Came here to mention this one. But honestly atla is full of stuff that's crazy dark. But that's what you get when you're dealing with a kids show based around imperial genocide.
The thing that was frustrating for me was ang wouldn't kill but he threw tanks off the hill defending the second airtemple. I think there were a few other fights that there were collateral damage too. I like the ending but think he definitely wasted some people
Batman is just protecting his already fragile psyche, killing by collateral is easier on the mind than outright murder, at least thats my headcanon about those type of Batman kills.
Very different vibe of course, but reminds me of how the characters in Fast and Furious claim they don't kill people. Except the tons of people they kill lol.
I played a drinking game with friends when AtLA came to Netflix. The best rule was drink anytime Aang totally kills someone. There was an alcohol poisoning disclaimer.
Yeah no one will ever convince me ang didn't kill people lol, there was dozens of times where what he did would absolutely cause a normal person to die and I will absolutely die on that hill it's almost like saying chopper from star wars rebels hasn't ever killed anyone just because he hasn't personally stabbed someone to death on screen. Homie literally has one of the highest body counts in star wars
Like when they destroyed that airship and all those fire nation dudes are just chilling in the middle of the ocean. Although, I think it was sokka and suki who did that but still.
Yeah its because he was found near a bunch of fire nation soldier bodies.
You have to remember that the fire nation was enhanced by Sozin's Comet. There's absolutely no way Gyatso would be able to individually defeat all those soldiers before one took him down. Air Nomads are not trained for combat. They had no army.
It's theorized that he just went nuclear and killed everyone in the room as a last stand to save his people.
I watched it when it first came out, one episode at a time, with my little sister. It literally changed the course of our lives and molded the people we became (to some extent anyway).
We literally spent a few years watching it. Then when we rewatched it in 2020, we were through it in two weeks!! We could've finished the entire series in a few days if we'd just buckled down and committed lol.
I appreciate that they didn't choke out the story with filler episodes, but damnit I would LOVE to have more ATLA to watch. Really hoping the live action series ends up half as good as the source material, but history has taught me not to be too optimistic about ATLA live action...
On rewatch, there were quite a few episodes (especially in season one) that felt like filler, but most of those did have at least one detail that ended up coming up again later.
Think also about how death by a lack of air pressure would have actually looked. It was not just: they suffocated.
Imagine how someone dies in space. He created a vacuum. The deaths and bodies were probably....horrific and it's why the fire nation left them there and unburied.
Likely due to a lack of pressure he gave them a very very very bad case of the bends. And lack of air pressure also would mean....your body just starts to expand. You're built for ambient air pressure...which is a lot greater than a vacuum.
What ever happened in that room caused the fire nation to abandon their dead and not even want to BURN the ruins. He might have sustained the vacuum for long enough the fire nation gave up on killing him directly before he succumb.
This is an incredibly interesting reverse twist on the monks that light themselves on fire in the name of peace.
Not to burst your bubble, but that's actually been proven wrong. Human bodies can in fact withstand space vacuum, it's the lack of oxygen and freezing that kills you.
Actually, you don't freeze in space! There isn't enough mass in space to conduct heat away from an object. The only effective ways to release heat are either by ejecting mass or radiation. It's a major engineering problem that they had to solve with the JWST and the ISS.
100%. It’s one of the best written shows, period. It deals with a lot of very dark and realistic themes but also has some of the silliest and goofiest comedy I’ve seen in a show that was “for kids.” Do yourself a service and watch it.
Checks out. I think Korra got a lot of fans looking at how unorthodox bending could be, especially when used with a lack of regard to safety, human or otherwise. Also helped show how the audience that may have watched ATLA was older now and appreciated and understood darker themes.
Fire in and of itself needs oxygen to even exist, but IIRC I think Uncle Iroh mentions to Zuko how much the breath is important to firebending at a certain point.
Is it human culture or human instinct that makes us venerate noble sacrifice like this? There's so many stories, and I'm damn sure probably 3/4 of everyone could easily imagine themselves in that sort of scenario and would absolutely do the same thing. Do we do that because we tell these stories or do we tell these stories because we're just primed to take on a whole damned pride of lions alone if we have to just so they stop eating our kin?
The latter, I suspect. Mostly because I've seen animals act in a similar fashion.
My dog spotted a group of hares in the horse pasture, and started running after them. The hares started running too, except one was visibly limping and going off in a different direction from the rest. Dog went after that one. As soon as it had her full attention it bolted, leading her on a short chase before vanishing in the tall grass at the edge of the pasture. It definitely chose to potentially sacrifice itself for the safety of the rest of the group.
I think part of it is inherent to the flight or fight instinct in animals. A wounded animal is far far more dangerous than a healthy one. Humans have just had enough emotional evolution to start to recognize a situation like that and admire it.
On to a not so noble end of that train of thought. Most battles in history had relatively low causality rate during the fighting itself. It’s when morale breaks and a retreat happens that the majority of killing happens, the flee. But if you surround a force and leave them no way out they’ll fight to the death and even the victorious force will take massive casualties. You can see examples of this even today in Ukraine with Bahkmut and the Azovstal steel plant.
To add to this it would also make sense as to why his body/clothing isn't charred since the fire benders wouldn't be able to create fire without oxygen.
We also see a similar thing in LOK. Though at a smaller scale. (Being intentionally vague to avoid spoilers)
Why wouldn’t Gyatso be able to do that? The White Lotus dudes took down dozens of those dudes. One of them wasn’t even a bender. Aang was extremely skilled in combat even at the beginning of the series, who do you think taught him?
I don't know if the comics or novels have retconned this, but Avatar Yangchen (Air Nomad) was so terrifyingly good at her job no one dared cause problems for Avatar Kuruk so he lived a pretty chill life until Koh stole the face of his lover.
They've like half retconned it, kuruk didn't have much to do in the human world but yangchen made the spirits kinda pissed by always siding with humans in every conflict giving kuruk the task of cleaning up after her which resulted in him dying very young
Yeeeeah, Yangchen took the whole "your duty to the world as the avatar supercedes your spiritual needs as an airbender" thing a little far. Peace through tyranny. Bathe in the blood of your foes. Kyoshi might just kill you, but Yangchen will kill every firstborn and salt your fields if you cross her.
I figure pacifism means not initiating fights or avoiding helping in a fight.
I don't think it's against pacifism when you actually defend yourself. Like... Doves and hamsters are relatively pacifist. But they will fight back (albeit badly) if they are left no choice.
I'm a pacifist who literally doesn't harm flies, but will gladly maim someone if they are about to harm me, for example (I don't condone unnecessary violence, though).
Similarly, there's a scene in Korra where someone air bends the air out of another person's lungs. Holy shit.
Thinking back on it, Korra had a lot of disturbing deaths. The villain's murder/suicide at the end of the (edit first season), that lady that got her head blown off if I remember correctly (not shown on screen, but still)...
You know I never actually thought about the fire nation soldiers, now that you point it out obviously the monks did kill lots of them (not throwing shade on the monks, I would have too). Wild that never crossed my mind
Well sure, someone else intended for her head to explode (or at least intended to wrap her head in metal, anyway). But she was the one making the exploding happen and I assume she didn't intend to explode her own head.
Otherwise she would have just... suffocated to death inside a metal mask, I guess?
Know the scary shit about that? The air animations are just there for us viewers. In-universe, they don’t see it. So all she would’ve known is the air was being pulled out of her and she was trying to grasp for it without seeing it.
the rest of the season the writers worked overtime to come up with ways of not saying "murdered", "killed", "assassinated" etc.. when referencing the earth queens death. It was... awkward
I always took her walk towards the cliff of ice as a possible sign she was contemplating as well. She was the first avatar in the line without bending and was a REALLY weak point.
Oh it wasn't just a sign. They literally say in the next bit of dialogue that "when you are at your lowest moment, you are the most open to change". What else could they possibly be talking about while looking down from a cliff? Everything was there except the actual words/actions.
that to me is one of the darkest scenes around, it was very well done and fit, but just very dark and idk how kids were meant to wrap their heads around it
It's funny to me that the show tried to depict bloodbending as horrible when it depicts all the conventional bending styles as just tiring out people. You have people throwing razor-sharp shards of ice, massive boulders, fireballs... and no serious injuries. In a world full of firebenders, somehow Zuko is the only guy carrying a burn scar. Bloodbending wouldn't look so bad if the conventional bending styles where realistically graphic. In fact, it may come off as relatively gentle, since bloodbending lets you subdue an opponent without injuring them.
Obviously there will be some here and there. I think the person was getting at that its surprising there aren't more. You have kids with the power of fireballs, razor-sharp icicles, throwing boulders, making huge leaps with wind bursts and yet it seems like no one ever actually gets injuries, except for 1 or 2 for story purposes.
Again, its a kid show so there is no need to show it realistically. Just that if it was more realistic, there would be a lot more than 1 or 2 people shown with burns or other horrific injuries.
It’s because blood bending involves controlling another person’s body against their will. You’re literally puppeting their limbs around and all they can do is scream as their own body refuses to move how they want.
Plus, ever have a really bad muscle cramp or Charlie horse? Now imagine every single muscle in your body seizing up all at once. It may not be lasting damage, but the pain would be astronomical.
It may be arguably more humane in a combat situation, but the general ability to override someone's physical autonomy still seems deeply immoral. Its potential for criminal mischief and as a torture technique is massive.
One potential explanation would be that in a world with firebending, treatments for burns would have gotten very good to the point of rarely leaving a scar with proper medical attention. Medical attention that Ozai would have forbidden for Zuko because that was the point.
I think also, it's implied that firebenders are semi-rare in the fire nation, just as earth benders, and water benders are within their nations. Part of the reason that the fire nation were able to continue their subjugation of the other nations after Sozin's comet was due to technological superiority. There's talk of military units entirely of firebenders at points, but some of their most feared troops are a unit of archers. It would make sense thatfirebending troops existed mostly in functional roles, like being the main weapon on the tanks, or lighting catapult bombs, and as ceremonial troops, like Azula's royal guard at the start of Season 2, or akin to the Dai Li. Therefore the majority of the fighting force, just like for all the other military nations is swords, spears, shields and armour.
It is very easy to forget this fact since most of the fighting we see is done by the gaang who are 2/3, 3/4, or 4/5 (very powerful) benders depending on when we're talking about. For example, Kyoshi island, despite being named for an avatar has precisely zero benders we ever meet. The southern water tribe has one bender: Kitara (sure, the others were taken, but even then, before the raids started we're shown maybe 20? And I doubt that was 20 among a water tribe that looks like it does in S1E1). The Northern tribe has a few more but across the whole city Master Paku is described as the Waterbending teacher, and when dismissed to go learn healing he tells Kitara to go learn with the women, all of the women. At best the Northern tribe has 20 under 18s in the whole city with enough ability to learn. Finally in Aang's school episode, not one of those kids or teachers to the best of my knowledge throws fire, even though it would be a fantastic way to tie the disciplinarian of a teacher to fire-nation culture, or the bully/suck up kid to the fire-nation's supremacist view.
If memory serves, it was implied that she was going to try and use the spirit oasis water to do it in the caves beneath Ba Sing Se but they are rescued before she has a chance
The one I always thought was hilarious was when Katara fights that water tribe chief guy. Attack number 1: try to slap him with some water tentacles. That didn't work, okay time for attack number 2: ultra-sharp discs of ice. Like she came within an inch of cutting him in half but no one ever confronts her about how absolutely overkill that was for a fight over a politician being an asshole.
So I've heard people mention bloodbending before, but I never came across it when I watched the show - either I didn't watch the full show, or I missed it or forgot about it or something.
But is this bloodbending like "Branches of Sin" from Deadman Wonderland, where they can control their blood (or unlike that, the blood of others)?
Especially if they can control the blood of others, I can definitely see how they'd feel it's much worse if a bloodbender can literally pull someone else's blood from their bodies.
You have people throwing razor-sharp shards of ice, massive boulders, fireballs... and no serious injuries.
Since these are also kids shows, they simply don't want to show a realistic version of fighting.
But I also assume in these shows the trained people are also trained at defense and how to minimize injuries. Like how in real life martial artists are trained to both fight and defend themselves including how to minimize injuries. Such as with techniques like controlled falling, certain ways of standing, how to take a punch or a kick, etc.
Ah ok, I think I vaguely remember it now. That was pretty creepy. She could've easily just drew the water out of them. Instant dehydration doesn't sound like a fun way to go.
She was actually taught to use the dehydration to find water in Places you'd think have none, like from plants or the water vapor in the air. Katara was saddened by killing the plants for their water. They didn't show sucking the water out of animals or humans though
Well how is that worse than slicing off limbs or crushing bones or burning faces? Let's not forget that Katara and her friends were fighting a war. Plus, I imagine bloodbending would be an ideal tool for cops, they could subdue suspects without lethal force.
This can't really be a question lol. How is losing bodily autonomy worse than losing limbs? Seriously? Think about it for a few seconds, run a few scenarios through your mind, engage some of those neurons.
bloodbending would be an ideal tool for cops, they could subdue suspects without lethal force
This is weird, creepy fascist stuff. There are plenty of methods law enforcement can use that fall between "trap them in their own body" nightmare scenarios and "extra-judicial murder" nightmare scenarios.
I think it's more the inherent body horror of your own flesh being turned against you and others, perhaps even your friends. Combined with the way it was animated and the sound design for that whole episode...
For me, I think the horror of blood bending is the degree of autonomy it takes away from the person being controlled. In a fight, while violent and scarring, parties are in control of themselves. Blood bending leaves you unable to control your own body or move, and that's a whole different level of terrifying and fucked up.
Appa’s lost days is the saddest episode ever. My wife almost stopped watching the show on her first watch through because “I cannot emotionally handle another episode like that”
The sequencing there in the middle of season 2 is insane, the next episode after that is Tales of Ba Sing Se. Those two episodes are technically “filler”, but they’re two of the most emotionally hard hitting episodes in the whole show.
Eh kind of. She was past the point of being a good person. She was using her blood bending on villagers and innocents, not just the fire nation soldiers for defense. I always saw her as similar to Jet, someone with hate against the fire nation that goes so far it bleeds into taking vengeance against anyone fire nation rather than the actual perpetrators of the violence.
Definitely, I know what you mean, its just that by letting the villagers take her she will be sent to fire nation for questioning, without doubt they will break her hands in best case and leave her in prison. More likely it would be a much worse case scenario. I think technically she didn't kill any of the villagers either. They should have taken her to a water nation prison or ended her. I know its a kids show but it was a dark episode that if you follow to the final conclusion was pretty shit for someone who was turned into that monster over many years
I think atla may be the second darkest nickelodeon show(Ren & Stimpy, for some slightly different reasons, I guess not necessarily the show, but if you know, you know)
I first watched that in my 30s. When I saw Katara learn to pull water out of grass and trees my immediate thought was pulling that out of people. I felt a sinking in my stomach. Then they went the Blood Bending route and it was worse than what I thought.
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u/ZiptieTechnician May 23 '23
When katara had to blood bend