#anti-comics

[zuko-always-lies]

Gene Yang/Bryke: "If Zuko has always believed that the throne is his destiny, even though he was born fourth in line, it's proof that he knows his own destiny, while if Azula wants the throne, it's proof that she's evil and power-hungry."

[orangepanic]

Turf Wars Re-write, Part II

(I have not actually read Turf Wars)

[kyliafanfiction-archive]

I hate being in these weird intersections in fandom, where like, everyone who agrees with me on X also thinks Y (or at least it seems like everyone) and I hate Y.

Like, it seems like every Lauriver shipper or Laurel fan (I count myself as both) ever cares *soooo* much about comics canon and how Arrow hasn’t lived up to the comics, used characters differently and ‘not followed’ the comics of yada yada yada and all that jazz

and its like

I don’t give two shits about comics canon. I never have with adaptations. I love the Laurel Lance we get in the show, not her legacy as a decades old character. I love the Lauriver dynamic we get in the show because of what we see in the show. I don’t care about their dynamic.

And as for bitching about how this or that character is only used in a cameo or not used to their standing in the comics -  after decades and decades, there’s no earthly way any comics character could ever be truly given justice in a goddamn TV show, and given how much you guys bitch about OCs...

JFC, I don’t care about the comics, I just want to enjoy the show!

[zuko-always-lies]

Commentary from “The Search”

Gene [Yang] - In the original series, Azula was all kinds of awesome. I found her tragic character arc incredibly compelling. She began as a master manipulator bent on power. But when she finally achieved her goals, her mind broke. We gave her a split personality in order to preserve both the manipulative and lunatic halves of her personality.

I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a writer who understood less about the character they’re writing about. The season 3 and 4 writers of New Battlestar Galactica and how they wrote Boomer seems to be only equally egregious example I can think of.

[zuko-always-lies]

I just realized another reason why “The Search” (and the comics more broadly, of course) is awful: why doesn’t Iroh, who was crown prince, Azulon’s favored son, the Fire Nation’s darling, doubtlessly someone who has many connections in court, and someone who canonically knew that Roku was Zuko’s grandfather,  know most of the basics of Ursa’s story and marriage, even if he doesn’t know what happened to her? Why wouldn’t have Azulon told him basically everything anyways? And if Iroh knows, why hasn’t he told Zuko anything? Why doesn’t Zuko think to ask him?

[zuko-always-lies]

I did a brief survey of “The Promise” and “The Search.” When talking about Ursa(but not to her), Zuko used “my mother” 12 times, “mother” 3 times, and “our mother” 3 times.

By contrast, When talking about Ursa(but not to her or her haulicination), Azula used “our mother” once and and “mother” once.

Interesting contrast her.

[zuko-always-lies]

A Thought on Comics! Zuko’s Treatment of Azula

It’s been remarked before (see @salixj for example) that “The Search” makes Zuko (and the Gaang more broadly) look like complete idiots for how they handle Azula’s mental illness. They(and this is mostly on Zuko) don’t talk to anyone who treated her about what her symptoms and how her illness effects her behavior, they don’t bring along anyone familiar with her illness, they act like Azula is in an entirely rational state of mind and thus try to use threats to control her and seem surprised when she acts recklessly and irrationally, and they seemed utterly shocked when she hallucinates or acts delusionaly and in fact don’t seem to get that she often hallucinates. It’s like they don’t understand she’s mentally ill, even though she’s been confined to a mental asylum for the last year.

This leads me to think that the crucial issue is that Zuko doesn’t believe that Azula is mentally ill at all and only threw her into the abusive asylum as a means to imprison and control her(this fits well with Suki calling Azula a “prisoner.”  He must think she’s faking any symptoms.  And to be “fair” to him, Gene Yang actively implies that most of Azula’s mental illness comes from her experiences in the abusive asylum, so she might not have been actively mentally ill when he imprisoned her.

[zuko-always-lies]

More Commentary from “The Search”

Michael Dante DiMartino - Over the years, the number-one question fans asked Bryan and me was, "What happened to Zuko's mom?" It was a story we always wanted to tell, and once Gene was onboard to write the graphic novels, we knew this would be the time and place to tell it. After catching up with Team Avatar in The Promise, we all agreed the next story should focus on Zuko's search for Ursa.

Mike - Coming into The Search, Bryan and I had some ideas about what happened to Ursa, but nothing was really nailed down until my discussions with Gene, who added a ton to the story, including Ursa's backstory with Ikem.

Mike - Although Bryan and I had never pinned down the exact details surrounding Ursa's exact whereabouts, I had always thought that amnesia would play a role in some way. I knew there had to be something big keeping Ursa from contacting Zuko all these years.

Bryke “always wanted to tell the story about what happened to Ursa,” but had no idea of what it was.