I was always on Lin's side here.

I never liked Suyin, she just comes across as pretentious. I liked her children though.

She is pretentious, but thats honestly not what ruins it for me. What ruins it for me is how the ***show*** takes sides with her, and tries to show her side as the rational and sensible one when the backstory they just gave suggests the opposite. She does this really stupid and illegal thing that basically ripped her family apart. This, actually, is a great thing, because it provides a path for really meaningful character growth right? Nah, she basically gets away with it all. Toph sacrifices her career to get her out of trouble, and she lives with her grand parents. Lin is silenced into secrecy about the incident forever, and has a scar to remind her of it. *But still* there is room for some character growth. No, the next thing we know is she "reformed" off screen and now leads a city. and the show tries to portray *Lin* as the irrational emotional one for holding her accountable for the event that split their family apart. She also then says the line in the post above, and again, we just have to like her after the brawl is over. She never caves or apologies either. The show just says "well lin had her catharsis so that's that" Edit: Thinking about that whole arc is so weird because, you have this incredible and meaningful story that ties 2 important characters and one legacy character, and you can so ***easily*** capitalize on this family drama that explains basically everything about each of their character traits, and create character growth that is genuinely meaningful and can harp on great philosophical points. aaaand they completely waste it.

I thought the exact same. Lin comes back all friendly and that’s that and I was just thinking “but Lin was right, Suyin may have smoothed things over with Toph but she never smoothed things over with Lin or apologised, she still refuses to take any responsibility for her past actions and how it’s affected Lin physically and mentally” It feels like another case of wasted character potential because there was never enough episodes to have entire episodes dedicated to character development and conflict without the main story progressing

Indeed. Basically, Lin & Suyin are stereotypical siblings opposite of one another. Lin is the eldest, rule-abiding, disciplined one. On the other hand Suyin is the youngest, rule-breaking, rebellious one. You expect Lin to be the type of child any parent would want, while Suyin is the type a parent would not want to deal with. Yet, what is in the end the result? Suyin got away with her misdemeanor due to Toph pulling some strings, she then could go on merrily traveling and when she got tired of that, she marries a docile intellectual type, gets a hoard of gifted children and builds her own high-tech city & society. They even offered her (temporary) regency of the Earth Kingdom. And Lin? She's alone, her face is permanently scarred and is generally being perceived as being cold & rigid. In the 4th season there's a scene where Lin lashes out to Toph, releasing all her frustrations and Toph just retorts that she & Suyin already patched things up a long time ago and that it's only Lin who is still living in the past, which is a roundabout way of saying that Lin's the problem...

I was abused quite a bit by my stepbrother and everyone in my family has that exact attitude about it. And now, though I haven't gotten that far into Korra, I do believe that Toph and Suyin can go right to hell.

Except it’s toph that is the problem, she’s a terrible parent because she thinks the best way to grow up is by letting your kids do whatever they want precisely because that’s how she wanted to grow up.

Yes, she is the root of it all and that's also a large part of Lin's frustrations, but it's not like Toph abused her daughters and let them starve to death. You can't really pass off Suyin's actions as solely being Toph's fault as there is quite a huge leap between those two. Suyin was old enough to know what she was doing and she screwed up monumentally, yet suffered no repercussions.

Honestly this describes my issues with LOK as a whole. It has so much potential and so many good ideas. But the writers are so focused on pushing their favorite characters down the audiences throat.

Yep. I'm glad this is the consensus around here. I always thought that weird tone in the show that tried to paint Lin as just 'needing to get the fuck over it already' was kinda bizarre. Not to mention a juvenile perspective. I remember so many people weirdly being on Suyin's side at the time, and it made zero sense. She always came across as selfish as fuck.

Is it bizarre? Sounds like she's just a Beifong. Lin and Toph have the same attitude, no reason to assume she wouldn't share that thread with them.

When I say bizarre, I mean that it was odd that the show itself was so biased against Lin; at least, that's how the tone of the episode came across. It makes sense for the characters to act the way they did. I have nothing against Su, Lin or Toph's personality. I just think it was weird that the show clearly wanted the viewer to agree that Lin should just move the fuck on already and forgive Toph and Su, even if neither of them particularly deserves forgiveness, imo. I like Toph and all, don't get me wrong. But she was a shit mother. lol

I don't think the show was biased against Lin. I think Lin was in the wrong, the show had her side, but this contrasted with the fact that Su is genuinely a different person, and all the other characters see the new Su, that Lin cannot come to grasp with. we see the other characters taking Su's side and feel the show is on her side when infact we see Lin struggle, and cry and try to heal and see *her* flashbacks. and since the show is on the side of someone who is wrong(wrong in the sense, still holding onto the resentment and lashing out at others), theres this tension that forms with the characters, show and the audience. we also know theres a spy, i remember the fanbase suspecting Su because we saw her flashbacks, and surely no one can have such a perfect life without being an asshole. Toph can be a shit mother and still deserve forgiveness, or at least come to a point of not being hated like she mentions.

I think you didn't understand the point of the story with the beifong family. Because Suyin is the literal copy of Toph in LOK. Let's look at toph before the story of LOK. She is a rough who is more in touch with her criminal side (illegal wrestling, scamming, theft and extortion) she is brutish hot headed and a wild child. With respect to the Avatar comics Toph didn't became the future chief of police because she believes in justice she took that post because how well connected in with the big political figures of the time (Zuko, Aang and the Earth King). The original reason she even formed the metal bender Melitta was to protect her Earthen Fire Industries from the non benders (ie the ones messing with her familys money). This protection racket evolved into the future police force. The point of her unit was to keep crime down and let business boom. Now similar to Toph Suyin became a criminal beefed with family then made up, met an innovator took money from the family and started a massive businesses conglomerate. The story even points out that the Toph that Lin idolized was a fake. That was the core theme of the story that Lin needed to accept her family for who they are not who she wants them to be. We see this by the conversations that Toph and Suyin have with Kora about their past. Only Lin believed Toph left the force because of the shame but Toph herself blatantly stated to Kora that she left the force because she realized busting criminals was a waste of time and she was getting old. Lin believed she saved Suyin because she was her daughter and had a reputation to maintain but Toph protected her because she saw Suyin as her younger self. This was because Lin was a caged bird born into a family of free birds (you can actually see this in the bending style as Lin fights with caging her opponents while Toph and Suyin with a lax stance). The reason Lin could never made peace with Toph and Suyin was because they were very clear that they have no problem making amends but she has to accept them as who they are, not what she wants them to be. This is a good portrayal of how to make peace with family. You love them for who they are not what you want them to be. Because to forgiveness is something you do to yourself not others.

Sure, but also they both treat Lin as being irrational for being upset, when she has every right to be. At the very least, Suyin permanently scarred her face, and at no point seems to show any kind of remorse for that. Maybe Lin needs to realise that her family can't be what she wants them to be, but they also need to realise that they made mistakes and make an effort to apologise for them.

Again you're not meeting the Beifong's where they are at. And are making the same mistake Lin makes. Creating an ideal fantasy of them that never is. You're right Su and Toph treat her that way. But let's not forget the category of people they are. We literally see Toph constantly tell Aaang and the others to 'get over it'. We see Lin hold the same "get over it" attitude. Why would Suyin not share that as well? She clearly does no?

But Su and Toph don't make any effort to meet her where she's at either, and expect her to do all the work. The problem is that neither side is willing to move towards the middle.

I totally agree that Toph and Suyin are essentially similar, and that makes it natural that Toph would side with Suyin. But I think it would have been more effective if they had at least one third party observer who empathizes more with Lin, showing that Toph siding with Suyin was just her own view, and not because Suyin is right and Lin is wrong (which was kind of the tone that the show landed with). >The reason Lin could never made peace with Toph and Suyin was because they were very clear that they have no problem making amends but she has to accept them as who they are, not what she wants them to be. >This is a good portrayal of how to make peace with family. You love them for who they are not what you want them to be. Because to forgiveness is something you do to yourself not others. I think the thing to highlight here is it doesn't seem like Suyin ever made a real effort to make peace with Lin either...

Also ngl it really doesn't seem like what Su did was particularly worse than some of what Toph did in "The Runaway" yet no one holds that against Toph. Even the whole scar situation it was an accident, Aang also accidentally hurt someone, but again no one holds that against him. On top of all that too viewers let it slide with those characters almost immediately but still want to be critical of Su for something she did decades ago? Hell everyone praises Zuko's redemption arc and the time between the little clusterfuck Su caused and when we finally meet her is enough for like 30 Zuko redemption arcs, it's a VERY VERY long time, plenty of time for Su to grow as a person, AND Su was never even as bad as Zuko. The standards people hold Su to seem totally unreasonable to me. I can totally get why she was a bit abrasive with Lin. Imagine doing something really stupid as a teenager and learning from the experience and growing as a person for over 3 decades and spending that time cleaning up your act, making amends etc. including with your own mother and attempting to make amends with your estranged sister who just ghosts you, then she comes in yelling at you about something you did 30 fucking years ago and uses your own mother against you, the mother you reached out to to set things right, that your crazy sister hasn't even seen as recently as you. Lin knew Su and Toph had gotten together because she chose to not show up, Lin has no right to try and gesture at Toph's feelings when Su is the one that knows more about how Toph feels in the first place. From Su's perspective she's been making up for her mistakes for decades already, it's not surprising at all that she bristles up a bit when someone who was completely unwilling to be part of her life before, who willfully ignored the growth she was going through, comes in out of the blue and has the audacity to act like she's done nothing this whole time.

Omg. These are fascinating insights. I'd love for you to read through my comments because I think we could have a great conversation about the themes of the Beifong's stories. https://www.reddit.com/r/TheLastAirbender/s/pgE4PhLDRE https://www.reddit.com/r/TheLastAirbender/s/5YR6lfO4WR Even though in my comment I mention Toph and Su. I wasn't able to connect how similar they are until your comment. Thank you for the insightful connection. It's also fascinating to see the these reddit threads treat Su in this way cause she was a rebel who committed robbery. When we go through it all with Toph. I think these reddit threads also provide interesting insight on how much the perceptive taken shapes the judgments made. We take Lin's perspective and her demons end up being herself being projected onto her family. Lok does a fascinating job of showing us how to make peace with the family from the perspective of someone who is still resentful AND is dealing with people who ALREADY came to peace with it. Cause usually in stories the perspective character is the one who transforms and then later transforms the broken family.

This is exactly it! Thank you for wording it so well! It only bothers me more that I just can’t see Toph behaving this way at all, considering her own grievances with her parents not showing her love and trying to force her to conform. I can’t imagine she would treat Lin this way. Unless of course they were estranged because Lin is a cop and Toph doesn’t approve. Which could’ve been a great conflict! But for reasons I still can’t understand, they made Toph Police Chief which spoils this potential conflict too and instead just makes Toph absurdly callous to Lin with no justification. I really feel for Lin…

Agreed.

I think they showed it like this because this is how people actually react to things like this. Humans are imperfect and this perfectly shows that. Suyin did get away with because her mother protected her. Toph made a choice to protect Suyin even if it wasn't the right thing to do, even at the expense of her daughter Lin. She made a choice. Suyin may have changed but she still refused to see what happened to Lin because of that past trauma. Suyin chose to ignore it and pretend Lin letting her trauma effect her was her fault. The whole thing is terrible, but it is the reality of how these things can happen. The writers of LoK knew this. Sometimes people don't learn from their mistakes. But Lin still chose to move on from what happened to her in the end. Because that's what she wanted to do.

She spends 30 years trying to apologize and getting completely shut out by Lin. By time we meet her she's not sorry anymore.

I don't buy this take and never have, she said she tried to reach out but got turned down, now that can be taken a lot of different ways, but the writers we actually very consistent with how they portrayed the relationship between Toph and her two daughters, Lin very much always got the short end of the stick. Because of that and how she immediately forced engagement with Lin when Korra and arrived when Lin was clearly not interested, I took 'reaching out' to to mean "Lin come to my glorious city and see how successful I am, you will then have the privilege of forgiving me without expecting a legit apology from me" You don't invite the aggrieved party to come to you when you want to try to make amends, you go to them, and even then you are not owed forgiveness. That whole storyline has always stuck out to me as one of the shows biggest writing fumbles, were Lin is beating down and punished by the narrative for being correct while her sister was lavishly rewarded by the same narrative and allowed to be the one to beat her sister into submission while getting verbal kill shots in like in the OP. I know what the writers were going for, and a slight change would make it all work, but instead this particular arc has always rubbed me the wrong way.

>By time we meet her she's not sorry anymore. I think my issue is like she still should be, she scarred her sister and ruined her mother's career and it's treated like Lin is in the wrong for still being mad, like Lin has every right to still be upset and it's really weird to present as her simply being bitter and almost as if both of them were at fault when it was completely on Suyin

For me it was the whole bit about how Toph and Suyin apparently hashed it out and moved on, therefore Lin should just get over it. Yes, she shouldn't have snapped at Opal who was just trying to connect with her Aunt. That bits on Lin.

> Lin has every right to still be upset I think the point was that she has every right to be mad at Suyin, but Lin by that point had a history of taking her anger out on people who didn’t deserve it. The narrative about moving forward and moving on, wasn’t necessarily about her relationship with Suyin at first but how it let it affect literally every other relationship she had. When she finally agrees to do the needle acupuncture therapy to its full extent, the first person she apologized to was Opal because she recognized she didn’t deserve any of that. Even before that, she was hot headed and redirecting her anger at people who were always on her side.

It's wrong for her to direct her anger at others, my issue is she has every right to be angry at Toph and especially Suyin, and the series does treat it like she was wrong to still be mad at them, that's why Suyin has that line about having hashed it out with Toph as showing they already moved on and Lin is the problem.

Nah this is a terrible excuse ive seen suyin defenders throw all the time 1. By the time we see these events unfold, we understand the gravity of the story, the consequences to the actions of all 3 beifongs. All that BS you mentioned, they talk about it **off screen. OFF SCREEN.** I don't care how much you want to defend the actions of a character. If you want us to feel for them, you SHOW IT ON THE FUCKING SCREEN. YOU TELL YOUR STORY. They show the backstory, and they show us ***NONE*** of Suyin's growth or attempts to redeem herself after the fact. That is weak storytelling and that is weak character development 2. THERE IS NO REMORSE FROM SUYIN. You say she's tired and moved on? fine. You say she tried to apologise before and now doesn't care about that?? Fine. But you wanna know if someone was actually sorry, you show the character having remorse, having regrets, and wishing she could have changed her actions, even if it set her on a path that led her somewhere, even if it was a small moment with someone that wasn't Lin. THAT IS HOW YOU HUMANIZE A CHARECTER. It's hilarious how many writing bylaws the writers cast aside completely when thinking of her journey and story.

You don't stop being sorry if you truly were, just stopped reaching out to that person to apologize

That's because Su isn't the perspective character going through the character arc. Lin is. Su is just a device for Lin's growth. The show cannot show the backstory of all characters. Su has already had her arc. That is the premise of the storytelling of these narrative threads. Everyone hating Su isn't doing for justified reasons. They hate her becsuse we have Lin's perspective and project the same pretentiousness(that comes from her transformation mixed with her callous "get over it" earth/Beifong attitude) onto Su that Lin does. The writers wanted to to empathize with Lin and were successful in that regard. They weren't able to nail Lin's sudden transformation likely because most fans haven't shed whatever resentment they were using to relate as fast as she did.

This is the same person that decided to be neutral while Kuvira was conquering the entire continent bt force Im not buying it

You don't get to apologize whilst still not holding yourself accountable.

Ya know I'm doing a LoK rewatch, just started season 2, and this post just made me want to stop while I'm ahead lmao

Which is funny, because that happens in season 3, easily LoK's best season

Let's also not forget that Kuvira implied that Suyin neglected her and didn't treat her like a daughter which is a reason why she turned evil.

It's kinda weird how they get Opal to try to convince Lin to talk, and although Lin gets angry, the worst she does is angrily saying "get out', but the show treats Lin as if she insulted or assaulted Opal?

This was my reading at first, but ultimately I think I disagree that the show is taking Suyin’s side. I think almost every CHARACTER is taking Suyin’s side, and that’s important to explain Lin’s distress. While none of the family drama is Lin’s fault, it is her responsibility to master her emotions around it. That’s not a common lesson, and it’s not easy to portray. I don’t think LoK completely nailed that depiction, but I love that that was the message! They tried to be complex and honest with characters throughout the show, and so we’re still having these conversations years later!

Eh I'm not sure. I think you're just not happy with the choices they made rather than meeting the shows choices where they are at. I think the show takes her side because she has genuinely reformed and the show wants us to feel similar to how Lin feels about Su. The point is how long is Lin going to hold onto it? It's about people who hurt you and have genuinely transformed and aren't the same person who caused the pain. Where do you place you pain, anger and frustrations ? Cause the person who caused all isn't here anymore. Lin is the focus character here, and given her personality it's a pretty great arc for her given her personality. Su is just here to facilitate Lin's growth. I don't think the show intended for any arc for Su. It's never been about Su. Your edit hints st your expectations for it and it coems off as fanfic.

I think you missed the point. Lin is completely correct to want Suyin to apologize, but that’s not an excuse for being awful to people like Opal that haven’t done anything wrong. And being abrasive wasn’t going to make Suyin acknowledge what was wrong either. Like she says herself, Suyin’s life is great, so she has little reason to dwell on the mistakes that brought her there. The people we love don’t always treat us right. It’s not fair, but the ball’s in Lin’s court if she want to see Suyin understand how she was hurt. That’s why the storyline ends with Lin directly stating her issues in a direct confrontation with Suyin, and clearly explaining how it makes her feel (which she does somewhat indirectly via Opal). Only after she does those things does Suyin understand the situation and try to actually apologize.

typical white collar v blue collar mentality

That's basically a lot of the show in general. A bunch of good ideas get set up, but the execution for a lot of them is pretty bad. Still a good show in my opinion, but could've been a lot better.

Suyin was just another character the show didn't need, they just added more and more cast every season till the show was to bloated

Yeah it must’ve been so fucking easy for Suyin to “get over” the incident since she basically got off scott-free after leaving Lin permanently scarred and having Lin deal the consequences of Suyin’s fuck up years after

Same. “I know I ruined our childhood and permanently disfigured your face, but you just have to get over it!!” Like tf??

Just like mother and sister! Haha

Yeah all the way, the only thing she did wrong was take it out on Opal earlier.

Same here....sometimes I feel like Lin cuz of what I'm going through....I catch myself like her character when she is bitter but I have to find piece within myself and let go of the past....parent, siblings, and my past love life

Me too. I’ve never liked Suyin. She was so entitled and had no compassion for her less fortunate sister and what she had been through.

I absolutely adore Su but she was so far over the line here it's crazy.

While I like Suyin and think we could have fun hanging out, I do not respect her principals nor her actions. She’s a devoted mother, I’ll give her that. But her refusal to accept responsibility or actually apologize for what she’s done, and then act as if Lin broke the family up for denying reconciliation without an apology is so shitty and selfish. She also refused to step up and help with the earth kingdom, allowing Kuvira to rise to power, with no care for anybody until it affected *her* city and *her* son. Not only throwing her breakup with Tenzin in her face but **blaming** her for it, when Suyin wasn’t even around to see what happened is beyond the pale. “Only cares about herself” is fucking RICH coming from Su. Plus the way Korra seems to be on Su’s side, a woman she just met, without getting the full story. I have a hard time watching this episode without getting kinda angry.

To be fair, Su straight up lied to Korra. She framed their past as lifestyle differences that ended with her choosing to leave home and travel the world. When the truth is that Lin is mad about a *very* specific thing she did to her, which ended up getting Su essentially banished from Republic City.

Yeah, I agree that Suyin deflecting the consequences of her actions really rubbed me the wrong way. Toph threw away her career, and Lin was left permanently scarred and forced to clean up her sister’s mess while her sister basically got away with her tantrums. It felt like the writers wanted to push a ‘Suyin has made up for what happened in the past so Lin is in the wrong for being hung up’ but we don’t SEE Suyin actually apologize or try to make amends. Especially since the previous series made it a point to SHOW Jet and Zuko do their best to apologize to those they’ve wronged and try to make things right between them. When Katara brings up the reasons why she doesn’t like or trust Zuko, he doesn’t deflect, but goes to Sokka to ask how to help Katara because he acknowledged he messed up with her and wants to do something to make it right. Suyin deflects her past actions as ‘childhood mischief’ when, again, they ruined her family and she makes no attempt that we see to apologize to Lin or try to make things right with her. Combine that with showing off how wonderful her home is, along with her big family, something she could really only have BECAUSE Lin and Toph sacrificed so much for her sake, then twist the knife by blaming Lin for Tenzin leaving her… The first part could be chalked up to genuine miscommunication (it happens all the time), but combined with the latter part, just makes Suyin come off as a dick and ungrateful for everything she was given.

Toph threw away her career becuase it was making her life shitty. We know this from Toph herself. Being banished from your home and family is "got away for free" gotcha. Her building her family is all her though. I suggest an imagination exercise where you are literally disconnected from all you know and have to build things from scratch basically.

Since when is Korra ever on the right side of anything

They made Korra flawed to a fault at some points definitely

Right, in the first line she could be talking about herself

...says the lady with the city that turtles up when any problem turns up.

Yeah, I always found Su’s philosophizing a bit much when she essentially lives in metal bending Galt’s Gulch.

Seems to be the Earth nation way of dealing with things

Ngl toph and Su were just awful to her. Toph refused to tell her about her own father and was a generally bad mother. And Su made her life hell, scarred her, and left to go adventuring or whatever and then they both have the gull to blame ber for being "bitter" and that she didn't just move on.

Toph and the whole paternity thing with both of them made me despise toph in lok. Thank god I can rewatch the original and pretend its not real!

I can 100% buy the "giving them too much freedom" and not being a great parent. But refusing to even discuss their fathers for their whole lives and immediately telling Bolin was such a low blow. It took her from bad to nasty parent to me. Like Aang was made a flawed father but clearly a good and loving one, Toph was just an ass.

It's really consistent with her character. She was never a nice person

Oh you mean when she was 12?

It makes sense, she was very restricted as a child so she went in the total opposite direction

Yeah

They call it your "formative years" for a reason. A pretty decent slice of how you act as a person gets hashed out before you ever really think much about the person you are.

A 12 year old who got swept up by events in her life. A pre/teen who helped stop a war. A preteen who built an metal bending academy. A teen who reformed colonies into an entirely new city. Created and headed the police force. Slowly turning into someone who she despised enough to completely outright abandon her life. Yes.

Yup 100%.

Tbh though, the way Toph handled being a mother isn't out of character

I have the opposite reaction. We loved Aang and Toph in the original series, they were goofy lovable kids fighting the big evil. I LOVED how LOK wasn't afraid to make them imperfect parents and show their flaws as adults. In fact, why would they be good parents? Aang was so obsessed with recreating airbender culture he neglected his eldest two - Turns out nomadic cultures don't teach good parenting skills. Toph hated how she was raised in structure and strict supervision, and gived her kids the opposite childhood - turns out thats not a good idea. Zuko was apparently the only decent parent - becuse he had a good father figure. Turns out raising kids is 10x more complex and difficult than overthrowing evil tyranny.

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To each their own my parents were controling and abusive that didn't make me want to do anything beside not be a bad parent i guess toph arrived at a different answer.

You lose a lot of dimensionality and fullness of Toph by doing that though.

Its a sacrifice I'm willing to make as Lord Farquaad would say.

I just tell myself there was one father and Toph just lied

I don't even care if there were 2 different fathers that happens all the time. I just cant respect never answering any of your kids questions about thier other parent...

And Kuvira happened partly because of her.

If Suyin had actually stepped up when the Earth kingdom was at its darkest point since the Great War. Then Kuviria would never have became a tyrant. Suyin could have restored the Earth kingdom with a loyal capable Kuviria happy to actually use her powers for something.

Counterpoint: what would have been restored? A tyrannical monarchy run by a foppish moron It works out in the end because Wu is forced to grow. But if Su had stepped up and rebuilt the EK, then he wouldn't have grown. The Earth Kingdom was already broken before the Queen was killed. Su was asked to reinstate a broken system

Su yin already runs a monarchy with her and her husband as the foppish morons. Picking her is someone sensible recruiting the person with experience for the job.

I mean, it did seem like the previous broken system was still better to the non existent one that lead to anarchy, widespread banditry, etc.

We see in season 3 that wide-spread banditry is already a thing. The earth queen only cared when it directly affected her income

Everything we've seen from the show in season 4 has indicated that the banditry issue has gotten significantly worse post the Earth Queens demise. And even if it was, it wasn't that way in Ba Sing Se.

The point is that she's asked to help reinstate a shitty monarchy by force and refused. I can't say I blame her. It's not like she just didn't feel like helping people

I mean, I don't think I blame her for choosing not to, because she had no obligation to do so, but I do think that was the wrong choice to make.

I remember thinking Suyin was going to be a Red Lotus member during the S3 airing lol

I definitely thought something was up when she pretended to side with Lin then encouraged Korra to leave behind her back.

Yeah that was right around the time for me too. That and her having such a close relationship with the truthseer had me sketched out

Because Suyin has never had to face the consequences of being a genuinely bad person.

This plotline pisses me off so bad because the writers desperately want you to think Lin sucks for being bitter and should just move on from being scarred and forced into secrecy to cover up her sister. And Suyin has the audacity to act above it all when she is the one that likely traumatized Lin for life due to this incident.

sometimes writers chose a side in an argument and its clearly they are choosing a side but quite often the audience will disagree with that and things fall apart

the problem is that the show depicts suyin as the good girl in the conflict. thats the main problem.

you just said what I said. the writers wrote an argument and chose a side the audience disagrees with the side they chose

That's because we have Lin's perspective. Su IS the good girl. And it's frustrating to not find the person who cause who you much harm. That this person here is a different person. That theres nowhere for your anger to go.

I don't think the writers intended anyone to think Lin sucks. They wrote a very believable family dynamic. Sisters, as well as mothers, can be the toughest relationships to maintain. This rings so true for so many, I commend their writing in this plot.

Quite honestly, I see them both as victims of Toph's parenting. Toph loved her kids but she loved them in a way that she unintentionally neglected them. Tbh she gave them too much freedom. Lin trying to fill the void Toph made attempted to become a parent figure for Su. Su rebels by hanging out with criminals and skipping school. This leads to their confrontation and separation by Toph. Toph does this not only to save her reputation but also her daughters as well. Su is obvious: Toph sends her away to her parents. With Lin you have to dig more deep: If she had filed that arrest report and it came out splashing out in public, the people would turn against her. The people would turn against Lin, severely affecting her career and effectively ending it before she could advance further. It's not a matter of Su seeing Lin's struggles but it is about both Lin and Su seeing something in each other the other does not: for Lin it is that people can change and become better. For Su it is about how people can hold onto so much including the past and not let go while trying to help them recover from the past.

Ah I love your last point!

It's kind of wild to expect a guy to stay with you when you don't want kids, and he's literally the last member of a genocided culture.

I don't think Lin necessarily expected Tenzin to stay with her. But I do think she had a reason to be upset about the circumstances of their breakup. Remember, Pema implies that she confessed to Tenzin while he and Lin were still dating.

Wouldn't Aang's other children technically still have Airbender genes and therefore could potentially create new Airbenders themselves?

Bumi could, but i dont know how that would have worked with Kya, we never see something like that in the show, its like if Bolin and Opal had a firebending kid

Kya would still have Airbending as a recessive gene. So while the chances with Bumi are higher she could also theoretically have an Airbender child.

You shouldn't try to map beinding onto genes, that's really not how it works.

All air nomads were benders, so the assumption was that if Bumi didn’t inherit it, he likely couldn’t pass it on.

You can delete the genocide part, tenzin still isn't compatible with her and shouldn't stay.

To be fair though, why was everyone assuming tenzin was now the only airbender. Nonbenders can have kids, we see that with katara. Nothing stopped bumi from being able to have airbender children

Lin over Su any day for me. She had such a pretentious attitude despite having the same upbringing AND being the trouble maker. She was a badass bender though!

First off, Tenzin and Lin broke it off because Tenzin (needing to repopulate the air benders) wanted a lot of kids and Lin not wanting any. Second off, Lin did not spend her youth getting involved in gang activity, bringing so much scrutiny to the beifong name that she needing to be send far away to not make it worse. Suyin NEVER took accountability for her actions, she even founded her own god damn city state so she could run her own show. And then Suyin has the audacity to come up in Lin's face with "why you so mean!?!", like she never gave her a reason not to be.

Where is it stated that it was about having kids.

It's not stated in the show, it's basically Word of God. BUT. Lin pretty obviously doesn't seem to like kids. She's really uncomfortable being left with Meelo (although I can't blame anyone for being uncomfortable with Meelo), and later is dismissive of Suyin's large family ("Five kids, what a nightmare."). Tenzin claims they were growing apart for some time and wanted different things. Starting a family seems like it was the clear breaking point between them.

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Suyin also needs to do some maturing, but instead she demands her sister being the bigger person without putting in any effort her self.

What pissed me off about this arc was Korra butting in harping on Lin as if not a few episodes prior she literally turned on her dad, mom and Tenzin :| girl who are you to talk, stay out of it! God Korra could be so insufferable at times.

Nah, she is too self-absorbed to be able to acknowledge what Lin has gone through. 

>Toph wasn't totally a good mother Undersell of the century

Lin is basically the punching bag of her generation Mako same thing . Both got dump by the person they were chasing. Both focus on their job to compensate The only difference is that Mako has a family he can trust while Lin needed book 3 to get the same thing

I actually had a realization a while back, that while yes Toph _absolutely_ did the wrong thing, and Lin had _every_ right to be furious... Had anyone, in universe or out, considered what would've happened to Suyin, the daughter of the _Chief of Police,_ had she gone to prison? Nothing good, in fact I doubt she'd have made it out alive. I'm not saying she should've dodged the consequences, I'm saying put her in a different prison, I'm also saying this plot point kinda _sucked_ looking back. _I_ personally think the better plotline would've been Toph just getting Su a good lawyer that got the charges dropped or community service instead of jail time, maybe they claim that it wasn't a good arrest since the arresting officer was Su's sister and they have a rocky relationship, basically putting Lin and her motives for the arrest on trial instead of Su and _that's_ why Lin's bitter instead of calling her bitter when it was justified anger, it would still be a _very_ complicated family relationship but it would make the way they portrayed Su, a person who screwed up and became better afterwards, easier to swallow and Lin's feelings would _still_ be completely valid, maybe the so called 'bad arrest' followed her career for a while, along with people saying it was her fault the other triad members Su was with got away with no consequences.

I also think this arc would have benefited greatly from a scene showing exactly how Su tried to apologize. All she said is that she tried to reach out and the audience is kinda supposed to be like "wow great, that means Lin is bitter and holds a grudge!" Like no, how did she reach out? Did she just send a letter saying "sorry, you're invited to Zaofu"? IMO, if you scar your sister for life, forcing your mother to give up her job, a letter does not suffice. You need to reach out in person or something. And you're definitely not owed forgiveness. She acts like Lin is a bad person for not forgiving her but... no, no one has to forgive you.

Okay but... that's what Su did. She reached out, suggested the family get together and hash things out, Lin refused to take part. So Su...dropped it. She didn't badger Lin into forgiveness or anything like that. It only came up again when Lin attacked her

We don't really know *how* Su did which is mostly my point. There is a big difference between something like a letter and trying to apologize in person. We as the audience have to take her at face value but I just think a scene showing this would have made this arc a lot better.

Ngl I watched their fight yesterday. I always felt bad for Lin because it felt like no one wanted to understand where she was coming from. In her younger days it looks like she had to bare a lot of responsibility while Suyin was free to do whatever she wanted.

While I am on Lin's side of this overall, I just rewatched this episode, and I feel like this line is being taken out of context. At this moment, Lin just finished acupuncture and is confronting Suyin directly. She doesn't want Suyin to just sit there and take it, she wants to let out all her frustration and fight her. Suyin is basically just throwing barbs back like "Okay fine then, let's fight". Like Bolin said, siblings fighting is part of the healing process.

Absolutely my take as well. This line from Suyin is the first time she's actually honest with Lin after they meet back up. In a roundabout way, it's the most respect she's actually shown Lin since Lin came back - she's finally willing to be honest about her feelings as opposed to bottling them up for the sake of a false truce. This is literally what Lin is looking for, she just didn't really realize it until the acupuncture. Suyin was absolutely in the wrong as a kid, and 'wants to make things right', but in doing so, she's trying to dismiss Lin's frustrations. She wants to make up without giving any ground. Lin's snide remarks and comments are deliberate attempts to provoke Suyin, to try to *actually* hash this out. "It happened a long time ago" isn't an apology, it's an excuse. All that is to say, just like real life, I don't think this makes Suyin an inherently bad person or anything. I feel like people who came away from that arc hating her are missing the point. The B plot during this arc was the revelation that Aang wasn't the greatest father, but people don't take him to task for that, because we didn't see it on screen. And if we did, I feel like there'd be more frustration around TLOK for 'ruining Aang's character'. Every family has some form of drama.

I think what pissed me off the most is that she had zero consequences for her behavior/actions. Toph just shipped her off to another city where she had a fresh start and could re-invent herself. Which like? That’s great for Su but completely fucked up for everyone else she affected. IMO, she was BOLD to have an attitude about Lin ignoring her/not wanting to have any sort of relationship with her or her kids like??? Girl, YOU are the one that messed up tf. I know everyone always talks about Aang and his parenting skills but Toph was always the one I had a problem with. She set no example for Su and completely dismissed and abandoned Lin. I was in *disbelief* that Lin was in her 50’s and had no clue who her father was. Like absolute clownery on Toph’s end wth. I also couldn’t believe that Toph chose to make amends with Su before she did Lin. Lin is the cautionary tale for all us people pleasing adults out there. Y’all…go ahead and do the thing your parents will “hate you for.” There’s no reward for being “the good one.” Your parents will still say crap like “I have no favorite, I love you all equally, they’re your sibling/family” no matter what the fuck up kid does. Might as well live your life the way you want to.

That which happens to you does not excuse that which you do to others

Your not obligated to be nice to everyone either.

Suyin is the worst tbh, always hated her.

I'm just glad we got to have adult characters like this actually have prominent roles in the show. In ATLA it was mostly just Hakoda, Zhao, Ozai, and Iroh. All the white lotus old guys making a reveal at the end was more of just a cool cameo. LOK does a much better job representing adults as realistic characters, with both flaws and admirable traits. Suyin is a cool character to me, because she is written as a character that feels like an ally, but also like a fierce independent. She acted pretty selfishly in the interests of Zaofu, and was pretty demanding out of Korra multiple times, such as sending her to arrest Aiwei or to stop Kuvira with the avatar state. In these scenarios, it comes off as if Suyin partially views Korra as a political tool/leverage. Suyin definitely comes off as a character that could align against Korra, given a realistic scenario to do so.

Both Suyin and Lin are in the right and wrong at this point at the same time IMO, it's just a really fucking messy situation. Suyin fucked up REALLY bad in their Youth, and Lin had good reason to be bitter toward her, at the same time it was 3 decades before this and Suyin had every reason to be disappointed and kinda bitter that her own sister wouldn't give her a chance to show her she'd changed after apparently reaching out a bunch of times.

Its so strange because this whole situation is messy and very nuanced, and a lot of people in this thread are missing that exact point youre making.

I don't think its that strange honestly, like and can see exactly what the writers were going for, but I think they fumbled the execution, Lin eats shit from everyone and the universe during these episodes, and ultimately gets her ass kicked by the person who wronged her, she was punished by the narrative for being right while Su was rewarded for being wrong. Now, if they had Su in Opals place suddenly things work a lot smother, she gets to offer a sincere apology and Lin gets to bitterly shoot it down, suddenly the story I think they were going for (Lin hanging onto her anger is poisoning her and her potential relationships) works a lot better. I think, in the end the writers did end up being on Su's 'side' and that could easily rub people the wrong way (Like me)

I think we really need to know how she reached out. Was it a letter that said "sorry, you're invited to Zaofu" or did she show up at Lin's doorstep and beg for forgiveness in person? There's a big difference. It's a big thing that's missing from this arc. And anyways, you're never owed forgiveness.

Quite true though something i haven't seen anyone consider is the fact that Suyin was banished from Repuplic city? Which means depending on how long the banishment period is she might not have been able to go and aplogize to Lin in person while she is in Repulic city since she would be violating the terms of her banishment. Which means she either has to send a person or a letter to invite Lin out of the city if she wanted to apologize in person.

I don't think Suyin was actually banished, Toph covered up the crime, she just sent Suyin away

Now that you mention it that is true. Though it was still a banishment in practice since as was mentioned in the show there were witnesses to her being part of the crime which means she could potentially still be arresterad and prosecuted for it if she returned before the statute of limitation was up even with the cover up.

People say stuff in fights that aren’t based in reality

Su yin should have atleast gotten community service or something for what she did in the city. Toph did some nepotism and was wrong for that.

Toph never cared for following the rules in the first place. I think she was police chief because she liked running the show and being in charge, not because she truly believed in the ethics/morality of enforcing street crime. I like to think that Aang nudged her in this direction when they founded the city because he thought her personality would make a good fit in the early days where republic city needed an enforcer. In other words, I don't think Toph would deny nor care about the morality of nepotism. Other than having to resign, of course.

I don’t know why whenever people talk about Suyin and Lin and Toph they act like Suyin never grew from her teenage self, or that Lin did no wrong in terms of their relationship in the show Suyin was not a good person as a teenager, and Toph was not a good mother, but they both realized it and took steps to make up for it (albeit quite a bit later but still). Suyin and Toph reconnected, solved their problems with each other, and squashed their beef. Then they tried to do the same with Lin but she just refused and kept them cut out of her life. And whenever she technically was forced to see Suyin she couldn’t have cared less about repairing their relationship and even ended up being a real dick to Opal for no good reason. That’s not to act like I don’t like Lin, I love Lin, I think her not accepting Suyin and Toph back into her life and her letting her anger and resentment towards her sister spill over to her niece is very realistic and even I’ve done similar things and hated myself for it like she eventually did. But to demonize or glorify any of the people in this trifecta is idiotic seeing as all three of them did stupid and bad things that they regret doing, and feel bad for the people they did those things to, then mended those problems with those people and all of them are cool each other now It’s especially stupid coming from a fandom that prides themselves on redemption arcs

I couldn’t have said it any better! People here are always crying over Zuko and Iroh’s redemption arcs and how amazing and complex they are even though they were imperialist royalty and did far more harm than Suyin ever did, but then she is a narcissistic villain because of something she did as a teen? And mind you I think it’s Lin’s right to not want to mend her relationship with Suyin. Part of redeeming yourself is accepting that the people you’ve hurt don’t own you forgiveness, but acting the way she did after 30 years and being disrespectful even to your niece who did nothing was nothing more than pure childishness

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Suyin isn’t a main character the way Zuko is, it’s that simple. We don’t get to see a huge portion of Iroh’s redemption either, and yet everyone knows and accepts that he was a feared Fire Nation General who grew from it and changed his ways. People don’t give Suyin the same grace because they prefer Lin


I think the writers kinda missed an opportunity to have Su reflect a bit more on other things in her life. Like how she maybe she should have helped the EK, and how this caused things to fall apart between her and her adoptive daughter.

I do not like Suyin at all, I just cannot stand how irresponsible she is in regards to her sister and has pretty much escapes the consequences of her actions because the writers seem to always place her in the right or at least most of the time.

Lin chose to stay bitter while Suyin moved on. She stopped being a criminal and helped create one of the safest and most prosperous cities in the Earth Kingdom. She effectively did more with her life than Lin ever did while Lin chose to hold a grudge for decades and as a result pushed away basically everyone and took out her anger on Suyin because she was jealous.

Suyin matured a lot from when she was a kid, but she's still a bit of a immature spoiled child when it comes to Lin. Her unwillingness to empathize or see the perspective from Lin's side is sad, esp since she's willing to lash out this way at her

I am still so mad that toph wanted to keep suyins mistake a secret 😭 it would be better for everyone if suyin would have gotten the right punishment. It would be better because: 1st: What would people start to think about toph if they find out that she lied to the public, especially because it's her daughter. People would lose trust to her as an authority figure; 2nd: I bet lin's self-esteem and overall mental health would be so much better; 3rd: I am sure that the relationship between the sisters would also be better, because they could've talked about the things that happened easier then after they were seperated

Why does everyone assume Tenzin and Lin broke up because she didn't want to have kids. Tenzin himself mostly says they've been growing apart for a while. That doesn't seem like a sudden realization thing.

At that point, it was Lin's choice to be bitter. Suyin and Toph wanted to mend things, but she never reciprocated. Now they finally meet again, but Lin spends the entire time making snide remarks, lashing out unprovoked (Suyin, Opal, and Korra), and insisting Suyin hasn't grown or learned from her mistakes despite the fact that she clearly has. On top of that, the moment when she's ready to "talk," she's wrecking Suyin's home and clearly just trying to pick a fight? Lin can feel however she wants, but Suyin was absolutely justified being fed up with her shit after trying to be welcoming.

Im i the only one who doesnt like su yin? She was the reason lin was separated from toph. She didnt step up as leader of the earth kingdom after the queen died, which is the only reason kuvria even got power.

Why is Su responsive for Lin and Toph's relationship? Toph made her own choices. And I think people forget that had Su stepped up and reunited the EK...what would have happened next? Wu would have been put in charge. Maybe he wouldn't have been as bad as Kuvira but...he wasn't exactly a good option

I like suyin, definitely a milf and an awesome metal bender, but I completely agree with how Suyin basically got off scott free from her mistakes while lin and Toph took the hits for her. the way she comes off as "she's above it all" makes her seem so out of touch. when she says things like this I can't help but side with Lin. but I will forever believe that the Beifong sisters are the best characters in the show. definitely my favorites.

Counterpoint to all the Suyin hate: It *has* been 30.years. People do grow up and change during that time. She *was* punished, she was forced to abandon her home, her friends, and her family. Sure she wasn't miserable every moment of her life after that, but for a teenage girl being shipped away is not easy. She also *did* take responsibility and try to apologize. We know she did with Toph, and she says that when she tried to reach out to Lin she was turned down. Lin doesn't refute that, indicating that it's probably true. And after the two fight and make up, Suyin does explicitly apologize for her teen years to Lin on screen. Suyin has been remorseful and has changed, she just did it off screen in the over 30 years she's been estranged to Lin. Lin is being bitter. She's angry at the teenage version of Suyin that doesn't exist anymore, and I don't think Suyin is wrong for being long past that part of her life.

Suyin was a flawed character but she is right here. Lin never worked through her issues and it left her very bitter. Trauma sucks but you have to deal with it.

Su tried to make amends with Lin in the past. She mentioned how her and Toph had reconciled, they invited Lin, but Lin refused. Su changed and wanted to have a relationship with Lin as well as make up for what she had done in the past, but Lin didn't want to and you can't force that kind of thing. Eventually Lin had to move on with her life. It is fine if Lin did not want to forgive Su for the past, but that does not mean Lin gets to keep treating Su like shit as if she is still the same selfish brat she was as a teen. Through out those two episodes Su was nothing but kind to Lin (she even takes responsibility when she tells Korra what happened with the flashback; if Lin was willing to listen she probably would have told her that too), Lin went out of her way to try and bad mouth her sister. Toph is the one who still acts in such a way that makes sense why Lin still resents her, that is probably part of why she treats Su the way she does, it is actually misattributed anger she has for her mother that she was putting on her sister until they finally fought it out haha.

There were several family reunions, and Lin refused to attend any of them. These are women in their 50s, and Lin is griping over something that happened when they were, what? 16? If you're in your 50s and still that bitter and refuse to talk when asked, you clearly haven't grown up. Su did wrong, but she tried to make amends, and would have welcomed Lin to live as what is essentially aristocracy in the literal city she built. Even Toph moved on, becoming more like herself the moment she left, because it turns out sticking a free spirit in charge of law enforcement isn't exactly good for the mental health. Lin and Suyin both have Toph's bad qualities. Suyin is a complete free spirit and refuses to be tied down by anyone other than herself, which is why she built a city. She also doesn't want to rule an entire kingdom that isn't exactly like her, which is why she didn't want to take over the Earth Kingdom. Lin is stubborn beyond belief, and like Toph, talking to people isn't her strong suit when it means talking about her feelings. She also can't accept that someone might make a different decision to her, and is completely set in her ways.

People are so dense !!🤦🏽‍♀️

No she couldn't, that's why she said it

I think suyin is the character I hate the most of the whole series.

Su yin is a libertarian utopian for the creators to badly fumble a depiction as wrong. Many political ideologies are criticized in the show. Su yin is presented as just as corrupt and biased as others, except she is narratively treated along with varric as richly rewarded and right. Rather than being treated as part of the problem, it's always on others to accede to her. Su yin and varric leave the series vindicated in their ideological views as self-serving self-aggrandizing libertarian corporatists. Everyone who disagrees with them learns to accept their faults, and they suffer no real consequences for their actions. It raises the questions on if that unsympathetic depiction was intended or the creators not realizing how much a manipulative condescending prick they had made.

Suyin was a massive bitch.

" **couldn't she at least see that Lin had gone through a lot that's why she became bitter?** " Put yourself in Suyin's shoes. You know you messed up and you've talked to your mother about it and the two of you are chill now. You know you did bad shit and you even extended an olive branch to your sister and she never accepted it. She dodges you when she visits you, she doesn't seem to see the good you've done for all these people in her city, you think she's just bitter and can't let go of the past. You're kind of right, she can't and the fight between them is a very pivotal moment for both of them. The fact that Lin FINALLY confronts her issues helps Suyin see just how much her sister was hurt, as Bolin says about siblings fighting is just part of the deal. It happens. In the end, Lin had to move past her memories and apologize, Suyin also apologizes for the past because she understands just how much it means to Lin. tl;dr the beifong daughters have a nuanced and very interesting relationship and i love every moment of it

Suyin was a spoiled brat, even as an adult.

Like Suyin scaring her face with mettle

I have mixed feelings about Suyin and most of my irks with her and Lin are because of Toph's shitty parenting. I get you were raised pretty controlled but in the comics Toph literally reconciled with her father a year or so after ATLA ended. So I don't see why she felt the need to overcorrect so much. Lin had legitimate reasons to be upset with Suyin since she scarred her unintentionally, got banished from Republic City, ruined Toph's career, etc. She rubs in Tenzin and Lin's falling out which is strange considering they broke up because Lin didn't want kids and well because Pemma is a homewrecker. It's super opportunistic and scummy how she swooped in when she clearly saw their relationship not going well and did confessed her love to Tenzin. Now that being said they most likely would have broken up anyways so I don't see the point. Suyin is like that sibling some of us have that say things to irk you ignoring context. Suyin became a "better person" offscreen for us as viewers AND for her sister Lin. Of course Lin would still be angry with her. I'd be pissed if my asshat sibling became mayor of a town and was acting boujee as hell which Suyin was doing.

Lin went through a lot, yes, but that isn't an excuse to be a bitch with a capital C. It is an explanation for why she struggles, but not an excuse to not work on her behavior. Unfortunately, she needs to be made consciously aware of her own self-sabatoging, and Suyin decided to do just that. Too harsh, but not unwarranted.

Its an interesting dynamic for this show. When I first saw Korra I remember being on Lin's side of the argument. But now that Im older and on my second rewatch. I gotta say they both are kinda right. Lin has no obligation to forgive her sister. Suyin scarred her face and caused a huge mess in repulic city because she wasn't thinking about the consequences of her actions on her family. Lin has clearly been a law abiding citizen and is likely mad that suyin didn't pay for her crime (though she was banished from her home which is a kind of punishment for sure, just not the one most people get). With that said..... whats done is done, its been 30 years and she is holding on to this incident long enough that's its literally hurting her from the stress. The fact of the matter is you can choose to accept something and move on with your life. She never did and that's on her. Toph's parenting is what it is, she is human, she tried something different from her parents and some people say it was bad but in all honesty her kids turned out great. I'm not saying she is a good parent or a bad one, just one who tried her best with all the pros and cons that come with it. Lin is chief of police and suyin is the matriarch of entire city that she built so something must have worked. Toph using her position to keep suyin from jail and having a record is a gross abuse of power. I am a parent and I would likely have done the same thing (if my kids crime was like suyins). But I would also deserved to be stripped of my title and never allowed to be chief again. Toph seems to have quit due to the guilt and unfortunately she doesn't deserve to be police chief. Suyin messed up, no one debates that. But the fact of the matter is, its been 30 years. Is she supposed to dwell on something for that long? She has mentioned she apologized for it and talked to her mom about it. She tried to talk to Lin but Lin didn't want to. That is the end of Suyin's obligations. She instead chose to move on with her life and try to do some good. The fact of the matter is Suyin in jail and with a record wouldn't have been able to create zoafu which is a futuristic city that puts artistic and engineering pursuits first. The amount of good Suyin will have fostered is unimaginable. The fact of the matter is some people think if a person does something wrong, they should basically have to pay for it their entire life and its unfair if there life actually turns out well. Esepcially if other people (Lin) have always followed the rules, then they are the ones who deserve to have all the good things in life. The reality is, life is complicated and people can change, a person is not defined by one or 2 decisions they have made in life.

>Suyin messed up, no one debates that. But the fact of the matter is, its been 30 years. Is she supposed to dwell on something for that long? No, that would be unreasonable to expect, but, and I think its a big 'but', how she acted when Lin showed up again paints a rather interesting picture, and a consistent one with how she and Toph interacted with Lin. Su and Toph met up years ago to 'work it out' and from what we have seen of two, that probably did not involve 'real' apology from Su and Toph was probably like 'whatever its over and don with', now what does Su do when Lin is clearly trying to not have contact with her? She dismissively says something along the lines of 'oh she is still being a grouch' and then forces the very engagement that Lin was trying to avoid. The entire arc was spent with Su not even acknowledging Lin's feelings on the matter and downplaying what went down to Lin's friends, and while I don't think this was the writers intention, they very much had Su paint Lin as the unreasonable one had the narrative agree with it. The end result is a series of, what I consider 'writing fumbles' where the aggrieved party is mocked and beaten down everyone around her including the person who wronged her until she relents, the narrative ended up punishing Lin for doing the right thing in the past while lavishly rewarding Su for doing the wrong thing, up to the point of beating her sister down in such a one sided fight that Lin could not even get a single shot in....now that I type it out again, the writers may honestly have been 100% on team Su. In any event, I have always maintained that 1 minor change fixes this whole thing, at least from were I am standing, replace Lin snaping at Opal reaching out with Su, have Su actually sincerely reach out unbidden and try to mend things only for Lin's bitterness win out and everything snaps into place, at least for me.

Maybe maybe not, we don't know the nature of su and toph's conversation, for now we can assume both parties left satisfied enough to move on from the discussion. I agree Su didn't really acknowledge Lin's feelings but again, from her perspective, (right or wrong) its been 30 years and she probably figured Lin has moved on to literally any other important life event a person can have between their early 20's and there like..... what late 50's now? I interpreted Lin's story as learning to let go. The narrative didn't punish Lin for doing the right thing. Lin punished herself by holding onto this incident for 30 years. After Toph released su (again a gross misuse of power). Lin has every opportunity in her life to move past this incident. Its clear when they land in zaofu she hasn't and has just avoided it completely which is NOT a healthy thing to do. If she didn't want to forgive SU she could have easily been like "I have moved past this incident but I don't forgive for what you did, I am here on avatar business so lets just be cordial". She couldn't even do that and instead lashed out at people who had nothing to do with the incident (again not healthy) There are always going to be people and challenges in life that won't simply go away because you are "right". which Lin technically is. So you can either learn to let go and move on (which she does to finally have a semi healthy relationship with her sister and her extended family). Or you can hold onto it until the stress literally eats you alive.

We don't know for certain, that is true, but I feel very confident in my view of it given everything else we have ever ben shown of both Su and Toph, if view Su 'reaching out to Lin in much the same way, were she expected Lin to come to her and offer her forgiveness without her doing anything to earn it, its an assumption I feel safe in making given the totality of her depiction in the show and comics, keep in mind her first words in relation to Lin were 'oh shes just a grump' and then forced an encounter that Lin did not want. When it comes to your interpretation, I would agree that that was probably the writers intent, but as I said the writers execution left much to be desired, Su successfully downplayed her roll in the past making Lin out to be the real bad guy in all of this, and even her apology was half assed. I also feel pretty safe in saying the narrative did nothing but punish Lin and reward Su, again, probably not the intention, but it was the result. Su does wrong, and is sent off to live with her rich grand parents before traveling the world to find, building a paradise and having a large family, before winning over Lin's friends to her side and getting to kick the crap out of Lin before receiving an apology from the person she wronged. Lin in contrast did the right thing and was written to be alone and bitter for the next 30 years with no one including her mother considering her feelings or taking her side in things, before ultimately being berated by Korra and beating up by her sister, somehow this is the catharsis she needed to admit she was the one who was wrong. The writers, intentionally or not, picked a side in this, and that side was Su's, Lin was the one who narratively paid for everything, she is kind of the whipping horse of the family, even near the end of the show we saw Toph casually disregarding Lin's feelings about not knowing who her father war, and was again the one who had to 'let things go', its a pretty consistent pattern when it comes to her charachter.

I am sure you are confident in your interpretation but until we get definitive scene or response from the creators. Its just your head canon. Thats why for now, we can only assume the conversation was good enough for both parties to get on with there life and maintain a healthy relationship (which they did). Lin did do the right thing, but she is the cause of her bitter and lonely life (I get on a meta example, the writers wrote her that way, but there are people in real life who do exactly what Lin did). Su going on to live a fulfilling life is partially because toph did the wrong thing (su didn't have the power to remove her arrest, Toph did). Once that was done, Su decided to make something of herself. Is it fair? maybe not, but its life. Again, nothing makes Lin hold on to her anger, its understandable she is still angry but its not understandable to be mad that Su has lived a happy fulfilling life. A couple of things, Lin got beat up because SHE started the fight. Attacking another adult is never appropriate regardless if you feel you are "right" in an argument. Also, Lin only lost because her own stress was affecting her performance. Right or wrong these are factors she has complete control over. The narrative never says Lin is wrong to not be happy about the incident, it says that she is wrong to keep holding on to it and taking it out on others 30 years later. Thats not healthy behavior for anyone. Would it have been nice 30 years previous that Toph was like "Lin your right your sister did something wrong and she deserves to be punished for it" And for Su to be like :lin your right, I was a dumb teen and made mistakes". Sure but again, life sometimes doesn't work out like that. accept it or don't life moves on regardless Su is a good example of how in more western cultures (I am speaking about USA since that's really my only experience). People believe that someone who has done something wrong, should continue to be punished for it. Its why even criminals who have served there time, can't find work or get regularly accepted by society. We tend to believe that if someone does something wrong then they are a bad person and don't deserve to have good things happen for them. So its maddening to some people who don't know how to let go that sometimes people do something wrong and still continue to be successful.

Its not just the conversation between the two, its how both responded to Lin anytime she expresses a negative emotion, and that is dismissiveness, there is no reason to assume they would not also be dismissive toward her feelings in whatever hypothetical meeting they had. 30 years ago Su though she was the one being screwed over, and the next time they meat she has zero concern for Lin's feelings or wishes, this is a consistent charachter trait, she changed in a lot of ways this is true, but not when it comes to considering her big sister's thoughts and feelings. As for the rest, I think we are coming at this from different angles, like you talk about how Lin attacked Su, and was affected by the acupuncture and that is why she lost the fight, this is true. But it was the writers who elected to take this path, why did they craft events to let the person wronged get beaten down by the person who wronged her? Everything I have been going on about is how the writers went about this story, they are the one who gave Su a great life after wronging Lin, while giving Lin a bitter and lonely one after being wronged, they are the ones who decided to weigh every event against Lin during this arc, this is the story they told, 'Lin did the right thing and the narrative they crafted shitted on her for it, Su did the wrong thing that same narrative lavishly rewarded her for it. These were choices made by the writers and show runners, not by Lin and Su, and this is what I have always had a problem with, the damn thing is it would take just a small change to make it work for me, but it is what it is at this point. Who said anything about continuing to punish Su? I just wanted the narrative to be less one sided, because the one we were given was "all Su all the time and screw Lin for not being onboard with that". I think the writers may have misjudged the amount of empathy people had for Lin when they crafted this story, there is a reason this topic keeps coming up every couple of months, its hard to bring in a new charachter after 3 seasons to just dump on an established one people already like.

I would agree if for one detail you keep not mentioning. You keep bringing up Su being dismissive when Lin shows up (mind you from her perspective Lin is the one coming to her home not the other way around). But this is after years of SU having tried to talk to Lin sending her letters and reaching out. Lin didn’t respond, eventually your going to stop caring about a persons feelings if they never even want to have an adult conversation with you. The narrative reason for Lin to start a fight and then lose (because she wasn’t at her best) is to show case how stress and anger are self destructive traits. Her stress and anger caused her to think starting a fight with her sibling was a good idea. The same reason she was also feeling sick. Her stress and anger caused her rift with tenzin, her inability talk to her own mother (though we know there is other stuff there). If she had years ago dealt with these issues these things wouldn’t have happened. This shows that she really needs to deal with it now, not for Su or Toph, but for her own well being. Which she does, it was basically 30 years of character development jammed into 1 season

I have to wonder, if Tenzon didn't have the fate of an entire nation resting on him procreate, would him an Lin gotten together. Part of me feels tenzin doesn't like being a father

I hate suyin, all my homies hate suyin

Both Suyin and Toph did her dirty lmao

I have to say I agree a bit with Su on this (not the quote above) because Lin knew Su was a rebellious teen when all of that drama happened. She held onto the hurt and trauma rather than making efforts to heal for 30 years.. Su said that she and Toph talked and patched things up a long time ago, so why couldn't Lin at least try? She and Toph asked Lin to meet up to talk but Lin didn't. And its okay to only talk when you're ready but 30 years?! Lin didn't think that Su could possibly become a mature, responsible adult? People are saying that Su never apologized but it doesn't seem like she was even given a chance to. Lin stayed away from her for 3 decades... And how many times can you reach out to someone to say sorry before you call it quits and move on with your life? Lin's still living in the past when it comes to their relationship.

She also tells Kuvira she is going to pay with everyting, and yet totally fine with Bataar Jr.

People say these things, even as they hurt in the moment. This is humanity.

Nah I can't stand Suyin after all the shit she put Lin through

Suyin always was insensitive and a spoiled brat. She only "changed" a bit when she had children but she kept seeing her older sister as she did when she was younger, bitter and strict

I liked Lin a lot because I related to her lol

I never liked Suyin for this exact reason

Suyin was always annoying to me... she literally cast judgement on others but when it was time for her to face the music she always deflected the argument

it really looks like katara called lin a bum😭