slipperywhenavatar:
ikkinthekitsune:
slipperywhenavatar:
[snip]
You’re not interested in debating, and yet you posted a massive rant anyway. Perhaps you might consider better uses of your time?
Alright, 1) I wrote that when I only expected to respond with a paragraph or two, but then I actually started skimming your post (which tbh I still haven’t fully read) and saw other stuff I wanted to respond to. 2) You’re the one who’s basically spent the last five months complaining about this show. Perhaps you might consider better uses of your time?
So… you wrote something thinking you were going to end the debate, cherry-picked things to respond to, ended up writing a massive rambling monster of a post, and didn’t go back to get rid of the part where you said you thought talking to me was a waste of time?
Allow me to register my suspicions as to the nature of your decision to imply that discussing things with me was a waste of time. =P
Also: I never said that debating about stuff was a waste of time in and of itself. I love debating. It’s a whole lot of fun to figure out ways to undermine opponents’ arguments and convince neutral parties that my position is better founded in the source material, and I’m pretty sure the practice these sorts of debates offer helps me improve at tasks required in my RL job (part of which involves, uh, figuring out ways to undermine opponents’ arguments and convince neutral parties that my position is better founded in source material =D ).
However, if you’re going to say, “I’m not really interested much in debating this further because I can see it not going anywhere,” you really should act like it instead of just using it as a way to imply that you don’t see me as worth your time. -_-
Anyway, my point wasn’t that Korra intended to seize control of the army – my point was that she planned to use it for her own ends regardless of Raiko’s own explicit intentions. > The plan Korra took from Varrick was always to take the troops to the south under Raiko’s nose. (“We don’t need the President to go to the South. We just need the troops, let’s go straight to them! If there’s one thing I know about troops, it’s that they love fighting.”) That Iroh’s implementation of that plan involved manipulation instead of outright theft doesn’t change that
And, honestly, forcing the URN into a war that didn’t concern them was already going rogue. What do you think would have happened if Iroh’s ships ran into Water Tribe resistance? People would have died, for the express purpose of causing enough outrage that Raiko wouldn’t have been able to stay out of the war. (The plan probably wouldn’t have even worked in the absence of casualties.)
Again, for what Korra did to come even close to what Kuvira’s done on the remotest level, she would have needed control. She wasn’t using it to her own ends, if she was doing what she wanted she’d be in the South fighting. She’s in RC on behalf of her father, trying to get RC into the war and to offer it it’s support. She’s there on behalf of her homeland, not just for her own ends. Hell, it wasn’t even her idea, it was Varrick’s (who was purposefully manipulating everyone into furthering the war for his own benefit). If this is as bad as your claiming it is intended to make Korra “Kuvira-like”, than so are Asami, Varrick, Bolin, and Iroh II, and probably all of the SWT that would have been totally on board for it.
I think you missed the point of the comparison, which wasn’t that Korra’s misappropriation of the UF was equivalent to Kuvira taking over the Earth Kingdom, but rather than Korra ignored the wishes of a head of state and tried to use his military in ways that he expressly rejected, and was entirely unconcerned about the collateral damage and casualties that would inevitably entail.
(Asami and Bolin seemed mostly naive, but Varrick was more anti-villain than anti-hero at that point and Iroh II seemed to be totally down for treason as long as he thought he could get away with it. Since you seem to put so much stock in Bryke’s fiat, they actually said flat-out that what Iroh was doing was really questionable.)
Regardless, one action that is (arguably) on level with Kuvira’s actions hardly puts Korra on Kuvira’s level. That’s severely overblowing Korra’s actions and severely downplaying Kuvira’s.
It’s not just one action; you just chose to split it off to pretend that that was my sole point of contention.
Kuvira was a ruthless dictator seizing as much power and control as she could through manipulation and force. Korra was trying to put an end to a war, Kuvira was trying to start one.
You seem to put way too much stock in what a character “is” and far too little in what they do. Kuvira’s character wasn’t defined solely by “ruthless dictator,” even if she shared some of the traits of one. She wanted to reunite the Earth Kingdom because she was convinced that that was what it would take for her nation to be able to defend itself, even if the end result was unnecessary war. Likewise, Korra wanted to do what it took to give her tribe the ability to defend itself and ward off Northern aggression, but the end result would inevitably have been unnecessary war – even if her intent was to end the War of the Water Tribes, her methods involved dragging an innocent nation into a war that its leader wanted no part of.
In any case, I wouldn’t compare Korra’s attempted misappropriation of the UF to Kuvira taking control of the Earth Kingdom so much as Kuvira taking Su’s security force to Ba Sing Se. And, in my last post, my point had more to do with the fact that Korra had done things that could have potentially resulted in lots of casualties than even that.
Still, there’s this assumption, which I’ve seen even from you (and might even be something you’ve been pushing out?) that Kuvira is “Korra if she’d gone rogue”. That’s just not the case. Is it similar to what Kuvira did there? Maybe on some surface level look at it, but it’s also a completely different situation.
Kuvira isn’t Korra-gone-rogue in the sense that Kuvira is what Korra would be if she went bad. It’s more that Kuvira’s actions reflect the result of Korra’s flaws taken to their ultimate extreme, albeit in service of a goal that Korra didn’t necessarily share (making her nation strong enough so it wouldn’t be vulnerable again).
Those two situations aren’t similar. Korra persuading a general to fight in a war is radically different from Kuvira actually stealing Su’s security force and charging it into Ba Sing Se.
Iroh didn’t have any authority to get the UF involved in a war that Raiko (the commander-in-chief) didn’t sign on to. Iroh’s position with regards to Raiko, in fact, was essentially identical to Kuvira’s with regards to Su – he had the responsibility for implementing military action, but the choice of whether to take action rested with someone above him on the chain of command.
Have you ever heard of a little thing called Death of the Author?
Have you ever heard of “pinning way too much onto your own analysis to the point where even the creators can’t convince you you’re wrong”?
As much as they might want to be gatekeepers of canon or whatever,
No no, they just ARE the gatekeepers of canon. All the tumblr meta in the world won’t change that.
Bryke don’t really have the authority to tell us how to interpret their show. They can say whatever they want about Korra (though I think you’ve kind of misrepresented them in your descriptions of what they said =P ), but it won’t change the fact that Korra has done some really messed up stuff that positions her far closer to Kuvira than to Aang.
No, but if you’re analysis contradicts both the show and the creators, you really don’t have the right to tell other people we’re wrong about the show, wrong for liking it as it’s presented, or that you have personal authority over characters.
Also, those excerpts are from a larger interview, and if you clicked on the link or watched the video, I’d hardly say the context changes it too much.
Again, you overselling Korra’s “really messed up stuff” to fit your own view that “Korra = Kuvira!” rather than adjusting your view based off what we actually see and how these things are actually presented, and the ~context~ they actually occur in, doesn’t make me want to put more stock into your view of it than the actual creators of the show.
Nothing the creators say can change what was actually committed to the screen. They’re only “gatekeepers of canon” insofar as they had the ability to choose what was put on screen in the first place. Now that the show’s finished, that role has come to an end – hence, the Author is Dead.
Thus far, you’ve done nothing to show that my analysis contradicts the show, and the only creator commentary you’ve even offered was not given with the intent to contradict the idea that Korra and Kuvira had more than surface-level similarities or that Korra’s issues ran deeper than Aang’s. Off-the-cuff responses are usually designed to fill a specific purpose, and it makes very little sense to imply that their lack of further addressing of tangential issues ought to be taken as authorial fiat denying the existence of those issues.
Personally, I think you’re putting way too much stock in the things the creators and show tell you and far too little in what’s actually shown. Bryke and even the show itself can say that Korra’s no worse than Aang all they want, but what’s shown is that Korra’s got far, far deeper issues.
Besides, you’re ignoring far more (and more important!) scenes than I do, while pretending that you’re not ignoring anything at all. Korra trying to burn a man alive and threatening to feed another one to her polar bear dog says a lot more about Korra’s actions in comparison to Aang’s than out-of-context Bryke quotes ever could.
Um, you’d have to ignore an entire half an episode of the show, on top of several VERY important scenes (like the scene where Kuvira threatens to through Bolin in a reeducation camp, y’know, the scene that convinces him to abandon Kuvira’s army) to ignore that Kuvira had prison camps for innocent people in an effort to keep her nation “pure”, but yeah let’s not draw any obvious real world parallels because you want to uphold your pre-baked hard coded ideas that you can’t let go of even after canon contradicts it.
You know, your conflating of the reeducation camps with the camps for foreigners (relocation camps? Yeah, let’s call them that for now) is really frustrating.
I have never, ever, ever ignored the reeducation camps. They are completely and utterly, 100% part of Kuvira’s characterization.
However, the reeducation camps are not the relocation camps, and the latter never appear in a context that demonstrates where they fit into Kuvira’s characterization.
Real world parallels aren’t an explanation for a character’s actions. Kuvira is not an expy of some real-life dictator; her final scene with Korra makes sure of that (since it’d be super super super questionable otherwise!). And, as such, Kuvira’s actions need an explanation within the context of Kuvira’s characterization, which simply does not exist with regards to the relocation camps.
I’m also not ignoring those apparently far more important scenes (why are they more important than the scenes I mentioned? Because they supposedly support your claims?). Let’s take a look into why neither of those scenes are anywhere near as bad as you make them out to be:
Tarrlok: Look, I’ll make you a deal. You fall in line and do what I say and I’ll release your friends.
Korra: [Shocked.] That’s why you arrested them? To get to me?
Tarrlok: [Close-up of Tarrlok creasing his brows.] I need your answer.
Korra: [Short pause; seriously.] No. You might be able to manipulate Chief Saikhan into following you, but it won’t work on me.
Tarrlok: [Stands up and turns his back; angrily.] You will regret that decision.
Korra: You need to be stopped. [Pointing at him accusingly.] You’re just as bad as Amon.
Tarrlok: [Eyes widen in rage.] I’ve tried to work with you, Korra, but you’ve made it impossible.
Tarrlok turns around, suddenly slicing a stream of water from the waterfall at her. Korra barely dodges, only a small section of her hair being cut.
He tries to manipulate her, attacks her first (with a move we’re shown might have actually killed her), and actually draws blood. The guy had proven himself to be a manipulative villain. Also, you act like fire’s ever actually done anything to anyone in this series outside of when plot demands it (Zuko, and once with Katara, both in a different series). Explosions have gone of basically inches from someone and all that happens is they get blown back. Korra firebends at a lot of people, and nothing horrible happened there. Y’know what probably would have happened here? He probably would have been tossed backwards, and Korra would have won. Assuming he’d have died or even been burned at all is a little hard a claim to back up, much less base your perception of a character on, especially with this series.
I’m not on-board with your interpretation of the context here, at all.
First off, if you’re going to pretend that fire isn’t deadly, then there’s no reason for you to go acting like Tarrlok’s attack was inherently lethal. We’ve seen waterbending take hair off before in contexts that were almost certainly not intended to be lethal –
– unless you think Katara actually fights using lethal force, regardless of every indication to the contrary in her characterization. =P
Second, Tarrlok attacks first because Korra won the verbal sparring match leading into the fight. Korra broke into Tarrlok’s office in the middle of the night, wearing a sleeveless shirt in the middle of a blizzard. There’s no way in heck she didn’t expect the situation to turn into a fight when she decided to go in the first place… she just didn’t want to be the bad guy, so she pushed him verbally so she could tell herself he attacked first.
With that out of the way, I’m going to include Redheadcjb’s arguments and your own admissions (which honestly tell me everything I need to know about where you’re coming from, which I’ll get to later) here, to make things easier.
So: Korra tried to kill Tarrlok by immolation. Unlike Aang, she wasn’t in the Avatar State, and therefore she was in control of her own actions instead of being driven by a force far beyond her own control. “Aang at his worst” wasn’t Aang at all – the Avatar State might have functioned as a viable metaphor for Aang’s deep-seeded rage at what he’s experienced, but the show never implies that the Avatar State’s actions line up with what Aang would have ever done in the absence of that spiritual defense mechanism. In fact, it heavily implies the opposite, given that the Avatar State tried to kill Ozai in spite of Aang’s wishes and Aang figured out how to shut it off in order to avoid that.
That scene makes a good point of comparison, too, because it demonstrates just how differently Aang and Korra react to helplessness. Because, honestly? Korra seems to feel a certain amount of contempt for helpless opponents, which is absolutely not shared by Aang and Wan.
Aang was horrified by the idea of executing Ozai. Wan was horrified by the idea of even firebending at a defenseless Chou brother. But Korra? Korra escalated three times after she had Tarrlok at her mercy. She saw Tarrlok on his back, scrambling away, and she took it as an opportunity to blast fire at him.
That’s messed up. It’s clearly framed as messed up. And, unlike Aang, it’s part of a clear pattern of behavior in which Korra struggles with issues of power and control..
And that judge was never in any actual danger. Naga’s a highly trained polar-bear dog Korra’s known for probably over a decade, not a vicious wild animal Korra was dangling the judge over. Korra was in complete control there. It was an intimidation tactic at first (when she was just having Naga growl at him) and became an interrogation tactic after finding out Unalaq rigged the trial to get her father out of the way. Again, basing your view of Korra around the assumption that Naga could have gone off at any moment is basically denied by canon by having Naga never act up unless out of protection, and also the fact that Korra is shown as never wanting to physically hurt someone who didn’t already do it to her/try to do it to her/seriously threaten to do it to her.
I never implied that Naga would have actually bitten the judge’s head off, or that Korra would have ordered her to do so. (I don’t think Kuvira would have thrown Varrick off the train, either, or that Zaheer would have ever killed all of the airbenders, either, because giving up all of your leverage over people you want something from is a terrible idea.)
However. I don’t think the judge needed to be at the risk of dying for Korra’s choice to interrogate him in that way to reflect on her character.
Because here’s the thing – Korra’s methods of interrogation are exemplars of the same sort of brilliantly vicious psychological warfare that Kuvira uses. Naga wouldn’t have killed the judge, but the judge didn’t know that, which gave Korra power (because he couldn’t insist that Korra wouldn’t kill him, and he had no idea how much time he had before Naga snapped, and he had no idea that Korra wasn’t just going to kill him outright initially anyway). Naga was also part of a species that was legendarily terrifying in the Water Tribes – polar bear dogs were such vicious adversaries that Avatar Kuruk was proud of killing one, which kind of implies that there’d be a hunter every now and then who failed and ended up as a mangled corpse.
In other words, Korra has terrorizing people down to a science. It’s not uncommon for heroes to make threats, but Korra sometimes goes all-in the way a villain would (the way Kuvira does), ruthlessly targeting specific fears and exploiting every available method of leaving her enemies powerless in ways that no other good-aligned character in the Avatarverse does. And, honestly, she doesn’t even seem to feel bad for it. (She actually smirks while telling Baatar that she’s got something more painful than physical torture in mind for him. That’s, uh… not exactly normal. XD )
(No worse than what Aang would have done, right? >.>)
On a different note, your claim that Korra is shown as never wanting to physically hurt someone who didn’t pose a threat is, quite frankly, absurd. Korra has a bad habit of mistreating antagonists’ flunkies (kicking Tarrlok’s page in the rear and shoving Gun), admitted she wanted to attack the Equalist protestor for proselytizing about the evils of bending, actually did attack him after Bolin was taken, was highly tempted to punch out Tahno (and settled for terrorizing him with Naga instead), bounced around a pro-bending opponent (and threatened the ref who penalized her for it), kicked over Mako’s desk while he was sitting at it, and subjected Baatar to a violent abduction, threw his chair at the ground when he said she wouldn’t hurt him, and came up with a punishment for non-compliance even worse than physical torture without hesitation. Early Korra kind of makes a habit of going after easy targets, actually, because beating up “bad guys” shores up her conditional self-esteem. She’s no Aang or even Wan; she often feels contempt where they’d feel pity.
I state what I’m ignoring outright and why (usually because it’s impossible to make consistent with the more interesting stuff that existed beforehand).
Or because you’ve pinned too much on your own perception of those “more interesting” scenes and refuse to accept anything that might imply those views are wrong.
[Citation needed]
A reference to Kuvira imprisoning foreigners that exists entirely within Bolin’s B-plot, without any direct mention in Kuvira’s part of the story is far more reasonable to toss out of continuity than a consistent pattern of dangerous behavior on the hero’s part.
Sorry, but throwing out behavior in line with that of a dictator (Kuvira was based on dictators of history, don’t give a shit how much you want to ignore that, Kuvira is a ruthless dictator acting well beyond what anyone would consider reasonable) is ridiculous. Kuvira is obviously portrayed as a ruthless dictator, so throwing out behavior in line with that because it “isn’t consistent” makes zero sense. Dance around it all you want, Kuvira’s a villain, Korra’s not an anti-hero. Ignore the creators and swaths of canon all you want, don’t tell me I’m wrong when my view doesn’t really require tossing anything out.
And here we get to the crux of the issue, which is that you put way too much stock in what you’ve been told and practically none in what you’re shown if it contradicts that in any way.
As far as I can tell, you order sources as follows:
Things the creators say.
Things the characters say.
Things that are directly shown without comment.
My own valuation is the exact opposite – what the show shows is far more important than what it says, and what it says outweighs what the creators say.
If you take “ruthless dictator” to be the most important data point in understanding Kuvira’s characterization, it’s not difficult to see why you’d assume anything a dictator has done is within the appropriate bounds of her characterization. But if you try to understand her character from the ground up, some things that dictators have done are utterly incomprehensible in the context of what we’re shown about who she is a person.
And, in this particular case, you’re cherry-picking Bryke quotes while ignoring the ones that don’t help. Because this?
Interviewer: [Kuvira] looks to be the central villain this season, but what can you sort of tease about her? I mean, she’s a really human villain, driven by greed, seemingly –
Mike: Not so… I wouldn’t say greed as much as… she’s really driven, she grew up in Zaofu and was part of Su’s guard there, so she kinda grew up with Su’s ideology in a way – progress and modernization of the world – so she’s got that mentality of… wanting to fix things is her drive.
Mike defending Kuvira against accusations of greed? Not exactly what one would expect out of someone who created her as a generic dictator!
Also, if you’re calling Korra’s actions “a pattern of dangerous behavior”, and you’re also saying the show should have validated that, then I don’t know what to say on that. Like, my view of that shit is totally different from yours apparently, but in line with your view of Korra’s actions, you’re essentially saying that the show should have validated Korra for wanting to try and murder people. Bullshit.
I feel like I should explain my view on Korra’s traits further, because I haven’t had an opportunity to make some important distinctions.
Anyway, the parts of Korra that I think ought to have been validated weren’t the obviously bad stuff like attempted murder and complete disregard for world leaders who don’t do what she wants.
What I think should have been validated is the core of her characterization – aggressive, driven, and ruthless on the one hand, enthusiastic, loving, and protective on the other. Naga reflects that duality perfectly… and yes, that means that Korra can act like a vicious predator as well as a friendly puppy.
The dangerous behavior I’ve discussed all stemmed from those traits, but it did so because Korra was out of balance, not because her inherent personality was wrong. Korra is not safe, but sometimes that’s exactly what’s needed.
The problem with the final scenes is that neither side of Korra is really in view there. She got to display some of the former earlier in the finale, little of the latter for most of the season, and none of either at the very end. That’s what I have a problem with.
Mako: Look, things are crazy right now. Can we deal with our relationship problems later?
Asami: Well, there might not be any relationship to worry about later.
Asami’s always been way less willing to push aside romantic concerns for martial concerns than either Korra or Mako. 1x09 made that really obvious, when she spent all of her time during the “rescue Korra” mission worried about Mako maybe having a thing for Korra.
LOL “Martial concerns”. She was cleaning a damn dish in that scene, they were having dinner. In 1x09 Mako was freaking out and showing obvious feelings, so he wasn’t exactly pushing his romantic feelings aside for “martial concerns” like you seem to think he’s all about doing. He was completely guided by his feelings/emotions. Blinded, I’d go so far as to say. I honestly don’t know how you were watching that scene, but you clearly don’t have a good read on these scenes if you’re really only taking that kind of surface level interpretation of both 1x09 and 1x05, and probably the whole series for that matter. She also never expected the mission to take a pause so that Mako could show affection to her, she was suspicious that Mako might have feelings for Korra because he was flipping shit and making it painfully obvious in front of her, and keeping shit from her, and refusing to talk about it,_ while they were dating_, while also shouting at her and anyone who dared stand in the way of him finding Korra. They were hardly in a time pressed war against a giant mech with a nuke-gun.
Even if she were like that (she isn’t), how is that a terrible thing about her while Mako and Korra’s constant bickering and arguing (complete with deep cutting insults and personal attacks) is apparently just what Korra wants and needs from a relationship?
The last scene ended by Tenzin saying that he thought Amon was entering his endgame. It’s totally understandable that Mako wouldn’t want to start talking about fraught romantic issues when there was no way to be sure when that shoe would drop (and Korra would understand it, because she’d been doing that very thing since the end of 1x07).
And there’s a huge difference between “showing obvious feelings” by freaking out over someone being missing and showing obvious feelings by talking about romantic issues. The former was rooted entirely in the danger posed by the war they’d all found themselves in, whether or not romantic attractions strengthened the reaction. The latter, in contrast, does nothing but distract from it, and risks fracturing the trust between people who are going to need to have each others’ backs at any moment.
I personally find it ridiculous that Asami would be more concerned about Mako freaking out that Korra was missing than that Korra was missing in the first place. I mean, talk about “not the time!” Romance simply shouldn’t be that high of a priority, as far as I’m concerned, and I get the feeling that both Mako and Korra agree.
1x09 and the Book 4 finale are hardly similar circumstances. Like, not even in the remotest sense.
I never said 1x09 and the finale were similar circumstances. What I said is that Asami requires way more attention to be paid to romantic concerns (i.e. stuff that is absolutely not potentially life-or-death!) than either Mako or Korra do, and I find it hard to believe that she’d be okay with Korra’s ruthless pragmatism in that regard. (If Asami sees exaggerated concern as evidence of romance… how, exactly, is she supposed to take Korra showing basically no concern for her whatsoever in the aftermath of her close call with death?)
If 1x09 made it “really obvious” that Asami requires affection on the battlefield, then 1x09 makes it “really obvious” that Mako doesn’t care about Korra unless she’s in a position where she needs saving, and obviously him not going into a similar fit of uncontrollable rage in the Book 3 finale shows he just doesn’t care about her anymore!
This logic is so twisted and bizarre that I have no idea how to even begin to address it. As far as I can tell, the most valuable thing to be gleaned from it is that you were definitely a Mako hater back in the day. =P
Those are two entirely dissimilar situations, just like Asami being upset with Mako in B1 is different from the Book 4 finale. Also just like Kuvira marching into Ba Sing Se after stealing Su’s security force is different from Korra asking Iroh for help.
But, as I said above, as far as the romance is concerned, it’s not about the situations being similar but about what the Book 1 stuff says about Asami’s character as a whole. Even a highly dissimilar situation can be useful in understanding a character’s core personality.
As for Korra and Kuvira, sure, the situations aren’t identical (personally, I think Kuvira had more of a right to ask her fellow guards to leave with her and try to fix things than Korra did to trick a nation into an unwanted war!), but there are similar dynamics guiding their choices, and I think that’s still really important.
Simply calling my parallels “reaching” and “out of context” without offering any actual evidence to back that claim doesn’t help your case, either.
If you’re going to attack my position, you’ve got to actually address it. Considering the complete lack of actual content in your criticism, I have no reason to believe that you read the list. =P
First of all, you were basically saying “read my meta before you continue”, and I’m sorry, but if you’re meta was as spot on as you think it is, we wouldn’t be having this discussion. Regardless I did read most of it. I’m not going to take the time to go through each of those and explain why they’re reaching and out of context (I actually almost did in the original post, but it was taking too much time and was too much of a detour).
I was saying “read my meta before continuing” because I didn’t particularly feel like saying the same thing over again but needed the same information as a core part of my argument. It’s not like I was saying, “read my dozen pieces of unimpressive arguments for the existence of Korrasami buildup;” that meta is just about as short as it could possibly be while being comprehensive. Would it have made you feel better if I C&P’d it into my response post?
Anyway, I think your arguments for why my comparisons are reaching are utter nonsense, but you probably already guessed that.
But here, I’ll do the first few:
Direct Comparisons through Dialogue
This is borderline the extent of their real, important-to-note similarities. Let’s take stock, shall we:
“hard to deal with, passionate, believes in what she’s doing, fierce, determined to succeed (sometimes without thinking things through)”
So, again, you’re ignoring everything that you’re shown and only listen to what the show and its creators tell you directly. That seems like a limited and unsophisticated way to engage with media, as far as I’m concerned. =P
She also wanted to use spirits in the war. But let’s not ignore the ~context~ you pretend to care about: Korra wanted to use them in defense of the city. Kuvira wanted to use it to attack it. She also actually successfully did so, costing the lives of plenty of people who were aboard those ships she blew up just to scare the president. Kuvira, like Unalaq, was also basically forcing the spirits to “help” (to the point where the vines got pissed off), while Korra was asking and trying to appeal for their help.
…except that you’re willing to throw even that aside when the show says things you don’t like.
Because, yeah, the context is different, but the spirits obviously found something compelling in the comparison, and you didn’t address that at all. Korra might have had better reasons for it, but she was still risking lives and collateral damage by staying to fight, and she still expected the spirits to help even though they didn’t have a dog in the race.
She also related her own experiences with vulnerability to Kuvira’s, but that kind of was the point of having them be similar? So Korra could do that? Because this season is much more about Korra’s recovery than it is about Korra vs. Kuvira, much less Korra = Kuvira? Like, the only times they face off is to help frame Korra’s arc? She loses to Kuvira the first time because she’s “disconnected from the people who love [her], and disconnected from [herself]”. She still hasn’t seen her loved ones and still hasn’t dealt with the mental side of her recovery until 4x07-4x09. The next time she faces off against Kuvira, she’s at the top of her game and ends up winning that time.
If you’re going to say that Korra vs. Kuvira was designed to help frame Korra’s recovery arc, why not accept the same thing about the parallels between the two of them?
As far as I’m concerned, Kuvira was a critical part of Korra’s recovery arc, because she reflects Korra’s reconciliation with her old self. That’s why she turned into Dark Avatar Korra.
If the point of this season was “Korra = Kuvira” they really did a crap job of doing that. Outside of a few vague lines from interviews that are easy to interpret in a variety of ways (“Kuvira is like a version of Korra”, but then he [Mike] goes on to explain “they have some similar personality traits”), though, there’s nothing to really indicate that’s what they were going for. They wanted Kuvira to be similar to Korra, not for Kuvira to be Korra, and if you ask me it seems like they only wanted that because they wanted Korra to end up relating to her in the end and have her show compassion (which is specifically a big deal and reflects growth in Korra because Kuvira didn’t deserve it much more than her past enemies) to show how far Korra’s come.
Maybe if you ignore everything that isn’t spoon-fed to you and explain away half of what is… but I can hardly see how that’s the show’s fault.
I mean, your argument here is that Mike literally saying that Kuvira’s like a version of Korra doesn’t matter because him continuing to say that they’ve got some similar traits means that that’s the only way that the two characters are similar.
You seem to be attempting to interrogate Mike’s claims about Kuvira in the same way as I do Bryan’s Korrasami post while failing to realize that there’s a big difference between a Doylistic defense of a narrative choice and a Watsonian discussion of a character. It makes sense to interrogate the former because its author has a vested interest in misrepresenting things to their advantage; it doesn’t make sense to interrogate the latter because it comes from a more dispassionate perspective. Mike had no reason to say Kuvira was a version of Korra if he didn’t believe it to be true; Bryan had a lot of reason to make Korrasami sound more planned than it actually was , because he was reacting to specific accusations about it being tacked on.
“Direct Visual Comparisons”
This scene showed that despite removing the poison, she still had mental stuff to work through. Was it implying similarities? Maybe, but it doesn’t actually say anything. Like, it literally says nothing. It was probably more for the sake of visuals and for having a dramatic reveal than actually trying to say anything paralleling Korra and Kuvira.
So instead of connecting the obvious dots between Korra seeing Kuvira as the old self that got her hurt and Kuvira making the exact same mistake Korra made in 1x04, you’re just going to insist that it’s a random side-effect of the poison that says nothing? Even though the poison has dealt heavily in symbolism all along?
Wow, is that a shallow reading.
“Implied Comparisons through Montage”
First off, I think “implied” is a stretch. “Perceived” is probably more accurate. The actual similarity you’re trying to point out is Kuvira getting angry at a Zhu Li and basically ordering her to be killed for spectacle (until Bolin saved the day) after she tried to blow up a superweapon that they spent a shit ton of time/money/resources developing while they were standing on it, compared to Korra being distrusting of her boyfriend after he places himself against her (in her eye). Surface level comparisons make for surface level arguments.
Did you actually read the paragraph explaining the comparison, or did you just answer based on the images? Because the actual comparison went far deeper than just comparing a couple of scenes, and you failed to address a single thing I said.
That’s a complete and utter misrepresentation of what Kuvira actually said.
Kuvira: Stand down. This battle is over. I owe the Avatar my life. Her power is beyond anything I could ever hope to achieve. I’ll accept whatever punishment the World sees fit. And Su, I’m sorry for all the anguish I’ve caused you and your family.
First off, she’s talking to her troops. She’s trying to convince them that they should follow her lead – that she’d make sure to point out that Korra was unimaginably powerful makes sense whether or not that’s her own personal reason for giving up.
And, more importantly, her demeanor, both in that scene and the previous one with Korra, offers all the evidence necessary to suggest that she gets that what she did was wrong. You basically have to ignore the context to believe that Kuvira just gave in because she knew she couldn’t win.
Kuvira did show remorse. That she didn’t spell it out in block print for the kiddies in the audience does nothing to change that.
Um, Kuvira doesn’t need to convince anyone to follow her lead. She’s their leader.
And people always follow leaders who agree to surrender unquestioningly?
Kuvira’s supporters are people, not drones. Presumably, a lot of them chose to follow her because they agreed with what she stood for. It’s almost a given that someone would refuse to surrender and take like-minded supporters with them, if Kuvira didn’t give them a good reason not to do that.
Her demeanor in the previous scene was angrily telling Korra that they all should have just complied with everything she said or tried to do and never stood in her way. She was blaming everything she did on other people interfering with her plans. The look she gives Korra at the end is more in amazement that this person is showing her compassion, and is the only time she actually has a non-angry demeanor that whole scene.
She maybe understands what she did was wrong, but she still stands by it and blames her actions on others getting in the way. “After everything I did to you” comes before “this wasn’t how I wanted things to end, if you’d all just surrendered none of this would have happened.”
And Korra isn’t having it: “You brought this on yourself. Messing with the spirit vines, acting like a dictator over your people. You had to know what you were doing wasn’t right.”
There’s a big difference between blaming others for your mistakes and believing it and blaming others for your mistakes while desperately trying to convince yourself you’re not a terrible person for making them.
Remember this?
Zuko: You brought this on yourself, you know. We could have returned together. You could have been a hero! You have no right to judge me Uncle. I did what I had to do in Ba Sing Se, and you’re a fool for not joining me. You’re not gonna say anything? Argh! You’re a crazy old man! You’re crazy, and if you weren’t in jail, you’d be sleeping in a gutter!*
And, honestly, Kuvira was way more half-hearted about passing the buck than Zuko was, because she couldn’t even convince herself enough to be externalize the blame onto Korra. Her demeanor wasn’t “I would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren’t for you meddling kids;” her body language screams guilty conscience.
Just look at the way she falls to her knees, holding herself tightly and making herself smaller when she says that. That’s not the anger of someone convinced that they’re in the right. That’s the anger of someone who’s got nothing else protecting them from an utterly devastating awareness of their wrongdoing.
And that’s why Korra reacts by saying Kuvira had to have known what she was doing wasn’t right – Korra needs to strip that defense away before Kuvira can deal with the crux of the issue.
The point of this scene is that Korra’s coming to understand her foe for the first time, taking the time to really understand her. “I think I get it now”. That’s not a moment she’s shared with any of her past villains. The point isn’t that Kuvira is more worthy of it, but that Korra’s grown more compassionate, to a point where she can actually understand her enemies and their goals and reasons. Korra, in previous books, was calling all her foes insane and crazy. Book 4 Korra probably wouldn’t do that.
Except Amon, Tarrlok, and Unalaq, right?
Korra defeated Amon by understanding his background. She was so moved by Tarrlok’s that she wanted to let him out of Amon’s prison even though he bloodbent and tried to kidnap her. And she understood Unalaq’s perspective on the spirits enough to do exactly what he said he wanted to do!
Zaheer’s the only one Korra didn’t understand in some way, but it wasn’t down to a lack of trying. That Book 4 Korra lost sight of her previous empathy for her antagonists doesn’t mean that understanding them is something new for her.
Korra’s relationship with Kuvira has to be more personal is it’s to be meaningful at all.
(And, by the way, Korra called Kuvira’s attack “madness” just moments before saving her, so…
And Korra’s line to Tenzin in the finale, by the way, was a personal one, not some kind of a “moral moment” for the audience. It was her attributing that newfound understanding and level of compassion (again, she’s always been compassionate, just not to a jump-in-front-of-a-spirit-beam-to-save-the-life-of-someone-who-tried-to-kill-you-about-ten-or-eleven-seconds-ago level of compassionate) to her experiences (after all, it was her experiences recovering that she used to understand Kuvira), to give them meaning and help her find peace, like she expressed wanting in her scenes with Katara in “Korra Alone”. It’s pretty damn realistic for a recovery arc.
Realistic insofar as Korra’s willing to latch onto just about anything to make meaning out of her suffering?
Because here’s the thing – I don’t get why self-sacrificing compassion for random dictators benefits Korra as a person, and I sure as heck don’t get why Korra would value it so highly.
The “all life is sacred” thing might have worked for Aang, but dealing with bad guys pragmatically is part of what makes Korra Korra.
If Korra thinks Kuvira’ s worth saving (which she does, per 4x05), then saving her is a practical thing to do so long as she believes she can do it. If she thinks Kuvira’s no better than Amon (who she nearly drowned) or Unalaq (who she spiritbent out of existence) or Zaheer (who she tried to kill repeatedly, and even attempted to sneak attack when he was in shock over his girlfriend’s death), then risking her life for her is a massive and irritatingly moralistic shift in her character.
“You wanted to create a place where you and your people would never be vulnerable again”. Korra’s relating her experiences with vulnerability to Kuvira’s, not because she feels Kuvira deserves forgiveness, or because they’re the same person, but because she can relate to that and that allowed Korra to come to a better understanding of her.
Kuvira was no more justified in what she did than Amon or even the Red Lotus. All were driven by their pasts and their ideals to commit atrocities and throw the world out of balance.
Kuvira might be more on the road to understanding what she did was wrong, but she’s not actually there yet. And understanding what she did was wrong certainly doesn’t mean she should be easily forgiven or that Korra wants to be her bestie.
I disagree. I think the only step Kuvira had left to take in understanding she was wrong at the point of her on-screen conversation with Korra in the Spirit World was to stop being defensive, and I’m pretty sure she actually took it off-screen between scenes.
As for Korra forgiving her/being her bestie, Korra’s always been super chill about past wrongs. It’s part of her pragmatism – there’s no value in holding a grudge, so she doesn’t.
And Kuvira holds an interesting position insofar as she understands aspects of Korra that Korra doesn’t share with anyone else. I joked in my fic about them bonding over killing people, but it’s definitely true that we’ve never seen Korra talk about her darker side with any of her friends, and I think it could be useful for her to have someone around who understands why she can be so cold-hearted when the chips are down.
“I’ll accept whatever punishment the world sees fit”.
Good. Don’t want to see her put to death or anything, but honestly anything up to life in prison seems pretty fitting for ruining countless lives and killing a ton of people, outright treason (often times a death sentence right there in itself), and trying to take over a nation she could lay no real claim to.
What good does locking her up do, other than offer vengeance? It seems rather unlikely to have much in the way of preventative value, and Kuvira’s the sort of person who would both want to help and have a great deal to offer if properly restrained.
That sort of thinking is part of Korra’s pragmatism too, by the way. As far as I can tell, she’s never seen much of a point to punishing people who are already repentant… and I certainly can’t see her being happy that the sole consequence of the massive risk she took for Kuvira was that she ended up locked in a slightly larger keyless box.
Most of Kuvira’s desires in doing what she did are probably no different than what real world dictators saw as their goals. It doesn’t excuse the atrocious acts they committed anymore than it excuses Kuvira’s.
Really? Because Bryke’s refusal to agree that Kuvira’s greedy and power-hungry seems pretty unusual to me.
Judging by the show itself, though, the degree to which Kuvira’s tragic backstory influenced her choices is pretty far from standard dictator motivations in and of itself.
And even if her reasons for becoming what she did are similar to those of standard dictators in some aspects… that might just mean she has the same problem as most people who are given power.
(Tellingly, a lot of those descriptions could be applied to early Korra as well… I mean, “flirt inappropriately, tease in a hostile fashion, and become totally impulsive?” Yeah…
Believe it or not, I’d probably like Kuvira if not for her fandom stanning so hard for her that they’re writing shit off and claiming “stupid writing decisions” rather than figuring that into their view. And how they act like she should just be forgiven, and Korra she should help her and push everyone to forgive her, and her and Korra should be best friends. People act like that’s all a given, and do seem to be quick to sweep a ton of shit under the rug.
This sounds an awful lot like you attempting to appropriate anti-Korrasami arguments without actually understanding what Korrasami fans did to turn people off of the ship. There’s a big difference between souring on a ship because people are making unfair accusations about your character for disliking it and souring on a character because people have an interpretation of her that you don’t like. People posting stuff that contradicts what you think is not an attempt to silence your view on Kuvira. =P
Says the person who completely refuses to accept that Korra might be more morally-questionable than Aang, in spite of the numerous scenes in which acts in ways that are completely out of line for a white hat in any show.
(I have never tried to argue against the existence of the reeducation camps, by the way. =P Chalk that up as another strawman argument.)
Says that person who is claiming “death of the author”. Nothing shuts down an actual argument faster than “I’m just going to ignore what the creators themselves have to say on the matter”.
So according to you, only strict intentionalist interpretations count as actual arguments? That’s… seriously out of line with literary critical theory as it’s existed for almost fifty years.
She might be somewhat more morally questionable at times, but not to anywhere near the extent you’re claiming. The creators talk about Korra’s plotline with regards to the civil war as “how would an Avatar deal with a war involving their home nation?”. Not “Korra’s coming super close to becoming a force of evil in the world this season and is threatening to throw the world out of balance”. None of what she does is really meant to be outside the realm of what other Avatars probably would have done in similar situations, it seems, including, in large part, Aang.
Calling Aang a “white hat” is also beyond ridiculous (and this is hardly the only example of him acting out, it’s just that people don’t overblow this behavior like they do Korra):
“Toph is ecstatic to learn that they are headed toward a rock. Aang, on the contrary, appears to be maliciously hoping to find some sandbenders there.”
“Not satisfied by this and eager for revenge, he uses his airbending to knock the fleeing creature down, showing his sinister and vengeful side, shocking Momo.”
“Aang again demands to know where Appa is and destroys another sand-sailer to emphasize that his patience is running low. The leader turns to his son and asks what he did to bring forth this kind of violence. The son denies any wrongdoing and continues to insist that Team Avatar are the thieves, but Toph states that she heard the son say to put a muzzle on Appa. Hearing this, Aang, enraged, crosses over into the Avatar State and destroys the remaining sand-sailers. Rightly fearful for his life, the son confesses he took the bison without knowing it was the Avatar’s. Aang, with the menacing Avatar voice on top of his own, demands to know Appa’s location, but the son can only tell him that he traded Appa to some merchants and that he is probably in Ba Sing Se by now. Avatar Aang, still outraged after hearing these unsatisfying answers, begins to form an air sphere around him, similar to when he was in the Southern Air Temple and had found Gyatso’s skeleton. Sokka, alarmed by this development, pushes Toph forward by the shoulders, while he shouts to the sandbenders to run.”
(x)
Kid came pretty damn close to killing those fuckers. Like I’m pretty sure he basically said he almost would have if Katara hadn’t backed him down. Saying Aang never did anything highly morally questionable make me wonder if we watched the same show here. Like all that ^^^ came from a kid raised as a pacifist by monks while living in a temple as a nomad.
You know, I’m really glad that you’re a strict intentionalist sometimes, because it makes stuff like this really easy to shoot down.
For one thing, you appear to have promoted fan summaries to canon, insofar as you quote the Avatar Wiki as if it’s an authoritative source rather than, y'know, fan interpretation.
For another… Bryke actually said outright that Korra was acting in ways Aang wouldn’t:
About Korra’s interrogation of Judge Hotah, they said that’s what they loved about her – she does stuff Aang wouldn’t, and is kind of a kid-friendly Jack Bauer. They said the scene itself was kind of inspired by 24, but they needed to figure out what they could do without upsetting the network.
See? Aang might lose control, but no one would ever accuse him of being a “kid-friendly Jack Bauer!”
And, from the same source:
They were very adamant that Korra should be the one to trigger the civil war by striking out, so she throws the first punch, egged on by Unalaq.
They might not have said directly that Korra was threatening to throw the world out of balance, but they were pretty clear that they wanted her to start a war. =P
(Yes, I cited my own commentary summaries, but a. I didn’t transcribe everything, b. I don’t know of anyone who even offered that much of a summary, and c. I haven’t touched that post in years, as you can likely confirm by checking reblogs.)
That commentary isn’t really necessary, though, because the stuff they’re talking about was shown directly on-screen – Korra effectively engaged in torture and started a war, and it was demonstrated directly for the audience’s benefit.
That’s not “somewhat more morally questionable at times.” That’s… pretty messed-up, honestly.
As for Aang’s loss of control with the sandbenders… it’s morally questionable, sure, but it’s also pretty clearly white hat behavior, since one would be hard-pressed to find a hero that didn’t lose their temper and end up almost doing something they regretted.
The difference with Korra is that it isn’t a momentary lapse of judgment for her that she immediately feels horrified by, but something that she’s entirely capable of justifying to herself even given space to calm down. It’s a very different dynamic.
Also, you might not have argued the camps don’t exist, but you do call using them to lock up anyone other than dissenters a “narrative misstep”.
“The existence of reeducation camps for anyone other than dissidents seems like a narrative misstep, as far as I’m concerned. It’s a really heavy subject to just throw in without ever really addressing, especially since the one camp we did see seemed to have been used just to hold the Beifongs.”
You also dance around it with the unfounded assumption that it was a “reinterpretation” to make it Kuvira’s generals wrong doing, rather than Kuvira just being awful:
“The trick to my interpretation is this: there is so little acknowledgement of the existence of that policy in Kuvira’s own words and actions that there isn’t really anything to rule out the “Kuvira’s generals creatively reinterpreted her ‘lock up dissenters’ policy” option.”
You even say it’s a “trick” to your interpretation. Like, OK.
I feel like you’re either forgetting or intentionally eliding the context that sparked this line of conversation, namely, that you accused me of “throwing out entire lines or scenes and chunks of characterization” and used Kuvira’s threat to throw Bolin into a reeducation camp of evidence of that. =P
It’s also worth pointing out that considering something a narrative misstep isn’t exactly the same as throwing it out, and that the reason I used the word “trick” with regards to that interpretation is because it’s an interpretation I value more as a demonstration of the show’s lack of interest in connecting the relocation camps to Kuvira than as a viable non-resistant reading of the show.
(My preferred explanation for the relocation camps is that Kuvira wanted to round up the people she felt were most likely to support the URN over her, and that either a. included everyone who wasn’t of full Earth Kingdom ancestry or b. was interpreted as such by the people she had carry out those orders. I am totally down with Kuvira as a dark mirror of the US circa WWII. I am not down with “Kuvira just being awful,” because that’s boring, trite, and doesn’t match up with the way the show treats her in the finale.)
You also have to assume Opal, who’s been consistently shown to foil Bolin in that she actually has an honest view of the situation throughout the season, while he only sees what Kuvira wants him to see, is lying about the slave labor. I believe you called it a case of “unreliable narrator”?:
You mean the same Opal who accused Kuvira of blatantly nonexistant torture? The same Opal who was raring to throw her vows of non-violence out the window to take out Kuvira?
I don’t think we’re meant to see her as an unbiased source. If we were, the show certainly didn’t do a very good job of supporting that interpretation; stuff like the slave labor claim should have been mentioned by Tenzin if he knew about it, and there’s no way he wouldn’t know about it given the number of airbenders he must have had in the field.
“It’s not so much that they think we think Kuvira’s flawless as that their view of her (i.e. Avatarverse Hitler) looks nothing like ours (i.e. Korra gone wrong, with a layer of unreliable narrator and stupid writing choices on top).”
A few people continuing normal lives hardly rules out or negates that there are still others forced to work for Kuvira, in whatever capacity. You think everyone in Hitler’s Germany was walking around angry with him all the time or that he didn’t have genuine supporters all around the world? Oh wait, you’re right, how could we compare him to “let’s ‘purge’ our nation of any ‘non-natives’” Kuvira.
No, but the thing is, the show never shows us anything else! We don’t see people suffering under Kuvira’s rule, outside of the subjection of Zaofu – we see people happy about her arrival in Yi (outside of the recalcitrant governor), people living normal lives elsewhere, and soldiers who seem to be personally loyal rather than pressed into service (the way Su claimed).
It’s not that uncommon for works to accuse their villains of things that they never show directly, but they at least make a point of having some of the random acts of evil portrayed directly. This is on a whole other level, to the point that I can’t even imagine how a team of writers could fail to notice that they didn’t actually connect the dots on-screen.
Korra was uncertain at first because leaving the portals open went against everything she thought she was supposed to do. That she ended up choosing to do so anyway, in spite of the potential for things to get really messed up because of it, shows a massive amount of confidence in her own instincts. It would have been way easier for her to close the portals like she thought everyone wanted, but she didn’t.
And, speech or not, that was the last glimpse of Korra we got in that season, which means that that was what defined her final position in her character arc. The Korra at the end of Book 2 felt triumphant and powerful, not unsure and worried about the future.
No no no, that’s what you’re ASSUMING is her problem. If she had a massive amount of confidence, why would her entire decision be comprised of questions:
Korra: Maybe I shouldn’t.
Tenzin: What do you mean?
Korra: What if Unalaq was right when he said the Avatar shouldn’t be a bridge between the two worlds? What if Avatar Wan made a mistake when he closed the portals? What if humans and spirits weren’t meant to live apart? Well, what do you think I should do?
Tenzin: I think you should trust your instincts. There is nothing else I can teach you. You are the Avatar. Whatever your decision, I support you.
And again, this is based off the good parts of spirits she’s seen (the show specifically cuts to Bum