With Korra chained to the walls of a cave, Zaheer makes like a Bond villain and completely reveals his plan to her. A poison will be administered to her skin and, once absorbed into her bloodstream, activate the Avatar State, at which point the Red Lotus will kill her, ending the Avatar cycle. They get pretty far along in this plan, but don’t count on a delirious Korra breaking free from her bonds and fighting back. At the end of the previous episode, my first thought was that things did not look good for Korra. My second thought was that Zaheer’s plan was really fucking stupid. This scene was visually reminiscent of Zhao’s capture of Aang in “The Blue Spirit,” which I believe to be intentional as it reminds us of Zhao’s astute observation that killing the Avatar would be counterproductive; he’d just be reincarnated into the Water Tribes and the Fire Nation would have had to start their search all over again. If they kept him alive and under lock and key, at least they’d know where he is. So, why would Zaheer be so fucking stupid as to kill Korra? Because he’s not stupid. The eponymous venom would force Korra into the Avatar State, changing her death from a setback into the ultimate victory. Shit. This motherfucker is stone cold brilliant. Luckily, Jinora is eavesdropping on this entire diatribe via her super-handy astral projection and reports back to the others that they’re looking pretty screwed. Ikki’s faith in Korra is sweet, but Jinora taking charge and forcing the novice airbenders to become proactive in their own escape is what the novices need. And though they ultimately do receive some help from the Beifong’s rescue party, it’s not really the point. They would have made their own way out eventually, possibly with a casualty or two, but they would have made it out. While it was unexpected that Bumi, Kya, and even Tenzin be more or less out of commission for these last two episodes, I can easily accept it. They got to have their big finish for the season in “The Ultimatum,” and fought well enough and took enough of a beating, that their minimal presence in these episodes makes perfect sense. It’s also necessary. Kya is a waterbending master, and Bumi, while as much of a novice airbender as the rest, still has all the strategic and leadership experience that a decades-spanning military career can offer. For Jinora and the others to step up, those skills need to be unavailable to them. It really all fits together rather brilliantly. And the romance we got with the pairings of Bolin/Opal and Jinora/Kai feel effortless and natural. It’s the first love interest for Bolin that feels genuine and organic, and Jinora and Kai’s whole vibe together is some of the best written tween romance out there. There has been a lot of criticism about the romantic subplots in Korra, much of which I have penned myself, but I think it’s much fairer to say not that romance doesn’t have a place in this show, but that the writers needed to better understand its place, and it appears that they finally do. Book Three continues to be pretty hardcore. Korra’s anguish at having the poison bent into her skin is palpable. So, if this poison works as it’s intended to, how can she possibly survive? Apparently, she’s resisting the poison and only dipping into and out of the Avatar State. Thus, killing her in the split-second that she’s getting her glow on is, well, difficult at best. If the Red Lotus succeeds, they succeed big, but if their timing is just fraction of a second off, they’re shit out of luck and have to scour the entire Earth Kingdom for their next assassination target. The. Entire. Earth. Kingdom. Not for nothing, but that could make them a little gun shy. I wonder how much of this is purely Korra’s willpower and how much has to do with the fact that she’s no longer connected to her past lives through Raava’s light spirit? Without that chorus of previous Avatars and all their skill and experience working through her, is the Avatar State less potent and thus easier for her to resist in its defense mechanism/override mode? As for Korra’s delirious visions of Amon, Unalaq, and Vaatu, these cameos are perfect. Seeing Amon for the first time in 26 episodes, in such an alien context, really is chilling. I’d honestly forgotten how creepy that fucker really was, and even as a posthumous fever dream, he loses none of his menace. Unalaq and Vaatu, given their literal and conceptual contributions to the Red Lotus, felt appropriate and out of place at the same time. The whole sequence is rather unsettling and a subtle reminder of how much Korra has been through since we first met her, the kind of challenges she’s been up against, her victories and the toll they took on her. It underlines what she’s capable of in this battle as well as what it could cost her. The final showdown between Korra and Zaheer is kinetic and brilliantly animated with lots of motion and camera movement, interesting angles, and some creative moves. And I could be mistaken, but… that location looks a LOT like the Wulong Forest from Aang’s battle with Ozai. The rest of the surrounding terrain doesn’t, so this is perhaps just a visual cue to evoke an association with that battle. It’s also worth noting that once grounded, Zaheer was immobilized by a brace of earth, his opposite element. Nice touch there. Korra really did take a beating in this episode. I mean, we’ve seen her knocked around before, but never to the degree where her recuperation required a wheelchair. It’s also interesting how this big battle seemed to disable her emotionally as well as physically. In these final scenes, her behavior is reminiscent of true depression. Even losing her bending, while it drove her to a fleeting thought of suicide, didn’t seem to crush her spirit the way this experience has. And it’s really great that at this time, her friendship with Asami, which was brought to the foreground in the season premiere, is what sustains her. It’s a great way to bookend the season. The reason we’re back on Air Temple Island is two-fold. One, it’s now once again the capital of the Air Nation, now that the Northern Air Temple has been destroyed. Two, it’s Jinora’s home, and these last moments are about Jinora, whose characters has been so marvelously expanded from the ancillary presence she had in Book One. Even as early as the Book Two premiere, this moment was subtly foreshadowed, and now it pays off. The name and theme of this season was “change,” and the rebuilding of the Air Nation has been a huge part of that. This cultural rebirth comes not just in the rise of new airbenders and the return of that people to their nomadic roots, but in the anointing of the first airbending master in a generation, the first since Tenzin. The instruction and leadership of his people will no longer be his burden to bear alone, because Jinora is now a master, tattoos and all. This finale succeeded in so many ways, including the ways the finale of Book One came up short. It’s acknowledged that the Earth Kingdom is still in a bad spot, what with the monarchy dissolved and no provisional government set up. It’s also pointed out that even with P’Li, Ghazan, and Ming-Hua dead, and Zaheer in prison, there’s still no telling how many Red Lotus members are still out there. And so, for the duration of Korra’s recovery, the new Air Nation will once again become the Air Nomads, traveling the world and providing aid to those in need and restoring balance in Korra’s name until she is healed and can once again serve the world as the Avatar. After the rushed ending of Book One, and the general unevenness of Book Two, there was a lot of pressure on Book Three to really get it right, and it achieved that goal. There are several factors contributing to this. When Book One was conceived, it was a standalone piece. When the greenlight was given to Book Two, the creative team still believed that it would be the end of the series. In fact, it wouldn’t be far from the mark to say that the key to Korra’s success this season was that it more closely resembled its parent series. While I appreciate, admire, and enjoyed Mike and Bryan’s attempt to distinguish Korra in certain ways, such as the modern setting, being more stationary and centered around Republic City, beyond Book One, it just felt constrictive. Book Two’s attempt to negotiate between that tone and Avatar’s more road-trippy, world tour vibe was just awkward, teasing us enough to want more of this new world without delivering fully on it. After all, the world has changed considerably in the last 70 years. We want to see how that world has changed. What is Ba Sing Se like now? How have these places changed? How have they remained the same? And what about all the places we never got to see in Avatar? Elements of the Avatar mythology were also explored, and even more so than Book Two, Book Three really deconstructed several elements of Book One, such as the fact that the function of the White Lotus has changed. Zaheer was right about that. In my review of the season premiere, I noted how interesting it is that Zaheer seemed to have a particular beef with the White Lotus, and the story cashed in on that brilliantly, better than I could have hoped for. What’s more, while the previous villains (with the exception of Tarrlok) had legitimate philosophical motivations, they were all to some degree hypocrites, their “noble” motives tainted by some kind of hunger for power. Zaheer was very refreshing in that he’s consistent with his morality and philosophy. His intent was to liberate Ba Sing Se, and he did. I mean, he threw it into chaos, but because he believed chaos was what was in everyone’s best interest. He didn’t do it to divide and conquer. He did what he thought was the right thing, and then left them alone to enjoy their “freedom.” This isn’t to say he isn’t willing to do horrible things in the service of his cause, but none of those things are antithetical to his philosophy. He’s morally consistent, and much as I think he needs to choke on a turd (or at the very least Bolin’s sock), you can’t fault him for being a phony. Overall, Book Three has succeeded in terms of consistency. We had a solid conflict that developed at a good pace, the momentum picking up in all the right places. The story came to a satisfying conclusion both dramatically and thematically with a nice helping of wrap-up to send us off. Each episode built on the story, even the seemingly filler “The Original Airbenders,” which to be clear was a good episode in its own right. However, it managed to set up certain elements that would play in to the second half of the season in an integral way. Even the weaker episodes of the season were incredibly strong and massively enjoyable. This is not to say the season was without its flaws, the most egregious being the baddies. The Red Lotus is a fine idea, and the prospect of seeing them again in Book Four is very exciting, but aside from Zaheer, none of them got any real depth, and even Zaheer didn’t get much in the way of backstory. P’Li, Ghazan, and Ming-Hua, while thrilling to watch and fascinating in concept and design, were fairly shallow characters. They weren’t without their moments. The conversation with Bolin in the truck added a touch of humor, rounding them out a bit, and the scene with P’Li did give us some blink-and-you’ll-miss-it backstory, but it was just so little to go on. It’s also worth noting that such a huge hullabaloo was made at the end of last season and in this season’s premiere about the coexistence of humans and spirits in the wake of Korra leaving the Spirit Portals open, but aside from a few jokes and one actual plot point, this whole story was more or less dropped. Now, to be fair, there was a lot that happened in this season, and if something had to go in order for everything that we did get to run smoothly, then I agree the whole spirit thread was the one to put on the chopping block, but it is nonetheless a failing. Aside from that, however, I really have no complaints about Book Three. It was a fantastic story that was superbly written and beautifully animated, and I’m looking forward to what’s next. Let’s all sit back and raise a glass to one fucking spectacular season of The Legend of Korra, unequivocally the best so far, and await together news of Book Four.
