Hiroshi Sato

"URN"

- These people... these benders... they took away your mother, the love of my life. They've ruined the world. But with Amon, we can fix it and build a perfect world, together. We can help people like us everywhere.

Hiroshi Sato is a non-bending, barrel-chested businessman with a big personality. His family lineage extends back to the first Fire Nation colonists. His idea for the Satomobile caused him to become the captain of industry in his era. During a police search of his secret factory, he revealed himself to be an Equalist, creating high-tech weaponry to fight against benders.

History
Hiroshi Sato was born to a poor family from the Dragon Flats district. A child with big dreams, he worked at a very young age shining shoes to help support his family. When he was eighteen, he convinced a wealthy businessman to invest in the idea of automobiles for the common man. Before long, he was producing Satomobiles in his first "Future Industries" factory. By the time he was twenty-five, the ingenious industrialist had made his first million yuans. Realizing that not everyone in Republic City could afford their own Satomobiles but needed transportation nonetheless, he created a taxi cab for the less wealthy to get around in the city.

At some point, he married and had a daughter named Asami, but in 158 ASC, his wife was killed by a member of the Agni Kai Triad after the invasion and robbery of their mansion.

In 170 ASC, Asami brought Mako to Hiroshi's factory where he explained his humble beginnings, and then announced that he would sponsor the Fire Ferrets in the pro-bending tournament, provided they would bear the Future Industries logo on their uniforms. Hiroshi later attended a gala hosted by Councilman Tarrlok in honor of Avatar Korra. There, he saluted Korra, saying that everyone was expecting "great things" from her.

As the Fire Ferrets' sponsor, he and his daughter attended the Pro-bending Tournament final, which, along with the Equalists' ambush, they spectated from a private balcony. After the Equalists attacked the Pro-bending Arena, Hiroshi was asked to come to police headquarters to be questioned about what he witnessed during the attack. When he was done, Hiroshi was led out by Tenzin and Lin Beifong. Lin told him to come back if he remembered anything else. He accepted this statement, demanding the Equalists pay for their crimes, stopped to acknowledge Korra, and walked out.

While Korra visited his home, she overheard Hiroshi talking on the phone and began to suspect that he was working with the Equalists. Lin and Tenzin interrogated him in his home and communicated to him their suspicion, to which Hiroshi came up with the excuse that it was all a misunderstanding and he was just talking about business and an opportunity to strike the market with a new line of Satomobiles, but at the obvious doubts of the benders, he offered his factory to be investigated. The Metalbending Police Force searched all of his warehouses but they were unable to find any evidence. After receiving a tip from a worker about Hiroshi being part of the Equalists by manufacturing their weapons and creating an underground factory beneath his mansion, Korra, Tenzin, Lin, and some metalbending officers searched the house and found the factory underneath his workshop. However, this was a trap laid by Hiroshi to ambush the benders; he and several Equalists, using mecha tanks, attacked the group and eventually overpowered them. After his victory, he took Chief Beifong's metalbending officers captive and ordered them to be sent to Amon.



When Hiroshi spotted Mako and Bolin trying to save the now unconscious Lin, Tenzin, and Korra, he prepared to thwart them. However, he was confronted by his daughter right as he approached the group, who questioned his actions. He tried to convince her to join the Equalists, stating that his reason for being part of the revolt was to get revenge on all benders due to the death of his beloved wife, who had died at the hands of a firebender. Hiroshi offered Asami an electrified glove and asked her to join him and the other Equalists. After telling her father she loved him, Asami took the glove and electrocuted him and the Lieutenant, allowing the benders and herself to escape to safety.

Hiroshi later took part, along Amon and the Equalists, in the Attack on Republic City, where he observed from an airship the progress of the operation through a telescope. He expressed his disgust at the fact that his daughter was fighting alongside benders, to which Amon replied that Hiroshi would have his daughter back soon.

Relatives

 * Asami Sato (daughter)
 * Mrs. Sato (wife)

Trivia

 * Hiroshi Sato's voice actor, Daniel Dae Kim, previously voiced Fong in the original series.
 * Hiroshi is a common Japanese male name, though its meaning depends on the particular Kanji used. Sato is the most common Japanese surname.
 * Hiroshi can be compared to Henry Ford, who was the first person to mass produce cars for the common man in America. However, similar to how Ford was a supporter of the Nazis, Sato is a supporter of the Equalists. He also has a large amount of control over his workers, as shown when he used one to lure the benders to his factory. Ford also had a large amount of control over his laborers.
 * Hiroshi was modeled after former U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, Japanese industrialist Keita Gotō, and Mitsubishi founder Yatarō Iwasaki. His mustache is based on Iwasaki's.
 * He shares a name with a character from the non-canonical Avatar: The Last Airbender related comic, New Recruits.
 * Hiroshi is similar to the mechanist in that they both provided machinery to the series antagonist, although Sato did so to avenge his wife and the mechanist did so to protect his son and his home. They are also similar in the sense that the mechanist's son did not accept his father's actions and was disappointed and so was Asami and also that the enemy took the inventors' inventions to their own use. Also, Hiroshi and the mechanist both lost their wives, but Hiroshi lost his wife to a firebender, while the mechanist lost his wife to a flood.