r/ATLA • u/CTYankee1788 • 6d ago
Discussion I've always wondered about this scene.
The way Azula worded herself made it seem like disobeying her and waiting for the waters to calm was the smarter decision. If they went against her orders, they'd have a chance of survival, but if they followed her orders, they'd die for sure. Maybe the captain figured that Azula's wrath would be worse than death, which is believable. Iroh and Zuko thought that too. But Azula didn't imply that in this conversation. She only brought up chances of survival.
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u/BlackRaptor62 6d ago edited 6d ago
(1) Do the tides command this ship?
(1.1) Azula is in charge of the ship, not "the tides". So Azula makes the decisions, not "the tides"
(2) And if I were to have you thrown overboard, would the tides think twice about smashing you against the rocky shore?
(2.1) If the Captain "fell into the water", would "the tides" be merciful and not kill him? No, they wouldn't be.
(3) Well then, maybe you should worry less about the tides who have already made up their mind about killing you, and worry more about me, who's still mulling it over.
(3.1) So rather than listening to "the tides", who have already decided to kill him if he "fell into the water", listen to Azula, who has not yet ordered him to "fall into the water", where the tides would them kill him.
(4) The actual logistics of bringing the ship into port aside, it seems pretty clear to me.
(4.1) Listen to Azula and you might live.
(4.2) Listen to "the Tides" and you had better hope that you can swim back to the Fire Nation.
I think you've got it backwards mate.
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u/pretty_smart_feller 5d ago
Even if the line didn’t make nautical/logistical sense, it’s one of the coldest lines in the series so it gets whatever pass it needs
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u/MissinqLink 5d ago
Do the tides command the ship?
Yes they do actually. Anyone who has spent any amount of time at sea will tell you. If you are really not sure then look at what happened to Zhao.
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u/Melodramatic_Raven 5d ago
Yes, that's the point. She's asking for the impossible and so the captain is forced to choose between risking the tides destroying the ship or Azula destroying him by throwing him to the tides.
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u/Anomandaris36 5d ago
I've always seen this scene as kind of a nod to Zhao's end. Like Azula saying to the audience " Yeah the last villain got killed by the tides (moon and ocean) but I'm way deadlier than them". Cool intro for the new villain.
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u/TOkun92 6d ago
I believe Grey DeLisle, her voice actress, actually used that line for her audition. They loved the way she did it so much that they actually added it into the show just to show off how dangerous, powerful, and well respected/feared she was. They were all so scared of her that they would rather risk their lives in bad waters than disobey her.
She was also the only one, or one of the only ones (that’s a lot of ‘O’s’), to speak calmly in her audition; most of the VA’s spoke angrily and yelled, like a hot-headed, spoiled child, when they read her character profile. Grey, meanwhile, spoke with icy venom that sounded authoritative and absolute.
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u/realamerican97 4d ago
Greys got a certain tone to her voice that I adore she’s got a perfect record of playing sociopathic women
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u/Maleficent_Spite_894 6d ago
"Do the tides command this ship?" It's one of my favorite lines from Azula along with, "Don't flatter yourself. You were never even A player."
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u/Midnight1899 6d ago
What she actually said was: "The tides will definitely kill you no matter what. I might not, so you should try to get on my good side.“
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u/Heroright 5d ago
It’s meant to convey that Azula presents herself as an intellectual, but she’s an abject fool. She disregards what a seasoned veteran says, she lords over the threat she possess—not because of her, but because of her father—, and ultimately loses Zuko because of it while still posturing like it’s someone else’s fault; and nobody can object to her.
The series perfectly weaves the fact that Azula isn’t as smart as she thinks she is, but she’s an expert at reading situations and leveraging her status of position over people to get what she wants; even if what she wants won’t work.
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u/Comfortable_Clerk_60 4d ago
Honestly Azula herself reminds me of a quote, “Intelligence without wisdom is worse than stupidity.”
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u/Heroright 4d ago
It even ultimately culminates with her being made Fire Lord, and now her tantrums have clear repercussions because she no longer has someone else to leverage. She has all the power, and her word is law; and she proceeds to do nothing right—again even throwing out her wisest advisors because they talked back.
Ozai kept his advisors on a leash, and listened to them. Often he wouldn’t do what they said, but keeping people smarter and more experienced than you close is the best thing you can do as a leader.
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u/gundaymanwow 5d ago
“whatever peril i command you face, i am infinitely worse if you’re on my bad side. “
pretty good intro i think. shame they lost the azulas obsession for perfection angle at some point. i mean she was frustrated at a strand of hair after her display of lightning
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u/Xenozip3371Alpha 6d ago
Honestly, this is Azula being childish and on a power trip.
The fact is that docking that ship absolutely risked crashing it, possibly killing some of the crew.
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u/OrlinWolf 5d ago
She’s saying “do what I tell you. Maybe the tides will hurt the ship, maybe they won’t. You better chance it rather than disobey me and get kill you for sure.”
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u/Cultural_Chest_6387 4d ago
I wondered about it too and what makes sense to me is that she was angry because rather than ask if she still wanted to proceed or wait, the captain walked up and stated with finality (even if respectfully) that the tides would not allow them to enter port. Implicitly though he's saying that HE has decided that they will wait, given the tides and expecting Azula to abide by this. And of course, because she's Azula that was a no go.
I also always assumed that the ship was plenty capable of entering under those conditions but that he was likely going super "by the book" in wanting to wait; perhaps out of an abundance of caution for the safety of the princess he was transporting. Obviously Azula knows every detail relating military protocols, ship designs (remember Chet from Ember Island lol), and their capabilities and she certainly would not have risked running her ship aground on her first mission from Ozai just to assert dominance lmao. I think she just saw no need for hyper caution in that case, and then was pissed by the captain informing rather than asking her about next steps.
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u/WildMboi 4d ago
There is probably a timeline where the captan has a smug look on his face when the ship gets stranded after running aground due to the tides pushing them too close to the shore.
(He knows he will probably die but he got to watch the hot head he was put under get some karma before he passed on of “Natural causes”)
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u/Dryhtlic 6d ago
The way I understood it, the tides made it unsafe to land right at the time, not impossible, and it would have been standard procedure to wait until they were more favourable. Obviously, Azula didn't care about caution and interpreted the captain's hesitation as disobedience and gave him the simple choice to find a way to make it happen or die.