Aang and Katara doesn't work as well as Zuko and Katara because very rarely does Katara benefit from being in a relationship (even friendship) with Aang. Very rarely does he grow her as a character, just by being himself.
Katara's main character traits are compassion, loyalty, and hope (could be translated "faith.")
Compassion = she's kind, and her knee-jerk reaction is to notice when people are hurting and immediately act to make them feel better/have more.
Loyalty = The chips being down, mind-numbingly bad circumstances, extreme danger, and even a lack of gratitude can't cause Katara to turn on or let go of someone she's decided to care about.
Hope = When there's a choice between being pessimistic and being optimistic, Katara will always choose "I believe the best outcome is about to happen." It's why she and Sokka are great devil/angel-on-shoulder traveling companions for Aang from the beginning—she's always seeing beauty and the opportunity to do good or see things improve, and Sokka is usually seeing something to complain about, something that needs fixing. But it's also why she's Aang's closest relationship in the show—she represents all of the good people in the world who believe in him and need saving and want to help him, and he represents the idea she believes in that Good WILL conquer Evil against all odds.
They're close. I'm not saying they're not.
But I'm saying look at those character traits—compassion, loyalty, hope—and then tell me which of those traits Aang woke up in her. Tell me how he makes up for her weaknesses, or encourages her strength? She's already demonstrating compassion, loyalty, and hope, even before Aang comes into her life, and before she really gets to know him.
They seem like kindred spirits, definitely. They're both compassionate. They're both loyal. They both lost someone to the war. They both would rather heal than destroy. They both enjoy making friends and loving others.
But he doesn't give her anything she didn't already have. He doesn't challenge or grow her.
And what's worse, he can't even really provide anything to her, externally. They set up this dichotomy where Katara is a powerful bender, too, and can take care of herself in a fight, so she doesn't need his protection. As patient and kind as he is, she's more patient and more kind, more often. Whenever he doubts himself she always believes in him, even when he's given her every reason not to trust him—which I admit is the most compelling part of their relationship, but even in this facet, it is KATARA providing something AANG needs.
Rarely, if ever, is that flipped. Usually because she's nurturing him. The nurturer is not nurtured by the person they're nurturing. She behaves like his mom, offering comfort when he's anxious, belief when he's insecure, encouragement when he doubts, care when he's getting careless.
Aang doesn't offer Katara anything except an object to place hope in. Aang can't be allowed to protect her physically or provide anything for her—because she has to be a strong woman. But she can offer him plenty.
The only time this is kind of challenged is in Southern Raiders when Katara is laser-focused on bitterness annd vengeance and Aang challenges her to forgive and choose mercy. But Katara very rarely actually struggles with vengeance. And when she does, it is not Aang who shows her how to back out of vengeance. She just sort of...does it on her own.
But Zuko has the POTENTIAL to challenge Katara to be a better version of herself, to grow and change. Because he, himself, grows and changes. It's why that one scene, under Ba Sing Se, kicked off the Zutara thing.
The reason they have "chemistry" is because her big character flaw is "loyalty to a loss--" so when someone she's loyal to is hurt or taken from her or brutally betrays her (Jet) all that ferocious energy she would have spent on loving that person goes into hating whatever took that person from her.
She sees Zuko as the kind of person who took her mother from her, and her loyalty-to-loss kicks in. But then Zuko reveals that he's lost someone, too, and she literally has to see him differently. Not just because he's revealed that has actual feelings—but because he could have snapped at her and argued with her accusations, and INSTEAD she's learning, from that comment "that's something we have in common," that he is different than she is.
Because he lost his mom to the war but he's not the one screaming at his opponent because of it.
The fact that he's from another nation already challenges her assumptions. But think about the potential—she is a character loyal, maybe to a fault. He is a character whose loyalty was never appreciated by his family, and they were evil, so he didn't remain loyal for loyalty's sake. When Aang is about to make a decision, Katara says, "I'll go along with whatever you decide," even if she disagrees. But Zuko is the "I know where my own destiny lies" guy.
I'm not saying Katara can't make her own decisions. I'm saying she makes them based out of sometimes-blind loyalty, and he could show her (after what he's lived through) how to strengthen what she decides to be loyal to.
I also think that obviously she could grow and help him. He's set up to be very untrusting as a leader of the fire nation. He's trying to backpedal their whole culture after he's crowned Fire Lord. Every memory he has in the palace is tinged with a sister and father who were always playing politics and fear games. Fire Lord Zuko needs someone like Katara who can believe the best of others.
They have things in common. Her culture tried to stop her from being a warrior, she kept pushing—he was told by everyone he was lucky to be born and techniques didn't come easy to him but he kept pushing. She refused to leave people in need even though they were Fire Nation enemies, and he refused to stay silent when a division of soldiers was being sacrificed.
I'm just saying, where two people don't constantly agree and have the right mixture of differences and similarities, all tied together with a decision to love each other--that's the strongest pairing.
annaxmalina
dededos
blakekathryn
stormborns
germansingergirl
izzy806
baratheonpilled
