She's the only thing in the entire Realm he's scared of, including other dragons and Dungeon Master. And Venger clearly didn't get his looks from his dad. If Skitty and Wailord is possible...
- But we already know from several episodes that Venger is Dungeon Master's son. How can that pairing work?
- Dungeon Master is not human.
- Many D&D dragons can shape-shift. Perhaps Tiamat was hanging around in humanoid form, and she and Dungeon Master fell in love.
- According to the game, Tiamat's human form looks like this
◊.- That's Takhisis, a goddess from Dragonlance who also takes the 5-headed dragon form. She may or may not be Tiamat; sourcebooks differ on that.
- The latest edition (from, admittedly, well after the show ended) basically states several times in Draconomicon that Takhisis and Tiamat are one and the same.
- Alternatively, Dungeon Master is the one who shape-shifted.
- Or he actually is a dragon, who always shape-shifts into A Form You Are Comfortable With to speak to the kids.
- Wait Dungeon Master...is Bahamut? The father of all good dragons? So his antithesis and opposite is Tiamat, the Chromatic Dragon and Queen of Evil Dragons, as well as the mother and deity of all evil dragons.
- Venger is a dragon-half. He has dragon wings, black in color, but look identical to Tiamat's wings.
- In Babylonian mythology, Tiamat gave birth to all monsters and hybrids.
- Its curious that Tiamat, being an indestructible primordial goddess of chaos, can easily find and crush Venger at any moment, but never does.
- She's angrily disappointed that Venger choose to follow the Nameless One, upsetting the Realm's chaotic balance, by defecting to a lawful evil alignment. The reason she once helped the kids nearly kill Venger was because she considers her son may be better off dead, than the walking abomination he's become.
- Its quite common for the dragon deity to take on the form of an old man or hermit.
- It is Canon that Eric was briefly a DM. If that can happen, then this can happen.
"The Dragon's Graveyard" contains evidence. Look at Dungeon Master's trepidation ("So, it has come to this...") when the kids decide to kill Venger, and his reaction to their sparing him. They narrowly avoided a road that Dungeon Master's last pupil went down.
Given that he's the ruler of the Nine Hells in the tabletop game and described as the ultimate evil by the Dungeon Master, it would make sense that he's Venger's master.Why hell? They're constantly being jerked around by the Dungeon Master. They lack adequate means to protect themselves. And they're constantly teased with the prospect of going home, but never make it — the curse of Tantalus.
- Discredited by Word of God.
- At the end of the unaired Grand Finale, the kids are offered a chance to return home. Whether this discredits the WMG depends on how sincere you think the offer was.
The other kids, DM, and probably Vengar are aware that they're in a fictional TV show; hence, they are particularly brave, given their situation. For example, the kids know they can't die because they're kids.
Vengar is pissed off all the time because he knows he can't win and because the Rule of Drama means he can't die until the show is over.
Eric is the only one who isn't in on the joke, hence his cowardly behavior. Since he doesn't know that the kids can't be in any real danger, he's scared out of his mind and can't understand why the others aren't feeling the same way.
Chances are, he's got a crush on Hank. He touches Hank a LOT, far more than he does any other character. Unfortunately for him, Hank is straight.
Eric's general unlikable attitude could be a defensive reflex to keep the others from getting too close and figuring out his secret. After all, in The '80s, tolerance for known gays outside their subculture was even less likely than tolerance for complete jerks.
The only female character he's shown getting along with is Diana, who is also a snarker and who has no interest in him.
- When he gets a marriage proposal from an attractive queen, he shows great interest...in her money.
- Assume Hank and Sheila are meant to be/become an item. Presto meets Varla in the Realm, Diana meets Kosar, and Bobby meets Terry. Who does Eric meet? Lorne.
- Eric is 14, by show canon. Not every boy starts pursuing girls in their early teens, especially ones who have confidence issues (which Eric obviously overcompensates for). But he does have some gay tendencies. I'd say its a case of could-be-true-but-never-confirmed.
This could've happened after the broadcast finale or during "The Winds of Darkness."
It also explains why Eric's shield doesn't consistently just dissipate magical/energy attacks, but sometimes transmits physical force towards him when doing so. It's user weakness or user error — maybe he wanted force feedback to be sure the thing was working.
- He seems to believe in a universe with rules, taking care of the Lawful part, and all the protagonists are supposed to be good, squeaking Eric into Lawful Good. As for a deity, Eric likely wouldn't object to sending a few prayers in the way of anything offering him extra powers to help him get out of the Realms.
Hopefully, he will be competent before he takes the position.
This is automatically true if "Presto will be DM" is.
- Note: this is canon unless DM lied to Presto during "The Last Illusion."
Reasons:
- The bow is colored gold. Both it and Presto's eyes were probably supposed to be a light brown, but that color shifted into gold in practice.
- Unlike ordinary bows, the energy bow does not flex. It does not work like a normal bow. But it's a magical energy bow that shoots flexible Hard Light! (And yes, it can do More Dakka.) Having it made of metal would both explain why the "bow" is rigid and improve its true functioning. Wood is an insulator, but metal is a conductor — and it would be easier to make that energy cord with a conductor. Gold is not only the right color but also an excellent conductor.
She might be Venger's stepmom. Or his real mom, since pure Evil is known to disfigure people.
DM may or may not know this.
Venger doesn't destroy the Earth (yet) because he has to take over the Realm first and because opening portals and leaving them not-quite-unattended is a good way to keep tabs on our heroes and their Weapons.
Generally, when this is presumed true, Bobby and Sheila are at most half-siblings.
Hank is unaware of the relation, natch.
Eric has survived a few situations unscathed with an "inactive" shield that mere armor could not have protected him from, including a close brush with a fireball of Venger's in a situation when magic in items was dead but magic in creatures was not. Eric and Venger both became aware of the nature of the bond then.
It would explain why Venger didn't just wait for the kids to go home in "Day of the Dungeonmaster," and why Eric didn't want the power of being a DM. His first thought on becoming DM was panicking about losing the Shield.
If this is true, then it could mean trouble for Eric if he ever does make it home for good. If not before.
We can safely presume that no changes were made that would significantly change the view from the portal, excepting ones wiping out the physical damage from "Zandora's Box." But it is quite possible that Venger was using the threat of a major change (that is, Nazi + jet plane) to get that crystal destroyed so that there would be no way to fix the minor changes done in the meantime. It's a late episode — there's plenty of time to act on that tendency of the Six to break magical artifacts, especially ones that can be used as portals, even if San Dimas Time was in effect.
These minor changes would have the same general purpose as the major one. While Venger would likely get a kick out of wiping out America, his main priority is those pesky kids with the weapons. It would be much more fun for one or more of them to go home and then find there wasn't a home to go to.
By accepting and using the weapons, the Six are beholden to DM. That they probably couldn't have escaped Tiamat without at least some of those weapons doesn't help.
You think it works bad for him now? It would've been even more recalcitrant if he hadn't made the deal, and he isn't dextrous enough for normal creative spellcasting. At least as things stand, the Hat has Mundane Utility as often as not; and at least as it stands, it rarely is a complete dud.
This is, naturally, a Fan Fic theory.
- I disagree with this one. I think Hank came from a good home, he's the archetypal "Boy Scout" type who is brave yet compassionate, and puts the needs of others before his own. He would have far more angst, as well as trust and temper issues if he was from a broken home.
The Weapons of Power are supposed to be carried by those pure in heart. But, for various reasons, and especially early on, he's rarely been better than an Anti-Hero as far as his behavior is concerned.
Nevertheless, the Shield still works for him. True, he didn't keep it at the factory setting, but it works efficiently most of the time.
Therefore, an exemption must have been made for him. Not all from Earth get Weapons of Power — Terri brought her necklace with her.
Perhaps it was Because Destiny Says So — that might be canon. Perhaps the rest of the gang talked DM into it, directly or accidentally....
It is left as an exercise for the Wild Mass Guesser whether the Shield would have to be retrofitted by someone other than him.
He can think them out of existence — that is, make them disappear without firing them; presumably they go back into the spiritual quiver then.
This would explain why Hank appears to have some slight character disintegration over the course of the series: the very purity of heart that granted him this weapon is what he must sacrifice to use it, and he doesn't always retrieve his arrows. If he were not so pure when he started out, things would have gone much worse by the end of season 2.
Because the decision to shoot the restraints instead of Venger came almost at the last minute.
Also, Hank was having something of a perverse streak, for him, around that time. He had betrayed his own heart during "The Traitor," three episodes prior. He would try to abdicate responsibility for Eric's continued existence and try to kill Venger again around "The Dungeon at the Heart of Dawn."
It was a depressing time to be DM.
Presto restrained Venger. He did it in such a way that, if Hank had done nothing, Venger would have died. So if killing Venger makes you as bad as Venger, Presto would be there.
He had also walked out on his soulmate not long before. Yes, Status Quo Is God, but ouch!
Those rare occasions when he has been most calm (as opposed to happy) are ones where he has appeared to abandon his survival instinct. The Shield needs that instinct to function. It clearly does not work on conscious will alone — magic energy works too fast. And it won't work on automatic unless he feels in danger — else, there wouldn't have been shapeshifting incidents.
If he has a secret altruistic instinct, then — well, he's not going to be happy in this crazy world under any normal circumstance, especially if he might have depression. He might as well keep everyone else's negative emotions aimed at him when the forces of Evil aren't active.
This would definitely have been Wild Mass Guessing during the original run of the series. There are signs that some Big Name Fans of this millenium believe variations on it.
Okay. At the end of "Beauty and the Bogbeast," Eric changes back into human form. The accepted explanation then is that The Realm is what Eric hates most.
Later that year, at the end of "The Box," he returns to the Realm more-or-less voluntarily (and almost misses the connection). There are several plausible reasons for this (which probably will be added to this list later), but let's throw this one in anyway...
Eric was restored to human form with a magic necklace after he decided he could not stay on earth as a bogbeast. This item was shown to be used by one other creature — to make an illusionary form. (You think Kawamauga wanted to change back?)
If that change was an illusion, then Eric missed his window for a true change back — DM made it clear there was a short deadline. Still, the nice thing about personal illusions is that you can hide what is causing the personal illusion if you like. We never see that necklace again, and neither does anyone else; Eric is passing for human.
Some kinds of magic lasted longer than others on Earth in "The Box." The Weapons stopped working promptly, but Venger's spells still worked fine. Hank decided to return to the Realm because he was, um, concerned that Venger's magic would never wear off at all; Diana, Sheila, Bobby, and Presto were supporting their leader. We will presume that, for Eric, at least one of the illusion necklace or the biology hidden under it fell somewhere in between. We will also presume that he realized this about the same way Wile E. Coyote realizes he's standing on mid-air. Eric was not trying to rejoin his friends simply because he gave into The Power of Friendship, which was both generally assumed and nobler. Bogbeasts, like unicorns, do not belong to this world. Either Eric's vanity or his survival overruled his staying "home."
This also explains why Eric as DM made it clear that he would not be taking that portal he created and why he couldn't give a reason the others accepted. He was unable to let knowledge be his Shield (book-burning doesn't count); he meant to die with this secret, and do it in the Realm so no one back home would learn it from the body.
At the end of "Citadel of Shadow," Sheila throws the Ring of the Heart and the Ring of the Mind at Venger. He disappears — and is never seen again.
Note: this necessarily means "Requiem" doesn't happen.
These beings were seen in "The Garden of Zinn." They are "hard shadow" that can convincingly shapeshift. And they are nigh-indestructible.
Eric places himself under the custody of Queen Zinn during this episode. He does not want to keep traveling. Queen Zinn is capable of creating and/or summoning these beings.
Why make a copy of Eric as Cavalier? Two reasons:
- Someone realizes that, if the others survive the Phantom Stalker attack, the gang might go back to rescue him, even if Sir Lawrence doesn't recover his humanity. (Yes, this is Wild Mass Guessing.) A Phantom Stalker is made and impressed so that Zinn will still have the original when the copy becomes the Cavalier.
- The original got lost or secretly executed while trying to hide from the responsibilities of kingship. Zinn does not want to lose face, and so makes a copy from the spirit traces in the remnants of the original. Most of the impressing happens after the gang "recovers" him.
This is not an Evil Twin in the usual sense, so a Phantom!Eric could still be using the real Shield. Or it could be a Phantom Shield.
That is why DM can say Venger was his mistake. Remember, folks, when sleeping with a succubus, use a condom!
The event that drives Eric to leave Earth again st the end of "The Box" is Venger threatening to destroy everything he has there. A couple of years later, we learn that Venger had the means to do this in the form of the Crystal of Chronos. And Venger is usually a villain of his word.
Eric still exists in the Realm, and will continue as long as he stays there. He has been aware of the situation since his stint as DM.
This likely took the old copies of Presto and Diana as well. Presto doesn't know. Diana learned while she was channeling Starfall.
Then they would wonder why she didn't follow them.
In the comic Forgotten Realms: The Grand Tour, the party appears to have different totems when they are adults than what they have in the series. The Animated Series Handbook also gives different names for the totems with different abilities than in the series. It is likely, throughout their adventures, the party has been changing equipment just as a game character would throughout multiple adventures. Besides, who wants to wear the same clothes for so many years.
The Realm is the First World; Dungeon Master is Bahamut, trying to guide the world he made while incognito. Meanwhile, Tiamat is off trying to stop the other Gods from breaking into the world SHE (and Bahamut) made.
The Nameless One is either an invading (evil-aligned) deity trying to place its creations into the world, or an Aboleth, who existed before the world, and corrupted one of the children of the Dragon Gods in order to undermine their creation and destroy the world.
(...This might mean that Venger is a corrupted Sardior.)
