Over the course of Avatar: The Last Airbender’s three seasons, Aang and his friends fought to defeat Fire Lord Ozai and end the Hundred Year War. While Prince Zuko, Ozai’s exiled son, was initially Aang’s enemy, he became his ally and close friend by the end of the series, and it seemed that the world would be a safer place with Zuko as the new Fire Lord. But just a year into his reign, Fire Lord Zuko almost started another war.
In Avatar: The Last Airbender – The Promise, the first graphic novel trilogy following the events of the series, Avatar Aang, Fire Lord Zuko, and Earth King Kuei discuss the removal of the Fire Nation colonies from the Earth Kingdom now that Ozai has been defeated and the war is over. All three of them agree that it is only fair that the Fire Nation citizens return to their homeland so that balance between the four nations can be restored. They dub the process the Harmony Restoration Movement – but the movement is anything but harmonious.
A year later, Zuko is nearly assassinated by Kori, the daughter of the Mayor of Yu Dao. Yu Dao is the oldest of the Fire Nation colonies, established in the Earth Kingdom over a century ago. Kori and her family, along with many other Fire Nation citizens in Yu Dao, have been there for generations at this point and are fully assimilated. Forcing them to move to the Fire Nation would greatly disrupt their way of life, so much so that the Mayor calls Zuko a traitor to his people for going along with the Harmony Restoration Movement: “Your Father would never have let the Avatar and the Earth King bully him into something so obviously bad for his own nation’s citizens!” The Mayor offers an interesting perspective – Ozai was only ever seen as the villain during the show and did some very obviously evil things, but he did always try to do what he thought was best for his nation, even if that meant harming others. So to someone like the Mayor of Yu Dao, Ozai was actually kind of a hero.
After seeing what things are like in Yu Dao, Zuko has a change of heart about the Harmony Restoration Movement, and while his logic for doing so is just, his methods are somewhat problematic. First, he seeks advice from the one person he really shouldn’t be emulating – his father. Then, he orders the evacuation of the colonies to stop immediately without consulting Aang or the Earth King. When Aang tries to talk things over with Zuko, his soldiers attack him and Katara. Even after they convince Zuko to sit down and talk things over with the Earth King, it’s too late. King Kuei refuses to let his kingdom be dominated by the Fire Nation yet again and sends his troops to enforce the Harmony Restoration Movement. Zuko responds by bringing in his own forces to protect the colonies and a fight ensues.
Fortunately, Aang manages to quell the conflict, and the Earth King decides to allow the colonies to remain after seeing how integrated the people are. So, as it turns out, Zuko had the right idea; he just didn’t go about it the best way. In his defense, he’s still pretty new at the whole Fire Lord thing. Just maybe try asking Iroh instead of Ozai for advice next time.
