Aang vs. Korra
Hey everyone!
I know this isn't a BL review, but I just want to make a review about the "Aang & Korra constant comparison" which drifted to an ongoing unfairness towards the Avatar franchise, as well as an undeserved hatred towards Korra.
The fandom glorifies little Aang, literally and I'm one of them because the glorification is legitimate: we grew up watching the three avatar books, we resonated with the characters, they were all strong and had a great friendship bond between them, it was fantastic, surreal, and that's okay. It's the author's right to make a group of the best benders all together working to save the world from the dictatorship of the Fire lord, first blood bender (to learn blood ending you can say), first metal bender and an undefeatable earth bender, the next fire lord in the team, a next water tribe leader, all amazing. It was beautiful and unflawed.
Yet, Korra was a disappointment to the majority, it was realistic to an unenjoyable point. The team was a bunch of complicated love relationships, technology was very confusing in all of it, Korra was always messing things up, being annoying and stubborn, and she never made improvements on her personality to be more likeable. Aang had to face the fire lord and prepared himself in only a year, whereas Korra had a 15+ training and combat experience, yet she struggled to face her enemies, always winning but at what cost? Great casualties were always there. So everyone starts hating on how bad she did and that she could've done better.
But that's the irony where basic fans get trapped in: an anime/cartoon/manga/tv show/movie IS NOT a real person that one can judge and expect certain things from, but it's actually the writer that you can argue with on how he should've written the characters, and for that that there are two things to consider: 1) the writer's right to free writing: they can write their characters as they wish, you can't refuse a character's behaviour just because it's not to your liking; 2) and the actual objective criteria with which we can say if a writer did a good job or not, no matter how he wrote the story, is the consistency of his story and characters with human psychology (a real science that tells us how humans usually behave in certain situations).
Objectively, both writers did an awesome job, yes. Korra was exactly how she should react, and the story was exactly how it should've happened. Let's make some realistic comparisons based on human psychology:
Aang never stood a chance of survival: so he was an 11 yo kid who just found out he was the Avatar, he was shocked, so he flew to the waters far away from the air temple, it can happen. But what if he didn't go in the waters and rather stayed alone in some alone place in the air temples, which is probabilistically speaking more likely to happen that a teenage boy is to distance himself just nearby. And then the fire nation attacked, he would go check it out, and be killed instantly on the spot. Just like that. No one would've saved him. And the avatar goes to a water bender, the fire nation would also, highly probable, find them and kills them, and even when it goes to the earth nation, until the avatar is a fire bender under the control of the fire lord. So to begin with, we wouldn't even have a story of the last airbender.
Nevertheless, Aang had entered a state of sleep for 100 years, and he couldn't awake himself in all that time, yet was suddenly discovered by some passing water benders. But what if no one had crossed him, I mean for a 100 years no one woke him, how come now he was found coincidentally? Logically speaking, by a 100 years, the fire nation would've had the water tribes under control so they don't roam freely (since they had no waterbenders). So the possibility of Aang being found by the fire nation is more likely than by the water tribe. And when found again, killed on spot.
Aang woke up, found out that all airbenders were wiped out, and there's war because of his absence. Clumsy he is, he sets a goal to correct his deeds and stop the war and restore peace. He was an 11 yo boy, he was a dreamer who doesn't believe in the impossible, facing the fire lord could you imagine! It's literally facing the most powerful who kings and queens didn't dare to do it or failed doing so countless of times throughout the 100 years. Now Aang thinks like this because he feels guilty with everyone blaming him for the disappearing, and he builds a high sense of duty and commitment to save the world again. And then his journey begins.
These are the parts that I'm gonna adress, because they are the core of the story, the other parts where he meets powerful allies they're acceptable and the author is free to make that happen, even though yes realistically the probabilities aren't that high.
Now for Korra
Korra was born in a time of peace, where there was Council of great and powerful masters controlling the city and ensuring peace across the planet. So when enemies emerged or wars would start, she wouldn't care as much since there are more experienced and powerful ones to resolve it before her. So Korra didn't have that commitment to save the world as she is avatar, nor the guilt if things went badly because the council wasn't able to solve it, how can I just a child?
Korra never took her trainings seriously because again, she lived in a time of peace, so she would never think that there would a great threat that the council won't be able to handle. So she didn't hurry herself to learn airbending, she can do it later on when she gets 25 or something, now all she wants and thinks is good is to combat using fire bending and some water and earth bending. She lived in a world filled with events, the city was lively and she was a prisoner in the air temple, and she wanted to discover things around her, just like Aang, and she found out friends who are basic, nothing fancy, nothing too strong, which is okay, it shouldn't be like the Aang team who was "unrealistic" as the Korra writer described, and again it's the writers right.
unlike Aang who was preparing to defeat the fire lord and save the world because he felt guilty, Korra had to face 4 enemies, not prepared for any of them, who by far exceeded her abilities and expertise, and who weren't ordinary enemies, but were extremely life threatening: 1) one arised from tge heart of the city threatening to take away her bending! It's scary for any bender, death would look merciful for them. He was the one running after her, and yet she took the courage to face him when he abducted the air benders (that's the same commitment Aang had to face the fire lord, so this element is present in both stories). 2) the second one caused spirit realm to go upside down, an event that happens once in 4000 years if I remember correctly, and she had to stop Vatuu and Unlok or else chaos would roam for 4000 years, not 100. That's an even heavier responsibility than correcting what happened in 100 years due to Aang disappearance. And Unolok breaking the connection with the previous avatars was likely to happen to any avatar, because Unolok became an equivalent to the avatar. 3) the red lotus, where her enemy poisoned her and was able to bend the life out of a person, and was able to fly on the wind (I genuinely liked him and his strength), if it wasn't for the avatar state, any bender would've died. 4) the fourth one was actually the hardest among them, because she wasn't facing one enemy who everyone was against, but she was facing someone who had the backup of a nation, just like facing the fire lord and his army, except Aang faced one-on-one the fire lord with bending strength, Kovira had technology and spiritual matter, so it's an imbalanced fight were Kuvira has higher chances of winning.
In all cases, she always thought the danger had cleared, which is the most understandable reaction in such situations, just like Aang when he defeated the fire lord, if anything were to happen in a book 4 for example (like the new released movie of old Aang), would he have predicted it? Surely not.
- Korra wasn't ready to risk her life to save the world as Aang believed. Aang was too determined to defeat the fire lord even if he dies doing so, because he had to get rid of the guilt of his nation being wiped out. Korra had no strong motivation to fight those who were after their own gains: the first enemy wanted no benders, Korra could've run away and left others to deal with him, yet she only fought him because he had taken the metal bender's bending and she wanted it back. Unolok threatened to distress the peace to become the new avatar, which made Korra more motivated to stop before he became too powerful to eradicate her. Same thing for the red lotus, he just wanted her on his side, she could've accepted and went with the bad guys, and the same goes for Kuvira, she could've allowed her to rule and conquer all the earth nation, so Korra actually was fighting with no motivation to fight, exhausted with the constant threats that she ended up wanting to escape to the spirit world, and with the burden of being the one who broke the cycle, just like Aang is blamed for not saving the air nation from the genocide.
Now just imagine if Aang was Korra and Korra was Aang, would you still hate on Aang for being such a loser and being unable to live to the expectations of the avatar before him Korra? If yes, then you still dont understand the beauty of storytelling and how amazing both authors did a great job.
Thanks for reading (sorry for writing too much hehe).