/media/ - Media

I hate that many of the same people who are watching this nostalgically are the ones who are also giggling at me when I say I watch current, ongoing cartoons.

Fucks me off.

I’ve never watched this but have heard how popular it is. What do people like about it?

>>6200
Nostalgia. And one or two really well written characters.

Also shipping. Lots and lots of shipping. There were so many "main" cast members who all interacted that it was a fertile ground for ships.

>>6200
It's a great show – nostalgia glasses can help, but Avatar was one of the first kid's shows that laid the groundwork for more a lot of the more complex cartoons that are made today. The characters actually had arcs, struggles, they overcame things and they failed at others, they had to deal with loss, isolation, success. It was also one of the first mainstream American hybrid animations – it's obviously styled after anime, but has a lot of Western influence in the facial expressions and humor. This style has filtered through quite a few kids shows today.

I'd recommend it. It's not the greatest show of all time, but it's very well-done and incredibly satisfying to watch.

>>6200
In addition to what others said, it’s an extremely well fleshed out fantasy world deeply engrained in ancient Asian cultures, which is something most western media hardly touches. All four elements are based on different parts of Asia: japan, different Chinese dynasties, the Inuits, and nomadic temples. There’s sprawling cities with seedy lowlifes and political conspiracies, small fishing villages next to bamboo forests and icy mountains, and misty mountaintops straight out of Chinese paintings where monks meditate. Aesthetically, both visually and musically, it’s extremely pleasant to watch.

Not only are the four nations based on different Asian cultures, Each style of bending uses a different real world martial art in combat. Fire bending is aggressive Kung fu, whereas water bending is a graceful tai chi motion. Bending and fight choreography is extremely well done and based off of actual martial artists. The actual bending is endlessly creative, with every element having more powerful offshoots harnessed by grandmasters and prodigies (firebending, for example, can become lightning by a select few highly trained royals). Waterbenders fight with water arms, freezing opponents, flinging shards of ice, even manipulating the water in people’s blood etc. earthbenders have several variations including sand and metal. Aang the avatar can go into the avatar state when angry, a heightened rage mode with all his bending set to max strength, where his blasts of air can literally turn rock into sand within seconds.

Also, the characters are really excellent. Zuko in particular is a fan favorite for an extremely compelling and satisfying character arc from tortured villain to an extremely dimensional antihero. His relationship with his uncle Iroh is actually heartwarming, and its conclusion literally makes me sob like a baby every time I watch it. Character dynamics are believable and fleshed out, each character gets a unique relationship with all the others, and there isn’t a single character that feels like a drag.

I seriously can’t recommend this show enough. I mean, there’s a reason a show that’s ten or fifteen years old is currently #1 on Netflix right now. This is far beyond other Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network fare such as powerpuff girls, Ben ten, etc. Season one is more little kiddy, but once you get to season 2 it becomes utterly fantastic. Please watch this show now, you’re honestly doing yourself a disservice by not experiencing it for the first time.

>>6196
such a great show, just finished the series again. <3
Also for OP's questions: Zuko, SokkaXSuki, and I will not choose for the last one

>>6205
sokka and suki are your favorite couple? why is that, if you dont mind me asking?

Tbh Ive always stanned Katara and Zuko.

Also ATLA is a a perfect example of how a kids show can be very well written, entertaining, and teach valuable lessons.

>>6208
Zutara is definitely the most obvious pairing that the writers seemed to be hinting at. Aang just never seemed edgy enough and the two have great chemistry. Do you also think sokka and toph should have ended up together?

Toph>suki>azula>>>>>>Katara>everyone else

>>6210
Azula is such a queen, I love her.

>>6207
They seem like the most healthiest couple, as they both seem to be stronger and happier when they're with each other. Sokka loves Suki so much and Suki loves Sokka. Also they are a legit couple in the show, so it doesn't feel wrong to ship them together.

>>6209
I am this person >>6226 , and obviously I don't think Sokka and Toph should have been together. They are an example to people that just because they're in the "gaang" they do not have to be shipped together. People can just be friends. Also, the age gap is too uncomfortable, sure it's just a few years, but it is a very obvious difference because they are young. Sokka is much more of an older brother figure to Toph, and the scenes where she clings to him and stuff are a sign of that, or having a one-sided crush on an older boy. And Sokka's not trying to catch a case, I hope.

Zuko
>"I'm not ashamed. I'm as proud as ever!"

Iroh
>"Prince Zuko, pride is not the opposite of shame, but its source."

My absolute favorite quote from the show.

>>6229
tbqh i know shipping is a huge thing in the ATLA fandom, but if we're speaking strictly about "relationships" in the broader sense (ie including familial and friendship relationships) i don't think anything comes even close to the bond between prince zuko and uncle iroh. like it really shows all the ugly moments, when they scream at each other and plead and sob and beg, the anger and forgiveness and the unquestioning love. theirs might be one of the best relationships in all of television imo

>>6233
yes, i loved the dad son relationship of zuko and iroh. magnificent. their scenes were always my favourite part of the show

i am still salty about zutara. atleast make a better love interest for zuko, i fucking hated mai

>>6260
yeah mai was a black hole of charisma, devoid of any personality. like april ludgate from Parks and Rec but without any of the humor. i wouldve preferred zuko end up with someone who was more of a foil to his own moodiness and sulking demeanor, mai just seems like she'd exacerbate his negative energy. plus, we already saw in the show that they didnt work well together as a couple anyway, whereas zuko and katara had tons of romantic tension.

I hate the ship wars, why stay stuck in the same arguments for over 10 years when there is so much more to this show/series? Like how boring are you if the only thing you care is who Katara fucks?

>>6597
The more time you've invested into thinking about a piece of media the less people there are that can have an insightful conversation about it with you. Rabid shippers are at the level where they're obsessive about the show but haven't transcended into interesting analysis

>>6597
Katara made so much more sense with Zuko and you know it.

>>6600
i don't think that's true tbh. in my experience, rabid OTPers are the ones producing 50 page google doc analyses of the canon's symbolism and themes.

the real shipper problem is tinhatting, which is a problem of transcending too high. they go beyond the limits of what you could reasonably expect a mortal show to deliver, until they're tljcers posting about elephants, or zutarans posting obsessively for a decade about epic to mythic story telling and yin and yang.

also zutara forever

>>6606
Ok but only if we get Azulaang

Why was the Avatar even concerned with the Fire Nation?

Not Aang specifically, for him it would be the airbender genocide. What "balance" is the avatar protecting? The one where the Earth Kingdom is the most powerful? Where the Airbenders live on 4 mountains? The one where the Fire Nation live on a tiny chain of islands?

Why is the Fire nation the bad guy?

>want to rewatch it now
>have shit to do
>>6208
>>6209
ahhh fuck I was really into zutara back when atla was popular and getting fanart/fiction like crazy. it was just so aesthetic.
>>6226
Yes. RIP moon-girl though.
>>6605
after a point it's cringy but you don't have to disparage everyone who enjoyed it and the fan generated material just because some people took it too far.
>>7740
it always bothered me that the world seemed so small. water tribe only lives in north and south pole for example. it would be like trying to make china into an entire globe in itself, just china mongolia korea and japan. nothing else at all. but even smaller, and kroea and mongolia are both single-village icy glaciers. that was the one thing that did really bother me.
>>6611
based

>>7740
Presumably a lot of the avatar world is decided by divine right, ie the spirits and original bender animals. Maybe that’s just how the world was originally when it got split up by pre humans

>>8493
I thought this too, but then I realized, if that were the case, the first spirits should be in favor of the invasion and the rest of the spirits should be against it. You should see parallels in the spirit world over this conflict, but I don't believe that case was ever made. It seemed like, universally, the spirit world disapproved of the Fire Nations actions, even the supposed Dragons.

>>8543
I think the spirits didn’t care because FL Ozai was just another “crisis of the generation” and the spirits were so ancient they’d seen it a thousand times before. Chin the conqueror is implied to be on the same level. And the giant owl Wan Shi Tong implies that this conflict was trivial