Ron Does Stuff

So! I liked the first episode of this Netflix adaptation and liked I said in the previous post, I can’t wait to see the rest of the season. So here we are with the second of this show! Hopefully, the show’s episodes get better and better as the season progresses!

This episode opens with Zuko throwing a tantrum and I don’t know if I’m really into how they’re displaying Zuko’s volatility during the first season of the animated series, but I don’t think it’s too much of a departure from who Zuko is as a character.

They’ve also really cut down on the episodes because rather than Katara stealing the Water Tribe scroll, they have it be something Gran-Gran packed into their supplies. I don’t know how that’s going to affect the story down the line, but it does make the plot move faster because let’s admit that some of the episodes of the 22-episode animated Avatar series were partly “today’s lesson” episodes, since it did air on a children’s channel.

While the trio head on over to Kyoshi Island, we get to see Uncle Iroh and Zuko are in a Fire Nation port city which is where I assume they’re going to meet General Zhao. Uncle Iroh is very much Uncle Iroh-ing and I really have to say that whatever faults I may find as I watch this show, the casting really does seem spot on.

Over at Kyoshi Island we finally get to see the Kyoshi Warriors and I really like them as well! The make-up, the outfits, and Suki making it very clear to Sokka that they are not the same was very delightful to see, even if it is a departure from what was from the animated series. And you know what, having Suki be the one checking Sokka out is a role reversal that I can appreciate! It’s a little tweak that sort of? Tries to do what the animated series did with its lesson on gender dynamics. That said, I don’t think this tweak needed to happen and they could have just done it the way the animated series did it but it’s not totally destroying my enjoyment of the series.

I also am starting to appreciate this running theme of division brought about by war that the show is building up, and setting up Aang as a uniting force. And it gives Suki a plausible reason to be attracted to Sokka because she’s spent her life ~avoiding~. I wanna make a dirty joke but I feel a little off doing this because in my head this is still very much a kids show despite the darker tone? I dunno!

The way they’re building up the Sokka-Suki relationship is entertaining enough and quite honestly wouldn’t be a problem if the animated show never existed. I really like how the roles have been sort of reversed with Sokka being the “feminine” one here and Suki being the mysterious “masculine” one that doesn’t quite know how to interact with the opposite sex. But like Isaid before, while this is an entertaining tweak, is it a tweak that really needed to happen?

WELL OKAY MAYBE THE TWEAK IS NECESSARY BECAUSE I AM INTO THIS TRAINING SEQUENCE. But GIRL you don’t expect me to believe she wiped that make-up off that quickly I watch RuPaul’s Drag Race that thick a layer of make-up won’t be undone by just a handkerchief who are you kidding.

Now for the things I didn’t like about this episode. I am not really gelling with the way they’re building up Aang’s character so far. He feels a little too dour and I am missing him being an actual child. I understand that they have to compress the whole thing into eight episodes but it’s one of the things that make Aang a great character — his ability to still be a kid in the midst of everything that happens around him. And having him be this dour goes against what the show is trying to build him up to be — a symbol of hope. It’s hard to look to a beacon of hope when that beacon always seems to be so hopeless!

ALTHOUGH, I am guessing that they’re setting up the groundwork for Book 3 when Aang finally grapples with the questions that he grapples with in this episode. I gotta admit, that part of Aang’s character development did feel a little rushed in the animated series. Even then, I still fear that they’re rushing it a bit too much. Is it enough to make stop watching the show? Not yet, but let’s see what happens further down the line!