12.05
4chan will use this for a dubs image, won't they?
So besides saving Zhu Li, what was the point of Bolin being in this episode? He didn’t really prove his worth or show off any lavabending moves. Instead, he’s just the comic relief in a recon mission. And while that would be just dandy in the first season, but we already had over 40 episodes to deal with that. I don’t think the writers know what to do with Bolin anymore. They keep throwing him around as a failed movie star or a savant or whatever seems interesting at the time, but none of that sticks. He’s still the stupid one out of the cast, and in a season where the staff have made Mako a bit bearable than before. Why not have the rescue operation be Beifong-only? Lin and Opal have had enough screentime to hold the show on their own, so why not devote an episode to them? The A-plot of this episode is so centered on the trials of the Beifong family that having anyone without a strong connection to the clan dilutes whatever dynamic the show’s going for.
And I bring that dynamic to question when the writing goes into the parental neglect angle that was scratched and scrapped in Book 2. They have little time as it is, and they’re going to introduce some angst between Lin and Toph? Because that worked well when Bumi and Kya bitched about how Aang didn’t love them enough. We already had Lin coming to terms with her family members a book ago, and we haven’t had any word that she had any beef with her mom beforehand, so why bring it up now? Furthermore, this angle gets resolved as soon as it’s introduced, so why bring it up in the first place if you weren’t going to delve into it further? For a season themed around the anxiety in exploring outside one’s comfort zone, it seems ironic for the show to keep on doing these tricks instead of something new.
Speaking of old dogs, are they going to deal with President Raiko? Instead of providing a morally gray teammate for the good guys, he’s been consistently portrayed as a politically inept man who would probably go the same route as Kuvira if he weren’t watched by the other characters. Almost every scene he’s been in for the past two seasons paints him as generic slimy politician. It’s grown excessive. And with almost ordering Varrick to replicate the spirit cannon, he’s becoming less subtle than Tarrlok. I want to know how he’s been holding Republic City for years. Maybe Gene Luen Yang can bring that up when Dark Horse eventually asks him to write a sequel comic. But then again, look what he did with the Zuko’s mom plotline.
We’re currently looking at a show with little time to waste, but is still playing around with plotlines than trying to resolve them. Like Korra still can’t get the spirits on her side because three years since Harmonic Convergence didn’t teach either side how to cooperate (though it’s probably a callback to how Aang couldn’t get useful advice from the past Avatars when dealing with Ozai during his show’s final arc). Prince Wu’s still a dipstick who wants to pork Korra. Kuvira is still stoic Earth Hitler after all those teases last season. If you’re going to make your main villain have little cameos before unveiling her, you could do well to have her be more special than the previous antagonists. Instead of any complexities, her plot revealed at the end is just “Hey, I’m gonna use my spirit cannon on everyone if they don’t obey me.” And I was really into her character at the beginning, so it’s disappointing to see her being given little in terms of characterization.