Should you watch this, Wiki this, or wait for the recap? Watch this.
With Korra and Asami captured by the Earth Kingdom’s forces and Mako and Bolin captured by Zaheer’s gang, can either pair of heroes escape their captors? Meanwhile, Zaheer and Earth Queen Hou Ting finally meet, with unfortunate consequences for the tyrannical empress.
“Long Live the Queen” is the 10th Chapter (episode) of Book 3 (Season 3) of The Legend of Korra. It sees the escape of both groups of heroes, and also some villain interaction as the big bad and the other antagonist of Season 3 come face to face. No, Hou Ting definitely isn’t an Earthbender as this episode reveals.
It pushes forward the series arc quite a bit, and while we don’t learn of Zaheer’s ultimate plan for Korra, it does show us the chaos that they’re capable of and foreshadows the scale of the conflict that is to come. Also, we get to see the White Lotus! It’ll be fun to see both groups in a fair fight – who’ll come out on top?
Highlights
Hou Ting’s comeuppance
Hou Ting has been incredibly irritating since her first appearance, and she finally gets what’s coming to her. Fittingly, it’s Zaheer that delivers her punishment, since it would be out of character for Korra or any of her friends to stoop to that level of brutality. I had still expected Hou Ting to pull some incredible Earthbending to save herself (this would have been the only way to make her character better), but alas! It was not meant to be.
Assembling of the White Lotus
At the end, we see Zuko, Tonraq, and Lin assembling to meet Korra. You know who’d round up the party perfectly? Tenzin – then we’d have all four elements to counter the four elements of the Red Lotus. I’m counting on a battle between these two groups (after which Korra and company will need to swoop in and save the day), but still I’m happy just to see that the good guys are proactive in stopping the Red Lotus.
Bolin chats up Ming Hua & Ghazan
In a brief but comic scene, a captured Bolin chats up Ming Hua and Ghazan, much to Mako’s chagrin. It establishes a connection between Bolin and the bad guys, which will be put to emotional use later in the season (I hope!), and it also helps to make the villains more well-rounded by showing that they’re still people, and not just superpowered cool looking Benders.
Letdowns
The desert plot
When Asami and Korra crash in the desert, they take incredibly long to get back to Ba Sing Se. This whole story feels draggy and forced, like it’s filler to prevent Korra from getting back too early. It’d have been better if they just did away with this and gave us more fighting in this episode.
Nerfing of the Earth Kingdom’s guards
The last time we saw the Earth Kingdom guards, Team Korra could barely get away from their snipers and machine gunning Earthbenders. Yet Hou Ting’s royal guard seems like an inept set of Earthbenders – we’ve seen their competency before, so why drop that now?
“Long Live the Queen” is by far the most ironic of titles, and gives away part of the plot. It’s the last we’ll see of Hou Ting, but it looks like Zaheer’s plot is about to go into full swing. Will the Avatar and the White Lotus be enough to stop this new group of terrorist Benders? Only the next 3 episodes will tell!
The Death of Queen Hou Ting was just sad in a way she was a very stubborn, and very irritable character in the story and most would justified her death as fitting for what she has done it does not compare to what Kuvira has done taken lives mercilessly Im sure this would of cause some sort of trauma to Korra if she would of witness this the same for Aang and my belief that its not right to take the life of another specially in a tormenting and suffering way even when it comes to the most ill tempered, illogical and irrational people if they have not taken a life then they deserve a second chance, But I gotta give props to this show for showing this type of theatrical comeuppance deaths might as well replaced Zaheer’s word with DEATH instead of Darkness for a more suspenseful scenario, the same with Asami’s father when he was killed it felt like a Lion King type of scenario of course subtracting the emotional scene of Asami screaming in silence it would of been to emotional to make some kids cry at that scene I know I did even for that miserable shut in Queen she but I guess in this world some people can be to blindly stubborn to see their own demise come and that was the Queens fateful mistake to underestimate and play waging her with comeuppance with blissful gestures of vanity.
It was interesting to see the two villains of that season come face to face.