Okay. The Zuko being called a bad boy thing has got to go. It is used so often to invalidate Zutara as a ship (to say that it's shallow or toxic), but it has to completely mischaracterize Zuko and his entire relationship dynamic with Katara to do so.
He is quite literally a subversion of the bad boy archetype. He is a failure to bad boy by design. His whole characterization from the beginning is that he's empathetic and cares about others, was punished for it, and goes out of his way to try to be the kind of man his father wants him to be opposite to his true nature. As long as he tries to be this person that he is not, he will suffer for it and fail until he embraces who he is and rejects the notions his father put into his head.
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Let's go over some of the common traits of the bad boy archetype!
See Zuko's complete social awkwardness and inability to talk like a normal person. He's literally a sputtering mess; he actually gives me second-hand embarrassment.
Emotional Unavailability/Avoidance
Zuko pretty consistently is empathetic, and especially with Katara is more than comfortable talking about his feelings and pretty personal life issues in an open way. He also is pretty consistent about persistently confronting problems and dealing with them even when it's an uphill battle. He takes issue with Mai being more shut down and avoidant. He doesn't ignore problems or run away from them.
He literally is incapable of being manipulative or deceptive, he's too forthright; times when he does try to lie, he is shown messing it up spectacularly and being incredibly obvious. If he was more manipulative or used any of his circumstances to make excuses for himself, his life would have been so much easier gaining sympathy with and getting into the group. But he takes the hard way through almost everything he does. He is a blunt instrument and takes the most direct path even if there's 100 obstacles in his path.
LOL Mr. Capture the Avatar Restore My Honor. He's got literally one thing on his mind and spends the entire show realizing that this narrow path he's clinging onto around every turn is not the only one.
Spends the majority of the show following the path put in front of him. His only true rebellion happens at the end of season 3 where he is arguably at his most "good", and it's him rebelling against the worldview put in front of him by someone evil. This is also when he sheds trying to be someone he's not, and his personality is furthest it's ever been from being like unto a bad boy.
I'll cede that his design might be cool, or his abilities- but competence at anything is cool on its own and does not make an individual's personality cool. He's a loser; he gets styled on so often for yuks. He's a dork. His personality is cringefail. He is cringe and he fails at nearly everything he does. It's great, it's endearing how uncool he is. He practices talking to himself to hype himself up to talk to the group, says "Hello, Zuko here", is like "no that's stupid I gotta say something else", and then goes up to the group and is like, "Hello, Zuko here." PLEASE.
My boy sat outside Katara's tent all night like a wet cat because he cared about her feelings so much, spent the rest of that episode making sure things were taken care of for her, and in general kept trying with her pretty patiently while she was consistently raging at him. He took his lumps from her for a long while. Also, the progression of his facial expressions seeing her to when he finds out she's mad at him are literally :D -> :c
Also, he's just constantly being clowned on to the point of utter resignation. He's very often a character you're supposed to point and laugh at.
The whole "fixing him" element, the emotional rollercoaster instability, maladaptive responses to conflict
But Zuko fixed himself. Him coming back and trying to prove himself is all his choice. The appeal of him with Katara is that he balances her out and makes an effort for her all on his own. He knows it's her choice to forgive him and he doesn't expect her to; he acts because he wants to and cares.
He is also shown to be stable and safe; she lets herself be mad at him for all manner of other issues because he's a safe person to be mad at, and he doesn't feed the flame or run away from the problem. In TSR he is the rock to her storm; he is a consistent, stable counterpart fully determined to show up for her no matter what just for her peace. There is no hot and cold to their dynamic. No emotional dysregulation. They actually help each other process their emotions when they talk about their problems. The appeal is that it's healthy and reciprocal (and dare I say cute)!
And for the whole "he corrupts Katara" argument I see against him in TSR all the time, look at his dialogue again. He doesn't once tell her what to do, he just trusts her to make her own decisions... like an autonomous human being... who he respects. He solely backs up the decisions she chooses to make, and makes sure she's taken care of and safe in the meantime. When she makes a decision contrary to what he expected, he goes along with it. He is just there to be there for her. His only motivation is to get Katara closure and justice on a man who otherwise will never see it and leaves it up to her how she wants to go about it. (In this case, justice was letting him live out the rest of his miserable life.) Is it toxic that he let her make her own decisions regarding her trauma and helped her process her emotions about it, or is it toxic that people act like Katara is incapable of making her own decisions and it must be because a man forced and corrupted her?
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