Katara's Lightning: waterbending technique
Part 2
By a happy coincidence, one firebender who just knows how to redirect lightning joined the Gaang. You have no idea how excited I was when I realized the potential for Zuko and Katara's interaction in this concept.
Two benders of opposing elements turn to each other's elements to master one phenomenon: lightning. She's a waterbender who creates this lightning, and he's a firebender who repels it. One draws these skills from the other's martial art: lightning redirection is based on the concept of waterbending, while lightning is a firebending technique.
This is not just a combination of elements, it's their unification into something whole. Mix water and fire! It would seem impossible, but Katara and Zuko are people who have always gone beyond human capabilities to achieve their goals. If they can't do it, no one can.
Thus, by blurring the boundaries between fire and water, they destroy the illusion of difference between peoples (if you remember, this topic was raised by Guru Pathik in book 2). People of water and fire can work together, help and even complement each other.
After all, in fact, each of them makes up for the lack of the other. Katara can't control the lightning, and Zuko can't create it to further deflect it. They need each other for the balance of power. Like Yin and Yang, like day and night, like the sun and moon. How beautiful it is, I can’t.
I think the whole idea of Katara personifying anger would have continued with Zuko joining the team. When he appeared, she found nothing better than to center her rage on him. He betrayed her, this is justified anger. He's the prince of the nation that started the war, he is responsible for these horrors. He's the son of the one who ordered her mother killed.
However, Zuko did something that no one expected, especially Katara: he allowed her to let go of the anger of her life. He achieved this by redirecting the power of her rage to the real culprit of all Katara's worries - the murderer of her mother. And the reprisal against him gave her inner peace and a solution to a problem that seemed unsolvable.
Her anger was just like lightning, which was eager to strike at least someone, just to throw out the accumulated energy. Righteous, but throwing itself at everyone. Zuko didn't hide it, didn't calm it down, but redirected it to where it was needed, finding the necessary target.
This is another metaphorical aspect of their joint technique. He learned to channel her lightning not just through training, but through interaction and strengthening their personal connection. And the result was that understanding at a glance, which formed the basis of their fighting style. I don't know about you, but I thought this summed up their relationship perfectly.
Thus, from now on, she can rely on Zuko and trust him not only with the emotional burden, but also with their lives in the midst of a storm, both metaphorical and literal. After all, she knows that he will always deflect lightning from innocent...
Remember this moment? Zuko and Katara fight back to back, showing their shared trust in each other and cooperation as warriors. But imagine if, on top of everything else, they trained a joint technique for generating lightning and then directing it. It looks so cool in my head, it’s a pity I’m not an animator and/or storyboard artist, I don’t know how to stage scenes (((
And then, when lightning seemingly brought Zuko and Katara together, it ended up nearly tearing them apart, taking his life.
Because Zuko will always deflect lightning from Katara…
< Part 1
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Just re-watched the first 2 episodes of ATLA again, and 😂:
[ID: Text saying "When anything at all happens in the Odyssey. Odysseus:" It then shows a meme of Sokka on Zuko's ship from a scene in ATLA s1e2. He is exasperatedly chipping away the ice Katara accidentally waterbent around his feet. His dialogue text has been edited to say "I'm just a guy with an extreme need to get home and see my wife again. I didn't ask for all this flying and magic." /end ID]
When my two current obsessions collide XD
(More of an EpicTM Ody meme, but it works for the broader Odyssey too so.)
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Toph Beifong (Avatar: The Last Airbender)
[Image Description: From the official show. Toph, a light-skinned young girl with shorter black hair, sits in a brown seat. She has pale blue (Almost white) eyes and is waving a hand in front of her eyes with a smile. Her clothing is mainly shades of green, brown, and yellow. She is in the sky above a desert, riding on a white fluffy creature that is partially visible. Another individual is partially visible in the background. End ID.]
Toph is blind.
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[Image ID: A caption that reads "Things that disappear when you need them the most". Beneath are 4 panels of different images. Clockwise from the top left: a pair of silver keys, a brown wallet, a white smartphone with the screen turned off, Aang from Avatar the Last Airbender /.End ID]
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[start image description: 3 digital grayscale drawings of Edric Tosser and Atlas Guerra from the game Blaseball. Edric Tosser is a cantonese jewish person, with choppy hair shaved on the sides. Atlas is a fat fillipino person with short black hair and choppy bangs.
The first image is of Atlas looking at something from the side, with Edric resting their head on her shoulder.
The second image depicts the two of them from the back. Edric is waving at something as Atlas leans inwards, hand near his back.
The third image is of the two of them leaning on each other, asleep. Atlas rests her head on Edric’s shoulder as they lean their head on top of hers. /end image description.]
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[ID: Fan art of Yue from Avatar the Last Airbender doing a piece sign, shown from the shoulders up. She’s smiling happily with her eyes closed. Her outfit consists of a white headscarf, purple under-scarf, and purple robe over a darker purple shirt. The background is blank apart from a large circle behind Yue, which is made from cloudy purple texture. /end ID]
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