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Korra finale
Well, the season finale was...pretty much as expected and feared.
While Tarrlok was doing his whole sob story, my brother and I were hoping the whole thing was a lie. I mean, Tarrlok is not exactly a friend of Korra, you know. And he hates Amon as well, so if it does discredit Amon, also a win! I mean, god, could it have been any more manipulative? Tarrlok going on about what a sweet, innocent young child he is and declaring he'd never bloodbend because it hurts people and he cares so much, and how he hated his mean evil dad... And also, just once I want to see a villain do the whole eye narrow bit and it's because they're thinking What the fuck is this person going on about? and then lets them talk because they know it's bullshit and it'll just discredit their accuser further.
Furthermore, Amon could be a bending hypocrite and still believe in what he's doing. Instead he doesn't even care about wiping out his own closest supporters if they know the truth. What the hell is the guy's motivation? He doesn't even do the usual bit about it being a shame it's come to this, it's just straight to evil murder.
And what's really annoying is that if they wanted Tarrlok to be at all sympathetic, they should have had him initially go on about how he didn't want to do this stuff and he hated having to resort to bloodbending but it was necessary for the greater good. Set him up as the pro-bending version of Amon in more ways than just being another villain, then it's properly foreshadowed when you learn they were taught the same things.
(Also, what the fuck was with him going on with how having an abusive parent means you'll inevitably become what they want from you, followed by murder-suicide? That's sure a great message. It's like that weirdness with Zuko learning that he's capable of goodness on the basis that half his genes came from good people, only without even that much of an out. If they wanted to get rid of the two things, have Amon saying that he was going to kill a whole mess of people or something so it'd be Tarrlock sacrificing himself for others, not Tarrlock deciding they just weren't worthy of living.)
It's also pretty dissatisfying on the basis that bloodbending doesn't fit quite right with what supernatural stuff we've seen him do - in past episodes he's jumped through walls of an element, and this episode he did it with fire. Waterbending lets you deflect fire now? (Plus...Katara managed to throw off bloodbending because she was a skilled waterbender, but Korra can't?)
And since his energybending is fake, it removes the contrast with Korra being a powerful bender who isn't spiritual - right in time for that subplot to just disappear. Her learning airbending at the last was understandable - it makes sense that if she has an aptitude for bending usually expressing itself through the other three more easily, all that channeled through the one remaining option would probably succeed. But it's hardly addressing the issue that her problem with airbending is that airbending is defensive when all she does with it is punch. But also sudden spirituality, really? Especially because last time we saw people messing with stuff like this it cut off Aang regardless of his spirituality.
But then Korra failing to address her problems was kind of theme for the finale, wasn't it? Korra doesn't address the bending/nonbending problem, she just says Amon's a liar. And she's right and he switches over to bloodbending and then ends up doing some super waterbending to reveal himself to half the city. Korra doesn't address her block with airbending - Aang learned the earthbending mindset to save a friend when airbending style wasn't working. Korra learns airbending to let her keep solving problems her usual way. Also, Korra needs Mako to carry her off yet again. Korra having to deal with being partially, not even fully but partially, depowered? Nevermind, it's fixed! Crying over the fact you're only a regular one of the most powerful benders on earth was totally character growth. (Also, apparently Korra's problem with spirituality was she needed to be more broken. Another great message.)
You know what we haven't seen? Korra running into trouble and powering through. We've seen her steamrolling opponents at time due to having power, but we don't see her struggling when she's at a disadvantage. I'm fine with her running when things go bad, but so far, she either runs away or she gets beaten up because she can't run. We never see her backed into a corner scared and then doing her best anyway and succeeding because she needs to.
There's also the issue that the stakes seem lower. Aside from when Tarrlok kidnapped her, she's always been able to go home for the day.
Bending has also been a real disappointment. The battles themselves tend to be epic, but people's abilities don't hold a candle to what we saw in the first series. Even the master level type stuff like lightningbending can be shrugged off now, it seems. (Except for bloodbending, which is now ridiculously overpowered.) The metalbending police of the first episode seem to exist only to be easily defeated mooks. Lin is apparently too stupid to figure out that if you're wearing metal armor, and they're using electricity, and they've used this electricity/metal combo to take you out several times before, do not grab the things that generate electricity with metal attached to you, let alone such advanced concepts as wearing rock armor instead, or sinking them into the ground, or anything. And sure, it's nice that she was brave enough to not panic when faced with losing her bending, but why exactly couldn't she fight back in the first place? She was kneeling on the earth, she couldn't pull anything up to shield her? And then Amon depowering all the benders in the finale...they sure do look pathetic and harmless. And Mako hasn't even figured out he can burn ropes yet! Or any of the other firebenders! At least Korra finally realized she could firebend away chains. Maybe next season she'll explain that to everyone.
(Also ugh did you notice that Bolin was saving Asumi? They're going to pair up and clear the way for inevitable Makorra, aren't they...)
Oh, and like AtLA the cast has become very obviously imbalanced toward males, and unlike AtLA, the shipping focus means that what women there are mostly sidelined. You've got Korra, then Asumi is like, what, third string? Lin is there to lose for drama's sake and be Tenzin's ex-girlfriend. Asumi's mother is there to be dead and motivate her dad to be evil. (Do you notice how you don't usually see a woman motivated by her husband getting killed?) Pema is there to be a mom. The airbender kids are cute but the boy is getting the focus as the comic relief. Who are the generals? Guys.
I also have a sinking feeling she's going to be repowering everyone, assholes included, and there's no sign she's considering trying to power up nonbenders. Asumi was standing right there, Korra, you could have at least checked for the sake of science.
So I guess here's what I wanted:
Korra needs to power through adversity and face her fears instead of either curbstomping or being curbstomped. Since airbending is what she has a problem with, show her struggling with defensive skills - not just focusing on offense, but that when she's trying to protect someone she tries to do it by beating up the other person as fast as she can, not by defending them, and how this doesn't work as well at protecting as it does beating someone else up. Closest we got to that was seeing her make a mess of things beating up the first episode thugs.
More time on her trying to learn airbending. We got the episode of her trying to do training and getting interested in pro-bending, then the pro-bending turned into the primary plot and Korra learning from it was sidelined, and Korra's airbending efforts afterward were just her being unable to do it.
For the love of god why did we see no politicking? Korra solved or failed to solve every problem in front of her on a basis of punching. Punching was never not the solution, it was just a question of if she could punch hard enough. Unless we're counting the love triangle as a problem.
Show Korra wanting to be the avatar for a reason otherwise than because being the avatar makes her special.
She shouldn't have gotten her bending back. She should have tried to keep on being the avatar with only airbending, which she struggles with horribly, until she's finally at a legitimate low point and pushes through out of immediate need (avatar state triggering, perhaps?) That's for season two, of course. Season one ends with her insisting that she's still the avatar in the sense of being responsible for helping people and she'll do it even if she's no longer backed up by extra powers.
Lin and the metalbender police needed to stop being taken out to show how badass their opponents were and actually succeed at things. The first bit with the electric gloves was good because it took them by surprise, everything else was a horrible idea. Lin can lose but have it be because they're getting swarmed. Also, have her take out most of her opponents before the airbender kids pick off the last one, instead of them doing half her job. (Or else make it a point they don't know how to fight airbenders at all, and show Tenzin kicking their asses despite being a weak combatant in any other context.) That's still perfectly impressive without making Lin and the equalists both look pathetic.
Also, it'd have been nice for the cast to have displayed actual concern for the people Amon took, instead of Lin waiting until the avatar was stolen so she figured she'd get them as well. Same for those people Tarrlok was rounding up - so what if your friends were released, what about everyone else? You know they're just as innocent.
Oh, and having the cops immediately turn evil as soon as Lin was gone? Makes Lin look pretty bad. Either she was so incompetent she didn't realize all her officers were assholes who'd turn on the population as soon as the person in charge let them, or she knew and never did anything about it, either because she was too incompetent to deal with it or because she's actually just as evil (after all, if she knew they would happily become fascists without her in charge, why did she resign at the first problem?)
Also why did she resign at all? I was initially hoping it was like a cop handing in their badge because they're going to go off and do what they think needs to be done. Especially when she's Toph's daughter of all people. But no, she just sat around.
Amon prior to the finale was really, really badass and I wish we'd kept that. I don't particularly care if he's a bender or not, either could work fine. If he is a bender, though, the response should be "but why is a bender anti-bending!?" not "I knew it! Lying weasel!" and also he should not use bending. If he's not a bender, the focus is on why he's apparently been empowered when that seems to fly in the face of everything they believe is right. If he's some sort of halfway thing because of the energybending, make that the point of contention - then the issue of hypocrisy is an interesting one to explore. I also really liked that his powers seemed entirely defensive in nature, which could not do the sort of damage he accused benders of doing, he was just unusually good at resisting their attempts to stop him.
Similarly, all we ever saw was benders being terrified and helpless in the face of the equalists or fighting back as badasses, never what it must look like from the nonpowered point of view to go up against them.
So what it comes down to, I guess, is that when they pitched this as being about Korra dealing with an anti-bender revolution, we were meant to go "oh no evil people who hate bending how will Korra defeat all the evil people?"
...
Well, at least it's a pretty, pretty show.
While Tarrlok was doing his whole sob story, my brother and I were hoping the whole thing was a lie. I mean, Tarrlok is not exactly a friend of Korra, you know. And he hates Amon as well, so if it does discredit Amon, also a win! I mean, god, could it have been any more manipulative? Tarrlok going on about what a sweet, innocent young child he is and declaring he'd never bloodbend because it hurts people and he cares so much, and how he hated his mean evil dad... And also, just once I want to see a villain do the whole eye narrow bit and it's because they're thinking What the fuck is this person going on about? and then lets them talk because they know it's bullshit and it'll just discredit their accuser further.
Furthermore, Amon could be a bending hypocrite and still believe in what he's doing. Instead he doesn't even care about wiping out his own closest supporters if they know the truth. What the hell is the guy's motivation? He doesn't even do the usual bit about it being a shame it's come to this, it's just straight to evil murder.
And what's really annoying is that if they wanted Tarrlok to be at all sympathetic, they should have had him initially go on about how he didn't want to do this stuff and he hated having to resort to bloodbending but it was necessary for the greater good. Set him up as the pro-bending version of Amon in more ways than just being another villain, then it's properly foreshadowed when you learn they were taught the same things.
(Also, what the fuck was with him going on with how having an abusive parent means you'll inevitably become what they want from you, followed by murder-suicide? That's sure a great message. It's like that weirdness with Zuko learning that he's capable of goodness on the basis that half his genes came from good people, only without even that much of an out. If they wanted to get rid of the two things, have Amon saying that he was going to kill a whole mess of people or something so it'd be Tarrlock sacrificing himself for others, not Tarrlock deciding they just weren't worthy of living.)
It's also pretty dissatisfying on the basis that bloodbending doesn't fit quite right with what supernatural stuff we've seen him do - in past episodes he's jumped through walls of an element, and this episode he did it with fire. Waterbending lets you deflect fire now? (Plus...Katara managed to throw off bloodbending because she was a skilled waterbender, but Korra can't?)
And since his energybending is fake, it removes the contrast with Korra being a powerful bender who isn't spiritual - right in time for that subplot to just disappear. Her learning airbending at the last was understandable - it makes sense that if she has an aptitude for bending usually expressing itself through the other three more easily, all that channeled through the one remaining option would probably succeed. But it's hardly addressing the issue that her problem with airbending is that airbending is defensive when all she does with it is punch. But also sudden spirituality, really? Especially because last time we saw people messing with stuff like this it cut off Aang regardless of his spirituality.
But then Korra failing to address her problems was kind of theme for the finale, wasn't it? Korra doesn't address the bending/nonbending problem, she just says Amon's a liar. And she's right and he switches over to bloodbending and then ends up doing some super waterbending to reveal himself to half the city. Korra doesn't address her block with airbending - Aang learned the earthbending mindset to save a friend when airbending style wasn't working. Korra learns airbending to let her keep solving problems her usual way. Also, Korra needs Mako to carry her off yet again. Korra having to deal with being partially, not even fully but partially, depowered? Nevermind, it's fixed! Crying over the fact you're only a regular one of the most powerful benders on earth was totally character growth. (Also, apparently Korra's problem with spirituality was she needed to be more broken. Another great message.)
You know what we haven't seen? Korra running into trouble and powering through. We've seen her steamrolling opponents at time due to having power, but we don't see her struggling when she's at a disadvantage. I'm fine with her running when things go bad, but so far, she either runs away or she gets beaten up because she can't run. We never see her backed into a corner scared and then doing her best anyway and succeeding because she needs to.
There's also the issue that the stakes seem lower. Aside from when Tarrlok kidnapped her, she's always been able to go home for the day.
Bending has also been a real disappointment. The battles themselves tend to be epic, but people's abilities don't hold a candle to what we saw in the first series. Even the master level type stuff like lightningbending can be shrugged off now, it seems. (Except for bloodbending, which is now ridiculously overpowered.) The metalbending police of the first episode seem to exist only to be easily defeated mooks. Lin is apparently too stupid to figure out that if you're wearing metal armor, and they're using electricity, and they've used this electricity/metal combo to take you out several times before, do not grab the things that generate electricity with metal attached to you, let alone such advanced concepts as wearing rock armor instead, or sinking them into the ground, or anything. And sure, it's nice that she was brave enough to not panic when faced with losing her bending, but why exactly couldn't she fight back in the first place? She was kneeling on the earth, she couldn't pull anything up to shield her? And then Amon depowering all the benders in the finale...they sure do look pathetic and harmless. And Mako hasn't even figured out he can burn ropes yet! Or any of the other firebenders! At least Korra finally realized she could firebend away chains. Maybe next season she'll explain that to everyone.
(Also ugh did you notice that Bolin was saving Asumi? They're going to pair up and clear the way for inevitable Makorra, aren't they...)
Oh, and like AtLA the cast has become very obviously imbalanced toward males, and unlike AtLA, the shipping focus means that what women there are mostly sidelined. You've got Korra, then Asumi is like, what, third string? Lin is there to lose for drama's sake and be Tenzin's ex-girlfriend. Asumi's mother is there to be dead and motivate her dad to be evil. (Do you notice how you don't usually see a woman motivated by her husband getting killed?) Pema is there to be a mom. The airbender kids are cute but the boy is getting the focus as the comic relief. Who are the generals? Guys.
I also have a sinking feeling she's going to be repowering everyone, assholes included, and there's no sign she's considering trying to power up nonbenders. Asumi was standing right there, Korra, you could have at least checked for the sake of science.
So I guess here's what I wanted:
Korra needs to power through adversity and face her fears instead of either curbstomping or being curbstomped. Since airbending is what she has a problem with, show her struggling with defensive skills - not just focusing on offense, but that when she's trying to protect someone she tries to do it by beating up the other person as fast as she can, not by defending them, and how this doesn't work as well at protecting as it does beating someone else up. Closest we got to that was seeing her make a mess of things beating up the first episode thugs.
More time on her trying to learn airbending. We got the episode of her trying to do training and getting interested in pro-bending, then the pro-bending turned into the primary plot and Korra learning from it was sidelined, and Korra's airbending efforts afterward were just her being unable to do it.
For the love of god why did we see no politicking? Korra solved or failed to solve every problem in front of her on a basis of punching. Punching was never not the solution, it was just a question of if she could punch hard enough. Unless we're counting the love triangle as a problem.
Show Korra wanting to be the avatar for a reason otherwise than because being the avatar makes her special.
She shouldn't have gotten her bending back. She should have tried to keep on being the avatar with only airbending, which she struggles with horribly, until she's finally at a legitimate low point and pushes through out of immediate need (avatar state triggering, perhaps?) That's for season two, of course. Season one ends with her insisting that she's still the avatar in the sense of being responsible for helping people and she'll do it even if she's no longer backed up by extra powers.
Lin and the metalbender police needed to stop being taken out to show how badass their opponents were and actually succeed at things. The first bit with the electric gloves was good because it took them by surprise, everything else was a horrible idea. Lin can lose but have it be because they're getting swarmed. Also, have her take out most of her opponents before the airbender kids pick off the last one, instead of them doing half her job. (Or else make it a point they don't know how to fight airbenders at all, and show Tenzin kicking their asses despite being a weak combatant in any other context.) That's still perfectly impressive without making Lin and the equalists both look pathetic.
Also, it'd have been nice for the cast to have displayed actual concern for the people Amon took, instead of Lin waiting until the avatar was stolen so she figured she'd get them as well. Same for those people Tarrlok was rounding up - so what if your friends were released, what about everyone else? You know they're just as innocent.
Oh, and having the cops immediately turn evil as soon as Lin was gone? Makes Lin look pretty bad. Either she was so incompetent she didn't realize all her officers were assholes who'd turn on the population as soon as the person in charge let them, or she knew and never did anything about it, either because she was too incompetent to deal with it or because she's actually just as evil (after all, if she knew they would happily become fascists without her in charge, why did she resign at the first problem?)
Also why did she resign at all? I was initially hoping it was like a cop handing in their badge because they're going to go off and do what they think needs to be done. Especially when she's Toph's daughter of all people. But no, she just sat around.
Amon prior to the finale was really, really badass and I wish we'd kept that. I don't particularly care if he's a bender or not, either could work fine. If he is a bender, though, the response should be "but why is a bender anti-bending!?" not "I knew it! Lying weasel!" and also he should not use bending. If he's not a bender, the focus is on why he's apparently been empowered when that seems to fly in the face of everything they believe is right. If he's some sort of halfway thing because of the energybending, make that the point of contention - then the issue of hypocrisy is an interesting one to explore. I also really liked that his powers seemed entirely defensive in nature, which could not do the sort of damage he accused benders of doing, he was just unusually good at resisting their attempts to stop him.
Similarly, all we ever saw was benders being terrified and helpless in the face of the equalists or fighting back as badasses, never what it must look like from the nonpowered point of view to go up against them.
So what it comes down to, I guess, is that when they pitched this as being about Korra dealing with an anti-bender revolution, we were meant to go "oh no evil people who hate bending how will Korra defeat all the evil people?"
...
Well, at least it's a pretty, pretty show.
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One big thing they never explained that I think mfking needs to be explained (this is not "where is Zuko's mom" level stuff, this is kind of important) is how Amon could legit energybend-- I was hanging onto the tumblr theory that he was doing extreme chi-blocking that made the target *think* they could no longer bend-- especially when Aang has to come down from heaven to teach Korra how to undo the removal of someone's bending.
I was very meh about the finale pretty much the whole way through except for that moment where it looks like Korra can only airbend and she's pushing away Mako and such-- what a depressingly great note to have ended the season on, that something was actually (apparently) permanently lost in the struggle. And I agree with you, the second season should have been about them fighting a new enemy or whatever, her learning to deal with only being able to airbend (poorly), hitting rock bottom, and finally getting in touch with Aang and restoring everyone's powers. But everything just gets handed to her and she literally learns nothing.
Disappoint. I'm also wondering if any critical questions will be permitted to be asked at the creator Q&A that they're advertising or if it will all be gushing and shippers.
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Even if they do, I bet the answers will be just as unsatisfying.
Oh, you know what their answer will be to the "can energybending give bending to nonbenders" will be? That it totally could, but the spirits won't do it, because nonbenders aren't supposed to use bending, so giving them bending would be wrong. They have to know their place.
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If they are I don't think the answers will be good ones. These are the same people who keep insisting bending isn't genetic but based on how spiritual you are.
The fact the characters are good is the worst part! Korra isn't a flat sue, but they keep writing the world around her like she is! Lin is badass except they keep deciding she's over allotment and making her lose. Asami has like ten minutes of characterization in all, and half of that is being jealous. And Bolin turned into ignorable comic relief guy halfway through, even when he was making perfectly good points. Shut up Bolin who cares she can still airbend we have to agree with Korra that she's ruined and worthless without the other three types apparently.
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I thought the army in general was pretty pathetic. It's true that Hiroshi is using new technology that they wouldn't know how to counter, but when you come down to it, the Equalists are mostly amateur freedom fighters specialized in guerrilla warfare. An army of trained soldiers should not be sucking so badly against them.
(Also, love how Aang's kid is the other commander. No nepotism going on here, nope nope!)
Also ugh did you notice that Bolin was saving Asumi? They're going to pair up and clear the way for inevitable Makorra, aren't they...
...I think you're right. Agh. I'm not invested in shipping at all, really, but I will be disappointed if they do make Makorra the official couple, because they're such an unhealthy relationship. Unstable personalities do not go well together, people!
This show really was such a disappointment.
(At least Asumi didn't turn out to be a secret Equalist, though. You do have to give them that much.)
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(Anonymous) 2012-06-25 01:22 pm (UTC)(link)Keep in mind that you're probably using Tenzin or Lin as a frame of reference here, and Iroh most certainly does not have to be a teenager. Tenzin is Aang and Katara's youngest son, and he was born when Katara was 34 and Aang was 32. Tenzin, himself, didn't have any children until he was in his forties.
If you'll look at the actual numbers, it's been 70 years since the finale of the first Avatar. Zuko was 16 when it ended, so even if he had a kid at 25 (the mean age today when people have kids), and his own child had a kid at 25, that would mean that Iroh is likely in his mid-thirties. (Years since the finale ended) minus (the years it took for Zuko to have a kid) minus (the years it took for Zuko's children to have children) equals the age of Iroh. (71)-(9 or 10)-(25)= 36-ish.
It's still pretty young for someone to be a general, but he's definitely not a teenager.
If you go by the mean age of people having their first children back in the 1920s (20-22. Let's say 21), it's possible that Iroh is actually in his mid forties instead.
Given how young-looking his character was drawn, though, I'd go with the mid-thirties option as being more probable.
(Oh yeah, on an slightly related note, the stuff said in the main post were my thoughts EXACTLY, but summed up far better than I could've ever done myself. I still had fun watching it up until this point, but man... I almost wish I didn't see the finale and just had a really clear and perfect idea of what should have happened in my head instead.)
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(Anonymous) 2012-06-25 07:07 pm (UTC)(link)It could be that he's good in a fight (royalty being able to afford tutors and instructors that civilians usually can't), and he'd been taught his whole life how to handle people, but he's not a soldier, and that sort of thing. Maybe they even had him bypass the regular footsoldier rank completely and started him off as a lieutenant or commander.
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Admittedly, we haven't seen other generals, so it's impossible to say if he's taking the job from someone more competent or if this is how everyone thinks generals should act.
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But you'd think by the third shock or so they'd start to change their behavior. That's sort of the foundation of classical conditioning and all.
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(Anonymous) 2012-06-24 11:30 pm (UTC)(link)And still I can't wrap my mind around all the potential they managed to squander. Korra didn't learn any patience, didn't overcome any fears, didn't have to question her world view or the status she's taken for granted, wasn't forced to deal with the spirit world, didn't have to re-evaluate her identity or her priorities as the Avatar, she didn't even try to open her chakras, let alone have to buckle down and trudge through her spiritual weaknesses in order to regain her abilities or help other victims. All immediate solutions were handed to her on a silver platter of Aang-ex-machina and a new energybending technique.
Yet the worst part was seeing Amon looking, what, 4 shades lighter in skin tone than kid!Noatok, and assuming Tarrlok had lied. Good god, that would have been so much better, but no, soap opera type revelation of parentage followed by a drawn-out flashback. Because the only condition which could have borne a leader fighting for social change is a criminal, abusive father and lots and lots of lying. No actual ideology, no spirit world connections, no legitimate grievances; the show which managed to put a suicide/murder combo on screen in a Saturday morning cartoon either shies away from or is simply incapable of moral and political complexity. Way to go, guys. Way to go.
I mean, I'd almost say Korra and Mako getting together means they probably won't stay that way. There aren't too many ways in which a relationship can progress and remain interesting without resorting to a) things deemed kid-unfriendly or b) betrayal, crashing and burning, at least not the way these writers have handled romance; but after this finale I don't think there are many standards of good story-telling left to uphold anyway. And, it's not like there's been any effort to make Makorra compelling or believable so far either.
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And I'm betting Makorra will be worse than either option: There will be relationship drama/reconciliation on an endless loop. All the irritation of things going wrong with none of the resolution, and probably with more Makodickery we're supposed to forgive.
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redemptive
God no. I had the sense that Amon knew what he was doing and let it happen, and it seemed like it was two messed up people making bad decisions. Amon hadn't even killed anyone (or, I do think it seemed he killed his second in command, but the show didn't really make a point of that, and otherwise we see people imprisoned but pretty well-treated) and while they didn't know it yet, his ability to remove bending had been neutralized. If he kept abusing it, Korra would have just removed his and fixed anyone else he'd gotten to. Neither of them needed to die to protect people or deserved to die for their crimes. It was one more mistake being made.
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I've now seen a headcanon that can make the ending slightly better if you subscribe to it. Look at how close Korra gets to that cliff. It actually did make me a bit anxious to watch after what had just happened, to the point I was thinking, Bad, Tenzin, bad, no, she did not need to be left alone! That is the opposite of what is true! The moment she backed away from it was the first moment she opened herself up to the possibility that there might be more of worth to herself than being a powerful bender, even if it still hurt to lose that, and that acceptance broke the block on her spiritual abilities.
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And even with it involving her making a realization of her own, it's still so unearned. Just think of the hoops Aang had to jump through to chat with Roku for the first time, and all he got out of it was being told things were even worse than they thought. In fact, the unspiritual Korra seems to have a much more useful relationship with the spirit world than Aang. She gets visions and energybending, Aang got told to go beat an entire country before it's too late or else, stop spamming avatar state or else, and shut up about your cherished nonviolent beliefs and murder a guy or else. Oh, and Kyoshi said she totally did commit murder while he was on trial for his life. When Aang is having a breakdown over losing Appa, he doesn't get a pep talk or Appabending to solve his problem as soon as he stops freaking out.
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In addition to what you've touched on, the resolution of the romance also drove me nuts. I didn't give a damn about the romance subplot at any point, but by the time of the finale, Mako had been so generally terrible that there were only two ways it could have come together to be any kind of satisfying: a) Mako dies and Korra develops as a result of dealing with that, including finally bonding with Asami, or b) Korra first goes through character development that gives her some perspective on Mako and makes her get over him and realize how awful he's been to Asami; she thoroughly calls him out on it, tells him to either shape up, apologize sincerely to Asami and become a decent person or get out of there; and he snaps out of it and chooses the former (and it could go several ways from there). Having him happily end up with Korra when they'd both been dealing with the situation in the most immature and dickish way they could was pretty much the worst possible end to the whole thing.
At least I liked the murder-suicide scene. And it really was pretty.