All My Favorite Cartoons

How to Train Your Dragon, Avatar: the Last Airbender, Voltron: Legendary Defender, Miraculous Ladybug, Dragon Prince, K-pop Demon Hunters

[free-my-girl-tourney]

Fandom Misogyny Victim Tournament

Round Four, Bracket 4

Katara (Avatar: The Last Airbender) vs. Rey Skywalker (Star Wars)

Katara

Rey Skywalker

Remaining time: 3 days 31 minutes

Propaganda below the cut:

Katara:

Mischaracterizing her, complaining of her having traits they love in male characters, straight up ignoring her, villainizing her for getting in the way of M/M ships, blatant racism… Katara has seen it all.

She’s literally the last bender in her tribe… put some fucking respect on her name.

Within the fandom, she is frequently relegated to her relationships with male characters. Also, many people simply "do not like" her. I've seen people call her a bitch! I don't think she was ever bitchy. There is an added layer of racism; many people read her as first nations. Native women and girls are always seen as more aggressive by racists.

She is a badass

she's probably in here already but i gotta make sure she makes it. she better win this entire goddamn thing. people act like her being mean sometimes makes her an irredeemable bitch. Jesus christ like she's fourteen and her mom is dead and a war is going on. god forbid she processes trauma differently from sokka and zuko. Like Hello.

Reduced her to the Zutara (fake news) vs Kataang ship war, reducing her to the "mom friend," ignoring her complexity, refusing to let her character exist outside of her relationships with men and eroding it within her relationships with men, ragging on her for being traumatized by her mom's murder, flattening her character as much as possible.

This poor girl gets brutally flattened into either "mom friend takes care of everyone :)))" or "miserable spoilsport who is mean to the boys and always yelling :((("

Literally one of the most nuanced characters in all of tv, she WILL be recognized for her fantastic portrayal of complicated trauma and parentification!

shes a teen girl who has never had space to process her trauma and the one time she let herself be angry everyone decided shes a bitch

Is reduced to one of three things. Either "the mom", "the nag" or "flawless perfect angel" when being bounced back and forth in other people's shipping drama.

Katara is a character with so much complexity. Her kindness underpinned by a trauma, her caring instinct born from being placed into the role of adulthood WAY too early. Having to struggle to be seen as a fighter despite being one of the, if not THE< strongest bender in the group for huge chunks of the show. She has anger, she has bravery, she has purpose and she cares because she CHOOSES to and then has to struggle with the parts of that caring that hurt. Or simply don't come naturally to her. She doesn't grin while cleaning up the boys' messes, she dumps the half empty cooking pot directly on their head and tells them if they're gonna leave it yucky, THEY should wash it (metaphorical but something along those lines) She is more than just Aang's "prize", Zuko's "anchor" or Sokka's "babysitter".

Rey Skywalker:

called a Mary Sue for being competent at a thing that the movie explained she was competent in

Rey was perhaps not the most original character ever, but she COULD'VE been great if only the writing for her hadn't ignored her in favor of the white men around her and forced her into a really terrible toxic romance with the villain for no good reason.

first of all we’re introduced to her as this smart, brave woman. she can fix the millennium falcon. she can fight. she’s guarded. she’s eager to help people she barely knows. she has this intriguing mysterious backstory about being abandoned on jakku by someone implied to be a skywalker. she’s force sensitive. she has a scene where she gets captured and interrogated by the main villain kylo ren, but actually to a good percentage of the fandom, kylo kidnapping her and torturing her friends and mass killing innocent people including his own dad is completely fine guys. bc reylos think kylo ren is hot so it’s fine. and to them, this interrogation scene means they’re in love and he’s just a tortured sad boy who needs a woman to redeem and fix him. which is basically what rey is used for in the following two movies. also we could have had finnrey as a couple and as the two main protagonists (rather than kylo suddenly becoming way more centered) if people weren’t racist and misogynistic af and instead people went so hard shipping one of the most toxic ships of all time that disney seemed to cave and make it happen despite it making zero narrative sense whatsoever. Crimes End of rant!

[luriuan]

I love how whenever ATLA recognizes Sokka is smart enough to solve a problem but it’d be too fast they just stick him in some kind of situation. Like he COULD’VE stopped jet from drowning a town so they tied him up and dumped him in a forest. He COULD’VE figured out what that spirits deal was so they lost him in the spirit world for 24 hours.

[sailing-ever-west-deactivated20]

One time they just stuck him in a hole in the ground for a whole episode.

[ectojester]

This is how writers should deal with characters who are too smart for the arc instead of making them suddenly dumber for no apparent reason.

If you frequently find yourself in random situations while your friends happen to be experiencing problems maybe you, too, are too smart for the narrative.

[not-deadsummer]

My favorite is that Sokka absolutely would've just navigated them out of the desert, so they had to put him on acid the entire time.

[elinorjaneofmanyfandoms]

One thing AtLA did really well is combine the Smart Guy with the Comic Relief in a way that works. I think it works because Sokka is genuinely skilled in many ways, but in the areas where he isn't, his inexperience, sarcasm, and skepticism is funny.

His sarcasm and skepticism is funny, regardless!

[clacy2812]

Lemme touch your face - Part 1/3

[twinprime]

teal and orange truly is the greatest color combo in the world. like name one better combo

[twinprime]

this is spiritually healing to me

[beans-after-midnight]

a platypus palette?

[zzoupz]

[beans-after-midnight]

PERRY THE PLATYPUS PALETTE???

[comradekatara]

atla just so happened to write one of the most insane and complex brother sister relationships in all of television, and yet for some reason everyone focused on zuko and azula instead, even though they are basically just normal siblings, and as such not even that interesting ..

[comradekatara]

their dynamic is more fraught and tragic than you could ever comprehend……

this☝️ is just a typical sibling interaction

[adrenaline-revolver]

katara and sokka are what happens when you are your brother’s mother and your brother also tries to be your father. you love them, you hate them, you’re half of them, you can’t stand them, you look after them, they keep you safe.

azula and zuko are both just gifted kid burnouts with a dad that only loves the winner.

[tanoraqui]

#yeah when they're not trying to kill each other azula and Zuko are p normal. #katara and sokka on the other hand spent the majority of their childhood trying to raise each other #and were also the ONLY kids in their age group that they ever interacted with. #they are so. they're so. #''i don't remember what my mom looks like I just picture katara'' WHEN HE HAS HIS MOTHER'S FACE. kills me. (@professorsparklepants)

[surgepricing]

I think about Azula shooters often and their common refrain of "if Azula hadn't had a mental breakdown, she would've won" and I'm here to tell you that no, she wouldn't have.

There is no universe in which Azula was winning that fight with Zuko (or Katara, for that matter).

Azula spent so much of Book 2 being built up as this deadly terrifying force against whom the heroes are badly outmatched that it can be difficult to catch exactly how quickly Zuko is advancing.

Back up a bit to Book One. For the fearsome exiled crown prince of the Fire Nation, Zuko's not that impressive a firebender. He's not bad by any stretch, and he's able to lay the untrained Sokka and Katara flat pretty easily. Then he gets in the ring with Aang, who is an airbending master, and the difference between a regular bender and a master becomes apparent when Aang literally puts his ass to bed:

People have attributed this to the fact that no one's fought an airbender in 100 years, but I think it's also worth noting that Aang (a 12 year old from a pacifist nation) has probably never fought anyone before. Like, ever. And yet the second Aang thinks "okay, I'll attack back", the fight's over.

Zuko's got the same genetic predisposition for firebending talent that Azula does, yet it never seems to manifest because of his mental blocks. At the beginning of the series, he's already so beat down that all he really has is conviction, pride, and anger, so even with training from Iroh (the firebending master, thank you very much), he struggles. Yet throughout Book 2, when he has no time to train because he's on the run, he actually seems to advance faster. The fact that his bending is literally tied to his character arc (as his morals become tangled and he has to fight off aforementioned mental blocks) is pretty brilliant. Like, by the time of the Crossroads of Destiny, Zuko getting his ass handed to him by Aang is a pretty consistent feature of the show--he just can't match wits with him.

Hell, at the beginning of the series, he and Iroh (again: the actual firebending master) launch a combined power surface-to-air attack...which Aang casually swats away into a nearby ice wall. Come the Crossroads of Destiny, however, and Zuko by himself launches this bigass fireball that blows through Aang's defenses.

Zuko advances so quickly that it's scary. That prodigious talent is in him even if it doesn't come through as cleanly as with Azula. Who, by the way, was busy about to get flattened by Katara some few dozen feet away, until Zuko took over and then effectively stalemated her himself.

All of this in retrospect makes it abundantly clear why Zuko's firebending seemed to skyrocket so much when he learned true firebending from the Sun Warriors: it was really the only thing left. He's hard a hard road learning how to fight waterbenders, earthbenders, and airbenders, and even if unconsciously, he's applying the philosophy Iroh taught him about augmenting his bending style with aspects of other styles (see also, the waterbending-like fire whips he uses in the above gif). Once he actually understands fire and how it works, he's got it mastered. Hence why any gap between him and Azula effectively disappears as soon as their next fight--before her friends have betrayed her and her stability goes out the window. There's no real sense of urgency to their fight at the Boiling Rock prison. True, Sokka's presence with the sword helps, but Zuko doesn't look remotely worried and he counters Azula's every attack perfectly.

All her life, Azula only ever learned fire. She was taught by the best people the fire nation can employ, so she knows all the cool tricks, but she's still poisoned by the corrupted firebending practiced in the modern ATLA timeline. Unlike Zuko, who managed to get the basics if nothing else from Iroh (fire comes from the breath, and can be used to survive as much as to kill), Azula has always used fire as a weapon and a means to hurt others. She has no true knowledge of the craft, meaning she's got the same weaknesses as Zhao, she's just better disciplined to the point she can make up for it.

Zuko's victory was a given considering Azula's complete loss of control by the time of Sozin's comet, but even had she been in a perfect mental state, she'd have lost, because in many ways Zuko is simply the better firebender.

And that's the truth of it.

[2blondiegirl]

[chuwenjie]

So stoked to share the official trailer for the Avatar Aang movie, now releasing JULY 25th on Paramount+!!

I’m so proud of our crew and honored to have been a part of this.. for everyone who has waited to watch the official release in order to support the artists and animators, I just want to say thank you so much, from the bottom of my heart - it truly means so much!!

[kyoshi-lesbians]

my controversial opinion is I don’t think Zuko was confused by “my first girlfriend turned into the moon”

[kyoshi-lesbians]

he was there during siege of the North. he infiltrated the spirit oasis. he has an uncle who studies spirits and the spirit world. he watched the sky go dark then the moon suddenly reappear like everyone else in the entire world did. and most importantly he watched zhao get eaten by a giant godzilla fish spirit.

[kyoshi-lesbians]

his entire life since he saw that beam of blue-white light in the south pole has been ‘this day has already been so goddamn weird’

[edgar-allan-possum]

The only really new information was that that was Sokka’s girlfriend

[library-graffiti]

Important opinion in the tags that I need to have be part of the post:

[clearascountryair]

Also, Iroh was there? He literally watched Sokka make out with the moon spirit. And you want to tell me that a romantic sap like him would not have immediately told Zuko about this romantic tragedy? Please, Zuko has known about this for ages, he just knows that this is not an acceptable situation in which to say “yeah, I know.”

[terriwriting]

Sokka: “My girlfriend turned into the moon.”

Zuko: “I know.” “Yes.” “She sure did.” “Uh huh.” “Tell me something new.” “Are we still talking about that?” “That’s rough, buddy.”

[alexseanchai]

[image: tags by samwisethebold: #it’s not that he doesn’t get what sokka means #it’s that how on earth do you respond to that]

[uberguber89]

When you put it like that, this is actually a legendary display of tact on Zuko’s part

[anachronic-cobra]

Zuko is not confused by spirit shenanigans, he’s confused about societal conventions

[thespiritofeon]

yo…. when jet breaks in the tea shop and accuses zuko and iroh of beinh firebenders….

do you think any of the patrons looked at zukos scarred face - obviously done by a firebender - and immediately think jet was an asshole? like

jet: hes a firebender!!!!

patrons, thinking about the backstory they concocted for zuko and iroh where their home was invaded by firebenders and they barely survived with their lifes so they could come and have a peaceful life selling tea in a city the war doesnt touch:

Jet: He’s a firebender!

The Patrons to the Tea Shop internally: You fucking stupid, sir? I think you might be stupid.

THE TAGS

[captainlordauditor]

#if someone shouted something racialized at a food service worker and he pulled swords#if be like ‘yeah that’s fair’

[brain-deadx0]

He didn’t even use his own swords. He took them from a guard and the guards let him

[vareidow]

[ironinkpen]

one aspect of avatar canon i feel like isn't talked about nearly enough is the fact that zuko canonically has prophetic dreams

[ironinkpen]

like during zuko's Morality Coma in season 2 he has an incredibly vivid dream about two red and blue dragons, and then in season 3 he just fucking. meets the exact same dragons for real? there are slight differences in how they look but otherwise he genuinely just dreamed about ran and shaw months before actually seeing them in person? and it's never elaborated on but huh???

[ironinkpen]

zuko: yeah i had some weird fever dreams. there were like these two dragons circling me, and the blue one sounded like azula and wanted me to die or whatever, and the red one sounded like you and was telling me not to do that—

iroh, the only person in this house who should know what those fucking dragons look like: hey What

[ironinkpen]

zuko for sure keeps having dreams like this for YEARS without connecting the dots that it's weird spirit shenanigans. aang eventually has to point it out to him and even then he thinks it's Uncle Bullshit for several more years

[puppetmaster55]

so what you’re saying is—

Zuko, freshly scarred: I had a dream that Uncle and I were clinging to a piece of driftwood for weeks before we ended up at a lovely spa and tended to and all my injuries were healed up

Iroh, years later, on week two of driftwood era: maybe I underestimated the sense of humor that the spirits have

[starsharks]

a collection of my fav tags on this post--

#I think there are explanations other than prophetic dreams but this is funnier#like for example him looking in the mirror and seeing air nomad tattoos is probably#just a manifestation of his anxiety around helping aang and what that means about him#but considering Zuko's grandfather is a former avatar and he later joins aang#that is a very funny dream for him to have#I vote Zuko has been having prophetic dreams this whole time but they involve a lot of symbolism#and he Does NOT do symbolism#so he's just like hm. yeah that was weird#and then when life poetically mirrors his prophetic dreams he doesn't even notice#This never comes up during his life time but some historian eventually uncovers his dream journal and finds it pretty blatantly#predicts every major event from his lifetime and beyond#and it ignites massive debate about how this foreknowledge was affecting his decisions as a head of state#hint: it wasn't (@an-android-in-a-tutu)

#listen not to read too much into the one line about love among the dragons#but zuko definitely knows about poetic symbolism but he doesn't believe in prophetic dreams due to thinking it's old man stuff for his uncle (@rogha)

#zuko thinks the curtains are blue and nothing else#prince ‘…which could mean nothing’ zuko (@averagemrfox)

#apollo throws the dodgeball and it just bounces off zuko @noccolibroccoli)

#Zuko being the spirit’s favored Normal Human (along w Sokka)#and him doing absolutely nothing with it#bc it never strikes him as relevant#(as opposed to Sokka who knows about the spirits but actively chooses to ignore them)#(out of spite and non-belief) (@seaglassdinosaur)

#sokka who had Multiple close encounters with spirits. still thinks they’re total bs#🫱🏽‍🫲🏼#zuko who has prophetic vision and thinks they’re total bs (@aneclecticmoonchild)

#zuko 🤝 sokka#yes I've had encounters with the supernatural no I don't believe in it (@emkini)

#he's that guy#the one who has prophetic visions but also impostor syndrome so he's like 'ugh it's just weird dreams'#'prince zuko have you considered maybe you have a gift--'#'there's only one gifted child in this family and she's a massive pain and also better than me at everything actually' (@aethersea)

#zuko gets into a coma everytime he makes a right decision bc the spirits gotta congratulate him somehow#they’re proud#do good and see the future as an exchange (@newbie-i-guess)

[ao3org]

Wrangling Update - Avatar: The Last Airbender 

Hello ATLA fans! With the recent changes to Fandom Metatags, a new change is coming to the way the Avatar: The Last Airbender franchise fandom on AO3 is structured! Don’t worry, the existing fandom tags will remain as they are - this change will not impact your ability to search for works in specific fandoms (i.e. Legend of Korra, The Chronicles of the Avatar novels, etc.). 

What is changing is that we are creating a new metatag for the fandom! 

What is a metatag, you ask? Great question - think of metatags (and subtags) like file folders on your computer or in your Google Drive. In this analogy, the metatag is the top-level folder and the subtags are sub-folders that live inside that top-level folder.

New ATLA metatag: Avatar: The Last Airbender & Related Fandoms

All current and future ATLA-related fandoms will be sub-fandoms ("subtags") of the new Avatar: The Last Airbender & Related Fandoms fandom metatag. Currently, this includes: 

Avatar: The Last Airbender (Cartoon 2005)

Avatar: Legend of Korra

Avatar: The Last Airbender: Chronicles of the Avatar Novels - Various

Avatar: The Last Airbender (Live Action TV 2024)

Avatar Legends (Roleplaying Game)

Avatar: The Last Airbender (Video Games 2006 2007)

Avatar: Realms Collide (Video Game)

There is no 2010 movie in Ba Sing Se The Last Airbender (2010)

As new ATLA franchise canon is released, those will be added as subfandoms as well. For more information on the hows and whys, keep reading below the cut!

Why are we making this change? 

In short, to make it easier to filter and search for what you’re looking for! 

Franchise-wide searching: Don’t care which part of canon is included in your search? No problem! Filter/search using the new metatag (Avatar: The Last Airbender & Related Fandoms) and all the fandoms listed above will be included in the results. 

Specific sub-fandom searching: Only interested in works tagged as Legend of Korra or one of the other sub-fandoms? We’ve got you covered, too! Simply filter/search using the subfandom, and you’ll only see results that have the sub-fandom tagged. And if you want to exclude works where some or all of the other sub-fandoms are tagged, you can still do that as well! Just add those fandoms under the exclude filter.

Crossovers: Don’t like crossovers with external fandoms? Or maybe you LOVE crossovers? Either way, this change is good news for you! By organizing all the ATLA subfandoms under the overarching metatag, works that are tagged with multiple ATLA fandoms will no longer be treated as a crossover work by the filtering/search system! This means that:

When you exclude crossovers from your search, works tagged with multiple ATLA-related fandoms will now show up in the results (since the system no longer considers them to be crossovers since they are now all part of the same fandom tree). 

When you include crossovers in your search, works tagged with ATLA fandoms and non-ATLA fandoms will still appear as usual.

Other ATLA Wrangling Tips

Beware the blue people Avatar! While you’re always welcome to tag your works however you like, we recommend selecting your preferred ATLA fandom directly from the dropdown or using phrasing specific to ATLA. If you tag your work’s fandom just using the word "Avatar" or something similar, you run the risk of your work being listed under the James Cameron Avatar franchise instead of ATLA. Tags are wrangled based on what they've most been used for, and many "Avatar" tags have already been made synonyms of James Cameron Avatar fandom tags.

Speaking of the dropdown - mind the dropdown! Because AO3’s dropdown prioritizes results that list a word multiple times, the first result may not always be the result you’re looking for. For example, the fandom for the ATLA novels is Avatar: The Last Airbender: Chronicles of the Avatar Novels - Various, which includes the word "Avatar" twice. We recommend double-checking what tag you select from the dropdown to make sure it's the fandom tag you intended! 

Happy tagging! If you have questions or need help, please contact Support, who will be happy to offer any necessary guidance.

(From time to time, ao3org posts announcements of recent or upcoming wrangling changes on behalf of the Tag Wrangling Committee.)

[comradekatara]

there are only so many world leaders, right? and they’re all beholden to sokka in some major way…

the avatar: will be 35 years old and still have a pavlovian response to sokka saying “all right everyone, time for bed!” 

the firelord: so ride or die it’s honestly concerning

the earth king: owes to sokka his newfound knowledge of basic critical thinking skills

chief of the northern water tribe: his daughter seemed to think he was pretty dope before she turned into the moon

chief of the southern water tribe: thinks her brother is an idiot but has good ideas sometimes, and appreciates the fact that he doesn’t care whether or not he gets credit for them as long as they’re implemented 

not to mention that toph is basically a one-woman weapon of mass destruction who does not listen to anyone—with the crucial exception of one person—and guess who that is!

and he’s basically an honorary member of the white lotus???

basically what I’m saying is sokka secretly rules the world

[ruffboi-mags]

I think what you’re saying is that sokka secretly rules the world and has no fucking idea.

[catgirlcaliphate]

I’m totally on board with this except I think Sokka is an actual, full-fledged member of the White Lotus, and he also doesn’t realize that.

[bisexualbaker]

The White Lotus kept inviting him to meetings, and he showed up and assumed they were just humoring his interest. His initiation was much the same; he’s dead certain that they just gave him a robe and made him part of the ceremony to “feel included”. And he’s super touched by the way they keep inviting him to those meetings and even seem interested in what he has to say! Sometimes (a lot of times, actually, but he doesn’t even notice that) they even use his ideas!

They’re really cool people, those White Lotus guys. Sokka thinks it would be pretty awesome to be a part of their group.

[ajhasmademistakes]

#broke: didnt know they were dating #woke: didnt know they were a secret society member #thought they were just being polite

[because-im-freaking-greed]

I know we all know that toph loves to cuss, but I just realized

She had an extremely sheltered upbringing, then when she snuck out to fight, she went to the Earth Kingdom version of WWE, which, if it’s like real world WWE, is family entertainment, and she never spent time backstage, she came she fought she left

I don’t think Toph knows any swear words

[lostfan10000]

She learns to swear from team avatar and becomes all powerful.

[because-im-freaking-greed]

I don’t think Sokka or Katara would know swears either; they grew up in a village consisting of them, Gram Gram, and a bunch of little kids and their moms

I don’t know if the airbenders taught aang swears or not but I know he’s not really the type to swear anyway

Zuko, on the other hand, spent about 3 years of his life as a young angry teenager surrounded by sailors

[waterbenderkat]

Zuko and Suki teach the Gaang to cuss— the Avatar spinoff.

[master-katara]

Zuko when he joins Team Avatar

[captainkirkk]

Toph’s REAL life-changing field trip

[wrenchinator-central]

Toph when Zuko stubs his toe and lets out a string of curses

[sboochi]

Made myself a new lockscreen!

[yourmajestybee]

EVERYONE NEEDS TO LOOK AT HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON UNTRAINABLE THE STAGE PLAY RN

[magnetic-rose]

“why does someone MATURE like katara fall in love with a CHILD like aang?” fundamental misunderstanding of katara’s character and her dynamic with aang. she was forced to mature because she lost her mom but she is still, at the end of the day, a fourteen year old child.

she falls in love with aang because he doesn’t just represent hope for the world but he also gives her back her lost childhood with his whimsy. she gets to be silly and childish with him and that’s so important for her.

this fandom tends to adultify katara too much. she’s literally a kid. and it’s okay for her to be.

[rrrrunk]

sorry but look how silly drunk gaang is