Legend of Korra Book 3 Chapter 9 review - The Stakeout

So, we come to the first online episode of Korra

Chapter 9 – The Stakeout

Wow, this episodes succeeds in being slow paced, funny and intense at the same time. Sadly it takes a little while for any of this to show itself.

I’ll put it right out, I don’t find Bolin’s ‘so annoying it’s funny’ schtick any better than Jar Jar Binks in Star Wars (it’s Star Wars month, had to make that reference) or all that funny. Not that I dislike Bolin as a character, but I prefer him to show some intellect and strength, as opposed to be the comic relief. With my review of the ‘everyone’s an idiot except Mako’ subplot coming up, I’ll start making it very clear.

Again with the small scene for Naaga, just to maintain her personality (the obsession with treats hasn’t really been explored since ‘Welcome to Republic City’)

Say, doesn’t one of those mover fans look amazingly like Sokka?

Nice to see the Misty Palms Oasis again, an underutilised city in The Last Airbender, so that’s what a natural ice spring is supposed to look like (but how do you get an ice spring in the desert anyway?)

That scene with Bolin and Asami playing Pai-Sho was clever, that game came up a lot in TLA (being Iroh’s favourite game and all) although Asami was a little upbeat about learning the rules from her dad.

So, Korra can enter the spirit world at will now? When did that happen?

Mako as the voice of reason works, but he still needs character development, badly.

Told you the Earth Queen was coming back, I knew her role wasn’t complete yet.

Zaheer is very good, able to talk in meditation

I like that Zaheer chose a meeting point in the spirit world, it’s also nice to see spirits, despite the spirit portals being open; we don’t see many of them. (None in Ba Sing Se or Zaofu) particularly, it’s interesting to see a little interaction between them (the bar-owner shooing them out of his bar)

But, let’s get to the meet of the episode. The Red Lotus. Zaheer finally gives answers as to who he and his group are, and why they’re doing it. And the involvement of Unalaq (sorry, you’re not any more of interesting villain in light of this) the Red Lotus’ belief that (as far as I interpret) that governments are corrupt, and the way to fix it and bring freedom is to remove them entirely and embrace the chaos it will bring. An oddly relevant concept given the middle-eastern crises of late. Also relevant to the change concept of the book, people willing to embrace change at its highest level.

Also, there’s the fight between Mako and Bolin and Ghazan and Ming Hua. To be honest, they shouldn’t have fought to win, they should’ve just held them off and fallen back at the next opportunity. It seemed obvious from the last episode that they couldn’t win. Even without P’li or Zaheer backing them up.

The animation is top notch as per usual, the opening scenes looked fantastic and the spirit world looked amazing, the fights are as usual fluid.

The music seems to have themes to it. The Red Lotus theme (which is the one from the trailer) has been going for a while. We also have the city running music (also from the city running back in beginnings) and I’d like to hear some more music from them, the studio has produced great music in the past.

Rating 8.5/10

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Images used in this review are from The Legend of Korra and belong to their respective owners. All images in this review are subject to fair use.