#redemption arc

I remember an Expanded Universe comic set immediately after RotJ where Leia tells Luke words to the effect of "Vader literally had me tortured and blew up my homeworld. What, am I supposed to feel kinship with him just because I discovered he's my dad yesterday?"

The important thing that happens in Return of the Jedi is that the Emperor dies and the planet-killing superweapon gets blown up. Vader spent the last two hours of his life doing something good after 25 years of genocide, mass murder and torture, and even then, it was partly out of vengeful hatred. Vader fucking hated Palpatine for a quarter century and never had the spine to do anything about it. It was only after his own son was being tortured to death in front of him that he chose to act - and he'd cut off the kid's hand like two years before that! That's not a fucking redemption arc.

Elisa... I know what you are. 🫵👁️👁️

A lil thing I had brain worms over for weeks now! Unfortunately I have the sense of humor of a child so I won't lie I was giggling the entire time making this. Believe it or not, the initial sketch for Demona was a little more.... egregious, lets say. xD

Because Zuko started as a good person, before he got the scar.

And Zuko has an extremely stable platform of support for most of the show.

Zuko couldn't have done it without Iroh's unflinching, unwavering belief that he could become a good person again. I've rarely seen any criticism of Iroh aimed at his unconditional support of Zuko- for good reason. It's a selfless act.

Similarly, I've rarely seen any criticism of Zuko saying that he didn't deserve Iroh's support. Maybe a few comments here and there about how ungrateful he is at times, or how he should have "suffered more"(?), but never anything outright saying that Zuko should stay exactly where he is in his misery because he doesn't deserve Iroh's helping hand out of it. And this is for a very specific reason- because A:TLA goes out of it's way to show very early on that Zuko was a good person and can be so again.

So Zuko's arc isn't really even a straight redemption arc. It's a recovery arc wearing a large redemption trenchcoat.

This is an important distinction because a raw, straight redemption arc is often unpalatable to the audience, because it starts with someone who isn't a good person receiving a helping hand out of their misery anyway. A redemption arc starts by looking like someone is forgiving an abuser. It starts by having sympathy for the bad people. It starts by engaging with them and listening to them and empathizing with their struggles.

"But they're a bad person, they don't deserve that kindness!" that's the point.

Certainly not to say that it's the job of the victim to be that understanding, helping hand- of course not. And extending kindness does not mean abandoning moral principles and not holding the person accountable for their actions, a la certain flavors of Harley Quinn-Joker romance nonsense.

But someone has to treat the bad person like they're a person if the bad person is ever going to stand a chance of getting better. Regardless of what the bad person "deserves". The bad person has to accept that help, of course, but there needs to be help (and more importantly, kindness) offered in the first place.

Not only does it take away the culturally christian connotations that "redeeming" has, but rehabilitating also better shows the context of, you know, actually putting in the work and effort to overcome their problems.

Oh, Starscream is scary like a litte shit, but swings from being in a total panic state to a "I'm perfect" state even after the born of the sparklings (pretty much like this previous answer)

And he also got very different reaction to the born of Atalanta and Windrider. To answer, Atalanta comes first and (i think one years later or some months? Is not really much time between the two, but I'll ask GF) then Windrider.

Since wasn't really ready to be a sire (and probably even Optimus didn't expect to could be a carrier), Star got very detached and very "Starscream" reaction when she was Atalanta. While for Windrider Skyfire was so excited and happy that Starscream refrain (as many times with Sky) to be a little acid glitch.

Also, I know you want zoom on babies derpy faces. Yes, yes I KNOW.