#Boiling Rock

[demaparbat-hp]

That infamous prison escape.

[rose-bunny-28]

I know people are gonna flip their lids at me. But I think this scene was Zuko showing off to Sokka.

Like, he could have just smiled and been like "Yeah." But nO, he had to show off he could breathe fire before answering.

And I know someone is gonna say "Well, he was in the freezer, so he was trying to warm himself up"

He didn't have to do that at all! He just chose to because he felt like it.

Either way, he was definitely showing off.

You all can decide if it was a "I'm gonna show off to impress you" or a "I'm gonna show off to impress you because I like you" That can be your interpretation.

Edit: I'd like to add this cocky smug grin he does

[offbrandzuko]

So i think Zuko and Sokka should have kissed aaand my feeling about that is.... first of all, how do you know they didn't? Y'know what I mean? It's a long treck to the Boiling Rock

[sillybillylulu]

Part 13 of re-drawing atla screenshots

"how do you know?"

"because I'm a people person."

[afoolishreader]

An old sketch of sokka and suki 😊 I just had to draw the hug form the boiling rock eps

[waterfire1848]

AU - There is no second gondola that comes for Azula and Ty Lee to jump onto, leaving them stuck as the gondola starts to fall. Out of desperation and pure panic, Azula and Zuko work together to start shooting at the soldiers cutting the line. Since they’re being shot at, the soldiers starts shooting back, causing Azula to trip and hit her head, knocking her out, before being saved by Hakoda. Bottom line, it really looks like the Princess has officially changed sides to the soldiers and the warden.

[dyingroses]

Avatar: The Last Airbender + AO3 tags

[zuko-always-lies]

Do you think that the betrayal at the Boiling Rock was done to give a reason for Azula's eventual breakdown in the finale? The more I think about it, the more Mai's anger towards Azula doesn't make sense to me. I know that people say that it's because Azula left Zuko to die, but if that's the case, she should have been angry with Ty Lee as well, since she also tried to stop them from leaving the prison. Also....they were chasing after Zuko and Iroh for the entirety of book 2, even though they kept on running into the Gaang and never actually came across Zuko and Iroh, and that was just Azula. Mai had zero issues with Azula's mission in the second season, and she already loved Zuko by that point. It feels like the writers just forgot about that.

So the thing to understand that in (well-told) narrative, everything happens for a reason. Everything serves a very deliberate narrative purpose. But perhaps we should take a moment to reflect on the differences between Book 2 and Book 3 characterizations before we go back to the Boiling Rock:

Book 2 Azula has some distinctive edges to her which shows the original ideas the writers had. She was consistently depicted as quite hostile to Zuko (this wasn't changed until the writing of the last episode of the series, when the writers realized that they needed Zuko to go home). She was depicted as using fear to control soldiers in a military context, including Ty Lee, but never as using fear to force or substitute for personal relationships. Azula was depicted as mean and cruel(and I believe she was originally supposed to be crueler and more merciless than she ended up being, but it ended up being scrapped as too dark). However, she was also, aside from maybe one scene, was depicted as stable and mentally put together well. Finally, Azula was never depicted as sympathetic in Book 2, and we can't be certain of what the original intentions in this respect were.

Book 2 Mai also has a couple interesting characteristics. First, she was consistently written as not being afraid of Azula. Second, the seed that she had a crush on Zuko was clearly planted. However, since Zuko was never supposed to "go home" in the original outline, it's not clear how this might have flowered, and it's possible the writers didn't know either.

Now let's move on to Book 3. We should note that Book 3 came out in two parts, but I'm not quite sure how much that reflects what the production looked like. It might be that everything was mostly decided before they started writing, but based on the shift between the first and second halves of Book 3, there might have actually that they mostly wrote Book 3.0 before they figured out what they were doing for Book 3.5

Anyways, Book 3.0 (and really we can kind of include the Crossroads of Destiny here) had two shifts in the depiction of Azula's character. First, she was now consistently depicted as caring a lot about Zuko. The first episode of Book 3.0 was kind of ambiguous here in a way that suggests the writers were tentative about this, but every following episode clearly showed Azula being kind to Zuko in one way or another. Second, The Beach introduced the idea of Azula as sympathetic character, including her trouble with her mother. Note that there are two ideas that Book 3.0 does not introduce or use: the idea of Azula being mentally ill/crazy (at her worst, Book 3.0 Azula is only a bit over the top), and the idea of Azula controlling her friends through fear. In fact, The Beach "normalizes" Azula's relationships with her friends a lot.

Meanwhile, Book 3.0's depiction of Mai centers around the seed about her relationship with Zuko flowering. 3.0 always continues the trend of depicting her as unafraid of Azula and generally not giving a shit what Azula thinks.

Book 3.5 is where the final shift in the depiction of Azula occurs. There are two new ideas introduced here. First, there's the idea of Azula using fear and terror to force people to have relationships with her due to Azula's own fear of loneliness. Let me point out that this idea conflicts strongly with her past depictions, where Azula only used fear as part of her methodology of ruling. Mai being "afraid" of Azula is also suggested, for the first time at this point, despite all previous depictions of Mai emphasizing that Mai was not afraid of Azula (while Ty Lee was). Second, the idea of Azula being mentally ill and "crazy" is introduced late. Previous depictions of her showed her being mean and cruel, but not her being "crazy."

Now, at long last, we can return to your question. Again, we must remember that everything which happens in a story happens for a reason. The Boiling Rock episodes served one primary purpose: depicting Zuko and Sokka bonding and getting to know each other. This is why these episodes were written. Hypothetically, reintroducing Hakoda and Suki could be another purpose for them, but Hakoda was instantly written out again and the writers made it clear that they had zero real ideas for Suki in subsequent episodes and essentially just had her character hang around in the background 95% of the time.

However, if the purpose is to show Zuko and Sokka bonding, why do Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee appear? Why does Azula show up and fight Zuko, and why does Mai save Zuko? None of this was necessary for the Zuko and Sokka bonding experience. I suppose having Azula and Zuko fight furthers their rivalry, but literally in the very first scene of the next episode (The Southern Raiders) there is a fight scene between them which serves to further this purpose far more effectively. The writers also could have written Mai's sacrifice as having a big effect on Zuko, but we all know they avoided that too.

The reason that Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee appear has to be almost solely for reasons related to the arc of those characters. The writers wanted Azula to have a big breakdown and go "crazy," but they hadn't built up toward that idea at all in the previous two seasons. They needed to speedrun toward it now, and having Mai and Ty Lee betray Azula offered a convenient start toward Azula's downfall and mental health collapse. Moreover, it also allowed them to depict Mai and Ty Lee as "redeemed" and "on the right side now," while having them stick by Azula until the end would make depicting this problematic. Zuko being Mai's love interest and Ty Lee always being depicted sympathetically probably contributed to urge to redeem these characters, but it's also important to remember that the writers took pains to make sure that child characters were "happy" and/or "redeemed," even if they died tragically, during the series. The only real exceptions to this were Hahn (NWT warrior who was Yue's betrothed) and...Azula. One of the reasons why Azula's ending strikes so many people as odd and at odds with the themes and tone of the series is that almost every other child got some sort of "happy" or at least honorable ending, while Azula was not only humiliated and utterly broken but also denied the slightest hope of happiness.

[samtamdan]

[manicpixieforwonbin]

More Mai in my style of art! I LOVE HER AHHHHHHHHHH! Mai is so brave and bold. She went through so much and people don’t give her enough credit. I love her dearly. I give my Mai dolls hugs every single day lol and take them on adventures. MAI DESERVES LOVE! I love Mai. Mai is an amazing character. She deserves respect, love, positivity, and just everything great. She needs it. Mai was ready to throw hands at boiling rock prison and threw knives lol tbh. She was NOT having it and tbh if I were her….. SAME GIRL! YES. SLAYYYY FOR MAI

[lalionnalunna]

i am not aware of the zukka ship until i went to tumblr.

tumblr, you always have the brightest idea among others

[jemkebaby]

atla au

Atla au where everything is the same but the northern riders actually DO take prisoners and sokka and zuko find sokka’s and katara’s mother at the boiling rock

[phoukanamedpookie]

Head canon: Azula truly cannot distinguish between fear and love.

The exchange at the Boiling Rock goes like this...

Mai: "You miscalculated. I love Zuko more than I fear you." Azula: "No, you miscalculated! You should've feared me more!"

Now, let's change one little detail...

Mai: "You miscalculated. I love Zuko more than I fear you." Azula: "No, you miscalculated! You should've loved me more!"

And there it is. This is why Mai and Ty Lee's betrayal fucks her up so bad. Azula has the ability to care deeply about others, but she was never taught how to express those feelings in a healthy way. Given her circumstances, it makes sense.

[monsieur-kazzle-dazzle]

i make fun of zuko a lot for this but really, what are you supposed to say when you're hot air-ballooning to a rescue mission and your new friend/former enemy tells you that his first girlfriend turned into the fucking moon

[tokyosmega]

they took home a souvenir though (the warden) (inspo and sans text under the cut)

[fruittarts-with-rosepetals]

Mai: if i betray you, i betray myself, but if i betray her, I betray my country, my country is very dear to me Zuko: dearer than I? Mai: No, not dearer than you..