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masterghandalf) wrote2024-10-03 02:44 pm
masterghandalf) wrote2024-10-03 02:44 pm
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Embers versus the Chronicles of the Avatar Novels
I was thinking about Embers a bit more today and was reminded of some of how Vathara’s worldbuilding contrasts with the currently ongoing Chronicles of the Avatar novel series (that’s a duology about Kyoshi, a duology about Yangchen, and a currently half-complete duology about Roku, if you’re not familiar). In particular… I don’t know if the writers of those books have read Embers or not (and we’ll probably never get an answer – talking about whether they’ve read specific fics for a fandom they’ve worked on isn’t really something most writers do, for legal reasons) but if someone told me they had… I wouldn’t be surprised. Because it sometimes feels like the novels are going out of their way to debunk some of the major points of Embers’ backstory. It might be coincidence (and some of these are a stretch, I’ll admit) but it is kind of amusing either way:
• Vathara presents Kyoshi as being really racist and despising the idea of the nations mixing to any degree, and in particular for nearly destroying the Fire Nation. The Kyoshi novels present Kyoshi herself as being biracial – Air Nomad mother, Earth Kingdom father – and as being in love with a Fire Nation girl.
• Vathara presents the Earth Kingdom as having already been organized in Kyoshi’s time, while the Fire Nation was still a collection of independent clans; when Fire Nation pirates attack the Earth Kingdom, Kyoshi doesn’t seem to understand they’re not acting on Fire Nation authority, and when she forcibly unifies the Fire Nation, she’s presented as imposing a more Earth Kingdom like social structure on it. The Kyoshi novels present the Fire Nation as having been unified long before Kyoshi’s time, while it’s the Earth Kingdom that’s fragmented and suffers from a bandit problem – and Kyoshi actually becomes an outlaw herself for a while! One bandit warlord does turn out to be a firebender, but Kyoshi has no problem understanding that he’s a renegade who’s not representing the Fire Nation government.
• Both Embers and the novel line give the Fire Nation a feudal clan structure, but in the novels, clan politics and clan wars are presented as something that’s very bad for the Fire Nation, and the Fire Lord comes to the conclusion that for the Fire Nation to move forward, the clans as independent power bases have to be broken (with the implication that, by the show’s time, this has indeed happened). Embers presents the clan structure as a good thing and has it persist into the show’s present without issue, even under Ozai.
• Both Embers and the novel line have an Avatar having been instrumental in unifying the Fire Nation; in Embers, Kyoshi unifies the Fire Nation by force, it’s presented as a terrible and traumatic thing, and the big reason no Fire National will ever trust an Avatar. In the novels, it was Avatar Szeto (three Avatars before Kyoshi) who centralized the authority of the (pre-existing) throne, who did so peacefully by politics, diplomacy and bureaucracy, and became a beloved national hero for doing so.
• On a related note, Embers presents Fire Nation Avatars, especially Roku, as being outsiders who can never really be Fire Nation because they don’t experience the all-important mystical “loyalty.” In the novels, Fire Avatars seem to be especially attached to their homeland – the aforementioned Szeto’s fatal flaw was prioritizing the Fire Nation over the rest of the world, while Roku’s unwillingness to let go of his identity as a Fire noble initially inhibits his ability to learn airbending. Not to mention that Korra established that before Wan became the first Avatar, he was a firebender. And of course, loyalty isn’t a thing.
• In Embers, Kyoshi’s attempts at playing Fire Nation politics while being ignorant of Fire Nation culture and the current situation has disastrous consequences for the Fire Nation. In the novels, it mostly just backfires on Kyoshi herself.
• In Embers, Koh the Face-Stealer is the ultimate Big Bad and presented as one of the most dangerous and powerful of all spirits. The novel line makes it clear that there are much worse things in the Spirit World than Koh, and Father Glowworm (the Kyoshi novels’ secondary antagonist) outright dismisses Koh as a “chatty little upstart.”
• It’s only mentioned in passing because Embers doesn’t give Kuruk much focus, but it’s mentioned that he lived even longer than Kyoshi. Per the novels, Kuruk died very young for an Avatar, which caused massive problems down the line.
• Embers depicts Yangchen as having been a brainwashed member of Xiangchen’s cult who had no idea what she was or even what violence was until she was rescued by her yaoren; she also died young, killed by a volcano. In the novels, Yangchen knew she was the Avatar from a very young age due to having visions of her past lives, has the overall air of someone who had to become too worldly too quickly, and has to find a balance between her sincerely held Air Nomad beliefs and the ruthless realpolitik her situation requires her to practice. She also seems to have died an old woman after a very long, successful career as an Avatar (to the point people are still literally praying to her by Kyoshi’s time) and was not killed by a volcano.
• Embers indicates that lots of people secretly resented the Air Nomads and weren’t all that torn up by the genocide. In the novel line, the Air Nomads seem to get along with their neighbors just fine.
• Dragons in the novel line are… just dragons, with none of the various bells and whistles Vathara gives them; and obviously, yaoren (Vathara’s own creation) don’t exist at all.
• Vathara presents Kyoshi as being really racist and despising the idea of the nations mixing to any degree, and in particular for nearly destroying the Fire Nation. The Kyoshi novels present Kyoshi herself as being biracial – Air Nomad mother, Earth Kingdom father – and as being in love with a Fire Nation girl.
• Vathara presents the Earth Kingdom as having already been organized in Kyoshi’s time, while the Fire Nation was still a collection of independent clans; when Fire Nation pirates attack the Earth Kingdom, Kyoshi doesn’t seem to understand they’re not acting on Fire Nation authority, and when she forcibly unifies the Fire Nation, she’s presented as imposing a more Earth Kingdom like social structure on it. The Kyoshi novels present the Fire Nation as having been unified long before Kyoshi’s time, while it’s the Earth Kingdom that’s fragmented and suffers from a bandit problem – and Kyoshi actually becomes an outlaw herself for a while! One bandit warlord does turn out to be a firebender, but Kyoshi has no problem understanding that he’s a renegade who’s not representing the Fire Nation government.
• Both Embers and the novel line give the Fire Nation a feudal clan structure, but in the novels, clan politics and clan wars are presented as something that’s very bad for the Fire Nation, and the Fire Lord comes to the conclusion that for the Fire Nation to move forward, the clans as independent power bases have to be broken (with the implication that, by the show’s time, this has indeed happened). Embers presents the clan structure as a good thing and has it persist into the show’s present without issue, even under Ozai.
• Both Embers and the novel line have an Avatar having been instrumental in unifying the Fire Nation; in Embers, Kyoshi unifies the Fire Nation by force, it’s presented as a terrible and traumatic thing, and the big reason no Fire National will ever trust an Avatar. In the novels, it was Avatar Szeto (three Avatars before Kyoshi) who centralized the authority of the (pre-existing) throne, who did so peacefully by politics, diplomacy and bureaucracy, and became a beloved national hero for doing so.
• On a related note, Embers presents Fire Nation Avatars, especially Roku, as being outsiders who can never really be Fire Nation because they don’t experience the all-important mystical “loyalty.” In the novels, Fire Avatars seem to be especially attached to their homeland – the aforementioned Szeto’s fatal flaw was prioritizing the Fire Nation over the rest of the world, while Roku’s unwillingness to let go of his identity as a Fire noble initially inhibits his ability to learn airbending. Not to mention that Korra established that before Wan became the first Avatar, he was a firebender. And of course, loyalty isn’t a thing.
• In Embers, Kyoshi’s attempts at playing Fire Nation politics while being ignorant of Fire Nation culture and the current situation has disastrous consequences for the Fire Nation. In the novels, it mostly just backfires on Kyoshi herself.
• In Embers, Koh the Face-Stealer is the ultimate Big Bad and presented as one of the most dangerous and powerful of all spirits. The novel line makes it clear that there are much worse things in the Spirit World than Koh, and Father Glowworm (the Kyoshi novels’ secondary antagonist) outright dismisses Koh as a “chatty little upstart.”
• It’s only mentioned in passing because Embers doesn’t give Kuruk much focus, but it’s mentioned that he lived even longer than Kyoshi. Per the novels, Kuruk died very young for an Avatar, which caused massive problems down the line.
• Embers depicts Yangchen as having been a brainwashed member of Xiangchen’s cult who had no idea what she was or even what violence was until she was rescued by her yaoren; she also died young, killed by a volcano. In the novels, Yangchen knew she was the Avatar from a very young age due to having visions of her past lives, has the overall air of someone who had to become too worldly too quickly, and has to find a balance between her sincerely held Air Nomad beliefs and the ruthless realpolitik her situation requires her to practice. She also seems to have died an old woman after a very long, successful career as an Avatar (to the point people are still literally praying to her by Kyoshi’s time) and was not killed by a volcano.
• Embers indicates that lots of people secretly resented the Air Nomads and weren’t all that torn up by the genocide. In the novel line, the Air Nomads seem to get along with their neighbors just fine.
• Dragons in the novel line are… just dragons, with none of the various bells and whistles Vathara gives them; and obviously, yaoren (Vathara’s own creation) don’t exist at all.