Ursa - Blog Posts
Wound
[Go check out Dogs In Love 2 on JelloApocolypse’s YouTube Channel!!]
A draw for Halloween, I hope your like It !
Me I’m really happy to see the results final with the shadow ! :D
ok here me out even more. as an avid zukka shipper lemme put this in here. toph: just chilling and vibing (she just wants her parents off her back) so she does not give a shit. zuko and sokka are like 'fighting' over her but it becomes too competitive at one point that they just start randomly dating. they dont know its happening and no one else except toph realises because, again, shes just vibing. suki and mai DO eventually realise and partake in the chaos by dating each other. suki still stays as 'team zuko' though, just cause she thinks its fun. MEANWHILE zuko and sokka still havent realised whats going on because yes they are smart but theyre also dumbasses. the earth king joined in on the bidding wars with hakoda and ursa but because hes a neutral party he bids for toph to not get with either zuko or sokka. aang's in the corner on the verhe of a mental breakdown trying to keep everything under control. agni himself shows up in zukos dreams telling him to 'beat that water tribe kid otherwise tui and la would tease him for all eternity'. reminder that zuko's still trying to run the nation. aang eventually uses his avatar powers to trap zuko sokka and toph in the spirit world until they figure it out. king kuei of the earth kingdom wins the bet
ok hear me out - when Zuko and Toph got to like 21 and 17 respectively they started being each other’s dates to fancy events they had to attend
Which of course the newly emerging media was taking to like fish to water, publishing all sorts of rumours and musings about whether the Fire Lord and heir to the Beifong fortune were being matched (which definitely would be an advantageous one)
And naturally Zuko and Toph both love it. Zuko because his advisors aren’t badgering him about marriage (whilst he continues to pine after Mai), and Toph because her parents think she’s months away from being the Fire Lady and so aren’t trying to set her up with suitors. So they basically encourage it, always walking into parties arm in arm, both looking hot af, playing up to the crowd
But the rest of the gaang (namely Aang, Katara and Sokka) HATE it because Zuko and Toph won’t actually admit they’re faking it. So even though they all keeping rolling their eyes and saying “we know you’re just messing with us” internally each one of them is like “zuko and toph afksrgkhjrh!!!!!”
Sokka keeps trying to get Toph away from Zuko because he’s like “no you’re too old this is inappropriate” and so is always trying to drag her away and interrupt dances but this just leads to the media thinking that the fire lord and the next chief of the southern water tribe are fighting over the same girl and they LOVE it
Aang is getting really cheesed off because every time he tries to do a press conference he keeps getting asked if he’s Team Zuko or Team Sokka
Suki 100% is living for the chaos
Katara proudly shows off her Team Sokka shirt in the clinic odd days
there are a lot of bad takes in the atla fandom (like, atla fandom may as well be a bad take generator) but something that has really been pissing me off lately is the assumption that you can categorize the fire nation royal family into good guys and bad guys. first of all, obviously, they're all bad guys. they are imperialists. but the idea that "sozin ozai azula bad" and "iroh lu ten ursa zuko azulon(?!) good" is actually insane.
lu ten died attempting to conquer the earth kingdom. lu ten was there because his father, iroh, was leading the siege. ursa laughed when iroh joked about burning ba sing se to the ground. zuko laughed too, mirroring his dear mother who taught him about the wonders of imperialism. and the fact that some people think that azulon was a good guy because he favored iroh is crazy. he favored iroh because iroh was the better imperialist, was more charming and tactically savvy as he bent the world to his will. people who think that azulon didn't like ozai because ozai was cruel literally have it backwards. ozai was cruel because azulon didn't like him. sozin shaped azulon, and azulon shaped iroh and ozai. azulon reigned for most of the war, and he was responsible for decimating the southern water tribe and colonizing the earth kingdom.
iroh only realizes the error of his ways well into middle age, after spending a majority of his life colonizing the world. he only stops to reconsider once he experiences the adverse effects of war for himself through the loss of his son. likewise, zuko can only gain empathy for the victims of the war by being one himself, as a refugee in the earth kingdom, and bonding with people who have been hurt by the fire nation. azula doesn't get that chance. ozai doesn't get that chance. azulon, lu ten, and ursa are dead, so they will never get that chance. but it's not like there is some ontological moral divide separating azula from zuko. zuko was a sensitive child whereas azula was better at embodying fire nation values of power and cunning. zuko was punished for his outbursts whereas azula knew how to keep her mouth shut. therefore, zuko experienced circumstances that led him to disavow fire nation imperialism.
but that doesn't mean that azula is ontologically evil. azula was the iroh of her generation to zuko's ozai, and iroh (eventually) disavowed conquest as well. there is no inherent divide between good and bad, monster and human. ursa was a warm and loving mother to zuko, just as iroh was a warm and loving father to lu ten, but they both laughed at others' suffering. their values were shaped by their circumstances and experiences. their ideologies do not make them less human, or less capable of change, just as their interpersonal behaviors do not negate their abhorrent ideologies.
Looking at this fanart physically hurts my heart
Post healing au where Ursa and Azula get along now
Azula would randomly cling to Ursa for like five seconds every now and again to make up for lost time
(she then goes back to being nonchalant because her? showing affection? to her mother? impossible.)
Also does anyone know any good Ursa-Azula fic recs??
You know I've always hated the argument "Ursa loved Azula too" because clearly Azula didn't feel loved, and not making someone feel loved is the same as not loving them at all
From the search part 2 …When Ozai and Ursa make a deal.
why did no one talk about this?!
Can we just talk about how powerful this scene is?
There are no words needed. Each panel shows us how their relationship was with each other. Silence often offers us a more powerful understanding than a thousand words ever could. Ursa knew she never showed her daughter how much she loved her. You can see the love and affection on her face for her high strung little girl… as well as regret and worry. Even in the last panel and the way she looks back…she was hesitant. She did not want to leave Azula, knowing how much Ozai influenced her at such a young age…she even chose to see her daughter first before Zuko. Maybe she had planned on saying something to Azula…but the words got lost on her tongue. What could she say? Instead she opted to give her a kiss on her cheek as a sign of love instead, praying she would be safe.
If only Azula knew…
I have a lot of Azula Feels now…excuse me while I go cry in a corner.
I still have this cap from the official Avatar site and it’s no longer updated so you can find a lot old concepts. I find it pretty strange how different the two Ursas are.
In the original animated canon (discontinued and overridden):
Ursa was originally written as a Fire Nation noblewoman who got along very well with Ozai when they were younger. She loved him dearly and her proper lady upbringing made her an ideal future princess. Fire Lord Azulon and the Fire Sages arranged a marriage between Ozai and Ursa due to their strong compatibility. Zuko recalls times his family was “actually happy” before Ozai became mad and abusive. Ursa was supposed to appear in Book Four but the entire season ended up being scrapped after Paramount bought the rights to create a three-season trilogy. They later decided to have her return in the Avatar finale but she was cut out at the request of Bryan Konietzko. Ozai’s thirst for power and control itself probably stemmed from his feelings of inadequacy when compared to his prodigious elder brother and favored son of Azulon, Iroh. This is why Zuko sparing Azula’s life and wanting to help her despite their twisted relationship was seen as a major catalyst in creating an era of peace.
In the new comics canon (considered to be official):
The new Avatar comics have changed Ursa into a lower-class theater actress who hated Ozai and was forced to marry him as a part of a eugenics experiment the Fire Sages believed in. Their relationship is never shown to be happy and is like absolutely nothing you could call a “perfect match”. Ozai was always power hungry and abusive. He never cared for his family members unless they were of any use to him. Ursa has remained in love with her childhood friend Ikem for years and marries him after she runs away from the Fire National Capital. She asks for help from a spirit known as the Mother of Faces to erase her memories, change her face, and give her the name “Noriko”. She later has a daughter called Kiyi with Ikem (who likewise was given a new face and the name “Noren”). Zuko meets Noriko and she decides she must confront her past and became Ursa again. Her youngest daughter, Kiyi despises this change as she has only known Noriko and not Ursa all her life. Azula is grief-stricken with the fact that Ursa had a good relationship with her half-sister and never with her.
One day the world will acknowledge that "Ursa loved Azula" and "Azula didn't feel loved by Ursa" are not mutially exclusive sentences and the world will we beautiful then
I just wish one day Ursa will understand how much damage SHE brought upon her eldest daughter.
Well you're not wrong-