Line #80 ComicBook/FiveWorlds


1	%% Administrivia/ZeroContextExample entries are not allowed on wiki pages. All such entries have been commented out. Add context to the entries before uncommenting them.
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3	->Think ''Franchise/StarWars'' [[JustForFun/XMeetsY meets]] ''Franchise/AvatarTheLastAirbender''!
4	-->--Blurb used to promote the books.
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6	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/the_cast_7.JPG]]
7	[[caption-width-right:350:From Left to Right: An Tzu, Jax, and Oona]]
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9	''5 Worlds'' is a ScienceFantasy graphic novel series written and illustrated by Mark Siegel and Alexis Siegel with three collaborators, Xanthe Bouma, Matt Rockefeller, and Boya Sun.
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11	[[ALongTimeAgoInAGalaxyFarFarAway In a Galaxy Far, Far Away]], [[TitleDrop five worlds]] live in close proximity to each other. On the planet Mon Domani, Oona Lee lives as a student at the Sand Dancer Academy. Her older sister, Tessa, was the ChosenOne who had the Living Fire; unfortunately, Tessa ran away, and Oona still carries the weight of her older sister's betrayal while also feeling the judgement of not living up to Tessa's greatness. When Oona discovers that the five worlds are overheating, she embarks on a mission to save the worlds, which can only be accomplished by lighting five ancient and mysterious beacons that must be lit by a skilled Sand Dancer with the Living Fire.
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13	Accompanying her is An Tzu, an impoverished but street-smart orphan who's suffering from a Vanishing Illness, and Jax Amboy, a star athlete beloved by sports fans on all five worlds. Trying to stop them is [[BigBad the Mimic]], an evil god who desperately wants to seize control of the universe via darkness and corruption. Oona, An Tzu, and Jax race to light the beacons before the worlds overheat and the Mimic takes control of everything.
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15	The five instalments in the overarching series are:
16	* '' The Sand Warrior'': Released on May 2nd, 2017
17	* '' The Cobalt Prince'': Released on May 8th, 2018
18	* '' The Red Maze'': Released on May 7th, 2019
19	* ''The Amber Anthem'': Released on May 12, 2020.
20	* ''The Emerald Gate'': Released on January 8, 2022.
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24	!!Tropes found in ''5 Worlds'' and its installments:
25	* AmazingTechnicolorPopulation: Characters with ordinary skin tones mingle among characters with more unusual colors, such as blue, orange, and green. A particularly obvious example is the Toki race, who have blue skin.
26	* ArcSymbol: Crescent moons for the Felid, circles in general.
27	** Cat heads-specifically, circles with pointy ears-are all over the place on all five worlds.
28	* ArtificialLimbs: An Tzu gets prosthetics for his right arm and leg due to his Disappearing Illness in Book 3.
29	%%* BigBad: The Mimic.
30	* BigEater: An Tzu has a big appetite and can usually be coerced into doing something as long as there's food involved.
31	%%* BigGood: The deceased Felid Queen.
32	%%* BigSisterInstinct: Oona's sister, Jessa.
33	* BilingualBonus:
34	** The lost prince is named Neko, which any anime fan will know means "cat" in Japanese.
35	** ''Aurinko'' means "sun" in Finnish.
36	** ''Felid'' is a word meaning "a member of the cat family."
37	** ''Kyojin'' is the Japanese word for "giant."
38	** ''Sao'' is Mandarin Chinese for "sweep" (or "broom"), while ''sangre'' is Spanish for "blood." Fitting for a city that's been trying to "sweep" those with shapeshifting blood under the rug.
39	* BlindSeer: One appears in ''The Amber Anthem'', though he's never given a name.
40	* CaptiveAudience: Oona is forced to watch [[spoiler:the rest of her classmates and teachers get held hostage by Toki forces in the burning castle. ]]
41	* CatFolk: The Great Queen and her son (especially when he was younger) look very cat-like in appearance.
42	* ChekhovsGag: At the beginning of ''The Red Maze'', An Tzu tells a joke to Oona and Jax.
43	-->'''An Tzu:''' A city man is lost and asks a Domani farmer for directions to [[ShiningCity Chrysalis]]. The farmer says, "Sure, go back to the crossing... Or no, take that valley road... Oh no, that won't work either." The farmer thinks and thinks, and finally he says, "The best way to get there is to not start from here!" This joke later helps Oona figure out how to reach the Red Beacon [[spoiler:by making a portal directly over the Beacon]].
44	* TheChosenPeople: The Toki, the shapeshifters of Moon Yatta, and the Kyojin on Salassandra were all chosen by the Felid Queen to protect the beacons from the Mimic.
45	* ColorCodedForYourConvenience: The Five Worlds each have a color attached to them: Mon Domani is white, Moon Toki is blue, Salassandra is yellow, Moon Yatta is red, and Grimbo (E) is green. To reflect this, each book has a color in its title that matches the color of the world in focus.
46	* CorruptCorporateExecutive: Stan Moon, who owns a monopoly called Stan Inc that has put many companies (like the one owned by An Izu's father) out of business if they didn't sell their companies to him.[[spoiler:It turns out that he's a puppet of The Mimic.]]
47	* DarkIsNotEvil: Tessa uses the black sand of Moon Toki , yet is an ally of her sister, Oona.
48	* DeceasedParentsAreTheBest: All three of the main protagonists are orphans [[spoiler:barring An Tzu/Prince Neko, whose father is [[ArchnemesisDad unfortunately]] alive and well]].
49	* DemonicPossession:[[spoiler:The Cobalt Prince and Stan Moon are secondary antagonists who are the puppets of The Mimic.]]
50	* DisappointingOlderSibling: Tessa, [[spoiler:or at least at first]].
51	* DisneyDeath: Averted.[[spoiler:Jax goes down in a ship crash and disappears on Salassandra at the beginning of ''The Cobalt Prince.'' Oona and An Izu believed him to be dead. However, the third book reveals that he was saved by a [[NatureSpirit Devoti]] who absorbed itself with him.]]
52	* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: A surprising amount for a kid's book. The writers [[WriterOnBoard seem to enjoy tackling several real-life problems with fantastic counterparts]].
53	** Moon Yatta is basically one big stand-in for America. It's the most technologically advanced of the five planets, the only one to elect leaders rather than have a monarchy, and its capital city, New Yatta City, is heavily modeled after American cities like New York City (it even has the same initials). Its self-centered government, greedy corporations, and rampant capitalism are all direct calling-outs to America's same problems. To drive the comparison home, the flag is designed to look similar to America's striped one, its official nickname is "The Superpower," and An Tzu (who heard stories about it from his father) frequently calls it [[ThePromisedLand "the land of freedom and dreams"]].
54	** The magical explosion on [[spoiler:Oona, Tessa, and Vector's hometown on Toki]] is basically a magical version of a nuclear reactor melting down and spreading radiation.
55	** The Toki are a double-whammy:
56	*** The way they lost a war, suffered deep poverty, and took to an evil dictator who promised to win back their former glory at the cost of thousands of lives is disturbingly similar to the Germans' situation post-WWI.
57	*** The Toki were also forced to take on menial jobs on Mon Domani after the war and are treated like second-class citizens by the Sand Dancers, much like the black people in America after slavery was abolished. The Toki are even drawn as if they're African-Americans with blue skin!
58	* FantasticRacism: There's plenty of prejudice and mistrust between the different races. Just to name a few, there's the Toki (particularly by the Sand Dancers on Mon Domani), the plant people, and the shapeshifters on Moon Yatta.
59	* {{Foreshadowing}}: In ''The Red Maze'', An Tzu plays a tune while Zelle makes a sand portal, and the portal opens up to an unknown place that's not on Moon Yatta. Later, we discover that [[spoiler:An Tzu is actually Prince Neko. The place in the portal must be his birthplace, the Felid Realm.]]
60	** An Tzu always wears a necklace in the shape of a crescent moon, which is the same symbol on [[spoiler:his mother's]] forehead.
61	*** Similarly, Peet Bowl has two small circles on his face that are connected via lines to a bigger circle. This same symbol is on the Mimic, albeit in a different order, foreshadowing that Peet Bowl is working for the Mimic.
62	* AGodAmI: The Mimic is really [[spoiler:a Felid named Aurinko who believed that he and the other Felids ought to be treated as gods by the mortals on the Five Worlds. His superiority complex led to him being banished from the Felids' home by the Queen]].
63	* HandicappedBadass
64	** Jax loses his right arm at the Siege of Mon Domani after it was crushed by rubble of the Stadium the majority of ''The Sand Warrior''.
65	** An Tzu is suffering from a disappearing illness that gets steadily worse throughout the series [[spoiler:with his right limbs dissapearing in book 3.]]
66	* HeroicSacrifice: [[spoiler:Jessa gives up her life to seal herself and The Mimic's heart in Molten Toki Sand.]]
67	* HidingYourHeritage: An unusual example in that the characters in question never had a choice. [[spoiler:Oona and her sister Jessa are actually Toki, but when they were rescued and brought to the Sand Castle on Mon Domoni, [[OldMaster Professor Plum]] hid their Toki heritage, even going so far as to genetically alter them to look Domani]].
68	* ImportantHaircut: Oona receives one in ''The Amber Anthem'' as part of her disguise.
69	* ItSucksToBeTheChosenOne: Oona, one of only three children who can wield the Living Fire, goes through a lot of trauma. [[spoiler:First, her classmates are kidnapped by Toki forces; then she discovers that her sister is a traitor who's working for the Mimic; after being captured by the Mimic, she learns that she's actually a Toki and that her whole life was a lie; ''then'' she has to deal with her sister's death after Tessa sacrificed herself to destroy The Mimic's Heart; she thought one friend was killed and is slowly losing another to an illness; and on top of all that, the puppets of The Mimic are constantly after her.]]
70	* JerkassHasAPoint: It's illegal for the shapeshifters of Moon Yatta to shapeshift, to the point that they're forced to wear special collars that prevent them from shapeshifting. While it's obviously wrong to enforce such a cruel and demeaning law, the idea of having a way to identify shapeshifters is perfectly reasonable. Having shapeshifters in a population is pretty dangerous-if you have people who can look like literally anyone or anything and have no way of telling them from the real deal, then imagine how easy it would be for one of those shapeshifters to break into buildings, infiltrate the government, or [[ShapeshiftingSeducer seduce someone under false pretenses]].
71	* KidsAreCruel: The kids at the academy who tease Oona for being clumsy and the sister of a traitor.
72	** [[spoiler:To a much darker extent, the missing and [[DemonicPossesion possessed]] children in ''The Cobalt Prince'']].
73	* MagicalNativeAmerican: There are hints of this with the shapeshifters on Moon Yatta, particularly their leader, Zelle, from their appearance to the [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything disturbing parallels between the two races]].
74	* MusicSoothesTheSavageBeast: The Kyojin only respond to music, and if they get out of line, songs played on a boom box will quickly settle them.
75	** To a lesser extent, An Tzu is able to control plants by playing particular tunes on his flute.
76	* OddNameOut: ''The Sand Warrior'', the first book in the series, is the only book that doesn't have a color in its name.
77	* OnlyTheChosenMayWield: The Living Fire, which only three sand dancers can use. It's also used to light the beacons of the five worlds.
78	* PowerCrystal: Sandstones are basically this despite not looking like a gemstone. They store sand for sand dancers to use.
79	* PlantPeople: A prominent race in the series who go by the same name.
80	* RagTagBunchOfMisfits: Oona befriends a scrappy teenage rebel gang in ''The Red Maze'' consisting of a Toki, a [[PlantPerson plant person]], a shapeshifter, and a junkie mechanic.
81	* RebelLeader: The shapeshifter Etta Zelle leads a rebel group of shapeshifters on Moon Yatta in ''The Red Maze''.
82	** Oona could also count as the leader of the anti-Mimic rebellion, though she's more the spokesperson for the rebellion and not their actual leader.
83	* {{Reincarnation}}: It's revealed in ''The Amber Anthem'' that [[spoiler:An Tzu is the lost Felid Prince, Prince Neko, who was reborn as a human in order to save his people]].
84	** It's also implied that Felids are supposed to reincarnate using a "Garden of Souls," though since the last one was destroyed, there's no longer a way for them to do this.
85	* RidiculouslyHumanRobots: [[spoiler:Jax, who is an android]], as well as all the [[spoiler:J.A.X. models]] like him.
86	* SandBlaster: Sand Dancers use "sandstones," which hold different sands for the user to manipulate.
87	* SealedEvilInACan:[[spoiler:The Mimic]].
88	* {{Shapeshifter}}: A whole race of them on Moon Yatta.
89	* ShipTease: Oona and Vector receive some, particularly in ''The Amber Anthem''.
90	* SlaveRace: The Kyojin.
91	* TentacledTerror: The Mimic, especially in his Stan Moon form.
92	* ThemeSeasons: Each book is set on one of the five worlds:
93	** The Sand Warrior takes place on Mon Domani.
94	** The Cobalt Prince takes place on Toki.
95	** The Red Maze takes place on Moon Yatta.
96	** The Amber Anthem takes place on Salassandra.
97	** The Emerald Gate takes place on Grimbo (E).
98	* TokenTrio: Or at least the equivalent for an AmazingTechnicolorPopulation: Oona is a white [[spoiler:later revealed to be blue]] female, An Tzu is (presumably) a white male, and Jax is a black male.
99	* [[UnlikelyHero Unlikely Heroes]]: The description of the book references this trope.
100	* VerbalTicName: Ram Sam Sam's name derives from his habit of humming, which sounds like ''rmmm smmm smmm''.
101	* WhatDoYouMeanItsNotForKids An downplayed in-universe example: An old fairy tale that An Tzu read as a kid was the tragic story of the Queen and The Mimic. He [[LampshadeHanging lampshades]] this by claiming it's the saddest children's book ever written.
102	* WhatsInItForMe: Derrick Stoak's stance in ''The Red Maze''.

Context ComicBook / FiveWorlds