I know I'm in the minority here. I also must have forgotten the lightning factory. I can also say you could be correct that Mako is just half-assing most of the time. But, you have to admit that if you say something happened "so a fight took longer", that is weak writing. Ideally, remember setup and payoff. If the setup is right before the payoff, it's a contrivance. I have a low tolerance for contrivance. So, let me suggest a different way the season could have gone if the writing was stronger:
** Zaheer escapes prison. He splits his time between trying to talk to Korra and looking for a rare ore. When he finds the ore, he starts looking for a rare plant. He finally talks to Korra who turns him down in the spirit world. He tells Ming-Hua and Ghazan where to find Korra but she escapes. Finally, a red lotus member (did we see even one before the finale?) brings Zaheer the rare plant. He mixes a jug of poison. In their next fight, Ming-Hua bends the poison at Korra but it is blocked and absorbed by some earth. After the fight, Mako and the team investigate the substance and theorize it is a poison and may trigger the avatar state. Korra suggests she could take just a little of it and it might reconnect her with her past lives. "It's worth the risk", she says. But, Tenzin counsels caution so they don't try it. When we get to the finale, Zaheer brings out a bowl of the poison and we immediately know what it is and that it is too much. It will kill Korra. We also know that the substance requires both the plant and the mineral so a metal bender might neutralize it. Instead of flying, in the finale, Zaheer starts to glow and becomes some sort of spirit who can fly. Since he keeps hitting Korra's spirit, and he moves fast and flies, Korra is getting badly beaten. Her body is dying of poison while her spirit is being pummeled as well. Finally, the novice airbenders form a whirlwind while Jinora asks local spirits for help. The combined effort brings Zaheer down and he loses touch with the powerful spirit form he had temporarily achieved. Korra still cries at the end as she feels like she failed and Jinora feels like more of an avatar than she is. **
You might not like a single thing from what I wrote above. But, all I am doing is taking things that showed up out of nowhere and adding a setup for them somewhere earlier in the season or taking a setup and giving it a finale payoff. I think it makes sense and I like sense in a show that tries to make a point. ATLA was amazing. Korra has had a lot of problems. If you haven't listened to the commentary for season 2, the creators know they are dropping the ball, even if you don't think so:
"Mike admits that some parts of the finale didn’t make sense from a physical perspective, but they made sense from a spiritual perspective – which is all the more confusing."
