Selling Yourself - Legend of Korra - Season 3, Episode 2

Who's ready for a whirlwind tour of the Earth Kingdom?  Asami is!  I guess after Varrick gave her back control of Future Industries at the end of Season 2, she whipped everything back into shape in no time.  And got all her awesomely cool toys back. She shows up with their ride and digs for the trip- a souped up, luxury zeppelin, called an airship.  Asami is back to treating everyone in style!  The team is optimistic about their trip.  Tenzin and Korra can't wait to see the Airbenders being talked about all over the Earth Kingdom; Bolin is excited to be going anywhere.  Jinora looks like she aims to find herself during the trip.  And Bumi is looking forward to whatever it is Bumi looks forward to.

Who wants to ride in my awesome airship?

There are some not going;  Kya and Pema will stay to take care of the baby, whose name I'm not learning until his crazy eccentricity is revealed.  Kya is introduced to babies by being vomited on by the baby, and Pema is right there to gloat over it.  Kya takes the incident well, considering she can always wash herself off without using her hands.  Ikki and Meelo are at first indignant they can't come. Even good old Poki the ring-tailed lemur is indignant.  But Kya mollifies them by informing them that more air benders are out there, and some will show up at Air Temple Island.  And they'll need someone to show them where the bathrooms are.  Meelo is excited at the thought of new students for him to boss around.  Ikki can't wait for company.

They're not the only ones staying behind.  Mako shows up with a scroll slung on his shoulder, but it's not for him;  he hands it to Korra, making sure to only address her in her official capacity as the Avatar.  Korra at first thinks it's funny to humor this, and she's pleased that Mako's made a map of where reports of new air benders came from.  She's not so pleased when she realizes that Mako's not coming.  In his defense, he does have a job that requires showing up.  Mako is getting ready to head back to Republic City when Bolin waylays him and guilts him into coming.  Bolin achieves this with a drama queen re-enactment of possibly meeting their father's mother in Ba Sing Sei and having to watch her die if Mako isn't there too.  Mako, who doesn't look like he ever expects to see any relatives ever, goes simply to shut Bolin up, complaining as he agrees that his boss isn't going to like this.

But Mako, what if you kill Grandmother?

As Team Korra lifts off and watches Republic City get smaller and farther away, a small motorboat brings a single man of the Order of the White Lotus to a wooden platform, secluded in the middle of the ocean.  It's a completely-made-of-wood setting for a wooden cage in which resides one extremely muscled and tattooed man.  Will flowing locks of black hair.  No metal, no rock anywhere in site.  The guards notice the approaching boat and think it's their shift change.  Who's here?  Zaheer!  He leaps out of the boat, with his spiffy new air bending powers, and has a little fun with the guards, as he tosses three medium sized rocks into the wooden cell.  The prisoner looks down and smiles.

Don't mind me, I'm just escaping

As Zaheer distracts the guards, the prisoner bends the rocks, and melts them into molten lava, then molds them into a shuriken, three curved blades joined together to make a center.  Sending his new toy out, the prisoner slices open the wooden cell in three cuts, and leaps out of his cell, creating pandemonium.  After defeating the guards, he greets Zaheer and asks about the new talent.  Zaheer informs him that he's been able to air bend since Harmonic Convergence.  What's more, Zaheer is convinced that gaining air bending is a sign.  From someone.  That he and his buddy, Ghazan, are doing the right thing.  Remember that.  Zaheer thinks he's the good guy.

How can we not be the good guys?

While prison breaks abound, Team Korra lands in the Earth Kingdom, at the first location on Mako's map.  As they land, the map pops up, showing a team in an airship floating around the map, all with excited smiles.  And Tenzin is rarin' to go once they land and are greeted by the local mayor, who's set up a dinner with Ku An, a local farmer who's been air bending as a hobby since Harmonic Convergence.  He's happy to meet Avatar Korra and Master Tenzin, and happy to screw up his air bending in front of them, all the while pretending not to love being a local celebrity.  But he's not so happy to find out that Tenzin and Korra want him to pack up, leave home, travel to the Northern Air Temple, and become a Air Nomad.

Yeah, I think I'll pass on being a monk with no stuff

Tenzin dismisses every reason Ku An gives for staying.  What's a farm compared to resurrecting Air Nomad culture?  Why would a man stay with his wife and kids and the only life he's ever known?  Tenzin is amazed that he's not aching to leave everything behind for the amazing life of an Air Nomad.  Korra tries to be polite, but her speech doesn't work on the kids, who don't want their dad to leave, either.  And Ku An's wife isn't pleased when Tenzin insists that she should be fine with her husband ditching her.  The dinner ends with Ku An kicking them out.

Back at the airship, our plucky gang tries to regroup.  What went wrong?  How could an airbender reject coming to a faraway temple, without his family, and learn about a culture he neither grew up in nor cares about?  Why would he want to leave his farm?  Doesn't he know there's a wonderful and totally alien life waiting for him if he gives up his old one?  Totally oblivious to what exactly they're asking of people, all except Mako strategize for future visits.  The idea to simply kidnap air benders in a potato sack and draft them as Tenzin's students is rejected, but only barely.

The journey to Earth Kingdom villages on their way to Ba Sing Sei goes pretty much like the dinner with Ku An, except Tenzin doesn't even get into anyone's house anymore.  Why?  He's got such a great life to offer air benders- you get to shave your head, wear a uniform, have few if any possessions, and meditate constantly.  If you advance enough, you'll even get some funky tattoos and a flying pet too big to fit in your house!  Why do people keep slamming their doors in his face?  He's got so much to offer the comfortable villagers of the Earth Kingdom!  Team Korra's map slowly shows a team going from happy to heartbroken.  All along their tour, they haven't gotten a single airbender to come with them.  Korra tells Tenzin to leave this last one to her.

The last one is a millennial with no ambition, and no desire to even move out of his parents' basement.  Mom is ecstatic that Avatar Korra has come to take him away, but he has no desire to go anywhere, do anything, and doesn't care about his airbending.  Korra takes to scolding him right away, completely flustered by his apathy and simple declarations that, actually, he doesn't have to care about the world, or balance. And neither does Korra.  Korra is horrified by his declaring that, actually, Korra doesn't have to work to achieve balance.  The guy doesn't seem to care about chaos; but then again, he gets to live in a rent-free orderly basement maintained by his parents.  How would he like the chaos of homelessness?  When Korra tries to angrily carry him away, the guy finally decides to use his new air bending to blow himself away from Korra.  Mako and Bolin end up dragging Korra away, while Mom can only bemoan still having her son in her basement.  Good luck with him, lady.  Maybe Zaheer should have come along to bust him out.

Dude, your mom's basement isn't that awesome

Contrast this homey situation with the next prison break we get to see.  Deep in a fiery pit, a single cage is suspended, currently occupied by an armless woman.  Ghazan and Zaheer sneak into the prison, using their new bending skills, and smuggle in water in a barrel, which Zaheer shatters within bending distance from the armless prisoner.  She immediately leaps into action, bending the water into prosthetic arms for herself.  And these are spiffy arms:  they can slice open her cell, swing her around, and climb back up the outside of the cage.  Her water arms can be like whips, or she can swing herself around the entire pit within moments.  When the guards are finally knocked out, she stands and happily tweaks the guys who just helped her escape.  Calling her Ming Hua, Ghazan and Zaheer are unfazed by her teasing, and Zaheer happily informs her that they're going to get his girlfriend next.  Oddly, she doesn't ask about the air bending.

Somebody make these for real, right now!

Too bad, because I think Team Korra would gladly take Zaheer at this point.  They are now completely dejected, with Tenzin still not seeing that the life of an air nomad is... well.. an acquired taste.  Bumi wonders if trying to sell the lifestyle could use some "razzle dazzle", and Bolin is on board, urging the team to put on a demo of what happens when air benders get some training. Make air bending look cool- maybe people will want to learn about it then.  Bumi was really just going to bedazzle Tenzin's jacket, but he thinks Bolin's idea is great.  Tenzin and Korra are actually ambivalent about making air bending look interesting for a crowd.  And the display they put on the next day, at some anonymous town in the Earth Kingdom, is as schlocky and tacky as they come.  Tenzin goes shirtless, maybe to look like a badass.  Bumi demonstrates that air bending is easy for novices to learn.  Bolin, as ringleader, wears a fake mustache and plays up everyone's performance.  He bamboozles the crowd into thinking a dangerous fire bender is nearby, one who just happens to be milling around in the crowd, and looks suspiciously like Mako.  When Mako appears, he deadpans his lines, and shoots up a pathetic puff of fire from his fist.  The crowd still loves the show as Avatar Korra uses air bending to "apprehend" Mako, and even uses some surprise moves, so she and Asami can get a kick of out startling Mako.

The crowd, though entertained, breaks up when the show ends, and Team Korra is left with one tweenie.  With his backpack, he's all ready to go with the team.  They're a little incredulous at first- is he sure he wants to live in an Air Temple?  But the boy, named Kai, is downright enthusiastic about leaving.  Right away.  When someone asks about Kai's parents, he launches into a teary description of a ruthless gang that killed his parents and are chasing him.  The group swallows it, except maybe Mako, who has yet to be enthusiastic about anything they've been doing.

Oh yeah, you're conveniently free to just come with us right now...

As everyone files back onto the airship, with Kai, some rough types show up on motorcycles, and shout out to the airship that they want Kai, and no one's leaving with him.  Korra, defender of everyone she thinks needs her help, marches out and promptly kicks their asses.  So, imagine her surprise when she finally spots the leader's badge.  Turns out, he's a cop, Kai's a thief, and his whole story was a lie.  Except for being an orphan.  He is.  But he's on the run after conning an adoptive couple out of their valuables.  When Kai can't be found, it's Mako who rejoins the group, lugging Kai and Kai's stolen goods back with him. As the cops lead Kai away,  Korra makes a decision.  Telling the cops to return the stolen goods, she offers to take Kai and raise him to abandon his life of crime.  Tenzin objects at first; can a liar and an thief really make a good airbender?  But Korra convinces him to agree to take the boy on.

However, that doesn't mean that Tenzin is going to like that arrangement; he snaps at Jinora when he catches her flirting with Kai and Kai flirting back.  Bolin is thrilled, already calling Kai his little brother.  But Mako makes sure to have a little "talk" with Kai, which is really just a series of threats if Kai doesn't stay in line.  Considering Mako and Bolin's past, as orphans with long criminal histories, Mako probably thinks he knows Kai and what he'll try to get away with better than anyone.  Maybe Mako, deep down, wishes someone had kept him honest as a child.  The speech also reminds one of Katara's "welcome" to Zuko when Zuko came to teach Aang waterbending.

Future best buds

We return to the prison of the fiery pit, where the Order of the White Lotus has to explain to a disappointed Fire Lord Zuko that Zaheer, Ghazan, and Ming Hua have all escaped before anyone really knew what was going on.  The poor schlepp also has to inform Zuko that Zaheer was air bending.  Zuko, seeming to know exactly what to do, tells the guard to call Republic City and put extra guards on the Avatar.  When the guard asks where Zuko is going, Zuko's response is to mount his ridiculously awesome dragon and tell the guard he's going to the Northern Water Tribe to talk to the chiefs there (guess who?), because he knows where Team Zaheer is going next.  Zuko then rides off, his dragon speeding away so that Zuko can get all Fire Lord on Zaheer's ass.

Consider his ride pimped.

Told By A Fearful Body - Legend of Korra - Season 3, Episode 1

Well, the gang has all returned to Republic City, or at least most of the gang.  The Wonder Twins have, presumably, returned to the Northern Water Tribes to break the "bad" news to their family about Unalaq.  And Varrik is who knows where, presumably with his loyal assistant Zhu Li.   Tenzin's family has returned to Air Temple Island outside Republic City, and Uncle Bumi and Aunt Kya are staying with them.  Spirits now roam throughout the material world, since Korra left last season with leaving the portals open between the worlds.  And not everyone's happy about it.  In fact, both spirits and humans seem to hate each other already.

Bumi is obviously up to important stuff, chasing his spirit buddy, Bum Ju (yes, that is short for Bumi Jr.), who he met during Harmonic Convergence, around Air Temple Island.  We find out, that Bumi just wants his spirit buddy to wear a sweater Bumi knitted.  The spirit buddy has shown enough sense not to ever wear anything Bumi makes by leading Bumi on a merry chase around the island, culminating in a tense standoff while Bumi hangs onto a tree growing over the edge of a cliff.

Just not a sweater guy

Bumi surrenders too late;  the tree branch he's on breaks and he plummets to the rocky ground below.
Just a couple feet above certain death, Bumi forces his hands forward, and out comes air!  Bumi is saved by a mini-ball of air supporting him.  Bumi realizes that he just unintentionally bent air!  He's ecstatic, but one can't help wondering if his spirit buddy maybe knew all along, and lured him over that cliff so that Bumi could learn the good news, too.

We catch up with Korra, Tenzin, and Jinora in Republic City, and Korra is frustrated.  Since leaving open the portals, enormous, unexplained vines have grown all over the city, rising to the tops of building like ivy.  The vines have created ecosystems within Republic City perfect for spirits, but really sucky for people, so, it's been Korra's job for two weeks to get rid of them.  Fire, as we see, doesn't work.  Jinora, cuddling with some spirits accompanying them, questions even trying to remove them.  Tenzin, after witnessing Korra defeating Unalaq, is confident that Korra will solve this problem.

When life hands you vines, grow grapes

He's the only one with total faith in Korra.  Even Korra doubts she can remove the vines.  And Republic City's news reporters have questions that show the entire city is sick of waiting and seeing.  President Reiko decides not to so much answer any of their questions, but instead just point out that Avatar Korra is to blame for all this, just as Korra appears at his side.  Korra, in typical Korra fashion, lashes out at the man who gave her no backup in the fight against Unalaq.  She reminds Reiko that the city wouldn't even exist anymore if not for her.  They're about to get into it with reporters watching, when Lin Beifong, still Police Chief, breaks it up.  Asami emerges from the disappearing reporters to try to cheer Korra up.

Why don't you just go climb the tree in your office?

Tenzin, meanwhile, has taken Korra, Asami and Jinora back to Air Temple Island for what I'm guessing is lunch.  On their way in, Bumi waylays Tenzin to give him exciting news.  He rushes everything out as if he's a five-year-old, and Tenzin treats him like one.  As Tenzin's whole family proceeds through the hellish ritual that is a family meal with young children, we see that Bolin is there too!

Aren't family dinners supposed to be good for you?

Bolin is asked about Mako, who Bolin says has stayed behind in Republic City, sleeping at the Police Station after work, since seeing just about anyone is awkward for him at this point.  Bolin drives the point home by impersonating Mako as a brooder with bad hair.  Bolin is in a fine mood, waxing on about how Tenzin's family contains every Crazy Family Stereotype.   Bumi has been staring at a napkin during this, but interrupts Bolin to point out that he moved his napkin.  Tenzin furiously tells Bumi to grow up and stop telling tall tales.  Bumi decides that the real problem is that his life isn't in danger, but Pema nixes Bumi's suggestion that Bolin attack him with a bolder.  Meelo has no such self-control, and excitedly hurls a dinner plate at Bumi's head.  Just as before, Bumi throws his hands in front of his face, and ball of whirling air envelopes the plate, spinning it inches from Bumi's face.

Wait, Bumi's not crazy????

The table is stunned. Even Meelo, who actually threw the plate.  Bumi is triumphant, declaring that he'll tell their mother, who will be so proud of him.  But, it doesn't last.  Bumi's airball runs out of air, and the plate crashes on the table.

We segue back to Republic City, where Mako is back at work, as a dedicated public servant of the police force.  Roused from sleeping under his desk, he answers a call to a bookstore, managed by two brothers for years.  The place is a wreck and one of the owners is frantic, claiming an argument became a storm.  Mako is confused, and even more so, when the man claims his brother was air bending.  Sighing because now he's got to get to the bottom of this, he proceeds to the room the so-called air bender locked himself into.  Mako is trying to keep calm, but the brother is scared of hurting anyone.  Mako threatens to break the door down, but that just ends up triggering a blast of air that blows the door off its hinges and right into Mako, throwing him across the room, buried under the door, as the air-bending brother races off, blown away by yet another gust of wind.  The first brother, bending over a recovering Mako, basically says I-told-you-so.

Back at Air Temple Island, Bumi desperately flails his arms and legs in futile attempts to consciously air-bend.  Its useless.  Korra and Tenzin try to theorize why Bumi might be air-bending now, but neither has an answer as both Mako and Lin Beifong quietly walk up to the family with no greetings to or from anybody.  When Lin Beifong mistakes Bumi's practicing as one of Bumi's crazy recreational activities, Tenzin has to give her the stunning news.  Except that the shared look between Mako and Beifong says that it's really not so stunning after all.  They share Mako's information with Tenzin and the rest.  Korra also tries to get Mako to come and stay on Air Temple Island.  Mako, wishing he was anywhere else but facing two ex-girlfriends who want him to move in, explains that he's doing important work.  The awkwardness ends in a completely unnecessary salute from Mako.

Korra and Asami, about to drive around looking for the mystery air-bender, decide that it's time for Korra to learn how to drive.  A stick shift.  It's not pretty, with Korra mistaking the brake for clutch.  They share some jokes at Mako's expense, and each ends up confessing that Mako kissed her while he was going out with the other.  Why they don't jointly realize that Mako is a total dog, but instead share a laugh over lost loves, is beyond me.  They have no time to realize the sad truth about Mako, as they've been missing the huge vines growing right in the road, which Korra barely misses.  Before they can be relieved, a porcupine spirit emerges from the vines, and Korra loses her calm.  She insists that the porcupine get rid of the vines, telling him that this is supposed to be a place for humans. The spirit insists that they didn't create the vines, and disdainfully tells Korra that spirits and their habitats can't be considered separate entities.  He implies, the snooty tone we've all come to know from spirits, that Korra should already know that.  She didn't, but she's suddenly inspired with an idea for getting rid of the vines.

Don't look at me, lady, I'm just a tenant

The kids, back at Air Temple Island, ambush Tenzin with questions.  With new airbenders, their lives could change, and they're ambivalent.  Ikki insists that she's not sharing her room with new recruits;  Tenzin tells her she'll keep her own room, but the Island itself will probably become more crowded.  That's fine with Meelo, who dreams of commanding an army of air benders.  Jinora schools him on air bender societies not having armies. Tenzin agrees with Jinora, but he gets a little misty-eyed as he wishes they get enough air benders to fill the temples around the world.  Meelo wants his dad to be their boss, but Tenzin is more worried about being their guide.  Meelo, with his grandfather's imposing statue behind him (somehow fixed right away after Unalaq destroyed it, I might add), tells his dad that the kids will help.  Oh joy.

Korra, meanwhile, approaches a vine-covered building in Republic City, a building built along a canal with plenty of water.  As she's about to begin her experiment, Lin Beifong and Bolin by her side, a crowd forms behind her.  It's President Reiko, with reporters.  Perhaps feeling that she needs supervision, or hoping she'll fail so Reiko can keep blaming her for the City's problems.  Korra demands that the reporters shut up, and turns to face the vine-covered building.  She bends water into tentacles that soon circle the whole building, and turns the water to spirit energy.  The vines respond by retreating back into the canal with her water/spirit energy.  She humbly bows to the vines, wishing them peace.  All are stunned.  The reporters dash to Korra, and are about to worship her, when the canal erupts, vines literally throwing themselves back around the building, covering even more of it, and the building on the other side of the canal, for good measure.

In fact, so many vines pull the other building, it's about to topple over.  Lin Beifong and Bolin react quickly, sending stone support pillars up to hold up the building so Korra can evacuate everyone inside, including a kid stuck in the upper stories.  A turret falls on the street just as Korra gets out from under it, and a crowd forms around the disaster.

Oh, I'm gonna' look like an idiot now...

Korra reverts to meditating, in an attempt to contact past Avatars.  However, they are still gone, just like Korra declared they were after defeating Unalaq.  Tenzin interrupts, but Korra's fine with giving up anyway.  Without past Avatars, can she even go into the Avatar state anymore?  Korra doesn't whine about losing her connection to the past, mostly because it's her own fault.  Instead, she bemoans her pariah status in Republic City.  Tenzin reminds her that she's not an elected official.  She has another job, which is keeping the world's powers in balance.  Sometimes, to restore balance, change must come.  And not everyone is going to like that change.  But what people "like" isn't necessarily Korra's problem.  Balance, Tenzin feels, might just be its own reward.  When Korra complains that she almost never knows what to do, Tenzin tells her that true wisdom is realizing what you don't know.

Bolin interrupts them with a rushed speech that he realizes too late is pretty rude. The police found the other new air-bender,  who has now climbed to the top of the bridge, begging the police to not approach him, and blasting them off the bridge into the bay when they don't listen to him.  Korra approaches from the air, and Mr. New Airbender can't ward her off.  She settles on the bridge with him, and tells him that there are people who can help him with his new powers.  Mr. Newbie wants his old life back; Korra tells him that might not be possible, but he should be taken to the Air Temple Island and just talk to the people there.  He doesn't sound optimistic, and then falls off the bridge. Korra, totally in control, saves him from falling onto the roadway, to the crowd's relief.  Tenzin warmly and kindly greets Mr. Newbie, who has gotten his stuff together enough to crack a joke about needing a diaper change.

Despite Korra saving the day, President Reiko is not pleased.  He's furious that Republic City just seems to be going from one disaster to the next, and blames Korra, banishing her from Republic City.  Korra, stoic, agrees that she'll be going.  She turns to Tenzin, and seems happy when she tells him that her new mission is to find these new air-benders, and get them to Tenzin.  Tenzin informs Korra that she won't be bringing anyone to him, because he's going with her.  This episode shows how the bond of Tenzin and Korra has grown; he's never exasperated with her, and knows now to follow her instincts. Korra has learned to stop resisting Tenzin's lessons, and can benefit from earning his loyalty.  Both seem completely unfazed by Reiko's banishment of Korra.  They've got a mission to look forward to; one only an Avatar and master air-bender can undertake.  Tenzin is already daydreaming of new and wonderful air nomads.

Far away (we think), in a mountainous country, where jagged rock-bergs jut from the sea below, a lonely prison cell is getting a visit.  It can only be reached by a bridge, that can only be extended by metal-bending.  A few members of the Order of the White Lotus approach, one with a tray of food.  They have a leader who lacks enough sense to wear a helmet.  He shouts at the prisoner, named Zaheer, to go to the back of his cell, and face away from the barred door.  The guard deposits Zaheer's meal through a slit between the bars.  A setup to show that this Zaheer is considered a dangerous man, who needs a cell in the middle of nowhere that is unreachable for normal people, with highly trained bender-guards.

Zaheer is a grizzled man, not young but not old.  And he is perfectly calm.  He decides now is the time for philosophy, and asks if the guard knows of Air Guru Laghima.  Apparently, legend has it that Laghima was so in tune with air-bending, that he one day rose from the ground and never touched it again.  Zaheer is particularly obsessed with one of Laghima's sayings:  "Instinct is a lie/ Told by a fearful body/ Hoping to be wrong".  Zaheer interprets it to mean that what you see doesn't even begin to describe the universe, and if you base your expectations on what is seeable, you can be taken by surprise.  By, say, a prisoner who can suddenly air-bend.  Zaheer blasts air at his guards, blowing them back far enough from the door so he can escape.  One by one, the White Lotus guards, despite bending fire and earth and water at him, can't touch him as he glides and somersaults his way around all elements and guards.  One by one, the White Lotus guards are blown into Zaheer's old cell, and then Zaheer blows the door back in place, leaving his guards with his meal as their only food.

He has a very special set of skills

The leader of the guards demands to know what Zaheer plans on doing.  Formally announcing that he's the bad guy of the season, Zaheer outright tells them that he can see a future without the Order of the White Lotus.  And without the Avatar.  He leaps off the rock-berg for who knows where.

Notice that, unlike last season's cat and mouse with Unalaq, where we suspected he was trouble, then realized he was evil, then realized what he was really up to, Zaheer is announcing his intention to rid the world of the Avatar outright.

And now on to a final thought.  There's another interpretation of Laghima's poem.  "Instinct is a lie/Told by a fearful body/ Hoping to be wrong."  Your fears will try to hold you back.  But inside, there is a part of you that hopes you won't listen to your fears.  Is that the real lesson to be learned this season, as Korra's world grapples with the changes of integrating the spirit and material worlds?

Welcome to Self-Awareness - Dawn of the Planet of the Apes

It's a tale of lost hopes, for both apes and humans.  Both communities fray and come apart, with disastrous consequences for the other.  Both communities have leaders bickering amongst each other, for war and for peace.  The human community is desperate for electrical power, and willing to kill to get a hydro-electric dam the apes live next to working again.  The ape community doesn't trust humans, after being treated cruelly in various forms of human captivity.  The humans mistakenly resent the apes for the simian flu that wiped out the rest of humanity, sinking them back into the dark ages.  Neither community has any good feelings for the other.

Warning: Obvious Animal Farm Reference!

They meet without expecting too, in an ugly incident that scares and angers both communities.  The human leaders and apes set conditions that our plucky band of human heroes struggles to meet as they work, sometimes together, to repair the dam and turn the generator back on.  There's oohing and aahing over a baby chimpanzee that almost brings apes and humans together, until another ugly incident almost ruins their plans for the damn.  There's a human who saves the life of one of the females who has just given birth, which gives everyone the chance to finish the task despite mistrust and anger.  There's Maurice, a gentle orangutan, wiser than the others, who finds himself interested in the humans and their books.

Shared baby love!

The main conflict of the story is between Caesar and Koba, two chimpanzees leading a band of a few hundred chimpanzees (calling them chimps when they can talk just seems like a slur).  There are human conflicts, especially between Malcolm, leading the human team to restart the hydro-electric dam, and Dreyfuss, wanting electricity and contact with the world outside San Francisco at all costs.  Carver, a jumpy, gun-toting fool, is in conflict with the rest of the dam team and the apes.  These conflicts fade as the other humans Malcolm disagreed with die during the film. Caesar and Koba's falling out, Koba's vicious betrayal, and Caesar's justice in the end, slowly take center stage.  As apes, they have a distinctive way of showing who owes loyalty to whom.  As Caesar and Koba's deep friendship turns to hatred, their "handshakes", showing Koba's loyalty to Caesar, and Caesar's trust of Koba, become briefer.  As Koba brings vicious, Game of Thrones-style plotting to ape civilization, Koba also hoodwinks Caesar's teenaged-son Blue Eyes, who realizes almost too late that he owed his father his loyalty all along.

Koba has good reason to hate humans, as he spent his early life as a test animal in a lab, basically being tortured in the name of science.  Caesar, as the adopted "child" of a researcher from the lab, has every reason to think there are good humans, even if they can be annoying.  Blue Eyes has almost never seen a human, and is a new generation of chimpanzee, who only knows of human mistreatment and civilization from stories.  He and his teenaged buddy, Ash, are prime for Koba's schemes.  As Koba's paranoia and hatred for humans puts him in conflict with Caesar, and with a small group of apes still loyal to Caesar, Koba becomes what he hates in humans.  However, since this leads to a ridiculously awesome shot of Koba riding a horse and firing two machine guns while a fire burns all around him, it seems like the conflict was worth it.

Holy fuck, yes, totally worth it

Not so for Caesar, even though he eventually wins his conflict with Koba.  Not so for Malcolm, though he and Caesar are best buds at the end, and the humans captured by Koba have been freed.  Not so for Blue Eyes, who will lose his friend Ash to Koba's greed for power.  Despite the stalemate fought to between humans and apes, the war is just beginning between them.  Caesar declares, at the end, that the apes started this war, but it's easy to point fingers at humans who unknowingly played right into Koba's hands; Dreyfuss, who wants to invade and slaughter the apes if they won't allow Malcolm's team to save the city; and Carver, who breaks the apes' conditions and is forced to admit being a total asshole by literally every other member of the human team.  There were apes who were more than happy to march to San Fran with Koba for revenge; but they lost their taste for blood early, and didn't want to kill scared and obviously innocent humans.  

Despite Caesar's hopes for a Great Ape Society, peaceful and strong and intelligent, their society is now one where apes will plot against each other, hurt each other, even imprison each other.  Malcolm must accept leaving his home, just after re-establishing electrical power and thinking his human settlement was finally safe.  When Caesar and Malcolm part at the end, after the ape version of a hug, both have accepted that, despite their friendship, their societies will never be the same, and never get along.

Actually we're all apes.