The Legend of Korra

I'm not going to blame them for not burning any bridges.

edited 30th Jan '15 1:50:33 PM by Bocaj

Toph and parenting.

Heatbending.

Politics.

On heatbending: heat is ultimately the kinetic energy of molecules. All any bender has to do is alter the rate of vibration to increase or decrease temperature.

edited 31st Jan '15 7:58:56 AM by MurkyMuse

Yeah, it just takes a very precise form of telekinesis. If you can move a rock, you can heat it up.

That's probably why both earth and waterbenders can phase change their element. It's just significantly harder for earthbenders because of rock's high melting point.

In theory airbenders could probably turn the air around them into liquid but that's probably too difficult and I don't see it being all that helpful.

Airbenders just use the technique to always keep themselves a comfortable temperature.

...Air is mostly made up of nitrogen. So a phase change would result in liquid nitrogen. That's kind of scary.

edited 31st Jan '15 8:06:50 AM by MurkyMuse

Politics.

Don't have to time read it yet, but... is that sound I hear my dear friend Gault sharpening his blade? I look forward to it.

edited 31st Jan '15 8:31:42 AM by KillerClowns

@politics: That is a good point with Amon. It also explains why Book 1 left such a bad aftertaste and why Tarrlok would've been bettin hindsight. Never did think much about what Amons plan lacked.

Hey I just want to submit a personal theory about Raava and the past lives.

When Unavaatu beat her against the rock, he loosened up her essence, including the past lives, and absorbed it into himself. When Korra beat them, she reabsorbed Raava's essence. She was not able to access the past live because the memories had been scattered and incoherent.

Korra is the new first Avatar.

@Killer Clowns, you may be a bit disappointed. The content is fairly reasonable and well-considered. It mentions Marx by name, even. Several points that are brought up within pattern to my thoughts exactly. For example, having Amon turn out to be driven by his secret daddy issues does completely undercut the political angle that the show had been building towards, as a sort of cop-out to not need to explain or resolve anything to do with it.

It was an interesting read that I think is worth discussing.

edited 31st Jan '15 9:24:38 AM by Gault

It would be hilarious if the next Avatar was homophobic or something.

I wish more villains would point out that their Freudian Excuse doesn't matter. It wouldn't work for Amon, but I remember one book I read had a villain get exposed as being motivated by something stupid (it wasn't daddy issues, can't remember what) in front of everyone, and he just went into this long parable about a completely insane and delusional man who thought he was being mind controlled and everything, and who also mentioned once that the sky was blue. "Does the fact that he is wrong about all these other things mean the sky is not blue?" He did lose some support, but he managed to power through by admitting that yes, he does have personal problems, but they don't invalidate his politics.

That would be funny.

That would be brilliant to see more often. And in Amon's case it's completely true. A lot of people seem to miss that.

The "politics" textwall can be summed up as...

• Blah blah blah overanalysis blah blah
• Actual good point on why taking any ideology to extremes is wrong

Not that the overanalysis is always wrong, it's just complete overkill, and even recognizes that, quote, "this type of show" is not made to offer deep political insight. I'm always wary of overanalyses, because it very often allows to bend whatever the source material is to fit a point you are trying to make - especially when a show explores how wrong extremes can be.

So far the Avatarverse has not been depicted with enough depth to make any extremely deep political/sociological analysis worth it. It's not Tamriel, it's not Mass Effect's Galaxy, it's not Westeros. If Bryke decide to go even more adult in the future, it may becomre such an universe, but right now, it has enough untold elements for anyone to just fill the gaps with whatever fits their views.

Honestly I wish that the next Avatar series would skip the homophobia phase of history and just make same sex couples a normal thing. Not just because I'm tired of it as a concept, but because I'm tired of it as a plot point too.

Something I've noticed is that you could take the last scene out of Korra's series and you would think that she and Asami were just good friends. But now that they are the First Outstanding Lesbian Couple of Western Children's Television (which may not be entirely true), it's like them being a couple is already normal.

Personally I think that the Avatar has better things to worry about in the world than romance. I like political villains over just politically incorrect villains.

I'm rather suspicious of claims of "overanalyzing". There's nothing wrong with deep analysis of themes and what not. I think it says a lot about Legend of Korra that people think it's worth analyzing to such an extent.

edited 31st Jan '15 10:22:12 AM by KarkatTheDalek

Someone else with different views on how the world works can make a completely different analysis of the Avatarverse just by filling the blanks differently, that's just what I am saying. As long as analyses go, this one is rather careful and acknowledges the lack of material in many situations. I will just say very politely that it is not always the fact.

I spent some time this afternoon on a blog that decided that every American movie was sexist. I support feminism, but it is exactly the kind of content anti-feminists tend to oppose to anything that even slightly criticizes something they like: that they have an agenda that they force on everything. Reading about sexism in the early and not-so-early Walt Disney movies - fine. Reading that Frozen was sexist and supportive of patriarchy - seriously?

I'd say the only thing it says about Korra is that people like it a lot. The same thing happens to pretty much any work people are really fond of.

By that logic, all analyses are worthless, since everyone is going to come to a different conclusion. It's really not that big of a deal. All analyses have some degree of subjectivity to them.

edited 31st Jan '15 10:45:33 AM by KarkatTheDalek

Of course, but the degree of subjectivity is linked to how much stuff you know, and how much you have to guess.

Some universes are absolutely filled with information -The Elder Scrolls, Mass Effect, A Song of Ice and Fire, and others... - so when you want to analyse something, you have all elements at your disposition. The analysis will remain subjective, of course, but will be based on facts, not on guesses.

I'm on the fence about this. On one hand, it's true that all analysis inherently has some subjective component to them. On the other hand not all analyses are equal, and it is absolutely true that some are better supported by evidence than others.

When it comes down to it, the world of Korra really is pretty shallow. It has a lot of pretty glaring holes in many places and the parts of it's worldbuilding it does show off are unimpressive.

I mean. Most things from our culture tend to have a sexist aspect to them.

Basically all things from our culture. There's a lot more to be done.

There's a quote I like.

When you have an infinite number of targets, it behooves you to be mindful of what you shoot at.

I'm always wary of people that brandy about concepts like "overanalysis".

I refuse to accept that such a thing is possible.

edited 31st Jan '15 11:04:21 AM by unnoun

I think that statement is usually just a more succinct way of saying "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar."