**spoiler
alert for anyone not yet up-to-date on the ending of Legend of Korra. For my thoughts on Book 1, click here and here. For Book 2, here. For Book 3, here**
“It’s been a bit of a bumpy ride, hasn’t it?”
“Yes. But I’ve come to realize that life is one
big, bumpy ride.”
The degree to which this exchange
between Korra and Tenzin, right at the end of the very last episode of The Legend of Korra, reflects the turbulent
and drawn-out events of the show’s creation and public release has me
reasonably convinced that it was a deliberate bit of metaphysical, almost
humorous reflection on the part of the show’s creators. They have certainly had to backflip through
an uncomfortably large number of flaming hoops to bring us this 4-season extension
of the Avatar universe. Given just how much Nickelodeon succeeded in
making every wrong decision possible as far as their handling of this franchise
is concerned, I am blown away by how excellent The Legend of Korra, as a whole, ended up being, especially these
last two seasons. This show has been a
prime example of how studio mismanagement can directly affect the artistic
quality of a final product. Because of
this, I give the Superhero Award of 2014 to Mike Dante DiMartino and Brian Konietzko, who
have proven their storytelling chops by taking a franchise that almost seemed
to be drowning by the middle of Book 2 and turning things around a full 180
degrees by the end. Against all odds,
they have once again given us something special, a grand tale that rises above
the sum of its parts and that, I believe, will be remembered as something truly
legendary.
I will admit it- I doubted. After the disappointing ending to Book 1 and
the hot mess of a middle act in Book 2, I was not sure that the series would be
able to effectively right itself in time.
What a rush of a corrective this year was, with Book 3’s powerhouse of a trailer, the rapid release of Book 3 itself, and the start and conclusion
of Book 4 shortly afterward, all taking place within 6 months. Granted, the circumstances under which the
releases happened were terrible, but in a way, that made the superbly high
quality of the show’s writing all the more apparent, since it became obvious
just how out of their element Nickelodeon was with a show that actually strove
to make its viewers think.
Central to this turnaround was the
fact that, after a bit of regression for some in Book 2, all the major
characters started to click at the beginning of Book 3, both on their own and
in tandem with each other, and this transformation was most noticeable (and
therefore, all the more effective) with Korra herself. My frustrations with her as a
character were probably my biggest issue with the first two seasons. She started out so cocky and aggressive, such
a polar opposite of Aang. A veritable
savant when it came to fighting and bending, she had none of the spiritual or
emotional strength needed to act as an effective Avatar. She was abrasive and sometimes downright unlikable,
whereas Aang started off funny and enjoyably childlike, but also already possessing
the core of the emotional and moral strength he needed to defeat the Fire Lord
and end the war. Looking at The Last Airbender as a whole, it was
fairly clear from the beginning what solution Aang would ultimately seek out to
end the war. All that remained was for
him to develop enough bending and fighting ability to match Ozai in
combat.
With Korra, we have observed the opposite
journey. She always had the sheer
physical power needed to be the Avatar.
But at the end of every season, that is never enough for her to
win. As the finale of The Last Airbender showed us, simply
winning a fight doesn’t mean you’ve won the war; you need to go deeper than
that. She first has to lose to Amon
before she can catch him off-guard and expose him. Her battle against Unalaq is only won after
Jinora is able to find Raava’s spirit and return her to Korra. Although able to hold off Zaheer at first,
the poison continues to weaken her, until she is saved by the intervention of
the airbenders. And the final battle in
Republic City against Kuvira’s mecha-suit is easily one of the best team-effort
battles I have ever seen, with everyone needed, bender or no, to
bring down the beast part by part. And
at the end, after the battle is all but won, only then does Korra go into the
Avatar state, to save a life and possibly turn the mind an enemy, instead of
simply killing her. It is a tidy
continuation of the final message of The
Last Airbender- responding to evil by taking more lives is easy. Finding ways to live on and build anew is
hard.
At the end of each of the first 3
seasons Korra loses something, be it temporary or permanent. Yet it’s through these losses that she
learns, and grows, and even though she is still not whole by the end- her
connection to the past Avatars is seemingly permanent now- we can see in her
eyes and hear in her voice that she has risen above that to become something
more. She's gone from “I’M the Avatar,
you gotta DEAL with it!” to “There’s so much more I want to learn and do.” There are worlds of maturity and intelligence
between these two statements. It is this
journey- through loss, through emotional turmoil, and after Book 3, through
what is clearly depression and PTSD in all but name- that, more than anything
else, raises The Legend of Korra far
above most other animation of its kind, allowing it to transcend its flaws and
become something very special indeed.
Given the success and pervasive love
for The Last Airbender, this was a
show that took a great deal of chances, and not just with its title character. Mike and Brian could have gone the safe
route, keeping the world in a cryogenic state, with little or no technological
or social advancement having occurred since the end of the war, so that
everything looked and sounded as much as possible like the original
series. Instead, they made deliberate
choices about what advancements they thought could realistically occur over a
70-year period, including radio, cars, modern dress, and flight. They worked out how the technology would be
incorporated into the different storylines, and even thought up ways in which
bending techniques themselves would have been developed, including a greater
use of lightning and metal. Even when it
came to the music, they worked with Jeremy Zuckerman to find a balance between
the traditional instruments present in The
Last Airbender and newer instruments (the Book One soundtrack, a fantastic
fusion of the original Airbender soundtrack
and early 20’s jazz beats, is the best stand-alone example of this). It was a jarring transition at first, but I
value the show all the more for so effectively setting itself apart simply
through the use of music and more modern visuals. It was never what we, the fans, originally
expected, meaning it was exactly what we needed.
On that note, how Legend of Korra relates itself to its
predecessor overall is an accomplishment in and of itself. As cases like the Star Wars prequels, and in recent years the Hobbit Trilogy show, follow-ups to massively influential, hugely
popular movies or series always run the very considerable risk of being so
overshadowed by (or over-compared to) what everyone saw years ago and already
knows and loves. In deliberately
focusing on a cast of entirely new characters, there was always the possibility
that they would either not click as a cast, or would simply not be able to win
our affections the same way the original gang did. Now, whether or not Korra and co. did worm
their collective way into one’s heart by the end is, of course, up to
individual taste (I hear there is a lot of Mako and Bolin hate floating around
the internet), but from the looks of it, more than enough of the fans responded
well to the new cast and loved them plenty.
I sure know I did (my personal favorites will follow in a later post).
That is not to say that the original
series was ignored, which would have been just as ruinous as relying too
heavily on the original characters.
Thankfully, Mike and Brian found the perfect balance, alluding to the
original tale when needed, and even including Katara, Zuko, and Toph in spot
moments, but never allowing them to shift focus from the new faces, stories,
and themes they wanted to focus on. Toph
herself summed it up nicely- “At some point, you gotta leave it to the
kids.” I think my personal favorite
example of this was the glorious shot we get of a photo of Aang, as a grown man
and fully realized Avatar, still doing the same spinning-marble trick and still
sporting that big, face-splitting grin.
If I had to pick my favorite aspect
of the new world Korra inhabits, it’s how politically and militarily powerful women
are a complete non-issue. It is simply
accepted, and never questioned or debated.
Avatar was from the start a
great franchise for girl characters, but in The
Last Airbender we never see any older women in positions of leadership, and
we get plenty of episodes highlighting how female roles in many areas of the
world were still traditionally restricted.
Here, though, we have, in addition to a female Avatar, the following; a female
Fire Lord, a woman heading up the police force in Republic City, her sister
presiding over a powerful sub-state nearby, a young woman running one of the
most powerful and influential companies in the world, and a queen reigning alone
over the Earth Kingdom. After Book 2, we
see that Eska is now jointly ruling the Northern Water Tribe with her brother,
and watch as Jinora becomes the first airbending master in a generation, as
well as learn of her extremely unusual and potent spiritual powers. Between Books 3 and 4, with the Earth Kingdom
descending into chaos, the first person the leaders of the world turn to is Suyin Beifong,
and when she rejects the offer, they turn to another woman, her best lieutenant
Kuvira, who as we all know proceeds to not only do the job well, but also
develop into arguably the best villain the series has ever had (and now that it
occurs to me, it would be pretty kick-ass to see her fight against Azula in her
prime).
These characters all run the gamut
of personality, age, and even body type.
There are several moments that draw attention to Korra’s extremely
muscular physique, still something viewed by many in our world as unattractive
or even unhealthy. Lin and her sister
are about or at least middle-aged, since they are both sporting gray hair. Kuvira has all the complexity, determination,
and intelligence of an Iago, or any other great, classic villain. The character that would probably be
considered the most “conventionally” beautiful (going by our culture’s
standards) is Asami, who is tall, very light-skinned, slender, and curved, with
long, flowing hair and full lips. Yet, nearly
every time we see her, she’s decked out in full-body mechanic outfits and
workman gloves, and all the praise and attention she gets from others is based
on either admiration and/or need for her brilliant engineering mind and
business acumen. This is a show that,
even more than The Last Airbender, puts
the power, skill, and complexity of its women on full display, not to be
debated, but to be celebrated and admired.
Actually, there are a lot of topics
and ideas that this show succeeded in including and doing justice to, while
doing it in a way that never oversimplifies things and never talks down to its
audience, but still breaks down and depicts things in a way that both younger
AND older audiences can grasp, discuss, and appreciate. Several articles have already devoted some
time to this, so I will not try to list all of them here, but in addition to
the truly wonderful variety of women in the story in roles devoid of
traditional sexism, I am also a huge fan f how political the show
got by the end. The creators have
repeatedly said that they never had a specific agenda in mind, nor do they
subscribe to a certain ideology or political philosophy, but there is no
denying how many parallels can be drawn between real-world figures, both
historical and current, and the likes of Amon, Tarrlok, Zaheer, and
Kuvira. And again, at no point does the
series tell the audience what to think- there are several challenging political
discussions across the seasons that Korra is never able to fully handle. We know the villains are wrong in at least
some aspects, but since we only sporadically hear the characters themselves
explain why, we must inevitably think of reasons ourselves. And thus, we are brought to think about both
the Avatar world and our own a little differently.
Alright, alright, now I’ll get to “the
moment.” I realize I have been prevaricating
somewhat, but there were a lot of thoughts on the show as a whole I wanted to
lay out before turning to Korrasami.
That said, let’s talk about Korrasami.
I have read/listened to a lot of
views on how this was done, and how it was handled. Without a doubt, it is a small landmark
moment of sorts, and given that my girlfriend and I had started hoping for it
during the last two seasons, I am personally really happy that it happened, and
that the, as of right now, final Avatar series
got to really break through another glass ceiling as far as children’s
animation is concerned.
That said, I do also feel that it is
an imperfect step. More could have been
done to set the relationship up, and I would love nothing more than a
continuation of the story in some form that really explores how the
relationship develops. However, I also feel
that the flaws in how this was handled reflect our continuing social hangups regarding
homosexuality far more than they do any lack of ability or daring on the part
of the writers. They have now gone on
the record as saying that as far back as Book 2, they started tossing this idea
around. However, they sat on it until it
was almost too late, figuring that they would never get the green light from
Nickelodeon. And given how hard Nick
screwed them towards the end, they had good ground to fear getting canceled
entirely if they pushed too hard for more than the studio was willing to
allow. And when they finally did ask,
they were given permission, but could not go as far as an actual kiss.
In a perfect world, free of the
sexual hangups that still infest our society, none of those doubts or
uncertainties would have surfaced, and Mike and Brian most likely would have
done much more to set up the relationship by the end, or may have even started
it sooner. Hell, they may have planned
to do so anyway, until Nick heinously robbed them of an extra episode halfway into
the production of the final season. All
major “what ifs,” and sadly we will never know what the show could have done in
less frustrating circumstances.
Yet, in a way, Korrasami is very
much a perfect microcosm of the show as a whole. It is a daring piece of work, hindered in its
results somewhat by a bad mixture of cultural hangups, uncertainty on the part
of the writers, and patently awful studio slip-ups, yet something that is still
beautiful to behold despite, and in many cases because of, how flawed it
is. I think The Last Airbender comes
away as the more solid show as a whole, which is largely a case of it being
able to build and develop an overarching story in a perfectly paced manner,
whereas Korra, by design, was meant to be a series of smaller, more compact
arcs, with only unspoken themes connecting them. It was another daring move on the part of the
creators. Like many daring artistic
moves, it only fully works in some parts and less in others, but like all such
creative risks, every minute of it is worth watching. Thank God for this show.
This is by no means the last of my
writings on the Avatar universe. Once the rush of awards season is over and
done with, I will be returning to this topic sometime in the Spring to do a
series of posts about my favorite characters and moments from both The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra, which will include
a bevy of various Top 10 lists, along with my personal thoughts on which is the
“superior” series. Until then, enjoy the
coming onslaught of Oscar coverage, last-minute 2014 reviews, and my own
various Top 10/end-of-the-year reflections.
Stay tuned.
-Noah
Franc
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