Yes, because the spirits becoming one with republic city which is Korra's proxy for "state of the world" is totally a giant middle-finger because everyone hates spirits. Oh wait no, actually it was symbolically representing the change that the world went through after harmonic convergence.
Well you've come a long way from asking my opinion and then mostly agreeing with it earlier this season.
"A Breath of the Fresh Air" is the worst episode of Korra
by far. Oh some ATLA episodes were worse (apparently I'm the one with for nostalgia goggles for ATLA right). By the time they were making season 3 fan judgement had come in from Air and except from you and me it was not good. Peopled hated Republic City. So what is the first thing they do in Change? An unnassailable nuisance is knocking down houses and rather than finding any kind of solution they kick Korra out and everyone is just like "yeah, whatever, not our problem anyway". Like what did they need Milo to jump out and yell "Fuck you Republic City nobody likes you!" for you to get that? It was the first big sign of what was to come from this season.
Dealing with the change of the nature of certain relationships (Lin and Su Yin, Korra and Mako, Tenzin and Bumi, Tenzin and Jinora).
Well let's just call Spirits Change then, since that's where the only real character development in this series has happened. I already explained why Lin and Su Yin fell flat. Korra and Mako? That lightning theory is one hell of a stretch. People are so confused as to how almost every character can be simultaneously underplayed that now they have to come up with headcanons for it. Korra and Mako made up in season 2. Just as in The Spirit of Competition, the important takeaway is the enduring friendships of these characters through hardship... in season 2. So in season 3 he's a little awkward sometimes and then hugs it out? That's the whole of his development? Wait wasn't he a firefighter or something? No, a doctor. Private detective? Yeah that feels closer. It's in the back of my brain but it just feels so long ago now.
What Tenzin and Bumi? Are you referring to "Original Airbenders", an episode where nothing would have been resolved had it not been for a convenient group of kidnappers to rally around? I thought Jinora's development in that episode, and in the series in general, was better but to say that the trifling amount of existing development constitutes Change when development should exist in every season is absurd.
Dealing with the large scale changes of the fall of the Earth Kingdom Monarchy (yo ba sing se literally went into RIOTS, and are STILL struggling according to the finale).
Hey, they kind of had a revolution before. In Fire remember? Yet after a century they still had a monarchy. They still had walls and class lines and crippling poverty. They still had a clandestine thought police. Their isn't even much technology or spirits. "Hey you know what people liked? City of Walls and Secrets. Yeah let's just do that again." That's not taking an old setting and juxtaposing it with a new age. That's just the old setting. A total rehash.
And as for this stuff about "Pandering" can we just be forthright and say that if they reuse any setting then they are clearly pandering? Obviously book 2 finale was just a rehash of the crystals in the Omashu episode in season 1 of AtLA. Like are you kidding me with this bullshit? Jebus nails it, there were conscious parallels being drawn but not because of nostalgia, but to show that this is a world far different with stakes far different than anything in AtLA. Like this is a sequel series, what were they supposed to do, ignore the old show? Those two gifs of them leaving the northern air temple is a perfect example of what they were doing. Or how similar Jinora looks to her grandpappy, showing that his legacy lives on. It's not rehashing the glory days to pander and cash in on free sequel money when they're literally just expanding on the world they're already in. To even suggest that this season was based mostly on pandering is just utterly baffling to me in how you could've missed the point so hard.
I'm not accusing them of resting on their laurels and cashing in an easy season. I am accusing them of getting the fan response from Air, which was mostly negative, and then losing their confidence and retreating into what they know how to do. Jebus compared this to Beginnings, but it's NOTHING like Beginnings. Beginnings was entirely new settings, art style, tone, rules, if it had any problems it was almost
too fantastic. Hell, at least Zaofu was new ideas. And people liked Zaofu right? Why not more Zaofu and less conspicuously American southwestern town from ATLA. Cause we really benefited from seeing what they were up to.
I'll give you the air temple scene, that's a good one. It's one I didn't complain about, and it's telling that everyone has to fall back on it. But what the fuck do the crystal caves and the cylinder rocks in Venom of the Red Lotus add to the narrative? It's not juxtaposition, they aren't even the same locations. The crystal caves in Crossroads were under the Earth King's Palace, and the cylinder rocks were on the western front of the continent, not the northern. It's a trick. Some people might not have noticed that the settings were ripped, but their brains did.
You want to talk parallels? Light in the Dark drew parallels with Sozen's Comet too. Parallels to abstract philosophical concepts that relied on seasons worth of character development arcs in both shows. And it was subtle enough that it had to be explained in this thread. You really want to talk about ripped environments like they are anything on that level?
It's also great that you complain about pandering back to the old series, cuz I'd figured you'd be really excited about that considering you have some of the biggest nostalgia goggles here about the old series. Water, Earth and Fire were great fun and were really entertaining, but they were no where even close to anywhere as good as Air, and Spirits was just fucking amazing despite starting off sluggishly. And with this season of Korra they finally hit the home run on being entertaining and fun while also still being richer and deeper than AtLA, making this imo by far the best season of them all.
You do me a massive disservice here. Nobody in this thread has defended Air and Spirits as much as I have. And time and time again I have brought up the fact that I saw ATLA only a year before Korra aired, and that Korra as an avatar I like far more than Aang. It gives a different perspective. For instance, Water is kind of shit. It has its redeeming factors no doubt, and there is no episode in Change that is as good as The Storm. And Fire felt a bit regressive in its plot structure but it was the season where all the characters were developed to the point that made ATLA one of my all time favorite shows. But Earth? Once you get to the Blind Bandit, it's just an explosive rush to the finale, one of the most perfect episodes of television. Earth is one of the best single seasons of television out there; and maybe so is Spirit. They both have different qualities that make them great. It's worth thinking about.
