u/F11SuperTiger

The Shang Dynasty famously had women serve in military roles and as military leaders, most famously Fu Hao. Notable Women of China: Shang Dynasty to the Early Twentieth Century claims that "Fu Hao was one, but not the only, female militarist of Shang China, as oracle bones of the period indicate more than a hundred women by name who were active in military campaigns."

I have two questions:

First, about how many men by name do we know from the oracle bones that were active in military campaigns? Is the "100 women" within an order of magnitude of the number of known men.

Second, both in the context of later Chinese culture and in the general context of Bronze Age agricultural state societies, having women take such an active role in military leadership seems very unusual to me. What, if anything, do we know about why the Shang were so "equalitarian" here, about how this worked in practice, or about why the Zhou and later were so different in this way?

I believe in this fandom that there is often a deep, underlying, unstated assumption that, if the audience and/or Zuko have a particular perceptive of Azula, the rest of the Gaang must share it, but I do not think that's remotely supported what the cartoon actually depicts. Let's look at their actual encounters.

"Return to Omashu": Aang, Katara, and Sokka have no idea who Azula is. Azula realizes Aang is the Avatar and tries to capture him, but is stopped by Bumi.

"The Chase": Azula tells Aang that she's Zuko's sister. This is the extent of what she reveals about herself. Azula tries to capture Aang.

"The Drill": Azula tries to conquer Ba Sing Se, fights Aang, has no substantive conversation with the Gaang.

"The Guru": Azula, Mai, Ty Le surprise and capture Katara.[1]

"The Crossroads of Destiny": Mai, Ty Lee, and Azula capture Toph and Sokka, then Azula and Zuko fight Aang and Katara. Azula hits Aang with lightning. Again, Azula doesn't say anything that substantive in the presence of any remember of the Gaang.

"The DoBS": Azula defends the Fire Nation and her father against Aang, Toph, and Sokka. She does deliberately try to get into their skin to distract them, including spin a tale about Suki being her favorite prisoner, but it's still a short encounter.

"Boiling Rock, Part II": Azula fights Zuko and Sokka, says nothing.

"The Southern Raiders": Overwhelmingly, it's Zuko that Azula fights here.

"Sozin's Comet": Zuko and Katara fight Azula. This is arguably the most substantive interaction interaction the Gaang (aside from Zuko) have with Azula, but it is fairly limited and Toph, Sokka, and Aang aren't there.

This is a fairly limited set of interactions, and the Gaang also hardly ever talk about Azula when she's not present. And why would they? Azula never had the sort of interactions with the Gaang that defined "pre-redemption" Zuko. She never invaded and terrorized Sokka and Katara's home. She never broke Aang out of prison. She never had her life saved (multiple times!) by Aang. She was never offered help by the Gaang. She never emotionally bonded Katara and then betrayed her. All the things which personalized Zuko's relationship with the Gaang, even before he joined them, are utterly lacking for Azula.

Azula also really never talks about herself or her motives in the presence of the Gaang. She says nothing about her backstory around them, and very little about her relationship with her family. Most of the stuff which define the audience perceptive of her and her characterization occur outside the handful of brief scenes that the Gaang are present.

Insomuch as the Gaang would perceive her motives, it would be

1. Trying to capture Ba Sing Se
2. Trying to capture or kill the Avatar
3. Trying to defend the Fire Nation

This isn't exactly things they're in favor of, but it's also bog standard stuff for your average Fire Nation commander. Azula really isn't unique there.

Further, the things that Azula has done or tried to do the Gaang are not exactly nice, but they're also not exactly unusual for someone to do their military opponents during a war. She never really did anything that was exceptionally cruel or anything like that to them. Even verbal taunts were essentially reserved for the DoBS, where she didn't have her firebending. Stuff like "disguising herself as a Kyoshi Warrior" is even very easily paralleled by some stuff the Gaang itself has done.

Putting this all together, I think the Gaang must generally view Azula as a military opponent, who they don't really know anything about or have any particular relationship with. Azula is particularly skilled and dangerous, but that's the main exceptional thing about her. Katara has somewhat of a grudge against Azula, for "killing" Aang, and also witnessed Azula's breakdown, and that's basically it for that sort of thing. Azula is neither someone they have particular reason to hate nor someone they have a reason to involve themselves with.

Ironically, I think even the comics, which I think handle Azula poorly, kind of support this. The Search has Azula on-page with Sokka, Aang, and Katara a lot, but she never has anything approaching a heart-to-heart with any of them, and it's also clear they're not paying any attention to what Azula is actually saying and talking about. I don't think they gain any enlightenment about her there. Beyond that, they just don't really directly interact with her in the other comics.

[1] As for Suki, her only real interaction with Azula seems to have been Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee kicking the Kyoshi Warriors' asses and stealing their uniforms. Suki is probably kind of mad about that, but on the other hand the fact she lets Ty Lee join really suggests that Suki is unlikely to have a massive grudge. Suki also doesn't seem to know anyone but Sokka in the Gaang particularly well.

Edit: The other side of this is that I don't think Azula has any personal hatred or real animosity toward any member of the Gaang. They're just military enemies in a war. She doesn't carry around grudges against them.

The damage to Republic City seems to have been pretty massive, with massive fires breaking out all over the city and various large parts of Avatar Sonam's temple hitting the ground. The damage from the fights in the city must also have been quite something.

Given this all, the death toll in Republic City must have been significant. The writers had all the fires magically go out somehow when Sonam's Temple began to return to the Spirit World, but that wouldn't save anyone who had already been suffocated or burned. I could only guess at how many people died, but a number in the thousands seems reasonable? And the property damage would also be extreme, with many people being left homeless.

I am reminded of the whole "Man of Murder" controversy which surrounded Zack Snyder's Man of Steel movie, more than a decade ago, where the director just didn't really think about the level of devastation he was depicting.

I just find it interesting that, in an Avatar movie which places so much emphasis on "protecting Republic City" and in which Republic City only gets threatened because the heroes screwed up, Republic City gets so devastated.

At certain point, Kallik, our designated "Good Denied Character," tells Katara

>"I'm not like you. The world hasn't been good to me."

Katara gives a very generic heroic response ("The world is what we make it"), despite hearing what must be one of the most offensive things she has ever heard.

Katara's home was raided, her culture was targeted for destruction, her people was reduced to a mere shadow of their past glory, her culture's bending was stripped away, her mother murdered. She's a genocide victim; the world wasn't "good for her." In this context, Kallik's line comes as a very strange inclusion, particularly from a writing perspective.

More broadly, Sokka and Katara are genocide victims, yet the movie never brings that up, much less utilizes it. A movie viewer who has never seen the original series would have no idea about the Southern Water Tribe genocide.

The thing that Sokka and Katara share the most with Aang is that they're all genocide victims. Aang is the last airbender, while Katara was the last Southern Waterbender. In a movie which focuses so much on the Air Nomad genocide and so much on the relationship between Katara and Aang, you would expect that there their shared experience as victims of genocide would be vital, yet it is absent. Katara is treated as "generic, good, optimistic, heroic supporting girlfriend," rather than someone who lived the life she did, and it's a shame. Why, for instance, is Katara far more obsessed with the future of Republic City than she is with the recovery of the Southern Water Tribe?

Edit: to be clear, the main reason I brought up Kallik's line was because I felt it was symbolic of the movie's broader disregard for Katara's past. It's not the main subject of my post.

One way we can think about the original cartoon is in terms of "half-seasons." This is most obvious for Book 3, but we can divide every season this way.

Book 1.0 arguably begins with Episode 1 ("The Boy in the Iceberg") and ends with Episode 2, "Avatar Roku (Winter Solstice, Part 2)," which massively shifts the stakes of the series.

Book 1.5 begins with Episode 9 ("The Waterbending Scroll") and ends with the season finale.

Book 2.0 begins with "The Avatar State" and ends with "Bitter Work," Episode 9, which caps off the storytelling arc of Aang learning Earthbending.

Book 2.5 begins with "The Library," Episode 10, and end with the season finale. "The Library" begins the Ba Sing Se arc that will consume the rest of the season.

Book 3.0 begins with "Awakening" and ends with "The Day of Black Sun, Part 2: The Eclipse," which is Episode 11. Book 3.0 encompasses the "Wait for the DoBS while hiding in the Fire Nation" portion of ATLA.

Book 3.5 begins with "The Western Air Temple," Episode 12, and ends with the series finale. It amounts to the "Zuko joins the Gaang" arc of ATLA, along with the final climax.

Under this framework, what is your favorite half season? Your least favorite? Which one do you think was the best written? Which one was the worst? Why?

I apologize for writing another post about the comics so soon after my one on character relationships in them, but the idea for this current post came to me while I was writing the last one, and I just needed to get it out of my head.

Before we get into specific comics, I should explain what I mean by contrived and inorganic conflict. An organic conflict is one that arises naturally out of the characters, their relationships with each other, and the setting they inhabit. A simple example would be "a Fire Nation commander wants to conquer a town for his country, so he attacks it, while the Gaang are in the area, so they have to reveal their presence and defend it." You can see how this conflict arises out of setting and out of the priorities and motives of the Fire Nation and of Team Avatar.

By contrast, an inorganic conflict violates the nature of the characters or the setting. Often it requires characters acting out of character, violating their deeply held beliefs, acting like idiots, or simply not behaving like humans ever would, all for the purpose of drama. The established rules of the setting are often ignored. Established antagonists have their motives conveniently reshaped to whatever the plot requires. When you see a plot which requires characters holding the idiot-ball or requires that two friends never spend 30 seconds communicating with each other, it's usually an example of a contrived, inorganic conflict.

The writing of the cartoon wasn't perfect in every episode and obviously the writers put their thumbs on things to drive the plot, but normally conflicts were organic and felt organic. Established characterization was not violated for cheap drama.

By contrast, most, although not all, of the comics rely on such plot contrivances to create drama and plot. Story, character, and setting elements that make no sense get added.

The Promise

Aang would never promise to murder his best friend, if he did make this promise he would never come close to going through with it, and he certainly wouldn't be eager to fulfil his "promise," before exhausting literally every other possible option. The entire core drama of this trilogy is completely contrived. The fact that neither Aang nor the book itself raises the question of who would rule the Fire Nation after Zuko's death (Ozai? Azula? Iroh, who's "son" Aang just murdered?) is a sign of how contrived and inorganic this entire plot point is. It requires violating the most core elements of Aang's characterization.

The Search

There are three matters I want to discuss: about The Search:

1. Azula. Arguably, Azula has her characterization and motives distorted (reduced to wanting to kill her mother), along with her being rendered completely unstable and prone random, uncontrolled actions, so that she can be precisely the antagonist Yang needed offer a threat to Zuko's "happy reunion" with his mother. She was included solely to fill the antagonist slot, and then distorted to be precisely the sort of antagonist Yang needed for the plot he wanted to write. I think this is a more arguable point than most others I plan to include in this post, but I wanted to bring it up because I will come back to Azula's use in the Smoke and Shadow later.
2. More importantly, the entire plot of "The Search" relies on the Gaang not realizing that Azula has a massive vendetta against Ursa, despite her bringing it up to their faces at every possible point. No matter how much Azula bring up hating "her" while they're in the middle of searching for a woman, Zuko and the Gaang can never be allowed to figure out she's talking about Ursa, because if they did, the plot would be over. The story requires them holding idiotballs for the first two-thirds of it.
3. Equally or perhaps more inorganic and nonsensical is the infamous letter. The plot requires Ursa to have written a letter claiming that Zuko is a bastard and not Ozai's son, under extremely contrived circumstances (it was part of a weird, and stupid, effort by Ursa to hurt Ozai). The plot ends up revolving around the letter for a while, but at the end Azula conveniently gets rid of it and Ursa conveniently reveals the truth, and all is resolved, to never be brought up ever again. It all was a convoluted and unnecessary way to create drama and, more importantly, to create a cliffhanger so that people would buy books 2 and 3 of the trilogy.

Sisters

Normally I would avoid even talking about a short, Free Comic Book Day comic, but Sisters, written by Gene Yang himself, relies on a contrivance so absurd that I felt I must mention it: Ty Lee and Toph are unable to defeat two entirely generic circus thugs and must be bailed out by the other Ty sisters.

Smoke and Shadow

Smoke and Shadow is one of the worst offenders, in terms of how contrived its plot is. Perhaps it even exceeds The Promise in this manner.

1. Ukano is the head of the New Ozai Society. Mai knows this. Ukano is trying to kill Zuko and his family. Mai knows this and doesn't want this to happen. Ukano is trying to influence Mai's little brother Tom-Tom. Mai knows this and doesn't want this to happen. Mai dislikes her father and has firmly opposed him since the events of Rebound, if not earlier. Yet for no good reason Mai spends months refusing to tell Zuko about Ukano's activities. The entire plot hinges on her inexplicably hiding everything from Zuko for no coherent motive. If she didn't, everything would have been resolved in the first book. Mai only gets over her silence (and outright lying) the third book, when it's time for the trilogy to end. The conflict required Mai to behave in a way that violated her character, because if she didn't it would have been brought to a swift conclusion.
2. Moving beyond that, Smoke and Shadow's plot is dependent entirely on Azula not wanting to hurt, kill, or overthrow Zuko anymore. Yet she orders Ukano to kill Zuko in the first book, and the assassination attempt nearly works! Zuko is only saved by luck. This makes no sense. Azula's motives change between different parts of the same story for no reason.
3. The New Ozai Society and Ukano are written as obsessed with "safety," rather than the power, glory, and wealth the Fire Nation lost when it gave up imperialism. This doesn't make a whole lot of sense (have street muggings drastically risen since Zuko become Firelord?), but it exactly fits the contrived plot Yang wanted to tell.
4. Azula. All of Azula's issues that she had at the end of The Search are randomly resolved offscreen, and instead she's been issued an entirely new set of motives. Her mental illness and emotional instability disappear, along with her relationships with her parents. There's no continuity. Azula has conveniently become the exact antagonist Yang needs for the exact dumb plot he wants to tell. It's pretty clear that this is a case of pounding a square peg into a round hole to give him the villain he needed, rather than asking what the logical evolution of her character from where she was in the last trilogy would be.

North and South

This trilogy has lesser issues than some others. However, there are a couple important elements which feel very contrived, since otherwise the conflict would have been resolved much easier:

1. Malina apparently told Hakoda that the original plan of the Northern Water Tribe contingent was to turn the South into a colony and seize its resources, and Hakoda didn't see this as something he should look into or tell anyone about?
2. Meanwhile, Maliq, Malina's brother, was apparently repeatedly telling Malina that the "steal the resources and colonize the South" plan was still on, yet she wouldn't listen to him?
3. A minor plotline is that there are a couple young waterbending girls who refuse to waterbend because apparently no one told them that the war was over? Not even their mom, when she apprenticed them to Pakku? And somehow it takes until the end of the third book before Katara actually explains things to them? It feels very contrived.

Katara and the Pirate's Silver

This is a minor issue compared to most other works, but there's a minor conflict between Katara and Jiang (the pirate leader) which is dependent on Jiang strangely repeatedly calling silver lilies "silver" and refusing to explain the truth, even when Katara gets mad at the pirates for charging money for medicine.

Suki, Alone

A central source of conflict in this comic is that Kyoshi Island is depicted as being entirely isolationist and refusing to have contact with the rest of the world, making Suki's decision to leave during the 100 Years War a violation of tradition that most of her community opposes. The only issue with this is that in the original show Kyoshi Island was depicted as having strong trading links with the rest of the world. Thus, the isolationism is an artificial impediment thrown up to create drama. There could be an equally dramatic conflicts over Suki being reluctant to leave her family, Suki being afraid that the Kyoshi Warriors leaving would render her home village defenseless, islanders being afraid that Suki joining the war would lead to Fire Nation retaliation against Kyoshi Island, but instead Faith Erin Hicks went with an unnecessarily contrived conflict.

The Bounty Hunter and the Tea Brewer

One of significant plot-points of this comic, and one of the major sources of drama in it, is that it claims that June is a bounty hunter who has sworn, ever since she was a child, to never work for a government, ever. It just makes no sense, considering June's choice of occupation (who does Hicks think issues most bounties? Who does Hicks think June was turning fugitives over to? Did Hicks just write June as someone whose chief occupation was kidnapping people for random private citizens and not realize what she was writing?). It only serves to create contrived conflict.

Ashes of the Academy

Ashes very nearly manages to escape contrived conflict. I personally think that having the Academy teach girls to never trust each other and to betray each other, rather than teaching them to serve and obey their families, their teachers, their ruler, and their nation, makes no sense, but I don't think it fits under the criteria I laid out.

Yet, at the very end of Ashes, it turns out that the evil, retired, 100 year old headmistress has Dai Li agents in her employ, who she uses to try to kill the current headmistress. It just makes no sense, and it was nothing more than a cheap, contrived excuse to add another action scene.

So, again, I feel like relying on contrived plots and contrived conflict is an issue that many of the comics have. In fairness, there are some (The Rift, Imbalance, Azula in the Spirit Temple, Toph's Metalbending Academy, Rebound, etc.) which don't, but most do.

The comics went out of their way to sand away any and all of the original "rough edges" or complexities of show's three-dimensional characters. Instead, we get trivialized versions, and any actually interesting character conflict or character traits are retconned away. Generally, the effect is that "good" characters are whitewashed while "evil" ones are demonized, while the natural character conflicts that would result from the original characters are replaced by contrived nonsense.

In this analysis, I'm going to focus primarily on Fire Nation characters, since I remember the most about their presentation in the comics and since I think they were particularly poorly portrayed in the comics. I'll go character by character, and discuss how the comic's managed to tear away the complexities away from them. I will be talking about the negative traits of certain characters a lot, because that was often the most interesting part of them and thus is precisely the aspect that Yang, Hicks, Bryke, etc. found desirable to strip away, but I want to clarify that I am not intending to criticize any character.

Ozai

Ozai in the show is utterly evil, not well-developed, and one-dimensional, but shockingly the comics managed to make him even more one-dimensional. In the show, it's very strongly implied that, once, Ozai took pride in Zuko as his son. In the comics, this gets retconned into Ozai hating Zuko from birth. In the show, there is no implication whatsoever that Ozai abused Ursa. In the comics, this gets retconned into him kidnaping and raping her. In the show, there is at least a minimal attempt to situate Ozai in the context of his ancestors. In the comics, nothing like this is done and Ashes of the Academy even retcons Azulon's 75 year reign out of existence.

A particular example of how Ozai is handled comes from the scene, at the end of Sozin's Comet, Part IV, where Zuko visits Ozai in prison. In the show, Ozai is bitter but also utterly defeated, depressed, and despondent. He knows he's lost totally and forever, and he's acting like it. The Promise then proceeds to take the exact same scene and retcon it so that Ozai is totally in control, confident, manipulative, and regal. The possibility of Zuko having to deal with his evil and terrible but depressed father is thrown out in favor of making Ozai the antagonist again.

Ursa

In the cartoon, Ursa was aristocratic, imperialist, and powerful. She, as a high-born noble, fully believed in the Fire Nation cause, but she murdered Azulon, along with doing other "vicious, treasonous, things," in order to protect her son. There's a certain ruthless quality to her actions, and there's no suggestion that she was forced to marry Ozai.

It would be very interesting to watch Firelord Zuko have to interact with his loving but also imperialist, active, and traditionalist mother, so of course that aspect of her was retconned away in the comics. Instead, The Search doesn't even let her be the one who poisoned Azulon, since we can't have a "good" character do anything morally questionable! Ursa is rewritten merely as a passive victim who bears zero responsibility for anything.

Moreover, Ashes of the Academy depicts Ursa as hating Fire Nation tradition, hierarchy, and imperialism, since she's a "good" character and we got to have "good" people" believe in "good" things.

Iroh

There is a lot that can be said about how Iroh's past and also the more negative aspects of his character get ignored by the franchise, but that's not something limited to the comics, so I think it would be unfair to single out the comics here.

However, there is one thing I want to focus on. Ursa, if we go by the show's narrative, murdered Iroh's father and stole Iroh's throne. Wouldn't it be interesting if Iroh was allowed to have feelings about this? Was allowed to hold onto a bit of a grudge over it, even if he knows it's irrational? And, on the other hand, Iroh didn't exactly do the world's best job protecting Ursa's children. Wouldn't it be interesting if Ursa was allowed to have feelings about this?

Smoke and Shadow instead pushes the idea that Iroh and Ursa are best buds, because of course "good" people must always get along with "good" people. This narrative already stands out as a little strange when you remember that Iroh never says a single word about Ursa in the show, and it becomes borderline nonsensical when you realize that the entire plot of The Search depends on Iroh having no useful information to give Zuko about Ursa.

Azula

There is a lot which could be said about her depiction in the comics, but for this post I just want to focus on a few things:

1. Two of Azula's strongest motives in the show are her loyalty to her father and her imperialism. These are completely ignored in the comics, in favor of making Azula's motives revolve around "throne-lust" and around "crazy" antagonism toward Ursa. The most complex parts of her motivations get erased.
2. In the cartoon, the very first episode that Zuko appears in establishes that he's unwilling to put in the work to master the basics of Firebending, instead demanding that Iroh skip ahead to teaching him advanced techniques. Likewise, the very first episode Azula appears in ("The Avatar State") establishes that Azula is willing to practice the same technique over and over again, until she gets it perfect. In The Search, these characterizations are completely reversed, so that Azula skips ahead without mastering the basics while Zuko complains about this, since we all know a "bad" character can never show a good trait and a "good" character can never show a bad trait. Thus, Yang saved us from dealing with the slightest bit of character complexity!
3. Smoke and Shadow has a bizarre episode where five year old Azula is demonized for stealing cookies mochi. Oh look, she totally forced her friends, who as good, non-demon children, would never consider stealing sweets, to do it! And Mai and Ty Lee refused to eat any of it and felt terribly guilty over it! It's not like stealing sweets is an innocent childhood activity!

Zuko

There is a lot that could be said about his depiction in the comics. However, there are a couple things I want to bring particular attention to.

First, in the show, there is a strong implication that, at a certain point in their lives, Zuko and Azula used to get along a lot better. Even "Zuko Alone" has a shot implying this, and it's reinforced by "The Storm" and "The Beach." One of Zuko's happy memories is of him, Azula, and Ozai playing together in a meadow.

The Search rejects this idea. Instead, it firmly suggests that Zuko has hated and feared Azula ever since she was a baby. This would be an interesting idea if the comics were actually willing to examine the implications of this, but they're not.

Second, The Search establishes two things in particular about Ursa:

a) she deliberately erased her memory of her children.

b) she also ruined Zuko's life by claiming to Ozai that Zuko was a bastard, in an attempt to hurt Ozai. She used her five year old son as a weapon against her husband, and this led to Ozai promising to treat Zuko like a bastard, a promise he carried out.

Zuko learns about both of these "facts," yet he's not allowed to have any sort of emotional reaction to them nor to hold Ursa the slightest bit responsible for either. The normal emotional reactions Zuko would have to learning this information get erased, so that Zuko and Ursa get along perfectly, since we all know all "good" characters must sing kumbaya together.

Ty Lee

Oh, boy, this is a big one.

In the show, Ty Lee is a Fire Nation noble, who received an imperialist education. She also grew up besides Azula and was her friend. Although Ty Lee did not want to leave the circus she enjoyed performing at, she had no moral or ideological objection to any of Azula or the Fire Nation's actions, and spent most of her time in the series gleefully furthering the Fire Nation's imperialist objectives, only switching sides because Mai was in danger. In particular, Ty Lee really seems to have enjoyed beating the crap out of people. She was also a mean girl, and "The Beach" showed that she and Zuko did not get along well.

All of this gets ignored and retconned in the comics. Ty Lee's imperialism gets ignored completely as factor, as are the ideas that it is something she might have to work on it or that other people might hold her accountable for her imperialist actions. The awful Sisters even has Ty Lee spout the line "the world just seemed so broken after the war, you know? I wanted to help fix it, so I became a Kyoshi Warrior," without any self-awareness on her part that she is one of the people who "breaking" the world. Similarly, Ty Lee's meanness gets written out completely. Ashes of the Academy also has Ty Lee and Zuko getting along perfectly. Finally, Ty Lee's relationship with Azula is reduced solely to hating and fearing Azula, with Ty Lee having zero empathy or compassion for Azula even when Azula is clearly in a very poor condition.

I suppose Ty Lee ended up on the "good" side, so she has to have all "good" traits, right?

Mai

Mai suffers the same sort of issues as Ty Lee. In the show, Mai is a Fire Nation aristocrat and imperialist. She grew up as Azula's friend, and she instantly joins Azula's mission, without even hearing what it is, due to boredom. She has no moral objection to the Fire Nation's grand "civilizing mission" nor to Azula's actions, only changing sides because Zuko was about to die. Mai likewise seems to enjoy hurting people in combat and kicking the crap out of people in socially-sanctioned settings.

Moreover, "Return to Omashu" and "The Beach" establish certain things about Mai's family life. Mai is not very attached to her toddler brother, Tom-Tom. She's a bit of a "dead-beat sister." Mai is also quite distant from her parents, especially from her mother Michi, who comes off as emotionally abusive towards Mai. In general, Mai hates her family life.

Once again, the comics retcon all the rough edges away from Mai. Her past imperialism and her responsibility for her imperialist actions are completely ignored, as is the imperialist ideology she was doubtlessly raised with. The idea that the people she was throwing knives at might need some cajoling to break bread with her was clearly not on the minds of the writers. Mai is also written, in Smoke and Shadow, as someone who hates Azula and always has.

Yet that's not the end of it. Rebound and Smoke and Shadow have their entire plots depend on Mai being incredibly close with her little brother Tom-Tom, which is precisely what the show established she was not. One of her big flaws, the fact that she is not a good sister, is just retconned away.

Similarly, Ashes of the Academy retcons Mai into an anti-imperialist who also hates class hierarchy. Again, Mai is an elite woman who grew up in an imperialist society. Class hierarchy and imperialism would both be natural to her. She could learn otherwise, but it would be a whole process. Ashes of the Academy wants Mai to be a "good person" without having her actually go through the learning process to learn to reject her harmful beliefs.

Ashes depicts Mai "befriending" Azula entirely to take advantage of Azula's social status and prestige within the academy. This could be an interesting plot point if that comic bothered to explore the implications of Mai using Azula as a tool from the very start, but of course it doesn't.

In fact, given that Ashes of the Academy depicts Azula a bully at the academy and given Mai forces her way into becoming Azula's "right-hand girl," logically Mai must have become a bully herself. If Azula is bullying people, you would bet that her "best friend" and strongest supporter, who convinced Azula to accept her by throwing knives at people, must have been involved. Yet, since Mai is a "good person" and we all know "good people" can never do anything truly bad or mean, Ashes refuses to follow its own logic, creating a situation where all the blame is placed on Azula while Mai is whitewashed. It's a bizarre choice, since having Mai regret how she hurt other children at the academy when she was younger would be a very strong motive for her to try to reform the academy in the present, but we can't have anything too morally complex, now can we?

Like the other "good" people, Mai has her flaws sanded down and ignored in the comics, to eliminate the possibility of any unsightly, complex, conflict.

Michi

Michi is Mai's mother. The cartoon established firmly that Michi was distant, controlling, and cold toward Mai. Yet the comics instead depict her as warm and loving toward her daughter, without an explanation. She gets retconned into being a "good mother," while destroying the possibility of interesting character conflict with her daughter.

The Kyoshi Warriors and Suki

The entire comics plot for these characters is that they end up in the Fire Nation, serving Firelord Zuko. They're living in a foreign, enemy land, in the employ of a foreign government, literally serving the guy who burned down their home village, yet the comics never even consider exploring the explications of this. I guess the Kyoshi Warriors/Suki are "good," and Zuko is "good," so there's no possibility of non-contrived conflict between them.

Likewise, they literally accepted someone into their ranks who beat the crap out of them and captured them, then used their sacred outfits as ruse of war, into their ranks. An interesting approach would be to examine the conflicts and tensions that result from that tension, but of course the comics aren't interested in that.

It's the same for Mai and the Kyoshi Warriors. She did the same things that Azula and Ty Lee did to them, but somehow she's their friend?

Katara

This is a very minor point, but it feels very odd that Katara saw Azula's breakdown, felt so much empathy for her, and yet there's no follow up all when the characters meet again in The Search?

****

Anyways, I hope I've proven my point. Interesting character conflicts and relationships are completely ignored, in favor of contrived BS like the plot of The Promise. Every character is sanded down, either toward a generic "good guy" or a generic "bad guy." Fascinating rough edges get erased, systematically.

These images from are from Ashes of the Academy. Headmistress Pearl, if she is very old, might have been a teacher for a few years under Sozin. By the time of Ozai's ultimately very brief reign, she was probably very close to retirement. The vast majority of her life and of her teaching career would have been spent during Azulon's 75 years on the throne. Yet for some reason this scene only mentions Sozin and Ozai, like there was no one between them.

You can look here, if you wish.

Aang, Katara, Toph, Sokka, Zuko, Iroh, Appa, Momo, Azula, Ozai, Suki, and Ty Lee all get bios, but Mai doesn't, for some reason. She's certainly not a less important character than Ty Lee is.

And who can blame them, with Zuko showing no respect for his "honored" uncle and blatantly declaring that "the safety of the crew doesn't matter?" It's no wonder that, when Zhao had them interrogated about the Avatar's existence, they readily told the truth. Unlike certain other people, they weren't willing to undermine Fire Nation national security so that Zuko would have a slightly better chance of catching the Avatar.

"The Storm" of course ends with an apparent reconciliation between Zuko and his crew, but it is interesting that later, when Zhao forces Zuko's crew to leave, Zuko still bitterly calls them "traitors." Apparently he still held a lot of disdain in his heart for them.

We see that each element has its special techniques:

Waterbending

Healing

Bloodbending

Plantbending (if this counts)

Earthbending

Metalbending

Seismic Sense

Sandbending

Lavabending

Firebending

Lightning Generation

Combustionbending

Blue Fire (if this counts)

Whatever weird fire healing that woman shaman used on Korra

Airbending

Flight

Spirit Projection (how this is an airbending technique I will never understand)

Are these special techniques dependent on being born with some sort of inherent affinity for them, or can any powerful bender of a given element theoretically learn them? For instance, could the Avatar theoretically learn all the different special techniques on this list if they really put in the time and effort to do so, or are there some things that you would have to be born with? And if so, which techniques are potentially available to all benders and which ones are "restricted?" Could Toph have learned lavabending? Could Aang have learned metalbending?

This a thread for discussing what Bayern Munich players had their careers significantly harmed or were unable to show their full potential because they played somewhere other than their ideal position during their time with Bayern. Even cases of mild harm are fine to bring up, as long as the issue stems from not playing in their ideal position.

To give an example, and to explain the pictures I posted, I personally suspect that Sane was much better as a LW than as a RW, and the stats (from Transfermarkt and Understat) seem to back that up. As I put it elsewhere:

>Sane's whole thing is that he can only go left, never right. 95% of the time, it's like anything to the right of him on the field doesn't exist. He'll almost never drive straight toward the endline. He always cuts inside instead. And he almost never passes to players to his right or finds an overlapping run. He'll literally cut all the way across the field, all the way to the left side, instead.

>As a Bayern fan, this always drove me crazy. Ironically, this isn't really a problem if he plays on the left wing (since he can't really go further left but also maybe because of how he has to carry the ball).

Sane was consistently about twice as productive on the left as he was on the right, yet for some reason he kept being played as a RW. I suspect that, if he had been mainly played on the left, his time with us would be looked at significantly more fondly.

Another potential case is Toni Kroos. He was seen, and played, mainly as an attacking player or as number 10 when he was younger, even by Jupp, and arguably his career didn't truly take off until he was permanently moved to a deeper role. If he had been more consistently playing deeper earlier in his career, it's possible that Bayern wouldn't have been so willing to let him go.

Some fans might also argue that Javi Martinez's career was never the same after he was moved from midfield to centerback.

What are some other of our players who had their careers affected by being played out of position?

The screenshots and images are from the show, but I also included several panels from the "Weaver's Ball" comic, even though I don't think it carries the same weight of the show, since it is technically canon and, in my opinion, it very explicitly shows Korra being abused. The show points in the same direction, but Weaver Ball is more explicit.

How Korra was raised is really striking. She grew up in a fortified compound in the middle of nowhere, forbidden from leaving and unable to visit anyone outside it, except perhaps on a handful of days a year. Her parents lived far away from her, and I think she was only able to spend time with other kids a handful of times a year. The White Lotus and her parents lied to her, telling her that this isolation was the wish of her past life, when really it was their decision. She was ordered around by the White Lotus, taught to obey them, and chided whenever she didn't. Tenzin scolds her for violating the "orders of the White Lotus," even though she is 17 and even though her parents were completely fine with her leaving. Who does the White Lotus think they are, to order around a nearly adult Avatar like that? And finally and perhaps most importantly, Korra was relentlessly trained to be Avatar while being denied to the opportunity to develop any sort of identity outside of that.

I know that it was all justified as "protecting her," but the reality is that the White Lotus treated her more as a weapon than a person. They denied her anything even remotely resembling a normal childhood, in complete rejection of tradition.

I say this all because I think two of the most prominent traits of Korra as a character are that she struggles to develop any sort of sense of who she is other than being the Avatar and that she's isolated, naive, and cut off from the broader world and has never developed the skills to cope with it. Both of these can be laid at the feet of how the White Lotus raised her.

One interesting thing about TLoK is that, although so much of show is about Korra struggling to overcome the ways her childhood limited her and stunted her, none of the people who are responsible for hurting Korra are ever really called out for what they did.

#	Player	Positions	Nat.	Club	Appearances	Assists
1	Thomas Müller	Second Striker	Germany	Bayern Munich	503	211
2	Franck Ribéry	Left Winger	France	Bayern Munich	273	120
3	Andreas Möller	Attacking Midfield	Germany	for 3 clubs	430	119
4	Marco Reus	Attacking Midfield	Germany	for 2 clubs	391	118
5	Gerd Müller	Centre-Forward	Germany	Bayern Munich	427	101
6	Zé Roberto	Left Midfield	Brazil/Germany	for 3 clubs	336	97
7	Julian Brandt	Attacking Midfield	Germany	for 2 clubs	383	92
8	Mehmet Scholl	Attacking Midfield	GermanyTürkiye	for 2 clubs	392	91
9	Joshua Kimmich	Defensive Midfield	Germany	Bayern Munich	324	88
10	Thomas Häßler	Attacking Midfield	Germany	for 4 clubs	400	86
11	Wolfgang Overath	Attacking Midfield	Germany	1.FC Köln	409	81
12	Stefan Effenberg	Attacking Midfield	Germany	for 3 clubs	370	80
13	Gonzalo Castro	Central Midfield	Germany/Spain	for 4 clubs	421	80
14	Mario Basler	Right Midfield	Germany	for 3 clubs	262	79
15	Max Kruse	Second Striker	Germany	for 6 clubs	307	79
16	Vincenzo Grifo	Left Winger	Italy/Germany	for 3 clubs	306	78
17	Dariusz Wosz	Attacking Midfield	Germany/Poland	for 2 clubs	324	77
18	Andreas Herzog	Attacking Midfield	Austria	for 2 clubs	264	76
19	Claudio Pizarro	Centre-Forward	Peru/Italy	for 3 clubs	490	76
20	Robert Lewandowski	Centre-Forward	Poland	for 2 clubs	384	75
21	Miroslav Klose	Centre-Forward	Germany	for 3 clubs	307	74
22	Jürgen Grabowski	Right Winger	Germany/Poland	Eintracht Frankfurt	441	74
23	Günter Netzer	Attacking Midfield	GermanySwitzerland	Borussia Mönchengladbach	230	71
24	Sergej Barbarez	Second Striker	Bosnia-Herzegovina/Germany	for 4 clubs	330	71
25	Lars Stindl	Attacking Midfield	Germany	for 3 clubs	376	71

A couple caveats:

I am using the Transfermarkt data, since it covers a much longer timeframe than other data sources, but Transfermarkt does have a broader definition of an assist than other data sources. In addition to passing assists, if you win a penalty and a teammate scores off of it that counts as an assist, and if you take a shot and a teammate score off the rebound that also counts.

Moreover, there are significant gaps in the data too. As far as I can tell, the assist data is mostly or entirely complete between 1963 and 1975, very incomplete between 1975 and 1990, and complete from about 1990 onwards. You can tell that there is an absence of players who had their peak careers in the 1980s on this list.

A couple caveats:

I am using the Transfermarkt data, since it covers a much longer timeframe than other data sources, but Transfermarkt does have a broader definition of an assist than other data sources. In addition to passing assists, if you win a penalty and a teammate scores off of it that counts as an assist, and if you take a shot and a teammate score off the rebound that also counts.

Moreover, there are significant gaps in the data too. As far as I can tell, the assist data is mostly or entirely complete between 1963 and 1975, very incomplete between 1975 and 1990, and complete from about 1990 onwards. You can tell that there is an absence of players who had their peak careers in the 1980s on this list.

Very Important Edit:

I looked into it and you are correct. The table I picked was the goalscorers table, which I sorted by assists, but I didn't realize that some players didn't have enough goals to get on it. Here is the correct table: https://www.transfermarkt.com/bundesliga/assistliste/wettbewerb/L1/plus/?saison_id=0&detailpos=&altersklasse=alle

The missing players are Ze Roberto (97), Kimmich (88), Castro (80), Basler (79), and Wosz (77).

My apologies.

Here is the correct table:

#	Player	Positions	Nat.	Club	Appearances
1	Thomas Müller	Second Striker	Germany	Bayern Munich	503	211
2	Franck Ribéry	Left Winger	France	Bayern Munich	273	120
3	Andreas Möller	Attacking Midfield	Germany	for 3 clubs	430	119
4	Marco Reus	Attacking Midfield	Germany	for 2 clubs	391	118
5	Gerd Müller	Centre-Forward	Germany	Bayern Munich	427	101
6	Zé Roberto	Left Midfield	Brazil/Germany	for 3 clubs	336	97
7	Julian Brandt	Attacking Midfield	Germany	for 2 clubs	383	92
8	Mehmet Scholl	Attacking Midfield	GermanyTürkiye	for 2 clubs	392	91
9	Joshua Kimmich	Defensive Midfield	Germany	Bayern Munich	324	88
10	Thomas Häßler	Attacking Midfield	Germany	for 4 clubs	400	86
11	Wolfgang Overath	Attacking Midfield	Germany	1.FC Köln	409	81
12	Stefan Effenberg	Attacking Midfield	Germany	for 3 clubs	370	80
13	Gonzalo Castro	Central Midfield	Germany/Spain	for 4 clubs	421	80
14	Mario Basler	Right Midfield	Germany	for 3 clubs	262	79
15	Max Kruse	Second Striker	Germany	for 6 clubs	307	79
16	Vincenzo Grifo	Left Winger	Italy/Germany	for 3 clubs	306	78
17	Dariusz Wosz	Attacking Midfield	Germany/Poland	for 2 clubs	324	77
18	Andreas Herzog	Attacking Midfield	Austria	for 2 clubs	264	76
19	Claudio Pizarro	Centre-Forward	Peru/Italy	for 3 clubs	490	76
20	Robert Lewandowski	Centre-Forward	Poland	for 2 clubs	384	75
21	Miroslav Klose	Centre-Forward	Germany	for 3 clubs	307	74
22	Jürgen Grabowski	Right Winger	Germany/Poland	Eintracht Frankfurt	441	74
23	Günter Netzer	Attacking Midfield	GermanySwitzerland	Borussia Mönchengladbach	230	71
24	Sergej Barbarez	Second Striker	Bosnia-Herzegovina/Germany	for 4 clubs	330	71
25	Lars Stindl	Attacking Midfield	Germany	for 3 clubs	376	71