Why Naruto Fandom > Avatar Fandom

[redbrunja]

Because when a poster in naruto_rants  bitches about female character for no reason, 95 percent of the comments will be like, "Thigh high boots are hot, bitch, and we like our murderous healer chicks."

You pull that in Avatar fandom, and you'll have the majority going "burn that waterbending bitch for having a spine! BURN HER IN THE FACE!"

Comments

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

I don't think she sucked so much as a.) wasn't the avatar and b.) had NO TRAINING WHATSOEVER.

But yeah, part of what makes Katara awesome is that she worked her ass off, and kept training and practicing even once she found a master.

And loving the Naruto girls more than their creator does is not hard, let me tell you.

[strange_quark]

Yes, but when you compare her to the real prodigies in the show--Toph, Azula--she started on a vastly different level. Azula you could partially explain by having teachers from a young age, but Toph learned on her own.

And when you take Katara from the beginning and Azula from where she's introduced, and you get to the finale where Katara beats her even when Azula has the Comet on her side... I'm sorry, at which point did you miss that Katara kicks ass and takes names?

You can argue about some moments in the show, with her mood (I'm thinking The Waterbending Scroll and The Chase), but she's not flipping perfect, guys. She's 14. Were you a perfect saint at 14? I think not.

It also pisses me off when people bitch about her treatment of Zuko when he joins. I love Zuko, but would you trust him after the shit he'd pulled? I don't think so.

*Hugs my Sakura* I like to think I treat her better than that idiot Kishimoto ever could.

[strange_quark]

Technically, she had the badgermoles to help her with her earth bending.

Right, but learning from a human being who's goal is to teach you bending is different from observing how an animal behaves and adapting it so you can use it. So I guess it's fair to say she had help, but I think a lot of it is ingenuity on her part combined with a natural gift.

After seeing him live the high life after he saw all the crap the FN dumped onto the Earth Kingdom, I WAS PISSED! It took me until episode 11 to completely forgive him!

See, I have to say that I wasn't mad at him, because I saw it as necessary to his character development. Sudden epiphany wasn't what he needed--I think The Earth King proved this. If he'd never gone back to the Fire Nation, it always would have been a "what if?" in his head. I think he needed to have everything he ever wanted in order to realize that it wasn't what he thought it was, and to realize who he really was and what he really wanted.

But I'm looking at it in terms of his character arc. To the people his actions affected, he's pulled some outrageous shit. Plus, for Katara, more than any of the others, it was a personal betrayal: he led her to believe he was different and then seemed to prove he wasn't at all, like he was manipulating her. She opened up to him and he went and threw it all back in her face. If someone did that to me, you bet they'd know how pissed I was about it.

[strange_quark]

It was the fact that he saw how people suffered in the Earth Kingdom and didn't seem to feel any remorse at the beginning of season 3 which upset me

Hm, remorse, maybe not. But he's certainly disenchanted with the Fire Nation as a whole, pretty much from day one. At least, I think so.

But after the telling off Zuko gave his father, it showed me that he thought about all the people he met in the EK much more than I thought.

This is the scene where I started to really and truly fall in love with Zuko. I've had various opinions of him throughout the series, but that was the true crossroads of his life and it was MADE. OF. WIN.

When I re-watch the finale, I pretty much skip every part that doesn't have Zuko in it because I found the rest of it fell flat. But Zuko! *Hugs him to death* God, I love that boy. If he wasn't jailbait I'd molest him in a heartbeat.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

Well said. Katata did take was is probably a decent but not genius amount of talent and then make herself a master.

Oh, god, don't even get me started on complaining about what she did to Zuko. He totally deserved it, and it was even worse when it was zutara shippers saying it. It's like, if you can't handle your OTP not being sweet to each other every moment SHIP SOMETHING ELSE.

*Hugs my Sakura* I like to think I treat her better than that idiot Kishimoto ever could.


You do. I do. My rule for fanfic is that if they don't treat Sakura better than Kishimoto, I don't read.

(On that subject, have you read the latest chapters? Because I have a rant about that.)

[strange_quark]

It's like, if you can't handle your OTP not being sweet to each other every moment SHIP SOMETHING ELSE.

Mostly, they've missed the point. How awesome is it that you get these characters from completely different sides of the track, who are really polarized against each other but who actually have a hell of a lot in common. One of them is constantly fucking up, and he tries to redeem himself but the other one is still pissed because he personally betrayed her. Then they get this really cathartic experience where they begin to fully understand each other, and in the end they've got this really strong friendship and they're very close. That's an awesome recipe for romance, but if you skip all of those beginning steps and go straight to the last, you get... Katara/Aang. Which is not nearly as interesting.

Also, hate!sex can be hot.

(On that subject, have you read the latest chapters? Because I have a rant about that.)

You bet I have, and I'll bet you do. Rant away, sister. FUCKING DEUS EX MACHINA AMATERASU-EXTINGUISHER WTF WTF

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

Word, word, word.

ANd frankly, I'm not even upset about Sasuke deux ex machina - I've been waiting for that from the beginning of this fight.

Was pisses me off is that Naruto is TOTALLY stealing Sakura's powers and it SUCKS and I just KNOW that when we get back to Konoha, Sakura WON'T have been powered up offscreen, even though she totally deserves it, and it three members of Team 7 are getting (undeserved) power boosts, she should too.

[strange_quark]

The new Sharingan. Why is it so ridiculous. Why. Jesus. I was even willing give Sasuke a little credit with the last chapter (because did we, wait, was that... ah, there's Sasuke's soul! There's a little bit of the Sasuke I liked pre-Shippuden) but this author, man.

Unlike Avatar, Naruto doesn't seem to reward hard workers without fancy tricks who pushed through with pure heart. I can only name a few off the top of my head, and very few of them get screen time. When was the last time we heard from Lee, huh? When was the last time Hinata got to do something cool?

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

*blinks*

on, wow, you may have spawned a whole post I need to do on Naruto's elitist themes. Because you are so right; people's talent and screen time is SO DEPENDENT about the blessings of God/Kishimoto.

Let's see, you have:

Naruto: has a demon put into him at birth, son of the Hokage.

Sasuke: bloodline limit, last heir to a hugely important clan

Kakashi: comes from a ninja family and is given a bloodline limit.

Shikamaru (who gets an insane amount of screen time, considering): bloodline limit, genius (genetics).

Neji: bloodline limit, naturally gifted.

Compare and contrast with:

Rock Lee, genius of hard work: has NEVER won a fight. EVER.

Hinata: bloodline limit - natural ninja talent=works hard to overcome. Never seen from again.

Sakura: no ninja background, gifted with genjutsu: ignored by her first sensei, ignored during the sasuke in a barrel arc, and then has her awesome based-on-her-own-skills strength stolen by the main character, because he didn't have enough gifts, what with the massive chakra reserves, heirloom jutsu, frog summons, and clones weren't freaking enough.

Kishimoto has an ANTI hard work theme. You either get your skills from her family, or you're fucked.

(The Sannin are the only exceptions to this, and I actually think they are better balanched characters than Team 7. First, neither Orochimaru or Jiraiya come from important families, Tsunade is the one with political power and they are all on the same level, power wise.)