SPOILERS AHEAD
Season 1:
Season 1 overall I think is a decent start, unlike the predecessor, Korra did seasonal villains. Which honestly did not work, in this case Amon is fine and I did actually like the plot line. I was hoping we would go deeper into the aftermath when Amon fell, but that sadly never came. However, during the season he was a big threat and I felt like he had good reasons to start the cult. In some scenes I felt a bit sympathetic towards him but, this show really loves it’s twist.
He ended up being a bender and I feel like his character got weaker once we learned that he was just after power. I liked him better when he was doing something to benefit the people, as he felt more human but had his flaws. Now he is just a super villain.
Moving onto our main cast, I will get straight to the point the love triangle was horrible. It isn’t as bad as the next season, but man it was hard to watch at points. Korra as a character is interesting, she is honestly like every teenager ever. We have all been angry and frustrated, I did relate to her in that capacity. It was frustrating to watch because lets be honest who liked their teenager self, but she is slowly starting to change her ways.
The rest of the avatar gang are all kind of surface level characters. We don’t get as much depth as I would have hoped, don’t get me wrong we got a good introduction to them but there isn’t much development to their character. Tenzin was interesting even though I mainly saw him as a side character, I feel he had some slight changes towards the end of season. Such as, learning that there newer and maybe better methods to teach bending.
Overall I wished we actually got more time with pro-bending as I really wanted to see just how different from the traditional method it is.
Now for the elephant in the room, that ending was just not it. Giving Korra her bending back was such a big mistake, considering what season 2 is about, this would have tied in perfectly into the plot. Honestly that whole scene of giving people their bending back, was just a bit underwhelming because at the end Amon wasn’t even a real threat in the end.
Some minor notes on the world building, we mostly discover Republic City and some parts of it it was okay, I did enjoy the vibe it had. I am big fan of steampunk so I was very on board with the design. The background were beautiful and the animation was really good, soundtrack really lifted up some scenes. I still did enjoy the journey and it is starting season which means it will be slower, so I will give it a 6/10.
Season 2:
Season 2 is something. This season’s villains is Unaloq, and he was good at the start and if they had just focused in on the whole Civil War I think this season would be better off. However, this plot line basically gets side lined, because he actually wants to release the evil spirit, Vaatu. I will get into the whole spirit stuff in a minute but to focus on Unaloq.
He was just a bit too much for my liking, and how does he know and nobody else what the spirit portals do. Like I have a very hard time believing that nobody else knew and I feel like that Korra’s past avatars could have maybe warned her. I know it is a stretch but this is world ending stuff, so expecting some help is not a far-fetched idea. Compared Amon, which ended up being a super villains towards the end, he was one from the beginning.
I will mention the ending now too, couldn’t we just get a bender fighter and not the giants. It felt so off, like I wasn’t watching Korra, I can’t fully put into words but there was something wrong there. This was probably my least favorite scene in the whole show.
Onto to the characters now and, Korra got so much worse. I understood her in the first season, but she is due for some change. I feel like she got angrier, but she is the avatar and at some point she will have to learn that she can’t be like this. Especially when it clouds her judgement to this extent. I know avatars are supposed to make mistakes and suffer, then learn and grow for them but this was painful to watch at times.
Boulin and Mako got their arcs in this season, I did not enjoy it actually. Not even mentioning the whole love triangle, which got so much worse, it was just felt pointless I guess. Boulin just too focused on this movie career, and the fame and money took over. In the end he mostly stayed the same character, so it feel like we didn’t go anywhere with it, I want to like it but I just feel like we could have been doing something better.
Mako was also just ignored in every way, like Lin would listen to him and take him more seriously considering his work with the Avatar. I can’t see her ignoring him to this extent, it feels really extreme. He was honestly the punching bag of this season, Asami was mostly in CEO mode.
Now onto the Tenzin/Jinora plot line, I felt the potential here but it was executed so badly. I almost wish we fully focused on Tenzin struggling to accept he is more than just Aang’ son. To then allow him to be able to go into the spirit realm, this would have been very emotional and would have at least made some sense than just Jinora being able just because I guess.
The writers had good ideas but the execution was just so bad, and even the animation was bad it was so clunky at times. Not to mention the dialogue was at it’s worse this season, just nothing went well this season.
I will also mention the other elephant in the room, Korra losing access to the previous avatars was not a big deal to me. I just never saw it as such an important piece. Especially now that Korra has Aang’s son, some of his friends and so on. She has many people to guide her, which would make her less reliant on the previous avatars.
Finally the spirit realm, I am kind of indifferent to it. I don’t have enough information to really form an opinion. I can see that the more cute spirits, are like of a lower tier spirit and the once that have crossed over are much more powerful spirits. That’s all I am gonna say really. There some comments that Vatuu/Raava broke some lore, I don’t think that is the case, since they learned the proper technique from the first benders while the actual powers came from the loin turtles. I am not the biggest fan of it, but I don’t hate it. Overall this season is the worst of Korra, at most I am giving it a 4/10.
Season 3
Season 3 was a blessing, I really enjoy the villains of this season. I felt like they had a good cause which was ruined by the extremes they were willing to go to. Considering how they were all skilled in fairly unknown sub types of bending, made them pretty terrifying. They felt really human at points, which I really appreciated after 2 seasons of just pure super villains. I do wish we got some more time with them, to learn about their dynamic, as I feel like this would have solidified their stance as Korra’s best villains.
One thing I also liked is that failed at their first attempt to capture the avatar. Yes they were powerful, but they were unbeatable which made the final fight that much better. We knew they had weakness and so does Korra, I do wish Korra got an actual chance to show her skills off. She was instead poisoned which greatly reduced her strength, which is a shame, as she really needed a win. Throughout the whole she always got beaten down and never got a proper solo win and this seemed like the perfect opportunity.
Onto some story elements, we got some consequences from the previous season, which I really liked. I am glad we even spent an episode just trying to deal with the problems that came from the spirit world, unlike the Equalists you can’t just remove them. The citizens and avatar will have to learn how to deal with them.
I assume because of the Harmonic Convergence, we also got more airbenders, and this this was my favorite part of the season. This was something I was looking forward to, and the show delivered. There were a lot of people who were hesitant to join, some didn’t want to and that is realistic. Very few people would want to do that, and I did like Kai being the first recruit. Showing no matter what kind of background you had, you can change and do better when somebody believes in you.
Tenzin struggling to teach the new air nomads about the culture is also fairly realistic, I really liked the journey Tenzin had to take to finally get everyone interested into it. While also realizing some might want to go home, and that not everyone is cut out to be like previous air nomads. I did have my gripes about Jinora and why they made her the chosen one, but that was justified in this season. She had her moments both from a useful team member but also just a nice side character.
I was very curious about what happened in this family, that is the Beifong family. Lin and Suying are Toph’s daughters, and I really enjoyed seeing what happened and how this conflict would be resolved. However, what I thought was going to be a moment where the sisters come together, Suyin instead lies to Lin to help team avatar escape from the city. This felt so wrong, because they were just starting to recover as a family and the first time your sisters needs some help, you lie. I mean that just seemed so off.
Boulin got a nice arc with Opal and him learning to lava bend, while not major happened I really liked the small things that happened to him. Finally some character depth from him. From what I remember Mako and Asami were just there this season, I really don’t remember much from them.
Finally Korra got a bit more grounded and less angry, while she still has problems with it on occasion it is leaps better than season 2. The final episode of the show hit really hard though, you can tell she is broken and then having Jinora getting her tattoos. That was the complete opposite of how Korra felt, Jinora was at her highest here and Korra at her lowest. Honestly probably the best scene in the show.
I did enjoy seeing the Metal Clan, and the other parts of the world, this is the most world building we got through out the whole show. Ba Sing Se was very interesting visit but I can see that happening, they were once a city of progress and now have greatly fallen behind as their leader became obsessed with riches and power. The animation also greatly improved, which I am very glad so I will give this season a 8/10.
Season 4:
Season 4 is for me the season of the characters. We got a deeper look into Korra’s struggles and I viewed her having the poison in her body more as a metaphor, that she mentally has not recovered. Her journey of struggle was a painful watch, and in that moment I really felt like Korra had become a proper avatar. The greatness doesn’t make the avatar, rather the struggle they go through to become the proper peace keeper. We see this change happen gradually over the season. Her first answer isn’t to fight it is to talk, and even after she learns this she is still afraid. This isn’t a quick fix, this is trauma that will haunt Korra for life but she is learning to deal with it. This was a beautiful part of her story that I am glad finally got told.
Zaheer helping her honestly makes a lot of sense, he had evil plans, but that was because he had good intentions. This isn’t what he wanted so of course he will help Korra, as ultimately he had made all of this happen.
Unlike Zaheer, Kuvira to me felt like a poor recreation of him. Kuvira was a master manipulator and she knew how to get here way but a bit too well. We don’t really see her fail ever until the final battle. Some might view the fact the the Beifong family escaping was a lose for her but I felt like it wasn’t enough. She was still a huge threat and to top it of, let’s give her a giant mech suit. They took the worst part of season 2 and made it worse. Like how do you hide a 200 meter tall mech suit, and that Zhu Li never saw it, just seems a bit far-fetched.
I know they like making over powered villains in Korra but this was way too much. Watching the the last few episodes was like watching ants get stepped on, it was hard to watch because it really was not fair. I will at least say the final fight between Kuvira and Korra was pretty cool but the ending just did not sit right with me.
I feel Kuvira should have broken down because she lost, she gave up everything and anyone to make this happen. I understand she was surprised she lived, but her reaction to everything seemed off. While I liked some aspects of her, sometimes I just really felt like they wrote her a bit too much like a perfect villain.
One character I did not expect to get such a good arc was Boulin. We already saw he was gullible so the fact he followed Kuvira is not surprising. I also liked the fact he did not figure it out right away. He really did believe in the cause and once he saw what was actually happening, it was too late. His relationship with Opal suffered greatly, and it was an easy fix which I appreciated. They really made him earn her trust back, we all knew he wasn’t a bad guy and so did Opal, she just needed time to see him change.
They did something similar with Asami and her dad, I did also like this it was a nice touch to her character. They didn’t rush it and Asami made small steps to trust her dad again, very beautiful. Mako was just side lined, instead we got a deeper look into Zhu Li and Varrick. Which I liked actually, when it comes to characters being purely there to be funny I tend to not like them. In Korra’s case I feel like they were well done in all season, and this touch of depth they gave them in this season was very fitting. They weren’t dumb either for purely comedic characters and they did benefit story, when it comes to side characters this as good as it gets.
To finish of the Beifong family issues Toph joins the party, and it felt fitting to bury the hatchet, and to start anew. The whole escape sequence was a lot more than helping them leave prison, it was the family becoming whole again. Overall I did enjoy this season, it wasn’t as good as season 3 but it was still good. There was that one episode that just was there, they recapped the story. Not sure if they were going for the ember island play but that was not it. I feel like giving this season a 6/10 is fair.
Overall:
Combining all of the reviews from the season it totals up to a 6, which does feel fitting. Korra had a lot of potential, and the writers really didn't utilize the chance they got. I still do recommend this show to anybody who wants some more Avatar related media.
