What are your favorite soft Azula moments?
Thanks so much for the ask! I really love talking about soft Azula. <3 There are quite a few moments that stand out to me but these are my top 3;
Starting with an honorable mention;
This was such a short moment but it was a really good one. I can’t see any reason for her to have reached out to Zuko in this scene, other than genuine care and concern. People like to argue that her apologizing to TyLee was all performative/to avoid the social repercussions of making her friend cry. So they write it off. But here Azula has no one to preform for at all. There is literally no reason for her to pretend to care. Which is exactly why I don’t think that she was pretending. I like this moment because I think that it was a real bonding moment for the siblings. And it’s a very subtle indicator that Azula does care about Zuko she just doesn’t have the tools/understanding of how to express it. But her words, “let’s go, this place is depressing” indicate an ability to empathize. Being in such a solemnly nostalgic place made her feel bad so it must make Zuko feel bad too and so she got him to leave and join the rest of the group. She invited him along so he wouldn’t just sit there alone and overthinking.
I talked about this pic in another post but I like this moment for her because as I interpreted it; her stance/posture & the way that she’s holding that cup indicates that she’s at least a little nervous or at the very least uncomfortable/unsure. This is her first time at a regular party, trying to make mundane conversation. She is very out of her element and doesn’t quite know how to navigate this situation so you get to see a very different side of Azula.
The reason that I choose this over the more overt scene is because of the subtly and because it’s such a rare moment. Like soft empathetic Azula has been seen a few times. But an Azula who is just straight awkward and nervous is...tbh I think that this is the only time where we see her hesitate. But like her moment around the fire later in the episode, this is brushed off and played for laughs so it’s easier to forget about it and the implications. The implications being that she has been so emotionally neglected and touched starved that she just doesn’t know how to bond with people at all.
But I still like this moment because she’s really adorable and I feel like this stance and expression is like the definition of soft.
This is more of a sad soft moment because I feel like the writers kind of downplayed it/played it for laughs. But I still really enjoyed it because this is arguably one of the most openly venerable moments we have of Azula save for her breakdown and defeat. I feel like this scene was a very quiet cry for help that she ended up playing for laughs. But I chose this screencap in particular because we get to see a more empathetic Azula. Like literally she has no one to preform for and there really is exactly 0 reason for her to lie about anything here. She was listening to the ‘sob story’ (I believe that this was during Zuko’s) and she seems to be genuinely concerned. This is one of three scenes that makes it hard for me to understand when people say that Azula can’t feel empathy. Because she does and it’s canon that she does. It’s not just her expression either, it’s her posture and the way she has her arms folded. It’s just a posture that indicates sincerity. And then she goes on to share her own story and it’s kind of just brushed off by the other characters and the show’s own tone/narrative. Her traumas are seriously downplayed, no wonder she doesn’t like opening up. She got met with sarcasm “because you’re just so perfect”) and no reassurance like everyone else got.
This image alone is why I refuse to believe that Azula is unable to love/is 100% evil. It’s also why I refuse to believe that she was just using TyLee/didn’t actually like her. I think that there are two emotions that you can’t fake; true, genuine happiness & true, genuine sorrow. There is a huge difference between a forced/fake smile and a real one and I don’t think that the above is an expression that she could have faked. She was really happy to see TyLee again and I think that she (at least lowkey) craved that kind of affectionate contact.
People always talk about how we got to see how ruthless and effective Azula was right off the bat. But this was also one of her first moments (aside from her two lineless cameos) this was in her second episode. So right off the bat we got a little glimpse of a softer Azula too but it was so brief and subtle that I think people just forget about it or brush it under the rug.
