Love in Danger chapter 20: Theater of T:LOK

Aang was sighing with a deep exasperation he had not known in many years. He found himself in the same place he had been years ago on the eve of the appearance of Sozin's Comet. Well not exactly the same. He was sitting in the nosebleed section of large theatre during a production by the acclaimed Ember Island Players. The only difference was he wasn't in the Fire Nation this time. He was in the eastern Earth Kingdom continuing his search for Long Feng. He was meeting a very important contact who would help him. Sadly, the only place his contact would agree to meet him was at the playhouse, being an avid fan of the Players. The Ember Island Players' popularity had grown so great in the years after the war they had even become famous in the Earth Kingdom. Their depictions of the exploits of Avatar Aang and his friends sold out every showing. Despite this Aang's undying hatred of the Players and their works had not diminished since the first time he had sat through one of their productions. Not only did their slanderous play portray Aang as woman, end with the victory of the Fire Lord and the death of Aang and his friends but it actually had the gall to suggest that Zuko and Katara were a couple. Now that was truly unforgivable.

After the end of the war Zuko and Aang made sure to make the Ember Island Players aware of the inaccuracies in "The Boy in the Iceberg" and they promised to put together a new play that would show their true story to the world. They even appointed a completely new director to the play who was famous for a few brilliant works. However, the disappointing result of that promise was a retelling of the first book of the original play called "The Last Airbender". Aang didn't think it was possible but that play was actually worse than "The Boy in the Iceberg." None of the actors remotely resembled their characters or were able to accurately portray their personalities and emotions, nearly all of the characters' names were pronounced wrong, the plot was stripped down to the bone, all of the lightheartedness and humor was removed, and the merging of Aang with the Ocean Spirit was completely omitted from the climax. Another horrible aspect of it was that instead of replacing Aang's romance with Katara for a fantasized one with Zuko, "The Last Airbender" did not include a romantic element at all, except for a few snippets of Sokka and Princess Yue. The play also operated under the erroneous assumption that most Firebenders can't create fire with their own chi, whereas that is one of the most basic skills of even the most mediocre Firebender.

Thankfully and much to Aang's satisfaction "The Last Airbender" was completely panned by critics and audiences alike to the point that its proposed sequel would likely never see the light of day.

The Ember Island Players' newest production was a story about the next Avatar, taking place about 70 years in the future. Surprisingly Aang had actually enjoyed it very much. He thought the plot was very creative and a nice continuation of the story. He loved a lot of the characters; he thought the next Avatar Korra was a compelling protagonist with a lot of interesting inner conflicts and admirable confidence, a good role model for girls. He also thought had very high hopes for the character of Mako, given his personality similarities to Zuko and the fact that he was given the name of the late actor who originally portrayed Iroh in "The Boy and the Iceberg."

At least that was how he felt at the beginning of the play.

"Oh Korra!" Mako's actor passionately declared on stage. "Even though I have a girlfriend and I know my little brother likes you I am still proud to declare, I love you!"

"Oh Mako!" Korra pontificated. "I have no moral objections to either of those facts, even though I was dating Bolin the first time I kissed you and Asami was always nice to me, even after she found out I liked you, but I can't love you!"

"Why not?!" Mako asked heartbrokenly.

"Because I'm not the Avatar anymore!" Korra declared running offstage while wailing melodramatically.

Aang let out another sigh of disappointment. This play had started out so well. "What is this love triangle crap?" he said to himself.

"I like it" said a voice standing behind Aang. "Adds a little bit of an edge." He turned around and saw his contact, a bounty hunter named June standing behind him.

Aang chuckled. "Well of course you do. After all you thought Zuko and Katara were a couple the first time you saw them. This Mako Korra relationship was pretty much put in to keep all you emo Zutara fans who were upset that Katara and I ended up together happy."

June took a seat next to Aang as she laughed. "Is that so? Well in any event it worked. And shouldn't you be happier? This play shows you and Katara got married and had three kids."

Aang lifted his hands up in surrender. "Hey I'm fine with that. Tenzin's probably the best character in this whole thing. Although I wished they showed Bumi longer than five seconds and would show Kaya at all."

"No arguments here" June replied. "And while they're at it they should tell us who the hell Lin's father is."

"Amen to that!" Aang agreed. "I mean it's Toph who wouldn't want to know who she ends up with? But anyway, my problem with the whole Mako, Korra thing isn't that the writers put them together it's that they made Mako cheat on Asami and Korra cheat on Bolin. That's just wrong. Asami's a nice girl who already had to deal with her mother's death, not to mention the fact that her father turned out to be a terrorist who almost killed her. What did she do to deserve getting cheated on in addition to all that?! How miserable does she have to be before the writers are satisfied? Not to mention Bolin is Mako's brother and he kissed Korra in front of him and barely apologized. I mean it's like Mako doesn't even care if he hurts his loved ones for this moody angsty teenage relationship!"

"Hey he's a bad boy!" June said with her casual air of relaxedness. "That's why the girl's liked Zuko; it's why the girls like him."

Aang was expecting this answer and was ready with a counterargument. "Zuko would never do this to Mai! Not in a million years. Mako is basically Zuko with all the likeable aspects of his personality taken out. He and Korra are kind of selfish jerks."

June merely scoffed and shrugged the comment off. She then pointed at the stage. "Hey look there you are!"

Aang looked where she was pointing and saw the actor portraying an older version of himself. He liked him; he hoped that he would actually look that cool when he was older especially with his beard although his voice didn't sound very much like his. He then witnessed his older self promptly

use Energybending to return Korra's Water, Earth and Firebending to her as she dramatically entered the Avatar State. He then witnessed Korra return the bending to everyone else who had lost it and then profess her love for Mako.

"Oh, come on what was that?!" Aang shouted. "All of a sudden I just show up and give her bending back no strings attached?! I had to risk my life to become an Energybender in a mortal battle of wills with the Fire Lord and you're telling me I can just instantly give that ability, not to mention mastery of the freaking Avatar State, to an Avatar who isn't even fully realized? How would Korra learn anything that way?"

"What's she supposed to learn?" June asked.

"I don't know" Aang replied. "But I thought she would go a little longer only being able to Airbend. I mean that would have been an interesting plot device her having to come to terms with the fact that she was still the Avatar. You know a lesson about how there's more to being the Avatar than bending. Besides she would be able to better master Airbending if she only had it to depend on for a while. That would have been cooler than all of their problems being magically solved at the end of the first act. I mean that was just lazy writing and it felt rushed. How are they going to have any conflict left for the next act? And I still have a problem with it ending with Mako and Korra kissing, they're still a cheating couple. It makes it very hard to like the two of them as protagonists." Aang then paused and laughed as he realized his final objection to the play. "Not to mention my life is still going on so it's possible some of the events of the future will directly contradict this play, especially this whole Earth Kingdom civil war fiasco. I wonder how that will get reconciled."

"Well with all the problems you have with how this play ended do you think you can do a better job?" June asked challengingly.

"I don't know" Aang admitted with humility. "I guess I'll just have to try my best."

"Ok but you have to at least admit that getting the actor who played Zuko to play General Iroh in this play was freaking sweet" June said.

"Well yeah no one's arguing against that" Aang agreed. "But anyway, back to business." June laughed. "You mean you didn't just come here to debate theatre?"