And the new episode is up. And I got to watch it, after, I assume, everybody else watched it and stopped GUMMING UP THE WORKS!! Seriously, Nick! Anyway, here's the link, just in case you're one of the four people on earth who wasn't trying to watch this episode at 9:34 Monday night.
So we're three episodes away from the end of the season. And we found out that the last two episodes are going to be shown together as the season finale. So, basically, we've got one more episode of set-up before everything comes crashing down. Which begs the question: What have the last two episodes accomplished in terms of getting us ready for the final showdown with Amon? The show confirmed that Tarrlok was an evil, vain mastermind in the last episode, and in this episode, he's completely depowered. I mean that in every sense. Not only is his actual bending taken away, the show strips him of his intelligence and menace, as well.
We start out all right, with Tarrlok's voice narrating his version of the abduction of the Avatar, while scenes simultaneously flash by, showing the audience how he set up the scene to make it appear that equalists had taken Korra. After that, however, Tarrlok pretty much just goofs from one scene to the next. Tenzin storms into the council chamber after the equalists claim no responsibility in the kidnapping and accuses Tarrlok of being responsible for Korra's disappearance. And Tarrlok basically does that "look around and stammer" thing that lets everybody know he's guilty, even though he has to know that Tenzin has no proof. And he doesn't comment at all about the Avatar's friends being out of prison. The Tarrlok I remember from earlier in the series would have stormed from a position of power, basically accusing the Avatar Crew of being in league with the equalists and demanding their arrests. And then, the air is let completely out of the balloon when Tarrlok's aide recounts the entire incident for Tenzin and his merry people. What a letdown. It would have been so much greater of a moral statement if Tenzin had been willing to attack a council member without solid proof, trusting instead in his comrades and his instinct.
Of course Tarrlok pulls out his bloodbending and knocks everybody out. Don't know why they didn't restrain him at the outset, instead of standing there in defensive postures. They have to know that there's no defensive posture that's going to work against bloodbending. But we have to build up to that scene up there in the screen capture, so... run away, Tarrlok. Eventually, Tarrlok has a conversation with Korra, owning up that he's Yakone's son (more on that in a moment), and gets depowered by Amon, who walks through Tarrlok's bloodbending ability (though not without some effort, it must be noted).
The other half of the episode (well, the other MAIN half, discounting more Asami/Mako nonsense) is spent with Korra and her visions of the past. Lacking any other pastimes, Korra finally settles down into some hardcore meditation, and gets a tale of bloodbending from her predecessor, Avatar Aang. What Aang's been trying to communicate all along was a memory of a bloodbender named Yakone who was able to bloodbend at will--regardless of the moon's status--much like Tarrlok. When the council (specifically Sokka) sentences him to life in prison for the heinous act of criminal bloodbending (they make it a point to say that Yakone used his powers for evil), he widens his eyes and bloodbends everyone in the council chamber, without using his hands. Avatar Aang scuffles with him and almost gets killed through some particularly crunchy and brutal bloodbending, but breaks out of it with Avatar State powers, finally restraining Yakone and taking his bending away.
The point of recounting both of these plot branches is to say: What now? We got some awesome stuff with Tarrlok, and now he's a non-factor? Aang was trying to tell Korra about something that, by the time she learns it, is completely useless? There's got to be more levels to this whole flashback/Tarrlok episode than just what we've been given. If there isn't, this has been a colossal waste of two episodes. You seriously could have taken ten minutes from one episode and given all of the character growth that occurred in these two episodes. My feeling is that, what Aang really wanted to show Korra is that bloodbending can be broken by going into the Avatar State, as he did against Yakone. The preview for the season finale (which can be seen here) makes it appear as though Mako and Korra are being bloodbent while Amon attempts to take away Korra's bending. Information such as the above bit about breaking out of bloodbending might be useful in such a situation. In addition, maybe some of the nuances of Aang's energybending technique will not be lost on Korra, and she'll notice that the way Amon takes away someone's bending is not the same way that Aang did it. They touch different spots. This episode made it very clear that Amon grabs the back of the neck before touching the 'third eye'. Aang, when he energybent Yakone as well as Ozai, touched the chest.
Other stuff:
- The flashback was actually... kinda boring. Everyone acted exactly the same as they used to in the old series. Not to say that Sokka's rambling wasn't great, but there appeared to be no growth in the almost 30 years it had been since we last saw these people. We also saw none of the supposed rage in Aang that I thought we would, after some of the flashes we got in previous episodes. He's pretty matter-of-fact when he goes in to take away Yakone's bending.
- Side note to that, a lot of the dialogue in this series has been atrocious. Aang's "You'll never get away with this!" to Yakone is just one of the examples. Unfortunately, Tenzin's been on the receiving end of a lot of stinkers, too.
- Is Amon firebending in the preview for the finale? I took a screencap. Judge for yourself.
- All right, I admit that Amon walking through Tarrlok's bloodbending was pretty cool.
- If I could work my will, we'd have ended "When Extremes Meet" on an ambiguous note, simply panning away from Tarrlok's window. Then, this episode could have happened as it did, with Korra meditating and the rest of her crew going after the equalists to rescue her, except that we wouldn't know that Korra was being held captive by Tarrlok until the end. Then, the next episode could have been the race to capture Tarrlok, maybe ending with him joining forces with Amon? I'm not quite clear on how it would have ended up, but I needed a little more tension in this episode.
Crackpot-theory-of-the-week: This week's crackpot theory is a bit tempered. We already know certain things are going to happen in the finale, because the preview said so. So my prediction is this: All those boats and stuff that we see? That's Grand Lotus Zuko, bringing all the might of the Fire Nation to aid the good folks of Republic City. Amon's war is about to go international.
Well, that's all I've got. Unfortunately, since I've started classes, I don't have quite as much time to plan these review out as I used to. But I'm still hanging in there, and I appreciate all of you who are hanging in there with me. As a bonus, here's another screen capture I did of Amon's eye, this time, from the finale preview. It's definitely yellow. And actually, it doesn't look that sinister, either.
All images are the property of Nickelodeon, Inc., Bryan Konietzko, and Mike DiMartino. All rights reserved.
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