Azula is the secondary antagonist in the animated series, Avatar: The Last Airbender. She also appears in the sequel comic series by Dark Horse, appearing as a recurring antagonist in The Lost Adventures anthology, the central antagonist of The Search trilogy, and as the main antagonist of the Smoke and Shadow trilogy.
She is the princess of the Fire Nation, daughter of former Firelord Ozai and Ursa, younger sister of Zuko, a master strategist and the archenemy of Team Avatar.
=What makes her sympathetic?[]
- A lot of her personality and her drive to be loyal is because of her upbringing and desperate to impress her father, Fire Lord Ozai, in order to win his approval and love of every parent.
- Shows some care for her friends Mai and Ty Lee. Azula comforts Ty Lee when she had insulted her by accident, spends some time with them and when they attempt to leave the Fire Nation, Azula simply imprisons them rather than executing them as her father had ordered.
- Even though she tries to kill him and has a sibling rivalry with him, Azula shows some care for her brother, Zuko. She allows him to pretend that he killed the Avatar and subsequently to return from his banishment, allows him to spend some time with her and her friends at the beach and later at a party and gives him an advice to stop visiting his uncle, so that he wouldn't end up in trouble. In the comics she tries to help him with his reign (even though her methods are destructive).
- She suffers from deep insecurities which were being unloved and abandoned by Ursa, even her final moments include hallucinations of Ursa coming back.
- At a party she attends, Azula falls in love with one of the boys and tries to impress him and to win him over as a boyfriend. However, her attempts fail miserably because she is socially awkward in situations where she doesn't have complete control or doesn't have to fight against someone.
- In the last days before her defeat, Azula's sanity starts cracking up from all the pressure she has experienced and from feeling left out by her father. She becomes more and more paranoid and starts fearing that everyone is conspiring against her and wants to kill her. Even when she hallucinated the words she wanted from her mother, she breaks the mirror as she cannot accept it due to going against Ozai's standards.
- When she is finally defeated and chained after losing her duel, Azula breaks down and starts crying because of her failure and pressure (betrayal of her two friends, Ozai's rejection and failed relationship with Ursa). The scene is obviously played for sympathy by the narrative.