Talk:Amon/@comment-4297023-20120823221048/@comment-4662143-20120828060012

In terms of the series, the "secret bloodbender" thing *is* stereotypical. It makes Amon just like Chin the Great, Sozin, Ozai, Zhao, Long Feng, and every other chauvinistic, power hungry, egomaniacal bending psychopath in the series. Yes, Amon is an anti-villain to a certain extent, unlike other villains, but all of the qualities that "redeem" him are dumped upon us in the finale, and that too, mostly via Tarrlok's flashback, making the entire exercise seem clumsy and painfully contrived. Amon simply being a nonbender victimized by benders (preferably with a backstory revealed over several episodes, perhaps with his own "Zuko Alone" episode) would make him a fully fledged anti-villain, unlike *any* other in the series with the exception of Zuko. It makes him someone actually fighting for a twisted, overly idealized version of equality stemming from palpable injustice in Republic City society, rather than someone disguising a cynical power grab under a veneer of imperialist propaganda.

Amon being a nonbender would also reveal to us the nonbender *perspective* on bending society and culture, a vital aspect of the world of Avatar that is, sadly, poorly represented. His experience could add richness and depth to what has hitherto been almost entirely a eulogy to bending power, the dark and exploitive side of which was not fully fleshed out. Yes, Republic City did degenerate into a police state, and, as Korra pointed out, Tarrlok and the cops exhibited the very bullying that Amon was fighting against. But this crackdown itself was a reaction to Equalist terrorism which seemed to be needlessly destabilizing an otherwise open and relatively prosperous society. We saw little of what nonbenders percieved as the "tyrrany of the bending establishment." Korra pointed out that the Equalists were oppressing themselves and she had a point. Before the Equalist Revolution, being an Equalist was perfectly legal. The Equalist protestor could openly disseminate was was essentially *treasonous* literature and rhetoric without fear of repression, despite his whining about the "oppression" of benders. Had Republic City really been run by an oppressive bending establishment, he would have been the first jailed. Tenzin, a bending councilman, was an advocate of retaining nonbenders' civil rights *despite* a terrorist insurrection, rights granted to them by Aang, Zuko, and other *benders*.

So what exactly got the Equalists so riled up? Nonbender poverty? Discrimination? Intimidation at the hands of bender gangs? What aspect of Amon's history makes him so aware of the nonbenders' problems, whatever they may be? What was the Equalist platform, and what was it that made it so compelling that thousands of citizens were willing to destroy the society they were born into to implement it? Amon's bloodbender backstory not only fails to answer vital questions about Equalism and nonbender suffering, but creates new ones about his own motivations, and none of these are solved in the season. How to nonbenders see bending culture? Do they pray at shrines dedicated to bending power? How do they feel about the Avatar? When that woman said to Korra "You're our Avatar too" I was positive that the show would soon present the nonbender perspective about bending religion, and was sorely disappointed. Presenting Amon as a nonbender would show us how nonbenders see the aspects of the world of Avatar that we always see from a bender point of view. While we see Aang showing a lot of respect for meditation and prayer, for instance, Amon might see this as useless superstition dedicated to preserving bender hegemony through mind-numbing ritualism. While Aang is shown as having immense respect for intricate Airbender architecture, Amon might see the grandiose temples and martial arts centers as wasteful expenditure of wealth created by the toil of the nonbender lower class, and stolen by a corrupt and narcicistic bending class, frittering it away on monuments to their own power. This perspective could add much-needed depth to the Equalist movement, but is snuffed out completely when Amon turns into Noatak. The writers open a whole new can of worms with Noatok, and don't have time to tie up all of the loose ends they create within the course of a single finale episode, thus resulting in the clunky, sloppy, shipping infested finish that we were all subjected to.