History WhatAnIdiot / AvatarTheLastAirbender

'''You'd Expect''': Zuko would remember that "Azula always lies, Azula always lies," and she has always been a manipulative liar since they were children. She tried to deceive him at the beginning of season two so as to capture him and deliver him in chains to their father. Also, she just captured him with the Dai Li's help. With all of this taken into account, Zuko has every right to [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech call out Azula for being]] [[CainAndAbel a horrible and unloving sister all his life]] and [[MistreatmentInducedBetrayal then betray]] ''[[MistreatmentInducedBetrayal her]]'' [[HeelFaceTurn to save Katara and the Gaang]].\\

** As a result of the above, Zuko decides to end his support for the Harmony Restoration Movement.\\
'''You'd Expect:''' That before taking any "drastic" action, Zuko would get in contact with Aang and/or the Earth King, explain the situation to them, and see if they could work things out peacefully.\\
'''Instead:''' Zuko publicly withdraws his support for the Harmony Restoration Movement, orders the departing colonials to return to the colonies and fortifies Yu Dao, not letting anyone in or out, and makes no attempt to talk to anyone. Unsurprisingly, a lot of people see this as Zuko refusing to give up his colonies, and another war nearly starts.\\
'''Bonus Idiocy:''' Much like Zuko himself, Kuei turns out to be a ReasonableAuthorityFigure once he's made aware of the true nature of Yu Dao. Zuko made the exact same mistake Kori did.
** Shortly after Zuko does this, Aang and Katara show up in Yu Dao hoping to talk to him. A Fire Nation soldier orders them to leave, and Aang explains that he just wants to talk with Zuko.\\

'''Result:''' The only thing that stops Zuko from imprisoning Kori and her father for the rest of their lives is Mrs Morishita -- practically the OnlySaneMan in the family at this point -- diffusing the situation, after which Zuko proves to be a ReasonableAuthorityFigure who would have been perfectly willing to help Yu Dao, if only he'd been made aware of what was going on beforehand.

'''Predictably''': The chief gives him a WhatTheHellHero, as Toph recognizes his voice and tells Aang that he was the one who kidnapped Appa. Aang, after the long few days they had in the desert trying to get water and futilely flying after Appa, ''snaps''. He goes into the Avatar State and starts destroying the sails, demanding to know what they did to the sky bison. The ringleader son is forced to confess as his father gives him a DeathGlare and goes, "[[WhatWereYouThinking What have you done]]?!" It's only because of Katara that Aang doesn't bury everyone alive in sand. Also, the sandbenders have no way of retrieving Appa, so you know that the chief is going to give his son a heavy punishment for his stupidity and KickTheDog moment.

'''You'd Expect''': Zuko would remember that "Azula always lies, Azula always lies," and she has always been a manipulative liar since they were children. She tried to deceive him at the beginning of season two so as to capture him and deliver him in chains to their father. Also, she just captured him with the Dai Li's help. With all of this taken into account, Zuko has every right to [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech call out Azula for being a horrible sister all his life]] and [[MistreatmentInducedBetrayal then betray]] ''[[MistreatmentInducedBetrayal her]]'' [[HeelFaceTurn to save Katara and the Gaang]].\\

'''You'd Expect''': Zuko would remember that "Azula always lies, Azula always lies," and she has always been a manipulative liar since they were children. She tried to deceive him at the beginning of season two so as to capture him and deliver him in chains to their father. Also, she just captured him with the Dai Li's help. With all of this, it would make the most sense for Zuko to [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech call out Azula for being a horrible sister all his life]] and [[MistreatmentInducedBetrayal betray]] ''[[MistreatmentInducedBetrayal her]]'' [[MistreatmentInducedBetrayal to save Katara and the Gaang]].\\

'''You'd Expect''': Zuko would remember that "Azula always lies, Azula always lies," and she has always been a manipulative liar since they were children. She tried to deceive him at the beginning of season two so as to capture him and deliver him in chains to their father. Also, she just captured him with the Dai Li's help.\\

'''You'd Expect:''' Roku to do everything in his power to quell Sozin's expansionist thoughts using everything he learning in traveling the world to explain or demonstrate why such expansion is a bad idea and make sure that Sozin has been convinced of this fact.\\

'''You'd Expect:''' Zuko to keep quiet. At this point, Ozai has already been mistreating Zuko for a long while, and tried to have him killed on Azulon's orders. Zuko to also realize Ozai will not accept anything from him, even if it's a much more sensible option, due to Ozai's hatred for the boy.\\

** Katara is overjoyed to learn Hama is a waterbender like her, but she notices a series of red flags over the course of the episode: Hama just so happened to be in the Fire Nation, she has puppets resembling Fire Nation citizens in her cupboard, and her waterbending involves draining trees and tiger lilies of their water, shrivelling them up.\\
'''You'd Expect:''' Katara to put all those red flags together and realise Hama is a psychopath. Even if she doesn't know this woman is a bloodbender yet, she could warn the rest of the Gaang and flee before it's too late.\\
'''Instead:''' She stays with Hama until the full moon shows up. By the time she learns this woman is a bloodbender, Katara is forced to bloodbend against her will.
** In the present, the Gaang investigates the disappearances in the village. Thanks to Toph's earthbending and ability to make facsimile keys out of stone, they are able to find and free the innocent Fire Nation villain from a mountain cell. They confirm that it wasn't the Moon Spirit kidnapping them, but Hama, using the power of the full moon to bloodbend their limbs. Sokka and Aang go OhCrap when they remember that Hama is training Katara under the full moon. They need to save her!\\

'''The Result''': Hama shows them the foolishness of their decision by bloodbending them, and forcing the boys to attack each other and Katara. Aang doesn't know how to resist the bloodbending the way Katara can, and apologizes for nearly whacking her. Katara has to bloodbend Hama and master the technique, to save her brother and the Avatar, which was the end goal that Hama wanted. Cue BittersweetEnding as Katara is faced with horrible realization about being a bloodbender master, while Hama returns to prison.

'''You'd Also Expect:''' Hama to sneakily invade the Fire Nation Royal Palace and just bloodbend Azulon or Ozai and ''end the war'' right there. Being known as the hero who ended the war would certainly boost Hama's reputation enough that many students will actively learn Bloodbending from her.\\

* "Jet": The titular character encounters the Gaang after they accidentally provide a distraction. Sokka is suspicious when Jet attacks an old man and tries to kill him, on the grounds of him being a Fire Nation civilian. Katara dismisses his worries, but unknown to her Jet wants her and Aang to bend enough water into the reservoir so it will flood the nearby town. She and Aang find out when they fill it and go to surprise Jet, though Katara at first is in denial and Aang prepares to fly and warn the villagers.\\
'''You'd Expect''': Jet would quickly give the signal to blow up the dam before Aang can fly and then stall Katara and Aang by lying to them. If Aang doesn't listen, then Jet can attack.\\
'''Instead''': He admits that it's the truth and attacks Aang to keep him from flying to warn the villagers.\\
'''The Result''': While Aang gets knocked from the trees, Katara pins Jet to a tree using ice within seconds. Only ''then'' does Jet give the signal. It turns out the delay was enough time for Sokka to go and warn the town, with the old man he rescued vouching for him so no one, soldier or civilian, is hurt. On top of all that Katara is incensed that Jet lied to her and wanted her and Aang to be an accessory to murder; she leaves him covered in ice.

Even the cast of [[WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender a great Nickelodeon cartoon]] aren't immune to stupidity.

'''You'd Expect:''' Him to sneak up behind him and kill him by surprise. He'll get the glory for killing him, be regarded as a worthy successor to Chief Arnook, and maybe even get Yue to reconsider her feelings toward him.\\

* "Zuko Alone":
** In the flashback in which Zuko reminisces about his mother, it is revealed that Iroh retreated from Ba Sing Se after his only son Lu Ten was killed in the fight. To capitalize on this, Ozai asked Azulon to make him the Fire Lord by arguing that Iroh's line ended with him now, and to punish him for giving up on '''the''' golden chance to end the Hundred-Year War.\\

'''You'd Expect:''' Zuko to keep quiet. At this point, Ozai has already been mistreating Zuko since a while, and tried to have him killed on Azulon's orders. Zuko to also realize Ozai will not accept anything from him, even if it's a much more sensible option, due to Ozai's hatred for the boy.\\

* "Sozin's Comet - Part 3": It's finally the moment we'd all been waiting for. Aang has forced Ozai to the ground, and it's time for the FinalBattle. But, due to not wanting to take a human life, Aang gives him a heartfelt speech to surrender before it's too late.\\
'''You'd Expect:''' Ozai to heed the Avatar's warning and surrender. Even when he himself has never seen the Avatar in action, he surely has heard stories about him, and knows very well the boy is ''not'' to be messed with. Also, at this point Ozai doesn't know his chakra pathways are damaged so he can't go to the Avatar State.\\
'''Instead:''' Ozai ''laughs'' at the speech and promptly begins to fight Aang, somehow thinking Sozin's Comet will be enough to overwhelm the Avatar State which uses ''all of the bending disciplines at their full potential'', effectively negating this advantage. Even without the Avatar State, he is also forgetting that Sozin's Comet empowers ''all'' firebending used, meaning that Aang's relative inexperience with it compared to him and his own pacifism is the only reason why Ozai himself wasn't fried to a crisp.\\
'''As a Result:''' Ozai accidentally fixes his pathways, and a promptly furious Aang decides to finally kill him, only stopping at the last moment. [[CruelMercy Though it's actually a very small relief]], Aang takes away all his bending abilities due to the backup of a lion turtle, as he's forced to watch everything he'd done being dismantled by his hated son, brother and rest of Team Avatar.

'''Instead:''' One of Azula's officers refers to Zuko and Iroh as "the prisoners" ''on the way up the ship'', leading to the pair of them realizing it's a trap and inflicting a CurbStompBattle on the crew before making their escape.

'''Instead''': When the Gaang realizes that firebenders lose their powers doing a solar eclipse, Sokka excitedly says that they'll invade the Fire Nation during one and jubilantly declares, "The Fire Lord is going down!" right as Wan Shi Tong shows up.\\

* "The Storm": The Earth Kingdom has put the Fire Nation in a stalemate since Iroh abandoned the Hundred-Year War after his son's death. To counter this, a Fire Nation General proposes sacrificing freshly-minted Fire Nation soldiers as bait to attack from the rear.\\
'''You'd Expect:''' Ozai to reject this plan. As mentioned above, the Earth Kingdom has the Fire Nation in a stalemate, and losing soldiers to a plan that might not work would be [[PragmaticVillainy heavily disadvantageous for their plans for expanding into the Earth Kingdom]]. Even more, even hearing the outcome may discourage would-be Fire Nation recruits from joining the war.\\
'''Instead:''' Ozai approves the plan.\\
'''As a Result:''' Zuko, who can see the flaw in the plan, objects to it, and Ozai (now seeing a golden opportunity to get rid of his weak son) challenges him to an Agni Kai. Zuko refuses to fight his own father, and Ozai burns his face as punishment and banishes him from the Fire Nation [[SnipeHunt until he captures the Avatar]]. This all goes swimmingly, until Zuko helps Azula temporarily kill the Avatar and is welcomed back to the Fire Nation. Despite everything, Zuko is unable to forgive Ozai for scarring him and eventually turns against him once Ozai makes his genocidal plans clear, which wouldn't have happened if Zuko didn't use his banishment to become a better person and learn more about the plight of the opposing Nations.

* "The Storm":
** The Earth Kingdom has put the Fire Nation in a stalemate since Iroh abandoned the Hundred-Year War after his son's death. To counter this, a Fire Nation General proposes sacrificing freshly-minted Fire Nation soldiers as bait to attack from the rear.\\

'''As a Result:''' Zuko, who can see the flaw in the plan, objects to it, and Ozai (now seeing a golden opportunity to get rid of his weak son) challenges him to an Agni Kai. Zuko refuses to fight his own father, and Ozai burns his face as punishment and banishes him from the Fire Nation until he captures the Avatar. This all goes swimmingly, until Zuko helps Azula temporarily kill the Avatar and is welcomed back to the Fire Nation. Despite everything, Zuko is unable to forgive Ozai for scarring him and eventually turns against him once Ozai makes his genocidal plans clear, which wouldn't have happened if Zuko didn't use his banishment to become a better person and learn more about the plight of the opposing Nations.

'''Instead:''' He announces that [[ParentalObliviousness he has been permitting her too much freedom by letting her wander the gardens of the family compound on her own]], and that [[OverprotectiveDad she will be guarded 24/7 from now on]]. In addition, he orders the Avatar and his companions to leave at once. This ultimately causes Toph to run away completely from him. [[NeverMyFault He then blames the Avatar for kidnapping his daughter]] and hires a team to kidnap her.

* ''Imbalance''

[[quoteright:333:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/sokka_facepalm.png]]
[[caption-width-right:333:A typical reaction from a fan who notices such [[DarthWiki/WhatAnIdiot idiocy]].]]

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