Legend of Korra: Season 1 Thoughts

Welp, I just finished the season, and I have to admit, I'm kind of disappointing. Obviously, MASSIVE SPOILERS HERE PEOPLE!

Don't get me wrong, it was pretty good, but I had two main problems with it:

1. The Love Dodecahedron: Ugh. This part was my least favorite part. It just felt awkward and contrived. It wasn't like Avatar, where I could handle it in sane and small doses which felt natural, considering they were in the middle of a war. This felt completely out of place, and the segments were painful to watch. I wanted to shake the characters and tell them to prioritize, and that's never a good sign.

2. The Ending: ...wow. I mean, out of every single person Amon has every bloodbended, Mako is the first to struggle to bend back? Seriously? Tarrlok is a far weaker bender, yet he bended Tenzin + Lin Beifong + Others without any of them being able to fight back. It felt cheap and Deux Ex Machina-y. And if Aang couldn't airbend when Hama bloodbended his baldness, why can Korra?

3. Characterization: Some of the characters felt a little flat to me, relying more on their archetypes rather than true characterization. I understand it with the side characters like Pema and General Iroh, but Mako didn't seem to have much depth. Everyone else seemed to have this revelation or epiphany, but Mako stays static.

4. Black and White: I'm disappointed they didn't go into the moral implications of benders vs nonbenders. Instead, Amon was immediately turned into a villain, clear as day.

5. Hostages: Please, no more hostages. That card was way, way overplayed.

6. Worf Effect: Below the wacky inventor's estate, those mechabots had insane accuracy, yet above ground, they began to suck ***. I understand Tenzin being able to avoid them more easily, since he's an airbender and he's out in open ground, but it made no sense when they just started missing later.

Now that the bad stuff is out of the way, here are the parts that I thought were incredible.

1. Lin Beifong is freaking awesome.

2. Articulate Hobo is also awesome.

3. Tenzin is awesome. In fact, almost everyone was awesome. Except Mako, because he has the intelligence of a tulip, and he's not even the comedic relief.

4. Great villain. I liked how you can understand the villain without destroying the aura of mystery around him. In the end, no one can be completely sure of his motivations and actions, which is why I like him so much. He plays the Mysterious Bad Guy trope very well.

5. Bloodbending is ****ing creepy.

6. Metalbending with metal whips. So amazing to watch.

7. Animation. We can never forget the 6-fingered Toph, but everything else was great (albeit not as good as TLA's last season).

8. Fight scenes are great, especially the Korra and Lin vs Chi Blockers on the roof of the stadium. That one deserves special mention.

9. That kids were also pretty funny.

10. The design for Republic City. Gorgeous.

I can't think of much else, since I'm pretty exhausted from the marathon.

I'll have a better reply later on, about to do some schoolwork, but the first "good thing" about season 1 brought a tear to my eyes. Lin Beifong was great in Book 1, but oh my god she is horrible in Book 2.
I just... after reading that, do yourself a favor: don't watch book 2 :,(

i do think you should watch book 2... just skip all parts with her in it so your opinion wont change for the worse.