I loved the mushroom. I'm glad she wasn't voiced as someone too big or related to Azula. LoK shouldn't rely too much on A: TLA. Kya, Bumi, and Tenzin's development was fun and I liked we got to learn more about Aang and Katara's kids, but their development was in more B plots this season and played a part in reducing the actual members of new Team Avatar to secondary characters. This season had a little too much fan service older characters, with Iroh I and Zhao cameo. I'm not saying Spirits was completely relying on A: TLA, because it wasn't. I'm just noticing that it had more focus on the original main character's kids than the new main character's main cast. Next season should be careful with use of original characters and their kids/grandkids.
***SPOILER***

@Kwando: I don't have any predictions yet.I don't think theyneed to escalate the threat to be bigger than Vaatu. It's hard to match that level of threat since Vaatu is the counterpart to the Avatar itself. The Dark Avatar plotcould have had its own book, but they went another way. I think it is better to have a more personal threat that graduallygrows to become a bigger threat to the overall world like Amon and the Equalists. There is still the little fact of Korra hasn't mastered air bending yet too. Maybe she'll go back to master it properly.Next season could be abouthumans and spirits learning to co-exist and Korra having to play mediator. The whole reason Wan separated them in the first place is because the spiritsconquered the physical world and forced the humans to liveon the lion turtles. The spirits were the invading army. It will be fun to see how Korra intends to keep that from happening again. Maybe there will be one villain who wants to invade the Spirit World or kill spirits because they are unnatural. I can't think of anything else at the moment.

Hopefully we get to see the aye aye spirit that Wan met, do spirits live that long? Jason Marsden is pretty cool.

I thought we were going to see a subskill of airbending. What happened to that?

I was a little disappointed that Korra loses connection to the past avatars. The writers may have wanted to make this series separate from the first but she could still have that connection without them having to go into it all the time. We didn't see it at all in season 1 until the end of the last episode. If all the past lives still exist in the spirit world, then maybe the next season will have Korra finding a way to connect to them again now that the portals were left open.

I agree with the general consensus that Unalaq wasn't a great villain. I thought it would have been better if Korra ripped Vaatu out of Unalaq like he did to her with Raava. Then she could imprison him again which would have more concretely told us what happened to Vaatu. We know he can never be destroyed but we don't know what happened to him. It was probably related to what Jinora did which we didn't get an explanation for. I would have liked to see Unalaq survive and then have Korra remove his bending like Aang did to Ozai.

Overall, it was a good season but not as good as season 1 or ATLA.

Remember Vaatu and Raava are reborn no matter what. Light and darkness can't exist without the other one. Korra purified the Dark Avatar , but Vaatu himself can't die permanently. He'll be reborn. It will take 10,000 years for it to happen unless the darkness in Raava is freed and Vaatu's rebirth is jumped started like when Korra and Jinora did with Raava.

The more I think about this the more I think Korra's connection with her past lives isn't permanently lost. I think it is possible for it to be retrieved. Korra herself is still the reincarnation of Aang who was reincarnated, and so on. It may be possible for Korra to restore the link similar to how Aang's link was restored eventually in the series finale of A: TLA.

@Teen: Don't you think you're being harsh on Mako and Bolin? Unalaq is master water bender who gave Korra a hard time even before he fused with Vaatu. If they succeeded then Korra would have beat Vaatu and the finale would have been over in the first episode with no drama or sense of urgency. I think comparing Mako and Bolin failing to keep Unalaq away to Sokka, Suki, and Toph stopping the air ships is bad comparison. For one thing the plot needed them to succeed in stopping the air ships, so Aang could focus on Ozai. Here the plot needed Unalaq to succeed in becoming the Dark Avatar to give Korra a threat to the world. Mako and Bolin had to fail for that to happen. Their performance was good. If any comparison to the series finale of original series is how Zuko lost to Azula even though that was his one task and Katara had to save him. Or saying Team Avatar sucks cause they got captured by Unalaqearlier and needed Bumi to save them.

Book 3 name confirmed as ENERGY

http://n-to-m.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/legend-of-korra-book-3-name-confirmed.html

Yeah wouldn't be surprised if Avatar pulled a buffy ending, I think there was a number of people expecting it when Korra gained her bending back through energy bending and would have used itto remove the tension of non benders and benders. Since the lion turtles wererevealed to give people bending it's probably moving closer to a similar idea. The only part that seems doubtful of that is how cheesy the ending would be then.

Possibly, not like the full power of the avatar state was any help in the previous book anyway

Can anyone explain why Hei Bai was able to get into the physical world in ATLA even though the spirit portals were closed? It didn't seem strange at the time but now that we know about the portals, I don't understand it.

My theory is some spirits can travel to the physical world if they have some connection to it or make a connection with it similar to how some humans can travel to the spirit world by becoming spiritually enlightened. Hei Bei was connected to the forest the Fire Nation destroyed and could travel there. The Moon spirits were connected to the moon and traveled to the physical world. Events like the solstices might bridge the two worlds together to make it easier for people and spirits to slip into different worlds. Maybe the portals just let every spirit and human travel between worlds without any spirituality or connection to the physical world.

I have a question. Are the spirit world and afterlife two separate places in the Avatar universe? I ask because there hasn't been any sign of deceased humans there besides Iroh I and Avatars of the past, but they were all very spiritual people who traveled there and or got enlightenment. Zhao was forcefully taken to the spirit world and the other lost souls there like Jinora seemed like they were thrown in there as punishment for trespassing instead of natural inhabitants there. I find it odd that Iroh I wasn't seen with his son there. I can't see him not being there or the writers actually showing him unless his son ended up in a different place. Any thoughts on that?

Maybe it's like the ghostzone in Danny Phantom in which there are major doorways but also small portals that open and close at different times.

I'd say separate, like you said I think being all spiritual they went to the spirit world. Otherwise it'd be nice to see spirit Iroh coming out and re-opening his tea shop...