Toph

Because Mike and Bryan and Shyamalan were painting each others' toenails while they talked about the movie, and basically left the writers to do most of Season Two on their own.

>>85144

>>85144
Writing for season 2 was completed before M. Night showed up and Mike & Bryan wrote the same amount of episodes they did in the other seasons.

I prefer Book 3, personally.

>>85148

If it makes you feel better to think I'm just making shit up instead of repeating information that I've been told, you go right ahead.

Honestly, I think it all came down to pacing. The Gaang always had something to drive them forward and it changed regularly from arc to arc. Book 1 had the North Pole as their goal, and that was drive enough to keep them plodding and explore the world somewhat, but in Book 2 the goals were more diverse with far higher stakes.

You had the Gaang approaching Bumi for the first three episodes, searching for another teacher for the next three, and in the three after that the driving influence switched over to the villains' search, which was novel. After that you had numerous intersecting goals that coalesced around Ba Sing Se. The second half managed in macro what the first half did in micro: the Gaang strove for a destination, looked to alternatives when their quest was frustrated, and then the villains stole the show just as things started going the heroes' way.

It kept a sense of constant movement that was elegantly spaced in such a way that never got stuck in a single format. Contrast that with Book 3: its pacing was very unsatisfying because for the first half it felt like there really wasn't a goal. There was no adequately explained reason why the Gaang were travelling through the Fire Nation except to kill time before the Day of Black Sun. That was the issue right there, it was a goal in time instead of space, which meant that the Gaang didn't have anything to do except prepare for a predetermined event for nine episodes. The villains couldn't pick up the slack in terms of motivation because besides Zuko they thought the Avatar was dead. They were stuck in 'preparation' mode too. The Day of Black Sun did come and it was glorious, but all the character development prior to that took place in a vacuum. Zuko's vital conversion to the Gaang's point of view felt like a part-time hobby with nothing to pressure it.

The second half picked up tremendously and was far, far more driven, but it was hamstrung in having to do in half the time what Book 2 had a whole season to indulge in: holding up some kind of macguffin for the Gaang or its enemies to strive for. While Book 2 could switch focus every three or four episodes, the second half of Book 3 rarely had more than one episode available for goal refocusing. The prime exhibit for this ghastly situation was "The Southern Raiders": just look at the distances the protagonists travel, and the amount of development that's shoehorned into just this one episode that should almost certainly have been spread out across three or more.

The writers did sterling and gratifying work with the time they had, but they really wrote themselves into a corner with that Book 3 opening half that they really should have been able to avoid. It's a definite lesson for the future should they be in a position to try a three-season arc again: always give the characters something to struggle for.

>>85152

Writing for the show was pretty much complete, as was most of the production, even by the time M. Night bought the director's rights. The full season DVD sets, even the book 2 interview with Shyamalan were all released after productin and the initial air date, and Mike and Bryan still wrote or collaborated on most, if not all, of the major plot-important episodes.

>>85155


You're right that for the first half of Book 3 neither side has a goal that was distance related, but I completely disagree with it being a bad thing. It was really satisfying to see a period in the writing where the characters weren't racing around, it was the closest period in the series of seeing these kids as just that, kids.


I don't see why The SR should have been more than what it was, it was really nothing more than "field trip with Zuko part 3" to drive home just a bit more character development for the 2 characters involved. They all had a main goal they were driving to, but it was still a "time" goal, just this time more "urgent".


As much as I loved the Travelling gaang, showing off the world and fixing local issues all in a days work, it was more than fine for the gaang to finally slow down a bit near the end. They had episodes out there to show off the fire nation civilians as being personal, average and otherwise good people who are just stuck on the other side of the war, and they still went out to fix "issues".


And Zuko's reasons for leaving his father's side were far more than a "side-hobby", it practically became his only interest right before DotBS. He was happy to be home but once the initial annoyances wore off, he was still angry and felt like he never accomplished anything, and kept focusing on it. The moment he realized exactly why he was angry and accepted it, he then took his confrontation with his father.

>>85152
Then you heard wrong.

>>85160

>You're right that for the first half of Book 3 neither side has a goal that was distance related, but I completely disagree with it being a bad thing. It was really satisfying to see a period in the writing where the characters weren't racing around, it was the closest period in the series of seeing these kids as just that, kids.

Maybe book one or two could have had elements of that, but with an Invansion / comet of impending doom 1 / 2 months away, it really wasn't the time for them to be kids anymore.

>>85168


And I'm sure you've never slacked off and took a longer than necessary break before, as you procrastinated for a major school project or exam? I'm sure the still prevalent tendency for many high school aged kids (many well off to begin with) to shoplift "just cause" are because it's a bunch of kids thinking things through with the best judgment they can possibly muster.



They're kids, they're going to make mistakes in judgment all the time, and it's really not that hard to see something like this happen.

They've spent a near year of their life fighting, traveling and avoiding death at all corners, fighting bad guys and "Proclaiming the news of the Avatar's return". For their efforts, they've been imprisoned/killed/kidnapped/betrayed and all of the such has been attempted on them for god knows how many more times. Is it really that hard to see them, in the small oppurtunity they got, spending it recharging their bodies and trying to stay hidden rather than continuing their "quests". They needed to stay low.

There's not much else for these guys to do during their period off outside of train or relax, and the ones who had something to do (Sokka) were finishing up what they had to do, planning for the invasion.


BTW, for Book 3, it would really be more immature imo if the Gaang were still keeping up their plethora of different objectives open, the only goal that was serious was the DotBS, and after that it was only necessity that drove the mini-quests (learning fire bending, saving Hakoda/Suki, Katara getting over herself). I'm not sure what else needed to be done for Book 3, it was the most intelligent thing for them to do, even if it's a mistake in our adulterated "Saturday morning cartoons where the good guys are always fighting, no matter what" opinion.

>>85189
> in the small oppurtunity they got

What opportunity? It's not like they didn't know about the comet, or how soon it will be. This is like saying "Woah, only three days before this report has to be completed, good job I have a chance to rest."

> it would really be more immature imo if the Gaang were still keeping up their plethora of different objectives open
Wrong. The mature thing would be to say "[X] is bothering me, but we have more important things to deal with at the moment than my [Y] issues."

>>85193


An opinion very well notable when an older person looks at an issue as a bystander. Not one so prevalent in the case of what the show was.


And it was more than 3 days of time. In that said time, they accomplished teach aang rudimentary fire-bending, they broke high-profile POW's from a prison (and set the seeds to ruin a ruling figure's entourage and soon psyche) and quell the one issue that Katara was proving that she could not get over (aka Katara getting over herself). She proved throughout the season that she just could not trust Zuko, despite being super selfish and even more so risky (which, we're talking about a 14 year old girl here) she still needed to do it. It was like they were going out of their way to save some insignificant village from fire nation control instead of preparing for the event, and they were preparing for the event. It was heavily implied that most of the downtime in Season 3 was spent on the characters training and bending.

Looking at as.net threads back in 2006, I'm surprised to read so much criticism for season two. Complains about how the show became too different from season one, people convinced that Zhao was a better villain than Azula and stuff like that.

>Zhao
>Better than Azula

lol wut

>>85784

http://forums.avatarspirit.net/index.php?topic=1214.0

>>85784

I thought Zhao was an all-around great villain. If you had asked me whether or not Azula surpassed him mid-book 2, I might have said no. Now that I've seen her rise to power and her fall into insanity, I'd have to say Azula is a far deeper, more interesting character than Zhao.

The only complaint I have about Book 2 was the rushed resolution of Toph's runaway sub-plot. Specifically that Toph lied and used the Gaang to escape from her parents and that issue was never addressed. It was like a sign that Toph would play a diminished role in Book 3.

Iroh and Zuko's plots in this season were my favorite part, at the time. "Blah blah blah Earthbending - give me more of Zuko in poverty!"

>>85878

I felt in season 2 Zuko was very much on an angsty baddassery scale always somewhere between Vegeta and Clint Eastwood. Next season he was more on an Angsty awkward scale somewhere between Ryoga and Shinji.

>>85880
In "Zuko Alone" he reminded me of Toshiro Mifune more than anything else.

I had to check out the pilot before it hit me- Zuko is a badass so long as he's not around Iroh. Their dynamic deconstructs the badass antihero archetype, making him come off as immature-which he arguably is, of course.

>>85907
>Zuko is a badass so long as he's not around Iroh
Not always.

>>85908
I would have liked to see more scenes like these.

>>85909
Seconded. Although I would prefer some pants on Iroh.

>>85909

>>85910
Pants are an illusion, and so is death.