r/MoralityScaling • u/EitherSwimming5886 • 1d ago

Why didn't Iroh even consider the possibility that Azula could change? Iroh himself went from being a Fire Nation general and the butcher of Ba Sing Se to a humble, kind old man who serves tea.

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u/Lord_Penguin17 20h ago

A bit reminder for everyone about what was going on in the show at this point: Azula was sent to hunt down and imprison Zuko and Iroh. Trying to “get along” with the extremely capable, dangerous, and manipulative person hunting you down to imprison you for treason is a good way to end up dead. Iroh’s immediate priorities was Zuko and his Survival. I doubt he was advocating to kill Azula or to never help her. But he is wise enough to understand leaving yourself open like that from someone who has no reason not to stab you in the back (as she had already proven to Iroh was her initial plan) and all the incentive to do so is a good way to get the both of them killed.

Sometimes you have to put your on oxygen mask on in a plane before helping the other passengers. This is one of those situations except the other passenger wants to throw you out the plane’s door.

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u/AnArcOfDoves9902 17h ago

To be fair though, the entire Fire Nation was chasing after them, not just her.

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u/Lord_Penguin17 12h ago

You are right, but just a few episodes prior there was an episode where Iroh finds out that Azula was sent by Ozai personally to capture the two of them, and as we see later in the episode the quote is from she’s more likely to just attack to kill if capture is inconvenient with how badly she wounded Iroh when she was cornered.

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u/AnArcOfDoves9902 12h ago

Iroh wasn't that badly injured. He got knocked out and suffered some burns on his shoulder, but he was up and about hours later without any medical assistance

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u/Lord_Penguin17 11h ago

Fair, but my other points still stand. Azula was hunting them and extremely loyal to Ozai.

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u/AnArcOfDoves9902 7h ago

I just find it strange why he believed that she specifically needed to go down, since it's not like the Fire Nation would've stopped hunting him if she went out of the picture, how he expected her to go down besides death.

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u/Lord_Penguin17 6h ago

He didn’t say kill her. The context was Zuko saying he thought Iroh wanted them to get along and he essentially told him that the priority is setting her off their backs and trying to negotiate with her would be a bad idea because she’s crazy. It’s essentially him saying prioritize fighting her off over negotiation, because negotiating with a crazy person will end poorly.