The Legend of Korra: Kuvira's Gambit (4x11)

Ahhh! Things are seriously heating up!! I can't believe next week is the end. The finale is being released in two parts, I guess, and after next Friday, we'll be deprived of The Legend of Korra forever more! Let's take a look.

So, Republic City is preparing for the imminent attack from Kuvira by evacuating the city. Prince Wu and Mako are in charge of these efforts, and they aren't going well, because the evacuation is voluntary. Asami and Varrick, meanwhile, continue to work on their Mecha-Suits to use during the upcoming battle.

Korra, Mako, Bolin, and Asami go to try and head off Kuvira and take out her Spirit Vine weapon before she can get to Republic City. However, they quickly discover that Kuvira is coming earlier than expected, and after dodging an attack from an enormous Mecha-Suit, Korra and the others rush back to Republic City to warn everybody.

Prince Wu is told that the evacuation of the city is now mandatory, and he does a surprisingly good job of calming the inhabitants of the city down and restoring order, after Mako first makes the announcement and riles everybody up.

Kuvira arrives and uses the giant Mecha to blow up the Republic's navy. Raiko, out of options, is forced to surrender. Korra has one last idea, though - if they can take out the Mecha, they might still have a chance to defeat Kuvira. How can they do that? By getting to the Mecha's creator, Baatar Jr. Korra and the others kidnap him. Baatar refuses to give them any information, but Korra then threatens to keep him away from Kuvira for the rest of his life. Baatar and Kuvira talk over a radio line, and Baatar tries to convince Kuvira to give up and leave Republic City alone. At least they will still be together!

Kuvira, realizing that the Avatar and a lot of other important figures are all together in one place, uses the opportunity to hone in on the radio signal, and then she shoots a giant Spirit-bomb at the location, which breaks Baatar's heart, and sends Korra and her friends running for their lives.

Yikes! I'm really excited by everything that's going on!

If I were to have one complaint, it would be the moment when Prince Wu takes over the evacuation. It felt a bit too simplistic to have him suddenly succeed at something like this. It seemed like, instead of showing him gain awareness of his flaws and start to improve, the writers just randomly gave him a win. Maybe this is a small nitpick, but with only the finale left to go on this show, I'm sort of disappointed with Prince Wu's entire character arc. Not to mention what they did to Mako.

Also, the fart joke with Meelo did not work at all, in my opinion. However, it was such a brief moment, that I can't complain too much.

Other than that, everything was amazing!

Zhu Li and Varrick reunited, and it was glorious. First, Zhu Li gave a big speech about how sorry she was, and how much Varrick meant to her. Then, Varrick predictably said that she was forgiven, and that she should immediately get to work and be a good assistant. That much, I could have expected. But then, Zhu Li does an awesome thing! She puts her foot down! She tells Varrick that she won't be his assistant anymore - he has to treat her like an equal. I'm hoping that Varrick will finally see what's right in front of him, and treat Zhu Li with some respect. I gotta say, Zhu Li is a remarkable character. She basically started off as a punch line to a bunch of great jokes with Varrick. "Zhu Li, do the thing!" From there, she's grown into an amazing character in her own right. I love her.

Korra making decisions and being a good leader! Pretty much every major move they made in this episode was done on Korra's orders. She's the one who suggested they go out and destroy Kuvira's weapon, which in turn allowed them to find out that Kuvira was on her way, giving everybody a bit more time. Korra was also the one who suggested they go after Baatar Jr. While that plan didn't work as well, it was still a solid strategy. I'm really glad that Korra isn't just a mindless fighting machine anymore. Her character development this season has been flawless.

Kuvira is such an amazing villain! I'm seriously excited to see her taken down in this finale. I mean... wow. The fact that she is totally willing to sacrifice Baatar Jr. is... it's... wow, that's insane. I just wasn't expecting her to be so ruthless, although now that I think about it, why wasn't I? She certainly hasn't gone half-measure on anything before now. So why would she give up?

Of course, there's also that giant Mecha-Suit. Wow. That's going to be so intense. What I like about it is that it's clearly going to have to come down to a fight between Korra and Kuvira in the end, but the giant robot thing gives the entire team an enemy to face. They are going to have to be creative and work together to figure out how to get that thing out of the way, in order to save Republic City. I'm not sure how I think it's going to happen, but I'm hoping that Asami, Mako, and Bolin will all get a chance to have their moments to shine. I also hope that the Air Benders play a big role. I'm just so excited for all of this, I don't even know what to do!

The best moment of comedy in this episode was when Team Avatar first saw the giant Mecha-Suit, and Mako asks Bolin if he knew about it. He responds "Oh, did I forget to mention that?" No, of course I didn't know about it!" That cracked me up.

President Raiko is a very interesting character. I'm not really sure what to think of him overall, but I liked the moment when he surrendered. He's not the kind of person who would endanger his people out of pride. I like that. We saw a little tiny bit of General Iroh in this episode as well, which was nice, although I'm still hoping for more of the Fire Lord. Will Katara, Toph, and/or Zuko make an appearance in these final episodes? I kind of hope so!

I'll leave it right there. I'm unbelievably excited for next week, but I'm also a little bit sad. I don't want it to be over!

9/10