Newbie's Perspective Avatar the Last Airbender Review Imbalance 2-3
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00:00Avatar The Last Airbender and Bounce, Issue 2.
00:04It starts with Aang reuniting with his friends, and a page later,
00:08explaining that the guy he captured was so grateful he told him he was hired by two teenage girls,
00:14but he didn't know exactly who it was that hired him or why,
00:18so there's no point in being given information.
00:21The heroes should have been able to figure out it was sabotage on their own.
00:25Aang tells Toph's dad to tell him the names of the other sabotage factories so he could investigate for a connection,
00:31and he gets thanked.
00:33They shouldn't need to investigate, though.
00:36This is the most obvious mystery ever.
00:39Eventually, somehow Aang does notice a connection between the factories,
00:43and Toph is the only one to notice that they're all owned by non-benders.
00:48You'd think every factory with job-stealing machines would have been hit,
00:51not just these ones, so they'd still be a threat.
00:55Somehow he has to explain why this happened.
00:58I hate that he has to spend almost two pages explaining the obvious to him.
01:03Aang plans on asking the benders who own businesses to help the damaged businesses of non-benders.
01:09Of course, it only worked with some of them, but I can see why he'd want to try just in case.
01:14I like that Toph isn't impressed by the mansion while Sokka is because of their backgrounds.
01:20Katara is smart enough to doubt Lillian would humor him because not only are the other factories owned by non-benders,
01:26but they're competitors, which is why she shouldn't have bothered with her,
01:30let alone had her as the first choice.
01:33Aang thanks her as she sucks up to him just to avoid suspicion,
01:36which I guess is why she's wasting time getting him to talk about the fact that this place has changed.
01:41Why did Momo do that? Of course it'd annoy the cat.
01:45Sokka again asks why she's staying humble when it's not true,
01:49but it's easy to believe that she knows that and it's just a figure of speech she's using because other people do.
01:55It's really boring to see this scene.
01:58It's no wonder the artist started showing Momo chase a cat.
02:02It may be completely irrelevant, but at least it's slightly more interesting to see than a billion panels of talking heads.
02:09This is an admirable thing for an artist to do, which I was first told about by Sonic Dissected.
02:14Don't just draw characters talking. Draw other things too so you won't get too bored.
02:20This is something Sonic Comics, every comic should do.
02:23But since I don't really care about Momo, it's still not enough to make up for the boring tone of the scene full of calm talking.
02:29This scene is mandatory to progress the plot, but they should have just had a heavily edited down version of the conversation.
02:37Predictably, something in the house gets damaged, and Aang offers to fix it with earthbending.
02:42Why did she tell Yelling to bring her sister here too? Just so she can watch an MV while she fixes it?
02:49Yelling could have poured water on it herself.
02:52So this means Rue's really desperate to feel useful.
02:56Top insists on showing off her metalbending to her.
03:00It's too bad it's not explained what Rue's other talents are.
03:03You'd think Rue would tell them what they are if the comic wants us to believe she's insecure.
03:09It's weird that Yelling's not being rude out of jealousy.
03:12All she does is say she's being amazing.
03:15Top acts like she's planning to tell her what else is cool, and asks her if she's ever been up a certain cliff, when clearly there's nothing else that's cool for her to say.
03:24Sadly, the story cuts ahead instead of showing me what in the world she said after that, when there'd be nothing, so she'd just wonder why she asked her that.
03:34Yelling thanks Aang, and stupidly turns down a potential reward.
03:38Then Top's approached by Yelling because she wants to learn metalbending, and she acts as respectful as possible.
03:45Then the two sisters have an argument about Yelling's idea, at full volume close to Top,
03:51who would be able to feel their exact conversation if she can feel everything around her all the time, because she'd have learned from experience how every sound feels.
04:00So even if she didn't have better hearing than other people because of the stereotype that blind people have better hearing, she'd still essentially functionally have better hearing.
04:11Somehow Rue doesn't think it's a good idea for her to become more competent.
04:16As soon as Aang leaves the house, Top tells them Yelling's involved in this sabotage somehow.
04:22She recognized her daughters because she felt them run away from the factory when it exploded,
04:27and somehow Katara thinks that's thin evidence even though her daughters would've had no excuse for being near the factory.
04:33Top says that Yelling lied about being near the cliff, so she figured out what she did.
04:39Eventually, Top says she'll only pretend to teach Yelling metalbending, and find out what she and her mom are up to while she's failing at it.
04:47So she's smarter than I thought.
04:50I guess by pretend she means that she won't teach her to focus on the impurities within the metal.
04:55She doesn't even have to just pretend, it takes too long to teach people metalbending anyways, so one lesson wouldn't teach her that.
05:03Apparently.
05:04Eventually, Suki shows up and shares a hug with Sokka.
05:09I wonder why she's wearing red when she's not Fire Nation.
05:12I like it, but it's confusing for this part of the series.
05:15She says that she got here riding a green animal.
05:19Why does Satoru think it'll take months to repair his machine?
05:22He should've known Top would be able to fix it.
05:24She fixed an engine in front of him before.
05:27Satoru fortunately reiterates that he feels guilty about causing this whole mess.
05:32Why does she think he knows it's not true that he made people obsolete?
05:37She says even if he hadn't made those machines, there'd still be some jobless vendors.
05:43It doesn't change the fact that he still put people out of a job so he could make more money.
05:48And he still caused the whole plot.
05:51Top sits there and lets Yelling try to metalbend with no direction about how to do it,
05:56and pretends to be her friend by talking about Aang negatively with her,
06:00and lying that she'd be fine with the machines not getting fixed right away.
06:04She's asked if Aang and her are close,
06:07and the other panel with no dialogue reveals that she's lying when she says no.
06:12She's trying to get her to underestimate Aang.
06:15If something could happen, that'd be great.
06:18Like the promise, this is just a novel with more pictures sometimes.
06:22I guess the reason she thought she wasn't lying despite her not talking in a panel
06:27is that she was really desperate to believe her?
06:30She expects me to believe that only since the end of the Hundred Year War
06:34have things gone out of balance between benders and non-benders,
06:37even though this is a conflict as old as bending.
06:40The Fire Nation was capturing earthbenders and waterbenders,
06:43making them rare and public ever since the start of the Hundred Year War,
06:47but now they've all been freed, so the balance is restored.
06:51I mean, it's out of balance for the waterbenders, but other than that,
06:55why would she say since the end instead of since the start?
06:59She tells Toph there's a meeting tonight for concerned citizens
07:03and gives her the password offscreen.
07:05I don't know why that'd be offscreen, but I'm all for faster pacing.
07:09It's just you shouldn't cut out stuff that's actually important.
07:12It's just weird what it chooses not to show.
07:15So Toph tells her friends to go with her there.
07:17She plans on finding people to force them to tell her what's going on,
07:21clearly not knowing that forced confessions can be fake just to get the torture to stop.
07:25And she became a chief of police later.
07:28I guess she matured when she grew up.
07:31Sokka makes another plan that doesn't involve violence
07:34and instead has them going to the meeting in disguises for the most part
07:38to just gather information, meaning more talking.
07:41I'm glad Aang wears a wig instead of a hat because that hides his identity better.
07:46I guess he couldn't find a wig store the last time he was disguised.
07:52Eventually Sokka flatters Suki and she thanks him and does the same to him.
07:57Eventually the password gets spoken
07:59and the heroes realize they were heading for the old mine that was supposed to be filled in.
08:03It's too bad Aang isn't written to whisper when talking to people he recognizes
08:08because I'm forced to assume he is or else they should recognize his voice.
08:12They should know it's him talking because he's talking about the fact that he recognizes him.
08:17Then the story gets boring again when Lily makes a predictable speech
08:21that she's mad at Toph's father for implying that he wants benders replaced with machines.
08:26She says benders are worth more than non-benders, which makes Rue look unhappy.
08:31Why is she up here next to her then?
08:33So far this is the only part of this that gives us new information.
08:37It's not like there's something wrong with her being written to do a speech.
08:40The point of this is to establish that she's rallying more bender violence.
08:44But why wasn't the speech condensed by a lot?
08:48I'm distracted the whole time by more boredom because I already know all of this.
08:53Why aren't the heroes written to be whispering?
08:56The comic already established how it shows people whispering.
08:59It has smaller text.
09:01And yet I have to pretend they're whispering for it to make sense
09:04that their dialogue doesn't give them away to the people around them.
09:07Lily has a plan to drive the non-benders away without attracting the attention of the Earth King army.
09:13And we already know that plan because she's already been carrying it out.
09:17She says her town will become a city that only belongs to benders.
09:21And nobody's reminding her that Rue isn't a bender.
09:24So I have to assume that some people don't know that
09:26and the ones that do are just being polite to her
09:28and assume that she thinks that Rue is the exception.
09:31And Rue does as well.
09:33I guess she plans to have a policy in place that exiles any new non-benders from the town
09:38other than her daughter.
09:39Because otherwise the town won't stay full bender.
09:42Her plan is doomed from the start.
09:44Plenty of people would keep their babies with them
09:47regardless of whether they turned out to be benders.
09:49Because they'd be too emotionally attached to them.
09:52I don't know why Toph went up on stage and threatened to arrest Lily and started a fight.
09:57I get that she's a hothead.
09:59But there's no point.
10:01It's just her word against a councilwoman.
10:03Nobody's gonna believe her so she won't be able to arrest her.
10:06A fight starts and Aang spreads dust drawing attention to who he is.
10:11The speech against him wasn't necessary
10:13because these people would've turned on him the second he showed that he was against them anyways.
10:18We already knew that she was manipulative and smart.
10:21Nothing but predictable, uncreative stuff happens after this.
10:25It's cool to see, especially towards the end of Toph's fight.
10:29It's just that there's nothing to say about this and none of it matters.
10:33It's smart of Toph to try to make Yelling think she can't metalbend
10:36because she's bad at bending when she's clearly not
10:39to discourage her from getting more dangerous to her.
10:42It's satisfying to see that because she's one of the bad guys.
10:46Yelling gets a rough landing getting her sister worried
10:49and I have to assume that she's just lying about the boomerang not being dangerous
10:53despite Sokka because she should know it can hurt.
10:57Sokka asks Rue how she could be okay with her mother's plan.
11:01Eventually, Yelling's chi-blocked
11:04and at some point Li Ling uses magic to make a way to escape for her supporters
11:08while she holds them off.
11:10She bluntly tells Yelling that when she's chi-blocked she's next to useless
11:14so she should know better than to offer to fight.
11:18Eventually Li Ling's told she's under arrest
11:21and somehow Yelling wonders if her bending won't come back
11:24and just has to say that then she'll be like her.
11:27Isn't it obvious she shouldn't say that?
11:30She knew to tell Sokka to shut up because he was reminding her she's a non-bender
11:34and then she says this.
11:37We end up seeing Li Ling in a metal cage
11:40and the heroes talk for a million years
11:42with one pointing out that the whole conflict won't be resolved by just keeping her locked up.
11:47Toph tells Aang to take her bending away so that her supporters would back off
11:51even though that'd only make a martyr out of her
11:54and wouldn't force them to back off.
11:57I have to assume that this makes sense because she's desperate
12:00and this is the only idea that came to her.
12:03She's too impatient to think things through all the way.
12:06The story ends there.
12:08Avatar The Last Airbender in Balance Issue 3.
12:12The first page is wasted
12:14and Toph somehow thinks it'll fix everything if Li Ling loses her bending
12:18even though clearly someone else could be chosen as a replacement anyways.
12:23Eventually, Katara says that taking away someone's bending isn't to be taken lightly
12:27because it's removing a part of who they are.
12:30And Sokka says if Aang did this to a civilian
12:33he'd make benders mad at him.
12:36It should be Aang saying all of this.
12:38He's the main character and the one who even can debend people.
12:42So the point of this scene was supposed to be establishing
12:45why he doesn't debend all of his enemies because he did it to Ozai.
12:50So for a scene like this, it should be him saying it to make excuses for himself.
12:55He somehow thinks he could talk Li Ling out of this
12:59and doesn't immediately just say that he's opposed to debending.
13:03That implies that it's more like it's that his friends pressure him
13:06to not doing this to keep their approval.
13:09Not that he's against it.
13:11Li Ling tells Aang he should've killed Ozai
13:14because she's dumb enough to think a life without bending isn't worth it
13:18even though there's other fun stuff to do.
13:21What's the point about seeing a villain scene?
13:24I already knew that Rue would end up having second thoughts about this from earlier issues.
13:29So there really is no point to showing them scheming
13:33because I already knew they planned on rescuing their mom.
13:37I don't need to see another scene of Katara telling Aang that debending sounds wrong to her.
13:43She makes her point better by saying that it sounds violent
13:46because she's comparing it to losing a limb.
13:49It's not literally like that.
13:52And she could've said this in the first scene.
13:55Satoru warns them that the council is under attack
13:59and some of the councilors are trapped in a burning building.
14:02So the fire starts getting put out by the heroes
14:06and Toph breaks into the building.
14:08So her father gets complimented because of her
14:11and he looks proud of her.
14:13He still barely interacts with her in this arc though.
14:16Of course Yelling rushes ahead with some benders
14:19and the non-bender heroes get trapped in the earth.
14:22Yelling does the same to the guard to steal his keys.
14:26Go figure, she effortlessly gets past the non-benders and unlocks the cage.
14:31And we get to see her and her mother share a hug.
14:34One of the injured councilors is scared because Lilling escaped
14:38showing that at least one person took the heroes' word for it on her.
14:43Katara wants to heal someone who once his officers taught how to chi block.
14:48The idea gets brought up to Sokka so he prays to Suki.
14:52Rue expected her mother to have the good sense to flee the city on a ship with them.
14:57And she's too stubborn and arrogant to do it
15:00even though she already lost to the Avatar.
15:03Which is further justified because she already had to leave the city once.
15:08Eventually it's revealed that she thinks the reason Ba Sing Se fell
15:12was because the Earth King was a non-bender.
15:15Even though he still would have been outnumbered and defeated anyways.
15:20So this is a flimsy excuse that wasn't even necessary to explain her.
15:25Kai Lee was among the fake Kyoshi warriors
15:28so she would have just chi blocked the Earth King.
15:33It's only logical that some benders would think this way.
15:36At least she stands up to her.
15:39She says Ozai was only doing what any strong bender leader would do
15:43by taking advantage of a weakness.
15:46Even though again bending wouldn't have prevented the coup
15:49and Azula would have tried to overthrow him either way.
15:52She asks her mom if she sees her as weak
15:55as if she somehow didn't already know that.
15:58Why would this be news to her?
16:01She doesn't deny it because it's true.
16:04She's not strong in any sort of way.
16:07She's not athletic for one thing.
16:10I thought Rue would be offended because of her sympathizing with the last Fire Lord.
16:14Because that'd make her see her as just like him.
16:17I guess she was but her acting like her problem was that she felt insecure
16:21just makes me wonder why it took her so long to turn on her.
16:25She could have been against her whole plan from the start and not admitted it
16:29and the arc would have been the same because there'd really be nothing she could have done.
16:33And it could make sense that she'd be too scared to tell Aang on her.
16:37It was really for the best that she stayed with her until this point
16:41because this way she finds out her plan.
16:44There was really no reason for her to tell a non-bender about her plan
16:47regardless of whether it was her daughter though.
16:50It turns out Tsuki's already taught some guards the basics of chi blocking
16:54and Aang wonders if Toph was completely right when he shouldn't need to be told
16:58that the supremacist movement is more than one person.
17:01Of course he's not willing to de-bender followers too.
17:05In any other franchise, the concept of de-bending would be controversial like this.
17:10In the Sabrina Zikom, the Witch's Council was perfectly fine with getting rid of Salem's powers
17:15by turning him into a cat.
17:18Although since Earthbending can be used for non-violent things,
17:21Katara had a point because it would be sad if some de-bended person wanted to do a non-violent thing with bending
17:27like make sculptures but couldn't after she stopped being violent.
17:32Aang says the Fire Nation only went to war because it had technology
17:36and demonizes machines entirely.
17:39Sokka has to talk him out of it, saying the machines are good for non-benders.
17:44Aang apologizes and Sokka reminds him that the Fire Nation war would have started anyways
17:49because Sozin was a jerk. He shouldn't have needed to tell him that.
17:54Eventually, Sokka sees Rue who's too shy to talk to him at first.
17:59Unpredictably, she says she's not okay with her family's plan.
18:03Sokka compares her to Zuko.
18:06So a page later for some reason, she finally tells him her mother's plan
18:10to attack Earth and Fire Industries in the morning with an army.
18:14Then she asks Suki to teach her to G-Block.
18:18The next morning, Aang sees some people go up to them with supplies for the non-benders
18:22and their benders themselves.
18:25But when Aang asks them to protect their neighbors, they cowered out.
18:29Which is smart of them at least.
18:32They are outnumbered.
18:35Li Ling once again doesn't clarify that she still wants Rue around in her ideal town.
18:40So I still don't know if she meant it when she said she loved her.
18:44I wish it was written to Earthbend right away.
18:47They already had this exact same talk.
18:50You'd think the heroes would point out that if she got her ideal town,
18:53she'd have to give up her daughter.
18:56Or people would expect her to.
18:59The actual show was mostly episodic.
19:02So there's no excuse for the comics never having the talent to tell a story
19:05and wrap it up in one plot.
19:08Aang makes a maze for the army, and eventually the wolves get moved by Toph,
19:11who reveals G-Blockers.
19:14And let's just assume that it makes sense that all of them can do that successfully
19:17with the amount of training they have.
19:19And the basics are all they need for this exact situation.
19:22After all, they did catch them by surprise in a dead end.
19:25So the benders didn't have any time to do anything in a panic.
19:28Then some of the benders get frozen.
19:31This is all entertaining. I love the variety.
19:34Toph says this is fun,
19:37gets knocked to the ground by Yao Ling,
19:40and the typical stuff happens between them all over again.
19:43Sokka gets faced with an army and gets asked to defeat a G-Blocker.
19:48He smartly boasts that he is,
19:51although he's not smart enough to boast a bit too much
19:54and run the risk of people assuming he's lying and trying too hard to convince them.
19:57And this makes me wonder why in the world he hasn't learned how to G-Block by now.
20:02There's no reason for him not to join in on the lessons.
20:05I know the meta reason is that Sookie being able to G-Block
20:08is what makes her special,
20:11and Ty Lee's not here to do that anymore.
20:14So it's okay for her to give up what makes her special as a main character.
20:17But considering that he could get into a fight again
20:20on any given day still,
20:23it's just dumb of him to not learn just to keep Sookie
20:26from feeling like she's not as useful.
20:29Because I doubt Sookie's that insecure.
20:32And most of the time he's not around Sookie.
20:35Sokka throws a boomerang at him and says he can G-Block from a distance,
20:38and the army runs towards him which disappoints him.
20:41He should've known not to do this.
20:44After all, they didn't seem interested in fighting anymore,
20:47despite him only being one guy.
20:50So he should've waited until one of them showed hostility again.
20:53Eventually.
20:56It only gets interesting again when a hole is made in the roof
20:59and Toph grabs a rope while Yalling falls into sand.
21:02She traps the people behind her,
21:05and Lillie wonders how the heroes were already prepared for.
21:08I guess the reason it makes sense that Rue fesses up
21:11is that she thinks she'll get figured out anyways,
21:14because she's the only reason they would already be prepared.
21:17And she gets angry when calling her out,
21:20so she also wanted an excuse to do that.
21:23She says that she helped Lillie out because she was told her plan
21:26was supposed to protect benders, but the non-benders aren't a threat.
21:29She tells her that she only did her plan for herself,
21:32and there's no proof that she's right.
21:35She tries to Chi-block her,
21:38but her mother thinks to dodge.
21:41Maybe if she tried to Chi-block her when she was talking,
21:44it would've worked.
21:47Because Ty Lee succeeded in this with Azula.
21:50She probably assumed she'd attack her because punches always telegraph themselves.
21:53But if that was the excuse,
21:56Azula would've dodged Ty Lee's attack
21:59because attacks telegraph themselves.
22:02She plans to bury her rather than just going away from her,
22:05so Aang plans to save her.
22:08Meanwhile, Toph gets knocked on the floor
22:11and says that it'd be stupid of her to think she's better than someone
22:14purely because he's a non-bender.
22:17And actually, since benders can do everything non-benders can do,
22:20and then some,
22:23she's completely confused by her calling this stupid,
22:26which gives Toph the time to hit her head with a boomerang to knock her out.
22:30Benders don't learn boomerangs because they don't need to
22:33because they abandon,
22:36so this was the only way to make a non-bender look special.
22:39Also, why is she knocked out by a boomerang to the head
22:42when Azula wasn't in the search?
22:45Toph thanks him,
22:48and eventually Aang saves Rue
22:51and frees their mother in place.
22:54Katara goes up to him because she happens to be nearby,
22:57and says that it's because she's his girlfriend.
23:00She tells him that he should de-bender for the right reason,
23:03not because it seems like an easy solution or because he's mad.
23:06This changes his mind.
23:09We get to see Rue call her out,
23:12even if she does agree that she's ungrateful,
23:15instead of pointing out that she is still grateful
23:18she raised her until everything went wrong.
23:21Because it's better a mother raise her than someone else
23:24because her mother still hugged her and was still related to her,
23:27and there probably isn't a good foster care system at this point in time.
23:30And god forbid her mother get rid of her
23:33and regret going too far with her,
23:36instead of being a one-dimensional cartoon villain
23:39who is lying about loving her.
23:42It's no wonder I forgot her.
23:45One of the only things distinct about this arc
23:48is the situation of a non-bender turning on her villain parent
23:51It's too bad it wasn't confirmed that Zuko's daughter
23:54in The Legend of Korra was a non-bender.
23:57I always assumed she was,
24:00but it should have been established to make Zuko look all the better.
24:03It'd be a nice contrast.
24:06Later, Toph's dad, Dank Suki, plans to stay in the town
24:09with the Kyoji Warriors to continue training the non-bender police.
24:12Somebody should point out that Zuko can handle himself.
24:15He's always been able to win against assassins.
24:18Even then, it's still risking his life.
24:21Rue complains that she should be in the cage with her family,
24:24even though she didn't break the law, and nobody says this.
24:27And when she tells Suki she could have stood up to them sooner,
24:30somehow Suki doesn't tell her that it'd be a bad idea
24:33because then her mother wouldn't have trusted her enough
24:36to tell her her latest plan.
24:39At least she has a blanket.
24:42But it gets needlessly depressing when you remember that she said
24:46At this age!
24:49It should be explained that she plans on becoming a G-blocking cop.
24:52At least then we'd have some direction
24:55for what her future's gonna be,
24:58and we could assume that she does have loved ones later on
25:01because she became friends with the other cops.
25:04Instead, it cuts off like she's gonna be alone the rest of her life.
25:07Sokka reassures Aang.
25:10Three days later, Aang explains that he knew
25:13that a D-bending villain wouldn't fix anything
25:16because it was the bigotry that was her problem.
25:19Even though Rue would appoint that if she became a non-bender,
25:22that's the only way she'd be able to find out that non-benders can have great lives
25:25and be useful too.
25:28But the fact that Aang even considered D-bending her
25:31is trying to imply that Katara stopped him from going down the slippery slope
25:34and hurting his reputation,
25:37which completely demonizes the entire idea of removing an evil person's magical powers.
25:41When in any other franchise,
25:44most people would think it's a reasonable solution.
25:47Aang says he wants to stay in this town for now
25:50because he feels a connection to this place.
25:53Just because the writer says so,
25:56even though it's a place where even benders and non-benders hate each other,
25:59so it's the worst town he's ever been in.
26:02And he's been completely unsuccessful at alleviating that problem.
26:05Sokka's argument that he bridged the divide by becoming his friend
26:09ignores the fact that they became friends because of Aang's personality,
26:12and getting people to like him in particular
26:15is not the same thing as getting them to stop being just jealous
26:18and scared of benders they don't like and trust.
26:21Instead, all it can do is get them to see him as the exception.
26:24I expect them to want to live in New Down.
26:27The story agrees with Aang agreeing with Sokka
26:30that the city needs a better name,
26:33but we don't learn what the name is anyways,
26:37The reason this joke keeps happening is that
26:40this place is supposed to be a precursor to the Republic City.
26:43I don't think it was clear enough.
26:46Just because there's conflict between benders and non-benders
26:49doesn't mean it makes sense that this place is Republic City
26:52because this kind of conflict could be in any town.
26:55I thought it was going to be New Down.
26:58These comics really needed better pacing.
27:01I constantly get taken out of the story by recognizing
27:05that it's getting boring and wasting my time.
27:08This issue by Faith Hicks is about the heroes
27:11infiltrating an anti-non-bender rally
27:14where Li Ling provokes them into turning on her
27:17and eventually chopping her.
27:20It was really boring because it was 99% talking
27:23and a lot of that is just reiterating what I already know,
27:26so it's not like most of it is interesting.
27:29I get it, there's tensions between benders and non-benders,
27:32that doesn't mean you should talk my ear off about it.
27:35We're not so stupid that we won't understand the situation
27:38after the first panel is mentioned.
27:41Constantly telling us about this hatred isn't going to make the story
27:44any more interesting. Using it does.
27:47Like having a machine get destroyed by it.
27:50But saying a rally where a boring speech happens isn't interesting.
27:53It's just another instance of characters standing around and talking.
27:56And eventually there's bending violence like in the beginning of the arc.
28:00So of course it's a forgettable story.
28:03It's not like it wasn't cool to see the bending,
28:06but none of it was plot relevant or super interesting.
28:09I suppose Toph's confrontation with Yallen was the highlight.
28:12It also establishes that Rue is looked down on by her mother,
28:15just in case there was anyone in the audience
28:18assuming that her mother was making her think she didn't look down on her.
28:21This issue by Faith Hicks is about the army
28:24trying to destroy a factory getting stopped by Toph
28:28who entertainingly traps them in a maze
28:31where they have to deal with a variety of things.
28:34And Aang frees this villain, which she could have done right away
28:37before she tried to kill Rue.
28:40Something that didn't need to be written.
28:43She felt more like a complex, believable character
28:46when she was telling her she loved her.
28:49There's nothing wrong with that not being a lie.
28:52A villain can have loved ones too.
28:56It's understandable as hers where it's not just black and white.
28:59Even non-villains can get mad at a machine for taking people's jobs.
29:02So she's only a villain by wanting non-benders
29:05taken out of the city just for not liking her.
29:08When they would only not like her if they knew she was a bender.
29:11She was still nice to her for the whole arc on the surface.
29:14So it seems like she only tried to kill her because it's an action series
29:17and it's supposed to make a big impression
29:20and it's signaling to you that now you're supposed to think she's really evil.
29:24Which makes me wonder why the writer wrote it to hug her kids so much then
29:27when I never saw a villain do that before.
29:30So this just dumbs her down by going with the more predictable option
29:33when she could have simply taken off from her.
29:36The only thing interesting about her was the idea that she seems to be a loving mother.
29:39So if you reveal that that was only an act
29:42she's just Ozai
29:45and a reverse Unalaq.
29:48Maybe they're not trying to kill Rue like she's not even her mother
29:52like it's Ozai trying to lightning band Zuko again.
29:55Instead trying to get away from her refusing to hurt her
29:58and apologizing to her after she's frozen
30:01would have had me remember
30:04because no villain in the series shows a genuine reluctance to hurt her kid
30:07and a willingness to forgive her.
30:10Which would have given her an identity bringing her character right back around
30:13to one of her first scenes to say that at the end of the day
30:16she's still a parent.
30:20So it would have been believable.
30:23Not every villain would do that.
30:26Parents are incredibly forgiving of their kids sometimes.
30:29This was the good issue in the arc.
30:32But it was still mostly boring talking.
30:35Li Ling should have known not to tell her non-bender kid
30:38about her plan against non-benders.
30:41There was literally no reason for her to tell her to work with Ya Ling
30:44because she was completely useless to Ya Ling.