OOO So True. I Saw Your Tags About How Nine/rose Had Her Calling Him Out A Lot More, Which Was Exactly

OOO so true. I saw your tags about how nine/rose had her calling him out a lot more, which was exactly what I read and made me like their dynamic a lot more. Then with ten it just felt so much like they 1: enabled each other too much and 2: she was really kind of pushy with him about wanting more from their relationship romanc-y wise.

With nine/rose I really liked how she had the self-respect to be really quite offended when people suggested they were and item and was straight up with him when he was being a twit. They seemed like friends. With ten/rose I got the vibe that being friends was "not enough" and she didn't seem sensitive at all to the legitimate objections he had to having a relationship with a human. IMO RDT actually canonized that Rose couldn't deal with the alien aspects (read: important parts of who he is) of him with the metacrisis Doctor and her conclusion in s4. I mean, I was so offended when she just put him on the spot to MAKE him say "I love you" and then started kissing his clone right in front of him because he could say it... I mean girl, you do remember why he doesn't do that sort of thing right? Because he is always going to have to watch you die? It was so inconsiderate of her smh.

I won't go into the MESS with Mickey because I just tried to pretend it wasn't happening because it was so stupid.

Okay but like from a writing standpoint there is no reason RTD and company had to change the dynamic in this way. If they really are supposed to be soulmates furrevahhhh(TM) then that's just lousy writing. As it turned out, the first assumption I had when watching the shift in the dynamic between Doctor/Rose after his regeneration was that she found him more superficially attractive and therefore started treating him different. However, this writing of their relationship could be granted meaning as an exploration of what type of person would truly be an equal and partner for the Doctor; if this was the case, Rose would truly have served the role of a character who loved the Doctor, but was unable to truly hold space (lol) for his alien-ness, as well as someone who could be swayed by his superficial changes through regenerations because she didn't quite see past the surface.

TLDR: There was no reason for the writers to make the ten/rose relationship less equal and mutually beneficial than the nine/rose dynamic, but this choice could have been easily justified by using Rose as a character to set up some of the traits that would need to be present in a romantic partner for the Doctor through her NOT having them. But RTD decided that he likes her too much so now the writing is just confusing.

I think that even if Rose and Ten hadn't been separated in Doomsday, Donna still would have told the Doctor that he needs someone to stop him, because the dynamic that Ten and Rose had wasn't that.

Southern Raiders

Well, after rewatching the Southern Raiders with my mom, it's easy to see why it could be interpreted as Zuko wanting violence and revenge, with scenes such as him lingering too long with his angry stare at Yon Rha after Katara already decided to leave, or him attacking and pressing on to get information from the captain of the Southern Raiders on the whereabouts of the man they were actually looking for, even though he could have called it quits as a "dead end" when Katara already started walking away.

But that's a misread. This is nothing personal to him and it wouldn't align with any of Zuko's previous behaviour - not in the Boiling Rock where he did everything to help Sokka, not in Day of the Black Sun when he didn't attack his father. Not in the North, where he offered a hand to try to save Zhao, a man who attempted to get him killed.

If the viewer invests two seconds into investigating the situation, it instantly becomes clear that when Katara was walking away when they hit the information "dead end", she was grim, tense, frustrated, bitter and still deeply hurt. Calling it quits there would mean her emotional wound would not heal. This is the reason why Zuko pressed on, and the reason he looked at Yon Rha with disgust. Not because he wanted specifically murder, but because it affected him by how deeply Katara was hurt.

"You should get some rest." "Are you ready Katara?" It's disingenuous to read Zuko's quotes as him doing this just to manipulate her into committing murder. He's never been portrayed as a manipulator in the show, and it makes perfect sense he's truly saying and doing these things to help her, just like how he was helping Sokka an episode earlier.

Yes, if I were directing the episode, I would have added scenes of more closeups, Katara despairing when they ran into a dead end, Zuko seeing her pain and it reflecting in his expression of sadness. That is where the focus actually is, and it would be conveyed visually this way. But:

Considering this episode was rewritten a thousand times, it's clear how the actual meaning was placed underneath the top layer of misdirection. And it becomes clear there was no chance for directing to put these visual explanations.

My mom commented, "maybe the Southern Raiders took Katara's mother as a prisoner, why is she overreacting?" and I had to facepalm. No, it's heavily implied Katara saw her mother's charred corpse. Her reactions throughout the show in regards to her memories of her mother are extremely intense, causing her to shake and cry. Third episode of the series, she outright says the Fire Nation killed her mother. And Yon Rha confirms in the end that he "didn't take any prisoners". It doesn't matter that Yon Rha was a pathetic person who was able to kill Kya due to Southern Raiders overwhelming their village and her being a nonbender. The trauma it caused to Katara became an integral part of her. Her "nasty" comment towards Sokka is logical. It's not nice or kind, but it's logical. Zuko was able to understand the depth of her pain and that simply "forgiving and moving on" was not an option for her.

And in the end, facing Yon Rha did help Katara get closure. It helped her. It alleviated the pain she was intensely bottling up for years. It gave her back control and power over the murderer she could do nothing about as an 8 year old girl.

everything, everywhere, all at once

Okay but it you ignore what actually happens in "The Forever Trap" and focus on the title, the banter, and the fact that they are stuck in a virtual reality that combines both of their homes into a domestic living space where people are literally constantly teasing them as a couple,

It kinda sounds like a romcom

it is a little funny, a little ironic, because as much as the Ember Island Players episode wants to be like "see?? you're silly for thinking zuko and katara's dynamic is romantic" it doesn't quite think through the in-world implications of the play because, conceivably, this play is built largely upon rumor, right? biased or purposefully distorted first, second, or third-hand accounts of the gaang and their journey? (and then of course, whatever artistic liberties the play writers want to take)

Because that all begs the question - why do the play writers think zuko and katara are together?? Like literally lmao was it just for the Drama of it all? Or do enough people in the avatar universe perceive Zuko and Katara to be a couple for it to be a far spread rumor?? Is June gossiping in taverns like "oh the fire nation prince? yeah he hired me to find his girlfriend. he had her betrothal necklace and everything"??

And how did the play writers (or anyone for that matter) even know that Zuko and Katara had shared a Moment with one another in the crystal caverns? Were there like, Dai Li Agents spying on them from afar? Watching katara huff and stalk around and yell at zuko then like five seconds later they see her cradling Zuko's face and they're just like "bro" "bro" "no way" "there's no war in ba sing se but we've got to tell people about that."

Then isn't it also implied this play is fairly popular in the fire nation? Like how many years after the war is the average fire nation citizen convinced that Zuko and Katara are an item?

I love this moment so much.

Katara is in a bad place, and it shows up on her face. She has feelings she’s been repressing for years out in the open, and it isn’t pretty.

But she still has Zuko there behind her, making sure she’s alright and trying to get her to take some time to rest. It doesn’t matter if she’s at a low point and the focus isn’t her being “pretty”; Zuko is still there for her, looking out for her.

Honestly I’m glad they weren’t written explicitly romantic because we get moments like these. We get to see a man listening to and caring for a woman because her feelings are important to him, not for superficial reasons. Katara feels so real in scenes like this.