Welcome to Gaia! ::

s**t, zuko would've knocked the apple off of AZULA's head. you're right, that's just how he is.

re: trust/communication/intimacy, they're really more specific symptoms of the main components of love. intimacy in the broad sense requires trust, and to a lesser extent communication. physical intimacy is a characteristic of passion.

mainly i figured katara and zuko getting together would have made for a more interesting story because there was MORE TO IT than kataang. kataang just kind of... happened, like a snowball rolling down hill. katara and zuko started out as enemies - one-sided, in fact, as katara hated zuko for obvious reasons but zuko didn't really care one way or the other about katara because all he was after was the avatar - then opened up to each other on the common ground they shared, then betrayed one another (zuko by siding with azula, katara by basically deserting zuko as soon as aang showed up), then became allies, then became friends, then came close to making the ultimate sacrifice for one another (after all, what would have happened to katara if she had NOT won the fight against azula?). it would have been the kind of love that happens so often in real life, the love that takes you by surprise. the kind of love where someone has become a part of your life to the point you may even start to take them for granted, then you wake up one day and realize you love them.

and for the record, zuko and mai DID get together because azula told mai to. it was in the nick mag, remember? zuko wasn't even THINKING about mai, but insisted on staying in BSS, and that didn't fit azula's plans so azula basically said "mai, go suck face with zuko so he'll come back to the FN with us." and that's all mai was throughout the course of the first half of season 3: the girl who surgically attached herself to zuko's face in order to keep him from thinking about his REAL problems and what he should be doing with his life. the girl tying him to his blah predictable life of aristocracy. the only time she ever did anything selfless for zuko's sake was helping him escape TBR; otherwise she kept referencing his POSITION. "i guess there are some perks to being royalty... let's order some servants around... it helps when your boyfriend is the fire lord..." she wasn't in love with zuko, she was in love with his STATION. that's exactly why she couldn't comprehend his decision to leave, to help the avatar and to take down his own father to end the war. zuko didn't care if he stayed the fire prince or not. he would have given his life to end the war, because he knew it was the right thing to do. mai couldn't have cared less if the war went on indefinitely, if the FN won or lost, or if ozai razed the entire world to ash.

anyway, i don't think it would do any good to keep harassing bryke about zutara at this point. i doubt they have the ability to make an alternate ending anymore even if they WANTED to, but their opinion of zutara is pretty clear - just listen to the commentary on the finale. they openly MOCK zutara and zutarians once they're finally in the clear to do so... the show's over, the DVDs are out, there's nothing anyone can do in retribution. not to mention, imo TSR was written as more of an ANTI-zutarian episode than a zutarian one. we certainly see katara at her worst in that ep, and zuko suddenly goes from adorkable and earnest for everyone's approval to a snarky, sarcastic a*****e telling everyone forgiveness is stupid. it was like bryke was trying to tell the fans that zuko and katara bring out the worst in each other.

at the same time, though, zuko and katara have more in common than pretty much any other characters in the show. their personalities are nearly identical. they've both lost a mother, and it's important to note that despite aang losing his people, he has a hard time relating to katara's loss, both because he was not there when it happened, and his upbringing has put him on a completely different spiritual level in regards to loss. he can lose his entire people and not even be angry - he got angry about gyatso, specifically, for about 10 minutes, but after that he almost never even acknowledges the loss. there's also a fundamental difference in the way aang perceives war compared to katara & zuko, specifically that the latter (along with the rest of the gaang) acknowledge the necessity of killing in certain situations, whereas aang refuses to believe it is ever an acceptable option. this is the main reason, i think, why zuko was not concerned with what decision katara made in TSR. even if she had chosen to kill the guy, zuko basically believed that the guy deserved whatever katara decided to do to him, including death. zuko placed the real and immediate suffering of a person he cared about above the life of a murderer or some high-and-mighty moral objection to killing. it's also alluded to that zuko is capable of killing when the situation warrants it - after all, his objection to killing ozai was not "killing is wrong," but "that's the avatar's destiny, not mine." he did redirect lightning at ozai, which could have killed him, and he was ready and willing to redirect lightning at azula, quite possibly killing her. zuko's not the best at planning ahead, but (in the words of yajiro kojima in "grenadier") he knows the weight of a human life.

Ain't that the truth

How so?

...That sounds about right. But I'll go with the castration bit, that way he will never be happy again. twisted

It kinda does, doesn't it rofl

Major LOLz