I don’t like Avatar, which is kind of crazy to say considering I grew up with. By the time that Avatar aired on TV I was already pretty much exclusively watching anime. If I watched western cartoons at all, it was only because at the time anime wasn’t a mainstay on American TV.
So when Avatar premiered I watched the first season of it, realized it wasn’t as good as Naruto, and then ignored it going forward. I watched a handful of episodes throughout book two, and then never even glanced at book 3. The series had failed to grab my attention because I had already discovered far better series from far better studios.
However, for whatever reason (Probably nothing more than Avatar being shown on daytime American TV) Avatar became this huge cultural phenomenon and is this extremely well regarded property from our generation. It’s shocking to me how many people proudly declare this to be their favorite thing ever- when I myself had moved on from Naruto years ago.
To me it felt like an issue with arrested development- similar to the disney adult phenomenon where grown people cannot accept that the media they grew up consuming is not the greatest thing in the world. It is insane to me how after two failed live action adaptions, an awful comic series, and an awful direct sequel series that there is still hype and excitement for this franchise.
It really is this generation’s Star Wars, where people will just blindly consume whatever slop is put in front of them as long as it’s branded ‘Avatar.’ Even today, you still see people trying to defend Korra as a character in spite of how universally disliked she is among viewers. It is downright absurd.
I’ve gone at length several times at how Star Wars fans refuse to admit that the 90’s EU and the Prequels are bad movies, but Avatar fans to a certain extent are even worse. For a Star Wars fan it’s very easy to just ignore content you don’t like, but Avatar in comparison has people constantly bringing up things that happened in the comics that contradicted the original show. Instead of just acknowledging that none of that is canon, you have people arguing over it.
And it’s about to pop off again in a big way. They are now producing a THIRD Avatar series, taking place in the post apocalyptic hellscape that Korra created by being such an awful Avatar. Right now fanboys are foaming at the mouth, ready to defend this series to the death from anyone that will dare criticize it.
Keep in mind it has not premiered YET, and we’re already seeing people run damage control for Korra and the writers for what they’re probably going to do. I fully expect this series will try really hard to re-contextualize Korra as a great Avatar, and directly respond to fan criticism about the actions of the character.
But the real issue here is that the creators have proven that they cannot create a good show. They are not capable of it. The series, in my mind, has never been good throughout its entire run, but most fans agree it peaked in the original series. You may see some Korra glazers who insist Korra is better, but usually those are the sort of people who will eat up anything with a girlboss lead and shouldn’t be taken seriously.
The series now has a reputation for not producing anything of value after the original run, and people are still convinced that the THIRD series is going to somehow salvage it. There’s no reason to think that, and after Korra no one should care. But the Avatar fanbase are full of such consumerist slobs that they’ll eat up anything that the creators put out.
My official stance is that I have no intention of seeing the series and will not encourage other people to do so. However, I have begun to see promotional material online and some of it looks absolutely appalling. As I said earlier, I’m certain that Korra is going to be blamed for the apocalypse even though she totally saved the world better than any man could, But really gets me is the fact that the Avatar has a twin sister.
“The Dark Avatar.”
The instant I heard that I knew this was never going to work. You’re telling me that there’s an Anti-Christ Avatar? What? The whole concept is ridiculous, considering the role of the Avatar was pretty clearly explained in the original series. The idea that there could be a ‘Dark Avatar’ out there is ridiculous in and of itself, but what’s even more insane is that Korra wasn’t considered one.
So instead of doing what you should have done (Say, having an Avatar take a more antagonistic role) you’re going to introduce a new concept that makes no sense with the established setting to give a sort of rival to the Avatar character.
Instead of using the established rules of the setting to make new and interesting stories and characters- you completely throw everything out the window to try and do something ‘new.’
Korra had this problem too, but that series at least was able to create the illusion that society had progressed and things were different now. The problems did not become apparent until the show actually came out.
However, that was the first major attempt at creating new material for the franchise, and it set the stage for what is to come. There is no possible way that this new series isn’t going to be a complete mess that butchers the series even more. Simply hearing the term ‘Dark Avatar’ raises so many red flags that I’m not sure how anyone can even be excited for it.
Korra proved that the creators cannot be trusted to create a new series. In my opinion, Korra is one of the worst things to come out of the last decade of entertainment and really was an innovator when it came to pushing extremist woke content in children’s entertainment. These elements did not make it popular among the actual target demographic- but among the adults who desperately wanted to push these ideas onto kids the series was seen as an important weapon in the culture war. This is the real reason why weirdos on twitter are so adamant to defend Korra and its controversial creative decisions.
The interesting thing though is how much the culture has shifted. These days people are a lot more skeptical whenever they see a female lead in a show like this. This is not something that ever would have happened back when Korra first aired, and it seems as if the general public has begun to notice the patterns when it comes to this kind of thing.
People are beginning to learn not to take female leads seriously, and I feel like this is going to be a major blow against the movement. People don’t really realize it, but the girlboss narrative exclusively came from media series like this. It was never a real thing, but people were gaslit into thinking that women can do anything a man can do because of movies and TV. Korra is the first major instance where people began to realize that there was a problem with how these characters were written and utilized.
Korra was supposed to be this hardcore, action character that was meant to be way better than Aang at fighting- but the end result was an extremely unlikable character that just endlessly causes problems for people around her. In a lot of ways, she is the defining example of everything wrong with the girlboss archetype- how the series wants you to like her, and think she’s a good powerful character who overcomes the odds, but in actuality she comes off like she’s being carried entirely by the writers. People who created her to win all of her battles and further their political agenda with no regard for worldbuilding or the overall story.
Obviously it remains to be seen if the new series is going to be AS BAD as Korra but I would argue that Korra was bad ENOUGH that no one should even really be wondering what happens next. Pick up a book, people.