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Introduction
Zuko and Mai have the most physically intimate relationship we see on-screen in Avatar: The Last Airbender, in startling contrast to how much they lack true intimacy of the emotional and ethical kind. Taking into account what is shown in Avatar, this pairing is a cautionary tale of the dangers of assuming you know someone or are meant for someone because you knew each other as children. Young Mai and Young Zuko may have played together, or least been bullied by Azula together, but they didn’t grow up together. Their character growth occurred separately, in varying quantities, and in Zuko’s case, so outpaced the growth of their relationship that Mai was left completely in the dark about who her boyfriend was. The only thing that could have fixed this was close and frequent communication—which not only did they not engage in, but in many cases actively avoided. This leaves us with two people who are glued to each other’s sides for several episodes, yet never really manage to connect.
To get a better view of this discrepancy, I have excerpted all the scenes wherein Mai and Zuko communicate directly with each other—or try to. The first such scene, all the way in the final season, lays the groundwork for their relationship as one based on physical intimacy without the emotional intimacy to match.
Season 3, Episode 1, “The Awakening”
(Cut to a shot of the entire port side of the Fire Nation ship as it rushes through the sea past the mountain on the other side. The shot fades into a similar shot of a royal Fire Nation ship in the open ocean. Cut to a shot of Zuko, his back to the camera, standing at the edge of the deck. The moon shines brightly through the clouds. Cut to a close up of Zuko.)
Mai: (walking onscreen) Aren't you cold?
Zuko: I've got a lot on my mind. It's been so long. Over three years since I was home. I wonder what's changed. I wonder how I've changed.
Mai: (sighs) I just asked if you were cold. I didn't ask for your whole life story. (smiles and wraps her arms around Zuko) Stop worrying.
(Mai pulls Zuko's face closer. Cut to a very close shot of Zuko and Mai sharing a kiss. Mai lets go of Zuko and walks off screen.)
When Mai and Zuko were last together, they were twelve and thirteen years old, respectively. This means that they are both working from the knowledge they had of each other when they were children. Since that time, Mai has been stuck in a static, sheltered, boring life that she hates and wants to escape from, while Zuko has undergone a wide variety of changes, challenges, and pressures that have dramatically altered how he sees the world and the people in it. In order for their relationship to work, Zuko and Mai need to bridge The Great Divide between who they were as kids and the young adults they are now. Thus, Zuko opens up to Mai and lets her in on the conflict and character development going on inside of him. Zuko is not a demonstrative person, and this couldn’t have been easy for him; the fact that he shares his innermost thoughts with her without any prompting shows that he has extended to her a great deal of trust.
How does Mai repay that trust? She completely shuts him down.
I just asked if you were cold. I didn’t ask for your whole life story. This unsympathetic response (which comes with a yawn, not a sigh as the transcript indicates) could be viewed as Mai putting Zuko’s teenaged broodiness to a well-deserved rest for his own good. There’s just one problem: this isn’t some trivial fit of teenage angst and anyone who dismisses it as such is ignoring the entire first half of Season 3. Zuko’s return to the Fire Nation ends with him denouncing the tenets of Fire Nation propaganda, declaring his intent to join the Avatar, and redirecting lightning shot at him by his own father. In other words, his worries are one hundred percent valid and Mai belittling those worries does nothing to fix the underlying problem. As if to confirm this, after Mai kisses him and leaves, Zuko’s expression goes right back to the way it was, accompanied by melancholy music. The only thing Mai has accomplished is given Zuko a stellar reason not to open up to her.
True, Mai not have known how serious Zuko’s turmoil really was, but Zuko would have given her the chance to find out if only she had let him. Instead, she just assumes that the three years he’s been gone haven’t changed him enough to merit a sympathetic ear. Think of all of the memories this cuts her off from: Zuko becoming the Blue Spirit and being offered friendship by Aang; the many ways his uncle became his father figure; his growing empathy for the Earth Kingdom and the people he got to know there; the choices he made, right and wrong, when on the brink of starvation; his conflict over setting Appa free and the ensuing fever; his transformation, a second offer of friendship, his temptation, and finally the fall that preceded his triumphant return. With such a cold rebuff, it’s a safe bet Zuko never tried to share his complex past with Mai again, a point supported by the fact that she has no idea why he leaves her and his nation. Perhaps if she had taken the time to get to know Zuko when he had offered, she would not have been caught off-guard by nearly all of his subsequent actions.
Nothing we see here is indicative of true intimacy, despite the full-on kiss. What is shown is that these two, after a long period of separation while undergoing adolescence under hugely different circumstances, have decided to jump headlong into romance without the necessary first step of getting reacquainted first. It’s an understandable mistake for two teenagers to make, but it begins a pattern of communication failure that will inform their whole relationship.
Season 3, Episode 2, “The Headband”
Cut to a sheltered little plateau on the rim of the royal volcano. Zuko and Mai are enjoying a sunset picnic and a chance to canoodle in private.)
Mai: (referring to the sunset) Orange is such an awful color.
Zuko: (snickering) You're so beautiful when you hate the world.
Mai: I don't hate you.
Zuko: I don't hate you, too. (They kiss.)
Sheesh, what’s wrong with you people? He’s got the emo Goth chick, they’ll be happily miserable together.
Zuko and Mai do seem to be happily miserable together, don’t they? The scene above is just one example of them relating as a couple by indulging in mutual negativity. We see it when they express their displeasure at Lo and Li’s cottage, again when they’re at the beach together, and again when they sit by themselves at Chan’s party. This scene, however short, is no mere scrap of throwaway dialogue; it is a microcosm of their relationship. You’re so beautiful when you hate the world, says Zuko, meaning that he has repeatedly seen Mai hating the world and appreciates it every time. Zuko is glad Mai hates the world, because at this point in his life, he hates the world, too:
Zuko got with Mai right after the crystal catacombs, when he was feeling dreadful about life, the universe and everything. Mai's gloomy view of the world and her apathy would have been refreshing – and her acceptance of Zuko's hatred of the world would have been validating. I never got the feeling that Zuko hated the world prior to season 3 – I think he was more frustrated with it, because he wanted it to be better and believed it could be better -but terrible things kept happening.
After the crystal catacombs – he pretty much hates the world and is, in his own words, so angry and he doesn't know why. Being with Mai would have normalised hating the world for him.
Since here, they share not only a snuggle but a similar worldview, that makes this a true moment of intimacy between them. So what’s the problem with them being happily miserable together?
The problem is that this is an intimacy that cannot and should not last, for the very simple reason that it goes against the character development Zuko has spent all series attaining. Contrast what Zuko being happily miserable looks like:
With what Zuko being happy looks like:
Even a cursory look at these pictures will tell you that Zuko is much healthier being actually happy than he is being happily miserable. Contrary to popular belief, Zuko is not a natural pessimist; it only seems that way because a negative outlook was literally and figuratively beaten into him by his family and by circumstance. But let’s take a look at who he was before his scarring and banishment:
Zuko: I want to go into the war chamber, but the guard won’t let me pass!
Iroh : You’re not missing anything, trust me. These meetings are dreadfully boring.
Zuko : If I’m going to rule this nation one day, don’t you think I need to start learning as much as I can?
This scene shows a bright-eyed, hopeful young man—the prince that Zuko always should have been. Zuko being miserable, happily or otherwise, is destructive and unhealthy in almost all cases (including during Mai’s picnic). Why did Iroh try so many times to get Zuko to join in music night on the ship, or date a nice girl in Ba Sing Se? Why did he raise his voice, which he hardly ever does, in order to tell Zuko not to sink into despair? Why was it so important that the Avatar give Zuko hope? Iroh needed to keep Zuko’s optimism—however buried—alive, in order to preserve Zuko’s willingness to change the world and himself. I can’t put it any better than the man who knows Zuko best:
Iroh: No! Zuko! You must never give into despair. Allow yourself to slip down that road and you surrender to your lowest instincts. In the darkest times, hope is something you give yourself. That is the meaning of inner strength.
Iroh tells us everything we need to know about why a girlfriend who encourages Zuko’s negative side is a terrible idea.The smirking prince who connected with Mai at sunset was not the person Zuko was supposed to be in the end—not just with respect to his outlook on life, but in his moral beliefs and desire to improve the world around him. This is Zuko defying his father and changing his life for the better:
We’ve created an era of fear in the world, and if we don’t want the world to destroy itself, we need to replace it with an era of peace and kindness.
This is Zuko at his most mature and enlightened:
A hundred years of fighting has left the world scarred and divided. But with the Avatar's help, we can get it back on the right path, and begin a new era of love and peace.
And this is Zuko when he is with Mai:
You’re so beautiful when you hate the world.
Notice how differently the world is treated in the first two instances as opposed to the third. Zuko at his best does not hate the world; neither does he love that someone else hates the world. Far from it: Zuko at his best loves the world enough to dedicate everything he has to helping it despite its flaws…just as his uncle was willing to do for him. Zuko’s words to Mai that granted him a kiss are the exact opposite of his true character, both the boy he was when he stood up for his people, and the man he becomes when he takes his rightful place on the throne.
If Mai were secretly an optimist, too, she and Zuko could grow out of their negativity together. Unfortunately for their relationship, Mai is and will always be a pessimist—a character trait, not a character flaw, in her. The key difference lies in how Mai and Zuko use their negative feelings. When Zuko sinks into negativity, he gives up on any actions that will materially change his world for the better; Mai, on the other hand, can remain negative even at the height of her character development, and it does not impede her ability to act. Quite the contrary: she wants to act. She wants not to be bored. She wants to be shaken out of her indifference. (It is this indifference that is Mai’s character flaw, not her pessimism.) While Zuko’s finest character moments are all about his optimism, here is Mai at her—still negative—best:
Guard: What are you doing?
Mai: Saving the jerk who dumped me.
This is why Mai’s smiles in those screenshots are more genuine than Zuko’s, and also why Azula notices Mai in a “strangely good mood” while dating him; Mai would be content to hate the world with Zuko until the end of time. But for all that Zuko smirks while dating Mai, she never spurs him on to become a better person; she never gives him hope; she never helps him figure out who he is or what he should be doing. Mai only helped Zuko continue his backslide into the same bad habits of cynicism and despair that were Iroh’s greatest fear for him.
This is not to put the blame for Zuko’s unhealthily pessimistic attitude on Mai; Zuko’s decision to surrender to his worst instincts was his and his alone. Mai merely took a cursory look at the Zuko she hadn’t seen for three years and thought, “He’s negative…I’m negative…I used to have a crush on him…perfect!” And on the surface, it was—but only because their orbits happened to overlap at a particularly dark emotional time in Zuko’s life. Once Zuko had rediscovered who he was and moved closer to his natural optimism, the intimacy of hating the world by the light of an orange sunset vanished and would never return. If Mai ever starts hating on the world again, she’ll be doing so alone; and if she ever drags Zuko down the path of negativity with her, it will certainly be no cause for celebration.
As for [Zuko’s] so called negativity, he displays this as a consequence of having you know a parent who does not love him and another go missing that did, being ridiculed and exiled from his nation and trying repeatedly to get back there only to fail time and time again, and seldom receiving praise when he actually does something right. After a while of having that, is a wonder one starts to think the world is truly against them? It’s not that Zuko inherently wants things to go badly. He just has a hard time seeing that they could ever go right for him. This actually is why he needs to interact with more positive people because negative people only bolster this cynical view he has garnered but positive people actually help him to see that the world is not as dark as he thinks it is.
—daughter-of-water (emphasis mine)
Season 3, Episode 5, “The Beach”
Zuko: It smells like old lady in here.
Mai: Gee, I wonder why.
(Cut to shot of Ty Lee looking at a painting of two young twins, twins standing back to back in a symmetrical seductive pose. Li and Lo approach her.)
Ty Lee: Who are these two beautiful women?
(Cut to close shot of the painting in question, the camera quickly zooms out to include Li and Lo standing on either side of the painting)
Li and Lo: Can't you tell (The elderly twins strike the identical seductive pose from the painting.) It's Li/Lo and me.
(Cut to close shot of the elderly twins rear ends touching in the foreground, while the four teens stand looking on, confused and slightly disgusted, in the background. Zuko covers his mouth to prevent himself from getting sick. Cut to an above shot of a Maroon printed bead spread. Ty Lee lies back on to the bedspread.)
Ty Lee: (snuggling against the pillow) Ooh, I love this seashell bedspread!
Mai: (Cut to shot of Mai) Are you serious? It looks like the beach threw up all over it.
(Cut to wide shot of the entire room, Ty Lee is still snuggling her seashell bed spread in the foreground. The other three teens stand listening to Li and Lo.)
Li: We know you're upset that you were forced to come here this weekend. But Ember Island is a magical place. (Cut to close profile shot of Li.) Keep an open mind. (The camera slowly pans around her face to reveal her twin standing next to her.)Lo: Give it a chance...
Li and Lo: ...and it can help you understand yourselves and each other. (Cut to shot of Li grabbing one of the smooth stones resting on table. Cut to wide shot from above. Li passes the smooth stone to her sister.) The beach has a special way of (Close shot of Lo rubbing the smooth stone) smoothing even the most ragged edges. (Cut to shot of teens. Ty Lee joins the group and Azula yawns. Cut back to shot of Lo and Li. In an identical series of motions, they clap and strip off their robes, revealing their elderly bodies in swimwear.) Time to hit the beach! (Cut to shot of Mai covering Zuko's eyes.)
Here we have another example of mutual negativity. Rather than repeat a topic that’s already been covered, it is time to address just why the physical nature of this relationship means so little in the long run. Zuko tends to shun or be uncomfortable around physical contact, as we see with Song and Jin, and even to some extent with Iroh. Mai also tends to be very closed off when it comes to personal space—contrast her reluctant half-hug with Azula to Ty Lee’s enthusiastic embrace. Yet during Season 3, Zuko and Mai share many physical touches, both casual and intimate—Mai putting a protective hand in front of Zuko’s face in this scene is just such an example. The fact that they are comfortable around each other must say something about their intimacy, mustn’t it?
Unfortunately, the natural conclusion—that they are physically intimate because they are psychologically and emotionally intimate—doesn’t pass inspection. Mai kisses Zuko after yawning at his efforts to bare his soul; they cuddle on beach blankets, only to get stroppy with each other because Zuko can’t bring Mai what she wants; Zuko puts an arm around Mai’s shoulders at the party, only to go into a fit of jealous rage a moment later. If we cannot conclude that their intimacy goes beyond the physical, why is it there? Emletish’s theory is that they are compensating for emotional vacuums elsewhere in their lives:
I think in some respects [Zuko] threw himself into the relationship because it was the one "good" thing to emerge from the [Crossroads of Destiny] schmozzle. He lost his Uncle – but gained a girlfriend in Mai. In the time when he is trying to convince himself that he made the right choice – he becomes more involved in the relationship. For Mai who feels as though she has been overlooked her whole life – this kind of constant attention and validation would be brilliant. Mai has almost all the power in the relationship until Zuko leaves. Mai is denied power in her other relationships (with her mother and Azula) – so she enjoys being the boss with Zuko.
Also Mai's biggest gripe against her parents is that they are posh and they deny her freedom and demand certain behavioural expectations from her. Zuko places no such expectations on her – and due to their power dynamics – it is unlikely that he ever would. He freely shares many of the perks of being royalty with her. I would argue that Mai enjoys these and the freedom to act how she chooses immensely and this ties in with her enjoyment of the relationship. Royalty can act how they please – and when she is with Zuko she can also act how she pleases. Zuko will never tell her no.
Viewed through the lens of this theory, the physical intimacy and emotional distance of Mai and Zuko’s relationship make sense. Zuko is comfortable around Mai because he knows her from when they were kids, and is conveniently there for him to be close to after alienating his uncle. Mai is comfortable around Zuko for the same reason: she knew and liked him as a child, and he is her ticket out of her parents’ strictures, now that Azula no longer needs her for a mission. Yet the next scene perfectly illustrates that the distance between the couple is as vast as ever:
(Cut to shot of Mai and Zuko huddled together under an umbrella. A small child runs by laughing. Shot of Zuko looking to the side at a seashell, which he picks up. Shot of Zuko handing the shell to Mai)
Zuko: Here... (Bringing the shell toward her) This is for you.
Mai: Why would I want that?
Zuko: I saw it and I thought it was pretty. Don't girls like stuff like this?
Mai: (turns away from him) Maybe stupid girls.
Zuko: (throws the shell away in anger) Forget it!
Complete, total, utter failure to communicate on both sides is apparent. Zuko tries to do something nice, and fails to please his girlfriend. Mai is completely blunt and honest about that—which is fine—but there’s no sense here that she even appreciates the effort. Then Zuko shows how little he actually knows Mai by assuming that she likes pretty but useless decorative objects because she’s a girl. (Maybe a knife with a shell-inlaid hilt would have been better, Zuko?) At any rate, instead of opening up and telling him something about her that would make it easier to gauge her wants and needs, Mai shuts down emotionally, which causes Zuko to retreat and have a giant sulk.
One of the reasons why Zuko and Mai are incompatible is that they both throw up barriers of apathy (Mai) or anger (Zuko) when they are emotionally wounded or vulnerable. And just because one blows hot and the other cold doesn’t make them opposites—it’s the exact same behavior, just expressed in different ways. This is understandable given their shared upbringing around Azula, but it also means that neither one is likely to be the first to reach out and lower those defenses. Mai and Zuko can cuddle all they want; it’s not sufficient to bridge the gap of verbal misunderstanding.
(Cut to shot of Mai still sitting under an umbrella, Zuko walks up holding two ice-cream cones and joins her under the umbrella.)
Zuko: (Close shot of the two of them) I thought since it's so hot... Here. (He hands her an ice cream cone, but the scoop of ice cream falls off the cone into Mai's lap)
Mai: (She looks down at the ice cream) Thanks. This is really refreshing.
This is the third time Zuko has tried to do something to impress or please Mai, and had it not get a positive reaction. Picnic at sunset? Hate the color orange. Pretty seashell? That’s for stupid girls. Ice cream? She wasn’t interested even before he dropped it in her lap.
This is where the “they know each other so well because they were childhood sweethearts” hypothesis falls apart. Zuko knows Mai so well that he doesn’t know a thing about her own tastes! Really, all these ideas are Zuko thinking of How to Please a Generic Woman, when he should be thinking about How to Please Mai. But he just doesn’t know Mai well enough to pull the latter off, and Mai’s emotional cues are so sublimated that he can’t read her without help—help that she seems perpetually unwilling to give. As before, while Mai is not to blame for being honest in her reaction here, neither does she show any appreciation for the fact that Zuko is trying to make her happy…well…less unhappy, anyway. Either that, or she really has no idea how hard he’s trying here—because, of course, she knows him so well.
(Shot of Azula with an enthusiastic smile, which quickly turns to a frown as Chan walks away. Shot of Ruon Jian combing his hair in a mirror. He sees Azula and her company walking by in the background. He turns toward them.)
Ruon Jian: Hey, first ones here, huh?
Zuko: (cut to shot of Zuko and Mai walking side by side) Pft. He thinks he's so great. (to Mai) Well, what do you think of him? (they stop walking)
Mai: I don't have any opinion about him. I hardly know him.
Zuko: You like him, don't you?
(Mai sighs and walks away, as Zuko looks angrily in the direction of Ruon Jian.)
This is what you get when you put two people, both of whom have extreme trouble effectively communicating their emotions, in a relationship together. There’s a reason why lack of communication is generally considered to be the number one killer of relationships.
Mai is a very understated and subtle communicator, with a heavy emphasis on the negative. When she says, “There really is no fathoming the depths of my hatred for this place,” she means that she is bored. When she says, “I don’t hate you” to Zuko, that means she really likes him. So the fact that she doesn’t have any negative opinion of this guy must mean she likes him too, right? Wrong—but Zuko is the social skills equivalent of a first year student of English being asked to decipher the subtle ironies of Jane Austen dialogue.
Remember in “Tales of Ba Sing Se,” when Jin spent the whole day staring at Zuko in the tea shop, and he didn’t get the hint? And then Jin asked him out, complimented him, and led him to one of her favorite places…but Zuko still didn’t get it? This is one of many signs that Zuko is both socially inept and terribly insecure (being told throughout his childhood that he was a disgrace and a failure didn’t help matters). Unless a girl is willing to wear her heart on her sleeve—and maybe even wave it in front of his face—Zuko won’t be able to tell what she wants, much less if she genuinely likes him. But not only does Mai not wear her heart on her sleeve; she keeps it tucked away between many, many layers of protective indifference. As far as true intimacy goes, this is a recipe for disaster.
(Cut to close shot of a few teen boys looking bewildered. Cut to shot of Mai and Zuko sitting together on a bench. Mai's arms are crossed and she looks displeased.)
Mai: I'm bored.
(Fire Nation Teen Boy walks across the shot, holding a tropical drink.)
Zuko: I know.
Mai: I'm hungry.
Zuko: So what?
Mai: So, find me some food.
Zuko: Sure. (gets up and walks away)
Notice the difference between Zuko smilingly giving Mai a seashell earlier, and this exchange. Zuko has tried over and over to please Mai, and as far as he’s concerned, his efforts have all come to nothing. Mai, meanwhile, is still expecting Zuko to dote on her, and seems to have resigned herself to the fact that she’ll have to order him to do what she wants, rather than wait for him to anticipate her needs. This does not bode well for either their power dynamics or their psychological intimacy, despite Zuko’s arm being firmly around Mai’s shoulders.
Something else even worse is missing, though: true knowledge of who the other is deep down. This is the farthest they get into their relationship before they break up (the first time); has either Zuko or Mai successfully shared a dream, hope, ambition, or fear with the other? Zuko tried once—and Mai put paid to that nonsense. It wouldn’t matter so much that Zuko doesn’t know Mai hates seashells if he actually understood what makes her tick. And it wouldn’t matter so much that Mai doesn’t appreciate Zuko’s efforts at courtship if she understood the heart of the struggles attached to his homecoming. As it is, their relationship is not built on a firm foundation, as the next scene together demonstrates all too well.
(Cut to shot of Ruon Jian leaning over Mai. Zuko rushes toward them angrily and pushes Ruon Jian away from her. Cut to shot of Ruon Jian straightening his hair.)
Ruon Jian: Whoa. What are you doing?
Zuko: (close-up shot of Zuko, angry) Stop talking to my girlfriend!
Ruon Jian: (Ruon Jian approaches Zuko) Relax, it's just a party. (Zuko pushes Ruon Jian hard, sending him flying across the room, breaking a giant vase.)
Mai: (Mai stands up and grabs Zuko's shoulder. He turns towards her.) Zuko, what is wrong with you?!
Zuko: What's wrong with me?!
Mai: (angrily) Your temper's out of control. You blow up over every little thing. You're so impatient and hot-headed and angry.
Zuko: Well, at least I feel something...as opposed to you. You have no passion for anything. (raising his arms is the air) You're just a big "blah".
How much more distant can a couple become than when they deride the essence of each other’s personalities?
Both Zuko and Mai are making the same mistake: they are treating fundamental aspects of each other’s identities as flaws that can be changed if only they would try. Zuko’s temper is out of control at the moment—that can be changed. But Zuko is impatient and hotheaded and angry? That will always be with him. Just as Mai’s lack of passion will always be with her—yes, of course she has feelings, but she is not a passionate person. Unfortunately, Zuko’s tone makes it clear that this is a failing instead of a statement of fact. If Mai and Zuko are having real trouble accepting these intrinsic parts of each other’s characters, frankly they should end the relationship now before any more damage is done.
Mai: (turning away from him) It's over, Zuko. We're done.
And…that’s exactly what they do. However, they will be back together before the end of the episode, going full steam ahead with the same communication problems that are never addressed or worked through.
(Zuko follows her and the camera pans down to the handprint, left alone on the porch. Cut to wide view of the camera panning down Ember Island Beach. Zuko and Azula are walking side by side toward Mai and Ty Lee. Close shot of Zuko looking toward Mai and then looking away. Close shot of Mai looking angry and a bit sad.)
Mai: Hey... (Interrupted)
Zuko: (close shot of Zuko) Where's your new boyfriend? (Mai turns away angrily. Zuko comes and sits next to her) Are you cold? (he puts his arm around her, but she slaps it away)
Empty physicality takes another hit in this scene. At this point, Mai does have feelings for Zuko, since she says she cares about him a short time later. But somehow, despite all of her kisses and caresses, the point didn’t get across to him! And justifiably so: think of all the times Mai rejected his non-physical advances even in the past day. This isn’t just Zuko saying something he doesn’t mean in the heat of the moment; Zuko is feeling genuinely insecure due to his aforementioned awkwardness and low self-esteem. Mai’s physical displays of affection are no substitute for the emotional affirmation that Zuko so badly requires.
Mai: I don't believe in auras.
(The camera pans right, towards Zuko. Zuko stands up)
Zuko: Yeah, you don't believe in anything.
(Cut to close shot of Mai who looks depressed)
Mai: Oh, well, I'm sorry I can't be as high-strung and crazy as the rest of you.
(Cut to over-head shot of the four teens. Zuko walks closer to the fire and Mai.)
Zuko: I'm sorry, too. I wish you would be high-strung and crazy for once, (Close shot of Mai looking away and Zuko standing over her) instead of keeping all your feelings bottled up inside. She just called your aura dingy. Are you gonna take that?Mai: (Cut to wide shot of the four of them. Mai lays back carelessly on the rock she is sitting on) What do you want from me? You want a teary confession about how hard my childhood was? Well, it wasn't. (close shot of Mai) I was a rich only child who got anything I wanted. As long as I behaved...(cut to shot of the clouds above) and sat still...and didn't speak unless spoken to. (cut to shot of Zuko listening) My mother said I had to keep out of trouble. We had my father’s political career to think about.
I wish you would be high-strung and crazy for once. As with the fight that broke them up, Zuko is still not happy with the way Mai is—not in her current mood, but as a person. He wishes a main facet of her character would change. This should have been the first clue for Mai to jump ship and not look back—but it gets worse. Zuko scorns the fact that Mai doesn’t believe in anything—and although this would be the perfect moment for Mai to surprise us with something she does believe in, instead, she doesn’t deny it. But then, why would she? The only good thing Mai ever does for someone who isn’t Zuko is tell him to leave Ty Lee alone when he picks on her—a good deed that she stomps on almost immediately afterwards by mocking Ty Lee’s “attention issues” and “needing ten boyfriends” to be happy. Mai is completely without a belief system of her own—so the only thing she can do is substitute Zuko’s in its place because she “cares” about him. Just as Zuko substitutes Mai’s physical affections for absent emotional support, Mai substitutes Zuko’s desire to change things for a sense of purpose that is otherwise absent from her own life.
Azula:(close-up shot on Azula) You had a controlling mother who had certain expectations, and if you strayed from them you were shut down. That's why you're afraid to care about anything, and why you can't express yourself.
Mai: (close shot of Mai) You want me to express myself? (she stands and yells) Leave me alone!
(The camera pans right, over the four teens. Cut to shot of Mai's face angry in the foreground and Zuko in the background)
Zuko: I like it when you express yourself. (he reaches for her, but she backs away)Mai: (yelling) Don't touch me. I'm still mad at you.
Zuko: My life hasn't been that easy, either, Mai. (Mai interrupts him)
Mai: Whatever- that doesn't excuse the way you've been acting.
Here it is again: I like it when you express yourself. Zuko is pleased when Mai behaves in a way that is contrary to her normal character. Unfortunately, he is not the person who actually getsher to express herself: Azula is, pushing all the right buttons that cause Mai to shout for the very first time. And notice that after Mai’s barriers have gone down, Zuko tries (gently) to help her keep them that way. But Mai can’t do it; she reacts defensively (“Don’t touch me!”) and then lashes out (“I’m still mad at you”). The dialogue continues with Zuko explaining how he’s angry at himself—but it’s a group conversation, no longer just the two of them, and the inner rage and confusion that Zuko is feeling would not have been expressed if Azula, Mai, and Ty Lee had not all banded together and badgered him about it. Zuko and Mai are both firmly in their respective shells with no way to pry them open until other people come along to help.
(Cut to shot of Zuko. His back is turned toward us as he looks out to sea. Mai approaches him and puts her arm around him.)
Mai: I know one thing I care about... (Cut to shot of Mai smiling at Zuko) I care about you. (Mai and Zuko kiss.)
Here is another kiss and another declaration, this one only a slight bit above “I don’t hate you”/“I don’t hate you too.” Neither one of these indicates a deeper understanding of each other’s characters. For all the ranting and self-exploration that goes on in “The Beach,” there’s no sign that Mai knows of or understands Zuko’s obsession with honor; she doesn’t get that there are two sides to his personality; figuring out why he’s so angry with himself is completely beyond her. These are gigantic clues that she knows nothing about the most important aspects of his character. She was not privy at all to the journey he was on, and we’re given no reason to believe that he told her about it in any detail. (Especially since there’s strong evidence that she had no desire to hear about it in the first place.) As for Zuko, he may know Mai better now, but it is painfully obvious that he still wishes she were something that she’s not, and no amount of her caring about him will fix that.
Mai and Zuko care about each other, and the fact that they care is being used to patch up the cracks in their relationship left by their mutual lack of knowledge and emotional bonding. As you can guess, this is inevitably a temporary fix, because they still fail either to understand or accept the very core of each other’s personalities.
Season 3, Episode 9, “Nightmares and Daydreams”
Cut to very wide aerial shot of the Fire Nation Palace and its surroundings area. Cut to shot of Zuko and Mai lying down together on an ornate couch.)
Zuko: Tell me, if you can have anything you wanted right now, what would it be?
Mai: Hmm. A big fancy fruit tart, with rose petals on top.
Zuko: (cut to close up shot of Zuko and Mai) You know, being a prince and all, I might just be able to make that happen.
Mai: (giggles) That would be impressive.This is the only time Zuko successfully treats Mai to something she wants. It’s not because he knows her so well that he can anticipate her requests; no, he has to outright ask her. If they were so incredibly close because they grew up together, you’d think he’d at least know which foods she likes. At any rate, this is not an intimate moment, despite their snuggling on the couch; no deeper issues are explored and no deeper bonds are formed. Zuko is spoiling his girlfriend because he can—there’s nothing wrong with that, and yet nothing very meaningful about it, either.
(Shot of two fire nation servants in a curtained doorway. The back of the couch lies in the center of the scene. Zuko and Mai sit up come into view.)
Zuko: Do you think (the guards turn towards the couple and bow) you can find a fresh fruit tart for the lady, with rose petals on top.
Royal Servant: (shot of the two guards bowing) Excellent choice, sir.
Mai: (close shot of Zuko and Mai. The camera begins to pan out slowly) I guess there are some perks that come with being royalty. (they lie back down) Though, there is annoying stuff too, like that all-day war meeting coming up.
Zuko: (Zuko sits up completely, surprised, and turns toward Mai, who is also surprised) War meeting? What are you talking about?
Mai: Azula mentioned something, (Zuko turns away and looks down. Cut to close shot of Mai speaking to a disgruntled Zuko) I assumed you were going too.
Zuko: (closes his eyes and turns away) I guess I wasn't invited.
Anyone with even a passing knowledge of Zuko would know that his exclusion from this war meeting would cause him immediately to draw ugly parallels between it and the war meeting responsible for his scarring and banishment. Between this scene and the next, he goes from lying, relaxed, on a couch to tensely staring out a window. He is obviously trying his hardest—and failing—not to think of that terrible day that led to his Agni Kai. This is how Mai responds:
(Cut to shot of Zuko looking out an open window. Mai approaches him from behind.)
Mai: Zuko, it's just a dumb meeting. Who cares?
Zuko: I don't.
(Close up shot of Mai talking to Zuko, while Zuko still looks out into the distance.)
Mai: Well good. You shouldn't. Why would you even want to go? (Cut to shot of Zuko and Mai standing in the window, the Fire Nation Palace before them. Mai puts her arm around Zuko) Just think about how things went at the last war meeting you went to.Zuko: (sighs) I know.
The lack of understanding that Mai shows toward Zuko here is staggering. Instead of supporting him or providing counterarguments to Zuko’s doubts, Mai actually encourages Zuko, at the worst possible time, to brood over the most painful memory of his entire life. She then puts her arm around his shoulder, as if her physical presence can span an emotional breach of this magnitude. “Zuko, I hope my embrace is a comfort as I bring up the time you suffered three years’ disgrace and horrible disfigurement. Especially since there’s a good chance you’ll be going right back in that war room where it all began!” But Mai’s failure to cheer him up doesn’t end there:
Mai: (cut to shot of Mai, circling Zuko, attempting to distract him) You know what will make you feel better? Ordering some servants around! I might be hungry for a whole tray of fruit tarts! And maybe a little palanquin ride around town... Double time!
(Zuko looks away from Mai. Mai backs away from him, looking worried. )
Mai’s words here are the equivalent of bringing Zuko a pretty seashell. (“Don’t princes like stuff like this?” she might as well have asked.)
For those of you who don’t remember what forcing servants to carry a palanquin at double-time the speed looks like, here you go:
Earlier in the episode, we saw just what Zuko really thought of palanquin rides: he was offered a ride (at normal speed) to Mai’s house, initially dismissed the idea as frivolous, and only assented at the encouragement of a servant, who unwittingly tied the idea to Zuko’s supposed return to grace. The fact that Mai thinks Zuko would condone ordering people around for the mere pleasure of it is a red flag—as if we needed another one—that she doesn’t really know who he is.
Some people think there is a clue that they spent the night together after this moment because Zuko’s hair is out of its topknot in the next scene. But Mai and Zuko’s signals, both verbal and nonverbal, actually indicate them drawing away from each other. Zuko is retreating into his morose thoughts; Mai is demonstrating how little she knows Zuko; Zuko physically turns away from Mai; Mai physically backs away from Zuko. If they did sleep together, it would only mean another giant disconnect between their physical and emotional relationship.
(Cut to an outside wide shot of Mai's House. Cut to close up shot of Prince Zuko. The camera pans out to reveal he is laying on the couch. Mai sits next to him pouring tea. A servant enters.)
Messenger: Prince Zuko, (bows to the ground) everyone's waiting for you.
Zuko: (Zuko and Mai approach him) What?
Messenger: The high admirals, high generals, the war ministers, and the princess have all arrived. (close up shot of the messenger raising his head to Zuko) You're the only person missing.
Zuko: (close up shot of Zuko and Mai. Mai is smiling) So, my dad wants me at the meeting?
Royal Messenger: The Fire Lord said he would not start until you arrived, sir. (bows his head again)
(Zuko smiles and looks towards Mai, still smiling.)
At last! Mai and Zuko share one emotional moment where they both know what’s going on in each other’s heads. Zuko knows that Mai is happy for him and understands why heis happy, with Mai breaking out an uncharacteristic smile for the occasion. In the past few hours, she has come to understand how big a deal this war meeting is for him. This moment of genuine intimacy is conveyed without a single word of dialogue, and their mutual understanding of each other will last…until their very next scene together, when they lose it all over again.
Cut to shot of the Fire Nation Palace. Cut to shot of Zuko exiting the war meeting. A few men and women are chatting outside in the background, Azula among them. Cut to shot of Mai leaning on a pillar. Zuko enters the scene and she follows him.)
Mai: So, how did it go?
Zuko: When I got to the meeting, everyone welcomed me. (cut to close up shot of Zuko) My father had saved me a seat. He wanted me next to him. (cut to wider shot of Zuko and Mai walking) I was literally at his right hand.
Mai: Zuko, that's wonderful. (grabs on to him) You must be happy?
(Zuko and Mai pause at the end of the hallway. The camera pans upward to a large ornate picture of Ozai, who is made to look incredibly powerful. Cut to shot of Zuko looking up at this picture and Mai looking concerned at him.)
Zuko: During the meeting, I was the perfect prince. (close up shot of Ozai's face in the picture) The son my father wanted. But I wasn't me.
This moment, right here, is the catalyst for Zuko leaving the Fire Nation. It will later be revealed that at this meeting, Ozai unveiled his plan to burn the Earth Kingdom to the ground, to which Zuko voiced no objection. He had come full circle—from the boy who spoke out in defense of the troops in the war room at thirteen, to a young, defeated man who had traded his identity for Ozai’s non-existent love. When he says, “I wasn’t me,” it is his moment of awakening. He is looking at his father’s portrait, in contrast to his words, which call back to his mother’s final admonishment: Never forget who you are. For the first time, Zuko remembers who he is—because he’s sure of who he isn’t—and he knows what he has to do, no matter what the cost.
Mai is there to witness what may be the most important revelation of Zuko’s life.
She has not the slightest clue it’s even happening.
As a character, Mai is very useful to the story during Zuko’s return, because she represents everything that Zuko gains by sticking by his father. A girl who cares about him; the ability to indulge her; the authority he has over others at the palace; we see it all in his interactions with Mai. But this makes Mai a tether to a life he has long outgrown. Her function is not to advance Zuko’s character development, but to obstruct it, which also unfortunately means that Mai gaining a full understanding of Zuko’s trials would be disadvantageous to the story. If she knew everything about him and still wanted him to stay, it would give Zuko more cause than he should have to remain in the Fire Nation, but if she knew and encouraged him to leave and join the Avatar, it would rob Zuko of the triumph of making this decision on his own. In other words, there are good narrative reasons for keeping Mai in the dark; it just doesn’t make their relationship any stronger.
The break is made, at long last, on the Day of Black Sun, where Zuko ends his relationship with Mai via a letter in order to protect her from suspicion. From that point on, Mai has no contact with Zuko until “The Boiling Rock, Part 2.” When she next meets Zuko, it’s in a prison during a bungled attempt to rescue Sokka’s father. Will she at last gain a proper understanding of his character? Let us see.
Season 3, Episode 15, “The Boiling Rock, Part 2”
(Cut to the inside of another cell as it opens. The guards shove Zuko in. Cut to a chair in the room as Zuko lands on it. He looks back at the guards.)
Zuko: I didn't do anything wrong.
Mai: (off screen) Come on (Zuko looks to the source of the voice) Zuko. (Cut to show Mai with her head down at the corner of the room) We all know (looks up and walks into the light) that's a lie.
Zuko: (Cut back to Zuko's surprised face) Mai.
(Cut to a side view of Zuko on the floor staring up at Mai as she looks on with his arms crossed.)
In this scene and the next, we see that Mai never understood why Zuko left or why he broke up with her. In Part 1 of “The Boiling Rock,” Zuko tells Sokka that he broke up with Mai to protect her from retribution now that he’s been branded a traitor. If Mai understood Zuko and his motivations, she might have been angry—but she would not have been heartbroken, as she asserts in the next scene. (The next scene, I might add, which shows the usual Mai/Zuko relationship on full display: arguing, misunderstanding, sarcasm, accusations, Zuko trying to tell Mai something important about what motivates him as a person, and Mai not interested in hearing one word of it.)
(Scene returns to Zuko sitting down in a chair with his head down. Mai leans against the wall silently.)
Zuko: How did you know I was here?
Mai: (Cut to Mai who looks angry) Because I know you so well.
Zuko: (he looks up to her) But... how?
Mai: (Cut to Mai who looks to the side) The Warden's my Uncle you idiot. (Cut to Zuko who brings his hand to his forehead and groans) The truth is, (Mai's glove hand comes into screen and she unrolls a letter) I guess I don't know you. All I get is a letter. (Cut to a side view of the scene to show Mai with her hands outstretched at the side) You could have at least looked me in the eye when you ripped out my heart.
Zuko: (Cut to Zuko who looks at her apologetically) I didn't mean to...
Mai: (interrupts) You didn't mean to? (she walks behind Zuko to read out the contents of the letter) Dear Mai, I'm sorry that you have to find out this way, but I'm leaving.
Zuko: (harshly) Stop! (looks back at Mai) This isn't about you. This is about the Fire Nation.
Mai: Thanks Zuko. That makes me feel all better. (she throws the letter at his head. Zuko grabs his head and rubs the spot she threw the letter at.)
Zuko: (Cut to a side view of the couple) Mai, I never wanted to hurt you. (gets up from his chair and faces Mai) But I have to do this to save my country.
Mai: Save it? You're betraying your country.
Zuko: (Cut back to Zuko) That's not how I see it.
At this point, they are interrupted, and when the prison riot starts, Zuko locks Mai inside the cell with only a single look back that conveys his resolution to do what he must, even at the expense of their relationship.
Mai still has no idea why he is doing any of this. Her assessment that she doesn’t know Zuko is quite correct.
As baffling as it is, Mai never gets any other explanation for Zuko turning traitor than “I have to do this” and “That’s not how I see it.” Yet a few scant minutes later, Mai will decide to sacrifice her freedom and endanger her own life for this person! It’s an important step for her, and it helps round out her character. But it leaves us asking the same question of Mai that she asks of Zuko: why, exactly, are you doing this? Who is she making this sacrifice for—the little kid she grew up knowing, or the man that she still doesn’t know well at all?
If you are still in any doubt that Mai does not know Zuko, go back through the scenes we’ve covered and try to view them from Mai’s perspective—pretending you don’t know anything more about Zuko than what those scenes show. Would you like the Zuko you get from those scenes?—would you even know him? The nicest thing he ever does in front of her is dislodge a burning apple from Mai’s head; none of the scenes even begin to scratch the surface of who Zuko really is. These scenes do his courage and sacrifice no justice; his all-important bond with Uncle Iroh goes unacknowledged; there are no lessons learned nor people saved, and nosebleed seats, if any, to his inner conflict and why he can’t fit in. There’s also a real mean streak to that Zuko that we don’t get anywhere else (“Circus freak!”).
Zuko in these scenes is an adolescent jerk with deep-seated issues who bafflingly leaves the Fire Nation and then pops up fully adjusted and emotionally healthy in the finale, with no explanation for why he’s changed so much as a human being. There are giant gaps in his characterization that make him impossible to take seriously as a three-dimensional hero. These gaps could have been filled by the implied knowledge Mai has of Zuko from their shared childhood, but since none of that helps Mai understand who Zuko is now or the decisions he is currently making, their upbringing becomes increasingly unreliable as a way to fill in the blanks. It is thus unclear why Mai would sacrifice everything for the person that Zuko shows himself to be in front of her.
In any case, Mai makes her stand in front of Azula, unknowingly striking a stronger blow than she had intended by facilitating Azula’s eventual mental breakdown. It’s a powerful scene: for once in her life, Mai is not hiding her emotions, but wearing them like armor against a death that is all but certain. She admits that she loves Zuko, and to continue with the “lack of communication” theme that so characterizes this couple, not only is Zuko not around to hear it, but there is no indication he was told about it by her or anyone else at a later date. But Mai’s one good deed brings into the light a greater bond that she and Zuko lack—perhaps the greatest of all for the kind of people that they are. It is moral intimacy that is the last and worst omission for Mai and Zuko.
Mai goes the entire series without making a moral decision. Even at the Boiling Rock, Mai wasn’t standing up for what she believed when she defied Azula; she was standing up for who she loved. And the creators make a very clear distinction between the two when Mai accused Zuko of betraying his country earlier on, which she clearly saw as wrong. And yet, she later aids and abets his and the prisoners’ escape, still believing that he is doing the wrong thing, which by extension, means she is also doing the wrong thing. She does it anyway, but because she loves Zuko, not because she believes in his cause or what he is doing. In her eyes, she is doing the wrong thing for the right reasons, rather than the right thing for the right reasons, which is what a sound moral decision requires.
What is Mai’s code of honor? Where does she draw the line when it comes to hurting innocent people on Azula’s behalf? Does she feel any guilt for the actions that she and Ty Lee participate in, or does she see everyone as casualties of war? Has she ever been kind to someone outside of her inner circle? When her brother was kidnapped, then used as a pawn by Azula, then endangered in a fight with Ty Lee, not one single emotion passed across Mai’s eyes. Does family mean anything to her? How deep does her loyalty to the Fire Nation run? How separate is that from her loyalty to Ozai, or to Azula? What exactly does she make of the whole Avatar business, anyway? And if the answer to all of these questions is, “She’s bored and can’t be bothered,” then I’m afraid Zuko is going to have an impossible task in front of him. How will he maintain a relationship with someone who is incapable of comprehending the depth of moral conflict he went through and the reasons he fought so hard for his convictions?
Zuko’s struggle to find and follow his principles is the most central aspect of his character, yet it is a struggle Mai neither understands nor respects. Whenever Zuko exhibits signs of his beliefs or moral strife, she either dismisses them:
Zuko: I've got a lot on my mind. It's been so long. Over three years since I was home. I wonder what's changed. I wonder how I've changed.
Mai: I just asked if you were cold. I didn't ask for your whole life story. Stop worrying!
Doesn’t understand them:
Zuko: For so long I thought that if my dad accepted me, I'd be happy. I'm back home now, my dad talks to me. Ha! He even thinks I'm a hero. Everything should be perfect, right? I should be happy now, but I'm not. I'm angrier than ever and I don't know why!
Azula: There's a simple question you need to answer, then. Who are you angry at?
Zuko: No one. I'm just angry.
Mai: Yeah, who are you angry at, Zuko?
Tries to downplay them:
Mai: Zuko, it's just a dumb meeting. Who cares?
Zuko: I don't.
Mai: Well good. You shouldn't. Why would you even want to go? Just think about how things went at the last war meeting you went to.
Or doesn’t value them:
Zuko: Stop! This isn't about you. This is about the Fire Nation.
Mai: Thanks Zuko. That makes me feel all better.
And really, how can she understand a struggle she has never gone through herself? There’s no way she can relate to him on any deeper level; there is no place that she fits in with this new era of love and peace. Zuko is famous for taking the GAang on life-changing field trips, but the most important life-changing field trip he took was with himself. Mai never went on a trip like this where she had her view of the world challenged and had to grow because of it. That is why, while Mai reserves her love for Zuko, it never extends to a cause or greater purpose—a fairly serious missing component for a character who may help rule a nation one day.
The only solution, as we have seen before, is for Mai to adopt Zuko’s belief system as her own. This leads some people to accept the idea that “Mai believes in Zuko” as a way of creating moral intimacy between them, when it is absolutely no help in this matter at all. First, at no point does Mai say or demonstrate any such thing; if she had the kind of faith in Zuko that, say, Katara has in Aang, Mai would have defiantly told Azula that Zuko would rescue her, or that he would triumph in the end, or that he would become Firelord. But there’s no hint that Mai thinks Zuko can or will ever defeat Azula and/or the Firelord and take back the throne. Second—and more obviously—Zuko’s belief system is in conflict and constantly changing. If Mai simply believes in Zuko, wherever his beliefs lie at the moment, not only does that chain her whole morality to her love interest in a frankly disturbing way; it means she is doing the exact opposite of what Iroh encouraged Zuko to do himself, namely, to find his own path, not what someone else thinks his path should be. Third, there are many signs throughout that Mai doesn’t understand what Zuko’s belief system actually is, or what is required for him to keep to it. Mai needed to bring an ideological system of her own to the table before there was even a question of her dating Zuko; without it, she is clinging to a moral raft that doesn’t necessarily fit her and has only just begun to float itself.
This gap of moral intimacy will only grow wider after Zuko joins Team Avatar. Armed with the courage of his convictions, Zuko’s fledgling long-term belief system will take flight for the first time. Once it does, there’s no going back to the kind of person he was when he and Mai were dating. In fact, from here on out, there is no real reconnection to Mai at all. After Zuko and Mai’s last angry conversation, not only does Zuko never go back for Mai at the Boiling Rock (which could be defended because of the danger not only to himself but to his teammates), but he never even thinks about doing so. When they run for the cliffs, Zuko suddenly stops and is shown pondering—pondering not whether he should return for Mai, but how he and the people he’s with can best escape and get to safety.
The more we look back on it, the more we see that Mai was a convenient relationship for Zuko at a dark time in his life and little more. Not once does Zuko mention her throughout the first two seasons; the only time he thinks about her is in a flashback of a memory that primarily starred Azula. He latches onto her in an unhealthy relationship which he then leaves via letter, completely distancing her from the redemption arc so crucial to who he is. Between that time and when he sees her again, he mentions her once—when Sokka prompts him to think of her, because otherwise she would have been included in the dismissive “It wasn’t that hard” (to leave his home). Then she betrays Azula, and Zuko has every reason to believe that Mai is dead—that she died sacrificing her life for him—because that’s exactly what would have happened if not for the intervention of Ty Lee. And not only does he not go back for her; while he is with Team Avatar, he never mentions or is shown thinking about her again. By contrast, he can’t shut up about his uncle when he’s with his new friends and constantly thinks of Iroh when he’s alone.
It is Zuko’s relationship with Team Avatar that really puts the hurt on Mai/Zuko in terms of emotional intimacy. The GAang spends about the same amount of episodes with Zuko on their side as Mai does; there are zero romantic interactions between Zuko and any of them; and physical displays of affection are limited to friendly punches and hugs. Yet think of how much deeper and more meaningful Zuko’s relationship is with any of them than it is with Mai. Look no further than Toph—Zuko bonds more emotionally with a twelve-year-old earthbender than he does with his own girlfriend. By the time the series ends, Zuko has spent time with and formed bonds with people who completely open up to him, who share their dreams, their fears, and their darkest memories, and allow him to do the same without forcing a confession; people who have moral struggles and convictions of their own, and understand why he has them, too. He’s been around people who’ve watched his back in combat, who have complimented him, encouraged him, and defended him to other members of the team. The emotional intimacy with Mai pales by comparison. Just listen to how the GAang compliments Zuko:
- If we know anything, it's that Zuko never gives up.
- You know, Zuko, I don't care what everyone else says about you; you're pretty smart.
- I think your Uncle would be proud of you. Leaving your home to come help us, that's hard.
- You have redeemed yourself to your Uncle. You don't realize it, but you already have. All your Uncle wanted was for you to find your own path and see the light. Now you're here with us. He'd be proud.
- I know, I had the same reaction [to Zuko joining the Avatar]. After all he’s done, it was hard to trust him. But he's really proven himself and I never would have found you without his help.
- Well, you are kind of the expert on tracking Aang.
- Yeah, if anyone's got experience hunting the Avatar, it's you.
Here, on the other hand, is how Mai compliments him:
I don’t hate you.
I care about you.
I actually kind of like you.
The GAang’s words help form a picture in your head; even without knowing Zuko, you can start to get a sense of who this person is. By contrast, the things Mai says about Zuko could be said about anyone; we have no idea what specific traits she finds attractive and compelling. The reverse is true, as well: the only things Zuko praises Mai for are either things that she doesn’t normally do, or a negative worldview that he ultimately rejects as detrimental to his own goals and ideals.
As with Mai being kept in the dark about Zuko’s turning, there is a good reason why Mai and Zuko’s emotional intimacy pales in comparison to the GAang’s: the writers likely dreaded falling into the “redemptive romance” trap that would deny Zuko agency in his own development. But a balance can be struck between a romantic interest with no impact and a romantic interest that “saves” her beloved. For a good example, take Sokka and Suki, where Suki plays a pivotal role in helping Sokka get over his sexism, without Sokka being “saved” by her or relying on her for his morality. When we think about, not whether Zuko would live, but who Zuko would be without Mai in his life, and the answer that comes up is, “He’d be exactly the same!” …well, no relationship that really matters to a person should feel like that.
Season 3, Episode 21, Sozin’s Comet: Avatar Aang
The Avatar finale cements this for all time with the ultimate demonstration of physical vs. emotional intimacy:
Cut to an overhead shot of the crater in the Fire Nation capital the next day. Camera pans across the roofs of some houses singed and destroyed during Zuko and Azula's Agni Kai. Cut to Zuko in his room standing near the windows as the morning sunlight streams in. He puts on his outer robe. Cut to a close of Zuko with a bandaged torso as he moans and struggles to put his arm through the robe's sleeve.)
Mai: (off screen) You need some help with that?
(He looks up surprised and moves aside to reveal Mai leaning against the doorway. Cut to a close up of Mai as she walks towards Zuko.)
Zuko: (Cut to a delighted Zuko) Mai! (Walks off screen) You're ok. (Cut to an area behind Mai's back as Zuko opens his arms out in a hug) They let you out of prison?(Mai walks behind Zuko and lifts up his empty robe sleeve.)
Mai: My uncle (Zuko puts his arms through the sleeve) pulled some strings, (she proceeds to fasten his robe) and it doesn't hurt when the new Fire Lord is your boyfriend. (She walks in front of Zuko and places a hand on his chest)
Note Zuko’s surprise here, and also note its source. Mai wasn’t released because Zuko ordered it; she was released because of her uncle and because of word that the new Firelord was her boyfriend. This means that word would have had to spread around that Zuko was officially going to be the new Firelord before her uncle was able to release her. Bearing in mind that word in the Fire Nation travels at the speed of messenger hawk, the sheer amount of paperwork that goes into releasing a prisoner, and also that Mai would have had to travel from the Boiling Rock to the Caldera before reuniting with Zuko, we are talking about a few days’ time, at least—not a single day, as the transcriber implies.
Zuko has been Firelord for several days and yet has not given an order to release Mai from prison. Why? The answer is all too evident from the damning surprise in Zuko’s voice. He has completely forgotten the woman who had laid her life on the line for him. He doesn’t say, “Hey, you’re out of prison quicker than I expected!” He doesn’t say, “Mai, I didn’t think the release order would’ve gone through so fast!” or “Mai, I’ve been searching the records everywhere for you!” The only reason for Zuko not to have thought of releasing Mai from prison is if he genuinely thought she was dead—which, again, was the most likely outcome of her Boiling Rock betrayal—but since we never see him mourn her death or even ask Azula if she killed Mai, that’s an even worse option than forgetting about her in prison.
Again, for a counter example to this, take Sokka and Suki: when Sokka learns that Suki is in danger from Azula, he stops in his tracks, completely loses his head, and outright ruins the mission in his desperation to find out what happened to his girlfriend. To be sure, the responsibility of being the new Firelord must have been overwhelming for Zuko, and Azula’s lightning blast had seriously injured him. But not critically injured him; Zuko was conscious and standing upright under his own power right after Azula’s defeat, and there’s no indication that his reason or judgment were impaired by her attack. If he loved Mai, really loved her, she would not have been forgotten.
Zuko: So does this mean you don't hate me anymore?
Mai: (she blushes) I think it means... (Cut to a close up of the couple) I actually (places a hand on Zuko's cheek) kind of like you. (They lean in for a kiss and part a few seconds later, looking into each other's eyes happily) But don't ever (She jabs a finger into Zuko's shoulder and Zuko's eye traces the movement of her finger) break up (She lifts her finger into the air and Zuko's eyes still follows it) with me again.
(She jabs her finger into Zuko's shoulder one last time and Zuko smiles goofily. They embrace and the camera zooms out slowly.)
Did you see that? No, not the kiss; the fact that Mai still can’t lower her emotional defenses around Zuko. “I actually kind of like you” is the most loving thing she ever says to Zuko’s face. Now we could say, “She’s not afraid of making herself vulnerable; she’s just understating her emotions because she’s Mai.” But if that’s true, then why was Mai totally willing to declare her love for Zuko to Ty Lee, Azula, and the whole Boiling Rock prison staff—but not to Zuko himself? She is afraid of making herself vulnerable, even now, after all she’s been through for him. Case in point: she threatens Zuko into never breaking up with her as a way of hiding her own insecurity.
The fact that Mai then kisses him is poor compensation, and is the final nail in the coffin of their emotional relationship. Tragically, Zuko probably thinks Mai means exactly what she says she means—that she actually likes him, not that she loves him. Why would he be so happy about a simple confession of affection? Because Zuko is used to being starved for affection in the first place. Given his self-esteem issues, the fact that Mai is his first real girlfriend, and the fact that people liking Zuko at all is a very new idea for him…he could very well have no idea at all that she loves him. After spending most of his life around people who hated him or disrespected him, Zuko would be over the moon about having a girlfriend who actually kind of liked him—he would be willing to settle for that. And until we see a declaration of love from Mai, it seems that he might have to.
Zuko never says he loves Mai, either, but considering his treatment of her after he joins the Avatar, this could just as easily be because he doesn’t love her, and has been guilted/threatened into resuming their relationship because he feels he owes her, both for liking him after he dumped her, and for the prison rescue. It’s the honorable thing to do, after all! In fact, as disconcerting as Mai threatening Zuko into not breaking up with her is (switch their genders around, and that line is really not as cute as it first sounds), it’s easy to feel just as bad for Mai, because of the self-doubt that must have led to that pronouncement, and also because of the life it will force her to lead from here on out.
There is a lot of emphasis in this essay on Zuko’s psychological and emotional needs due to the fact that Zuko is the most developed character in Avatar, while Mai is one of the least. But let’s examine Mai and what she needs from her life for a moment. Right when we meet her, we know she is trapped: trapped as a spoiled Fire Nation noblewoman, a position so unpalatable that even joining up with Azula was preferable for a while. Fast forward to the end of the series, and what do we have? Zuko is Firelord over a nation that had only recently branded him a traitor. This means that what Zuko will need, and soon, is a wife and heir, in order not to leave it to chance that Azula (or worse, Ozai) will gain power if something happens to him. No matter what freedom Mai may want from her life, if she stays with Zuko, she must marry him, she must become a mother fairly quickly, and she must live out the rest of her days as Fire Lady in the palace. Unhappiness with one’s life and oneself is a huge obstacle to true intimacy—just ask Zuko!—so let us examine how Mai being Fire Lady would decrease her chances at happiness.
What, exactly, the Fire Lady’s duties consist of is never explicitly stated, but there are one of two ways it could go. One: she is a decoration piece, only there to look pretty (an insult to Mai if ever there was one), or two, she is a partner for Zuko in the political, moral, and social aspects of the huge job laid out for him. Unfortunately, Mai is shown to loathe being quiet and proper for the sake of her father’s political career, never mind her husband’s; she has never shown a moral compass or concern for social issues; and she is even less the life of the party than Zuko is at the one party they were shown attending. If you’re thinking of a working partner for the Firelord—one with political and military savvy, possessing a strong ethical code, who takes pleasure in the social graces, and is diplomatic to balance Zuko’s brusqueness, there is one person who fits this bill 100%: Iroh, who has also has the benefit of sticking by Zuko’s side through everything. Why Iroh is shuffled off to a tea shop in Ba Sing Se at a time when Zuko is fending off his fifth assassination attempt, while Mai is by Zuko’s side (and still failing to communicate with him!) in the comics is anyone’s guess. But even disregarding all of that, no one who appreciates Mai as a character would want her to have the life of a courtier, because that’s both the life she spent the entirety of Season 2 running away from and the direct cause of her greatest character flaw: her indifference.
A Word on the Comics
The characterization in the Avatar comics is dubious at best, and there are several moments that are just plain hard to believe coming from the characters we saw from the show. But for those who believe them to be a true spiritual successor to Avatar, we can certainly find a telling view of Mai and Zuko’s relationship. Not content with two break-ups in the course of a single season, Mai and Zuko try for Round 3 due to (what a surprise!) lack of communication—in this case, Zuko’s failure to tell Mai about his midnight chats with Ozai.
Zuko: I know I keep screwing up. But please...I…I love you, Mai.
Mai: I know. But lately I’ve realized that you love your secrets more. You’ll have an easier time keeping them when you’re alone.
Zuko: What are you telling me?
Mai: Good-bye, Fire Lord.
In this single instance, however, Gene Yang hits home. This moment follows exactly what you would expect from two people who don’t open up to each other, don’t really know each other, and don’t communicate well with each other. It’s an almost perfect amalgamation of their first break-up and Mai’s acknowledgement of their problems in the prison cell at the Boiling Rock. They haven’t progressed beyond that, and there’s no reason they would have, given that neither character makes a better effort to communicate in their final scene in the show than they did in their first episode as a couple.
Could they get back together in the upcoming comics? Of course—in fact, DiMartino and Konietzko might very well mandate it. But the real question is: could they get back together believably? Perhaps it is possible for Mai and Zuko to turn their relationship around 180 degrees, mend their communication issues, become emotionally and ethically intimate, and live happily ever after. After all, Zuko started out as a villain and ended up a deuteragonist! There is, however, one critical difference: the seeds for Zuko’s redemption were sown very early in the show, whereas no seeds were sown for Mai and Zuko’s compatibility at any point. As early as Episode 3, we had Zuko demonstrate a code of honor; in Episode 7, he halts his chase for the Avatar to save his uncle; in Episode 12, he risks his life for the helmsman and is shown to have gotten his scar due to his compassion for his people; at the end of Season 1, he tries to save Zhao, who had just attempted to kill him. But other than the fact that Mai and Zuko like each other in the most generic way, there is no touchstone for Gene Yang to use as a basis for a healthy relationship. If they do get back together, happily, healthily, it will come 100% out of nowhere—which is sloppy, inconsistent writing, and most of all, forced. And since Konietzko stated that he felt the other canon romance, Katara and Aang, also came off as forced, is that really the way they want to go?
More importantly, though, does it matter? Does it matter whether Mai and Zuko get together in the comics, when the show that was one complete story, beginning to end, finished seven years ago, in a different medium, with different writers and animators? To say that it does is to say that Avatar: The Last Airbender was somehow an unfinished product, just waiting for more “episodes” to be produced. But it wasn’t: Avatar had a beginning, a middle, and a big grand finale with the words “The End” in two languages. (In fact, the only words we see in English during the episodes themselves are the words “The End.”) That seems to hold as much finality as anything a creator could make. The ending of Mai and Zuko’s story is the ending they had on the show, and if that ending is not satisfactory, nothing tacked on to that ending after the story is over will change that.
The unfortunate thing about Mai and Zuko is: they are perfectly understandable as a couple. We can believe that they would become infatuated and physically intimate. We can believe that they would have the communication and trust issues that they did. We can understand their fighting and break-ups and why they could not develop on-screen together. We know why they are frustrated with each other, but also why they keep getting pulled back into each other’s lives. Mai and Zuko are completely viable as a dysfunctional teenaged couple who are holding onto each other until they can find their own identities and/or people who will help them to be better human beings. It’s just a shame that their course seems set towards marriage and children, instead of a final realization that they do not have the kind of closeness needed for a lifelong union.