The Legend of Korra 2012

@clobsters

1. Yeah, Aaron Ehasz not being part of the production did show a bit (especially in the later seasons). But again I'd argue that the audience for ATLA was not specifically the audience for TLOK.
2. IDK, the show tried to approach some adult themes, maybe in the wrong way sometimes. I didn't like the "grey area" approach it took in the latter 2 seasons with Zahir and Kavirra but that's more to do with the systemic problem in hollyweird wanting to move away from traditional "good vs evil" storytelling and more of the "evil is ok as long as the intention is good" storytelling. So I guess seasons 3 & 4 were somewhat divisive. Also, for me personally, it definitely could have done without all of the CW drama stuff, but as I stated above, I don't think I was the only demographic they were going for with TLOK.
3. Here I disagree with you. The way I looked at it was that the world had modernized and just like when Sifu Bruce Lee was developing Jeet Kun Do his philosophy was that all of the extravagant and long-gated movements from the past were unnecessary and just got in the way of REAL combat and that's how I saw their martial skills/bending changing in the technique movements area. I saw it as that age-old debate: Could Mike Tyson in his prime beat Muhamed Ali in his prime. Both are excellent fighters just with different styles. I didn't take offense to that because Sifu Kisu, DiMartino, & Konietzko all stated that it was a deliberate decision to streamline ALTA's, stylistic combat mechanics. The "watered-down look" you're referring to was done on purpose and I don't agree that because of that, all the combat "...looks the same...". I thought the choreography had its own unique style and yeah, I loved it.

Having said all that, I still overall loved the show. Is it better than ATLA? For me, no. But I like apples AND oranges. I can talk and chew bubblegum at the same time. The ONE THING I hated about TLOK was the last scene in the last episode of the series. It felt forced and lazy. In the four seasons, there was never any lead-up/implying/inferring to that outcome so when they did that I had a head-scratching moment. But that's hollyweird and I don't expect any more form them than that type of stuff. It's what they do. I wasn't going to let that one scene, at the end of the series corrupt the entire series. At least that's how I looked at it. The whole virtue-signaling, #Woke, SJW, #MeToo movement wasn't really a thing in back in 2012 but it did start rearing its ugly head right around the time **TLOK** was wrapping up.

@archangell

1. ATLA and TLOK are definitely aiming for different audiences, I agree. The shows themselves are very different.
2. Personally, I like the "grey area" stuff in the latter two seasons. I found it made the villains more complex and interesting. Because, in the real world, people aren't either just straight up good or evil. And the love-triangle stuff was just terrible, imo.
3. I enjoyed looking at the bending in TLOK, but it didn't have the same feel as ATLA's bending, which I found less enjoyable to look at, but stylistically more interesting to analyse. That's just me though.

Final note: I can respect where you're coming from. I can see you enjoyed both series (I did too, but not to your extent) and I'm sorry if it sounded like I wanted to take that away from you. That was my bad. I can understand where your coming from and your reasoning was pretty solid. gg.