Netflix's The Dragon Prince

Are we sure that the ability to speak with animals isn't some sort of arcana?

If I remember correctly earth magic does have something to do with animals.

So maybe we have already Moon, Wind and Earth covered. And maybe fire is already seeded, too….

The key responds with Sun when it's close to Bait. I doubt the show will go all in on having Bait heavily involved in combat, but he is already used as a Solar Flare every so often.

So, between Callum, Rayla, and Bait, the main cast already has three elements covered. If the stuff with Ez and earth magic turns out to be correct, then they'll only need to pick up two more people to complete the set, which sounds feasible. The party is currently split, but I'm sure everyone will be reunited in a season or two.

There is also the dragon….

Oh yeah, I can't believe I forgot about the dragon prince in a discussion about The Dragon Prince.

Zym's element overlaps with Callum's, though, so they'd still need at least two more characters to hit all six elements.

I kind of wonder if there will be some way of Zym and Callum combining a spell. Like, an opposite dark magic (light magic I guess, not to be confused with sun or star) or just straight-up a living being acting as a primal source.

I really liked this second season!

Some thoughts: I might have thought that Callum learning the sky Arcanum (despite it being established that humans can't do magic) was a bit out of nowhere... except that we already knew that Ezran can talk to animals, so there had to be something more to it than Lujanne knew. So I rather enjoyed the reveal.

Regarding that scene where Viren is trying to convince the rest of the Katolis nobles that there's an attack... I'm really hoping that they were just being deliberately obstructionist because nobody wants Viren to seize power. Because otherwise... 'maybe the elves will just go away'... I hope they aren't that dim I guess it is nice that for a change the whole kingdom didn't fall in lockstep behind the Obviously Evil Vizier, as often happens.

I definitely like Viren as an antagonist - particularly in the flashback sequences, he genuinely does seem like a character who could be protagonist/hero material with just a few things tweaked.

I wonder if there's a way you could do 'ethical' dark magic using only naturally shed magical creature bits. Feathers, hair, reptile skins, that sort of thing. Or if it works on 'life force' therefore the creature actually has to die?

I think it's entirely possible to use dark magic with only shed parts, the problem is that important body parts from living magical creatures are even more potent and there are people willing to go there for extra power.

From what we've seen so far, I'm still not sold on dark magic being actually evil. I still think it can be used ethically, in the same way that we can ethically hunt or farm livestock. As long as the spell is cast without sacrificing sapient beings, the mage only takes as much life as needed to get the job done, and all sacrifices go towards worthy constructive causes (eg. healing, disaster relief, etc.), I'd say that particular dark magic spell is cast ethically.

Obviously, not all humans would willingly abide by those guidelines, in the same way that humanity overhunts and such in the real world, but that's more a failing of human nature than it is the fault of dark magic itself.

Well first time Claudia sacrificed a living creature, a hair of her turned white and she seemed really out of it first I kinda think if you keep sacrificing living creatures you end up like Viren before he kills more butterflies

(aka, you become some sort of cruel vampire thing that needs to drain creatures to look normal)

Edited by SpookyMask on Feb 24th 2019 at 12:25:17 PM

There is probably a corruptive element to Dark Magic yes. Although if all it took to cure paralysis was to sacrifice fawns that seems like a pretty good trade.

Claudia always sacrificed creatures for dark magic. Usually small insects. She wasn't joking about using DARK MAGIC in her cooking as the credits scene showed.

I just finished bingeing S2 of The Dragon Prince. I enjoyed more than the first season.

Claudia is my favorite human. Claudia, like Azula, would be an amazing and powerful protagonist if she didn't have such crappy parents. There's still hope for Claudia. I love her relationship with Soren. Soren grew on me this season. I started shipping her with Callum after epi 2, but I'm fine with Callum and Rayla. Just hoping they don't do a Claudia, Rayla, Callum love triangle.

Viren is turning into one of my favorite villains. I don't like him or agree with him. However, I find him interesting. He is doing everything he can to save humans. He's just doing all the wrong things. He is a dangerous liar and a manipulator, but he is passionate about saving humanity. Loved how he kept trying scare people by saying the sun elves were gathering near the border but left out the part about humans building a freaking secret post on the Xadia's side. Xadia should've built a wall .

Janai and Aaravos are my number one reason for watching season 3. I hope Janai has a bigger role next season and she gets to speak. Aaravos just makes everything better. I wanted to see him since the series opener.

Aaravos said the elves and dragons had to put an end to the humans' madness. I hope it turns out dark magic users were hunting dragons, killing rare magical creatures, and cutting off elf horns for spells. Those kinds of spells are in the dark magic books for reason. It's a war both sides think they're right. I'm excited to hear more from the magic side in S3.

It'll be funny if it turns out Callum is 1/16 elf and that's why he can use magic .

Edited by CodeXYZ on Feb 24th 2019 at 7:05:15 AM

That actually brings up something I've been wondering. Can elves and humans interbreed? If so what does that mean for the hybrid? Are they functionally one or the other? Do they have an Arcanum? What if two different types of elves breed? Is the Arcanum randomized?

I think if two different types of elf got together the baby's type would be randomized. I think it's more interesting if humans and elves can interbreed.

I wouldn't be surprised if no one knew if humans and elves could interbreed, but I'm going to assume they can.

"Now you sound like my first three husbands."

One of my favorite lines of the season. It's amazing how much it tells us about Lujanne in less than 10 words.

I find it kind of odd Lujanne has had husbands. How long has she been guarding that nexus? It's in human territory which got split off 1000 years ago. Has she been there even longer than that? Or are there other elves living in secret among the humans?

Edited by Kostya on Feb 26th 2019 at 9:31:35 AM

Something I wonder, can Callum do magic because he is special in some aspect or is he living proof that normal humans can do magic?

We must wait for the next seasons to know.

I think its the latter more likely.

I feel its incredibly harder for humans to tap into magic, and Dark Magic was taken to precisely because it requires little effort to do.

Edited by OmegaRadiance on Feb 26th 2019 at 5:42:05 AM

And for all we know, learning dark magic first might actually make it even harder to connect to sources because it'd be even more unintuitive to practiced dark mages <_<

What's your interpretation of the Dark Callum in Callum's dream?

My understanding was just that Dark Callum was just a representation of Callum's own mind internally debating his use of dark magic. However, I've since seen theories that dark magic has a mind of its own, and that Dark Callum was the will of dark magic intruding into Callum's psyche to tempt him to the "dark side."

I haven't really changed my mind - I still think that scene was a straightforward Self/Shadow internal dialogue - but I'm interested to see everyone else's thoughts on it.

Frankly, don't know, don't care. Both ideas work. I was mostly into Callum as a sail.

On a side note I just realised Aaravos is voiced by THREE DOG from fallout 3.

My mind. It is blown. If the character ever mentions "The Good Fight" then I will squee.

His voice is so compelling! It'll be interesting to see how far down the road he leads Viren before tossing him aside... or maybe he will be a twist on that and actually value the silly human dark mage.

I like how this series has played with expectations - the Moon Nexus being one point; Viren's motivations and underlying insecurity for another (I agree the True Sight potion actually showing him the truth in his reflection... from a certain point of view.) There are a lot of lessons in this series about having power but not correctly using it or interpreting it (Lujanne being quick to dismiss Callum even potentially having magic; Viren not seeing what the True Sight showed; Soren only realising truths at the 11th hour; Claudia not really learning the repeat lessons of her surroundings and instead just doing what she always does.)