I really, really enjoy being right. So when the main conflict of this week so perfectly echoed the exact debate Katie and I had last week, I felt smug-ish. On one hand, I had kind of predicted the future – the debate over legitimate abuse of bender power and privilege was the entire point of this week’s storyline. And they really ran with it on Korra. I mean, bloodbending? That is literally taking away another person’s bodily integrity. It is the ultimate power play. I did not anticipate they would go there.
On the other hand, I was also kind of wrong. You see, when I approached the question of bending and privilege, I approached it from a very secular, political, American point of view. I live in a world where someone claiming to have spiritual power over the balance of the universe is probably crazy, a megalomaniac or both, and I forget that in the world of Korra, it’s actually true. Korra really is a human embodiment for divine solutions to human failure. She really does have special powers that allow her to fix things others can’t fix. But since I am used to living and thinking in a world where that isn’t true, I’m hardwired to think of it in terms of, “You’re not my mom, you can’t tell me what to do! God, oppression.”
Whoever wrote the “You’re our Avatar, too,” line deserves a pay raise. I have no idea who they are, but they deserve a pay raise. Because I think when we look into the world of Korra, that’s something fundamental we have to remember when we consider characters’ politics and points of view. There are going to be some characters who have the same reaction as my kneejerk negative one, both benders (see: Tarrlok) and anti-benders. But for the most part, these characters live in a world where the spiritual is not abstract. In our world, we can consider the concept of everyone being equally unable to bend. In their world, certain people being born with supernatural abilities is normal, and looking to those people as being an elite, gifted class is only natural. The entire point of the Avatar isn’t to bend all four elements in order to control people — it’s to have part of each type of person literally in every single Avatar. And that is the flaw in Amon, Tarrlok and formerly my train of thought.
Now, how Korra’s going to figure out how to do that while imprisoned is anyone’s guess. My theory is that next episode is going to finally start putting together the flashbacks, and this Korra fan’s Tumblr post is a great analysis of what we’ve seen as well as a great prediction of what it’s going to mean. I won’t technically label it as a spoiler since all it does is analyze what’s already happened, but it’s so perfect and perfectly Avatar that I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out to be true. And hey, if I’m right, that’s awesome, but I don’t think any show has ever made me enjoy being kinda wrong the way Legend of Korra has.