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On November 19 2013 16:02 ZeaL. wrote:Reminisced and watched some TLA + Show Spoiler +Really makes me sad. None of the episodes so far have come even close to those two videos in eliciting any emotion from me, and those are just two random clips I pulled up.
Comparing final book of A:TLA to an as-yet incomplete LoK. 
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On November 19 2013 16:02 ZeaL. wrote:
Reminisced and watched some TLA
Really makes me sad. None of the episodes so far have come even close to those two videos in eliciting any emotion from me, and those are just two random clips I pulled up.
Why did Yon Rha and his Rhinos take water bender prisoners? That sounds so difficult. Illogical even to do in a war.
Zuko's voice acting was never any good. This was one of his better scenes and the video had to edit his sound bites to raise their pitch to almost chipmunk levels so it wouldn't get taken down by youtube. His voice still sounds slow and dull.
I thought it was dumb how he said "What's the matter Azula, no lightning today? Afraid I'll redirect it?". Who says that in the middle of a fight?
Finally, that scene was from the last episode of Avatar. It was definitely one of the coolest fights, but the last episode of avatar had both of the best two fights in the series between Ozai and Aang and between Zuko and Azula. It's not a fair comparison.
TLA was probably better than Korra's show at eliciting emotion, but that's partly because they could spent time to develop characters instead of finishing a plot in one season. TLA was not perfect and people complained about it too.
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....
What.
Okay if you really want to compare TLA vs LoK in terms of "completeness," then firstly:
TLA had a single overarching story. There were themes for each season/book (training aang in each element) and then sideplots throughout the seasons (day of the black sun, azula going mad, etc), but the main plot was to defeat fire lord ozai to bring peace/balance to the world again.
LoK does not have an overarching story. In TLA you learn the main enemy is the fire nation (although in reality mainly just ozai himself). You learn that in the first episode. We are now half done with LoK (2 out of 4 seasons).....and there is still no overarching story.
Each book is essentially it's own story. This is not a bad thing. Star wars actually had 3 seperate stories for each movie, although there was an overarching story of defeating the emperor to bring down the empire. But LoK has no real overarching story to bring everything together. Like I guess you could say Korra's basic life is it...? But that's really grasping at straws.
But even if you do compare LoK's 2 complete stories to TLA being half completed, when TLA was half over zuko had just split up with iroh and was going through changes, they had an epic comfrontation at the north pole, and you had a really deep connection to aang already. You saw how he regrets running away, and his utter distraught when he learned his people are gone. You see him fail and you see him grow from it in a manner that is normal for a person. You are beginning to understand all of what Zuko has lost and why he's so impassioned. You really felt for the characters, something I can't say the same for any LoK characters. So I'd say even when you compare it to LoK so far, including the Wan episodes, metal bender introductions, amon, and the korra season 2 finale, TLA still wins out. Even as half a story. The characters each had more depth than anyone in LoK. Literally the only LoK character i really felt for was Wan, because his story made sense, had heart, and had the "avatar feel" to it that the series is known for. It just gave you a sense of understanding the character and his personality and he deep devotion and generosity to others. It made him human, someone you could relate to. The TLA characters had this. The LoK character's just don't....
Like if you just compare korra to aang, you actually watched aang fail and grow from it. He was a kid with a large weight on his shoulders, and he actually FELT like that throughout the show. Even though hos struggles were greater than our own we could relate to them because of how they presented them to us through aang's actions and emotions shown. Korra basically acts like she's somebody better than everyone else the entire time, annoying and brash. Now obviously the creators did it on purpose so that this season she could learn to "be herself" instead of "be the avatar," but that's honestly no excuse to make her so emotional, irrational, and flat out annoying to the viewers. Zuko was emotional too, but he wasn't irrationally stupid and annoying. He was emotional in a way we could understand and relate to. Korra is not like this. You've seen plenty of posts in here from other members complaining about her rationale, and that's because it's just bad.
LoK just doesn't really have any other characters that compare to aang, zuko, toph, ketara, iroh, or even azula. 2 seasons and nothing but Wan, who isn't even a main LoK cast member. Like think of zuko's struggles and how you always wanted to see what he'd do next because his character was just so interesting. You were watching his journey unfold and it was captivating. Korra's is like....
Sunday: bitch at someone
Monday: bitch at someone
Tuesday: bitch at someone else
Wednesday: say I'm the avatar
Etc
Not exactly stimulating character development. Honestly if you wrote out her complaining you could probably have made amon into a proper and awesome villian like azula was lol.
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@obesechicken - I think Yon Rha was from the Southern Raiders, not the Rough Rhinos (those were the 5 weapons specialists in the Earth Kingdom)
As far as the bending goes - yeah, it isn't as grand and spectacular as it was in A:TLA. (I still think the most impressive scene of bending is from S1 where Aang cools down lava to protect The Fortuneteller's village from the volcano. It just showed what one single master bender was capable of even at the age of 12.) The only thing I've grown to dislike strongly about A:LOK is that they haven't showed us much of the world, how it's changed after the war, what the fire nation looks like, if the walls have gone, what happened with the Dai Li. All those things that Team Aang had an impact on. Hopefully they'll show us more in the upcoming Book 3.
+ Show Spoiler +There's also been talk about a new character named Opal (female) being introduced. Source is a blog from Alyson Stoner. Link.
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On November 19 2013 16:56 iamcaustic wrote:Show nested quote +On November 19 2013 16:02 ZeaL. wrote:Reminisced and watched some TLA + Show Spoiler +Really makes me sad. None of the episodes so far have come even close to those two videos in eliciting any emotion from me, and those are just two random clips I pulled up. Comparing final book of A:TLA to an as-yet incomplete LoK.
Could find clips from book 2 (though yes, not as much from book 1 that I can recall).
Don't get me wrong, I think LoK has been enjoyable enough to watch so far, it's just that I miss having 2 dimensional characters, I miss having more "filler-ish" episodes that are just for character development, I miss having longer, more overarching themes.
Only thing I will say that I wish TLA had that LoK has is the animation is nicer.
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Watching those clips made me remember just exactly how the bending has gone weak in LoK. Azula was a formidable bender, and Zuko and Katara weren't bad themselves, and all of their bending seem to exceed Korra's most times.
The perfect example is the one mentioned earlier: Aang cooling down an entire eruption with his airbending, without even entering the Avatar State. Back in ATLA, Aang was an incredible bender normally, and when he entered the Avatar State he was just completely batshit badass.
Maybe it's due to the rise of technology, benders don't shine as much anymore or something, but I don't think so. It seems the show runners just decided to make the bending less impressive.
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Yeah, I just have the impression that half the characters from TLA could have wiped the floor with the entire cast of LOK. If Azula got in a fight with Vaatu + Unalaq she would have laughed, then proceeded to blast them with lightning for 20 minutes.
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Well, in all fairness, even Ozai seemed ridicule in comparison to Azula. Azula is a regular and consistent enemy for like two seasons, and every time they face her they don't beat her, they just stall her somehow.
She also generally displays incredibly power throughout the two seasons she's featured in, and as a whole I always got the impression she was a tougher opponent than Ozai was. Hell, during the eclipse, Zuko confronts his father and redirects lightning toward him, pretty much KO'ing him or at least knocking him away. That scene actually made me feel like Zuko could have handled Ozai.
But all of that is pretty much the result of the lack of development of Ozai as a villain. Nonetheless, the point stands, even in the first season, the bending in ATLA is much more impressive than anything seen in LoK.
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I think Ozai is stronger than Azula tbh.
Ozai was probably taken unawares when Zuko redirected the lightning, and there's no evidence that he was actually injured in any way by that. I'm pretty sure that the sheer scale of firebending we saw Ozai perform (albeit empowered by Sozin's Comet) is greater than anything Azula could come up with. She's like a surgeon's knife or something, he's like a wrecking ball.
If we had to rank firebenders, I'd go with Iroh > Ozai >> Azula > Zuko or something like that.
The coolest use of firebending we've seen in LOK is when Iroh and Mako flew around a bit with the jets.
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United States10328 Posts
Interestingly, though the fight scenes seem watered-down in Korra (which largely seems a product of the animation rather than the storytelling), so-called "advanced" techniques like metalbending / lightning are surprisingly commonplace (the former because of Toph and the police force, and the latter because ???)
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I suppose they learnt from necessity? With all the technological advancements a power source was needed. What they showed us in one of the episodes is like a tamer, more controlled version of the lightning bending in TLA. Also, it never was said lightning bending is a very special skill, just that it requires being at peace with yourself or something like that (Iroh said it while trying to teach Zuko). They could've made a school for it.
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To be fair though, the metal bending is on a fairly limited scale with equipment that is essentially designed for it. On the other hand, we saw Toph taking slabs of iron and crumpling them with her bare hands.
Though it is a little odd because IIRC the way metalbending worked was that Toph sensed the bits of dirt in the metal and used those to manipulate it or something like that, which would call into question the use of metal cables and such.
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On November 20 2013 09:15 ticklishmusic wrote:
To be fair though, the metal bending is on a fairly limited scale with equipment that is essentially designed for it. On the other hand, we saw Toph taking slabs of iron and crumpling them with her bare hands.
Though it is a little odd because IIRC the way metalbending worked was that Toph sensed the bits of dirt in the metal and used those to manipulate it or something like that, which would call into question the use of metal cables and such.
Well I imagine she could teach other earth benders how to do it. I mean it would be kind of weird if the only way to earth bed was to be blind and be an earth bender to see with your feet. I imagine it's all teachable (but harder for a normal earthbender as they would have to focus on doing it through their earth bending to learn the skill I imagine).
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On November 19 2013 17:49 BlackPaladin wrote:.... What. Okay if you really want to compare TLA vs LoK in terms of "completeness," then firstly: + Show Spoiler [Big post alert] +TLA had a single overarching story. There were themes for each season/book (training aang in each element) and then sideplots throughout the seasons (day of the black sun, azula going mad, etc), but the main plot was to defeat fire lord ozai to bring peace/balance to the world again.
LoK does not have an overarching story. In TLA you learn the main enemy is the fire nation (although in reality mainly just ozai himself). You learn that in the first episode. We are now half done with LoK (2 out of 4 seasons).....and there is still no overarching story.
Each book is essentially it's own story. This is not a bad thing. Star wars actually had 3 seperate stories for each movie, although there was an overarching story of defeating the emperor to bring down the empire. But LoK has no real overarching story to bring everything together. Like I guess you could say Korra's basic life is it...? But that's really grasping at straws.
But even if you do compare LoK's 2 complete stories to TLA being half completed, when TLA was half over zuko had just split up with iroh and was going through changes, they had an epic comfrontation at the north pole, and you had a really deep connection to aang already. You saw how he regrets running away, and his utter distraught when he learned his people are gone. You see him fail and you see him grow from it in a manner that is normal for a person. You are beginning to understand all of what Zuko has lost and why he's so impassioned. You really felt for the characters, something I can't say the same for any LoK characters. So I'd say even when you compare it to LoK so far, including the Wan episodes, metal bender introductions, amon, and the korra season 2 finale, TLA still wins out. Even as half a story. The characters each had more depth than anyone in LoK. Literally the only LoK character i really felt for was Wan, because his story made sense, had heart, and had the "avatar feel" to it that the series is known for. It just gave you a sense of understanding the character and his personality and he deep devotion and generosity to others. It made him human, someone you could relate to. The TLA characters had this. The LoK character's just don't....
Like if you just compare korra to aang, you actually watched aang fail and grow from it. He was a kid with a large weight on his shoulders, and he actually FELT like that throughout the show. Even though hos struggles were greater than our own we could relate to them because of how they presented them to us through aang's actions and emotions shown. Korra basically acts like she's somebody better than everyone else the entire time, annoying and brash. Now obviously the creators did it on purpose so that this season she could learn to "be herself" instead of "be the avatar," but that's honestly no excuse to make her so emotional, irrational, and flat out annoying to the viewers. Zuko was emotional too, but he wasn't irrationally stupid and annoying. He was emotional in a way we could understand and relate to. Korra is not like this. You've seen plenty of posts in here from other members complaining about her rationale, and that's because it's just bad.
LoK just doesn't really have any other characters that compare to aang, zuko, toph, ketara, iroh, or even azula. 2 seasons and nothing but Wan, who isn't even a main LoK cast member. Like think of zuko's struggles and how you always wanted to see what he'd do next because his character was just so interesting. You were watching his journey unfold and it was captivating. Korra's is like....
Sunday: bitch at someone
Monday: bitch at someone
Tuesday: bitch at someone else
Wednesday: say I'm the avatar
Etc
Not exactly stimulating character development. Honestly if you wrote out her complaining you could probably have made amon into a proper and awesome villian like azula was lol.
This kind of response makes me feel like you didn't really pay attention to LoK Book 2 at all. Maybe you already wrote it off in your mind or something. Your bit about Korra's character development is most revealing in this regard. When you compare Korra at the beginning of Book 1 to Korra at the end of the Book 2 finale, her growth in both maturity and perception of the world rivals that of Zuko, and I only expect it to continue. I also really don't understand people's complaints about Korra's attitude; they're very reflective of a young teenage girl who's lost and unsure of herself while holding a title with such immense weight to it. It's beautifully reflected throughout the series (Book 1 and 2), starting from Korra's awe as she sees Aang's statue for the first time all the way to the symbolic portrayal while she was lost in the Spirit World. Can such an attitude be abrasive? Yes, but it's realistic.
Frankly, Korra's seen more character development than Aang ever did, and we're only 2 books in. Even when simply looking at the Avatar state, her knowledge and appreciation of its power and history were non-existent even going into Book 2. Again, compare that to the Book 2 finale. It's all part of the over-arching theme of the show: Korra's journey as the Avatar (and if you think delving into the rich lore of the Avatar and the world it takes place in is somehow grasping at straws, well I feel sorry for you I guess). Sure, there isn't some big final boss that needs to be defeated in LoK as there was in A:TLA, but that was a conscious decision by Bryan and Mike (to paraphrase them, they've already done that and wanted to do something different). They've been quite vocal about how they wanted to focus on expanding on a lot of the other aspects of the Avatar universe, which they weren't able to properly due with A:TLA because they had to focus on the core story of beating the big bad guy. Remember the Lion Turtle? It seemed like some out-of-left-field plot device in A:TLA, but we got over it. It was really nice that Bryke could expand on their lore and help explain the events of A:TLA better.
As for the battles and what not, are you really saying the Siege of the North was a more spectacular battle than Raava vs. Vaatu (even just pick one of those battles: Wan or Korra)? Come on. And watching Aang fail and grow from it? Seriously: Korra facing Amon for the first time (learning to accept her fears and learn from them), fighting Tarrlok and getting imprisoned (learning that raw strength alone won't solve all your problems -- which led to her seriously connecting with her spiritual self for the first time), the whole mess of the civil war and losing her memory (trying to be her perception of the Avatar and failing, then learning what it truly means to be the Avatar -- from the very first Avatar, no less), losing her attachment to Raava and her past lives (learning that what makes the Avatar great isn't the fact that they're the Avatar, but because of who they are as an individual), and so on. And those are only a bunch of the super-obvious lessons. It kind of makes it hard for me to take you seriously, to be honest.
Anyway, with all that said, would I like to see some more character development for the rest of Team Avatar? Sure, but there's still 2 whole Books to cover that stuff as well (I've heard there's gonna be some focus on Lin and her family in the next book). Hence my complaint about people judging an unfinished work against a completed epic. If it still falls short after completion, then there'd be something to whine about IMO.
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On November 20 2013 14:23 iamcaustic wrote:Show nested quote +On November 19 2013 17:49 BlackPaladin wrote:.... What. Okay if you really want to compare TLA vs LoK in terms of "completeness," then firstly: + Show Spoiler [Big post alert] +TLA had a single overarching story. There were themes for each season/book (training aang in each element) and then sideplots throughout the seasons (day of the black sun, azula going mad, etc), but the main plot was to defeat fire lord ozai to bring peace/balance to the world again.
LoK does not have an overarching story. In TLA you learn the main enemy is the fire nation (although in reality mainly just ozai himself). You learn that in the first episode. We are now half done with LoK (2 out of 4 seasons).....and there is still no overarching story.
Each book is essentially it's own story. This is not a bad thing. Star wars actually had 3 seperate stories for each movie, although there was an overarching story of defeating the emperor to bring down the empire. But LoK has no real overarching story to bring everything together. Like I guess you could say Korra's basic life is it...? But that's really grasping at straws.
But even if you do compare LoK's 2 complete stories to TLA being half completed, when TLA was half over zuko had just split up with iroh and was going through changes, they had an epic comfrontation at the north pole, and you had a really deep connection to aang already. You saw how he regrets running away, and his utter distraught when he learned his people are gone. You see him fail and you see him grow from it in a manner that is normal for a person. You are beginning to understand all of what Zuko has lost and why he's so impassioned. You really felt for the characters, something I can't say the same for any LoK characters. So I'd say even when you compare it to LoK so far, including the Wan episodes, metal bender introductions, amon, and the korra season 2 finale, TLA still wins out. Even as half a story. The characters each had more depth than anyone in LoK. Literally the only LoK character i really felt for was Wan, because his story made sense, had heart, and had the "avatar feel" to it that the series is known for. It just gave you a sense of understanding the character and his personality and he deep devotion and generosity to others. It made him human, someone you could relate to. The TLA characters had this. The LoK character's just don't....
Like if you just compare korra to aang, you actually watched aang fail and grow from it. He was a kid with a large weight on his shoulders, and he actually FELT like that throughout the show. Even though hos struggles were greater than our own we could relate to them because of how they presented them to us through aang's actions and emotions shown. Korra basically acts like she's somebody better than everyone else the entire time, annoying and brash. Now obviously the creators did it on purpose so that this season she could learn to "be herself" instead of "be the avatar," but that's honestly no excuse to make her so emotional, irrational, and flat out annoying to the viewers. Zuko was emotional too, but he wasn't irrationally stupid and annoying. He was emotional in a way we could understand and relate to. Korra is not like this. You've seen plenty of posts in here from other members complaining about her rationale, and that's because it's just bad.
LoK just doesn't really have any other characters that compare to aang, zuko, toph, ketara, iroh, or even azula. 2 seasons and nothing but Wan, who isn't even a main LoK cast member. Like think of zuko's struggles and how you always wanted to see what he'd do next because his character was just so interesting. You were watching his journey unfold and it was captivating. Korra's is like....
Sunday: bitch at someone
Monday: bitch at someone
Tuesday: bitch at someone else
Wednesday: say I'm the avatar
Etc
Not exactly stimulating character development. Honestly if you wrote out her complaining you could probably have made amon into a proper and awesome villian like azula was lol. This kind of response makes me feel like you didn't really pay attention to LoK Book 2 at all. Maybe you already wrote it off in your mind or something. Your bit about Korra's character development is most revealing in this regard. When you compare Korra at the beginning of Book 1 to Korra at the end of the Book 2 finale, her growth in both maturity and perception of the world rivals that of Zuko, and I only expect it to continue. I also really don't understand people's complaints about Korra's attitude; they're very reflective of a young teenage girl who's lost and unsure of herself while holding a title with such immense weight to it. It's beautifully reflected throughout the series (Book 1 and 2), starting from Korra's awe as she sees Aang's statue for the first time all the way to the symbolic portrayal while she was lost in the Spirit World. Can such an attitude be abrasive? Yes, but it's realistic. Frankly, Korra's seen more character development than Aang ever did, and we're only 2 books in. Even when simply looking at the Avatar state, her knowledge and appreciation of its power and history were non-existent even going into Book 2. Again, compare that to the Book 2 finale. It's all part of the over-arching theme of the show: Korra's journey as the Avatar (and if you think delving into the rich lore of the Avatar and the world it takes place in is somehow grasping at straws, well I feel sorry for you I guess). Sure, there isn't some big final boss that needs to be defeated in LoK as there was in A:TLA, but that was a conscious decision by Bryan and Mike (to paraphrase them, they've already done that and wanted to do something different). They've been quite vocal about how they wanted to focus on expanding on a lot of the other aspects of the Avatar universe, which they weren't able to properly due with A:TLA because they had to focus on the core story of beating the big bad guy. Remember the Lion Turtle? It seemed like some out-of-left-field plot device in A:TLA, but we got over it. It was really nice that Bryke could expand on their lore and help explain the events of A:TLA better. As for the battles and what not, are you really saying the Siege of the North was a more spectacular battle than Raava vs. Vaatu (even just pick one of those battles: Wan or Korra)? Come on. And watching Aang fail and grow from it? Seriously: Korra facing Amon for the first time (learning to accept her fears and learn from them), fighting Tarrlok and getting imprisoned (learning that raw strength alone won't solve all your problems -- which led to her seriously connecting with her spiritual self for the first time), the whole mess of the civil war and losing her memory (trying to be her perception of the Avatar and failing, then learning what it truly means to be the Avatar -- from the very first Avatar, no less), losing her attachment to Raava and her past lives (learning that what makes the Avatar great isn't the fact that they're the Avatar, but because of who they are as an individual), and so on. And those are only a bunch of the super-obvious lessons. It kind of makes it hard for me to take you seriously, to be honest. Anyway, with all that said, would I like to see some more character development for the rest of Team Avatar? Sure, but there's still 2 whole Books to cover that stuff as well (I've heard there's gonna be some focus on Lin and her family in the next book). Hence my complaint about people judging an unfinished work against a completed epic. If it still falls short after completion, then there'd be something to whine about IMO.
I agree with this - my roommate complains all the time in a very similar fashion about Korra (though he still watches the shit out of it lol) and I've always felt like it's just a different story, better in a lot of ways. Not that I don't love Aang too but Korra is at least as good story-wise - she feels like she's dealing with issues that are a lot more real and relatable than the ones Aang had to deal with.
I mean, I liked how epic Aang's whole journey was - but a lot of the time it was pretty cut-and-dried, you know? The characters all felt less like people and more like embodiments of morals sometimes. Like, Sokka was SOOOO cheesy and clowny and Katara was SOOOOOO motherly and Iroh SOOOOOOO fucking WISE. Which is cool - but Korra seems more grown-up to me, and she also seems like she has real problems, like 'oh shit, my boyfriend hates my guts' and 'my family all think I'm a baby'. Aang's problems were always like 'ohhhh, I must defeat the epic and evil nemesis who is threatening to destroy the world!! And learn deep and resounding personal and moral lessons along the way, very clearly!'
Again, this isn't to say that I didn't like The Last Airbender... but people complaining about Korra being a worse character than Aang are just flat-out wrong in my mind. Everyone in Legend of Korra has a few more dimensions to them in my opinion.
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The earth bending at the end was like throwing little rocks. Where as toph could throw mountains. Is this a planned weakening or studio just being lazy
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Walls of texts everywhere! Korra is a decent show, enjoyable enough to watch, but pales in comparison with TLA imo...
its less of an epic journey and more of numerous cheesy drama subplots spiced up by battles deciding the fate of the world, the characters being a major issue here, it feels more like a standard episodic superhero cartoon with more slice of life.
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On November 19 2013 17:49 BlackPaladin wrote:Zuko was emotional too, but he wasn't irrationally stupid and annoying. He was emotional in a way we could understand and relate to. Korra is not like this.
Don't forget Korra is a girl  . I'd bet money that women disagree with you, just like every girl I talked to thought Walter's wife was the best character in Breaking Bad, and all the guys hated her guts
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Again, this isn't to say that I didn't like The Last Airbender... but people complaining about Korra being a worse character than Aang are just flat-out wrong in my mind. Everyone in Legend of Korra has a few more dimensions to them in my opinion.
Korra improved a lot this season, and Tenzin kind of but the rest of its supporting cast got cut down, beaten to a pulp, and mauled by animals. The only supporting character that kind of "improved' without having an arc was Mako.
Everyone else was just useless, comic relief, or was wrong in the head.
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The overarching story of LoK is that all waterbenders are evil and the fire nation was justified in their genocide.
On November 20 2013 21:51 Zergneedsfood wrote:Show nested quote +Again, this isn't to say that I didn't like The Last Airbender... but people complaining about Korra being a worse character than Aang are just flat-out wrong in my mind. Everyone in Legend of Korra has a few more dimensions to them in my opinion. Korra improved a lot this season, and Tenzin kind of but the rest of its supporting cast got cut down, beaten to a pulp, and mauled by animals. The only supporting character that kind of "improved' without having an arc was Mako. Everyone else was just useless, comic relief, or was wrong in the head.
The supporting cast actually did 90% of the work. Mako and Bolin stopped the war, Jinora and Tenzin stopped the spirits. Korra was carried through the entire season. In the end, the cosmos defeated Vaatu.
It's actually kinda dumb how they retconned the whole cosmic energy thing and just made the avatar into the vessel for a spirit.
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EPT
