#[[ she didn't even ask or explained x'D ]]

[countlessrealities]

@rapxir sent: "Fucking christ!" (Mabel, bc we talked about her and Ruby's language habits a while back)

Mabel doesn't have any sort of verbal reaction at the curse. She merely turns her head towards Ruby and pins her in place with a penetrating glare, the kind that makes you feel bad even when you're innocent.

Chocolate brown eyes linger on the older teen's face, as the Pines girl's lips curl in a displeased frown. Then, always without a word, she hands over a large glass jar, already half full with one-dollar bills.

The label says, in large, bright red letters "SWEARING JAR", and that's all the information one needs to get the hint.

[amethystina]

Girl you're calling that a sex scene? That was the ART OF CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT. You are the best at what you do and I'm sorry I know I'm shameless but your fic got me thinking, understanding the boys as good as you do, how do you think Yo Han would react if he got some indications or evidence that Ga On is cheating on him? Not that I'll ever believe Ga On to be capable of it, but I'm just wondering if some signs pointed that way, what do you think Yo Han would do or think?

I have to say, this ask nearly gave me a heart attack x'D Because the notification only said: "Girl you're calling that a sex scene? That was" before it cut off, so I definitely had time to start panicking, wondering just how terrible that sex scene must have been. A part of me didn't even want to open the ask x'D

It was fine once I did, obviously, but man, I was scared there for a second.

ANYWAY. I think Yo Han's reaction depends on how long they've been together. And also what kind of hints and evidence he's seeing, of course, but his actions depend mostly on how long they've been together and how secure he feels in their relationship.

Like, I think that after a couple of years, once they've gotten settled, gotten better at communicating, and Yo Han has learned that no, he won't actually end up devouring Ga On because Ga On has enough darkness of his own to withstand whatever Yo Han can throw at him, he'll calm down significantly. He'll realise that Ga On doesn't want someone else and, even if Ga On did, he's bold enough to just flat-out say that. He wouldn't go behind Yo Han's back and cheat — he'd tell Yo Han to his face that he's found someone else and wants to separate.

Not that Ga On ever would, but he's too honest and righteous to sneak around and lie, basically.

So, like, after a certain point, even if they ended up in the cliché, dramatic scenario where Ga On comes home with lipstick on his shirt collar, Yo Han's first thought wouldn't be: "Are you cheating on me?" but rather: "Did someone try to assault you?"

Quickly followed by: "Who is she?" and "Where does she live?"

Yo Han, NO.

And when Ga On explains that he was just trying to help a drunk woman get a taxi home and she collapsed against him as they were waiting and must have smudged lipstick on his collar as she did so, Yo Han would just go: "Yeah, that checks out. That's definitely something Ga On would do — and much more reasonable than him cheating on me."

(Partly also because Yo Han kind of expects that if Ga On truly was cheating on him, despite all odds, he would be much better at hiding the evidence. He trained his sugar baby better than that, okay?)

But if it's earlier in their relationship? When Yo Han still thinks that he's going to suffocate or scare Ga On away? And Ga On hasn't learned to open up yet? So he won't tell Yo Han what he's feeling and thinking? Then things might develop differently — and can turn quite ugly, unfortunately.

Like, it can start with something as simple as Ga On being tired. Perhaps work is being difficult — forcing him to stay late a lot — and maybe it's getting close to the anniversary of Soo Hyun's death and Ga On is closing himself off more than usual. But Ga On doesn't want to bother Yo Han with something as silly as him being tired, or reawaken the jealousy Yo Han feels towards Soo Hyun, so he just doesn't say anything. And tells white lies when Yo Han asks if something is wrong. But Yo Han would notice that Ga On starts brushing him off, is home less often, and probably isn't as physically affectionate as he usually would be.

And once the thought that Ga On might be cheating on him appears, it'd be difficult for Yo Han to let it go. He'd probably push it aside at first, with the very reasonable explanation that, no, Ga On is too honest and good for something like that. But it would resurface the next time Ga On brushes him off, and get even worse when Ga On seems tense and a little awkward when he hugs Yo Han — as if he's feeling uncomfortable.

Or guilty.

And Ga On is feeling guilty, because he's missing Soo Hyun and he knows that Yo Han wouldn't like that if he knew. And so Ga On clams up even more, refusing to talk about it. But Yo Han would assume it's because of something else — something even worse.

And, sadly, once the suspicion gains hold, I think Ga On would be guilty until proven innocent in Yo Han's mind. Because Yo Han is never wrong, right? So, clearly, it's just a matter of finding the evidence. And so he'd try to find said proof by invading Ga On's privacy, having him followed and investigated — all that unacceptable shit Yo Han does. Because now Yo Han has something to prove and he'd lose sight of the fact that, in doing so, he might just be causing an even bigger problem that will, sooner or later, blow up in his face. He'd lose himself to the hunt.

Because it's not like there will ever come a time when he goes: "Okay, I've had Ga On followed for three weeks now and he hasn't done anything, that probably means he's not cheating on me." It'd be: "He just hasn't slipped up yet."

On pure habit, he'd start treating Ga On like a target — like someone he has to expose.

And since Yo Han can't exactly talk to Ga On about this — who is now one of the few people who'd try to hold Yo Han back when he crosses the line (R.I.P. K, we miss you) — there's literally nothing stopping him. And so it just becomes a question of what happens first: Ga On figuring out that Yo Han is having him followed for some reason, Ga On catching Yo Han invading his privacy, or Ga On getting unsettled enough by Yo Han's behaviour to ask what the hell is going on.

Because Yo Han wouldn't be able to just keep behaving normally. He's a good actor, yes, but Ga On knows the difference between Yo Han's genuine affection and when he's trying to fake it. And Yo Han has to start faking it after a while, once his doubts grow strong enough. Because it's difficult to keep giving it your all when you think your partner is cheating on you.

And Ga On would be able to tell when Yo Han starts acting weird. But there's also a danger that he might assume that it's because Yo Han has figured out what's going on with Ga On. As in, Ga On thinks that the displeasure he's picking up on is lingering jealousy over Soo Hyun, not this new threat that Yo Han has conjured up in his mind. Because the day Soo Hyun died is a date both of them know, and all that. So, maybe, Ga On wouldn't actually say anything at first, afraid that would just make Yo Han more agitated.

Meanwhile, Yo Han would be so goddamn confused because he really didn't think Ga On was this good of an actor. Because despite a bit of awkwardness, Ga On is still mostly himself, not showing nearly as much guilt as Yo Han had expected. Yo Han is surprised that Ga On can act that well.

(It's because he's not acting, you pickled cucumber)

So, most likely, I'd say that it all comes to a head when Yo Han gets caught snooping. Either because Ga On figures out that, yes, he truly is being followed, or catches Yo Han looking through his phone or something. And the resulting argument would, uh, not be pretty.

Because even if some part of Ga On could probably see that Yo Han's actions are mostly founded in insecurities — Yo Han thinking he doesn't deserve Ga On, being sure he'll scare him away eventually, thinking Ga On can easily find someone better, etc. — it's also incredibly painful to hear that Yo Han thought he'd do something like that. Like, I think Ga On could forgive the invasion of privacy and light stalking relatively easily, but the fact that Yo Han genuinely thought he'd cheat on him? That his trust in Ga On and Ga On's devotion to him is apparently that weak?

That hurts.

And, sure, Yo Han's doubts are understandable to some degree but, as per usual, it's the way he chooses to act on them that's the biggest problem. Instead of having Ga On followed like a criminal, he should have just asked to have an adult conversation about it.

Not at all helped by the fact that Yo Han would, of course, get defensive when Ga On points this out, and insist that he had very good reasons because Ga On was behaving so weirdly. Which of course means that Ga On has to explain why that is, and then Yo Han does end up feeling jealous over the whole Soo Hyun thing again, but also kind of terrible because Ga On has been suffering for weeks and he didn't notice. Like, jealousy and all that aside, Yo Han still loves Ga On with every fibre of his being and wants to protect him from everything that can hurt him — including the lingering grief after Soo Hyun's death. Ga On shouldn't suffer, period.

And it's not until after he's had that thought that Yo Han suddenly realises just how badly he's fucked up. Because Ga On would definitely be crying by then, in between the angry yelling. Like, Yo Han only has to look at him and see how devastated Ga On is, and then he'd realise that's all on him. It's Yo Han's fault.

He did that.

And, in that moment, Yo Han would also realise that he isn't immune to the concept of self-fulfilling prophecies. Since, in all the time he and Ga On has been together, this is definitely the closest he's actually come to scaring Ga On away. Because Ga On would, at the very least, move out of their shared bedroom for a while after that. If he still has his apartment, he might even go so far as to return there, too hurt and humiliated to stay at the house.

(Let's hope Elijah is somewhere else — exploring the world or something — because, otherwise, she would smack the everloving shit out of Yo Han)

And so they would both be miserable for a while and, not so surprisingly, Yo Han would feel terrible. Like, that man would spiral, probably faster than he ever has in his entire life. Because, understandable trauma and insecurities aside, this is his fault. The situation got out of hand because of his choices. And Yo Han can't say for sure if Ga On will be able to forgive him.

Meanwhile, Ga On has the dubious benefit of being the wronged party. Which, in theory, means you'll be hurt and angry, but don't have to take the blame onto yourself quite as much. Or at least it would — unless you're Kim Ga On. Whose abandonment issues run so deep he's rivalling the Mariana Trench. He'd of course begin to wonder if, just maybe, it's his fault. Maybe this happened because of something he did. He must have done something to make Yo Han doubt him that much.

And, tragically, that's probably what will eventually make him reach out to Yo Han again. Because Yo Han certainly won't try to approach Ga On but, for once, it'd be more out of guilt than pride.

And he'd be wary — then horrified — when Ga On comes to him and instead of being angry, Ga On is just sad and subdued and asks what he did wrong. What did he do to lose Yo Han's trust? Should he have been kinder? Less abrasive? Less angry? What can he do to earn it back?

Had he made Yo Han feel unloved? Neglected? Unappreciated?

Or was the love Ga On had to give simply not enough?

Should he give Yo Han more? Try harder? Be less of a burden?

And Yo Han would shatter.

Because there is not a single part of Yo Han that sees Ga On as a burden. And of course Ga On's love is enough. It's literally impossible for Ga On to give more than he already is.

It would break Yo Han's heart, especially since he can tell how desperate Ga On is. That if Yo Han told him that, yes, he has to try harder, Ga On would. Ga On would do whatever it took to try and fix this problem he now thinks he's the cause of. And, what's worse, Yo Han knows he could use that to push the blame away from himself. If Yo Han wants to spare his own pride and come out the victor, all he has to do is let Ga On believe it's his fault. And it would be so easy, since Ga On is already halfway there, all on his own. Ga On wouldn't even argue.

Suddenly, Yo Han has to make a choice between his own pride — his own kneejerk reaction to never admit to a fault, never appear weak, and never surrender — and Ga On's well-being.

And the only thing Yo Han has to guide him is his own sense of morals.

Which, as we all know, are not only questionable but, a lot of the time, entirely optional.

He'll obviously pick Ga On's well-being in the end — he loves him too much not to — but Yo Han hates himself for even considering the other option. Never mind that it's based on childhood trauma and years of abuse, Yo Han hates that his first instinct is to save himself, at Ga On's expense. That realisation, more so than admitting he's done wrong, makes him feel weak.

(... many of these answers are just (unintentionally) turning into various ways to make Yo Han break for some reason?)

And, to be entirely honest with you, I can't say exactly what Yo Han's reaction and actions would be without writing it in detail and following his thoughts more closely. Mainly because there are a couple of options and which one it ends up being will depend on literally the smallest shift in his and Ga On's expressions and mannerisms.

But what I can say is that it would be a struggle for him, both to find his words and keep his emotions in check.

And he would cry.

In that way we've seen him do in the drama, where his emotions overwhelm him to the point where not even he can stop them from spilling over. So not violently or anything — he'd try to talk through it, pretending it's not happening — but he would cry. Because he'd feel so wretched over how far he's accidentally pushed Ga On. Like, forcing Ga On to the point where he'd go: "Should I be less angry? Should I give you more? Will you love me then?" is exactly what Yo Han has always criticised Soo Hyun and Professor Min for. And now he's done it himself.

But, thankfully, that also means he's going to be pretty damn motivated to fix this. Sure, some part of him might feel that, maybe, he should just let Ga On go if this is what happens when Yo Han is left to his own devices, but he's a little too selfish for that. And, deep down, he knows that Ga On wouldn't actually want Yo Han to let go.

So they would Talk.

And it would be awkward and kind of stilted for them both, but, in the long run, they both love each other too much not to. And sure, the pain and doubts wouldn't magically go away, but they'll keep working on it. And, if nothing else, the whole disaster will teach them just how important it is to communicate — even if the issue might seem small at first glance.

Like, yes, Yo Han shouldn't have jumped to conclusions and gone to the lengths that he did, but if Ga On had been a bit more open, maybe Yo Han wouldn't have. That's not to say it was Ga On's fault — Yo Han was the one to blame — but it could have been avoided if Ga On hadn't tried to keep his suffering to himself.

Communication is key, and all that.

SO YEAH.

Something like that.

There is also a middle option that would probably happen when they are, unsurprisingly, somewhere in between these two scenarios. As in, they've been together for a while so Yo Han feels a bit more secure (and his Abyss tendencies have softened a bit), but not secure enough to just brush it off. Then I think he would be tempted to have Ga On followed and that whole shebang but, after some thinking, he'd realise how much Ga On would hate that. And, eventually, he decides to just ask Ga On instead.

And Ga On will look at him and go: "I'm sorry, what? And give you a reason to start planning another unhinged, ten-year-long revenge plot?"

Which, Yo Han can admit — fair point.

And then they'd actually talk it through, too, and Yo Han can (grumpily) explain why he's feeling insecure and Ga On can (patiently) explain why he doesn't have to. And smother Yo Han with little kissies until he stops being such an idiot.

... at this point, I'm basically writing fics in these answers, aren't I? x'D

AH WELL. Thank you so much for your kind words (even if they gave me a scare) and thank you for the interesting question! Clearly, I had a lot to say on this subject.

Take care! 💜

[seyaryminamoto]

hello! I really like your meta about Zuko, and I'm so glad that I finally found a person who also thinks that Zuko in book 3 is a much worse person than he was in the book 1. I always thought that something was wrong with me, since literally no one sees this obvious fact for me! But I would like to ask you: What do you think about Katara in book 3? the fact is that she was my favorite character in books 1 and 2, and the way she was written in book 3 upset me a lot. it seems to me that they spoiled her character, but I can't explain why. Please share your thoughts!

Glad you've enjoyed my extensive meta on the fandom's fave, haha. I did write a lot about him, always nice to know my thoughts on the subject are still deemed relevant.

As for Katara... well, I have thoughts on her, too. My experience with her character is quite similar to yours, I'd say, because I too felt a lot better about her character in the first two seasons of the show compared with the third. I don't usually give this a ton of thought, but after your ask, I figured I'd try and figure out what exactly went down with her that made people like us feel so uncomfortable with Katara's portrayal at multiple points of Book 3...

For starters, I'll say I vibed with Katara a lot when I started the show for reasons beyond her being a great character or being written wonderfully: she could very well have been written mediocrely and I would have loved her anyway simply because I ran away from anime to ATLA in an era where anime kept shoehorning incest undertones into every sibling relationship, even in shows that didn't have that as a core subject. It happened at least twice that I can remember, I kept seeing people raving about shows where it WAS the core of it (I still do not understand the Oreimo deal, like, the minute I read that show's title I puked in my mouth and knew I'd never watch it), and I just needed... safety from that concept, I guess?

So when I went into ATLA, and the first sibling relationship you're exposed to is Sokka and Katara, two siblings who very much act like siblings? I was thriving. It was thrilling. I felt so refreshed that I think I didn't care much about the flaws of Book 1, despite my inability to sense direction for most of it, because thank the universe, it was a sibling relationship that made sense to me!

With that as an opening, I'd say that, initially, I thought Katara was fine for most of Book 1. In Book 2? She fell off the radar for me a bit simply because other characters are introduced that just appeal to me so much more than she does. I vibe better with characters like Azula, who tend to be the type of female character I just LOVE, and with characters like Toph, she's a tomboy, I was a tomboy (... was? x'D maybe I shouldn't use past tense...), so I gravitated much more towards those two by no real fault of Katara's core personality traits. Back in Book 1, there aren't as many main characters, so you don't have a lot of variety to choose faves from. It's not that strange, I think, that once the cast broadens, people's interest in certain characters can scatter too.

But then Book 3 happened, and I just couldn't enjoy Katara outside of episodes where she wasn't that important. The Katara-centric episode of Book 3 stand among my least favorite episodes of ATLA altogether, and among the least likely episodes I'd ever want to rewatch. I literally skipped over The Painted Lady in my first rewatches of the show, every bit as much as I skipped The Great Divide or Avatar Day, both of which annoy me a lot in the first two seasons. The Puppetmaster? Not even close to being an episode I could enjoy. Even the Runaway, that's supposed to be Toph-centric, ends up making me count down the minutes for it to end and I'm not even going to get started on The Southern Raiders and the absolute can of worms that episode is...

So, with all this being said, if we peel this particular cabbage open little by little...

After mulling it over, I've grown to suspect that Katara has major inconsistency issues since day one that most people don't particularly like to acknowledge, and that flew over most of our heads from the beginning of the show. She's pretty much portrayed to us as an empath, someone who has so much heart that she can't help but feel everyone's pain and suffer with them all the time. The fandom 100% acts like that's who she is (while also obsessively adultifying her unnecessarily, and forcing her into the mom!friend role, which... we'll talk about that later)

But this is also the same character who, when her brother banished Aang from the Southern Water Tribe as early as in episode 2, protested in a very particular way once Aang was gone. Which one of these statements sound more accurate to Katara's character, and a suitable protest for her to proclaim upon witnessing this injustice against Aang?

"Aang is alone! How could you send him away on his own? He could be in danger, Sokka! He's just a kid!"

"The Air Nomads are gone, Sokka! Where do you think he'll go? He doesn't have a home to go back to and you just sent him away!"

"You happy now? There goes my one chance at becoming a waterbender!"

If you ask the fandom? They'll most likely think that her reaction was either #1 or #2.

Surprise surprise: it was actually #3

I'm not saying she didn't show empathy towards Aang while Sokka was ranting at him, because she did. I'm not saying she wasn't willing to be banished along with Aang until Sokka asks if she'd choose pretty much a total stranger over their family and tribe, because she was. She absolutely did all those things.

... So why would she focus only on how he represented her one chance at becoming a waterbender once Aang is gone?

This feels off to me. I've never particularly liked that line. And you could absolutely say that Katara has every right to be mad at losing her chance to reclaim an aspect of her culture that she cannot connect to, but the way it was framed here? It absolutely makes Katara look more selfish than she actually was. The wording is not good. The show doesn't emphasize, at this point, that bending is such a core and crucial part of their culture and that Katara feels a major responsibility in being the ONLY person in the South Pole that can keep it alive. So it just comes off as a child's tantrum. Sokka's concerns were 100% valid too, even if he went about them while being a jerk (he is, indeed, an older brother...). He wasn't even wrong in the end about how dangerous Aang was to their tribe, since Aang's mishap with Katara on the ship gives away his position to Zuko, and it results in Zuko ramming a huge ship into their home and nearly killing people in the process. But you DON'T see the show fully framing it as though Katara and Aang did something wrong -- it was an honest mistake. We know it was. Sokka is framed as unreasonable for being so paranoid even though later events in the very episode prove he wasn't.

And that's... the crux of the issue with Katara's writing. If you ask me.

There are far too many instances where Katara makes mistakes that she's not held accountable for, that she doesn't apologize for, that run against the core logic and principles of her character and they either get shrugged off or overlooked. There are far too many situations where she acts out, and is a jerk at her jerk of a brother, even unprompted on occasion, and it's supposed to just be funny. One particularly stood out to me when I revisited it a few years ago, I can't really remember what for (maybe when I was writing Jeong Jeong's arc in Gladiator and I had a look at the fishing village...?), but it's the famous flashback episode in Book 1: The Storm.

The scene in question is... humorous. Supposedly. Katara is trying to buy fruit in the market but then realizes they have no money to pay for it. Not only does Katara piss off the vendor, but the vendor actually takes her rage out on Sokka once she realizes these kids won't give her any business: he gets kicked in the rear, as the transcript's description says. No one protests the woman's violent reaction, not even Sokka. Katara most certainly doesn't do it. But that's not all there is to it: Sokka doesn't hold what happened with the fruit vendor against Katara, they have a conversation on how they have no money and no food... and Katara offers him the golden ticket solution to their problems:

"You could get a job, smart guy."

Am I too feminist for thinking it's insane that Katara expects her brother alone to get the job? That she's not saying the THREE of them should get jobs? She and Aang are BENDERS! That's an asset most people aren't likely to find in any would-be employees in the central Earth Kingdom! So... wouldn't it be logical for all of them to do it? But no, instead, Sokka alone has to get the job?

And yes, I know, Sokka is the provider, Sokka is the protector, Sokka would do ANYTHING for his sister and the people he loves: you ask the fandom, though, and that's Katara instead of him. Moments like these simply do not exist in the fandom's eyes and, if they do, they're just excusable because Sokka is boring/weird/annoying/insert-demeaning-nonsense-here and Katara is a queen who can do whatever she wants.

Then, the consequences arrive once Sokka gets a dangerous job on a fishing boat and nearly gets killed in a storm. Aang is the one who shows concern about the potential storm when the fisherman's wife brings it up: from all I can see in the transcript, there's nothing from Katara. Sokka says they told him to get a job, so that's what he's doing, and there's no manifestation of concern from either of them about maybe joining him on this fishing trip to ensure he's safe. Instead, Aang is haunted by his past and Katara goes with him when he leaves, which, yes, is very important for context on the Air Nomads and Aang's life... and yet we don't really NEED for this scene to be Katara and Aang only. It could've included Sokka too. The plot of the second half of the episode would change? Likely. They could've come up with another idea, and not shown us a Katara who doesn't show concern for her brother's safety or any remorse when her unfair demands or expectations from him could result in catastrophic outcomes :') yes, she worries about Sokka's safety once the storm hits, but there's no sign of her feeling responsible for Sokka being out in the storm at all. No apology. Which is ironic, because Zuko apologizes to Iroh in that very same episode, hence, an apology from Katara to her brother could have mirrored that side of the story well, and they REALLY loved doing Zuko-Gaang parallel scenes like that, so it would have fit perfectly! Didn't happen, though.

Point being... Katara's compassion and empathy are not absolute. It's important to keep in mind is that they don't need to be! But precisely because she falters with them in moments where she REALLY shouldn't, with people as important to her as her own brother? It becomes very difficult to believe that she's the empath the fandom is convinced she is, and that the show's narrative tries to push her as.

The real reason why her failure to show compassion to Sokka in "humorous" situations feels so unnerving isn't because she's a typical little sister who takes her brother for granted (which is a perfectly logical/believable behavior!): it's because there are no consequences for it. Maybe at some point or another there were? But I for one can't remember many instances where Katara failed Sokka and it was framed as her fault and her responsibility. Let's look at other Book 1 instances that exemplify what I mean:

She freezes him to the deck of Zuko's ship, which puts Sokka in MAJOR danger, and she just tells him to hurry up as if it weren't her fault that he's frozen in the first place. We don't even see her making efforts to thaw him out of there when she IS the waterbender so it seems logical that she should be able to help with that (and if she's too inexperienced to do it? The least she can do to help her brother out of a dangerous situation is to TRY???). But apparently it's funny that she doesn't help him when it's her fault! So this is fine!

She endangers the entire group over the waterbending scroll, which, of course, the pirates had no right to have anyway and it's reasonable that she'd want it for herself... but she antagonized a group of fully adult, dangerous, potential murderous pirates, against Sokka's constant warnings that they shouldn't pick that particular fight. As far as I can remember? Her apologies on that episode are exclusively about how she hurt Aang's feelings by being jealous over his greater talents as a bender. Basically, nothing for Sokka, no apology for not listening to him about danger, making it worse when the very final moment features Katara proudly telling her brother that she won't steal things... unless it's from pirates. So lesson not learned because it's funny, again, to never acknowledge that Sokka has a point.

She actually cares about Sokka's fate in Jet! But the thing is... the narrative doesn't frame that as Katara's fault. Because it's not. Jet made his choices and he did awful things and he captured Sokka, lied and gaslit everyone, because he had a goal to fulfill and he used Katara to make that happen. As angry and upset as Katara is, it's not exactly shown that Katara is sorry for having trusted Jet when Sokka could have ended up paying a deadly price for it. She's angry at the betrayal, even in Book 2 it's constantly framed as though Katara is upset at him as an ex-girlfriend would be upset at her ex-boyfriend for lying to her rather than, you know, being pissed at him for nearly killing her brother + an entire village. My point is, the narrative framing never holds her responsible for Jet's choices. Which, again, she's not. But she IS responsible for her own choices... and one of those choices was disregarding Sokka's warnings about Jet. THAT was her fault, and her responsibility. She jumped to conclusions and assumed that Sokka was bitter and jealous that Jet was the charming cool leader Sokka could never be. There were no apologies to Sokka over that, either.

I could go on, and on, and on. The truth is, I bring all this up to show with solid evidence that Katara's writing was always a little... unstable. Weird. Disconnected from logic in many regards, I'd say. It's not logical/compatible to tell us that this character has the BIGGEST heart of the entire cast when she fails to show that heart to none other than her own brother, who is inarguably the person who she knows best and with whom she should share the closest relationship, even as her friendship with Aang grows and thrives. That makes no sense, thematically speaking.

Is it meant to be comedic? Yes, every bit as much as Iroh sexually harassing June was done for comedy's sake. That's not an excuse for characters behaving in ways that are thematically contrary to what they're supposed to be portraying... and along with that? No excuse for them facing zero consequences for that behavior. Which is, in fact, my main issue with these flaws from Katara: I have no issue with the writing choices in the scenes I listed just now! I take issue, however, with the lack of follow-up and consequences that you can BET, 100%, would have befallen Sokka if it had been him instead of Katara acting that way. He faced consequences even for things he didn't do, for comedy's sake: he wouldn't have gotten away with disregarding Katara's safety as often as Katara did with him, no chance at all.

Ultimately, these scenes in Book 1 are kind of ignorable in the larger scheme of things (or at least, that's how the fandom has always acted). Not a lot of people take any of this as major proof of characterization for Katara. You won't see a lot of fic writers showing her acting like this. Canon, though, often would go down this route for funsies, and the comics certainly did it plenty too, that I can remember. Part of the issue here is that, as funny as it is, it also makes Katara feel stale as a character, as does the Sokka-Katara dynamic, at large, because there's no progression for it. That's probably my greatest gripe with the Great Divide, believe it or not: it fakes being an episode where Sokka and Katara are going to be confronted over their conflictive tendencies, and the ONLY potential development in that basically-filler episode SHOULD HAVE BEEN Sokka and Katara learning to be a bit more harmonious and respectful of each other? ... And that's just not what happened at all. The status quo remains exactly the same after that episode, and it continues to be like that until the end of the show.

The real reason why Sokka and Katara are deemed the healthy siblings is because, of course, compared with the other main set of siblings in the show, these two appear to get along wonderfully. But the truth is, their relationship is not as dynamic as it deserved to be. And that's part of why Book 3 ends up failing in ways Book 1 might not have, while having similar flaws: Book 1 is when you're still getting to know these kids, and that's why I find its flaws far more forgivable than anything that comes later. When there's basically no development for that connection at all, Book 3 winds up falling flat with characters like Sokka and Katara and the bond between them.

All this being said... I'm not saying that Katara is terrible in Book 1. I still stand by the fact that I really enjoyed her character in many instances of this season, there absolutely are situations where she sasses Sokka that still make me crack a smile, and genuinely humorous situations that don't paint her in a questionable light over her lack of concern for her brother's safety. Her fight to earn the right to be trained as a waterbender is deeeeeply flawed but it's not her fault, it's more the misogyny of the writers/creators that decided that a betrothal necklace from his past would make Pakku unlearn all his sexism and get over his bullshit right after beating up a girl who was fighting tooth and nail to make him acknowledge her. That he only acknowledges her because he wanted to marry her grandmother is... uh... fuckboi behavior even when he's well over 70 years of age? XD

So, yeah, Book 1 still has my favorite Katara of the entire show even though I REALLY wish she wouldn't get away with things that other characters wouldn't get a pass for (... well... other than Zuko...). I can't enjoy her as much as I enjoy other characters because I really don't like it when characters aren't held accountable for serious mistakes they made.

Moving on to Book 2, though, and leaving behind my greatest gripe with Katara's Book 1 writing (lack of direct consequences/self-reflection on her part), Book 2's biggest sin when it comes to Katara is the beginning of the "mothering" trope. I honestly did not feel motherly vibes from Katara towards anyone in Book 1. Sokka is very often the one playing the responsible role, while Aang and Katara are seeing the world, practicing their bending, doing reckless and fun things. The entire thing about Katara being the mom friend started in Book 2 when she suddenly becomes the epitome of responsibility (well... kinda) when Toph joins the group. She still does sketchy stuff with zero consequences (I'll forever complain about how ice is not cold in this show, the kids she froze to the wall may have been dicks, but freezing someone alive that way should have resulted in serious health repercussions, just as ANY case of freezing someone alive should have, ffs, be it Zuko in Book 1's finale or Azula + Katara in Book 3's...), but once Toph is part of the group, she becomes the cool girl who's "one of the boys", and now Katara is "the mom". This dynamic gets forced into the story pretty much right after Toph joins the group. And after that? It doesn't really change for the better often. There are only a handful of instances where Katara wasn't acting wholesome and comforting and kind and compassionate in Book 2 (... particularly with Sokka, ofc), but the point where her dynamics, even with Aang, start to feel motherly is definitely Book 2.

And this adds to the issue, in the end: Katara's appeal as the main girl in the show is suddenly gone because Toph is here, and she's a way more unique character that the writers definitely were having fun working with, probably more fun than they had with Katara. So they had to find a new niche for her, I'd dare guess. Thus, instead of actually building up an awesome and solid friendship between Katara and Toph, they mostly just clash and collide. Toph is basically the ONLY character who gives Katara grief and isn't framed as in the wrong for it, which is its own set of issues (namely, Toph not being challenged enough by the narrative, which stunts her character growth), but among many things, we suddenly get shown that Katara is a girly girl who likes makeup and she ropes Toph into this when nothing we've seen so far suggests that Toph would be comfortable with that. Katara pushes her into doing things because they're the "girls of the group"... and it doesn't often look like Toph's feelings on anything are important when Katara is pushing her around for whatever purpose. I'm not saying Toph hated the spa day, she certainly had fun eventually, but even when the comics made a "Katara and Toph's day out" story, where Toph got to choose what to do for once, the story devolved into Katara's show anyway, and things concluded with Toph deciding they're better off doing girly things together when they want to hang out because Katara is just too intense for the things Toph would like to do.

This isn't even in the show, but it's basically a response to Tales of Ba Sing Se to try and even out Katara and Toph's one-sided dynamic, where Katara calls the shots of their entertainment... and even then, Toph doesn't really get what she's looking for. But Katara does get that out of Toph because all she wants is a girl to do girly things with and Toph provides that in the end, no matter how much of a tomboy she may be. Toph might just want a friend who loves the things she loves, and who knows, Katara could be that person! But the story never leads her in that direction so we never see that happen. And that's why that particular friendship never really... clicked for me. Their dynamics don't really feel enjoyable to me as they were written in the show, even though they very much could have been.

That's one thing I'll always give ATLA: the character potential and synergy they captured with that cast could be absolutely incredible. Team Avatar is so iconic because they really could work well off each other. A lot of teams in other media just aren't this good (... one of my main reasons to not enjoy Voltron and drop it in season 1 was my absolute failure to find any synergy between those characters, it felt like they all hated each other and I honestly did not enjoy their dynamics in the least), but Aang, Katara and Sokka have great synergy due to their different personalities in Book 1. Same when Toph joins them in Book 2. Zuko ABSOLUTELY could have been better in the group than he was if Book 3 hadn't devolved into the Zuko Woobifying Show by the second half, where the only writing priority was making him friends with everyone, and making them all feel sorry for him and have compassion towards him. But, broken down to his core traits, Zuko's personality would have resulted in solid chemistry with everyone else's if they'd gotten off that agenda anyway! So ultimately, ATLA has a big win in this respect that a lot of TV shows would LOVE to recreate but they simply haven't struck the right kind of balance in character traits.

Hence why the way they wrote Toph and Katara's dynamics kind of feels like a betrayal to me. Those two could have been a lot of fun, they have EVERYTHING it takes to be entertaining characters with not a ton of things in common and yet building a solid friendship that hinges on their differences. I've seen a fair few examples of that kind of dynamic in other media, and it absolutely would be possible with Toph and Katara. It's really unfair that they couldn't capture their dynamics in such a way that both characters would SHINE, rather than constantly resorting to conflicts between them that never seemed to truly be resolved.

So: Toph should not be a problem for Katara. She should enhance her character and doesn't because of writing failures. One of the core failures is "mom friend Katara", of course: there's nothing inherently wrong with Katara stepping up and taking care of people she loves, but there's something very wrong with it when she's suddenly portrayed as this motherly figure when she's doing things that Sokka had been doing just fine in Book 1. Main reason why this is the case? Sokka got dumbed down to full-time class clown for whatever reason in Book 2. While he has good moments, a lot of times they went WAY overboard with making him a source of comedy this season and that, too, contributes to mom friend Katara. Since Sokka is being so meh? We even feel relieved that Katara is there to keep things together because nobody can expect the other three to do it, right? But... Sokka was doing it in Book 1. And there's no real development to explain him NOT doing it anymore once Toph joins in besides "Katara is now the mom friend and Sokka is just here to be funny". It's not organic development: it's forcing tropes that just don't fit. And while Katara's mothering doesn't feel as unpleasant as it could here, it ultimately forces a new interpretation and portrayal of her character that honestly isn't all that interesting, most of all when the other characters are constantly portrayed as "more fun" while she's just here to keep them in line.

It just isn't the same Katara we met in Book 1, and it shows in spades. Book 1 Katara would have been hyped to join Aang and Toph in chaos while Sokka screams at them to behave themselves. Book 2 Katara is the one trying to keep the other three in line, and there's genuinely zero development that led things to that stage. It's not organic storytelling. There's no growth that leads to that, and so, it feels off.

But the core problem of all these flaws in Book 1 and Book 2 is that they roll together and snowball into something far greater that then proceeds to just... disrupt everything we thought we knew or understood about Katara. We've been told she's a kind person above all else, someone who cares about people close to her, someone who embodies hope and strength and love...!

... And then Book 3 starts, and we're actually facing a Katara who shifts into a wholly different person with the speed of a whiplash that we're left not knowing who tf this is anymore.

"Mom friend Katara" absolutely comes back in Book 3, why lie? She takes care of people, she tries to provide, she tries to be nice and sweet and then also enforces discipline on Toph (particularly) when she's being irresponsible!

But the reason why The Runaway is such an unpleasant episode is because Katara's behavior is dialed up to a thousand, and the conflict between her and Toph feels WAY too similar to what it was when they were barely getting to know each other in The Chase. Why are they STILL clashing over such things? There are occasional glimpses of friendliness there in The Runaway, sure! But they're not so strong that you actually feel like that friendship supersedes their conflicts and their propensity to bicker and argue and hurt each other. Toph blatantly calls her out on her mothering and fully canonically confirms that Katara is The Mom Friend™. Where Toph is annoyed but eventually complies with doing what Katara wants to do in Tales of Ba Sing Se, this time Katara makes a huuuuuge fuss over Toph's misbehavior and her scamming Fire Nation people. And you could argue that Toph has every right to do it, or that Katara is right to be worried, just like Sokka used to worry about such things in Book 1...

But what we get is a stale dynamic that repeats the same problems we saw in Book 2, as well as Katara coming off as rather hypocritical because she, too, did dangerous shit and picked dangerous fights where she shouldn't have, and ignored everyone who told her not to do it: she gave Toph that kind of grief over things Katara was willing to do back when Toph wasn't in the group (see the pirates thing), and she will try to stop Toph from having fun on her own terms when nobody has ever tried to stop Katara from doing that in hers. Of course, any Katara advocate would read this and go "you're missing the point: Katara was sad and upset that she was being LEFT OUT! That's why she was so mad about this!" Then the irony of the matter is that this argument STILL reflects poorly on Katara. She gave her friend a tough time, called her a wild child and a crazy person, went through her personal belongings because "she could tell Toph was hiding something from her", so she fully disregarded Toph's privacy... all because she couldn't say "Wait, you guys went scamming Fire Nation people? Damn, why didn't you wait for me! I would've gone too!", and there you go, problem solved! Katara's not left out anymore!

Yes, of course, that's not how it WORKS, people can struggle to identify what they feel...!

... And now it's my turn to say that that's not the point.

The point is that Katara said and did hurtful things to her friend. Things she eventually regrets, yes, but that she didn't have to do at all. This is the same person who fed Appa a bunch of food that made it look like he was sick, all be it to keep the group from leaving the Jang Hui river village so she could go out of her way to heal the injured and sick without telling anyone what she was doing. That, too, was a choice she made with no concern regarding how the rest of her team might feel about it: was she doing something nice? Sure! But it's not fundamentally different from Toph doing whatever she wants with zero regard as to Katara's feelings on the matter. Katara KNEW she was stalling their journey and that Sokka wanted them to move on: she didn't care about his feelings or priorities, and the story eventually frames Katara as being in the right for feeling that way. Here, she's in the inverse scenario, only it's with Toph rather than Sokka, and instead of realizing that she, too, has made choices that were irresponsible/dangerous/risky and STILL went all out with them, down to fighting whoever opposed her choices? Katara just doubles down until she, again, breaches boundaries and overhears Toph and Sokka's conversation, WHICH IS ANOTHER CAN OF WORMS DUE TO THE SOUTHERN RAIDERS FOLLOW-UP...

The thing is, Katara as a mom friend is not even a good thing. It's not conducive to fun or interesting storytelling, not in Book 2, not now. It doesn't make Katara a more interesting and dynamic character. The way she's portrayed isn't so she looks tragic for taking this role, it's all about forcing these kids into tropes that don't necessarily add up to who they have been so far. Katara's mom friend status is NOT treated with any compassion. It's not handled as a sore, difficult subject outside of the ONE conversation Sokka has with Toph that Katara overhears. And it's not centered on Katara's tragedy, on how she overcompensates for her mother's absence, it's centered on Sokka accepting her as a motherly person and encouraging Toph to do the same thing. The people who saw further depth in it probably haven't looked at the script itself in a long time: you CAN see more to it, but that's not the point of the scene. That's not where it's going. And the fact that such a tragic situation is what conduces Katara to take up the mom friend role actively makes it look like... she shouldn't have it. Why would she be the mom friend if she's just overcompensating for Kya's death? If she's taking up responsibility by thinking that no one else will (a blatant lie because, again, in Book 1 there's NO SIGN of this behavior and it's Sokka who's in a role of responsibility compared to her), it suggests that EVERYONE ELSE ought to step up and stop "relying" (and Sokka very much uses that word) on Katara being the mom friend. It's not a healthy thing. It's a coping mechanism that seems to be actively damaging Katara: and the story doesn't acknowledge it that way.

So... "mom friend Katara", dialed up to a thousand in Book 3, absolutely has a connection with why her character loses its sheen by this point in the story. There's no attempt to deconstruct this coping mechanism by Katara. No indication from the rest of the team that maybe Katara should get to be a kid just like them and stop being so uptight (even though VERY often she's not that uptight but the show very much tries to pretend she is). It's Katara's initiative to do a scam, it's not Toph or Sokka or Aang who think she needs to join in on the fun, she basically inserts herself in it. So basically, those three take the route of saying "that's what she's like, we just gotta bear with it", instead of actually helping her. If we'd seen that? Mom friend Katara would actually be a fun element to witness deconstructed by the story. And I'm not blaming either Katara or the other three for this:

This is EMINENTLY a writing problem.

Mom friend Katara is not a good trope. It could be if the point was to help her break free from it. It's not. It's simply weak writing that can't handle two girls with proactive, aggressive personalities and a ton of agency, a lack of creativity in realizing how much potential there could be in making Toph and Katara the absolute best of friends. It's seriously a disservice to the two of them that this trope literally blooms over Toph joining the show and then NEVER gets resolved or chased away. And when you have characters like Sokka or Aang kind of joining the bandwagon of "yeah, Katara's a mom!" when the two of them traveled with her in Book 1 and she WASN'T that at all? It makes matters infinitely worse.

So, if you ask me? This is the first thing that makes Katara feel more unpleasant than ever before in Book 3.

The second thing is even worse.

We return to accountability, as well as to illogical flow of thought when it comes to the writing of Katara: in Book 1, we see a hopeful girl who never speaks ill of her father or betrays any manner of displeasure or distrust towards him. No sign of her being conflicted by what Hakoda is doing: the focus is entirely on Sokka's feelings on the matter once it finally comes up in Bato of the Water Tribe, and Katara is a secondary matter, if even that.

This would be fine if Hakoda hadn't come up at all as a subject throughout Books 1 and 2. If Katara had never had the potential opportunity to see her father in any of these instances and had backed out from them for bigger reasons than... plot reasons.

For reference: she's excited, just as Sokka is, when Bato says he can bring the kids to meet their dad again. They're HYPED. We see no sign of Katara being upset at Hakoda for leaving at this point. The only portrayed reason why she and Sokka decide not to go see Hakoda is because they think Aang needs them more and they decide to forgive him for hiding the map. Katara, from the get-go, is not as angry at Aang for hiding the map as Sokka is. Clearly, Sokka wants to see Hakoda far more intensely than Katara does: even so, there's no sign anywhere here that implies that Katara harbors resentment or dissatisfaction towards Hakoda.

Book 2 gives us a similar situation: Katara declines going to see Hakoda and offers to be the one who stays in Ba Sing Se so Sokka can go see Hakoda himself. Sokka is soooo thrilled and thanks her and calls her the best sister ever and Katara very much says she is, indeed, the best. Which she's allowed to, worth noting, I'm not saying her reaction to Sokka's praises was bad, it's actually funny: but what I AM saying is that she knows how much this matters to Sokka and that's why she makes the offer she does. It's also VERY convenient! Because logic dictates that, if Sokka stays behind, he realizes the Kyoshi Warriors aren't themselves far faster than Katara does (even though, to be fair, Katara didn't really have much time to realize it at all), and we wouldn't have Aang suffering over Katara's imprisonment because the one in chains would be Sokka and then Aang might just go "oh okay it's just Sokka, I can go cosmic if it's not Katara"

... yeah I'm being sarcastic I actually don't think Aang wouldn't have saved Sokka, but they very clearly had Katara stay behind first and foremost for this specific purpose...

But Katara's acknowledgement that this is a good thing for her brother makes you REALLY wonder how much of a secret grudge she was supposed to feel towards her father at this stage of the story. The truth, in my opinion? She wasn't actually supposed to resent Hakoda as she did, let alone quite so harshly.

My sister personally told me that she thought Katara's anger at Hakoda was a fine storytelling choice when I told her I didn't like it. She told me Katara herself most likely didn't realize how hurt she had been by her father's leaving, that it wasn't until she was around Hakoda again that she understood she resented him at all, and that she had a lot more pent-up rage and frustrations than she had EVER acknowledged, and they burst out frequently in Book 3. Which, you know, is one possible explanation that tries to make this whole thing more palatable. From a human standpoint? This is valid.

... From a writing point? Not so much.

A Katara who struggles to understand her heart (which... is odd, tbh. As far as they portray her, Katara tends to know exactly what she's feeling, why she's feeling it, and she acts on her emotions rather than brains more often than not) would be portrayed as confused over her own rage at Hakoda. She would not have been written as a snappy teenager who hates her dad. She would have snapped at him and then apologized by reflex, unsure of what's come over her. We would see Sokka trying to mediate between them too, probably asking Katara what's her deal, and she would have no idea how to explain it. Katara would be avoiding Hakoda, knowing she loves him, not knowing why she seems to hate him now, afraid of saying things she shouldn't. Every time she snaps at him, she should worry about what she did, she should fear for Hakoda's feelings, she should reflect on what's going on inside her heart...!

... But that doesn't happen. And that knocks SO HARD on the concept of empath/compassionate Katara that it basically turns her into a whole different person.

As I've said countless times so far: it's not about Katara being perfect. I don't WANT her to be perfect. But I DO want the show to acknowledge that she's not. I want the flaws to REALLY read as flaws. I want other characters to react to those mishaps on Katara's part, and I want HER to reflect on what she's doing and realize she's messing up, just as she does when she hurts Aang's feelings in the Waterbending Scroll, which is most likely the best situation where Katara actually owns up to the exact mistake she made and feels genuine, palpable, obvious remorse for it. But when you feature Katara lashing out at Hakoda, and everyone just staying quiet because "uuuuh, awkwaaaard...", it feels off. Aang asks Katara, outright, what's her problem with her dad! And Katara goes "What? What problem?" She's acting like she's not even aware of the fact that her behavior is out of place, basically gaslighting Aang into pretending that she didn't do anything rude or mean to Hakoda. Aang literally saw it with his own eyes and is the ONLY person to bring it up.

To make matters worse? Katara has been with Hakoda for WEEKS. It's not like they just crossed paths two seconds before Aang opened his eyes. The implication is that she's been behaving like this, or her behavior has been deteriorating towards Hakoda with no one worrying about it or trying to make her reason with it. for that long. Sokka didn't do anything. Hakoda just took the teenage rants and left her alone because that's what she wants. And when the one person brings up that she's not acting like herself? Katara pretends nothing's wrong and acts like everything's fine and she's not acting any differently from herself. Whether she actually is just lying to Aang or ALSO lying to herself is a matter of debate... but what it suggests is she's unwilling to confront the gravity of her choices and how she can be hurting her father with them.

This is NOT to say that Katara has no right to be angry about Hakoda abandoning her in the Tribe. She has every right to be upset and feel forsaken. Their mother died, and Hakoda left with all the men of the tribe, and Sokka was left behind, tasked to protect everyone, and Katara apparently felt responsible for the whole village too: as valid as Hakoda's quest to fight in the war might be, it's not out of this world for Katara to harbor frustrations and resentment over what happened.

What IS out of this world, and particularly, not appropriate to her character, is that her way to convey those feelings was something she gave herself to, completely, only to reason with it once Aang was missing so that the episode would conflagrate her problems with Aang and Hakoda into the same thing.

This is basically a dark expansion of what we've seen in Katara's treatment of Sokka since Book 1: where it was typically "humorous" when she was a jerk to him and paid no price for it, this time it's not humorous. This time, you're supposed to see her being a jerk and then go "aaaaw, poor dear," even if you're not supposed to get mad at Hakoda because he is very much a decent dad. The show was trying to have its cake and eat it too with this situation, because Katara DOESN'T apologize to Hakoda for being unfair to him: HAKODA APOLOGIZES TO HER. Hakoda acknowledges the pain he caused Katara and the damage his leaving has wrought upon his children by apologizing and explaining how much he missed them... but Katara does not acknowledge the pain she inflicted on her father by acting out when he wasn't doing anything wrong. Is this teenager behavior? You could chalk it down to that, but that's precisely why teenagers can be a pain in the ass! And that's very much how Katara is being portrayed if she's unwilling to acknowledge she acted out and hurt someone she loves!

Her problems and resentment towards Hakoda magically go away after that single conversation. After this? She loves him. No hard feelings left. If her problems with Hakoda were this deep and difficult to navigate and work through, either she bottled them up in the rest of the show and stopped them from affecting her father... or she just got over it that quickly. Which would be very unrealistic because Hakoda apologizing for leaving doesn't change the damage Katara suffered through because he was gone. A single apology doesn't fix everything that people read into Katara's deep anguish in this scene and episode. And yet that's very much how the show portrays it: Katara is 100% fine in every single other interaction with Hakoda she gets past the first episode of Book 3. Does that make sense? Is that good writing? No, actually: it's literally digging up a problem, making it up last minute with zero lead-up to it, where the ONLY way to read "lead-up" is to pretend that Katara always had ulterior motives to avoid going to see Hakoda, even though we NEVER were shown that she was hiding anything, something that could be VERY easily shown in the story if they'd always had this in mind. The truth is that they didn't. They made it up for this episode, forced it in there, didn't even write it right because nobody reacts to Katara's behavior reasonably except Aang, and she gets away with it without even having to apologize. That's... not good form for any character, let alone Miss Responsibility and Empathy, is it?

This is why it's such a problem that Katara acted as she did towards her father. It's not because this is an unthinkable flaw: it's because there's very much no lead-up to it, kind of like there's none with Korrasami's big reveal in LOK's finale. It's because there's no follow-up to it either. It's because we don't see Katara living up to her supposed core character traits, where she should have a realization that her choices and actions and behavior have hurt someone else, someone she cares about. None of that happens.

And I will say: it's different when it comes to her clashes with Zuko and her reactions to him in the second half of Book 3. This is basically the MAIN thing the fandom gives her grief for and I hate them for it: she has every right and reason and justification to show no empathy or compassion towards a person who, as far as she could tell, took advantage of her compassion in Ba Sing Se, of Aang's compassion frequently across Book 1, and paid them back for all of it by joining forces with Azula and showing no concern to help Aang when Azula almost killed him. I am no fan of Iroh's... but Iroh jumped in to help Katara and Aang escape, at risk of being captured. Zuko stood beside Azula and did NOTHING to help those two leave. He showed zero concern for Aang's survival. He saw his sister potentially murder someone and had ZERO REACTION. So, no offense but full offense: Katara's unwillingness to trust Zuko is JUSTIFIED. Not only is it justified? It's CORRECT. It's the only writing choice that makes sense. Sokka getting over it relatively quickly feels off to me, no matter if the Boiling Rock adventure isn't as bad as others might be. Aang not holding a grudge for too long kind of fits because it is Aang... but Katara being that mad at Zuko? That's 100% fine. It fits. It works. And anyone pretending that what I said about Hakoda applies to how she treated Zuko is just completely biased in Zuko's favor.

Katara and Zuko do not have a secret magical powerful soulmates bond in canon. Their one instance of bonding comes after multiple instances of the exact opposite thing. Katara and Sokka were 100% down for leaving Zuko to freeze to death in the North Pole, and the ONLY reason why Zuko survives is because Aang can't let that happen to him. It's AANG'S compassion that saved Zuko. Katara felt none, AND SHE DIDN'T HAVE TO FEEL ANY. Let's not forget that!

Moving on to Book 2, Katara actually makes her first offer of kindness to Zuko and Iroh in the Chase when she offers to heal Iroh after Azula's attack. Zuko's reaction is to lash out violently and yell at her to leave: who, exactly, would feel inclined to think this poor beautiful sad boy just needs love when you OFFER HIM kindness and his reaction is, in a manner of speaking "go fuck yourself I'll handle this on my own"? And it's worth bringing it up because it feels like the fandom is hilariously misled into thinking the Gaang magically knows what Zuko is up to and how he's growing and evolving, as if they were part of the audience: they're not. The last time Katara saw Zuko before Ba Sing Se is literally when Zuko refuses her help. We're also talking about Fire Nation people: Katara has every right and every reason to believe that Zuko is refusing her help, not out of personal, internal strife he's dealing with and has no idea how to handle... she very much can read this as "inferior Water Tribe peasant, you will not heal my uncle with your wretched waterbending!" Because... let's be real, that's what Zuko looked like to Katara across Book 1. She has no real reason to think he's any better or different from that until their catacombs scene...

... And he stabs her in the back and joins Azula there. Right after "bonding" with her.

So let's be VERY clear on that respect: Katara has no real reason to forgive Zuko. She has no real reason to feel empathy outside of the show constantly trying to push that she's kind and compassionate with no boundaries, even if she forsakes that kindness and compassion at random whenever the plot requires it. But her death threats to Zuko? They're completely fine by me. I'd be pissed if she had acted any differently, and if anything I hate how easy Zuko had it to befriend everyone but Katara.

... Not to say I'm happy with how he befriended Katara either, but anyway...

As this isn't Zuko meta, we're not going to get into the true core glaring issues in The Southern Raiders, because ultimately, that episode paints Zuko in a disgusting light that his fans are constantly gaslighting themselves about. He was not beinga heroic good dude helping someone he connected profoundly with. His behavior leaves so much to be desired and proves he hasn't unlearned a lot of toxic things he had internalized. He didn't unlearn them in this episode, either. But the GREATEST sin Zuko commits in this episode, without a doubt, is bringing Katara on a journey that ultimately did NOTHING for her. The only person benefitting from it was Zuko himself. I've seen people pretend that Katara finally found closure: she did not do such thing. She learned what kind of scum killed her mother, but she did not forgive him nor did she kill him. Closure would mean peace. Katara did not find peace with the situation. She's shown troubled, sitting at that pier, miserable, when Aang talks with her, she's STILL angry. That's not closure. It never was.

What it was, however, was the journey where Katara thanked Zuko and forgave him because..! Uh... because...

... Why, exactly, did Katara forgive Zuko here?

He brought her to her mother's killer: she found no closure from it. In fact, she learned the VERY disturbing truth that she hadn't realized so far: HER MOTHER DIED SPECIFICALLY TO SAVE HER. Her mother sacrificed herself for Katara's sake. She CANNOT find peace with this reality in a single afternoon because holy shit, who would? Katara KNEW her mother had died. It's not until Yon Rha tells her what happened that she understands what happened in the igloo. Katara herself, her waterbending skills, and the target she painted on her own back because of something 100% out of her control, something that is NOT evil and that the Fire Nation was hellbent on destroying, are the reasons why Kya was murdered. This is DISTURBING SHIT to deal with. And the show completely sidelines this revelation and the dark impact it could have on Katara, which, seriously, is HUGE, way worse than what happened with Hakoda, because it very much could have triggered a profound self-hatred by Katara towards her own skills because how tf could her bending cause her mother's death?! Not to mention the obvious: who was that source? Who told the Southern Raiders that there was a waterbender? Who the hell is responsible, beyond the Fire Nation, for her mother's death?

There's A LOT to unpack here.

And none of it matters because Katara is just supposed to forgive Zuko for exacerbating and worsening her trauma regarding her mother's death :') funny how that works.

This IS the point where Katara should make a display of darker sides of herself that she didn't know or understand. THIS is where Katara turning dark like Aang did after Appa vanished would make PERFECT sense. With this revelation about Kya that's beyond disturbing: not with Hakoda... and certainly not with Sokka.

The cusp of Katara's worst is, by far, her behavior with her brother in the Southern Raiders. I know a million excuses have been made for this moment: my problem is NOT the fact that she lashed out at him as she did and said something DEEPLY hurtful. It's the fact that KNOWING, SEEING HE'S IN PAIN...

... does not matter to her one bit.

Instead of a trite scene with Zuko spouting shit he does NOT mean (aka "violence wasn't the answer... but lol go kill my father okay??"), we deserved a scene with Katara and Sokka talking this out. People pretend it's fine as it is: it's not. Katara has spent the ENTIRE show disregarding her brother's feelings in a myriad of ways: this time, it was way more painful and way more hurtful and SHE KNOWS IT. It's not funny. She's not amused. She's not being a shithead little sister. She's ANGRY. She's UPSET. She has every right to be! What she DOESN'T have a right to do is hurt her brother DELIBERATELY and then escape every consequence from doing that.

There's very much no way to spin that moment into making Katara a decent sister. There's no way she remains true to her core values of being empathetic, kind and wholesome when she will insidiously, vindictively hurt her brother this way. And what I said earlier about her overhearing Toph and Sokka in the Runaway? It actually gets a follow-up in this scene: Katara telling Sokka that he didn't love Kya as she did is basically her WEAPONIZING the information that was NOT meant for her as her alleged evidence that Sokka didn't care about Kya as much as she did. As if his inability to retrieve Kya's memory was NOT a manifestation of trauma, as if it were something he's FINE with! He's not! How guilty must he feel for that? Does that matter to Katara at all? Why... nope. Because all that matters at that point is her own rage, her own feelings, her own fury. Which is, then, entirely against the character we've been told she is.

The lack of apology or follow-up to this horrible moment will never stop being one of the absolute biggest misfires in one of the WORST written episodes of this show. Yes, I said it. The more I ponder The Southern Raiders, the more I realize it's an immensely flawed speedrun to establish a friendship that simply doesn't add up. Katara and Zuko becoming friends after this journey requires some wild, absurd leaps of imagination that, boiled down to basics, don't make any sense. There's no reason for Katara to decide she'll forgive Zuko after she regains enough clarity. Why does she forgive him? Because he proved he'd rather make her happy than defend his nation anymore? Ironically, at no point does Katara show any appreciation of the fact that Zuko is setting aside his firebending supremacist attitude completely for her sake. So maybe that's not it.

Ah... is it because of how he, and he alone, was ready to help her go on this journey of revenge...?! Why, ironically, the only reason why ONLY Zuko goes on this journey is incredibly artificial and fake: this IS intended as Katara's "field trip" with Zuko. None of the field trips make sense, from a logical standpoint, as duo journeys. I've mentioned it to a few people: Sokka and Zuko could have brought Toph with them to the Boiling Rock, a metal location where her abilities would be VERY useful, used her as a false prisoner and turned her in as a captured ally of the Avatar's, who 100% will bait him into coming here to rescue her so that the Fire Nation can get him next! A cover as strong as that one might actually get them further along on that rescue attempt than what they did in canon. But this CANNOT BE... because it was Sokka's field trip with Zuko so nobody else is invited, even if they're very much not doing anything else (as is the case with Toph). Aang? Why didn't everyone join the firebending discovery with Zuko and Aang? They weren't doing ANYTHING in the Western Air Temple at the time. They very much could have gone with them too. But they don't. And that's exactly why Katara's trip works exactly as it does: it's the solo journey with Katara and Zuko, and the ONLY way to make it work is to show Sokka and Aang completely opposed to the concept of finding Yon Rha. I'm not saying I think Sokka and Aang would have been on board if they're allowed to remain IC... but they could have wanted to go on this trip with Katara regardless of not agreeing with what she wanted to do. Hell, as is OBVIOUS: Kya is Sokka's mom too. His opinions, his feelings on this subject, should matter just as much as Katara's do, and fuck anyone who pretends otherwise. These two are NOT supposed to be the well-known unhealthy siblings Zuko and Azula, who each got one parent in their corner and therefore the other parent treated them like they were worthless or a monster. Hakoda and Kya were parents to BOTH their children, and any narrative or interpretation that attempts to say that ONLY Katara's opinion on Kya matters is immediately ruled out, for me, as absolute bullshit spouted by someone not worth listening to. Point blank.

Also, the fact that Zuko USES Sokka to gain this information about the southern raiders, and then doesn't even extend the chance to Sokka to join them? When Sokka is basically his new best buddy? That... does not make sense. It basically portrays Zuko as a disloyal asshole who takes advantage of his friends for his purposes and tosses them aside, disregarding their feelings whenever it suits him.

So Sokka's treatment at the hands of this episode is just deplorable. Both Zuko and Katara are HORRIBLE to him... but Katara is our focus here, she's actively hurts Sokka and then proceeds to not care. Because that's how she has operated so far, and that's how she always will.

Hence: we have a long, long tradition of Katara not treating Sokka fairly all across the show. The reasons why it's not a fair or balanced relationship at all is because Sokka typically pays the price for being a dick to Katara: either she inflicts the punishment herself, such as when he's disrespectful in the Drill and she smacks him with the slurry, or the narrative inflicts some magical punishment instead that CONSTANTLY proves that Sokka is not allowed to be a dick without facing consequences for it. Does he ALWAYS learn the lesson? Sure he doesn't! But the consequences for it NEVER stop. He doesn't get away with being a jerk to his sister. That's forbidden. But Katara? She's allowed to get away with it every single time! And the reason why it gets worse and worse is because we went from relatively silly/comedic things, in which Katara did not apologize because "it's funny that she didn't apologize", to NOT funny things at all, such as this scene in Southern Raiders. Even just a troubled glance at Sokka, or a slight hesitation after seeing how hurt he is, would be enough for me: there's NOTHING. She doubles down and keeps charging ahead. Zero thoughts or concerns given to her brother.

If this isn't why you have issues with Katara, well, I don't know why it might be the case in your case x'D But I absolutely attest that the combination of "mom friend", "selective compassion particularly when it comes to her brother" and "absolute imperviousness to consequences for her mistakes" are the things that fully caused my initial appreciation of her character to shift into ambivalence and then into full blown dislike once I reached Book 3.

Worth noting: THIS IS A COMPLAINT ABOUT THE SHOW'S WRITING. Boiled down to basics, written by any more competent hands, I don't think Katara would have acted the way she did often, ESPECIALLY in episodes like The Awakening or The Southern Raiders. I categorically refuse to write Katara in my stories as someone who gets free passes for EVERYTHING she does. I also refuse to portray her as the mom friend, particularly in Gladiator. There's a lot of depth you can give this character! So much you can do, so much worth exploring... and canon just settled for stunting her and then only bringing her out to play in ways that make her unpleasant, not particularly bright and extremely resistant to character development even after allegedly learning lessons (see how her initial behavior around Hama, who shows red flags often, isn't all that different from how it was with Jet? There's only a handful of moments where it looks like Katara MIGHT be wary, and yet they're quickly overcome by her excitement, which Hama manipulates in her favor until she does the bloodbending reveal). So I'm NOT saying Katara had no potential... but I am saying the show itself failed her, big time, because of how she was written. A quick glance through the transcript of the Puppetmaster to confirm my memories that Katara shows no sign of concern over Hama when Sokka finds her suspicious reveals that, after Hama shows them her comb and that she's from the Southern Water Tribe, Sokka, and Sokka alone, apologizes for suspecting her of being sketchy. Nothing from Aang, even though he was part of it too. Nothing from Toph, either. And certainly nothing from Katara. Only Sokka apologizes. As usual.

So... what does this tell you? What does this tell any of us? That Katara's development is... erratic, at best. That it's not linear isn't a bad thing, but that it contradicts itself non-stop, that her core traits come and go willy-nilly as the plot demands it, that her motivations to do things (like forgiving Zuko) don't add up to her experiences or to any lead-up we've witnessed, is most certainly not good.

If I were to rewrite ATLA, the main characters I'd want to rewrite into making a lot more sense than they do, and making their arcs actually logical, are Zuko and Katara. I'd definitely add a few rewrites for Iroh, particularly to make him WAY more accountable for shit than he ever was, and to show he's not universally loved and shouldn't be, since people would have very reasonable grievances with him. I'd also rewrite a handful of things with Aang, too. Toph, full-stop, deserves a growth arc of her own beyond getting stronger and getting used to having friends. Girl has the range. They just never let her explore it. And of course, I'd change a fair few elements of Azula's writing as well. But I feel like no characters would warrant a deeper intervention than Zuko and Katara, precisely because they constantly fail to live up to all the stuff people keep pretending they're flawless exhibits of.

And this is one more issue we've got going on with Katara:

The fandom ABSOLUTELY has been unfair to Katara. A lot of people hate her for no reason. A lot of people who potentially have unexamined racism making their hearts' choices for them and they despise her just because she dared not have fully-white skin. A lot of people pick completely ridiculous things to get angry at her, such as people who HATE HER because she's "rude to Zuko". Just, fuck off. That's about the stupidest reason to hate this character and stupid reasons for that have been heard plenty.

But Katara's fans have become... reactionary. They appear think that any criticism to her character NEEDS to be fought off with "she was right tho" or "she has every reason to act this way" or "she's HUMAN she's allowed to make mistakes you heathen!! That's what a flawed character is like!"

Here's the kicker, though: if you have justifications and excuses for every little unpleasant thing Katara EVER does? You're basically taking a dump on her character yourself and saying she IS flawless.

Flaws in characters are bad things that cannot be justified. They can be funny! They can be annoying. They can be infuriating. But they're things that inconvenience other characters, that hurt them, that show they're not above or beyond doing harmful things! All of what I listed in this crazy long post are Katara's flaws. The reason why I don't like the way these flaws were handled are all the things I already have talked about: no accountability for flaws is basically saying that these flaws don't matter. No follow-up, no lead-up, means Katara is allowed to be as much of an ass as she wants to be and nobody cares: THIS IS NOT FAIR. This is not how ANY character should be written. This is the core reason why I've spent years feuding with Zuko and Iroh: they get away with shit they should NOT get away with, EVER. They're not held accountable for so much they should be. This happens to Katara too. particularly in her dynamcis with her brother. And when people see those flaws and just start listing reasons why it's actually okay? All you're doing is dehumanizing these characters to pretend everything they EVER do is fine.

Also worth noting... character flaws are the way characters grow. If a character is DEEPLY flawed, you know what kind of work you have cut out for you as a writer. If you're writing a story heavily steeped on character development? Then those flaws are VITAL to the work you have to do in order to develop these characters!

But when Zuko is unnecessarily violent and you're told "it's because his culture and family are!", you rightfully assume that as he drifts away from Fire Nation ideology, Zuko WILL grow less violent. Then, you watch how he picks an unnecessary fight with Aang in the finale because everyone's being lazy, an EXTREMELY violent fight at that, and you contrast his earlier behavior with it and... where's the difference, exactly? How did he grow or learn better if violence is STILL his immediate reaction to anything he doesn't like?

Thus, when Katara's flaws get overlooked, ignored, disregarded? What kind of development does Katara get, if none of her flaws are addressed in a way that makes it look like she's genuinely learned any lessons? At least, none of the worst, biggest, glaring flaws were addressed. None of the things that she SHOULD be troubled by and that she shouldn't be happy with herself over, especially after seeing how she hurts people with her actions. This isn't cool. This isn't a fun way to write a character. And it's so glaringly unpleasant when you can so very easily contrast this with the well-known terrible flaw Sokka displays early on: sexism! And then he gets his ass kicked by Suki and he learns to respect the Kyoshi Warriors... and we never see him displaying that particular flaw again. THAT is what growth looks like! What can we point to with Katara that remotely compares to this? That she accepted Zuko? Yeah, no, that sincerely could not count any less. Her personal arc CANNOT be about Zuko. That she got over her mom's death? She didn't. So that's not it either. That she helped Aang save the world? So her personal arc was about Aang and not herself? Was her whole role in the story to play Aang's cheerleader, then? Because if that's it... she was doing that just fine at it since day one. She's the only person who faithfully believed the Avatar would return well before Aang turned up in her life, if the first episode's introduction is to be believed.

So... what, exactly, was Katara's arc? If it's just her waterbending skills, then she's as stunted as Toph, unexplored and underdeveloped and left to just strengthen her fighting skills while Aang and Zuko and Sokka are getting full character arcs, even if very lowkey but very much effective in Sokka's case, where they develop and grow (or they should) into the men they're supposed to be to end the war! Why don't Katara and Toph get similar arcs? Why aren't they challenged on a level that actually provides them with lasting, solid, provable growth, where you can look at them where they started out and see how they ended up and conclude their journey was beautiful?

I insist... writing. Weak writing. Failures to understand/develop characters properly. And of course, lack of accountability in storytelling. I wrote that one focusing mostly on Zuko... but it's very much applicable to every character who fails to own up to the things they should and deserve to face consequences for.

Anyway... this is what I'd say about Katara atm. I'm not 100% sure this is everything because I might have overlooked some stuff that also made Katara's character kind of backfire (while I'm no Kataang hater, I 100% agree that the ship should have been written better too, and after writing them whenever I have, it's honestly kind of ridiculous how such an easy ship could get fucked over so badly by weird writing choices...). Whether you agree with these assessments or not, ultimately, there are valid reasons to feel offput by Katara and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Most of all when you DID appreciate and cherish the character once before, but her fans just jump to the conclusion that you must be a mindless hater to think she's anything but flawless (this, while claiming they love that she's flawed, then they proceed to reveal they have no idea what a flaw is...).

(final note: SORRY IT TOOK ME FOREVER TO ANSWER! Super lengthy answer to make up for it, I hope :((( sorry)

[backtothethunder2023]

Another thing I want to see in the new movie...Max's & Phoebe's twin power!

We obviously need to see Max's and Phoebe's shared power (twin power) in action! Like I really, really do hope they don't just forget about it, because we only got it in the LAST episode of season 4 and it was so cool and that was it. Let them use it, let them demonstrate how insanely powerful their joint forces are! (Through the whole show they hint at it with things like "if Phoebe and Max combined their freeze breath, they could freeze the whole city!!!", but we really only saw a tiny glimpse of it so far).

Also, I recently thought back on the scene when they "unlocked" the twin power and Phoebe's like "yeah, probably bc we never held hands before" and even Barb is like 🙄 . Then only one minute later we see Max and Phoebe do their secret hand shake thing (which looking back on it was their thing for the ENTIRE fourth season X'D) and it just immediately activates their power. It's just wholesome but also really funny.

So I know the movie will take place a few years later probably and Max&Phoebe should really know how to use it by then, but I still want someone to write how they both struggled, trying to figure it out, when they had just recently unlocked it. Causing damage to the furniture & other objects randomly being blasted away. On day fourth Nora is so annoyed that she asks: "How HARD can it be to not activate your power every five seconds?! Just stay one meter apart!" And Phoebe's like "Inexplicably, that seems to be a lot more difficult than we initially thought and I don't know why!" Max: "Yeah, but it saved all of our lives, so MAYBE show some more appreciation!" Phoebe:" That's right! High five!" Nora: "NOOO! Not AGAIN!"

It also makes you realize that the Thundermans got pretty lucky that Phoebe and Max didn't unlock their twin power way earlier, because imagine the chaos if it would have been activated when they both were glued with their hands to the remote. Imagine Hank having to explain THAT to the hero league. LMAO X'D

[fff777]

reaction part 1 to wayv working at haidilao ep 2

hendery really is a MESS he had no idea how to present the menu tablet to the customers and jingmin still did all the work lol

apparently the customers so far have been real haidilao customers and already two of them have recognized wayv so that makes me think that wayv are perhaps more popular than i thought in korea

clapping for hendery after he did the bare minimum

jingmin coming back and apologizing to the customers for hendery's awkwardness lol. i get it though. this is just a fun bit for wayv but this is actually jingmin's job.

hendery walking like a video game character when he was standing in front of a seat and kun and yangyang told him to walk forward lol

dejun diligently scooping the food (possibly the shrimp paste) into the pots for customers

hendery: do you need recommendations? customers: yes hendery: this friend will help you dejun: yes

dejun didn't know how to explain 貢菜 and was like "...it's good"

jingmin says that the staff are allowed to give customers dishes on the house for special events like birthdays and such

this group of customers had one friend who came late and she asked for the same sauce as her friends, so kun went over to mix some more :3

dejun also offering to make sauce for the table he's helping <3

hendery saw jingmin helping customers with their coats and hendery was like I CAN HELP

this table was asking yangyang questions. the lady who knows sm idols probably told the others about them. they were asking him if he was only working for a day, another asked if he was maknae :3

HENDERY STRUGGLING WITH THE COKE CAN this man is HOPELESS like dude all that happened was that the tab was a little bent X'D and dejun opened the can with no problems 真係大驚小怪!!!

kun: who wants the coke? male customer: me kun: ah i'm sorry, men have to pour their own drinks YOU MEANIE

dejun offering for the customers to have kungfu noodle performance

i fucking hate this XD hendery painted 224 on plates with peanut sauce as a celebration for february 24 and gave it to the customers

lol the shifu putting on music on his phone for the performance

wayv will start the performance with some one direction lmao. i am yangyang here, i am trying so hard to be hype but my cringe barriers are too low XD

meanwhile kun doing some noodle performance for another table

kun: real talk, i learned this this morning

at least kun's noodles are actually edible and he put them into the hot pot

time for hendery the disaster lol. at least the customers are having fun XD

hendery: how was it, was i cool? dejun, in english: yes hendery: i know

hendery and yangyang playing hand games but messing up

dejun asked these customers if they knew wayv and the lady on the left said she was a fan! she said she'd even gone to nct nation concert and like them from debut! :D

birthday time!

kun got assigned to sing the haidilao birthday song

sowoneul marhaebwa~

a big group came in and hendery very loudly greeted them and this customer was like "hendery?!" and hendery went "???"

there's another table where the customer recognizes kun and yangyang. i just realized that it's probably because people who are interested in chinese food are more likely to be interested in chinese pop.

dejun: 唔好嚇親人啦 hendery: 我別人嚇親啊, 好緊張 and then hendery was like touch my heart bro, feel how fast it's beating

also i noticed the three camera people in the seat behind that big group? it must feel a little uncomfortable to be eating there on that day ^^;;

another canto convo between hendery and dejun. hendery was feeling idle and dejun was all "well you just have to see what they need" but he was saying it...a little cutesy. anyway dejun said that that large table was at haidilao for the first time so they might need recommendations. and then as he pushed hendery to go he reminded hendery once again not to scare them lol.

dejun: who even are you

these two customers asked for kun and yangyang's recommendations on soup

THIS FUCKING GUY I CAN'T WITH HIM

the customer was trying to input numbers and asked for help and hendery kidnapped yangyang just as he walked past.

yangyang figure it out. can i make an ipad baby joke? lol

this customer on the right was like "...so handsome" and yangyang got embarrassed hehe

it's getting busy now it must be around proper meal time (lunch or dinner)

hendery greeting a new customer cutely lel

yangyang suggested that hendery ask the big table if they want sauce and hendery was like "i asked...they didn't want :("

LOL offering photocard stands to the customers

[thenexusofsouls]

((sdfghdgfs I figured it'd be easier to respond to that ask in a new one, just because idk how easily the notes can show up ahah

but! I also have no issue with those kinda asks! C: For me, if it were an issue, I'd either delete it, answer it myself instead of Carter, or answer it ooc and explain my issue with it. So far, that,,, hasn't really been an issue? and usually if I answer for her it's because it's a topic that would genuinely bother Carter and isn't something she really can speak about, or it's something that's just easier for me to explain ooc versus ic. Plus, I,,, don't put a whole lotta canon stock into those kinda asks? like I have no issue making those things a part of her canon (or the canon for that thread/ship), but if I were to think of it in a more "reality" sense, because,,, why would Carter listen a complete stranger? xD I feel like it would be more of a "who are you get the hell out of my house" versus her spilling her guts and/or taking their word without even questioning anything about that interaction fshjdf

and like Silence said, I also have no issue writing out of order! My thoughts don't work in a linear fashion anyway, and I really do enjoy writing things outside of linear. I like writing from point a to point h to point c, because it's fun! C: Plus, none of what we write also really needs to be considered part of our ship's main canon, so to speak. Like, any stuff involving Pietro and Carter's kid is in an au verse, rather than it being a part of their main, so we have that variety and not so much a huge commitment to that plot! I very much so enjoy winging it when I write in certain ways, and I'm not really tied to having any particular thing happen in a specific fashion

also, I do wanna say I do understands your concern, nonnie, but I can definitely assure you, for Carter at least, her feelings for Pietro and Basch were very much so her own to begin with sdfgjhdsf - Carter fell for Basch in the ikau, and since she is still herself as seen in her main verse deep down, it was easy to reflect her feelings for him in her alt main! And with Pietro, I told Silence this, but I actually meant to reply to one of her opens for Pietro's birthday a year or so ago but never did because I was worried Carter would come across as flirty. Which,,, in hindsight, she absolutely was, and that happened before the anon started sending us stuff xD Carter was definitely into him before intervention, ahah - I just tend to overthink and was worried it would come across as me trying to force a ship or something, and that goes with anytime any of muses have feelings for another x'D

but uhh yeah! I'm not at all worried or bothered by any asks we get pushing our characters to say something or know about something before they would if we just wrote it ourselves C: Like Silence said, it's a fun way to get our characters to actually do/say something they wouldn't normally approach otherwise (or would in a different manner/way later), and, like she also said, it's always something we can redo later if we wanted!

personally, I'm here to have fun and enjoy the ride, and those kinda asks just add to it xD I just feel bad for Tony who's constantly getting whiplash from 'em DFSJHGSDFJHK

{i am the caretaker of souls} @starcchild, Okay cool, I didn't want to step on any toes, but it seems like we're on the same page. Yeah, I personally like jumping around too. I figure if we're here to have fun, then we should go where our inspirations take us. Why not write any scenes we want to, however we want to, whether they're in order or not? We're not limited or bounded by things we've written before. We can always rewrite or add onto what we've already written. I've had really developed ships for some of my muses that went for years, and then one day we decided... why not start all over again as if they didn't know each other, just for the hell of it? If you love the characters and you love how they interact, then nothing is boring and nothing is a waste because it's all enjoyable.

And yeah, that's a good point too. Pietro and Basch were definitely into Carter before those asks were sent, heh. It wasn't like those ships only happened because anons forced us into it. They were going to happen anyway, heh. And a lot of times, Midge and I are talking behind the scenes about things and potential threads, and then we'll get asks that are along the same lines. Or we'll get something and one of us will be like, well I never thought about that but it's a cool idea, let's do it. So if anything, these asks only add to our overall rp experience.

Don't worry, both Midge and I are perfectly capable of saying no, or not answering something, or answering OOC if need be, regardless of the reason for us needing to do so. It could be an issue with the muse, or we just don't want to go there for some reason. Some of you may remember me refusing to answer a lot of asks for Martha on this blog a while back because they got very inappropriate, and addressing that out of character. So yeah, don't worry about us. If we want to assert ourselves or we don't like an ask, we'll let everyone know. ;)

[yurimochi]

I love your twst writings! can i have a seperate headcanons or scenarios for the dorm leaders, please? where the dorm leaders who turned into a babies/kids because of the lab accident in crewel's classroom, but MC/ reader is suprisely good at babysitting or good taking care of children so Mc/ reader decided to take care of the boys until the antidote is finished, when the boys are back to normal they also remember what mc/ reader do to them too. x'D

i'm so happy that you enjoy my writings! (*´∀`*) and i love this trope, it's so cute ♡ i actually had some trouble writing this one, so i'm sorry it's not exactly what you wanted... ><

♡ they accidentally turn into a child scenarios ♡ ♡ fluff, platonic or romance (up to you) ♡ ♡ fem!reader ♡

♡ riddle rosehearts ♡ ♡ he was just in alchemy class, everything seemed to be going like usual. ♡ suddenly someone slipped dropping a potion right on riddle and it turned him into a child, surprising everyone in the room. ♡ he looked around the room, confused, he didn't know anyone in the room and he started to ask where he is and where his mother is. ♡ he was starting to get worried since he wasn't home and didn't want his mother to get mad at him. ♡ y/n walked into the alchemy classroom after hearing what happened to riddle, she got worried and wanted to check on him. ♡ and it wasn't a lie, he really is a child... ♡ when crewel asked for someone to look after riddle until he finished an antidote for him, y/n instantly volunteered. ♡ they were in the ramshackle dorm and riddle was just worried, mostly about his mother. ♡ y/n who knew that he had a rough childhood just tried her best to calm him down and said that everything will be fine. ♡ she also told him that just for today they'll do anything he wanted to do that isn't anything too crazy of course, which surprised him but also made him happy. ♡ they spent their time playing some games like tag or just kicking a ball and he even got to eat a slice of tart, that she promised she wouldn't tell his mother about. ♡ crewel finally finished the antidote and gave it to riddle, he was finally back to his current age and was confused at why he was at the ramshackle dorm. ♡ it didn't take him long to remember what happened in alchemy class and he just sighed, he's going to make sure to talk the student who dropped the potion on him so it doesn't happen again— ♡ suddenly he remembered something else, that y/n looked after him while he was a child, as his face turned red, he was slightly embarrassed. ♡ but he's not going to lie, he did enjoy the time he spent with her. ♡ y/n noticed his red face and asked if he was okay and told him that he should rest, still babying him. ♡ that made him even more embarrassed as he just said he's fine and that he had to go back to his dorm.

♡ leona kingscholar ♡ ♡ ruggie forced him to go to alchemy class, he was just bored and didn't care about anything, he just wanted to nap. ♡ he just put in some random stuff into the cauldron and then suddenly it exploded and turned leona into a child. ♡ he was slightly confused, he wasn't the palace anymore, though he didn't mind that at all since he doesn't have to be reminded of how his older brother is better than him in every way. ♡ y/n and ruggie just arrived at the alchemy classroom after hearing that leona have turned into a child and it was true, surprising the two. ♡ crewel explain that he has to fix an antidote for leona and that they had to look after him. ♡ ruggie sighed, he always looks after leona normally and now he has to look after a child leona? ♡ y/n told ruggie that she could look after leona while he takes the day off, he thanks her and left the classroom, leaving her with leona. ♡ they were outside since the weather was really nice, y/n asked leona what he wanted to and he didn't answer her and just sat under a tree. ♡ she at next to him and told him that if he ever needed something she'll get it for him, he just nodded as he laid back against the tree and took a nap. ♡ she wasn't that surprised to see child leona being like how he normally is, suddenly he laid down and put his head on her lap. ♡ it surprised her but she just smiled and started to pet his head gently. ♡ crewel finished the antidote and saw that leona was asleep, y/n told him to give her the antidote and she'll give it to leona when he wakes up. ♡ when he finally woke up, she made him drank the antidote and now he's back at his current age, he just yawned as he started to get hungry. ♡ then he suddenly remembered that he pretty much slept on y/n's lap the whole time he was a child. ♡ he looked at her with a smirk thanking her for letting him nap on her lap and that he's looking forward to sleep on it again. ♡ then he just walked away and started to look after ruggie, while y/n just stood there, sweatdropping.

♡ azul ashengrotto ♡ ♡ he was in the alchemy classroom, he wanted to try and make a potion that he found in one of the book he read. ♡ he somehow messed up two ingredients making the poition explode and turned him into a child. ♡ he was confused and scared, he was in an unfamiliar place and on land. ♡ he started to look around the room, he found an empty cauldron and hid in it. ♡ y/n was helping jade and floyd looking for azul since he has been gone for quite some time. ♡ she decided to check the alchemy classroom and didn't see anything unusual at first, until she saw that someone had used the cauldron in the middle of the room. ♡ she was slightly confused, why didn't someone clean it after leaving the room? ♡ suddenly she heard something move, it was another cauldron? she walked up to it and saw a baby octupus? ♡ then she realized it was azul after remembering the photo of him as a child. ♡ she instantly texted jade, telling him where she and azul is, what happened and that he should ask crewel for an antidote. ♡ y/n stayed by the cauldron that azul was in and kept an eye on him, she tried her best to calm him down since he was crying a lot. ♡ she encouraged him, saying stuff like he's smart, that he shouldn't believe what everyone says about him and that he's the cutest octopus she knows. ♡ well he's the only octopus she have ever met but she doesn't tell him that. ♡ she successfully calmed him down, he was still hiding in the cauldron but at least he stopped crying. ♡ jade arrived with the antidote, as he and y/n helped azul out of the cauldron. ♡ they gave azul the antidote, he drank it and turned back to his current age, as he sighed in relief and thanked y/n and jade. ♡ then he suddenly remembered every word that y/n told him when he was a child making him embarrassed. ♡ y/n asked if he's alright he immediately answered that he's fine and that he has to do something important with jade. ♡ jade just smirked, as the two left the classroom.

♡ kalim al-asim ♡ ♡ he was in the alchemy classroom with silver, they were working on a project. ♡ silver was pretty much half asleep and kalim didn't pay much attention to what he put in the cauldron. ♡ then the potion exploded, turning kalim into a child, waking and surprising silver. ♡ kalim looked around the room, slightly confused, he wasn't at the palace anymore and jamil wasn't around. oh maybe he's hiding somewhere! ♡ he was about to leave the room, looking for jamil, but silver stopped him from running off and texted jamil. ♡ y/n was walking around the hallways as she suddenly felt someone run into her, she looked down and saw a child kalim? ♡ kalim just greeted her with a smile then she saw jamil running towards the two. ♡ he explained the whole situation for her and she noticed he was getting stressed already, so she told him that she could look after kalim until they find an antidote. ♡ jamil was hesitant at first, but then he agreed and told her that if there's any problem she can text him right away, as she nodded. ♡ she has been playing and doing whatever kalim was in the mood for, playing tag, hide and seek, hop scotch and many more games. ♡ they also ate some snacks that jamil had prepared and then they went back to playing more games together. ♡ then she noticed that he was getting tired, she told him a few stories until he fell asleep. ♡ jamil walked up to the two and gave the antidote to kalim when he woke up. ♡ kalim hesitated on drinking it at first but jamil showed him that it wasn't anything dangerous, after that kalim drank it and turned back to his current age. ♡ kalim was confused at first since he wasn't in the alchemy classroom anymore but he just shruged it off when he saw jamil and y/n. ♡ jamil told him what happened, then kalim suddenly remembered everything he and y/n did when he was a child. ♡ he happily thanked her for taking care of him and hugged her, he also told her that they should do it again well maybe not the turning into a child part, as he laughed, she laughed too and agreed.

♡ vil schoenheit ♡ ♡ he was in the pomefiore lab, helping epel with his homework for crewel's class. ♡ vil was showing epel how to do the potion that crewel assigned to him and when vil asked epel to grab an ingredient. ♡ epel accidentally gave him the wrong one and made the potion explode, then vil turned into a child, surprising epel as he called rook for help. ♡ he looked around the room, slightly confused, where is he? who are these people? ♡ rook told vil the truth saying that he's in college and that epel accidentally turned him into a child, as epel apologized. ♡ vil didn't believe them at first, but then he noticed that he was in a lab and decided to trust the two. ♡ rook told epel to look after vil until he have finished the antidote, epel nodded as he took vil to another room. ♡ y/n was in the ramshackle dorm, sitting in the lounge, suddenly heard a knock at the door, confusing her as she got up from the couch and opened the door. ♡ there she saw epel and child vil? epel just walked in with vil, saying that he can't deal with him anymore and begs y/n to look after him instead. ♡ y/n was still confused but she agreed to look after vil, epel sighed in relief as he left the dorm and went back to his dorm, helping rook with the antidote. ♡ what epel was talking about? vil isn't hard to take care of at all. ♡ they where just watching some movies together while vil would fix her hair. ♡ the only time he was slightly bossy was when he wanted something to eat and she didn't have the snack he wanted, so she had to go to the school store buy it for him. ♡ rook and epel walked into the ramshackle dorm with the finished antidote and gave it to vil, he drank it and turned back to his current age. ♡ he was relieved that he's back to normal as he just sighed, he told epel to be more careful next time and not take the wrong ingredient, as epel nodded sadly. ♡ vil also said that it's his fault too for not double checking the ingredient, then he thanked rook for the antidote. ♡ also thanked y/n for looking after him as he remembered all of the time they spent together. ♡ she said it was no problem, then she asked epel why he had a hard time taking care of vil, since he was calm with her. ♡ vil answered that epel deserved a little punishment for the potion with a smile, making epel surprised and slightly pissed.

♡ idia shroud ♡ ♡ he was helping ortho in the alchemy classroom, ortho wanted to try and make a potion and everything was going fine until ortho decided to add an extra ingredient. ♡ ortho wanted to see what would happen, then potion exploded and then he saw his older brother was now a child. ♡ idia looked around the room, confused, why isn't he in his room and playing video games with his little brother? ♡ ortho just told idia not to worry and that he'll make an antidote real quick, making idia more confused. ♡ then idia started to complain, wanting to go to his room and play video games. ♡ after seeing ortho's text, y/n immediately walked towards the alchemy classroom and when she got there she saw a child idia clinging to ortho, making her confused. ♡ ortho noticed her and asked for her help, telling her to play some video games with idia until he finished the antidote. ♡ y/n nodded, as she told idia that they'll play video games together, making him happy. ♡ the two where in idia's room playing whatever game he wanted to play. ♡ she thought that his expression was really cute when he saw games that he haven't seen before that he wanted to try out. ♡ after playing some time they decided to watch movies that idia wanted to see, she even got him some snacks when he asked for some, as the two enjoyed the movies together. ♡ ortho walked into the room with the finished antidote and gave it to idia, he drank it and turned back to his current age. ♡ idia looked around his room confused, wasn't he just in the alchemy classroom? ♡ ortho just happily welcomed his brother back and apologized for adding the extra ingredient in the cauldron. ♡ idia remember now what happened, suddenly he also remembered that y/n looked after him when he was a child, making him embarrassed. ♡ y/n started to tease him saying that he's very different when he was younger. ♡ idia started blush slightly, as the tip of his hair turned pink and he started to push y/n out from his room, making her laugh.

♡ malleus draconia ♡ ♡ he was in the alchemy classroom, making a potion he heard from lilia and got interested in it. ♡ he followed every step and suddenly the potion exploded, turning him into a child. ♡ he was confused, he's outside the castle? where is he? he started to call for lilia, who immediately teleported to malleus. ♡ lilia was about to ask him what was wrong, but he instantly noticed that malleus was a small child. ♡ y/n was walking through the hallway, then she suddenly heard someone yell in the alchemy classroom. ♡ she headed towards the classroom and saw sebek was being loud like he usual is. ♡ she walked into the room and asked what's wrong then she noticed a child malleus, making her confused. ♡ lilia just smiled when he noticed y/n and asked her to look malleus until he have finished the antidote. ♡ she asked why sebek or silver couldn't look after him. ♡ lilia answered that silver is sleeping somewhere and that sebek is being too loud. ♡ she nodded and agreed to look after malleus. ♡ they were in the ramshackle dorm and malleus was just quiet. ♡ y/n noticed that and asked him if he wanted to do something and he just looked at her, confused. ♡ he was used to being alone or doing stuff with lilia so he wasn't sure what he wanted to do. ♡ she then asked him if he wanted to play some games she used to play when she was younger, he got interesed and nodded. ♡ then the two just played a lot of games together, hide and seek, treasure hunt, simon says and more. ♡ lilia teleported into the ramshackle with the finished antidote and gave it to malleus, he drank it and turned back into his current age. ♡ lilia couldn't believe malleus would actually do the potion he told him and laughed. ♡ malleus just sighed, he should've known that it was a prank. ♡ then malleus looked at y/n with a smile and told her that he enjoyed their time together when he was a child. ♡ she said it was no problem at all and that she had fun too. ♡ then he and lilia left the ramshackle dorm and malleus isn't going to lie, he wouldn't mind making that potion again just to spend more time with y/n.

[dungeons-and-dragon-age]

32, 43, 47, 48, 55, 56 for the DA questions <3

heya, thanks for the ask!! prepare for some rambling and incoherent attempts to explain my opinions x'D

32. Favorite DLC mission overall?

Judging Storvacker. 11/10 love it. Amazing. Perfect.

I do really love the entire questline about Ameridan though.

Also liked Soldier's Peak and Return to Ostagar a lot for the lore and the atmosphere of those places.

43. Favorite romance overall so far?

hmmm good question.. Thing is my first answer would be Fenris because I feel that he and Liam have the best chemistry out of the romances I did, and because the thought of them actually finding some happiness and peace with one another makes me very sappy. But the thing is that the actual in-game romance I have quite a few gripes with, specially with the pacing /timing of some things? Idk it just felt a little off to me. And anyways the reason I like them so much together is because of the relationship they already have regardless of romance or not. That's also where the problem lies in general because that's kind of the case for all my romances x'D Plus there's the fact that I've only done 5 romances so far anyway (and one not even complete yet lol).

If we're going by the romance related content we get in game I think I'd say out of the ones I've done so far Alistair is my fave. I just love how genuine and sweet he is and you really get the feeling that he has a deep admiration and respect for the Warden.

48. Worst antagonist in the series?

Corypheus for sure. I mean, conceptually and from a lore standpoint he is incredibly interesting! But his execution was.... eh. His presence in Inquisition is really weak despite supposedly being this big threat, and he generally doesn't come across half as menacing and dangerous as he is supposed to be. I guess it's partly the fault of DAI's game design that there is not much sense of urgency or suspense, but also Corypheus's whole motivation isn't exactly the most nuanced x'D Idk he just feels very shoehorned in as a plot device to fill the empty villain spot until Solas takes that place, and I think it's a bit disappointing they didn't do more with Cory

Also thanks to emerald-amidst-gold i remembered that Erimond also exists and that I cannot stand him lmao

47. Best antagonist in the series?

I meann does Solas count? He hasn't technically been an antagonist yet but I think you can't argue that he's the best set up antagonist yet. I think Meredith was pretty good too because imo you get the feeling that she really does believe she is doing what is best, that she's entirely convinced that she is right and that there is no other way, but even so it's so easy to just hate her and everything she does because it is so clearly wrong.

55. Your non-Player Character OTPs?

I'm not much of a shipper in general and also my relationship with ships is... odd probably? So I don't really have and OTPs I think. Not sure how to explain it exactly but my stance is usually "yea I can see these characters work together" but I don't explicitly ship them either? If that makes sense? So e.g. I think Fenders can have a very interesting dynamic and could work out pretty well depending on how you interpret them, and in that way I like their ship, but I don't actively ship them or think they should definitely be together. Or I think Merribela is cute as heck and would work amazing as a couple, but I love a platonic relationship between them just as much.

56. Your absolutely NOTP?

Hm I don't think I have one? I can't think of any pairings I've seen around that I absolutely don't like. Closest I can get is probably the rivalmances from DA2 I'd say? Like I know a lot of people like it and that's valid! But idk personally I just find it hard to get behind the idea of a romance with someone whose principles and/or major opinions you fundamentally disagree with. It's not just a DA thing though it's more of rivalry romances in general. I can understand the appeal, but it's not really for me ^^"

---

Aight, that's the last one! Thanks to everyone who sent asks, I appreciate yall <3 Was more than i expected but these are really fun!! So idk if anyone still feels like asking questions I'm always open for more haha