Let's Talk

Welcome! Here, I (she/her, age 23) talk, analyze, and rant about a bunch of stuff. Come join the conversation!

[ciricearts]

my bi queen for pride month<3

[archives468833]

Katara: Brings up her mother's death in an attempt to emphasize with other victims of violence. She uses her grief to connect with others and to provide sanctuary.

The fandom: Ugh! Why won't Katara shut the fuck up about her mama? Doesn't she know others have been through worse? Katara is such a bitch for what she said to Sokka!

Zuko: Was burned alive by his father and had his honor dangled in front of his face since the age of thirteen. He holds onto his honor so hard that it leads him to act in ways that could possibly kill him.

The fandom: Haha! Zuko's honor! So funny.

Jet: Mentally unstable from the ethnic cleansing of his village that made him the pseudo father of his team. He tried to do better but was brainwashed and killed mercilessly.

The show and fandom: Haha! Jet's dead. Fuck him tho.

Korra: Was groomed by her uncle and isolated from her support system. Her spirit was ripped from her body and was spiritually tortured.

The fandom: Why did that dumbass trust her uncle?

Aang: Aang is an adult man who dragged his politically important friends on a wild goose chase. He drove them into a storm while on a boat and nearly killed them at sea. When his wife/gf tried to get him to turn the ship around, Aang refused to address any of her points and instead used his trauma as a get out of jail card. Aang's trust in a stranger ended up killing them all but his gf/wife revived everyone. They all forgive Aang and go on a journey at the end of the movie to go collect artifacts from Aang's culture. He even gets a group of Air acolytes who dedicate their lives to Aang's culture and its survival.

The fandom: Yes, I will throw a temper tantrum if my goat experiences a fraction of what Katara and Korra went through in this fandom. Who cares about them? Only Aang gets to kill his friends. That doesn't reflect anything about him at all. If anything, they weren't supportive enough.

[sapphic-agent]

The silence from Aang fans since the movie is so telling. They'll drag every other character to hell but the moment Aang fucks up (in one of the worse ways possible, mind you), not one ounce of criticism in his direction.

Which shouldn't be surprising considering how staunchly people defend him for neglecting his kids

[sapphic-agent]

You know what's wild to me? Just how... Tame the canon Zutara dynamic actually is.

The way Bryke and antis describe it, it's some toxic barrage of arguments where both parties treat each other horribly. And that's just... Not true? If anything, that's closer to canon Maiko. Or even Kataang considering that Aang's technically lashed out at Katara more than Zuko has post-redemption.

Zuko and Katara admittedly did have a rough start, but they worked out their differences and she forgave him. After that, I would argue they're actually fairly close. Katara felt comfortable teasing him multiple times. She confided in him during TSR before even forgiving him. They were close enough to the point where she was the one he trusted to take down Azula.

As far as enemies to lovers (or shipping in general) goes, they're pretty mild

[sapphic-agent]

I personally do not care for the term "media literacy is dead" because it feels like a blanket excuse for a story or creator's shortcomings. Like, I don't think you can use it loosely whenever someone says something you disagree with.

That being said, the thought that Jax abstracting off-screen is bad writing is a media illiterate take.

[aq-zhurek3]

Fans need to be able to differentiate between fanon and canon. If something created by a fellow fan changed your opinion on a character/ship/etc, that's just your problem

Anyway, this singular piece of artwork has made me dislike Zutara

[dragonfoxandfound]

I already covered this but let's repeat for those who are choosing to be willfully ignorant. This art is over 13 years old made by a fan who may have been 16 at the time and was part of a Disney couples series. She also did Rapunzel, Mulan and others I'm sure you'll come up with some other nonsense as to why those are morally disgusting if we wait long enough.

She was a kid who liked Disney, Zutara and wanted to be an artist - something she achieved - and didn't understand the implications because she was a kid.

American history isn't default knowledge, there are a lot of nations with their own histories that even today do not the true story of Pocahontas, many just thought it was a cute movie and only found out years later. America isn't the center of the world.

No one in the ZK fandom praises this art but we're also not going to disparage a child who didn't understand the implications of her Disney art.

You're cherry picking a decade old, kid made fan art to justify a made up moral high ground and it looks incredibly stupid.

[sapphic-agent]

I couldn't imagine being so miserable that I'd deliberately blast a decade old fanart on a post I didn't even bother to tag correctly. It's sad, really

[sapphic-agent]

With Goose's confirmation that Pomni was originally designed with anger issues, it feels like half-validation of my own headcanon that Jax and Pomni are actually pretty alike and that's why they got along (as well as anyone could with Jax anyway).

I like to think that Pomni was a pretty prickly person prior to putting on the headset which is why she didn't have many friends. I think she, like Jax, had a fear of being rejected (obviously for different reasons) so she tended to keep her distance by being pretty harsh with people.

I agree with Goose that it would have been cool to see explored in the show. Low-key, I feel like an episode with Jax, Zooble, and angry Pomni would've been peak

[sapphic-agent]

Haru not being in NATLA makes sense don't get me wrong but it still hurts

[sapphic-agent]

WHAT DO YOU MEAN PEOPLE GO UP TO MILLIE AND TELL HER THEY BELIEVE I'M GOING TO SOB

[oh-a-mic]

Tadc rant

Y'know I'm getting kinda pissed with all the posts that try to make Jax more palatable just because Jax's actions make these people so uncomfortable in their need to have everything 'morally justified'.

Jax was cruel. A complete asshole who caused some pretty irreversible damage. No way about it. But it wasn't because of nothing. It wasn't just for kicks and it damn well wasn't because the show 'was poorly written' or something like that.

The entire show is about being human. It's about what it means to be human when you are in a world that doesn't follow any rules and it has less than a dozen people and you're all cut off from reality and you don't even know who you are so what does it still mean to call yourself human? What makes you that?

When your actual body can do crazy stuff when the laws of physics don't matter when you don't need to eat or sleep or take a fucking shit when you're crammed into a small space with others with nowhere to go when you're all sharp edges and growing despair and trying so hard to survive in your own way while trying not to kill each other and if you get too depressed you' might reach this unrecognisable irrational state where you lose your form and become completely focused on causing damage and you understand nothing and remember no-one including yourself and this state is basically un-becoming who you were and it's the digital version of going insane and it's a one way trip and all this is under control of a manic AI who proclaims to care but doesn't actually show it apart from words so what does it mean? What are you? How do you survive? (If surviving even means anything in this place)

Jax had a fucked up childhood and consequently became a fucked up person and kept refusing help and lashing out and not helping when his friends are near abstraction and who knows he was and is and continues to choose to be a terrible person and cannot make himself change and doesn't ask for help till in the end and now he's become like them become an unrecognisable monster to be shut up in the cellar and isn't it ironic? Isn't it what he deserves?

I remember op saying in the post that Jax's actions didn't make any sense and didn't have any emotional complexity. Then they go on to make Jax in their take morally upright and in such a way that excuses her actions and completely opposite of canon Jax.

As though everything has to fit into neat little boxes for them to swallow. As though being human is anything even remotely like that. Easily categorised and needing moral justifications for their every action else they're 'bad'

[sapphic-agent]

Absolutely this.

"Jax is a bad person who did bad things to hurt others" and "Jax is a human being who deserves to be treated as such" are true statements that can and should coexist without trying to make her or her writing seem worse or better than she was. Like OP said, the point of the show is being human and being flawed

[lesbianano]

No more limits, no more hiding 💗💜💙

[sapphic-agent]

I think Apple White and Glinda are better and more well written examples of “privileged blonde Disney princess-esque characters who are well meaning but are very flawed” than Charlie.

Why does Apple do what she do? Apple is a teen who has been taught all her life if she didn’t follow her destiny her world was going to fall apart and disappear, and her destiny is basically her whole existence she’s been prepped for. So when her worldview starts to crumble, of course she still stubbornly clings onto what she’s been taught all her life until she’s proven wrong.

Glinda is a privileged rich girl who was raised in comfort and security, so when her world view cracks, she chooses the security and comfort of Oz than going with Elphaba.

It also helps to note both Apple and Glinda aren’t meant to be in the right, and are the purposeful opposing viewpoints to Elphaba and Raven.

Charlie is what happens if you make Glinda or Apple the protagonist but don’t have anyone to actually challenge their worldviews as characters, and they were right all along.

To be fair to Charlie, she does genuinely think she's doing the right thing. Glinda knew she wasn't and stuck her head in the sand. Apple... Well, she's a little more complicated.

The show plays fast and loose with Apple a lot. It implies selfishness from the beginning only to later flip the script and say she just wants her friends to be safe. But then she gets jealous when things turned out okay and Raven was becoming more well-liked.

The book is a lot more consistent. Apple in the book is very clearly manipulative, she just does it under the guise of being good and nice. The books do a much better job of showing that Apple's idea of good is more performative than genuine, very similar to Glinda.

Charlie is different, as in she's not "wrong," the show is just terribly inconsistent with her behavior and development and the characters around her

[sapphic-agent]

I was thinking, if Jax checked in at Hazbin Hotel, Charlie would treat him similar to how Pomni did from Episode 5 onwards

But unlike the TADC cast, Charlie's friends would kick his ass, or at least put a stop to his antics

Eh, I feel like they wouldn't. Either Charlie wouldn't let them or they wouldn't care all that much. I think they'd all just ignore Jax because they don't have time to give her the reaction she wants to get out of them.

Alastor might, though, for the love of the game

[sapphiresaphics]

I wonder how many people understand that these are two separate things happening in different times. One is Caine coming more and more into existence and discovering the obsolete unused brain scans, and the other is Caine gaining access to the random WiFi hotspot that just appeared temporarily (as they often do) nearby. They’re both moments of self discovery which is why we cut back and forth between them, but they are undoubtedly not happening at the same time.

I worry people might think these are congruent events and be confused why Scratch suddenly appears in the circus but is never seen again afterwards. That was them showing how Caine used his powers to figure out how to use the brain scans. It was a flashback. And it’s juxtaposed to him using his powers to learn more about the outside world and about the remaining circus members.

[sapphic-agent]

Dude you're so smart. This makes so much sense especially as the red orb version slowly gains a body

[sapphic-agent]

I'm so late in this but-

CODE LYOKO IS GETTING A SEASON 5

We're so back

[sapphic-agent]

While I agree with the overall take of the tweet, going on Twitter just to see korra being compared to catra, stolas, and Jax is insane to me. Compared to the other 3, Korra hasn't really done much wrong.

This is the case where two things can be true at once. Queer characters should be allowed to be flawed and messy and even overall bad people. But also, Korra just isn't comparable to the rest of these characters.

Korra's worst grievance was losing the connection to the past Avatars, something that wasn't even wholly her fault. She was lied to and manipulated. Even if you argue that she should have listened to her dad and Tenzin, she had no reason to think her uncle was plotting against her.

Korra was never malicious or intentionally tried to cause harm. She was arrogant and had a temper, but always tried her best to do the right thing.

(I've also made a few posts that Aang's done a lot of the same things that Korra's done and has gotten nowhere near the same amount of hate. The Legend of Aang movie proves this)

Catra has willfully engaged in colonization and tried to destroy the world because of her own feelings of inadequacy. She's purposely hurt a ton of innocent people, most of all Adora. I actually don't hate Catra or even her arc (I think it was rushed, but I don't have many complaints about how it was executed. I think had it been done over more than a season it would have been more meaningful), but c'mon. Comparing her to Korra isn't even legit. Azula would be a much more apt comparison.

Jax intentionally hurts people because she's afraid of letting people get close due to what happened when she (presumably) came out to her mom and as a coping mechanism. I think it's also important to remember that it's implied that Lee put on the headset either during or shortly after that night. Jax was quite literally created when Lee was at her worst.

Jax is supposed to represent that even bad people are still human and deserve to be treated as such. You're not supposed to defend her or make excuses for her. You're just supposed to remember that she's a person.

Which again, isn't nearly the same vein as Korra. Korra isn't a jerk on purpose nor does she treat people like they're beneath her. She's abrasive and gets angry, but as people have pointed out, she usually has a legitimate reason to be angry.

Stolas is a neglectful father who uses monetary leverage to coerce a lower class citizen into sex. And the show he's in tries to make everyone else the problem. Korra would never.

(Catra might be the most morally wrong out of these four, but in my personal opinion Stolas is the worst)

All this to say that even people "defending" Korra make her out to be worse than she is when they make these posts. Korra suffers from unfair treatment when compared to other characters, these three are actually bad people who have done purposeful damage to others. Putting Korra in the same category as them is a disservice to her

[sapphic-agent]

The way people have just accepted Bryke backtracking with Katara. I maintain my stance that it proves that they could have always done it they just chose not to, but it also gives them leeway to backtrack more. They can keep pushing the envelope, undoing the canon they established almost 15 years ago that they didn't think they'd get shit for.

Next thing you know we'll get another movie showing Aang being a good, attentive dad to Kya and Bumi. And then every criticism of him from LOK will be met with, "But ____ movie said!!"

Aang already isn't held accountable enough for being a bad father to Bumi and Kya. If we get another movie like this one, who knows what Bryke will do to make Aang/Kataang look better?

[sapphic-agent]

What kind of gets to me about Vaggie in Season 2 is how she reacts to Charlie's concerns about things.

Like Charlie is airing out the things she's worried about, such as Vox plotting a revolution and their "friends" either disappearing or fucking off to who knows where. And Vaggie just... doesn't care?

She just goes "Oh they'll be alright, just come in bed with me and we'll scissor our problems away." It's clear to see she doesn't take her girlfriend's problems seriously even though it's all leading to something dangerous for Hell AND Heaven.

Now some could say that this is just Vaggie being confident in her and Charlie's "love" to get through anything, but then you remember neither of them ever does anything important in both seasons other than fucking things up. So this whole "We've been though tough things and we can do it again." she says is entirely bullshit since we see they aren't even important to the plot.

God I hate this character...

The whole Easy scene was just weird (the song is good though). Charlie's super upset and vulnerable and Vaggi's solution is... sex? Mind you, this is also after Charlie apologized to her and she couldn't even be bothered to do the same (which she also didn't do in season 1). It makes the sequence almost uncomfortable in a way. At best, Vaggi's being dismissive. At worst, she's taking advantage. The whole thing is just so disingenuous from her end that I struggle to see her in a positive light at all.

Side note, but am I the only one who cringes whenever I watch this scene? I wish they would have been more explicit than the weird sequence they tried to do to mimic sex. They never hesitate with VoxVal or Stolitz, why is Chaggie any different?