One consistent theme in The Legend of Korra is: Korra trains. It’s a motif consistent with Avatar: The Last Airbender, in fact. Aang traveled the world looking for bending teachers, and Korra has been doing the very same thing, right under our noses, learning from both friends and enemies. Airbending from Tenzin, pro-bending from Bolin and Mako. She’s learned spiritbending from Unalaq, she’s learned metalbending from Suyin, she’s studied with Toph…and now Zaheer. Korra’s problems stem from her being cut off from the Spirit World, which is ultimately caused by the anxiety caused by trauma, and with Zaheer’s guidance—as crazy as that sounds—she accepts what he did to her, and accepts that she survived it. The what is, not what might have been.
A quick word on last week’s episode, “Remembrances.” I don’t get angry about clip shows. I skip clip shows, sure, but I don’t get angry about them. Some weeks a baseball game or the network’s schedule will result in me not getting to see a television show I like, right? I don’t get angry about there not being a show that week; that’s the reality of television scheduling. It’s a business and there are business conventions like “seasons” and “sports” that are factors. I shrug and move on, or put the clip show on while I eat dinner or do chores just to have it in the background where I can half pay attention to it. I’m not disappointed, because I just consider it a bye-week. Given Nick’s treatment of The Legend of Korra, however, I can’t say I’m surprised that this had to happen.
So Zaheer just…helped? No…strings attached? I saw three plausible ways Zaheer could go after being captured. One, full Azula, all screaming and ruin, madness inspired by frustration; two, Captain Regret, where defeat led to him seeing the error of his ways…and three, the Zaheer we got. Hannibal Lecter, sitting in his cage, not as much of a prisoner as we’d like him to be, but more than he would like to be. As soon as they showed him floating there in chains, I figured it was the latter option. Unfettered by earthly concerns…except literal earthly fetters. What a great image: Zaheer really is a home run as a villain. He seems to regret paving the way for Kuvira; I wonder just how incarcerated Zaheer is, and just what he gets up to in the Spirit World. We also have the blue and white glow of Raava with Korra engaged in high level spiritbending in the Spirit World, despite thinking she had no powers there. Could be more cobblestones on the road to re-unifying Raava and Vaatu, if you ask me.
Everyone seems ready to accept Bolin back with open arms…except Opal. It is great to see the original Team Avatar back together, hugging it out. Bolin is apologetic, and the others are understanding. I would be too; Bolin escaped with crucial top secret information, spurred by the first injustice he sees. Papu is more than eager to help Bolin with his half-baked plot to woo Opal; while I sympathize with his intention, there’s no way a cute protestation of affection is going to win her over. Opal is a Beifong; they don’t take crap like that sitting down…but Opal is a good enough communicator that she’s the one who tells Bolin that he should make a grand gesture and come with her and Lin to rescue their families. It’s a good sign that she and Bolin are a good couple; Bolin needs someone who can clarify what he is supposed to do next.
Is there a single greater moment in this episode then when Asami flips Varrick’s handshake into a joint lock? I do not think there is. Not even seeing hipster Ryu again. Not even Jinora’s backflip landing. As a side note, regarding Jinora being abducted by the spirit vines, I can only respond: “So Dawn’s in trouble? Must be Tuesday.” Korra using earthbending to play with Naga was another standout for me; this was a good episode for reminding us that the critters exist and that they have distinct personalities.
I guess the other moment is hearing Fire Lord Honora—I mean, Izumi—finally speak up. Look at those glasses. Look at the glower. Don’t tell me Mai isn’t her mother. It is yet another meeting where President Raiko demonstrates how useless he is as a leader—I sure don’t like that guy—but the scene is handled deftly. Having everyone unite to take down Kuvira would be too easy; having Fire Lord Izumi decline to go on the offensive given the Fire Nation’s history? Well that’s downright plausible! As is Tenzin’s reluctance to escalate things to a military solution, I suppose. But…giving Wu a seat at the table, while excluding the Avatar? I told you I hated Raiko.
Mordicai Knode didn’t want to finish this without writing the phrase “spirit pods” at least once. “Spirit pods.” Find him on Tumblr or Twitter.
Wow, no comments whatsoever about last week’s clip show beyond that? Nothing about how BryKe did some “Ember Island Players” style winking at the fans by putting their exact criticisms of Mako’s mad relationship skillz in the mouths of the other characters? Nothing about how Varrick basically stole the whole episode with his more-mangled-than-Ember-Island-Players rehash of past events, right down to having the villains get together on a conference call and putting Bolin’s face on the giant blue Korra? Clip show, yeah; Nickelodeon screwing Korra over yet again by slashing their budget, yeah. But it was still the best clip show I’ve ever seen. Nice to see that even Nick being jerks couldn’t completely diminish the ol’ Avatar spirit.
As for this episode, it’s interesting to see how the World War II parallels continue. You know, looking back at the 1930s from our present perspective, it’s easy to wonder how on earth the European politicians of the era could have been so naive, with their practice of “appeasement” supposedly bringing about “peace in our time.”
But when you create a parallel to that situation in a show like Avatar, suddenly that historical behavior is made that much more understandable by seeing the thought processes that led to similar behavior in characters you’ve come to know. Legend of Korra really should get some accolades for being the best form of educational TV—the kind that slips education in while you’re not looking, instead of hitting you over the head with it.
1. Robotech_Master
Yeah, I don’t have a lot of deep thoughts about the clip show!
You’re right though, it is a good parallel for WWII, in a non-Godwin-y way. “Start a war?! BUT WE JUST HAD A HUGE WAR!”
Oh yeah, Korra using earthbending as a laser pointer! That was a lovely bit of texture.
@1: I find that the parallels are mainly to 1920s/30s Asia; Kuvira is basically Mao, leading what starts out as a populist revolution to replace a corrupt and abusive regime but becoming just as bad as what she replaced, if not worse. Interestingly, though, the Fire Nation is about a generation ahead of that, since Izumi’s stance reflects post-WWII Japan — committed to a pacifist, defensive-only stance in atonement for the previous regime’s unfettered imperialism and the profound damage it caused to its own nation as well as the rest of the world.
Who on earth (or wherever) designed that prison!?!
I was concerned when I saw the giant door and then the rest of it did not help my confidence at all. The man can FLY for pete’s sake, why would the door need that kind of height except for Zaheer to have the easiest possible exit where no-one can reach him even if they notice him at all. The lift shaft is just a direct route to surfaceville and then he is kept in a giant arena with just as many stupid flaws in it as the door. The only thing of any inconvenience to him are the chains but one or two greasy meals and he could be out of them. He’s probably only hanging around out of politeness.
1) Escape chains and wait above massive door.
2) As soon as door opens zip out at full speed before anyone can react.
3) Get to elevator and fly up the shaft.
4) make suspicious noise at the big door so they open it to investigate, then fly out the top.
A proper prison for an flying airbender involves small tunnels with lots of earthbent doors, proper restriction of movement.
3. ChristopherLBennett
“Texture” is the perfect word for it.
4. ChocolateRob
I’m more concerned about the fact that his spirit isn’t bound…at least, presumably….
@1, YES, BEST clip show.
All the little chibi faces!
Korra’s segment was the let down(the fact that the show again skipped over Korra’s decision to rescue the Air Nation at the expense of millions of Earth Nation citizens STILL BUGS ME). But Varrick’s callout of Unalaq as the BORING villain was PRICELESS!
But this week showed why, because Korra’s always more engaging when she’s moving forward, and boy did THAT happen this week.
All kinds of awesome! Including Hader and Bamford’s return!
I have an idea for security on prisons for benders: Hire former Equalist chi-blockers as guards. Put their skills to constructive use.
I wonder whether, now that Korra “has her groove back,” she’ll be called upon to remove Zaheer’s Bending abilities as Aang did Amon’s father…and what she would say if she were.
@8: After having her bending taken from her by Amon, I think Korra would be very reluctant to do the same to anyone else. Of course, that’s exactly why it could be interesting to see her under pressure to make that choice.
8. Robotech_Master
& 9. ChristopherLBennett
I was going to say “or if she’s even capable of it,” but since she could restore it, odds are she is. But I also wondered that. She clearly wasn’t in a state to do it before, when they imprisoned him. Say, I wonder if that’s Zaheer’s long con. Help the Avatar so she doesn’t Gentle him.
@9, I wonder if we’ll see Korra pursue that option against Kuvira in the finale.
It’d be a great parallel to “Sozin’s Comet”.
@11: If they just have Korra do the same thing to Kuvira that Aang did to Ozai, that would be boring and repetitive. If they do draw a parallel, it should involve Korra choosing a different path.
I still think the trajectory of the season is heading toward Korra redeeming Kuvira, not breaking or killing her. First we have Toph point out that Korra’s enemies all had good intentions but bad methods. Now we have Korra finding common ground with her greatest foe, Zaheer, and working with him for a positive end. And the parallels between Korra and Kuvira have been evident throughout the season, as exemplified by Korra seeing her own face on Kuvira when they fought. And this book is called “Balance,” after all. Balance doesn’t mean one side destroying the other, it means the two sides coming into equilibrium.
That’s what I meant; parallels.
Can someone explain to me just why the spirit vines were attacking the people in Republic City? What were they trying to do by capturing the tour group and Jinora and imprisoning them?
I mean, other than creating a crisis that required Korra to get her groove on. But that’s Plot. I’d like to think that there was some real in-world reason for it.
@14: There is a great disturbance in the Force, err, spirit world. Kuvira’s destroying the vines and making them angry and out of balance, and so they’re lashing out. Maybe it’s some sort of defensive reflex, or maybe Kuvira’s attack has deranged them.
I wonder if the people who got vined will experience any weird after-effects? Spiritual visions, whatever. Probably too short a time left in the series to explore that.
@10 mordicai
You think that Zaheer is conning Korra? I took him as being sincere. Granted, I’m nervous about him having access to the Spirit World too, considering he, for all intents and purposes, killed Iwei there. But I thought this was an absolutely incredible episode in an incredible season.
Good thing that we all hate Nick for how they’re treating Korra. It’s just a pity that they don’t seem to realize what they have on their hands. Did you all read Konietzko’s comments about “Remembrances” on his blog?
It’s funny to consider that this is the same Nick who gave them budget for an extra episode for the original Avatar series. How times change.
@18: Well, A:TLA was a better fit to Nick’s target demographic, so it did better on television. Korra does great online but doesn’t perform as well on TV, because it skews older than Nick’s advertisers prefer. TV is a business, and the decisions are based on what makes money and what doesn’t.
@10 mordicai
Gentle him? Nailed it.
@17, This is why I was hoping the White Lotus would excute him. With access to astral projection, there’s nothing to stop him from issuing orders to his confederates.
Then again, if there are still any Red Lotus members out there, they’ve probably disavowed him.
After all, Zaheer’s plan to killed the Avatar failed. He got three of the society’s elite members killed. His actions exposed their existence to the White Lotus and the world governments, forcing them further underround.
And ultimtely, Operation Earth Kingdom Freedom backfired horribly. putting someone even worse in charge.
I wanted to write this on episode 8 review, but since it didn’t exist, I’ll write it here. I am not a troll. Seriously. I might have sounded harsh on my comment on episode 7, but that’s because I’m frustrated and usually don’t have a lot of time to write long discourses, since I read tor.com mostly at work. So I try to be as concise as possible, but in hindsight, this does sound like I’m baiting the people here into a flamewar or something like that.
I love the avatarverse, TLA is one of the best series of all time in my opinion, and it was the first time in recent years I saw an animation so weel done with themes like a consistent diverse world, elemental powers and martial arts. Toph is my favorite character of the series and one of my favorites of any series.
The first season of Korra was brilliant, and even more so with Mordicai’s reviews. We had a teenage avatar, which made sense, since the target audience of TLA grew and that made possible to focus on new topics and new problems. The reversal of benders being considered evil was genious and Amon is a terrific villain.
And then it all went downhill from there. The retocons started and this portals, that never existed in TLA, now always existed and are pivotal to the whole series. The villains were plain evil with no depth to them or empathy. Korra aquires new powers or lose them whenever the plot demands it. That purifing water that only worked in very specific circunstances, cosmic Korra, feeling the vines and now she can manipulate spiritual energy in the spirit realm, because she always could apparently.
So sorry if I sounded like a troll in the past, I will just watch the next few episodes, see where they take us with this. I wish they done better with such an incredible world and incredible characters.
12. ChristopherLBennett
I completely agree; I think there is a compromise in the future.
14. David_Goldfarb
I do not know, but I don’t think it will be ignored– I think the plot is “what is up with these spirit vines?” & the animated vines & pods were part of that. I think Vaatu is hiding in the vines, I think he is the Spirit Cannon.
17. hihosilver28
Just that I…always look to see what the other side is benefiting, when situations of sincerity come up. Not that I doubt them, neccisarily, but I…weigh them in context. How motivated are they? What do they stand to gain or lose? What’s the other side of the coin?
I did see & like I said; I get it! These things happen. I just…skip ’em.
22. franksands
I don’t think you sound like a troll. You are totally allowed to not like it. There were definitely times the show struggled. I don’t agree with your assessment, but it is a more interesting world for having people in it who don’t all agree with each other, especially when we can talk about it respectfully.
I can’t see how there can be a compromise. They’ve painted Kuvira about as dark as they could for her type of villain. Fascism, internment camps, ethnic cleansing, and a twisty little scheming mind that gets what it wants by hook or crook. Hostage-taking, building a super-weapon…
Korra “compromising” with that seems about as likely as Gandalf “compromising” with Saruman.
One of the Nick shorts was a “Do the thing!” compilation, which made me wonder: why is there no remix of “Zhu Li! Do the thing!”
Start with this old playground game: Little Sally Walker
Add a baseline and some beats and go!
Here’s some inspiration: Punch Your Buns Remix
So…somebody with musical talent…DO THE THING!
@24: You misunderstand. My prediction is not that Korra will put up with or excuse Kuvira’s methods — it’s that she’ll help Kuvira see how wrong she’s been, how much her methods betray and corrupt her goals. Kuvira will see the error of her ways and attempt to redeem herself.
Just look at the arc of the series. All of Korra’s enemies have been trying to redress imbalances in the world: the dominance of benders over non-benders for Amon, the exclusion of the spirits for Unalaq, the evils of tyranny for Zaheer, the evils of chaos for Kuvira. But they’ve all employed methods that were just as imbalanced in the opposite direction, and thus have been as bad as what they fought. But this season is actually called “Balance.” Every book of the franchise has been named after the thing that the Avatar had to learn to understand or cope with: Water, Earth, Fire, Air, Spirits, Change, and now Balance. This final season is the one where Korra must master balance, and implicit in that is that she must bring balance to others as well as herself. All of Korra’s enemies have done evil because their attempts to correct imbalances in the world have themselves been unbalanced. It was their methods that were wrong, not their goals, as Toph explained. So the only way Korra can master balance is by dealing with Kuvira in a different way than she did with the others, by helping her understand how her methods are wrong and what she can do to restore balance, rather than just punishing her for her imbalance. Everything is pointing toward that outcome.
@26: The thing is, cartoons like these tend to have a strictly moral core. People who intentionally do bad things have to be punished in the end. They aren’t usually allowed to skate on that punishment based on being very very sorry. I just can’t see someone who’s done the stuff Kuvira’s been doing being allowed to get away with repentance.
For that matter, it would be rather inconsistent with the way she’s acted so far. Her goal has never been to unify the Earth Kingdom for unity’s sake, but to get herself into power and kick those unwanted non-Earth types out so the Earth Kingdom can be “pure” once more.
I can’t see her ever backing down from that. I’m certainly willing to be surprised if the show can sell it well enough, but it would go against the unwritten rules that these shows tend to follow.
@27: You’re doing this show an injustice by lumping it with “these cartoons.” It’s not just a typical kiddie cartoon. If it were, Nickelodeon wouldn’t have pulled it from the TV schedule.
It’s also very strongly rooted in Asian culture, and Asian philosophy is built more around balance than on the Western, Manichaean good-vs-evil paradigm.
And Kuvira doesn’t have to “get away with” anything in order to redeem herself. That’s an assumption you’re making and it has nothing to do with what I’m saying. Maybe she’ll sacrifice herself to undo the damage she’s caused. Maybe she’ll voluntarily surrender herself to punishment. I have no idea where you’re getting the notion that redemption means “getting away with it.” Redemption requires facing one’s guilt, not hiding from it.
But there is no way this is just going to be another “Korra wins the fight, the end” resolution — not because of Kuvira’s story arc, but because of Korra’s. This is the final season of Korra’s story. It has to end with her learning to do something she couldn’t do before, specifically to fulfill her goal as the Avatar to bring balance to the world. Korra’s ultimate triumph will be to resolve the Kuvira crisis in a way that she failed to achieve with the Amon, Unalaq, and Zaheer crises. It has to be, or the story has no climax.
And no, Kuvira’s goal is not simply to claim power. Her goal is to end the chaos that’s torn her beloved kingdom apart. Her method has been to claim power for herself, but she sees it as a means toward that end. Remember Toph’s speech about how all Korra’s enemies had benevolent goals and corrupt methods. The writers wouldn’t have planted that distinction between ends and means in our minds, in Korra’s mind, if it weren’t meant to be important.