the fire palace should hire some child psychologists
A conversation over chat had me realizing that Mai and Zuko would be the most fail parents ever. Okay, maybe not as fail as Jet and Azula, but still pretty fail. Mai would be the most horrible mother out of all the sane Avatar ladies, because she does not seem to have that sense of...compassion? Empathy? That I think is necessary for a good mom. She let her baby brother go with kidnappers who may or may not have wanted him dead, and then proceeded to endanger his life by fighting with his captors. Something about that signals 'bad momma' waves in my brain.
Added to that, she had a very emotionally uninvolved family. She seems to have been raised to suppress and hide everything, and her relationship with her parents doesn't seem to be close or loving. Someone coming from that kind of background is going to find it hard to raise a child, and Mai especially seems to lack the motivation to cultivate interest. She more or less seems not to give a shit about people, as the only person we have ever seen her generate clear, genuine, positive emotion towards is Zuko. (And that's the 'I love you enough to do something about it' kind of emotion, not: 'I'm friendly enough with you in my own way' emotion.) One person. I wanted to include Ty Lee, but really couldn't. It would be a definite struggle for her. I'm not sure how well she'd be able to raise the kid on an emotional level.
And then there's Zuko. He seems good enough with kids for the one episode we see him interacting with one- Li, in Zuko Alone. He's not amazing, but I'm sure there are worse people out there, and he seemed to genuinely enjoy hanging out and being a weird pseudo brother. I think it's because he is an older brother, even if his sister turned out to be a backstabbing bitch to him. He also had two positive parental figures in his life- Ursa and Iroh, to give him some kind of an idea on how parenting should go. He's on a much better footing than Mai in that regard.
He'd want to be the best dad ever forever because his own dad was such a miserable excuse for a father and a human being, and end up trying too hard and being Zuko, but I think he'd end up doing pretty okay by the kid. He's no Iroh, but he tries hard enough to succeed despite all obstacles. (Obstacles being: he has very little patience. He fails at basic human interaction. Also he's a total dork and would probably take his eight year old to the baby playground and get irritable if she didn't like it.)
I also think he'd be one of those ridiculous dads who is just awestruck by their baby and has no idea what to do with it at all. It's...a crying ball of baby flesh. It's HIS damn ball of baby flesh and he loves it, but hell if he has any idea about what to do with it. Thank god these people are royalty and they have wet nurses to take care of all the necessary cuddling and such that a baby requires to thrive.
The problem with Zuko is that he's the damn Fire Lord of a post-war nation still loyal to the previous, bloodthirsty regime...and he's going to be damn busy. No matter how you slice it, those problems will still be lurking around when that kid is old enough to care about how daddy's always busy in the Peace Council. (No war council anymore! Only Peace, Welfare, and TAXES.) He's going to be more uninvolved than he wants to whether he likes it or not.
It all makes me want to write a fic about poor Mai and Zuko's kid, wandering around a palace with a phalanx of guards to keep them safe from possible assassination attempts.
Added to that, she had a very emotionally uninvolved family. She seems to have been raised to suppress and hide everything, and her relationship with her parents doesn't seem to be close or loving. Someone coming from that kind of background is going to find it hard to raise a child, and Mai especially seems to lack the motivation to cultivate interest. She more or less seems not to give a shit about people, as the only person we have ever seen her generate clear, genuine, positive emotion towards is Zuko. (And that's the 'I love you enough to do something about it' kind of emotion, not: 'I'm friendly enough with you in my own way' emotion.) One person. I wanted to include Ty Lee, but really couldn't. It would be a definite struggle for her. I'm not sure how well she'd be able to raise the kid on an emotional level.
And then there's Zuko. He seems good enough with kids for the one episode we see him interacting with one- Li, in Zuko Alone. He's not amazing, but I'm sure there are worse people out there, and he seemed to genuinely enjoy hanging out and being a weird pseudo brother. I think it's because he is an older brother, even if his sister turned out to be a backstabbing bitch to him. He also had two positive parental figures in his life- Ursa and Iroh, to give him some kind of an idea on how parenting should go. He's on a much better footing than Mai in that regard.
He'd want to be the best dad ever forever because his own dad was such a miserable excuse for a father and a human being, and end up trying too hard and being Zuko, but I think he'd end up doing pretty okay by the kid. He's no Iroh, but he tries hard enough to succeed despite all obstacles. (Obstacles being: he has very little patience. He fails at basic human interaction. Also he's a total dork and would probably take his eight year old to the baby playground and get irritable if she didn't like it.)
I also think he'd be one of those ridiculous dads who is just awestruck by their baby and has no idea what to do with it at all. It's...a crying ball of baby flesh. It's HIS damn ball of baby flesh and he loves it, but hell if he has any idea about what to do with it. Thank god these people are royalty and they have wet nurses to take care of all the necessary cuddling and such that a baby requires to thrive.
The problem with Zuko is that he's the damn Fire Lord of a post-war nation still loyal to the previous, bloodthirsty regime...and he's going to be damn busy. No matter how you slice it, those problems will still be lurking around when that kid is old enough to care about how daddy's always busy in the Peace Council. (No war council anymore! Only Peace, Welfare, and TAXES.) He's going to be more uninvolved than he wants to whether he likes it or not.
It all makes me want to write a fic about poor Mai and Zuko's kid, wandering around a palace with a phalanx of guards to keep them safe from possible assassination attempts.