review megapost, part 2

[freetosay]

These are the recaps and reviews associated with the second quarter of this season's The Legend of Korra, enjoy!

forewarning: i will not add the reviews from The Movie Pool this time. they didn't review the episodes weekly and I'm currently searching for the site who did. leave a comment if you found one. thanks.

Comments

[linbeifong]

So where are we at the halfway point of the first season? I’ve been kind of baffled by comments complaining that the characters of Korra aren’t as well-developed as the ones in the original series, so I decided to revisit the first half-dozen episodes of A:TLA. (Hey, remember Haru?) Most of my favorite episodes of the original are in the second and third seasons, and I hadn’t really revisited the first aside from “The Blue Spirit” and “The Siege Of The North.” So when I went back, it was almost jarring how juvenile those early episodes feel in comparison to later ones, and to Korra. The characters are eerily reminiscent of their caricatures in the Ember Island Players: Sokka is hungry, Katara is naïve, Aang is an incurable prankster who does that goofy laugh a lot (like, a lot), Zuko shouts at his uncle and has a doofus ponytail.



Yeah, Sokka is a teenage boy so there are quite a few jokes about him eating all the things, but come on. There are major points from the beginning about him trying to grow up and protect his family and preserve his culture all while dealing with self worth issues from being left behind by his dad. Also he's already on his way to working past his sexist concepts that he had in the pilot.

Hopeful to the point of annoying? Yes. Naive? No. Her mom was killed and she became the substitute caretaker for her family; she doesn't get to be naive again! (I haven't done this since I was a kid!)

And Aang is dealing with the genocide off his whole culture!

They're three kids dealing with a world that none of them are completely prepared for and having to rebuild their preconceptions/expectations.

There's significant, if somewhat heavy-handed, character growth by the fourth episode. Out of twenty!

Burn it to the ground tbh.

(Also Pema's not a homewrecker ffs.)

[evilsherbear]

ia. I remember Sokka trying to fill his father's shoes of trying to protect the village and rally the children. It was funny, then heartbreakingly sad when you thought about it. They're kids dealing with a lot of serious personal issues. I'm just just not feeling any of that with Korra. I don't know what motivates her, how she feels about being the avatar, etc. I like that she's fierce and good at fighting, but I'm not getting how she feels she places in Republic City other than "I'm the goddamn avatar!"

[microlm]

Well, to be honest, I'm not Korra knows what she is other than the Avatar either.

[evilsherbear]

I'm getting that sense too. I'm hoping this will lead to character development later on down the line, but as the episodes go on her personality is starting to wear on me.

[silly_izzy_me]

ia!!!