TV (but I guess mostly Korra)
Jun. 23rd, 2012 07:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
newnumber6So, the Legend of Korra's first season is over, and... well, I did like it, and there is a lot to like. (oh, and behind every cut there will be many significant spoilers... you probably shouldn't read if you haven't seen the whole season).
But there's a lot of flaws too. Pacing is uneven, and most of the characters never really shone through. I didn't really root any particular way for the romance because the characters never got much development.
I think the problem is the shorter season. The creators claim that this is their decision, they want it this way, to tell a "leaner" story, but... it just doesn't work as well. There were far too many characters and plotlines to juggle, and a lot of balls got dropped. It was good, but it could have been great.
I mean, the Equalists could have been an extremely nuanced group, because theoretically, they do have a point, but instead, with the exception of one episode where Tarrlok goes all super-anti-nonbender, they're all just one huge group who seem to hate benders equally.
Imagine if, say, there was an episode where Korra tries to take some of the fire out of the Equalist platforms by tackling some of their concerns head on - the abuse of nonbenders by benders. She tries to take on the Triads, only to find that puts Mako and Bolin at risk. Or she gets involved in a civil dispute between a bender and non-bender, only to find that the bender's politically connected.
Or maybe if we meet an equalist character who's actually sympathetic and unsure about the 'remove all bending forcefully' part of the platform (although he's okay with doing it with criminals), and maybe even changes his mind due to the events of the episode. Or follow around a debended person (like Tahno) who has trouble getting work because he spent his whole life refining his bending while the nonbenders practiced other skills they could make a living on (and Equalist sympathizers dislike him and won't hire him for menial jobs just because he USED to be a bender). For all Amon's claims, he's not equal, he's WORSE off than nonbenders.
Or if they had an adventure where they met the crazy homeless guy and his undercity in advance (aside from Korra's brief meeting in the pilot), setting up Korra and her friends staying with him later?
Or if Asami had a crisis of faith where she thought about maybe joining the Equalists (I'd want it to be the same final result, or maybe it was all a ruse to begin with to get information on Amon's plans).
These wouldn't all be episodes on their own, of course, but they could all be elements in episodes and give the whole conflict a much richer texture. But we didn't have time for any of that, because we were all focused on plot plot plot, and what little time wasn't devoted to plot was mostly either pro-bending or romance (which didn't work so well because, again, the characters didn't get enough development time before they were shoved into romantic roles)
Let's break it down (this is for the whole season)...
Things I really liked:
Amon, despite being a masked figure, NOT being anybody connected to the Avatar state or the old gang, or somebody we already knew in disguise. I would have preferred they went one furthur and not have him be Tarrlok's brother, but this is the next best thing.
Amon and Tarrlok's final scene.
Lin... I didn't think I was going to like her this much. I mean, I figured I'd like her, but not this much. The real star of the series so far.
Asami NOT turning to the Equalists because of the romantic difficulties (or having been a secret Equalist all along)
Tarrlok turning out to be a bloodbender earlier in the series was an awesome moment.
The animation, overall, music was also pretty when I did notice it, and a lot of great action sequences.
Things I didn't like so much:
Pacing as discussed before
Tarrlok turning out to be a bloodbender, and then being exposed in front of everybody next episode (probably also a pacing issue)
Too many things wrapped up at the end
Too many 'just because' things: Korra losing her bending but getting airbending, the return of bending abilities, Korra and Mako's love for each other (they didn't feel like they really connected, they felt like the writer decided they were in love).
Too much pro-bending... but just barely. This is another thing that would have been fine if they'd had more episodes to develop the characters. It felt like almost all of the 'flufftime' was devoted to Pro-Bending, and that's the wrong kind of fluff, because, mostly, it doesn't really develop the characters.
The flashback to Aang's time. I don't know, I would have liked a little more, especially given all the buildup we got to it. All it turned out to be was basically three scenes all about the same guy: Yakone. And I'd have loved to see young Tenzin and Lin.
Everybody getting their bending back. As much as I would have wanted to have Lin back to normal, I think the show would have been better without the magic cure. Maybe make it so they could GET their bending back, but it took a lot of work. Maybe with Korra too. Like with Magneto at the end of the X-Men 3 travesty... lost his powers, but a little hint that it wasn't complete. Maybe Aang, instead of just curing her, telling her that bending is like a muscle, and she still has the SKILL but not the strength... that will have to be built up (except when she's in the Avatar state). She could explain this to Lin, who tried and makes a pebble move or something. But I worry that now that she's a fully trained avatar WITH access to the Avatar state at will (at least, so it seems), she'll be too powerful for the show to pull off threats realistically. There was a problem already with this, lots of the people they faced could have been more easily dealt with if the benders thought about what they were doing
Dante Basco's voice for Iroh being exactly the same as Zuko. I loved having him back, but I just didn't think it fit the new CHARACTER. Possibly because of his look, he had the look of someone who had a deeper, more authoritative voice. If he was a more slightly built character it might have been better.
The romance feeling a bit flat,probably because of the characters not getting as much development.
Asami's father suddenly going all murderous towards her.
Things I hope for Season 2:
More fluff, but we're getting only two extra episodes, and the creators are standing by their "WE DON'T LIKE FLUFF OR FUN WE WANT ALL PLOT" line.
Mako and Korra break up, deciding it just can't work. Why? Because it'd be realistic, despite being rare on cartoons... not all first loves succeed, no matter how strongly you feel them at the time. Probably not going to happen.
A few different/better characters. I don't think Mako and Bolin worked out like intended, they COULD get better, but I'm still waiting for a character like Toph in Avatar who really makes the team dynamic sing. If you have to keep them (and you probably will), maybe push Tenzin and his family to the background more: they won't be needed as much if Korra knows Airbending. Not gone altogether, mind you, just busy most of the time with raising a new baby and things like that.
More flashbacks to the previous series characters, or Tenzin/Lin's earlier relationship. (I kinda wanted Pema to die in childbirth so that Tenzin/Lin could get back together. Is that wrong?)
Bolin training to be a cop with Lin.
More writers: Every episode was written by the same two people. And that can be okay, if you're great writers, but a lot of times, having more voices makes you more aware of your own blind spots. Maybe YOU think that these characters are being developed beautifully, but outsiders see that they're not. And also, maybe you, privately, find you don't care as much for one particular character, but another writer might really dig them and give them a chance to shine. The original Avatar benefitted from a larger writing team, and I think this one would as well.
It just overall being better.
On to other shows...
Game Of Thrones: Finished up for the season. Really good, although not quite as good as last year. Still liking Tyrion and Arya the most, but Sansa's storyline really surprised me and made me feel a lot for her. Can't wait for next year.
Falling Skies: Just the first two episodes of the new season. Still enjoy it, but still have the same weaknesses as before: the aliens are about as incompetent as the plot requires. (Really, they're super-advanced aliens but can't track the movement or locations of huge numbers of hidden humans except by heat signatures of active vehicles?)
Continuum: Still sort of on the fence on this one. At the very least, they avoided one of the obvious mistake paths I thought they were going to take (her initial fake story lasting far longer than it should have), but I'm still a little unsure about the political... tone of it. (some spoilers)
They seem to be dancing around with the idea of the badguys being "people with laudable ideals but who are ruthless in getting them done", but they seem to be hitting their brutality a little hard, and the "rah rah protesters are bad, pro-authority peple are good" vibe is a little disturbing (especially with the tech-geek kid's stepfather being involved in some sort of anti-corporation movement himself). They do have moments where they seem to be playing up the complexity (like when Master Bre'tac's discussion group about the evils of corporations was busted up by cops even though they hadn't done anything violent), but... well, I'd like to see more nuance in their actions in the present day. They seem to kill far too freely even when they don't have to and don't seem to be trying to do anything actually GOOD. I don't know, it still could work, but I just have some worries.
House: Disappointing series finale. I choose to believe (spoilers)that House did die, and Wilson is just hallucinating him with his brain tumor like House kept hallucinating Amber and Kutner and such.
But there's a lot of flaws too. Pacing is uneven, and most of the characters never really shone through. I didn't really root any particular way for the romance because the characters never got much development.
I think the problem is the shorter season. The creators claim that this is their decision, they want it this way, to tell a "leaner" story, but... it just doesn't work as well. There were far too many characters and plotlines to juggle, and a lot of balls got dropped. It was good, but it could have been great.
I mean, the Equalists could have been an extremely nuanced group, because theoretically, they do have a point, but instead, with the exception of one episode where Tarrlok goes all super-anti-nonbender, they're all just one huge group who seem to hate benders equally.
Imagine if, say, there was an episode where Korra tries to take some of the fire out of the Equalist platforms by tackling some of their concerns head on - the abuse of nonbenders by benders. She tries to take on the Triads, only to find that puts Mako and Bolin at risk. Or she gets involved in a civil dispute between a bender and non-bender, only to find that the bender's politically connected.
Or maybe if we meet an equalist character who's actually sympathetic and unsure about the 'remove all bending forcefully' part of the platform (although he's okay with doing it with criminals), and maybe even changes his mind due to the events of the episode. Or follow around a debended person (like Tahno) who has trouble getting work because he spent his whole life refining his bending while the nonbenders practiced other skills they could make a living on (and Equalist sympathizers dislike him and won't hire him for menial jobs just because he USED to be a bender). For all Amon's claims, he's not equal, he's WORSE off than nonbenders.
Or if they had an adventure where they met the crazy homeless guy and his undercity in advance (aside from Korra's brief meeting in the pilot), setting up Korra and her friends staying with him later?
Or if Asami had a crisis of faith where she thought about maybe joining the Equalists (I'd want it to be the same final result, or maybe it was all a ruse to begin with to get information on Amon's plans).
These wouldn't all be episodes on their own, of course, but they could all be elements in episodes and give the whole conflict a much richer texture. But we didn't have time for any of that, because we were all focused on plot plot plot, and what little time wasn't devoted to plot was mostly either pro-bending or romance (which didn't work so well because, again, the characters didn't get enough development time before they were shoved into romantic roles)
Let's break it down (this is for the whole season)...
Things I really liked:
Amon, despite being a masked figure, NOT being anybody connected to the Avatar state or the old gang, or somebody we already knew in disguise. I would have preferred they went one furthur and not have him be Tarrlok's brother, but this is the next best thing.
Amon and Tarrlok's final scene.
Lin... I didn't think I was going to like her this much. I mean, I figured I'd like her, but not this much. The real star of the series so far.
Asami NOT turning to the Equalists because of the romantic difficulties (or having been a secret Equalist all along)
Tarrlok turning out to be a bloodbender earlier in the series was an awesome moment.
The animation, overall, music was also pretty when I did notice it, and a lot of great action sequences.
Things I didn't like so much:
Pacing as discussed before
Tarrlok turning out to be a bloodbender, and then being exposed in front of everybody next episode (probably also a pacing issue)
Too many things wrapped up at the end
Too many 'just because' things: Korra losing her bending but getting airbending, the return of bending abilities, Korra and Mako's love for each other (they didn't feel like they really connected, they felt like the writer decided they were in love).
Too much pro-bending... but just barely. This is another thing that would have been fine if they'd had more episodes to develop the characters. It felt like almost all of the 'flufftime' was devoted to Pro-Bending, and that's the wrong kind of fluff, because, mostly, it doesn't really develop the characters.
The flashback to Aang's time. I don't know, I would have liked a little more, especially given all the buildup we got to it. All it turned out to be was basically three scenes all about the same guy: Yakone. And I'd have loved to see young Tenzin and Lin.
Everybody getting their bending back. As much as I would have wanted to have Lin back to normal, I think the show would have been better without the magic cure. Maybe make it so they could GET their bending back, but it took a lot of work. Maybe with Korra too. Like with Magneto at the end of the X-Men 3 travesty... lost his powers, but a little hint that it wasn't complete. Maybe Aang, instead of just curing her, telling her that bending is like a muscle, and she still has the SKILL but not the strength... that will have to be built up (except when she's in the Avatar state). She could explain this to Lin, who tried and makes a pebble move or something. But I worry that now that she's a fully trained avatar WITH access to the Avatar state at will (at least, so it seems), she'll be too powerful for the show to pull off threats realistically. There was a problem already with this, lots of the people they faced could have been more easily dealt with if the benders thought about what they were doing
Dante Basco's voice for Iroh being exactly the same as Zuko. I loved having him back, but I just didn't think it fit the new CHARACTER. Possibly because of his look, he had the look of someone who had a deeper, more authoritative voice. If he was a more slightly built character it might have been better.
The romance feeling a bit flat,probably because of the characters not getting as much development.
Asami's father suddenly going all murderous towards her.
Things I hope for Season 2:
More fluff, but we're getting only two extra episodes, and the creators are standing by their "WE DON'T LIKE FLUFF OR FUN WE WANT ALL PLOT" line.
Mako and Korra break up, deciding it just can't work. Why? Because it'd be realistic, despite being rare on cartoons... not all first loves succeed, no matter how strongly you feel them at the time. Probably not going to happen.
A few different/better characters. I don't think Mako and Bolin worked out like intended, they COULD get better, but I'm still waiting for a character like Toph in Avatar who really makes the team dynamic sing. If you have to keep them (and you probably will), maybe push Tenzin and his family to the background more: they won't be needed as much if Korra knows Airbending. Not gone altogether, mind you, just busy most of the time with raising a new baby and things like that.
More flashbacks to the previous series characters, or Tenzin/Lin's earlier relationship. (I kinda wanted Pema to die in childbirth so that Tenzin/Lin could get back together. Is that wrong?)
Bolin training to be a cop with Lin.
More writers: Every episode was written by the same two people. And that can be okay, if you're great writers, but a lot of times, having more voices makes you more aware of your own blind spots. Maybe YOU think that these characters are being developed beautifully, but outsiders see that they're not. And also, maybe you, privately, find you don't care as much for one particular character, but another writer might really dig them and give them a chance to shine. The original Avatar benefitted from a larger writing team, and I think this one would as well.
It just overall being better.
On to other shows...
Game Of Thrones: Finished up for the season. Really good, although not quite as good as last year. Still liking Tyrion and Arya the most, but Sansa's storyline really surprised me and made me feel a lot for her. Can't wait for next year.
Falling Skies: Just the first two episodes of the new season. Still enjoy it, but still have the same weaknesses as before: the aliens are about as incompetent as the plot requires. (Really, they're super-advanced aliens but can't track the movement or locations of huge numbers of hidden humans except by heat signatures of active vehicles?)
Continuum: Still sort of on the fence on this one. At the very least, they avoided one of the obvious mistake paths I thought they were going to take (her initial fake story lasting far longer than it should have), but I'm still a little unsure about the political... tone of it. (some spoilers)
They seem to be dancing around with the idea of the badguys being "people with laudable ideals but who are ruthless in getting them done", but they seem to be hitting their brutality a little hard, and the "rah rah protesters are bad, pro-authority peple are good" vibe is a little disturbing (especially with the tech-geek kid's stepfather being involved in some sort of anti-corporation movement himself). They do have moments where they seem to be playing up the complexity (like when Master Bre'tac's discussion group about the evils of corporations was busted up by cops even though they hadn't done anything violent), but... well, I'd like to see more nuance in their actions in the present day. They seem to kill far too freely even when they don't have to and don't seem to be trying to do anything actually GOOD. I don't know, it still could work, but I just have some worries.
House: Disappointing series finale. I choose to believe (spoilers)that House did die, and Wilson is just hallucinating him with his brain tumor like House kept hallucinating Amber and Kutner and such.
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Date: 2012-06-23 11:50 pm (UTC)