#The Search

[longing-for-rain]

I don’t understand why people think Zuko was “acting like Ozai” by thinking that killing Ozai was the best option.

I mean.

Deciding to murder a Fire Lord because it’s objectively the best option given the situation is more of Ursa’s thing.

Momma’s boy Zuko as always.

[akiizayoi4869]

I love how The Search had the dumb plot line of "omg what if Ozai isn't actually Zuko's father?!" and actually has Zuko doubting it for a while, when he is literally the spitting image of Ozai.

The writers deliberately created Zuko to make him look like Ozai, who is pretty much the adult version of Zuko without a scar, and who Zuko could have turned out to be just like if things went differently for him.

[manderley]

Jacques Perrin in La Busca / The Search (1966)

[myimaginationplain]

On one hand, I think that Kiyi is actually a wonderful idea for a character; you can get a lot of interesting stories out of inserting this innocent, guiless little girl into such a fraught & complex pre-existing family dynamic.

However, some mind-numbingly bad storytelling decisions surround Kiyi's existence in canon. Ursa's magical amnesia chief among them; it is so goddamm boring to take a character with as much baggage to chew on as Ursa has, only to make it so she has to grapple with literally none of it.

No Ursa looking at baby Kiyi & mourning for the two babies she was forced to leave behind, grieving children who are still alive. No Ursa looking at Kiyi grow up & seeing Zuko & Azula in her, equally as happy as she is afraid for her. No Ursa trying to give Kiyi as normal & happy a childhood as she can, while constantly looking over her own shoulder, praying that she won't be recognized. No Ursa hearing wild rumors about her older children's whereabouts & actions, not knowing what to believe.

No, instead of any of that, we just get Ursa becoming a blank slate who can now go off & live a blissfully ignorant happily ever after with her (equally blank) high school sweetheart, forgetting the very children whom she risked everything for in the first place. And that sucks.

Also, if I were writing Kiyi, I'd just say fuck it & make her Ozai's kid. That's a thousand times more interesting.

[allgremlinyaps]

whatever. collection of Ursa for whom it may concern (part 1)

[samtamdan]

Lil Azula

[waterfire1848]

I was today years old when I realized that’s Ozai in this picture of the Search which could mean two things.

One. He told Azula to go with her mother and brother because he didn’t want to deal with her anymore so Azula literally has no one in this picture who actually wants her/wants to spend time with her.

Two. Azula saw her father but opted to continue following her brother and mother in the hopes that they would notice her and include her.

Either way 😭😭😭

[jaydude1992]

Since I've recently come across two people wrongly claiming otherwise - including one of my followers - I'm just going to set the record straight here: Ikem NEVER encouraged Ursa to give up her memories of Zuko and Azula in The Search.

The only time the option to have memories erased is ever bought up is when Ursa's speaking with the Mother of Faces. And it's the Mother of Faces who brings it up, when she senses that Ursa's desire for a new face by itself isn't going to fix her trauma over her life in the Fire Nation Royal Palace. Ikem never says a word during this conversation, and prior to the appearance of the Mother of Faces, he actually suggests trying to abscond with Zuko and Azula so that they, him and Ursa can live like a family together, before Ursa points out that this would ultimately cause Ozai to come after the four of them as well as their hometown.

If you want to hate the plot point of a mother being so traumatized by her past that she feels she's got no choice but to forget the traumatic part of her life in order to have a chance at moving on, whatever. But do your damn research and get the facts right beforehand, would you?

[fullmetalavatar]

I really like the reference to the avatar comic "the search" in the episode Masks! It's almost like netflix is setting up "something " in the future. 😏

[sokkastyles]

I think it's implied that Azula started firebending before Zuko did, and not even just that Zuko started at a later age than Azula. If Azula 5 or 6 in the flashback in Azula in the Spirit Temple when she first starts firebending, then I think Zuko hadn't started firebending yet as a 7 or 8 year old. And that probably informs the reactions we see in the comics from their parents as well.

I mean, I think Ozai would have very much held Zuko's lack of firebending over his head. My theory is that Ozai's disfavor of Zuko began to fester as soon as Zuko was born, due to Ozai protecting his own insecurities onto Zuko (and also being jealous that Zuko divided Ursa's attention). This would be easy for Ozai to do since Zuko is both his firstborn and a boy.

So by the time Azula comes along, Ozai is already convinced that Zuko is a failure (and it's possible that there were disfavorable omens when Zuko was born that fed into that perception, maybe Zuko was late learning to walk or talk, etc.) and that he will be a late bloomer, or maybe not a bender at all.

And poor Zuko, for his part, becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, as kids often do when they live in a household where the adults in their lives don't expect them to flourish. So every time Zuko failed to hit a certain milestone, Ozai would use that to either torment him or Ursa on how her son was a failure.

So when Azula is born, Ozai is determined that she will be everything Zuko is not. And maybe Azula does things that encourage this perception. We know she's precocious, and again, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. Ozai gets pleasure out of giving Azula every praise and advantage he denied to Zuko. How long before either of the children began to make a single spark do you think Ozai was telling his family how sure he was that Azula would firebend first, and rubbing it into their faces how that meant Zuko was a failure?

I think this fits with both the reactions we see from Zuko and Azula as young children in the comics. A lot has been made of that scene in Azula in the Spirit Temple when Ursa reacts with fear and disappointment on seeing her daughter bending, while Ozai is exuberant and demands Ursa praise their daughter. We, the audience, know who Ozai is. We know his excitement for his daughter's firebending skills is not out of caring or pride for his daughter, but all about himself and the weapon he wants to make Azula into. There is reason for Ursa to be fearful, here, but it's fear of Ozai, not fear of her daughter. And, as the comic also states, fear for Azula.

I also want to go back to that scene in the Search where we see young Zuko coming to his mother, waking from a nightmare where Azula has set his room on fire. Both Azula and Zuko are very young in this scene, and of course Zuko's fear is ridiculous. Neither of the children have started bending yet.

But if Ozai had already been telling his family how strong Azula was going to be, and how weak Zuko was in comparison, that explains very well Zuko's fear.

There's also something here of fire as an element both prized and feared by those who wish to control it, and I think both children learned very quickly the dual nature of fire and made it a core aspect of their personality.

I think about that image of baby Zuko in awe of Iroh's flames in Legacy of the Fire Nation. How long before the wonder of fire turned to fear, and anxiety because he just couldn't seem to measure up?

Can you imagine how terrifying it was for all of them living with Ozai? Not because he was physically violent, but because of the violence in his threats, the subtle reminders of how his rage could be turned on those who didn't meet his expectations at any moment. And he'd already made up his mind that Zuko would never meet his expectations and that Azula had to. No wonder Zuko learns to fear his sister at an early age. No wonder Azula learns that it's better to be feared than to be a disappointment.

[akiizayoi4869]

Had some more thoughts about the letter Ursa wrote to Ikem about her only comfort in her marriage to Ozai is her and Ikem's son, Zuko. And I realized something. I know that a lot of people in the fandom say that the reason why she didn't include Azula in that letter is because Azula reminded her too much of Ozai, and other stuff like that. But there's just one problem. When Ursa writes that letter? This is how old both Zuko and Azula are:

Zuko looks like he can be either 3 or 4 years old, and Azula is a baby. So you're telling me that she reminds Ursa of Ozai at....one years old? At best? Yeah, no. It's just more bad writing and Yang not understanding the characters to the point where he thinks that this actually makes Ursa more sympathetic. Which, it does, if you don't really think all to much about it. But in reality, all it does is make her look worse and worse as a mother. And again, that's fine. Character flaws are good. It makes the characters more interesting. You know what's not interesting? Never having the character own up to said flaws and writing it as if it were a good thing, and pretending that they did nothing wrong. And acting like the people who rightfully have issues with that character because of these flaws are in the wrong and crazy.

[ilikepjo24]

Here's an interesting detail I just noticed.

Ursa poisoned Azulon with a poison made from the very same flower he was gazing at the day he ruined her life.

The flower is so pretty too, just like the irony.

[ly0nstea]

The Search but instead of an abusive mental asylum, Azula goes in Greg House style trying to sabotage the facility only to get someone else hurt and committing to getting help

[allgremlinyaps]

Azulon examining a flower in Ursa's family greenhouse, while Ozai watches - The Search, Part One // Ursa using her mother's flowers to make the poison that Ozai will use to kill his father - The Search, Part Three

[book4air]

Social Media: https://linktr.ee/book4air

Fire Lord Zuko’s struggle to reform the Fire Nation and maintain peace continues. Now he believes that to help his people, he must first set things right with his family. But the only way to do so is to team up with his lifelong enemy and occasional tenuous ally: his sister Azula.

With the help of Avatar Aang and friends, can the royal fire siblings find their mother? And even if they do, what will become of their family and their nation? Do some scars run too deep to ever heal?

Enjoy our adaptation of “The Search” with brand new original scenes and story changes that may surprise even the most devoted comics fans!

Want to see the original version? Please support the official release.

Showrunners @somethingwithther @prying-pandora666

Based on 'The Search' by Dark Horse Comics Additional Writing by Lucía Lobosvilla

'Not A Messenger' by @venusdegoat Scene adapted with permission Support the full comic https://tapas.io/series/Not-A-Messenger/info

Art Team Artists: Melissa Palacios, @samleewins, @rick-orange Letterers: Sam Lee Wins, Melissa Palacios, Ryoma Ishizuka, Austro Calligraphy: Cherry Cheuk Yu Chang Translator: Yvette Su

Audio Team Head Engineer: Sam Gabriel Line Placement: Valravn Mixing Engineer: Ryoma Ishizuka, TheTVBunny (Elise Lepley), Kurt Cañez Mastering: Kim Morton

Video Team Head Engineer: Ryoma Ishizuka Editors: TheRealizer367 (Walter Vitola), Curtiscreatesstuff, Hazco Fox, PhantomSavage, Astrid Ev, franky1581

Music Team Music Director: James A. Reilly Composers: James A. Reilly, Aneesh Kashalikar, Mark 'Nowa' Taylor, Ty Porter

Voice Team Voice Directors: Lucía Lobosvilla, Anthony Rodriguez Casting: Ryoma Ishizuka, Lucía Lobosvilla

Voice Cast Aang - @somethingwithther Katara - @sometimesstephstuff Sokka - Grant Corvin Toph - @muslimsupersaiyan Zuko - Cade Watts Azula - @prying-pandora666 Iroh - D. Tyler Fultz Appa & Momo - Josh Lee Ursa - @charaito Ikem - Anthony Rodriguez Ozai - Jakob Dillon Suki - @queen-mickey-the-sass-master Ty Lee - Heidi Tabing Kota - James A. Reilly Kenji - Ash Rucker Ezo - Nichelle Phillips Professor Phom Lee - John Archer II Eula - Iris Azulon - Edward Hong Rina - Sara Dunham Jinzuk - Dylan Rasbold Guard - Jazzy Oliver Kid Zuko - Mel Valentine Baby Zuko - Victoria C. McMullen Additional Voices True Blue Grant Corvin Kauthar Harrak-Sharif Lucía Lobosvilla James A. Reilly Heidi Tabing Cade Watts Ara’digm Wong

Promo Bumper Animated by ‪@samleewins Voice of Sokka by Grant Corvin Video Editing by Ryoma Ishizuka Audio Editing by Sam Gabriel Mastering by Kim Morton Special Thanks Book 4 Restoration Project Team Dark Horse Comics Nickelodeon Gene Luen Yang Gurihiru Avatar Wiki Ara’digm Wong The Flying Opera Company Productions KikwishhArt Dave Roman Kevin Coppa Baby Lion Turtle Aaron Ehasz Bryan Konietzko Michael Dante DiMartino AND YOU Produced by Staff And Seer Studios, LLC.