#you will learn nothing you didn't already know about the character if you're an azula stan

[likeabxrdinflight]

I have read azula in the spirit temple, because of course I did. it's like 7 bucks for the digital version and honestly? wouldn't pay much more than that.

it's...fine. it's fine. it's not offensive, it's not groundbreaking, it's just...fine. I will say I do really like the art style, it's a vast improvement over the yang-led comics. there's some great drawings and all the characters look really good.

otherwise...? I mean it just doesn't do much with its story, and I think that's kind of intentional. I strongly suspect that now that avatar studios is a thing, major story beats in the comics series are over for the time being. this very much feels like a tease of "can azula redeem herself?? we just don't know!!!" and then they very much do not commit one way or the other with it. which tells me that if any major storylines featuring azula are going to be happening in the future, they probably won't be happening in the comics, but in some future movie or animated series.

and honestly? good. I always felt comics were the wrong medium for telling stories in this universe, they have never managed to replicate the gravitas or complexity of storytelling of the animated shows. so if this comic is meant to be like...a palate cleanser, a teaser for things to come in future projects...fine. that's fine. but it does mean this particular story comes across non-committal and honestly...kinda boring.

like, every character azula interacts with outside the first couple pages is a spirit. none of it's real, the stakes are so low, and everything that happens once azula arrives at the temple is a vision from this guardian spirit, who tells azula that if she could accept what the visions were saying then this was her chance of redemption. but honestly that just feels like a cop-out and I don't really buy it, because none of it was real. and azula knows that.

what this story felt like instead was less redemption arc and more character exploration. and as a character piece it's...it's fine? like I said, it's not offensive like the search or smoke and shadow were (though it does loosely play off where smoke and shadow left off, it mostly ignores the search, so props to it for that lol). but there's nothing in here that will come as a surprise to anyone with basic reading comprehension who's watched the original show. the writing's a bit shallow but broadly inoffensive.

honestly the most surprising thing for me was azula acknowledging out loud to a vision of ursa that she's entirely aware that her father used her as a weapon, and felt that ursa failed to protect her from that fate by leaving. which is an interesting dichotomy given that much of azula's character is bound up in that identity as her father's perfect daughter in contrast to zuko being the failed son. (then again, quite a bit of time has now passed in universe since the end of the tv series, so maybe it's not overly shocking that azula has done a little introspecting in that time.)

other than that, there's some fun interactions with spirit!mai and ty lee, and then there's a final vision with spirit!zuko that comes so close to being a halfway decent climax to this little story, but none of it's a major revelation to anyone who's been paying attention to azula's character. the spirit visions all serve the same function that azula's hallucinations did in the series finale- they act as her unconscious mind telling her the truths she already knows about herself deep down.

the ending leaves azula in kind of a middle ground place, very little about her circumstances have changed except she's decided to ditch her girl gang and go run off to do something else- which is kept extremely vague. I can't help feeling that is an intentional move to set her up for a totally new story in a different medium that likely doesn't want to rely on any foundations laid in any of the comics series. and I wouldn't be shocked if that medium is one of the alleged movies that avatar studios is supposed to be producing. so this feels less like a real character arc so much as a character reset.

and from a creative, lore standpoint I don't have a problem with this. that's probably what they needed to do if they want to use azula in their future animated projects. my problem is that the story the comic tells to give us this reset is just kinda boring for someone who's been with this fandom since the original series aired.

The fact is that I've read and seen fan works that addressed these exact same issues and character beats with much more finesse and for much higher stakes. this comic gave me the feeling that the dialogue was directly addressing what fans have been saying about azula for years and putting a neon light on it. and that's...again, it's fine? but it's not groundbreaking for those of us who've been saying this shit since 2008. and I guess it's nice to see some of those character beats canonized officially, especially if there's a likelihood that we'll see animated azula again, but as far as I was concerned the fact that azula wanted her family to love her and was used as a weapon of war was already obvious, so spelling it out with another comic felt...redundant.

and I guess that's how I'd describe this. it felt redundant to me, as someone who's spent a lot of time with this character already. maybe it's good that it exists so that larger and newer swaths of the fandom can see azula in this light, but for long time fans of the character? there's truly nothing in here about her that you don't already know.

if this really is a reset button for the old comics canon/jumping off point for an animated project, then...I'm not mad about it, exactly. but as a stand alone story it's just...fine. it's fine, but little more.