#all of this is being shown in live action atla and i want it gone for all of these reasons
Text
RWBY and Neurodiversity
Ive been thinking about this for a while but resisted posting until Volume 9 ended. Mainly to see how Ruby’s ascension would resolve, because I knew it would impact how I felt about this.
Also this is long. Like seriously long. Once I started it got out of hand. But I feel it is all Important.
I will start by saying that I am autistic, and I have friends and family who are both autistic and or neurodiverse. I also understand that a lot of this maybe subtext or head cannon, and at times deeply personal. I also get that this will never be made cannon or had ever even be intended by CRWBY. But, I cannot escape some of the connections I have made or how I relate to some characters.
Right with that out of the way
RUBY IS AUTISTIC, or at least somewhere on the spectrum.
From the first volume I could see some of the traits coming through. From the use of headphones and music separating her from the world around her. Her over exuberance when is excited or interested in something. Right up to her passion/special interest in weapons and being a huntresses. This is not to lessen the other characters interests or passions, but Ruby’s is very much all consuming. She speaks about how she went over board on Crescent Rose’s design, and about how much she likes others designs. Including Jaune’s classic Crocea Mors. I cannot help but see my own love of history. That took me to university and beyond. Like Ruby with any weapon, I love any history.
Then there is her abilities in the classroom. Ruby is clearly a natural talent, but she is never shown to be a savant. She has issues keeping her attention in class and with the work load. Although I do understand that this can be put down to being jumped ahead and that Port n Oobleck’s class seem to have a similar effect on others. Much like me and some of my friends we had classes we loved but struggled to show it though other academic difficulties.
The early volumes also cover her struggles to connect with people. Such as wanting to be with Yang, instead of meeting new people. Or with Weiss and hers rocky relationship, early on. Countered with the open acceptance by Jaune, who sees a fellow outsider. Although for different reasons. Her own comment of wanting “normal knees” is something I think everyone one with autism can relate too. The wish to be just like everyone else and not stand out. That, at times, can be the greatest wish living in a world you struggle with.
Then there’s the events post Beacon. They show a defining personality trait so common in autism. Her unshakeable moral centre. It can be hard to describe but it is well documented the autistic people have a very strong sense of justice and morals. Although obliviously not all the same morals. We are all have a different in outlook, just like everybody else. Ruby’s is based around helping people and making the world a better place.
This is shown most strongly in her mission to walk to Haven. Even if most would say she is too young and it is too dangerous, for 4 unqualified huntsmen/huntress. They went and got hurt and burnt out along the way. Yes others went with her but would they have gone without her taking the lead. It shows a lack of self awareness that can be common as autistic people. To the point that they burn themselves out pushing to achieve things, without taking time for themselves.
The other massive tell is her reaction to Ironwood. She has no dislike for him and shares his goal. But, his actions and plans go against her moral code. So again she sticks to her morals and works to stop him, while rescuing Atlas, at the same time. Yes others agreed that he was in the wrong, but would the likes of Winter changed their allegiance, without someone like Ruby offering an alternative.
Then we get to the biggest thing for me and the reason I felt I had to put my feelings down. Volume 9. While Ruby’s mental state and issues during this volume are very much based in trauma, lose and depression. That a lot of people can relate too, not just the autistic community. I cannot help but think about what she says before she drinks the tea. “I don’t want to be me anymore.” I have never related to a character more. Or be triggered more, for that matter. When I spoke to some of my autistic friends about it, it was something all of us had felt at one moment or another, to varying degrees. See we all know we cannot separate autism from the rest of our person. Most of us don’t even know what is an autistic trait and what is just us. But, I need to make this clear, none of us want a cure or to be changed. More the reaction was things I have felt at times when at your lowest a small voice screams that would it be easier if you weren’t you.
Then there is Ruby’s ascension. After episode 9 when it was put to her she could change to be someone else, and people where discussing how she might change, if you see Ruby though the lens I’ve described it can be harmful.
Now I don’t want it to sound like I’m accusing CRWBY of not thinking about this. Thousands of people watch RWBY and can be effected by it in ways they would not think, not having that person’s experience. They are telling a story, and that story includes these real moments.
Back to the point. Telling someone with autism or that person thinking they have to change to achieve or be accepted is a horrible experience. And it is something almost all autistic people experience. It is the reason we learn to mask and hide who we are. The world tells you that it is what’s expected of you. So when in episode 10 Ruby chooses herself and is then reminded that her friends accept her for being herself. It is powerful. Again I understand that this can relate to a lot of things; imposter syndrome, being gay or race issues. But, as someone who is autistic this is how I saw it. I personally have only had 2 people truly accept me like this.
PENNY is the only other character I see as on the spectrum. Obviously a lot of her character traits are put down to her being a robot. But as Ruby says to her does that make her any less a real person. In fact the relationship between Penny and Ruby is a massive indicator for me of them being on the spectrum. When they first team Ruby asks if she was just like Penny to Weiss. It is not uncommon for autistic people to spot each other quickly, whether they realise it or not. Then when they meet up at the tournament, both feel no need to hide who they are. Ruby is openly dorky in asking Penny about Ciel’s knowledge and Penny doesn’t hide her excitement to see her friend.
This is repeated multiple times when Penny returns in Atlas. Each time they see each other they share and communicate in away that they don’t with others. Such as hugging Ruby first and asking do all hugs feel like this, before hugging others. She knows that Ruby will be honest and non-judge mental. In fact we can see how non autistic people react when Penny is her over excited, unmasked, self in front of them. Winter stopping Penny bouncing is a typical action from neurotypicals. Even if it comes from a place of care and concern, with no wish to harm, as I believe Winters was. But it is something neither Penny or Ruby would do to the other.
Then there is Penny’s morals. She is clearly guided to help her friends, people and world. At great detriment to herself. She becomes the hero of Mantel, protecting those who can not protect themselves, and when others will not. Much like Ruby she will risk it all for her sense of justice.
One of the most impactful parts of Penny’s story is that of virus. I didn’t even think of this, my friend pointed it out when I spoke to her about it. But her Penny is controlled by the virus, she felt it worked as a metaphor for Applied Behaviour Analysis or ABA. Which if you haven’t heard of it, is a horrible thing to experience as someone with autism. Much like conversion therapy for the LGBTQ+ community this works by trying to train you out of being autistic and make you more accepting for others. Penny is pushed towards things she doesn’t want to do and most horribly to do harm. She becomes a tool to the villains, which can also mirror how some savant autistics are treated. There skills used for a “greater good” instead of them being in control of their own destiny.
Now I want to move on to discuss Ships. These are all Ruby related and while I’m not saying these should be cannon or that they are over other ships, cannon or otherwise, but I feel they work at different points in Ruby’s story when viewed as discussed above.
LADYBUG is the first ship I gravitated towards in the show. For me Blake was the first character to simply accept Ruby as who she was. This does stem from Blake’s own wish to be accepted for who is she and not what she is, but it is still important to outwardly show it to others as well. I understand that a lot of people find this to be a boring ship, I think that’s because it lacks drama, but for me the idea of someone new accepting you without question or concern is powerful. That is why I like the ship. It is comforting and has little interpersonal drama between the two. More mutually assured care and concern. In fact that is why they talk so little in the show. They understand and trust each other. One of the many reasons people have Blake as a deputy team leader, during and after the events of Volume 9, is this mutual trust.
NUTS AND DOLTS maybe the most loved ship these days. Outside of Bumblebee, that is. As I have already gone into Penny and Ruby’s relationship as being very neurodiverse. They are themselves with each other, and communicate more easily with the other. Although I would add this is the only one I see as asexual, but I think both characters can be seen as both asexual and not. Just when they are together, they are asexual. Plus after events in Volumes 8 & 9 I think we can call it as close to cannon as possible.
WHITEROSE i find the most interesting. At the start of the series I never got it. Weiss was mean and uncaring to Ruby. Why would Ruby ever being interested romantically in Weiss. But then as the show progress I understood it. Weiss is just as bigger dork as Ruby but due to reasons outside of autism, she had to mask this. Seeing Ruby act as she wishes and not be punished for it, as she might have been, lets her drop the mask. Two big things outside of the main show solidified this for me. The first is Ice Queendom. We see inside Weiss’ mind and how she has locked away her childish side for protection. Going as far as to do the same thing to Ruby. The second is that I was recently introduced to The Owl House. Luz and Amity’s relationship has a lot of similarities to Weiss and Ruby. Both start with a cold and unforgiving person who is thawed by the loveable dolt. Bringing out there more natural playful side, originally hidden away to protect themselves. Now after the loss of Penny and Weiss being so accepting of Ruby in the ever after. She is the first to call her name when she returns and doesn’t ask any questions, after all. I can see it becoming cannon. If there is time.
Thank you for reading this I know it is long but I felt I never saw much discussion about RWBY from this perspective.
#rwby#ruby rose#penny polendina#blake belladonna#weiss schnee#autism#neurodivergent#neurodiversity#rwby ladybug#nuts and dolts#whiterose#ruby x weiss#ruby x blake#ruby x penny
187 notes
·
View notes
Text
I think people underestimate the changes that need to be made to stories when adapting them to different mediums/structures and maybe if they understood, they wouldn't have such issues with scenes/character moments not being 1-1 adaptations.
The structure of episodes is really important when considering how the story will unfold and what to include in each episode. Every single episode needs struggles and payoffs, a goal and an accomplishment of that goal - especially in an episodic show like the animated ATLA. By necessity of this, each 20 minute episode is going to have a lot of stuff going on - and tons of issues cropping up where character can be shown. Also, it's common to only have one plotline being followed per episode per group of POV characters - often it's Zuko's plot (much less screen time) and the Gaang (more screentime).
When you only have 8 episodes, cramming all that in would make the episodes feel disjoined and cluttered. It would be a constant whiplash of 'small struggle, overcoming, small struggle, overcoming, small struggle, overcoming' and all those little struggles together might start to feel insignificant and like the plot is just trying to come up with something for the characters to be doing. An example that might have been frustrating is in the first episode of the live action, having Aang and Katara travel to go penguin sledding, then jump to the fire nation ship where they reveal Aang's been gone so long, then back to the village to yet again talk about how long Aang has been gone (to catch everyone up), then Aang leaves, then Aang comes back, then he's off on the ship, then Katara and Sokka have to figure out how to get Appa to work, then they go to the ship, they fight on the ship, Katara struggles to figure out how to waterbend, Aang goes into the Avatar state, they escape, they go to the southern air temple, Aang plays around, they figure out Avatar stuff, they chase Momo, Aang goes into the Avatar state again, Katara talks him down, then the goal of the narrative is introduced.
While that works spread across three whole episodes - episodes not meant to be watched back to back but rather week to week as well as the writers understanding that since this is a kid's show airing, it's possible the watcher has missed the episode before - it would not work for hour-long episodes intended to be binge watched. When the show is episodic and people might not be able to catch all of them, a unique issue needs to be introduced each episode and resolved that same episode (minus the few 2-parter storylines in the OG). It's just the nature of that sort of structure. Just like you wouldn't want a comic structure in a chapter book or a movie structure in a serialized show, different mediums require different structures.
So how to resolve this? We've got one hour to do all that in - so instead of having all that time traveling (or gods forbid just jumping to the next setting without any establishing shots/travel scenes), things need to be condensed: which means, take several individual actions that share a common theme - say, how a character reacts to certain issues, and combine it into fewer actions that flow in a single sitting rather than three individual ones. Not only condense individual scenes, but also weave together multiple plotlines that might have been in separate episodes, but share a common theme, and have them all occur simultaneously. This means that specific beats from each of the 20 episodes might not all fit in the episodes, but the spirit of those scenes can be adapted to fit with the situation that's at hand - I think episode 3 in the live action does this masterfully.
A specific example is moving Zuko and Aang's first one-on-one fight from his ship in episode 2 of the animated series to episode 3 in Omashu - combining that with the epic fight between them at the perfume place. Episode 1 had already had many fight scenes and one more might have blended in with all the others - setting this big, impactful fight aside for the moment until it could be…well, a moment, I think was a good choice. It was different, an adaptation, but it held true to the significance of the interaction as well as weaving in to the other storylines.
So again, the change of medium is going to necessitate many scenes to be altered to 'fit'. Though many scenes can be translated pretty closely to the animated counterpart, all of them won't be and if you think every single character beat being shown is a must in order to understand character, then just go watch the OG, a different structure just won't work for you point blank no matter how well it's done. Trust me, you do not want to try to just shift a 20 episode season into 8 episodes with no structural changes despite the raw run-times being similar - it would be bad. Like really bad.
#media analysis#story structure#natla#natla spoilers#avatar the last airbender#live action avatar#netflix atla#this argument that 'they had the same amount of time as the cartoon so that means they have no reason not to include every single scene' is#just wild to me#story structure is IMPORTANT PEOPLE#this should be very obvious but apparently it's not#there's not just one way to show specific character traits - the same trait can be shown in a different type of scene just fine
24 notes
·
View notes
Text
My views on the atla live action (6.8 out of 10)
What I liked about atla live action:
-Zuko, aang, iroh, monk Gyasto and jets actors really knocked the ball out the park so far
- I liked how they showed that there were people in the fire nation who fought back regarding resisting the war, and how azula went undercover to expose them. That scene showed not all fire benders were bad or agreed to the war due to the loss of lives
-I liked how they portrayed monk gyasto and his bond with aang.
-The scene with the earth kingdom soldier, iroh and the scene with Lieu ten was amazingly done. It really captured how loss happened on both sides, while showcasing more of who lieu ten was as a person and also Zuko’s kind nature towards Iroh
-Iroh joining Zuko on the boat after his banishment was a beautiful scene
-the bending, costumes and music are on point
Issues
-Aang meeting kyoshi too early and learning about the attack on the northern water tribe which he shouldn’t know
-Suki and sokkas romance didn’t develop over sokka learning from his sexism. It takes away from their development since he had to learn to humble himself to become a better warrior.
-Azula didn’t bend or fight enough. Also Ozai hated Zuko and adored azula but here it seems azula is fighting for his approval? It takes away from her character. She had it ALL and Zuko didn’t. Also ozai did not care if zuko discovered aang he just wanted him to suffer. He hated his son but in this version they make it seem like he cares?
-Aang isn’t training enough at all. We only see katara training on her waterbending but she trained with aang too. In the series it focuses more on aang going to the northern water tribe rather than learning the elements and helping others along the way.
-Kataang needed more moments. So far they only had a few but I liked the one they shared in the final episode
-Sokka seems to not like aang? It seems like he’s only there for his own benefit when in the original he warms up to aang.
-Ozai learning of aangs existence too early on makes it less easy for aang to travel on his journey.
-Aang and sokka didn’t meet Jet
-katara saving haru and the earthbenders got scrapped which I would have loved to see
-The meaning of the cave of two lovers didn’t make sense. Also it didn’t help aang as he was not there to learn more about the badger moles and earth bending. Plus he kissed katara there, so that love development is gone.
-Wan shi tong shouldn’t be there in book 1 and sokka and katara shouldn’t be in the spirit world
-Where is Appa and momo? They barely are shown. If they were pets with zero presence I wouldn’t mind but in this series they are apart if the show but the live action doesn’t showcase them enough.
-No Jeong Jeong ? he was a huge character regarding the use of fire plus aang had trauma over fire bending. Will he still show up in the future if this is renewed?
-Azula shouldn’t lose her cool she seems like she’s already cracking and that’s not her character. She is perfect and that breaks her in book 3. Not book 1. Also her fire is not blue.
-Aang is a bit too focused on being the avatar i wish it wasn’t so strong at times
-The fog of souls shouldn’t have shown up. It make things a bit messy and unclear, especially including koh into it all.
-Rokus erased as aangs guide isn’t the best change since he’s tied to the reason why the war happened. Also he links to zukos bloodline and struggle of good and evil.
#atla#avatar the last airbender#avatar the last airbender netflix#atla live action#netflix#atla netflix
9 notes
·
View notes
Note
What do you think about Teen Titans TV Series?
Best Cartoon ever created? Best Cartoon ever created.
I think the strongest thing about the Teen Titans Cartoon is that it's the most cartoon, to ever cartoon. The writers have gone on record by saying that their challenge was to always try to do the most creative thing possible with every episode, and the result we get is that it's this wild, unrestrained beast which uses the medium of cartoons to tell a story. In my opinion it's as hard hitting as like ATLA, Batman the Animated Series, etc. etc. but like it's made by people who are huge warner brothers cartoons nerds. There's scooby doo references! There's FLCL references! They do entire episodes where the goal is to animate the weirdest thing possible. It is just so unashamedly a cartoon and not trying to be what it is, like no wonder so many children got attached to this.
It's also essentially what everyone's introduction to the Teen Titans was, and the most popular team lineup nowadays.
So like there are two ways you can talk about it, as it's own show, and as an adaptation. As someone who has read every Teen Titans comic ever though, I do have some hot takes on it as an adaptation. UNDER THE CUT.
Number one: Donna Troy's character is missing, and there's a big Donna shaped hole in the team. I don't know if they just couldn't get the rights to Donna, or they couldn't make her work with the story they were going for but like Donna is actually super important to the team dynamic of the Titans. She's the one normal person, the babysitter, the mom.
People wonder why Starfire is so softened in this adaptation, and while I generally agree they rounded off the edges too much on Starfire to make her more palatable especially for kids I feel like Starfire had to have these rtaits of being the patient one, being the naive newcomer, being the one who always served as the therapist friend because Donna wasn't there, but the group needed SOMEONE to be the emotionally intelligent one. I'd say Starfire isn't really out of character so much as they grafted Donna's traits onto her and had her pulling double duty as being Starfire but serving Donna's role to the team, and to Dick Grayson.
Number Two: I don't actually think the Teen Titans cartoon character ruined Raven's character in modern comics. I think the fact that DC editing staff repeated the terror of trigon arc about, five times, until Raven was like double dead and they had no place left to take her character in fact ruined Raven's character.
Dc Editing staff has not figured out basically what they want Raven's character to look like post-trigon, where they would want her character to go, or what she would even act like having grown past the phase of her life where she has removed herself from Trigon's influence and it's shown by Raven basically being a non-character for the past ten years.
Marvel does the exact same thing with Jean Gray where they keep on recycling Dark Phoenix forever, and ever, and ever. I don't think Raven's character being empty is the fault of the titans cartoon, I think it's because they keep recycling her dark phoenix moment and don't know what to do past that. Like "They keep resetting Raven to a younger version of her character" that's not necessarily the fault of the cartoon either, they do that to Jean Gray. and it's cuz they wanna repeat Dark Phoenix / Terror of TRigon instead of just trying to move past that.
Number Three: So when it comes to individual character adaptation.
Robin: This is the best Dick Grayson adaptation, with the exception of the Live Action Titans show Dick Grayson. Dick suffers from what I like to call the "WanyeFamilyAdventures-ification" where people like to sand off all of his character flaws to make him a wholesome good boy. Dick was an angry little kid for a long time, like Batman turning into him into a sidekick and Bruce's like really overbearing controlling nature did a number on Dick and he's a way more compelling character when he's working through those issues then when people skip straight to NIght Wing and make him "The Good Robin."
Also, like Dick Grayson is always better in Titans adaptations bar none. I wonder why. It's almost like he's a Teen Titans character and that's where his good development is.
Cyborg: Cyborg is probably the most accurate to his comic book counterpart, the only thing they really cut out was his interactions with his father, and his connection to the city he grew up in which are important but like they were superheroes most of the time in this show. Cyborg just has like a really strong disability representation narrative which has always been a big part of his character and how he stands out. On top of that they do a lot of focus on Cyborg's flaws and his own personal narrative how like unlike most of the other characters he was a completely normal kid, and he had his life thrown off by his life altering accident and now he is still trying to grow up and gain some semblance of his life back. And like living with prosthesis is not the end of the world to him because he figures out he can still live just like everybody else, his life can be just as fulfilling before the accident. The fact that Cyborg is just kind of a normal kid who went through a horrible accident, but chooses to do good and become a hero makes him one of the more compelling and down to earth characters. Cyborg's all about his emotions too,he's like the most driven, the most in a hurry to grow up, the most argumentative he's cool.
Starfire - I mean I kind of explained why, but Starfire is the character who suffered the most from the adaptation. Especially since she's the only character who doesn't get a season. If you want to watch a more comics accurate Starfire, who still keeps her traits of being the loving, emotional, heart of the group while having a much rougher exterior then please watch the Live Action Titans on HBOMAX.
Beast Boy - Actually pretty accurate, I like to bully Beast Boy so don't take this too seriously, but Beast Boy is like if Dick Grayson was more annoying and whiny. Beast Boy is an essential member of the team, but he's not the smartest, not the strongest, not the most driven. He's kind of completely necessary because you need one person on the team of children who acts like an actual kid. Beast Boy's weird immature bullshit is actually just as important as the other character's issues, and this Beast Boy especially gets two seasons sort of since his character is so tied to Terra. The only thing that I'm sad they cut out is Beast Boy's trauma from losing the doom patrol is so interesting in New Teen Titans and such an important part of his character for a long time, it's a little bit sad they cut out his really bad depression.
Raven - I don't knooooooooooooow. The thing is I don't know if you could have done a comics accurate adaptation of Raven as a character. Raven in the comics is like such a slow burner character. For the longest time she barely interacts with the team she just like teleports in and out. When she starts living with the team she has no relationship to anybody besides Jericho until like, way past the Terror of Trigon arc. If you wnted to do a cartoon that is about the dynamic of the whole team, where every character consistently shows up every episode, where they have to get in group fights, those traits of Raven would not have fit well at all.
Like, adaptations sometimes have to make changes. However, I think Raven's character is actually a lot more in spirit of the original character than people give her credit for. Like I've said in othe rposts Raven is Jean Grey. What you need to get right about her, is that she is a heavily abuse and isolated child who believes deep down she is evil, and she will hurt people if she ever loses that carefully managed control of herself. If you keep that core to her character I believe you have essentially captured the spirit of her character. Characters aren't just like personality traits, they're also themes, and the most important theme of all to Raven is a young girl told she wasn't even allowed to exist, and that her birth is a sin reclaiming agency over herself and learning how to live. Teen Titans has that and so you have a character that is true to the spirit of the character if not a 1:1 adaptation.
Terra - This is probably the best adaptation of Judas Contract. Yes, I know Terra in the cartoon is way more sympathetic than comics Terra but like, a twelve year old cannot process comic book Tara Markov, grooming victim, sociopath, hater and still see those sympathetic traits. I think once again the spirit of the character, rather than a 1:1 adaptation.
I read an interview somewhere where, the gist of what they said was the creators also didn't want Terra to quit the team, or fail at the end of her arc. But, some people aren't meant to be heroes. That is who Terra is at the core of her character. She's not necessarily a bad person, she just couldn't make it as a hero. Terra's self involved, and unempathic, and hurts a lot of people but at the same time her life is genuinely hard, and she was groomed by Slade and all of these things make Terra a mess.
I think one thing that the cartoon nails is number one Terra is a fake human being TM. Basically no matter who she is around, Terra is never presenting her real self to anyone. Terra's personality changes wildly depending on who she is with, when she's with Beast Boy she acts like a normal kid, when she's with Raven she's catty and mean spirited, when she is with Slade she's conniving and manipualtive, there's like no consistency between any of these identities because Terra is in constant survival mode. She is just a runaway kid who is saying and doing anything to live to the next moment because she's had no stability in her entire life.
Number two, is that Terra does not trust anyone, ever. Terra is exactly the kind of person who would blow up over a little betrayal of thinking Beast Boy told someone else about her powers, because like I said she is in survival mode. She is constantly expecting that betrayal coming and trying to make herself ready for it. In fact, I think from Terra's point of view the Teen Titans betrayed her to begin with. The night that Terra betrayed the Titans, she makes it sound like Beast Boy is the one who betrayed her by breaking his promise to her to always accept her and be her friend no matter what happens. That's insane because obviously he'd be mad at her for letting Slade get the access codes to the tower, and distracting Beast Boy while he attacked all of his friends. but like...!! In Terra's weird little head it makes sense. Terra can't really see the consequences of her actions because she's always reacting to things. She literally cannot decide things or choose things for herself, so it's almost easier to do what Slade wants of her because number one the way Slade treats her alligns with Terra's idea of what relatinoships are, based on transaction and not trust. Number two, he at least introduces some kind of control in her life, whereas the easy trust the titans share with one another is something she's to scared to belive in.
So yes, I think cartoon Terra is different than comics Terra and I definitely like comics Terra better but I don't think it's a bad adaptation of the character at all. I also don't want to fault the show for not being like the comic books, it's an adaptation it's supposed to make changes.
#teen titans#new teen titans#raven#beast boy#robin#cyborg#terra#tara markov#starfire#dc asks#askspookies#teen titans meta
87 notes
·
View notes
Note
None of them liked Ironwoods growingly tyrannical actions, it's the whole reason Ruby lies to him, he looked shady as hell. They are shown very clearly uncomfortable with what he's turned Atlas into in the First episode. It's just that at the end of Volime 7 he crossed the line.
The key words there are “first episode.” I’ve mentioned on other posts that if the plot had simply continued the forward momentum of the group being disgusted with Ironwood’s choices and working against him (hiding out in the city, gathering like-minded allies, etc.) then we would have been golden. Ironwood is Volume 7’s antagonist. There, done. The problem is what starts in the second episode. Our basic events are as follows:
The group (and audience) learn that Ironwood has arguably justified reasons for everything “shady as hell” that he’s done. The embargo? They are at war with Salem and people have been stealing resources since our introductory trailers (Blake). Soldiers in the streets? That first episode showed that grimm are attacking defenseless civilians and, if the soldiers hadn’t been there to fend the grimm off prior to Penny’s arrival, they likely would have died. Taking resources? That’s to re-establish global communications and enact a plan to stop Salem for good, freeing the world from the danger she presents.
However, they’re still morally gray choices which our group could have opposed… but they didn’t. They join Ironwood as public allies (standing with Clover and Penny against Robyn), as Inner Circle allies (they learn all of Ironwood’s plans—and we learn that he never lied to them), as huntsmen (it’s his power as general that gives them their licenses), and as fellow soldiers (they are indistinguishable from the Ace Ops in the missions they conduct). Now toss in a bunch of other connections like living in his academy, taking his weapon upgrades, and carrying the Relic. They might not like his actions, but they’re certainly doing everything possible to support and reap the benefits of them.
Ruby does lie to him… which two in the group oppose (however lackluster that was). Yang and Oscar both question the wisdom of doing the very thing they punished Ozpin for. Ren also develops a strong (if quiet) alliance with Ironwood that will carry into Volume 8... until his semblance changed and he forgot about it.
During all this there are efforts—mostly through Nora—to condemn Ironwood for his choices. How can you continue to hurt the people like this? Same answer as above: because he believes a short-term struggle is worth the long-term victory. Nora doesn’t agree… but Ruby, the leader, does. She pushes Ironwood to finish Amity somehow.
Which is an incredibly strange stance to take considering she knows that amassing a world-wide army will not defeat Salem. If the group wants Ironwood to stop hurting Mantle, all they have to do is tell him that Salem is immortal… but they don’t. They let him continue under this false belief, despite having more information about this war than he does and despite that information being the key to stopping the harm he’s enacting.
The arc of the volume is not the group choosing to trust Ironwood and then realizing he actually isn’t trustworthy, it’s the group (or rather, Ruby) deciding not to trust Ironwood and then realizing he is trustworthy. We get that climactic scene of Ruby and Oscar simultaneously realizing they should tell him about Salem and Oscar apologizing for keeping that secret in the first place.
Note that this occurs after they’ve talked him into telling Mantle about her. So not only is the group not made up of mindless subordinates being ordered about by a powerful general—it’s their advice Ironwood listens to—but now they’ve put an entire city in the position they were in during Volume 6. We’re told, via Ozpin’s arc, that telling people about Salem without including the issue of her immortality is a horrific thing to do. Those like Qrow have supposedly “wasted” their lives fighting an impossible war and the fandom has argued strongly that Ozpin has manipulated everyone involved in this fight by not giving them the full picture. Yet now, the group has spent months keeping that information from Ironwood when his questionable choices are based on that ignorance, and they’ve talked him into telling half his population that Salem exists and they should rise up to fight her… but not the pesky detail that she’s immortal. They did to Ironwood and all of Mantle exactly what Ozpin did to them.
Immediately after hearing that they’ve kept this secret from him the entire time they’ve been here (which he takes very well) Ironwood captures one of their main villains, loses his arm in the process, learns that two in the group have outright betrayed him to a political enemy, learns that despite all their best efforts Cinder has just waltzed into his office, learns that Salem herself is on her way and their defenses are already gone, knows that everyone is exhausted from a major battle… so when he decides to take all of Atlas, the majority of Mantle, and the Relics/Maiden they have to try and get out of Salem’s reach… Ruby says no. What’s her plan? She doesn’t have one. You’re just not allowed to leave.
The problem with the writing is it wants us to believe two contradictory things at once. Looking back, Ironwood is meant to be seen as an unambiguously bad guy in Volume 7, which we know because of scenes like Winter’s fight wherein she condemns him for everything he did in Volume 7, not just Volume 8 stuff like threatening to bomb Mantle. Yet at the same time, we’re simultaneously meant to believe that the group is made up of unambiguously good people who function as direct contrasts to Ironwood. Given what we got, these two things cannot coexist! Either Ironwood was a good man who the heroes backed for an entire volume and there’s no acknowledgment of that, or Ironwood was a bad man… who the heroes backed for an entire volume and there’s no acknowledgment of that either. If the group’s defense is, “We knew he was shady as hell. We knew what he was doing was wrong. We knew he was the bad guy here… but we still helped him maintain power, forward his plans, and reap the benefits of the flawed system for months on end”… that’s really bad. “I supported, assisted, and benefited from the guy who was shady as hell, but that’s fine because I felt uncomfortable about it the whole time” is not the hot take the fandom wants it to be. We cannot make these broad, sweeping statements about how the Atlas military—merged with its huntsmen—is an Evil Thing and then show scenes like, say, Jaune using his military grade huntsmen license to convince a bunch of civilians to follow his evacuation plan. The heroes cannot be Good and Pure while supporting the supposed villains and their systems; or, the villains cannot be purely Bad and Evil if they’re supported by the heroes.
The reality is that RWBY is badly written and this sort of simplistic, inconsistent writing doesn’t lend itself to a topic as complex as this one. To be frank, we don’t even know enough to make informed decisions about these actions because the world building is nearly nonexistent. What are these “resources” and how are the resources to patch a hole in the wall the same as the resources used to make Amity Tower into a world-wide communication device? How much power does Ironwood actually have and what other decisions has he made that impact Mantle? We never hear about any policies to explain things like the poor conditions, or the slum areas with the faunus. Why are the civilians so against the soldiers patrolling when we don’t see them abusing the public in any way, but we do see the grimm threatening them on the regular? Why does Ruby want Amity built so badly—willing to hurt Mantle to do it—when she knows a bigger army isn’t the answer/that telling people about Salem has almost always led to panic and betrayal? Is there really any difference between huntsmen and soldiers here? And if the answer is, “Yes. Huntsmen aren’t beholden to any power. That’s a good thing because following orders is Bad. They do what they think is best” than what are we supposed to make of someone like Rhodes who, apparently, did what he thought was best? If he’d been beholden to some superior there might have been a system in place to help Cinder. As it was, he was left to his own devices and a lot of fans are furious with the solution he, as one flawed individual, came up with. We simply don’t have a good picture of this world and when we do, things constantly contradict. It’s good for huntsmen to make their own choices, but only when Ruby does it, not Rhodes. It’s bad for heroes to keep the Salem secret and tell lies to their allies, but only when Ozpin does it, not Ruby. It’s bad for someone to try and save who they’ve got, but only when Ironwood does it, not Ruby, who apparently left Atlas after failing to create portals for her Uncle, Robyn, the Ace Ops, Pietro, Maria, and an entire army.
The way that the fandom gets around these problems—because too few are willing to just acknowledge that they are problems and RWBY is shoddily written—is by simplistically comparing RWBY’s military to a real world one. I cannot tell you how many posts I’ve come across that amount to, “Imagine thinking the teenage girls are the bad guys when a military general is right there, being a military general 😒 ” Those posts imply that fans like me are too stupid (too brainwashed, too close to “bootlickers”) to be critical of the military, but I assure you, that’s as far from true as can be. Those posts are trying to conflate real life politics with a fantasy story whose world looks nothing like our own. The is not a question of being critical of the military, it’s a question of being critical of RWBY as that fictional text… and that fiction never established any of the military problems we deal with in the real world. It might have (very easily), but it didn’t. Is Ironwood leveraging his people to conquer others or go after wealth? No, his world has literal, unambiguously evil monsters to fight. Does he amass power out of a desire to control the people? No, he lays out his exact thoughts on how these measures will help protect against those monsters and a witch. Does the military abandon its soldiers after war, leaving them with few resources and fewer prospects? No, we never see anyone struggling in that manner and one of the most prominent tragedies—Yang losing a limb—is answered by Ironwood personally sending a replacement to her home. Is the military at least built around propaganda, painting civilians an inaccurate picture of Freedom and Glory to convince them to fight? No, we see no propaganda, Ironwood—since Volume 2—has been focused on replacing people with robots and our entire story is built around one child’s desire to fight the exact same battle. Why do you want to be a huntress, Ruby? Because I want to help people! And that goal is never painted as a naïve outlook that Ruby becomes disillusioned with. Posts like the one mentioned above bank 100% on the reader mapping real life military criticism onto RWBY… rather than actually looking at the world RWBY built, what choices the characters make, the amount of information we’re given (little), and whether that in any way reflects our current, political problems. It doesn’t.
I’m never going to pretend there weren’t problems with Ironwood’s decisions. In fact, I love that this was actually a conflict in Volume 3 that gave both sides a fair shake: is it better to scare people and have an army at the ready to defend them, or is it better to keep them in the dark and potentially be defenseless? Ironwood’s kind heart bumping up against extreme measures is what made him compelling, especially when the story was having him grow in the “right” direction (AKA, listening to Ozpin). His treatment of Penny is another big issue, creating a whole ass person to serve as a military defense tool. That’s horrifying! So he’s absolutely had his problems long before the writing had him turn into a trigger-happy murderer, but part of the issue here is that the writing doesn’t acknowledge those problems in other characters. If Ironwood is “shady as hell” for forwarding a military agenda and using military resources… then so is Ruby, the leader who backed that for months. If Ironwood is “shady as hell” for funding the creation of a person to defend his kingdom… then so is Pietro, the scientist who not only built Penny, but came up with the idea in the first place. He’s not some defenseless victim who was forced by the evil Ironwood to create something morally reprehensible, he suggested it! The same way Winter wasn’t some defenseless victim who was forced by the evil Ironwood to go along with these plans. She supported them, agreed to be his Maiden, and was the first to suggest martial law! Yet Ruby, Pietro, Winter and their like are all presented as unambiguously Good People, whereas Ironwood is presented as the unambiguous Bad Guy—and when a lot of fans went, “But you’re not writing him like a Bad Guy? Especially when we compare him to the heroes?” we got his sudden, OOC murder streak in Volume 8. But it doesn’t work. Either the group is made up of morally gray/bad people because they did the things our antagonist Ironwood did, or Ironwood is not the morally gray/bad person the show insists he is (prior to Volume 8) because he did the same things as our heroes. You cannot give us that plot, those choices, that agency and insist on both at once. This problem has existed ever since we got an entire volume about how simplistically evil Ozpin is for keeping this secret… only for Ruby to immediately turn around and keep it herself, with no acknowledgement that either a) Ozpin wasn’t the bad guy then or b) Ruby is as bad as he is. But the show wants Ruby to be the Good Person in every situation, no matter how much she models her behavior after those she deems her enemies, and Ironwood’s arc only increased that problem tenfold.
89 notes
·
View notes
Note
I've seen a lot of people talk about Katara as a trophy wife like the certain subset of fans wink wink. I'm not trying to start a ship war but I saw you felt similarly, so could you elaborate on that if you feel comfortable
yeah, sure. and i also don’t want to start a ship war so if you want to argue, please keep it out of my asks.
i actually watched lok for the first time back in june because i wanted to see for myself how katara was such a trophy wife with aang, and i easily gathered from the first episode that she wasn’t. and as the series progressed, katara was anything but a trophy wife.
so let’s break it down:
katara is introduced first and foremost as master katara. korra was born a waterbender in the southern water tribe, and with katara being the best waterbender of her generation, it’s without a doubt that katara would be korra’s master. it’s confirmed that she is in this comic, which in my understanding, is canon. case in point, in her lifetime, katara was the master of two avatars.
when katara is first introduced in lok, korra is in the middle of her firebending test. the order of the white lotus look to katara in order to see if korra has actually mastered firebending and can go on to master airbending. again, she is referred to as master katara. not avatar aang’s wife katara. master. korra doesn’t pass her test until katara says that she’s ready.
katara is world renowned for her healing. korra says that she is the best healer in the world, and korra trained under her.
katara outlawed bloodbending.
katara is the matriarch of the only living airbenders in the world. say what you will, she is the mother and grandmother of the last airbenders and i think that’s pretty important to mention.
katara is still in action. at the end of book 2, katara is healing all of the injured soldiers in her hut. there are a lot of them. just because katara is not out on the battlefield like she once was kicking ass doesn’t mean she’s sitting around doing nothing. she even goes on to heal korra full-time while she’s injured in the south pole.
all of this talk about how katara is nothing more than a sad old lady in the south pole who doesn’t do anything and doesn’t have a statue in her name negates the fact that 1) she is pushing 90 years old and 2) she is not dead. katara is not in her prime anymore, and hasn’t been for a very long time. she is not just avatar aang’s wife, she is master katara, a legendary fighter and healer in her own right. on top of that, she is still a loving mother and grandmother, and there is nothing wrong with that. the most motherly character in the show becoming a doting mom and grandmother is not out of character and does not diminish her legacy or make her any less powerful than she was in atla.
of course she’s going to have an aura of sadness around her. her husband, the father of her children and her best friend, as well as her brother and most of her friends are gone. her children are grown up and living their own lives. just as we are sad about how aang and sokka and the rest of the gaang’s time has passed by the time of lok, katara is sad because the people she loved most are gone.
katara not having a statue was a decision by the writers, and it’s kind of foolish to believe that she would’ve gotten a statue if she hadn’t ended up with aang or with zuko or whoever else (and this goes for aang being a bad dad too. it’s pretty ridiculous to think that if katara had ended up with zuko or someone other than aang that that person would’ve been a better father and she would’ve been in a happier marriage or something). if you think about it, katara probably doesn’t have a statue because she is still alive, or she has one and it’s just not shown. aang’s statue was likely not built until he passed, and zuko being the co-founder of republic city, they decided to carve one out for him too. same goes for sokka. toph, on the other hand, has three. it wouldn’t be surprising if she had just carved them herself (but two of them were in zaofu, which her daughter founded, so it makes sense why she would honor her mother). katara’s could’ve been in the southern water tribe, and we just didn’t see it. it’s clear that the writers knew just how significant katara was, hence why she is the one character from atla who makes the most appearances throughout lok.
in conclusion: katara has never been a trophy because she cannot be won, and she was never a trophy wife. thanks for coming to my tiff talk.
561 notes
·
View notes
Text
ATLA Unpopular Opinions
I’ve had some thoughts about various aspects in Avatar: The Last Airbender. So, in order of least to most controversial, here we go:
Sokka looks better with his hair up. Sokka’s wolf tail is one of the more unique hairstyles in the show, at least for the guys. He looks so basic with his hair down. The wolf tail adds to his personality, his dramaticness, and humor. How can a water tribe warrior fight with hair in his face? Please also refer to his topknot in Book Three.
Sokka didn’t have as much pull as fans think he does. Pull, in this context, means to attract someone romantically/sexually. First of all, Toph is a child, so I’m not counting her because a 12 year-old crushing on a 15 year-old should be nothing more than that---a crush. Yue and Suki pulled him first, as he fell for them before they fell for him. Suki could care less for the sexist guy who insulted her on her own island; but teaching him the ways of the Kyoshi warriors, plus a kiss on the cheek had him blushing---HARD! He thankfully changed his mindset after that. Yue, while she barely had a choice, had accepted her role as princess and was prepared to dedicate her life to the values of her tribe in an arranged marriage. The amount of times she ran away from Sokka was both tragic and hilarious. But that only made Sokka want her more, she never chased him. To be honest though, he was probably the first guy who treated her normally, despite her status. I think she mainly wanted a friend, but was surprised to find a potential lover in Sokka. Plus he made her laugh. Ty Lee thought he was cute, but Ty Lee thinks everything is cute. That is all. If you wanna talk about pull, Aang had Zuko risking his life chasing him for three seasons (I’m joking, don’t think too deeply about that).
Azula and Katara are almost equal in power. I get that Azula is a firebending prodigy, but sometimes her skills are overestimated by fans and she’s made to seem as though she can overpower everyone. It makes perfect sense that she lost to Katara in almost every fight. Before meeting her, she’s only ever fought nonbenders, firebenders, and earthbenders. She never had experience fighting a trained waterbender, so her losing to Katara shows that even she has her limitations. Whenever she did win a fight against her, it was because she got help from her friends, brother, or subjects. Katara never hesitated to fight her, and being 14 years-old herself, allowed for an even exchange of combat. Let’s be honest, what bender would go up against Azula fearlessly except the one who’s element puts out fires?
Ursa was not a bad mother. Ursa was a victim of an abusive, arranged marriage. For context, Fire Lord Azulon wanted Ozai to marry Ursa because she was the granddaughter of Avatar Roku, and he felt that they would produce powerful heirs to the royal family. Ursa was forced to leave her village, family, and fiance behind for this marriage; because who would dare turn down the request of a Fire Lord? Ursa never really loved Ozai, but he never cared. He just wanted to increase his status and power. Ursa is often criticized for giving Zuko attention over Azula, while scolding Azula and not showing her any love. However, Azula was praised by Ozai, and as a result showed more of an obedience towards him. Ozai showed a great disdain for Zuko. Ursa was simply doing her best to show Zuko how much he mattered. He was living in his sister’s shadow, while being neglected by his father. I also really feel for Azula, because she was only valued for her firebending skills, and she probably had no emotional outlet that she trusted to help guide her. However, I do think Azula was too far along for her mother to really help her. Ursa encouraged Zuko to play with Azula; she genuinely wanted her children to get along like any other parent. I just don’t think there was anything she could say or do to encourage Azula to be less destructive and show remorse for her actions. She should have never called Azula a monster, but she was a woman filled with fear. She feared her abusive husband and the repercussions of speaking out against him, she feared the destructive tendencies of her daughter and the ways she hurt other people without caring for how they felt, and she feared for Zuko’s life for not living up to the impossible ideals of the royal family. Ursa was not a perfect mother, but she tried given the little power she had. Also, to be fair, we only see Ursa’s life from Zuko’s perspective in the show. Azula probably had many memories with Ursa but she most likely blocked them out to hold space for firebending forms and her father’s approval; one of which she never really secured.
Bloodbending is overrated and unnecessary. Some fans claim that Katara should have had a more positive reaction to becoming a bloodbender. However, it was never in her character to be so controlling, especially against another person’s will. Bloodbending is also not as useful as it’s made to seem. Since one can only bloodbend on a full moon, you would have to wait an entire month to even utilize the skill. That’s extremely inconvenient and because you have to wait until nighttime, it’s even less practical. How often does Team Avatar fight during the night compared to the day? They would be sleeping if anything. Also, when your team consists of an agile airbender, a master waterbender, a powerful earthbender, and a weapons strategist, plus Appa and Momo; why would anyone need to bloodbend? Most of the Gaang’s enemies never required that level of power in order to be defeated. Bloodbending is also VERY niche. If this is allowed, should bonebending be allowed since there are minerals in bones? Should soundbending be allowed since sound is produced from vibrations? I admit it’s a really cool ability, but it’s not that important in the grand scheme of things. Also, speaking of Katara...
Katara gets too much hate. I’m not sure if it’s the surge of new fans since the Netflix debut or the repressed thoughts of old fans but lately Katara’s character has been mercilessly criticized. It’s been said that she brings up her mother too often, and that she’s overly emotional and selfish. First of all, Katara was eight years-old (and Sokka nine) when her mother was murdered. During the run of the show, only six years have passed since then, as she’s 14 when she finds Aang. She lives with survivor’s guilt due to her mother lying about who the last waterbender was so that Katara wouldn’t be taken prisoner. Unfortunately, the firebender soldier Yon Rah wasn’t taking prisoners that day, implying that he was going to murder her. Katara mentions her mother only a handful of times, usually to relate to another character who lost someone close to them in an effort to empathize (Aang, Haru, Jet, Zuko). People forget that she saw her mother’s dead body after running to get help. It was definitely wrong for Katara to tell Sokka that he didn’t love their mother the way she did in the Southern Raiders episode, and she definitely should have apologized. But, she was right. Sokka was shown to be closer to his father. She was in extreme emotional pain and instead of being comforted, she was criticized by Aang and Sokka for wanting revenge. How many times has Katara sacrificed something for the sake of others? She barely had a childhood considering she took on a maternal role in her tribe after her mother’s death. She had to deal with Sokka’s sexist comments, she had to suppress her talent for waterbending, and she felt isolated and alone because the one parent that was alive left to fight in the war. When someone needed encouragement, Katara was always there to encourage them. When someone needed help, she never hesitated to assist them. She often put herself in harm’s way if it meant someone else didn’t get hurt. For a 14 year-old girl in a war torn world, she is immensely brave. How many times has Zuko gone on and on about his honor, or lashed out at his Uncle for a seemingly small reason? How many times has Sokka talked about meat? Or Azula and her speeches about controlling and manipulating people? Toph and her rebelliousness? Even Aang’s laid back attitude turned into carelessness every now and then. Every character has a crutch that they attach themselves to, but Katara isn’t given the grace that other characters have been given. Yes, Aang lost his entire nation, and Katara would never know what that felt like. However, Aang wouldn’t know how Katara felt either. Aang was in the presence of children his age and was able to travel around the world to make friends (i.e. Bumi from the Earth Kingdom and Kuzon from the Fire Nation). He was taught to be less detached, so his idea of family is very different from Katara’s. He never witnessed the dead bodies of his people firsthand, though he did see Gyatso’s skeleton later on. Katara grew up in a world ruined by war. She had little to no friends, and the one person she was closest to left her life very early. Her tribe was VERY small and I doubt she had a lot of people to talk to. She had never left the Southern Water Tribe before, so it’s very likely that she was going to stay there her entire life had she not met Aang. She’s been accused of not allowing Sokka to feel sad about their mother, but why should she? It’s not Katara’s job to burden the weight of Sokka’s emotions, especially about their mother. She cannot force Sokka to open up about his feelings, that is something he must do at his own free will. Sokka hides his pain behind his masculinity. He’s protective because he feels guilty about not being able to do anything to help his mother. He doesn’t even remember what she looks like, he could only picture Katara’s face in her place. He felt even worse when his father left and he, understandably, couldn’t go with him. Sokka is not upfront about how he feels, but Katara should not be blamed for that. Overall it may be said that Katara was a flawed character that has recently been more scrutinized for her flaws than acknowledged for her strengths. We can do both, but there’s been an imbalance. She successfully revolted to free Haru’s father as well as other prisoners of the Fire Nation. She guided her friends out of the Si Wong desert despite the obstacles that stood in their way. She healed Aang and Zuko when shot by lightning, ultimately saving their lives and the lives of many other people who have been physically hurt by someone. She even washed Sokka’s underwear and sewed his pants. We can cut the girl some slack if she wants to talk about her mother, can’t we? She’s the glue that holds everyone together. Katara’s emotions make her a stronger fighter. Her trauma has shaped her into someone determined to master waterbending and has allowed her to be more empathetic to those around her. But she shouldn’t have had to go through all of that. She was forced to mature faster in order to survive. Katara can sometimes be arrogant, misguided, oblivious, and doubtful, yes. But she is also resilient, brave, selfless, and generous. That is the duality of her character. She is NOT to be disrespected. After all, as she said to Sokka in The Painted Lady, “I will never, ever turn my back on people who need me!”. And she hasn’t.
Iroh should be banned from the Earth Kingdom. It’s not an unpopular opinion that Uncle Iroh is a war criminal, but I just don’t think he should be allowed anywhere near the Earth Kingdom; either temporarily or permanently. Yes he played an instrumental role in Zuko’s redemption, with tea in his left hand and wisdom in his right. However, that does not excuse his invasion of Ba Sing Se. He laid siege to the impenetrable city for 600 days. Surely hundreds, maybe thousands of innocent people died under his commands. He broke the lower ring, home of the poorest members of the Earth Kingdom. The only reason he stopped was because his son, Lu Ten, died in battle; not aware that many citizens also died as a result of his actions. How many children’s lives has his army taken away? How many sons and daughters, fathers and mothers, aunts, uncles, and grandparents have died under his siege? Not only does he get to establish a business and earn money, he is elevated to the upper ring of the city; meanwhile an entire population can barely afford food and stable jobs. I understand that is was for plot purposes, but It’s a slap in the face to allow him to thrive in the city after Aang defeated Ozai. His wanted poster should be everywhere, not just for supposedly betraying the Fire Nation, but also for crimes against the Earth Kingdom. The very least he could do was shut down his tea shop and hand the building over to a family who may need it, and establish a tea shop in the Fire Nation. I’m not saying Iroh couldn’t be redeemed for his war crimes, but it definitely would take more than what was seen in the show for him to be forgiven for them.
Anyways, let me know what you think. This took an ungodly amount of time to write.
#atla#avatar the last airbender#sokka#aang#katara#toph#zuko#iroh#ozai#ursa#azula#ba sing se#fire nation#water tribe#bloodbending
346 notes
·
View notes
Text
RWBY V8 Episode 13 “Worthy” Reactions
There is so much going on in this episode and naturally because it’s the penultimate episode, so much conflict still in progress. I may miss or forget things and this will take me a while to get out because I have so much nervous energy it took me half an hour just to start typing. So keep that in mind as you read on
People were saying the plan went so smoothly but as I pointed out in my last reaction, local comms going down was and has thrown the evacuation into disarray, we can see it. So already we have Jaune and Nora splitting off from their team to spread the message, leaving less people to secure the gathering point in Vacuo
Second complication, a sandstorm that cuts off local comms and makes it impossible to know where Vacuo is. And a growing number of terrified refugees just out in the open with less than a handful of fighters to protect them. No way back to relative shelter or to even warn the rest either because true to his nature Ambrosius built exactly what they ask for.
Third complication, I wondered why Cinder seemed to be prepared for their plan. I thought Watts somehow also intercepted comms between Winter and Weiss but it seemed a stretch. Using the last question is going to bite her in the arse later, but I suppose she is in a damned anyway if she can’t give Neo Ruby before Salem respawns
And now we can also confirm she knows of Emerald’s “betrayal” but unless she leaves or gets knocked through the Vacuo portal, we may not get a confrontation this volume. Hard to say what she makes of this, she’s only shown to treat Emerald as someone she can use, much like how Cinder herself was and is being used.
Also Jinn definitely looked remorseful, but just like Ambrosius and the other spirits, she has rules to follow. BTW, I thought of a possible loophole for Jinn’s question limit. She can only be asked three questions every 100 years but I find it curious one question was already used. So my question is would it be possible to ask Jinn the same question twice. Technically it would not be a fourth question, but is that technicality enough to at least allow Jinn to repeat information for new ears.
Watts has access to the Command Centre. Jimmy’s need to control everything has once again backfired and given the enemy everything they could possibly want to do as much damage as they desire
All those people that Cinder blasted off the edge just to get RWBY’s attention, this has always been who she was, which is why there will not be any form of redemption for her. Even if she turns against Salem, it will be for her own selfish reasons and it is why she’ll never truly be able to escape from her fate
Our first RWBY vs Cinder fight (and probably not the last). Not many places worse for them to fight (if at all), with little ground (not a problem for a flying enemy), no cover, civilians in the line of literal fire (and glass). Got knocked off, game over. Speaking of which...
And Neo. Fucking Neo. And of course, protective big sister to the rescue. And she is the first to fall.
I did find it interesting that she seemed to vanish at a certain point on the way down. I interpret as proof, it’s not some endless void, there is something down there. And of course, there has to be a way back. We’re talking the Y of RWBY here, not to mention half the show’s most prominent LGBT+ couple. Contrary to what some individuals claim, RT do not do “Bury Your Gays” or “Queerbaiting”, at least not intentionally. As I said for Penny when she got hacked, Yang is going to be just fine, eventually. She’s not fine right now, obviously, but this isn’t the end for her. RWBY isn’t that type of show.
Ruby seems to be just surviving, no time to think or process what happen unless she wants to end up dead-dead by her sister’s supposed murderer. In this case, it is somewhat fortunate that Ruby’s coping mechanism is through actions, but when she stops it’s going to catch up with her
As for Blake, who got over repressing all her emotions several volumes ago, is not only the one to lose it the most but has gone absolutely feral. Still, she is not so far gone that she isn’t completely unaware that Penny and Weiss are unless in danger. Dilemma, exact vengeance on Neo, or lose another person you love?
While I’m on this point though, this is an excellent example of the destructive nature of the cycle of vengeance. An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. In her pursuit of vengeance, Neo has naturally made herself the target of the same type of vengeance. Precisely why killing often not actually a final solution, it also has consequences as well.
I fear for Penny but I’m still confident she’ll survive this somehow. She is something new and unique, a whole new chapter of her life has just started and it would be anti-climatic and a huge waste for the show not to explore that. Besides, if Cinder has learned anything than she knows the relics must take priority over her power lust. All the power of Maidens won’t save her from Salem if she doesn’t return with both of them.
Weiss seems to be the one in most trouble right now, and in most danger of falling next. Still, I’m curious to see if her Nevermore summon will come into play again. A finale seems like the best time for it, and could potentially be a tide turner, perhaps more so than the Queen Lancer summon in Volume 5. She could use more wins.
Back to the Loser Ops. Hoping Marrow is okay. But of course, Harriet is still set on delivering that bomb. Much like her boss, she seems incapable of admitting she is wrong or has lost. I don’t think most people expected Vine to be the next one to concede that Jimmy was not the one to follow, but it makes sense. At that point, blowing up a city for man who has already lost is the furthest thing from logical. It’s just spite at that point, and just a way to make sure everyone loses.
So the bomb is back in play, thanks to Harriet. And while everyone is focused on her, no one will notice Watts pulling the strings from behind the curtain. But what is his target? He wouldn’t waste such a thing on mere civilians. It could simply be to occupy and/or eliminate several powerful combatants, given the villains are currently outnumbered. Still, he’s in his element and the last person we want to underestimate now. If this is truly the end of Atlas, this may probably be his last great act of villainy before he truly falls into irrelevancy and expendability
Lastly, Jimmy F@#$ing Ironwood. Forcefield prisons are such a bad idea. And of course, we can’t forget Chekhov’s gun-gun-gun. We had to see it in action and what it can do to a person. He recovered extraordinarily quickly, but then his body is more machine than man at this point. Also, as I predicted, shattering his aura did not snap him out of it. Atlas the city, the idea, is everything to him. He stopped seeing the people in it a while ago. He’ll kill them all if it will keep the city afloat.
I have complicated feelings about Jacques Schnee. I don’t need to tell anyone how much of a terrible person he is but I can’t ignore the truth that not everything he touched turned to shit. Weiss is perhaps my favourite character in the show, and she would not only not exist if it weren’t for Jacques, she wouldn’t be the person she is that I love now if Jacques was any different as a father. Same goes for Whitley and Winter. It’s a reminder that some good can come from even the shittiest of people acting in the shittiest of ways. He was also right about Ironwood all along, can’t forget that.
That all said, Jacques did not deserve to be murdered like that, whatever his crimes. The man had nothing left, no threat to anyone anymore. He should have lived for the rest of his pathetic existence knowing what he lost.
So now Winter is facing Ironwood again, this time she is alone and he is armed. Neither are in the best shape. I only see this ending with one or both of them dying.
One final note, Yang may be gone but... what if instead of the others also falling... those still standing take a leap of faith to jump after her and whoever else falls
17 notes
·
View notes
Text
The trope Last Minute Hookup shouldn’t be used for LGBTQ+ relationships.
AND DEFENDING MY LAST POST ABOUT THIS.
I DO NOT hate any of these pairings. A good many of them could have been handled differently by the creators, writers, and networks. But this isnt me hating the relationships or characters or shows. Just going off about how they shouldnt have been tacked on at the end of their respective series.
As of writing this all of these shows have ended their original runs. Except for Supernatural which is on its last few episodes. And Supergirl, which announced its coming to end with season 6.
LGBTQ characters and relationships aren’t as common in the media as straight-cis characters and relationships. Sure things are improving but a lot of networks and writers still don’t fully understand why representation is important why they can’t keep using the same throwaway tropes they’ve been using for the straight-cis relationships.
You could name any piece of media and find and name one character that isn’t LGBTQ+, but you can’t do this with LGBTQ+ characters. We haven’t gotten to the point where they are as common as non-LGBTQ characters.
I have a whole paper I wrote on why asexual representation is important to have in the media and the same logic applies to any part of the LGBTQ+ or anything that falls under minority.
Back to the topic on hand. The trope of “Last Minute Hookup.”
Its exactly what it sounds like. Characters get to together at the very end of the story. These characters could have a on and off again relationship, lots of ship teasing, the classic “Will They or Wont They?” trope. What makes it different for non-LGBT characters in relationships to do this, we know what these relationships look like. Not to say the that both Non and LGBT relationship cant have similar struggles, however members of the LGBTQ+ community know how hard it is to feel like your identity and self matters and is normal.
I know that the whole “will they, wont they” thing is done for drama and networks and showrunners think if they give the fans what they want that they’ll start losing viewers and they have nothing to look forward to. Which is true to some degree. But most of this comes from the writers not knowing how to fucking write relationships.
Let’s just focus on whats it like to be in a non-straight relationship.
Heres an example: you have an action series, with 2 male leads and halfway through the show, they get together. Cool. Now you have a Battle Couple.
By making LGBTQ relationships happen at the end of a series that’s already had plenty of other non-LGBTQ relationships happen before it, it makes it look like the people in charge don’t care for it or were afraid of backlash. But it’s the end of the series so its not like they can get the show cancelled or anything. (The only people who are going to lash out at LGBT couple or characters are homophobic people, we don’t want them around any way so just make stuff super gay, so they’ll leave)
This is especially a problem when the writer and network have spent the whole series queerbaiting the audience with these characters.
Side note for anyone is doesn’t actually know what queerbaiting is:
It’s a marketing technique used in entertainment, which the writer or creators hint at but then don’t actually depict sex-same romance or LGBTQ representation. They do this to attract (bait) the LGBT/queer or straight ally audience into the show with the suggestion of representation but at the same time avoiding this as not alienate other audience members *cough* (homophobes) *cough*
Definition is from Wikipedia, not a reliable source says my highschool teachers and college professors but fuck em
The Legend of Korra is a great example of Last-Minute Hookup. Korra and Asami had VERY little ship teasing, and that was in the last 2 books/seasons. Any thing that was perceived as romantic came from the fans wearing shipping goggles. So to a lot of people just casually watching, yes this looked like it came out of nowhere. Nickelodeon had some serious balls to say how brave they were for putting 2 girls into a romantic relationship.
Theres a few problems with this.
A. It never actually aired on TV (to my knowledge). The last 2 seasons of Korra were put on Nicks website.
B. The confirmation that this Korrasami was canon had to come from the creators on twitter because of how unclear it was.
C. The show did the bare minimum when it came to hooking them up in the series. They walk off holding hands (very cute btw). They didn’t even get a kiss. Aang and Katara had a Last Minute Hookup at the end of ATLA after 3 seasons of ship tease and THEY GOT A KISS. Hell the original end of LoK*, has Korra and Mako kissing. *(the first season, they didn’t know they were getting more seasons at the time, no matter what you hear the writers say, they’re full of shit)
D. Anything continuation of Korra has come in the form of comics, which her and Asami are in a fairly well written relationship. Yes, they do kiss. Yes it would’ve been great to see this stuff happen in series.
A show that handles this a little bit better is Adventure Time. Not by much though. It implied several times that Princess Bubblegum and Marceline have history together and its shown more and more in its last few seasons that there is some ship tease happening. However its not until the finale where they kiss, and they are shown in the last minute of the show cuddling together in Marcy’s house. HBO has picked up Adventure Time and has a miniseries called Adventure Time: Distant Lands, where Bubblegum and Marceline’s past relationship is shown.
I had brought up in my original post about being upset with networks making LGBTQ+ relationships canon in the last season/episode. I originally had Catradora tagged. While Catra and Adora have history together, they did not become official couple until the end of the series.
Yes, I was wrong about the network making things canon in the last episode as they’ve always had ship tease with each other, and it probably was the writers’ intent to put them together by the end. They do technically fall under the Last-Minute Hookup, however.
I wanna talk about Once Upon a Time really quick. Fans of the show were hoping and wishing for an LGBTQ couple for the show as a lot of characters, especially Regina and Emma, have alot Ho Yay moments. The showrunners weren’t going to put those two together, for whatever reasons they may have for that (im indifferent on all the shipping going on with this show). The showrunners thought to put two characters together, and hoo boy did it not make people happy. The characters they put together are Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz and Ruby the red riding hood, which would be fine if they had properly been developed.
The entire episode they did this in was a mess. They stopped the current arc during the season 5 episode ‘Ruby Slippers,’ to go over the characters that haven’t been seen in years, Dorothy was introduced and last seen in season 3, and Ruby was introduced in season 1 and was last seen in season 5 before ‘Ruby Slippers’. The characters get together in the same episode the meet in and are never seen again. The characters barely interacted, barely got along, and showed little to no ship tease or interest in each other and BOOM they are in love and together aaaaaannnnndd they’re gone. Other than having One Million Moms, a Christian fundamentalist organization, protest against the show and want it taken off the air (yes this really happened). The fans weren’t please with this development of the characters either.
(also Mulan was right there and already knew Ruby from a previous episode, and Mulan already is established to like girls as shown by her being in love with Aurora. Don’t know why the writers didn’t just put these 2 together but whatever I guess)
So they tried again in season 7 with MadArcher. The characters of Alice, a version of Alice in Wonderland from another realm (its complicated) and Robin, the daughter of Robin Hood and the Wicked Witch (it’s also complicated). And the writers did a lot better here. Both characters were allowed to have time together and have a history together too and it was done over the whole season. Not just one episode.
Now even though the writers decided to do something different with the last season and it could be detached from the previous 6 seasons, MadArcher is not really a Last Minute Hookup per say but still falls under my thing about it being the last season so who gives a fuck if One Million Moms gets mad us and tries to get us cancelled again.
I would like to say I have never watched a single episode of Supernatural in my life. I may one day. But as of right now my knowledge of it is coming primary from what ive seen on tumblr. You know a great source for doing research and looking for reliable information among the piles of shitposting.
From what I know from fans, the writers of Supernatural have been queer baiting for years. I mean it’s the CW, I’m not that surprised. What also wouldn’t surprise me, that by the end of the series Castiel is back and he and Dean actually start and relationship or strongly hint at starting one. I actually fear for the writer lives if they threw out a confession scene after years of queerbaiting and potential ship tease (debatable) and they don’t put them together. Fans are going to be angrier than they probably ever have been with this show and the showrunners and writers really would be known for queer baiting.
From what I know about how previous shows have done and if anyone that has ever worked on this show wants to continue living, Castiel will be back from Super Hell (is that what yall are calling it?) and he will get together with Dean. And they will fall under the Last-Minute Hookup trope and my networks make LGBTQ relationships canon last season.
One last show I want to talk about is Supergirl, which in has been recently announced that the 6th season will be the last. The show started on CBS but moved to the CW after the end of season 1. So more CW bullshit. There is no confirmation about whether the CW or any of the Supergirl writers are planning to do this, its all speculation. Supergirl is more LGBTQ friendly than some other shows on the Network. One of the main characters came out a few years ago and had a girlfriend a season and has had plenty of hookups with other ladies around the Arrowverse. They even introduced a trans-woman superhero in the form of Dreamer.
Let’s talk SuperCorp. Lena Luthor was introduced in the 2nd season and has been a major character in Kara’s life ever since her introduction. Even if she isn’t involved in the plot, Kara always goes to her to talk and check in on her and worry about her. They are best friends. Since the 2 have met, there has been plenty of Les Yay going on. The writers seem to be aware of the fans wanting SuperCorp to be canon and they keep throwing in moments like Kara and Lena struggling together or Kara carrying Lena bridal style.
Why I bring this up after the announcement of Supergirl’s final season to start next year. We may get SuperCorp. Kara has a relationship with William in the show and not a single person likes this relationship. The writers may scrap it and get put Kara and Lena together for the final season. This is a big maybe though. The Supergirl writers and crew get called out a lot for queerbaiting.
Let me know if you guys have any other examples of last season/last episode LGBTQ+ hookup.
And please let me know if you see any mistakes. This was all done in one sitting so I may have some things wrong.
Also check out the video by @aretheygayvideos on this topic too.
undefined
youtube
#lgbt+ representation#lgbt#lgbtq#lgbtq community#legend of korra#korrasami#she ra netflix#she ra#catradora#adventure time#bubbleline#supergirl#supercorp#supernatural#destiel#once upon a time#ruby slippers#madarcher#atla#cw#nickelodeon#cartoon network#hbo#abc#disney#queerbaiting#stop queerbaiting#why can i sit down and write 2000 words about lgbt rep in one sitting#but not my fucking research projects#i care about rights too much
43 notes
·
View notes
Text
Avatar and Korra and gender roles, Part 2 of 2
So, that brings us to Legend of Korra, which continues and fulfills the trajectory Avatar: The Last Airbender was on in terms of how female characters are integrated into the story.
Summary of Part 1: Avatar: the Last Airbender started out with an imbalance towards male characters, and in general only had female characters when there was some “reason” for the character to be female, such as showing a conventionally female role or so that the character could be a love interest for a (more significant to the story) male character. Often the female characters were powerful and nuanced and well-written anyways -- I’m definitely not saying that any of the characters are in there just as a love interest. What I’m saying is that, there’s a noticeable difference between female characters in Season 1 vs 2 and 3, and that difference is the writers stopped writing all characters as male by default, and only female if they couldn’t more easily be written as male. Which is how we got Toph and Azula and a wider range of female minor characters.
In Legend of Korra, we’ve gone from “women can fight as well as men, sometimes better” to a fighter’s gender not even being relevant. They could have had some big story about how Lin Beifong had to fight against sexism to become the chief of police, or keep fighting against subordinates who wouldn’t respect her authority later, and...didn’t happen. Her gender was a non-issue. When Tenzin’s family is escaping from the Equalists towards the end of Season 1, and Lin risks her life to protect him, there’s no weirdness about a woman protecting a man who’s capable of fighting himself. It’s just the logical choice. And you don’t see that in action movies often: a woman risking her life to protect a group of people that includes a man who can fight but isn’t. He’s a dad, his kids need him; in the moment, that’s more important than gender.
And it’s not just fighting, for instance Asami races cars and runs a major business. Lin’s sister is the head of a city; she’s a metalbender, but as far as I know she’s not a fighter at all. We get a bit of Mako and Bolin’s grandmother: a frail old woman who’s nothing special in the wider world but who definitely wields authority as the beloved matriarch of the family. We get an Earth Queen who’s a terrible and self-indulgent leader, and Kuvira the conquering dictator.
And it’s also not just that all women are tough and bad-ass; women get to be tough in different ways; women get to be tough in some ways and vulnerable in others; women get to be just ordinary people and have interesting lives (like Caia) or to be in conventional supportive roles (like Pema.) Women can be uncomfortable with children (Lin) or feel fulfilled with motherhood (again, Pema.) We get relationships between sisters (Lin and Suyin, Jinora and Ikki), which I don’t think we have at all in ATLA.
And men can be athletes, artists, movie stars, non-action guys who are into fashion, devoted and protective brothers, fathers and sons. We have an arc with one of the central male characters falling into a relationship with an abusive girlfriend (although ymmv on how well that was handled -- the dynamic isn’t explicitly named as abusive in the show, although it is shown as being pretty unambiguously bad for the boyfriend.) In the first season, Mako is in an awkward position where dating Asami is financially advantageous to him and breaking up would leave him and Bolin in a difficult position, but he’s not entirely sure he does want to be dating her -- a storyline you see more often given to women, when that sort of power and relationships situation is addressed at all.
It’d be easy to dismiss a lot of the interpersonal dynamics as “just love triangle stuff”, but it goes a lot deeper than “which of these two wonderful people do I want to be with.” There’s power and vulnerability and what healthy and unhealthy relationships look like. Legend of Korra’s central characters are a little older than Avatar’s characters, and they have different problems, ones that are more focused on romantic relationships. But they’re not badly done or just-for-cheap-drama. They’re saying things.
And with the older characters, there is so much family drama: difficult parent-child dynamics and difficult sibling dynamics and Tenzin having trouble acknowledging he was the favored child because he was the airbender and Lin still not being ready to forgive Suyin. And the dynamic between responsible Mako and impulsive Bolin.
(Incidentally, not my main point here but that’s another thing the show does well: writes characters of dramatically different ages well. The protagonist is a teenager, but younger characters (Tenzin’s children) get significant roles, and older characters aren’t just parents and authority figures, they get their own drama as well.)
The plots kind of waver between classic bad guys and something more complex, and the more complex stuff...I’m not sure it always works. The overarching theme in Legend of Korra is balance, in the same way that the overarching theme in Avatar: The Lost Airbender was saving the world from the Fire Nation. There’s still, power can be corrupt and bad, but mostly the bad guys are not the ones in power (or with Kuvira, weren’t initially in power), they’re extremists trying to change the (admittedly far from perfect) status quo. Which can be frustrating if your politics run more anarchist/revolutionary/anti-colonialism. But I don’t think it’s actually a change from ATLA: ATLA actually was pro-status quo, or at least pro the status quo from before the fire nation started its take-over-the-world war. And basically pro-authority/pro-good-government. You *can* read anti-Western-colonialism messages into ATLA, but it’s a relatively indirect read; the Fire Nation is modeled on Japan and if anything the war is modeled on WWII, not on hundreds of years of Western colonialism. If ATLA was meant to be about Western colonialism, there’s a lot more they could have gone into and didn’t. It...kind of “works” better (the interpretations are more consistent) if you see it as a really simple anti-war/anti-aggression theme, rather than an anti-colonialism theme.
8 notes
·
View notes
Text
why atla’s ending is bad
so this post has likely already been made before, but I’m new to tumblr so what the hell. I recently finished watching atla, and I thoroughly enjoyed the series. This post is in no way about how the series itself is bad; I really did enjoy the series. Rather, it is about how the ending does a grave disservice to aang and the philosophical theories in question.
One of the reasons I love atla is that it is willing to ask the hard psychological questions: the scene in the library about how everybody thinks their war is justified? That is an amazing scene, it recontextualizes the entire series up until that point and forces us to ask: is fighting the fire nation really as justified as we claim? This question is brought up even more as we actually meet people who live within the fire nation: we see that they are not taught history as it actually happened and they are often ruled by fear. They are not the monsters that they seem to be. However, and this is the huge however, atla refuses to actually address the biggest question of the series: is it morally correct to kill someone in the service of a greater good?
Up until this point in the series, atla mainly avoids this question by making all forms of bending essentially the same: sure, they all have different animations and such, but at the end of the day they all serve as different ways to knock people backwards until everyone is far away enough that they seem defeated. Obviously, this is a children’s show, so it makes sense that they would do this. But, while its ok to knock around enemy henchmen, no one (even kids) is going to buy that one of the greatest firebenders of all time is properly subdued by a kid, especially when aang is shown to be clearly weaker in some of the bending forms than he would like. So, the philosophical question of killing has to be brought to the forefront. However, while the writers seemed to get that killing had to be brought up at some point, they narratively structured the story to prevent the question from actually being brought up at all.
At the core of this question is the push and pull between consequentialism and deontology, the two major schools of thought on what defines a moral action. Consequentialists (broadly speaking) argue that an action is right if the consequences brought about by that action are right. Deontologists argue (broadly speaking) that an action is right if the action itself is right, regardless of the consequences. This post is not going to go into a full-throated analysis of either philosophy, but will simply state that despite what everyone on the internet likes to claim after having read the trolley problem briefly, there are some legitimate benefits to deontology (and consequentialism can often lead to some things that we would think of as morally dubious.)
Anyway: suffice it to say, aang is a deontologist. He is focused on doing right actions because they are inherently right, and he doesn’t believe in bending his principles just because it would be convenient or because it could lead to a better outcome in that specific instance. Principles are principles for a reason, goddamnit, if you bend them all the time, how useful are they? And despite the fact that a lot of people here on tumblr would definitely describe themselves as consequentialists, we applaud aang throughout the series for his decisions to be morally upstanding, even when it makes his life harder.
Here’s the issue though: deontology, even though it has some serious benefits (I am somewhat of a deontologist and pacifist myself) it also has some serious downsides. Sometimes, when you stick to your principles, bad things will happen. Sometimes, those bad things will happen because you weren’t willing to stop them. And while there is a larger argument that can be made about how sticking to what is right leads to a better world overall, that doesn’t help the fact that in the moment, deontology can seem like a really sucky philosophy.
The writers of the show never actually make aang face that issue with deontology, and they trivialize it as a philosophy. Throughout the second half of the third season, aang is portrayed as not having the stomach to kill ozai, or not wanting to do what needs to be done. It is implied that aang is weak for his beliefs, that he must overcome his weakness and pacifism to become the strong avatar the world needs to undo the horrible damage of fire nation imperialism. The issue with this, though, is that it never confronts the actual issue at play? What if (ignoring energy-bending entirely for a second) aang is entirely right to not want to kill ozai?
I posit that a non-murdery approach to the final battle is the actually correct decision for the world. The fire nation has been steeped in fear and anger for over a century, and their leaders have based all of this division and fear and nationalism on the idea that might makes right, that if you are strong and just and powerful enough, it is your right to spread this glory to the rest of the world. If aang were to beat ozai handily and murder him, all that he would prove is that the firelords were right all along: it is the right of those who have power to control those who are powerless. Aang killing ozai just proves that ozai was right all along. The only way to break the fire nation cycle of fear is to prove that there are other ways to approach conflict, to prove that a non-violent approach is not just preferable to killing someone, but is actually what is necessary for the world to heal and grow?
It is at this point that the readers who have read this far into this abominably long post say, “but wait chromecausation, aang didn’t kill ozai. That was the whole fucking point of the final episode!” And to those of you still reading: kudos, you have my gratitude. My issue is not actually with the ending of the story (despite the title of this piece) but the way that it was presented.
Because I just recently watched avatar (and I had seen some spoilers earlier on tumblr so i knew that something called energybending was coming), I realized that energybending was introduced AS A CONCEPT in the last 2 episodes, and it was explained as aang was using it to defeat ozai. This is literally the definition of a deus ex machina, a plot device that solves a previously insurmountable problem that arrived out of basically nowhere. I really really hate that the entire conflict of the series is solved through deus ex machina. It cheapens all of the struggles, and it makes the conclusions of the story that much weaker.
Think of how all of the arguments aang had with sokka, zuko, katara, the other avatars, and like a billion other people would have gone if it were known that energy-bending were a possibility. Instead of being “hey I don’t want to kill the firelord because it is morally wrong, even if that is a more dangerous path to take, but I think it will be better for the world as a whole” it becomes “hey instead of killing the firelord, I would like to take this equally easy option to not kill him but subdue him instead.” (The reason I say equally easy is because killing the firelord is shown to be fucking difficult to do). The existence of energy-bending renders the whole point of the argument moot, because of course in a vacuum it is better to not kill people. (I say of course here because the moral discussion at play is not whether retributive punishment is better than rehabilitative punishment, or whether the death penalty should exist. Those moral discussions rest on the premise that the victim is helpless and we in the position of power must decide their fate. The moral question here is whether aang should try to kill the firelord, because if he tried to hold back with bending so that he didn’t kill ozai, aang might actually lose the fight). Energybending does not exist with enough screen time for us to learn if it has drawbacks or is difficult to do. We are told that it is difficult, but so is killing the firelord during sozin’s comet; we need to actually see it in action first or discuss it ahead of time to actually know what the stakes are. Instead, with it being presented at the last minute, it seems like aang is given a cheat code out of his moral dilemma. He is never forced to confront the actual consequences of pacifism, and is never given the chance to prove why it is a good idea to stick to your principles even when you don’t have a deus ex machina up your sleeve.
I believe that aang was right to not kill the firelord, but because the mechanism was energybending, it means that aang is never forced to confront the idea that pacifism and deontology require a difficult route and that there is a good chance he will not succeed. Conversely, he is never given the chance to prove how his way of thinking is better for actually breaking the fire nation cycle of fear. Imagine, instead of energybending, aang was forced to learn all of the techniques taught to him by his teachers. When fighting ozai, he must take a heavy blow that he must heal through waterbending he is taught from katara. He is only able to dodge attacks because of the seismic sense from toph, and he must become comfortable enough with fire that he can redirect ozai’s lighting, as shown by zuko. This techniques are shown to be incredibly difficult, and by clearly setting up a path where aang is forced to take the more difficult route in order to stick to his convictions, it would strengthen the moment when he actually does, as well as provide a nice way to remember the journey along the way. If it were shown that aang had a way to kill ozai and chose not to, instead choosing to rely on his skill, it would show that he is committed to his convictions. Instead, the use of energybending almost implies that all of the knowledge up until this point was useless. What is the point of learning to bend if the only way to defeat ozai is through energybending?
Finally, I will say this: aang needed to defeat ozai in a way that did not rely on murder so that he can finally join the ranks of the avatars before him. When conversing with the previous avatars, it is clear that they think that aang should kill ozai. However, the actual words they speak matter too: aang must make a decision, he must serve justice. The other avatars do not actually speak on whether or not aang should kill ozai, but rather they speak to his conviction. Up until this point, aang is a kid who has the world thrust upon his shoulders, and he is trying the best he can, but at the end of the day he is still a kid. He doesn’t want to kill people because the monks told him it was wrong, and while he feels deeply that he wants to uphold that, he also doesn’t want to kill people because he is young and it would scar him. I choose to see the meetings with the avatars not just as them arguing for aang to kill ozai, but them also having a meta discussion with aang: he must make an actual moral commitment, and stick to the path he has chosen. In order to claim the mantle of avatar, he must strike out on his own and become an independent person with independent beliefs who is willing to talk to the avatars as an avatar. When aang walks back from the battle with ozai, he is able to talk to the other avatars on an equal level because he has committed to his own path and succeeded. He is no longer dependent on guidance; even though he is young, he is a fully realized avatar. By introducing energybending, the writers rob aang of that ability. They prevent him from joining the ranks of the avatars as someone deeply committed to pacifism even when there are no more tricks up your sleeve, and this is a damn shame.
1 note
·
View note
Text
The Red Dragon - Chapter 22
AO3 | FF.Net | Tumblr: Ch1 | Ch21
@ao3feed-gratsu
Natsu had left the cave with no clear direction in mind. He'd just needed to get away. He'd meant what he'd said, he absolutely understood why Sting had done it, but that didn't lessen the pang of betrayal any. Sting was the only one he had trusted with his secret, it wasn't like he hadn't known what could happen.
He could almost hear his father in his head telling him there was no point in dwelling in things he couldn't do anything about, but after everything that had happened in the last few days, he wasn't capable of much else.
With nowhere else to go, he flew towards Drak Aast, trusting Atlas to get Weisslogia there on his own. Upon his arrival, he was greeted eagerly by all the dragons before getting flooded with problems that required his attention, grateful for the distraction they offered. He set to work on them, promptly ignoring Belserion's concerned expression at seeing him there at all.
By the time Atlas arrived a few days later, Natsu was on the other side of the island, mediating a dispute between the earth and rock dragons.
He spent months on the island immersing himself more and more in his duties, happy to see many dragons had already begun nesting. He was excited about the possibility of seeing plenty of hatchlings when he returned on his next visit. If they had a successful season, they might be able to bring their numbers up sooner than expected.
Natsu never stayed in any one area of the large island for long, moving along to the next one as soon as things had settled, and he had too much time to think. But no matter how much he did to try to keep himself busy, he could never escape his thoughts of Gray completely. The continuous physical ache was a consistent reminder of what he'd lost.
After entering a mating bond, a dragon needed to remain close to his mate for a full year. Any extended separation within that time was painful and to be avoided at all costs, with the intensity increasing every day. It was one of the reasons he had decided to wait when they had first confessed to each other, knowing he might have to leave at any moment.
While he was on the island, he could keep himself busy, but Natsu knew he should go home eventually. He'd only meant to be gone for a month or two, just enough time to process what had happened and accept his fate. But he could feel a pull at his bond, and he knew that it was Gray calling to him. He didn't know what to do, but he also knew he couldn't ignore it much longer.
0-0
Gray wiped the sweat off his brow with the back of his hand, taking a break from cutting wood with the saw he'd fashioned out of his ice. He had taken off Natsu's scarf so as not to get it dirty, setting it down neatly on top of his shirt. Lyon had taken off his shirt as well, the strenuous work making them both uncomfortably hot despite having set up the sawhorses by the lake.
After making sure no other nearby villages had been attacked by the black dragon, they'd set about rebuilding Talos to the best of their ability. Everyone chipped in as best they could, from the village guards all the way down to the orphans in Anna's care. Together they'd managed to get the village back into livable shape, forging a closer community along the way.
Gray noticed Erza and Juvia coming over carrying what looked to be two large picnic baskets and sat down, willing the breeze to pick up so he could cool his body without having to resort to magic. He looked forward to taking a break after a long morning spent doing construction work.
Things with Juvia had improved somewhat after that first disastrous night. He had apologized for the necklace incident, although he still didn't understand what had prompted it. It had not responded that way to anyone else. In return, she'd toned down her advances, which had made her a lot more pleasant to be around.
Lyon waved at the girls and hurried over to take the basket from Erza, taking a moment to kiss her in greeting before setting up a blanket where they stood.
Juvia kept walking towards Gray, giving the two lovers some space. She sat down next to him and smiled shyly.
"Juvia thinks Talos is beginning to look nice again," she remarked, absently grabbing some water from the lake and turning it into a cool mist she let fall on Gray, who smiled at her in appreciation.
"Thanks, it's murder out here."
Juvia nodded and stared out at the water, "It's so hard to believe how quickly everything was destroyed."
The dragon fight had ruined many buildings and caused many injuries, but miraculously no lives had been lost. Gray had been the one to suffer the most wounds, and since his memories had yet to return, he had no idea how bad they had really been.
He'd returned to the field in daylight, hoping it would trigger something, but outside of dismay at the large patches of blood splattered grass, there had been nothing.
It was a constant hum in his brain that he couldn't quiet. Where had he gone? Had he been alone? But no matter how much he thought on it, the answers still evaded him.
All he could remember for sure was that he had begun walking to Talos full of a feeling that something good was going to happen. Then he'd woken up in the field. As soon as the village repairs were done, he planned to return to the village where he'd taken that last job. Maybe if he retraced his steps, it would give him some sort of clue as to what had happened to him.
"How are the repairs to the orphanage going?" Gray asked, mostly to make conversation.
"We're almost done," Juvia assured him although her expression got a little teary. "Anna is a lovely woman, Juvia wishes there had been a place like that for her when she was younger."
"Yeah, she took care of most of my friends before they were adopted by… uhm before they were adopted." Gray caught himself before he revealed they'd been taken in by dragons, a fact that as he understood it, was not generally known.
"Are these the dragonslayers that left to fight in the war?" Juvia asked cautiously, her eyes searching his face for a reaction, suggesting she knew she was getting close to a forbidden topic.
"Yes," Gray replied and immediately opened the picnic basket to see what was inside, not wanting to invite any further discussion, but Juvia seemed to be on some sort of mission.
"And the scarf you wear belongs to your partner?"
Gray's head jerked as he heard those words, his eyes widening in panic before realizing much too late that Juvia was referring to the fact that Natsu had been his guard partner. And even as he bravely tried to answer noncommittally, he knew he'd given himself away.
"Uhm, yeah."
"Oh," Juvia remained silent for a moment, her cheeks reddening slightly as she grasped what his reaction to her innocent question meant. But then she rallied, gazing at him intently.
"Juvia is sorry for her actions, she should not have made assumptions," she grabbed his hand, squeezing it gently before letting go and smiling at him, "Juvia is sure he will return to you."
"I wish I was," Gray muttered as he absently fidgeted with his necklace.
0-0
Natsu flew home with Atlas, who had shown up to retrieve him a few days earlier. They hadn't spoken since he'd left the cave Sting and the others had been staying in, and although he could tell Altas was working hard to remain quiet, he could also see that the effort wasn't easy for him.
They slowed down as soon as he could pick out Gray's scent, and Atlas finally spoke.
"I didn't tell Igneel what happened. I will leave it up to you whether you want to do that or not."
"Thank you, it's probably best he doesn't know."
Atlas grunted, although Natsu wasn't sure if he agreed with his decision, "How are you feeling these days, Kid?"
"About as expected, I figure if I'm near him, it might be enough to help."
They arrived at the cave, and Natsu spent a few days catching Igneel up on the goings-on of the island. Each day his curiosity and need to see Gray grew incrementally until he finally gave in.
He found a perch atop their mountain where he could sit and have a clear view of the village without being seen. Natsu was relieved to see the repairs had been finished, remembering with some guilt how much damage he'd caused during his fight with Acnologia.
Throughout the day he got peeks of Anna as well as Lyon and Erza and some of the other guards he recognized from his time there. But it wasn't until the third day that he got a glimpse of Gray. He was doing his patrol sweep, a route Natsu remembered well.
He'd been expecting to feel something when he saw him, but he hadn't anticipated the overwhelming need that came over him at seeing Gray so close.
Natsu watched him eagerly at first, noticing all the small changes the last few months had wrought. All he wanted was to hear Gray’s voice and know his touch. To share his bed and feel his love. Images he'd spent months trying not to think about played in his mind, each one stealing his breath and shattering his already damaged heart further.
And as the scent of what he wanted most but could never have again filled his nostrils, he imagined that this was what hell would be like. No blazing inferno, but having his heart shattered over and over again. He steeled himself for what would surely be several months of this torture, swearing to himself that once the required time had passed, he would make his way back to Drak Aast, never to return.
0-0
Gray glanced around his apartment in the dim light of the early dawn hours, trying to make sure he had everything he needed before he left. He was getting ready to go when he was startled by a noise behind him.
"Aren't you even going to eat anything?" Lyon complained, exiting his room with his travel bag slung on his back.
"Where are you going?" Gray asked, puzzled that Lyon hadn't mentioned leaving on a job.
"Where do you think, dumbass? With you." Lyon walked into their kitchen, opening their refrigerator in search of something to eat and throwing a piece of fruit at Gray. "Or did you think I was just going to let you leave on your own?"
"How did you —?"
"Know you were going to leave?" Lyon smirked, "Erza told me you asked for leave, it didn't take much for me to figure out what you were up to. Knowing you, there were only two possible choices. You're either going to go retrace your steps, or you're going to go off in search of Natsu. Or both?"
Gray stared at his brother, and while his first inclination was to tell him he wanted to go alone, the truth was he was somewhat scared of what he might find. Having Lyon around would be a welcome distraction, not to mention his brother had always been very observant. He could be a lot of help on this journey, but more importantly, it had been a long time since they had done anything just the two of them.
But it wasn't fair, Gray had no idea where this trip was going to take him. If something happened to him, no one would miss him all that much, but if something happened to Lyon, Erza would be devastated. She'd already had too many people leave her behind, it wasn't fair to her.
"I'm not taking no for an answer," Lyon insisted, arms crossed across his chest in stubborn defiance.
"Erza?"
"Already knows I'm leaving," Lyon remained in the same posture, but the way his eyes strayed away from his face let Gray know he'd had similar thoughts.
"I don't know what's going to happen," Gray cautioned, trying to give him one last chance at an out.
Lyon sighed, putting his arms back down by his sides, "Look, I'll admit the thought has occurred to me that we might not return, but I understand you have to do this. The truth is, if something like this had happened to me, I'd want to do the same. I'm your brother, let me help you."
"Alright, but don't say I didn't warn you."
Lyon grinned in triumph, moving forward to give him a quick hug before opening their door and stepping out into the chilly morning air, "Let' s go!"
Gray immediately followed, locking their apartment door behind them. They made their way to Gray's last confirmed location slowly, neither knowing what it was they were looking for but hoping they'd recognize it when they found it.
The first few days were filled with a lot of talks, and Gray had almost been enjoying himself, despite the lack of progress. It had been a long time since he'd gotten to spend time like this with his brother outside of a few hikes into the mountains, and he'd missed the closeness they'd shared before Lyon had begun dating Erza. Not that he minded, he felt they were right for each other.
They finally reached the town, and even after two days of asking questions of anyone who would listen, they had come away with zero answers. Gray had sort of expected that, though. After all, Erza had mentioned Lyon and Juvia had already investigated when he had gone missing.
So they began their search for Natsu and the other dragon slayers, heading towards the last location where they had heard there had been fighting. But after a week of finding nothing but destroyed scenery, Lyon had become very quiet, and Gray didn't know what to make of it. He was almost startled when Lyon finally spoke.
"When we return, I'm going to ask Erza to marry me." Lyon declared, his words filled with a strange determination that didn't quite vibe with their message.
"That's great!" Gray replied with a smile, and he meant it. He was glad things had worked out for his brother and his friend, and he refused to let his own perpetual misery mar that.
"Thanks," Lyon smiled briefly, walking alongside Gray with his hands stuffed into his pockets, once again seemingly deep in thought. He remained silent for a few more minutes before starting a line of conversation that Gray hadn't seen coming.
"It's been almost three years, Gray," Lyon began, stopping amidst a particularly charred area in the forest they were currently traveling in, "I don't think they're coming back."
Gray could only gape, his brother's words going straight through to his heart, for they were words he thought often but refused to believe.
"He's coming back, he's too stubborn not to. You said so yourself."
"I know what I said, but look around you," Lyon pointed at the remains of the once lush forest, "The things they were fighting were capable of all the destruction we've seen, they didn't stand a chance."
"You don't know that for a fact," Gray argued angrily, "All of them were more powerful than us, and their magic was meant to fight dragons."
"Then, where are they? If the war has ended, why aren't they back yet?" Lyon debated, his voice remaining collected even as Gray's began to rise. "Don't you think he would've already rushed back if he could?"
"Shut up."
"This is Natsu we're talking about here, he wouldn't keep you waiting. I think you need to accept the fact that he's never coming back."
"SHUT UP!"
"Gray —"
"If he were dead, I would know it," he felt that with every cell in his body. His bond had felt muted since he'd woken up in the field, but it was still there.
"How? That spiritual bond you talked about? It's a child's story, Gray, a pretty tale he spun when he romanced you. Things like that don't exist in real life."
"That's not true, I've felt it. I've heard Natsu in my mind since I was a child, and I've been able to reach him a few times too."
"Alright fine, let's assume for the sake of argument that you're right. When was the last time that happened?" Lyon peered at him, not needing to wait for a response when he saw the way Gray's shoulders slumped at his question.
"Look, I will be with you on this journey for as long as you need me to, but I want you to promise me that if we don't find anything, you'll give up on this," Lyon pleaded, "You need to move on, Gray. While you insist on living out this fantasy, your life is passing you by. We both know that's not what Natsu would have wanted for you."
"Stop talking about him as if he were dead!" Gray snapped, feeling angry and scared. He didn't want to listen to any of the things Lyon was saying.
"Gray —."
"Natsu is out there, and he will come back to me when he can."
He could see the pity in Lyon's eyes, but he didn't care. He refused to believe he'd never see his mate again. They continued to search for an additional week before returning home, and Lyon wisely never brought up the topic back up, but Gray could still feel the weight of his worried stares.
He ignored them, the trip had been a complete waste of his time, he hadn't retrieved any memories or found any sign of Natsu, but even so, Gray refused to give up hope. He would see him again.
0-0
Natsu woke up slowly, eyes still closed, enjoying the warmth of the sunlight and the late spring breeze as it blew in through the window and caressed his body. He whimpered, knowing this dream well. Gray would be lying beside him, their limbs tangled up in each other as they always did when they slept together.
Natsu would move his blessedly human body slowly to face his mate and just stare at the ice mage as he slept. A soft smile playing on his lips at the sight, and his heart would soar with the knowledge that they were now one. That they would spend the rest of their days fighting together and loving each other. Nothing would ever tear them apart.
But then the dream would inevitably change. Natsu's body would transform into his dragon self, causing Gray to pierce his heart with one of his ice swords, even as Natsu cried out that he was still the same. He knew the whole thing was ridiculous, Gray's swords couldn't hurt him, but that did nothing to lessen his anxiety.
Natsu waited for the dream to shift, but to his surprise, there were only the sound of a soft sigh as long fingers threaded through his hair in a way that he instantly recognized. What kind of cruel dream was this? He sniffed the air in disbelief.
How could this be? He recalled flying down to the field to reminisce on some of his earlier times with Gray. He must have fallen asleep, but when had Gray gotten here and why wasn't he freaking out? And wait, hair? What the hell was going on?
"You still can't control it when you're asleep, can you?" Gray teased him softly, his voice fond and full of craving. Natsu found himself wanting to cry in response. He'd missed Gray so much, the time they'd been apart had been agony for him both physically and mentally.
"Why didn't you come find me when you got back?" Gray continued, his fingers stopping their gentle petting and thwapping him roughly on the head. "I wouldn't have cared if you woke me up. Are you back for good?" Natsu heard the hope in Gray's voice and wished he could reassure him, but he had no idea what to say. He was in unchartered territory at the moment.
Natsu opened his eyes and was instantly accosted by a pair of deep blue eyes staring down at him, donning too many emotions for him to track. Even so, those emotions were assaulting him through their fractured bond, overwhelming him with all of Gray's worry and pain and, gods, so much love, and this time Natsu did cry. From relief, from anxiety and from a joy he hadn't felt in so long.
Maybe he was getting a second chance, perhaps it had just taken him much longer to turn back this time. If that was so, he promised himself he would never transform again, it wasn't worth it. He didn't want to move from this spot, from this moment, afraid that it would somehow break whatever this spell was that had turned him back into his human self. He looked around to see he was indeed at their field, he'd fallen asleep at the very edge of it beneath some trees that would have usually hidden his body but now afforded them some privacy.
"Hey, are you okay?" Gray fussed over him, checking him over for injuries and rediscovering scars all over Natsu's torso he didn't know he'd forgotten. Not finding any open wounds, he grabbed Natsu and enveloped him in an embrace that threatened to take Natsu's ability to breathe away, yet Natsu found he didn't care.
"I thought I'd never see you again," Gray whispered into his ear, "Lyon told me to give up hope, that if you hadn't come back yet the worst must have happened, but I knew--" Gray swallowed around the lump that was threatening to drown them both in his tears. "I knew that if you'd died, I would know."
"I told you I'd be back," Natsu managed shakily as he attempted a smile. He touched Gray's face reverently and used his thumb to gently wipe away the tears. Now that Gray was in front of him, he wasn't about to waste any time. He wanted to hoard every second he was allowed, still not daring to believe this could be permanent.
"You did," Gray agreed readily enough, releasing Natsu from his embrace before growling, "But nearly three years is a fucking long time to go without any word."
Natsu felt guilt flood him as he looked at his mate and rushed to mask it, not wanting Gray to realize anything was amiss. He still felt terrible for removing Gray's memories of their six months together, but he knew he'd done the right thing.
The knowledge that they'd been so happy before it had all been wrested away from them in such a cruel manner killed Natsu a little more each day. He didn't want that for Gray. No, it was best Gray didn't remember, he'd already suffered enough. Natsu was only thankful he'd had enough magic left to heal the worst of Gray's injuries after Acnologia's attack.
"We should go back to the village, I'm sure everyone would love to see you," Gray said, but Natsu could tell it wasn't what he really wanted, and he had no desire to see anyone else at the moment either, just Gray.
"Not yet, it's been so long, I don't want to see anyone else, I just want to be with you." He looked at Gray, eyes pleading with him.
Gray smiled at him and leaned forward to capture Natsu's lips with his own, and Natsu was embarrassed by the needy moan he heard himself utter as he returned the kiss with a desperation born of separation, but Gray only wrapped his arms around him tightly.
Natsu had yearned for this, to believe his mate still loved and wanted him. He could feel their bond healing, reforging, and that worried him a bit, but it was so hard to think when his body's desires were raging out of control. The almost constant pain he'd experienced since leaving Talos had dissipated the moment Gray kissed him.
He wanted, no, he needed to claim his mate again, and the raw urgency of that thought scared him. But Gray's hands were soon straying from the embrace, beginning to explore Natsu's body as he continued to kiss him. His touches were tentative as his hands touched every part of Natsu they could reach in this position, reminding Natsu of the first time they had made love, both of them fumbling in their desperation to join together after so much time spent apart.
Natsu's heart ached at the memory as his body responded to the familiar touches. Gray's kiss grew more demanding, and Natsu didn't want to stop, his hands already returning the touches with an urgency he couldn't deny.
"Natsu," Gray's voice dripped with desire, a heat so intense that it melted through all of Natsu's quickly dwindling resolve and caused him to moan in anticipation, "If you want me to stop, please tell me now."
Natsu shook his head, and that was enough for Gray to begin undressing him, his mouth soon following his fingers. Natsu's back arched as he felt cold lips touch his skin, the perfect complement to his heat. He went to return the favor, only to realize Gray had already lost his shirt at some point. Was Gray even wearing it when Natsu first saw him? Natsu couldn't remember, but he also didn't care as it allowed him immediate access to the broad chest he was already covering with kisses. It had been so very long since he'd been able to touch his mate in any way.
"I love you," Natsu blurted, having only been able to recite the words in his head for too long.
Gray stopped for a second and peered at him in wonder, "You've never said that to me before."
"I never got the chance to," Natsu lied, memories of all the times he'd told Gray that very thing in those six months flitting through his mind. He'd said it often, sometimes in fondness, sometimes in ecstasy and sometimes just to remind himself from within his frustration or anger, but every time it was told with the same honesty that his feelings for Gray demanded.
Gray remained still, hands no longer roaming as he seemingly absorbed Natsu's words, interiorizing them. He flashed Natsu a smile that would forever become engraved in his heart, it was beatific and full of a tenderness that Natsu knew Gray never showed anyone else.
"I love you too," Gray's words nourished Natsu's soul, healing it from all the pain he'd experienced since Acnologia had shown up on their doorstep.
"I haven't said that to anyone since my parents died," Gray sighed at the realization that he'd never even uttered those words to Ur, although he thought that she'd known all the same.
Gray kissed Natsu again, and although this kiss was tender and full of promises, it had lost none of the earlier passion. There was no going back at this point, they were too caught up in their emotions and desires to rein themselves in. They spent the next few hours exploring each other's bodies slowly and repeatedly, neither bothering to muffle their cries of ecstasy. Though at first the noises of the forest stopped at their intrusion, they soon became complicit, masking them in their chatter. That noise, in turn, lulled them into a deep sleep as both their bodies and souls had now become sated. The last thing Natsu saw before his eyes closed was the radiant glow of Gray's necklace, and he smiled, knowing it meant their bond was whole once again.
O-o
Gray awoke to find Natsu watching him, and although he couldn't quite figure out his expression, it still brought a smile to his face. He'd missed waking up with Natsu, it was something that had been snatched from him just as he'd begun to get used to it.
"See something you like?" Gray grinned at the flustered expression on his lover's face at being caught staring, thrilled he could still affect Natsu that way even after all this time. He was a bit surprised that he felt so comfortable being naked around the other, but considering what they'd just shared, perhaps it wasn't so surprising after all.
"Always," Natsu replied, his gaze adoring as he leaned towards Gray and kissed his forehead gently before moving to kiss his lips. "Good afternoon, or whatever time it is." Natsu scratched his head as he looked up at the position of the sun in the sky, trying to figure out how long they had slept for. It looked like the sun was beginning to set.
Gray took advantage of Natsu's distraction to look at his body, really look at it. It was covered in faint scars, some that looked like the wounds had been quite severe. He started to shake at their enormity, he could've lost him to any one of those wounds. Just what had Natsu been through while they were apart? Natsu noticed his gaze and tried to cover the worst of them with his arms.
"Don't," Gray scolded, "I need to see them."
"They're nothing," Natsu shrugged, but he stopped trying to hide them and remained uncomfortably still as Gray traced the scars with his fingers.
"Dragons did this?" Gray growled angrily, every scar burned into his memory, adding fuel to his hatred.
"No, most of these were done by people," Natsu said, and it was true, Acnologia had once been a human before he had devolved into whatever he was now. "Most of the dragons are gone from this world."
"People did this? I find that hard to believe," Gray retorted, unwilling to let go of his earlier assumption.
"Why? People have always killed each other. Why would war be any different?"
Gray knew there was truth to Natsu's statement, so he changed the topic, not wanting to argue so soon after joining together. "Are the others back too? They are okay, aren't they?"
"They're alive," Natsu responded, and this was true enough, " I don't think any of us can really be expected to be okay, though,"
Gray studied him, quickly recognizing a lot was hiding in that statement but not precisely grasping how to pursue it without ruining the moment further. He felt like he needed to know, he'd worked and played with the dragon slayers since his arrival in Talos. He considered them all friends, and he'd worried about them too, but maybe now was not the time to push the subject, so he began a hasty retreat.
"Do, do they look like you?" Gray asked worriedly, fingers once again tracing Natsu's scars.
Natsu shook his head. He didn't want to talk about this, about them or the war or any of his other failures. The other dragon slayers were bruised, and they were definitely not the same, but they had survived, and maybe they would choose to return someday, but even if they did, he knew things would be different. Still, he felt he had to say something.
"They've chosen to stay with their dragons for the moment, I don't know when they'll be back."
Gray hastily switched subjects, this Natsu was different than he remembered, almost fragile. He supposed that was to be expected. Gray had no idea what his mate had been through in the last three years, but he was starting to realize they'd be sorting it out for years to come. The thought was daunting, but he didn't care because that meant that Natsu was home to stay. They could finally begin to build the life they'd wanted, together.
"Are, are your dragons, okay?"
"They're alive," Natsu responded, but Gray could tell that once again, a lot was being left unsaid.
He was getting frustrated by all of Natsu's non-committal responses. Gray was trying to understand what had happened, what things Natsu had been through so that he could start the healing process, and he pushed more than he should have, "What was it like?"
"I don't really want to talk about this right now," Natsu snapped, his voice loud and angry, startling Gray. He immediately looked chagrined, and he softened his tone, "I don't want to waste whatever time we have rehashing all of that."
"Whatever time we have?" Gray looked confused and disappointed, " What do you mean by that, do you have to go back?
Natsu looked away, not knowing what to say, he had no idea how long he had, but he could already sense the change coming. Had felt it the moment he'd woken up, and no amount of trying to fight it off had made any difference. He wouldn't be able to stay in this form for much longer, and he was trying to hide his despair at the fact that he would soon have to say goodbye to the man he loved. Again.
If only they hadn't wasted so much time sleeping.
"Are you hungry? Cause I'm starving," Natsu got dressed and tossed Gray's clothes at him, trying to conceal the way his hands were shaking, "How about we go find a place to clean up and hunt down some food?"
"Natsu," Gray grabbed his clothes and put them on. "NATSU!" he repeated louder when Natsu seemed to be ignoring him. He grabbed Natsu by the hands and forced the fire mage to look at him. "What aren't you telling me?"
He'd expected a fight, a denial, anything but the broken look on Natsu's face, and that's when he felt it, despair so deep Gray lost his balance for a second. It was enough for Natsu to escape his grip.
"Natsu, what's wrong?"
"I'm so sorry," Natsu said as his fingers instinctively moved towards his neck, searching for the scarf he hadn't worn for years now.
It was no use, his transformation was beginning. Natsu could feel the scales start to cover his body. He was out of time. He hoped Gray could forgive him for leaving him without any answers. He tried to contain his tears, not wanting that to be the last thing Gray saw of him. "I'll always love you," he said one last time before running off into the wooded area that led away from the mountains.
"NATSU! Natsu, come back," Natsu heard Gray's yells below him as he managed to take to the skies unseen, but try as he might he couldn't ignore the deep, unmistakable hurt in his mate's voice. He'd done it again, only this time he'd managed to make things even worse.
Dammit!
Natsu flew towards his cave, hoping Atlas would know why he'd changed and if it was likely to happen again.
A/N: Sorry I'm a little late with this one, I've had a lot of family obligations with the holidays. This will be the last chapter update until mid-January. I am putting this story on hiatus briefly as I need to fulfill other obligations for holiday exchanges and events. The next chapter is probably one of the most important to the story and I don't want to half-ass it because I was trying to spread myself too thin. I might switch to weekly updates for a bit once I return to try to get back on schedule.
That said I hope you enjoy this one! A special thanks to @oryu404 for their help when I was stuck! Happy Holidays to everyone, however you celebrate it, and thank you so much for helping make this year a great one for me. I love you all!
8 notes
·
View notes
Text
Nerding out on the Borderlands
I finally got around to playing Borderlands 3 and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Personal order of preference for the franchise: Tales ≥ BL2 > BL3 > BL1 > TPS
Depending on how the DLC goes though, 3 could be just as good as 2 for me. Unlikely but it’s possible.
I really enjoyed playing all the Vault Hunters, Zane in particular, even if it seems like he lags behind the rest of them. And while she’s fun as just a straight up gunner, my only real bummer is Moze. For me when it comes to the playable characters, it’s all about their Action Skills and if I don’t find myself using it regularly then I hope they have something fun in their skill trees to make up for the lack of it other than shooting guns exceptionally well (ie. Gaige with Ricochet-Anarchy stacking abuse, Krieg with Flame of the Firehawk-Raving Retribution Hellborn madness, etc.). The idea of Iron Bear is rad but vehicles have never been useful outside of a means of map traversal, which this mech isn’t for, and if I’m gonna give up the benefits of my gear then it better be fucking OP or at least viable, especially at the highest of difficulties. So far it’s not looking like it is and I don’t expect it ever will get to that level. For the most part though, she’s still a lot of fun to use as a Plain Jane FPS character.
Overall, I actually enjoy all four initial characters pretty much equally which I can’t say about the other games. I still had fun with them but I didn’t like Roland, Salvador and Nisha as much as their fellow Vault Hunters in their respective games. I’m really looking forward to what DLC Vault Hunters they have in store though, they’ve all been pretty solid and just plain fun to play as.
-SPOILERS FROM HERE ON OUT-
I liked the story well enough and felt engaged the entire time. I didn’t really feel bogged down throughout and enjoyed the pace. Even the sidequests I thought played along well with the storyline missions, they didn’t feel as jarring with too much backtracking or as tediously boring as The Pre-Sequel had it. Although, all the games are guilty of this, the Underdome/Circle of Slaughter missions are still lame.
I loved pretty much most of the new NPCs, however major or minor a role they played. Lorelei was interesting and I want to know more about her, the same goes for Clay, who I could both see becoming Vault Hunters themselves (hopefully) in a future game. The Katagawa-Rhys dynamic was fun, as was BALEX and GenIVIV. I loved Wainwright Jakobs and I especially loved Typhon DeLeon, two of the more likable and wholesome characters in the entire franchise. They don’t hold a candle to Loader Bot & Gortys from Tales but still very admirable in a universe full of assholes and psychopaths. Even some of the minor villains were fun, the Traunt Brothers and Pain & Terror specifically.
Now it’s going to be unfair to compare the Twins to Jack but... they still could've been written better. Brats with god complexes and one with an inferiority complex to boot is fine, not the most compelling, but wait! They’re also streamers because *nudge, nudge, wink, wink*. Despite that, the VA performances of what they were given were both still very well done. When they start to actively antagonize each other is when they started to turn around for me, especially with the power corrupting Troy to the point of almost killing off Tyreen. The Twins being the children of Typhon is a neat twist reveal but I feel like if you’ve been discovering his logs throughout the maps you can put two and two together long before they outright state it.
Though I should probably give credit to the Twins for being a part of why I love Typhon so much. With him being revered the way he was, especially by Tannis, as the first Vault Hunter, it’s refreshing to see a fabricated myth actually turn out to be mostly a myth and not a 100% accurate depiction or historic event like most other games usually do. Even the damn posters of Typhon got him all wrong which I loved. He’s endearingly flawed and his admittance to not being the best father to Tyreen & Troy after they lost their mother actually really got to me. He wasn’t around for long but it was smart of Gearbox to have built up his backstory through those logs, it allowed his character to make some sort of impact like it did on me which made his death actually quite poignant.
Thus leading to probably what I can only assume, since I haven’t bothered to read other people’s reaction to it, is the most controversial part of the game. I love character deaths, especially for ones I adore. When done properly it brings more meaning to them and for the character that may have taken their lives. Bloodwing and Roland helped build Jack up to be even more of the villain that most people love (to hate). Hell, even Sasha’s death in Tales actually had me crying... then immediately laughing because I totally got baited by it especially after already losing Scooter.
youtube
Now, like I said, I love character deaths and I’m totally fine with Maya being the one we lose but the way she dies was more of a pathetic wail than whatever Gearbox was hoping to achieve. And for what? All I hope for in a character death is to have more meaning to it than a passing of the torch to a cipher of a character that was basically just introduced and I have no real connection towards, good or bad, because going forward from then on certainly isn’t going to be positive at all. Who knows, she could end up being a favourite character of mine in the future as she develops more but as of right now, no, the only reason for her existence in this game world so far was to take the place from two beloved characters that hasn’t been earned yet.
The other character being Lilith as she sacrifices herself to keep Pandora closed. I don’t believe she’s actually dead, gone for now but at least not dead. It’ll probably be the main focus of the next game, if not in a DLC, in figuring out a way to get her back from Elpis, if she’s even stuck up there. It’s sad to lose her immediately after regaining her powers back but at least she went out with Alicia Keys singing her a fire swan song. Unfortunately, before going off to save the day and Gearbox not being entirely satisfied yet with shoving Ava down our throats the first time, Lilith hands over protection of Sanctuary III to her. Hopefully Ava is given an extremely satisfying character arc in the proceeding games because woof, that’s going to be a tough mountain to climb especially if it takes another 2-5 years for the next game to release.
I don’t actually hate Ava, I just don’t care about her. Also our Vault Hunter(s) were right there, technically, and as was Tannis. She may not be able to fight but she’s more than capable of leading the Crimson Raiders. She’s also the most consistently well written character that’s shown growth over the games that she’s been a part of in the franchise, in my opinion.
As for the rest of the characters, I’m good with moving on from Vaughn now. He was unexpectedly funny to okay during Tales but yeah, he’s already worn out his welcome for me. Rhys was fine, not as good as he was in Tales but he wasn’t really even my favourite character from that game anyway. Who I was missing was Fiona, I really wish that she had shown up but hopefully that might still be a possibility in DLC. Maybe she’ll show up alongside Athena & Janey, continuing her VH training somehow saved from wherever she disappeared off to. Preferably with Loader Bot and Gortys as well. It’d also be nice to run into Axton, Sal, Gaige and especially Kreig considering the whole Maya situation and her promising to see him again.
Then there’s also the B-Team, which a part of me wanted to interact with more but another part where I think I’m okay with what we got. I was disappointed in Tina’s development however, I didn’t expect a full maturation of character but I also hoped she wouldn’t be the spaz that she was when she was a young teen. Even in Dragon Keep she showed a little bit of growth with her acceptance of Roland’s death but I guess they wanted to keep her annoying, which was fine back in 2 and TPS when she was basically a kid but I believe she’s supposed to be at least 18 now? I guess it’s fine as long as it fits the dynamic between her, Brick and Mordecai. I will also say that Mordecai’s side quest to attend his protégé’s birthday party was really bittersweet, I loved that brief respite from the chaos that is the rest of the game and a stark reminder that Pandora sucks.
Aside from the actual plot and characters, I thought they did an even better job at world building the rest of the universe. The mega-corporations side of Borderlands has always been fascinating to me and I feel like they often take a backseat by most fans since they’re just these ever present entities in the universe and not actual characters themselves, despite each of them having quite unique “personalities” in the products they manufacture and the individuals that represent them. We had Commandant Steele & General Knoxx show off a militaristic side of the original Atlas as The Crimson Lance, then there was Jack as the face of the Hyperion we knew, and the fallout from his demise during Tales. There’s also Tannis giving us slight tidbits of how Dahl operated on Pandora between the first & second game and, of course, Mr. Torgue with, well, Torgue and I guess now he’s in charge of the battle arenas. Now we get insight on the current incarnation of Atlas with Rhys at the helm, Maliwan with Katagawa Jr. and Wainwright as the heir to Jakobs. It’s just fun to see these corporations steadily being fleshed out with each game and I’m interested to see how Tediore, Vladof and maybe even S&S Munitions, if they ever make a return, will turn out.
On the other end of the spectrum and more of an active danger to the universe are the Vaults, their purpose and the monsters contained within, one of them called the Timekeeper who we have yet to encounter. Also more insight into who the Eridians were, the siren Nyriad’s role with their eradication and warning of a seventh siren who shouldn’t be found. There’s definitely plenty of seeds that were planted, it’s just a shame that it’ll probably be a long time from now before any of them get answered unless they start pumping out these games which I hope they don’t. Oversaturation and fatigue can ruin a franchise.
This has been my TED Talk, thank you for reading.
5 notes
·
View notes
Note
Has Azula really never killed anyone? That doesn't seem like her but it does seem like it could be an interesting plot point that she's been hiding the fact that she has from sokka out of shame or something
*sigh*
Well, this isn’t the kind of ask I usually get on this blog, but I’ll answer as earnestly as possible. Preemptively sorry if I come off strong, but I’m going to assume you really haven’t read the whole story and thus some of its underlying themes and established backstories (or absence thereof) have gone unnoticed for you because of that.
Canon Azula, at fourteen years of age, goes out to track down her brother and uncle in war times. Canon Azula is not morally appalled by murder, not by any means, but unless you count Aang, who (because of LOK and because he literally came back to life) hardly really counts despite her very obvious intent to kill him, Azula’s canon kill count would be ONE (1), and it’s still someone who didn’t stay dead. Aang has canonically and consciously killed more people than Azula (and I don’t mean Koizilla, I mean Sozin’s Comet, the falling airship that crashed pretty hard against solid ground when he knocked it down. Were there survivors? Likely. But genuinely thinking no one would have died after that sounds extremely naïve). So, please, keep that in mind before thinking “that doesn’t seem much like *insert character name here*”.
Gladiator Azula, at fourteen years of age, goes NOWHERE. Gladiator Azula didn’t have to track down Zuko and Iroh because they were a failure and a traitor, respectively. Why? Because Aang didn’t come back. There was no Avatar on the loose that Zuko and Iroh would fail to capture heaps of times. Therefore, if Azula doesn’t have to go find Zuko and Iroh by Ozai’s orders, Azula doesn’t fight the Avatar and friends, Azula doesn’t end up anywhere near Ba Sing Se. Someone else (General Tiang) takes Ba Sing Se in Gladiator with the power of the comet, because in this setting the Fire Nation wouldn’t have the opportunity to take it any sooner. I am pretty sure the comet-enhanced take of Ba Sing Se is literally stated in the first chapter: there are no aircrafts yet because Sokka hasn’t helped the Mechanist complete them, ergo, Ozai can’t rain fire from the sky even if he dreams of that. There are also no dragons, so the firebenders couldn’t use this grand opportunity for something gradiose like burning the entire world to the ground and had to settle for an old-school military strategic victory.
Gladiator Azula is established, then, to not have taken action in her younger years because Ozai had no need to send her anywhere. Gladiator Azula has seen no military glory when the story begins, she has taken no missions before the first one she has in the South Pole, a mission where her role was meant to be diplomatic, first and foremost. The first enemy she meets whom she just might have a pretty good reason to kill? It’s Sokka. And we all know how that turned out. Had she been a trigger-happy murderer like you might think she is (considering zero murders “doesn’t seem like Azula” to you), that’s where our story would have ended. Funny.
Therefore, had Gladiator Azula killed someone before Sokka was part of her life, it’d have to be a Fire Nation someone. I repeat, she had never dealt with anyone who could be considered an enemy of her nation before the South Pole. If she didn’t kill Huang Li for disrespecting her, if she didn’t kill Admiral Chan for trying to screw her over and instead bided her time until she could one-up him for good… do you SERIOUSLY think the way I’m characterizing Azula leaves room for her to have committed, what, recreational murder of her own people because she was frustrated she didn’t get any chances to join the war?
Throughout the story, Gladiator Azula has showed very little compunction about threatening people with death, or even talking about killing others when she’s in a really bad mood. This is done as a very deliberate and intentional contrast with Sokka, who has killed countless people and wishes he’d never have to do it again. Why’s that?
Because often in fantasy fiction, in many stories I’ve found (including ATLA), killing isn’t treated with the gravity and seriousness it deserves. Sokka has canonically killed plenty of people too, and yet it never seems to bother him in the least there. I’ve read at least two other fics that give him PTSD for the deaths he dealt through the war, and to me, that’s a thousand times more sensible than him being utterly unconcerned with what he’s doing or who he’s killing. I like my characters more complex than Liam Neeson in Taken. Want senseless killing with zero consequences? That’d be a good movie to go to for that.
Gladiator Sokka killed his first man in the settlement, chapter 2, remember? He hasn’t forgotten it even now, despite at the time he tried to ignore it and move on to his actual mission. What was the purpose of that? If it needs spelling out, the purpose of it was to outright contrast the Canon Sokka mentality of “it’s what needs to be done”, a mentality he shares in this story at first, with the eventual Gladiator Sokka mentality of “taking people’s lives destroyed me on the inside because I don’t think I deserved to live when they died”. All this to make death a lot less leisurely, recreational, inconsequential than it is in countless works of fiction. Do you shrug off real life deaths as though they were inconsequential too? Has any relative of yours died and you’ve thought it’s irrelevant? Or, like me, are you living in a tyrannical country where fighting back against said tyranny has resulted in meaningless deaths of young people who were fighting for a future that was stolen from them? People whose deaths have just become a mere number on a list of atrocities a tyrannical regime refuses to answer for? Yeah, that sounds hella dramatic, I know. But I like to take my storytelling and the themes I deal with in it seriously, and death is one theme I categorically refuse to take lightly. ATLA did try to take death seriously too, but they certainly failed more often than not for me, especially when their heroes cared about death only if the plot required it.
That Azula hasn’t killed anyone so far doesn’t mean she won’t ever do it in the story’s future. But it does mean that, by the time she does, it will affect her, as it rightfully should affect any human being who isn’t completely amoral and, if you’ve read any further than the first three arcs, I’d like to think you already know Azula has a conscience she tends to ignore but that is still there. Spoiler alert, said conscience becomes louder and harder for her to ignore until eventually she starts abiding by it.
In conclusion, no, Azula hasn’t killed anyone. No, I don’t find that implausible for a character who hadn’t gone to war the way her canon counterpart did, especially considering said canon counterpart has only ever killed ONE (1) person if you do count him, despite being involved directly in the war to the point of even conquering a city herself. No, there isn’t some secret death Azula is responsible for that she hasn’t told Sokka about, because if there were, she would already have shown signs of keeping that kind of secret (yes, Sokka kept secrets that weren’t strongly hinted at, but they WERE hinted at: Rhone for instance was teased all the way in chapter 41 despite he only showed up in chapter 113, and the reasons for his reluctance to go home were implied since chapter 3, even if he didn’t outright tell Azula about them until chapter 106).
I’m sure there are countless other stories that don’t deal with death the way I do. But this is how Gladiator does it, and this is how Gladiator will continue to do it, because it’s being written by someone who doesn’t think carnage should be dealt with as lightly as it often is. Yes, there’s death in this story, a fair share of it, and that share will only increase in later chapters (I literally just finished an entire arc about serial murders through the Capital?), but I won’t ever take it lightly and I sure won’t turn my characters into secretive murderers for drama’s sake, especially if said suggestion contradicts virtually every bit of characterization I’ve worked on and developed for Azula throughout six years of studying her character and writing it in this story.
(Also… hiding it out of shame? If you think it’s unlike Azula to not have killed anyone, do you really think it’s “like her” to be ashamed if she really had done it? Do you really think she wouldn’t have been proud to own up to her kill count before her conscience kicks in for good later on in the story? What reason would Azula possibly have to be ashamed of killing someone in the earlier stages of Gladiator?)
19 notes
·
View notes
Text
Who is really at fault for what happened at Argus?
Needless to say, the debate about whether Team RWBY and Co were right or whether Cordovin was right has caused a bit of a debate.
However, I find that looking at it that way as one side having to shoulder all of the blame vs the other correct side removes a lot of nuance and the thoughts behind each action. Each side had their own reasons for making the choices that they did and those choices may not have been entirely correct with different consequences to each.
So, with this, let’s look at the choices from both sides that lead up to this point. Also known as another episode of Regalia rambling.
"Couldn’t they have come up with a better plan than stealing a military ship?”
Arguably, yes, they could have come up with a better plan, this is what happens when you leave a group of teenagers and an old lady in charge of a dire and dangerous situation. Sometimes in a desperate situation, the dumb and crazy idea is all you have.
They tried asking Cordovin if they could get to Atlas, which, to any situation or plea, Cordovin said “No”. Understandable, their ports are closed and yes, she could have just left it at, “No we cannot help you, our ports are closed, no one is going out under any circumstance.”
and the only circumstance Cordovin would allow is Weiss returning to Atlas on her own... Which, given that Weiss had to smuggle herself out of Atlas, it’s understandable that she nor the group want to go back alone. Because once Weiss is gone, they will have no way of reaching or contacting her, she will be alone on a military ship with a lamp that attracts Grimm, and chances are, Jacques wouldn’t allow her to speak with Ironwood at all and would have her put right back under lock and key.
If the team went with that plan and Weiss found herself in danger, it would be SOL for everyone, especially given they would have no idea what even happened to Weiss because she wouldn’t be able to reach them. It’s understandable neither team RBY and Co or Weiss herself wants to go through with that plan because there is no way back out for Weiss and we know what Jacques could do to her.
Given the stress and direness of the situation, it’s only natural they eventually ended up going with stealing the ship... But it wasn’t their first choice. Before making that decision... Let’s go over the things that happened leading up to it.
They find out Ozpin is hiding a very dangerous secret about Salem’s presumed immortality and naturally, in their anger, tear him a new one and he retreats back into Oscar’s mind.
They find a house and Qrow grabs himself a drink and ends up oversleeping and not waking the group up on time.
In his frustration of dealing with the tire, he goes and gets himself another drink.
Team RWBY and Maria end up fighting for their lives against the Apathy while Qrow was busy being drunk. If not for Maria, team RWBY would have died right under his nose... almost literally.
He had to be dragged away from the bar and it was only while the house was going up in flames that he realized the kind of danger they had been in while he was drunk.
Rather than deciding to drop the drink, he gets another one when they arrive in Argus.
Oscar vanishes and it sends the group into a panic, while they are out looking for him Qrow is passed out drunk... on the stairs... in public.
Needless to say, Qrow has caused more issues and grief for the group more than Maria or Ozpin. Ozpin’s worst crime is holding a secret and Qrow has been a hindrance to the group’s efforts and an unnecessary source of stress.
When Jaune brought up stealing a military airship everyone looked at him like he had straight lost his mind. Even they thought it was a dumb idea... but no one had anything else.
Sometimes when you have nothing else, the dumb idea is what you have to go with.
But what does Qrow do? He immediately shoots down the idea as worthless and something they wouldn’t be able to pull off. Which, in hindsight, he was right... They didn’t really pull it off and it went just about as well as he expected.
However, rather than assuming the reasonable adult position and sitting down with the team and saying “Let’s come up with a better plan.” what does he do?
He’s about to march right back to his room after shooting down the only other idea they had for getting to Atlas after the ones they had tried were exhausted either to mope around, sleep off his hangover, or get drunk some more.
In either case, even though he is technically correct... He’s been more of a hindrance to the group than even Ozpin whose worst offense was keeping a secret and retreating into the back of Oscar’s mind. Someone who doesn’t help but neither actively hinders the group is better than the person who is an actual hindrance.
So naturally, Ruby (and I assume the others as well, but the focus is on Ruby) is fed up with this and wants to hear Jaune out. Whether it is just pure defiance and teenage rebellion or desperation and stress of the situation they’ve been put in is a different analysis altogether, especially given Rubys mentions of not needing adults. Be on the lookout for that episode.
At the end of the day, they ended up stealing the ship and given that they had Saphron and Terra’s help, they likely discussed the plan in further detail so they weren’t running entirely blind into the situation.
Were they right to steal the ship in the first place? No. But they exhausted the other options they had seen because the only way to Atlas, is by an airship.
Naturally, upon finding out the ship has been hijacked, Cordovin goes to stop them.
Is she right to do so? Absolutely.
But her methods were incorrect.
You see, you can be correct in what you are doing or what you intend to do, but go about it in the wrong way.
Cordovin went about it in the wrong way. Just like the question about whether or not team RWBY and Co could have come up with a better plan... Could Cordovin have come up with a better plan for stopping them?
Yes.
With the reveal of this episode especially, it showed that they had more airships... Several more airships.
She could have easily sent more airships out after them and given that the people of Argus live near a military base, it likely wouldn’t have caused any measure of panic or concern. They probably see ships flying in and out daily, what’s seeing two or three more fly after another ship? They’ll probably just assume they’re doing a drill or carrying cargo or something or maybe there was a Grimm spotted and they sent out ships to assess and take care of the situation.
No big deal.
But what does she do instead? Break out this huge mecha that undoubtedly caused the people of Argus to panic.
The panic wasn’t caused by team RWBY and Co stealing the airship... but the huge mecha coming out of the ground after all of the shit Atlas got from what happened at Beacon.
The people of Argus aren’t paying attention to the airship... but they are paying attention to that huge mecha that was likely not public knowledge and not to mention, absolutely hidden from public view. They do not see that thing all the time.
Where Cordovin is wrong isn’t in trying to stop them from stealing the ship, but rather the methods that she takes to do so... Because needless to say, that mecha isn’t for handling stolen ships.
She brought it out not because she thought a group of teenagers, a drunk, and an old lady were a genuine threat to Argus safety... but because she felt like they had tricked them and her pride got in the way of her thinking clearly and felt that they needed to be shown Atlas’s might so they would never underestimate Atlas again.
Her thought process and actions have little to do with protecting the people of Argus and trying to retrieve a stolen ship... but wanting the group to surrender and recognize how great Atlas is.
While you can say that it is team RWBY’s fault that Cordovin broke out a huge mech... It really isn’t considering Cordovin had other options to choose from before getting to the mecha... The huge mech, intended for taking down huge Grimm like the Leviathan and not chasing after a group of teenagers and two adults.
It was disproportionate to the situation. It’s like responding to some kids breaking your window by burning down the entire block.
Should you stop them from breaking your window? Yes. Are you right to have them pay for fixing the window? Yes. Are you right by burning down the entire block in response to them having broken the window? No.
While Cordovin was right to try to stop them and right to try to arrest the group, the way she did about it is arguably the worst way possible.
Team RWBY and Co should be blamed for stealing the ship, yes, but they shouldn’t be blamed for Cordovin’s disproportionate reaction to the situation and the resulting damage.
Even though it was Ruby who broke the mecha, Cordovin was arguably willing to kill them by using a huge mecha because they stole the airship. She was going to use a cannon to kill a group of teenagers, an old lady, and a drunk who were of no immediate threat to the people of Argus... The people she was sworn to protect.
The result is that the mecha got damaged and she was stuck in the water when the Leviathan surfaced along with the horde of Grimm that her military base had been fighting off while she was busying flaunting her power around.
Cordovin’s actions caused more damage and panic than what Team RWBY and co did. So while Cordovin was right to stop them yes, Team RWBY isn’t responsible for the fact that Cordovin’s actions ended up causing more damage and panic than they did.
It’s like blaming the kids who broke your window for you burning down the block because burning down the block was in response to the actions of the kids.
Just because your actions and choices are in response to someone else’s, doesn’t mean that the actions and choices you made were correct... Even if your intentions were correct. Cordovin had the right intention on stopping them... Just not the correct method in stopping them.
And it was her choice that ended up putting the people of Argus in more danger and causing the destruction and rise of the Leviathan. Team RWBY’s choice of stealing the airship didn’t cause immediate danger or panic for the people of Argus. It was Cordovin bringing out a huge mech to deal with the choice team RWBY made.
But naturally, RWBY and Co feel terrible about this. They feel bad that they broke the only thing that could fight off that Leviathan... So naturally, they do what they can to make it right but putting themselves in danger and risking their plan of not going to Atlas falling apart. Even though they could have easily made it to Atlas in all of the chaos, they didn’t want to leave helpless people in danger and that shows even though they stole an airship, they didn’t actually want people in danger.
So they did the right thing and helped them fight back even though they were considered hostile... and Cordovin came to her senses about what she was sworn to do rather than her pride in the atlas military. Cordovin’s change of heart is a bit of an analysis in its own right. So I’ll save that for another time. Be on the lookout for that episode as well.
But to keep it brief, Team RWBY and Co didn’t point fingers or blame people for their actions whereas Cordovin did.
At the end of the day... Team RWBY is at fault for stealing the ship... However, Cordovin is at fault for the resulting damage and panic at Argus. Either side is truly blameless for the situation, but one Cordovin’s actions caused more damage than the others... even if those actions were in response to some teenagers stealing a ship.
Both sides had the right intentions, Team RWBY and Co were trying to fulfill their mission of getting the lamp somewhere safe and Cordovin in her attempts to stop them because they did commit an illegal act. But, they were wrong in their methods... Which naturally, both realized as well.
#rwby#rwby volume 6#rwby rose#qrow branwen#RWBY Ozpin#Ozpin#RWBY Meta#RWBY Analysis#crtq#character analysis#rwby character analysis#mod regalia
53 notes
·
View notes
Text
[ 365 Days of SasuHina || Day Forty-Eight: Dancing ]
[ Uchiha Sasuke, Hyūga Hinata ]
[ SasuHina, NaruSaku ]
[ Verse: Healing Waters and Scorching Flames ]
[ AO3 Link ]
Up until meeting the Avatar, the only dancing Hinata had ever done was the occasional traditional routine in the Southern Water Tribe’s various festivals. Of course, as she got older and the raids left them listless, such celebrations were cut short until they were nonexistent. And her time traveling with their ragtag group, attempting to save the world from the encroaching Fire Nation, left little time for play. Children though they were, the burden upon their shoulders had to take precedent. All too quickly, the lot of them were forced to grow up.
Which was...easier for some than for others.
Naruto, what with his element of air, was simply playful by nature. Even early on in their journey he insisted on taking time out of their way to pull pranks or visit places that had little to nothing to do with mastering the four elements. As exasperating as the rest of them found it at times...it was, admittedly, a silently welcome respite.
But the more time went on, and the shorter they learned their window grew, the less Naruto allowed himself to become distracted. No more side trips. No more breaks.
And then, with one final battle...it was over. Suddenly they weren’t just beacons of hope - they were true-to-life heroes. They - even if most of the credit was Naruto’s - had brought a war a century in the making to an end. The Fire Nation was defeated, the Fire Lord bested. Peace, at last, could resume.
But it wasn’t easy.
All of them had work to do. Lands living so long until the grip of the firebenders were suddenly free, and not all of them with stable means to regain their independence. That’s where Naruto and his role of Avatar came in, alongside his young but seasoned friends. While Sasuke’s inclusion had left some sticking up their noses, his experience was - admittedly - invaluable.
He’d been raised a prince, after all: embroiled in politics from a young age. Misguided, sure - brainwashed, most certainly. But that didn’t mean he didn’t learn, even with the bias that came with it.
So, it was mostly them as a pair that negotiated and led. Hinata’s main concern had been the freeing of imprisoned waterbenders, and their reintroduction to society and fresh air. The old woman that had shown her bloodbending had been warning enough: she had to be careful with those who had spent anywhere from months to years to lifetimes under firebender thumbs for the crime of being a waterbender.
But once things began to settle - once some semblance of normalcy returned - celebrations began to take place.
Everyone everywhere had something to sing and dance about. Even the Fire Nation - battered and wounded in pride as it was - needed to embrace change, and peace. Festivals of every banner began cropping up like flowers from beneath the ashes of a wildfire. And given their importance, the group was invited to as many as they could physically attend, if not more so!
Naruto reveled in them. At last he could let loose as his element was wont, and of course he never minded people praising him. Sakura had to keep an eye on him and bring him down whenever he floated a bit too high in any sense, but even her stubbornness was lessened in the wakes of the celebrations. All of them were hard pressed not to find relief in the gatherings.
Of course, Hinata had never been fond of crowds. Her village had been small, and her nature reserved. But one could still find her lingering around the edges, watching with happy, if not tired, eyes.
Another face she often found lurking was Sasuke’s. It was no secret his guilt at his actions - as well as treatment still received for it by some - made him...wary of such goings-on. He had no intention of his presence ruining the atmosphere and people’s fun. But there was still a longing on his face Hinata couldn’t help but feel sympathy for.
But it’s been years since then. Now the group of them are grown, with even more responsibility than they had before. Hinata is the upcoming matriarch of the Southern Tribe. Naruto still travels and attends to his duties, all while working on plans for a unified city in the heart of the nations. Kiba tends to the navy, Sakura helping train upcoming metalbenders. And Sasuke serves as right hand for his elder brother, the Fire Lord.
None have much time to spare. But with the tenth anniversary of their victory and peace upon them, there’s no excuse to miss it.
It’s held in Ba Sing Se, as best to meet in the middle of the lands. And all of their old troupe is in attendance. Greetings are had, comparisons of work loads made: all the expected banter of friends who’ve gone too long without seeing one another.
Hinata greets them all cordially, giving warm smiles and warmer hugs. Then there’s the obligatory banquet, including a heartfelt (and rather unscripted) speech by their Avatar. And it’s only once they’ve all had their fill that the main event begins.
Dancing.
It includes displays of regional dances: all brought together to celebrate the diversity of the lands, but also the balance and unity between them. Unlike as a child, Hinata isn’t part of the spectacle. Instead, she watches proudly as waterbenders of all ages go through long-standing, traditional movements: part dance, part bending.
All four lands have their routines, and then a final unified performance that gets wild applause from all in attendance. It’s then the floor is opened, and anyone is allowed to take part.
Watching, as always, Hinata is content in it for a time before spotting Naruto and Sasuke a short distance away. They seem to argue quietly before the blond gives up, abandoning his friend to instead have a dance with Sakura.
Observing the exchange and then glancing between the parted pair, Hinata finds the Fire Nation prince looking much as he used to: hanging around the edges and watching almost painfully.
...so she decides to intervene.
“Beautiful night, isn’t it?”
He jumps a bit, clearly not expecting - or noticing - her. “...it is.”
“Any inclination to join the fray?”
“...not really. I’d only be in the way.”
“Oh, I doubt that - surely you, as a prince, were taught to dance?”
That earns a glance. She takes his silence as a yes.
“Well, would you care to show me how? I bet it’s quite different than what I was taught.”
“I…” There’s a hesitation. “...I don’t want to interrupt.”
“Sasuke.” Hinata gives him a look. “You aren’t the corrupted prince anymore -” his flinch is ignored “- and you aren’t about to bring the party to a grinding halt just by dancing. I can see you want to - just go have a little fun!”
For a moment, it doesn’t look like he believes her - his gaze moves back out over the party.
“...just give it a try. If it goes poorly, we’ll stop. If not...we can keep going.” Her head tilts, trying to catch his eye. “...please?”
A soft sigh heaves through his nose. “...all right.” To her surprise, he offers a hand, which she takes, and leads her out into the throngs.
No one stops. No one stares. They’re all too busy with their own dancing. Sasuke seems to see as much, eyes flickering around before moving back to Hinata. “...why don’t we just start with the basics?”
“Sure.” She lets him guide her hands into position, unable to help a small smile at his flush as he takes her waist.
“Then, we just…” There’s a step, letting her mirror it before taking another. Eventually, they make a small loop of movement much like many others are doing. It’s nothing flashy like she’d expect from a nation of fire, but...it’s nice enough.
“How long has it been since you’ve done this…?”
He heaves a small sigh. “...a few years. Itachi’s held some gatherings in the capital, and...I was encouraged to attend. I didn’t feel so -” Realizing what he’s admitting, Sasuke quickly clams up.
“...I don’t blame you for fearing their reactions,” Hinata offers softly, still following his lead. “But things have changed. Especially you. You shouldn’t let that fear deprive you. Look at all you faced: a few glares and muttered curses surely can’t be any worse, can they…?”
“...you’d be surprised.”
It’s her turn to sigh. “...well, pay them no mind. We know who you really are, and all the good you’ve done. Yes, you still made mistakes,” she goes on, cutting off his predicted retort. “But those are behind you now. And from that day forward, we should all be looking forward. No more back. It’s like...dancing.” There’s a smile at his frown. “Even if you had a few stumbles...look at you now. And you can’t just stop dancing because you make mistakes. The only way to get better...is to keep practicing.”
He doesn’t reply, instead looking quietly thoughtful. Hinata doesn’t interrupt - instead, she leans a cheek against his chest...which immediately makes him stiffen as the gap between them shrinks to nothing.
“H...Hinata…”
“Hm?”
“...nevermind.”
Her lips lift just a hair, eyes closed.
She’s going to have to take time to dance more often.
Late OTL
Some more AtLA crossovers - been a while since I've had a chance to use this verse. It's one of my favorites to do, in all honesty. It's just such a neat parallel to a lot of things in Naruto canon, but with enough different to keep it interesting!
Anyway, that's all I've got tonight. Though, just a heads up: things irl are very...unsteady lately, and may start shifting soon. And there MIGHT be a chance of my ability to post being interrupted. While it's not a for sure thing yet, just thought I'd warn you all now. Really hoping it doesn't come to that, but...well, life's been kinda hard in my household lately. I don't want to get too personal, but as it might affect my work here, thought it best to just be upfront. We'll see how things go. But until I can't anymore, I'll keep on posting!
Thanks so much for reading!
#uchiha sasuke#hyūga hinata#sasuhina#narusaku#healing waters and scorching flames [ au ]#365daysofsasuhina
15 notes
·
View notes
Last Seen Blogs
isyrich
Love Life
hirac-delesbian
Profiled For Being An Edriss Stan
antidisneyinc
Make Good Movies or Die
theherosreturn
Adventures beyond anything imaginable
die-katholische-kirche
ave maria