people with bad taste are always like “yurr hurr The Beach is about zuko and mai and how they’re a great couple” while intellectuals know that Actually The Beach is about mining any and all of the untapped friendship potential of this striking exchange
One of the best twist moments in Avatar is when Ty Lee suddenly and dramatically turns against Azula at the Boiling Rock. Azula was completely convinced that Ty Lee would obey her without question forever, but Azula wasn’t the only one fooled. Mai is just as shocked when Ty Lee rebels as Azula is. Ty Lee’s survival instincts were so sharp that she never let anyone know what she was thinking, not Azula, not Mai, and certainly not Zuko.
Zuko really believed that Ty Lee didn’t understand who he was at all. He completely bought into the act that she’s just a puppet for Azula, who lives in her “little Ty Lee world where everything’s great all the time”. But the thing is, Ty Lee is one of the most perceptive characters in the show, and she’s excellent at keeping that on the down low, but she sees a lot more of Zuko than he thinks, and a lot of what she sees is very familiar to her.
Overshadowed by prodigious siblings?
Wanting to be acknowledged for the talents you have rather than the talents you don’t?
Kept in line by fear?
Spending your whole life bending over backwards to fit the persona the royal family has set for you?
So yeah Zuko. She knows you.
This characterization is definitely emphasized with Ty Lee’s acrobatics, flexibility, and ability to hit pressure points. There’s a level of subtlety and precision that is required for such skills. She had to know her own body to be able to bend it in such ways, and she has to know other people’s bodies to be able to disable them.
And pretty much from the moment you meet her, it’s fairly clear that there’s more to her than her lighthearted, bubbleheaded persona, long before she uses her battle skills. Look at what happens when Azula recruits her.
Azula used blatant intimidation tactics to get Ty Lee to comply, ordering the net to be set on fire and all the animals released (which, for the record, would not only have endangered Ty Lee but the circus creatures themselves–I bet Ty Lee was attached to them, and that would’ve been a double threat in itself). Ty Lee is visibly terrified, but instead of calling her out or letting Azula see that she was intimidated, she says this:
Instead of endangering herself by pointing out that Azula crossed a line, Ty Lee falls back on her talk of “the universe” and “auras,” talk that canonically gets her indulged or dismissed but never taken seriously.
She knows that Azula’s dangerous. There’s no way she doesn’t know that Azula is threatening her. But if she can keep Azula from realizing she knows that, she’s a little safer.
Because she’s one of maybe two people Azula never considered as potential enemies–even (especially, but that’s another thread) Ozai is a threat in her mind, but Mai and Ty Lee are the closest thing Azula has to trusted friends, right up until their betrayal.
Ty Lee’s spent a lifetime cultivating a personality that not only allows her to stands out among her siblings–it protects her from being treated as a threat. When you’re friends with Azula, that is an essential facade to maintain. and she does it consistently enough that no one ever sees through it.
All of the Fire Nation kids are so messed up. Zuko’s just the one who gets in the most trouble, because he’s the only one who doesn’t have a mask.
