The Prosperity Gospel (which I personally like to call the “Osteenian Heresy”) claims that if you believe hard enough, bad things won’t happen to you. And if bad things do happen, you either don’t believe enough or did a sin.
The book of Job takes extreme pains to establish that Job has a devoutly sincere faith and is not doing a sin. Satan and God single Job out as someone whose virtue is unassailable. Yet he suffers. A lot. The word “calamity” is probably too mild. And Job personally yells at some loser friends who try to kick him when he’s down by claiming he must have done something to deserve his suffering.
The Prosperity Gospel fails on Scriptural grounds in many ways, but Job in particular not only runs it over with a tank, it then throws the tank in reverse and runs it over again.
When Zuko apologized to uncle Iroh in the tent cause he was so
ashamed of his actions and what he’d done to the only person who
unconditionally believed in his ability to do good >>>>>
So okay, I’ve given this rant before but this is another good time for it.
Structurally speaking, ATLA did something important with Zuko that, in a purely mechanistic sense of narrative development, I think a lot of people don’t notice immediately, and that even fewer people who want to emulate what was done with him get.
Which is Zuko is made a protagonist VERY early, and the show goes out of its way to continually place Zuko into situations where the audience empathizes and roots for him.
This happens in literally the second episode of the series, if we count the two-part premiere as a single episode, which I think we should. The A-plot of that episode, “The Southern Air Temple,” is Aang reckoning with the genocide of his people… but the B-plot?
The B-plot is the introduction of Zhao, and more specifically, his introduction in a way that is calculate to shift the audience, whose introduction to Zuko did NOT engender a ton of sympathy to him, directly and forcefully onto his side. They want Zuko to kick Zhao’s ass.
This continues all through book one and book two. Remember, Zuko is never, ever the main villain of this series. That’s initially Zhao, followed by Azula and Ozai. (Plus various temporary players like Long Feng.) Whenever Zuko isn’t placed into direct conflict with the other protagonists, he’s always written and presented in a way that is careful, VERY VERY careful, not to make him too monstrous, and to make us root for him. He’s placed right next to Iroh, who is designed for people to like, and that reflects back onto Zuko; we want Zuko to be better than he is because we want Iroh to have good things.
Put aside for the moment whether any specific character, including Zuko, deserves their redemption. If you’ve decided you’re going to do that, you have to erect the proper narrative scaffolding around them, and it extends to far more things than “did this person not do things that were too horrible” and “is this person genuinely sorry and is working really hard to atone.” There’s a difference between protagonist and white hat, but if you want someone to eventually wear that white hat, you REALLY need to establish them as a plausible protagonist early on.
Yeah, it was made obvious from the get go that Zuko is definitely nowhere near Zhao’s level of nasty, which in turn means he’s nowhere near Azula’s and nowhere in the scope of Ozai’s.
1.)
He made a deal with Aang to leave the Southern Water Tribe alone if Aang went with him. When Aang escaped with help from two of those tribe members, Zuko didn’t demand they go back and destroy what was left of the tribe as revenge. He didn’t even think of it as an option. There was no split second where he went, should I/shouldn’t I?
2.)
This is repeated. He corners the Avatar somewhere, causes some damage to the area in the ensuing fight, but does not stick around to raze the village/monastery to the ground and kill the people when he doesn’t get what he wants. Doesn’t consider this a necessary action even once.
3.)
The Iroh&Zuko relationship is juxtaposed with the Zhao&Zuko relationship. Both older men have more power over him. Iroh is a retired War General and Prince who is not banished. Zhao is a Commander in favor of the Firelord, who is also not banished. We could tell early on that Iroh is wise and despite being on the bad side, seems to be pretty chill. We took a liking to him immediately. Zhao is the opposite. He is very much like early!Zuko. Impulsive, rude, loud, cocky, etc… But why is he more annoying? Why do we root for Zuko as opposed to him?
Because we see what Zuko is like with his Uncle Iroh. Iroh does not rub in the fact that he’s banished. He doesn’t use that when reprimanding him for his attitude or his failings. That is a hot iron and he knows it. It’s to the point where Iroh can bend fire in Zuko’s face and Zuko is perfectly relaxed over it and doesn’t once believe his uncle will hurt him. There is a lot of faith in Iroh, from this angsty teenager, and it’s very obvious with their interactions.
Zhao is not trustworthy from the start. We’re shown this by how both Zuko and Iroh are hesitant to interact with him and don’t want to linger in areas he has control over, for too long. They even lie to him despite him obviously having more favor in the Firelord’s eyes than either of them do. Zhao’s personality opposes both Zuko and Iroh. And as we like Iroh, we want him to win and have nice things, as stated above. But Zuko&Iroh is a package deal. And as Zhao reveals himself more and more to be nasty even if it’s subtle, we want Zuko to win even harder.
And even when Zuko wins and he’s in the prime position to do to Zhao what Ozai did to Zuko for also ‘speaking out of turn’… he doesn’t do it. He walks away. He is the bigger man in that scenario. And Iroh further puts shame onto Zhao when he goes against the sacred rules of the Agni Kai because he can’t handle a loss to a banished teen. We are shown that Zuko follows rules and has honor, which is reinforced by Iroh’s, ‘even in exile, my nephew is more honorable than you’. Iroh’s Word is basically Law at this point. Sf he says it is so, then he must be right and the audience accepts that. He knows Zuko better than us and hopefully we’ll get to understand more as the story progresses.
Already by the 3rd episode, we’re shown that Zuko is in no way the worst person from the Fire Nation. In fact, we’re given a sort of scale now from the four major Fire Nation people we know of. Iroh–Zuko——-Zhao–Firelord.
We’re also hoping that Iroh rubs off on Zuko enough for him to also become wise and learn to chill out.
4.)
When “The Storm” finally rolls around, we’re pretty invested by then in the Iroh&Zuko relationship and that episode gives us so much more info into Zuko’s character and we are shown that Iroh is right. He has honor and he cares for others. And yet it’s obvious the Firelord doesn’t because we see Zuko do the right thing(protesting the plan to treat new recruits as cannon fodder) in the wrong place, and then his face gets burned off by his father because of it. And further, he’s banished for refusing to fight his own father. What sane parent wants to do battle with their own child? What sane parent banishes their child for speaking out of turn at the defense of their own peoples’ lives? What the fuck is wrong with the Firelord?
Zuko was punished severely for showing compassion and having a kind heart. And Iroh(and the ship crew even) is properly mortified by the punishments his nephew received for it, which in turn affects the audience’s perception of this situation. Iroh doesn’t like it, it’s especially bad then.
Now we start wondering why does Zuko wants to go back to the guy who burned his face off?! Iroh, talk some sense into him! PLEASE!
Halfway through S1, they got us to the point of wanting Zuko to have a redemption arc.
Making the audience want a character to be redeemed is also very important in this. We were shown he has redeemable qualities. We want that pay off! Do it justice!
my five year plan? read a lot of books. visit museums. walk through woods. stand in a river. adopt a little kitty. drink lemonade while sitting in a rocking chair on my porch.
I just think murtagh noticing you’re cold as you’re traveling, not having anything of his he can give you, so running to the nearest market and taking the utmost care to pick out a jacket he thinks you’d like and that would look good on you, then running back to shyly give it to you, refusing to take any of your money and saying it’s just a little gift for you is cute okay
Do you have any advice for someone who wants to get into writing fantasy? I get stuck in my head that I'll never put out anything great like Stardust or Earthsea and that it's just not possible to ever write anything like that in the modern world, because the stories have already been told and no one cares what the next generation has to say. And while I know most writers think they're garbage and you'll always be your worst critic, I can't help but think it's impossible to create great fantasy, and even if you do, no one will ever read it because the new generation isn't Le Guin or Tolkien or you. I guess what I'm REALLY trying to ask is how do we continue fantasy as a genre with the new generations when it's so intrinsically tied to old and, in most cases, dead authors? Thanks Mr. Gaiman, and my fantasy lit professor loves you.
You take the torch, touch the magic and pass it on.
You don’t try and write something big and important. You try to write something good.
Take the gift that Ursula Le Guin gave you in the Earthsea books. Write your book. Pass it on.
When I wrote Stardust I wanted to pay my own homage to writers I loved, like Hope Mirrlees, like Jack Vance, like Sylvia Townsend Warner, like James Branch Cabell, like Lord Dunsany. And I filled my fountain pen, because, I decided, the book I wanted to write tasted like a pen sort of a book, so I bought and filled the first fountain pen I’d had since my school days, and started to write. I wasn’t trying to write an important book. I was trying to write a book that would keep people reading and give Charles Vess, who would be illustrating it, lots of wonderful things to draw.
One of my favourite things about Stardust and Sandman is that Susanna Clarke read them and decided that she wanted to do that, and felt the books had given her permission to write what needed to be written.
All literature, fantasy or otherwise, is a conversation with the dead and those who told their stories before we were here. They speak to us, we listen, and then we tell our own stories in response.
I’ll let you in on a little secret: when you get better at lifting weights you also get better at lifting everything else. The muscles can’t tell the difference! They’re fucking idiots!!!
