The Legend of Korra (season 4)
| Book Four: Balance | |
|---|---|
Region 1 DVD cover art
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| Country of origin | United States |
| No. of episodes | 13 |
| Release | |
| Original network | Nick.com |
| Original release | October 3 – December 19, 2014 |
| Season chronology | |
Book Four: Balance is the fourth and final season of the animated television series The Legend of Korra by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko. It consists of thirteen episodes ("chapters"), all animated by Studio Mir. The episodes are made available on the Nickelodeon website and other online outlets each Friday beginning on October 3, 2014. Critical reception of Book Four, as of the series in general, was positive.
Book Four is set three years after the previous season. It deals with Avatar Korra's journey of self-discovery following the physical and psychological injuries she incurred in the fight with Zaheer and with unrest in the Earth Kingdom where Kuvira, formerly a security officer in Suyin Beifong's service, seeks to seize power by military force.
After Nickelodeon cut the budget for season 4 by about the amount required for one episode, DiMartino and Konietzko decided to include a clip show episode, which reuses previously produced animation, instead of letting many of the creative staff go. Inspired by Samurai Champloo's clip show episode "The Disorder Diaries", they chose to frame a series of edited clips from the previous seasons of The Legend of Korra with about five minutes of new animation. Aired as episode 8, "Remembrances", the clip show was also intended as "a lighthearted romp" similar to Avatar: The Last Airbender's episode "The Ember Island Players" before the series enters its dénouement.
In the final scene of the season and the series, Korra and Asami face each other holding hands. This scene recalls the earlier wedding scene between Zhu Li and Varrick, as well as the last shot of Avatar: The Last Airbender, in which Aang and Katara kiss. It was subject to discussion outside of entertainment media, notably after the series' creators confirmed that the scene was meant to signify Korra and Asami becoming a romantic couple. According to Joanna Robinson for Vanity Fair, who described the series finale as "the most subversive television event of the year", it "changed the face of TV" by going further than any other work of children's television in depicting same-sex relationships – an assessment shared by reviewers for TV.com,The A.V. Club,USA Today,IGN and Moviepilot. Megan Farokhmanesh of Polygon wrote that by portraying Korra and Asami as bisexual, the series even avoided the error of assuming sexual orientation, as many other TV series did, to be a strict divide between "gay" and "straight".
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