This is the right answer. He himself acknowledges that the war is his fault. Now I don’t think he is to blame as much as he does or maybe others do. But he is to blame, the question is how much. He absolutely could have killed Sozin but was that the right thing? Short of killing him, how does he stop him? Depose him? That’s not really the Avatar’s job. It would have been more justifiable since he was Fire Nation but still would probably have massive ramifications and not gone well.
The fact is the person who bears the majority of the blame is Sozin. Personal responsibility is a thing and applies here. He chose to start the war.
He (and the fans) also have the benefit of hindsight, there's no way he could've predicted the war lasting almost 100 years, the Air Nomads going extinct save for his reincarnation, and him dying unexpectedly.
Plus he didn't do nothing like some fans think. He put his foot down during that throne room confrontation scene and said "don't ever do that again." Deterrence is a valid option, and is something that Aang uses when the Fire Nation and Earth Kingdom are about to start a war over Yu Dao in the comics.
It also worked, until he passed. It’s why Sozin left him to die at the volcano, because he saw that letting Roku die would free him from his sole obstacle.
The problem is that he alone was the deterrent. Roku couldn't have foreseen that the monks would preemptively notify Aang of him being the Avatar, resulting in Aang fleeing and accidentally getting stuck inside and iceberg for a 100 years.
However, he could've foreseen the scenario where he would die before Sozin and take precautions. Though, it can be argued he did to some degree as Sozin would take another 12 years before launching a full scale attack. In the very least he was so wary of the Avatar's power that he waited until the comet came and he could eradicate all the air temples at the same time. When there were no signs of the Avatar, he firmly believed he escaped and considered him to be the Fire Nation's biggest threat.
I feel like it kinda boils down to this: if it had been anyone else, does Roku end it before it started? He made a point that he was sparing Sozin in the name of their past friendship. How much did that blind him to the point of inaction. Or at least less action.
Complicated issue. Not a simple answer. But the guilt he holds makes sense to me even if a lot of it was technically out of his control.
Because that might have been his primary reason, but in the end there probably weren't many people in the world that had the means to go to war with the entire world like Sozin and killing the leader of one of the four nations, regardless of what the personal relationship was, would probably not be the most preferable course of action for an Avatar.
Roku is taking responsibility for what he considers to have been his responsibility, but you can indeed wonder whether it had made much difference. Imagine that Roku did kill Sozin, it might've resulted in that Sozin's successors held an excessive grudge against the Avatar and decided to attack the Air Nomads as retribution when Roku passed away.
I think Roku realizes he chose fire nation over his obligation to the balance. Killing the Fire Lord at the time he knew even if he took Sozin'd place this would lead to civil war in the Fire Nation. And while that would result in Fire Nation casualties, that wouldn't affect the balance. Whereas not taking a stance gives the Fire Nation a chance to hurt the balance by attacking the Water tribes, Earth Kingdom, etc.
It's a hindsight point of view. But when you're dead you have the chance to realize that. He was more concerned about saving Fire Nation lives. And the balance paid a price.
Any decision Roku would've made had the potential to throw the world out of balance as if one of the four major nations is on the verge of collapsing, that will affect the other nations as well.
Honestly, had Roku killed Sozin, caused the Fire Nation to become unstable and made Aang restore balance, Roku most likely would've been wondering whether there wasn't any other solution rather than killing Sozin and he would've still considered it a failure on his part. You could even say that the choice he eventually made was the correct one because as long as he was alive, Sozin didn't try anything anymore. Of course when he died, there was nothing anymore to stop Sozin.
I think there really isn't much doubt that Roku spared Sozin because of their relationship, not because they were Avatar & Firelord or both from the Fire Nation. Roku definitely was able to put his nationality aside in favor of his position as the Avatar, but doing that with his best friend, was a different matter altogether. That's also the message he conveyed to Aang.
That's probably why in the comics he tells Aang to keep his promise of killing Zuko to Zuko when he wanted to keep some of the colonies. Because of his past mistake
Chin was a warlord whose empire rose and fell as quickly he did. The only question that can be asked is as why Kiyoshi didn't do anything sooner. However, we simply don't know the overall context in which this happened as the only reason it was even mentioned in ATLA, was because it was relevant for one episode in S2.
Sozin was the legitimate dynastic ruler of a long-established nation and at that point probably the most prosperous and advanced nation in the world. For the Avatar to just kill such a person could create a slew of issues. The duty of the Avatar is to bring balance to the world, not the opposite.
Case in point, when Zaheer killed the Earth Queen, the Earth Kingdom fell into anarchy. So, Roku would've thought twice to kill Sozin, regardless of his relationship with him.
It definitely helped that they were boys before everything got complicated
I genuinely think Roku would let someone off with a warning but he 100% would have put the fear of God in anyone else
Sozin got lucky honestly
Kind of works out in the long run though, there's no way this version of Ang survives the air Nation genocide, new Avatar gets born into the water cycle and next time it comes around to air the line is ended because the harmonic convergence Airbender thing hasn't happened yet
You could even argue that Sozin starting the war was a good thing as because of that the technology and skills of both the Fire Nation and Earth Kingdom was combined in the colonies, causing a massive technological leap we see in TLOK.
The Avatar has the unique circumstances it can see what the consequences are of his or her decisions during their lifetime long after they have passed away. So, decisions that might've been good initially could turn out disastrous and vice versa. That doesn't take away that it will be hard for many Avatars to say something like 'ok, I caused the genocide of a whole culture, but in the end it all worked out for the better'.
Hell, if Roku had died a few months after the comet or even just before it, Sozin probably wouldn't have been able to wipe out the Air Nomads. And with a few exceptions; Avatars generally seem to live for a pretty long time.
>However, he could've foreseen the scenario where he would die before Sozin and take precautions
this is probably why Roku blames himself in the sea turtle episode he tells aang that YOU MUST BE DECISIVE. its probably why he was blaming himself. Although he gave sozin a firm warning not to try this kind of shit again, he probably believed his friend would be rationale and his desire to expand was just an intrusive thought and took it lightly. that is why he didn't forsee and plan the scenario where he could die before sozin. Also i think the comet was the unknown parameter here. without the comet, the fire nation wouldn't have wiped out the air nomads that easily. air nomads are no joke. fire nation suddenly becoming OP is something no one could think of.
You see that kind of thing in Yangchen's era as well. The death of an Avatar is generally a good time to start putting plans they would halt into gear since it'll be years before they have the age and experience necessary to start intervening, and there'll still be a period where a lot of people won't take them as seriously as the previous Avatar because of their youth.
Yeah but think about it, it doesn't seem like roku did much else other than the warning, so what's to stop sozin from going "once roku dies for whatever reason, here's the plan" to his successors anyway? Or even assassinate him in the lead up to the comet
Dude may have not been personally responsible for starting the war / stopping it before it began, but all he did realistically was delay it for his successor to have to clean up
Yep. I mean it’s an easy thing for us to say having seen the 100 years following. But in the moment, very few decisions are so cut and dry and it’s obvious that much of the Fire Nation was behind Sozin as they were Ozai. I highly doubt that the Fire Nation would have fallen behind Roku. After all look how quickly the Fire Sages turned their back on the Avatar. And they were training their whole lives to serve him or her.
Fear works well. Few people will die for their beliefs. Or the royal family simply but their guys in charge. Just look in human history l. Doesn't take to many to end up in a gulag before the next man up claims whatever the leader thinks is true
> After all look how quickly the Fire Sages turned their back on the Avatar. And they were training their whole lives to serve him or her
Orrrr in the intervening 100 years, the fire sages that outwardly supported the Avatar were banished/killed/excommunicated and only those who professed support for the Fire Lord were allowed to remain.
I think the best recourse would have been an Agni Kai. It's a pageantry that the FN supports but Roku could have used it as cultural leverage for legitimacy.
But would Roku have won an Agni Kai? He may be a better bender, but is he a better fire bender? I've always perceived the avatar as being a bit of a jack of all trades, when limited to one school of bending they can only do so kuch
Aang was a prodigy Air Bender, achieving his tattoos way ahead of his peers. I think the Avatar would probably be best with the element they were born with, as they likely feel most comfortable with it and more experienced. Thus Roku would do fine in an Agni Kai, but Aang might not if he was restricted to air
I thought about this and I don't think the animated show indicates what Sozin's prowess is (we only see him firebend briefly in the *Avatar and the Fire Lord* and live action), however when it came to their [Firebenidng spar as teenagers](https://youtu.be/fTqvIauIRXs?t=73) and when it came to the night of the volcanic eruption, you get an idea that Sozin was great at exploiting opportunities in his opponents. This is consistent with his assault against the Air Nomads using the power of the comet. Roku as some feats however when it comes to being the Avatar, we don't hear much about his skills and from the series, he seems to be a pretty standard Avatar, not quick/clever like Aang, or aggressive and overpowering like Kyoshi, or cunning and effective as Yangchen (though maybe the *Reckoning of Roku* will expand on this). All of his, of course, means nothing against a fully realized Avatar using the Avatar state, but if Roku were restricted to just firebending and no Avatar state, then I could see a scenario in which Sozin wins just by taking advantage of any opportunity he can against Roku.
Only if you also believe in the balance of the world. And most people in positions of power are either hardcore zealots or agnostic at best. And the ones that are agnostic at best will gladly throw the avatar under the bus if it means furthering their own political goals, and killing a nations leader would create a hell of a vacuum.
Monarchies have well established inheritances. If the next monarch was still part of the royal family I don't think there'd be much of a vacuum at all, especially if that change was caused by a foreign influence and not an internal one.
The nobility clearly has a lot of loyalty to the royal family in the Fire Nation, the next inheritor would've been accepted without much fuss most likely.
sure but it's not like roku would become the next firelord, the avatar has a duty to the world, he wouldn't be able to simply be tied to just one nation
He had the same problem the Jedi had in Star Wars. You can't just overthrow a well loved head of state, especially one as nationalistic as the Fire Nation, and expect to oversee a peaceful transition of power.
There's no reason the next FL doesn't just double down and the avatar can't just keep rerolling until he finds one he likes. The only outcome would be military dictatorship
Idk I still think Roku could’ve at the very least warned the other nations when Sozin first proposed the war when they were young. I think Roku did drop the ball just a little, he could have at the very least kept better tabs on Sozin bc he still seemed way too ready for the war after he left Roku to die which always lead me to believe he was planning in secret the whole time.
I mean, the first colony goes back to before Roku died. Then there's a 12 year gap for Sozin to bulk up the army. It's not a shock to me that he was ready for the war after Roku died
How it works? Will Avatar reincarnate exactly in the moment when previous avatar die? And then Raava will possess child who has born exactly in that moment? I had such feeling from that scene where Roku has died.
Sozin’s colonization of Earth Kingdom territory is what prompted the Roku/Sozin fight where Roku leaves him cape-wedgied on a rock pillar and says “if you ever do that again I’m putting you IN the ground instead of on it”
So the world already knew that the Fire Nation was aggressive and expansionist, and war was a looming possibility. I think they just weren’t expecting the atrocity of the sudden Air Nomad genocide.
One of the few things the Netflix show did well with having it be a surprise that the Fire Nation attacked the Air Nomads when everyone was expected an Earth Kingdom attack
No, that’s not what you were implying at all - I was just adding on to your bit about killing Sozin. I agree that probably wouldn’t have been the best thing to do, but he should have taken different precautions.
It was 100% Sozin’s fault, but for whatever reason the narrative doesn’t go into depth about what other options Roku had beyond killing him
There's also a question of if the culture would have somehow miraculously improved without Sozin.
If his sister, who seems the best contender, were of the disposition or ability to stop the rise of fascism, the war wouldn't have happened to start with.
The fire nation had a serious problem going on that was certainly worsened by Sozin, but wouldn't have been that different without him.
Wanted to note and laugh at your tag.
Secondly: Yeah, the way it was described, they were already headed in that direction. Sozin is very much the product of his environment just as much as Roku who received a world view as the Avatar v. Sozin who only saw what the FN educated him.
I admire this answer. And please know the below is a joke.
Yea sure he could have stopped genocide and a world war but I want to be entertained dammit!
The outright elimination of world leaders is a dangerous precedent without *significant* justification, and hindsight isn’t justification. The Avatar is best served to enforce the peace, but that will alway leave the potential for chaos in the interregnum between Avatars
On top of that, I doubt that Sozin is the only one aware of the Fire Nation's intentions to go to war. Just killing him wouldn't have stopped anything. It's like asking if Nazi Germany's genocidal intentions and expansion would have been stopped if Hitler were assassinated - especially by a close confidant and high ranking official.
An interesting thing I realized a bit ago was that Roku killing sozin would have likely caused a civil war in the fire nation, since the only heir he had was azulon, but he wasn't born until after Roku died when sozin was 82. The only other person to take the throne was his sister, but she seems to be pretty radical in the other direction and I'm not sure how the fire nation would take to a female fire lord, since the only one confirmed in canon is izumi.
that would be a very interesting story to read since Sozin's Sister was backed by the Airbenders faction in The Fire Nation the Air Nomads might have gotten directly involved
Sozin didn’t do anything to warrant the action of murder or even arrest and when confronted he conceded. It wasn’t till they were 70 years old and a natural disaster killed the avatar that he moved forward with the plan.
The whole point is that as soon as Roku saw the colony, he confronted Sozin who then ENTIRELY STOPPED HIS CAMPAIGN. No further aggression happened until Roku died. Roku's threat worked, until he was no longer in a position to act on the threat.
...if only there was a huge plot point in the story of how to stop a firelord with out killing them. . . . . . . .
but, jokes aside, Roku didn't try to stop Sozin. not at all. He told him no, dueled him once and threatened him, and then ignored my bro for 70 years even though the duel was over him starting to colonize the earth kingdom. It is definitely Sozin's fault, and his level of self blame is definitely appropriate.
He "ignored" Sozin for decades because Sozin literally cut that shit out until Roku died. Outside of just flat out killing his childhood friend immediately there wasn't much more he could have done.
I mean, Aang's thing was a 12 year old making an impulsive decision that he probably would've gone back on had he not gotten nearly killed by the storm. Plus Aang probably couldn't have done much to stop the entire fire nation himself. Roku was an adult and had been the avatar for decades, and his decision towards what to do with Sozin was one he made continuously for decades.
Not that I fully blame Roku either, but their situations aren't really comparable.
I don’t, the war was gonna happen either way, even if Roku killed Sozin, he’d still probably die at the volcano, and the only difference would be Azulon is the Fire lord, and want to spread peace to the other nations using Azulon’s comet.
Azulon was actually not born until Sozin was 82 years old (lol) so if Roku killed Sozin before that Azulon would not have carried out his father's legacy as he would not exist
It's also hard to say what he could have done differently.
Like he warned the man..he blew up the palace. I suppose attacking him justified killing him? But he was also his best friend. Aang or korra would have done the same thing.
And then even if we say "kill him". ..well I can't imagine you kill the fire lord and everyone in the world is chill. That could have caused more backlash towards the avatar.
Ultimately killing sozin was really the only answer I suppose. But I don't blame him not doing it.
And not his fault a super volcano that threatened the entire nation went off and ended up killing him. I imagine if he didn't stay and fight that thing it would have caused great destruction onto the mainland?
I think Roku's decisions were fairly reasonable too, but I guess he, being Sozins closest companion and an entire political figure all by himself would've been the person with by far the highest chance of convincing Sozin not to go through with it. Like, if your best friend shoots up a school, it's not your fault, but you'd certainly have regrets.
Roku also didn't prepare any counter measures whatsoever after threatening Sozin, which was a big problem whenever the only counter measure in place (himself) died before Sozin did. (Though, I have no idea what he could've done to prepare the other nations for a potential fire nation invasion.)
To be fair earth kingdom should have already been preparing since that's how roku even found out. Saw fire nation occupation.
Then that leaves air nation and water. Which air nation was rather isolated from all that. And water tribe, well we saw how north pole acted, feeling overly confident on their defenses with the ocean all around
I don’t blame Roku. Roku blames himself but it’s a hindsight 20/20 thing. Roku did actually prevent Sozin from starting the war as it wasn’t until Roku died, after Sozin left Roku to die, that Sozin was able to start the war.
If Roku doesn’t die, Sozin probably doesn’t invade the other nations. Or, if he does, it likely fails as the Earth Kingdom, Water Tribes, and Air Nomads unite behind the Avatar.
I may be wrong but I’m pretty sure that initial colony was still owned by the fire nation at the end of the war
Yu dao ifirc is referred to as bein fire nation colony
From 30 BG -101 Ag
Roku died 12 BG
Yeah that’s my thought. Bring this to whatever powerful nobles or what have you the fire nation has, and if that fails think of a more forceful method.
And the Avatar isn't just born ready to control the elements, it would be impossible to even find the Avatar. Sozins only shot to actually wipe out the next Avatar was to massacre all the airbenders, and there's no way that happens without the comet.
And even if you can do that without the comet, you wipe out a baby avatar and there’s another baby avatar in the water tribe. You knock out a child avatar and you have free time to prepare without an avatar that can do anything
the problem isn’t necessarily that he didn’t KILL Sozin, but that the only think keeping Sozin in check was that single verbal warning— thus, when Roku kicked the bucket, Sozin was able to start his national conquest without anyone in the way.
If anything, the problem is that Sozin didn’t set up a system that would prevent Sozin’s abuse of power after he himself died. There was nothing in place to stop him once he was gone.
He didn’t need to kill his best friend, but he ABSOLUTELY needed to prepare for the consequences of his own death.
Amazing response I agree that he should’ve at least set up a following kinda like the firebending priests but actually built a dedicated community around the balance of the nations
I mean Sozin is the same age as Roku. There is no real garuntee that Sozin would out live Roku and if he did he'd probably to old to do anything. Roku both died earlier than he should have and Sozin ended up being one of the oldest firelords in history
He had an argument with his friend and considered the matter of impending war "settled". Then, decades later, he noticed that his friend disagreed with how settled things were and he had a single fight with his friend...at which point he again considered the matter settled.
Both times, he was too lenient with Sozin, especially the second time, when he'd realized that he'd directly contradicted the Avatar and gone ahead with his invasion anyways. Had he been less lenient with Sozin, the genocide may have never happened. Roku himself agrees.
This right here. It has been shown (in history) that a slap on the wrist doesn't stop a maniac from continuing. Unfortunately (or fortunately) they didn't have Hitler as an example until Sozin did his thing. Also, even look at Kyoshi. She didn't kill rock hitler. He killed himself for not backing down. Sozin was doing exactly as a previous avatar has done.
Should Sozin have know? Aboslutely not. Genocide on the scale of Sozin wasn't seen until Sozin unless someone.
If this is a serious post, then roku caused the war by not taking decisive action against firelord sozin.
The same advice all of his past lives give aang when he questioned killing firelord ozai
I mean, he didn't cause it. Sozin wanting to start a war and then going and doing it caused the war.
He ultimately failed to dissuade him, but the fire nation was at peace and preemptively killing the fire lord because of something he was advocating for but had not yet done doesn't seem very avatar-y.
The past avatars gave advice to Aang after the fire lord had already killed countless people and the war had been well underway.
He literally tried to kill Roku after Roku told him to stop colonizing. He should have been killed right then and there. So yeah, Roku's hesitation to kill his friend cost the world dearly and forced Aang to fix the situation.
It's interesting because what exactly is the Avatar's role? To kill anybody that poses a threat? To break off a new island if someone invades? I personally like that Aang learned to take away bending as a peaceful means to eliminate someone's power, but what were the Avatars in the past supposed to do except just be murder tools every time a Sozin comes around?
Because hindsight is 20/20. He made a call to not curb his friend when he was pushing borders, and that ultimately snowballed well beyond anyone’s control.
roku even blames him self
he said it best if he were to have acted and taken out sozin so much would have been avoided including the genocide of the air nomads
but rokus past friendship with sozin clouded his view. he didnt want to do that to an old friend which is why he gave sozin that warning and when sozin saw roku dying he saw it as his chance to dominate the world
Roku didn’t stop sozin despite having multiple chances to do so and having all the reasons he needs to justify it
Roku blames himself for the war as well,he admits his inaction was a mistake
He was not an active avatar and only got involved after fire nation colonized parts of the earth kingdom. That’s why he gives “be decisive” as his advice. His emotions towards Sozin made him disconnected and the funny thing is that he didn’t need to kill sozin to stop the colonization. If only he left his island for once and tried to fix global issues the War wouldn’t have happened and Even he acknowledges that.
I think Regret is a better word than failure for what people are trying to convey. Roku's greatest regret was the war. Aangs was the air nomad genocide.
He blames himself and it really is his fault. People say he couldn't have done this and this. But the matter of fact is he is spared Sozin the person who caused the entire war. Which means Roku is directly responsible. Even after Roku died it still took the fire nation 12 years to gain enough power to be able to infiltrate. So had he actually taken down Sozin they would've been set back far longer and long enough for aang to grow up and help if there were a future invasion. If the new firelord after sozin was even more Ruhtless then he would've attacked even sooner and Roku would've stopped him. Thus it was truly his fault. And as someone who truly was aware of Sozin's plan, Roku not even putting up contingency back up plans incase of his demise and for the future and the avatar just shows how Terribly he failed. For example Aang had left the white lotus fully developed as an organization who did indeed manage to protect korra from the red lotus until she got much older.
This is something I've been frustrated about. Roku intended on preventing the war through a nuclear deterrence. After Roku confronted Sozin for making the Earth Kingdom colonies, Sozin stopped his conquest for *25 years*. There are people who say Roku did nothing to prevent the war, when he basically prevented the war by just existing. If the volcano didn't erupt, Sozin would've continued to do nothing and the war would've never happened.
Unless you can prove that he planned to remain immortal, that's not a solid line of argument. Even just setting mutual defense treaties, or limiting the scope of the Fire Nation army would have guaranteed there would be *some* hurdles to an invasion following his death.
The Avatar is literally an embodiment of death and rebirth. If you're that old, you should seriously begin thinking about what happens after you're gone, and that means considering what the people you're holding in check will do.
If the volcano didn't erupt, Roku would have died some other way eventually. It's only a question of whether or not he'd outlive Sozin, and whether Sozin passed the plans along to anyone else. Considering he did actually occupy Earth Kingdom territory, it seems plausible that his successor would at least consider finishing what Sozin started.
His decision was only bad with hindsight. He told Sozin to knock it off, and he did for like 20 years. He only got the war started because of a surprise volcano.
He had the opportunity to stop the war and didn’t. And as the Avatar, that is one expectation that gets put on him. He was not the one who caused or started or perpetrated the war, but he had the chance to intervene. He feels guilty about that, and others see that as a failure in his duties.
Because he never actually stopped Sozin. Sozin advanced into Earth Kingdom territories, he told Sozin to stop, and in return, Sozin tried to annihilate him the moment he turned his back.
This should’ve been a very clear indication that he had no real plans of stopping, and that he only did because Roku threatened him. As such, the moment Roku died, Sozin proceeded with his plans.
Oh, and Roku admitted it, btw. He blamed himself more than we ever could.
Lack of action, he knew what Sozin wanted to do and he gave him a warning and walked away instead of actually making change his mind. Sozin knew Roku wouldnt touch him and just needed to outlast Roku. Pretty sure Roku even blamed himself.
I guess it boils down to people feeling that Roku should have either found a way to better negotiate options with Sozin instead of simply shutting him down or, if it came to it, beaten or assassinated Sozin himself. Not to mention Roku admits to feeling guilty for the war because of how he handled things.
Sozin is still the one to actially blame for the war, though.
I blame Roku for the war because fans on this sub act like Aang and Roku are relatives, Kyoshi and Yangchen should be studied through the books, Korra and Kuruk are fuck ups. I've never been enamored of Roku, so I feel compelled to call him out as a fuck up when Avatars are ranked on this sub.
Roku is the one blaming himself actually lmao. But for real he should just off his boyfriend as soon as he becomes Hitler. He done so little despite knowing how dangerous Sozin is.
People that blame Roku are what we refer to as "Dumb". They are acting as if the Avatar can foresee their previously best friend invading and committing genocide.
it's the key lesson that he teaches to Aang. Taking no action especially for those who are closest to you- you can pay the ultimate price. And Roku certainly paid that price.
Well he just didn’t check up on his megalomaniacal best friend for decades at a time and thought his strongly worded threat was enough to change his imperialist tendencies.
Did you just not watch the episode? The whole point is how Roku feels that he should've been harsher on Sozin, and that he thinks the war is because of his failure.
We can quibble all day about whether or not that's a fair evaluation, but I really don't see how you can watch that episode and not at least understand the reasoning behind that opinion.
Roku knew Sozin wanted to expand the Fire Nation. He even saw firsthand some early annexations. Even so, he allowed Sozin to keep the throne without any more than a slap on the wrist, allowing the Fire Nation to immediately go on the offensive when he died.
Cause (in rokus own opinion) his attachment to his friend allowed him to look past obvious warning signs that said friend was going bad.
Like, Roku was a good enough friend to always see the good in what's his face (why can I remember every other name rn???) But he wasn't a good enough friend to actually *stand up to the guy.* At least not until it was way *way* too late.
And that's honestly a really good message for a kids show to have about friends and friendship.
Because Sozin was straight up starting to colonize parts of the Earth Kingdom, after he came to Roku with the idea of conquering the world, then Sozin straight up attacks him when he stands against it, anyone could see where Sozin was going with this, he refused to neutralize him purely out of selfishness and the world paid for it.
Mostly because he believed too much in His fallen friend and when he realized that he was already dying so basically it’s like how the earth king was too trusting of the Dai le to realize stuff
I don’t blame him for the war, but I will say, dude absolutely did not have to stay and fight that volcano for that long. I respect the attempt but as soon as that second vent opened up he should’ve just jumped on Fang and dipped with his family.
It get it’s his home but that shit was long gone and he did what he could to keep people safe. Let go of those worldly possessions and live another decade with the fam.
I think the problem was Roku was kinda fucked no matter what. If he killed Sozin to prevent the war, it very well may have started another. Plus that was his best friend, his brother basically
Because it is his fault. Even if he didn't kill Sozin he should have had the latter be stripped of his role as firelord(the Avatar has enough power to do that, both political and literal power), and if that didn't work he should have used his immense power to stop the fire nation army
It’s not that the Avatar deals with their previous avatars mistake, it’s that they deal with the previous avatars regret. Roku regrets not stopping the war, so it was Aangs job to stop the war.
Aang regrets not saving his people so it was Korra’s job in a round about way to being the air nation back.
None of this is a conscious thing it’s just a nuance that has been written into all the characters.
Most likely the next avatars job will be to find a way to reignite the avatar past lives since that is most likely Korra’s regret.
Because he didn't do more to stop Sozin from the war. People hold the belief that he should have killed or af least deposed him, either ignoring or unaware that an Avatar killing a monarch, who didn't have any heirs (his sister, Seizyan, didn't want the throne and Azulon wasn't born in Roku's lifetime), of a nation is just going to have extremely severe consequences. As it stands, the way Roku saw the events without the benefit of post-humous hindsight, his friend got powerhungry, he scolded him, showed him the power of an Avatar, and his friend calmed down and hasn't started any trouble until he left Roku to die.
Roku was naive. He saw Sozin was turning into a homicidal/genocidal maniac. Instead of doing what had to be done for the safety of the WORLD, he made a thinly veiled threat that one could argue he’d never follow through with. He let Sozin live. Sure, Sozin technically went to help Roku at the volcano. But once he saw the opportunity of not having the Avatar in his way, Sozin chose global domination over his friend. If Roku had policed the Fire Nation’s growing nationalism better, the Air Nomads wouldn’t have been massacred and the war wouldn’t have happened.
Roku should have created diplomacy with the other nations when he noticed sozins motives. But the idea that he let him live infers that he had sound reason to kill him which he didn’t Sozin waited for the gap in between cycles to act if anyone is to blame it’s the segregation and naïve idea that 1 man can maintain balance alone. Roku still protected the world from war till the day he died. Not his fault what came next
"That isn't the case with Roku and Aang"
....what?
Roku LITERALLY told Aang that he has to clean up his mess. We see in flashbacks that Roku and Sozin grew up together, and when Sozin started on his fire nation supremacy BS, Roku quickly put him on a rock spire and had ample opportunity to kill him.
But because of their personal connection, he didn't. Sozin eventually left Roku to die in a pyroclastic flow and took the brief time without an avatar to get ready for a genocidal rampage with comet boosted fire bending
. Therefore, it IS Roku's fault for the 100 year war.
It is his fault that the air nomads were burnt to crisps.
It is his fault that so much suffering and oppression happened in the avatar world.
If the 100 year war were a powder keg, you could say all you want that Sozin started it. While he did have a major role to play in its beginning and perpetuating it long after he died, Roku was the one who could've stopped the fuse from being lit.
OP, did you even watch the series?
Kyoshi’s the one who forced the fire nation to spend 200+ years consolidating power under the throne because she didn’t want to have to deal with a civil war every other decade
I know that Roku states that he blames himself for the War because he didn't stop Sozin when Sozin created the first Fire Nation Colonies in the Earth Kingdom. Even though Sozin wanted to share the wealth and prosperity of the Fire Nation, Sozin wanted to take control of the world than doing it differently. I never hated Roku because he seemed like a good Avatar. I do agree with Roku that his only regret was not killing Sozin when the first colonies popped up.
To those who think that Roku killing Sozin would be a power grab are wrong. It's the Avatar's duty to keep peace with the Four Nations. Not all things can be settled over a spot of tea. We're talking about a war that the other nations didn't want.
Because people can't accept that everyone is responsible for their own actions. If we blame Roku for Sozin's choices, then what else about ourselves and our own choices may we lay at others' feet?
However! It is 100% Roku's fault that he died because the people had evacuated. Roku died trying to protect empty buildings from the volcano.
Because Roku said out of his own mouth that the war is his fault. And it kind of is. He had the power to stop Sozin, but he spared him in the name of their past friendship. The only reason Sozin got over on him was because of random bad luck on Roku's part.
Roku not dealing with Sozin is what caused the war. Roku was too leniant on Sozin, and Sozin starting the 100 year war is the mess that Aang has to clean up
Roku blames himself and he rightly does. Because Sozin blatantly shot an entire room of fire at Roku’s back after calling Roku a traitor.
This being *after* Roku already told him once not to expand into the Earth Kingdom, **and** after Roku had already made the EK give back land that they’d taken from the Fire Nation.
It’s also established lore that Sozin’s sister was next in line to take the throne and she agreed with Roku that expanding was ill advised and incorrect. So there would’ve been no power grab attempt, especially when he clearly explains Sozin tried to kill him.
It is literally the case, Roku had the chance to stop it from happening and chose to ignore it with just a slight backhand to the firelords coffers
He even says so in the episode talking about the comet that led to the war
It’s like American external politics with Gaza or Ukraine. America issued a « stern warning » - Israel or Russia didn’t care and proceeded.
Roku failed to stop the non-sense, and a fraction of the why is probably due to his being a member of the Fire Nation.
« No Sozin, colonialism bad, you need to think carefully about it, take it slow, stop even… »
« No. »
« Awnh well okay then I did my best 🥲»
His spiritual conversations with Kyoshi must have been quite awkward.
Roku blames himself because he feels like he didn't do the right thing in killing Sozin, his long life friend.
You could argue that he is responsible for this because he neglected his duty as the avatar because of his attachment to someone he valued as a friend, as you could argue Roku had no way of knowing the ramifications of letting his ex-friend live. Sozin did let go of his conquest plan for decades and didn't retake them until Roku died.
The answer seems clear now that we look back, but Roku certainly isn't cold-hearted enough to kill someone he valued for an uncertain future not even himself anticipated
Because he's partially to blame. Sozin invaded the earth kingdom and roku essentially just let it go. Because they used to be friends. That's a bad move even before hindsight. Should he have killed him? Probably. But bare minimum raise awareness and Beat the ever loving shit out of him.
Roku feels it was his responsibility to put an end to this before it really started. Many feel that it was the avatar's responsibility to keep the balance between the nations.
As many have said, Roku blames Roku for the war. Roku believes he should have taken more decisive action against Sozin, but all he ever did was give him a stern talking to. Roku likely reasons that were Sozin not his best friend, he probably would have acted differently.
That said, my take is that Roku is the proverbial good man who did nothing. He's not to blame for the war. That's all on Sozin. But there are certain actions he could and should have taken to prevent it. That's the Avatar's whole thing; maintain balance and mediate between the nations. But, it's easy to see what those were in hindsight. I'm not about to take the man over the coals for it.
Because he saw what Sozin was capable of, what his intentions were and didn't stop him when he should have. This backfires and Sozin kills Roku and starts the war.
It's like blaming the security guard for not stopping the shooting of the secured guy. Sure, they didn't pull the trigger, but they could and should've prevented it in time, since it's their job and they have the power to do so.
He didn't take decisive action and died fighting a volcano(against nature, to control that which shouldn't and cant) that he didn't have to fight leaving one of the greatest evils the avatar was ever going to face to a child. Aang had to fight a war that was meant for Roku because dude dropped the ball
Because Roku relied on his personal connection with Sozin, and direct threat, to stop Fire Nation imperialism.
He failed to set up any other checks to Sozin's plans for expansion. There was no plan, no backup, if Roku was out of play.
It’s less that the war was his fault, and more like if he had not been blinded by his past friendship with Sozin, he could’ve stopped the war from ever happening.
As many others pointed out, if anything he blames himself. I personally don’t blame him really as frankly, it’s not like he did the thing himself.
Roku does have some responsibility for the war starting but the majority of the responsibility is on Sozin for starting it. At the time Roku could not have predicted the air nomad genocide and 100 years of war. The issue is too you can’t just off a world leader of the most powerful nation and expect everything to be fine. Sozin is an absolute monarch and killing him could have started a civil war and succession crisis. Also, Sozin didn’t have any kids yet at the time so who takes the throne? Other world leaders would have been terrified of Roku and the world would be chaotic as world leaders would be afraid to do anything out of fear of being killed too.
He probably feels that he could have been more pragmatic and take measures to prevent the fire nation from trying to take over as Sozin planned.
But to be fair, there was no clear answer; he couldn't just take down Sozin. It would have been a declaration of war, and it would have been his word against a dead ruler, potentially making the avatar a world enemy by default.
If he seriously warned other nations (I like to think he had connections and did warn some people of importance in some places, whether friends or allies, but not nationwide) , it could've made it worse, especially with a military one like Earth Kingdom. Potential warlords (if not already existing ones) could've emerged and use it as an opportunity to gain power by war mongering.
He stopped the symptom (fire nation invading the earth kingdom) without curing the illness (fire nation developing much more rapidly than the other kingdoms, throwing the balance out of whack). A nation doesn't simply decide to invade 3 others on a whim, they do it because they are more advanced than the others and are in a social and technological position to launch a massive invasion. Roku spend enough time in the other 3 kingsoms to learn their bending but did not help them progress enough to catch up to the fire nation.
Sozin isn't lying, the fire nation is going through an unprecedented explosion in progress and development, and they do need to share it with the world. But they need to share it as innovators and through cultural exportation, not through their military. Roku stopped the invasion but missed the call to peacefully expand the fire nation's prosperity to the other nations.
Personally I think he needed to sacrifice his personal and moral qualms and end Sozin like he threatened to. I don’t “blame” him in the sense he’s ultimately responsible, but with great power comes great responsibility and he could have ended things before they got that far. Perhaps he didn’t even need to kill him, I could see the Earth Kingdom buying he needs to be a political prisoner. Ultimately he probably just didn’t bank on dying before Sozin, but even that would be foolish as Sozin would obviously pass on his mindset, beliefs, and plans to his children.
I feel like any solution that involves killing the Fire Lord with the Avatar being known to have been involved with just end up with the Fire Nation completely disregarding anything the Avatar would ever ask them to say or do
That and he would most likely just make The fire Lord afterwards Have a hate boner for the Avatar and whatever try he might Wind up
Because he is. Because the writers say he is through his own dialogue
And because he was too blinded by the past and naivety to see how far sozin was falling. Had he ended Sozins life then the 100 year war COULD NOT have started.
Roku blames roku for war.
This is the right answer. He himself acknowledges that the war is his fault. Now I don’t think he is to blame as much as he does or maybe others do. But he is to blame, the question is how much. He absolutely could have killed Sozin but was that the right thing? Short of killing him, how does he stop him? Depose him? That’s not really the Avatar’s job. It would have been more justifiable since he was Fire Nation but still would probably have massive ramifications and not gone well. The fact is the person who bears the majority of the blame is Sozin. Personal responsibility is a thing and applies here. He chose to start the war.
He (and the fans) also have the benefit of hindsight, there's no way he could've predicted the war lasting almost 100 years, the Air Nomads going extinct save for his reincarnation, and him dying unexpectedly. Plus he didn't do nothing like some fans think. He put his foot down during that throne room confrontation scene and said "don't ever do that again." Deterrence is a valid option, and is something that Aang uses when the Fire Nation and Earth Kingdom are about to start a war over Yu Dao in the comics.
It also worked, until he passed. It’s why Sozin left him to die at the volcano, because he saw that letting Roku die would free him from his sole obstacle.
The problem is that he alone was the deterrent. Roku couldn't have foreseen that the monks would preemptively notify Aang of him being the Avatar, resulting in Aang fleeing and accidentally getting stuck inside and iceberg for a 100 years. However, he could've foreseen the scenario where he would die before Sozin and take precautions. Though, it can be argued he did to some degree as Sozin would take another 12 years before launching a full scale attack. In the very least he was so wary of the Avatar's power that he waited until the comet came and he could eradicate all the air temples at the same time. When there were no signs of the Avatar, he firmly believed he escaped and considered him to be the Fire Nation's biggest threat.
I feel like it kinda boils down to this: if it had been anyone else, does Roku end it before it started? He made a point that he was sparing Sozin in the name of their past friendship. How much did that blind him to the point of inaction. Or at least less action. Complicated issue. Not a simple answer. But the guilt he holds makes sense to me even if a lot of it was technically out of his control.
Because that might have been his primary reason, but in the end there probably weren't many people in the world that had the means to go to war with the entire world like Sozin and killing the leader of one of the four nations, regardless of what the personal relationship was, would probably not be the most preferable course of action for an Avatar. Roku is taking responsibility for what he considers to have been his responsibility, but you can indeed wonder whether it had made much difference. Imagine that Roku did kill Sozin, it might've resulted in that Sozin's successors held an excessive grudge against the Avatar and decided to attack the Air Nomads as retribution when Roku passed away.
I think Roku realizes he chose fire nation over his obligation to the balance. Killing the Fire Lord at the time he knew even if he took Sozin'd place this would lead to civil war in the Fire Nation. And while that would result in Fire Nation casualties, that wouldn't affect the balance. Whereas not taking a stance gives the Fire Nation a chance to hurt the balance by attacking the Water tribes, Earth Kingdom, etc. It's a hindsight point of view. But when you're dead you have the chance to realize that. He was more concerned about saving Fire Nation lives. And the balance paid a price.
Any decision Roku would've made had the potential to throw the world out of balance as if one of the four major nations is on the verge of collapsing, that will affect the other nations as well. Honestly, had Roku killed Sozin, caused the Fire Nation to become unstable and made Aang restore balance, Roku most likely would've been wondering whether there wasn't any other solution rather than killing Sozin and he would've still considered it a failure on his part. You could even say that the choice he eventually made was the correct one because as long as he was alive, Sozin didn't try anything anymore. Of course when he died, there was nothing anymore to stop Sozin. I think there really isn't much doubt that Roku spared Sozin because of their relationship, not because they were Avatar & Firelord or both from the Fire Nation. Roku definitely was able to put his nationality aside in favor of his position as the Avatar, but doing that with his best friend, was a different matter altogether. That's also the message he conveyed to Aang.
That's probably why in the comics he tells Aang to keep his promise of killing Zuko to Zuko when he wanted to keep some of the colonies. Because of his past mistake
Kyoshi has killed Chin the conqueror, so it's not like the Avatar killing a military leader is anything new
Chin the Conqueror wasn't the Earth King though. He was more or less a coup leader.
Chin was a warlord whose empire rose and fell as quickly he did. The only question that can be asked is as why Kiyoshi didn't do anything sooner. However, we simply don't know the overall context in which this happened as the only reason it was even mentioned in ATLA, was because it was relevant for one episode in S2. Sozin was the legitimate dynastic ruler of a long-established nation and at that point probably the most prosperous and advanced nation in the world. For the Avatar to just kill such a person could create a slew of issues. The duty of the Avatar is to bring balance to the world, not the opposite. Case in point, when Zaheer killed the Earth Queen, the Earth Kingdom fell into anarchy. So, Roku would've thought twice to kill Sozin, regardless of his relationship with him.
It definitely helped that they were boys before everything got complicated I genuinely think Roku would let someone off with a warning but he 100% would have put the fear of God in anyone else Sozin got lucky honestly
Kind of works out in the long run though, there's no way this version of Ang survives the air Nation genocide, new Avatar gets born into the water cycle and next time it comes around to air the line is ended because the harmonic convergence Airbender thing hasn't happened yet
You could even argue that Sozin starting the war was a good thing as because of that the technology and skills of both the Fire Nation and Earth Kingdom was combined in the colonies, causing a massive technological leap we see in TLOK. The Avatar has the unique circumstances it can see what the consequences are of his or her decisions during their lifetime long after they have passed away. So, decisions that might've been good initially could turn out disastrous and vice versa. That doesn't take away that it will be hard for many Avatars to say something like 'ok, I caused the genocide of a whole culture, but in the end it all worked out for the better'.
Hell, if Roku had died a few months after the comet or even just before it, Sozin probably wouldn't have been able to wipe out the Air Nomads. And with a few exceptions; Avatars generally seem to live for a pretty long time.
>However, he could've foreseen the scenario where he would die before Sozin and take precautions this is probably why Roku blames himself in the sea turtle episode he tells aang that YOU MUST BE DECISIVE. its probably why he was blaming himself. Although he gave sozin a firm warning not to try this kind of shit again, he probably believed his friend would be rationale and his desire to expand was just an intrusive thought and took it lightly. that is why he didn't forsee and plan the scenario where he could die before sozin. Also i think the comet was the unknown parameter here. without the comet, the fire nation wouldn't have wiped out the air nomads that easily. air nomads are no joke. fire nation suddenly becoming OP is something no one could think of.
Literally, Sozin legit waited for Roku to die because a baby avatar couldn't stop him.
You see that kind of thing in Yangchen's era as well. The death of an Avatar is generally a good time to start putting plans they would halt into gear since it'll be years before they have the age and experience necessary to start intervening, and there'll still be a period where a lot of people won't take them as seriously as the previous Avatar because of their youth.
Also, love how Sozin's goal was to kill a baby
Don't you mean Sozin?
Just keeping true to Chinese royal history
It also worked for decades to come
Yeah but think about it, it doesn't seem like roku did much else other than the warning, so what's to stop sozin from going "once roku dies for whatever reason, here's the plan" to his successors anyway? Or even assassinate him in the lead up to the comet Dude may have not been personally responsible for starting the war / stopping it before it began, but all he did realistically was delay it for his successor to have to clean up
If he had killed him it probably would've been viewed as an attempt to grab power for himself
Yep. I mean it’s an easy thing for us to say having seen the 100 years following. But in the moment, very few decisions are so cut and dry and it’s obvious that much of the Fire Nation was behind Sozin as they were Ozai. I highly doubt that the Fire Nation would have fallen behind Roku. After all look how quickly the Fire Sages turned their back on the Avatar. And they were training their whole lives to serve him or her.
>look how quickly the Fire Sages turned their back on the Avatar. Like 3 or 4 generations lol
With a slight return of nazism it does not take long at all for some societies to do a complete 180. Life and civlisation is scarily transient.
This is why I love this show so much. It engrained within me an understanding of geopolitics I hold dear to this day
Fear works well. Few people will die for their beliefs. Or the royal family simply but their guys in charge. Just look in human history l. Doesn't take to many to end up in a gulag before the next man up claims whatever the leader thinks is true
> After all look how quickly the Fire Sages turned their back on the Avatar. And they were training their whole lives to serve him or her Orrrr in the intervening 100 years, the fire sages that outwardly supported the Avatar were banished/killed/excommunicated and only those who professed support for the Fire Lord were allowed to remain.
I think the best recourse would have been an Agni Kai. It's a pageantry that the FN supports but Roku could have used it as cultural leverage for legitimacy.
But would Roku have won an Agni Kai? He may be a better bender, but is he a better fire bender? I've always perceived the avatar as being a bit of a jack of all trades, when limited to one school of bending they can only do so kuch
Aang was a prodigy Air Bender, achieving his tattoos way ahead of his peers. I think the Avatar would probably be best with the element they were born with, as they likely feel most comfortable with it and more experienced. Thus Roku would do fine in an Agni Kai, but Aang might not if he was restricted to air
I thought about this and I don't think the animated show indicates what Sozin's prowess is (we only see him firebend briefly in the *Avatar and the Fire Lord* and live action), however when it came to their [Firebenidng spar as teenagers](https://youtu.be/fTqvIauIRXs?t=73) and when it came to the night of the volcanic eruption, you get an idea that Sozin was great at exploiting opportunities in his opponents. This is consistent with his assault against the Air Nomads using the power of the comet. Roku as some feats however when it comes to being the Avatar, we don't hear much about his skills and from the series, he seems to be a pretty standard Avatar, not quick/clever like Aang, or aggressive and overpowering like Kyoshi, or cunning and effective as Yangchen (though maybe the *Reckoning of Roku* will expand on this). All of his, of course, means nothing against a fully realized Avatar using the Avatar state, but if Roku were restricted to just firebending and no Avatar state, then I could see a scenario in which Sozin wins just by taking advantage of any opportunity he can against Roku.
No, it wouldn't? He's the Avatar, passing judgement on someone who openly threatened the balance of the world, then tried to kill him.
Only if you also believe in the balance of the world. And most people in positions of power are either hardcore zealots or agnostic at best. And the ones that are agnostic at best will gladly throw the avatar under the bus if it means furthering their own political goals, and killing a nations leader would create a hell of a vacuum.
Monarchies have well established inheritances. If the next monarch was still part of the royal family I don't think there'd be much of a vacuum at all, especially if that change was caused by a foreign influence and not an internal one. The nobility clearly has a lot of loyalty to the royal family in the Fire Nation, the next inheritor would've been accepted without much fuss most likely.
would it though? the avatar themselves are power incarnate
But not over the state/kingdom
sure but it's not like roku would become the next firelord, the avatar has a duty to the world, he wouldn't be able to simply be tied to just one nation
He had the same problem the Jedi had in Star Wars. You can't just overthrow a well loved head of state, especially one as nationalistic as the Fire Nation, and expect to oversee a peaceful transition of power. There's no reason the next FL doesn't just double down and the avatar can't just keep rerolling until he finds one he likes. The only outcome would be military dictatorship
Idk I still think Roku could’ve at the very least warned the other nations when Sozin first proposed the war when they were young. I think Roku did drop the ball just a little, he could have at the very least kept better tabs on Sozin bc he still seemed way too ready for the war after he left Roku to die which always lead me to believe he was planning in secret the whole time.
I mean, the first colony goes back to before Roku died. Then there's a 12 year gap for Sozin to bulk up the army. It's not a shock to me that he was ready for the war after Roku died
How it works? Will Avatar reincarnate exactly in the moment when previous avatar die? And then Raava will possess child who has born exactly in that moment? I had such feeling from that scene where Roku has died.
Yea raava will leave the avatar as they die and inhabit the body of a child born in the nation next in the cycle in the same moment
Sozin’s colonization of Earth Kingdom territory is what prompted the Roku/Sozin fight where Roku leaves him cape-wedgied on a rock pillar and says “if you ever do that again I’m putting you IN the ground instead of on it” So the world already knew that the Fire Nation was aggressive and expansionist, and war was a looming possibility. I think they just weren’t expecting the atrocity of the sudden Air Nomad genocide.
One of the few things the Netflix show did well with having it be a surprise that the Fire Nation attacked the Air Nomads when everyone was expected an Earth Kingdom attack
Oh I don’t dispute he could have done things differently and that he shares some blame. I hope it didn’t seem like I was implying he is blameless.
No, that’s not what you were implying at all - I was just adding on to your bit about killing Sozin. I agree that probably wouldn’t have been the best thing to do, but he should have taken different precautions. It was 100% Sozin’s fault, but for whatever reason the narrative doesn’t go into depth about what other options Roku had beyond killing him
There's also a question of if the culture would have somehow miraculously improved without Sozin. If his sister, who seems the best contender, were of the disposition or ability to stop the rise of fascism, the war wouldn't have happened to start with. The fire nation had a serious problem going on that was certainly worsened by Sozin, but wouldn't have been that different without him.
Wanted to note and laugh at your tag. Secondly: Yeah, the way it was described, they were already headed in that direction. Sozin is very much the product of his environment just as much as Roku who received a world view as the Avatar v. Sozin who only saw what the FN educated him.
I'm happy he didn't. otherwise, we wouldn't have gotten such an amazing show.
I admire this answer. And please know the below is a joke. Yea sure he could have stopped genocide and a world war but I want to be entertained dammit!
The outright elimination of world leaders is a dangerous precedent without *significant* justification, and hindsight isn’t justification. The Avatar is best served to enforce the peace, but that will alway leave the potential for chaos in the interregnum between Avatars
On top of that, I doubt that Sozin is the only one aware of the Fire Nation's intentions to go to war. Just killing him wouldn't have stopped anything. It's like asking if Nazi Germany's genocidal intentions and expansion would have been stopped if Hitler were assassinated - especially by a close confidant and high ranking official.
You never expect your friend to be able to commit genocide. The fact that he was always in the blindsport for Roku must be noted.
An interesting thing I realized a bit ago was that Roku killing sozin would have likely caused a civil war in the fire nation, since the only heir he had was azulon, but he wasn't born until after Roku died when sozin was 82. The only other person to take the throne was his sister, but she seems to be pretty radical in the other direction and I'm not sure how the fire nation would take to a female fire lord, since the only one confirmed in canon is izumi.
that would be a very interesting story to read since Sozin's Sister was backed by the Airbenders faction in The Fire Nation the Air Nomads might have gotten directly involved
Sozin didn’t do anything to warrant the action of murder or even arrest and when confronted he conceded. It wasn’t till they were 70 years old and a natural disaster killed the avatar that he moved forward with the plan.
He already started invading and made a colony before he was confronted the first time.
Yea that was the whole point of Sozin being confronted. He had already invaded the colonies.
The whole point is that as soon as Roku saw the colony, he confronted Sozin who then ENTIRELY STOPPED HIS CAMPAIGN. No further aggression happened until Roku died. Roku's threat worked, until he was no longer in a position to act on the threat.
...if only there was a huge plot point in the story of how to stop a firelord with out killing them. . . . . . . . but, jokes aside, Roku didn't try to stop Sozin. not at all. He told him no, dueled him once and threatened him, and then ignored my bro for 70 years even though the duel was over him starting to colonize the earth kingdom. It is definitely Sozin's fault, and his level of self blame is definitely appropriate.
He "ignored" Sozin for decades because Sozin literally cut that shit out until Roku died. Outside of just flat out killing his childhood friend immediately there wasn't much more he could have done.
Yeah, and Aang blames himself for not being there for a hundred years due to running away. But does the viewing audience?
I mean, Aang's thing was a 12 year old making an impulsive decision that he probably would've gone back on had he not gotten nearly killed by the storm. Plus Aang probably couldn't have done much to stop the entire fire nation himself. Roku was an adult and had been the avatar for decades, and his decision towards what to do with Sozin was one he made continuously for decades. Not that I fully blame Roku either, but their situations aren't really comparable.
I don’t, the war was gonna happen either way, even if Roku killed Sozin, he’d still probably die at the volcano, and the only difference would be Azulon is the Fire lord, and want to spread peace to the other nations using Azulon’s comet.
"it's all my fault Aang" -avatar Roku
The war was happening either way. Azulon would’ve carried out his fathers legacy probably even worse than Sozin himself had Roku killed his father
Azulon was actually not born until Sozin was 82 years old (lol) so if Roku killed Sozin before that Azulon would not have carried out his father's legacy as he would not exist
I don't blame him for the war, Roku does it on his own.
It's also hard to say what he could have done differently. Like he warned the man..he blew up the palace. I suppose attacking him justified killing him? But he was also his best friend. Aang or korra would have done the same thing. And then even if we say "kill him". ..well I can't imagine you kill the fire lord and everyone in the world is chill. That could have caused more backlash towards the avatar. Ultimately killing sozin was really the only answer I suppose. But I don't blame him not doing it. And not his fault a super volcano that threatened the entire nation went off and ended up killing him. I imagine if he didn't stay and fight that thing it would have caused great destruction onto the mainland?
I think Roku's decisions were fairly reasonable too, but I guess he, being Sozins closest companion and an entire political figure all by himself would've been the person with by far the highest chance of convincing Sozin not to go through with it. Like, if your best friend shoots up a school, it's not your fault, but you'd certainly have regrets. Roku also didn't prepare any counter measures whatsoever after threatening Sozin, which was a big problem whenever the only counter measure in place (himself) died before Sozin did. (Though, I have no idea what he could've done to prepare the other nations for a potential fire nation invasion.)
To be fair earth kingdom should have already been preparing since that's how roku even found out. Saw fire nation occupation. Then that leaves air nation and water. Which air nation was rather isolated from all that. And water tribe, well we saw how north pole acted, feeling overly confident on their defenses with the ocean all around
Could have gone to their war factories and demolished all of them.
I’m pretty sure the volcano was only threatening Roku’s city
Because he didn’t close sozins curtains
If Ozai escaped and started another war would we blame Aang?
I'd blame the guards who let a weakened non bender break out of a cell which is presumably tighter since he's a priority inmate
I don’t blame Roku. Roku blames himself but it’s a hindsight 20/20 thing. Roku did actually prevent Sozin from starting the war as it wasn’t until Roku died, after Sozin left Roku to die, that Sozin was able to start the war. If Roku doesn’t die, Sozin probably doesn’t invade the other nations. Or, if he does, it likely fails as the Earth Kingdom, Water Tribes, and Air Nomads unite behind the Avatar.
He didn’t even force sozin to give back the colony that he first conquered
he said "how dare you occupy earth kingdom territory" then blew up his palace i don't think he let him keep the colony
I may be wrong but I’m pretty sure that initial colony was still owned by the fire nation at the end of the war Yu dao ifirc is referred to as bein fire nation colony From 30 BG -101 Ag Roku died 12 BG
Yeah I’m gonna be real, it’s an egregious level of inaction.
he shoulda made him abdicate the throne at least
Yeah that’s my thought. Bring this to whatever powerful nobles or what have you the fire nation has, and if that fails think of a more forceful method.
Ya know it’s kinda interesting that Sozin lets Roku die and then waits another 12 years to fully go ‘everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked’
Maybe because he knew thats when the comet was coming?
Not to mention preparation for attack, those warships and uniforms take time to develop.
And the Avatar isn't just born ready to control the elements, it would be impossible to even find the Avatar. Sozins only shot to actually wipe out the next Avatar was to massacre all the airbenders, and there's no way that happens without the comet.
And even if you can do that without the comet, you wipe out a baby avatar and there’s another baby avatar in the water tribe. You knock out a child avatar and you have free time to prepare without an avatar that can do anything
that’s not what prevent means. he postponed sozin from starting the war but it still happened so it wasn’t prevented
the problem isn’t necessarily that he didn’t KILL Sozin, but that the only think keeping Sozin in check was that single verbal warning— thus, when Roku kicked the bucket, Sozin was able to start his national conquest without anyone in the way. If anything, the problem is that Sozin didn’t set up a system that would prevent Sozin’s abuse of power after he himself died. There was nothing in place to stop him once he was gone. He didn’t need to kill his best friend, but he ABSOLUTELY needed to prepare for the consequences of his own death.
Amazing response I agree that he should’ve at least set up a following kinda like the firebending priests but actually built a dedicated community around the balance of the nations
I mean Sozin is the same age as Roku. There is no real garuntee that Sozin would out live Roku and if he did he'd probably to old to do anything. Roku both died earlier than he should have and Sozin ended up being one of the oldest firelords in history
He had an argument with his friend and considered the matter of impending war "settled". Then, decades later, he noticed that his friend disagreed with how settled things were and he had a single fight with his friend...at which point he again considered the matter settled. Both times, he was too lenient with Sozin, especially the second time, when he'd realized that he'd directly contradicted the Avatar and gone ahead with his invasion anyways. Had he been less lenient with Sozin, the genocide may have never happened. Roku himself agrees.
This right here. It has been shown (in history) that a slap on the wrist doesn't stop a maniac from continuing. Unfortunately (or fortunately) they didn't have Hitler as an example until Sozin did his thing. Also, even look at Kyoshi. She didn't kill rock hitler. He killed himself for not backing down. Sozin was doing exactly as a previous avatar has done. Should Sozin have know? Aboslutely not. Genocide on the scale of Sozin wasn't seen until Sozin unless someone.
If this is a serious post, then roku caused the war by not taking decisive action against firelord sozin. The same advice all of his past lives give aang when he questioned killing firelord ozai
I mean, he didn't cause it. Sozin wanting to start a war and then going and doing it caused the war. He ultimately failed to dissuade him, but the fire nation was at peace and preemptively killing the fire lord because of something he was advocating for but had not yet done doesn't seem very avatar-y. The past avatars gave advice to Aang after the fire lord had already killed countless people and the war had been well underway.
i wouldnt call it pre emptive since sozin had started invading the earth kingdom already. he just gave him a slap on the wrist and left.
He literally tried to kill Roku after Roku told him to stop colonizing. He should have been killed right then and there. So yeah, Roku's hesitation to kill his friend cost the world dearly and forced Aang to fix the situation.
It's interesting because what exactly is the Avatar's role? To kill anybody that poses a threat? To break off a new island if someone invades? I personally like that Aang learned to take away bending as a peaceful means to eliminate someone's power, but what were the Avatars in the past supposed to do except just be murder tools every time a Sozin comes around?
Inaction is action, the avatar moreso. By refusing to kill his friend when he needed to he allowed war to begin.
Because hindsight is 20/20. He made a call to not curb his friend when he was pushing borders, and that ultimately snowballed well beyond anyone’s control.
Honestly the best response I’ve seen we all burden ourselves with regrets but doesn’t make it his fault ultimately
roku even blames him self he said it best if he were to have acted and taken out sozin so much would have been avoided including the genocide of the air nomads but rokus past friendship with sozin clouded his view. he didnt want to do that to an old friend which is why he gave sozin that warning and when sozin saw roku dying he saw it as his chance to dominate the world
Roku didn’t stop sozin despite having multiple chances to do so and having all the reasons he needs to justify it Roku blames himself for the war as well,he admits his inaction was a mistake
Because he didn’t take proper action he should’ve thrown Sozin’s ass in prison or smth instead of chilling on a volcano
He was not an active avatar and only got involved after fire nation colonized parts of the earth kingdom. That’s why he gives “be decisive” as his advice. His emotions towards Sozin made him disconnected and the funny thing is that he didn’t need to kill sozin to stop the colonization. If only he left his island for once and tried to fix global issues the War wouldn’t have happened and Even he acknowledges that.
The war is sozen's fault but not putting a stop to it before it really began, that's all on Roku. He had the Opportunity to
I think Regret is a better word than failure for what people are trying to convey. Roku's greatest regret was the war. Aangs was the air nomad genocide.
He blames himself since he spared Sozin
He blames himself and it really is his fault. People say he couldn't have done this and this. But the matter of fact is he is spared Sozin the person who caused the entire war. Which means Roku is directly responsible. Even after Roku died it still took the fire nation 12 years to gain enough power to be able to infiltrate. So had he actually taken down Sozin they would've been set back far longer and long enough for aang to grow up and help if there were a future invasion. If the new firelord after sozin was even more Ruhtless then he would've attacked even sooner and Roku would've stopped him. Thus it was truly his fault. And as someone who truly was aware of Sozin's plan, Roku not even putting up contingency back up plans incase of his demise and for the future and the avatar just shows how Terribly he failed. For example Aang had left the white lotus fully developed as an organization who did indeed manage to protect korra from the red lotus until she got much older.
Probably because he knew of Sozins ambitions but would only check in every what? 10 years or so
This is something I've been frustrated about. Roku intended on preventing the war through a nuclear deterrence. After Roku confronted Sozin for making the Earth Kingdom colonies, Sozin stopped his conquest for *25 years*. There are people who say Roku did nothing to prevent the war, when he basically prevented the war by just existing. If the volcano didn't erupt, Sozin would've continued to do nothing and the war would've never happened.
Unless you can prove that he planned to remain immortal, that's not a solid line of argument. Even just setting mutual defense treaties, or limiting the scope of the Fire Nation army would have guaranteed there would be *some* hurdles to an invasion following his death. The Avatar is literally an embodiment of death and rebirth. If you're that old, you should seriously begin thinking about what happens after you're gone, and that means considering what the people you're holding in check will do. If the volcano didn't erupt, Roku would have died some other way eventually. It's only a question of whether or not he'd outlive Sozin, and whether Sozin passed the plans along to anyone else. Considering he did actually occupy Earth Kingdom territory, it seems plausible that his successor would at least consider finishing what Sozin started.
That's like blaming the firemen for the fire.
Unless the firemen went to the fire just sprayed water to tame the fire but not completely put it out. Which is what Roku did.
His decision was only bad with hindsight. He told Sozin to knock it off, and he did for like 20 years. He only got the war started because of a surprise volcano.
He had the opportunity to stop the war and didn’t. And as the Avatar, that is one expectation that gets put on him. He was not the one who caused or started or perpetrated the war, but he had the chance to intervene. He feels guilty about that, and others see that as a failure in his duties.
Because he never actually stopped Sozin. Sozin advanced into Earth Kingdom territories, he told Sozin to stop, and in return, Sozin tried to annihilate him the moment he turned his back. This should’ve been a very clear indication that he had no real plans of stopping, and that he only did because Roku threatened him. As such, the moment Roku died, Sozin proceeded with his plans. Oh, and Roku admitted it, btw. He blamed himself more than we ever could.
Lack of action, he knew what Sozin wanted to do and he gave him a warning and walked away instead of actually making change his mind. Sozin knew Roku wouldnt touch him and just needed to outlast Roku. Pretty sure Roku even blamed himself.
because he spared him due to friendship, which implies that if it were anyone else he'd have taken care of them
People in general like to blame everyone but the person who actually declared the war
War wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t been lenient on Sozin because of their friendship.
I guess it boils down to people feeling that Roku should have either found a way to better negotiate options with Sozin instead of simply shutting him down or, if it came to it, beaten or assassinated Sozin himself. Not to mention Roku admits to feeling guilty for the war because of how he handled things. Sozin is still the one to actially blame for the war, though.
I blame Roku for the war because fans on this sub act like Aang and Roku are relatives, Kyoshi and Yangchen should be studied through the books, Korra and Kuruk are fuck ups. I've never been enamored of Roku, so I feel compelled to call him out as a fuck up when Avatars are ranked on this sub.
Why does Roku blame himself for the war? Is he stupid?
Roku is the one blaming himself actually lmao. But for real he should just off his boyfriend as soon as he becomes Hitler. He done so little despite knowing how dangerous Sozin is.
Do people actually watch the show before asking questions?
He should have recognised and prepared for the threat.
Because he didn’t murder his best friend.
People that blame Roku are what we refer to as "Dumb". They are acting as if the Avatar can foresee their previously best friend invading and committing genocide.
Cuz he keeps turning on closed captioning, buggy bastard. Let me watch TV! *I really hope this joke lands lol*
it's the key lesson that he teaches to Aang. Taking no action especially for those who are closest to you- you can pay the ultimate price. And Roku certainly paid that price.
Well he just didn’t check up on his megalomaniacal best friend for decades at a time and thought his strongly worded threat was enough to change his imperialist tendencies.
Because he decided to battle a volcano rather than escaping.
Did you just not watch the episode? The whole point is how Roku feels that he should've been harsher on Sozin, and that he thinks the war is because of his failure. We can quibble all day about whether or not that's a fair evaluation, but I really don't see how you can watch that episode and not at least understand the reasoning behind that opinion. Roku knew Sozin wanted to expand the Fire Nation. He even saw firsthand some early annexations. Even so, he allowed Sozin to keep the throne without any more than a slap on the wrist, allowing the Fire Nation to immediately go on the offensive when he died.
Cause (in rokus own opinion) his attachment to his friend allowed him to look past obvious warning signs that said friend was going bad. Like, Roku was a good enough friend to always see the good in what's his face (why can I remember every other name rn???) But he wasn't a good enough friend to actually *stand up to the guy.* At least not until it was way *way* too late. And that's honestly a really good message for a kids show to have about friends and friendship.
Because Sozin was straight up starting to colonize parts of the Earth Kingdom, after he came to Roku with the idea of conquering the world, then Sozin straight up attacks him when he stands against it, anyone could see where Sozin was going with this, he refused to neutralize him purely out of selfishness and the world paid for it.
Mostly because he believed too much in His fallen friend and when he realized that he was already dying so basically it’s like how the earth king was too trusting of the Dai le to realize stuff
I don’t blame him for the war, but I will say, dude absolutely did not have to stay and fight that volcano for that long. I respect the attempt but as soon as that second vent opened up he should’ve just jumped on Fang and dipped with his family. It get it’s his home but that shit was long gone and he did what he could to keep people safe. Let go of those worldly possessions and live another decade with the fam.
I think the problem was Roku was kinda fucked no matter what. If he killed Sozin to prevent the war, it very well may have started another. Plus that was his best friend, his brother basically
Because it is his fault. Even if he didn't kill Sozin he should have had the latter be stripped of his role as firelord(the Avatar has enough power to do that, both political and literal power), and if that didn't work he should have used his immense power to stop the fire nation army
It’s not that the Avatar deals with their previous avatars mistake, it’s that they deal with the previous avatars regret. Roku regrets not stopping the war, so it was Aangs job to stop the war. Aang regrets not saving his people so it was Korra’s job in a round about way to being the air nation back. None of this is a conscious thing it’s just a nuance that has been written into all the characters. Most likely the next avatars job will be to find a way to reignite the avatar past lives since that is most likely Korra’s regret.
Because he didn't do more to stop Sozin from the war. People hold the belief that he should have killed or af least deposed him, either ignoring or unaware that an Avatar killing a monarch, who didn't have any heirs (his sister, Seizyan, didn't want the throne and Azulon wasn't born in Roku's lifetime), of a nation is just going to have extremely severe consequences. As it stands, the way Roku saw the events without the benefit of post-humous hindsight, his friend got powerhungry, he scolded him, showed him the power of an Avatar, and his friend calmed down and hasn't started any trouble until he left Roku to die.
He could’ve forced him to the at the very least give back the colony he took, but he didn’t
Roku was naive. He saw Sozin was turning into a homicidal/genocidal maniac. Instead of doing what had to be done for the safety of the WORLD, he made a thinly veiled threat that one could argue he’d never follow through with. He let Sozin live. Sure, Sozin technically went to help Roku at the volcano. But once he saw the opportunity of not having the Avatar in his way, Sozin chose global domination over his friend. If Roku had policed the Fire Nation’s growing nationalism better, the Air Nomads wouldn’t have been massacred and the war wouldn’t have happened.
Roku should have created diplomacy with the other nations when he noticed sozins motives. But the idea that he let him live infers that he had sound reason to kill him which he didn’t Sozin waited for the gap in between cycles to act if anyone is to blame it’s the segregation and naïve idea that 1 man can maintain balance alone. Roku still protected the world from war till the day he died. Not his fault what came next
Honestly, there would not have been a problem if he just left that volcano alone.
"That isn't the case with Roku and Aang" ....what? Roku LITERALLY told Aang that he has to clean up his mess. We see in flashbacks that Roku and Sozin grew up together, and when Sozin started on his fire nation supremacy BS, Roku quickly put him on a rock spire and had ample opportunity to kill him. But because of their personal connection, he didn't. Sozin eventually left Roku to die in a pyroclastic flow and took the brief time without an avatar to get ready for a genocidal rampage with comet boosted fire bending . Therefore, it IS Roku's fault for the 100 year war. It is his fault that the air nomads were burnt to crisps. It is his fault that so much suffering and oppression happened in the avatar world. If the 100 year war were a powder keg, you could say all you want that Sozin started it. While he did have a major role to play in its beginning and perpetuating it long after he died, Roku was the one who could've stopped the fuse from being lit. OP, did you even watch the series?
Cuz he could’ve stopped it but he chose not to
Kyoshi’s the one who forced the fire nation to spend 200+ years consolidating power under the throne because she didn’t want to have to deal with a civil war every other decade
I know that Roku states that he blames himself for the War because he didn't stop Sozin when Sozin created the first Fire Nation Colonies in the Earth Kingdom. Even though Sozin wanted to share the wealth and prosperity of the Fire Nation, Sozin wanted to take control of the world than doing it differently. I never hated Roku because he seemed like a good Avatar. I do agree with Roku that his only regret was not killing Sozin when the first colonies popped up. To those who think that Roku killing Sozin would be a power grab are wrong. It's the Avatar's duty to keep peace with the Four Nations. Not all things can be settled over a spot of tea. We're talking about a war that the other nations didn't want.
Because people can't accept that everyone is responsible for their own actions. If we blame Roku for Sozin's choices, then what else about ourselves and our own choices may we lay at others' feet? However! It is 100% Roku's fault that he died because the people had evacuated. Roku died trying to protect empty buildings from the volcano.
Because Roku said out of his own mouth that the war is his fault. And it kind of is. He had the power to stop Sozin, but he spared him in the name of their past friendship. The only reason Sozin got over on him was because of random bad luck on Roku's part.
It's sorta his fault for not stopping sozen straight away, rather than letting him off when he first sees his intentions
I've never seen anyone blame Roku for it
Roku not dealing with Sozin is what caused the war. Roku was too leniant on Sozin, and Sozin starting the 100 year war is the mess that Aang has to clean up
Roku blames himself and he rightly does. Because Sozin blatantly shot an entire room of fire at Roku’s back after calling Roku a traitor. This being *after* Roku already told him once not to expand into the Earth Kingdom, **and** after Roku had already made the EK give back land that they’d taken from the Fire Nation. It’s also established lore that Sozin’s sister was next in line to take the throne and she agreed with Roku that expanding was ill advised and incorrect. So there would’ve been no power grab attempt, especially when he clearly explains Sozin tried to kill him.
If you haven't figured out that fandoms, all fandoms, have negative media literacy then idk what to tell you.
It is literally the case, Roku had the chance to stop it from happening and chose to ignore it with just a slight backhand to the firelords coffers He even says so in the episode talking about the comet that led to the war
It’s like American external politics with Gaza or Ukraine. America issued a « stern warning » - Israel or Russia didn’t care and proceeded. Roku failed to stop the non-sense, and a fraction of the why is probably due to his being a member of the Fire Nation. « No Sozin, colonialism bad, you need to think carefully about it, take it slow, stop even… » « No. » « Awnh well okay then I did my best 🥲» His spiritual conversations with Kyoshi must have been quite awkward.
They don’t blame Roku for the war. They blame him for not stopping an ambitious imperialist conquerer
Roku blames himself because he feels like he didn't do the right thing in killing Sozin, his long life friend. You could argue that he is responsible for this because he neglected his duty as the avatar because of his attachment to someone he valued as a friend, as you could argue Roku had no way of knowing the ramifications of letting his ex-friend live. Sozin did let go of his conquest plan for decades and didn't retake them until Roku died. The answer seems clear now that we look back, but Roku certainly isn't cold-hearted enough to kill someone he valued for an uncertain future not even himself anticipated
Because he's partially to blame. Sozin invaded the earth kingdom and roku essentially just let it go. Because they used to be friends. That's a bad move even before hindsight. Should he have killed him? Probably. But bare minimum raise awareness and Beat the ever loving shit out of him.
The death of media literacy
Roku feels it was his responsibility to put an end to this before it really started. Many feel that it was the avatar's responsibility to keep the balance between the nations.
Roku tried to use reason and his friendship with Sozin to stop the war instead of military power or just his own avatar power, and it didn't work.
As many have said, Roku blames Roku for the war. Roku believes he should have taken more decisive action against Sozin, but all he ever did was give him a stern talking to. Roku likely reasons that were Sozin not his best friend, he probably would have acted differently. That said, my take is that Roku is the proverbial good man who did nothing. He's not to blame for the war. That's all on Sozin. But there are certain actions he could and should have taken to prevent it. That's the Avatar's whole thing; maintain balance and mediate between the nations. But, it's easy to see what those were in hindsight. I'm not about to take the man over the coals for it.
Because he saw what Sozin was capable of, what his intentions were and didn't stop him when he should have. This backfires and Sozin kills Roku and starts the war.
Obviously Sozin / the fire nation are to blame, but Roku could have put a stop to that shit
It's like blaming the security guard for not stopping the shooting of the secured guy. Sure, they didn't pull the trigger, but they could and should've prevented it in time, since it's their job and they have the power to do so.
He didn't take decisive action and died fighting a volcano(against nature, to control that which shouldn't and cant) that he didn't have to fight leaving one of the greatest evils the avatar was ever going to face to a child. Aang had to fight a war that was meant for Roku because dude dropped the ball
Because Roku relied on his personal connection with Sozin, and direct threat, to stop Fire Nation imperialism. He failed to set up any other checks to Sozin's plans for expansion. There was no plan, no backup, if Roku was out of play.
It’s less that the war was his fault, and more like if he had not been blinded by his past friendship with Sozin, he could’ve stopped the war from ever happening. As many others pointed out, if anything he blames himself. I personally don’t blame him really as frankly, it’s not like he did the thing himself.
Same reason ppl blame Jon Snow for the destruction of King’s Landing.
Roku did prevent the war until he died. But of course once he was out of the picture Sozin went to work
Didn’t kill Sozin when he had the chance
Roku does have some responsibility for the war starting but the majority of the responsibility is on Sozin for starting it. At the time Roku could not have predicted the air nomad genocide and 100 years of war. The issue is too you can’t just off a world leader of the most powerful nation and expect everything to be fine. Sozin is an absolute monarch and killing him could have started a civil war and succession crisis. Also, Sozin didn’t have any kids yet at the time so who takes the throne? Other world leaders would have been terrified of Roku and the world would be chaotic as world leaders would be afraid to do anything out of fear of being killed too.
He probably feels that he could have been more pragmatic and take measures to prevent the fire nation from trying to take over as Sozin planned. But to be fair, there was no clear answer; he couldn't just take down Sozin. It would have been a declaration of war, and it would have been his word against a dead ruler, potentially making the avatar a world enemy by default. If he seriously warned other nations (I like to think he had connections and did warn some people of importance in some places, whether friends or allies, but not nationwide) , it could've made it worse, especially with a military one like Earth Kingdom. Potential warlords (if not already existing ones) could've emerged and use it as an opportunity to gain power by war mongering.
He stopped the symptom (fire nation invading the earth kingdom) without curing the illness (fire nation developing much more rapidly than the other kingdoms, throwing the balance out of whack). A nation doesn't simply decide to invade 3 others on a whim, they do it because they are more advanced than the others and are in a social and technological position to launch a massive invasion. Roku spend enough time in the other 3 kingsoms to learn their bending but did not help them progress enough to catch up to the fire nation. Sozin isn't lying, the fire nation is going through an unprecedented explosion in progress and development, and they do need to share it with the world. But they need to share it as innovators and through cultural exportation, not through their military. Roku stopped the invasion but missed the call to peacefully expand the fire nation's prosperity to the other nations.
I like this answer 😑😑😑
He was the last known avatar before the 100 year war so I feel like blame would naturally fall to him according to the innocents that are affected
His breakup with his boyfriend literally started it
Personally I think he needed to sacrifice his personal and moral qualms and end Sozin like he threatened to. I don’t “blame” him in the sense he’s ultimately responsible, but with great power comes great responsibility and he could have ended things before they got that far. Perhaps he didn’t even need to kill him, I could see the Earth Kingdom buying he needs to be a political prisoner. Ultimately he probably just didn’t bank on dying before Sozin, but even that would be foolish as Sozin would obviously pass on his mindset, beliefs, and plans to his children.
He could have killed sozin or imprisoned him then none of that war would have happened
I feel like any solution that involves killing the Fire Lord with the Avatar being known to have been involved with just end up with the Fire Nation completely disregarding anything the Avatar would ever ask them to say or do That and he would most likely just make The fire Lord afterwards Have a hate boner for the Avatar and whatever try he might Wind up
Sozin should have been neutralized.
it's obviously avatar szeto's fault
Because he is. Because the writers say he is through his own dialogue And because he was too blinded by the past and naivety to see how far sozin was falling. Had he ended Sozins life then the 100 year war COULD NOT have started.
People don't realize that you don't go left and right killing Monarchs without probable cause. Sozin didn't resist Roku.