Congratulations!!! You are the Chosen One – now suffer.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before.  

A boy born into a prophecy. He is told he is special. He is handed a sword, or a wand, or a glider. He is told he must defeat a large imminent threat. He is told he must save the world. 

As readers or viewers, we love a Chosen One. 

They are cool, fun, powerful, and even their outfits are fire. 

But there’s a different perspective to this trope which may hint at something darker.

What often looks like empowerment is usually just manipulation hidden as a guiding force. Rather than focusing on the protagonist’s possibilities (or freedom), the  “Chosen One” narrative puts her or him on the path of what is presented as a necessary sacrifice (forced upon the character). This sacrifice may be understood as actualizing and therefore empowering (by giving the character access to a hidden inner power), but this power is something the character must be taught to want. 

One reason why the genre is so appealing for the reader is not because we see the Chosen One experience freedom, but rather because the reader is alleviated of the daunting responsibilities forced upon the main character. In a broken world, it is comforting to look up to one person to fix it for us. 

My favorite example of this trope is from a childhood TV show which you may have seen after SpongeBob was done playing: Avatar: The Last Airbender (ATLA). I remember when my brother and I begged our mom for every DVD about ATLA from our town’s library. We would watch it during car rides, laughing in the back seats the entire time. However, with age, I realized that ATLA is far more complex than it seems at first glance, hiding valuable moral lessons regarding war. ATLA manages to mask its subtle critique of the Chosen One trope beneath a deceptively gentle and childish cartoon. 

The main protagonist is a boy named Aang. He is 12 years old when the Air Nomads tell him he is the new Avatar, a reincarnated being whose only job is to restore and maintain balance in the world. Imagine being told that you can now bend all 4 elements, talk to spirits, and that, with practice, you will become the most powerful bender there ever was. 

At a glance, it sounds almost divine. 

Unfortunately, the new status and powers forced upon Aang also mean that he can no longer have a normal childhood. Furthermore, he is unable to grieve the genocide of his people, and cannot refuse to help when the world needs him to fight. Even when he isn’t ready, people around him begin to use him to fix their problems. 

This occurs in season 2 when General Fong tries to manipulate him into being in an Avatar State which would create a weapon against the Fire Nation, traumatizing him in the process. Even though Aang tells him he is unable to do so, the general continues to use different tactics to achieve the Avatar State from Aang. Over time his tactics become more violent, until he captures a character named Katara, successfully getting Aang to reach his Avatar State. However, due to the cruel tactics he used, including putting Aang’s friend Katara in danger, the child no longer trusts him. In that moment, the General didn’t see Aang as the child he was, but rather a weapon to be exploited. This is a recurring theme in the show, with characters setting Aang’s humanity and childhood aside and instead prioritizing his abilities as the Chosen One. 

When he is unsuccessful in fulfilling what people ask of him, Aang is shamed. 

That is precisely what this trope does to children protagonists over and over again. Think of Harry Potter: praised as a baby for surviving an attempted murder, abused as a child by his Aunt and Uncle, and finally destined for martyrdom at the age of 17. He is predestined for a life of danger, ironically only being able to live in peace once he is dead. Or take for instance Katniss Everdeen, who never wanted the role of the Mockingjay, but becomes the symbol of the revolution anyway. She is manipulated by both sides of the war, each wanting to shape her into a perfect mold which fulfills the role they have designated for her; for the capitol, she is an exotic exhibition, and for the rebels a beacon of hope. By the time she breaks from her mold and kills President Coin, many of her friends and family have suffered a great deal. By then, it is no longer a victory, but a relief from it all.

All three of these stories include a Chosen One who is supposedly in charge. But if everyone is telling you what to do and who you have to be, are you really choosing?

That is the problem with prophecies since they put one on a path predetermined by fate. The hero is born, a battle must be fought, and balance will be restored. But with this, choice is erased as well. 

So maybe, instead of wondering whether or not “choice is real” in such stories, a better question would be: Can a Chosen One reclaim their fate?

I believe Aang is someone who succeeded in doing so.

In the series finale, Aang is pressured by the entire world, including his friends and even past Avatars, to kill Fire Lord Ozai to end the war and restore balance. This is his destiny and therefore his duty. 

But Aang refuses. 

He is led on an enlightening journey to a giant LionTurtle’s back. There, he is presented with a second option which would allow the defeat of the Fire Lord without taking his life. He discovers the ability to take bending away. Aang chooses this other way of doing things, which proves not to be a “loophole” to escape hardship, but a moral stand where his personal input led the way. Aang never surrenders his beliefs to serve the expectations of others and changes the world in his own way. 

This also occurs in The Hunger Games when Katniss is tasked with the public execution of President Snow, where she kills Coin instead. She could have done what was expected of her and simply shot Snow, but instead, she rationalized her options and decided the world would be better off without both of them. She kills Coin with her arrow and lets the eager crowd behind her get Snow. Through this action of killing the next authoritarian leader, she reclaims her agency, refusing to be used as just a symbol and refusing to be a part of a rebellious force that pretends to be on her moral side.

So why are we so obsessed with these kinds of stories? Why have there been so many adaptations of this trope, leading back all the way to Ancient Greece with stories such as those of Achilles, Perseus, and Hercules? 

It might be because of that feeling of being special. We want someone else to need us, to say that we are meant for more and that we have a destiny. While this can be entertaining or even comforting, it can also be dangerous. We should not get used to the idea of one person always coming to the rescue when things get hard. There cannot be one person who was born with the sole purpose of saving. This would have us end up unable to fix anything for ourselves. 

The world doesn’t need another prophecy or a promise for things to improve in the future. It needs people willing to act without some kind of destiny dictating their actions. Without a myth concealing them from the truth. The real hero chooses themselves. 

Even after all these years, a mere kids show remains influential, showing us a young boy as the Chosen One who dared to defy its meaning. 

Aang isn’t great for being born the Avatar. He is great for the choices he made.

Albert Camus once said in his work The Myth of Sisyphus, “There is no fate that cannot be surmounted by scorn”. Aang’s quiet disobedience and refusal to kill is his revolution. 

What if that is the kind of hero we need now? Not one who was chosen, but one who refuses to rely on predetermined paths laid out by others.