The Legend of Korra: Book 1 Finale Talkback (Spoilers)

[JME2]

General Iroh, grandson of the now-retired Fire Lord Zuko,[4] joins in the war against the Equalists.[5] Meanwhile, Team Avatar is lying low in an alley where benders and non-benders seem to coexist harmoniously, and Mako and Korra go undercover as the war intensifies.

***

I know it's a couple of hours earlier than usual, but Steve's out of town and asked me to handle it. I also won't be online until after the West Coast airing, so I figured I'd post it now.

So, sit back and enjoy the United Forces vs. the Equalists and Korra vs. Amon.

[hongi]

Worst...episode...ever.

Could that romantic plot have been handled any worse? Could there have been a worse resolution to Korra's inability to airbend and achieve Avatar state? This episode sunk the entire series in my eyes.

[Themightytom]

Worst...episode...ever.

Could that romantic plot have been handled any worse? Could there have been a worse resolution to Korra's inability to airbend and achieve Avatar state? This episode sunk the entire series in my eyes.

I disagree entirely. This was an excellent finale.

The romantic triangle was handled as effectively as it could be given needs of the plot and the characters for development.

The airbending moment was not in keeping with the concept of air bending by itself, but this is the avatar, all season Tenzin has been telling her to be patient to wait for it to come, and she couldn't do it. Now it seems evident that this was because all of her other bending was getting in the way. Amon gave her the clarity she needed to make the connection with Air, because he blocked all of the connections she had.

I do not object to the avatar state either, because Aang had those moments too, and it is utterly in keeping with the theme of Korra discovering who she was. Seeing the lineage of avatars standing before her is an opportunity Korra hasn't had, while Aang saw it every other episode. That was an awesome moment.

Lin getting her powers back was a surprise, and because of that I don't object to it. I like surprises personally, and honestly it seemed inevitable that Korra would learn spirit bending, or regain her powers at some point, the way it has been handled here gives us no false pretenses about the next season, we have no idea what will happen, which makes me look forward to it more. The icing on the cake for me was Korra's bow to Lin, fist in palm, demonstrating her mind and body, her spirit and her bending are now together. They aren't one... she's not a master she has plenty more to learn, but she's had a massive epiphany that suits what she has been through.

Tarlock and Amon's story was incredibly well revealed, and altered my perceptions of both characters significantly without seeming inconsistent. Adding that kind of dimension without making it seem like a retcon, was savory.

I like Naga getting some serious face time in the last two episodes, she's a power house, and she's not dumb, she understood timing, she saved the day, but she also found time to use mech suits as chew toys. Bolin, an earth bender riding an animal to defeat the mechs was very much in character, and they didn't give him the easy way out of being a metal bender to escape the prison.

Tenzin's family being kidnapped, we got to share Korra's shock because that DID come out of nowhere. I was tempted to scroll back through the episode to see if I missed something.

Mako got some good treatment. He was a probending star before he met Korra, and its easy to forget he's gifted in how own right, blasting Amon with lighting while practically frozen though, reminds us he's a badass in his own right.

In a lot of ways, Mako and Bolin echo the story of Tarlok and Amon, except Mako never let himself be changed, and Bolin never lost faith in him. It's kind of an irony that the fiction Amon created about himself, is Mako's truth. Both are powerful benders, Amon however had the benefit of experience and nobody to protect.

The Satos were just a sad story. Hoshi hoped Asami would some day find redemption in his eyes but he was just beyond it in hers. The thing is, if Amon had been right, it could have gone the other way for the two of them. Asami's friendship with korra, Mako and Bolin was really not that old, a couple years down the road, they're still alive, accustomed to life without bending, she might have gone the other way.

Amon was just a great villian. He WAS always one step ahead, right up to the end. Hoshi knew about the reinforcements, Amon had the scar ready for the Avatar's revelation, he even had Tenzin's family ready too, I think only thing he REALLY didn't count on was Mako. Amon was overwhelemed by Mako's attack, which gave Korra the opportunity to free Tenzin, and from then on, Amon was effed. He should have taken Tenzin's bending before the show.

He even could have salvaged it at the end when he was unmasked, by simply not resurfacing immediately. The crowd was turned against Korra, I figured we were going to see a resurgence but NOPE, dramatic exposure instead. Then when he was boating off with Tarlock I thought the same "Amon's got equipment, he's planning revenge" except Tarlock either thought the same, or decided Amon was just too far gone and blew them both away in what was...a fantastically powerful speedboat explosion by the way.

Every step of the way the show kept me guessing. it didn't ignore obvious solutions, it simply presented them in an entertaining way, consistent with what we have seen all season. I'm ready for season two...

...especially the NAME now, i have a feeling it might be earth after all.

[Davis 51]

That was pretty awesome. I was extremely surprised at the dark ending for Tarrlok and..."Amon". It was pretty brutal, but but also made sense. I liked that The Lieutenant turned on him once learning the truth, as he was easily just as fanatical as Amon.

General Iroh was an amazingly badass character. The biplane bombers were a really cool addition, and I'm glad they don't treat the world as a vaccum. I was disappointed that the energy packs the equalists use were never elaborated upon, but that's OK.

Really really glad Asami didn't go full retard and turn back to her dad. That would have been disappointing. If someone had told me when A:TLA was airing that the next series would feature a mecha-tank battle I wouldn't have believed it.

The resolution was actually rather satisfying, the creators were honest about keeping it a self contained show, though part of me wonders what it could have been had the second season been a bending-recovering quest. Still, this opens up the second season pretty well without any real story handcuffs.

[mr friendly guy]

Well I haven't seen the episode, but I have read some spoilers. So I called it, Amon is a bender, and a blood bender which allowed him to overcome Tarlokk's bloodbending.

Although I was wrong in that I thought Amon really energy bends based on my theory that one must be an elemental bender to also be an energy bender.

Edit - my theory that Amon steals a Bender's power is also wrong, but I got the fact that he was a bender correct, so I will take that.

[Vehrec]

There was just SO MUCH STUFF here I hardly know where to start. Like, how about those Ironclads and planes? My god, those were carry 4 torpedoes EACH? That was either a diminutive torpedo, or one very large plane to have only one crew member. Then again, these things are in their infancy, you'll get strangeness like 3-engined bombers with 1 pulling and 2 pushing.

[Ritterin Sophia]

Talk about a disappointment.

[JME2]

My one major complaint is that it's still not clear how Amon was able to use bloodbending to strip bending. I'm guessing given waterbending's healing aspects, he experimented and found some way of duplicating energy-bending's effects.

While it was meant to serve as a series finale before the additional order, there are certainly major threads to follow up on in Season 2. Amon is dead and the Equalists are discredited -- but the anti-bending sentiment hasn't faded. The civic government has been completely gutted and much of the city is in ruin. And can Asami redeem her father?

Then when he was boating off with Tarlock I thought the same "Amon's got equipment, he's planning revenge" except Tarlock either thought the same, or decided Amon was just too far gone and blew them both away in what was...a fantastically powerful speedboat explosion by the way.

It was an unexpected end. I loved it, but I'm still wondering how the hell Nickelodeon let them get away with it.

[hongi]

And can Asami redeem her father?

I think that boat's well and truly set sail.

...pun not intended.

Hiroshi was going to kill her remember. Hatred really did twist him into a monster. Same thing it did to Amon.

[Haruko]

Liked the episode.

In regards to the resolution to air bending, not the best solution, certainly, though it reminds me of when Aang finally "got" earth bending only after Sokka got his body trapped in the ground and was about to get plowed by an elephant sized beast.

As for the Avatar State, not sure when Aang first went into it, but wasn't it after an earth bending general trapped him and his friends and made it appear that Sokka and Katara bit the dust? Seemed the lowest point he could be in.

[JME2]

Aang went into during the second episode when they were drowning after fleeing Zuko's ship.

[Zixinus]

It's kind of a shocker episode. Personally, I liked some bits and didn't like others. It feels rushed and hurried, as if trying desperately to fill out a checklist of things they wanted to do.

Things I liked:
-Korra finally kicking Amon out.
-The way Amon was defeated: Korra realised where Amon's true power lies, rather than somehow a personal defeat would just end it all.
- How the fleet was pushed back: using new technology effectively (even though the new technology seems to be have been pulled out of their ass a bit). Iroh the Second could have only handled things better if he ordered his fleet to pull back and change invasion strategy.
- The battle scenes in general.
- Korra being de-bended, even if only partially. It was something that I was expecting to happen eventually.
- The two brothers having a hug-moment.
- "We're your sons, not your tools of revange."
- "PRISON BREAK!"

Things I didn't like:
- Aang's weird appearance. In life, he had to meditate to contact his previous lives. Now, Korra just gets a visit anyway? Could they at least make her fall asleep on that edge, so Aang would have visited her in her dream?
- Amon's trick card of bloodbending. Having it done not in the full moon is one thing, but just throwing in and winning by default was kind of annoying. Katara managed to beat it, why can't the others? Furthermore, ok, he can blood-bend other benders in range, but how the hell is he just immune to fire and all the elements? Was he ewearing some special armor or something?
- The love triangle. I just can't care for it and it feels forced.
- "You are a weakling!" Dude, he didn't say no, just that they should bring their mom along. You know, the woman that didn't do anything wrong in the whole bending-mess (and may not even be a bender)?
- Korra's asspull moment of airbending. Yeah, she studied it, but suddenly just having it was kind of annoying. Contrast it with the first episode where Korra learned a bit when she TAUGHT like an airbender. Now she does it because we need to wrap the story up fast.
- The two Sato's back-and-forth with Mrs.Sato. It just doesn't have context to make it really meaningful.

Things I don't know about:
- Amon's backstory. On one hand, it starts to make sense. On the other, it feels a bit ass-pulled. That, and it still doesn't explain how the hell did Amon learn spirit-bending (that's what it is, he even copies the move).
- Iroh the second's battles and impromptu learning-of-aircraft-flying. He wasn't a character before, so I kind of feel weird watching him fight all the time. However, his fights WERE awesome.
- Tarrlek's "redemption". I just don't know.
- Why didn't Temzin's family get away?

Things I was hoping to see:
- Amon's spirit-bending backfiring, Korra having a stronger spirit than Amon.
- An explenation as to how Amon got his spirit-bending. It.is.not.bloodbending.
- Korra learning spirituality a bit, even if in her own way.
- Ex-benders coming together and showing that just because they took their bending away does not make them helpless.
- More of Temzin's family and learning what happened to the rest of the old ATLA gang.

Generally, I think they could have handled Korra's character better.

[hongi]

Can someone explain to me if it was a Nick decision or something to restrict the season to this many episodes? Couldn't they have squeezed in two or three more episodes into this season?

I simply don't think it's acceptable to have drawn out the Yakone flashbacks throughout the season, as if they were the most important things, when it's obvious that Amon and Tarrlok's story was more important. It's not acceptable for it to have been delivered in a ten minute monologue in the last episode of the season. Sorry.

[Sarevok]

Mind blown ! This is one of THE BEST episode I ever watched, I put it right up there with best of everything I watched out of DS9,nBSG,Farscape,Justice League and all my favorite shows. It is EASILY a contender with Crossroads of Destinu for the best Avatar episode ever.

My euphoria aside this episode was seriously everything I could hope for and more. All my fears were proven wrong and I retract every single negative thing i ever said about this series.

Hats off to the producers for a masterful finish to an amazing series. The bar for Avatar series has been raised exceedingly high and lets hope they go even better when they return with another season.

[SylasGaunt]

Can someone explain to me if it was a Nick decision or something to restrict the season to this many episodes? Couldn't they have squeezed in two or three more episodes into this season?

I simply don't think it's acceptable to have drawn out the Yakone flashbacks throughout the season, as if they were the most important things, when it's obvious that Amon and Tarrlok's story was more important. It's not acceptable for it to have been delivered in a ten minute monologue in the last episode of the season. Sorry.

Nick initially only ordered this many episodes. They did greenlight another season, but only after production was already progressing so my impression is that the creators decided to just run through the 1 season arc they'd planned instead of pulling the brakes when they were partly done and rewriting things.

Here's something that may have been answered, I'll have to rewatch it.. but do we know if Korra has all her bending back? Or can she just use the other elements when in the Avatar State? Because we saw Aang do that in the original series (ep. 2 where he waterbends during the avatar state even when he's never done any waterbending previously and possibly the episode with the Fire Sages depending on whether you interpret that as Aang doing firebending with Roku controlling him or Roku's spirit firebending to assist Aang).

[Mr Bean]

I liked this episode kind of, I wish the episode has ended with a De-powered Korra and a victorious Amon but ehh what can you do. As well 90% of my theories were wrong and it's all blood bending's fault.

Sad to see we get Amon's back story here in the last pair of episodes and how pedestrian it was. No giant mystical vision quests, no face stealer he's just the other unmentioned son of the mob boss.

[Vendetta]

As for the Avatar State, not sure when Aang first went into it, but wasn't it after an earth bending general trapped him and his friends and made it appear that Sokka and Katara bit the dust? Seemed the lowest point he could be in.

The first time Aang used the Avatar State was after he's run from the monastery and he and Appa are downed by a storm and are about to drown. It's how he trapped himself in an iceberg for a hundred years.

Aang had just discovered that he was the Avatar and would be expected to fight the Fire Nation, so he ran away from home. Emotionally that was the lowest state he had ever been in.

[JME2]

Sad to see we get Amon's back story here in the last pair of episodes and how pedestrian it was. No giant mystical vision quests, no face stealer he's just the other unmentioned son of the mob boss.

I'm a little disappointed too, but I do like that there was another layer to Aang's visions, that everything ultimately led back to Yakone.

And it all works thematically since Korra must maintain balance by fixing the mistakes of the previous generation -- much as Aang had to correct Roku's mistakes. It's the sins of the parents being visited on their children.

I'm also not ruling Koh out just yet. Again, we still don't know how 'Amon' developed his technique and I wouldn't be surprised if someone from the Spirit World gave him a boost. That could easily be picked up in Book 2.

[SAMAS]

- Amon's backstory. On one hand, it starts to make sense. On the other, it feels a bit ass-pulled. That, and it still doesn't explain how the hell did Amon learn spirit-bending (that's what it is, he even copies the move).

- Amon's spirit-bending backfiring, Korra having a stronger spirit than Amon.
- An explenation as to how Amon got his spirit-bending. It.is.not.bloodbending.

It wasn't Spiritbending, you mean. Compare Aang Spiritbending Ozai, Yakone, and Korra to Amon's removal (which if anything, looks a lot like he's plugging up their Chakras, which we've seen can be blocked when Azula backshot Aang back in tLA Book 2.

If he was Spiritbending, there's no way Lin would've gone down so easily. There would've been a contest.

[Sute]

Was anybody else bothered by Tarrlok and Amon's backstory? Maybe it's just because I'm used to thinking of Tarrlok as the more vicious of the two (because of how he treated non-benders), but the parts where Amon took to cruelty and violence more readily than Tarrlok felt artificial. I kept expecting something that would hint that he was lying, at least about those parts, but nothing ever did.

[JME2]

My take is that Tarrlok considered himself weak and was filled with lingering guilt over not going with his brother. He might have felt that had he not refused to bloodbend, it wouldn't have set in motion the dissolution of their family.

In essence, he overcompensated in his adult years by emulating his father's expectations, showing no mercy and trying to always be in a position of strength. He might have viewed non-benders as being weak like he once was.

Also, the Track Team deserves a round of applause for the finale's score. The buildup to the full reprisal of the Avatar theme was glorious and awesome.

[Murazor]

So, my thoughts reposted from elsewhere.

Hmmm...

I kind of get the feel that heavier-than-air vehicles aren't completely new/unknown, even if no one had weaponized one or made an airforce. Iroh the Younger seemed to grap real quick the importance of the runways for take off and how to control one.

As for other stuff:

Hobos having a radio-station in their sewer town was... WTF?

Amon's backstory was a mixed bag. The delivery was inelegant, but the content was serviceable enough and it make the Yakone B-plot somewhat more relevant that makes the whole season tighters in terms of continuity.

·I'm fine with Yakone and his brood plain being a bunch of unusually talented waterbenders/bloodbenders who managed to push their ability beyond Hama's limits (maybe Katara could have done the same, if she had actually bothered in furthering her mastery of bloodbending?).
·I was less fine with the "psychic bloodbending" thing, until I realized that it is essentially the same technique used by Combustion Man back in the day and applied to waterbending (and thus resulting in less lost limbs during the learning process). And I realized that the series actually had established this fact as possible with Sokka mentioning the guy who firebent with his mind during the Yakone trial.
·We were given a giant clue when Amon resisted Tarlok's bloodbending. Katara pretty much did the same thing in the fight against Hama and outright stated that the technique was useless against her thanks to her bending being stronger.

Liked Asami's comment about the mecha-tanks having the same control as the Future Industry forklifts. Goes a good way towards explaining where the Equalists got so many mecha-pilots.

Tenzin's family getting away and then being captured offscreen is kind of random and kind of dumb. At the end of Turning The Tides, Lin disabled one of the airships but got captured before destroying the second which then abandoned pursuit for some reason. I reckon that those guys should have been shown continuing the pursuit, before cutting to Lin's de-bending. Would have made the whole thing neater.

I can excuse Amon losing his shit and revealing himself as a water-bender. Within a couple of minutes he 1) had to kill his second in command after being nearly found out as a fraud, 2) was electrocuted, 3) was air-blasted by someone he had just depowered, 4) was knocked out of a third floor window, 5) was nearly drowned. Dude probably wasn't in the clearest frame of mind.

Tarlok's suicide was also kinda random.

Yes, a more supernatural Amon could have worked. A semi-permanent depowering of Korra and Book 2: Spirit could have been neat. But what we got wasn't bad, in the whole.

Also, considering Amon displayed obvious knowledge of chi-blocking, I think that it is fairly obvious at this point that what he did was something like chi blocks made permanent with his water-bending.

[Guardsman Bass]

That was interesting, and surprising. I can definitely see how it was originally just a 12-episode series, since the ending feels like a conclusion to Korra's story. My guess is that they'll time-skip a bit for season 2.

1. I . . . don't know about the Amon back-story. I know they were foreshadowing it with Yakone and Tarlokk (and I thought Tarlokk said that "Tarlokk" was an identity that he created to cover up him being the son of Yakone), and I did love that conclusion where Tarlokk ends it all by blowing up the boat. On the other hand, it felt like they slammed it all on us at once, where it might have been more interesting to have Team Korra piece it together (or discover it once the mask came off).

It did feel a little less than epic.

2. I was wrong about Amon did his bending-removal. No idea on how blood-bending can remove bending ability a la energy-bending, but maybe he stumbled on it while perfecting his blood-bending abilities. Not everybody can learn it from a giant turtle.

3. The visuals, of course, were fantastic. Airplanes! Battleship guns! Steampunk mecha! I don't think it was as cool as the fourth part of "Sozin's Comet" in terms of effects, but it was still nice to see that stuff.

4. Korra and Mako get together. Was that . . . surprising? Did anyone really doubt that he would end up with Korra at some point? Poor Asami.

5. Speaking of which, I really didn't care for most of Asami's parts. It looks like they were trying for the whole father-daughter conflict to have emotional impact, but it didn't. Maybe it's because Sato himself felt like too much of a one-note minor villain, deranged by his hatred for benders. I felt more when Asami was looking sad over being left behind by Mako.

6. Bolin got a few good lines, although he's got a long way before he catches up to Sokka. "Where does Sato keep finding time to invent all these evil things?" made me crack up.

All in all, it was a good ending with some flaws. I'm curious as to what happens next in season two, since there's no obvious set-up for another villain.

[Zor]

About the airplanes: Sato secretly experiments with some airplanes before the Equalist revolution. Either fully secretly or publicly giving the official report of "it was a novel idea that we had high hopes for but unfortunately it was ultimately impractical. I am sorry to report that we have ended the fixed wing areonautics program." to the press, or just lies about how much progress has been made. Showing the press films of contraptions like this...



Which was what they were doing two years ago and have since moved onto this...



That said, I wonder what they are going to do with season 2? Amon is dead, Korra can undo Amon's anti-bending move and the Equalists are broken as a political movement on top of being leaderless without their special debending ability. ATLA was constructed as a single coherent story, from the Boy in the Iceberg to Avatar Aang. I hope they manage to come up with something that goes along with that. If i was to hazard a guess bender supremacists would be a likely bad guy.

Zor

[evilsoup]

Well that sucked.

Lin's sacrifice last episode is rendered meaningless to add false tension (yeah, right, you're going to let Amon do shit to the airbending kids); but it turns out none of that matters anyway, Korra's going to suddenly get in touch with her spiritual side!

In the last two minutes, with no foreshadowing :\
Just like the ending of ATLA, I guess.

Amon and Tarlok's backstory works well enough, even if it was inelegantly done. I think it would have been better if we'd just had a mention of Tarlok going missing from that cell along with his brother, and then maybe one or both of them could appear some time in the future... and Tarlok's murder-suicide didn't quite make sense. If the rest of the episode had been better I'd probably just accept it.

I found Iroh pretty underwhelming - he abandons his fleet far too easily. We should have seen a bunch of his soldiers vs the chi-blockers.

Korra discovering her airbending - fine. I also quite like all the love triangle stuff. But the biggest issue I had with the episode, by a long long way, is Aang suddenly appearing and making everything better. If it had ended a minute earlier, just after Mako says 'I love you' and Korra rides off to sulk, then that would have been much better. They threw away their best hook!

The villain for the next series should be Cabbage Corporation.