Korra Finale: More Thoughts

12/22/14

Update (12/22/14): Both creators of the show have talked about the ending. Bryan Konietzko's post is here. Michael Dante DiMartino's post is here. I really like what they have to say, too. Some of it mirrors my own feelings. Some of it is distinctly different. I'm glad I wrote my thoughts down first, and so I'm glad they deliberately waited to let people think.

Three days later, and I'm still get those pangs of sadness over it being over. The more I think about the finale, the more I like it.

Anyways, I'm just going to talk about the very ending, though, like, the more I think about the whole finale, the more I like basically every bit of it. But, I'd like to focus only on the very last bits for now, becaue one, that's what a lot of people are talking about, and two, I especially liked it for a variety of reasons.

Seriously, spoilers, don't read past here if you haven't seen the series finale, Stephan.

So, the final scene consists of Korra and Asami talking together about what they've been through. They decide on taking a much needed vacation and head off together into the spirit world.

There was hand-holding, general closeness, and the final scene had some key mirrors to the final scene of The Last Airbender. Romantic interest is a perfectly obvious and reasonable thing to infer. Though, I honestly believe that the alternative explanation that they've become close friends is also a perfectly reasonable interpretation.

I really like both interpretations, story-telling-wise.

An Aside: My Cynical Commentary

Actually, as an aside, this was basically the source of my cynical comments at the end. Korrasami was a popular ship on various corners of the Internet but I didn't believe for a moment they'd do anything resembling romance between the two characters, but I did know as soon as the two characters started talking during the ending that people would talk about it as such online.

To me, it looked purely like a conversation between close friends up until the last minute. But my thinking of the ship, and various other factors led me to make various "now kiss" comments during the final scene. Saying anything was ruining the moment, and I said basically the same thing several times. And it was a well-crafted scene, so I felt pretty bad as the credits started rolling.

I no longer feel as guilty about being all cynical at the end. It didn't really ruin the ending that much, and I'll watch the whole series (and its predecessor series) again fairly soon and be better about my commentary habits. But what my actions during this scene have convinced me to do is to stop perusing fan communities of entertainment online.

....

I went ahead and wrote a blog post about that first, to keep this tangent under control.

Romantic Love Interpretation Greatness

This would be a pretty awesome boundary push for American-made family animation. That doesn't make it good story-telling, but it being a milestone is also pretty great.

I hate how romance unfolds in most stories. Even in both Avatar series, I mostly didn't enjoy the romance that was present. Lots of infatuation without really knowing each other. It's pretty rare to see romance grow out of a friendship where that friendship was honestly just a friendship and wasn't set up as teasing a future romance.

Thinking about it, the only other one I can think of is Kim Possible. Oh, and Chandler and Monica, I think. Both are cases, like this one, where romance between the characters wasn't originally planned.

Now, I understand that infatuation is how a lot of romantic relationships start, maybe even some friendships where the romance doesn't go well (aka Korra and Mako, and Asami and Mako). But, seriously, fiction makes it to be the only way to a long-term romance. Which annoys me, because one, I don't enter romantic relationships that way, and two, puppy-dog love gets annoying pretty quickly. Not always, but when it's the only version of love that's shown, and love is present in basically all fiction (a super annoyance for me).

So, under the romantic interest interpretation, I really like this as an ending to the series. I also like that so many agree that it was quality, because I'd like more romantic stories to evolve out of friendships in fiction.

Friendship Interpretation Greatness

Friends can be super close and also look physically intimate. Both same-sex and different-sex friends. Again, personally, I have very few boundaries with my close friends beyond outright romantic affection.

All contact in the finale is short of outright romantic affection. Now, there's reasons this is the case even with a romantic intention from the authors, but I also appreciate the idea of showing that friends can be super-close. There's a spectrum of boundaries, and the line between friendship and romance is blurred in my opinion. I feel that's not properly represented in fiction.

Amgiguity Greatness

I really appreciate ambiguous romance between characters in plot, and I would like to see it happen more often, because, you know, sometimes romance isn't necessary to the plot and could at least be subtle if not present at all.

Seriously, though, some things are more powerful when presented subtlely, and with more ambiguity. Personal interpretation is a powerful thing, and it allows fiction to become a mirror by which the consumer can carefully view themself.

For instance, for me, this scene is all about the blurred line between romance and friendship. That's because, for me, romance is only something I'm interested in when it grows out of friendship. I feel quite sure that a lot of my friends would be fine romantic interests, but that doesn't really matter, because the first friend who showed romantic interest turned out to be the person I plan to spend the rest of my life with.

Since the very beginning, Asami and Korra were pretty good friends in this series. There was a bit of drama over the Mako love-triangle, but interestingly enough there wasn't much bad-blood shown between Asami and Korra (though, there was a bit shown with Asami/Mako bad blood, but that was more of an end-of-romance pain thing, I feel).

Their friendship really seemed to grow during season 3, and there was an implication of further growth of three years worth of writing letters between season 3 and season 4. And after they finally reunite, they have to get used to the initial frustrations of being in each other's life again. Which is totally a friend and/or lover thing.

After some growing pains of being back together again, though, they don't have much time to think of anything other than Kuvira and the war that's imminent. Friendship, romance, catching up, it all takes a backseat to the priority at hand.

Which is exactly how it should be.

And when it's all over, and there's time to relax, these two friends, realizing they have time to themselves, decide to go on a much needed vacation with each other.

That just makes sense, really.

And now they have time to think about each other, and what they mean to each other. It could mean they're really good friends, it could mean they're more than friends, but regardless, now they have time to spend together and be with each other as either, or both.

I love it.

Update (12/22/14): Both creators of the show have talked about the ending. They have confirmed the obvious implications are true. Bryan Konietzko's post is here. Michael Dante DiMartino's post is here. I really like what they have to say, too. Some of it mirrors my own feelings. Some of it is distinctly different. I'm glad I wrote my thoughts down first, and so I'm glad they deliberately waited to let people think.