This is why I say Avatar and Korra are my favorite shows. Because they hit so many of the things that I love in my entertainment. And these were just the first 10 examples I could think of. (I stopped at 10 because Tumbl'ing with more than 10 images is a bit of a layout puzzle.)

1) Found Families



This is a theme I’ve loved for quite some time now and one that is highly prevalent in the works of one of my favorite writers: Joss Whedon. The idea that your family is not necessarily your blood kin, but the people you find and choose. This concept is in nearly all of my favorite fiction.

2) Serialized Plotlines



If the network isn’t asking you to do a recap at the beginning of every episode, chances are high that I wish your show had more serialized elements. Some shows do the contained-weekly-adventure format very well while still not being “reset television,” but I always prefer the continuous plot threads.

3) Awesome Women



Knowing that The Legend of Korra had a female lead was definitely an influence in my decision to watch these shows. In 113 episodes of half-hour television, the Avatar universe produced a whopping 18 female characters that I would not hesitate to call awesome. Nothing else that I’ve watched can match that ratio. Sailor Moon is the only one that can even dream of coming close, by virtue of simply having so many female characters overall. Avatar and Korra do so well by so many female characters and it was one of the things that truly stunned me on first viewing. I’m so used to having to suspend my feminism along with my disbelief in order to enjoy most entertainment and these shows were such a breath of fresh air that I’m still having difficulty going back to normal programming. The women of this universe are many, they are varied, they are multifaceted, and they are treated with great respect by their writers.

4) Mental Health



If you were to ask me who are my top 3 favorite superheroes, I would readily reply: 1-Avatar Korra, 2-Buffy Summers, and 3-Tony Stark. And I place them in that order for a reason. Korra is number 1 for a reason. Tony is number 3 for a reason. But what they have in common is that I can relate to them personally because they are shown to experience depression and/or anxiety. Buffy’s depression is frequently coded into supernatural metaphors and subtext. Tony’s anxiety attacks are kind of translated into shorthand for the sake of moving the movie along. And while the lion’s share of Korra’s struggles take place off-screen, enough is shown to really emphasize what she’s going through in a very balanced presentation. Avatar Korra is, without a doubt, my favorite superhero. The strength she displays is truly awe-inspiring.

5) People with Disabilities



Representation is important. The Avatar universe has these characters with disabilites…and they’re just people. They live with disabilities that affect their lives, but their disability is not their identity. While I don’t identify personally and so am not really qualified to judge, these seem like very positive portrayals from where I sit.

6) Nuanced Conflict



The world is not divided along rigid lines of good and evil. And there are certainly no antagonists in either show who are just evil for evil’s sake out of the evil-ness of their hearts because they serve evil. These shows feature antagonists who are acting on a sense of conviction that they’re accomplishing something beneficial. They really dig into the reasons why a good person chooses to do bad things as the means to achieve their ends. Particularly in Legend of Korra, I frequently found myself going, “Well, those villains actually have a point, you know?”

7) Empathetic Villains



This kind of ties in to the previous one. Not only are the villains given motivations for their actions, they’re also frequently made to be very human and relatable characters. Even when the good guys triumphed, I would often feel for the bad guys and all that they had lost or sacrificed to ultimately fail. And one of my favorite character arcs from either show is the bad guy who joins the good guys. It’s a story I like in a lot of shows and other media, the reformed villain seeking redemption, but it is executed very well here.

8) Magic & Mythos



The lore and world-building in these shows are remarkably strong. I love anything with a rich mythology and the Avatar universe has it in spades. The show really earns its magic in a lot of ways and the world has such a strange believability to it that makes suspending my disbelief and immersing myself in the narrative a very easy task.

9) Compassion



This is something I feel like I don’t see enough of in my entertainment. The idea of extending compassion to your enemies. The idea that, to quote one of the characters, “We all have the same roots and we are all branches of the same tree.” To go up against the Big Bad and say, “You deserve to be treated with understanding.” That is an idea that really speaks to me in ways I can’t even articulate. Not long ago I saw a quote that said, “The true mark of maturity is when somebody hurts you and you try to understand their situation instead of trying to hurt them back.” The character Korra takes on suffering and allows it to teach her to become more compassionate to others. It’s kind of exceptional in some ways. A villainous character could take the same backstory and let their suffering teach them to be callous, cold, and cruel. And that’s why Korra’s a hero. That’s why she’s the kind of hero who I look up to, who makes me want to be a better person in my own life.

10) Canon Bisexuality



Again, representation matters. Same sex relationships translate to automatic bonus points when I’m consuming media. The best part though is that the romance presented here is probably my favorite romance in anything ever. It’s the couple dynamic that I always seem to be cheering for in every show I watch, but this time it actually happened. And the romance is, in some ways, very incidental to these women as characters. It’s just another facet of who they are, not the sum total of their identity. There’s no big issue made of it, it’s just: “I used to date Mako and now I’m dating Asami.” So, I like the relationship on its own terms and I’m also really happy that it’s a thing that exists in the world. From the creators… Bryan Konietzko: But as we got close to finishing the finale, the thought struck me: How do I know we can’t openly depict that? No one ever explicitly said so. It was just another assumption based on a paradigm that marginalizes non-heterosexual people. … And I didn’t want to look back in 20 years and think, “Man, we could have fought harder for that.” … We approached the network and while they were supportive there was a limit to how far we could go with it, as just about every article I read accurately deduced. … If it seems out of the blue to you, I think a second viewing of the last two seasons would show that perhaps you were looking at it only through a hetero lens. Was it a slam-dunk victory for queer representation? I think it falls short of that, but hopefully it is a somewhat significant inching forward. … (Despite what you might have heard, bisexual people are real!) … But this particular decision wasn’t only done for us. We did it for all our queer friends, family, and colleagues. It is long overdue that our media (including children’s media) stops treating non-heterosexual people as nonexistent, or as something merely to be mocked. I’m only sorry it took us so long to have this kind of representation in one of our stories. Michael Dante DiMartino:

As Tenzin says, “Life is one big bumpy ride.” And if, by Korra and Asami being a couple, we are able to help smooth out that ride even a tiny bit for some people, I’m proud to do my part, however small it might be.

I suspected before I started on these shows that I would probably enjoy them. What actually happened was so much more magical than that. I was absolutely blown away by a stronger product than I ever thought I would encounter. The Avatar universe takes nearly everything I have ever loved in entertainment and puts it into one show…and then does it again in a second show with even more things I love. There’s a reason I can’t keep a lid on my enthusiasm for these shows and it’s because they’re spectacular.

EDIT: Editing the source because this keeps coming up. I’m sorry I didn’t include more representations of mental illness in my post. I understand that the post has become very popular and is getting a lot more attention than my stuff usually gets, but it was still just a post about the things that struck a chord with me personally. Korra’s struggle made me feel a little less alone and helpless.

Korra’s the one I identified with because her experience most closely aligns with my own experience. And Korra is someone who makes me believe I can get better. Korra’s story is one of overcoming depression and living a fulfilling life. Korra made me feel hope for the first time in many years. Korra gives me strength and that’s why she gets my focus. That’s why she was the one who came to mind for me when I was making the graphic. I didn’t mean to de-legitimize any other instances of mental illness presented in the series. My apologies.



I would add some more remarks, but I just don’t have the same level of pesonal connection with the other characters to really speak eloquently about what they go through.