at zuko’s continued insistence that the ember island players are desecrating the good name of The Theàtre with their terrible performances, sokka gets an idea.
he contacts pu-on tim and gets copies of the original script for the boy in the iceberg.
now of course, it would be tacky for them to play themselves.
after all, 80% of the reason sokka is doing this is so that he can play toph.
toph plays zuko. the mannerisms are so dead-on it’s uncanny.
mai says she’ll participate as long as she can play sokka. she gets an undercut and claims that it’s because she’s method. really it was just an excuse for her to get an undercut. she’s always had sokka hair envy.
suki wants to play katara, which sokka thinks is really weird, not least of all because she’s making his sister look hot and cool.
ty lee plays suki and iroh. darling, she has the range.
katara tells sokka this is the stupidest idea he’s ever had—and that’s saying something—until sokka informs her that he thinks she should play aang, at which point she readily agrees.
aang is like, “what? do I not get a role?” and katara’s like, “don’t be silly, you’re the iceberg.”
“there is no role of ‘the iceberg!’”
“it’s the TITULAR. ROLE.”
ultimately, aang plays cabbage man. he gets so invested in the role he ends up writing the cabbage merchant a deeply sincere apology, and inviting him to the performance as a guest of honor.
it’s not hard to convince the rest of the kyoshi warriors to play everyone else. they’re all friends with sokka, and they greatly enjoy both stage makeup and pranking zuko.
they spend approximately one day in rehearsals, but they’re all so invested in their roles it actually goes over really smoothly.
the night of The Performance, sokka convinces zuko that they’re just going out to see a normal play. he promises zuko it received critical acclaim.
zuko is immediately suspicious when the only people in attendance are himself, bosco the bear (he’s a patron of the arts), and, of course, the cabbage merchant.
zuko wants to be angry, but they’re all really, really good.
for one thing, the effects are actually amazing.
mai’s sokka is so on point it’s concerning. apparently mai cares less about her own wellbeing and safety than she does pleasing sokka. zuko would be mad, if he couldn’t say the same.
katara puts on a slightly babyish affect to play aang. sokka does the same for toph. aang and toph get offended, but they’re just like, “what? that’s what you sounded like.”
zuko is surprised to find that he is genuinely having a good time watching this.
after the performance is over, zuko goes to toph to admit that it’s scary how good she was, at which point toph admits she thinks she broke both her wrists.
sokka’s like, “okay be honest here— how were the effects?” zuko tells sokka truthfully that the effects impressed him a great deal. sokka’s like oh thank god. he personally thinks that if his effects hadn’t worked, this whole thing would’ve been a bust.
but it wasn’t a bust. not at all.
the kyoshi warriors are like, “the fuck are we doing fighting people when we could’ve been a theatre troupe?”
katara makes the bold claim that she was simply born to be an actress.
but everyone in attendance agrees it was aang who truly stole the show.
his cabbages! O, his cabbages..........
