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Pre-Release
The film will be Lighter and Softer than the source material (to an extent)
From the sound of it, Ballistar Blackheart will be a knight named Boldheart rather than an outright villain for one. Nimona will also likely have more subtly altruistic or sympathetic traits and get a happier ending than in the comic.- Confirmed. It's PG after all.
The crime Ballistar will be accused of is the murder of his kingdom’s queen.
On the poster on the main page, if one looks closely, one can see news articles talking about the Queen’s death.- Confirmed by latest trailer.
- There may be a twist that the Queen is still alive and Ballistar was framed as part of a conspiracy.
Whatever Ballaster’s crime, Nimona could have been the one to frame him.
She may or may not have committed it, but she probably made it look like he did it so she could have a partner in crime.- Jossed.
There will be a moment of meta-humor where Nimona throws shade at Disney for shutting down Blue Sky and nearly stopping production on the film.
Probably a voice over during the credits or something.- Jossed
- Confirmed, actually. A Freeze-Frame Bonus during the opening scene reveals that the scroll talks about the Golden Age of a kingdom that lived in the embrace of "Blue Skies," and was ultimately engulfed in darkness by another kingdom that lived in "blis[sful] ignorance" where "rod[ents] of the foulest hearts skitter and scream".
The film will deconstruct fairy tale villains
Ballistar says in one clip
he's not a villain when Nimona starts proposing to be his sidekick, so perhaps the premise of his character arc and Deconstruction is "What if a character didn't want to be the villain?"- Confirmed. The whole story is about what happens when you try to structure the entire world, for hundreds of years, around a fairy tale - and how that kind of development can affect the villain.
Ballistar and Nimona will have a temporary falling out at some point.
Ballistar will berate Nimona for her lack of concern for others and/or society in general and ask why she doesn't at least try to fit in (by not shapeshifting). While Nimona will respond that she shouldn't have to feel ashamed and hide who she is.- Adding into this, Ballistar can also call out Nimona for just insisting that he would ever want to a villain and not listening to him or allowing him explain himself, making it clear he does not ever want to be a villain. This will make Nimona hurt and furious to hear that he wants to clear his name and would dare choose to be a hero over a villain, perhaps even attacking him over it in a fit of rage.
- Confirmed. It turns out Nimona is the monster in the legend, leading to friction between Ballistar and Nimona - and said legend got everything wrong.
Possible Villains
Because of how the film will have a Big Bad in it, it could be possible on what other villains could appear.- The real Murderer who murdered the queen.
- A Con Artist.
- A thief who scans people with their money.
- It's the first one. The director was a Knight Templar.
The real Murderer who killed The Queen will be The Big Bad
Because of how the person has got involved and framed for the murder of the Queen, it could be possible that the person will become the Big Bad of the film.- The murderer is the Knight Templar Director of the Institute, who became a paranoid wreck from endless nightmares and did everything to keep the wall up.
Post-Release
Gloreth didn't build the wall to keep the monsters out, she built it to keep the humans in.
Seeing herself betray her closest friend 'for the greater good' and realizing that a mere village of peasants could defeat even the greatest titan in the world - by emotionally torturing it into compliance - caused Gloreth to realize that humanity was a Superior Species of monsters. One which needed both a guiding light to protect them and to be kept far, far away from every other creature on the planet. Gloreth's cult was a means of protecting both the human world and the monster world. Technically, every animal Nimona transforms into is a 'mythological' creature.
If humans have been stuck in the walled city for a millennia, then how do they know what a whale is? Or an otter, for that matter? To them, these animals may be as mythological as Kwispy the Dwagon, created in their art to stave off the boredom of being stuck in one city. Alternatively, previous generations may have used the last embers of magic from the Age of Magic to scry the world and make records of animals, and the findings eventually faded into myth. Nimona is a goddess.
Specifically, she's this world's goddess of mischief/a trickster, hence the shapeshifting. Nimona has figured out Ballister and Ambrosius were an item without Ballister explicitly coming out of the closet to her.
The way she specifically uses the term "love language" to Ballister comes off like she's giving him dating advice. ND Stevenson also drew Nimona's comic counterpart drawing Ballister and Ambrosius kissing. So if the "love is love" graffiti isn't a reference to her feelings for Gloreth, it's her acknowledging/supporting her boss' feelings for his boyfriend. Gloreth's memory of Nimona became distorted as she grew up.
She was only a little girl when the incident happened, and even fully grown adults sometimes misremember things. The people of her village hailed her as a hero for "defeating" the "evil shapeshifter" who had destroyed their home. Even when she said sadly that she didn't defeat Nimona, they just laughed and praised her for being modest. Over time, she started to believe what she heard. Maybe by the time she was grown, she forgot that she and Nimona had ever been friends.Nimona is a dragon.
She is (initially) a self-aware monster for knights to slay, a role traditionally for a dragon. However, dragons in this world aren't treasure-hoarding, princess-stealing, kingdom-burning monsters, but Pure Magic Beings bordering on Dragons Are Divine. It's possible that Nimona is the Last of Her Kind, to explain why she's so in the dark about her origins. Spending most if not all of her early life trying to integrate with other creatures by shapeshifting slowly made her forget her birth form, and if she tried again now, her body would be tempted to stay in its dragon shape.- The movie itself seems to support this theory with various posters showing Nimona with dragon wings and tail, and the climax has her (in the phoenix form) pass by the mural of the dragon who is seen attacking Gloreth. If this theory gets confirmed in any sort of continuation of the movie, my mind will blown up (in the positive way).
Nimona is at least partially subject to Psychoactive Powers
Nimona has no trouble transforming into mundane animals like bears and gorillas normally, but when it comes to her really impressive forms, she needs to be in a particular mood for the transformation to work. That's why she doesn't become a cereal mascot dragon until she's propelled to it by seeing Ballister in danger and being unable to save him, for example, or why she doesn't go full-blown One-Winged Angel until the climax - as she's never been despairing enough to assume that form until then. Sequel Theories
More details will be given on Nimona’s origins
We could learn about her species and if there are more creatures like her.We will learn about the world beyond the kingdom. Another kingdom could be explored and serve as an antagonistic force.
- If another kingdom appears their goverment/equivalent to the Institute could be seen as an antagonistic force to Nimona as "our" kingdom becomes open to all after the first film's epilogue.
The Director could still be alive
The sequel could see her plotting to take back the kingdom and even have her clone Nimona, like in the comics.Dr. Meredith Blitzmeyer could be introduced after being Adapted Out.
The next Big Bad is Nimona's 'mother', the entity she budded off
Nimona turns out to be a sapling offshoot of a truly terrifying Beast, one which destroyed the previous civilization.As yet another twist, it turns out the Beast isn't malicious, but incomplete in some way.Nimona was cloned by the explosion
What's the only thing more awe-inspiring than a shapeshifter? Five shapeshifters.They're all weaker due to being split apart, but that's still four more. If there is a sequel, Meredith Blitzmeyer will appear
Since she was a fairly significant character from the original graphic novel who was Adapted Out, she seems like a likely candidate to appear in a hypothetical sequel. Possibly relating to her research of magic, and journeying beyond the mountains.Nimona is the Literal Split Personality of a great power, possibly a God.
There are six other "children" with abilities like Nimona in the world. Each has a Color Motif (Nimona obviously being Red) that together make up a rainbow. The higher being is the original "Nimona", explaining where our Nimona got her name despite spending most of her life without anyone to give her a name. A sequel will follow some of Nimona's "siblings" trying to merge back together, while Nimona and the others want to stay separate, having developed a sense of self.