AWKWARD ZOMBIE

EDIT:
Someone did it.

So I rewatched the Guru episode of Avatar and things start to make sense now

Guru Pathik said that there are four chakra points that connect to the elements. Chakras can also be manipulated by physical stimuli (ala Aang getting poked in the back in the finale), so I'm just guessing that Amon was using bloodbending to somehow block off the chakras associated with each element. With Korra, he blocked the Fire, Earth, and Water chakras, figuring he could ignore the Air chakra. Korra could suddenly airbend because it was the only way left for her spiritual energy to go.

In regards to Mander's Chakra reference.Another possible reason that he couldn't take her Airbending: he's never sealed that particular Chakra before. When would he have had the chance to practice on an Airbender? He made the mistake of leaving the Airbenders tied up and with their bending intact.

My thoughts regarding the finale:

Amon being a Bloodbender. Somehow more mundane than I hoped for, but reasonable. Plus it links into Tarrlok's story, pulling the 'special benders' into a common origin. If they were separate it might have felt off, Tarrlok would have just been an extra villain to move the plot along a bit.

The sealing of Korra's bending except wind can not be deliberate, it would be way too sloppy for him. He doesn't need to target specific Chakra's to block bending, just damming one up should work well enough for his purposes. However, he has never worked with someone who has locked bending already, so just going to guess that wind was a 'dried pool' and that by sealing Korra the Chakra had nowhere else to go. And/or when in an emergency your body gives you more strength than you can normally muster, right? Korra was desperate to save Mako (or whatever his name is), and like an adrenaline rush to the muscles, she unlocked air.

the 'Dues Ex' at the end. The avatar state unlocks every ability from the past avatars. Even if Katara is currently the greatest healer in the world, there were others before her. It's a long line, someone will likely have a relevant skill. (I'm willing to bet somewhere there's an avatar who mastered bloodbending and more with spirit bending.)

My question though: How long has Amon been around, and Mr. Sato working for him? Because when the planes came flying out it seemed no one had seen one before. I'm willing to give Sato and his engineers credit, but they'd never publicly released information about the planes that did no more than skip like the Wright's? I'm a little curious on how fast they managed reached that level of plane-sophistication.

My theory on the planes is that they probably started off trying to mimic the Air Nomads' method of flying and skills. They would often spin their stick around really fast, and that causes wind to fly out. Propellers. They use the wind to lift their gliders and fly, add those two together with the brand new electricity, and bam, planes.
I'm assuming they off-screened a whole lot of trial and error, as well. Getting a working design, training all those people to fly them, ect.
My favorite thing about this universe is that the all the technological advances all of a sudden can all easily be explained by the benders giving the nonbenders ideas, and the nonbenders making that a reality. Or, both benders and nonbenders working together, which is how I imagine electricity was harnessed in this universe. All five types of people working together can work wonders.

Technological advancement in the avatarverse is kind of weird to analyze because they never actually had to invent things like generators, they just hire people who can shoot lightning out of their fingertips.

Oh no

You've awakened the inner aviation nerd within me

and he is angry at you.

Just imagine what we could accomplish today if we could bend the elements to our will!

What? You can't?

Manmade lakes, hills, forests, and wind turbines

So... the partner and I had been avoiding this thread since we hadn't watched it. Now we have.

TL;DR: I didn't like it.

Spoiler for negative opinion.

For me, it wasn't just the ending. Pretty much everything from the moment she shows interest in Mako onwards sucked. There were a lot of things I liked too... but they are completely outweighed by what, I felt, was shitty story telling.

There were a lot of poor story choices that were made, a lot of unexplained plot threads, and a lot of late additions to the plot.

Animation and music was pretty awesome, though later on the music didn't stand out as much. The swing music early on was a sweet addition.

I think they might have also been missing a voice director. The voice actors themselves weren't that bad, some didn't fit the character and some just needed a bit of coaching to be a bit less flat.

Characterisation was hit and miss. Some characters were just swept under the rug entirely.

Too much new information was revealed in the second last episode due to the climax being pulled out of their asses.
Too little plot development leading up to the climax.

They missed out on dealing with a lot of complex themes and concepts and instead devoted way too much screen time to teen romance.

The ending for Amon and Tarlok was pretty good, though that plot device only turned up in episode 11. So it missed out on having the impact it could have had if it had been a simmering story thread.

We could go into so much detail as to what is wrong but we'd probably piss people off.

Okay, it bothers me whenever people saythat just because Amon died, that the equalists were still a threat

THE UNITED REPUBLIC JUST SENT TWO FLEETS TO THE CITY
THE WEAKENED REMNANTS OF THE EQUALISTS CAN'T DO SHIT AGAINST AN ARMY
THEIR PLANES ARE DONE FOR, THE MECH SUITS MORE OR LESS USELESS, WITH NO WAY TO RESUPPLY THANKS TO SATO BEING OUT OF THE PICTURE

Gah, it's like they ignored the UR entirely.