Civil War - Part 1

[talibusorabat]

I really liked this episode, especially in comparison to the premiere. What did the rest of you think?

At first I wasn't sold on Aang not being a great father, but now I really like the idea. It's a nice reminder that he's not perfect, and it makes sense to me that he would become fixated on preserving his culture over making sure all his children felt equally loved. And it was nice to see an acknowledgement that people can grow up in the same circumstances but remember them differently, and that our memories of the past aren't objective.

I wish we could have seen more of Jinora, though -- I feel a little teased that we got so much great stuff with her last week that still isn't explained, and then she was on screen this week just to explain that Ikki is missing. I don't see how they could have fit her into the episode, really, but I'm still sad we didn't get more.

Comments

[kaberett]

I'm still disappointed, which ugh, I don't WANT to be, but -- I am genuinely astonished that Katara would let Aang get away with being such a dreadful father, and that none of that backstory would come through in her interactions with all three of them together. And having seen Tenzin as a very active parent in season 1 (think running after Milo at the ball Tarrlok threw!) I'm really, REALLY not sold on him suddenly being shit - and the siblings we've never seen before knowing enough about it to have opinions.

I am also pissed that Mako compared Asami to a blood-sucking leech.

-- I mean, I continue endeared by Jinora (oh sweetie, get better at lying), but... Bolin is better than this, really he is, and WHY has Korra not learned anything about trusting skeezy older men who flatter her and then want her to do morally-dubious things?

[batrachian]

+1

[talibusorabat]

I guess I see it more as the siblings having opinions on Tenzin's parenting based more on their experience with Aang than what they've actually seen of Tenzin? Neither of them have children either, so it's very easy for them to see some of the shit that goes wrong when you have kids and think "YOU'RE A BAD PARENT!" rather than "Wow being a parent is hard."

The leech comment was deeply unfortunate, ick. I know they don't have bandaids in Republic City, so the writers had to rework the metaphor, but WOW did they screw the pooch with that one. Poor Asami!


I don't have a problem with Korra trusting Unalaq. It is kind of irritating that he has the same exact skeezy vibe as Tarrlok did, but I don't actually see her relationship with him as similar. Korra didn't trust Tarrlok for very long -- he got her to work with him not because she trusted him, but because he manipulated her into making a public promise. She continued to go along with him for awhile because she had promised. Unalaq she does trust, and I think part of that comes from the fact that he's family. If it were a stranger saying sweet words she wants to hear, I think she'd remember Tarrlok and be suspicious, but this is her uncle. She may not see him often, but she knows him already.

[opusculasedfera]

Better than the premiere, but the pacing is still incredibly awkward.

I like their ideas, but I'm still not sure about the execution. Aang being imperfect and fixated on airbending: believable! Aang expressing this by actually leaving some of his kids behind? That strikes me as weird. I'd definitely believe that Kya and Bumi didn't have equally fond memories of vacations that Aang spent focused on Tenzin, but I don't think we're supposed to think that they actually did go and now don't remember it.

[sholio]

I am finally caught up so I can read reactions now, and I'm totally with you on the way they're handing the Aang-Katara-kids family dynamics!

For one thing, I'm really amazed that so many people are assuming that just because Aang's kids don't have good memories of their childhood, it means Aang was objectively a bad father. Aang would have had to spend extra time with Tenzin to train him, especially since he was the youngest so the older kids were big enough to have had their own hobbies and pursuits by that time, and I can easily see "training trips with Dad" blowing up into this giant thing where the older siblings were jealous and resentful, but were too deep in teen angst to actually talk to their parents about it, so they've been sitting on that bitterness all these years, especially since they all lost their dad so young. There was no time to work things out -- they were all busy with their own lives, and then suddenly Aang was dead, and all the conversations they might have had never happened. It's also worth mentioning that not all of the siblings' conflict dates back to their childhood; there's also Kya's perfectly legitimate resentment that neither of the boys helped her take care of their mom after their dad died. There's no way that can possibly be Aang's fault!

Basically it just strikes me as a very believable conflict of the sort that many families, even happy and loving families, can have, based mostly on miscommunication and the different kids' different personalities causing them to react differently to the circumstances of their childhood. And the whole storyline right now is about the grown kids working through their issues and realizing that all families have problems (... does Ikki running away mean Tenzin and Pima are terrible parents? of course not!) and the important thing is that they all love each other anyway.