Is Korra worse than Aang as an Avatar?

Aang vs. Korra. Who was better?

As a fan of both Legend of Korra and Avatar: The Last Airbender, I have seen people compare the two main characters: Aang and Korra. I've also seen many people state Korra is weak, while others have praised her strength. Either way, the character as been mixed, which makes sense. We, as an audience, have to compare Legend to Korra to its predecessor, the wonderful masterpiece that is known as Avatar: The Last Airbender. I think the main reason why Korra gets a decent amount of hate, is because of the fact that we have to compare her series to the first one. If Avatar: The Last Airbender was not there before Legend of Korra, people would definitely have a different opinion of her. Either way, much needs to be said on both sides. YANDEREPANDA IS HERE, TO JUSTIFY THE SALT THAT BELONGS IN THE OCEAN.

Situations on Both Sides

Avatar Aang-

The last survivor of his kind. Aang was a 12 year old air nomad who was the Avatar during the events of ATLA. He had to master four elements and bring balance to the world. Conflict was arising, and he had to act fast and defeat the Fire Lord, Ozai in only a year. He had his comrades to help him out, AKA Team Avatar, and had different masters to train him in Fire, Water, and Earth. During the events of ATLA, he saved multiple lives, villages, learned energybending, defeated Ozai, brought peace back to the world, ended the war, and created The United Republic of Nations and Republic City. Pretty impressive stuff, if you ask me. Especially when he did most of it at 12 years old. He was great at the spiritual side of being the Avatar, having a crazy powerful Avatar State, but he fell short in the physical side and was more of a pacifist than anything. He had flaws and overcame them, and ultimately achieved a lot in his lifetime. He was pretty cool for a bald, midget kid.

Avatar Korra-

The Avatar right after Aang's time. Korra was a 17 year old female from the Water Tribe. After already mastering Fire, Water, and Earth, she had to master Air from Tenzin, Aang's son. Conflict arose multiple times during the events of Legend of Korra. She had to deal with Equalists and a Blood Bender who could take away bending, a Dark Spirit that fused with her Uncle, having her past lives destroyed, dealing with a crazy powerful Airbender while being poisoned badly, live with post-traumatic stress after being badly weakened from the poison, and defeat a ruthless dictator. Granted, she also had help, from her own Team Avatar and her teachers. She was skilled in the physical aspect of bending, but had trouble with the spiritual side, which was why she couldn't airbend at first, but later could. She could also heal, energybend, and metalbend. She had her own set of flaws, and was able to develop quite a bit and ultimately achieved a lot in her lifetime as well. Say what you want, but she was freaking awesome. Not as much as Toph, but nobody is as awesome as Toph Beifong.

I mean... Come on.

Seriously.

No? Fine. Moving on.

The Arguments

I've seen quite a lot of people state that "Korra is so much weaker than Aang" and "Korra is the worst Avatar ever", blah blah blah. Now, I would like to point out that while Korra may not necessarily be stronger than Aang, she definitely is not worse either.

People have stated that Korra is weaker because of the fact that she gets beat up a lot, or because she can't bend as well, or the fact that she doesn't go into the Avatar State as much and that her's isn't as powerful as Aang's.

Granted, I do believe that Aang has a more powerful Avatar State, but that doesn't necessarily make him the better Avatar. Keep in mind that Aang had to deal with one extremely powerful Fire Lord. Korra on the other hand, had to deal with an Equalist who could take away bending, a Dark Spirit, and fight two major villains while she was in a weakened state due to mercury poisoning. Now, I don't exactly know how much stronger the villains were in ATLA vs. LOK or vice versa, but keep in mind that both Avatars were thrown into different situations in different time periods, so it's honestly hard to compare them. 

Aang definitely has more powerful abilities in terms of spiritual power, while Korra is better with physical, as stated by Tenzin. Do realize that with the different time periods, there must be different styles of fighting. The creators based Aang and the other people in ATLA's fighting styles to be more based off traditional Martial Arts while Korra and the other people in LOK had more MMA style martial arts. I wouldn't necessarily state either as better, they're just different styles. Although I do miss all of the creative forms of the bending and the graceful style from ATLA, but it's personal preference I guess.

While I do believe that it is impressive for Aang to deal with so much at the age of 12, while Korra was 17, again, it's hard to compare as the two were still in very different situations. Also, Korra had to deal with the last two major villains WITHOUT her past lives as they got destroyed in Season 2. All Avatars dealt with different situations in their lifetimes. Compare Aang and Korra as much as you like and think what you wish about who is better, but Korra is definitely not the "Worst Avatar Ever", as we have only seen a handful of Avatars and their situations. Aang has the better Avatar State and spiritual ability, while Korra is better physically, with the ability to heal and metalbend as a bonus. She arguably dealt with more hardship and more enemies to deal with that could arguably be more powerful, depending on how one looks at it. Keep in mind that the two Avatars that we mainly saw had to be different. If we just had another carbon copy of Aang as the main protagonist in Legend of Korra, that would be just boring and repetitive. Making them different makes each Avatar unique, just like how each person is. Both had different abilities, situations, personalities, storylines, and growth. Comparing the two overall would be difficult in terms of who is better, but I definitely do not believe that Korra is worse than Aang and I don't think that she's the "worst Avatar ever".

Anyway, Korra is one of my favorite characters of all time, along with Aang. Yeah, yeah, I know, I know. She could be irritating in the beginning with her impulsive, rash, tomboyish nature and was whiny. But she developed into a fine Avatar who grew up into someone who no longer needed Tenzin's help, learned compassion, learned patience, dealt with Post Traumatic Stress, etc. She overcame so much in a few years, more than some of them in a lifetime, as said by Tenzin, aka the Yoda of LOK. Though, I would like to complain about that final battle in Season 4 with Kuvira. Was expecting more of a fight, but whatever, the Avatar State part was pretty awesome. Though I was expecting something more epic as the finale, but whatever, thanks Nickelodeon. Say what you want, she's still more useful than freaking Sakura Haruno, aka one of the most irritating and worst female characters.

Okay, I'll admit she became useful later on, but she still sucked as a character. Fight me. 

Haha, fine, I'll stop. The Sakura bashing can go somewhere else, maybe another blog post.

Now, now, I bet you're wondering, "Where's the snark, YanderePanda?" Well, I guess there's just not much to complain about, as LOK and ATLA are AWESOMESAUCE and they're part of my many fandoms. Nothing too rant worthy about it, except the fact that Nickelodeon is an a**hat and shouldn't have cut the freaking funding for LOK, otherwise we would've had more and better quality episodes. But NOOO, they just had to troll us viewers. Gee, thx brah. Hah, oh well, at least Korrasami happened. Why? Because KORRASAMI!Problems would've happened if Nick took THAT away. Don't mess with a Yandere. Especially a Yandere Panda. And don't mess with her Senpai. You'll get murdered into the last Oblivion, I tell you. SENPAI NOTICES ME, NOT YOU. BECAUSE UR DEAD. Do you wanna know what also ticks me off? When people call ATLA and LOK an "anime". IT'S A FREAKING CARTOON. IT'S AMERICAN MADE. IT'S AN ANIME INSPIRED CARTOON, YOU BAKA WEEBS! GEEZ.

Ahem... Er... Anyway... First Actual Post Thingy! Catch you guys later, with more commentary/rants/spiels/etc! YanderePanda Out!