[No Spoilers] To my friend who refuses to watch LoK, but loved The Last Airbender.

I agree, and it's a point that I've consistently held, that Korra was severely restricted by the length of its seasons and its format when it comes to character development.

Bolin did some things differently in later seasons compared to before, but I'd say that the difference is relatively superficial. Although yeah, standing up against Mako to support Kuvira was probably one of the better character moments for him. Bolin's character works best with charm rather than straight out laughs IMO (see: fight vs Ghazan or fight as Nuktuk), so I don't know what I'd have done with his character to be honest.

You raise a possible point about the innocence of little kids being relevant, but I don't see how that necessarily translates to that episode. It was clearly framed as a sort of sibling moment where the siblings learned about each other, it wasn't framed in a Korra context. Taking out that episode completely wouldn't have changed a thing, since we've seen Korra be far more tender with kids in many other moments anyway.

I actually don't think that ATLA is that much more predictable than LoK when it comes down to it. We know Aang is going to defeat Ozai but not kill him because it's a kids show and the good guys don't kill. Similarly, we know Korra is going to triumph and that she won't kill in the process, even if the villains might. It's not just about whether you're surprised by the result, it's also about execution. You mentioned twists in Korra, but did you expect Aang to get straight up killed by Azula and lose his ability to go into the Avatar State as well? Or for Zuko to betray Iroh? Those were plot developments that certainly didn't follow a standard storyline, and relied heavily on the characters to pull it off. Literally the only predictable constant in the show was that Aang would eventually confront Ozai 1v1; everything else was constantly in motion. I would't say that the show was exactly predictable on the whole.

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