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Avatar: The Last Airbender - North and South
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Caution: spoilers.

This is a 3-issue miniseries, released in 2016-17, but I didn't get around to reading it until 2020. It's the fifth miniseries based on the TV series Avatar: The Last Airbender, partly concurrent with the events of Smoke and Shadow. In part one, Sokka and Katara return to their home in the Southern Water Tribe, and are shocked to find their village replaced by a city. And their father, Hakoda, is now head chieftain of the entire tribe. Other changes include the fact that their Gran Gran is now married to Pakku, who is trying to teach a couple of young girls, Siku and Sura, to waterbend, though they insist they're not waterbenders. Sokka and Katara also meet a couple of people from the Northern Water Tribe, Malina and Maliq, who are in charge of planning the reconstruction of the Southern Tribe. While Sokka is excited about this progress, Katara is upset that nothing about their home is the same as they remember it. (Well, nothing except Gran Gran's hut.) Despite her misgivings, Katara supports her father. But she and Sokka soon learn that there's a group led by a former comrade of their father's named Gilak, who don't trust the Northerners at all, and consider Hakoda a traitor for working with them. So they're planning a coup. Oh, and at the end of part one, Katara and Sokka learn that their father is now in a romantic relationship with Malina.

In part two, they learn that the Northerners are collaborating with Earthen Fire Industries (as seen in The Rift), who have sent an executive partner to represent them: Toph! (It's also in part two that Sokka and Katara first meet Siku and Sura.) And Aang arrives, following the events of "Smoke and Shadow." So he helps when Gilak's group stages an attack. Team Avatar and the Southern Tribe's police manage to thwart the attack and arrest Gilak and some of his followers. But they'll make more trouble in part three. Also in part three, Earth King Kuei and Fire Lord Zuko come to meet with Hakoda and discuss their respective nations working together. But a lot of Southerners aren't happy about having foreigners there, and stage protests. (It reminds me a lot of some Americans- as well as other countries- opposing immigration. There's a lot of xenophobia in the Southern Tribe. Though after all the years of raids by the Fire Nation, one can't entirely blame them. But it still makes me sad and angry.) Anyway, I'm leaving out lots of details, bult ultimately there's a happy ending, even if our heroes know there's still a lot of work ahead in building trust of other nations (including the Northern Water Tribe, who aren't all as interested in equality with the Southern Tribe as Malina is).


Dark Horse index

Untitled Document Avatar: The Last Airbender comics
The Lost Adventures * The Promise * The Search * The Rift * Smoke and Shadow * North and South * Imbalance * Team Avatar Tales *
Katara and the Pirate's Silver * Toph Beifong's Metalbending Academy * Suki, Alone

The Legend of Korra comics
Turf Wars * Ruins of the Empire