#master pakku

[azulasmommyissues]

[staliaqueen]

Mal's Avatar: The Last Airbender rewatch: The Waterbending Master 1.18

[dyingroses]

Avatar: The Last Airbender + text posts and stuff

[i-put-the-ass-into-sass]

rewatching ATLA and I just saw a little parallel of the avatar being humbled by an old grump (except Lin isn't that old and also MOTHER (freudly 😏))

[a-todd-illustration]

[starlight-bread-blog]

Katara is More Patient Then We Give Her Credit for

Katara has been getting a lot of flak for supposedly being hot headed and getting angry at very minor things. Even those who love Katara seem to accept this as the truth. But it's not. In reality, Katara is simply a female character who owns her rage. And I feel like there are two main components that debunk this notion.

Warning: Long, long post.

1. In the instances where Katara is angry it's either justified or makes sense in context.

The Waterbending Scroll

Katara stole, wouldn't you know it, a waterbending scroll. She practices before giving it to Aang, and fails hard. Then Aang who she's supposed to be teaching, gets it right and explains how to do it. Katara has an outburst.

Katara: Will you please shut your air-hole! Believe it or not your infunite wisdom gets a little old sometimes. Why don't we just throw the scroll away since you're so naturally gifted!

Why is Katara that mad here? Why did she have an outburst? Because she was carrying the burden of being the last waterbender of the Southern Water Tribe her whole life. Because her waterbending is the reason Kya died. Because she have been independently studying waterbending her whole life. And now her student is having it all easy and is trying to teach her.

And wouldn't you know it, she realized what she did immediatly. Literally, a second later.

Katara: Oh my gosh Aang. I am so sorry. I don't know what came over me. But you know what, it won't happen again. Here [the scroll] is yours. I don't wanna have anything to do with it anymore.

She even apologized to Momo. Katara had an isecurity rooted in trauma and pressure. When Aang try to teach her she hit a breaking point and lashed out. And not one second later she's already apologizing.

The Waterbending Master

Katara and Aang are going to see Pakku, the waterbending master. But when Pakku sees she's a girl, he says he won't teach her. This is why Katara gets angry. She flew across seas just to get rejected due Pakku is being a sexist freak. I think we can all agree that being denied something because of sexism is a good reason to get angry. And when Katara realized Pakku won't teach Aang if she'll keep insisting, she drops it abd tells Aang to drop it too.

However, that doesn't mean she won't study in secret. She deserved to learn waterbending and she knew it. She took the consequences into consideration and decided to not make a fuss.

But of course, they both get caught. Pakku says he will no longer teach Aang, the Avatar who absolutly needs to study and still refuses to teach Katara because he's still sexist. Only then Katara challenges him to a duel. Only when they have nothing to lose. She challenged a sexist prick to a duel, one who shamelessly denied her oppretunity because of her gender.

The Chase

At the start of the episode Katara gently hints Toph to help unpack a camp for the night. This is when she's not tired yet, and shows patience.

Katara: So Toph, usually when setting up camp, we try to divide up the work.

Toph: Hey, don't worry about me. I'm good to go.

Katara (still calmly): Well, actually, what I'm trying to say is, some of us might fetch water while someone else might set up the fire pit or put up the tent. *smiles* Even Momo does his fair share.

Toph (slightly irritated): Katara, I'm fine. I can carry my own weight. I don't need a fire. I've already collected my own food. And look. *earth bends a tent* My tent's all set up.

Katara: Well, that's great for you but we still need to finish-

Toph (loudly): I don't understand. What's the problem here??

Katara: Never mind.

Katara then goes to apologize. While also attempting to make sure her and Toph are on good terms by having her acknoledge that she wasn't 100 absolutly in the right.

Katara: Hey Toph, I wanted to apologize for earlier. I think we're all just a little tired and getting on each other's nerves.

Toph: Yeah, you do seem pretty tired.

Katara (slightly irrutated): I meant all of us.

Toph: Well, good night.

Katara: Good night.

By all means, Toph is in the wrong for the sheer refusal for communication. At first Katara calmly explained to her what was needed without even spelling it out. Toph was being passive, so she dropped it. And then she apologizes after doing nothing wrong just so they could be on good terms. Toph was the one being passive agressive. And Katara pretty much let it slide.

This is Katara. The patience she showed right here is her natural, normal self. The rest of the episode is under the context of sleep deprivation and how it's making them all hostile to each other. Including the pacifist Aang. Who's outburst leads Toph to leave. After she does, both Aang and Katara express remorse.

(Side note: I heard people take issue with the line "The stars sure are beautiful tonight, too bad you can't see them, Toph". It's been interpreted as Katara making fun of Toph for being blind, but it's just another instance in the recurring joke of the Gaang forgetting Toph is blind, and listed as such in the official A:TLA Youtube channel).

The Runaway

Update: This section, especially, is majorly outdated.

The episode has a silly opening where Aang is trained by Toph and Katara. Toph misses and accidently hits Katara with a big rock. After Toph doesn't apologize, it leads into a fight which is absolutly not to be taken seriously, that ends with Aang pointing out that it was supposed to be training.

It doesn't work as an exapmle for supposed hot-headedness because the reason this whole thing started because Toph hit Katara with a rock and refused to apologize.

But moving on to the real conflict of these episode, Toph scammed someone and Katara makes it clear that they shouldn't do it again, it'll draw attention to them. Aang promises her it won't happen again but.. um.. you know what happened.

Katara, being responsible, told them to quit because they'd potentially get exposed. Toph didn't reach well, telling her to lighten up. Katara rightfully gets angry, because they really might get exposed and Toph is dismissing her like her concerns are nothing. They have a short argument and Toph storms out.

This is why Katara was angry this episode. Her reasoning for being upset is the Gaang potentially exposing themselves for easy money. That's the conflict.

The Painted Lady

In this episode Katara sees a starving Fire Nation village but Sokka won't allow them to stay due to time limits. So she faked a disease for Appa so they could. Sokka confronts her. At first, she gives up and packs to leave. But since she destroyed the factory that's been polluting the villages water and taking their medicine, the people in charge assumed it was the civilians, and were coming to attack. Sokka and Katara get into a small but intense argument. Important to note, that she doesn't react intensively until Sokka does.

Katara: Well, what was I supposed to do?

Sokka: Leave! Do nothing.

Katara: No! I will never, ever turn my back on people who need me.

Her anger here doesn't highlight hot-headedness, it highlights compassion. Compassion is one of Katara's core traits. She's angry because she's being angrily demanded to see people suffer and stand by. And she will not tolerate it. She will never, ever turn her back on people who need her.

2. In reality, Katara is defined by her patience and compassion.

What I did here was listing off times where Katara did get angry. But Katara is generally a caring, kind person. Rather if it's cheering up Sokka, going shopping with him after he admitted to feeling useless; if it's pulling Aang out of the Avatar state, putting herself at risk when he's out of control; if it's helping deliver a baby of a stranger; or if it's freeing prisoners of the Fire Nation. She demonstrates impressive patience throughout the show.

The Deserter

In this episode Aang was asked to just control fire. Aang gets irrutated himself at this, but Katara assured him that it's probably for a good reaso. But when his master left, he firebent. He was being extremely careless with his new found Fire Bending and burned Katara's hands.

Did she...

A. splashed some water at him.

B. Yelled at him.

C. Ran away crying.

Yeah, she didn't express anger at all. Sokka was who's angry at Aang.

The Desert

The sand benders stole Appa and the Gaang is suck in a desert. Katara demonstrates her patience a lot this episode.

Toph and Aang are arguing about Toph not stopping them.

Aang: You just didn't care! You never liked Appa! You wanted him gone.

Katara: Aang, stop it. You know Toph did all she could. She saved our lives.

Sokka: Who's gonna save our lives now? We'll never make itout of here.

Aang: That's all any of you guys care about, yourselves. You don't care whether Appa is okay or not.

Katara: We're all concerned, but we can't afford to be fighting now.

Aang accused the Gaang of something horrible. Katara told him to stop, but still understood his anger and calmly explained to him that it's important not to fight in a life threatening situation.

Aang then storms out to look for Appa. Katara's response?

Katara: We'd better start walking. We're the only people who know about the solar eclipse. We have to get that information to Ba Sing Se.

She didn't get angry, she was rational and thought about the greater good.

After Aang comes back, Katara suggest they should try sleeping, gives the Gaang all of her bending water without drinking herself. And then finds a way to get to Ba Sing Se using the locations of star systems.

The Gaang spots a cloud and mistakes it for Appa. But Katara realizes the potential in a cloud. She tells Aang to fly and bend the water from the cloud so they could drink.

Katara (disappoibted): Wow, there's hardly any in here.

Aang (intensively): I'm sorry, okay? It's a desert cloud, I did all I could. What's anyone else doing? *Points at Katara* What are you doing?

After dealing with everyone's tireness, Sokka's high nonsense and Aang's attitude, carrying everyone, thinking of possible solutions to ensure they'd all survive, how did she react to Aang accusing her of not doing enough?

Katara: Trying to keep everyone together. Let's just get moving. We need to head this direction.

And after everything she did for everyone, she pulls Aang out of the Avatar state when he's raging, out of control.

Katara is not so hot headed.

She's sweet, nurturing and caring. She demonstrated incredible patience and perhaps even saved the Gang's life in The Desert with her resilience. Katara's compassion is her defining trait.

But that doesn't mean she's not a human being – she's allowed to be flawed, and in the moments where she does, she's very remorseful. And in the moments where she doesn't, people will still hold her accoutable for simply feeling a justified emotion.

Does it make you oh-so-hot headed to stand up to a sexist denying her opportunity? To make sure your friends don't destroy your chances to win a war? To not tolerate being told to see people in need and do nothing in a middle if an argument she didn't start? Of course it doesn't.

And other characters are allowed to express anger, to be flawed, in ways that are way worse than Katara without being labelled annoying hot headed by the fandom.

Katara is widly known to be irrational, letting her anger get the better of her, but it's simply not true.

[colduaire]

Is it just me or are Azula and Katara's arcs kinda switched? What, with Katara having natural talent in natla as opposed to the practice and determination she had in animated series to become a master and Azula struggling with perfection and growing into a prodigy instead of being born one and eventually proving to 'the man' she has what it takes?

[sokkas-therapist]

So…Katara and Sokka canonically knew their grandfather?? I never caught this before 😭

I got back to my rewatch of atla and in S1 E5 (when Aang dresses up as “Bonzoo Pippenpadlopsicopolis II” in Omashu) Sokka says “great! Now you look just like my grandfather.”

…

I’m sorry. GRANDFATHER?? Are we just gonna slide right past that??

As far as grandparents go, we only visually see and get interactions with their grandmother (or Gran Gran) Kanna. Then there’s Pakku who, as we learn later in the series, used to be engaged to Kanna. But Katara and Sokka don’t learn that information until later in the series, and even then it’s never implied that Pakku is Hakoda’s father.

Which begs the question, who is this grandfather that Sokka mentions in Omashu?? Is he still alive yet never shown in swt flashbacks? The fact that Sokka was the only “man” left behind in his tribe is a fairly large point in his charecter arc, so if their grandfather is still alive, has he been fighting the war with Hakoda this whole time? Or had he passed away fairly recently given Sokka’s ability to recall his image? And if he has passed, we can assume his death wasn’t related to the fire nation, or else Sokka and Katara would be unable to joke about him with such ease.

This is so interesting to me and I wish the concept was explored more in canon, but I also get that the series had a limited run time so the bits of Worldbuilding/character-building they could dive into were limited as well.

[ukingk24]

So I finished the Avatar Live Action and while overall, it was a good attempt at emulating the original series, the finale of the LA was perhaps the weakest episode, particularly for what it did to Katara, and I'll explain why.

Her biggest arc in season 1 in the original is that she starts off slow because she's naturally self-taught. She gets better and better but eventually her hard work and talent only goes so far and she hits a wall, so she needs a master to teach her. That master, Pakku, denies her and she challenges him. She looses the fight, but wins the ideological war and Pakku and the North change their ways because of Katara's determination. She literally fights the patriarchy and wins!

That does not happen in the live action!!

In the LA, she still fights Pakku, she still looses, and Pakku still doesn't change! The patriarchy still stands! But it turns out, that doesn't matter because Katara's a master already!! Somehow!?! Her fight with Zuko in the LA literally goes like this

Zuko: You little peasant! You found a master!

Katara: Yeah, you're looking at her!

What!!?? That doesn't even work as a "girl power" moment because there's absolutely nothing to suggest that she had reached that level all on her own. No flashback or montage of her watching Pakku's classes in secret and then practicing on her own, no Aang teaching her what Pakku taught him, no her going through scrolls to learn, nothing! You can't even say it's because of her experience in battle because there's a noticeable difference in her skill from before she gets to the North and after. In the original, the moment she gets that proper guidance and instruction, her skill skyrockets to master level.

In the LA, she's just that good because the show needed her to be.

The North and Pakku eventually do change their ways on women fighting, yes, but it's not because of Katara. It's because of war. It's only during and after the siege of the North, when he sees the devastation and damage done, does Pakku change. And initially, that's only because there aren't enough troops, so he relents and begrudgingly allows the women on the front lines. Katara is the one that points out to him that the women are there and willing to fight, but it's only the external factor of war and the Siege that makes Pakku change his mind, not Katara's determination. The patriarchy was dissolved because of the war-time logistics emergency, it was not defeated because it was wrong.

It is a disservice to Katara's character and to what she achieved in the original.

[paddysnuffles]

Sokka: *after Katara holding her own against Waterbending Master Pakku despite being 14 and self-taught* People won't say you're weak anymore after that.

Katara: No, they'll just say I lost.

Northern Water Tribe People: *excitedly chattering about the fight*

Sokka: Did you?

[cienie-isengardu]

Avatar The Last Airbender: North and South

[dyingroses]

Avatar: The Last Airbender + text posts and stuff

[justthoughts1310]

ATLA and Marvel have the same misogyny

So... I've finally made it to episode 8 of Netflix's Live Action ATLA.

This may be shocking for some of you, because I wrote a post about how Netflix ATLA is misogynistic a month ago, but now I'm back again.

I specifically want to talk about the absolutely ridiculous and bullshit feminist virtue signaling that we are habitually forced to endure.

The scene I am specifcally referring to is the scene in which Katara demands that Master Pakku let's her fight. Then all of a sudden, the camera pans to all of the healers in the Northern Water Tribe (the female water benders) who stand ready to fight.

Yet, despite their immense power, they are begging this old as man for permission, instead of just doing what needs to be done.

This scene is giving... stupid. It's giving the 999th Marvel movie that NOBODY freaking wanted... okay! Does anybody remember that scene from Avenger's End Game (of course you do), in which all of the female avengers assemble, and it's one female cameo after another? I have no idea who liked this scene, but I didn't. I HATED this scene! I thought it was tacky and cringe, and I didn't understand why I felt that way.

Then in the Marvels, there's this scene in which Captain Danvers gets knocked down, and then there's this sequence starting from when she was a little girl playing softball in which she gets knocked down and gets back up.

The whole thing is soooo cringe.

It's cringe because it's heavy handed. It feels like one of those inspirational quotes you put on your wall that says something stupid like "She believed she could so she did..." or "Shero" or "Herstory".

It feels like a moment in which the male writers were like, we got to make women feel seen, so let's stop the flow of the entire movie and series and whatever is going on and have this really stupid overproduced moment in which the women look like bad asses, before we hide the women back in the background and let the real heroes (the men) take over.

All of this despite the fact that in hindsight, of all of the avengers assembled there to fight Thanos that day (both male and female, alike), Scarlett Witch and Captain Marvel were the only one's canonically strong enough to stop Thanos. Yet, we can't have that, because a man needs to be the hero.

Like stop stealing women's W's. It happens all the time in shows like Naruto, in which the most powerful kunoichi will get caught up by the most stupid insignificant thing, so that a man can end up saving her and she becomes the damsel in distress.

The narrative of women can be strong but never as strong as men because men need to be the hero is weak and tired, tell a new story!!!

Especially, because it really isn't all that true anymore. After the industrial revolution and the boom of tech, women and men's physically strengths have become increasingly more similar for decades. Why, because very few people need to carry giant logs and chop down trees to survive anymore! You don't need to be swol to complete a spreadsheet.

I digress.

My point is what these scenes from ATLA and Marvel have in common. It's the reason why they are both cringe.

Men don't see women as women who are unique human beings with our own unique desires. Therefore, male writers force powerful female characters to embody male characteristics that appeal to men.

You know all that flexing and all the abs and the sweat and the thirst trap scenes of half naked men like Thor and Captain America (even the scene with Sokka in it). Do you think those scenes are for women? Well, they are not. They are for men. Men get hard-ons for these kinds of scenes, and these scenes are specifically created for men and the male gaze.

Then they try to extend this to female characters, to show that they are feminists. However, this completely ignores the female gaze and female motivation.

The scenes really are women quietly asking for permission (not really) and then men loudly given women permissions to stand out and be powerful, but only in a way that satisfies the male gaze. Which considering the fact that men are socially conditioned to like feminine or overly sexual women, I have no idea who these scenes appeal to!!!

Like bro... read a freaking book. Learn about history!!! Real history!!! Women do not need the permission of men to be powerful, intelligent, strong, tactful or ambitious. Women have already been all of these things since the dawn of time.

Therefore, women don't need weird cameos that break up the pacing of the story or scenes of little girls playing sports, getting knocked down, and getting back up to feel seen. Women and girls do not need to be convinced that we are powerful. We already know it. We've been working in the background for centuries while men have taken credit for our labors, efforts, and endeavors.

All we need is for men to get the hell out of our way! We can see it right now with education and employment. Ever since women were allowed to attend school, women have outperformed men in education is almost every subject (and men and women are at par with each other in Math and Science). Women are also out enrolling men in college 2:1.

So instead of giving women 5 minutes of permission to be powerful in movies and shows and embuing them with masculine characterists, write a compelling female character from the beginning of the show. Develop her character as a person, who has to deal with the unique intersectionality of being a woman. Don't make her whole personality being a woman.

And if you cannot, write a compelling female character, then get a woman to do it!

End Rant. Thank you for attending my TED Talk.

[jenna-rayofsunshine]

Okay, I’ve actually have REALLY been loving the Avatar live action and haven’t had many complaints. But what is wrong with episode 7???

Like why isn’t Katara more angry? Where is her crazy feminine rage😡?? Somehow her fight scene with Pakku was really disappointing. It feels like there are very little stakes. Maybe I like the original too much.

Also, why hasn’t Aang even attempted water bending and he’s about to go to the big final fight?

[the-air-nomad]

when the moon falls in love

You were just an ordinary child from the Northern Water Tribe. Your father was one of the priests of La and your mother was a housewife like the vast majority of women in your tribe.

 You had a happy and fun childhood until one evening when your father came home strangely happy.

 As a child, it seemed strange to you to see the man as cold and rigid as a piece of ice smiling.

You became anxious when you noticed that your mother was trying to mask her anxiety with curiosity.

 Soon your father revealed that Chief Arnook wanted you to start having play dates with Princess Yue. 

Apparently, Master Pakku/Yagoda had praised your waterbending and intelligence.

The Chief thought you would be a beneficial influence for his daughter

At first you were happy, you understood too late that your father only wanted to use you to gain influence over the leaders. 

You met the princess the next morning. 

In the beginning, you understood each other very well, even if she was a bit shy. 

You became friends and started to love Yue more and more.

 She was adorable, always waiting for you with cakes and excited about any idea you had. 

When you got into trouble, she did everything she could to save you from punishment.

The first time you noticed that Yue wasn't as perfect as you thought she was was when you skipped a play date.

 It was a friend's birthday and you had completely forgotten about the princess.

 Chief Arnook was not happy and came to your house to talk to your father. 

Yue had cried all day and refused to eat or get out of bed. 

Of course, your father went absolutely crazy and punished you. He tried to slap you in front of Yue's father but your mother made you promise not to be selfish anymore. 

That upset you. Were you selfish? No way! Now you didn't want to see Yue anymore.

You had no choice, so the next day you apologized to the princess and her father. But from then on, you started not enjoying Yue's company anymore. 

She noticed that you no longer treated her with such warmth as before and tried to flatter you by giving you gifts. You told her to give up, which disappointed her.

 She tried to subtly threaten you by telling you that your fathers will not be happy if she is sad. 

You told her that you don't care and that you'd rather spend your time looking at your ceiling than looking at her.

 That made her bite her lip and burst into tears. 

You felt horrible and thought you were too mean to her.

 You hugged her and she told you about how she was born sick, she was blessed by Tui and her father was too protective and didn't let her have any friends. 

Now you wanted to dive into the ocean because of the shame you felt. Not allowed to have friends? This is so bad.

You continued to be her friend out of pity, even if sometimes she freaked you out with her jealousy and protectiveness, you were sorry to leave her alone locked in a boring palace. 

As you grew up, you thought more and more about marriage and how you would be able to forget about the palace and your father.

 Unfortunately for you, the others had other plans. So you were engaged to the princess.

You felt that the spirits liked to make fun of you. 

Then came the avatar and his two companions. 

Let's just say the whole tribe exploded when Master Pakku saw you trying to teach Katara waterbending. 

Yue looked half ready to pass out and half ready to kill Katara with her bare hands. 

Who did she think she was?! How dare that girl come into her house and steal the love of her life?!

Did I mention you were born to create drama?

When Katara confronted Master Pakku you defended her and spoke out against your sexist traditions.

 You decided that it would be good to have the support of the princess, so you gave her a tearful speech about how you want to make a better world for her and for your mother. 

Yue believed you the moment you mentioned your mother, she knew that you absolutely adored your mother.

Then came the siege and sacrifice of Yue. 

The sadness you felt surprised you.

 You shouldn't have been sad for Yue.

 But you should have been saddened by the loss of your freedom forever because Yue was ready to have you both in life and in the spirit world.

 And you couldn't do or say anything, 

what waterbender would dare fight the moon?

Although I do not own the characters from avatar the last airbender, this work belongs to me! I sincerely hope you liked it. please rate it and leave a comment! follow me to see my next posts! Don’t forget that the request are open💖💖💨

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[maaruin]

So Aang doesn't need to learn from Bumi, Katara doesn't need to learn from Pakku, and the previous Avatars already are presented as giving Aang advice that the story wants him to grow beyond.

Yes, storytelling wise it is pretty expected that the student outgrows the master. After learning. The student being able to outgrow their master after learning is the highest praise for both the student and the master.

But instead they went for innate power and goodness.

(Even many Zuko-learning-from-Iroh moments are missing.)