Whenever I look back on the early episodes of Avatar: the Last Airbender, I realize that Iroh was probably acting a little ridiculous on purpose. He knows that Zuko still has fresh emotional wounds from his cruel, uncompromising father and sadistic sister, and the one source of softness and warmth in his life, his mother, is long gone. Iroh always tried to be a friend to Zuko, but now that his nephew has been scarred and banished, he tries to be goofy and funny and carefree so desperately hard because all he wants is for Zuko to smile and relax again. If making a fool out of himself is what he has to do, he’d do it a hundred times over.
how dare you give me iroh feels all these years later
that, and it gives him cover to slow things down.
he doesn’t want to capture the Avatar, but he can’t tell Zuko that; he needs time to help his nephew get out of the mindset Ozai’s abuse taught him.
nobody’s going to listen to him if he just tells them to stop – it’s too blatant a betrayal of the Fire Lord’s wishes – but he can play the buffoon; when they get too close, he can lose a piece of his pai sho set and delay the entire operation to replace it.
because he’s a loving uncle, and this is what Zuko needs on that level; but he’s also a genius strategist and an experienced conspirator, and this serves his purposes on a few levels
there’s even a pretty damn direct implication that he’s doing this deliberately. it’s easy to miss at the time, because you don’t have the context, but that first time we see Iroh delay Zuko and the soldiers chasing Aang? it is, as I mentioned, when he loses a piece of his pai sho set, only to realise he’d been carrying it all along
specifically, it’s the White Lotus tile – the one that gave its name to the order of benevolent meddlers he’s secretly been a member of this whole time. there’s no way that’s a coincidence.
Pretty sure I’ve said this before, but Uncle Iroh is possibly the most brilliantly sophomoric character ever written.
hey… do you guys think… that the blue spirit became kinda like a criptid/myth in the ATLA verse? like Zuko never told the public about it obviously. and we know from the ember Island players episode that the blue spirit was “The scourge of the fire nation” so do like… do you think people are out there… looking for the blue spirit like bigfoot… and Zuko is sitting in his palace like “I wonder what I did with that old mask”
i wonder if korra had always known she was bisexual or if she saw asami one day and thought lmao ok if i was straight at one point i’m not anymore
i have this headcanon that when she was younger and found out katara was married to her in her past life korra would get excited and be all “does that me you’re my wife?” and then if someone was rude to katara young korra would yell something like “don’t talk to my wife like that!” and just basically assume being with women was okay simply because she’s already been with them in past lives
I love seeing the lok fandom on my dash simply for cute shit like this man
Okay this might just be the most far-fetched theory I’ve ever come up with and there’s no actual proof that this happened but just…hear me out okay?
Let’s present the facts before I present the actual theory:
We know that Iroh is fairly old, definitely older than Ozai as indicated both by his hair color and the fact that he’s the first-born son and should have been the heir to the throne.
Speaking of that throne, the Fire Nation royal family looks like this:
Sozin —> Azulon (Father of Ozai/Iroh) —> Ozai and Iroh —> Zuko and Azula
Meaning that Sozin, the man who started the war, is only two generations ahead of Iroh. He’s Iroh’s grandfather.
We also know that Sozin was in his eighties the first time the comet came around. I’m just saying — he was old. So it stands to reason that his son, Azulon, would have been an adult during this time. Meaning it’s entirely possible that his wife couldhave been old enough to give birth to Iroh during this time.
Now that would make Iroh 100 years old during the series which seems completely insane but remember something important: People grow to insanely old ages in Avatar!
Proof:
Kyoshi: Died at 150
Bumi: Is 112 and still a badass
Sozin: Died at 102
Guru Pathik: His age is unknown but he was a Gyatso’s friend/confidant so he has to be over 100.
We also know that Iroh was fit both physically, mentally, and spiritually so yeah this guy could have definitely been 100 years old during the series.
Okay so we’ve established the fact that Iroh could have theoretically been born 100 years before the series began. Who cares?
I do. Because I don’t just think that he was born roughly 100 years before the series began. I think that Iroh was born during a very specific moment.
And before I outright state the theory, I want to remind you all of the most important factor here: The World of Avatar is centered around the theme of reincarnation.
So hear me out:
Nobody likes thinking about what happened during the Fire Nation’s invasions of the Air Temples (unless you’re @tashiandnima in which case you write an entire amazing comic about it; seriously go read it). But as painful as it is, we have to think about the invasion for this theory.
We know that there was one fateful day when a comet shot across the sky and Sozin used the resulting power to send his armies to the Air Temples in order to wipe the airbenders out. So just imagine that.
Imagine the monks all fighting to the best of their ability (they’re pacifists after all; they didn’t have an army).
Imagine Gyatso taking down dozens of soldiers but eventually being killed himself.
And imagine, hundreds of miles away, at that exact moment, Prince Azulon’s son is born.
Yep.
My theory is that
This kind, spiritual, and lovable teacher/father-figure:
Was reincarnated into this kind, spiritual, and lovable teacher/father-figure:
(Hey, Bryke originally wanted Gyatso to be reincarnated into Momo and I frankly think this does his character a lot more justice.)
Which suddenly puts a whole new spin on this scene:
