Searching for Love
Apr. 3rd, 2013 10:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
loopy777At this point, Avatar: The Last Airbender is only gaining steam, but it’s not yet running with the power of a locomotive. With The Legend of Korra's second season a faraway dot on a vast horizon, the ongoing comic book adventures of Avatar Aang and Friends (or Fire Lord Zuko and Friends, as is increasingly the case here) are the only new story that fans will be getting for at least the next six months. The first trilogy of graphic novels, The Promise, was in my opinion as awful a story as you could ever hope to see in a licensed cash-in (I know my awful cash-ins), but ATLA fans aren't picky and they made Dark Horse Comics' new line a rousing success. As either a reward or consolation, the next trilogy is focused on the matter of Zuko's mother, a dangling plot thread from the cartoon that has started off more interviews with Avatar creators Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko than any sane person could be expected to tolerate.
So, after the storytelling disaster that was The Promise, has scripter Gene Luen Yang upped his game and finally delivered something that lives up to the Avatar name?
Since this is a fresh start for the creative team, I'm not going to give that away in the introduction. What follows are extensive spoilers, critiques, compliments, and as much silly humor as I can pack into this review.
Most Epic Momma's Boy Ever
In the cartoon, the major sequel hook was the matter of Ursa, mother to Zuko and Azula, and (former?) wife to big bad Ozai. Part of Zuko's backstory was that Ursa had disappeared during his childhood, somehow preventing him from being sacrificed to his Ozai’s father Azulon via mysterious circumstances that involved Azulon suddenly dying and Ozai himself being named as the new Fire Lord despite Azulon previously not thinking much of the idea. Good thing the Fire Nation doesn't have tabloids; that kind of thing would have been solid gold, no phone-hacking required! Good for Ozai, I mean. Not so good for the Fire Nation, because Ozai was the crazy conductor of the crazy train to Crazyville. Anyway, it was later revealed that Bad News Ursa was alive and banished as a result of her mysterious mystery actions, but Zuko never got more information than that before the cartoon came to an end. The only indication that there was something more in that subplot was a scene at the very end of the finale where Zuko confronts his defeated father and asks for Ursa's address and phone number, a scene that was cut short in a rise of dramatic drum music that was one of most blatant and teasing sequel hooks in the history of epic animated sagas produced by Nickelodeon.
Although it's popular these days to say you never cared much about Ursa's fate, most of the fandom has been dying to know how that conversation ended, although not literally because then Dark Horse would have no one to sell a comic book to. Sadly, the follow-up appeared in The Promise, where it was revealed that Ozai instantly changed the subject and went on to talk about how out-of-character Zuko was going to act over the course of the next three graphic novels. It was a warning to us all, but we stuck around regardless, and Dark Horse rewarded our lack of spending wisdom by giving us another sequel hook at the end of the trilogy in which Zuko finally goes to visit his sister Azula in the asylum where she hid from The Promise's horrible characterization, and asks her to help interrogate Ozai. Azula, of course, agreed, because stealing the Avatar franchise from Aang is something she's not going to let her brother do without getting a piece of the pie for herself.
Dun dun dun, as the kids say.
The story picks up now in The Search - Part 1, which follows two main storylines that weave in and out of each other. One follows Zuko, Azula, and a bunch of people I don't care about as they track down information on Ursa's current whereabouts. The second follows Ursa in her younger days, and details how she came to be married to Ozai while supplying background for the clues that Zuko and Azula are digging up.
For simplicity's sake, and because the back-and-forth doesn't seem to line up in any mandatory sequence aside from one point near the end, I'll do Ursa's shorter storyline first and then follow her kids in the modern era.
Sins of the Mother
The story opens with the vaguest framing device ever, in which an unseen and unnamed storyteller is talking to an unseen and unnamed audience of one over a solid black panel. This made such an impact on me that I completely forgot about it until I saw people discussing it online. The actual beginning of the story shows a stage in a peasant village, upon which a young Ursa is rehearsing a play with her boyfriend, Ikem. (Can I just say that Young Ursa is a cutie? Hey, she's of marrying age, so there's nothing creepy here. And I never said I wanted to date her.) The play in question is "Love Amongst the Dragons," the play that Zuko mentioned back in the cartoon proper as the one his mother took him to several times. "Aha!" die-hard fans say. "At last we have that burning mystery explained!" As for myself, I'm a little disappointed with this trivia nugget. I enjoy it when characters are fleshed out with likes, dislikes, hobbies, and quirks that don't necessarily relate to the plot, and discovering that Ursa wasn't just a theater buff, that this play is SIGNIFICANT and MEANINGFUL and STUFF, feels more like fan-service than storytelling. It's not a big deal, but it's a trend I think reduces continuation fiction to a lesser state than the original material. It's like when Star Wars books have to add a tragic incident involving odds to Han Solo's backstory to explain why he didn't want the odds of survival quoted at him when he was about to flee into an asteroid field. Least necessary explanation ever, in other words.
Anyway, Ikem and Ursa are playing the romantic leads in the play, and Ikem is so enthusiastic about their performance that he asks Ursa to marry him on the spot. Before I can wonder if the Avatar world is going Hollywood and Ikem just wants some juicy Twitter gossip to help promote his next big role, he gives a heartfelt speech about loving Ursa since an incident where she beat him up when they were six years old. Wow, spicy. Fire Nation romances are the best. No wonder Zuko went for the gloomy girl with the knife fetish. (And then tossed her away when she mellowed. Ohhhhhhh.) Now, Ursa is depicted here as a peasant, not a rich noble, so either she really doesn't care that two-car garage and white picket fence or actors for the local community theater make a lot more annually in the Fire Nation than they do elsewhere, because she says yes to the proposal and immediately initiates a blushing make-out. Awwww.
However, tragedy is around the corner! (Dun dun dun?) Ursa gets home to find her mother sobbing over the Crown Prince Hairpiece that Sozin gave to Roku in the cartoon episode "The Avatar and the Fire Lord." It's soon revealed that Fire Lord Azulon is sitting in the backyard and wants Ursa to marry his son, Ozai. However, I'm still boggled by that hairpiece thingy. We distinctly saw that thing left behind when Roku went to fight the volcano, and shortly thereafter he died and his house was buried in lava. How did Azulon and/or Ursa's mother get it? Am I to believe that Roku's wife paused in the middle of that whole running-for-her-life thing to pick it up? I'm guessing Roku's wife was either a history buff or a packrat. And yes, I know Iroh had it in the cartoon with no explanation as well, but at least he's a connected world traveler who also visits the Spirit World. Mysteries are more appropriate with him.
Anyway, I want to take a moment in all this frivolity to discuss the reason that Azulon wants Ursa and Ozai to marry. He knows that Ursa is descended from Avatar Roku, and he believes that joining that bloodline to the Royal Family's will produce exceptionally powerful children. I really like this idea, and not because I used it in a fanfic I wrote two years ago. It ties back into the major ATLA theme of people dealing with the legacies and mistakes of their ancestors, and nicely illustrates the Fire Nation's corrupting nature without being overtly villainous, just elitist, obsessed with power, and a little inhuman. But wow, talk about cutting it close. The implication is that Azulon arrived out of the blue with this idea in hand. What was he going to do if he got there and Ursa was already married? Just pretend that he got lost on the way to the dentist and ask for directions home? I mean, we're talking about peasants, here. Ursa and Ikem might have been married within 48-hours of the proposal. Heck, they might not have waited for the marriage to set up house! No wonder the Fire Nation took 100 years to win a one-front war.
The story jumps right to lucky, lucky Azulon leaving with the happy couple in the backseat of his car, when who interrupts the return trip but Ikem himself! He's brought along some wooden sword props and is going to attack the royal procession in order to free his one true love from the awful fate of being part of Zuko's backstory. Fortunately for stupid-pants over there, Azulon must have left behind his regular royal guards in favor of a pair of arrogant spear-carriers. That was a close call! I mean, can you imagine if Ikem brought wooden swords to a Firebending duel? The idea of a barbeque doesn't even begin to cover it. It would be like... um, really crispy bacon... that's on fire.
Hey, they can't all be winners.
But like I said, it's just a pair of spear-carriers. Spears are considered a beginner weapon in Chinese martial arts military training, so Ikem 's knowing how to not bonk himself on head while holding a pair of swords (dao, specifically) puts him on top in this fight. He starts to get a few good hits in, but in a shocking twist it turns out that one of the spear-carriers is a Firebender, and quickly gains the upper hand. I guess this is before they gave special armor to the Firebenders? But if these guys really are royal Firebender guards, then how come Ikem was kicking their butts there for a while? I mean, I know Christopher Lee killed people with knives at one point in his life, but I didn't think that was standard training for actors. Of course, in a world where all culture is rooted in various styles of martial arts, maybe local actors do get that kind of training. Well, now I want a comic about a wandering actor/ronin person who goes on samurai adventures and stabs dudes.
Anyway, Ursa sees that her Lover Boy is about to get his wooden swords stuck where Agni don't shine and begs Ozai for mercy. She says that Ikem is just a confused childhood friend, and claims that Ozai has her true love. So Ozai, nice guy that he is in these comic books, gives in, and lets Ursa say goodbye. Aw, that's sweet. Ursa goes on to tearfully reassure Ikem that this is cool, we're all fine, she totally loves Ozai, The Promise was awesome and had everyone in character, and M Night Shyamalan is a genius filmmaker.
Ikem starts crying right there in the street (which was, coincidentally enough, my same reaction to seeing positive reviews of The Promise) as Ursa is driven away in Azulon's sweet ride. He walks out of town (still sobbing), into a foresty-looking place (just moping now), past a big circular rock with four circles carved into it (still moping, also foreshadowing) and onto a random tree branch (sobbing again). We then get a montage of Ikem making a home and life for himself in the wilderness, but sadly without "We Built This City" playing in the background, and the passage of time is marked only by the growth of his facial hair. The scene ends when a fully-bearded Ikem sees a glowing ghost wolf, but before we can say, "Aha, that's the wolf on the cover to the next comic according to the advance solicitations!" we cut over to Ursa's wedding.
She's wearing white and red, just like Roku's wife as seen in the cartoon episode "The Avatar and the Fire Lord." I never understood why ATLA went with both the Asian idea of wearing white at a funeral, white being a symbol of death, and the Western idea of wearing white at a wedding, white being a symbol of purity. Anyway, Ursa doesn't look very happy here, surprise, susprise, for a not-so-blushing bride. And Ozai is being so nice, he says that Ursa should thank and compliment her parents for their love when she sees them for the last time, since she has to give up everything from her old life in order to be a proper Princess. Because she "belongs" to the Royal Family, you see.
Just in case you're not feeling sorry enough for Ursa yet, there's a picture where she's got these completely freaked out eyes while Ozai is giving her an affectionate peck on the cheek. It looks like Ozai is making out with his secret blow-up doll.
Things flash forward from there several years, where Ursa is writing a mysterious letter in her room. She takes a moment when she's done to open a secret panel beneath a giant picture of the Fire Nation sigil to reveal... stage masks! (Dun dun dun?) Two are the masks she and Ikem were wearing for their rehearsal, a third is the Blue Spirit mask, and there's a mysterious fourth there. Putting aside the obvious mystery (please, I’ve typed that word enough) that we can't even begin to ponder without more information, why is the Blue Spirit mask there? Is it being implied that Zuko chose that mask because he was familiar with it thanks to his mother? Or are the masks supposed to represent her family? Even though this smells like another attempt at continuity porn and/or fan-service, I'm cool with this one, since it means we can forget the idea floated in that otherwise decent Zuko's Story manga that Zuko had his whole Blue Spirit identity and modus operandi handed to him by a Gary Stu. I had always kind of liked the idea that the Blue Spirit was just a random mask that Zuko bought or stole as a disguise, but I'm willing to see where they're going with this. As depicted here, Ursa hides the masks when she hears a knock at the door and finds Zuko looking for some mommy-comfort, so he can't have seen it yet, and there might be more story about the connection between him and the mask.
Anyway, Zuko complains about a nightmare in which Azula was laughing while Zuko and all his stuff burned. Foreshadowing! Or, even better, prophecy! Zuko should head to the racetracks with that kind of premonition. Quick, Zuko, what are my lucky numbers? I'm playing the lottery tonight! Ursa soothes Zuko and puts him to bed, saying, "When the good dreams come, hang on to them with all your might," which is good advice but apparently Zuko is as capable of learning as ever, considering that he goes on to drive his girlfriend Mai away from him several times. And returning to the topic of gambling, I'm willing to bet that we'll be seeing that phrase again in future installments of this trilogy.
Ursa then leaves and hands her mysterious letter over to a dear, trusted servant for delivery. But Ursa ain't no Batman, and this servant certainly ain't no Alfred, because it turns out she's been re-routing all of Ursa's outgoing mail to Ozai. You know, in the United Staes, the FBI can shoot you for that. As if we needed more proof that the Fire Nation is evil, now it's being blatantly un-American! The contents of the letter immediately freak out both the woman and Ozai (who is fighting empty suits of armor modeled on the guards in Ba Sing Se, in a nice bit of finally getting a soldier's suit of armor right for once) but the scene ends without the audience being allowed to know what everyone is talking about. Thus ends Ursa's story, for now.
Dun dun dun!
A Family Affair (but not a Zucest kind of affair, yuck)
Back in the present, Zuko, Aang, Katara, and Sokka are dealing with the fallout of the Yu Dao Crisis from The Promise by... attending a lecture on ancient Earth Kingdom forms of government. Okay, I'm all for treating the issue like something other than a melodramatic grudge match between Aang and Zuko, but... really? The Fire Lord has to leave his nation to come to Yu Dao (and they must be in Yu Dao, because Kori and Sneers are also present) to attend a lecture? Like, the professor guy giving the lecture couldn't have just written down the info and sent copies to all the relevant parties? I would think that Zuko has better things to do, no? He does run a nation. Supposedly. Actually, the more I see of him being Fire Lord, the more I'm convinced he doesn't do squat in his day job. The only time I've seen him give orders is to his military, and he's never shown as commanding anything even as large as the defense force from the Day of Black Sun. Seriously, I think it's canon that the adults really run the Fire Nation and Zuko is allowed to play in his sandbox with his toy soldiers and deal with the barbarian foreigners in hopes of reigniting the war.
More to the point, what ancient Earth Kingdom form of government had representatives from foreign nations appointed to be absolute dictators of another country? Maybe things took a really weird turn before Korra's time.
Anyway, the gAang reacts with typical teenage boredom to the lecture, which I can totally relate to. In my day job, there's nothing more annoying than sitting around while someone prattles on about something that could just have been sent out in an email. See, the Avatar franchise is finally addressing grown-up issues that I can identify with. Already we're doing better than The Promise! Good job, creative team! There are even some funny bits where Sokka makes fun of Katara for trying to get everyone to behave and she throws some snowballs in his face. No, really, I found that part funny. Can you believe it? Even the art contributed to the humor.
While that's going on, Zuko catches that the lecturer is talking about "family" in some way, and it turns out that there's an old Earth Kingdom adage about how treating your own family with dignity is the first step in learning how to govern a nation with dignity. I can see a certain amount of wisdom in that, I suppose, although I think there's plenty of room for debate, but it fits nicely with how- in the flashback sequences- Azulon was treating Ozai and Ursa like breeding stock instead of letting them live their own lives, and we all know how well he ran the Fire Nation. And, hey, who can forget that Ozai lit Zuko's face on fire (except everyone involved in The Promise, cha cha cha) and then went on to try to light the Earth Kingdom's face on fire? So, yeah, this is good advice for these characters. Zuko, of course, immediately realizes that he showed up to lecture without doing any of his homework, proverbially.
However, what has him bummed is not that he recently launched deadly attacks against the friends who became like family to him, or that he ignored and insulted the woman he loves, or that he nearly plunged the world into war because he failed to understand that his uncle is always willing and happy to impart a little advice in a letter. No, Zuko is upset that he locked up his genocidal father, and committed his hallucination-seeing sister to an institution.
...ah, I finally get it. This comic is pretending that The Promise never happened.
And you know what?
I'm totally on board with this. Let's party!
Back in the parallel universe where a version of The Promise played out that wasn't completely goofballs, Zuko's reaction actually makes a bit of sense. Hear me out. Yes, Ozai and Azula were awful people who had to be fought and put where they couldn't harm people, but this is a new world order where things are supposed to be accomplished without fighting. The fact that Zuko had no choice but to win with fighting was a tragedy, but since Zuko could always use more practice at getting what he wants by talking to people in a reasonable manner, it couldn't hurt to try to salvage something from those family relationships, provided that he keeps a healthy view of things and pulls back if it looks like more harm than good is being done.
Right?
Back in the Fire Nation- because, apparently, we're still doing that thing where Zuko can just commute to work across an entire ocean- Zuko looks in his latest project, which is using Azula to get Ozai to reveal what he knows about Ursa's whereabouts. Suki and Ty Lee have been overseeing things while he was gone, which basically amounts to watching with growing discomfort as Azula and Ozai stare at each other wordlessly. Sheesh, no wonder Zuko has no time to do any actual Fire Lording. His subordinates are useless. So he gets the bright idea to bring in some tea for his father and sister, figuring that treating them like human beings might be the first step in healing his family. It's that whole dignity thing in action. And you know what he gets for his troubles?
The most spectacular scene in the entire book!
Azula grabs the tray with her teeth, yanks hard enough to knock Zuko off his feet, and hops up to confront Zuko while all tied up in a straightjacket.
Oh, Azula, I've missed you!
Fortunately, the Kyoshi Warriors aren't completely incompetent, and Ty Lee is on the scene quick enough to hit Azula with some paralyzing blows. In response, Azula asks Ty Lee when she began working against Azula on the behalf Ursa. She's become paranoid that everything that went wrong in her life was her mother's doing because Ursa is afraid or jealous or something. So, while Azula's abilities haven't diminished, she's still quite crazy and is now denying all responsibility for her fall from grace by making up conspiracy theories and pushing the blame on others. I, really, cannot get over how well Azula is being written here. This all ties in quite nicely with her established flaws, and her psychological difficulties are only making her more of a threat since she can't perceive reality properly but still has all her strategic faculties intact. Let's give a round of applause to the writing team!
Azula goes on to say, while doing these creepy boneless poses as a result of being paralyzed and chi-blocked, that if Zuko wants to give her some real dignity, he wouldn't hold the world’s lamest tea party, he'd let Azula and Ozai talk in private. Oh, gosh. Remember how I was saying that Zuko should take a healthy view of that whole fixing-family thing? Yeah, it's about to go to unhealthy places. Zuko is obviously being a bit of a goofball here, but I'm willing to allow that this is within his character. He's taken the idea into his head that fixing his family will make him a better Fire Lord, and his mistakes are all going to stem from that. I can buy that Zuko would be stupid in this way. It's the type of idealism he's displayed before, and hasn't quite made this kind of mistake yet in his life.
From there, things jump to the return trip to the palace. Zuko dismisses Suki and Ty Lee, saying that he's more than capable of bringing his paralyzed sister back home without guards. Thankfully, The Promise didn't happen in this universe, so I don't need to point out that any random teenage girl with some martial arts training can get to Zuko and try to assassinate him at will. Zuko tells Azula that he's going to let her stay at the palace for now, albeit under guard, and guess what Azula's response is?
The second most spectacular scene in the entire book!
Azula's just coming out of the paralysis, and uses the extra flexibility and lack of pain to twist her way out of her straightjacket and get her hand up for a Lightning-bending attack against Zuko!
Azula, you are the best villain in this franchise. Don't let anyone tell you different.
However, I'm not keen on how Azula's Lightning-bending is portrayed in this comic, and this scene is a good example of the problem. Lightning-bending was always shown as requiring a certain set of circular arm motions. Azula always did them, Iroh did them, and even Ozai did them. What varied between all three of the Lightning-benders was the speed with which they performed the motions. Ozai was the fastest, and when Azula was going crazy during Sozin's Comet, it took her longer to summon the lightning, implying that she wasn't in as much control. Yet, throughout this comic, Azula needs to only point her fingers and will it to fire off a lightning blast. This is consistent with a disturbing trend started in The Promise, where Bending is treated more like a set of superpowers than a function of a martial arts style. In my opinion, the fault lies mostly with the writing team, since Gene Yang clearly scripted Azula to throw lightning here without being able to perform the proper arm motions, while in some places further in the comic it looks like the art is meant to at least evoke the old poses when possible.
Nevertheless, this fight scene is pretty cool. Azula's lightning blast merely seems to stun Zuko's eyes in the dark, so perhaps it's an especially weak form of the style. Azula then rips through her straightjacket (wow, getting chi-blocked makes you stronger?) and does a handstand that places the chains on her feet in the proper position to intercept Zuko's Firebending blast, fully freeing Azula from all her restraints. She does a Firebending jump-kick at Zuko, which also launches her up to the nearby rooftops. I'm getting this specific because this is actually one of two times in the entire book when Azula uses fire, and while it's still her signature blue color, I wonder if her Firebending is somehow impaired, given that she seems to default to underpowered lightning attacks all the time.
One off-screen rooftop chase later, Zuko tracks Azula down to a room in the palace, where she's found one of Ozai's old secret rooms. Azula is looking at some letters that Ursa apparently wrote and Ozai saved all this time, but that's the least interesting thing about this room. There's Water Tribe stuff on display, including pottery, some spears, and a parka (that looks a little feminine to me). There's an Air Nomad shirt on display, plus a necklace like Gyatso used to wear. There's Earth Kingdom pottery, along with one of those suits of Ba Sing Se armor that Ozai was using for target practice, and a Dai Li costume! (I knew Long Feng was responsible for The Promise! Everyone was brainwashed!) Plus there are tons of other knickknacks lying around. What was Ozai hiding all this stuff for?! I mean, the armor was being used for targeting dummies, why hide a set? Where did he get the parka? Did he like to wear this stuff sometimes? And what of the Air Nomad stuff? They were all dead by the time he was born. Is this his secret cosplaying room? Was Ozai a fan of LARP? Did he and Ursa or some concubine come in here and play 'Fire Nation Solider and Barbarian Prisoner' sometimes? I- I was joking about the blow-up doll thing.
I feel like we've gotten a glimpse into Ozai's true psyche and it is more disturbing than I ever could have imagined.
Oh Mother, Where Art Thou?
Back to the plot, Azula teases Zuko by burning one of Ursa's letters while she uses the distraction to tuck another of them into her clothes. She implies that the letter she burned held the key to Ursa's whereabouts, and that if Zuko wants the information, she'll share so long as she gets to go with him. I'd give a little DUN DUN DUN here, but we all pretty much guessed this based on the cover. Zuko isn't a complete moron, though (99% still isn't complete!), and so brings in Aang, Katara, and Sokka to help keep an eye on Azula. Iroh is appointed as acting Fire Lord in Zuko's stead, but I honestly wonder if anyone would even notice if Zuko just up and left for a month. No, wait, The Promise didn't happen. That's right. He just nips away for diplomatic day trips every so often. Everyone reacts predictably to the idea of taking a stroll with someone who tried to kill them all (Sokka even threatens Azula and she responds with a little static electricity jolt that doesn't invoke the proper arm motions), but Azula takes it all fairly calmly for a psycho, and Zuko explains why they have no choice. So everyone agrees, perhaps a bit quickly, but given all of the context we've had for this, I'm fine with not belaboring things.
As they leave on Appa, Azula gives her CRAZY EYES look and asks the gAang which of them Ursa recruited for her epic 'Troll Azula' scheme first, and an argument almost breaks out when the gAang object to being part of a paranoid delusion. (Don’t you hate it when that happens?) I have to say, I'm loving the balance they achieved with Azula here, so calm and in control until she casually says something that makes you realize she's perceiving a completely different reality than the rest of the world.
Speaking of different realities, we flash ahead to the end of the flight to Ursa's hometown just in time for a little Close Encounter of the Spirit Kind. The gAang is about to land Appa and settle in for the night when Aang suddenly starts making a face like he just heard about his characterization in The Promise (zing!), which turns out to herald the arrival of the same giant blue Spirit Wolf that hangs around with that Ikem guy. See, the markings on the wolf's chest match the angry eyes Aang was doing. This is kind of goofy, and I'm guessing will tie in to Ursa's mask fetish in some way, but for now it just seems really silly to have Aang doing these over-the-top expressions just before what are supposed to be serious and spooky encounters with mythological beings. Anyway, Aang is apparently the only one who can see the wolf, and Azula uses the resulting the debate as an opportunity escape her leash by-
-in what is the third most spectacular scene in the book-
-jumping off of Appa in midair!
Aang jumps with his glider to catch her, but Azula was apparently planning for that, and once he's lowered her to a safe altitude she does another one of those low-powered lightning blinders (and it looks like she uses the proper arm motions this time!) to get away from him and land safely.
I honestly cannot believe how great Azula is being written here. It just goes to show, the people making these comics really are smart people, because in my experience it takes someone with real intelligence to write an actual strategic genius. Sure, it helps when you can arrange characters, events, and environments to support the strategist in question, but making it feel right for the audience still takes a degree of cleverness that's fully on display here.
Back to the story, Azula tries to pull a runner like she was eating in Ba Sing Se's most expensive restaurant and just realized she forgot her wallet, but she's held up when she crosses a river and the image of her mother shows up to say that leaving the waitress to pay your dinner bill is just bad manners. Azula and the image of Ursa have an argument about paranoia that nicely straddles the line between the possibility of Azula hallucinating all this and Ursa actually reaching out from the Spirit World or something (I’m in favor of the former situation, but I have a feeling the latter will be the case), and Azula lets slip that the letter she hid from Zuko is the evidence she needs to steal the throne from him. (DUN DUN DUN!) Zuko shows up and Azula refuses to go quietly, but thankfully, Katara is on hand to put a damper on the situation and cool everyone's temper!
Come on, that one wasn't so bad. Cause, see, she's a Waterbender and covers Azula in ice. It's funny.
That's when the Spirit Wolf arrives, and for some reason, this time everyone can see him. This is never explained, and we jump straight to the fight between the gAang and the wolf. Bending attacks don't work, nor does Appa's bulk, and then the wolf vomits a bunch of Spirit Moths at the gAang which swarm them and suffocate the gAang with their combined mass.
I don't know about you, but I think this is all cool stuff. I love it when Spirits do weird things that seem like they came out of some ancient and wacky mythology (for all I know, this whole sequence does), and while this fight scene takes up a lot of pages, I think that demonstrating the wolf's abilities is worthwhile, as it's clearly going to be a major factor and/or plot device. This is loads better than spending multiple pages on Aang fighting Firebender mooks again.
The gAang doesn't want to hurt the spirits until they know what's up, but that leaves them on the losing end of the fight, so Azula offers to solve their problems for them if Zuko agrees to trust her and let her out of the icebox. (Cause, see, 'icebox' is a slang term for... oh, never mind.) I'm not sure if Azula is just pushing a power struggle here, or if her Firebending is actually impaired enough that she can't free herself, but Zuko eventually Firebends to melt the ice around her arms. Azula uses her little lightning flare trick to attract the attention of the moths (with what looks like something vaguely inspired by the proper arm motions), and then flings the lightning ball to draw them all away like moths to the flame, ho ho ho. The wolf, for some reason, follows the moths. Dang, that thing is about as brave as Cobra Commander at the 23-minute mark of an old GIJoe episode. I can practically hear it screeching, "They have an Azula! Run, run for the hills!"
In the final scene of the main story, Zuko and Sokka have a little talk about little sisters and the wonderful relationship between Sokka and Katara, and it's actually very nice and worthy of Sokka's character. He puts a blanket on a sleeping Katara, and Zuko, who has heard about nice sibling relationships but has only ever seen them in fiction, figures that copying Sokka might just be a good thing in this one case. However, no sooner does he successfully drape a blanket over a shivering Azula before he notices a suspicious-looking paper sticking out of her boot. This sets up our tired old cliffhanger, where it turns out that the paper is a letter from Ursa to Ikem- possibly the letter from the flashback sequence that had Ozai all upset- in which Ursa refers to Zuko as "our son," implying that Zuko is an illegitimate with no claim to the throne of the Fire Lord.
Dun dun dun, if you actually think the people behind this comic have the guts to pull the trigger on that one. It's completely out of nowhere, especially given what we saw in the flashbacks, and it would strongly undermine the whole issue of legacies from the original cartoon. However, the fandom has been going crazy over it, and even rampant complaining is good advertising when it gets everyone talking! Raise your hand if you bought this book after the cliffhanger leaked and you wanted to see if it could possibly be true.
Yeah, that's what I thought.
Moreover, the primary speculation this kind of thing is promoting is about how it could even be possible, not the effect it would have on the characters. The big time-jump between Ursa being forced into marriage with Ozai and her writing the mysterious letter, after Zuko and Azula are walking and talking children, leaves things so completely without context that some fans are even speculating that Ursa is completely insane, and has concocted a fantasy in which Ikem is Zuko's father despite it being physically impossible. People are either complaining about how the cartoon's messages and themes are ruined, or else scrambling to explain why they aren't ruined. The whole thing seems to imply a lack of confidence on the part of the writing team in the audience's investment in the characters, otherwise the 'cliffhanger' would be real proof of Zuko's parentage, and not merely the possibility.
It's really just a thorougly lacklaster ending to a graphic novel that had done so well up to this point.
Parallels and Perpendiculars
I'll take just a moment to talk about the interweaving of the two plotlines. Honestly, it works well enough, but I just can't see any logic or reason behind how it's done. The only time it looks coordinated is when they set up Ursa's letter just before Zuko finds the cliffhanger letter in Zuko's boot, implying that they're one and the same, but otherwise the juxtapositioned events don't seem to have any relation to each other in terms of either plot points or thematic relevance. That's not a problem or point of criticism, because things flow smoothly and it helps to break up the scene changes in each of the two plotlines, but I would have liked to see more artistry and parallelism there. Neither Zuko nor Azula's journey seems to mirror Ursa's, and revealing what we see of Ursa's past is taking away some of the mystery surrounding her without actually answering any of the big questions. I guess we'll see in the next two parts if that's a good decision or a bad one.
The Art
It's still Gurihiru, it's still the same exact same art, and it's still completely functional while not being particularly interesting. At least they draw Azula well, but I'm more than ready for a change.
Conclusion
As you can tell, there was a lot less to ridicule in this book than the last set of comics, so I apologize for any subsequent loss of amusement, but not too much because I'm actually getting a fairly good story about Azula here. There's still some dumb bits like the cliffhanger and the ease with which the gAang accepts Azula, we don’t really need the gAang involved at all, and the next two parts of this trilogy could really botch things up, but no story is perfect and this is a strong-enough start to give me hope. We all have our own notions about Ursa's past and fate, and what should be done with Azula, but what this graphic novel provides is interesting and flows naturally from what we saw of both characters in the cartoon, so I'm willing to see where things go. My one fear was that The Search would just serve up more of the same of what I've been seeing in fanfiction for years, but the story thus far has forged its own trail. This isn’t the start of an epic Avatar Expanded Universe, but it’s a fun tale that looks like it will answer some of the questions many of us have been asking for years.
More of this, please. After that, we’ll talk.
So, after the storytelling disaster that was The Promise, has scripter Gene Luen Yang upped his game and finally delivered something that lives up to the Avatar name?
Since this is a fresh start for the creative team, I'm not going to give that away in the introduction. What follows are extensive spoilers, critiques, compliments, and as much silly humor as I can pack into this review.
Most Epic Momma's Boy Ever
In the cartoon, the major sequel hook was the matter of Ursa, mother to Zuko and Azula, and (former?) wife to big bad Ozai. Part of Zuko's backstory was that Ursa had disappeared during his childhood, somehow preventing him from being sacrificed to his Ozai’s father Azulon via mysterious circumstances that involved Azulon suddenly dying and Ozai himself being named as the new Fire Lord despite Azulon previously not thinking much of the idea. Good thing the Fire Nation doesn't have tabloids; that kind of thing would have been solid gold, no phone-hacking required! Good for Ozai, I mean. Not so good for the Fire Nation, because Ozai was the crazy conductor of the crazy train to Crazyville. Anyway, it was later revealed that Bad News Ursa was alive and banished as a result of her mysterious mystery actions, but Zuko never got more information than that before the cartoon came to an end. The only indication that there was something more in that subplot was a scene at the very end of the finale where Zuko confronts his defeated father and asks for Ursa's address and phone number, a scene that was cut short in a rise of dramatic drum music that was one of most blatant and teasing sequel hooks in the history of epic animated sagas produced by Nickelodeon.
Although it's popular these days to say you never cared much about Ursa's fate, most of the fandom has been dying to know how that conversation ended, although not literally because then Dark Horse would have no one to sell a comic book to. Sadly, the follow-up appeared in The Promise, where it was revealed that Ozai instantly changed the subject and went on to talk about how out-of-character Zuko was going to act over the course of the next three graphic novels. It was a warning to us all, but we stuck around regardless, and Dark Horse rewarded our lack of spending wisdom by giving us another sequel hook at the end of the trilogy in which Zuko finally goes to visit his sister Azula in the asylum where she hid from The Promise's horrible characterization, and asks her to help interrogate Ozai. Azula, of course, agreed, because stealing the Avatar franchise from Aang is something she's not going to let her brother do without getting a piece of the pie for herself.
Dun dun dun, as the kids say.
The story picks up now in The Search - Part 1, which follows two main storylines that weave in and out of each other. One follows Zuko, Azula, and a bunch of people I don't care about as they track down information on Ursa's current whereabouts. The second follows Ursa in her younger days, and details how she came to be married to Ozai while supplying background for the clues that Zuko and Azula are digging up.
For simplicity's sake, and because the back-and-forth doesn't seem to line up in any mandatory sequence aside from one point near the end, I'll do Ursa's shorter storyline first and then follow her kids in the modern era.
Sins of the Mother
The story opens with the vaguest framing device ever, in which an unseen and unnamed storyteller is talking to an unseen and unnamed audience of one over a solid black panel. This made such an impact on me that I completely forgot about it until I saw people discussing it online. The actual beginning of the story shows a stage in a peasant village, upon which a young Ursa is rehearsing a play with her boyfriend, Ikem. (Can I just say that Young Ursa is a cutie? Hey, she's of marrying age, so there's nothing creepy here. And I never said I wanted to date her.) The play in question is "Love Amongst the Dragons," the play that Zuko mentioned back in the cartoon proper as the one his mother took him to several times. "Aha!" die-hard fans say. "At last we have that burning mystery explained!" As for myself, I'm a little disappointed with this trivia nugget. I enjoy it when characters are fleshed out with likes, dislikes, hobbies, and quirks that don't necessarily relate to the plot, and discovering that Ursa wasn't just a theater buff, that this play is SIGNIFICANT and MEANINGFUL and STUFF, feels more like fan-service than storytelling. It's not a big deal, but it's a trend I think reduces continuation fiction to a lesser state than the original material. It's like when Star Wars books have to add a tragic incident involving odds to Han Solo's backstory to explain why he didn't want the odds of survival quoted at him when he was about to flee into an asteroid field. Least necessary explanation ever, in other words.
Anyway, Ikem and Ursa are playing the romantic leads in the play, and Ikem is so enthusiastic about their performance that he asks Ursa to marry him on the spot. Before I can wonder if the Avatar world is going Hollywood and Ikem just wants some juicy Twitter gossip to help promote his next big role, he gives a heartfelt speech about loving Ursa since an incident where she beat him up when they were six years old. Wow, spicy. Fire Nation romances are the best. No wonder Zuko went for the gloomy girl with the knife fetish. (And then tossed her away when she mellowed. Ohhhhhhh.) Now, Ursa is depicted here as a peasant, not a rich noble, so either she really doesn't care that two-car garage and white picket fence or actors for the local community theater make a lot more annually in the Fire Nation than they do elsewhere, because she says yes to the proposal and immediately initiates a blushing make-out. Awwww.
However, tragedy is around the corner! (Dun dun dun?) Ursa gets home to find her mother sobbing over the Crown Prince Hairpiece that Sozin gave to Roku in the cartoon episode "The Avatar and the Fire Lord." It's soon revealed that Fire Lord Azulon is sitting in the backyard and wants Ursa to marry his son, Ozai. However, I'm still boggled by that hairpiece thingy. We distinctly saw that thing left behind when Roku went to fight the volcano, and shortly thereafter he died and his house was buried in lava. How did Azulon and/or Ursa's mother get it? Am I to believe that Roku's wife paused in the middle of that whole running-for-her-life thing to pick it up? I'm guessing Roku's wife was either a history buff or a packrat. And yes, I know Iroh had it in the cartoon with no explanation as well, but at least he's a connected world traveler who also visits the Spirit World. Mysteries are more appropriate with him.
Anyway, I want to take a moment in all this frivolity to discuss the reason that Azulon wants Ursa and Ozai to marry. He knows that Ursa is descended from Avatar Roku, and he believes that joining that bloodline to the Royal Family's will produce exceptionally powerful children. I really like this idea, and not because I used it in a fanfic I wrote two years ago. It ties back into the major ATLA theme of people dealing with the legacies and mistakes of their ancestors, and nicely illustrates the Fire Nation's corrupting nature without being overtly villainous, just elitist, obsessed with power, and a little inhuman. But wow, talk about cutting it close. The implication is that Azulon arrived out of the blue with this idea in hand. What was he going to do if he got there and Ursa was already married? Just pretend that he got lost on the way to the dentist and ask for directions home? I mean, we're talking about peasants, here. Ursa and Ikem might have been married within 48-hours of the proposal. Heck, they might not have waited for the marriage to set up house! No wonder the Fire Nation took 100 years to win a one-front war.
The story jumps right to lucky, lucky Azulon leaving with the happy couple in the backseat of his car, when who interrupts the return trip but Ikem himself! He's brought along some wooden sword props and is going to attack the royal procession in order to free his one true love from the awful fate of being part of Zuko's backstory. Fortunately for stupid-pants over there, Azulon must have left behind his regular royal guards in favor of a pair of arrogant spear-carriers. That was a close call! I mean, can you imagine if Ikem brought wooden swords to a Firebending duel? The idea of a barbeque doesn't even begin to cover it. It would be like... um, really crispy bacon... that's on fire.
Hey, they can't all be winners.
But like I said, it's just a pair of spear-carriers. Spears are considered a beginner weapon in Chinese martial arts military training, so Ikem 's knowing how to not bonk himself on head while holding a pair of swords (dao, specifically) puts him on top in this fight. He starts to get a few good hits in, but in a shocking twist it turns out that one of the spear-carriers is a Firebender, and quickly gains the upper hand. I guess this is before they gave special armor to the Firebenders? But if these guys really are royal Firebender guards, then how come Ikem was kicking their butts there for a while? I mean, I know Christopher Lee killed people with knives at one point in his life, but I didn't think that was standard training for actors. Of course, in a world where all culture is rooted in various styles of martial arts, maybe local actors do get that kind of training. Well, now I want a comic about a wandering actor/ronin person who goes on samurai adventures and stabs dudes.
Anyway, Ursa sees that her Lover Boy is about to get his wooden swords stuck where Agni don't shine and begs Ozai for mercy. She says that Ikem is just a confused childhood friend, and claims that Ozai has her true love. So Ozai, nice guy that he is in these comic books, gives in, and lets Ursa say goodbye. Aw, that's sweet. Ursa goes on to tearfully reassure Ikem that this is cool, we're all fine, she totally loves Ozai, The Promise was awesome and had everyone in character, and M Night Shyamalan is a genius filmmaker.
Ikem starts crying right there in the street (which was, coincidentally enough, my same reaction to seeing positive reviews of The Promise) as Ursa is driven away in Azulon's sweet ride. He walks out of town (still sobbing), into a foresty-looking place (just moping now), past a big circular rock with four circles carved into it (still moping, also foreshadowing) and onto a random tree branch (sobbing again). We then get a montage of Ikem making a home and life for himself in the wilderness, but sadly without "We Built This City" playing in the background, and the passage of time is marked only by the growth of his facial hair. The scene ends when a fully-bearded Ikem sees a glowing ghost wolf, but before we can say, "Aha, that's the wolf on the cover to the next comic according to the advance solicitations!" we cut over to Ursa's wedding.
She's wearing white and red, just like Roku's wife as seen in the cartoon episode "The Avatar and the Fire Lord." I never understood why ATLA went with both the Asian idea of wearing white at a funeral, white being a symbol of death, and the Western idea of wearing white at a wedding, white being a symbol of purity. Anyway, Ursa doesn't look very happy here, surprise, susprise, for a not-so-blushing bride. And Ozai is being so nice, he says that Ursa should thank and compliment her parents for their love when she sees them for the last time, since she has to give up everything from her old life in order to be a proper Princess. Because she "belongs" to the Royal Family, you see.
Just in case you're not feeling sorry enough for Ursa yet, there's a picture where she's got these completely freaked out eyes while Ozai is giving her an affectionate peck on the cheek. It looks like Ozai is making out with his secret blow-up doll.
Things flash forward from there several years, where Ursa is writing a mysterious letter in her room. She takes a moment when she's done to open a secret panel beneath a giant picture of the Fire Nation sigil to reveal... stage masks! (Dun dun dun?) Two are the masks she and Ikem were wearing for their rehearsal, a third is the Blue Spirit mask, and there's a mysterious fourth there. Putting aside the obvious mystery (please, I’ve typed that word enough) that we can't even begin to ponder without more information, why is the Blue Spirit mask there? Is it being implied that Zuko chose that mask because he was familiar with it thanks to his mother? Or are the masks supposed to represent her family? Even though this smells like another attempt at continuity porn and/or fan-service, I'm cool with this one, since it means we can forget the idea floated in that otherwise decent Zuko's Story manga that Zuko had his whole Blue Spirit identity and modus operandi handed to him by a Gary Stu. I had always kind of liked the idea that the Blue Spirit was just a random mask that Zuko bought or stole as a disguise, but I'm willing to see where they're going with this. As depicted here, Ursa hides the masks when she hears a knock at the door and finds Zuko looking for some mommy-comfort, so he can't have seen it yet, and there might be more story about the connection between him and the mask.
Anyway, Zuko complains about a nightmare in which Azula was laughing while Zuko and all his stuff burned. Foreshadowing! Or, even better, prophecy! Zuko should head to the racetracks with that kind of premonition. Quick, Zuko, what are my lucky numbers? I'm playing the lottery tonight! Ursa soothes Zuko and puts him to bed, saying, "When the good dreams come, hang on to them with all your might," which is good advice but apparently Zuko is as capable of learning as ever, considering that he goes on to drive his girlfriend Mai away from him several times. And returning to the topic of gambling, I'm willing to bet that we'll be seeing that phrase again in future installments of this trilogy.
Ursa then leaves and hands her mysterious letter over to a dear, trusted servant for delivery. But Ursa ain't no Batman, and this servant certainly ain't no Alfred, because it turns out she's been re-routing all of Ursa's outgoing mail to Ozai. You know, in the United Staes, the FBI can shoot you for that. As if we needed more proof that the Fire Nation is evil, now it's being blatantly un-American! The contents of the letter immediately freak out both the woman and Ozai (who is fighting empty suits of armor modeled on the guards in Ba Sing Se, in a nice bit of finally getting a soldier's suit of armor right for once) but the scene ends without the audience being allowed to know what everyone is talking about. Thus ends Ursa's story, for now.
Dun dun dun!
A Family Affair (but not a Zucest kind of affair, yuck)
Back in the present, Zuko, Aang, Katara, and Sokka are dealing with the fallout of the Yu Dao Crisis from The Promise by... attending a lecture on ancient Earth Kingdom forms of government. Okay, I'm all for treating the issue like something other than a melodramatic grudge match between Aang and Zuko, but... really? The Fire Lord has to leave his nation to come to Yu Dao (and they must be in Yu Dao, because Kori and Sneers are also present) to attend a lecture? Like, the professor guy giving the lecture couldn't have just written down the info and sent copies to all the relevant parties? I would think that Zuko has better things to do, no? He does run a nation. Supposedly. Actually, the more I see of him being Fire Lord, the more I'm convinced he doesn't do squat in his day job. The only time I've seen him give orders is to his military, and he's never shown as commanding anything even as large as the defense force from the Day of Black Sun. Seriously, I think it's canon that the adults really run the Fire Nation and Zuko is allowed to play in his sandbox with his toy soldiers and deal with the barbarian foreigners in hopes of reigniting the war.
More to the point, what ancient Earth Kingdom form of government had representatives from foreign nations appointed to be absolute dictators of another country? Maybe things took a really weird turn before Korra's time.
Anyway, the gAang reacts with typical teenage boredom to the lecture, which I can totally relate to. In my day job, there's nothing more annoying than sitting around while someone prattles on about something that could just have been sent out in an email. See, the Avatar franchise is finally addressing grown-up issues that I can identify with. Already we're doing better than The Promise! Good job, creative team! There are even some funny bits where Sokka makes fun of Katara for trying to get everyone to behave and she throws some snowballs in his face. No, really, I found that part funny. Can you believe it? Even the art contributed to the humor.
While that's going on, Zuko catches that the lecturer is talking about "family" in some way, and it turns out that there's an old Earth Kingdom adage about how treating your own family with dignity is the first step in learning how to govern a nation with dignity. I can see a certain amount of wisdom in that, I suppose, although I think there's plenty of room for debate, but it fits nicely with how- in the flashback sequences- Azulon was treating Ozai and Ursa like breeding stock instead of letting them live their own lives, and we all know how well he ran the Fire Nation. And, hey, who can forget that Ozai lit Zuko's face on fire (except everyone involved in The Promise, cha cha cha) and then went on to try to light the Earth Kingdom's face on fire? So, yeah, this is good advice for these characters. Zuko, of course, immediately realizes that he showed up to lecture without doing any of his homework, proverbially.
However, what has him bummed is not that he recently launched deadly attacks against the friends who became like family to him, or that he ignored and insulted the woman he loves, or that he nearly plunged the world into war because he failed to understand that his uncle is always willing and happy to impart a little advice in a letter. No, Zuko is upset that he locked up his genocidal father, and committed his hallucination-seeing sister to an institution.
...ah, I finally get it. This comic is pretending that The Promise never happened.
And you know what?
I'm totally on board with this. Let's party!
Back in the parallel universe where a version of The Promise played out that wasn't completely goofballs, Zuko's reaction actually makes a bit of sense. Hear me out. Yes, Ozai and Azula were awful people who had to be fought and put where they couldn't harm people, but this is a new world order where things are supposed to be accomplished without fighting. The fact that Zuko had no choice but to win with fighting was a tragedy, but since Zuko could always use more practice at getting what he wants by talking to people in a reasonable manner, it couldn't hurt to try to salvage something from those family relationships, provided that he keeps a healthy view of things and pulls back if it looks like more harm than good is being done.
Right?
Back in the Fire Nation- because, apparently, we're still doing that thing where Zuko can just commute to work across an entire ocean- Zuko looks in his latest project, which is using Azula to get Ozai to reveal what he knows about Ursa's whereabouts. Suki and Ty Lee have been overseeing things while he was gone, which basically amounts to watching with growing discomfort as Azula and Ozai stare at each other wordlessly. Sheesh, no wonder Zuko has no time to do any actual Fire Lording. His subordinates are useless. So he gets the bright idea to bring in some tea for his father and sister, figuring that treating them like human beings might be the first step in healing his family. It's that whole dignity thing in action. And you know what he gets for his troubles?
The most spectacular scene in the entire book!
Azula grabs the tray with her teeth, yanks hard enough to knock Zuko off his feet, and hops up to confront Zuko while all tied up in a straightjacket.
Oh, Azula, I've missed you!
Fortunately, the Kyoshi Warriors aren't completely incompetent, and Ty Lee is on the scene quick enough to hit Azula with some paralyzing blows. In response, Azula asks Ty Lee when she began working against Azula on the behalf Ursa. She's become paranoid that everything that went wrong in her life was her mother's doing because Ursa is afraid or jealous or something. So, while Azula's abilities haven't diminished, she's still quite crazy and is now denying all responsibility for her fall from grace by making up conspiracy theories and pushing the blame on others. I, really, cannot get over how well Azula is being written here. This all ties in quite nicely with her established flaws, and her psychological difficulties are only making her more of a threat since she can't perceive reality properly but still has all her strategic faculties intact. Let's give a round of applause to the writing team!
Azula goes on to say, while doing these creepy boneless poses as a result of being paralyzed and chi-blocked, that if Zuko wants to give her some real dignity, he wouldn't hold the world’s lamest tea party, he'd let Azula and Ozai talk in private. Oh, gosh. Remember how I was saying that Zuko should take a healthy view of that whole fixing-family thing? Yeah, it's about to go to unhealthy places. Zuko is obviously being a bit of a goofball here, but I'm willing to allow that this is within his character. He's taken the idea into his head that fixing his family will make him a better Fire Lord, and his mistakes are all going to stem from that. I can buy that Zuko would be stupid in this way. It's the type of idealism he's displayed before, and hasn't quite made this kind of mistake yet in his life.
From there, things jump to the return trip to the palace. Zuko dismisses Suki and Ty Lee, saying that he's more than capable of bringing his paralyzed sister back home without guards. Thankfully, The Promise didn't happen in this universe, so I don't need to point out that any random teenage girl with some martial arts training can get to Zuko and try to assassinate him at will. Zuko tells Azula that he's going to let her stay at the palace for now, albeit under guard, and guess what Azula's response is?
The second most spectacular scene in the entire book!
Azula's just coming out of the paralysis, and uses the extra flexibility and lack of pain to twist her way out of her straightjacket and get her hand up for a Lightning-bending attack against Zuko!
Azula, you are the best villain in this franchise. Don't let anyone tell you different.
However, I'm not keen on how Azula's Lightning-bending is portrayed in this comic, and this scene is a good example of the problem. Lightning-bending was always shown as requiring a certain set of circular arm motions. Azula always did them, Iroh did them, and even Ozai did them. What varied between all three of the Lightning-benders was the speed with which they performed the motions. Ozai was the fastest, and when Azula was going crazy during Sozin's Comet, it took her longer to summon the lightning, implying that she wasn't in as much control. Yet, throughout this comic, Azula needs to only point her fingers and will it to fire off a lightning blast. This is consistent with a disturbing trend started in The Promise, where Bending is treated more like a set of superpowers than a function of a martial arts style. In my opinion, the fault lies mostly with the writing team, since Gene Yang clearly scripted Azula to throw lightning here without being able to perform the proper arm motions, while in some places further in the comic it looks like the art is meant to at least evoke the old poses when possible.
Nevertheless, this fight scene is pretty cool. Azula's lightning blast merely seems to stun Zuko's eyes in the dark, so perhaps it's an especially weak form of the style. Azula then rips through her straightjacket (wow, getting chi-blocked makes you stronger?) and does a handstand that places the chains on her feet in the proper position to intercept Zuko's Firebending blast, fully freeing Azula from all her restraints. She does a Firebending jump-kick at Zuko, which also launches her up to the nearby rooftops. I'm getting this specific because this is actually one of two times in the entire book when Azula uses fire, and while it's still her signature blue color, I wonder if her Firebending is somehow impaired, given that she seems to default to underpowered lightning attacks all the time.
One off-screen rooftop chase later, Zuko tracks Azula down to a room in the palace, where she's found one of Ozai's old secret rooms. Azula is looking at some letters that Ursa apparently wrote and Ozai saved all this time, but that's the least interesting thing about this room. There's Water Tribe stuff on display, including pottery, some spears, and a parka (that looks a little feminine to me). There's an Air Nomad shirt on display, plus a necklace like Gyatso used to wear. There's Earth Kingdom pottery, along with one of those suits of Ba Sing Se armor that Ozai was using for target practice, and a Dai Li costume! (I knew Long Feng was responsible for The Promise! Everyone was brainwashed!) Plus there are tons of other knickknacks lying around. What was Ozai hiding all this stuff for?! I mean, the armor was being used for targeting dummies, why hide a set? Where did he get the parka? Did he like to wear this stuff sometimes? And what of the Air Nomad stuff? They were all dead by the time he was born. Is this his secret cosplaying room? Was Ozai a fan of LARP? Did he and Ursa or some concubine come in here and play 'Fire Nation Solider and Barbarian Prisoner' sometimes? I- I was joking about the blow-up doll thing.
I feel like we've gotten a glimpse into Ozai's true psyche and it is more disturbing than I ever could have imagined.
Oh Mother, Where Art Thou?
Back to the plot, Azula teases Zuko by burning one of Ursa's letters while she uses the distraction to tuck another of them into her clothes. She implies that the letter she burned held the key to Ursa's whereabouts, and that if Zuko wants the information, she'll share so long as she gets to go with him. I'd give a little DUN DUN DUN here, but we all pretty much guessed this based on the cover. Zuko isn't a complete moron, though (99% still isn't complete!), and so brings in Aang, Katara, and Sokka to help keep an eye on Azula. Iroh is appointed as acting Fire Lord in Zuko's stead, but I honestly wonder if anyone would even notice if Zuko just up and left for a month. No, wait, The Promise didn't happen. That's right. He just nips away for diplomatic day trips every so often. Everyone reacts predictably to the idea of taking a stroll with someone who tried to kill them all (Sokka even threatens Azula and she responds with a little static electricity jolt that doesn't invoke the proper arm motions), but Azula takes it all fairly calmly for a psycho, and Zuko explains why they have no choice. So everyone agrees, perhaps a bit quickly, but given all of the context we've had for this, I'm fine with not belaboring things.
As they leave on Appa, Azula gives her CRAZY EYES look and asks the gAang which of them Ursa recruited for her epic 'Troll Azula' scheme first, and an argument almost breaks out when the gAang object to being part of a paranoid delusion. (Don’t you hate it when that happens?) I have to say, I'm loving the balance they achieved with Azula here, so calm and in control until she casually says something that makes you realize she's perceiving a completely different reality than the rest of the world.
Speaking of different realities, we flash ahead to the end of the flight to Ursa's hometown just in time for a little Close Encounter of the Spirit Kind. The gAang is about to land Appa and settle in for the night when Aang suddenly starts making a face like he just heard about his characterization in The Promise (zing!), which turns out to herald the arrival of the same giant blue Spirit Wolf that hangs around with that Ikem guy. See, the markings on the wolf's chest match the angry eyes Aang was doing. This is kind of goofy, and I'm guessing will tie in to Ursa's mask fetish in some way, but for now it just seems really silly to have Aang doing these over-the-top expressions just before what are supposed to be serious and spooky encounters with mythological beings. Anyway, Aang is apparently the only one who can see the wolf, and Azula uses the resulting the debate as an opportunity escape her leash by-
-in what is the third most spectacular scene in the book-
-jumping off of Appa in midair!
Aang jumps with his glider to catch her, but Azula was apparently planning for that, and once he's lowered her to a safe altitude she does another one of those low-powered lightning blinders (and it looks like she uses the proper arm motions this time!) to get away from him and land safely.
I honestly cannot believe how great Azula is being written here. It just goes to show, the people making these comics really are smart people, because in my experience it takes someone with real intelligence to write an actual strategic genius. Sure, it helps when you can arrange characters, events, and environments to support the strategist in question, but making it feel right for the audience still takes a degree of cleverness that's fully on display here.
Back to the story, Azula tries to pull a runner like she was eating in Ba Sing Se's most expensive restaurant and just realized she forgot her wallet, but she's held up when she crosses a river and the image of her mother shows up to say that leaving the waitress to pay your dinner bill is just bad manners. Azula and the image of Ursa have an argument about paranoia that nicely straddles the line between the possibility of Azula hallucinating all this and Ursa actually reaching out from the Spirit World or something (I’m in favor of the former situation, but I have a feeling the latter will be the case), and Azula lets slip that the letter she hid from Zuko is the evidence she needs to steal the throne from him. (DUN DUN DUN!) Zuko shows up and Azula refuses to go quietly, but thankfully, Katara is on hand to put a damper on the situation and cool everyone's temper!
Come on, that one wasn't so bad. Cause, see, she's a Waterbender and covers Azula in ice. It's funny.
That's when the Spirit Wolf arrives, and for some reason, this time everyone can see him. This is never explained, and we jump straight to the fight between the gAang and the wolf. Bending attacks don't work, nor does Appa's bulk, and then the wolf vomits a bunch of Spirit Moths at the gAang which swarm them and suffocate the gAang with their combined mass.
I don't know about you, but I think this is all cool stuff. I love it when Spirits do weird things that seem like they came out of some ancient and wacky mythology (for all I know, this whole sequence does), and while this fight scene takes up a lot of pages, I think that demonstrating the wolf's abilities is worthwhile, as it's clearly going to be a major factor and/or plot device. This is loads better than spending multiple pages on Aang fighting Firebender mooks again.
The gAang doesn't want to hurt the spirits until they know what's up, but that leaves them on the losing end of the fight, so Azula offers to solve their problems for them if Zuko agrees to trust her and let her out of the icebox. (Cause, see, 'icebox' is a slang term for... oh, never mind.) I'm not sure if Azula is just pushing a power struggle here, or if her Firebending is actually impaired enough that she can't free herself, but Zuko eventually Firebends to melt the ice around her arms. Azula uses her little lightning flare trick to attract the attention of the moths (with what looks like something vaguely inspired by the proper arm motions), and then flings the lightning ball to draw them all away like moths to the flame, ho ho ho. The wolf, for some reason, follows the moths. Dang, that thing is about as brave as Cobra Commander at the 23-minute mark of an old GIJoe episode. I can practically hear it screeching, "They have an Azula! Run, run for the hills!"
In the final scene of the main story, Zuko and Sokka have a little talk about little sisters and the wonderful relationship between Sokka and Katara, and it's actually very nice and worthy of Sokka's character. He puts a blanket on a sleeping Katara, and Zuko, who has heard about nice sibling relationships but has only ever seen them in fiction, figures that copying Sokka might just be a good thing in this one case. However, no sooner does he successfully drape a blanket over a shivering Azula before he notices a suspicious-looking paper sticking out of her boot. This sets up our tired old cliffhanger, where it turns out that the paper is a letter from Ursa to Ikem- possibly the letter from the flashback sequence that had Ozai all upset- in which Ursa refers to Zuko as "our son," implying that Zuko is an illegitimate with no claim to the throne of the Fire Lord.
Dun dun dun, if you actually think the people behind this comic have the guts to pull the trigger on that one. It's completely out of nowhere, especially given what we saw in the flashbacks, and it would strongly undermine the whole issue of legacies from the original cartoon. However, the fandom has been going crazy over it, and even rampant complaining is good advertising when it gets everyone talking! Raise your hand if you bought this book after the cliffhanger leaked and you wanted to see if it could possibly be true.
Yeah, that's what I thought.
Moreover, the primary speculation this kind of thing is promoting is about how it could even be possible, not the effect it would have on the characters. The big time-jump between Ursa being forced into marriage with Ozai and her writing the mysterious letter, after Zuko and Azula are walking and talking children, leaves things so completely without context that some fans are even speculating that Ursa is completely insane, and has concocted a fantasy in which Ikem is Zuko's father despite it being physically impossible. People are either complaining about how the cartoon's messages and themes are ruined, or else scrambling to explain why they aren't ruined. The whole thing seems to imply a lack of confidence on the part of the writing team in the audience's investment in the characters, otherwise the 'cliffhanger' would be real proof of Zuko's parentage, and not merely the possibility.
It's really just a thorougly lacklaster ending to a graphic novel that had done so well up to this point.
Parallels and Perpendiculars
I'll take just a moment to talk about the interweaving of the two plotlines. Honestly, it works well enough, but I just can't see any logic or reason behind how it's done. The only time it looks coordinated is when they set up Ursa's letter just before Zuko finds the cliffhanger letter in Zuko's boot, implying that they're one and the same, but otherwise the juxtapositioned events don't seem to have any relation to each other in terms of either plot points or thematic relevance. That's not a problem or point of criticism, because things flow smoothly and it helps to break up the scene changes in each of the two plotlines, but I would have liked to see more artistry and parallelism there. Neither Zuko nor Azula's journey seems to mirror Ursa's, and revealing what we see of Ursa's past is taking away some of the mystery surrounding her without actually answering any of the big questions. I guess we'll see in the next two parts if that's a good decision or a bad one.
The Art
It's still Gurihiru, it's still the same exact same art, and it's still completely functional while not being particularly interesting. At least they draw Azula well, but I'm more than ready for a change.
Conclusion
As you can tell, there was a lot less to ridicule in this book than the last set of comics, so I apologize for any subsequent loss of amusement, but not too much because I'm actually getting a fairly good story about Azula here. There's still some dumb bits like the cliffhanger and the ease with which the gAang accepts Azula, we don’t really need the gAang involved at all, and the next two parts of this trilogy could really botch things up, but no story is perfect and this is a strong-enough start to give me hope. We all have our own notions about Ursa's past and fate, and what should be done with Azula, but what this graphic novel provides is interesting and flows naturally from what we saw of both characters in the cartoon, so I'm willing to see where things go. My one fear was that The Search would just serve up more of the same of what I've been seeing in fanfiction for years, but the story thus far has forged its own trail. This isn’t the start of an epic Avatar Expanded Universe, but it’s a fun tale that looks like it will answer some of the questions many of us have been asking for years.
More of this, please. After that, we’ll talk.
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no subject
Date: 2013-04-04 03:20 pm (UTC)The Promise was just Azula's version of actual events, interpreting what Zuko told her through her own screwball worldview. The Search, meanwhile, will end with that mysterious conversation at the start of the trilogy being Azula talking to a snow globe.
I mean, can you imagine if Ikem brought wooden swords to a Firebending duel? The idea of a barbeque doesn't even begin to cover it. It would be like... um, really crispy bacon... that's on fire.
Hey, they can't all be winners.
Now we know where Zuko gets it from.
More to the point, what ancient Earth Kingdom form of government had representatives from foreign nations appointed to be absolute dictators of another country? Maybe things took a really weird turn before Korra's time.
It's not too different from the Qing Empire appointing governors to manage its provinces. We've speculated a lot that the Council might not be elected, or at least not in a way we'd consider fair and democratic, but that arrangement isn't too wacky all things considered. Republic City would basically be a province where there are five governors appointed and they all get equal say in matters of state.
And to keep either the FN or EK from dominating/subverting the ex-colonies, the Republic lacks even a basic self-defense force. Its national defense gets provided by an international coalition with mixed crews and commands, ensuring no one segment can pull a Fifth Column.
On reflection, not a bad solution to the problems raised in The Promise. Just a bad set of rules for seventy years down the line when the facts on the ground have radically altered.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-04 10:04 pm (UTC)But like I said, The Search makes a lot more sense if whatever version of The Promise that happened wasn't completely goofballs. So Aang's gut instincts are still reliable, at least in terms of the contemporary situation.
The Promise was just Azula's version of actual events, interpreting what Zuko told her through her own screwball worldview. The Search, meanwhile, will end with that mysterious conversation at the start of the trilogy being Azula talking to a snow globe.
I speculated on ASN that Azula is telling it all to Honora, so you're more generous to her than I am. In your version she's just crazy, in mine she's engaging in malicious slander. ;)
no subject
Date: 2013-04-07 07:32 pm (UTC)Why?
I didn't read this comic, but from your review I think I have enough of a grasp of things to comment, but please correct me if I screw up.
Western thought tends to assume that democratic republicanism is the best form of government but I'm not so sure that's true in all situations. Current day China seems hell bent on putting the lie to that and their share of atrocites and human rights abuses, as terrible as they are, aren't any more numerous or worse than America's. In a world like the AtLA-verse where authoritarian regimes are the norm then having that authority spread over a council as opposed to the hands of a single person sounds to me like as radical an idea as the Magna Carta was in its day. The only other people to try that were the Airbenders and they were not centralized, so a council's judgements only extended as far as the temple in which they resided.
Although I know post WWII Germany is a terrible analogy for the FN colonies it provides a framework in which I can understand why they instituted the council. The winners take over and get to dictate how the territory is run. Though it's more like in dividing Germany up the Allies agreed to let the Nazis have a chunk because Hitler wasn't in charge anymore so it was all okay now. Like I said, not the best analogy. My point is that if I don't think of the United Republic of Nations as either united or a republic, but as foreign-run territory, I can make sense of it.
Lavanya brought this up in her Nationalism essay already but now that we know a bit more we can expand upon it. Immediately post war, the council as established made a lot of sense. Nearly two generations later, where the people of the URN no longer identify with any of the remaining nations but are not able to or allowed to forge any kind of identity of their own, it's a huge problem, because the councilors DO still identify with their own nations and will do what's in the best interest of the nation they come from. To be fair to the GAang, I can't see how anyone, child or adult, could have seen that coming, with national identity being as entrenched as it was even in colonies put through over 100 years of war.
I'll be a little generous and say the URN's councilors might hold themselves to a higher standard of wanting to maintain peace or some other intangible goal. Regardless, by Korra's time they are not in sync with the average person on the street and I can't see how they ever would be. This explains the crime, the dissatisfaction with the status quo...I'm sure the anti-bending sentiment was in large part scapegoating, because it isn't really about benders having more power.
I know I argued that we had a situation in LOK where benders were more powerful than non-benders as presented, because we no longer had warriors and those who would learn chi-blocking were punished, and I stand by that argument. But I concede that ultimately that's not the real problem. The problem is the lack of community/national identity. There's no reason for anyone in the URN to care about anyone else in the territory save for whatever small group or family they build, nor any reason for them to care about the nations of their ancestors. That kind of displacement could only lead to trouble for benders and non-benders alike. If I knew that Bryke could be counted on to address these issues eventually in a reasonable way I might forgive the travesty that was Book 1: Air...but I have no such faith.
See, my heart is breaking all over again. So much potential for mind-bogglingly good story wasted. Arg, I need to stop torturing myself.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-08 02:01 am (UTC)And even then, our (the West's) current form of democratic republicanism is just one way it could have evolved. Some of the early stabs at it had far odder ideas than proportional representation (http://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showpost.php?p=7430287&postcount=550).
But yeah, I'm onboard with your general train of thought about governments in Avatar. They're seventy years out from the two major countries in the world being absolute monarchies. It'd be stranger if Republic City's council was democratically elected than if it wasn't.
he only other people to try that were the Airbenders and they were not centralized, so a council's judgements only extended as far as the temple in which they resided.
There was also the NWT. Arnook was a monarch by another name, but he didn't have the comparative power of Kuei or the Fire Lords. Pakku could tell Aang to piss off and there wasn't anything Arnook could do to countermand the dismissal.
aren't any more numerous or worse than America's.
I wouldn't go that far. The current government of China was, after all, responsible for the likes of the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution. And even if we're just talking post-Deng China, there's still Tiananmen Square, the One-Child Policy, and a fair amount of internal corruption/oppression. America's not a white knight, but they're still a lighter shade of grey compared to the PRC.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-08 03:29 pm (UTC)Really? I rewatched this episode recently and I'm not sure that it's that he couldn't do anything, just that he wouldn't because keeping his most powerful waterbender happy and maintaining his tribe's traditions was more important than making sure the Avatar learned waterbending. Cause at that point, they still were under the delusion that they were safe from the FN.
Arnook's such a blank other than being Yue's father, though, that eitIher interpretation fits.
"America's not a white knight, but they're still a lighter shade of grey compared to the PRC."
I dunno. With us recently coming out of two ugly wars, one which was not necessary, with the more that I'm learning about Vietnam and the Cuban missile crisis, with all the horrible things American politicians would do to halt the spread of Those Awful Reds and all the indigenous people we have either directly slaughtered or indirectly contributed to the slaughter of, I'm just not so sure we are a lighter shade of gray.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-08 02:58 am (UTC)First of all, I don't consider this point a real complaint. I'm just pointing out an inconsistency between the themes of The Promise and what the overall situation turns out to be when factoring in other works, plus snarking about the excuse that Gene Yang used to link back to The Promise (got to sell those books to newcomers somehow) and set up Zuko's character motivation to become a better Fire Lord by sorting out his family. As a plot point, it's functional, but I think that not a lot of thought was put into it.
Second, I'm not at all criticizing the system of government of the UR, at any point in the timeline. Yeah, the system is shown to not really be working in Korra's time, but it's just as easy to blame rampant corruption and/or incompetence. (Also, bad writing.)
I'm just pointing out how it looks. The system of government for the colonies when owned by the Fire Nation is an appointed Governor from the homeland who runs the each city-state supplemented by a military force that belongs to the Fire Lord. The system of government for the colonies in Korra's time is... a team of appointed co-Governors from the various other nations who run the only city-state we see and are supplemented by a military force that belongs to and is shared by the other nations. It's literally the same form of government, just with red replaced by a rainbow.
When I think of more complicated systems of government, I'm not comparing democracy versus republic versus dictatorship versus whatever. I'm talking about something like the United States has with both federal and state levels, and each has executive, legislative, and judicial branches that check and balance each other. That's exotic and complicated. I'm talking about something like Britain, where the monarchs have bartered their power with a more mundane government (with that more mundane government having pretty much all the power these days). That's an interesting mix of old and new. I'm talking something... adult. For all that The Promise made a big deal that something new was needed for the colonies, the end result seems to be recycling what it already had, with the only change being a recognition of the multiculturalism of the colonial people.
So, it just seems odd that The Search shows some kind of old, renowned expert on various systems of government to advise people, yet when Yakone was put on trial in Korra's cartoon, his fate is decided by the same council that made the day-to-day governing decisions. They couldn't at least learn about and implement a fancy judicial system? It would have been just as easy to show the gAang learning about basic diplomatic skills, and Zuko taking his little family fixation out of that, rather than claiming that they're learning the ins and outs of government.
no subject
Date: 2013-04-08 03:19 pm (UTC)But this seems to be more of a problem with how Bryke wrote LoK than how Gene Yang is writing those scenes of the Search, you know what I'm saying? The GaAng had to come up with an immediate solution to end a second potential war so the fact that the government they set up isn't a drastic shift from the one that was already there, just more multicultural, actually seems like a pretty mature choice. After all, that government was working as least from the perspective that it was stable and profitable - classist and racist as hell, sure, but stable and everyone had enough to eat. With the radical changes and rampant uncertainty the colonists underwent during the year after the first war was officially ended keeping the government more or less the same, changed just enough to help the severe class divide between EK natives and the FN oppressors, makes a lot of sense to me. It doesn't seem childish. I'm guessing that the problem is the emphasis on making something new and then not actually doing it, yeah?
Now, keeping that same government eighty years later when it is clearly NOT working is the part that seems immature to me. I agree 100% that in the thirty-forty years between the Search and the Korra flashbacks someone could think that maybe a court system separate from the legislature might be a good idea, even if the council still holds the ultimate authority they could designate some power to magistrates or whatever. But then we wouldn't see adult!Toph being snarky and adult!Sokka being funny! *sigh* This is doubly tragic because adult!Toph and adult!Sokka weren't actually that funny, to me, and I don't know if that's because neither Bryan or Mike was responsible for their humor in AtLA or if it's because what was funny in a 12 year old and a 15 year old isn't funny in 40 year olds and no one could have helped that. I dunno.
This is not to say that I don't agree that the version of the Promise we got still sucked, cause it totally did. I'm completely on board with the idea that there was a different version that we didn't see that the Search is drawing from. I'll just tell myself that the Promise Comics are the Ember Island version.
Edit: since I didn't comment on it previously, I'm so glad to hear that Azula is being Azula. I was worried from the leaked stills that she was going to be too generic babbly crazy that we wouldn't get any of her cold calculations. The idea that she's just as rational and calculating, just her premises are screwed up because she's perceiving a different reality, is awesome.
Since I refuse to believe that Zuko is not Ozai's son, to hear that the particular scene and phrase used is not what fandom reactions had led me to believe is gratifying. If it turns out, however, that the whole wolf thing means that Zuko is somehow Ikem's son after all I just...well I can't quit the franchise since I was already supposed to do that...um...I'll just be even louder in my annoyance?
no subject
Date: 2013-04-08 09:57 pm (UTC)As for Zuko's parentage, I think the fandom is basically falling right into the trap set up by the cliffhanger. I reason that if what's being implied by the letter is true, then the evidence would be airtight; the fact that it's slightly ambiguous and completely unexplained leads me to think it's a fake-out. (Unless our storytellers intend to use the exact same cliffhanger, this time with better proof, for the next volume. But I like to think that they're better than that.)