(no subject)
Surely I can't be the only one tired of the way Avatar fandom exaggerates Katara's mood swings, and annoyed by the constant 'lol Katara has teh PMS' memetic mutation. Big deal, so a girl is emotional and has mood swings. She's a damn human being.
Maybe it's because the other girls on the show have a Default Mood. Azula is smug and calculated, Mai is apathetic, Ty Lee is bubbly, Toph is boisterous and Suki is laid back. Katara can be sweet and happy one minute, sad the next, and then pissed off enough to hit someone later on. And somehow, to the fans that equates to "constantly PMSing". Because God forbid women have fluctuating moods.
Especially when they've gone through as much as Katara has. Losing her mother, having to keep an eye on her snarky, lazy older brother, her dad leaving them to fight in a war where there was a chance he might not make it back. The Fire Nation is breathing down their necks. And then she finds Aang, who needs protection from people who want to kill or capture him as well as her help saving the world. That's a lot to take on at age 14.
Which is why the mood swings are neccessary, IMO. Katara knows how to express her emotions in a healthy way. Look at Azula, another 14 year old girl who has a lot on her plate. Her brother and her uncle are traitors, she's her megalomaniac father's only heir to the throne and essentially his go-to girl for all the invasions and takeovers and magnificent bastardry. She essentially keeps her emotions perfectly in check, only expressing smugness or annoyance or fighting spirit. Guess where she is at the end of the series? Chained and bawling and flailing on the ground and later shipped off to a nuthouse.
But I digress. Point is, Katara is only human, and there's much more to her character than mood swings. And frankly, I've come to find the whole "let's assume all women have PMS when they're being anything but cute, sweet and proper" deal in fandom quite fucking offensive.
I am, however, glad that a double standard is avoided with the fans giving Zuko just as much crap for his emo. Even if I don't particularly enjoy that either because just as Katara is more than her mood swings, Zuko is more than his emo.
Maybe it's because the other girls on the show have a Default Mood. Azula is smug and calculated, Mai is apathetic, Ty Lee is bubbly, Toph is boisterous and Suki is laid back. Katara can be sweet and happy one minute, sad the next, and then pissed off enough to hit someone later on. And somehow, to the fans that equates to "constantly PMSing". Because God forbid women have fluctuating moods.
Especially when they've gone through as much as Katara has. Losing her mother, having to keep an eye on her snarky, lazy older brother, her dad leaving them to fight in a war where there was a chance he might not make it back. The Fire Nation is breathing down their necks. And then she finds Aang, who needs protection from people who want to kill or capture him as well as her help saving the world. That's a lot to take on at age 14.
Which is why the mood swings are neccessary, IMO. Katara knows how to express her emotions in a healthy way. Look at Azula, another 14 year old girl who has a lot on her plate. Her brother and her uncle are traitors, she's her megalomaniac father's only heir to the throne and essentially his go-to girl for all the invasions and takeovers and magnificent bastardry. She essentially keeps her emotions perfectly in check, only expressing smugness or annoyance or fighting spirit. Guess where she is at the end of the series? Chained and bawling and flailing on the ground and later shipped off to a nuthouse.
But I digress. Point is, Katara is only human, and there's much more to her character than mood swings. And frankly, I've come to find the whole "let's assume all women have PMS when they're being anything but cute, sweet and proper" deal in fandom quite fucking offensive.
I am, however, glad that a double standard is avoided with the fans giving Zuko just as much crap for his emo. Even if I don't particularly enjoy that either because just as Katara is more than her mood swings, Zuko is more than his emo.