you know, when i was attacking you?

ATLA—headcanons, meta, and fic. I stan the whole dang gaang plus Azula. I ship anything, which is to say I ship nothing. I just like it when characters are happy 🥺 after they’ve been very sad 😈 I’m Erin, they/them. Main blog— lokiisanerd

[soapsquare]

i love it when girls are like "oh, girls have their ways" all hair twirlingly and then those ways are just excessive violence

[femmehowl]

New pet peeve: people who downplay Zuko and Azula's relationship. I get it, Zuko-centrism, yada yada, but he isn't just some dude she happens to know. He is her brother. The way they were pitted against each other by everyone--intentionally or not--has left deep scars on both of them. Azula canonically wanted to BRING HIM HOME. She cares about him! There is a reason why the Zuko & Azula tag is one of the most used Azula tags on Ao3, and it's not due to something sinister.

[theowritesfiction]

Most of the moments that made Azula a fascinating character came from her relationship with Zuko in the show. Furthermore, most of Azula's humanizing moments in the show were also wrapped up in her relationship with Zuko. They are too closely connected for this dumb 'Azula needs to be separated from Zuko' take to make sense. It makes zero narrative sense.

Maybe people who feel that way have been burned by the horrible comics or horrible fanfics, but guess what? Just because you are unable to curate your own fandom experience it doesn't mean you have to perpetuate a brainless take. Learn to seek out stories that do Azula and Zuko's relationship justice, and maybe you'll end up feeling differently.

[avatars-and-fire-lords]

I am probably in the top .1% of self destructive people, which is interesting.

[avatars-and-fire-lords]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

[emkini]

AZULA GET BACK HERE-

Any fire siblings concept that gives them this vibe is an automatic favorite 

[zuko-always-lies]

Times that we see on screen a family member showing legitimate love, compassion or care toward Zuko or Azula(judging from actions, not feelings).

Zuko: Grand Total 32

From Iroh: 22

From Ursa: 4

From Azula: 6

From Ozai: 0

Azula: Grand Total 0

From Iroh: 0

From Ursa: 0

From Zuko: 0

From Ozai: 0

[timur-pannonicus]

Shitpost 6

The reason "the debate" is almost always framed as "Does Azula DESERVE redemption?" is because if it were framed as "Is Azula CAPABLE of redemption" the antis would have less of a leg to stand on.

Azula is smart and determined enough to achieve goals she sets for herself, she just needs to believe they are achievable and desirable.

Thus the antis need to direct the conversation from practicality to morality. Some do go for the "her mental illness is incurable in that setting" but that's another discussion.

However, next time someone says "She doesn't deserve it!!" respond with "So you think she CAN do it?"

[avatars-and-fire-lords]

Has there literally ever been a straight avatar

[avatars-and-fire-lords]

“Remember who you are” is what Ursa and Iroh constantly try to tell Zuko. His redemption is cast as a return to himself. Azula they see as a monster—that’s who she is. Yet by Ozai, who holds the emotional power, Azula is good and Zuko is bad.

This fits with the narcissistic parent dynamic of the scapegoat and the golden child. The scapegoat is abused and degraded and put down by the powerful narcissistic parent. But he gets to retain his identity, since he is othered from the toxic family unit. The golden child, on the other hand, is absorbed by the family unit. Perfection in a role in exchange for love and acceptance; a complete lack of personal identity development in exchange for childhood psychological safety. When a scapegoat grows up they often have a lot better luck finding real happiness than golden children. Golden children have been robbed of not a happy childhood, but of having a childhood at all. They never explored how the world works or who they were, because they were performing.

Zuko’s redemption arc is good, but Azula’s could be even better. She is the more damaged of the two, and damage is what a redemption arc is for. She’s done bad things, I know. But that is literally the point of a redemption arc. And she is so massively a victim. There’s so much to explore.

[boadiceaforspiritssake]

[ineffectualdemon]

People seem to forget that Azula is the way she is because she has been groomed to be that way

And that the reason she's so horrible to Zuko is because she knows if she doesn't act exactly as her father wants she will become Zuko

They say it explicitly!

When Ozai sidelines her she says "You can't treat me like Zuko"

Now there are layers to that. She isn't as...I don't want to say gullible but easy to placate might cover it. And I think she's saying "I know what you're doing. You can't fool me like Zuko"

But for all that in Iroh's memory (and remember it was specifically Iroh's memory of the event we saw) Azula was gleeful about Zuko getting half his face melted off, in reality that must have been a constant threat over her head

"Live up to my expectations and do as I say at all times or I will do to you what I did to your brother"

And I know Azula was mostly manipulating Zuko when he returned but I also think in a way she was hoping everything would be fine

Partly because I think she did want her brother back. Azula is lonelier then she acts and Zuko is one of the few people who understand her. But I think she also wanted her buffer back. She wanted Zuko to take their father's anger and give her a buffer of safety which she had been lacking.

Azula pretends everything is fine but there is always always an axe over her head.

She is an expert liar because that's how she protects herself

I'm not defending what she did but she was a hurt child who was doing her best to survive knowing full well what would happen to her if she stepped out of line

Azula at the end of the day was still a child who had been abandoned by everyone

That's why her story is a tragedy

She is not an evil mastermind

She's a child who had been shaped into a weapon by an evil man

[imbalancekatara]

the way mai and kei lo are making fun of sozin - and by extent zuko - while aang looks on concerned at him because he knows just how much zuko struggles with his identity in relation to his ancestors … that’s a ride or die right there.

[avatars-and-fire-lords]

I know no one follows this blog because I haven’t been here in fully two years but —

A dark Avatar AU where Zuko finds Aang in the iceberg instead of Katata and Sokka, so none of the events of the show’s main timeline take place. Zuko takes Aang home to the Fire Nation and gets everything he thought he wanted long before Iroh had much effect on him. And the Fire Nation disposed of the Avatar. So over the following fifteen years, both the world and Zuko get much worse than they were in canon.

At one point, Azula and Zuko conspire to murder and overthrow Ozai, a thing Zuko fully expects (being very angry and confused) will make him feel better, but instead it makes him feel much worse, though he denies this to himself and others.

The story begins when Zuko is 30, and his royal doctor tells him he’s dying of alcoholic organ failure. The Fire Nation has just dealt the resistance a devastating blow in a battle that was widely considered the resistance’s best chance. So Zuko decided he has one last great act in him before he kicks the bucket: He will end the war. Since he’s had so much luck hunting symbols before, he decides he will hunt down and kill the symbols of the resistance, Toph the Builder and the Turncoat General Iroh. With their heroes dead, the resistance will crumble, and Zuko can die at peace knowing he made the Fire Nation’s supremacy enduring and complete. (What he doesn’t realize is that he is very much mistaken about the causes of his lack of inner peace.)

There’s just one problem: Azula knows Zuko is a drunk, even if he is also a capable military commander, so she sends a trusted aid of unknown origin but unquestionable loyalty along with Zuko: The intelligent, sarcastic Soza. They dislike being on this mission together immediately, and things don’t get any better when they come across a man and a woman in the forest outside the Fire Nation stronghold in Ba Sing Se. The woman is someone who Soza fears will recognize him—resistance spymaster Katara. She’s just busted out this man, who claims he’s an escaped mental patient who used to believe he’s the Avatar—and who Zuko alone knows *is* the Avatar, which means Azula has been hiding important things from Zuko all these years.

So with a little luck and a little skill, Zuko convinces this strange crew to help him find his uncle—lying to them that he just wants to see the man again. The rest of them would love to find Iroh’s hidden encampment, since the fractured nature of the resistance means they don’t always know where he is. So they set out together, Zuko absolutely filled to the brim with betrayals waiting to happen, Soza working very hard to not go within six feet of Katara, and Aang battling the deeply ingrained belief that he cannot trust his own mind for anything.

[kaligraphy]

I absolutely love the headcanon of zuko swearing like a sailor after three years on a ship with his crew (and then toph demands he teaches her ALL of the swears lol)

I ALSO love the headcanon where iroh would have NEVER allowed that sort of language to be said around or be heard by zuko

zuko? his little boy? he couldn't even say "darn it" without covering his mouth as a child! who taught his son nephew these words?! there will be consequences!

[professorsparklepants]

Man do you ever think about how many places Zuko has broken into? Like

The Western Air Temple (twice), which was canonically built so that it could only be reached with airbending

(It’s also implied he broke into the other three too)

The Northern Water Tribe, whose defenses hadn’t been breeched in 100 years and was also currently under siege

Pohuai stronghold, which was on high red alert after capturing the fucking Avatar

Avatar Roku’s temple, mostly notable because he broke through a naval blockade to get there (dude wtf)

Lake Laogi, the secret underground headquarters of Ba Sing Se’s evil secret police that is also crawling with Earth benders

(Ba Sing Se at large doesn’t count since they forged their papers)

The Fire Nation capital’s prison, where the main threat to the Fire Lord’s rule (Iroh) was imprisoned for months

His own family’s vacation home (this isn’t an achievement I just thought it was funny)

A thousand+ year old sacred site dedicated the first firebenders that was also full of booby traps, Indiana Jones style, because why not

The Boiling Rock, the highest security prison in the Fire Nation

The headquarters of the Southern Raiders, an elite naval force on an island in the middle of nowhere

The Fire Nation’s royal palace, which was admittedly mostly empty at the time but still had Azula in it

His own family’s vacation home (again) after getting banished (again)

[tanoraqui]

he’s…a rogue. How did I not realize that he’s a rogue. Who happens to firebend.

[cooltastrophe]

One of my favorite things about zuko is he thinks of himself as a failure for not being a firebending prodigy, but is actually INCREDIBLY competent (even prodigious!) At almost everything else

[vertigo-vertere]

Zuko is that insufferable kid who gets perfect grades, speaks four languages, writes musical compositions just for fun, but whines over how worthless he is because he came in second at the track meet.

[firelxdykatara]

zuko is that kid who seems insufferable, until you realize that the one time he came in second at the track meet, his father beat him so badly for it that it left permanent scars.

then you realize that he’s not crying because he got a B+ on a test–he’s crying because he’s imagining his father’s reaction.

[the-badger-mole]

Someone get Zuko a blanket and a hug!!! How did we get here?

[urbanfantasyinspiration]

This started out so light-hearted

[benditlikekorra]

Azula reading Trump tweets is destroying me

[sparkles-and-trash]

the bonus story Gym Time from the Lost Adventures is too much 😭

first of all; CHIBI BABIES!!!

also, of course Kyoshi would be a gym teacher???

Zuko and Mai get picked last in sports, it’s canon now

Zuko’s little fireworks show, he’s so happy about it 😭😭😭

ZUKO AS THE BALL SKKSHSJSJ I CANNOT