Review: The Legend of Korra “Kuvira’s Gambit”

All hail the Great Uniter!

 

Before I even started with the feels, Nick sack tapped me with making next week the finale of Korra. That’s right, next week is a double episode to end the series. Don’t worry,  I’ll give you a couple of seconds to collect your thoughts, and make peace with the soon to be departed.

What can I say about “Kuvira’s Gambit” that would put my feelings correctly into words? Well, I think a “What the fuck?!” is in order. Kuvira has proven, yet again, that she is one step ahead of everyone. Her mistrust of everyone has led her to Republic City, and she finally united the entirety of the Earth Empire. And how she did it was glorious. How many times have you seen a city just say “We’re going to fight, and we don’t care about what happens to the city?” Raiko did what is so seldom seen when a city faces grave opposition. He backed down and gave Kuvira what she wanted with minimal damage to the city.

The story arc for “Kuvira’s Gambit” was something you don’t see often. We had a false hope of the city actually being prepared to take on Kuvira, until she took out a United Forces outpost with one shot. The only thing I didn’t really enjoy was that this giant mech that Kuvira is piloting. Here’s why:

1. Looks like the designers of the mech watched the remake of The Day The Earth Stood Still. Yeah, I’m talking about that terrible Keanu Reeves movie.
2. Does Kuvira need to be more powerful than what she already is? Holy shit. She has the entire Earth Empire behind her, a massive army, airships, and a giant spirit vine weapon. Now she has a 25-story tall mech that has the weapon just casually attached to its arm? What the hell, guys?!
3. Is there no security on her airships? Baatar Jr. got taken relatively easily, and there was no muscle on that airship at all. So much for being Kuvira’s beloved.
4. Other than being the final imposing obstacle, this giant mech suit serves no purpose. It’s Kuvira’s win more strategy, and I didn’t dig it at all.

This was another in what seems like an endless stream of episodes where Korra takes a back seat to someone else in terms of main focus. For being the title character, the last three episodes have been lacking in focus on Korra. How she has been arcing this season, I can’t really complain. I feel that the writers took a smarter route when it came to the aftermath Korra had to go through by taking a very minimalist approach. She wasn’t really around, so we didn’t have deal with another amount of episodes of Korra not coping correctly with getting her ass handed to her.

One thing struck me odd as I watching “Kuvira’s Gambit.” Why was that she is hellbent on killing Korra. I spent a few minutes thinking on this, and I think i found an answer. So far, we have had two Avatars: an Airbender, and a Waterbender. Before the Airbender, the Avatar was a Firebender. What’s left? That’s right, the next in the cycle is an Earthbender. Why is that important? The odds are almost 100% that the Avatar would be born in the Earth Empire, and this Avatar wouldn’t even need to leave the Empire to master the other three elements. Republic City would have benders from every other nation, so that Avatar can learn everything needed to become an Avatar.

What happens after that? Well, Kuvira has an Avatar she can mold to make sure that the kingdom lasts long after Kuvira dies. I know it’s a bit of a stretch, but it does fit. Kuvira would have everything to just steamroll the opposition. She already handled the Avatar that didn’t believe in herself once, and as of this writing, there isn’t anything that says she won’t be able to again. Maybe that’s it? Maybe They’re both meant to die, so the next Avatar becomes the true Great Uniter. Like I said earlier, I gave up trying to figure out the story on this cartoon. Every time they seem like they go one way, they do a Barry Sanders cut into a different direction.

There was a lot going on, and for the first time since the second through fourth episodes of the week, it felt like the stories flowed well. No one story took over, because they overlapped into the overall story. There was not one moment where I felt like I had to rewatch more than once just to dissect. Hell, I even liked Varrick and Zhu-Li’s little reunion. It was short, to the point, and showed how Zhu-Li’s  growth and ambition to mean more to Varrick than just an assistant. This was just a small sample of how well things went this week. I can only hope that the series ends next week in a similar fashion. It’s what The Legend of Korra deserves.