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Zutara aka Katara-Zuko community on Livejournal

I used to be a mod on here when the show was airing (as @rashaka).

I read recently that Livejournal may be soon taken down entirely as a platform. It hasn't been itself in 15 years but I will be sad to lose all of the fandom content that existed there through the 2000s. Zutara fandom was a huge part of my fandom experience and I have a soft place in my heart for it.

If anyone wants a time capsule, look at this ship community and go back to the dates when the show was airing. See what people thought about the ships, the showrunners, the fandom.

Some highlights

Episode discussion: Cossroads of Destiny

Episode discussion: The Southern Raiders

Episode discussion: Ember Island Players

Episode discussion: Sozin's Comet

rec: large rec lists

fan-fiction

On a related note, you may enjoy the ATLA tag for the ship-manfiesto community, which has two Zutara manifestos and some for the other major pairings as well.

For reference, here's the tags on the katar_zuko community:

⚠️: Do not download anything from the ads on this site. Livejournal has been compromised as a platform owned by the Russian government for years now.

In that regard, some posts are likely gone/lost/deleted. Many of the links to videos or art no longer work. This is not a full snapshot of the community, but it can give insight into how ephemeral fanworks are when they live primarily in social media platforms. The internet is not forever after all.

theethighpriestess

Where my Annie x Smoke girls??? Mike just blessed us on the Gram!

@nahimjustfeelingit-writes @uzumaki-rebellion @soufcakmistress @ghostfacekill-monger @kumkaniudaku @youreadthatright @theogbadbitch @thickemadame & anyone else I forgot to tag!

#hereeeeeeee #I need fic pls #smannie #sinners #smoke moore #annie moore

bluumey

Smoke and Annie study :]

#smannie #sinners #art

pinkhysteria

JAYME LAWSON Sinners

#a beauty #jayme lawson #pearline #sinners

anxietycarebear-deactivated2025

#they own my heart #smannie #smoke moore #annie #sinners

rylandsgrace

That was the last sunrise I ever saw. Perhaps the kindest thing the dark gift has given me. // It was the last time I saw my brother. It was the last time I saw the sun. It was the only time I ever felt free.

Interview with the Vampire (2022 - ) // Sinners (2025)

#sobbing #sinners #iwtv

aaygplegail

omg.... two posts in one month o o don't call me out on my arcane brain rot ok, its not a problem I swear

#mel medarda #fanart

mercutio-the-velaryon

Just letting y'all know in the grand scheme of the Arcane narrative, including what is to come in Noxus, Mel Medarda is the somebody. She is going to be as close to a traditional hero as the logic of the series will allow. She's Hercules, She's Achilles, Odysseus, Perseus, Paul Atreides, Luke Skywalker, Daenerys Targaryen.

Meljay were torn apart by their narrative responsibilities. They are hero x hero, bound to duty, bound to sacrifice for the greater good, for the people they love. Her hero's journey begins as Jayce's ends. She's not Jayce's accessory. She's not a lesson to be learned, nor an ex to compare to real love. Or the other woman. If anything, she's a widow, Jayce is gonna occupy the space in Mel's story traditionally filled by women; the lost lenore, that is utilised for her characterisation and development.

#mel medarda #arcane #jayce talis #love that for her!#meljay #otp: nothing feels impossible when i'm with you

mercutio-the-velaryon

The way he manages to be desperately sad and a little horny at the same time. Jayce Talis, you astound me...

#lolololololol #not riot delivering the yearner meljay we deserved instead of the show's lacklustre nothingness #embarrassing #goldenforge #jayce talis #mel medarda #meljay

melmedarda

“This blood is alien to me.”

⸻ MEL MEDARDA, Arcane Season 2

#mel medarda #queue it up

oliverplague

Queen Medarda of Noxus 😩😩😩

#the vibes are immaculate #mel medarda #arcane #fanart

scapegods

Chosen of the Wolf

#gorgeous #I would fight a thousand men for Mel I would do anything for her I love her so much #same here same here #mel medarda

melmedarda

For a while, the fandom has wondered, what on earth is the gold on Mel's skin? Are they tattoos? Is it armor? Well, all, I believe I know what they are. First, enter Mel's in-game lines:

I believe that the gold on Mel's skin are sigils. Not tattoos or armor, but sigils. We get an understanding of sigils from Rell's bio, that sigils are painfully grafted onto the skin. This would explain the agony Mel was in during her transformation. The more sigils one has, the more powerful they become, because sigils amplify magic. Which is interesting, because the Black Rose has been experimenting sigil magic.

Now you may ask, what the heck is a sigil, and what does it do?

Sigil magic seems to be type a branding, and seeing as Mel's power was awakened in the Black Rose's hands, does this mean the additional sigils she gained were branded upon her by the Black Rose? Just as they did with Rell? Amara mentions that Ambessa stole is more precious than any gold. So perhaps the thing Ambessa stole from the Black Rose were the sigils on Mel's neck, back, and thighs in season 1, and they served to protect her magic, but now they empower it.

This theory makes more sense when you consider how Mel did not have any markings on her skin in the 1.08 flashback. She was not born with the sigils, and I don't believe she needed the sigils to use her powers, she uses them in BS&T to protect Ambessa from death.

However, if her powers were awakened before her exile, Ambessa who before had not known of Mel's powers before this, might have stolen the sigils from the Black Rose in an effort to grant Mel the extra power she might need not only to protect herself, but to serve Ambessa's purposes. ("Your birth, the entire course of your life, was no accident. She hid you because you are that which she covets most: a weapon.")

I do believe the additional sigils (gold on her skin) might have been a Black Rose addition from LeBlanc, especially because after Mel is awakened, her jumpsuit is decorated with thorns. So perhaps, in her awakening, it is Leblanc who brands Mel with the sigils to finish the work Ambessa started. To make Mel into a powerful weapon at her disposal. After all, LeBlanc does comment on how swiftly Mel's talents have developed, which is possibly because of the sigils that helped to channel and focus Mel's magic.

But now that Mel is no longer in league with the Black Rose, I wonder if and when Leblanc will come to collect. Of course, I could be wrong, because these sigils do not resemble anything the Black Rose does. They look more Solari, which might be the kind of magic Mel inherits from her father, if she inherits any magic from him at all. So the sigil could have taken form according to her expression of magic.

And there we have it; my theory of the gold on Mel's skin. If you've gotten this far, thank you for tuning in!

#mel medarda #mel meta #queue it up #still in a state of mild shock that I get so much mel and she's a champion and I'm gonna get lore and so much for her #it's not sunk in yet #arcane #league of legends

mollysunder

I think it was a mistake for s2 of Arcane to gloss over the implications of Amara and the Black Rose's deception in Mel's story because it fundamentally unmoors her perspective. Mel believed that violence like war could be avoided through diplomacy, and she applies that philosophy by maintaining the complex political environment in Piltover where every house is in some way content.

In the face of the nobility's discontent with Jayce's anti-corruption measures, Mel sought to appease them to stave off retaliation. Through her lesson to Jayce, Mell didn't just help potentially enrich her colleagues but also the woman and by extension the organization that KILLED HER BROTHER AND STOLE HER FAMILY'S ASSETS.

Can you imagine the horror and disgust she would feel at having trusted Piltover to be different? Mel thought she understood the game but she wildly underestimated the machinations of the nobility in Piltover. Mel accepted Piltover's corruption as a means to avoid violent conflict, only to indirectly enable the recent violence harped upon her own family. And the worst irony is that even though politics and corruption have largely been viewed as a cynicism game, for Mel this was an avenue she genuinely believed conflict could be avoided but in fact it was just more insidious.

The opera scene was a lesson for Jayce in politics, but the effects should be the real education for Mel as she heads to Noxus. From what I can tell Noxus is in its pre-Trifarix but post-First Invasion of Ionia, which means Swain has his demon powers but he hasn't overthrown the emperor yet. She will probably ally with him as they're both opporpsed to the Black Rose's existence, however once he's in power he will alienate a large portion of the nobility as they root out the Black Rose's influence.

The challenge for Mel (possibly as Guile) is to deal with these disgruntled nobles because as Piltover proved, you can appease them through corruption all you want, but once their ideology is truly set against you, diplomacy becomes a far more complicated balancing act.