Kuvira
As always I will clear out the shallow reason first. Like many others I can very well appreciate physical beauty. To be rather honest, usually I start to appreciate my favorite character's physical appearance after they become my favorite. But with Kuvira, this was not the case. She just has such a beautiful and elegant face but all at once there is this sort of toughness to it. And she doesn't even really wear make up. I love her eye shape loads and their pretty shade of green. I also like the beauty mark under her eye, it's something unique to her. Also them eyebrows! That smug expression she always wears defiantly does her face justice. And her hair is is also amazing from that very first long braid to the up do to the messy lose hair. She's just very pretty.
Naturally there are many other things that have me loving Kuvira. One of which is that she's a strong powerful independent woman. I just love the badass female characters. She recognized at a young age that she had talent and she acted on it. She also didn't let Suyin get in the way of her goals...okay so this could be a good and bad thing...but I love a character who sands for what they believe in. A character that isn't afraid to break the rules and such. And the fact that she does it so well is amazing in itself. And then there's that confidence. She had the balls to go one on one against Korra when she had a whole army at her disposal. And she won. She beat Korra, had Jinora and Opal not intervened she would have had Korra--making her the second badass to take down an Avatar. This woman is amazing.
To go with her strength, I admire a villain with brains. Kuvira is smart, manipulative, and a good strategist. For a good while she was able to keep Bo and Verrick on her side. She manipulated many cities into siding with her. And on top of that she had cities that just wanted to join her because they believed in her as a leader. Her speech at Wu's coronation was just beautiful, she knows exactly what to say to gain a good following. And her plan for dealing with a sneak attack, amazing. I also think it's pretty spiffy that she wasn't all out attack Zaofu, that she was willing to...smart enough to display an air of civility. It wasn't until Jinora and Opal intervened that she sicked her army on Zaofu. She played fair until her opposers made a dirty move first, and that's something most antagonists just don't do. Hell, even after Suyin tried to claim her in her sleep she was still merciful to those within the city of Zaofu. She would only hurt the one who went at her directly. I can name many antagonists who would just go berserk and kill everyone after the protagonists pulled something like that. She's calm and composed, and she plays her cards smart.
And finally, she reminds me so much of Azula. I think I'll make a separate article for that one. Ya'll know how much I love Azula, so naturally I'm drawn to Kuvira.
Ming Hua
Much like Kuvira beauty is a factor. Honestly I think all of my favorites are pretty though. I explained in my top five article why I think Ming Ming is so pretty, so I'll just move to my next point.
Ming-Ming took a serious disability and turned it into a strength. Where most would simply give up or overcome, Ming completely turned a situation around. This woman had no arms and she drove the freaking getaway car! That's badass right there! To go with that she created herself a nice pair of water arms and she was whipping booty with those! Don't even get me started on Octo-Ming. I just wish we knew how she lost her arms.
Which leads me to point three. She's a rather mysterious character. Though a back story would have been super nice, I do think that it adds something to Ming that we don't have one for her. In a way its showing that it doesn't matter how she lost her arms, what matters is that she was able to move forward. That she isn't her disability...there's more to her.
Speaking of there being more to her, I think that she's a villain with a heart if that makes sense. She seems to care a lot about P'Li (this portrayed in that jail-break scene) and even more so about Gahzan. I firmly believe in that 'unspoken attraction'. They'd be so cute. While yes she's without a doubt a bad guy (much like Kuvira) I think her heart was in the right place. Like her fellow Red Lotus members, she wanted a world without corrupt leaders. She and the others just didn't go about it right, and the idea was simply to idealistic.
I also adore Ming for the fact that she is portrayed by the lovely Grey DeLisle. Honestly I just love the woman in all her roles. Her voice is just amazing and the raspy Ming voice was awesome.
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