wouldn't say i'm much of a shipper, but i am a strong-opinion-haver, and i do love writing unnecessarily long thinkpieces. so.
korvira: "if she's your girlfriend, why am i your narrative foil?" sort of situation. works best, i think, with kuvira's jealousy/fawning towards the avatar slowly festering into a one-sided romantic obsession over the course of the three years korra's gone, then exploding during their confrontation (with korra turning out exactly as powerful as s3 kuvira would have imagined her, yet also kinder, more benevolent in that power than kuvira could have ever hoped, symbolizing a true "good future" for the rest of the world as compared to kuvira's false "good future"), and then slowly building back up while kuvira's in prison—this time around not as an obsession with the avatar but as an obsession with korra. rote may have been terrible in its politics and its treatment of asami, but i do like the characterizations it provided, and i find the idea of kuvira willingly giving up some of her agency (something she's very attached to) in order to aid korra in her mission, effectively allowing korra to use her, quite delectable. kuvira is one of my most beloved characters. naturally, i must torture her.
korrasami: the ideal couple! korra provides a sense of emotional security for asami, allowing her to relax in knowing that korra would never betray her, and asami helps korra better regulate her emotions, accepting her emotionality without judgement and providing genuine, yet critical commentary when needed. a match made in heaven. i loved the two of them working together to get out of the si wong desert in s4, and i really, really wish we'd seen them collaborate more often prior to s3. they compensate for each other's weaker sides perfectly. also. i mourn the potential korra movie we are unlikely to see in the nearest future. the comics simply aren't enough to satiate me. i need more.
kuvirasami: a tricky one, since my desire to give asami anything she could ever want inevitably clashes with my desire to put kuvira through the meat grinder. i think that there is an interesting dynamic there: both of them are orphans who have a complicated relationship with their family, trust, and acceptance... and one of them pretty much orphaned the other with her own hands. you also get a compelling contrast between the two of them in the field of morality—asami is pragmatic, but unwilling to accept harm to others for the purposes of a "bigger goal", while kuvira is so willing to prioritize the achievement of the purpose that even her own life seems a reasonable enough piece to give up in a game. they are both strategic, but in two distinct, different ways. plus there's that parallelism kuvira has with korra, which does make her a curious love interest for asami... lots to ponder there. ultimately, however, i believe that asami should be allowed to stomp kuvira with her boots and then electrocute her with her gloves. no guarantee this won't turn kuvira on though. she has some of her wires crossed when it comes to intimacy.
koropal: an unexplored goldmine. my belief is that the krew would have been much more cohesive as a team if jinora (aged-up one or two years) would have joined them in b2, and if opal came in as an addition in b3, following atla's pattern of introducing a teammate each season, so any possibilities of opal/krew interaction are of interest to me. korra, in particular, has the most similarities with opal—it's easy to imagine them bonding over having been raised in isolation, surrounded by people who love them, yet distinctly separate from the rest of the world, for which they develop a longing. somewhere in an alternate universe, korra could have stuck around in zaofu as opal's airbending teacher, leading to the two of them growing close, and then she could have been the one to encourage opal to stand up for herself and to express her feelings more boldly, resulting in them both leaving for opal's further training at the air temple. cue cute yuri. overall, a genuinely delightful ship. i like how opal's sweet, yet sharp nature complements korra's intense, yet loving one.
makorra: it's okay! it makes sense for both mako and korra back in seasons one and two, and it allows us to see clearly what the areas the two of them struggle with are (mako needs somebody to take care of, korra needs somebody to be compassionate about the weight of the duty on her shoulders) and how that results in them clashing (e.g. both of them aren't particularly in tune with their emotions, so neither of them knows how to articulate why they are upset at the other person). i also like that even after their relationship is over, the friendship isn't. korra is still one of the dearest people to mako. i don't imagine them as an endgame ship, especially not with asami anywhere in the picture, but i don't hate that they are a thing in the series. korra's relationship with mako made sense to me. it's asami's relationship with him that felt shallow.
bosami: let's kill bolin.
kuviraopal: can't really ignore the emotional incest this would imply, and while i don't mind the works exploring that, writing off the dynamic as a genuine romantic connection doesn't work for me. the siblingism between those two goes deep enough to echo lin and su's relationship thematically, and so, technicalities of kuvira's adoption aside, they are firmly in the "fucked up family" category to me. as a side tangent, it makes me wheeze when opal screaming that kuvira is NOT her sister panels from rote are used as proof of them not having been raised as a family. "you are not my sister!!!" might just be the most typical thing for an adoptive sister to say. tl;dr: i like the dynamic between those two—a lot, but not romantically.
