LEGEND OF KORRA S01E01
Jun. 30th, 2012 10:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lyswatchesI'm doing these based on my reactions as I watch the episodes, so the episode commentary may seem a little disjointed. After I finish the first season, I'll collect this into something more structured. Until then, this is just pure gut reaction and meta.
BOOK ONE, AIR: CHAPTER ONE, REPUBLIC CITY
Another flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance. ― Kurt Vonnegut
The series begins with a voice-over by airbender Tenzin, who is a son of Aang, the Avatar from the original A:TLA series, and Tenzin goes on to describe what Aang had told him before Aang's death (prior to the Korra series): Avatar Aang and Firelord Zuko transformed the Fire Nation's colonies into the United Republic of Nations. A society, Tenzin states, where benders and non-benders from all over the world could live together in peace and harmony. I take note of this, because we quickly discover that all is not so well anymore in this society which is trying to be as utopian as possible. It seems likely that it never came as close as Tenzin perhaps believes.
The capitol of the United Republic of Nations, we are told, is Republic City. I am going to guess that the majority of the action of the series, rather than spreading across four nations and the whole of the world, will take place in this city.
We're treated to a sight of the city, and we quickly learn that technology is reasonably advanced within the time between the two series. Reasonably, because a lot of the tech we see - steam engines and so-forth - had rudimentary beginnings among the Earth and Fire people even in the previous series. It isn't jarring because it's, honestly, a logical conclusion.
Korra's first line in the series is: "I'm the Avatar, you gotta deal with it."
Which I'm taking as a narrative warning that Korra is the Avatar, and throughout the first season, she's going to have to deal with it. Why should she be the only one absolved?
Very, very quickly the series begins a pattern of other characters damning Korra through faint praise, except gran-gran Katara, who in her old age has apparently become zen as hell.
DAMNED BY FAINT PRAISE
Already the music composed for the series is very promising - it's very emotionally-driven, even more than the music of A:TLA. Excellent use is made of a variety of different instruments to counter-point the emotion of a scene, and the tracks use swells in both music and general volume to their advantage. It's more reminiscent of a movie soundtrack than one for TV to me, but more on that later.
Something I note pretty immediately about Korra's bending in comparison to Aang's: Korra is more martial. Aang used his body as well, when he was bending, but he was essentially an airbender from the beginning, and he chiefly used his body to redirect blows.
Korra uses her body to add physical blows to her repertoire, and as oppossed to most often redirecting, she simply blocks blows. The series addresses this very quickly, and makes a point of it toward the end of the premiere episodes. The results are pretty satisfying.
I won't say that she's the opposite of Aang ... even though I almost feel like the series wants me to think this. They emphasize that she is more comfortable with the physical side of bending and mostly ignores the spiritual side. Even for Aang, at about the same stage of character development as Korra is at at the beginning here even for her older age, bending was never totally a sagely pursuit. He definitely wanted to use it to win fights as non-violently as possible and, especially, to play -- physically. It's more the approach that the two Avatars have to LIFE IN GENERAL that seems to distinguish the two. One thing they have in common: they both want freedom from restraints in many forms. They were both, tellingly, raised in fairly strong isolation (for slightly different reasons).
Another thing you notice very quickly? For better or worse, nobody trusts Korra. Not even necessarily her honesty, but they just don't trust her to take care of herself or to make the right decions and, well, ouch. Sucks to be Korra.
Rather than, with Aang's closest individuals having such high expectations that it's nearly impossible to meet them even when trying, Korra's closest individuals for the most part at this point in her life have such low expectations that there's no reason to try particularly hard to exceed them. And we're not talking about bending here, necessarily.
Meanwhile, the writers troll the fandom: "Gran-gran, I've been reading all about your old adventures. I've been dying to ask you: what happened to Zuko's mom?"
What we are basically being told so far is that Korra's life is a string of mild disappointments. Yet she, like Aang, for the most part manages to remain fairly optimistic about things despite this.
WE'RE STUCK WITH EACH OTHER.
"I don't think keeping me locked up in this compound like a prisoner is what [Aang] had in mind," Korra says.
When Korra goes to leave the pole to travel to Republic City, her parents tell her that they love her, but Katara says "Goodbye, Korra." And I have to wonder if this is a throwaway line or if this will have any significance for their characters. It seems heavier than some of the other dialogue, but it could just be me.
Let me just say while I'm noticing it again that the art in this series is absolutely beautiful without relying on too many modern rendering gimmicks. It is intensely visually appealing, and quite a bit more atmospheric than its predecessor, although Avatar itself certainly played with art style and color with regard to creating atmosphere.
I CALL THIS HER NARUTO SMILE, SHE IS SUCH A PROTAGONIST
We're treated to a pretty long sequence of Korra adjusting to the fact that Republic City works because Republic City has well, rules - and like the machines that help to build it, rules are what keep it running smoothly. Korra doesn't like rules much though she tries to follow them, usually, but more importantly, she's totally foreign to these rules. Korra doesn't understand city life, the City doesn't understand Korra (probably because Korra seems to just like to watch shit get destroyed), and given the message of balance, this is interesting. Also notable, apparently the cops in the city are metalbenders and, more importantly, apparently at Metalbending Cop Academy, everyone is given a script to follow when they graduate. The results are this hilarious transplant of tropes from an entirely unrelated genre into this genre and I get the feeling the writers are going to play with this sort of thing a lot.
During Korra's little introductory romp, something pretty sinister happens. It's played for laughs - but make no mistake, this is not a funny revelation. We're introduced to the Equalists. The Equalists believe that non-benders are being oppressed by benders. Korra thinks that the Equalists are oppressing themselves, and that bending is "the coolest thing in the universe."
Which, fair point, Korra.
DR. DOOM WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN REPUBLIC CITY?
More on the soundtrack: it is weird. Not in a bad way. In a good way. I mentioned that it seemed more suited to a movie, and it does, but it also has this bizarre quality for it that just ... works. Korra has this melancholy leitmotif - I think it's an erhu? - that is both a little 'country' and a little haunting, and they combine this with the almost masculine tribal roughness of the previous soundtrack and then they add something. And this something is so unexpected. They add swing and slightly discordant jazz improv over top of these more familiar drums and woodwinds and 'Avatar' sounds and the result is so energetic and just this treat for the ears.
Because this series is stressing that one word above the others: balance. It tells me that the remaining episodes are going to be about that balance, and about power struggles, between groups and individuals. While Avatar's larger story focused on the struggle to overcome, Korra as a series seems to to be focusing on showing us the struggle to maintain. Maybe that's even more important.
IS IT HOT IN HERE OR IS IT JUST MY WEIRD CRUSH?
In summary: Can I please gay marry Lin Bei Fong?
More on all of this when I go over the second episode of the premiere, and also hopefully some examinations of the individuals when I get the chance to talk about them individually, because I have stuff to say about Tenzin and Bolin. A lot of stuff.
BOOK ONE, AIR: CHAPTER ONE, REPUBLIC CITY
Another flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance. ― Kurt Vonnegut
The series begins with a voice-over by airbender Tenzin, who is a son of Aang, the Avatar from the original A:TLA series, and Tenzin goes on to describe what Aang had told him before Aang's death (prior to the Korra series): Avatar Aang and Firelord Zuko transformed the Fire Nation's colonies into the United Republic of Nations. A society, Tenzin states, where benders and non-benders from all over the world could live together in peace and harmony. I take note of this, because we quickly discover that all is not so well anymore in this society which is trying to be as utopian as possible. It seems likely that it never came as close as Tenzin perhaps believes.
The capitol of the United Republic of Nations, we are told, is Republic City. I am going to guess that the majority of the action of the series, rather than spreading across four nations and the whole of the world, will take place in this city.
We're treated to a sight of the city, and we quickly learn that technology is reasonably advanced within the time between the two series. Reasonably, because a lot of the tech we see - steam engines and so-forth - had rudimentary beginnings among the Earth and Fire people even in the previous series. It isn't jarring because it's, honestly, a logical conclusion.
Korra's first line in the series is: "I'm the Avatar, you gotta deal with it."
Which I'm taking as a narrative warning that Korra is the Avatar, and throughout the first season, she's going to have to deal with it. Why should she be the only one absolved?
Very, very quickly the series begins a pattern of other characters damning Korra through faint praise, except gran-gran Katara, who in her old age has apparently become zen as hell.
DAMNED BY FAINT PRAISE
Already the music composed for the series is very promising - it's very emotionally-driven, even more than the music of A:TLA. Excellent use is made of a variety of different instruments to counter-point the emotion of a scene, and the tracks use swells in both music and general volume to their advantage. It's more reminiscent of a movie soundtrack than one for TV to me, but more on that later.
Something I note pretty immediately about Korra's bending in comparison to Aang's: Korra is more martial. Aang used his body as well, when he was bending, but he was essentially an airbender from the beginning, and he chiefly used his body to redirect blows.
Korra uses her body to add physical blows to her repertoire, and as oppossed to most often redirecting, she simply blocks blows. The series addresses this very quickly, and makes a point of it toward the end of the premiere episodes. The results are pretty satisfying.
I won't say that she's the opposite of Aang ... even though I almost feel like the series wants me to think this. They emphasize that she is more comfortable with the physical side of bending and mostly ignores the spiritual side. Even for Aang, at about the same stage of character development as Korra is at at the beginning here even for her older age, bending was never totally a sagely pursuit. He definitely wanted to use it to win fights as non-violently as possible and, especially, to play -- physically. It's more the approach that the two Avatars have to LIFE IN GENERAL that seems to distinguish the two. One thing they have in common: they both want freedom from restraints in many forms. They were both, tellingly, raised in fairly strong isolation (for slightly different reasons).
Another thing you notice very quickly? For better or worse, nobody trusts Korra. Not even necessarily her honesty, but they just don't trust her to take care of herself or to make the right decions and, well, ouch. Sucks to be Korra.
Rather than, with Aang's closest individuals having such high expectations that it's nearly impossible to meet them even when trying, Korra's closest individuals for the most part at this point in her life have such low expectations that there's no reason to try particularly hard to exceed them. And we're not talking about bending here, necessarily.
Meanwhile, the writers troll the fandom: "Gran-gran, I've been reading all about your old adventures. I've been dying to ask you: what happened to Zuko's mom?"
What we are basically being told so far is that Korra's life is a string of mild disappointments. Yet she, like Aang, for the most part manages to remain fairly optimistic about things despite this.
WE'RE STUCK WITH EACH OTHER.
"I don't think keeping me locked up in this compound like a prisoner is what [Aang] had in mind," Korra says.
When Korra goes to leave the pole to travel to Republic City, her parents tell her that they love her, but Katara says "Goodbye, Korra." And I have to wonder if this is a throwaway line or if this will have any significance for their characters. It seems heavier than some of the other dialogue, but it could just be me.
Let me just say while I'm noticing it again that the art in this series is absolutely beautiful without relying on too many modern rendering gimmicks. It is intensely visually appealing, and quite a bit more atmospheric than its predecessor, although Avatar itself certainly played with art style and color with regard to creating atmosphere.
I CALL THIS HER NARUTO SMILE, SHE IS SUCH A PROTAGONIST
We're treated to a pretty long sequence of Korra adjusting to the fact that Republic City works because Republic City has well, rules - and like the machines that help to build it, rules are what keep it running smoothly. Korra doesn't like rules much though she tries to follow them, usually, but more importantly, she's totally foreign to these rules. Korra doesn't understand city life, the City doesn't understand Korra (probably because Korra seems to just like to watch shit get destroyed), and given the message of balance, this is interesting. Also notable, apparently the cops in the city are metalbenders and, more importantly, apparently at Metalbending Cop Academy, everyone is given a script to follow when they graduate. The results are this hilarious transplant of tropes from an entirely unrelated genre into this genre and I get the feeling the writers are going to play with this sort of thing a lot.
During Korra's little introductory romp, something pretty sinister happens. It's played for laughs - but make no mistake, this is not a funny revelation. We're introduced to the Equalists. The Equalists believe that non-benders are being oppressed by benders. Korra thinks that the Equalists are oppressing themselves, and that bending is "the coolest thing in the universe."
Which, fair point, Korra.
DR. DOOM WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN REPUBLIC CITY?
More on the soundtrack: it is weird. Not in a bad way. In a good way. I mentioned that it seemed more suited to a movie, and it does, but it also has this bizarre quality for it that just ... works. Korra has this melancholy leitmotif - I think it's an erhu? - that is both a little 'country' and a little haunting, and they combine this with the almost masculine tribal roughness of the previous soundtrack and then they add something. And this something is so unexpected. They add swing and slightly discordant jazz improv over top of these more familiar drums and woodwinds and 'Avatar' sounds and the result is so energetic and just this treat for the ears.
Because this series is stressing that one word above the others: balance. It tells me that the remaining episodes are going to be about that balance, and about power struggles, between groups and individuals. While Avatar's larger story focused on the struggle to overcome, Korra as a series seems to to be focusing on showing us the struggle to maintain. Maybe that's even more important.
IS IT HOT IN HERE OR IS IT JUST MY WEIRD CRUSH?
In summary: Can I please gay marry Lin Bei Fong?
More on all of this when I go over the second episode of the premiere, and also hopefully some examinations of the individuals when I get the chance to talk about them individually, because I have stuff to say about Tenzin and Bolin. A lot of stuff.
no subject
Date: 2012-07-01 02:34 am (UTC)I wish I had more to offer but I'm just tempted to go +1 to all of the above.
no subject
Date: 2012-07-01 02:37 am (UTC)THIS IS A CARTOON WITH IMPORTANT SHIT TO SUGGEST