Doctor Who | 4.13 Journey's End

Doctor Who | 4.13 Journey's End

Oi, you two. You're just mad. Do you hear me? Mad! And I'm going to report you for madness.

DOCTOR WHO - 4.01 Partners in Crime

Doctor Who | 3.00 - "The Runaway Bride" /✫/ 4.02 - "The Fires of Pompeii"

They are just everything okay

There is something to be said about how Donna is the only companion (New Who) who sees the inside of the Tardis before she sees the outside and how that paralells that she is the only one who when first meeting them sees the Doctor how he really is: raw, emotional, even forced to be honest about his deepest wound (the fact that he "loses" companions), his powers and ship incredibly intimidating and scary for humans (a spaceship that can snatch you from thin air where you can open the doors and look outside into space)

She meets the real version of him before she meets the public persona of him. In first meeting him she sees aspects of him he normally hides and only reveals later because he doesn't want to scare people away (like the inside of the tardis who he doesn't show to anybody).

And in the end she still chooses to trust him. She saw him at one of the worst day of his life, depressed, defeated and lashing out at her and still said I trust you.

The runaway bride is essential for understanding the Doctor Donna dynamic.

It’s like something’s binding us together.

Doctor Who: The Doctor and Donna Noble

I'd contribute a tiny bit to the pro-Zutara side when it comes to the idea of Katara in the role of a co-ruler of the Fire Nation.

I understand where the negative arguments are coming from, how it's especially "shocking" if she enters the royal family (one which led the oppressive regime which waged war for 100 years and caused so much devastation);

however, firstly it is really no longer that family. Zuko committed high treason, almost died TRICE for that and still kept steady on that course, rejected his family, the family's terrible ideas about the world and both Ozai and Azula were imprisoned. Nobody supporting the old ways is still there. I don't understand negative arguments which treat Zuko's early background, lineage, political role (which may be incredibly undefined as the entire nation is being restructured, it's fantasy) as a more important factor than him as a person. He treats others with respect after undergoing redemption, he's demonstrably empathetic, he's working on undoing as much damage the Fire Nation has caused as possible, he was ready to die for these things. Secondly, why should a job or a title in a fantasy setting be a more relevant argument than love? If love was real and strong: if there's mutual respect between two people, understanding, cooperation, splitting of tasks, mutual care, communication on how to tackle problems, this is much more important and holds more weight than whether or not a role granting political power is from this or that side.

From what I've seen, the dominant headcanon for Zutara is that it wouldn't be oppressive to her but instead allow her to affect the world. It makes sense, most people want their favourite characters to be happy - AND there's no canonical evidence to suggest that being a co-ruler of the new Fire Nation would be a terrible, oppressive, restrictive position. Sure, there can also be headcanons where duty to other parts of the world might be too heavy and they split Zuko and Katara up, but this is a Tragedy trope and it only exists when there's incredibly strong love between them underneath this. So even this argument ends up supporting zutara.

I think that any arguments that use outside reasons why their relationship would be terrible are in the end much weaker in philosophy, compared to arguments about whether or not there are strong feelings between them. This is fantasy, love is an incredibly powerful force. And audience wants to believe in the power of love.

Now, if you ask me, I'd say I believe two characters absolutely do not need to have an on-screen kiss or anything completely explicit in order to convey that yes, they have deep feelings for each other. Shipping comes down to preferences, many people certainly simply Do Not Vibe with Zuko as a personality or whatever. However, this is a separate thing from what the characters are written as doing, how they are behaving in each other's company and how they treat each other.

So I'd say, if Katara loves Zuko (and vice-versa), then that's fullstop. Anything else is just an obstacle in their way which they'd tackle together.