the original Koh plot with the fog of lost souls from Korra, and the mother of faces from the sequel comics? The spirit world episode ties to Roku, like in the original, but Roku barely does anything outside of info only important to that episode. Out of all the avatars Aang contacts, Roku is the least relevant. Kuruk is more relevant than Roku. The bit with Monk Gyatso was sweet, but it did feel like one more thing on top of an already cluttered episode. Also, I don't love that Yue was a fox in the spirit world, it felt kinda out of left field. I didn't love what they did with Yue and Sokka in general, their whole vibe felt rushed.

Final thoughts, obviously it wasn't incredible. It's a show that doesn't really need or want to exist. They stuffed the first season of a cartoon with notoriously thorough writing into 8 episodes. But I didn't hate it. Honestly, I was pretty entertained. I fully intend on seeing season 2. I want to see what they're gonna do with Azula moving forward, how they're gonna handle Toph, and what the fuck they meant by "there actually is no war in ba sing se" bc clearly there was a fucking war in ba sing se, Iroh nearly gets crushed by a boulder by a vengeful soldier over it. I came into this with rock bottom expectations, and I was pleasantly surprised

#atla #live action atla #live action avatar #avatar the last airbender #inarticulate ramblings

[captainvulcant]

ATLA Live Action Review

I will preface this by saying that largely I enjoyed watching ATLA and I would watch a season 2, would even look forward to a season 2.

However, I did have a lot of issues with this series, issues which I don't feel can be solved by saying "well it's a different series it shouldn't be an exact copy paste of the original". If their changes are worse than the original then that is a failing, and there was a lot which was objectively worse. I'll begin with:

Dialogue Are these things written by AI now or something? The dialogue was giving me "I forced an AI to watch x hours of halmark movies and write one for me" but for your standard adventure series. Listen, we have had this already in 100s of other series and films. ATLA is so unique, could we not have kept the dialogue to that style instead of the expositiony "It's my responsibility" style basic adventure hero stuff? At best it was dull, at worst it was actively cringy. I felt that Zuko and Iroh's dialogue was better and most engaging, no real issues there, but only on a couple of occasions did I experience the Gaang's characteristics and dynamic that I was hoping for from the dialogue.

Music Would have very much liked to have heard some East-Asian instruments and music style. The bog-standard western orchestra did the same as mentioned above: it's dull, it's predictable, it didn't bring me into the world it took me out of it. I was metaphorically taking a shot every time the orchestra swelled at a dramatic or poignant moment. The exception was the little Leaves from the Vine motif they dotted in around Iroh, that was wonderful. Could have done with more of that for Aang's emotional moments.

Exposition So much exposition. Imo they shouldn't have shown the air nomads being attacked. We should have seen Aang fly off and then seen the fire nation making its way up the mountain ominously (on foot!! why do the firebenders have bending jet packs now??? this defeats the later plot??? why can everyone fly now????) before cutting to black. If they really wanted to show it it could have been in quick flashbacks as Aang makes his way through the air temple, which I think would have made it feel more personal to Aang and more devastating. As it was I was just reminded of Star Wars through the whole thing (so many Star Wars vibes at the air temple it really threw me off). Dialogue exposition also awful. If they had spent less time explaining every single plot point to the audience like we're stupid and more on the relationship between the characters and character development we might have actually felt like we progressed from episode 1 to 8. Which leads me to:

Characterisation I'm considering making an entirely different post for this honestly, but here it is in brief. I think we really lost something in this series, and for that I blame the 8 episode thing Netflix is obsessed with. The actors did a good job I felt, particularly with a script that was more rote phrases and platitudes than wise words and attitudes. We didn't really get to see friendships developing, they were just there. We didn't see the characters grow, and the issues which they faced and overcame in the series (which worked perfectly well!!!) have been changed for no reason. Sokka's dad was disappointed in him?? Why???? We already have Zuko whose dad is disappointed in him. I love Sokka's original character, I love seeing him getting over his mysogyny. You know what might have been helpful, in 2024 where all studies show that young men who spend time online become more conservative and sexism is rife?? Maybe showing that it's ok to change your views, that it's ok to work with and respect women, that people will still love you, and that it's not always your fault when you're taught stupid shit. That would have been useful. Taking away that aspect of his character meant changing Katara's and Sukis, and not for the better!!!! Like jesus Suki, my poor Suki. She's such a cool character in the animation. She has responsibility, she is competent and cool and knows her place in the world, but is also open to the idea of change. Why did they make her so awkward (original Suki is fun and funny as well) and unsure? And more parent drama?? Again??? Do they only have one plot?

I also felt that by missing key episodes like the Northern Air Temple we really missed out on Aang's character from the animation, and the emotional weight those scenes could have brought. This Aang doesn't goof off, he's already learned his lesson. This Aang doesn't struggle to balance his beliefs as an airbender (the last airbender, the only one who can continue them) with his job as the avatar, he's just 100% up for the fighting with no conflict. This is a huge part of his character's original internal struggle (and a massive plot point later on) and it feels like we lost something by taking it out.

Final Thoughts Once again, I did enjoy the series. I got super emotional at some parts, I particularly enjoyed the first 4 episodes. Overall I liked the casting and I think the actors did a pretty good job and I'm excited to see where this will go in season 2.

But, I do think that we are allowed to criticise and compare things. I'm seeing a lot of people on here being like stop over-analysing things!! No, lol. Firstly, this is tumblr, the over-analysing website. If you want a superficial review go to tiktok. Secondly, if I had one thing to place the blame on for my issues with this series it's that it is more generic and dumbed down than a cartoon made for kids almost 20 years ago. I am not alone in thinking that media is becoming very basic and sanitised (while at the same time becoming more explicit and violent? It's like no we can't have nuance or complex issues but we will show you explicit sex scenes and awful violence) and also it all feels the same. And I do think we should be wary of the homogenisation of media.

#natla #natla spoilers #atla live action #atla live action spoilers #natla review

[tarmac-rat]

15 Lines Game

Tagged by @seraphfighter (and I may or may not have already compiled some of these hoping someone was gonna tag me so thank you for making my dreams come true lmao 👉 👈)

Rules: Share 15 or fewer lines of dialogue from an OC, ideally lines that capture their character/personality/vibe. Bonus points for just using the dialogue without other details about the scene, but you’re free to include those as well. If you wanna you can send me one of these and i will give you context/ a snipped of what it is from! (you could also guess the context if you like!)

Open tag to anyone who wants to try this one but @seeker-of-truth @trashcatsnark @nightcxty @clusterfxckedbysirens @haveyouseenmymarbles idk maybe you guys will have fun with this one :3

These are all Riley's, shocker. Most of these are pubbed work but a smattering of them are from drafts and WIPs because Idk if those works will ever see the light of day and I really love some of the bits I write for her there too:

"I'm just a kid with a bike and a jacket. Nothing more."

["You're supposed to be dead!"] "So I've heard. Thinking I might've missed a memo on that one."

"I just don’t think the kettle gets to spout off about why he thinks the pot’s in the wrong.”

"Apologies for not coming up with a goddamn SWOT analysis for why I shouldn't get my brains blown out by a two-ton war mech!"

"No, you don't get to pull that shit on me! I am not some girl you can give flowers to in the hopes for another quick fuck. I am not a Samurai groupie you can treat like dirtshit 'cause you think I've got nothing better to do with my life. Because for the very first time, you're not the one in control, and I bet that just scares the living goddamn shit outta you, doesn't it? Well, too fucking bad!"

"If I wanted salvation, I’d’ve gone to fucking confessional. Let’s settle for survival instead."

"Want me to play by your rules? Fine. But if I do, least you all can do is help me not get another bullet buried in my skull."

"Might be an asshole but I’m an asshole with some fucking standards."

"I spent my entire childhood in a desert. When the hell was I supposed to learn how to swim?"

“But don't you dare think for a moment that I'm putting myself through all of this misery out of some twisted need to prove you wrong.”

"Oh, you're gonna wanna pick your next words real carefully, asshole, else you're gonna see why daddy Deckard should've told you not to piss off dirty nomad skanks like me."

"Got a kind of confidence in me I'm not even sure I possess."

["I want Yorinobu to answer for his crime of patricide."] "And I want ten million eddies and a gold-plated Nazaré— doesn’t mean I’m getting either of ‘em anytime soon."

"Learned from the best, take after the worst."

"Is it really that stupid to hope that everyone'll make it out of this hellhole of a city with their souls still intact, even if we can't!?"

#V #My V #Riley Aldana #Too many backlogged lines for her I think I cut like 10 I still really liked lmao #Aldi speaks #Aldi writes

[rocksanddeadflowers]

Asking about fae Jon and his court :) and also martin and dragons and

YAY THANK YOU!!!!

So basically the entities sorta exist in this universe but more in a force-of-nature-in-a-fantasy-world way that everybody knows about. Like "Did you hear about what happened to the linen trader? I heard his home got touched by the Crawling Ones. He's fine, but his home is a wreck." Or "You know she's supposedly been associated with the Story Weavers. I wouldn't trust her." Sorta thing.

For Fae their Courts are often aligned with a specific entity. Jon was a high ranking Fae in a Court under the All-Seeing. He would've been fine with the life that he had already, except that Elias was technically the leader of this Court and he just. Really pisses Jon off. There was a breaking point when Elias did something really nasty that lead to Jon rebelling and saying screw it and causing absolute mayhem before hauling ass. While he willingly ran away from the court as he had planned, if he stayed after pulling the stunt he probably would've been executed or tortured or something so there weren't many other options.

Leaving the Court stripped him of much power (not all- nothing could ever truly strip away the touch of the entities) which lead the Court to presume him dead. He's fine though, actually way happier than before. The more minimalistic power took much weight off his shoulders, and in running away he found an old cottage in the middle of the woods.

There's a strange sentience to the cottage- it only reveals itself to those who need it, and it powerfully guards those who live there. Jon sensed this immediately, and was hesitant, but the cottage welcomed him kindly. He stays there for many years, the cottage somehow supplying anything he may need. Clothes, food, books, art supplies. Though he still wonders the woods foraging and whatnot. For fun.

(Also love thinking about his forest creature fae energy. His hair is long and unruly and has leafy vines growing out with it (sometimes things bloom from the vines due to strong emotions). He's almost always barefoot and his vibes are literally so weird but alluring. He's so pretty and weird and silly and I love him <3.)

At some point after many years, he meets Martin!! Yay!! (I actually have that scene written out somewhere). Martin, Tim, and Sasha are all dragon riders in a world where dragons are so often hunted down and slaughtered. They're leading a nomadic rebellion for lost people and dragons alike. Martin was caught during a raid of dragon hunters and left to die in the woods bound to a tree. Jon finds him and takes him in. After a while of Martin healing and the two bonding (Martin is terrified of Jon at first btw and Jon is absolutely fascinated with the pretty human he found in the woods) stuff happens and Jon finally leaves the cottage and follows Martin's group of nomads (per the cottage's instance).

As I said, the dragon riders take in dragons and lost souls, typically people black listed from society. People like a an ex baker who was Fog-Touched, a shapeshifter and a werewolf who both hate clowns, and a Courtless Fae. Jon gets found family trope'd.

(Also for the dragon characters- i don't have all the notes rn but Martin's dragon is named Fog-Walker (the dragon is also Fog-Touched so those two are stupidly bonded and cute). Fog-Walker is huge, has two sets of wings, and is very helpful in travels bc she can summons fog and clouds! Tim's is a tiny and speedy racing dragon named C.C. (short for Clown Crusher.))

#tma #the magnus archives #jonmartin #fantasy au

[pinkyjulien]

So- I just had my first Phantom Liberty "ending"... 👁👄👁 I had a lot of thoughts, might be messy and long

⚠ Spoilers ahead, obviously!

Holyshit. HGFHGHFH Where do I even START

I smelled it coming FROM MILES AWAY-- OF COURSE So Mi was somehow- tied to AI, tied to the blackwall, it SMELLED TOO STINKY FROM THE START! Holyshit

Going to share my live reactions that I had in my dev friend's DMS cause those were the raw reactions ghfhgf

I took Reed's side during the Kurt meeting

Of COURSE it would go to shit tho like- man OF COURSEEE she would know...

The Kurt boss battle made me sweat, that man s'quick! AND THE MUSIC... Always felt like it was tied to the voodoo boys somehow? Tho the vibes makes sense, considering it's kind of theeee Blackwall theme-ish

When Reed talks about getting against MaxTac my jaw dropped like-- ARE YOU FOR REAL RIGHT NOW.......

Also special kudo for this lil thing here I was really happy

Then came the battle against MaxTac- AND AGAIN... What a battle, I legit can't say right now which big fight I prefered outta the whole EP cause they were all so good

The game SLOWLY BUT SURELY got more and more spooky, into straight up TERRIFYING, I did NOT expect that at all, holyfuck!

And it worked SO WELL TOO, of COURSE anything tied to the blackwall would be horrifying

I LOVE horror- horror movie, horror games... But I don't like playing them 🤠✋ Because I'm a lil pussy HGFH who jump, who look away, who let go of the mouse when spooky thing happen

So LET ME TELL YOU When I started to grasp where the game was heading, I shat myself full time

Everything was PERFECT... The vibes, the lights, the set up, the sound design- the music, the different scenes/memories triggering over the place as you progress, just- fucking CHEF KISS

When I thought it couldn't get any better, any spookier- the game kept on delivering, somehow

It got really dark, stressful, gory, haunting

I decided to kill So Mi at the end

Seeing moments of So Mi's past, of how she got there- it was hard to not feel for her, even tho I never really trusted her, too many red flags and manipulation, V was just a token in achieving what she wanted, just like Myers was, just like Kurt was. But she didn't deserves to be kept as a pupet, a tool

The ride with Reed made me feel really numb, and so did the talk with Myers. Sittin with Reed and watchin him walk off in the distance....

I feel empty ghfhgf that one ending didn't felt satisfying at all- BUT I don't mean it in a bad way!! I like it, I think this was supposed to feel like this! So Mi is dead, whatever hope you had to deal with the Relic died with her, Reed wanted to save her, Myers NEEDED her alive- it's a miracle V can even walk it off freely even

-bear with me here as I'm gathering my thoughts as I type everything-

Little tidbits now, I didn't played through all of the new gigs either, so I'm going back to do these, as well as try all the other endings!

Sadly as expected, not a lot- if anything- new for us nomads lover 😞 I liked the cameo of Panam and Carol, sending Paco and Babs to the Aldecaldos to get out of DTown felt comfy too, as well as all the dialogue options! It felt nice to get those opportunities to bring our past! And we did get some crumbs of interesting lore

God and like- what I like the most in games are the Characters, and PL is up there with some amazing peeps! I'll try to rank them from most to least liked

Starting with Alex, probably my favorite of the 5 main! There were a lot of good moment with her, she felt the most... genuine? Might be naive, but I love good hearted, honest characters, and she felt the more "human" out of the bunch even if she did and does horrible things

Second place comes Kurt, man knows what he want and how to get it, can respect that. Wished we could learn more on him actually, maybe I missed a lot of content

Reed was interesting, too secretive for my taste- and that's normal duh he's a spy, but as expected I didn't felt too connected ( and just to be CRYSTAL CLEAR, that doesn't mean he's a bad character! Not vibing with a character doesn't mean they're badly writen or built)

SongBird started off STRONG at the top of my list, but the more she sugarcoated and smooth-talked V into helped her, the more a lot of red flags started to pop. Lot of lines reminded me of similar convo I had IRL with people that turned out to be shitty, so it send off alarms in my head 💀 NOPE...

and finally Myers, who I never trusted and rightfully so

All of them are incredible characters, made me parano on who to trust, who to believe

All of the minor NPCs are so memorable too? I absolutly loved Slider, the voodooboy dude? His design was insane! Loved meeting all of the different peeps during Kurt's party too, and LIZZY'S CONCERT??? AYO... Was simply incredible

This getting PRETTY LOOOONG I'll stop right here but yeah, raw thoughts after 3 days/nights of non stop playing 😩✋ UGGH...

Fucking love this game man. You can really see CDPR took their time with it, fucking nailed it too... Letting go of the last console gen was a good choice, Dogtown is gorgeous, all the visual effects are breathtaking--

I gotta STOP TALKING LMAO. ALRIGHT Back to it I go

AND. I will definitely rollback to a pre-PL save and continue the vanilla content, cause I feel like doing PL just before meeting Hanako gives a lot of interesting options :3

#Cyberpunk 2077 #Phantom Liberty #PL Spoilers #Spoilers #Text #Long post #REALLY Long post #CP77 Replay

[sixth-light]

This post by @lesbiancytherea, as well as @butterflydm‘s ongoing series re-read made me think about how one of the things RJ did pretty well - not perfectly but well - was grasp that there are significant differences between how cultures understand themselves, how other cultures familiar with them see them from the outside, and what is seen by someone engaging with a culture for the first time. And that stereotype and prejudice can play a really strong role in how cultures are viewed externally, to the extent that this view can be almost unconnected to how the culture actually operates. Importantly, I think he also grasped that 1) there can be significant ELEMENTS of truth to all three of those possible viewpoints, but none is the ‘most’ true, because culture isn’t something that has an objective truth, and 2) stereotype/prejudice generally arises as a twisted version of something that is true, coloured strongly by what the external culture finds convenient or useful to believe.

This plays out most obviously w/r/t the Tuatha’an and the Aiel, where ‘wetlander’ understandings of how their cultures operate are just flat-out wrong for the most part, based on limited engagement - black veils used ritually in battle become ‘black-eyed Aiel’ who will kill anybody at any time, the Tuatha’an’s strong and unique philosophical/religious stance and nomadic lifestyle, which attract some people to join them, become child-snatching. It plays out more subtly with the Seanchan, who have very strong top-down propaganda/beliefs about how their culture operates, with extreme oppression and authoritarianism necessary to maintain stability and order, when their history and expectations demonstrate that they have never been stable or orderly or safe - *because of* their authoritarian regime. But you also get it between Randland countries, c.f. how Murandians think about Andorans and Andorans think about Cairhienin, with none of their views being universally true. Also, for the most part people are allowed to be people, whatever their culture. (I think this falls down most significantly for the Atha’an Miere in later books, where Atha’an Miere characters are boxed into being roadblocks for the sake of the plot needing roadblocks rather than having individual personalities.)

Anyway, if I have a point here, I think it’s that in retrospect this is one of the things Sanderson just doesn’t get very well in his books. He operates on a much more Planet of Hats vibe where there ARE objective, universal truths about cultures (whether their own or external). Which is how suddenly Seanchan rule in Altara brings stability when their invasions of Falme, Tarabon and Amadicia were marked by chaos, oppression, and massive disruption to the lives of ordinary people, and the Aiel are only capable of being warriors. It’s of a piece somehow with the way character start saying everything out loud instead of operating on unspoken assumptions and beliefs. IDK if you can call RJ ‘subtle’ as a writer but one of his strengths was a real grasp of things believed but not said and how they matter. It was a shame to lose that. 

#wheel of time #wot book spoilers #RJ for sure was not the Most Culturally Sensitive writer but #IDK #an attempt was made to make his cultures and their relationships complex

[honourablejester]

Thoughts on Starfinder’s Pact Worlds Setting

So I went back and bought the Pact Worlds sourcebook as well, because the hints of the setting from the Core Rulebook were intriguing. I have not regretted it. There is an awful lot of fun stuff in here. I’m only partway through, but some thoughts so far:

The Sun is fucking cool. Even just the option that the sun is an interactable location in the system is fantastic. The Burning Archipelago is such a cool setting element and idea. I love Verdeon so much, this bubble city given over to horticulture and pleasure gardens in the surface of a star. A giant greenhouse with floating planting platforms, some angled straight into the sun’s burning light for extreme heat-thriving plants, and others angled outward into space for more shade-loving plants. Beautiful pleasure gardens, again, hanging inside a star. It’s fantastic.

Also, continuing the theme of solar horticulture, the NatuReal corporation with its orbital jungle boxes full of plant monsters and incredibly well-protected corporate HQ-slash-company-town in Fireside would make a great villain for an adventure. Investigating the oopsies in the jungle boxes and trying to figure out if there’s a more sinister pattern underlying what’s going dark (or a PC/NPC character who survived one of the ‘going dark’ incidents and wants revenge-slash-answers) could wind up with a party trying to do a heist on a fortified corporate HQ inside a fucking bubble city floating in the sun. Which, let’s be real, would be fun.

(If this has shown up already in an adventure, feel free to tell me!)

Verces is also really fucking cool. It’s not the planet I thought would be as cool as it is, but there’s a lot to work with on Verces. The whole tidally-locked thing, and the wildly diverse landscapes and timescapes that enables, are amazing. The perpetually night Darkside and the viciously sun-seared Fullbright, with the full cyberpunk equator-spanning city-belt in the middle, are a spectacular way to get a lot things going on on the same world. You’ve got full on (genuine, entirely literal) Mad Max, Warlords of Barsoom going on in one corner, cyberpunk terrorist shenanigans in the middle, and then John Carpenter’s The Thing on the other.

My horror-loving heart probably does love the Darkside best, naturally. This frozen evernight wasteland of ice and blood. The artificial lights of mining rigs and industrial platforms looming out of the ice and the darkness. The horrific creatures out on the ice who’ll bind you alive inside their bodies and slowly drain you of blood while you still live. The fucking cenobite monastery of terrifying ascetics who let frostbite eat their limbs so that they can be wired directly and bodily into starship drive systems. Verces’ Darkside is less Hoth, and more The Thing meets Event Horizon meets Hellraiser meets Chronicles of Riddick. I’m vibrating. It’s incredible.

(Sidenote: I’m not sure on the timing here, but is it possible the Starfinder writers were taking some notes from Sunless Sea/Skies? There’s a couple of things on Verces that give me definite Unterzee vibes. Lempro and the intis in particular give me Whither/Codex vibes. There’s a lot of influences apparent in Starfinder, I’m catching pieces of so many of my favourite sci-fi/horror/fantasy canons, so I’m just idly wondering)

The Diaspora may well be my favourite of all the Pact Worlds. If you want space. That full kind of working-class SF, roguish SF, asteroid miners and smugglers flying junkers and the wrecks of derelict starships, the Diaspora is for you. The Expanse, Alien, Event Horizon. Godfall from Sunless Sea. The Millennium Falcon accidentally hiding inside the maw of an asteroid worm. Magnetic Rose. Captain Harlock/Queen Emeraldas. If you want to find strange objects and eldritch mysteries floating silently in space. If you want space pirate outpost-cities hidden in asteroids. If you want starship nomads on mobile trade and repair outposts servicing miners and outlaws. If you want vast mining facilities hanging gently in space. If you want underground slave-liberation movements hiding in the ‘mountains’ (asteroids) away from civilisation. If you want vast ship’s graveyards inexplicably bundled around innocuous points in space. The Diaspora has it all. It’s incredible. I would play a whole game that was just dootling around the Diaspora doing odd jobs and stumbling into horrifying mysteries. If Paizo ever wanted to make a Starfinder video game, set it here. I will play it.

Within the Diaspora, The Hum is so fucking good. Look. Vast fields of wrecked and disabled ships orbiting around a weird anomaly in space that makes them lethal to go near is a trope, it’s a fucking good trope, I love it a whole hell of a lot. A madness inducing anomaly that pulls people in and makes it near-impossible to escape is a fantastic mystery to just put there. Can you do anything with it? Maybe not, not survivably, but it’s an excellent thing to just have be there, a known weirdness and danger to shipping, a piece of the lore of a place.

I also really, really love the Farabarrium. A ratfolk trade and salvage barge made from a salvaged warship that they just took over, there’s vibes of Star Wars Legends in there, but also just … Ysoki are one of my favourite races, and them just operating a stolen/salvaged mobile garage/gas station out of a repurposed dead warship in this backwater area of space does something happy for me.

The fact that the Diaspora has significant quantities of ysoki, dwarves and sarcesians, three species that are rapidly coming to be my favourites, also does not hurt its place in my internal rankings. There’s a lot of just good stuff in the Diaspora. Mystic rivers that flow inexplicably through space. Rat-run flying petrol stations. Vacuum-capable player races with solar wings. Monasteries that are not-so-secretly worshipping Nyarlathotep. Strange wailing insane asylums/prisons that drive people insane and may involve the King in Yellow. Dwarven asteroid-cities. Robot liberation movements. The Diaspora is such a perfect intersection of so many things I like. It wins. It has to win.

But I still have six planets to go, so maybe we’ll see. Heh. This is a very fun setting. Also, I suspect I may be showing my tastes in fiction over here.

#starfinder #ttrpgs #worldbuilding #science fiction #science fantasy #science horror #many references to canons i have loved #the sun verces and the diaspora come out on top so far #aballon is also cool though #let's see what's left

[avayarising]

Thoughts on the first episode of ATLA live action

The sacking of the Southern Air Temple was very dramatic, and in the scenes leading up to it I loved the shots of the approaching comet in the sky. I liked Gyatso trying to protect the children – very The Storming of the Jedi Temple vibes. I did feel it wasn’t crowded enough – it felt like maybe fifty firebenders killing perhaps up to two hundred air nomads, rather than the thousands upon thousands it really needed to be.

Conversely, the ‘Wolf Cove’ village was larger than I expected, but then I do think the cartoon version was too small to be realistically viable, so that’s reasonable. I did wonder why Sokka was supposed to be in charge given that there seemed to be a fair number of capable adults though.

Sokka has some great lines and he delivered them well; it looks like they’re going to make something good of his character and I look forward to seeing more of him. There were some lovely scene transitions involving him too.

But the removal of tension between Sokka and Katara means there’s nothing for her to display her righteous anger on, and without that she becomes very Ember Island Players. She didn’t even get to talk Aang down from his Avatar State – that role went to a flashback of Gyatso – which meant that we also lose that scene of transition for Aang from his old family and his old life to his new one. I hope that Katara will display more character in future episodes, and that this isn’t a case of removing the sexism from Sokka and giving it to the narrative as a whole instead.

Zuko’s actor is very good – some lovely facial expressions displaying his internal conflict. And I did like his conspiracy board – it really shows how much effort and drive he’s been putting in to his search. That’s not any sort of burn scar he has on his face though. If he’d even just lost the eyebrow it would have worked better.

Iroh doesn’t work, at all. He’s far too blunt and straightforward. And without the proverbs and cryptic speech and humour, the tea comments feel very artificially tacked on. I get the impression the writers went ‘Ah, it’s obvious the writers of the animated series didn’t know what Iroh was about to start with, so we’ll make it clear we know what he’s up to from the start’, and went far too far with it. Again, maybe he’ll improve in future episodes.

Aang has lost his denial arc, completely, and become much more serious and determined. While I think the denial arc was good, I also like this reworking of his character. I did enjoy him helping Katara with her bending. But I did wonder why everyone else so easily accepted that Aang was the Avatar, when he gives them absolutely no proof whatsoever other than being an airbender.

I still think they could have made Appa look more like an Earth land bison. But the fur blowing in the wind was beautiful.

(Was that supposed to be Jee? He looks awfully young and scruffy to be Jee.)

#natla #atla live action #so far so good #i don't expect it to be the same so i don't mind if they change the plot #much more interested in what they do with the characterisation

[roaaoife]

Avatar: The Last Airbender Netflix Live Action Episode 1 Review

So, going in, I made it a goal to have an open mind. This is an adaptation, not a remake. There are different constraints and considerations when changing the medium like this. (For example, in the One Piece Live Action they removed the typical anime cartoonishness from the violence because in Live Action punching your friend in the head just comes across as abuse, not a gag.) There's also pacing changes from fewer but longer episodes to ensure the story is cohesive. Having watched the first episode, I am getting a feel for the kinds of changes that have been made and I understand and appreciate the creative choices involved.

Spoiler Free- What I liked and Didn't like

Liked: The Bending

The way bending is depicted beautifully merges with martial arts choreography, so that bending is an extension of the martial arts. It feels very much like old school wire fu in the best way. In fact, the first 15-20 minutes has very strong Hong Kong cinema vibes, and I really enjoy that.

Liked: The characters

While there are some changes (necessary for the medium, in my opinion), the core of the characters still comes through. Aang is very clearly a sweet kid with too much responsibility, and the adaptation does a great job of conveying the inherent unfairness of putting all this on a kid. Zuko accurately conveys anger, hope, desperation, and arrogance with good facial expressions. Sokka is sarcastic, an over-protective big brother, and clearly struggling under the weight of his own responsibilities in protecting the tribe. Katara is brave and kind, and she struggles but still refuses to give up and is very focused on doing the right thing. (She is very clearly someone who will later say she won't ever turn her back on people who need her.) Iroh hasn't had a lot of screen time yet, but his two main interactions with Zuko and Aang show someone who is wise and compassionate. He's more direct in this adaptation and less cryptic, but I don't think that's a bad thing.

Liked: The world building

I think the thing I appreciate the most is that the adaptation doesn't rely on you having watched the original to understand what is going on. This is a common trap that many adaptations fall into, creating a disjointed narrative, but here they have taken the time to establish the world, the stakes, and the chief players, and while there is some necessary exposition, for a lot of it they do a good job of following Show Don't Tell. Also, the sets are beautiful.

Disliked: CGI

While the fight and bending choreography look great, and Appa is adorable, there are moments where they over-rely on CGI, especially when depicting the Avatar State, that leads to some Uncanny Valley moments. I wish they had used more practical effects.

Dislike: GranGran

Probably the weakest performance comes from the woman playing GranGran. I'm sure she's a lovely person, but her delivery was flat and wooden.

Spoilers: What I liked and Didn't Like

Liked: The Air Nomads

Opening with the events of the Comet and the Air Nomad Genocide was perhaps the biggest change from the original. (RIP Random Earth Bender guy- you were a real one.) We're shown Aang's relationship with his people, especially Gyatso, and then we're actually shown the Fire Nation attack on the Air Nomads. We see the horrors of what is happening (and get a pretty potent reminder of why incendiary weapons are a war crime) and this very effectively gives an emotional weight to this war while clearly establishing the stakes. Again, this is very different from the original, which was a children's cartoon and therefore danced around the horror of war (for a very good reason.)

Liked: Aang and Katara friendship

Another big change- they scrapped Aang's early one-sided crush in favor of building a friendship based on mutual understanding and support. The door is still open to develop it into a romance, but by giving it this base I feel it will be more earned. I also think that given the constraints including the crush would have been an unnecessary distraction to the Very Important Events going on.

Mixed: Aang didn't runaway

Well, not really. Instead he goes on a flight to clear his head because he is (very understandably) feeling overwhelmed. He very clearly intends it to be a short flight. I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, Running Away is Aang's chief character flaw in the original. On the other hand, I have always been annoyed that this flaw is never really dealt with in a meaningful way. The deus ex machina at the end of series that let's Aang keep running away without consequence instead of forcing him to overcome it, allowing him to hold to his No Murder stance without any struggle is probably the point I criticize the most in the original series. I would have preferred if they had kept that flaw and actually dealt with it, but if there was one thing they cut I'm not exactly mad it was this.

On the whole, it's not perfect, but I am enjoying it a lot. I'm looking forward to seeing these characters and story develop in new ways.

#avatar the last airbender #netflix #atla live action #spoilers