tuesdaywriter

[tuesdaywriter]

[tuesdaywriter]

just making sure everyone’s seen this amazing zk edit by zuzuualone from the tic-tac

[tuesdaywriter]

ok, there are already a lot of things factually wrong in this anti-zutarian pro-lok-katara post underneath all the bashing  but I just want to point out the main argument and how they contradict themselves with when paired with evidence.

I was reading reading reading… then I got stumped over this line:

just because a woman fought a war when she was younger doesn’t mean she has to still do so at the age of EIGHTY FIVE. what the hell are you expecting from an elderly lady lmao.

So I thought, well… what do you expect?

This is their post in the right sequence:

katara was a child born into a war that took her loved ones from her, and that THAT is why she wants to fight. she wants to fight to protect and to avenge (in a way) her loved ones.

WHEN KATARA NEVER WANTED TO FIGHT FOR THE SAKE OF FIGHTING. she was a child who fought in a war she never should have fought in, for the sake of good. a war that gave her so much trauma, may i add.

is it really a surprise that katara chooses NOT to fight for the rest of her life unless absolutely necessary ? katara fights because she has to. and damn if she isn’t an absolute badass and queen for doing so, but just because a woman fought a war when she was younger doesn’t mean she has to still do so at the age of EIGHTY FIVE. what the hell are you expecting from an elderly lady lmao.

and to anyone who says ‘but toph and zuko fought in their old age !’ you’re missing one really key point and that is that toph fought BECAUSE she needed to protect her family. she even said something about NOT wanting to fight anymore because of course, she’s an old woman and of course, katara is the same. as for zuko, he also needed to protect his daughter, he said it himself — the red lotus threatened world leaders aka. izumi.

Cool. They’re saying, Katara never wanted to fight. She only fights when necessary for her loved ones, which is the same with Toph and Zuko, who also fight because they needed to protect their family.

So, what they expect is…

Katara = Toph & Zuko.

They all fight for their families.

Interesting.

What does the evidence say? (from @araeph post)

?

??

???

[tuesdaywriter]

AU where AtLA ended on a shot that captured the themes of friendship, found family, and the 4 nations coming together in peace… instead of a shoehorned kiss (and everyone wearing Earth Kingdom outfits..?).

I’ve been a diehard Zutara shipper since forever, but I maintain that the show should have ended without any canon ships except Sokka/ Suki. This “alternate ending” shot is one I’ve wanted to do basically since the finale first premiered, so I’m pleased to have finally drawn it (only 13 years late…).

♥ Please do not repost. If you like it and want to show people, share a link to this page instead. Thank you! | Background from AtLA, but otherwise it’s mine. That’s right folks we have progressed from manips to original art like a pokemon evolving.

[tuesdaywriter]

I've always felt like we would eventually hear the full Cave of Two Lovers song and it would very much solidify the fact that Oma and Shu are a foil for Zuko and Katara.

Agni My Two Cents

Hey, so I’ve been seeing some hot takes about how the Agni Kai scene- one of the Zutara scenes- wasn’t a romantic moment between Zuko and Katara. And, okay, fine. Everyone has a right to their…ahem…takes. Also, I kind of get where these fans are coming from. Zuko was a  Good Boy ™ © ® whose heart was so pure he tried to save Zhao, who had literally just tried to kill him. Of course he would take a bullet bolt for his beloved friends. 

HOWMSTEVER!!!!!!!!!

I respectfully disagree. I see this moment as romantic for two reasons. Firstly,I see this moment as romantic because of the set up. 

Now, I don’t really remember when I started shipping these two. I know the seeds were planted for me in season 1, but the first episode I remember as set  up to eventual Zutara was- say it with me- The Cave of Two Lovers. Nothing about that episode makes sense if it wasn’t supposed to be set up for Zutara. And, I know that there are people who think that CoTL was a Kataang episode. Well, hehehe! Ain’t that cute?

BUT IT’S WRONG!!!!!!!!

I kid! I kid! Sorta. But here’s the thing. If it was supposed to be Kataang, the writers- who up til this point have proven to be masters of their craft- did a terrible job. It all hinges on the story of Oma and Shu.                    Two lovers forbidden from one another

                  A war divides their people

                  Built a path to be together…

Blah, blah, blah. So on. You all know the story. What’s this got to do with the Agni Kai? Patience, Iago. I’m  getting there. The story of Oma and Shu was clearly meant to be foreshadowing and a meta statement of the show’s over all themes. Balance. The illusion of separation. And of course, everyone’s favorite..love conquers all. Nothing about this fits Kataang. You know who it does fit? You know who it fits.

Yeah, okay! So what’s this got to do with the Agni Kai? Everything.

Two lovers torn apart by war. They come together despite their people hating each other. Peace comes as a result of their love, and the death of one of the pair. The inclusion of this plot cul-de-sac makes absolutely no sense if at this point in the series, Zutara wasn’t planned and it wasn’t planned for one of them to face death. I don’t pretend to know if the Agni Kai itself was set up (but probably, right?).  Then, of course, there’s Zuko and Katara’s relationship itself. They’ve made a complete 180* on their relationship. They’ve gone from enemies, to friends, to each other’s ride-or-die. Theoretically, sure, Zuko might have taken that bolt for anyone, but in actuality, no he wouldn’t. Not because he didn’t care deeply for all of his friends, but because he wouldn’t have asked anyone else to go with him. 

Look, if it was just about having a good fighter on his side, Sokka would have done. Sokka was smart, a good fighter, and the boys had already proven they work well together. Toph would have been a great choice, too. Toph is every bit as formidable as Katara, and she has and extra helping of vicious that would have been useful against Azula. Zuko had options. He chose Katara. He didn’t even have to think about it. That’s their relationship in a nutshell. I wish the show had expanded on this more, but it’s clear that at this point, Zuko and Katara are each other’s support system. It doesn’t mean that either of them loves their friends any less, but what they have (even platonically) is fundamentally different. Which is why it’s absolute rotten bull pie what happened to their friendship in the post ATLA canon. What do you mean they didn’t stay the very best of friends after all of that? Brkye are some haters, I swear…

Ahem…

Anyway, all of that- the Oma and Shu plot detour, the evolution of Zuko and Katara’s relationship, Zuko wanting to keep Katara safe from Azula- all led up to that moment. 

To me the Agni Kai scene isn’t just romantic because he risked his life for her, but it was because it was a culmination of something that had been building all series. That moment didn’t happen in a vacuum. Zuko wouldn’t have done that for anyone else, because there wasn’t anyone else he wanted there with him. 

Point, the Second….

That Agni Kai moment was absolutely romantically framed. ATLA fans, I call you to show your non-ATLA fan friends that moment, with no context or commentary, and ask them if that was supposed to be a romantic moment. I promise you most of them will say yes, that was supposed to be romantic. Why? Because TV and Film have a very specific language that most people recognize. The slow motion; the Big No; Katara forgetting the fight to try to get to Zuko. It all reads very romantic. 

Yes, I know that friends have taken bullets, grenades, punishments, what have you, for friends, but the way this scene is framed specifically speaks to a very strong love between the two. And I know that there are those of you who still will read this as platonic, as is your right. 

But that is possibly the single most romantic thing I have ever seen in kids’ media, and I hope that one day I’ll meet a man who loves me as much as Zuko loved his…ahem…friend. 

[tuesdaywriter]

What kind of clown shit is this? They don’t know the quality we’re used to.

They need to DM @hayleynfoster and get this corrected.

NOT THE OFFICIAL ATLA YT CHANNEL MAKING A ZUTARA KISS SCENE >>>>>>

[tuesdaywriter]

She is a queen and, IMHO, Suki, Alone is the best Avatar comic out there.

anyways read suki alone 

[tuesdaywriter]

New, in character canon accepted.

Avatar: The Last Airbender - The Promise AU where Zuko’s friends don’t agree to kill him because wtf Aang wasn’t even willing to kill Ozai when he was burning the Earth Kingdom to the ground what kind of out of character bullshirt was this story line where Aang agreed to kill his friend AND THEN ALMOST WENT THROUGH WITH IT?? I have many thoughts about these comics guys, and 99% of them are not good.

Transcript under the read more.

Keep reading

[tuesdaywriter]

Interesting. Very interesting.

You ever think about how water is the element of change and Zuko’s character arc is centered around change and fire is the element of power and Katara’s character arc is about coming into and honing her own power and you go hmmmmmmmmmmm

[tuesdaywriter]

favorite comedies that ended too soon ≡ Galavant (2015-2016)

“I’m not an animal. I mean, sure, I’ll kidnap a woman and force her to marry me, but after that, I’m all about a woman’s rights.”

[tuesdaywriter]

Say it louder for the people in the back!

I don't know much about ATLA but based on my objective observation, how Katara looks at Zuko is the same as how Kagome looks at Inuyasha. So I can see why Zutara is still a popular ship even though it's not canon

Thank you, now I can't get this parallels out of my head and... holy shit! You might be onto something there. There's also the fact of them working so well as a team. Their (more than) rocky start. The fact that their friendship is so deep and meaningful on its own.

Also, you should definitely give ATLA a try, though. Not onlly for Zutara, but because the story is really, really good. In fact, I'd argue that the romance part is actually its weakest suit and not as important as the other themes it tried to explore.

As for Zutara, I'd say it is still popular precisely because it didn't become canon. I don't know if you're aware of this but apparently the writers (and couple) Aaron Ehasz and Elizabeth Welch Ehasz, who were mostly in charge of Zuko's character, wanted to go in a very different direction than what we ended up getting, but the creators Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko (they're know as "Bryke") put their foot down.

The rumor is that another season called Book Four: Air was supposed to happen, featuring Azula's redemption, what happened with Ursa, the discover of alive airbenders, Iroh's spiritual journey and so on. They could have taken this chance to develop Zuko and Katara into something... more. But it was canceled in favor of that awful live action movie.

So they stuck with three seasons and even though the Zuko and Katara's american voice actors thought Zutara was going to happen and the Ehasz couple stilll wanted to leave the ending open in that sense, Nickelodeon and Bryke pushed for the end game we got because, and I quote, "children would cry if it didn't happen."

But it's actually more than that. Bryke, two grown ass man, were so pressed over their favored ship not being as popular as Zutara that they not only dedicated a whole episode of the show (The Ember Island Players) to make fun of Zutara shippers, they also made this cringy ass video and played at SDCC 2008 as a joke:

They used fanarts made by their own damn fans in order to publicly take a dig on them for liking Zutara and, not satisfied, straight up told these people, mostly children and teens, that if they thought Zutara should be together, they would forever have doomed relationships. And they thought it was funny.

That's why I have no doubt if Zutara had gone canon, they would most definitely find a way to ruin it for us the same way they ruined most of the end game couples, so this is actually for the better.

The Zutara fandom made these characters' journey and relationship justice in a way Bryke couldn't, because they didn't have the same interpretation of Zuko and Katara as the Ehasz couple did and since they were the creators, their word was final.

So who knows? Maybe the fact Zutara was not canon is one of the reasons we still have so many great Zutara content to this day?

[tuesdaywriter]

Zutara Week 2021 Day 1: Hair

(a veryy normal reaction to someone tying your hair)

[tuesdaywriter]

DID U GUYS SEE THE MEXICAN SWIMMERS WITH ATLA THEMED SWIMSUITS THEYRE SO CUTE

[tuesdaywriter]

A Personal Vent: Ma1ko scene & the Invalidation of Abuse Victims

(Triggers Warning: abuse , invalidation of an abuse victim . )

So, I want to talk about something, something that I have seen on ATLA Twitter and it has directly affected me in an emotional way.

This person on Twitter made this tweet:

As you can see, this tweet isn’t a Mai hate-post, it isn’t “Mai slander”, the person that tweeted this was just talking about how they feel towards a certain scene. The most you can say about this tweet is that it has Mai criticism, but I don’t think I do even need to explain that criticism is the same thing as hating.

And these are some of the replies for this tweet:

As you can see, people have been really misinterpreting what the OP had said, and started to make some “takes” because they were trying to defend Mai.

So… there’s a lot to unpack here.

I don’t even need to make a whole essay explaining that Zuko is an abuse victim, because if you watched the show, you know what I’m talking about, and you probably already know about what scene, that all of these tweets, are referring to.

So now let’s start talking: look, I don’t know if most people are aware of this, but abuse victims always have their own way to deal with their trauma, they have triggers as well. And @sokkastyles has already written an analysis about this: How Zuko deals with his traumas & his coping mechanism. I really recommend everyone to read this, it’s an interesting analysis, and shows to us that the way that Zuko deals with his trauma is talking about his trauma, in other words: venting is his coping mechanism. So, in Zuko’s case, it’s really important when he, an abuse victim, is talking about his traumas and experiences, and it’s even more important that the person who’s hearing this doesn’t invalidate what he was just talking about & don’t make jokes about what he have just said. 

But you can go and just say this to me:

“Oh, but you’re being unfair with Mai, how was she supposed to know that this is the way that Zuko deals with his trauma?”

And you’re right, she isn’t supposed to be his therapist, she isn’t supposed to know his coping mechanism, but she, as his partner, as his girlfriend, is supposed to be aware of his triggers and traumas.

And she knows his story, she knows what his father did to him. So, she is aware of his trauma and that what his father did to him is a trigger for him.

Mai: Why would you even want to go? Just think about how things went at the last war meeting you went to.

She is aware of his life story. She isn’t supposed to be his therapist, but she’s supposed to be aware that he was opening himself to her about his trauma, that he was talking about something traumatic and personal to her. And as any empathetic person, not only because she is his partner, she was supposed to be more careful towards him in that moment, she was supposed to offer some emotional support.

And some people who are trying to defend this scene always say that Mai is not supposed to cuddle Zuko. And honestly, what the fuck that’s supposed to mean?

Look, I personally don’t like Mai, but I’m not a Mai hater at all, I don’t think she’s a horrible person, I don’t think she was just a terrible girlfriend and Zuko is her poor boyfriend. I do think she, at some points, tried to be a good girlfriend, tried to cheer him up, as in this moment:

“Mai: I know one thing I care about. I care about you.”

And I do agree that Zuko as well failed with her. One example: in the Beach Episode, at some points, he was being an asshole with her, and him being a jealous boyfriend wasn’t cute at all.

So now, as you can see, I’m not a Mai Hater, who thinks she was a terrible person and blabla, I do think that she tried to be a good girlfriend (I just don’t think she achieved this goal). But my whole point is:

Since when being aware and careful with your partner’s trauma and triggers is cuddling? Since when offering emotional support to an abuser victim is cuddling? Since when offering emotional support to your partner is cuddling/spoiling at all? Y'all be treating abuse victims as shit.

Do you think that a person who is aware of someone’s story, a person who knows that their partner has been through some traumatic experiences is right when they make a joke just after their partner opens about their trauma & talking about how a certain situation is kinda triggering for them (?).

But no, for real, I really want to know if this is the way that some of all treat abuse victims. For real. How do y'all view people who have been through trauma? I’m not gonna talk about what I have been through, but I can say, as someone who has been already a victim of abuse, someone who has traumas and triggers, seeing the way that some of y'all treat abuse victims as shit has completely ended my whole day.

I’m literally talking about all of this because, yes, some of these replies did trigger me. (That’s why this post is a “Personal Vent”). I already had my experiences being invalidated by some people, can you believe that someone has already even made jokes? Yes, that’s right. Jokes. So I’ll be saying: Any jokes you do when an abuser victim is talking about their trauma & experience & triggers are wrong. I didn’t even think I was supposed to say this. I thought that, God, people were already supposed to know that.

And I know that some people will be continuing to defend Mai’s attitude in that scene, and one of these argument is gonna be: 

“Oh my God, but you’re being so unfair with Mai, ok that what she did was wrong but she is as well someone who has coping mechanisms, and hers are being quiet & keeping her thoughts and feelings to herself.”

And guess what? I completely agree with you. Mai is someone who has grown as an only kid, probably alone, she was taught to keep her feelings and thoughts to herself, and that’s why she wasn’t capable to offer the emotional support that Zuko needed. 

And guess what too? The sentences “Mai didn’t offer the emotional support that Zuko needed because she, as well, deals with her own coping mechanism” and “Mai made an insensitive joke at the wrong moment to Zuko, just after he opened himself about his fear and traumatic experience, and this was a form of invalidating his feelings, even if it wasn’t her intentions” can and should co-exist.

So, as you can see, in this whole post I’m just talking about how problematic it’s the way that some Mai stans try to defend this scene. This post has Mai criticism? Yes, but my main point is not to talk about how problematic was the Mai and Zuko scene, my point here is to talk about how problematic is the way that some people have been treating this whole discussion. How problematic is the way that some people are talking about abuse victims, how problematic is the way that they go around and make fun/jokes of this, when this is definitely a delicate topic, a real issue that people in real life struggle with.

So please, be aware of the way you’re talking about an abuse victim and how far you’re going on a discussion just to defend an animated character. Especially when we’re talking about this.

(Read my tags).

[tuesdaywriter]

On My Way to Steal Yo…Seat: Ember Island Players & Zutara Shipbaiting

(Or: The best time for a Zutara Rant™ is all the time.)

Ah, Zutara, the ship of dreams, technically sunk ten years ago but still afloat in countless shipper hearts. The ways in which the creators of AtLA did the fans dirty on this one could be an entire discussion unto itself, but right now I want to focus on a particular episode, which I think suggests that, when it came to the show’s romantic relationships, the showrunners’ priorities were not where they should have been.

That episode is The Ember Island Players. And the trouble all starts with one little comedic moment.

An extremely awkward moment they went out of the way to include.

Before we dive in, let’s take a step back and establish our priorities here. I’m not going to use this post to make claims about secret Zutara subtext, or even argue the merits of Zutara as a ship, really. Conversely, to the extent that I critique Kataang, it’s going to focus strictly on writing choices and leave aside the question of whether Aang and Katara are romantically suited for each other as characters or not. For the purposes of this post, we will take as granted that Kataang was the intended endgame pairing from the beginning, and romantic Zutara was never intended at all, and look at how the showrunners went about handling that.

(under a cut because woah this got long)

The Ember Island Players is an entire episode built around the show parodying itself and its fandom. In such an episode, it would be almost impossible to avoid at least alluding to the ship wars, which for those of you not part of the fandom back then, were absolutely massive. (And encouraged by the show’s promotion - but that’s another story.) Whatever Bryke’s intentions, the Zutara phenomenon had grown so influential that Zuko was perceived by fans as Aang’s main rival for Katara’s affections - in spite of never being presented as such in the show. That’s begging for a joke or two, isn’t it?

So before the parody play even starts, we get the moment in the gif above, a joke which is painfully dragged out by Aang shyly pointing out that he wanted to sit next to Katara, and Zuko’s utter obliviousness as to why. (Katara herself shows no reaction to any of this fumbling - perhaps unintentionally foreshadowing some of the problems to come.) Aang relents, and sits on the other side of Zuko.

In practical terms, there are two things that justify this gag beyond a bit of awkward humor. The first is that subsequent moments in the episode where the characters comment on the play involve both Katara and Zuko interacting with each other, and Zuko and Aang interacting with each other, making it most effective for Zuko to be seated between Katara and Aang for blocking purposes. 

Aang and Katara don’t interact much during the play. More unintentional foreshadowing? You be the judge.

The other reason is that this moment of making a fuss over seating arrangements sets up early on what is actually going to be a significant theme addressed in the episode - the question of whether Zuko is going to figuratively come between Aang and Katara the way he literally does here. And make no mistake, the episode is very concerned with this question.

After a brief spoof of Jetara that gets only a mild reaction of embarrassment from Katara, the first time the play-within-the-show really dives into shipping is its sendup of ridiculous Zutara expectations of the crystal cave scene in The Crossroads of Destiny. Actress!Katara declares the Avatar to be like a little brother, professes her attraction to actor!Zuko, and the two embrace. This is, of course, absurd for these characters at this point in the story, but to be fair, it’s a pretty accurate rendition of the wildest Zutara fandom predictions for the episode. The silliest of enemies-to-lovers tropes have always had their place in Zutara fandom. Capture!fic was very much a thing. Haha, it’s good for us all to laugh at ourselves sometimes. 

Pictured: Artist’s reconstruction of Zutara fan fic c. December 1, 2006

Aang, however, is not laughing. After growing increasingly frustrated with his own portrayal in the play, this scene makes him so angry that he storms out of the theater. It’s clear that, to Aang, this is no joking matter - and that means it’s quickly going to become more serious for the audience as well, as we soon move into what might be the episode’s most controversial scene, and certainly the one that has the largest dramatic impact on the actual narrative of the show. The tone of this scene is a stark contrast to the majority of the light-hearted, self-referential, tongue-in-cheek episode.

When Katara goes to find Aang, he confronts her about what her actress counterpart said, and we finally, after fifty-six episodes, get a scene where Aang and Katara directly talk about their relationship. This is a big moment, not just because it’s a weighty scene in the middle of a fluff episode, but also because it’s a huge opportunity to push forward the relationship that, remember, we’re accepting as intended endgame all along. The writers know Aang and Katara are going to end up together. They’ve known it for years. After playing coy about Katara’s feelings for nearly three full seasons, they must have been dying to get to this moment. 

This isn’t a shy kiss-or-die scenario. (Let it never be said that Zutara has the monopoly on silly tropes.) This isn’t a heat of the moment, one-sided pre-battle kiss that will be ignored later because of more pressing concerns. This is the chance for these characters to have a frank conversation about where they stand and what the nature of their relationship should be.

Spoiler Alert: It doesn’t go well.

Obviously we can’t have any actual Kataang resolution in this episode - we have to save that for the finale. Fair enough. So what do we do instead? We muddy the waters a bit more, make things even more complicated to resolve in the four episodes we have left, after giving this relationship little to no serious development in the previous fifty-six episodes.

Katara dismisses what her actress counterpart said in the play, but admits she’s confused about her own feelings. When Aang tries to kiss her again, she’s upset by it and storms away. This is the first and last time we ever see Katara address the possibility of her romantic feelings for Aang, until they kiss in the final seconds of the very last episode, her confusion apparently resolved off-screen.

Zuko isn’t mentioned in this scene, but from the perspective of showrunners trying to set up Kataang and unexpectedly confronting a popular rival ship they never intended, in the context of the previous scenes discussed above, this having Katara be dismissive of the play’s portrayal of her also seems like a pretty clear dismissal of Zutara. In fact, arguably this scene is a better casual dismissal of Zutara than it is a setup of the last-minute Kataang endgame.

And then, when the gaang returns to the theater for the final act of the play with the seating arrangements now reshuffled, we get one last awkward reaction shot of Aang and Katara when their stage counterparts declare their platonic affection for each other. And look who’s also in the frame for some reason.

Since they’ve all left the theater and come back, Zuko doesn’t need to be sitting next to Katara at this point. 

So the overall effect of the “shipping” subplot of this episode comes across as the writers assuring us that Zutara is silly, and that in spite of fandom expectations Zuko is not a romantic rival for Aang, while at the same time maintaining enough ambiguity between Katara and Aang so as not to preempt the resolution of them getting together in the finale.

What’s bizarre about it is…they didn’t actually have to do any of that? Within the world of the show, nobody had ever raised the possibility of Zuko and Katara being romantically involved prior to this episode. If it was never going to happen, it wasn’t something that needed to be addressed. Instead of taking this opportunity to give us reasons why Katara is going to get together with Aang - perhaps the review of their past adventures helps her clarify some of her own feelings, while still leaving her reservations about the timing? - this subplot seems more interested in trying to tell us that she’s not going to get together with Zuko. 

This is writing to the fandom, rather than writing to the narrative. From a storytelling perspective, it’s a waste of time. If the Zuko/Katara/Aang triangle is just a product of silly fans and doesn’t actually exist in the show, then there’s no need to make such a big deal of it. Rather than a throwaway gag, the seating shenanigans and dramatic weight given to Aang’s insecurities make the on-stage Zutara romance a central feature of the episode. There was no reason this had to be the case. 

So why was it?

Welcome to the realm of speculation.

One possibillity is that the writers of this episode (or Bryke themselves, directing them) simply got carried away with spoofing the fandom and lost sight of the actual narrative work they should have been doing. This is a case of bad priorities and poor judgement, but it’s fairly innocent.

The other possibility, and the less innocent one, is that it was deliberate shipbaiting. The shipping subplot seems meant to dismiss the possibility of Zutara in hindsight, working under the assumption that Kataang was always intended and Zutara never was - but it obviously wasn’t read that way by Zutara fandom at the time. With Zuko and Katara’s dramatic reconciliation in The Southern Raiders coming immediately prior to this episode, now the question of romantic Zutara is introduced and Katara’s feelings for Aang are less clear than Kataang shippers had assumed? Sounds pretty promising for Zutara when you look at it that way.

Was this actually intentional? As mentioned earlier, promotional material for the show did outright encourage the idea of the love triangle, even though the show itself hadn’t before. If the idea of this subplot wasn’t explicitly to give Zutara shippers false hope and set them up for disappointment, it may yet have been the last effort to throw kerosene on the fire of the ship wars before the show’s finale. 

It’s hard to believe that fan reactions wouldn’t have been considered when writing such a metatextual episode that engaged with the fandom so directly, but I do hate to assign malice as a motive where incompetence is a suitable explanation, so let’s assume that if this was the case, Bryke thought it was all in good fun. It still reflects poor judgement and priorities, because egging on drama among your fans shouldn’t be more important than developing the narrative you’re actually trying to tell.

So whatever the reasoning, in this episode, on the eve of the show’s finale, it seems that dissing Zutara was more important than developing Kataang.

YMMV on whether this is better or worse than the finale itself, where developing Zutara was more important than developing Kataang.

[tuesdaywriter]

some very important info re: paid accounts~

I am not a lawyer, but I can decently interpret legalese and, being as I also suffer from tl;dr syndrome and assume others may as well, I took one for the team and went through the updated TOS for the post+ accounts and highlighted (what I understand to be) the most pertinent information, which ultimately comes down to this:

You cannot monetize copyrighted works (aka charge and earn money from fanfic, fanworks, etc) and if you do decide to put your fanworks behind a paywall via Tumblr, when you are inevitably sued, Tumblr will not protect you and will not defend you and you alone, personally, will be responsible for whatever monetary damages said lawsuit results in.

If anyone is a lawyer and knows I've gotten any of this wrong, please do not hesitate to correct me/this post.

Screenshots taken from Tumblr's TOS (updated 7-21-21), Stripe's Account Agreement, and the post+ FAQs.

1. Your paid account will not be hosted by tumblr; it is routed through a 3rd party.

2. By signing up for a paid account, you're entering into an agreement with Stripe, so in addition to Tumblr's TOS, you are also bound to Stripe's TOS.

3. Stripe, like Tumblr, will not defend you or protect you against any lawsuits.

4. Furthermore, you may end up owing Stripe money (indemnify = compensate)

5. Tumblr's TOS specifically states that you can't put any content on your post+ account that violates any laws, including laws that protect intellectual property rights of others. This is super important, because Tumblr's post+ FAQ also states that you can post anything that you would regularly post on tumblr, which I'm sure many will take to mean that gifsets, fanworks, etc are fair game, since all of that stuff can be posted on tumblr now. However, the difference is, you're not making money from the fanworks you're posting or reblogging now. Once money enters the equation, the game changes.

Tumblr is making it seem like any and all content goes for post+ accounts, knowing 90% of this site is fanworks. This is not true and you'll be opening yourself up for lawsuits if you charge for fanworks.

6. Tumblr further disclaims any and all liability in any legal issues.

tl;dr: Please do not make a post+ account, bc you will be opening yourself to lawsuits and if that happens, Tumblr's response will be not our problem, you agreed to all the terms which said you couldn't do that, sorry not sorry. Please protect yourself.

[tuesdaywriter]

Who's gonna tell her 😞