Korra, Asami, and crew make it back to Air Temple Island across from Republic city. Mako and Prince Wu are hiding out together. It comes out that Korra wrote to Asami, but not Bolin and Mako. Asami defends Korra, but Korra doesn't know how to explain it, why she felt the way she did. She apologizes, but Mako walks off. Feeling betrayed after he wrote all those letters to her too.
(One difference with our version of Season Four is that Asami's father doesn't play a role, he doesn't really exist. See, in our version of Season One, Asami was the Equalist owner of Sato Industries. Which, by the way, was the creator's original intention before they backed off from it. So we don't have Asami's conversations with her father. And Asami also still has ties to the Equalist factions who help rule Republic City. It's only with those connections that Korra is temporarily allowed back in. See, in our version the Equalists weren't sort of wiped out. They were sort of incorporated into the government.)
Asami, the air-benders, and Korra talk about Zaofu. And what Kuvira has become, a dictator. Korra feels ashamed and guilty for not stopping her. And even though everyone tells her not to worry, she still feels it, that it's her responsibility.
Prince Wu was kidnapped by Kuvira's forces, and they chased them across the city. As they do, Korra blames Mako for losing him as the king's bodyguard, but this only inflames the distance between them. They managed to rescue Prince Wu, but only just.
At the same time Varrick and Bolin are sneaking past an empire checkpoint. They learn that Kuvira is coming for a Republic City.
(Now, there's a weird detail at this point on the show. We also learned that Kuvira is rounding up fire-benders and water-benders into camps. It's pretty clearly meant to be a Holocaust parallel, if you didn't get the Nazi comparison yet. But this always felt really out of place for me, because they don't really do anything with this, it never comes up again. And even though Kuvira has a nationalistic streak, we never see that paired with prejudice towards non Earth Empire citizens. Like, she never blames them for the Earth Empire falling apart, which is a common fascistic scapegoat tactic, right? Like this group of people of why our country is in chaos. It's a tiny detail, but I'd probably just replace it with a prison camp rebels or something. In the show stands, I think this is a pretty clumsy bit of commentary, even if you are doing the fascist thing. Because if you're going to do a Holocaust parallel, I think it should be done better than this. But we don't really have the space in this series, so instead, we should just probably cut it.)
[Episode 8: Beyond the Wilds]
(Now, okay. Technically, Episode Eight is “Remembrances”, which is a flashback episode. It's not very good, it's not important. It doesn't do anything to further the story. So I'm not going to bother with it. Keep it if you want, I'll discard it. I don't care, I thought it was annoying.)
In our version, Varrick and Bolin arrive and explained that Kuvira has set up this Schwerer Gustav super-weapon. Which we're going to call the Colossus, and they're planning to take Republic City, too.
(Now, the show kind of makes the sound like this is purely about law and order and power for Kuvira. And see, while fascist governments did rise with populist promises of law and order, their expansionism is usually justified, by appealing to reuniting or liberating the “P” People or “L” Land. That they feel entitled to, because of historic ties, see Russia today. Now, the show does pay lip service to the land idea once. But if the show wants to comment on nationalism or fascism, then I think it should have delved more deeply into the sentiments that are behind them. Especially given this kind of expansionism, doesn't come from just one person's desire for power. Which, again, the show kind of suggests it does, but a dangerously widespread cultural belief. That's why we're going to have Kuvira emphasize these ideas in the historic Earth Kingdom lands, and reuniting their people, it's a small tweak. Even then, it's not a perfect parallel, right? Like, fascism exists almost inherently in opposition to democracy. And we don't have democracy here, we've got a bunch of monarchies. I still think, though, that this change in focus does do the original intention of her character more justice.)
Asami, Tenzin, and the Republic City Council reach out to the Water Tribes and Fire Lord Izumi.
(Who I always wanted to see more of. I wanted to see what the Fire Nation had become.)
They asked for help to take the fight to Kuvira. But Izumi, as in the show, insists that the Fire Nation has made war too much a part of its history and intends to stay out of it”. Once again, people pressure Korra to go fight Kuvira. But Korra says, “She can't”! And sort of breaks down, and leaves. Tenzin says, “Leave her”.
But hours later, Asami finds Korra in the forest outside the city. “I don't know what's wrong with me, I thought the poison was gone. I thought I'd go back to normal, but I still see him... Zaheer. It's like I'm not in control of my own body.” “Maybe it's not as easy as that.” “I'm over people telling me it'll get better. It hasn't, it won't. Tenzin is tired of me being like this. Mako is angry at me.” “Tenzin isn't angry.” “Mako is.” “Mako is just being Mako. Look, sometimes there's a big difference between what we know and what we feel. Maybe you know you're safe, maybe you know that your body is okay again. But you don't feel it, and that doesn't mean that those feelings aren't real.” Korra looks up, “Yeah, I think I want to face Zaheer”.
Tenzin takes Korra to Zaheer's prison and asks her, “Do you think you can do this?” They have a touching moment of mentor to apprentice, and she goes in to face Zaheer.
(Honestly, this episode is a little bit of a mess in the series. Jinora gets taken by the spirit vines, so they need to get her back. But to do that, they need to go into the spirit world, but Korra can't, and that's why she goes to face Zaheer. But it all feels a little bit contrived and distracted and weirdly paced from the main story.)
I think this is a more intimate exploration of Korra’s trauma, and a more meaningful reason to go talk to Zaheer.
Bolin tries to make up with Opal, but she will not have any of it, he worked for Kuvira. Mako comforts Bolin, but doesn't have any great advice on women, it seems, and neither does Prince Wu, making the whole situation worse.
At the same time, Varrick and Asami enter a tense, unfriendly working relationship. To help stop Kuvira and shore up the city's defenses.
Korra faces Zaheer in the same way that she does in the show. I think it's a really great moment, good visuals and dialogue, and it holds a lot of meaning. Zaheer hates Kuvira, this tyrant who has risen up in his wake, and he offers to help Korra bring her down.
(In the show, this moment is all about reconnecting with Raava. But personally, I just don't put that much stock in Korra and Raava's relationship. You can go watch my video on Beginnings to understand why further.)
But she faces up to Zaheer, this person who has caused her so much trauma. And in doing so, she regains a sense of control over herself. After that, he helps her meditate into the Spirit World. Connecting with the past avatars, and understanding her own pain better than ever before. Letting go of her guilt, and hopefully giving her the ability to face Kuvira as well.
This episode closes with Opal and Bolin making up, but only when Bolin promises to help rescue the Beifongs.
[Episode 9: Operation Beifong]
The crew tracks down Kuvira's huge ass super-cannon. Toph turns up to help, but things are tense between her and Lin.
During the fight, Korra and Mako have to rely on each other, and together they rescue the Beifongs. But they have to leave when Kuvira and her army close in. Just as the super-weapon test goes off, and they can see it blow apart a mountain.
(I gotta be honest, I always felt like Toph was underutilized in this scene. That they kind of held her back because she was so OP. But that's really a little bit contrived, isn't it?)
So we're going to have Toph fight Kuvira while the others get away, and Kuvira is going to have to make a calculated retreat. But even Toph is going to have to escape too, when the rest of the army arrives and it becomes just all too much, and she vanishes into the ground. In the aftermath, Lin and Toph make-up and talk about the past.
Mako and Korra apologize and admit to their wrongs.
Back in Republic City, Varrick and Asami are inventing some kind of machine, though we don't get to see what it is.
(In the show, it's these weird humming-bird machines, but we're going to do something a little bit different with it. One detail about this episode that I always kind of hated was Zhu’li, okay? It turns out she was faking the betrayal and actually loves Varrick unconditionally, no. See, it was more interesting to have Varrick's constant mistreatment of Zhu’li turn her against him, motivating him to reflect on his behavior afterwards. Whereas this just kind of says, “Oh, Varrick can actually get away with anything”. So, no!)
Zhu’li is going to stay with Kuvira in this episode.
[Episode 10: Kuvira’s Gambit]
Prince Wu and Mako evacuate the city, and Republic City calls up its navy. Now, Prince Wu does have an arc in the series. He has to live amongst the common people, and he learns to see what really matters in the world. His character is fine, he's kind of in the background, and so he's going todo all the same stuff that he does in this episode.
Kuvira has already seized much of the surrounding land in our rewrite. So they haven't been able to sabotage the railways and prevent the Colossus from moving forward. Because of this though, they do set out to destroy the super weapon before it ever gets into range of Republic City. They go with a few airships, a sky-bison, and bombs. And just like in the show, it goes wrong. The airships are shot out of the sky by this huge cannon. None of the bombs make it, and they flee back to Republic City.
Luckily, though, in the chaos, they managed to kidnap Bataar Jr., Kuvira's lover and her second-in-command.
When Kuvira arrives at a Republic City, she obliterates the navy from a distance, taking out the ships one by one. It's all a display of force and power, a warning. The ships fire in return, but they simply don't have the range. Kuvira issues an ultimatum to the city. “These lands”, she says, “were Earth territory many years before, for as long as history remembers. Till they were taken from us (and our people), by war and tyranny. And even in our victory, our people were kept from them and their birthright. The United Republic is the stunted child of politicians and monarchs who know nothing of what it means to lose their home, their families. We offer you now a chance to return home, to join your brothers and sisters. Those who rule you might resist for selfish reasons, but we come here as liberators. Lay down your arms”.
The Republic City council, partly made up of Equalists after Season One. Sees this as just more bender, war, and expansionism, just like Amon said, and they refuse to surrender. Korra intervenes and tries to calm everyone down, “Just give me one more chance to talk to Kuvira”. They allow her that, and Korra asks Kuvira to leave. She even allows Bataar to talk with her.
But the man communicates their position through coded language. And Kuvira tearfully orders to fire on their location, killing Bataar and severely injuring Asami. The council, urged on by Asami, says that they will not surrender, not after everything the Equalists fought for.
[Episode 11: Day of the Colossus]
After the explosion, everyone is separated. Asami and Korra together, Bolin and Marco, Tenzin and Lin, the kids too.
(Now, this episode in the show is mostly centered around trying to destroy the Colossus. Till Hiroshi Sato, Asami's dad, sacrifices his life so that they can get inside. But we have neither the Colossus nor Hiroshi Sato. By the way, one other thing about the Colossus, I could just never buy that it was a threat. It was such a clumsily built thing, and when it's like getting tripped up, it looks so inept. No!)
So anyways, Kuvira's forces into the city and the fight begins. The leadership evacuates with Tenzin to Air Temple Island.
Every so often, the Colossus-cannon will take out their positions. Leveling the city, before Kuvira's soldiers move in.
Mako and Bolin decide that they need to take out the Colossus, they find a sky-bison, and fly off.
Meanwhile, Varrick sets off a number of traps of enemy forces passing through the city. Electrical tripwires and bombs, that sort of thing. Insisting that they just need to lure the enemy further into the heart of Republic City.
Korra points out that Kuvira always stays on the front lines herself, and the two sneak past the lines, hoping to take Kuvira out.
Asami is injured, and Korra has to support her the whole way. But Asami insists that she wants to stay with her. She manages to point out enemies several times, saving Korra's life. They manage to find a quiet ruin of a building, and take a break from the fighting to help wrap up Asami's leg. Explosions echoing in the distance, “It's my turn to take care of you”, says Korra. “You've got more important things to worry about than me.” There's silence for a moment. “All those years writing me letters. Why did you come to find me in the swamp?” “I told you, Kuvira just declared she was in charge, and I was worried.” “Everyone else came looking because they needed the Avatar back.” “Yeah, we all did. I guess.” “I was just wondering if well, you could have waited. You could have waited until Jinora found me. So maybe you came because I missed you.” “Yeah, but I missed you in that way. In every way.”
(This is basically them both saying that they care about each other, but more than that, it's romantic. There's also a symmetry between the Banyan grove and here, when Asami helped Korra heal.)
In this moment, they'll be found and attacked. Korra will beat them off and get Kuvira's location.
Korra insists Asami stay behind while she's injured. That she has to do this herself, and she can't worry about Asami if she's going to fight Kuvira.
The episode ends with Korra finding her enemy. “Kuvira, I'm here”, she declares.
[Episode 12: The Last Stand]
Kuvira talks to her straight, “We've already done this, Avatar. I beat you”. Korra bids her one last time to stand down, and let the other nations decide her fate. But Kuvira says she'll have to take her down herself if that's to happen. “Nobody can say I didn't give you a chance”, says Korra, entering the Avatar State. Kuvira orders her soldiers to stand back, “I've done this before”.
At the same time, Mako and Bolin are trying to take down the Colossus-cannon. They fight their way past lines of Kuvira's soldiers, and their movements flash between the past and present. A symmetry between their fine now, and how they trained alongside each other for pro-bending when they were younger.
Varrick, the air-benders, and Lin all find each other in the city. Varrick insists they have a plan, grinning a covered machine in the city square.
Korra is holding her own in a way that she couldn't before at Zaofu. But it's relatively evenly matched between the two of them. Even with all the elements and the Avatar State, Korra is well out of practice. While Kuvira is battle hardened and isn't injured, she didn't just get out of a massive explosion. She mostly avoids Korra's blows, hoping to wear the Avatar down.
Bolin and Mako fight their way up to the super weapon. They can see it being ready to fire once more. We get more of these flashbacks between the two brothers as they fight all the time, as Mako defended Bolin when they were younger on the streets of Ba Sing Se. Bolin pushes a spread of lava underneath the Colossus-cannon, but it's not enough. The two break inside into its inner workings, and Mako begins unleashing a torrent of lightning, just like he kind of does in the show.
Kuvira's forces are taking the city street by street with tanks and mechs. But for every tank they destroy, it feels like two more rise in their place. Lin says, “You'd think I shed enough blood for this damn place? Maybe it's waiting till I die here too”. “Hopefully not today, sister.”
By this point in their duel, both Korra and Kuvira are injured, stumbling through the city ruins. But Korra does have the upper hand, Kuvira insists that Korra will have to kill her. “I'm not going to kill you”, she says, “You're going to call off your army and surrender. We can end this, Kuvira”. “If you want to end this, then come do it yourself”, Kuvira attacks Korra. But Korra brushes it aside, approaching her slowly.
Back with Mako and Bolin, the super-weapon is sinking into the lava, overloaded and about to explode. Mako is still blasting it with lightning, trying to stop it before it goes off and kills more people. But he realizes it won't be enough, he looks to Bolin. He orders him to go, to get out. He says that it's his job to take care of his little brother. Bolin insists that he won't leave him, but Mako blasts him out of the machine. Right as the super weapon explodes, killing Mako in the process.
But not before it lets off one last shot. That last shot fires directly at Korra and Kuvira. And Korra, sensing the huge caliber bullet coming for them with her air-bending, spins to protect Kuvira. She enters the Avatar State, rending the metal from metal and controlling the inferno around them. a blazing storm of red and gold and white. We still get that iconic chorus scene that so vividly encapsulates Korra's character arc. She goes from someone who is just looking for the right person to punch, to someone who puts her life on the line to defend even her worst enemy. At that same moment, Varrick reveals what he and Asami were working on. As Kuvira's army is drawn into the city square, an EMP goes off and deactivates a lot of Kuvira's tanks and mechs. This gives the Republic City forces just enough of an advantage to turn the tides, in the confusion.
(See how the laser went off in the original version of Korra and Kuvira's fight, always felt a little bit clumsy to me. That Korra walks into this place, and then there's a giant gun in front of her, and Kuvira is up at the top and pulling it. It just felt a little bit contrived and odd. I don't know what it was about it. But I do like the conversation that kind of follows in its wake.)
So they're sitting in the ruins of Republic City in the wake of this blast.
(There are some lines that I didn't really like all that much. Kuvira basically confesses that her own parents abandoned her, and it's implied that this is why she turned into a dictator. That she wouldn't stand by when her nation needed guidance, just like she needed guidance as a kid. Again, this seems to diminish the role of the people, and the land in nationalistic and fascist ideas. And instead focuses on one person's childhood insecurities, when that wider cultural context is so important. It's odd, it's a clumsy comparison. And then there's this ham-fisted stuff about Korra being poisoned, when Kuvira wouldn't know about any of that.)
So this conversation is going to just focus on the other parts of that, something else. Kuvira is going to say she didn't want war, that the Avatar was gone and someone needed to do something, so she did. Korra empathizes with that, like she does on the show, and she admits that the two of them are similar. They both have that drive to take action, to protect others when they have the power to do so. “It's a responsibility”. “Not like this though, Korra insists.
This is the culmination of Korra's arc in our rewrite:
In Season One, she learned that sometimes it's better to empathize and listen and fight.
In Season Two, she learned that it wasn't always up to her to decide how the world organizes itself. Even as the Avatar, she can't just choose to kill Kuvira.
In Season Three, she saw the importance of self determination.
And this brings us here at last, to this moment.
Kuvira calls off the last of her forces and is taken into custody.
Prince Wu is inspired by Mako's sacrifice and does the same as in the show. He abdicates with the regions, becoming loosely connected democratic states. Bolin is heartbroken with the death of his brother, but he's comforted by Opal, the city begins to rebuild itself.
(Now, unlike in the show, we don't have that new spirit portal, which was an interesting idea with beautiful, fantastic visuals. But ultimately doesn't really work in this rewrite, not without the spirit vines or super-weapon, the way the show does it. Mako's funeral kind of replaces Zhu’li and Varrick's marriage, which I do realize makes it a bit of a more somber ending. Though maybe they reconnect after Kuvira's fall.)
Tenzin and Korra have the same conversation they do in the show, about how she's transformed more in the last few years than many Avatars did in their entire lifetime. Korra remarks how the pain helped her understand people, even Kuvira or more. Bolin and Opal decide to travel the world together. That Bolin needs to be away from the place that he and Mako spend so much time together. So maybe the happiness streak kind of comes from their relationship working out. Korra and Asami meet up a few weeks later. Asami is healed, and the two openly talk about their feelings. Korra says she thinks the Avatar just needs to go back to being the bridge between humans and the spirits. That in all her travels it's always the spirits who lose out. That things could have gone very differently in another world. She says she needs a vacation, that Asami should come, and they should call it a date. Asami blushes and asks where, Korra asks if she's ever wanted to see the spirit world.
The last shot is of them at a South Pole, entering a brilliant beam of light.
[Series Conclusion]
This is fundamentally the same, right? It keeps the integrity of the story, but I think we do it in a more thematically cohesive way. With more narrative build up to the beats that really matter, like Korrasami.
(Now, I got to be honest. I thought for along time about how I was going to do this, because there's something really interesting to me with Korra.)
See, Legend of Korra has a thematic undercurrent about the place of the Avatar in a modernizing world.
Season One: We reflect on class status as a bender, and she is the ultimate bender.
Season Two: Conflicts being so complicated that the Avatar can't solve them not on their own, and that's the Water Tribe civil war.
Season Three: The Avatar's institutional authority, and whether or not she actually deserves it.
Season Four: Could have had Kuvira be the good guy, with Korra reflexively defending the monarchy or the states. The people who have been in power for so long, because that's the way things are meant to be, and supposedly she's meant to keep the world in balance. Only to realize that Kuvira is democratizing and modernizing the places she's taking over. And that Korra, she's actually on the wrong side of history this time. And then at the end, deciding the Avatar should be a spiritual figure again, which we kind of did at the end there.
It'd be a real full circle if it played out like this. From Korra being an Avatar who just wants to fix the world through raw power, to someone who understands the nuances of power and restraint to minimizing her own role. But, I mean that would have required a greater rewrite than I felt was fear for the series. So here we come to the end, we've done all four seasons, it was a lot of fun.
(I really didn't think I would get through this so quickly, but my goodness, there we are. Especially because it's taken me years to do the other series on the world, building the different nations. I've done three of them in like four years or something like that. And people are going, “When are you getting the last one?” “I will, I'll get to it. In the meantime, have a completed series that I did in the last few months.” What did you think of the series? I think looking back, Season Two is probably the best rewrite. Thinking back, I don't think I quite address the Amon conflict as well as I could have. Or the Equalists more broadly, and the ramifications of what happened afterwards. But, yeah, it is a really hard story to do. I think it required more time than we really and I just couldn't quite figure out a way to work around it. I still think it's pretty good. It's got a lot of really good beats in it, a bit of focus, maybe. But yeah, no, I mean, it's not perfect. But I do like this version do I like Season Two. And then Season Three is just, of course, amazing because of course it is. Anyway, stay nerdy, and I will see you in the future.)
In the opening moments of the episode, Asami is preparing a huge shipment of Sato Industry weapons. And that, she assures, will bring the conflict to its end. "This will be decisive. There will be no more war. That the Northern army just isn't equipped to fight these kind of mechs." That night, though, the whole warehouse is bombed. The loss of this immense stock nearly bankrupt Sato Industries, which was already struggling. But Varrick kindly offers to buy out a controlling stock in her company. "Well, come on, it's got to be worth it for a pretty yuan. And I've got a few ideas of where we can take it. The stars. How many of stars? Were gonna go with so many stars on planets and other planets and stars. Yeah, how about it?" Mako tells her not to. But Bolin says, "Oh, hey, Varrick, he's a great guy. I've been working for him for a while. He's a lovely man, great sense of humor, good amount of money." And Asami agrees. Mako and Beifong suspect that this bombing of her warehouse is trying to prevent Asami from providing help to the South. "They don't want their tribe to be humiliated." "Benders have always been proud of their abilities", Asami says, "sometimes too proud". And while investigating the warehouse, Mako again finds evidence of the Triple Triad. Which is strange, they're a bending gang that is often hired for odd jobs. He wonders whether this, the embassy and the attempt on Asami's life are connected. Asami brushes it off because of course it's going to be to do with the South, and she assures him that there are better explanations. We also see Varrick's new propaganda pieces, which paint Unalaq as this terrible tyrant with his foot on the boot of the working Southern man. And Tonraq as this glorious muscled hero.
In the South though, the fight continues. Korra goes off to find where Tonraq was banished to and locates him on Kyoshi Island. She talks with him about the dreams she's been having and asks whether he might know who the boy is, it's not an Avatar she recognizes. Tonraq says, "That dreams come from strange places, but should never be ignored". She asks if it's true that he burned up the Spirit Wilds in the North. And Tonraq pauses, turning to her, and confesses. "I was young and I was ambitious, I was destined to be chief. I felt invincible and no one could come for me. And I let my pride get the best of me. They didn't just banish me, but everyone close to me. Including your mother? Including those who had nothing to do with it, we were shunned. See, Korra, I know tradition has its value, but I have also seen traditions spite people like it did me and your mother. Tradition is why the North remains in the hands of a single chief, or the South has tried to be more democratic. For a long time, women were forced to be healers up there, not warriors." This idea resonates with Korra, who swears that she will bring him back home, and she thinks that she knows what she has to do as the Avatar. She's got a side to fight for, she returns to the South to challenge Unalaq. "This has gone on long enough", she declares, and she decides that her mother was wrong. That she can choose a side, that it can be solved by the Avatar. Unalaq insists, "Avatar, your role is to be neutral here. You cannot do this". That her duty is to the spirits. But Korra says, "No, it's more than that". However, with little air-bending training and none of her other elements, Unalaq just wipes the floor with her.
(And let's be honest, the fight scenes in Season Two were top tier. Holy crap, the water-bending in Season Two. We haven't seen amazing stuff like that in so long, it blows my mind. I want to keep all of those fight scenes as much as possible.)
Korra attempts to water-bend and turn the tides, but no, she's defeated. Believing that she needs to get her bending back in order to make a difference in this war. She sets out to find this island that she's been having dreams of near the fighting. That maybe some ancient spirit is pulling her towards it to get her bending back for her. That it might hold the secret of this ancient pact that the Water Tribe once made to bringing the war to its close. Now, like in the show, she sits out, but she's confronted by a huge, corrupted spirit. A fight ensues, and she loses, drags down into the ocean depths. And that leads us into.
[Episode Eight: Beginnings, Part One]
Tenzin and his family are meant to head to the Northern Air Temple, but Jinora says that she needs to head east, not South. When asked why, she looks over and sees the cat-deer spirit who has been guiding her, someone that apparently only she can see. Without much explanation, she says goodbye, that she'll meet them in the North, and she dances away, heading to the coast.
She flies to the this nearby strange island that looks like it's covered in the ruins of an old city, and she follows the spirit there. There she finds Korra's barely conscious body washing up on the shore. She helps bring her back and offers to help meditate when Korra explains her problem. This might help her get in contact with the past Avatars who could have more answers, and they suspect that something was drawing them together. They explore the strange island but have no idea who once lived there. They settle down on the peak and try to meditate.
(As I said, one of the things that always annoyed me about the Beginnings episodes, and if you want to learn more, go watch the full video on that. I'm quite proud of it. I think I anticipated my thoughts quite well, and people really liked it, was that there's no demand for Korra to look into the past here. There's no reason for her to go and learn about Avatar Wan. She doesn't ask any questions about it just something that happens to her, right? It's something that just interrupts the story. This is hopefully fixing that. It is Korra going out to learn things.)
As on the show, Korra meets Wan, who explains that in order to get her bending back, she needed to understand how the Avatar and bending came to be in the first place. If she wants to understand her role in the Southern War.
(Now, my thoughts on Beginnings are basically that they're a fine story on their own, but they ruin a lot of the world and story around them. If it were up to me, Beginnings would just never have happened because normal. But we have rules here for a reason, and these two episodes are a fundamental part of the season and of the wider series as a whole. So I will not cut them. I will only modify them in ways that I don't think undermine what was already there, which was my main issue.)
I kind of hated how we're told that Raava and Vaatu were kind of like Yin and Yang. They're light and dark, order and chaos, but narratively, they're not right. They're just treated as good and evil. Vaatu never once does anything that could be conceived as good, ever. There's no way getting around it. And it doesn't really fit Avatar like that idea of morality. So we're going to really hype up the order and chaos elements of their characters and really walk away from that good versus evil thing. This also gives us a parallel to the Southern conflict. Tradition and order are closely connected. They're positive, but sometimes stifling forces. And chaos, is this new Southern culture a mismatch from the rest of the world? And it can be liberating, but it also forgets or destroys other things.
Bending is no longer going to come from the lion-turtles. It's dangerous to go alone, take this. Instead, people are going to learn it by looking to the moon and ocean, the sky-bisons, the dragons and the badger-moles. This was kind of the way that it was envisioned in The Last Airbender, and I'm not going to get into the discussion about whether or not this is a retcon, it's not. They got the elements from the lion-turtles and they learned how to actually bend from the animals, but blah, blah, blah, I don't care about that. The changes is that they just learn it from those original benders. Because to be perfectly honest, getting the bending from the lion-turtles doesn't really change Avatar Wan's plot line that much. It just doesn't.
Beginnings part one plays out mostly the same. The humans live in the cities on the backs of lion-turtles, while the whole world is full of spirits. Few humans venture out because it's dangerous out there in the wilds. But Wan and a few of his friends are banished from the city after stealing from the ruling class. Everyone expects them to die soon after because few make it, and only if they're trained hardened warriors, but Wan doesn't. He finds himself living amongst badger-moles, and instead of being defensive or aggressive, he tries to respect them and live alongside them. Years later, Wan develops the ability to earth-bend. Wan returns to the Lion-Turtle’s city to demonstrate his powers, saying, hey, it's possible to live out here if you respect the spirits, if you live alongside them, if you learn from these creatures and the spirits who are all deeply connected to these powers. And for the first time, people begin living on the continent.
(Years later, Wan chances across two massive spirits who personally let's get rid of the kites. Okay, They don't look good. I've never really liked them. It looks okay when it's like, patterned on her chest, but when they're just flying around, no, it's weird. It doesn't feel like it fits in this world, you know?)
So imagine them how you like, but like in the show, he breaks them apart with his new found bending abilities, and rather, the spirit of order is wounded and she can only be sustained by fusing with one. He vows to rather to bring Vaatu to justice, who now works around the world unchecked. But he needs to become more powerful if he's ever going to challenge him. So Wan begins working his way around the world to learn other elements. He finds communities of humans living alongside sky-bisons and dragons, just as he had badger-moles and across the years, he gains air and fire as well. Seeing how they live and truly understand these very spiritual creatures. It's about showing that profound experience. Not just treating it as something that you can copy, but something that you have to learn to empathize with, to align your mind with, to understand on a truly profound and personal level. And these non-benders, because they need to have this respect for these creatures, they learn it as well.
[Episode Nine: Beginnings, Part Two]
The world has waned in the years since that fight. Wan begins to encounter communities of people roared with chaos, with Vaatu's chaos. They're free, but they are destructive and uncaring individualistic, with no sense of community. The environment is growing out of control, all weeds strangling other plants. “This”, says Raava, “is the domain of Vaatu”. “You see what is chaos does to the world. And most importantly, the humans and spirits are at each other's throats. They're constantly getting at each other, fighting wars even. Vaatu is thriving on this chaos of violence. These people need order”, Raava insist. And Vaatu arrives amidst the chaos to breathe it in. Wan gets up to fight him, but is swiftly defeated. But on the other hand, Wan wanders and comes across places that were influenced by Raava, the spirit of order. Places where nobody is free, where the land grows, only one type of tree or fruit. There's less violence, but there's also little happiness. And importantly, the spirits are dying here too. Spirits who have always taken on strange, chaotic forms, who rely on the constant forces of change in the world. Vaatu comes for them again, seeing how weak Raava has become. And the two fight once more, and with Raava's help and encouragement, controlling himself and those impulsive tendencies, Wan wins and brings Vaatu down into a weakened state. End him, presses Raava, and let the chaos end, but Wan realizes something. The world needs both order and chaos, that it can't be one or the other. Disregarding Raava, one chooses to take Vaatu into himself. The spirits of both order and chaos in balance with one another, fused together in a mortal human destined to reincarnate forever. And yet the spirits and humans don't stop fighting. Even with the spirits of order and chaos fused, Wan's confused that was meant to work. They're still hunting each other, spirits and other humans battles and wars and hatred. In the middle of a grand battle between humans and spirits, Wan intervenes as the Avatar and declares that humanity cannot coexist with the spirits. The spirits agree to leave through a portal at the South Pole, but only after they make a pact with the Southerners that they would always keep this portal open and preserve the spirit wilds around them as a symbol of the promise that one day, when humanity was ready, the spirits will be able to return to this world. Avatar Wan presides over that agreement, and the episode ends the same way it does in the series, with a scene that I actually really love.
(It's amazing and melancholic and deeply evocative and kind of horrific when you think about kind of the role of the Avatar. Is this person destined to just sit and admires of human conflict forever? Real commentary on humanity's proclivity for violence.)
Korra wakes alongside Jinora now, knowing how the original benders first learned and what the pact that the Southerners has made with the spirits was.
(So, here's the thing. My version of Beginnings really isn't that different, or at least I don't think it's that different. I think it keeps the core concepts, and the only major things I change is...)
Clearly, Vaatu isn't the main villain of the series because, well, he's a part of the Avatar, and, well, I kind of hate him.
Harmonic convergence just isn't a thing, okay.
(We're going to tone down those more fantastical scenes of the series to focus on the more grounded philosophical concepts. As I said, if we're up to me, Beginnings would just never be a thing. But it is. And so I want to respect that decision, you know, but I will also admit that this is where I'm going to take a little bit more creative liberty only for the season with where the story goes. It's going to end up in roughly the same place, but we're going to take a slightly different route to get there. See, the biggest criticism of Season Two is that it is that bait and switch. It has this fascinating interplay between colonialism and tradition and war profiteering, and it's got a commentary on the Avatars place in this new world, but then suddenly it forgets any of that. No, suddenly it's about good versus evil. And the giant demon kite, giant spirit lasers... who thought that this was a good idea. It is the most amateur writing decision to think that simply upping the stakes, to be all of the multiverse, is that's bad is at stake here. Making the evillest character you can is the way to make something feel more dire, more important. So, no, we're going to stick with that more interesting story that we have already set up.)
[Episode 10: A New Spiritual Age]
Realizing that they are atop of not only one of the lion-turtles on which humanity once lived, but the lion-turtle that Aang once met. Immediately, Korra goes to meet it, and it says, "You have come to me with yet another face". It recognizes her instantly, she asks what to do about the Southern Water Tribe civil war. And the lion-turtle responds, “There is a day for spirits, a day for man, and a day for the Avatar”. Korra thanks Jinora and doesn't quite know what that means, asking how she knew to come here. "Oh", she says, "you've just got to listen to the spirits, and they will talk to you". The two part ways, with Korra heading South and Jinora heading back North to meet her father with the help of that spirit, that lead her there.
Back in the Southern Water Tribe, the rebellion has gathered momentum and Unalaq is losing grip on the city. The propaganda and Varrick's technology are doing their job, the Northern Forces are being pushed back. This has also led to an uptick in those corrupt spirits attacking the city, which Unalaq is able to deal with. but the resistance can't. Korra race in the South and immediately goes to face Unalaq. “Unalaq, I know you're just trying to help”, she says, “but I know what the Southern pact is now. The fight is over, go. It's clear that the South doesn't want the North here”. Unalaq leans forward, “I'm glad you have learned about the pact, Korra. Tradition needs to be preserved, sometimes even by untraditional means”. “What does that mean?”, asks Korra. Suddenly, a wave of mechs and tanks that we haven't seen before roll into the Southern city, technology that outpaces those of the Southerners. Their limited number of water-benders are captured or pushed back, and Unalaq seizes back much control of the city. He shows mercy, of course, to those who are willing to lay down their arms. He welcomes them, he provides them with food and lodgings.
(We don't want him to be an evil tyrant, exactly. I mean, he's kind of being a bit of a tyrant. But at the same time, he's not the worst tyrant, which is a thing.)
In Unalaq's part of the city, people are living a more traditional water tribe life, just like they really wanted to. The resistance is left believing that they need more, more and better technology. More deadly technology, if they had to compete with the Northern army. And they sent out a call to Varrick and Asami for help. Varrick and Assami received the call from down South. “Who on earth is funding them, giving them technology like ours? I'm going to go see it for myself and help Korra”, Asami and Varrick agreed a set sale for the South. Meanwhile, Mako, Bolin and Beifong have had a breakthrough. In their case, the Water Tribe embassy was looking into a strange company called Karav Limited, which was looking to sell weapons to the North. Any official owners have been faked, their houses are just entirely empty. But they do have a headquarters in Republic City, Mako and Bolin go to investigate. Tenzin and his family are flying towards the Northern Air Temple, with Tenzin recounting nomad history to them. When they spot an island in the distance, not unlike the very island that we see Korra washup on in the show. It's an isolated, insular community who have escaped the view of the world as they care for a sky-bison herd. Sky-bison, of course, at this point are thought to be near extinct.
(But unlike in the show, these aren't going to be fire-benders, right? These are going to be fire-benders who are taking care of the sky-bison. In fact, they won't be benders at all.)
Now, we already know from the comics that following the enormous genocide and Aang's return, there were some people who tried to emulate enormous culture. They took on vegetarianism and nomadism, they were at peace with the spiritual world and detachment and non-violence. They weren't very good at it, but they did try, brownie points. By the way, the people on this island aren't trying to copy the air-nomads, per-se. But they have been emulating and following the way of life of the sky-bison, supposedly for generations, and there are clearly air-nomad influences in how they live. Tenzin is astounded to find these people, but he isn't sure how he's meant to feel about it. It feels like co-opting his culture, a culture that he felt was on his shoulders alone. And this lost herd of sky-bison surely fall under his care, right? Like he has to take them with him. He has to care for them because they're such an important part of his culture. His family tell him to be happy, but he wanders off, unsure of himself.
[Episode 11: Night of a Thousand Stars]
Korra, having seen the North's new technology, attacks Unalaq in the streets. Unlike the first time, though, she wins and throws them down. "You will leave the South", she cries. But she draws the ire of the Southerners, who actually do want the North to help them maintain order and traditions, and she realizes she was tricked. Of course, the Southern forces are already being pushed back and taking Unalaq out alone isn't going to solve that problem. The press as well captures this moment and paint her as the aggressor, perhaps as Unalaq intended. "The tyrant Avatar. Let us decide for ourselves", the headline reads. Shocked and not quite understanding what happened, Korra flees into the city alleyways. That night, she listens to a group of those very Southerners. They're practicing an ancient water-bending technique on the shore during a full moon. They tell her about all the things that the South has forgotten. Its heritage, its old stories and tales, its unique style of water-bending, and they're trying to bring it back. And they even offer to teach Korra, nervously... Korra agrees. "While the North listens more to the moon", one girl explains, "we listen to the ocean. Its fury and calm, its tenacity and its kindness, always carrying us home". Korra feels for the tides and thinks back to what Jinora told her, "If you listen to the spirits, they will talk to you". And for the first time since she lost to water-bending, she senses the water at her finger tips. She leaps and punches the air, ecstatic, and these girls don't even understand why she rushes off.
Jinora arrives at this island, puzzled as to why the spirit was drawing her here. When she meets this community of people following the sky-bison way of life. It's kind of magical to see so many people immersed in, well, kind of adjacent to her culture. Right? The children in the family immediately fall in love with this community, and they love learning about how these people do things. And in turn, they want to show them air-bending. The people living here are excited to see it. I mean, this is them seeing air-bending for the first time potentially ever. They want to learn, but of course they're like, "Well, I don't know if we can". Eventually, Jinora figures out that Tenzin is nowhere to be seen, and she goes off to find him.
(So just like in the series, Jinora does have a spiritual arc of her own. She's got a really key storyline that pans out in the end. And I really love her character.)
She finds Tenzin meditating at the top of a mountain, talking to himself and wondering what Aang would do with all of this. Jinora finds him, and they talk about the burden of being the last air-benders. That there's alot riding on them, that they have to be perfect for the world because they're the only ones there, and everyone's looking to them. Jinora explains that she read in the archives about these acolytes that Aang met, and he, too, struggled to accept them at the start. Tenzin feels vindicate and starts walking down the mountain to say, "Ah, this is my culture, stop this". Before Jinora continues, "But he accepted them, she says. "And they helped bring nomad culture back to life today, they're still out there." Tenzin sighs and admits that she's right.
[Episode 12: Darkness Falls]
Asami arrives in the South Pole to meet Korra, along with a shipment of Varrick's new weapons to help the resistance. She asks around to know who is supplying Unalaq's forces with all this stuff, and she bumps into Korra, who has snuck around with Naga to get to the resistance side of the city. The two are glad to see each other, and desperate to show her new abilities, she drags Asami to the ocean. "I've got my water-bending, back", she cries. And then admits that maybe Asami, who was once an Equalist, isn't super keen on that. But Asami assures her that she know show important bending is to Korra. Korra also says that she knows how to end the conflict. That she needs to open the Spirit Portal at the South Pole and restore the pact that they made with the spirits. Asami says, "Go for it". She takes Naga and rides off into the icy wilderness, Asami watching her go fondly.
Back in Republic city, Bolin and Mako are investigating this Karav Industries limited warehouse. While it appears abandoned, they find a secret floor full of mechs. Just like the ones that were sent to the North, at which point they are attacked by the Triple Triad. Mako and Bolin fight them off and find these special designs for the tank and the mechs. As well as shipment plants and huge amounts of money being promised by the North, Mako gasps and dashes off to call Asami.
Asami picks up Mako's call to Varrick's ship and listens to what he has to say, her eyes widen. "Somebody's been targeting me?", she says. "And what could you have possibly done to deserve that?", says Varrick in his signature way. But he knows by the look on her face that she has already figured it out, and his face curls into a mischievous snarl. Asami goes on, "You sent the assassin". "Mako is a Triple Triad member pretending to be an Equalist. An easy cover, because, of course, they'd come for me. Who's been selling the North weapons? You're a war profiteer. Sell weapons to both sides, and when one gets the upper-hand, you sell more and better ones to the other. Up and up and up. And more people dying, you get rich." "You bombed the embassy because they were onto you. To stoke even more attention". Varrick smiles, "Competition. Competition. It's great for innovation, terrible for business". Varrick flees into one of his mechs, Asami dust pick up one of the electric gloves and a mechanized arm that gives it the strength of three men. The two fight to top Varrick's ship until Asami gets the upper hand and brings him down, he is promptly arrested.
[Episode 13: Echoes of the Past]
Korra arrives at the Southern Spirit Wilds that Unalaq took her to at the beginning of the season. Following her vague memories of the landscape from her time with Avatar Wan, she locates where the Spirit Portal should be. It's currently wrapped up in brambles and thorns, entirely hidden from view. She senses something is following her, and something is. A huge spirit tears out of the forest, a love-crafting creature of vines and pincers, and ice and things Korra doesn't even recognize. “I'm here to open the portal”, she tries to explain. But the spirit is enraged and attacks her. Unalaq decides that this is the time to end the fight for the South, and gives a speech to the unionists and his forces. “Time and again, we have seen the scars of war and history leave cultures forever wounded, unable to recover, unable to remember. You don't think that the air-nomads have lost their ancient traditions? They are left with the memory of one man. The spirits have been angry for this reason, yet they do not attack us because they know that our cause is right. Only in preserving this heritage can we ensure a stable and true South for the Water Tribe. Yes, the One Water Tribe, as it was and now shall be.” But at this speech, it's also noticeable that the South is less in favor of the Union than it was at the beginning. People are whispering amongst themselves, you know. “Why is Unalaq using these mechs and all this technology after denouncing this lifestyle for so long? Mechs that were clearly not built in the South, but in Republic City.” The final battle commences with Unalaq launching a new offensive, outward. The resistance has gone to find Tonraq to bring him home, their chief as a symbol of their resistance. As the South has started to unite a bit more around independence, they say that it might have once been around tradition or moving into the new world. But the mechs kind of changed that, and independence from the North is more important now. Varrick's propaganda, for better or worse, has reached them as well. They see the smoke and the distance of Unalaq's mechs approaching and ready for one final battle. They have the numbers, but not the technology. Korra continues to fight the spirit, and the episode ends with it trapping her and a tangle of vines right over the portal, about to kill her.
[Episode 14: Light in the Dark]
Korra tries to fight off the spirit, straining harder and harder. Thrashing before realizing that she can show the spirit her good intentions by opening the portal. She reaches for it desperately, only just managing to touch it with the tip of a finger, just like we see in that really cool scene at the beginning of the show. The bridge between man and spirit shattering the barrier that has grown between them. An explosion of spiritual energy throws them backwards and illuminates the sky with the Southern Lights. The Spirit Wilds turn from ice and cold to a gorgeous green forest, an oasis in the cold. Warmed by the life of the portal, which now glitters like a marble. The spirit attacking her returns to its uncorrupted form, a gorgeous tree entity. In fact, one of the ones that she saw in the vision with Wan when the pact was originally made. This spirit is ancient, she boughs reverently, and the spirit bows back. With that, she feels assured in her role as the Avatar, she managed to do something really good. Not someone who needs to decide every man-made conflict in the world, but the bridge between spirits and humanity, that she can do. Korra returns to the Southern Water Tribe to find it in chaos, she tries to intervene. "The pact is restored", she tries to tell people, "the Spirit Portal is open". True enough, no corrupted spirits are involved in the fight. Slowly, the South pushes Unalaq's forces back with Korra and Asami's help. They fight together and work together, and they seem to work really well as a couple. But when it comes to the final blow, Korra makes herself take a step back. And she lets Tonraq, the chief, face Unalaq himself. "Hello again, brother", he says. "I knew you'd come back. You always do." "You can't banish every problem Unalaq." Soon they have nowhere to go. The press takes photos of this interaction and paints it as a victory for the South. The South winning over the North in a real resolution, rather than the Avatar just deciding. Korra reconnects with her mother. "You are right", she says. "Sometimes people have to solve their own problems and I've got to solve the problems of the Avatar." She explains how she got her bending back by listening to the spirits the same way the original benders had learned. And wonders if maybe other non-benders could do the same with dragons, with badger-moles and sky-bison.
On the distant island of sky-bison that Tenzin and his family have found, they're learning the strained ways of life of these people. And in turn, Tenzin introduces them to Nomad ways of life. He sighs, knowing that they will never be full air-nomads, but admits that he feels some camaraderie with them. But as the autumn winds sweep into the valley, one of the children riding one of the young sky bison land and turns to touch its forehead. The exact same way that we see Aang do, that the nomads are always taught to when they're young. And in that moment, the boy floats, air-bending, for the first time.
With Southern sentiments strongly for independence now, the Northern forces leave and Unalaq with them. He warns against losing their culture, and Tonraq acknowledges the truth of it. He swears in front of his people to do more, to preserve and remember their culture, with Korra standing beside him. Korra and Asami talk about the civil war, about how hard it is to intervene. Not only that her duty to her family often gets in the way of her duty to the world, but it's hard to know how to intervene effectively. That it wasn't about just picking the right side and giving it the biggest weapon, the Avatar. But it was about finding out the way to help. Asami says, "This is why the Avatar has been such a target for the Equalists. That they're flawed beings with immense power, but sometimes people need to solve their own problems, like Republic City is now doing." Asami says that she faced the same problem. She was on the right side with the Equalists, but wasn't sure the right way to help. Korra then admits that the role of the Avatar isn't what she grew up thinking, it was the policeman of the world. Korra and Asami get word from Tenzin to come to this strange island. Who announces proudly that he might have found a new community of air-nomads, which is just bizarre.
They don't understand and so they rush off. Korra arrives and goes, "Oh, my gosh, I'm right, you know. Like these people have learned, people could learn with the right dedication to that way of life", just like she saw with Wan originally.
And the series closes as they reunite with Mako and Bolin.
[Season Conclusion]
Okay, let's be real. The main problems with Season Two were the spirit lasers, the bizarre left turn halfway through the series that totally abandoned the interesting plot, and the strange Deus Ex Machina ending. I tried to fix those, while also respecting the original intention. You've got new air-benders, you've got the portal opening, you've got the spirit and mortal worlds being connected again.
(My question is, though, how would you fix Season Two? How would you rewrite it?)
This also builds into what I feel is pretty clearly the overarching theme of Legend of Korra. The shifting role of the Avatar in the modern world. What is their role in these new geopolitics? We see this with Amon, with Zaheer and Kuvira all questioning the role of the Avatar. And here she learns a bit more about what that means for her personally.
Korrasami: Let's be honest, Korrasami wasn't really set up. Or at least it wasn't enough for me. I mean, Nickelodeon was afraid that the moment a child saw two women kiss on a screen, they would immediately combust into rainbow confetti. So we're going to fix that.
The giant robot was weird out of place and tonally bizarre.
Kuvira: She kind of bounces from sympathetic to cartoonish villain, and I think we can handle her better in just a few scenes.
(We've actually already fixed the previous three seasons, and you don't need to watch those videos if you don't want to. All you really need to know is...)
Korra’s Bending: Korra has regained her water-bending and air-bending after Amon, but not her fire-bending and earth-bending quite yet.
She's semi-banned from Republic City because the Equalists.
Opal is an air-bender, but she's not a Beifong. Or she is a Beifong, but not an airbender. It doesn't really matter, it's whichever you prefer.
(But do go check out those other videos they're linked up in the corner.)
[Episode 1: After All These Years]
Just like in the series, we jump forward three years in time. Prince Wu is about to be crowned Earth King, Mako is his bodyguard.
While Bolin and Varrick are working with Kuvira to unite the Earth Kingdom after the chaos, in the wake of Zaheer. We are introduced to Kuvira in that same iconic scene on the rail line, which is just fantastic, a brilliant way to introduce your main antagonist.
(But there is going to be one slight world-building change here. So in the show, supposedly every province of the Earth Kingdom fell into anarchy and chaos after Zaheer killed the Earth Queen in Ba Sing Se, now there's bandits everywhere. But the thing is, the Earth Kingdom is extremely decentralized politically, already. Ba Sing Se falling apart would not cause the rest of it to fall into chaos. Like, imagine if Florida collapsed, it wouldn't mean that California collapses as well. But Ba Sing Se was still the biggest boy on the block, and if any of these outlying provinces started fighting amongst each other, then the Earth King could probably step in to stop them. So we're actually going to make it so that the chaos that the show talks about, was the result of Earth Kingdom provinces picking up old grievances in a ton of little civil wars with nobody to stop them.)
This does three things:
It's more realistic.
It means that Kuvira isn't just extorting and blackmailing these states into giving up control so that they feel safe again. Yeah, she's still extorting them, but she's extorting lords who want to wage their own little petty wars for selfish gain, wars that affect the common people the most. In the Opening Episode, she'll confront the governor, but this time she'll say something like, “Your people are running out of food, your borders are collapsing, you can't wage this little war of yours any longer. The question is not if your people will starve, but when. You'll stop this little tantrum, put down your grievances against the Yai Province, and return to the fold of the Earth Kingdom- your people will thank you for it. You'll remain in charge, but under my supervision”.
I actually think it's more interesting to have Kuvira go from someone who puts down war-mongers in the name of unification and order and peace, to becoming a war-monger herself. It'll also make Bolin and Varrick's moral decision to leave her cause more complex.
(Because in the show, it's really just about them finding out the truth of how extortionate and black-maily Kuvira always was.)
In this version, they'll instead have to reconcile their own values with her actions as she begins pushing too far and taking states that aren't like this. In the show, they're just kind of lied to. We also see how decadent and disconnected Prince Wu is from his own people, even though he insists he's just like everyone else. And we're meant to see how antiquated the institution of the monarchy itself is.
Immediately juxtaposed with Kuvira's efficiency and meritocracy and inclusiveness. Opal, as in the show doesn't like Kuvira, and this has caused a rift between her and Bolin.
Elsewhere, Korra is wandering in the wilderness, having renounced her identity as the Avatar. She's managed to heal enough after Zaheer to walk again. But she's lost emotionally and spiritually, losing cage fire fight after cage fight. So Episode One is basically the same. These characters are in the same places, and we've really just softened Kuvira's starting position.
[Episode 2: Korra Alone]
This episode parallels Zuko Alone, centering on a single character's struggles when they feel most lost in themselves: physically, emotionally and spiritually. And it's literalized by them being lost out in the world.
(Some people have complained that it's dumb that Korra is struggling so much here because, I don't know, she went through harder things before and she was fine. But I think this really misunderstands trauma and Korra's arc. Trauma isn't a linear experience, and the path to recovery is rarely predictable. Especially when you've been physically debilitated the way that Korra has, it has lasting psychological implications. We often feel out of control of our own bodies, and I think the show captures that really, really well.)
We see flashbacks of the past few years as she tried to heal at the South Pole. Meditation and physical therapy and Katara's healing, and in this time, she did manage to improve. She even managed to get back some inkling of the earth-bending and fire-bending inside her again, the same way that she regained her water-bending in Season Two. She can feel it inside her just beyond the tips of her fingers, but she can't control the elements at all. And she certainly can't control the Avatar state, just like she feels barely in control of herself. “Of course I'm frustrated!”, she says, “A crazy man poisoned me, and now I can't dress myself, or cook for myself, o-or do anything for myself! And this whole time, my friends have been off helping the world while I'm stuck here with you, and you can't even heal me! I'm sorry, that came out wrong. I'm tired, Katara. I'm so tired”. People do come to visit her every so often and send her letters. But Korra feels so isolated that she stops replying to all of them, except Asami.
(We’re meant to get the impression that these two have bonded over the last few years. I remember watching this when the series first aired and thinking it was odd that she wrote back to Asami. But hopefully in our rewrites of Season Two and Three and One, we've given that a little bit more of a build up.)
Korra writes to Asami saying, “Don't tell the others I'm writing to you and not them. [she writes] I mean, Tenzin is all busy, and Mako just keeps talking about how excited he is for me to come back to being the Avatar. And Bolin just says, ‘All I need is a distraction’. I can't handle that... it's like I've hit a wall. Sometimes I worry if I'll ever fully recover. You're the only one that seems to listen”.
(Asami is her confident in this scene, and we're meant to see a level of empathy from Asami, that Korra doesn't get from others. There's a romantic subtext here too, but I didn't want it to be about sexual attraction. And when you look at the supposed evidence of them building up to this relationship in the series. A lot of it's just casual flirting between the two of them, which I think is a pretty shallow way to explore the relationship. It's got to be about this intense sense of isolation and shame after having lost so much in her place in the world, and Asami is the only one that seems to be able to break through.)
So Korra decides to leave, she's fed up, and she tells everyone that she's going to Republic City.
But after being defeated by just a couple of bandits on the way, all her insecurities takeover, and she begins that wilderness wandering.
She can't get better, she can't return. So what is she to do but disappear? Korra cutting off her hair here resonates symbolically with that moment that Zuko does the same. In both cases, it's a rejection of their identity, as much as it is them being unable to figure out who they should become.
The only person Korra keeps in contact with throughout her wandering is Asami. Sending her letters from place to place, and Asami keeps her secret from the others.
Korra travels to the North Pole, to the Spirit World, to the desert. She seeks out a dragon and badger-moles, the original benders. Hoping to reconnect with the Avatar State and the final two elements, and all the while she keeps seeing this dark-chained vision of herself following her. This is the image of herself in the moment of her trauma.
Her journeys across the world, though, end her up in those same fighting pits we saw at the end of Episode One. And it's here that she stops sending Asami letters, wanting to truly fall into hiding.
Finally, she's led into the swamp, just like she is in the series and to Toph.
(Again, Episode Two is virtually identical, with just a few twicks to make Korra's journey align with rewrite. And how she's trying to get back to those elements, her identity or sense of self, and to further that relationship with Asami, which is so important.)
[Episode 3: The Coronation]
This episode plays out again, basically the same. Prince Wu is due to be crowned. But we continue to see how immature, ineffectual and inappropriate not only he is, but the institution of the monarchy.
(That's a crucial difference, right? So fantasy, including, like Avatar the first series has this: All you need is the right man on the throne approach. But Season Four explicitly says “No”, the monarchy itself is antiquated and bad as a system, and Kuvira's speech highlighting that technology and innovation should be the way forward. You can't help but kind of want her to take power, and that's a really cool trick.)
Again, though, we're gonna soften her rhetoric:
Be clearly less villainous
Actually make her more fascist, which is clearly the inspiration her character design is coming from. If you didn't get it from the whole, “I will bring order in uniforms, and everything”.
(“And let me assure my fellow leaders of one thing: We will not interfere in your internal affairs, and we expect you not to interfere in the Earth Empires. As we bring our people back together and reclaim our historic lands”)
Kuvira will say something like, “And let me assure my fellow leaders of one thing: We will not interfere in your internal affairs, and we expect you not to interfere with ours. As we finally bring back the Earth Kingdom peoples back together and reclaim our historic lands”.
(See, Dictatorships often slip into fascism when they take on this nationalistic historical narrative, right. With representing the “P” People and “L” Land. Often as a populist way to frame their restoring order, or seeking justice for historical wrongs. This leans into Kuvira's populism and shows how she's slipping from it. Just being about bringing Order to bringing about Her Order, that's the difference. That there is now kind of a virtue to her herself being in charge, it's got to be her. Whereas in the show, she seemingly frames herself as the aggressor from the start.)
So Mako and Bolin fall out over whether Kuvira is doing the right thing. Bolin is fully drinking the Kool Aid here. Kuvira is uniting the Earth Kingdom and helping the common people. While Mako is defending Prince Wu, who sort of represents this antiquated world order.
Meanwhile, Toph quote “Trains” Korra, by basically beating her up. And afterwards they sit down to talk. Korra explains how she's tried for so long to find what she's been missing, a new way to get back to who she was, but she can't find it. She asks, “What made you want to go off the grid?” And Toph says, “I'm more connected to the world than you've ever been! The roots and vines... here they run all over the world. I can see Su and Lin, and Zaofu, and Republic City. I see all those I've forgotten, all those I love. You're blind compared to me though”. Toph senses that there's still some metal inside Korra from when Zaheer here poisoned her. Which Korra leaps at because this is an answer, this is why she's still been so ill. This is why she can't get back to who she wants to be. But Toph can't bend it out of her because Korra can't relax. And Toph tells her, “Maybe you don't want to get rid of the poison because it means you have an excuse for not going back to being the Avatar, and you don't have to risk getting hurt again”. Korra shaken by that suggestion that on some level she doesn't want to go back, wanders off.
[Episode 4: The Calling]
Korra has managed to throw her friends off her trail. But with Kuvira taking power, they decide they need to find her. Asami is worried because Korra's letters have stopped. Though she only tells Tenzin this, not Mako and Bolin. Asami gives Korra's last known whereabouts, and Tenzin sends his kids to find her. After the air-bender kids leave, though, we see Asami packing a bag too.
Korra explores this spiritual swamp, because Toph really isn't being all that helpful. She tries over and over again to connect with the Fire and Earth elements in spiritual ways. She even encounters a badger-mole and mimics them for a time. But just as she exercises some small control over the metal in her body, she suffers from a flashback. That dark version of herself, and then Zaheer, striking at her, collapsing in a spasm of pain and memory.
(We're only really adding in the badger-mole here. It might not be necessary, but she needed to encounter one at some point in this story I feel, same with the dragon.)
The air-bender kids follow Korra's trail, but when the trail runs dead, Jinora decides she's going to try contact Korra through spiritual means, and begins meditating. Ikki gets captured by Earth Empire soldiers, but Meelo manages to rescue her. Toph brings Korra to the Banyan Grove, this huge spiritual tree. Toph tells her, “Your problem is, you've been disconnected for too long. Disconnected from the people who love you, disconnected from yourself. I can sense everyone I need from here, and so can you”. Following Toph’s instructions, Korra touches and meditates with the Banyan Grove. She reaches out to the people she needs most, and at the same time, Jinora's eyes snap open with realization. So I'd like to frame this moment so that we think these two are connecting, Jinora and Korra. When it's actually revealed that Korra has connected with Asami. Who has followed the trail on her own and was drawn into the swamp. When Korra imagines the people she needs and loves, she sees Asami first.
(See, there is a real problem with Korrasami in Season Four, okay? We don't get a single real scene between the two of them until Episode Seven. Over half the series gone, and even then, it doesn't amount to much more than light flirting. It certainly doesn't communicate anything deep about their personal relationship. Asami just gets mad at Korra over her dad. So in this, we're working to make Asami this emotional touchstone again, and give them more screen time together.)
Asami will help Korra patch up, after a training as they talk. “I suppose you're here to tell me the whole world has gone to hell without me.” “Well, yeah... But that can wait till later, you stopped writing.” “Not exactly a post office and a swamp.” “Why are you out here all alone?” “I met an old friend, you could say.” “Has it helped?” “I thought, if I could find something out here that would help heal me. Nothing was working back in the South Pole, I thought.” “It's all right, you don't have to say.” “I just get so angry because I've tried so hard, and I'm still not better.” She puts her head in her hands. “Why did you come? Why'd you find me?” “Because every time you try to go at it alone, it doesn't work out, but I'm here now.” “I guess you are.” And just like in the show, having reconnected with others and herself, Korra bends the poison metal out of herself, allowing her to re-enter the Avatar State, and regaining control of the earth and fire elements.
(I didn't want to make this story about Korra getting the four elements, we've already had that with Aang. So I wanted to bring it back in, but with more meaning in a different way.)
In the final scene of this episode, Jinora reveals that she has sensed Kuvira's army moving towards Zaofu, and a lot quicker than they ever first suspected.
[Episode 5: Enemy at the Gates]
This is the first episode that we really see the Spirit-Vine laser, that Varrick and Bolin are working on.
(I am not a fan of this plot beat or aesthetic, whatever you want to call it, for two reasons.)
It feels like bringing artillery into Middle Earth, it just doesn't fit.
And more importantly... This whole thing, right, is based on the idea that spiritual energy is a harness-able, quantifiable force of nature in the world that can be turned into a laser. No!
(Spiritual energy is a psychological, philosophical thing. Even as far back as Aang's conversation with Guru Patik. The power of spirituality or the like, was so much more subtle. Expressed through bending ability, and wisdom, and the ability to controls one body. Like Kyoshi used it to slowdown her aging, to 230 years. Turning it into raw power like this, feels almost antithetical to the role spirits and spirituality have played in the series. Just like I don't like the laser battle at the end of Season Two, I don't like this. It is also meant to be a rough parallel to nuclear weapons.)
Varrick even says, “This power is too dangerous for anyone to have”.
(But I don't know. I don't think the show explores that prospect particularly well, you know, especially with how flippantly the laser is used. So, no! We're going to change this. I don't mind the idea of Varrick building super-weapons and having second thoughts, but we're going to scale it back to something like the Schwerer Gustav. The largest piece of artillery ever built by the Nazis that moved along railways. And also, here's why. It's the very inspiration for the railway gun that we see in a later episode. This doesn't feel as unnatural to the world, and it doesn't undermine the spiritual themes.)
As in the show, Varrick will test this new weapon with greater range and destructive power than anything we've seen before. But Varrick is going to have second thoughts, that this can't fall into the wrong hands. Only for Kuvira to insist that she is the right hands, and threaten him.
(One funny side note about this, though. Is so every single time people tried to build these huge artillery guns to be terrifying, they always failed. They were useless, they never worked in battle. And they just always fell apart, and were super expensive failures, I love it. So they're not actually threatening, but this is fiction.)
Kuvira demands Zaofu join the Empire, and when Suyin refuses, Kuvira says, “All right, I'll just take it by force”. Bolin and Varrick are conflicted, they were on board with stabilizing the empire. But not conquering regions that weren't doing anything, that weren't waging war like Zaofu. The two decide to abandon the cause, but here Zhu’li betrays them, and they were captured. Suyin implores Korra to go stop Kuvira herself, just like in the show. But Korra is reluctant, and she'll say something like, “I don't know. Last time I got involved in politics because of my friends, it didn't turn out well. The other nations appointed Kuvira, they should be involved. But fine, I'll talk to her at least. See if I can make her turned back”. Here, She's thinking back to the Water Tribe's civil war. Korra parlays with Kuvira, but it doesn't work. Korra returns only to find Suyin and her two sons have already left to try and assassinate Kuvira.
[Episode 6: The Battle of Zaofu]
This is probably my favorite Korra episode, it is perfect from start to end. Suyin and her sons are captured after trying to assassinate Kuvira, who’s enraged that their peace was broken. Opal wants to attack Kuvira, damning her air-bender oath of non-aggression, but Jinora insists she should keep it. Kuvira challenges Korra to a duel for control of Zaofu, and Korra initially refuses. “The other nations have to be involved”. But when Kuvira says, “Well, all right. I'll just take it anyway”. Korra agrees reluctantly, partly because she has no choice, and also because she wants to prove herself as the Avatar again. And then, Korra gets absolutely nailed in a brilliant scene. This moment where Kuvira says like, “Fight me! Use whatever you want, even the Avatar state”.
(It is such a good tone setter, and moment for our villain, really establishing the threat she poses.)
The thing is, even without the poison, Korra is out of practice and still mentally unstable. She hallucinates a dark version of herself in the middle of the fight, and Zaofu falls. Asami watches in horror, “What's wrong with her? We got the poison out. I don't understand?” Asami rushes to pick Korra up in the last moments, dragging her away. While the air-bender kids whip up a whirlwind to help them escape, Zaofu surrenders.
In the meantime, Bolin and Varrick make a daring escape together.
(There's not much else to it. I wish I could spend more time in this episode because it's so damn good, but there are no big changes.)
Previously on Legend of Korra…
The battle with the Equalist is over, but only on one condition, the Avatar leaves Republic City. While Asami was an Equalist, she eventually realized that getting rid of bending was not the only way to solve their problems, and had a change of heart. And though the fight is over, Korra has lost all the elements except for one, her air-bending.
[Episode 1: Rebel Spirit]
Korra has returned to the Southern Water Tribe with Tenzin and hopes that healing might be able to bring her bending back, but it doesn't work. "Aang came to me", explains Korra, “and he said that there are great powers out there in the world that might be able to help, but I have no idea where to start”.
Meanwhile, back in Republic City, Asami, Mako, Lin Beifong and Bolin are working to create a new peace between benders and non-benders. Reforming the police force to include non-benders with their new technology. Setting up job programs and electing a council with equal representation between them. Asami explains, “With all these changes, Amon's radical branch of the Equalists have gone into hiding, but they're still out there. Pro-bending is now more popular than ever, especially because there's a new variant of it where non-benders are able to compete too. With the new technology that Sato Industries has provided and proliferated”. Mako is still skeptical of Asami, who forced Korra to leave the city. But Bolin keeps the peace between them. Asami insists that getting business back into Republic City is crucial to getting the city off its feet. Which is when we're introduced to Varrick, who promises huge investment with wild business ideas. “How about a sports tournament with all the nations and they can compete? No, wait, it'll just be us. And all of the other nations can watch how amazing we are. And then we'll call it the World Series, despite all of them.” Ultimately, though, they bond over a sheer desire to bring peace to the city.
Returning to Korra in the South, we see how in the years since the Hundred Years War, the South has rapidly rebuilt. It's developed an oil industry and a new culture of its own that is heavily influenced by the Fire Nation and the Earth Kingdom, who have been providing aid and trade as a way of helping it rebuild. While the South has always celebrated the Winter Solstice, the celebration this year is commercialized, like we see in the show. Korra has a fantastic time trying new foods and rides with Tenzin. But she eventually finds Katara off to the edge of the village, who explains that a lot of the tribe just isn't happy with this. They don't like seeing this kind of commercialization, that people have forgotten Water Tribe traditions around the Winter Solstice. That they're treating them like they don't matter, and the fair itself was built over an important cultural site during the Hundred Years War. Katara says, “Our cities dwindled, we forgot this place. Legend says it was where we first landed, and the Ocean Spirit blessed our land with food. Now look what we have done”. Behind her is a group of Southerners who are carrying out an old traditional Water Tribe blessing, led by Unalaq, Korra's uncle, and chieftain of the Northern Water Tribe. Korra participates in this cultural blessing, but when the ritual asks her to water-bend, she frightfully backs away. Pretending she has to be somewhere else for vague Avatar reasons, an explosion inside the city draws Korra away. Just like in the show, a rebel spirit is attacking the fair.
(But we're going to change one small thing about this spirit, right? It's not going to be a dark spirit, like the demon-inspired creature that we see in the show. But it's going to be more of a twisted version of a tiger-seal ocean creature. Not unlike Heibi in The Last Airbender, was a twisted version of a panda that represents the forest. One of the things that I never liked about Season Two, and I don't think many people liked it. Was that it introduced this dichotomy of good and evil spirits, when they were always meant to be these otherworldly unknowable beings. So we're turning away from that visual aesthetic.)
As the spirit attacks the celebrations, Korra and Tenzin can't bring it down. It's only when Unalaq intervenes and destroys the Ferris wheel that was built over top of that sacred spiritual location that he confronts the spirit and it calms. Transforming back into its original form, and slinking back into the ocean. Unalaq turns to Korra, “The South's corrupted culture has angered the spirits, they've forgotten who they are. Look at this place, a desecration of our history. And you, Avatar, you've lost your water-bending”. Korra is shocked that Unalaq figured this out. She just barely told anyone, but admits what happened. “Amon took it, and I'm trying to find it again.” Unalaq nods, “I see. Avatar. No. Korra. May I? Much like the water tribes, I believe you must return to your cultural roots. To understand where water-bending truly comes from, if you are to find it again”. He offers to train Korra in the old and forgotten arts of the Water Tribe. Tenzin resists this and he insists, “No, I am your mentor. This is not how it's meant to be”. But Korra gets up in arms, “How are you meant to help with me getting my water-bending back?” Korra does go with Unalaq, and Tenzin frustrated leaves to go rejoin his family.
(So episode one is actually almost identical to what we get in the show, right? All we're really doing is emphasizing the themes that are really already there. Season Two plays with a really fascinating idea that post-colonial or post-genocide peoples often struggle to hold on to their cultural heritage. There's this economic incentive right, to conform as they reintegrate into a global world. Taking on Fire Nation, Earth Kingdom culture, and protecting traditions is really difficult in that environment, we see that in our own world. This corruption, I think, is best expressed in a corrupted version of a spirit rather than this demon looking thing.)
[Episode 2: The Southern Lights]
Korra joins her family the following day. Her father Tonraq is the Chief of the South. "Didn't the solstice go brilliantly", he says. "Money is finally flowing back into the South." "Aren't you worried about the loss of our heritage though, our traditions?", asks Korra and her mother intervenes. "Look, building this place up again hasn't been easy. We're we're not the same people we once were. We aren't the same people we were before the war. People leave for the big cities all over. This is bringing jobs back, it's bringing money, life back into this place we love. We can be the South and we can still find out who we're meant to be." Now, unsure what to say, Korra explains that she's going to train with Unalaq in hopes of getting her water-bending back. Korra is kind of vulnerable to this idea that culture is really important at the moment because she's lost her water-bending and she needs to find a way back. And it's not just part of who she is as the Avatar, it's her original culture, right? She is a water-bender at heart. Her father warns her that Unalaq is a difficult man. But Korra doesn't budge, she senses a history between them. That night, Korra dreams of a strange boy stealing some bread.
Back in Republic City, Varrick is building this new factory that hires both non-bender technicians and benders. Asami, Mako and Bolin are inspecting one of the factories when an Equalist assassin breaks in and tries to kill Asami. Mako saves her, and they theorized that it must be the last remnants of Amon's radicals trying to take her out. You know, a final revenge, but Mako isn't so sure. Beifong and the police force meet with Mako, who has been appointed a detective. Upon inspecting the body, they find a tattoo of a Triple Triad member, a gang that is almost entirely composed of benders. Why would they be dressed up in non-bender garb?
Unalaq takes Korra deep into the wilderness towards the South Pole, just like he does in the show. He explains, “That long ago the South made a pact with the spirits, but that packed has long been broken. That during the Hundred Year War, it was even forgotten, that they neglected it. And they made it even worse by neglecting their culture, as they do now”. They come upon the Spirit Forest at the South Pole.
(The wilds we see in the show that I really do love.)
This ancient forest in the midst of ice and wind, except it's all dead. It's riddled with brambles and thorns and ugly creatures. Unalaq explains, "Did you know that once, long ago, our two tribes were united as one? Only war and time separated us. And since then, the South has neglected its spiritual needs, much like this place, you can see it. It needs the North to guide it back to who it is. You see, we did not forget Avatar. We remember, let me show you". They found a metal deposit here in the midst of the forest, stripped it dry for a pretty yuan and abandoned it. Korra replies, "I'm not much of an Avatar anymore". But Unalaq stops her, "Of course you are, A few elements don't change that. You're still the Avatar, nobody else's. It's a part of you, more than the elements ever are". Corrupted spirits limping in the shadows attack them, and a fight ensues. And Unalaq presses her, "You know what you have to do, Avatar". And Korra, with a blast of her air-bending, brings the mineshaft down on itself and the spirits return to normal. "That will placate them for a time", says Unalaq. "But the problem runs much deeper than a few buildings here or there. Cultures, it runs deep, it's hard to change. You must look to the past for the pact and uphold it while I bring the South back to its roots." She asks what the pact was, and Unalaq admits he doesn't know. That she needs to find out what it is as the Avatar. When they return, though, they find Northern forces arriving in the South.
(Again episode two really isn't that different, right? We've got the intrigue plot around Varrick and Asami in Republic City, and Unalaq taking corridor the forest and the North arriving. The only real difference here is that we're not introducing the Spirit Portal, at least not yet. It will come. One of the core issues with Season Two is that there's really these two stories that don't work together at all. We've got in the first half of the series this Civil War plot where Unalaq is trying to bring back the South to its roots, its culture. And then I say there's the evil kite plot where Unalaq is pure evil and just wants to conquer the world to become Satan. Just makes me laugh thinking about it. There is no narrative need for Korra to learn about Avatar Wan, the way that they set up the story in the in the show. There's this hard left turn right in the middle of the series that just forgets the Civil War plot entirely. We don't come back to it, so I want to fix that. By introducing this concept of the Southern pact, it ties together that Korra needs to get her bending. It's her looking into the past, and it's the Civil War plotline.)
[Episode 3: Civil Wars, Part One]
Southerners immediately begin to organize and resist this Northern occupation. But there is also a sizable group who welcome it, who we saw at the start. Who think of this as uniting with their sister tribe as a way back to tradition, to remembering who they are, rather than being the puppets of the Earth Kingdom and Fire Nation. And she comes between the two sides. "You're on their side." "I'm not on anyone's side", just like we see in the show. And that small girl hurls a snowball at her, "You're the worst Avatar ever". That night, a band of Southerners break into Unalaq's room. They knock him out and kidnap him just the same as they do in the show, but Korra intervenes. "Stay out of this, Avatar", says one. But when she beats them all up and rescues Unalaq, she discovers that her father was leading the raid. "Korra", he says, "I understand that we have left behind some of who we once were, who our parents and before them were. But we don't have the privilege, the North does, they were untouched by the war. We still barely have benders amongst us as it is, and those we have, they leave. Our independence is valuable, we don't just want to be a poor copy of the North". Her father asks her to hand over Unalag's unconscious body, but Korra refuses. Desperate to get her bending back and feeling that this man is kind of the only way. Unalaq recovers, but when he asks Korra if she knows who took him, she lies to protect her father. With the city settling into an uncomfortable calm, Korra begins to look into what this ancient pact might have been. Unalaq points it to a cave outside the city where settlers originally took shelter, that there might be some hints there. Korra finds the cave and sees a huge carving in the walls. It depicts a sphere of some kind, and either side of it is a planet, the pattern of which mirror each other. Korra has no idea what this means, thinks of the Spirit World, potentially, and wishes Tenzin were there to help. He was always better with this stuff than her.
Tenzin rejoins his family at the Southern Air Temple, taking them around the different Air-Nomad locations as part of their education, just like in the show. Though Jinora is strangely drawn to statues of the past, of Avatars and of sky-bison. Tenzin explains that the sky-bison were the original benders that people had once learned from them, but it's a long lost art. And he laments that they are the only air-benders left in the world. That Aang knew this burden too, but Tenzin really didn't understand how hard it would be.
[Episode 4: Civil Wars, Part Two]
In Republic City, the Southern Water Tribe embassy is bombed. Mako and Lin Beifong investigate and conclude it has to do with the evolving tensions down South. Figuring it must be agitated Northerners in Republic City, they begin rounding them up for interviews. But again, Mako isn't convinced. "Why bomb the embassy?", he says, "If they're Northerners, the last thing they'd want to do is get Republic City involved when the north has the the upper hand". Lin Beifong replies, "Young people get swept up in all sorts of stupid things". She then laments about how hard policing is without her bending, having lost it to Amon last season.
In the South, Unalaq orders Tonraq's arrest. Korra's father under suspicion that he tried to assassinate Unalaq, but also because he wants to control the South. Korra begs his forgiveness, swearing that she didn't turn him in. And he says, "Quiet, Korra, I know you didn't. Unalaq and I have always had a difficult relationship." He was never going to let the Chief of the South walk free. Korra insists that this is all temporary, that she'll sort it out. That she has a duty as the Avatar to bring back balance between the spirit world and the mortal world, and this is the only way. Her father shrugs, taken off towards his trial.
(See? Okay, around this point in the show, we start to get the idea that Unalaq is literally just a psychopath. It's all about power for himself. It's not really about tradition, and he just wants to be evil. Okay? All of the other villains in the show have a real point to make, but Unalaq is just pure evil. He's a liar, and frankly, he's boring. Okay, so unlike in the show, this isn't going to be a sham trial.)
Korra watches Tonraq get banished, but it's legitimately because he tried to kill Unalaq when asked about it. Unalaq will explain that back in the Northern Water Tribe, Tonraq harmed a similar spirit forest at the North Pole. He brought corrupted spirits down on the city, and he wouldn't let that happen again. He laments the loss of that relationship with his brother.
(And unlike in the series, this isn't going to be a lie either.)
Unalaq is genuinely going to grip this, he loves his brother.
(So Unalaq didn't stage any of this. Tonraq harming a Spirit Forest in a modernizing world is thematically cogent. And it complicates Korra's place in the story. That conflict between her love for her family and her duty to the spirits, something that every Avatar is going to deal with and this story critiques.)
"Remember who you are, Avatar", says Unalaq. "Your duty lies to both worlds, not any one man or family."
(And also Tonraq. Damaging the Spirit Forest doesn't destroy his character. It just makes him complicated, right? He's got a whole bunch of different things that he has to manage.)
That night, though, Korra again dreams of that strange boy and of a lion turtle and of the deep past.
[Episode 5: Peacekeepers]
Mako and Beifong continue to investigate the embassy bombing, which has since caused an international uproar of sympathy for the Southern cause. A Triple Triad member then tips them off, that they were investigating something to do with the Southern conflict. They found something, a deal had been struck between the North and someone else. But who? They joined Asami and Varrick, who insists that Republic City stay out of this fight, it wasn't theirs. But a survivor of the bombing explains that the South has barely any benders left, even after 70 years, compared to the North. Asami then begins to view the Southern resistance as a conflict between benders and non-benders, and she promises Sato industry weapons to help the cause. But Varrick says, “I'm already three steps ahead of you”. He's been a patron of the Equalist movement before himself, and has already sent a shipment of weapons to the resistance.
Shifting to the South, the trial and banishment of the Southern Chief galvanizes that Southern Resistance who spark a fight in the streets. But this time they have Varrick's powerful technology that takes the North by surprise, electric gloves and mech-arms that allow them to turn the tides. Korra is, of course, caught up in the middle of all of this and tries to insist that she's not picking any side. But she's seen as Unalaq's ally and is attacked, the Northern forces are pushed back, and the resistance takes over half of the city. Water-benders from the North in a bid to hold them back, carve a river through the middle of the South to separate them. The resistance takes this as a victory. Korra meets with Unalaq, who isn't worried about this fight. And insists that soon the tides of war will turn back in their favor, though he refuses to elaborate how. Korra again feels conflicted, unsure if she is betraying her people or helping them in response. Unalaq takes her deep inside an old maze of icy catacombs, where some Southerners are learning ancient water-bending forms that follow the rivers of arctic water through the ice. Something that was only ever done in the South, but that the North remembered. Korra tries the forms herself and almost tricks herself into thinking she's got her water-bending back, listening to the ocean and feeling for the moon, which shines through a tiny gap in the ceiling above. But nothing, she hasn't got it back. Even though she's glad to see these old parts of her culture. That night, Korra dreams of two things: An island near the Fire Nation and a group of humans dressed in old water tribe garb meeting spirits between two worlds.
[Episode 6: The Trap is Sprung]
Tenzin and his family arrive in the Western Air Temple. Jinora is drawn off by glimpses of a cat-deer spirit into the wilderness, and her siblings follow. Tenzin, Kya, and Bumi all set out to find them.
Back in Republic City, Varrick is producing anti-Northern propaganda pieces to help garner sympathy for the South.
(But unlike in the show, Bolin is not going to star in them. Because personally, I thought there was a terrible plot, and it just made Bolin look like an idiot. And also everything with Desna and Eska, that was a horrible storyline. It was just abusive and bad. No, we're not doing any of that.)
(Okay, I may have been a bit harsh on the whole Bolin being in the propaganda thing. He can do that if you want, It doesn't really matter, that he's not getting into a relationship with Desna or Eska, okay. The twins can be there, but no relationship, that was bad. But Varrick and Bolin still developed that amazing inventive friendship, because that was adorable, and it made me laugh.)
In the South, the newly armed resistance members move to take Unalaq out. Korra is starting to have doubts about which side she's on. But still committed to getting back her water-bending, to preserving that ancient pact. And she sneaks around to talk to her mother. See, for so long, Korra has worked in black and white morality. The idea that there has to be a right side to be on. There has to be a clear place for the Avatar in history, and she has to be able to do something right. But her mother challenges this, "The problems between the North and South started long before you were born. You can't expect to undo them in a day". Korra replies incredulous, "So I should just sit back and watch the water tribes go to war?" "No, but this situation might be out of your control." This is the first time that Korra has really been confronted with the idea that something might be beyond her role as the Avatar, that it has to be solved by other people. Her mother asks whether Korra will warn Unalaq that the attack is coming. And we cut there. Korra doesn't warn Unalaq, but Unalaq has another plan anyway. He lures the technologically armed Southerners into a sacred old temple for the South. "Their ignorance will see them destroyed", he says. As corrupted spirits form, furious that these Southerners would bring such technology into a place like this. They didn't follow the proper rituals, the Northerners are able to get away unscathed. But the Southerners, who don't know how to interact with the spirits, are defeated, their technology destroyed. The press has arrived in the South as well to document this war, as well as Varrick's Moviemakers to document footage for his propaganda. Capturing some of the corrupted spirits and Unalaq's trap to use on the world stage.
Tenzin, Kya, and Bumi bond over memories of their father, Aang, just like they do in the show. I actually really liked the scene, Tenzin insists that he was the perfect father who was a model dad. While the others point out that he wasn't perfect, that he played favorites.
(Now, I got to be honest, some people kind of hate this scene because it paints Aang as less than perfect a father. But I really like it, I think it's really dumb to extrapolate what kind of parents someone will be by their personality as a twelve year old. But also I think it makes total sense that Aang would struggle to balance his duty to the Nomads and Tenzin as a symbol of that legacy compared to his other children. It is an interesting conflict and a flaw for him to have. And it didn't make him a terrible father, it just made him human.)
The adults find Jinora and the other kids in front of a statue of humans learning to bend from sky-bison. And Jinora asks, "Is it possible to do that again". But Tenzin insists, “No it's not”, and they need to get on with their training.
So, in our rewrite, Season Three starts in virtually the same place, practically. The Southern spirit portal has opened, the spirits are moving into the physical mortal world, and new air-benders have appeared, the only difference is the reason. It's still a magical moment in its own right, but it doesn't come from the vague magical space kite energy from space with planets. It's because Tenzin finds this group of people, who we're going to call the bison nation. Who have been living amongst sky-bison, kind of learning their own spiritual and philosophical ways for generations. And this is actually kind of drawn from Season Two, where we find this isolated tribe of people who are super spiritual, living along sky-bison, and we're taking that and just changing a little bit. It's not just genetics, and I think it reflects the deeper themes of the show better. Just like on the show, Tenzin is going to try and recruit these people to join his new air-nomads, but most of them aren't going to want to. I mean, they have their own lives, their own traditions, their own culture that they don't just want to uproot. A new group of air-benders inspired to go and find out who they are, will even set sail with their newfound powers to go see Ba Sing Se for themselves. Believing that they can make it on their own, that they want to see the world. That's when Tenzin will get wind that Zaheer has escaped, and the village elder's face will go dark at the mention of his name. “Zaheer was one of our greatest spiritual leaders. He kept the histories like few others, but when he took a dark path, he was exiled. If he has developed air-bending, as some of ours just have, then he will be extremely dangerous”. So this explains Zaheer’s knowledge of the air-nomads, his history, and it gives him more of a grounding in the story at hand. It's also how we're going to meet Kai nd no, I want to clarify this doesn't mean that anyone can become a bender. So it's a common theme in fantasy, for magical things like this older magics to fade as time goes on. Later on in the season, when Korra meets Iroh, you know, he's going to explain to her that humanity has probably lost the ability to learn like that. As they distance themselves from the spirits, from nature.
It only happened with the air-benders because...
These guys have been living the spiritual lifestyle alongside sky-bison for generations.
It's only happened to a handful of them.
Air-bending was always the most spiritually connected, and so it was probably the one most likely that this happened to.
Maybe it could happen elsewhere, but it would be so rare and difficult that it be dismissed as rumor. Or as someone who just already had bending, right? Only someone likes Zaheer or the Avatar could do it. So Tenzin and Team Avatar spend time learning about this community, their ways of life. How similar they are to the Nomads, even though they branched off a long time ago, but also that they're different. They have their own culture, and they stay there on this island to keep Korra safe. To keep a secret, while they learn exactly what's going on.
And weeks later, Tenzin will get word that the other air-benders who left the Ba Sing Se, have vanished. Team Avatar will go to investigate, just like they do in the show, and rescue them.
[Change #4: Zaheer’s Philosophy]
Change Number Four: Zaheer's Philosophy
One more small thing to change is how the show represents anarchy.
In Episode Nine, Zaheer gives Korra the spiel about how they need to overthrow tyrannical governments. You know, we've seen how Sozin's autocracy led to the air-nomad genocide. Then there's the Earth Queen, who has the temperament of the 50 year old woman drunk on the power of a shift manager at a supermarket. There was Unalaq who tried to do a colonialism, and he is right. But I don't think it quite articulates why the Red Lotus is doing what it's doing, or what anarchy really means, like philosophically. There's this line that he says, “The idea of having nations and governments is foolish, the natural order is disorder”. But like this isn't actually what anarchists believe. It's not that nations or governments are foolish or just dumb, right? But that the ones we don't consent to live under are. That the natural order isn't disorder, but it's whatever order people willingly choose to engage in. It's that idea of consent that they really care about, it feels a little bit like an infantile way of portraying anarchy. So I'd prefer he says something like, “People are born into this world as slaves. Slaves to Queens and Fire-Lords, Presidents, even Avatars who decide their place in life for them. Don't you think the world would be better off if leaders like them were eliminated? True freedom can only be achieved when oppressive governments are torn down- Governments people did not choose for themselves. Power should be freely given, not taken by force of an army, or bureaucracy, or tradition”. This also sets up why they want to kill the Avatar, which is never actually explicitly stated in the series. It's all subtexts because the Avatar is given power and authority simply because of how they were born, not because people choose to give it up. It's kind of like power by tradition, by lineage. I love season three because it has the goal to explore these fascinating world-building questions. It works really well with the overarching theme of Legend of Korra in this evolving modernizing world, with Korra trying to figure out what her place is in it, and even the place of the Avatar. Like what does it mean to exercise power justly to inherit authority. It interrogates the responsibilities she has in ways that we've never really seen, and have real ramifications for how she approaches the problems in season four.
This is why rescuing air-benders from the Earth Queen is also a really important plot point. Tenzin starts out trying to force people to join him because he says, “You have a duty, it's on your shoulders now as an air-bender. You should join me whether you want to or not”. The Earth Queen's behavior forces Tenzin to confront that behavior. And he says, “You are nobody's property, your path forward is your own”. In both circumstances, people were dictating the place of others without their consent. But Tenzin evolves in the show to show how air-nomad culture is in this way.
The archetypical and epitome of anarchic society, purely voluntary, and there's a beauty in that. Air-bending isn't just the element of spiritual freedom and detachment, but the element of societal freedom. A political structure without the oppression that we see throughout the rest of the world.
[Change #5: Astral-Projection]
Change Numero Cinco: Astral-Projection
So this is a power Jinora has in Season Three.
(She gets it at the end of Season Two, but well. At our rewrite, we didn't do spirit lasers because it was terrible, so she never really got that power.)
This season is about air-nomad culture, about rebuilding in the wake of genocide, about the different ways that can happen. Jinora becoming a master at the end is a beautiful culmination of those themes because it's not just the celebration of her character, but it's the very visceral resurrection of the air-nomad community. It only happens because she invents a new air-bending move, the tornado we see in the finale. Which requires a community of air-benders with a ceremony performed by that community in front of them.
(Astral-projection plays a very small role in the actual plot, which can easily be worked around. So we're instead going to build up to it in this season because I think it fits better in Season Three anyway.)
We're going to see Jinora meditating several times across the series, helping Korra get into the Spirit World. She's communing with the spirits, teaching the others air-nomad ways, and we're going to see hints of this ability, right. Glances outside her own body, and it's going to culminate in The Ultimatum. Episode Twelve, when it's revealed that the new air-nomads are actually being held in a hidden location somewhere else. Jinora is going to be able to astral-project to tell Korra and the others where they are being held and that they're being played, allowing Korra to break the truth like she does in the show.
This does two things:
I think it gives more of an arc to Jinora, because initially Tenzin refuses to let her get her full air-nomad master tattoos.
It foreshadows the Zaheer’s new air-bending ability, flight.
Now, I personally really like these two new abilities. The moment where Zaheer loses P’Li and then recites the old air-nomad proverb "Empty and become wind" is just fantastic. It totally makes sense within the series and it's set up really well. He can finally let go of the one thing holding this man to the earth, his emotions and love, P’Li. He can let go of them and it allows him to express air-bending in this pure way. Likewise, astral-projection really reflects the spiritual roots of air-bending and keys really well into Tibetan cultural influences in the show.
(This is in contrast to spirit-bending, which if you watch my Season Two video, you'll know that I actually didn't include. It felt cheap to me as a way to deal with spirits. Like you just magically purify them, rather than actually trying to understand the spiritual relationship between the physical world, the spirits and the mortals around them. It just didn't really align also with what I felt water-bending was about or should be capable of. It also led on to the spirit lasers, which is whole thing we'll get to in Season Four.)
[How Korra ends up]
But either way, this leaves us in relatively same way. Well, Korra doesn't have access to earth-bending or fire-bending yet. She's still going to get those back in the future. But she ends up after a fight with Zaheer in the finale. She ends up crippled, broken and exhausted with being the Avatar.
Previously on Legend of Korra
After Amon took almost all of her bending away, Korra was left searching for a way to restore her powers.
A Water Tribe civil war forced Korra to look into the past for help and answers, which she saw how people first learned bending from the original benders.
Tenzin and his family find a hidden island of non-benders living alongside sky-bison.
And in the final moment of the season, a young child there begins to air-bend.
[Change #1: Zaheer keeps the beard]
The most important change, all right. Zaheer keeps the beard.
(He doesn't shave his head, I get why they did it, all right. Yeah, I know, enormous culture, blah, blah, blah. But come on, which would you pick, for reasons?)
Korra’s Villains:
Zaheer and Koh are easily some of the best villains we've ever had in Avatar. They bantered, they're funny, they're really human. And it's so cool to see someone with an amputation in a role like this with Ming-Hua, who is voiced by the same actress as Azula, by the way. Zaheer being in love with P'li is another great touch. You genuinely feel kind of awful when she dies in Episode Twelve.
(It is, for me, Avatar's one true ship P'Leer or Zap'li? I don't know. What should it be?)
There's this real look of horror on Zaheer's face, one that only would have looked even better if he had a beard. What I love about these guys is that they have all of the traits we associate with that of a hero team, right? They work together, they complement each other's strengths, they negate each other's weaknesses. And if you really get down to it, the Red Lotus has some good points to make. Not like the murder points, but the other points. They don't feel like robots, but living, breathing humans. Unlike Unalaq from Season Two or Vaatu, who were just evil for the sake of being evil. Amon was also a really human and compelling and threatening villain, nut the writing around Zaheer in Season Three is a lot better, on average than in Season One. So it gives Zaheer a more potent role overall. One problem with writing villains is, of course, that you can't have them lose too much, or they don't feel like a threat anymore. So I went through the series, and I counted. There are roughly ten fight scenes with Zaheer of which he outright wins six, even against people like Zuko, the Fire Lord and all that, and he only loses four. And the times that he does lose, he was nearly always in control of the scene anyway, like he tactically retreats. The exception to this is him versus Tenzin, a fully trained air-bender, and him versus Korra in the Avatar state. Which to be fair, I think if I went up against Korra in the Avatar state, I wouldn't do much better. Narratively, the Red Lotus repeatedly demonstrates how capable they are by besting all of our main characters at least once. And they're not just beating up, say, faceless goons. That's kind of a cheap way to demonstrate how dangerous your villain is.
(This is one reason why Azula always felt more like a threat than Zuko. She repeatedly demonstrated herself against the heroes tobe their equal or even more competent. Now, do I need to mention how Season Three has easily several of the best fight scenes, not just in Korra, but in Avatar as a whole?
Tenzin versus Zaheer is only surpassed, in my opinion, by the Agni Kai, because there's so much more between Zuko and Azula, you know, in this emotional, relational way.)
The fight between Korra and Zaheer in the finale is, and here's what's really cool. Designed to be a mirror of the Aang versus Ozai fight in the Last Air-bender, it's got these huge pillars of stone with an air-bender fleeing the very embodiment of rage. The parallels contrast their characters, Aang and Korra, and it better than any other moment in the series, exemplifies how determined and unshakable Korra is. She, at this point, is dying. There is mercury flowing through her veins, with some of the most powerful benders ever seen fighting her, and she still manages to best all of them. She will give up her life, but she will never give up letting the bad guy win. Across the series, we see how she learns to direct her anger, her self-righteousness, her power, which have been occasionally flaws in the past, into real strengths that come out in these moments.
(I think that it and she and the series is a complicated mess, and I love it.)
One thing that people seem to complain about is that Korra doesn't grow, she doesn't change or learn. And that's just not true, not at all. Across Season Three, we see her learning self control and learning the difference between anger and righteous anger. We see her recognize her flaws and learn to rely more on others. Not do everything on her own, by herself. We also see her refine her strengths, raw power rarely gets her anywhere at the season. She has to learn to trust and stop thinking in ways that, once upon a time meant people like Amon outsmarted her. She recklessly, if you'll remember, challenged Amon to a fight one on one, the moment she could basically, in Season One. That's the sort of person she was at the beginning. But here, here we see she waits and plans before stepping up to face Zaheer. And all of this change, I think, is really facilitated by these fantastic antagonists who prompt her to think and consider herself.
[Change #2: Korrasami]
Nickelodeon were naturally terrified of letting Korra and Asami get together on screen, because it would immediately turn every single child who watched the show into a lesbian. We're going to change that, Season Three is going to be a lot more Korra and Asami centric. Now in our rewrite, she was originally an Equalist before turning to help keep the peace in Republic City. Ao at this point, she and Korra respect each other, but it's more of an alliance than a friendship. So this season we want that to be Korra and Asami becoming real friends. Korra is allowed back into Republic city, just like she is in Episode One, to fix the spirit vines. And we're going to see Asami and Maya Korra as she helps the spirits resettle in a new location outside the city. With the promise that they will plant a spirit tree in a grove in the middle of the city park. They'll take care of it, a pact similar to the one that she saw with the Southern Water Tribe last season. And as they look out over the spirit's new home, Korra will say something like, "Everyone keeps telling me that the Avatar needs to be this or can't be that, but I think this is what I was meant to be". Asami says, "It's beautiful and most of the world just sees it as inconvenient. I heard some spirits have taken up living in the catacombs under Ba Sing Se but I suppose this is us, we we both have places to be". Korra says, "Yeah, I do, but we can take a moment longer". When she's frustrated, she's going to turn more and more to Asami. This other person who has so much anger and rage at trying to find their place in the world and trying to help, but not necessarily knowing how to, right? And so she's going to find that empathy in this person she didn't necessarily expect. And we actually see her turning more to Asami in the season anyway. You know, there's this episode where they're trapped in the desert and it's going to be a bonding moment where they learn to really rely and trust and rely on each other. And it's going to go beyond admiration and into mutual respect and that into friendship. B efore Korra realizes that, "You know what, she's kind of hot too". Just a little moment here or there, with a dash of flirting. At the end of the series, when Zaheer demands Korra turn herself over to the air-nomads, everyone is going to be like, "No, Korra, you can't do that", except Asami. And with Tenzin captured, and with Mako and Bolin not really listening to her, she's going to confide in Asami again. "I don't really know what Zaheer wants to do to me, but I can't keep running away just because other people are scared, I won't." Asami says, "I know you have to do this for yourself, and I know how strong you are too, I fought you. Do it, you'll find a way out". So that's really the crux of this arc.
We got to show:
Mutual respect when they're dealing with spirit stuff in Republic City.
Show they can trust and rely on each other in the desert.
Show Korra can be vulnerable with her fears and hopes at the end of the series, plus a dash of flirting.
As I said, "They're not fully in love yet, but they are going to come out of this trusting each other as friends. It's that story of people with very different backgrounds, both seeing issues in the world, wanting to help, but having to learn how to help. That's a very different thing, where Asami is emotionally insecure, Korra is very sure of herself. And where Korra is very often impulsive, Asami is a lot more cautious, tending to plan ahead. We're going to see them complement each other's strengths and negate each other's flaws, which is what we see in the villains as well. And these are going to naturally come out in the story beats that are already in the series.
Following the terrorist attack at the Pro-bending Arena, Tarrlok calls for Beifong's resignation and institutes a curfew for non-benders. Exploiting the tragedy to gain more power, he has an iron grip on the Council. Korra feels conflicted but doesn't speak up. Bolin opposes the measures, saying that they're going too far. And that rift in the group becomes a fall out between the two brothers, with Mako staying on the task force. Asami comforts Korra, listens to her worries, and insists that there is a right thing to do here and that the Avatar is meant to be a force for good in the world. Korra just says that she doesn't know what the right thing is to do some of the time. And Asami says, "She thinks Tarrlok is getting out of hand".
That night, the curfew was enforced, and we get that iconic scene where the woman calls out to Korra, "You're our Avatar too". Realizing that she has been acting impulsively and that's led to horrible consequences for non-benders, Korra decides to stand up to Tarrlok. Mako doesn't know which side he should choose, unwilling to turn to violence around so many people. Knowing that that's been an issue in the past, Korra backs down.
(Here we see that Korra is growing. She is internalizing that she needs to find other ways to solve her problems. But she isn't quite understanding how she's meant to implement that, and that sometimes has negative consequences.)
At midnight, Korra finds Tarrlok in his office, wanting to finish what they started out on the streets, insisting that things have gone too far and that she was so concerned about Amon when she should have been concerned about Tarrlok. They fight, and she gets the upper hand until he reveals he's a blood-bender. He imprisons her in his cellar in a metal box, something that he prepared in case she ever turned on him.
The following day, Mako goes to the grave of his mother, killed by a non-bender not too long ago. Feeling conflicted on what to do, he talks to her about how he's feeling and wonders what she would say there. He finds Asami, though, as well. She's grieving for her own father, who was killed by a bender around the same time during those very same riots. They confide in each other, these similar experiences between benders and non-benders. But Asami looks like she's holding something back. She almost starts to talk when Mako says that things should turn out fine soon. "That Tarrlok and the task force know where Amon is, and they've got a plan to take down the Equalists really damn soon." He asked what she was thinking, but she says it was nothing and leaves.
[Episode 8: When Extremes Meet]
It's the early morning when Amon himself comes to face Tarrlok, who thinks he has the entire city in his iron grip. "You shouldn't have come here. I just dealt with the Avatar, now I get to deal with you", he says. But as he tries to blood-bend Amon, Amon resists. Taking one hard step forward at a time and then turning his own blood-bending on him. "It's you, isn't it?", Tarrlok says when he realizes whom he faces and the Counselor is brought to his knees, his bending removed. In the early morning, explosions rack Republic City, important infrastructure is either seized or destroyed by a rapid series of attacks by the Equalists. One by one, they capture the Counselors and begin rounding up benders. Tenzin is drawn into an ambush with a fake message from Korra. But he only just manages to escape when Lin Beifong sacrifices herself for him. She's dragged before Amon and loses her bending. We see the tight bond that these two have always had, their history together. Asami breaks Korra out, explaining the city is under attack and she needs to come with her immediately. Before Korra notices the exact same white rabbit tattoo of the Lieutenant. Asami is one of them, and always has been. Before she can fight, Asami shocks Korra unconscious.
(Asami being an Equalist is a really important change for me in the show. As it stands, there is no protagonist that we really like who is empathetic, who personifies and legitimizes those Equalist concerns. There's Hiroshi, but he's a minor character at best, and he's treated pretty explicitly as a villain. All of our protagonists are set in opposition to Equalism, and even Asami, a non-bender who suffered the very same loss as Hiroshi, has no sympathy for it. Which kind of gives the viewer permission to ignore Equalist concerns, and it feeds into that problem of not showing it to be a legitimate systemic issue. I felt like they were worried that having Asami be an Equalist might make us hate her, so they substituted it for her father. But I think this betrayal is so much more meaningful. We legitimize those concerns, we make Asami more interesting, and we deepen the character conflict of the story.)
Korra awakes amidst a massive Equalist rally, the city finally having fallen under their control, bound against a pole on the stage. Amon gives a speech about the Avatar being the ultimate tyrant. “The Avatar thinks they can decide the fate of nations by themselves, deciding for you, for all of us, for all the world. And in their wake, they leave a trail of destruction, while leaving the rest of us to pick up the pieces. Need I remind you of your homes, reduced to cinders by her fire, broken by her earth-bending. While the immense power of the Avatar state is left to the whims and emotion of an unstable child.” While he speaks, you see the neighborhood the Korra destroyed at the beginning, the apartment facility brought down by the special task force. And the crowd erupts in applause. “Need I remind you of Avatar Aang's destruction of the Fire Nation fleet during the Hundred Year War? That non-benders were sent to die in a bender's war, and he gave them no thought or care.” Korra spies Mako and Bolin in the audience, but they're too far away. Amon has Korra untied and says, "I want you to see that you're no threat to me, even with your powers. Let us fight, Avatar". And she tries, but she loses. He gets in close, and her bending is removed. Republic cities benders go into hiding, Amon lets Korra go. “You're no threat to us now. You're one of us.” Despondent, Korra gives up. Bolin finds her. He tries to empathize, but she insists that she is nothing anymore, and she leaves the city. Mako yells after her, "What, you're just going to leave the rest of us to fight it out? You're the avatar". "Not anymore", she says quietly, "I'm nothing".
(This is, in my opinion, the most important change. Season One has the perfect setup. Korra defines herself by her powers and her position as the Avatar, and she is faced with an enemy who can take that away from her. But there simply isn't enough time to explore who she is without her powers. We get barely half an episode in the original series between her losing her bending and getting it back, and as a result, her air-bending feels less earned than it could have been. The principle is there, don't get me wrong, that she only learns air-bending when she grows spiritually and personally, and taking away her powers is a vital way to do that. But the lack of time to explore that means, it feels more like she air-bends because she simply got more emotional. Seeing Mako about to lose his powers too, and being too driven by emotions and relying too much on punching and anger was always a character flaw. But this would, with several episodes still to go, hopefully give her enough time.)
[Episode 9: Darkest Hour]
Republic City is at war, most of the city lies under Equalist control. While a small group of benders still holdout, but the rest are in hiding. Mako pretends to be a non-bender to avoid the roaming Equalist forces. He's nearly caught, only to be rescued by a non-bender who hides him in their closet. He asks why she would help him, and she explains that yeah, she supports the Equalist's movement, but doesn't think that he deserves to lose his bending, that she got behind the movement before that was a thing. He sees her washing from a bucket and asks about why she doesn't use tap water. "Everyone in the city has it", he says. "Not us, not down here", she says, and Mako stays silent. Starting to see what life is like for them.
Korra walks out into the freezing wilderness, up to a cliff face overlooking Republic City. She contemplates her existence and purpose in the world now, the same way that she does at the end of the series, believing herself worth nothing anymore. But she steps back, unable to do it, and slacks to the ground. She cries out to Aang, "What am I meant to do? Who am I meant to be?" When no visions or voices come, she concludes that the Avatar State has left her too. "Why would you want to talk to me anymore, right? Korra, the Last Avatar".
Meanwhile, Bolin and Beifong organize a measure of resistance. Tenzin is concerned for his family, but he's also worrying about Korra. He doesn't know where she is. Tenzin warns that things are only going to get worse before they get better, no matter who ends up on top, and he regrets not acting to support the non-benders sooner. Bolin volunteers to go find Korra, saying the city needs Beifong, the chief of police, and Tenzin, one of the last Air-benders, more than they would need him if he gets captured.
Korra returns to Republic City, to those same lowest, poorest paths that she found when she first arrived. She sees an old man being hassled, and she clenches her fist, the muscle memory, expecting there to be fire or earth, but there's nothing. She turns away, feeling helpless, and slips down an alleyway to find an old ruined apartment building to hide in, even the same one that she helped destroy. Bolin finds Korra with the help of Naga, who follows her scent. Naga cuddles in close, and Bolin hugs her. The two just sit there in silence together, Korra unable to explain how she feels. Bolin brings out a Pai Sho game, and they play together. Korra wins, but Bolin just laughs, saying it's good to have someone to play with. She asks why he came to find her and insists that he cares about her, and so does Naga. He then shows her a small rock carving that he did, and not with bending, mind you, he says, but with my hands. He teaches Korra to chip and carve for a while. And Korra finds that she enjoys that, too. “See, there's a lot more more to you than your bending. And I care about you for a lot more than that. Even if we never did another pro-bending tournament again, I still want to be your friend.”
[Episode 10: Out of the Past]
Regaining a little self esteem, Korra decides to meditate and put some of Tenzin's teachings into practice alone. She heads up to the rooftop, it's snowing, it's windy and cold, but she sits down to meditate anyway. And when the wind stills around her and she stops shivering, using her breath to control her body temperature, she realizes that she has just air-bend for the first time. Korra leaps into the air, cheering for herself, and Bolin bursts out onto the rooftop. Scared that something had just happened, the two then spot an explosion in the distance. "I have to face Amon", Korra declares. "But first, we need to talk to someone."
(And this is something that I prepared earlier. Remember the whole breathing control thing? Yeah, there you go. And to be clear, I would actually prefer this take even longer. Like if we had multiple seasons to play with, but we don't.)
Korra and Bolin sneak into Asami's mansion using those same maps that she gave Mako all that time ago, a special tunnel that leads under her property. There they find Tarrlok locked up. And when he says that his bending is gone, they wonder why he's still being kept here. After all, he let Korra go. Tarrlok reveals it's because he knows who Amon is.
(And we get that full flashback about Noatak straight out of the series. Tarrlok is his brother and Yakone, a ruthless bender is their father. With only one change, Yakone leaves Noatak with a brutal scar across his face, in his final fight.)
Korra finally understands Aang's vision she was pointing her all this time towards Yakone.
[Episode 11: Turning the Tides]
Korra and Bolin confront Asami in her home, demanding she explained why she betrayed them. "I betrayed you", she exclaims. "You betrayed me when you joined Tarrlok's task force, when you saw what they were doing and you did nothing. All we wanted was to be treated like equals, not an underclass." Bolin turns it around, "But I mean, look at you. You made it, you're wealthier than any of us will ever be". And Asami's eyes narrow, but Korra speaks up. "But that's it, right? It's so easy to point to you and think everything's fine, but it's not. I know you're the exception and then there's all the rest who never made it. But this isn't how we fix it, right? We don't have to get rid of bending. It's just going to mean more fighting, more resentment. There are other ways." "What ways?" Asami asks. "I just want to understand, Princess Korra." Asami softens for a moment, then hardens and seizes up her electric weapons to attack. A fight ensues, and Korra doesn't reveal her air-bending. Relying on those air-bending moves to avoid and dodge, just like Tenzin taught her.
Meanwhile, a fight breaks out in Mako's part of Republic City, between a group of benders and Equalists. It begins to destabilize the neighborhood as benders tear up the foundations, and Equalists start an electric fire. As Mako looks out, he sees the man who he thinks killed his mother. Spotting that prosthetic leg at a distance, Mako watches from the apartment building above, and initially wants to leap into the fray to go after the man before he sees all of the people in the nearby buildings are in danger. The fire is climbing higher, and when he looks back at the old woman who saved him, he realizes what he needs to do. Mako begins saving everyone, this group of non-benders from the growing fire, using his bending to put it out and get them to safety. "You don't have to fight", the old woman tells him, after saving the last one. "You can just leave." Mako catches the eye of the man that murdered his mother, and they stare at each other from across the fray. And Mako turns away, both from vengeance and from violence, at least this time.
Returning to Korra and Bolin, Bolin carves away out of the mansion, and the two escape into the poorer parts of the city.
[Episode 12: Endgame]
Korra and Bolin eventually come across Mako, who is safeguarding a group of non-benders amidst the conflict. Mako almost brings himself to apologize to Bolin forgetting so caught up in his anger and frustration following their mother's death. But doesn't, when Korra reveals that Asami is an Equalist, and that feeling of betrayal and anger returns and intensifies with him. Flyers are dropped from the sky, calling for a huge Equalist rally in the Pro-Bending Arena, where Amon states that an historic event is about to take place. The trio rush to the Pro-Bending Arena and they see Amon and Asami down on the stage. And they reveal that they have captured Tenzin and his family, just like we see in the show. And we realize that this historic event will mean wiping out air-bending forever. Asami glances to the side, while Amon speaks about removing air-bending from the world. She's uncomfortable, but she stands by him. "The revolution is here", Amon says, but Korra interrupts. Amon assures the crowd that they have nothing to fear, and that even if he should die, his right-hand man Asami, would succeed him to finish the fight. And just like in the show, Korra reveals his secrets. “Amon has been lying to you. Or should I call you? Noatak”. Amon doesn't have a special power to take away bending. He uses blood-bending to do it." But the crowds just don't believe her. In response, Amon reveals his face rippled and scarred from an attack by a bender.
(Except, unlike in the show, the scar is real. It isn't painted and it won't wash off. It is from his father Yakone, even if it was when he wasn't a bender. It always irritated me that the Equalist movement kind of fell apart, after seeing Amon's scar melt away. As if realizing that because Amon lied to them about something, it meant that the non-benders concerns just didn't matter anymore. It just felt like a cheap way to destroy the movement.)
But knowing Amon would be reluctant to use blood-bending in front of so many people. Mako, Korra and Bolin move in to rescue Tenzin and the other air-benders. Korra unties the others while Mako and Bolin hold them off and they flee into the corridors of the Pro-Bending Arena. Up to the roof, Tenzin gets his family out on a sky-bison piloted by the nervous Beifong. Mako, Bolin and Korra turn to face Amon, who has followed them up and burst out onto the roof, out of sight of the public. Amon isn't afraid to blood-bend, and he quickly subdues both Bolin and Mako. "Not going to blood-bend me too", Korra yells. "I am not afraid of you, Avatar. You have already been neutralized." Amon shoves Bolin to his knees, about to remove his bending. When Korra reveals her air-bending, shunting him onto the ground. Tenzin watches from afar, "She can air-bend", he says, cheering her on. "You've grown, Avatar", says Amon. "But I assure you, even if you kill me, it'll just be fuel on the fire of Equalism. But I see I need to teach you a lesson again." Shocked but not defeated, Amon blood-bends her as well. But Korra, having a new mastery over her body, thanks to her air-bending training. Is able to move just enough to get in one more air-bending move, knocking Amon unconscious and removing his mask.
Asami bursts out onto the roof and shocks Bolin in the back. Seeing Amon down, she leaps into the fight with Mako and Korra. Dodging bending attack after bending attack, she too is taken by surprise with Korra's air-bending. But eventually gets the upper hand on Mako. Furious at Mako's treatment of non-benders, she pins him down to the ground. But remembers back to him telling her about his mother, and she telling him about her father. Korra begs Asami to stop, that it's over, that they can solve this another way. And Asami steps back and sighs. "Tell me how?", she says.
Asami appears in front of the rally and holds up Amon's broken mask and declares to the crowd, "Amon has fallen, but in his last moments, he bought us what we have all been fighting for a better world. For non-benders like you, like me. Too long has the world treated us like second class citizens. We don't want to live in the shadows of our own city. We need jobs, we need a voice in the way our city has run. And with his last breath Amon bought us what we have been fighting for, what we need. Republic City will no longer be ruled by a council of benders. But all of you will vote for who should lead us". And as part of this peace she pauses with a deep breath, looking back at Korra. "We will govern without the Avatar." Shocked gasps are bound when this is revealed, because Korra wasn't expecting this either. She wasn't told, Asami seems to have decided this for herself. But Beifong, having arrived during the negotiation, steps up, and Asami continues. "We have shown the world that with this new technology, we can bring order to Republic City. That thugs and bending tyrants are no longer a threat to us. The police force has for far too long been dominated by benders who didn't know what it was like for you, for us. But with this new technology, non-benders will ensure equality before the law too." Asami goes on, "Do not let the world say that we want blood, we want equality, and for that we do not need the Avatar. The Avatar will leave Republic City immediately".
The crowd cheers for Korra to go, who is shocked by Asami's sudden reveal. They had agreed to a peace, but not to this. Backstage, Korra says that she could have done the speech, that she is the Avatar after all. But Asami insists that a non-bender had to do it. "That sometimes people need to solve their own problems." "I'm the avatar, I'm meant to help." "You're the bender of all benders, even without your powers. Some may want revenge, but it's the only thing that will stop most of the Equalists from fighting. And it's what Republic City needs just for now." "What am I meant to do?" “Korra? You have the rest of the world, and you will do them well. I know how much you care. And I know you'll be a great Avatar.” Mako speaks up, "The people don't want violence, they want peace, their homes, their lives back". "And this is one way we're going to give it to them", says Asami. "I should have seen it before, I know, but I was too caught up in my anger. Most will follow me, will handle it with Beifong's help."
Amon’s Speech
[Ep12 Conclusion]
(See with this ending, Korra doesn't unlock air-bending with a burst of emotion. But by understanding herself and the world more. But more importantly, it was always a little odd that in the show the problem was violence and bending and not caring about the damage that they do. And Korra kind of solved the problem with more violence and more bending and more property destruction. It's kind kind of like Lex's Luthor insisting that Superman is too powerful. He destroys too many cities, and Superman just destroys New York while fighting him to say hey, that's not true.)
Here she defeated the Equalist and Amon by empathizing with Asami and understanding their concerns and finding another way other than violence, which she always relied on too much. She was symptomatic of the problem and this is about her growing beyond that.
(The show also doesn't recognize non-bender concerns as much as it could have. It gives us a non-bender president in the second season, but nothing more. And because it falls apart after Amon's reveal, it suggests that all of this was only motivated by his malice and personality cult. I think we need some more recognition of those systemic issues when putting the Equalist down. Make them lose popular support by giving the moderates what they want and the radicals won't have the power to do as much anymore. In this rewrite, there are real consequences to the Equalist movement. People don't get their bending back and there is systemic change. Asami pushing Korra out of Republic City as the price of peace also plays into what I feel is the overarching theme of Legend of Korra. And I'm going to build on this in future videos that the world is finding a way to work without the Avatar, challenging their role in politics and life, but moving on.)
Mako finally apologizes to Bolin for how far he took things and the two reconcile. Mako and Asami are tense, but they shake hands and admit that they don't want to repeat the same mistakes that happen with their own parents. Tenzin hugs Korra, impressed with how she air-bend, but then criticizes her form and then reiterates her how proud he is.
A team of water-benders and metal-benders secretly take Amon away, kept inside a metal box and chained still to prevent him water-bending as much as possible. However, Tarrlok ambushes the convoy, takes his brother, and the two escape into the sunset on a boat.
Tarrlok explains the Equalists have been defeated, but they can live out the rest of their lives together. Amon, having lost everything, takes both of their lives.
(I always really loved that scene.)
The final scene of the series has Korra sitting on the edge of one of Republic City's massive skyscrapers. She's playing with a small ball of air and wonders if she will ever get her bending back. At which point Aang appears to her, saying he's proud because at our lowest point we are open to the greatest change. He doesn't give her her bending back like it happens on the show, but he does tell her that the world is full of strange spirits and powers, and that there may be a way to restore them out there. With that tiny glimpse of hope, Korra sets out to discover what that means.
(I was always disappointed, not that they gave her bending back, but that it happened so easily, literally within 13 minutes of her losing it. I wanted there to be real consequences to the Equalist movement, and allowing her the time to internalize who she is without it was vital. Now, there is evidence to suggest that this was actually a corporate interference decision, not one made by the writers. And you can see how that might have been the case, because Korra getting her powers back does feel tacked on right at the end. So maybe there was an earlier draft where she didn't get it back, and that was a question for the future, but we don't know. The three ride also gives stronger arcs to both Mako and Asami. It creates a sort of symmetry between them that plays into the narrative conflict and gives more personal stakes. The reveal of Hiroshi Sato being an Equalist was good, but Asami being one would have meant so much more, and here it's an arc. Asami is also, well, a little perfect, and making her a little more flawed makes her more interesting. What do you think of this rewrite, though? I mean, does it solve your main concerns? And how would you rewrite it?)
Attempts to categorize the canon events in the best of my abilities.
1978
November 11th: Mikage turns 17 years old.
Mamiya is born in the same years as Mikage, which is 1960.
1979
January 23rd: Ruka’s birth
April
April 1st: Souji Mikage meets the Chida siblings
April 30th
Mamiya Chida dies from illness
Mikage burns the Research Building, then commits suicide by going back in there.
Tokiko is 19-20 yrs old in 1979.
1980
April 2nd: Kanae’s birth
1981
June 4th: Touga’s birth
September 25th: Saionji’s birth
1982
December 1st: Juri’s birth
1983
February 2nd: Shiori’s birth
May 25th: Masaomi & Koto left the school when they were caught together by Chairman Ohtori’s wife.
August
August 23rd: Chigusa receives an invitation to Koto & Masaomi’s wedding.
August 25th
Wedding Day of Masaomi & Koto
Chigusa burns the Old Fencing Hall, then commits suicide by staying inside there.
December 29th: Utena’s birth
1984
March 14th: Wakaba’s birth
March 28th: Yukiko’s birth
1985
May 28th: Miki & Kozue’s birth
August 8th: Nanami’s birth
1988
July 10th: Mitsuru’s birth
1990
May
Touga and Saionji met Utena by finding her in a coffin. Though they weren’t able to convince her to leave the casket on that rainy night. The next day, those two noticed a certain look in the girl’s eyes. Seeing something has changed in Utena that neither of them couldn’t do for her.
Utena’s parent’s died in an accident, leaving her orphaned. On that rainy night, she lost the will to live. Until she subconsciously met Akio/Dios and Anthy. From that fateful encounter, Utena found her strength to live. The next day, Utena attends the funeral with her legal guardian. Her aunt named Yurika, who chose to take her in.
Aunt Yurika stated, “Utena’s parents died when she was six. I was still young myself… and I couldn’t explain it to her.” Meaning that Yurika must have been 21 years old at the time. However, an age requirement on becoming a legal guardian to someone’s child is 18 and above.
1996
January 23rd: Ruka turns 17 years old.
February 2nd: Shiori’s turns 13 years old.
On that year, Shiori fell into a river. Juri dives in and saved her, then places Shiori at the riverside. However, Juri loss the strength to swim towards the surface. Until Ruka swam to Juri in attempts to rescue her. The next day, bad news occurred at Ohtori Private Academy Hospital. Juri wakes up from the hospital bed, finding out that Ruka died saving her. She can hear it from Shiori’s cries, asking why he would that for Juri.
1997
December 29th: Utena turns 14 years old.
1998
This would most likely be assumptions and a bit of headcanon. Unless anyone reading this have the actual manga version of Revolutionary Girl Utena, then you won’t have any idea what I’m talking about.
Prologue
Early June (3 days)
Day 1 (Pg3-33) // Day 2 (Pg34-49) // Day 3 (Pg50-82)
During Summer Break
X
July 29th: Utena’s arrive to Ohtori Private Academy.
[Before] [During] [After]
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