Revenge (Avatar: TLoK Fan Fic)
“This is not fair! It was our title first! I HATE this job!” Michael DiMartino slammed the door hard behind him and slammed his briefcase even harder onto the table.
Bryan Konietzko, completely unruffled by the minor earthquake that had stormed into the room, continued flipping through his copy of Mockingjay as he said nonchalantly, “Somebody skipped his morning coffee this morning.”
Mike replied by slamming his coffee thermos onto the table. “It’s not the coffee, it’s lawyers! I hate James Cameron!”
“I guess that means you got the news that they made the final call,” his partner replied, closing his book.
“Yeah - we can’t use the word ‘Avatar’ in the title... a word we were using in our title long before his Ferngully-remake,” Mike said as he sat down and crossed his arms.
“Ah, don’t worry about it,” Bryan consoled him. “The fans’ll call it ‘Avatar: The Legend of Korra’ anyway.”
“That’s not the point,” said Mike. “He uses one word that just happened to be in our title already and then accuses us of trademark infringement-whatever. It’s ridiculous. Man, I’d love to get back at him.”
“Well, do what Cinna does,” Bryan said, patting his book in reference. “Channel it into your art.”
“Why are you reading that anyway?” Mike asked.
“Just getting some ideas,” Bryan answered. “Come on, we gotta get started.”
Mike sighed and tried to push away his anger. “Okay. Which episode were we working on again?”
“We were gonna start Episode 4 today,” Bryan explained as he began flipping over pages of old notes. “In this one, we deepen the enmity between Amon and Korra and set up the, uh... the, uh...” He struggled to find the right word.
“Love pentagon between Asami, Mako, Korra, Bolin, and Tarrlok,” Mike finished for him as he opened his briefcase and removed his own writing tablets of notes.
“Tarrlok is not a...” Bryan began, but his partner quickly interjected, “You think the fans will see it that way?”, making him sigh in resignation. Better to accept the inevitable.
Mike continued, “We shouldn’t even be writing this - at least not so early. We promised the higher-ups we could make a show with a female protagonist that the male demographic would still love. Throwing all this romance at them in one punch is gonna turn them away faster than you can say ‘Monkey feathers.’ ”
“Well, we gotta keep the fangirls happy, too,” Bryan argued. “The boys already have the Pro-Bending subplot to keep them hooked. You think the girls enjoy taking time away from the heroic fantasy plot to focus on a purely recreational tournament of dueling like on Yu-Gi-Oh?”
“Fangirls love Yu-Gi-Oh,” Mike reminded him. “That’s why you decided to give Mako Seto Saiba’s backstory.”
“Yeah, nobody else suggested completely stealing Mako’s backstory from a nostalgic fangirl magnet...” Bryan retorted sarcastically.
“Hey, the fans were the ones constantly comparing the first promo shot to Batman, not me!” Mike snapped.
“Maybe we should switch Asami from a rich girl to a cat burglar and have Mako catch her breaking into their apartment,” Bryan joked to ease the tension.
Mike took the offered turn back onto the intended course. “Too late. Nope, the material we gave ourselves to work with is about as cliché as you can get - handsome, poor, orphaned street rat falls in love at first sight with hot rich girl meets during tumultuous times, and- hey...” His voice trailed off as he began looking rapidly back and forth over his notes. Perplexed at the abrupt silence, Bryan looked up to see him simply staring off into space, his brow wrinkled in deep thought.
“What?” a very curious Bryan eventually asked.
“Well, I was just thinking...” Mike said in an almost dazed tone, still mulling over whatever had clicked in his mind as he considered Mako and Asami.
“What, you get an idea?” Bryan guessed.
“Oh, yeah...” Mike answered, smiling.
“A good idea?”
“No - a horrible, stupid idea...”
“What are you talking about?” Bryan asked, thoroughly confused now.
“I can’t explain it,” Mike said, shaking his head. “See, I just thought of... well, why not?” He was laughing as he spoke now. “Here, I’ll show you,” he added as he left the table and walked over to the computer on the desk in the corner. He logged in, sat down, and began typing, mumbling to himself something that sounded like, “I’ll show you copyright infringement.”
Bryan shrugged and picked his book back up. There was no point in continuing to brainstorm alone, so he might as well wait. Besides, District 13’s plan of turning Katniss into their Mockingjay had given him great ideas for Korra’s conflict with Tarrlok.
It wasn’t long before Mike returned to the table with a few sheets of paper. “What do you think of this for a romantic B-plot?”
Bryan barely read the first two lines before handing them back and saying impatiently, “Hah, very funny.”
“Keep reading,” Mike told him, putting the draft back in his still-outstretched hand.
“You’re serious?” Bryan was no longer confused; he was completely bewildered. “What are you, insane?”
“What do you mean?”
Bryan stood up and held the so-called script in his right hand like an exhibit at a trial. “Mako takes one look at a girl and instantly starts blushing and mumbling like a goofy, lovestruck teenager? A fan fiction writer couldn’t get away with that! They’d be tried, convicted, and executed for Severe Out-Of-Characterness within 5 minutes of posting it!”
“Keep. Reading,” was all the writer responded.
Bryan sighed, sat back down, and tried to read, hoping to get to the punchline soon so they could get back to work. But he didn’t get far before finding himself unable to go on again. “ ‘I don’t have any clothes nice enough for a place that classy?’ That sound like something anyone, let alone Mako, would say to an almost complete stranger under any circumstances?”
“Keep reading,” his evidently-psychotic partner repeated.
“I can’t; I’m not strong enough to stomach it,” the irate reader said sardonically but continued nonetheless. He didn’t pause again until he got to Asami lending Mako a suit for their date. It didn’t take long before he remembered why that sounded so familiar; Mike noticed, however, when it clicked, and said pre-emptively, “You got it, huh? Keep reading.”
Bryan managed to stay calm through the end now. He was silent for awhile after he put the draft down before asking the writer, “Why am I reading a bad fan fic that has the Legend of Korra characters acting out Titanic?”
“It was clear enough?” Mike asked sincerely.
Unsure how to respond to that, Bryan simply repeated, “Why am I reading a bad fan fic that has the Legend of Korra characters acting out Titanic?”
“It’s horrible, isn’t it?” Mike said eagerly. “Cliche, unrealistic, unromantic, silly...”
“As silly as when James Cameron did it the first time around,” Bryan said, exasperated.
“Exactly!” Mike said, pointing at him with both fingers to emphasize that he’d hit the nail on the head without realizing it. “Look, we know the shippers are gonna hate Asami anyway, right?”
“They’re gonna chew her up and spit her out, dump more hate on her than fans have done to Rowena, Amy March, Ginny Weasley, and Mai combined,” Bryan stated matter-of-factly.
“So, they’re gonna find reasons to hate and criticize any romantic plot we give her and Mako, right?”
“Sure, but that’s part of the fun,” Bryan agreed.
“You know what would be more fun?” Mike suggested with a smug, satisfied grin. “Making the romantic plot they hate and criticize the one from James Cameron’s masterpiece. If we could remind the world how stupid it is... Emphasize how much better our work is by the contrast... Man, when I just picture the fan art making fun of these two... You know it will all also make fun of Cameron; the similarities are too much to resist.”
Bryan had to interrupt him, or he’d be musing all day. “Or we could just be inviting another lawsuit on our heads.”
“Come on,” Mike begged him. “This may be the only way to show Cameron he can’t push us around. We could expose his pet project love story for the ridiculous hackneyed... thing it was.”
“It’s been done,” Bryan pointed out. “But...” he said grinning, “It would be hilarious to watch.”
“The episode or the fandom reaction?” Mike asked.
“Both. Ah, the shipping fandom’s going to explode anyway; we might as well do it in epic style,” Bryan decided with mock emphasis. “Only... if you really want to show the contrast, and don’t want to ruin our reputation entirely, we should follow up the ridiculous set-up with something genuinely sweet and beautiful.”
“Yeah, you’re right,” the schemer admitted, crossing his arms in deep thought. “Hey, did we have anything planned for Asami’s mother yet?”
“No.”
“That’s our way in then,” Mike concluded. “Dead mother - they’ll bond over dead parents.”
“Just like Zuko and Katara?” Bryan added with a knowing smile.
“Shhh!” Mike joked as he put his finger to his lips, picked up his pen, and sighed contentedly. “I love this job.”