#azulaang

sorry if this comes off as rude it's 2 am i do just genuinely want to pick your mind about this

hi!! you're literally my first ask ever so live with that knowledge. and it's about one of my favorite ships so I loved it!

tbh I can't say EXACTLY how and why people started shipping but I can tell you my reasons!

the short answer is: I loooove almost ALL ships with Azula. it's simple like that. and it's my favorite trope (enemies to lovers)

the long answer: I feel like Azula and Aang are very interesting characters that have some parallels to each other (child prodigy; having a lot of pressure on them; having to pick between "good" and "bad" really early), and I think they would compliment each other really well! I like to think about them in a scenario after the war, and Azula is going through stuff, and Aang, of course, wants to help. He forgives her, obviously, because it's what he does. He tries to understand her.

I just think Azula would be perfect to put Aang in his place when he's being too avoidant or stupid, and Aang would know how to deal with her breakdowns.

and you know Azula would NOT let him be a deadbeat dad so passively. something to think about.

(cont.) Im not done about Azula actually. My poor girl was so robbed. I want scenes after the 100 year war of her learning to be a 14 year old girl. Learning to have friends and be her own person and not live with the constant pressure of being Ozai's perfect daughter. And when she messes up, there's her brother, and her uncle, and the Avatar who still think, despite it all, she is worth it and deserves love. And maybe if the best people she's ever known think she isn't irredeemably awful, just maybe she isn't beyond saving. I want the entire gaang to come around and give her the Zuko treatment. She's a baby who did awful things to earn the approval of a parent and I want her to have the chance to do better and earn the approval of people who can actually love her instead. But ATLA wasnt ready for that. (cont.) We get a child who is rejected by her mother and groomed to be a killing machine who knows nothing but violence, competition, and hatred. I think it would be so poetic to get some interaction between her and Aang, who is the manifestation of balance, peace, and benevolence. I want so badly for her to see, through the lense of his forgiveness, how wrongly she was treated and how they does not have to define who she is. Instead we get a lazy hand wave "oh yeah she got locked up at 14 and was evil forever" which is just....not realistic or good story telling.

Hello Anon! Firstly thank you for this wonderful ask, what a wonderful thing to wake up to this morning!

So I've put a lot of thought into how I would handle Azula's redemption and growth. And here's the thing, balancing realism and a believable healing journey with the hopeful optimism of what I believe fiction is for is difficult, especially when it comes to this.

Realistically I don't think Azula would ever really get her childhood back. Similarly I don't think any of the Gaang would. The tragedy of the Hundred Year was is that they were all robbed of their youth, their innocence, their chance to just be kids. I think it's important to any story about them that that impact is fully explored.

This doesn't mean they don't ever get to experience childlike joy, just that the timeline for healing is a long and crooked one.

Also I don't want Azula's healing to be at all dependent on a potential relationship with Aang. I think one of the fundamental issues I have with Kataang is that Aang leans very heavily on Katara to process his grief of the Air Nomad Genocide. It becomes co-dependent very quickly and that's not healthy or sustainable.

What I envision for Azula, post hundred year war follows three stages; The Triage Stage - Healing Spirit Journey - Self Discovery.

Initially it would be Zuko is crisis management mode, he's eighteen years old, the leader of a country in crisis and probably trying to deter several assasination attempts while holding the court together and taking care of his sister. I think he would confine her to the palace with healers from other nations, probably the northern water tribe or earth kingdom. I also think his decision to not imprison her would be very controversial politically and this would cause him a lot of problems.

Now Azula being Azula, she's not one to sit idly by and let herself be contained. She's still in crisis, mentally and spiritually and we're shown that this impacts bending ability. I think it would be interesting if post-breakdown Azula lost her bending, not completely but like it's blocked for her and she can barely light a candle. Maybe a year or so post war Azula breaks out cause she's still physically skilled, but then when her bending still won't work she runs off and whoops, falls through a spirit portal or something and goes on a Spirit World Journey ala Iroh post the Siege of Ba Sing Se.

I have a lot of thoughts about Azula alone in the Spirit World. I have a whole series of scenes mapped in my head of her getting de-aged (like Korra) and running into her grandmother Ilah. What would ensure is an exploration of her childhood, her self-image, her beliefs and fears. Resulting in this scene that I have like, picture perfect in my head of Aang essentially pulling her out of the Spirit World.

And then we get to stage three which is Azula and Aang on a self-discovery adventure. Aang is a year or two out from his breakup with Katara, everyone's been looking for Azula of course, and here she is. They travel together and fall in love yes - but more importantly we get this dynamic of understanding between them. Aang becomes the first person to meet Azula as she is, not as who her father made her to be.