It's the finale! I separated this from the first half, because while technically you can sort of look at it all as one episode, so many things happened that I wanted to split it up to make sure I got a chance to look at it all. And there's a lot going on in this final episode. What works well about it is that it's all a very tight interconnected story. Everything connects to everything else. There aren't really any subplots or multiple parallel plots - it's all one big story in which most of the characters play an active role. That being said, this finale wasn't perfect. It had quite a few moments that I didn't enjoy, and we'll have to talk about those.
Tenzin, Bumi, and Kya find Korra, Bolin, and Mako, all of them badly injured. With the help of Spirit Water, Kya heals them. Korra tells everyone what happened with Unalaq and Vaatu, and reveals that her connection to Raava and to her past lives is gone. This means that Korra is the last Avatar! Korra needs to help save the world from Unalaq and Vaatu, but she isn't sure how, now that her connection is gone. Tenzin tells Korra that she needs to find her own personal Spirit, and that she'll be able to save the day that way. In order to get in tune with her Spirit, she goes to meditate under a special tree in the Spirit World, called the Tree of Time. She connects with her Spirit, which manifests itself as a large blue Spirit Giant, which then goes off to confront Vaatu/Unalaq.
Meanwhile, Vaatu/Unalaq has been terrorizing Republic City. We see President Raiko, General Iroh, and Lin Beifong trying to fight him off. During all of the chaos, Varrick escapes from prison. Blue Spirit Korra shows up, and she does battle with the giant Balrog - I mean, uh... Unalaq. The two of them have an epic fight, and just when it looks like Unalaq might have the upper hand, Jinora shows up. She guides Korra to the faint light of Raava inside of Vaatu, and Korra is able to retrieve the Spirit of Light. With her renewed power, she defeats Vaatu (for the time being) and Unalaq dies.
While Korra has been fighting Unalaq or Vaatu or whatever we're calling him, the others have been protecting Korra's body. Tenzin, Kya, Bolin, and Mako all fight against a huge hoard of Dark Spirits, and they are later joined by Desna and Eska. Bolin is overjoyed to be facing the end of the world with Eska, and she returns the sentiment. Just as it looks like our heroes will be destroyed, Korra shows up with Raava and drives the Dark Spirits off. Korra and Raava fuse once more. Korra is now again connected to the Spirit, but her connection to the past Avatars remains broken.
Korra makes the decision to keep the Spirit Portals open as Harmonic Convergence ends, keeping the Spirit and the human worlds open to one another for good. This means that she as the Avatar will no longer be the bridge between the two worlds. She also announces that the South has achieved independence from the North, and that her father Tonraq will be the chief. Korra apologizes to Desna and Eska for their father, but the twins reveal that they understand how terrible he truly was in the end, and they have accepted his death. Bolin and Eska talk, and they both agree that they got caught up in the moment and that they shouldn't be together; Eska and Desna decide to go back home to the North to be with their mother. Korra and Mako talk, and they break up for good this time, saying that they will always love each other.
Do you see how long that plot summary is? For a 23-ish minute show? Yeah! A lot of things happened! But now I'm going to talk about what kind of sucked about this finale. Everything was a bit too convenient, and there were like four things that could sorta constitute being a Deus ex Machina. Let's count them, shall we?
1. Deus Ex Foliage! (aka The Tree of Time). Now, I have no problem with a magically convenient Spirit Tree that will help Korra get in touch with her inner self. That's actually fine. I'm with ya so far. But dang, Korra was so quick about it. She just sat there for a few seconds and suddenly she was a blue giant? The animation of the whole Spirit thing was beautiful, truly stunning, but I just didn't feel like Korra had earned it. In the first season, she was notoriously impatient and bad at connecting to difficult parts of herself. When exactly did she become so proficient? Maybe if they had shown her in some sort of a timeless state, like when she learned Wan's story? She could have had some whole big long journey that's only hinted at in the episode, and then come out of it more enlightened. Instead, apparently Korra's just a mad genius at connecting with Spirits.
2. Deus Ex Jinora! This little Spirit expert just comes floating out of freakin' nowhere and conveniently tells Korra exactly where Raava is! That's lucky! Again, I don't have a fundamental problem with the concept, because I think they did a pretty good job of showing how connected Jinora is to the Spirits. What's annoying about this is just the timing. Just as things look entirely desperate, suddenly Jinora is there to save the day.
3. Deus Ex Eska! (and Desna). This one is mostly okay. They show up at a rather convenient time to save the rest of the group from the Dark Spirits. Again, this would be alright, but it's just that the twins have gone back and forth so many times that it's beginning to be rather silly. It seems they have fully accepted that their father is evil by the time he dies, but the problem is, I'm not entirely sure whether I'm supposed to take these characters seriously. It could just be an ironic thing how they never make up their minds and never seem to have strong emotions, but it could also just be poor writing. I'm just never sure what to make of them.
4. Deus Ex Avatar! Again, the timing is just too darn perfect. When Korra shows up, she saves everyone from the Dark Spirits and is able to easily fuse with Raava once more. I am really glad that her connection to past Avatars is broken. Well... I mean I'm not happy that that happened, because it's so scary, and poor Korra, and Tenzin, and poor everybody. But in terms of the story? God, this is genius. I hope that Korra remains disconnected from her past lives for at least the whole next season, and maybe even beyond that. However, in my opinion it would be a smart move for Korra to find a way to reinstate the reincarnation cycle again, because it would open up for more sequels in the future.
So, beyond all of the way-too-convenient plot points, what did I think of this episode? Well, yeah, a lot of great stuff was going on. The animation and the creativity of some of these ideas... just wow. The Bending was more impressive than ever before. I particularly loved the image of Tenzin (Air), Kya (Water), Bolin (Earth), and Mako (Fire) all standing in line and defending Korra's body from the Dark Spirits. How powerful. Mako even did a bit of lightning, which was considerably more bad ass than we've seen him be before. Surprisingly, there were also a few good comedic moments mixed in with all this crazy action. When Korra shows up in Republic City as a spirit, Pema and her kids (sans Jinora) see her and they happily declare that Korra's back! And she's a blue giant! When Pema sees Jinora floating in some sort of Spirit ball, she says "be careful, sweetie!" or something like that, which made me chuckle. Varrick's escape from prison was also hilarious, especially when he said "do the thing!" I also loved the moment when Lin and some of the other police officers helped to rescue the President. Lin wrapping her arm around Raiko's waist and swinging him to safety was a very powerful image. Of course we got to hear Dante Basco as General Iroh, and even if it was only for a moment, it was still good. I hope they bring his character back in a big way for the next season.
Then there were the little things that bugged me, such as the fact that although Varrick's escape was cool, it didn't lead anywhere. Why even show that? I hope that Varrick comes back next season, too, and has more of a purpose. As it stands, he's a really cool character with practically no point. I also get annoyed that we spent more time with the Eska and Bolin thing, though I am glad that they've parted ways. Mako and Korra's breakup, surprisingly, I didn't hate. I hate how much time was wasted on their relationship earlier in this season, but as an isolated scene, I think it was well done. I hope the two of them have a good solid friendship moving forward, and that they don't ever go down the romance path with them again. It would be interesting if Korra had a completely different endgame romance, or if she didn't have a romance at all when it's all over. Tenzin's journey was great, as he learned a lot about himself in the last episode, and now used that knowledge to be a better teacher to Korra.
I feel like I could keep going. There's a lot to say. Because honestly this episode did so much in such a short amount of time. I didn't love this finale, but I certainly think it was a lot stronger than last season's finale. Although this season was pretty rocky, I ultimately thought the last few episodes were amazing, visually, to watch. They were full of action, and drama, and suspense, and they were beautifully animated. Yeah, things fell into line a bit to conveniently at some spots, but at the same time, they didn't try and wrap everything up in a bow - Korra is still not connected to her past lives, and the Spirit Portals are open now. What will that mean for next season? I just don't know!
7.5/10
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