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avatar-news · 1 year

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Update: It’s likely these characters’ voices were being cast for a video game, not a movie/show.

Original post below:

Exclusive: Kyoshi, Rangi, Yun, and more Kyoshi novel characters will appear in Avatar Studios’ first movie/show!

We have a huge Avatar News exclusive for you today... and an Avatar News redemption?!

We can confirm that Kyoshi, Rangi, Yun, and more characters from the Chronicles of the Avatar novels The Rise of Kyoshi and The Shadow of Kyoshi by F. C. Yee will have substantial roles in Avatar Studios’ first animated movie and/or show, both slated for 2025!

Currently we don’t have details on which of the first-year projects-- the adult Gaang movie lead by Aang and Katara, or the new earth Avatar show-- the Kyoshi characters will appear in. Right now, a solid guess between the two is the show; it would make sense for the previous earth Avatar to feature in the next earth Avatar’s story. However, this is just a guess and the adult Gaang movie could easily have some kind of Kyoshi-related plotline we don’t know about yet (what we do know is that it’s set 12 years after ATLA and has a rumored title of Hidden Kingdom). It’s also technically possible that the Kyoshi characters are for a later project, but the production timeline strongly favors one of the first-year projects. In both cases these are almost guaranteed to be flashbacks/visions/etc. (And based on some other details I can’t share yet, I’m fairly confident this isn’t for a Kyoshi movie/show itself.)

What’s interesting is that our very first Avatar News exclusive report on Avatar Studios’ slate infamously had a Kyoshi movie as the first project. This became pretty controversial for us when it was announced that the first movie would actually be about Aang (gasp, Avatar News was wrong!!!!!!!!), and even though a first-year project about an earth Avatar (just, the next earth Avatar rather than the previous one) later came to light, and we got confirmation a Kyoshi project was on the table, and we explained how all this together could have been the source of confusion that led to the Kyoshi report, certain segments of the internet peanut gallery have continued to hold this against Avatar News. But ohhh no, Avatar News kept its nose to the grindstone and some might say that Avatar News was vindicated by this new information! But Avatar News doesn’t care about petty matters like that, Avatar News is just happy to be here. ^_^

The Kyoshi novels are some of the absolute best entries in the whole Avatar franchise (and by the way, live-action Kyoshi agrees!), so this will hopefully be welcome news to everyone who was super excited when there was a Kyoshi movie and then disappointed when there wasn’t. Currently we’re waiting on F. C. Yee’s confirmed next Chronicles of the Avatar novel, the second Yangchen book, which will potentially be announced this month. What we know F. C. Yee isn’t involved with, or at least wasn’t 9 months ago, is the animated movies/shows. Right now, we don’t know if that’s changed in the time since that interview. We do know House of Cards’ Kenneth Lin is writing the adult Gaang movie, but there’s no crew information for the new earth Avatar show yet. It’s possible F. C. Yee could now be joining that as a writer, especially if that is where the Kyoshi characters will be showing up. But! That’s just speculation for now, and there’s already a lot to be excited about just from today’s news.

#news #movie #aang movie #next earth avatar #chronicles of the avatar #kyoshi series #kyoshi #rangi #yun #avatar news exclusive #paramount plus #kyoshi movie

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radiantanor · 2 years

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Can you imagine if Zuko hadn’t shown Uncle Iroh the Appa flyer and Uncle had just stayed home. How the whole stealing the Avatar’s bison plan would go?

First Zuko removes Appa’s chains (except for like two chains for steering). He knows that you have to say yip-yip by now, and Appa has no problem letting him climb on, they take off… The moment they are above the lake Zuko notices that he has a) nowhere to take Appa and b) no way to steer him away from the Gaang, whom Appa is currently flying towards at top speed.

The Gaang are delighted to see Appa rescuing them from the Dai Li, and then they notice the still-disguised Blue Spirit clinging to his back. And only Aang knows who the that is. Sokka and Katara are like ‘the Blue Spirit, of the Wanted Posters? Wanted mostly for crimes against the Fire Nation? Noice.’ Then Detective Sokka asks if he is even the real Blue Spirit or a copycat, because what are the chances of the original ending up in Ba Sing Se, so far from his first appearances, right?

Meanwhile Aang has been making his classic ‘I’m not mentioning something that I really should’-faces, and huh, what Sokka says makes sense. He kind of wants to believe it too, seeing as they’re about to storm the palace and there would be no time to deal with Zuko, if he were here. So hopefully it isn’t him! (He is still ready to protect his friends from maybe-Zuko at a moment’s notice, of course.)

Anyway, Zuko manages to keep his mouth shut (the Blue Spirit disguise kinda helps with that), and he reluctantly has to admit that fighting the whole Team Avatar right now might not work out super well, but he also can’t just leave and try again tomorrow. And that’s how Zuko gets dragged along when they depose Long Feng and tell Kuei about the war...

He gets home in the evening and has to explain to his worried Uncle that he has technically helped the Avatar with a coup. The Blue Spirit is officially an Earth Kingdom hero now and has been invited to join the Earth King’s personal security. He doesn’t even have to take the mask off or talk (they can give him some paper to write when they really need to ask some questions) because Kuei doesn’t realize that isn’t exactly normal hiring practises for royal security. It’s still a prime information-gathering opportunity, though. Yes, he knows it’s dangerous and he even told the Earth King (in writing) that he has to work for his uncle and that’s how you were invited to serve tea to the Earth King, Uncle! (For real this time.) (Safety concerns are suddenly a lot less important to Iroh.)

(This is the best case scenario – worst case, the Gaang realize who he is, kick his ass, and later they tell the Earth King he has infiltrated Ba Sing Se and now the City Guard, the Dai Li and maybe the Army are searching for him. Fortunately they don’t know where he lives, but fat chance of being able to work at the new Upper Ring teashop with Uncle.)

#atla #zuko #the gaang #avatar the last airbender #this was supposed to end after like the 5th sentence it got as out of control as zuko's plans #i thought of this after seeing a post about if zuko had not shown iroh the flacer and iroh had seen another later #and decided to resce appa himself not realizing that he would run into zuko there #and ofc i can't find that post anymore

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spacedace · 2 years

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So because I’ve ended up with so many ATLA AUs/fic ideas (more than I’ll probably ever reasonably be able to write) I’m just gonna go ahead and drop some of them here for anyone who might be interested in using the ideas. What’s listed below isn’t all of my AU ideas, just some of the ones that I like but don’t know if I’ll ever get to actually writing. I’ll probably end up making more of these fic idea/writing prompts as I end up coming up with more lol

Living Shrine AU: From an early age Zuko is trained in a secretive sect of Fire Nation Spiritualists that serve the Fire Lord. The Spiritualists gain powers/abilities through binding themselves to willing Spirits in exchange for worship and servitude.

Instead of binding himself to a minor spirit like he’s supposed to, Zuko ends up forming a bond with the Blue Spirit. When the Agni Kai happens, the Blue Spirit goes on a rampage, nearly kills Ozai and scares the shit out of everyone in attendance, resulting in Zuko having to go on the run at 13.

Lone Dragon and (Air Bison) Cub AU: An AU that starts with Zuko leaving Iroh behind in Zuko Alone where instead of the Earth Kingdom town, Zuko stumbles upon a small group of strange refugees seeking a new life. After spending some time with them Zuko realizes that they’re actually some of the last living Air Nomads in the world.

One thing leads to another and Zuko helps them find a safe place to stay (trading his ability to Fire Bend to a Spirit in order to make sure), only for one of the Air Nomads - one of the small handful of Air Benders in the group - to ask him to help them hunt the Avatar down so they can become an Air Bending Master themself.

Which means Zuko is, once again, hunting Aang, only this time so he can yeet another Air Bender at him and then die in a ditch (Zuko is both very dramatic and making a little bit more of an emotional/mental wreck than normal in this AU). Everyone is very confused by the whole thing.

Prison Prince AU: In which Zuko, still very injured and not at all recovered from the Agni Kai and not even officially banished yet, storms the docks when the 41st Division is to be deployed, very publicly screams at several generals about how he refuses to let them sacrifice his people for no good reason, maybe causes a riot and ends up in Boiling Rock at age 13.

Instead of being murdered immediately like Ozai expects, Zuko ends up flourishing. The prisoners love him. The guards love him. Everyone is desperate to keep him safe and teach him anything and everything they can to keep him alive, unintentionally turning him into a nightmare of a skill monkey.

By the time Zuko is 16 he’s broken out of (and into, and out of again) every prison in the Fire Nation and half of the ones in the Earth Kingdom to boot, doing whatever he can to help his people wherever he ends up along the way.

Now if someone could explain to him this whole new fashion fad where people keep smearing red paint over their left eyes that’d be great. Maybe he’ll ask that Water Tribe kid what the deal is after they get done breaking all these people out of Boiling Rock (again, he’s really ruining this place’s reputation.)

Azula says “Fuck the Fire Lord” AU: After taking Ba Sing Se, instead of getting Zuko to help her attack Aang (and the Gaang at large) Azula instead convinces Zuko to stay with her and help her rule over Ba Sing Se/use the resources the city offers in order to fight against Ozai.

Things get confusing for the war after that, and even more so when Zuko decides he doesn’t want to just hide behind Ba Sing Se’s walls and sneaks out to hunt down Aang (again) and teach him Fire Bending. He may have forgotten to tell Azula of his plan. Azula may, due to some faulty information, believe that her brother has been kidnapped by the Avatar to force her hand into helping fight the Fire Nation. Things get a bit chaotic.

#atla #Avatar The Last Airbender #atla fanfic #writing prompts #fanfic writing prompts #Zuko #azula #blue spirit #blue spirit zuko #aang #sokka #honestly all of these are also zukka but i haven't added that to any of the blurbs so i'll just put it here #zukka #atla au #air nomads

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littlegingermochipie · 3 years

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anastasia au / アナスタシアバージョン zukaang week 2021 day four | ba sing se season 2 au / 平行宇宙

aang woke up under the control of dai li, while zuko and iroh lived in ba sing se three years after banishment. set as canon divergent version before crossroads of destiny. more of this story below the cut!

excuse my fuzzy brain for incoming plotholes maybe hehe yeah wow i love impulsiveness. anyway yeah sozin comet ain't comin until like, 120 AG-ish

zuko and iroh stopped searching for the avatar and peacefully worked under quon's patronage at ba sing se.

fortunately, due to their successful tea business, they found better access to knowledge of the avatar, as well as various air nomad's relics and textual informations. they decided to keep everything at their secret warehouse, hiring bands of thugs to keep it safe.

unbeknownst to iroh and zuko, four years before they lived as refugees, dai li was the first one to find aang in his iceberg state near eastern air temple.

hundred years ago, aang briefly fought against fire nation army at the temple alongside pathik, gyatso, the nuns, and several young monks. he was saved by pathik from dire situation by getting thrown into the ocean.

long feng planned to raise the boy as their secret weapon so earth kingdom could rise, taking down the fire nation.

upon woken up, aang was hypnotized, and could only remember that he's an orphan named liu jun, born as earthbender.

he was told that the markings on his skin was a curse since birth by angered spirits, and to never let other people see it or they'll be facing the consequences of his misfortune.

he lived like a bird in a cage under long feng's watch and the head of dai li's tutelage. for six years long, he felt horribly stressed.

one day, aang finally found a way to get out of his residence by tricking the caretakers, sneaking and riding on earth kingdom's logistic vehicles.

once he's out of the food supply cart, he found and saved momo from being sold by black market thugs in the lower ring. there, he stumbled upon zuko and iroh's secret warehouse.

zuko was mad for the intrusion, but quickly realized something about the boy's appearance. iroh, however, noticed that this liu jun has upper class upbringing, and concluded that he's one of the rebel child who wanted the taste of outer walls.

zuko just blatantly state the obvious; "kid, you really, really look like the avatar in that painting," but aang was like, "who's avatar?" and ended up being educated about hundred years war history.

aang felt shocked by the tattoos he saw on the painting. still, he quickly dismissed the idea that he might be a living airbender, since their tattoo was supposed to be a sign of mastery, not a curse like long feng said. he didn't tell this to iroh and zuko, yet.

"aish, you must be mad for ever thinking i'm the avatar. he should be an old man by now! i'm afraid of being near fire or under the water for too long, and i dislike being in cramped spaces with damp air. how am i supposed to bend those elements?" (those are also the mental issues resulted by long feng's braingwashing, ofc)

either way, he needed to hide from long feng. aang quickly sealed the deal to iroh's offer who gave him the chance to help their tea shop in the meantime. well, anything but being under dai li's supervision works.

for a week of working together, zuko had noticed a lot of strange things in aang; like how he could easily play kangling (air nomad's bone flute), how his footsteps were so light he almost can never be heard walking, and how he never want to bathe and get dressed with other people nearby.

in the hunt for aang, long feng sent royal guards to every corner of earth kingdom territory. finally, they found aang at the warehouse. chaotic pursuit ensues. iroh and zuko managed to save him—at the price of being labeled as criminals.

with the help of june, iroh and zuko found their way to their old ship and crews. they brought aang there, and asked who he actually was since he's so important for the dai li.

from zuko and iroh's research, the only living people who could confirm the avatar's identity was bumi, who's in omashu, and the temple sages. too much risk for those, ofc, so they opted to go to the empty eastern air temple for more hints.

there, they met pathik, who went, "monkey feathers! aang, is that you?" to which aang replied, "nah, i'm liu jun." and pathik's like, "but i can sense your avatar spirit! and-and your tattoos, let me look at it!" but aang was so, so afraid of showing it.

then, by nudging his inner ki, pathik managed to trigger the avatar state out of aang, causing him to remember everything, including his airbending ability.

zuko and iroh be like, "well, shit, he's really the avatar," and their journey went rather hellish from that, with both zhao's fleet and the dai li on their tail.

after being informed by pathik that he had bonded with an air bison named appa, aang wished he could find him, since appa's the only family that might remain alive with him in this world. zuko promised that they would find appa.

under the pretense of companionship, zuko secretly plotted to give aang to ozai, while he and iroh helped the boy to master four elements by travelling around the world.

feelings were hindering him on the way, though. months of travelling together did that. "i think we could be good friends, even in another lifetime, if not a hundred years ago." oof, aang.

just like dimitri and anastasia, zukaang had deep bonding session at the boat with their dancing dragon and firebending lessons. iroh did smile knowingly at them.

betrayal slapped hard when aang found out about zuko's actual plan during their fight against zhao at north pole, who revealed with, "you befriend this dishonored prince, avatar? all he wanted to do was to send you to the fire lord as a nicely wrapped gift! this was all a ploy to earn your trust, to take you down by knowing your exact blind spots! you are merely a tool for him to regain his former identity!"

ouch. they got separated from there. aang then teamed up with the eventually formed gaang at the other side of the world, while zuko getting scolded by iroh, "you don't only lose someone that you care about, but the hope of the whole world! your hope! hadn't the past three years taught you something? hunger for power only bring despair to you!"

both once separated parties then reunited with the crossroads episode. aang ended up dead, katara swore to finish the fire siblings off, and zuko went absolutely mad, drowned in grief.

it's up to zuko now, to actually fulfill his promises; from finding appa to saving the world from his father—all without knowing that katara could revive aang. angst angst angst, final boss, zukaang banging then everyone lived happily ever after ♥

the musical scores would be:

a rumour in ba sing se

once upon an agrahāyana

caldera holds the key to your heart

learn to wield it

learn to wield it (dancing dragon reprise)

in the dark of the moonless night

feels great to finally manifest this draft of zukaang anastasia au for @zukaangweek uwu

#zukaang #zukaang week 2021 #zukaang anastasia au #longer haired aang is life #yes yes shonen haircut #had too much fun with this #zuko #iroh #aang #pathik #aang fanart #zuko fanart #avatar: the last airbender

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seyaryminamoto · 3 years

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As someone, who's favourite character is Zuko, let me just say that your analysis about the Southern Raiders is spot on. Something about that episode (especially the way Zuko acted) always felt a little... off to me. And I could never figure out what it was exactly and considering the fact that discussion about this episode centered around the Kataang vs Zutara, I thought I was the only one who felt that way. So, I guess thanks for putting my thoughts into words.

Oh, I really feel ya, anon. If you actually don't look at the episode from a shipping point of view, which seems to be the focus of most the fandom, a lot of unpleasant things really start sticking out. I'm personally neutral to the Kataang vs. Zutara debate, I see good points and drawbacks to both ships, and no one's going to convince me that this episode proved the superiority of either pairing, especially when the shipping interpretations have never been important to me when analyzing this episode. People can say Aang is right in the end, they can say Zuko understands Katara's plight better (which, considering Aang has lost even more people he loved than Zuko has, he certainly should have understood Katara's suffering quite well too), but focusing on whether Zuko or Aang are the angel or the devil on Katara's shoulders practically blinds everyone to the very glaring and mindboggling flaws in this episode's writing, imo.

In general, the concept of Zuko's life-changing field trips with the three Gaang members he'd wronged the most is fine and fun for most people, but from the first time I watched the show it felt like the production team knew they were pressed for time and needed some veeeery quick and effective solution for Zuko to gain acceptance in the Gaang ASAP despite all the bad blood there. I can imagine a lot of people love these episodes, but admittedly I wouldn't rank any of them among my favorites because, as interesting as some of their concepts could be, if executed right, my immersion certainly wasn't as strong as with the rest of the show due to the nagging feeling that this was all for the sake of redeeming Zuko in the eyes of each Gaang member... and not necessarily in the eyes of the audience.

They get away with it, of course, because by this point in time, the audience is 100% conditioned to love the Gaang and Zuko, and if you see them getting along, you should be rejoicing in their team-up... but if you put some emotional distance between yourself as a viewer and the events of these episodes, their writing leaves a lot to be desired, especially in the concept of giving Zuko a quick whitewashing in the eyes of Aang, Sokka and Katara, one after the other, so they can genuinely accept him as a teammate and friend. If we'd seen similar trips frequently or occasionally in the rest of the show, with two specific members of the team taking off on an adventure by themselves, it might not be so glaringly obvious (and even... artificial? I guess?) that they're trying to quick-redeem him for each of them here, but on top of it happening thrice, it's literally happening one after the other, too. There's no episodes in-between, it's just literally a four-parter arc of "let's help Zuko become friends with these three".

The plotlines to be dealt with in these episodes are basically catered to each Gaang member, tailor-made life-changing field trips based on whatever they'll value the most, all of it conveniently possible and doable in the span of time they have between Zuko's joining of their group and the show's finale. Aang needs to learn firebending, Sokka needs to save his dad, Katara is permanently grieving for her mother's death. And so, Zuko to the rescue! If he helps them with their personal character quests, he gets 50+ approval points! :'D Honestly, I'm absolutely not against the notion of Zuko befriending them, obviously not, but the methods through which they chose to make it happen simply might not be the finest...?

Zuko loses his ability to bend because he "lost his rage", but he's still angry pretty often, the show even spoofs its own writing by showing him losing his patience at Sokka... while at the same time trying to sell that Zuko "isn't angry" anymore? Zuko helps break out random prisoners from the Boiling Rock without taking a single moment to actually learn who they are, why they were locked up, and without pondering if they deserve to be helped or if perhaps they're genuinely dangerous? Zuko gives Katara every possible tool and information she needs to take revenge on Yon Rha, because, loosely quoting his own words, he "cares what she thinks of him"...?

How about if we'd seen Zuko trying to connect with Fire Nation people, to help his fellow Fire Nation citizens, especially the ones who were living in dreadful conditions, like the ones in the Jang Hui river village? How about if we'd seen Zuko saving lives rather than threatening to take them? How about if we'd seen Zuko actually reasoning with his anger, and either working his way out of it, or repurposing it consciously, or making legitimate, personal efforts to find a new source of strength for his firebending through self-reflection, above all else?

We didn't really need sudden one-on-one field trips to teach Aang, Katara and Sokka to trust Zuko: we needed Zuko to prove himself worthy of that trust, to show how much he has changed, to literally contrast his new behavior with the old, to actually see that the guy no longer jumps into violence-mode 24/7, that he's willing to listen to other people's opinions or wisdom, that he wants to learn better when he knows he's misguided or misunderstanding something or another. Would he have become BFFs with any of them in four episodes if this had happened? Well, it definitely would have happened with Aang, the other two would have been trickier, but they definitely would have been more willing to accept him if they actually got to SEE that the changes in Zuko weren't skin-deep. Katara can be as thick-headed and stubborn as she may want to be, but I have no doubts she wouldn't have been able to hate Zuko as much as she used to if she'd seen him helping people, much like she often wants their group to do. But instead, they don't get to see the actual changes and growth... they just get their biggest goals and wishes satisfied, and that's enough to decide Zuko's trustworthy, no matter whatever sketchy behavior he displays in later episodes.

I absolutely appreciate the worldbuilding context we gain for the raids on the Water Tribe through The Southern Raiders, but I don't think this was an organic way to tell the story of how Zuko became friends with the Gaang. If pressed, I'd even say that Zuko's overt desperation to be their friend is OOC, to a degree: if this guy actually knows how dangerous his father's plans are (and he's supposed to :'D), how isn't he focusing on that side of things, when he's always been such a go-getter? It's not like he grew out of this sort of ends-justify-the-means behavior, seeing as he's absolutely obsessed with stopping his father ASAP, by any means possible, in the finale, when there was no such urgency to be found ever since he joined the Gaang. How isn't he more worried about stopping Ozai than about becoming best friends with the Gaang? Immediately sharing everything he's learned about Ozai's intentions of destroying the whole world might not make them friends instantaneously, but it would certainly get someone like Sokka to take his information seriously and immediately begin strategizing how to counter Ozai's plans. Instead, Zuko spent all those weeks, over a month, even, teaching Aang firebending, going on field trips and hanging out with his new friends in Ember Island. Once you have all the cards on deck and you actually look at all of them at once, doesn't it feel like there were so many more ways to achieve what the show was going for, far more effective ways than through the "let's be friends with Zuko" arc?

Ultimately, there's very little display of growth, in my opinion, in this small arc, on Zuko's side, despite the most obvious and reasonable way to earn the trust of the Gaang would be by outright showing them how much he's grown. I won't deny I appreciate that the writers respected his personality and didn't just warp him into the perfect good softboi the way the fandom apparently interprets him, but even if Zuko was going to be cranky and speak one-liners like "I'm never happy", it wasn't impossible to write better situations for him to connect with the Gaang's members and gain their trust. Even if the writers were set on having these episodes happen exactly as they did, they absolutely could have been written in a much better way, to create an explicit and direct contrast between Zuko's early behavior and the new Zuko's behavior when it comes to things that matter (most the parallels I've seen the fandom drawing are things like "oh look he hated tea before but now he brews it for his friends! So much growth!"... would've been nice to see the growth when it came to a lot of other things, too, if the growth really was there? Am I rite...?).

I may just be influenced by other redemption arcs that focus mainly on characters having common goals and working together to achieve them, then becoming friends in the process... but I really don't see how Zuko's character benefited from these episodes. Yes, bridges were built... but they absolutely could have been built in a more organic way that didn't make people like myself (and a few others) question if Zuko had learned or grown at all, considering the way he behaves isn't all that distant from the Zuko we've seen and known throughout the rest of the show. And the fact that he really seems to have learned nothing in The Southern Raiders once you reach the show's finale... you're basically asked to take for granted Zuko did learn a lot of lessons because he says he did, to assume he's going to put them into practice sometime in the future despite he has chances to do it during the show itself but never does, simply because they drop the ball upon every opportunity to show how much he's changed.

I really don't blame his character at all, when it comes to these shortcomings... it's seriously, genuinely, a problem with the writing department. Take a look through the fandom and you'll see thousands of people who claim Zuko's character arc is the most touching, complex and beautiful writing they ever have seen... and why? Because we're in the face of tell-don't-show :'D most people's perception of Zuko's character are based not so much on HOW Zuko displays his growth, it's strongly based on him stating he made progress, even if there's too many instances where the growth simply seems to have fallen to the wayside or gone forgotten for the sake of a plotline or another. Zuko absolutely could have been written far better than this, he could absolutely have the redemption arc his fans are sure he does have, but for me... there's way too many gaps in logic, too many missed opportunities, to truly think his growth was as extraordinary as a lot of people are hung up on saying it was.

#anon #woops #I probably shouldn't have written this much here but what can I say #I've got beef with these storylines #and I unfortunately can't bbq it (?)#so instead I ramble and ramble and hope you guys forgive me for how long-winded I can be :'D

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whentheynameyoujoy · 3 years

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Yup, Sure Was a Finale

I had an epiphany. The reason why I never re-watched the final two parts of Sozin’s Comet even though I’ve popped in episodes at random many times over the years isn’t that I can’t bear the sadness of seeing one of the best, most engaging narratives out there come to an end.

It’s simply that the finale isn’t all that good.

Some honorable mentions of what was enjoyable.

(+) This

Just this.

(+) The Church of Zutara has another convert

“Are you sure they don’t get together?” Hubster, 2020

(+) The tragedy of Azula

And the fact that it’s acknowledged as such. I hope Zuko will do his best to get her help and have a relationship with her…

(+) Sokka being a big bro

And the whole airship sequence in general. It’s wonderfully paced and plotted, with moments of humor, real stakes, Toph being both badass and a scared crying kid, Sokka strategizing and protecting, Suki saving the day, and non-benders being instrumental in thwarting the bad guy firebender’s plans. Would be shame if Bryke never portrayed them this capable ever again…

And now for the main course.

(-) Blink and its over

The wrap-up feels too quick (hashtag Needs More ROtK-style False Endings). A part of this is due to how fast the story goes from the thick of the action to hastily tying up a bunch of loose ends, but the larger issue is how Book 3’s uneven pacing comes home to roost. After spending half a season on filler episodes that at best subtly flesh out established characters while dancing around a huge lionturtle-shaped hole, and at worst contradict the theme of “no one is born bad” with “you’re a hot mess because your great-grandfathers didn’t get along too well”, the frantic “go go go” rush of the second half screeches to a halt with “they won and everyone was happy because now the right people have power and it will be all good from now on yup nothing more to deal with baiiiii”.

Yes, I know, it’s a kids’ show. But goddamn, this particular kids’ show has proven so many times it can do better than the expected tropiness. Showing the characters in their roles as builders of a new world was the least that could have been done.

Oh well!

(-) Ursa

We’ll never know. There will never be a story that delves into this. Yup. Shall forever remain but an intriguing mystery. Is good, though. Mystery is better than a story where Ursa shares her son’s penchant for forgetfulness. Imagine how embarrassing that would be. Speaking of which…

(-) What does Mai see in this jerkbender?

Look, I like to harp a lot on the mess of inconsistent writing that’s Mai but let’s unpack this scene from her perspective, shall we?

Zuko forgot about her! It totally slipped his mind that the one person who prioritized the safety of his dumb ass was rotting in the worst prison in the Fire Nation—because of him! And she was rotting there long enough after the final Agni Kai for the news of Zuko’s upcoming coronation to spread and her uncle to feel sufficiently secure to release her. But then the coronation scene is attended by every single member of Gaang & Friends that was imprisoned?

So what this tells me is that either a) the invasion force had the ability to break themselves out the whole time and for some reason decided not to exercise it until after the war was over, b) Zuko forgot about them as well and no one thought to remind him there were prisons full of POWs until Mai arrived, or, and that’s even better, c) Zuko took care to free every single resistance fighter while making sure Mai would be the one to stay behind bars.

Never thought I’d say this but Mai? Honey? You deserve so much better.

(-) “What does Katara want?”

Asked no one in the writers’ room ever, apparently.

This is not so much anti Cataang as anti romance stories that pay attention to the needs, opinions, and wants of only one partner in general. Over the previous 60 episodes, Katara actively expressed romantic interest in Aang exactly, wait for it,

Once.

And it got retconned out of relevance by the following two interactions where the possibility of a romantic relationship came up, making the Headband dance pretty easy to reclassify as just one of those examples where Aang “teaches” Katara to have fun (as if one of the main obstacles to her having fun wasn’t him constantly fooling around and offloading his duties). And because the writers not only didn’t succeed in portraying Katara’s internal state of mind, but also failed to root her reluctance to pursue a relationship in outside circumstances that could change, her sudden state of unconfused once Aang steps into the spotlight has a single canonical explanation that as much as approaches coherency.

The fact is, though, that trying to interpret canon Cataang from a Watsonian perspective is an exercise in foolishness. Because there is no Watsonian justification for the ship and never has been. Bryke simply conceived of Katara as nothing but a tropey prize for Aang, never saw her as anything beyond that, and were perfectly happy to go on and immortalize her as a passive broodmare for the rest of her life.

And I fully intend to die mad about it.

(-) Iroh dips

OK, it’s been long apparent that the show doesn’t intend to do anything about Iroh’s complicity in AzulOzai’s regime in any meaningful way, and that his sole motivation for doing anything whatsoever is Zuko whom he views as a replacement son which is supposed to be good for some reason. But the finale has him abandon even that, and instead turns him full-on YOLO, idgaf anymore. It really throws Iroh’s supposed love for Zuko into doubt when his last act in the entire show is to take a half-educated 16-year old with no political savvy or an heir to secure a dynastic continuity and plomp him on the throne of a war-mongering imperialist regime where the entirety of the militarist and ruling class is guaranteed to fight him tooth and nail for power.

(I sure hope Mai’s ready to start popping out babies by tea-time otherwise the whole country is fukd in about a week)

Christ, how hard would it be to have Iroh keep the throne warm for a few years while Zuko is getting ready to succeed him? Not only would it make the whole FN reformation bit quite likelier to occur, it would require Iroh’s hedonistic ass to actually sacrifice something for once. And not having Zuko ascend to power, instead spending some time bettering and educating himself first, would be a wonderful message that no matter what you endured and overcame, you never stop growing. A kids’ show, remember?

(-) The conquering of Ba Sing Se

Gee, I feel so blessed to have my attention diverted from battlefields which actually matter to an old dude vanity project I would have been perfectly happy to assume resolved itself off-screen.

The White Lotus in general just bugs me. I was fine with the individual characters and their overall passivity when they were portrayed as lone dissenters living under circumstances where it wasn’t really possible for any single person to mount a meaningful resistance. But as members of a far-reaching shadowy organization that’s left the real fight to a bunch of kids for 59 episodes straight and didn’t turn up until a perfect opportunity presented itself to take control of the largest city in the world and bask in the spotlight?

Yeah, no.

Similarly to the lionturtle-ex-machina, the White Lotus represents a huge missed opportunity for a season-long storytelling. Here’s just a brief list of what they could have been doing throughout Book 3:

orchestrating a Fire Nation uprising;

gathering those directly persecuted by AzulOzai’s regime to help Zuko keep his hold on power once he’s crowned;

establishing themselves as a viable alternative to Ozai;

sabotaging Fire Nation’s war efforts from the inside;

countering Fire Nation propaganda (Asha Greyjoy’s pinecones, anyone?);

running a supply network to alleviate the suffering of Earth Kingdom citizens.

Instead, they sit on their asses until the time comes to claim personal glory.

You know what, good on Bryke for making me conclude that in comparison, the Freedom Fighters were perfectly unproblematic, actually.

(-) Fire Lord Dead-by-Dawn

Yes, a kids’ show, I know! But ffs, this is the same kids’ show that came up with Long Feng and portrayed courtly intrigue, kingly puppets, secret police, spy networks, and information wars. Was it really too much of me to expect something other than “enlightened despot solves everything”? Especially if said enlightened despot has persisting anger issues, no personal support system, no base of followers, and no political experience whatsoever?

If Zuko’s actually serious about regaining the Fire Nation’s honor (i.e. by dismantling the country’s military machine, decolonizing the Earth Kingdom, paying reparations to everyone and their lemur, and funding any and all cultural restoration projects Aang and the SWT come up with), then there is no way, no way in the universe that he doesn’t face a civil war, deposing, and execution within a month.

One reason why his future as a Fire Lord seems rather bleak is that little’s been shown about the actual subjects of AzulOzai’s regime. While we get a vague reassurance that “no Toph, they’re not born bad” (le shockings), they largely remain a voiceless uniform mass of brainwashed clapping seals. What is their view on the Fire Nation’s crimes? Do they associate their condition with their country’s war-mongering? How will they react when Zuko starts dismantling the country piece by piece to rebuild it, bringing it to economic ruin? What will they do when noble Ozai loyalists come out of the woodwork and begin rounding them up under the banner of “Make the Fire Nation Great Again?”

I have no idea, and Zuko doesn’t either because he’s unironically more qualified to rule the Earth Kingdom than his own people.

You know what would have been better? Fire Lord Iroh, White Lotus pulling the strings to maintain the regime, and Crown Prince/People’s Champion Zuko travelling the Fire Nation with Aang and an army of tutors to promote the new boss, only to realize that absolute monarchy is kinda crap for the people he’s one day supposed to rule and gaining their support by ceding some power to them.

I’d laser holes into my TV due to how much I’d enjoy watching that.

(-) All hail Avatar Rock

Literally and metaphorically. Aang doesn’t sacrifice anything, gets everything, and the clever solution of going about getting said everything is handed to him on a silver platter, requiring no active participation on his part whatsoever.

He doesn’t work to unblock his chakras, spiritually or physically.

He only speaks to his past lives to get a pat on the back and a bow-tied solution he could mindlessly follow.

Energy-bending doesn’t require any sacrifice from him, leaves no lasting marks, and only serves for the narrative to praise him as the rare individual that’s unbendable and thus so very very special.

The most infuriating thing is, however, that Aang is clearly shown as being able to beat Ozai without either the Avatar state, or energy-bending.

And he chooses not to. From this moment on, Aang no longer fights to save the world. He fights to preserve his beliefs, going directly against the instructions of his past lives and effectively reneging on his duties as the Avatar.

Again.

It’s not like you can’t portray Aang’s faithfulness to his spiritual beliefs as the key to beating Ozai and saving the world. But that’s not what the show did. There is no link between Aang sparing Ozai and securing a better future, quite to the contrary—Ozai’s survival ends up being a massive problem for the continuation of Zuko’s rule, and consequently a threat to the world at large. His survival benefits Aang and no one else.

Aang’s spiritual purity and his status as a savior of the world are allowed to coexist only due to a deliberate stroke of a writer’s pen.

And I hate it.

Welp, nothing to do about it now except to bury myself up to my tits in fix-it fics I guess.

#atla #atla rewatch #meta #zutara #anti bryke #anti-kataang #anti-aang #anti-maiko

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thinkingisadangerouspastime · 3 years

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hi! random question that you’re not obligated to answer (i just love your ka metas): do you think that aang acted like he was entitled to katara’s affection? sorry for the bother if this is a question you’ve gotten before, i’m just curious about your thoughts

Hi anon! It’s always lovely to hear people like my metas 💛 And you’re in luck - I have not gotten this specific question before, though I have answered similar questions, and as such I will probably link those posts throughout.

Forewarning: I use the general you very liberally in this post, so like. It’s not directed at you, anon djhskdjsajs I don’t want you think my sarcasm is in response to your ask (your ask was very lovely!! 💕)

Okay. Let’s get started! The funniest thing about the (nonsensical) claim that Aang acted “entitled” to Katara’s affection is that there is no canon evidence to support it. Opponents more often than not can only bring up one (1) episode as an example of supposed “entitlement” because no other Kataang interactions in the series demonstrate entitlement from either end! Like, wow. Talk about scraping the bottom of the barrel. And I’m sure we all know what episode opponents love to propagate, don’t we?

Yep, you guessed it: “The Ember Island Players.”

From the get-go, the fact that people who vigorously oppose Kataang essentially only appeal to the contents of one episode for Aang’s supposed “entitlement” is a major indicator that, in fact, the entitlement is not truly there, and that those opponents are actually misconstruing the entire episode. I mean, if you are trying to make an argument about something but you only have one piece of “evidence” to support your claim, then a) any half-decent teacher/professor would fail you, rip and b) that’s a sign that maybe your claim doesn’t hold water. If you can’t find evidence to support it, then you’re probably looking at your case from the wrong angle. Analysis 101.

As such, I find the “entitlement” claim particularly ridiculous because opponents repeat the same faulty rhetoric over and over! The only people that might be convinced are those with confirmation bias. I’m sure that’s their audience, of course, but it’s still hilarious dfjaksdasks.

Anyways. Here’s the excerpt from the EIP transcript that opponents l o v e to spotlight with their “entitlement” claims:

Aang: Katara, did you really mean what you said in there?

Katara: In where? What are you talking about?

Aang: On stage, when you said I was just like a… brother to you, and you didn’t have feelings for me.

Katara: I didn’t say that. An actor said that.

Aang: But it’s true, isn’t it? We kissed at the Invasion, and I thought we were gonna be together. But we’re not.

Katara: Aang, I don’t know.

Aang: Why don’t you know?

Katara: Because, we’re in the middle of a war, and we have other things to worry about. This isn’t the right time.

Aang: Well, when is the right time?

Katara: Aang, I’m sorry, but right now I’m just a little confused.

Aang tries to kiss Katara.

Katara: I just said I was confused! I’m going inside. [Exits the balcony.]

Aang: Ugh, I’m such an idiot! [Puts down his head on the balcony railing.]

Opponents claim Aang’s behavior is “entitled” here for two reasons:

1) He asks Katara several questions about their relationship status.

2) He kisses her.

Before I get too far into this, we have to consider the context of the episode. Katara and Aang have this conversation after just watching 95% of “The Boy in the Iceberg,” aka Fire Nation propaganda. I have talked about the specifics of the play being imperialist propaganda here, but the gist of it is that this play is meant to demean the Gaang, to portray them as lesser and weaker than the Fire Nation. The fact that the play ends with Ozai’s victory is a stark reminder of this mentality. So: Katara and Aang have just watched this play that preys upon their insecurities and paints them as awful caricatures of their true selves. It is only natural that they would be more tense than usual. The reason I bring this up is solely to inform their conversation on the balcony, however; I don’t think their frustration solely defines what they say/do, but it’s worth keeping in mind, “Hey, they’re stressed and upset, of course this conversation might not go perfectly.”

Now, I have talked about the infamous EIP kiss before and approached all the rhetoric surrounding it like Snopes Fact Checker in this post, lmao. I did discuss in there why the kiss is wrong, which no one has ever argued against, but also why the kiss is simply a mistake: not sexual assault, not entitlement, not an unforgivable decision. I’ve copied and pasted specifically my notes on the “entitlement” claim below regarding the kiss, but if you have time, I definitely recommend the whole post jksdhjasdka (I’m quite proud of it). Anyways! Here’s the excerpt:

Claim: Aang acted entitled to Katara and her affection.

Status: False.

I’ve briefly addressed this already, but Aang backing off when Katara pushed him away is the exact opposite of entitlement. An impromptu kiss is not always indicative of entitlement. It can be, especially if the person being kissed has never expressed any interest in the person kissing them, but Katara and Aang were mutually interested in each other. They’d mutually kissed twice already by that point: in CoTL and during DoBS. The EIP kiss was inappropriate. NO ONE HAS EVER SUGGESTED OTHERWISE. But when you’re 12 and you’re already kind of in this semi-relationship with a girl you’ve been through hell and high water with (who has kissed you twice on the lips and on the cheek multiple times, not to mention it is only you she ever expresses such affection towards), it is not fucking “entitlement” to make a move on her, even when the timing is off. IT’S JUST A MISTAKE. A POOR DECISION. NOT ENTITLEMENT. NOT MANIPULATION. NOT SEXUAL ASSAULT. Full stop.

Also, these EIP people love to call Aang entitled for this kiss, but there isn’t a single peep heard from them about Zuko’s line in TSR where he demands to know what’s “wrong” with Katara, since she hasn’t forgiven him yet when everyone else has. And look. I think Zuko was just frustrated here, and that he, too, made a mistake and is obviously not irredeemable for it, but. If you’re going to argue that Aang was entitled in EIP, you’d better be ready to acknowledge the argument that Zuko was acting entitled in TSR, too. And hell, let’s take it a step further! Call Aang entitled for EIP. Call Zuko entitled for TSR. Call Sokka entitled for choosing to stay at Boiling Rock on the off chance his father would arrive, thus making Suki and Zuko feel obligated to stay behind with him, effectively putting all of them in danger. What an entitled decision, risking his friends’ lives on the 0.01% chance Hakoda would be one of the many, many possible war prisoners arriving at Boiling Rock!

Damn. That sounds ridiculous as fuck, doesn’t it?

And guess what. That’s exactly how the “Aang was entitled” arguments come across. Hate to break it to you. Trust me when I say to do yourself a favor and stop perpetuating that faulty rhetoric!

So that is what I have already assessed, lol.

To be frank, the most frustrating thing I see perpetuated is that the EIP kiss somehow ruined Aang and Katara’s relationship. But when it comes to assessing weighty issues like the notion of “entitlement” in a relationship, the fact of the matter is that you have to look at both the relationship as a whole and the context in which it is situated. Opponents never want to do that, because doing so debunks their entire (baseless) argument, lmao. Katara and Aang are best friends. And by EIP, they have both expressed romantic interest in each other multiple times. (Here is a post explaining the development of Katara’s feelings for Aang, just to put out that fire before anyone sets it lmao.)

So why, why do opponents think Katara would never find it in herself to forgive Aang for a mistaken kiss? Katara is shown over and over again throughout the series to have one of the biggest hearts. She wants to see the good in people. That’s why she gives Jet a second chance (even though a person could argue he did not “deserve” one); that’s why she helps the Fire Nation village in “The Painted Lady”; that’s why she forgives Pakku (once she sees he’s willing to change); that’s why she is the second person in the entire show (excluding Iroh) to offer Zuko a hand of kindness (in CoD)! That’s why she eventually forgives Zuko, even after all he has done to the Gaang (e.g. sending an assassin after them, being complicit in Aang’s death, attacking her and kidnapping Aang at the NWT, manipulating her with her mother’s necklace, to name a few, lmao. bless his heart, but like Jet, someone could easily argue Zuko doesn’t “deserve” another chance - and yet Katara still gave him [and Jet] one. in fact, she gave Zuko multiple).

In other words, Katara is almost always willing to extend friendship and compassion and forgiveness to others - why would she revoke that privilege from Aang after a single error that is comparatively lesser to all the other horrible things she’s experienced in the war? Again, I’m not downplaying how terrible of a decision Aang made. It’s inexcusable. But it’s not the end of the world, and considering the context of the show (e.g. Aang and Katara liked each other and they both knew it), it’s… not some heinous crime. Compared to, oh, how about attempted murder? lmaoo

Even beyond Katara’s innate kindness, Aang is Katara’s best friend. She loves him. The show portrays it as romantic through the seasons, but even if someone isn’t into shipping (which is super valid), Katara and Aang’s connection is one of the primary lynchpins of the show! (The other being Aang and Zuko, the greatest foils of all time.) Katara and Aang epitomize several of A:TLA’s thematics (and aesthetics) because they are complementary: yin and yang, push and pull, Tui and La, moon and ocean, blue and orange, water and air. This gifset and related commentary beautifully demonstrate how even when Katara and Aang disagree, they respect the other’s the decision. So after 60~ episodes depicting Aang and Katara as having mutual respect and love for each other in every form as well as emphasizing Katara’s natural inclination towards kindness/giving people the benefit of the doubt, opponents still think Katara wouldn’t forgive Aang because of one mistimed, inappropriate kiss? What?? Make it make sense, lmao.

In sum, the kiss was a mistake, not an act of entitlement, and it’s absurd to think Katara would hold that against Aang for the rest of his life.

To backtrack a bit, opponents also love to use the fact that Aang asked Katara several questions about their relationship status as examples of his “entitlement.” Just typing that out highlights the ridiculous nature of this assertion, lmao! Let me rephrase it for maximum hilarity:

“Aang was unsure about where their relationship stood? Well, how dare he ask numerous questions to resolve his confusion!”

Like, what was the alternative jskfajksdas if you are in relationship limbo with someone, it is far better to ask them ‘too many’ questions for clarification than to simply assume one way or the other! Kissing Katara was wrong, flat-out, but asking her questions to better understand where they were in their relationship was like. exactly the right decision, lmao. I genuinely don’t see how that could be indicative of entitlement? Especially because, once again, Aang and Katara both like each other and they both know that by this point in the show. That’s why Aang doesn’t ask if Katara likes him - he knows she does. That’s why Katara doesn’t negate her feelings - she knows she’s interested in him, and the blockade between them is not a lack of reciprocation, but the fact that they’re “in the middle of a war” and consequently it’s not “the right time” for them to begin a relationship. Katara has seen Aang die before! She knows he’s facing a near-impossible victory! I can’t blame her for not wanting to start a relationship with him at that point. It would hurt twice as much to lose him again if they were together in a romantic fashion (amatonormativity, am I right?). Again, Aang’s kiss was entirely inappropriate, but him asking her questions about their relationship is a) an example of fostering healthy communication and b) what any therapist would encourage, lol.

Oh, but I’m “forgetting” something, aren’t I? Right. This line:

Katara: Aang, I’m sorry, but right now I’m just a little confused.

If we want to talk about parallels, which I know the A:TLA fandom adores, this line sounds suspiciously like:

Yue: … but I like you [Sokka] too much and it’s too confusing to be around you.

Yue and Katara are actually in similar situations here. Outside forces are interfering with their relationships; for Yue, there is her arranged marriage, and for Katara, it’s the life-or-death nature of the war itself. They aren’t confused about their feelings, as Yue knows she likes Sokka and Katara knows she likes Aang, but they are confused about how to reconcile those feelings with their external circumstances. And can you blame them for that? They are facing impossible decisions (the fate of their nation and the fate of the world respectively). I would be confused, too! So Katara’s response isn’t a reaction to any so-called “entitlement” from Aang; she is experiencing genuine confusion about how to approach her own feelings for him in the midst of a war.

In sum, Aang asking questions about their relationship was a logical step to take resolving his confusion and is in no way related to “entitlement.” Katara’s confusion was not “letting Aang down easy” and interpreting it as such requires disregarding every preceding line of the conversation and its context.

As you can see, Aang’s actions in EIP are not at all “entitled.” His questions were understandable. While his kiss was inappropriate and inexcusable, it was also a mistake, and there is no canon evidence to support the conclusion Katara would never be able to forgive him (her literal best friend!) for it.

Before I end, I’ll touch briefly upon the DotBS kiss, because it is also occasionally used as an example of Aang’s “entitlement” towards Katara’s feelings. Whether you like the trope or not, this moment falls under what is called the “Now or Never Kiss.” TV Tropes actually lists Kataang/DotBS as an example under the Western Animation tab:

“Avatar: The Last Airbender: The fact that he’s finally going to face the dreaded Firelord, and possibility that he might not come back alive from that battle, gives Aang enough motivation to kiss Katara.”

Again, whether you like the trope or not, it involves reciprocation from both parties:

“The Not-A-Couple [i.e. both parties] don’t want to go out without revealing how they [i.e. both parties] really feel. It’s now or never. They kiss.”

Katara and Aang both like each other. When Aang initiates the DotBS kiss, Katara kisses him back. Her lips are still puckered when he pulls away. Furthermore, Katara had initiated a kiss with Aang prior to this incident, in CoTL. Katara was also the one to initiate every cheek kiss with Aang (who is the only character she ever demonstrated such affection towards). So Aang kissing Katara during DotBS follows an established precedent of Katara initiating different kisses, romantically inclined, with Aang. It’s not entitlement; it’s him knowing they mutually like each other and him realizing this might be the last time he ever sees her. Again, you can hate the trope, but don’t blatantly misconstrue its meaning. You’ll sound like Fire Nation propaganda, lmao. (For clarification, jic: the general you. not anon!)

Here is a fantastic post by @imreallyhereforkataang explaining the DotBS kiss in more detail as well as discussing why Kataang’s progression in the second half of Book 3 was, in fact, well-developed, and how Katara and Aang are best friends above all else and know that (which was the core of their relationship from the start).

And a bonus fun fact: in the original storyboard (link takes you to storyboarder Giancarlo Volpe’s DeviantArt with said storyboard), it is noted that Katara smiles after Aang kisses her. Why? Because she likes him as much as he likes her! It was changed by a “higher authority,” according to Volpe, probably to add more realism to the romance (i.e. Katara likes Aang, yes, but as she herself points out in EIP - there’s a war going on, and love is always terrifying to reconcile with war).

(Seriously, though, do read Volpe’s description on the storyboard. Takes you a second to scroll down and maybe a minute to read. Short yet informative, discussing how you can see on the storyboard itself that someone revised the image so Katara isn’t smiling after the kiss.)

Anyways! Opponents’ argument that Katara wasn’t interested in Aang therefore is and has always been entirely inapplicable.

To conclude: the entitlement assertion is laughable. There is no canon evidence to support it. As such, I encourage you to laugh whenever you see it! Pull an Azula, for that matter:

[ID: Gif from “The Beach” episode of A:TLA. Ty Lee, mimicking a guy, asks Azula, “Hey there sweet sugar cakes. How ya likin’ this party?” Azula proceeds to burst into exaggerated laughter, earning stares from everyone else at the party. End ID.]

Thank you for the great ask, anon! Hopefully my response was satisfactory 💛

#surprise friends!! a kataang analysis!! i probably will not write any others until may 💀#kataang #kataangtag #aang #katara #atla #avatar the last airbender #atla meta #amy answers #anon #amy analyzes

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pinetreeinlatin2 · 4 years

Text

Zukka: "At The Party"

Modern highschool au

(I can make a part two)

the gaang, Suki, Azula, Zuko, Ty lee, Mai and Yue, all are in the same highschool in Ba Sing Se,

Sokka is a Junior and Katara's a Sophmore,

Aang and Toph are Freshmen,

Zuko is a Senior,

Azula and Ty lee are Sophmores,

Suki is a Junior, Mai and Yue are Seniors

(Kyoshi warriors are cheerleaders (everyone refers to them as Kyoshi warriors)),

Sokka and Katara still live with their father- Hakoda, and with Bato (2 years after Kya's death Hakoda and Bato started dating and now they're engaged),

Zuko lives with his uncle Iroh, who runs a great teashop- the Jasmine dragon, Zuko works there so he can have money for collage,

(Zuko's has a scar because his father- Ozai after years of abusing him throw hot water onto his face, so he ran away to his uncle),

Azula, still lives with her (and Zuko's) father. Ty lee lives with Azula in her house (she sleeps in Zuko's bedroom (she actually sleeps in Azula's bedroom, she only have her stuff in Zuko's bedroom)) since she ran away from home,

Mai's parents are rich, Mai, Azula and Ty lee are the highschool meangirls,

Toph lives with her parents, she argues with them a lot, but she loves them (they're overprotective because she's blind). Toph also is the first person who has ever stood up to the highschool meangirls (she done that defending Sokka because they were making fun of him),

Aang lives with Monk Gyatso since he's parents died, he has a white dog named Appa and a white lemur named Momo,

Yue is a daughter of a very rich businessman, before she went to a private school but she decided she wanted to be like other kids, and now she's in a public highschool of Ba Sing Se,

Suki lives with her mother, she's a leader of cheerleaders in highschool and she do martial arts,

Sokka comes to Jasmine Dragon everyday after school to get some tea and do his homework, sometimes he comes here with Katara, Aang and Toph,

Zuko has a lot of school so he can't work at the Jasmine Dragon everyday, so he don't see Sokka there often (but he has a little crush on this boy becase his smile is so pretty),

one saturday the gaang is at the Jasmine Dragon, Zuko notices them, and he remembers Toph, she's the one who stood up to his sister in school, which means Zuko and whole gaang are probably in the same highschool,

Zuko's too shy to ask them if it's true,

a day after that, at lunch Zuko notices gaang at a table with leader of Kyoshi warriors, she was sitting next to this boy with a beautiful smile, he assumed they're a couple,

Zuko sat with Azula, Ty lee and Mai because he doesn't have any other friends.

Zuko instead of eating lunch stares at Sokka totally zoomed out, Ty lee notices it, it was obvious that Zuko has a crush on Sokka so she starts to make a plan how to help him,

she knows that Sokka's a Kyoshi warrior, so she decides to one too, so she can have some informations about him (Ty lee also tried to make Azula and Mai join the Kyoshi warriors but they didn't want to),

after Ty lee joins the Kyoshi warriors, she becomes friends with Suki, Suki tells Ty lee that Sokka is single, and after talking with Sokka a few times she knows that he's bi,

one day Ty lee mentions to Sokka about Zuko and that he's single, turns out that Sokka has a crush on Zuko too,

now Ty lee needs to figure out how to get these two dummies to start dating. She came up with an idea to make a party in Azula's house (technically it's her house too), she invates Sokka and the rest of the Kyoshi warriors, Mai, Yue, gaang and Zuko (he didn't want to come at first, but after Ty lee told him that his father would be out of town he changed his mind),

at the beginnig of the party everyone was dancing but then someone brought alcohol,

Aang refused to drink alcohol, Katara drank a little but then stopped and strated dancing with Aang (Katara was visibly drunk),

Azula drank A LOT of vodka and started complimenting Ty lee, everyone was suprised (not because Azula liked Ty lee (everyone knew that already) but because Azula was nice),

Toph drank a little but then she stopped because alcohol was messing with her senses,

Yue and Mai get a little to drunk and they end up making out in the bathroom,

Sokka is freaking out in the living room's corner, because he let Katara get drunk, but then he noticed that Zuko isn't here so he started look for him,

after finding Katara and Aang dancing in the kitchen and Mai and Yue making out in the bathroom he finally found Zuko sitting in his old bedroom holding a mask and staring at it,

Sokka sat next to Zuko:

-"Why aren't you at a party?" -Sokka asked

-"It's too loud there" -Zuko answerd

-"What's that?" -Sokka pointed at the mask

-"This? Oh.. It's the Blue Spirit mask" -said Zuko

-"You're Zuko right? I'm Sokka"

-"How do you know my name?"

-"Ty lee told me about you"

-"How do you know Ty lee?"

-"Well.. I'm a Kyoshi warrior. Just like Ty lee"

-"You're a cheerleader? I thought they were only girls"

-"I'm the only male Kyoshi warrior.. Do you know who's room this is?"

-"It's Ty lee's room"

-"Really? It doesn't look like it's her room"

-"Well.. it used to be mine"

-"Your? But you don't live here"

-"I ran away.. Because my father done that to me" -points at his scar- "Now I live with my uncle"

Sokka was muted, he didn't knew how Zuko got that scar, he thought maybe it was an accidient, but it wasn't, Zuko's father done this to him..

-"And this mask.. It belonged to my mother. She gave it to me before she died" -said Zuko

-"I'm really sorry.. I know how it feels.. my mother, she's dead too" -Sokka noticed that Zuko looks really sad- "I know what would make you feel better.. playing 20 questions!"

they started playing 20 questions, and both realized how many things they have in common,

it was Zuko's turn to ask a question, his last one:

-"C-can I kiss you?"

Sokka was visibly shocked, he didn't expect that question,

-" I.. uhh.. y-yes"

so Zuko kisses Sokka, it was a short kiss, but after the kiss they stare each other in the eyes and Sokka just says:

-"Wow"

-"How did your mom died?" -Zuko asked Sokka

-"What? Ohh.."

and Sokka told him the whole story about his mom,

they were talking until 3 am when both fell asleep still sitting on the floor,

in the morning Suki and Ty lee found Sokka sleeping with his head on Zuko's shoulder

You can use it for you're Zukka fic, but if you do please give me some credit I've spent 5 hours writing this, thank you <3

#zukka #tyzula #bakoda #kataang #atla #zukka au #atla gaang #ty lee atla #sokka of the southern water tribe #prince zuko

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stitch1830 · 3 years

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Ahhh but then if we go with Taang once again the issue arises where I don’t really ship Sokka with anyone but Toph. Maybe I’d like him with Suki more if we fleshed out her character a little and gave her relationship with Sokka more depth and development? But again I just really don’t like the idea of the first person you date as a teenager being the person you spend the rest of your life with, especially if you totally rushed into a relationship with that person and ultimately don’t know them very well on a personal level beyond that initial spark of attraction. It’s cute and all but I just don’t care for it nor do I find it realistic as an endgame ship.

That's definitely valid! I'm always torn about it, too, because I think in general it's unrealistic and even silly when we pair off characters in a friend group so perfectly that everyone ends up with someone and is happy lmao. But then I'm like, it's fanon! We can do whatever we want, doesn't have to be realistic. I literally fight myself on this idea all the time so I feel ya lol. But I do know quite a few high school sweethearts that ended up getting married so I'm a little biased when it comes to the idea that people can spend their whole life together and can sort of see it happening to ships haha (it definitely isn't as interesting as other fics, but sometimes simple is good. Only sometimes).

And if we can create a character story based off a name, I think we can do some good damage with Suki's backstory ;) This is one Sukka HC I've had in the back of my mind, and it's definitely not as cool or crazy as some of my other HC's, but I think it's a start!

So maybe Sokka and Suki don't end up together after the finale. I like the idea that the whole Gaang go their separate ways and find projects to help rebuild. Sokka would immediately go back home, and I think Suki would either go back to Kyoshi Island or travel with her warriors. Maybe they spent a few days together and preparing for their own missions, and Suki suddenly feels a great deal of dread. She was imprisoned for months (I think), maybe even tortured or interrogated for information because she's the leader of the warriors and has abandonment issues now. The thought that Sokka leaving her scares her, and instead of talking about her fears, she breaks it off with him and says that they should focus on themselves and their projects. No distractions. And Sokka is super upset because all the people he's loved and cared about seem to leave him. That makes him mad that she would just break it off like that, and he agrees that they should break up.

Years pass and they're in their twenties now. The Gaang decides to reunite and Katara invited Suki, even though he requested she not be there since "she wasn't technically part of the original Gaang!"//"She saved your life, Sokka, get over it." So he swallows his pride and strikes up a conversation with her, because everyone else is paired up and in a conversation for him to butt in. And Sokka and Suki hit it off again. They literally talk about everything, and they both admire how much change and work the other has done. At the end of the night, they are about to go their separate ways, and Suki suggests that he come to Kyoshi Island to help with a project. They could use his inventive mind... He hesitates, but ultimately agrees because he mentally set up boundaries for their relationship.

And after a few weeks he ignores the rules he made up and they fall into a FWB situation, maybe? Super casual situation, and they spend a lot of time working together. When he leaves, they're both sad, but agree that this was nothing. No relationship.

But then they miss each other and start writing to each other to pass up their solitary free time. They both come up with silly projects that require each other's skills and for them to visit. Suki's in the SWT with Sokka, and she's noticing all these women coming up to Sokka and chatting, even flirting with them, and she finds herself jealous... Sokka confronts her about it in the most Sokka and sarcastic way possible and she responds angrily, "Fine! I like you! I don't want you flirting with anyone but me." He wiggles his eyebrows and is like "Wow, Wonder Warrior's got a crush on me."

Cue long-distance relationship... it's definitely hard and they don't love it, but they're trying their best. And then boom. After a very long stay at Kyoshi, Suki finds out she's pregnant.

Definitely not what they had in mind, they've only started dating again for a couple months and the idea that Sokka is gonna leave her with this baby is making her mind spiral into the absolute worse case scenario because that's how she thinks now. Sokka grabs her by the shoulders hard and promises her that he's not going anywhere. He's with her 100% of the way.

And he is. They navigate their relationship and this big change together and it's not easy, but they work through it. Sokka slowly realizes that he's always been in love with Suki one way or the other, and her becoming the mother of his child further solidifies this thought. It's a quiet and simple confession he gives her one lazy afternoon, and she reciprocates the feeling.

They learn how to live with each other, travel for projects, and raise their kid together. Time still moves on, and one day Sokka just asks her to marry him. Simple and a little off the cuff like most of their relationship at this point. But he still can't help but smile when she says yes.

Sorry for going a little overboard, haha! But I too want our boy Sokka to be happy! We just gotta find one or two more possible people for him besides Toph for our semi-multishipping needs lol.

#sukka #atla #sokka #suki #sokka and suki #headcanons #my asks #thanks for the ask!#mudbend #they've got that rom com stuff #maybe romantic drama lol #on/off again #breakup to friends to FWB to dating to PARENTS to marriage?#it could work #we just need some more depth for suki!

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multishippingtrashfire · 4 years

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zukka soulmate au opinions/headcanons?

I apologize Anon for how long this has sat in my inbox, but soulmate AU’s are really not my forte, so i had to think long and hard. (no sexy pun intended)

Background information

- Soulmate marks sit on the same place on both parties

- They are there their whole life

- I believe in multiple soulmates, so if one soulmate dies, i think another exists (aka, Hakoda and Kya, and then Hakoda and Bato; Kanna and unnamed Grandpa, and the Kanna and Pakku)

Zuko

- Zuko DREADS the notion of soulmates, only because Zuko believes it is also the universe’s divine order to make his life as sucky as possible. So in Zuko’s mind, he’s like the perfect way for the Universe to punish him further would be one of 3 ways:

1. His soulmate would be the Avatar, because of course he’d be on an impossible quest to literally find and surrender his soulmate for death at Ozai’s hands (also a betrayal to his nation)

2. His soulmate would be a woman, (because I truly canonically believe that Zuko is a gay)

3. He wouldn’t have a soulmate

Of course none of these guesses are correct, he should’ve looked behind door number 4: His soulmate is from another nation and has had the Fire Nation ferociously take everything they’ve loved (aka Sokka)

Fire Nation tradition also dictates that Soulmates are for common people, not for Prince’s, so his soulmate mark (a glistening black sword), is to be covered at all times anyway. He is thankful that his Soulmate mark is non-nation identifiable, which saves him from Ozai’s wrath if it was obviously Water Tribe or Earth Kingdom. Also sucks, because Zuko isnt even sure where to start looking (not that he would), so he just traces the mark with his fingers as bathes sometimes, wondering if his soulmate is doing the same.

When Zuko first meets Sokka, he doesnt realize it, he just sorta is like “no point in brutally hurting this person, let me just shift him out my way”, which in my opinion is more restraint than most people get from Zuko at that time.

Zuko doesnt even know Sokka is his Soulmate until he sees the sword after training Aang at the Western Air Temple, and it all just clicks and Zuko wants to throw himself into the Sun because Sokka has Suki and Zuko just wants him to be happy.

So really, he was right, he will be alone.

Meanwhile on Sokka’s side

Sokka’s family have always been very supportive of him and soulmates. Katara’s mark is something that looks like a kite (it’s Aang’s staff but they didnt know that before meeting him) and Katara is wishful for her soulmate. She spends nights dreaming up what it could possibly be or mean.

And tbh, Sokka is against the idea because he’s devoted to the idea of being a warrior, of doing what’s right by his people. And his soulmate mark of a what looks like an exploded burn (the lightning strike Zuko takes protecting Katara) doesnt convince him, because only another selfless person/warrior would understand him in his opinion and he knows those are hard to come by. He doesnt care if his soulmate identifies as a guy or girl or in between.

Then there was Aang, Katara’s necklace wrapped around his ankle as his mark. And Suddenly, Sokka was confronted with the realization that Aang and helping him become the Avatar was apart of Katara’s fulfillment and that his little sister was growing up and Sokka could see the way Aang and Katara looked at each other. He knew they say lifetimes when they looked into each other’s eyes.

And then Zuko chases them around the world and Sokka totally acknowledges that Zuko is mental and a dick, but he also gets why Zuko does it. In their travels they heard the story of the banished Fire Nation Prince and his impossible assignment to return home and Sokka understands. He knows what it is to have to feel like you have to prove yourself to your father (Sokka thinks he has to prove himself to Hakoda; Zuko literally has to prove himself to Ozai, per Ozai’s words), what it means to be fighting for your nation as something greater than yourself, and Sokka would never admit to Katara but he empathized with Zuko.

Sokka wonders if it’s Suki, but Suki tells him honestly that her mark is the mark of the Kyoshi Warriors, because she’s dedicated to this, this is what fulfills her. She loves Sokka and loves romance with him, but she knows Sokka is destined for greater love. And she tells Sokka that companionship is something that he shouldnt miss out, just because he thinks its not the ways of the warrior. Wearing a dress and fighting in fans and makeup wasnt his idea of the ways of a warrior either and he learned how that turned out.

He thinks it may be Yue, but her mark was always the moon.

And then Zuko abandons Ozai and tries to offer himself up to the Gaang. He’s turnt away, and even burns Toph’s feet before coming back again and tries sacrificing himself to stop combustion man. Sokka is at least a little bit impressed that he would continue to offer himself up to berating judgement of their group because he’s decided what’s right. Then Zuko becomes Aang’s firebending teacher and everyone gets hang out with him and Sokka likes the guy even more, although he’s weird around the sword (he blushes everytime he sees it)

They never really talk about soulmates, and Sokka’s soulmate mark sits on his thigh, so it’s not exactly easy to see unless he’s undressed.

Then Zuko takes the bolt for Katara and survives and suddenly Zuko has hung the Sun in Sokka’s sky, because he was so selfless, he was willing to die for Katara. He knows the shape sitting on Zuko’s chest anywhere. Zuko is his soulmate. And then Sokka realizes maybe he was late to this party and that was why Zuko was weird.

When he first sees Firelord Zuko alone afterwards, he asks Zuko how long he knew. And Zuko lets him know that it was long enough that Chit Sang, Hakoda AND Suki knew (which meant by then Toph had probably figured it out too). Basically everyone but Sokka, Katara and Aang had been privy to the information.

Then they unpack some of that pesky childhood trauma they’d been carting around and talk about how they both thought the soulmate thing wasnt for them, but then again both of them were completely unusual and extraordinary people, so maybe they just had a more unusual extraordinary soulmate story to live out. Sokka promises Zuko a lifetime and Zuko promises Sokka everyday in between now and when the Sun goes out. They can see it in each other’s eyes.

Sokka says that Zuko’s scars are beautiful, something Zuko has felt made him a monster all this time. Sokka is the first person to acknowledge them truly and he tells him how enthralled he is by the stories they depict of Zuko. How he was selfless and did not fear the burn of flames because it was more important to do the right thing.

And Zuko says Sokka would have the world in the palm of his hand with his intelligence and that spirits knew giving him bending too would basically just make him the avatar anyway. Sokka has always felt inadequate and Zuko makes him feel like he could win a hundred battles blindfolded.

Zuko sends a search for Sokka’s sword (and recovers it) and Sokka uses it to ask Zuko to marry him.

They get married at Sunrise, because Zuko sets the Sun in Sokka’s sky and they celebrate until Sunset/moonrise, because their union blessed by the moon herself. It casts an iridescent glow over the Fire Nation.

It’s love.

#Zukka #my writing #prompts #ask nick #ATLA #Zuko #Sokka #headcanons #soulmate au

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hello-yue-here · 3 years

Note

About your atla ship songs, I have a couple of questions (sorry if my phrasing comes out wrong, english isn't my first language and I worry it might across as accidentally defensive): how did you end up with the choices for zukka, jetko and yuekka (note: I haven't seen the great comet, so feel free to obsess over it, I'm intrigued now and the hype is appreciated!)? Sidenote: I think the mailee choice is HILARIOUS and the tokka one just make me sad, I didn't expect to be attacked like this😭

kdjfha;s i love you im gonna obsess SO HARD over great comet now. you may regret this

this is gonna be so long so the rest is under the cut whoops

yuekka: no one else from great comet

where do i even begin. WHERE DO I EVEN BEGIN

okay so background information on this show: it's based off of a 76 oages excerpt from war and peace and its centered around a woman named natasha (and this guy pierre but he's irrelevant to this song so we wont worry about him) and natasha's bethrothed is off fighting in the war right now. she hasn't seen him in a while but she is in love with him.

every single lyrics of this song SCREAMS yuekka to me. the innocence and purity of their love. the love at first sight. and even the melancholy ending just- i go apeshit for this song. i love this song so much. and denee benton's voice??? kljsdhflwksugf please listen to this song if you haven't already. listen to the whole show. your life will be changed forever.

onto the lyrics (i stg this is ab to be the whole song whoops)

"the moon"

THOSE ARE THE FIRST WORDS ON THE SONG. natasha and andre (her bethrothed) met underneath the moonlight. Sokka and Yue first spoke to eachother at night and always met each other for their most intimate moments under the moonlight. also yue is LITERALLY the moon so like: right of the bat with those two words it's yuekka.

"and i saw your eyes / and i saw your smile / and the world opened wide"

sokka fell in love with yue the moment he saw her in the canal. she literally enchanted this motherfucker. everything about her made his heart go crazy. and 'the world opened wide' to me is from yue's perspective. Yue had never left the north pole and sokka had seen a good chuck of the world at the point. He took her on appa, he told her about his adventures. he saw the world yue wished to see and you know damn well that Sokka would have done anything to give it to her.

"oh the moon /oh the snow in the moonlight / and your childlike eyes and your distant smile / ill never be this happy again / you and i and no one else"

natasha sings fondly about the moon and the snow, seeing as it was where she fell in love with andre. yue and sokka LITERALLY fell in love in the same place: in the snowy nothern water tribe under the light of the moon. childlike eyes: THEYRE CHILDREN!!! distant smile: this is where it gets a little sad. theyre both children with way too many duties during a world that has known nothing but war for the past century. they want to be happy but yeah, theyre smiles are distant and far away because happiness seems out of reach for them most of the time. i'll never be this happy again: the moments yue and sokka shared together were probably the happiest either of them ever were. they were able to ignore the war and the world in the moments they shared together. and with no one else. no one else would be able to give each other this sense of peace and happiness and love.

"joy and life inside our souls / and no body knows just you and me / it's our secret"

Yue and Sokka had to sneak out in secret at night to go and see each other. Yue and Sokka couldn't be together for real because Yue was already engaged, but they were literally in love so she decided to see him anyways in secret. kasdjfhklasjd im losing my mind over them at this point.

"this winer sky / how can anyone sleep / there was never such a night before / i feel like putting my arms around my knees / and squeezing tight as possible / and flying away"

these are my FAVORITE lines in the entire song. yue and sokka had never felt this strongly about anyone before and that's why they are so drawn to each other. they had never experienced love before and they wanted to hold onto it for as long as they could even though they knew they couldnt. Sokka takes yue up on appa and she is wistful and wishes she could live like he does every day: ie flying away. oh my god these two deserved so much better. so much fucking better.

now for the saddes part. the saddest fucking part.

"maybe he'll come today / maybe he came already / and he's sitting in the drawing room / and i simply forgot"

natasha misses andre so intensely at this point. when i first listened to this show and heard this song i was like "wait a min... is andre like... dead?" and im sure i wasnt the only person who assumed that this was why natasha felt so sad by the end of such a beautiful song. (spoiler alert andre is fine)

but this line really exemplifies how sad natasha is, and hints at the fact that andre may never come back. it implies that their relationship is doomed (at least in my opinion) and that's all yuekka. Sokka misses yue intensely when shes gone. Yue accepted her fate almost immediately but sokka was in denial. he thought there had to be another way. but in the end it wasn't meant to be. and sokka will go on, loving yue, wishing for her back, even though it's not possible.

fuck im gonna cry.

zukka: all i've ever known- hadestown

"i was alone so long / i didn't even know that i was lonely / out in the cold so long / i didnt even know that i was cold"

sokka is from the swt so theres where the cold comes in. also in the gaang (initially) it was just him katara and aang. and katara and aang were much closer to each other than sokka was with aang and the two of them were benders so sokka was kind of an outsider with the two of them. He also represses a lot of his emotions and feels the need to do everything himself so i do see a lot of loneliness in sokka. and the fact that so many people in his life have left him (his mom, yue, his dad, suki briefly, etc...) he is known to keep people at an arms length. i see a lot of loneliness in sokka.

zuko's loneliness is a lot more obvious: he has literally been cast out and abandoned by everyone except iroh. and even then he still feels the need to be alone (remember zuko alone? thought so) these boys look after themselves and push others away and revel in their loneliness in order to keep themselves from getting hurt. at least in my opinion on canon and also some fanon because id be a liar if i said fanon didnt influence how i view ALL my ships (not just zukka)

"all ive ever known is how to hold my own / but now I wanna hold you too"

COME ONE MANNNN, they just wanna hold each other. theyre both very big protectors as well and kljhflkasdhg they wanna protect eachother like kljdhfl im gonna lose it rn.

"You take me in your arms / And suddenly there's sunlight all around me / Everything bright and warm / And shining like it never did before / And for a moment I forget / Just how dark and cold it gets"

SUNLIGHT SYMBOLISM. zuko is literally powered by the sun. i don't think i even NEED to elaborate on this one anymore lol. They find comfort in each other away from all of their trauma. when they're together nothing else matters and i personally love that for them. they both deserve love.

"I knew you before we met / And I don't even know you yet / All I know is your someone I have always known"

these two are extremely similar in canon. many parallels. older brothers overshadowed by their prodigy little sisters. longing to make their fathers proud (granted one dad is good and one is fuckin evil), both are pretty bad with emotions. both are seen protecting others before themselves (sokka protecting suki during the serpant's pass, sokka protecting toph on like multiple occassions, zuko protecting katara in the final agni kai), the list goes on. they know who the other is because they see themselves in the other person. they already know each other because they are each other (in a way, not entirely, but the similarities are strong in my opinion)

"I'm gonna hold you forever / The wind will never change on us / Long as we stay with each other / Then it will always be like this"

i just think this line is so cute and sweet (ignoring all the symbolism and foreshadowing that comes with the last line in the musical itself. im gonna pretend this is nothing but happy) and i think these boys deserve happiness so yeah. this song is zukka to me lol.

jetko: thrill of first love- falsettoes

if you've never listened to this song go an do it now. you will know INSTANTLY that it is jetko because of the dynamics alone. marvin and whizzer are pure jetko and i take no crticisms.

marvin and whizzer are both extremely stubborn, and they don't always get along, and they fight a lot, and they get mad at each other a lot, and they are both passionate as hell, and they will bring this passion into everything. they love each other that is without a doubt, but they arent perfect and they are once again stubborn and determined as fuck.

sound familiar? it's literally jetko.

the lyrics aren't what remind me of jetko, but the dynamic itself. the lyrics are too on the nose for a gay couple in 1970's america so that rlly cant apply to jetko all that much. but the way these two characters bounce off of each other and get annoyed with each other and argue with eachother reminds me of jetko. because let's be honest: these two are the most stubborn characters in the whole show. they will fight for what they believe and it will take literally everything to change their minds.

i love jetko but i think they would have petty arguments all the time and get aggravated by one another so easily. and this is even seen in canon: they work so fucking well together but they did not even HESITATE to fight one another after neither of them would give in and let the fight about whether jet was right or wrong about zuko being a firebender. like i cannot say it enough they are stubborn as fuck.

but underneath all that stubborn pettiness and bickering: marvin and whizzer still love each other. and jet and zuko would still love each other. because even though they are stubborn when it comes to arguments, they are even more stubborn and determined when it comes to each other. these two passionate motherfuckers are in love.

(now when i chose this song i decided to ignore the fact that this song literally spells out the fact that marvin and whizzer's relatinoship is doomed because they literally say passion dies. thats the difference between jetko and whizzer and marvin because i dont think passion dies. i chose this song strictly for the bickering lmao)

and i know you didnt ask about tokka but,,,,

i rlly wanna talk about the tokka one

so im going to

tokka: on my own- les mis

look. i KNOW this song is about unrequited love and i love tokka as a couple but,,, the unrequited love in this song just SCREAMS unrequited tokka to me so thats what i went with.

eponine is a girl who has neglectful parents who lives life by her own rules: toph. eponine is shown to be tough and confident and spunky to others but behind all of that she has emotions, she feels love, she hides her vulnerability so much: toph. she is in love with a guy she cant be with because he loves someone else: TOPH

eponine is toph to a t and toph is eponine to a t. this is not up for debate lmao

"without him i feel his arms around me"

toph is always seen grabbing onto someone (and its almost ALWAYS sokka) when she's somewhere where she can't use her feet to see. FEEL and ARMS cmon. look at it.

"and i know / i know that he is blind"

COME ON. IMAGINE TOPH SINGING THIS LINE. this line is already powerful enough in les mis but having toph, a blind character, sing it just makes the symbolism even deeper. toph sees the potential relationship they could have together. toph sees that sokka is oblivious to this. toph is not blind to the truth or the potention, but sokka is blind to her feelings. im about to lose my mind over this line.

"I love him / But every day I'm learning / All my life / I've only been pretending / Without me / His world will go on turning / A world that's full of happiness / That I have never known"

i need to sit down for a moment. toph grew up in a household where her parents did not understand her. she has learned to hide her true emotions and vulnerabilities from everyone. and its the fact that toph knows that she and sokka will never be together and the fact that she still loves him in spite of that is what makes this even more heartbreaking.

"but only on my own"

TOPH AND EPONINE SWEETIES I LOVE YOU

thank you for indulging my theatre kid nonsense. you are very sweet and kind and lovely and awesome and i hope you have a lovely day bestie :) <3

ask me why i think these songs go with these ships

#asks #liv is a theatre nerd #liv is an atla nerd #yuekka #zukka #jetko #tokka #ask me about my ship songs

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avatar-news · 3 years

Photo

The Fire Nation Awaits 🌺 An in-depth look at the ever-elusive islands in the era of Korra and when we will finally pay them a visit

[Artwork by Avatar News; not official.]

Note: This article was published before the official announcement of Avatar Studios at the Paramount+ investor day.

“Water. Earth. Fire. Air. Long ago, the four nations lived together in harmony. Then, everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked.” We’ve all heard those words a million times. The four elements, and the power to control them bestowed by four subspecies of giant lion-turtles, are at the very heart of the world of Avatar. The balance between them was once upon a time broken by one of the four, the Fire Nation, forming the main conflict of Avatar: The Last Airbender. For much of Aang and the Gaang’s quest at the close of the Hundred Year War, the Fire Nation was a forbidden, far-away location, until the curtain was finally drawn back in the aptly-named Book Three: Fire when our heroes entered the inferno, undercover behind enemy lines. A dramatic tropical destination! New outfits! Culture shock! Needless to say, it was a big deal.

→ 🌺 The big reveal of the Fire Nation in Book Three: Fire had its own marketing push, matching public anticipation.

When the Hundred Year War ended, the newly-instated Fire Lord Zuko dedicated his life to righting the wrongs of his forefathers and working with Avatar Aang to bring the Fire Nation back into the fold under peace. By the time Aang’s successor debuted as the next Avatar in the titular The Legend of Korra, Zuko had abdicated the five-pointed crown and his daughter, Fire Lord Izumi, took the stage leading a reformed, rebalanced Fire Nation.

There was no more war, no more enemy lines, yet the Fire Nation became more distant and mysterious than ever before.

Korra’s close encounters with the land of fire

To this day, Korra has never visited the Fire Nation, nor has it been seen at all, nor do we know anything about it in her era. In fact, practically the only thing we do know is that its leader is a noninterventionist, which conveniently gets it out of the way of making an appearance in Korra’s journey as the Avatar so far.

The closest we have come to seeing the Fire Nation in The Legend of Korra was in Book Two: Spirits, Chapter Five: Peacekeepers. In the midst of the Water Tribe Civil War, Korra sets out across the sea to get help from the royal family, however, she is intercepted by a dark spirit and never makes it to her destination. In the next episode, she washes up on a secret island home to the Bhanti sages, which probably technically counts as Fire Nation territory, but as we know from The Shadow of Kyoshi (more on that later), this faction predates the Four Nations themselves so it doesn’t really count.

→ 🌺 Korra washes up on the beach of Bhanti Island in Book Two: Spirits, Chapter Six: The Sting.

No, as cool as that location and the events of the Beginnings two-parter that happened there were, it wasn’t the main draw of seeing the Fire Nation that we’re still waiting for: seeing how the Fire Nation, which was already industrializing in Aang’s time, changed over the decades, compared to places like Republic City and Ba Sing Se; meeting new characters; visiting new and familiar locations; worldbuilding both new and expanding on what we already learned.

After this aborted tease in Book Two, we never come close to the island country again (at least not with this Avatar and in her era; yes I’m leading up to something...). Instead, the focus turns strongly to the Earth Kingdom in the third and fourth Books, and beyond.

Keep in mind that The Legend of Korra aired for about two-and-a-half years total from 2012 to 2014. Since then, the story has continued in comics. The comics era has lasted from 2015 to present-- seven years to the animated series’ two. In that time, there have only been two comic trilogies due to various production troubles, and neither have touched the Fire Nation. Instead, they directly continue the Earth Kingdom-focused threads started in Books Three and Four of Korra, both originally airing in 2014. Or, in perspective: we had a focus on Republic City in 2012, the Water Tribes in 2013, and the Earth Kingdom from 2014-2021.

Will we finally see the Fire Nation in the next graphic novel trilogy?

This question comes to mind every time new Korra content is supposed to roll around, and the powers that be know it-- it’s a pretty obvious gap in the world of Avatar right now. This franchise is iconically built around four elements and the Four Nations based on them, so one of them being MIA is quite glaring, and for that reason everyone is understandably always asking about it.

The most concrete confirmation we’ve gotten was this AMA answer from franchise co-creator Michael Dante DiMartino in 2016, two years after the show ended and a year before the first graphic novels did come out:

“Yes, hopefully in the [Korra] comics, we’ll have a chance to go to the Fire Nation and see how it has changed since A:TLA.”

Since then, as previously discussed, two comic trilogies have come and gone, obviously not getting closer to the Fire Nation-- and I would actually argue entrenching themselves further away from it.

I want to make it clear that I’m against fan entitlement. Creatives telling the tales they want to in service of the story and the artform is how the industry should run. I’m just hoping to offer some perspective on how we got to where we are almost a decade into the era of Korra and the metatextual pacing of the franchise itself.

Either way, the next Korra comic trilogy has been official confirmed by the editor for Avatar at Dark Horse Comics in this informal statement on Twitter:

We’re not ready to announce any details yet, but we are working on the next trilogy. I really appreciate your patience and hope it’s worth the wait! ✨

There’s currently some kind of holdup for which we really have zero context or information, and we of course have no idea what this next trilogy will be about. (I do speculate a bit on what it could be a few paragraphs down.)

But, like what turned out to be Ruins of the Empire before it, I faithfully made a mockup graphic for my post announcing the confirmation of the next The Legend of Korra graphic novel trilogy. And like before, I chose to completely speculatively and blindly make it Fire Nation-y, as if the next comic could/would(/should?) feature it. This is mainly because I feel like that’s what most people’s eyes would be caught by and thus result in the most successful post (hey, at least I’m honest), but also because it’s just fun.

Here are both images, from 2018 and 2020 respectively:

→ 🌺 Speculative edits I made for my posts on the announcement of previous and upcoming Korra comics before we knew anything about them.

In both cases, the response was huge, and people were super excited about the prospect of Fire Nation content just from my quick speculative mockups. I am of course hoping that the new artwork I made of the Krew for this post will have a similar effect (it’s the first time I just straight-up drew it instead of editing existing images) but again it’s really mostly just for fun.

Anyway, until the next trilogy is properly revealed, we’ll just have to wait and see.

However, that’s not the only place this could happen.

Are they saving the Fire Nation for an animated movie?

With Avatar’s HUGE success on Netflix last year, interest in the franchise rocketed to an all-time high. The streaming wars have begun, and Avatar’s owner and its parent company, Nickelodeon and ViacomCBS, have finally started to notice.

ViacomCBS is launching Paramount+ on March 4th, a relaunch of its existing streaming service CBS All Access. Paramount+ is meant to be a big expansion and refocus to compete with the big hitters: Disney+, HBO Max, and, yes, Netflix. (There’s quite an entanglement there, with Netflix being the home of Avatar’s big year and the upcoming live-action series.)

One of the keys to a successful streamer today is high-profile originals to drive new subscribers. ViacomCBS knows this and they know Avatar has just become among the highest profiles a property can have, breaking records and going toe-to-toe with other big-hitting sci-fi/fantasy/genre franchises. This knowledge goes right to the top of the food chain: the CEO of ViacomCBS mentioned Avatar by name when discussing potential originals for Paramount+.

I have previously discussed how The Search relates to this. The Search was the second ATLA comic trilogy, focused on the search for Zuko’s mother in the thick of the Fire Nation, and if you didn’t know, it was originally pitched by Bryke as an animated movie after the original series ended.

I just want to be clear that what I’m discussing here is purely speculative, but this is the only other piece of the Avatar franchise that we know was optioned for animation besides the shows themselves. It’s possible they would be interested in going back to this idea as a Paramount+ original (and it would certainly be popular among audiences), but it is of course set during the era of Aang and thus covers both a time period we’ve already seen, and also by nature of already being released as comics, events we’ve already seen too.

However, the whole point of this article is that there is one major, huge thing we haven’t seen yet, with massive anticipation building for a decade behind it: the Fire Nation in the era of Korra. So, again, this is just speculation, but it’s also possible that they could return to the very smallest seed of the original idea for a The Search movie, and do a Fire Nation-focused Korra movie now.

→ 🌺 ATLA’s Fire Nation-focused The Search was originally pitched as an animated movie.

You can skip this next part if you don’t want to see me embarrassingly promote my fan idea 😆 but this is where the artwork I made for this article comes into play. The general idea for it, and the reason I tried to replicate the show’s style as much as possible, is that it’s what a Fire Nation-focused movie could maybe look like. Something as standalone and unrelated to Earth Kingdom drama as possible, with fresh new looks for the Krew to get people excited for something fresh and new! I really feel like the Avatar franchise has so much potential for expanded content like this, that’s why I have high hopes that Paramount+ will make the most out of it! You can see the individual characters’ artwork in larger size here. Ok I’m done back to business.

If the idea of a movie seems too impossible to you, we can also take a deeper look at Bryke’s involvement with upcoming comics instead.

After Korra ended, they officially each went their separate ways. They vaguely consulted on Avatar stuff, and Mike of course wrote the Korra comics, but Bryan was planning on writing and drawing his own original non-Avatar comic series and Mike was releasing his own non-Avatar novels. This all appears to have come to a stop when they signed on to showrun the live-action retelling of ATLA at Netflix, officially reuniting the partnership and committing to Avatar again in a big way. Of course, they ended up leaving that project over creative differences, but it did result in a big, lasting change: this time they remained official creative partners and have indicated they’re still working on Avatar now, together. This is a far cry from the official breakup after Korra, so it begs the question what exactly they’re working on. I of course have my fanciful predictions of a sprawling expansion of the Avatar franchise at Paramount+, but what if it’s actually a combination of the ingredients from before the live-action series...

More speculation, but what if the reason for all the mystery behind the next Korra comics is because they will be made by Bryke, with the two of them co-writing and Bryan doing the art for the first time? If that’s the case, they could want to make them a bigger deal than the other Avatar comics have been so far, and maybe that’s why it’s taking so long to iron everything out, have a more significant story, have more of a marketing push, etc. If they’ve been saving the Fire Nation for something big, this could be it.

I personally think this is less likely than a show or movies or something, but it is possible. Anything is possible right now since we know so little about the large-scale direction of the franchise moving forward, just that it’s gonna get big.

⛰️🌋 The Fire Nation in the era of Avatar Kyoshi

We’re not done! Despite everything I’ve written here, believe it or not, the Fire Nation was actually the star of the show in the last year.

With the debut of the Avatar franchise’s first original novels, Kyoshi made a huge splash (in a way only she can). If you haven’t read them yet, you NEED to-- they’re some of the best Avatar content EVER. The Rise of Kyoshi hit shelves in 2019 and The Shadow of Kyoshi followed in 2020. The latter is of particular interest here, because it was almost entirely set in the Fire Nation and featured practically everything and anything you could want from a visit to elusive islands. Though obviously set in a historical period some four hundred years before Aang’s time, Kyoshi’s sojourn in the Fire Nation gave us a huge amount of new information, a depth and breadth of worldbuilding, culture, and character we’ve never really seen in Avatar before. It truly makes the most of the literary medium, so hats off to author F. C. Yee for the passion and effort he put in.

In The Shadow of Kyoshi, we learn about the era of the previous fire Avatar before Roku, Avatar Szeto. Through Kyoshi and her own Team Avatar, we learn about the different clans and islands of the Fire Nation, as they experience the fraught early reign of Fire Lord Zoryu and the conflict between the Keohso and Saowon clans, culminating in the Camellia-Peony War. We get a multitude of fleshed-out perspectives from the upper crust to the flea-bitten underworld, matching the heights of the worldbuilding quality of Republic City. It’s such cool, intricate stuff, and really shows Avatar’s potential (and that’s all just the worldbuilding-- the character work is also top-notch).

That’s not the only place the Fire Nation has shone recently. One of Insight Editions’ awesome scrapbooks, Legacy of the Fire Nation, gave us a tour through the royal family’s history, including never-before-seen looks at young Iroh and Ozai and much, much more.

All this just goes to show that the Fire Nation has been a hot ticket throughout the ages and there’s one conspicuous gap in that history: the era of Avatar Korra. With so much recent expansion and development of the Fire Nation in our world, it would be perfect to see the culmination of it all in the current time period in the world of Avatar too.

If this made you excited for the potential of what the Avatar franchise could look like in the coming years, same boat!

The next concrete date where something could be announced is February 24th, when ViacomCBS will host their investor day and present their streaming strategy, including Paramount+ originals. There’s no guarantee Avatar is mentioned, but I’m keeping a hopeful eye out.

As for comics, Dark Horse’s schedule marches to its own beat, so there’s no way to know when the next drop of information is coming our way.

Could this finally be the comics that take us to the Fire Nation, or could the much-anticipated visit be in another medium like animation? Stay tuned-- as always I’ll post as soon as we learn anything new!

#korra comics #paramount plus #the fire nation awaits

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lucy-dont-give-a-fuck · 3 years

Text

Jet in the Fire Nation

While I was thinking on the Princess Usha AU (Fem!Zuko) I thought of Jet accompanying the gaang on their travels through the fire nation.

Yes, this will contain jetko, thankyou very much

In my particular version (only what I think, please check the tag and other users fics, THEY ARE AWESOME!) Jet doesn’t die and has a kind of relationship with Usha. When they fight Azula in the crystal catacombs she doesn’t go with her or the gaang, being separated as she tries to save aang and help all of them to escape. Jet and the freedom fighters escape with the gaang wich would mean he gets on the stolen fire nation ship and later goes to the fire nation.

I think this could be a great situation to explore his character, to develop him even more.

1) his relationships with Sokka and Katara:

This teens are now stucked together on a ship, what could go wrong? Tensions would be on an all high road, that plus the fact no one knows if aang is gonna survive and the sudden knowledge that Jet’s girlfriend was the firelord daughter and that she betray her whole ass nation.

Jet, who probably slowly had come to terms that not all firebenders are monsters (maybe Usha talked with him and made him realize that), would be so conflicted, maybe regressing into anger. This would be a great moment for him and Sokka to bond over beating the other. A good heart to heart fist fight. Maybe he ends up braking down and we get to see things from his perspective, the boy who’s family was murdered in fromt of his eyes and was fuled by hate, the boy that lost everything he had twice and when he makes a genuin conection, when he starts to see things over the haze of revenge and hate, she ends up being the daughter of the monster under the bed, the one who ordered her village to be destroyed. Sokka hates this guy, he is an asshole who broke his sister’s heart, who wanted to destroy a village, who was totally daranged, but now he sees him, broke down, weak, compleatly defeated. This makes him reconsider, to see things differently, after all, they are all in the same boat right? Now they can’t fight eachother, they need whoever can fight against the firelord on their side. With that in mind they start to bond, to comprehend eachother, they are not friends by any means but they have eachothers backs. Maybe he helps him to work through his PTSD? Being him to help him stay calm when they travel through the fire nation? making him remember this are civilians, not the enemy? Maybe becoming friends at the end of the journery????

On other hand we have Katara who HATES THIS DUDE GUTS and is on edge, like she never was. So at first she is openly hostile towards him, being coldly civil when needed and compleatly detesting how “friendly” his brother is towards Jet. Maybe it comes to a point that even Toph calls her out, she loves chaos but this is too much. It gets worse when Jet becomes actually helpful, wooing people to get out of problems, get information and cheper things/free things, when he starts befriending aang who gave him a second chance, when he and Sokka understand eachother. It all could explode with Hama, here is when shit hits the fan for both her and Jet. For Jet, he realize he would have ended like Hama, they have more or less the same core story. Is this what he will become? This monster? Maybe he breaks down again having a fight with Katara has to confront the fact that Jet isn’t this two dimensional jerk that broke her heart and tried to flood a village, that he is a victim just like her and that if she continues her path she could end like him and Hama. From here we could have them both start working things, both helping the other to heal while still being snarky and a bit hostile.

2) The fire nation

This guy, who’s village was wipe out, who saw his parents being murdered by fire benders, who spend big part of his life fighting against anyone of the fire nation, is now on enemy territory. Can you imagine how nerve wracking that must be? He would be on edge 24/7, waiting for the other shoe to drop, jumping everytime someone firebends. Now he has to confronts that these are real people, with emotions and lives, that they are not the enemy, maybe even getting angry and cofused with himself after some time not thinking about it, just interacting and living. And then he starts to hear the stories about Usha. Here she isn’t the exiled princess who disrespected her father. Yes, she was exiled but no one knows why, her scarring is probably an open secret, everyone coming up with their own story. She is a hero, she stopped the slaughter of the 41st Division, she visited injured soldier, she was KIND. He hears them and the pain of feeling betray, of knowing that she is the daughter of a monster, lessens, she is her own persona, she is different, she isn’t a monster. And later let’s add all the rumors about the princess returns, about the sightings and the call to join the avatar and stop the fire lord. He sure is gonna kiss this woman when they meet again.

I just think this would be an excelent way to devolp him even more and make an interesting story.

#princess usha #jetko #fem!zuko #fem zuko #avatar the last airbender #atla #atla au #prince zuko #zuko

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bluepluto03 · 4 years

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I’m working on an atla yt au and I wanna ramble about it

- so jsyk it takes place in like a modern/atla fusion world, so they have modern tech as well as bending and atla animals

- note that when I say fusion I don’t mean modern America w/ benders. I mean I literally spent 4 hrs developing/world building what I thought the avatar universe would be like a thousand yrs post cannon, including cities, really basic politics, an education system, a job/degree/aprenticeship system that is very different from our own job market, bending certification, a back story for the dragons, a fifth air temple bc the genocide never happened, and some other stuff as well.

- (all of that for a youtube au. *sigh*. can anyone explain why I’m like this?)

- anyway the Gaang all have like 1 joint account that they’ll post to as well as their own main accounts. (They also have another joint account where they get someone to make like compilations of funny stuff from their vids and they donate all the revenue that acct makes)

- technically the only ppl officially apart of the Gaang/able to post on the joint channel are Aang, Sokka, Katara, Toph, suki, zuko* and yue. (Though yue posts there very rarely) but a lot of their friends are also YouTube’s and they like constantly collab w/ them to the point of them basically being honorary members

- * zuko doesn’t make a channel for a while,,, he just keeps appearing in his friends videos until ppl start demanding that he makes his own channel

- at first he’s like,,,,, nah bc he Legally is supposed to stay out of the public eye. (Bc of Scar Related Reasons) but eventually he’s like “actually fuck it” and does anyway

- so he just does a lot of random stuff bc he’s just,,,,, himself he has no freaking clue how to social media. Tho he does a lot of showing off his firebending and sword play stuff. As well as introducing everyone to the literal seven turtle ducks he owns

- aang shows off air bending plus has tutorials on animal care and gives advice. Also slot of vids about having good mental health, and random video game stuff

- Katara only really does video game stuff w/ others but she mainly does like water bending stuff, informational videos about healing (both bending based and traditional medicine based), and life advice bc she cares about everyone!!

- Sokka does a lot of video game stuff as well as lots of different weapon stuff! Tho obviously he specializes in the boomerang and sword. Zuko was on his channel a lot b4 making his own and ppl wondered if they were together since Sokka was very openly bi. (They were and ofc everyone freaked)

(Although on that note pls remember shipping real ppl is gross ty have a nice day)

- Toph!! Obvi earthbending but also Literally Teaching Metalbending since she u know invented it?? Also she has a podcast and has a lot of random asf vids on her channel

- suki!!!! She does a lot of makeup stuff, both traditional Kyoshi warrior makeup and those really out there types of makeup where ppl turn their faces into canvases. As well as obviously showing off her incredible skills

- yue does a lot of informational vids especially about the history of the water tribes and spirits! Also a short series of her doing suki’s nails bc for some reason suki is really bad at them?? Dispite being super precise with makeup???

(Spoiler alert suki just wants an excuse to hold her wife’s hand. Yes suki and yue are married don’t @ me)

- the main channel is mostly for them goofing around. They don’t have to put cross overs there (and they don’t put all of em there) but the main channel is just filled with them hanging out and being dumbasses. Also suki doing Sokka and aang’s makeup while yue does zuko’s nails.

- iroh gets featured in a couple of advice giving videos and somehow ends up with a Twitter that he just uses to give wholesome advice to anyone who needs it!

- Sokka and aang have a series doing a “buzzfeed unsolved” type thing w/ spirits. Except. U know. spirits are real. so poor aang is dragged along as Sokka cusses out random spirits apologizing after every word Sokka says.

- mai, ty lee, and azula have a channel called “the killer trio”. Mostly to show off ty lee’s acrobatics, mai’s knives/knife skills, and occasionally azula and her fire bending

- (azula is nice bc she left w/ zuko and Ursa when they were 11/13, then got A lot of Therapy. Now she’s on good terms w/ her fam, including her step dad and step sister)

- anyway bc her and zuko legally u know. Have to stay out of the public she very rarely goes on camera. When she does it’s usually wide shots sparring w/ one of her gf’s or her face is blurred. Her identity becomes a huge mystery and she’s just referred to as “the blue fire bender” bc that’s all anyone really knows about them

- she’s way more parinoid than zuko bc she’s actually a lot more scared of their dad and is trying to protect her brother even if he won’t protect himself

- ofc zuko eventually drops the truth of the whole thing (azula is like bitch wtf??? do u want Ozai to send a hitman after u???) but after all the legal stuff azula just. Casually posts a pic of mai and ty lee both kissing her on the cheek and the internet explodes

- (they knew mai and ty lee were dating but holy shit they’re dating the blue fire bender??? And she lives with them??? And she’s zuko’s sister??!?!)

- teo and his dad have an inventing channel and ofc Sokka shows up pretty regularly

- Haru has a very small channel mostly for fun tho he’s gotten his butt kicked in some of toph’s vids

- ppl like the bolder do not have channels they’re the equivalent of like actual famous wrestlers. Toph has invited them over to fight and has beaten all of them

- zuko has a video titled “I swear to Agni I can explain”. He posted it after about 3 months of not posting. The video features druk’s introduction.

#atla youtube au #atla #zuko #aang #toph #katara #sokka #suki #yue #iroh #azula #mai #ty lee #atla au #my post #my wiritng #my wips

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radishaur · 4 years

Note

May I please request 87, 93 & 95 from dialogue prompts to make a reader swoon for Zuko? I'm in the mood for something angsty. Thank you!!

We love a good angst moment. I hope this lives up to your expectations! I might write an optional happy ending later on, but for now I’m going to leave this one open ended. I feel like that’s the ultimate angst. Just not knowing. Anyways, I hope you enjoy! For those who haven’t read the prompt list here they are. #87 is “Don’t tell me you love me unless you mean it”, #93 is “They told me that you’d break my heart but, holy shit, they never said it’d feel like this”, and #95 is “I just want you to be happy, even if your happiness doesn’t include me, I just want you happy”.

- Zoe

•••

All Just Lies (Zuko x Reader)

Warnings: None

Genre: Angst

Part: 1/3

Summary: See Request

•••

You hated Ba Sing Se. It all seemed too happy. Traveling with the Avatar had shown you that pretty much every town was touched by the war in some way. Even if it wasn’t physically touched, the stress and emotions that war brought along was undeniably present everywhere you went. Everywhere expect here. To you, Ba Sing Se seemed just too good to be true.

There wasn’t any mention of the war anywhere you went. Not a single conversation or passing comment. Not even the hint of one.

Granted, you had only been allowed to stay in the Upper ring of the city. It was easy for rich socialites to ignore the hardships of war. You wanted to explore the other rings, but Joo Dee had insisted that you stay with the group to be under her careful guidance. You weren’t buying it. She was hiding something for sure.

That’s why you decided to sneak into the lower rings on your own. You pretended to be sick and left the house when the group had gone with Joo Dee. And that’s how you found him. You were walking around the lower ring watching for anything out of the ordinary when you saw him.

He was serving tea to an old couple with a forced smile on his face. His hair was longer than it had been the last time you had seen him and you probably wouldn’t have recognized him if it wasn’t for the scar. It made him hard to miss.

You decided to watch him carefully to see what he was up to. You spent the entire day outside of the shop and he simply continued serving tea. You were about to leave when you saw him walk outside. You hid further in the alley way as he began looking around. He had his hair smoothed down the middle which made you laugh. He looked ridiculous. It was almost worse than the ponytail. Almost.

Your mouth hit the floor when you saw a girl come up to his side and ruffle his hair. You trailed after them as she brought him to a restaurant. You watched in disbelief as you began to realize what exactly you were watching. Prince Zuko of the Fire Nation was on a date.

You continued watching mostly to make sure he really wasn’t onto anything, but also out of curiosity. Unfortunately, you let your curiosity get the better of you. When you saw him kiss his date you accidentally knocked over a crate. You snapped your head to see Zuko staring at you, recognition crossing his face. You had been seen. You immediately ran off to avoid him finding you, but no such luck.

Just when you thought you were out of sight, you felt a warm hand grab your wrist and yank you into a dark alley way. Zuko stood in front of you with the familiar angry glimmer in his eyes.

“What are you doing here?” he growled, his hold on my wrist still firm.

“What are you doing here?” I shot back.

“I’m the one asking the questions. Answer me,” he ordered.

His grip was beginning to get warm as he struggled to contain his anger. I wanted to rip my arm away but I knew he was stronger than me.

“I was trying to figure out why this place gives me the creeps. I stumbled across your little tea shop as I was exploring,” I answered, desperately hoping that he would let go of my wrist.

“You’re lying,” he hissed, his palm now beginning to burn my skin.

I whimpered slightly and began to tug my wrist out of his grip. He held on tighter which caused me to let out a small cry of pain. At that, his eyes widened in shock and he cursed slightly under his breath as he let go. I cradled my wrist in my other hand and saw that it had burned slightly.

“Come with me,” he huffed, reaching out to grab my arm again.

I immediately back up against the wall and looked up at him in fear. I was stupid for believing that this would end any other way than badly. Why did I have to trail him on his stupid date.

His eyes softened at my response and he seemed almost upset as he realized I was terrified. He ran a hand through his hair and sighed.

“I’m not going to hurt you. My Uncle can fix your burn,” he said.

I hesitated, but decided to go with him. His Uncle was a kind man and the burn on my skin was really painful. Not to mention that it was dark out. I didn’t want to walk alone in this part of town injured. I sighed before nodding and following him as he lead me to their apartment.

When his Uncle opened the door and saw me, he sent his nephew a questioning look. I waved slightly and his eyes widened when he saw the burn on my wrist. He immediately pulled us inside.

“I see my nephew has still not learned to control his temper,” he scolded as he sat me down on the couch.

“She was following me!” he exclaimed, sitting himself down on the opposite end of the couch.

“So you burned me? That seems equal,” I snipped back in response, glaring at him.

“You know, I liked you better when you were terrified,” he snarled.

That earned him a smack against the back of his head from his Uncle. I had to hold a hand up to my mouth to muffle my laughter. Zuko was practically glaring daggers into me.

As his Uncle parched me up, I continued to explain what I was really doing in the lower ring and why I had been following Zuko. That lead to his Uncle explaining why they were there in the first place. To say I was shocked was an understatement. I promised not to tell the others they were here in exchange for them letting me check up on them. Just to make sure they kept true to their word.

The gaang had been super worried when I finally got home, but I gave them a story about how I had burned myself trying to cook while they were gone and had to go get myself patched up. They all seemed to buy it.

For the next few weeks, I continued to do surveillance checks on Zuko and his Uncle. At first they were just that: checks. I would slip in and out. But they soon became longer and longer. I got to know them both and I would even have called Zuko a friend. As my stays became longer and longer, Zuko and I became closer and closer. Eventually, we even started dating.

He seemed happy. He had given up on searching for Aang and seemed to be content living the rest of his life here with his Uncle. He made me laugh and he treated me well. It was everything I could have hoped for, until it wasn’t anymore.

When the time came to choose, he chose Azula. I managed to hold them off with Uncle as Katara escaped with Aang, but I was then taken as a prisoner. Zuko didn’t visit me the entire ship ride back to the Fire Nation. The first time I saw him after his betrayal was a week after his return.

“You have a visitor,” the guard informed me.

I was shocked to see who it was. There Zuko stood, a plate of food in hand and an unreadable expression on his face. I glared at him and stayed silent as he sat down on the floor outside my cell.

“I brought you some food. I figured you might be hungry,” he said, shoving the plate under the whole in the bars.

“I have no interest in speaking with you,” I growled, turning my head away from him and crossing my arms.

“I thought you might say that. So, all I ask is that you hear me out,” he pleaded.

He took my silence as his invitation.

“I know you don’t understand and that you’re upset. But you have to understand that I did what I had to do. This is where I belong and I wasn’t going to give it up. But I still.....that doesn’t mean I don’t miss you. That I don’t still have feelings for you,” he said, scooting closer to the bars in an attempt to get my attention.

I scoffed at that. If he thought I was stupid enough to believe that he had another thing coming. I expected him to get angry and yell at me for not responding. What I didn’t expect is what he actually did.

“Y/N, I’m in love with you,” he said quietly.

His words broke my heart into a million pieces. I clutched my fists at my side and turned to look at him.

“Don’t you dare say that. Don’t tell me you love me unless you mean it”, I spat venemously, “Which, by the way, I can assure you you don’t.”

“You can’t tell me what I feel!” he exclaimed, finally giving me the angry response I was expecting.

“Oh really?” I challenged, turning my body to face him, “If you loved me, would I be sitting in this cell right now?”

“That’s not-“ he began, but I cut him off.

“Everything you’re saying is a lie! It’s all a lie!” I screamed, pointing a finger at him in accusation, “I’m in this cell because you decided to sacrifice your Uncle and I for your own selfish need. You gave up the only two people who cared about you for a man who burned you and threw you away.”

“Shut your mouth,” he hissed, small flames igniting in his hands.

“And don’t think I haven’t heard about your new girlfriend. Mai, I believe her name was,” I said cooly, leaning back against the wall.

He was shocked into silence. The flames that were in his palms immediately disappeared.

“H-How....How did you even find out about that?” he asked in disbelief.

“Maybe you didn’t visit me on the ship ride home, but your sister sure did,” I said, wiping at a stray tear that had begun to fall.

“Oh,” was all he said.

His head hung in shame. I shook my head and laughed as I wiped yet another tear from my cheeks.

“Can you believe I was stupid enough to fall for you? I even told my friends about you,” I said, chuckling slightly about my own stupidity.

“You did?” he asked.

“Katara saw you and your Uncle in the upper ring when Iroh opened The Jasmine Dragon. I told her you had changed,” I let myself laugh at the last sentence, “I told everyone about us and how much I cared about you. And do you know what Katara said?”

He didn’t say anything.

“She told me that I was a fool. Who knew just how right she would be,” I sighed.

“Y/N, I didn’t do this to hurt you,” he argued, clearly grasping at straws for what to say.

“I should have listened to them. They all warned me. They told me that you’d break my heart but, holy shit, they never said it’d feel like this,” I admitted, now letting the tears fall shamelessly.

“You could have come home with me. The Fire Nation would have welcomed you as a hero,” he said.

“You’re delusional. I’m not from the Fire Nation. I’m your enemy. I’d be in this same spot wether I helped you or not,” I snapped back, my temper finally getting the better of me.

“I knew this was a bad idea! I take back everything I said. You can sit in this cell and rot away for all I care!” he exclaimed, standing up and throwing fire at the wall in frustration.

I watched him and I couldn’t help but feel so sad. Sad about what could have been if things had been different. If we had not been on opposite sides of a war we never asked for. I wanted to be angry at him, but I couldn’t. I looked at him and smiled.

“You know, even after everything, I don’t hate you. In fact, I know I’m in love with you. I just want you to be happy, even if your happiness doesn’t include me, I just want you happy,” I said sadly.

He stopped at my words. I could tell he was struggling with what to do next.

“I hope the sacrifice was worth it,” I said, turning my head to hide my tears.

“What kind of mind games are you trying to play?” he snarled.

“I’m not playing any game, Zuko. When you truly love someone, you want them to be happy no matter what,” I huffed, desperately wishing he would leave.

I just wanted to lay down and cry. I wanted to cry until my head hurt and my eyes were puffy and red. I wanted to cry until my voice gave out. I wanted to mourn what we had so I could forget about him.

Zuko didn’t say anything. He stood up and opened the door as if to leave. He paused to look over at me one last time.

“Goodbye, Prince Zuko,” I said, smiling sadly.

He slammed the cell door. The sound reverberated back and forth into nothing. And the silence was back. The horrible, head splitting silence that comes after such a moment.

The calm after a storm.

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