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No. 113692
>>113685 >>Season Two, from what we've been gleaned so far, seems to be of a similiar theme going on in the background, beyond even the invasion of spirits/Korra's journey to the Spirit World. That is to say, the appearance and intervention of Korra's uncle, who wants to instill North Water Tribe religion and values into the people of the South.
I wouldn't go that far. In fact, I'd say that S1 and S2 seem to shaping up to have almost completely opposite themes. Lemme explain...
S1 was, ultimately, about one city and one people collapsing into conflict because of their belief in false dichotomies. For all the talk about benders and nonbenders, the real divide within Republic City was an economic one, and one papered over with a hollow multiculturalism. Korra and Tenzin are the only ones who ever talk up Aang's vision for the city, and neither of them are exactly natives, y'know?
Look at the Satos. Look at the bros. What's their real objective? To get rich. Hiroshi did it. Asami will be trying to do it again in S2. The brothers spent half of S1 trying to strike it rich via probending. Even Tarrlok saw success in terms of gathering political power and soft influence (and it's not exactly like he was hurting when he bought Korra that car!). With the absence of their originating cultures, the homegrown one of Republic City is a kind of hollow thing where money/power is their American Dream.
The bender/Non-bender conflict was thus basically racism. The divide might have been "fake" but it had real consequences, and, like how poor race relations are sometimes thought to have sabotaged the American socialist movement, it turned the working class benders and nonbenders against their common interest. Between the vaguely aristocratic bender leaders (Tenzin, Lin, Tarrlok) and the nonbender revolutionaries deep in the pocket of the world's greatest plutocrat (Hiroshi), it's more than a little telling that Our Heroes in S1 are two blue collar gutter rats, an heiress who gave up the privilege of wealth in order to fight for the greater good, and a penniless (if dim) warrior-philosopher in training.
But I digress.
Season 2 seems to be shaping up to be about how two *different* sorts of people have to learn to live together: North and South, human and spirit. The Avatar Wan stuff hints most strongly at it, as we know the Avatar forms a bridge between both worlds, and we'll be seeing Wan's journey as first establishes that balance between each population. Just from a narrative standpoint, it seems likely that Wan's story will reflect on Korra's, which is to say that she'll spend S2 learning that both the South and the North deserve to each live their own way, and that each needs the other.
As that line from Persona 3 goes: "Two in harmony surpass one in perfection."
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