LogFAQs > #870184538

KORRA - Season 3, Episodes 12-13

Recap: Korra agrees to trade herself for the Air Nation, but neither side has been dealing in good faith. Sparky Sparky Boom Woman is lost and Zaheer gains flight in the void she leaves. He poisons Korra to induce the Avatar State, but she breaks free of her prison and, after dueling Zaheer, is rescued by the collective force of the Air Nation. Ghazan and Ming-Hua are killed in combat and Zaheer re-imprisoned. Jinora graduates Air Nation Academy. Kai survives.

Well, I'm disappointed.

When you have enemies this great, you want them to kick ass. You want them to have a lasting impact. You want them not to get reduced to being weaker in single combat than lower-tier good guys simply because pairing off that way makes for a nice tie-up. You want there to be actual lasting consequences from their actions when they've gained great strength - especially if a bad guy is gaining a legendary, unknown power at the eleventh hour and is seriously pissed off that his girlfriend has just been killed.

Instead, you have Tonraq surviving (WHY???), Kai surviving (WHY?????), another pointless, effortless escape from the Air Nation (UGHHHH), Mako killing Ming-Hua with Lightning (She's seriously never been hit by it before, waving around giant water arms constantly attached to her body?! I mean, yeah, she's standing in water this time, but ugh, this is a world where Lightning is a common industrial skill!), lava behaving nothing like the way it should and thus making Ghazan's power level super-confusing (there's literally nothing different between lava and rock, so the fact that no one thinks to bend the lava that Ghazan bends is incredibly stupid), and... well, Zaheer actually acquits himself like a f***ing boss against Korra, so hard to hate on that.

Yeah, I'm butthurt about the ending of this season. I never once felt a moment of tension or emotion during any of the battle scenes other than rage that the good guys survived. Which is kind of astounding considering that there were so many good guys who could have potentially died. The perfect opportunities were there for Tonraq and for Kai - two awful characters who can nonetheless be mourned and used to show credibility - and for some reason they get magicked into survival with no damage at all. f***. Lin also basically sacrifices herself to get P'Li... but she makes it out with minimal damage, too. No price is paid whatsoever!

The Great Zaheer is gone for now, and despite his most badass ability only coming into play at the end of Episode 12, his most lasting feat was already done in Episode 10.

There are some clear plus sides, of course. Zaheer's showdown against Korra is fantastic. I love his fighting - the defensive style of Airbending allowing him genius counterstrikes. While it's not on that level, I felt definite echoes of Aang vs Ozai. Despite the stupid decrease in their power levels, Ghazan and Ming-Hua still produce some fireworks. P'Li's method of attack is incredibly lame, but she at least has acrobatic dodging skills, making her defensive tactics appealing, if not the offensive techniques.

Also, that final graduation scene is actually pretty neat.

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* I like that the table is set for next season already - rebuilding Ba Sing Se. Random Steelbender mook Kuveera looks like she's going to play a role, too. Korra will likely be spending much of it wheelchair-bound, which means maybe she'll finally learn a little bit on how to operate politically.

* 'Say hello to the Earth Queen for me!' I'm really bummed that such an awesome line didn't go anywhere.
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yet all sailors of all sorts are more or less capricious and unreliable - they live in the varying outer weather, and they inhale its fickleness