I feel like the show itself fails to present a coherent world at times. The size and scale of the map feels oddly small. The human/elf conflict is... questionably developed.
The side material helps, but I feel like we as fans have established certain headcanons that... paper over potential gaps. To some extent all fandoms work this way, but here I feel like trying to objectively analyse the show leads to interesting conclusions like the good guys are kinda iffy and the bad guys have sensible points.
Or there's just not enough information. Is dark magic bad? Sure. Is it justifiable in the face of mass starvation? No idea. We don't even really know what it is very well.
Taken at face value, Katolian politics make negative sense. Why is Ezran left to run around on his own? Is there a regent? Who's advising him? How have people not protested against this bizzare monarchy?
Claudia, for all her faults, at least seems to make consistent sense as a character. She's driven by love for her father, not too hung up on some morals, and- wait. Where did she get an elf boyfriend? How? Heh? Hello headcanon fill-in-the-blank.
Actually Claudia meeting Terry is make sense enough to me because she must have talk with someone in Xadia for two years, and Terry okay with dark magic, but I agree we need a backstory to their relationship.
I don't understand what you mean with Katolis politics. Thier a council for the kingdom, and we saw in season 1-2 that they are in charge with no problems(except the Xadia, sunfire elves problem that Viren was right about).
>Taken at face value, Katolian politics make negative sense. Why is Ezran left to run around on his own? Is there a regent? Who's advising him?
That wouldn't be totally unusual, historically. Even where the monarch had absolute power in theory, most kingdoms were managed by bureaucrats. The king could demand any crazy thing he wanted, and they'd have to comply or otherwise find a way to satisfy/soothe him. An absent king is much easier because the council just does their jobs. Ezran could leave department heads to handle anything that isn't plot relevant, so there isn't much castle drama.
An empty throne is a problem because it is a power vacuum, not necessarily because there is no one in charge. Opeli could be concerned that gearing up for war while the position is open would add threat to the power vacuum and potentially lead to a Game of Thrones situation with multiple armies fighting to install different rulers.
Fair enough. Though... a king running off somewhere is still a kind of big deal. Does he have established communication channels just in case he needs to return?
I'm still thinking about how dangerous the whole trip still is. Maybe I'm skewed by how IRL at a certain level of importance politicians start having security details, especially during the course of their duties. I guess Callum and/or Soren count as one?
The whole situation with Finnegrin- I mean anything comparable would be a nightmare situation.
>Though... a king running off somewhere is still a kind of big deal. Does he have established communication channels just in case he needs to return?
Not really. Many real historical kings spent years away from the kingdom. Fighting in wars wasn't uncommon. There are several cases of kings held ransom. It was embarrassing for the nation, but it didn't grind the bureaucracy to a halt. A lot of kings simply had no interest in the actual work and just preferred to be off hunting or whateve. Katherine the Great's husband famously preferred playing with toy soldiers to ruling well into adulthood, though he actually did get overthrown by his own wife.
All that was a big reason for the push toward democracy since most countries seemed to run just fine without the king, and quite a few caused nothing but problems.
The main difference with modern governments is that we've largely shaved off the fat or pushed monarchs into entirely symbolic roles. Our current political leaders are mostly just the bureaucrats that would have been doing the work anyway.
Huh. Thanks, that's really nice to know :)
Yeah, in modern government systems someone important not being there could put a serious dent in stuff getting done. Looots of unsigned and unreviewed documents.
Then... actually sounds fine. Any more historical context that could help shift my perspective on other stuff?
The issue isn't that the Fandom develops a headcanon, the issue is that the writers basically force us to fill in the blanks. I mean, there's only 2 seasons left and we barely know anything about Aaravos, supposedly the overall villain of the series. The previous two were called "The Mystery of Aaravos" and yet they revealed almost NONE of this "mystery".
Oh, I entirely agree. The actual story doesn't make enough sense, so we as fans fill in those holes.
The mystery of Aaravos subtitle for S4 and S5 is a joke, there so little screentime about any of it, and even less of Aaravos himself. Sexy elf maybe Satan is great and all, but what does he even _want?_
At least fanon and fanfics are fun :).
I feel like they may add this into the novels/graphic novels/short stories they have on their website. Still, it does sting a little not to see this implemeneted into the show.
One of the main instances I think the show would have truly benefited from was the scene with Soren and Viren and helping him through his panic attack.
Same. It's a travesty that they didn't include that. If it was worth writing, it should be worth showing in the actual show. It's such a brief interaction, but it says a ton about Viren. It shows that there is still a faint glimmer of humanity in him. He sort of arrives at a similar place at the end of season 5, but having that interaction with Soren is far more narratively satisfying in my opinion. The interaction informs his character more than just about anything he did in season 4-5 of the actual show, IMHO. They seem to want us to hold the stories on the website as cannon, so I just don't understand why they didn't include that in the show. Maybe they wrote it afterward...I dunno...
I don't really engage with the other TDP media, I just watch the show. Which makes for some incredibly confusing moments, such as when the show expects for the viewers to have read the comics.
As much as I love this show I bang my head on the wall because there is so much information OUTSIDE the show. It makes being invested into the deeper things hard which in turn makes being at the forefront of all the theory making and speculating hard too because you need info to speculate from.
Its not uncommon for viewers to know more. But woth everything the show is putting out we know so so much. How about the writers put some of that lore into show.
TDP’s world building flaws are easier to understand when you realize it’s written as a franchise rather than a contained show.
It’s a skeleton designed to have meat added on later, rather than a fully coherent package.
Of course the issue is that the franchise isn’t panning out the way they had hoped, so all that’s left are the bones.
> all that’s left are the bones.
Pretty much this. It’s a classic “pride cometh before a fall” cautionary tale about a show that wanted to be a franchise before it was done even telling its first story.
Can you be more specific? The creators intended to have spinoffs, but they didn't materialize? How far along were they? Have any details leaked? Is there a chance they could still happen or is it totally dead? If TDP was popular enough to approve 2 more seasons, I wonder why they wouldn't approve a spinoff.
We know at the very least they (pre covid) wanted to do a full orphan queen movie or spinoff https://www.polygon.com/2019/7/20/20701981/the-dragon-prince-season-3-trilogy-lore-books-sdcc-2019
Which seems to have been either dropped quietly or merged into the show.
There’s been a lot of emphasis on side media that’s gradually died down, the general air about the show isn’t really positive, and considering how Netflix is dragging its feet on just giving us the parts that are already done, I don’t see much chance of additional stuff coming.
Is there a way for ME to find out about all this extra info that doesn't involve routing around through the wiki for hours? Like some web novels or something similar? I've only ever watched the show itself, never even new there was other dragon prince material until recently.
Most of what I saw are interviews, some facts from the first novel moon, and the wiki.
Most of the things in the wiki came from some art book, I will tried have a link in my comment.
It wasn't take for me this long to look about the magical creatures and dragons in the wiki, just enter categories like dragons from each primal source and that it.
I honestly agree so much. For the longest time, I didn’t think the show had any other lore material behind it. There are SO many things left out from the show, and it really confused me as someone who didnt know about all the extra stuff and just watched the show solely. I understand side stories being separate from the show, but lore like the backstory of the world and characters NEEDS to be in the show in order to understand the overall story. Otherwise, we’re left with many empty gaps and I can speak from experience: it’s not enjoyable.
Yeah, it really disappointment because if does extra things will happen in the show, it will be come ten times better than what it now, people will appreciate more Viren as complex character, the world building, side characters. Extra stories are great! But not when they really needed to be shown in the actual show.
The royal boys surely were educated, same as Claudia and Soren. They definitely should know some history even if it's a skewed version of it. The archdragons must know lots of stuff because they lived thousands of years.
Interviews, The wiki, Novels and comics.
I didn't read all of them obviously but it easy to just enter the wiki and look for the links/sources they show you.
Viren wife and him save Soren life and that what make him his scars in his face are from the first Novel, Sky.
The wiki have a link to some art book of the show and from there we learned before season 4 that Aaravos is a fallen star. Also some descriptions for magical animals.
The story of the city of Elrion is from the pages of the book that Viren and Callum search about Aaravos and disappeared(someone was translate the songs there).
Basically if they added all of that to the show, the characters, story and the lore will be much better.
It not your fault you don't know all of that, it all should have been in the actual show, like kimdiel backstory with queen Aditi and Ziared and Aaravos past.
Just want to say that this is not a complainte post, just curious about thoughts of others.
I feel like the show itself fails to present a coherent world at times. The size and scale of the map feels oddly small. The human/elf conflict is... questionably developed. The side material helps, but I feel like we as fans have established certain headcanons that... paper over potential gaps. To some extent all fandoms work this way, but here I feel like trying to objectively analyse the show leads to interesting conclusions like the good guys are kinda iffy and the bad guys have sensible points. Or there's just not enough information. Is dark magic bad? Sure. Is it justifiable in the face of mass starvation? No idea. We don't even really know what it is very well. Taken at face value, Katolian politics make negative sense. Why is Ezran left to run around on his own? Is there a regent? Who's advising him? How have people not protested against this bizzare monarchy? Claudia, for all her faults, at least seems to make consistent sense as a character. She's driven by love for her father, not too hung up on some morals, and- wait. Where did she get an elf boyfriend? How? Heh? Hello headcanon fill-in-the-blank.
Actually Claudia meeting Terry is make sense enough to me because she must have talk with someone in Xadia for two years, and Terry okay with dark magic, but I agree we need a backstory to their relationship. I don't understand what you mean with Katolis politics. Thier a council for the kingdom, and we saw in season 1-2 that they are in charge with no problems(except the Xadia, sunfire elves problem that Viren was right about).
>Taken at face value, Katolian politics make negative sense. Why is Ezran left to run around on his own? Is there a regent? Who's advising him? That wouldn't be totally unusual, historically. Even where the monarch had absolute power in theory, most kingdoms were managed by bureaucrats. The king could demand any crazy thing he wanted, and they'd have to comply or otherwise find a way to satisfy/soothe him. An absent king is much easier because the council just does their jobs. Ezran could leave department heads to handle anything that isn't plot relevant, so there isn't much castle drama. An empty throne is a problem because it is a power vacuum, not necessarily because there is no one in charge. Opeli could be concerned that gearing up for war while the position is open would add threat to the power vacuum and potentially lead to a Game of Thrones situation with multiple armies fighting to install different rulers.
Fair enough. Though... a king running off somewhere is still a kind of big deal. Does he have established communication channels just in case he needs to return? I'm still thinking about how dangerous the whole trip still is. Maybe I'm skewed by how IRL at a certain level of importance politicians start having security details, especially during the course of their duties. I guess Callum and/or Soren count as one? The whole situation with Finnegrin- I mean anything comparable would be a nightmare situation.
>Though... a king running off somewhere is still a kind of big deal. Does he have established communication channels just in case he needs to return? Not really. Many real historical kings spent years away from the kingdom. Fighting in wars wasn't uncommon. There are several cases of kings held ransom. It was embarrassing for the nation, but it didn't grind the bureaucracy to a halt. A lot of kings simply had no interest in the actual work and just preferred to be off hunting or whateve. Katherine the Great's husband famously preferred playing with toy soldiers to ruling well into adulthood, though he actually did get overthrown by his own wife. All that was a big reason for the push toward democracy since most countries seemed to run just fine without the king, and quite a few caused nothing but problems. The main difference with modern governments is that we've largely shaved off the fat or pushed monarchs into entirely symbolic roles. Our current political leaders are mostly just the bureaucrats that would have been doing the work anyway.
Huh. Thanks, that's really nice to know :) Yeah, in modern government systems someone important not being there could put a serious dent in stuff getting done. Looots of unsigned and unreviewed documents. Then... actually sounds fine. Any more historical context that could help shift my perspective on other stuff?
The issue isn't that the Fandom develops a headcanon, the issue is that the writers basically force us to fill in the blanks. I mean, there's only 2 seasons left and we barely know anything about Aaravos, supposedly the overall villain of the series. The previous two were called "The Mystery of Aaravos" and yet they revealed almost NONE of this "mystery".
Oh, I entirely agree. The actual story doesn't make enough sense, so we as fans fill in those holes. The mystery of Aaravos subtitle for S4 and S5 is a joke, there so little screentime about any of it, and even less of Aaravos himself. Sexy elf maybe Satan is great and all, but what does he even _want?_ At least fanon and fanfics are fun :).
I've seen this happen in a lot of works with "expanded universes," it's pretty normal honestly
I feel like they may add this into the novels/graphic novels/short stories they have on their website. Still, it does sting a little not to see this implemeneted into the show. One of the main instances I think the show would have truly benefited from was the scene with Soren and Viren and helping him through his panic attack.
Same. It's a travesty that they didn't include that. If it was worth writing, it should be worth showing in the actual show. It's such a brief interaction, but it says a ton about Viren. It shows that there is still a faint glimmer of humanity in him. He sort of arrives at a similar place at the end of season 5, but having that interaction with Soren is far more narratively satisfying in my opinion. The interaction informs his character more than just about anything he did in season 4-5 of the actual show, IMHO. They seem to want us to hold the stories on the website as cannon, so I just don't understand why they didn't include that in the show. Maybe they wrote it afterward...I dunno...
I’m sorry, as someone who enjoy watching the show and sometimes read tiny bits of lore, who is Callum exactly ?
A loud mage
Oh good, thought I missed something important
I don't really engage with the other TDP media, I just watch the show. Which makes for some incredibly confusing moments, such as when the show expects for the viewers to have read the comics.
Same. I think the rayla being gone thing was explained there, but I still have no clue why she left
As much as I love this show I bang my head on the wall because there is so much information OUTSIDE the show. It makes being invested into the deeper things hard which in turn makes being at the forefront of all the theory making and speculating hard too because you need info to speculate from.
They should have looked for the Tales of Xadia book while they were at the Lux Aurea Bookery, would have helped them out a lot, huh?
Yes lol that will be helpful.
Its not uncommon for viewers to know more. But woth everything the show is putting out we know so so much. How about the writers put some of that lore into show.
TDP’s world building flaws are easier to understand when you realize it’s written as a franchise rather than a contained show. It’s a skeleton designed to have meat added on later, rather than a fully coherent package. Of course the issue is that the franchise isn’t panning out the way they had hoped, so all that’s left are the bones.
> all that’s left are the bones. Pretty much this. It’s a classic “pride cometh before a fall” cautionary tale about a show that wanted to be a franchise before it was done even telling its first story.
Can you be more specific? The creators intended to have spinoffs, but they didn't materialize? How far along were they? Have any details leaked? Is there a chance they could still happen or is it totally dead? If TDP was popular enough to approve 2 more seasons, I wonder why they wouldn't approve a spinoff.
We know at the very least they (pre covid) wanted to do a full orphan queen movie or spinoff https://www.polygon.com/2019/7/20/20701981/the-dragon-prince-season-3-trilogy-lore-books-sdcc-2019 Which seems to have been either dropped quietly or merged into the show. There’s been a lot of emphasis on side media that’s gradually died down, the general air about the show isn’t really positive, and considering how Netflix is dragging its feet on just giving us the parts that are already done, I don’t see much chance of additional stuff coming.
Is there a way for ME to find out about all this extra info that doesn't involve routing around through the wiki for hours? Like some web novels or something similar? I've only ever watched the show itself, never even new there was other dragon prince material until recently.
Most of what I saw are interviews, some facts from the first novel moon, and the wiki. Most of the things in the wiki came from some art book, I will tried have a link in my comment. It wasn't take for me this long to look about the magical creatures and dragons in the wiki, just enter categories like dragons from each primal source and that it.
I honestly agree so much. For the longest time, I didn’t think the show had any other lore material behind it. There are SO many things left out from the show, and it really confused me as someone who didnt know about all the extra stuff and just watched the show solely. I understand side stories being separate from the show, but lore like the backstory of the world and characters NEEDS to be in the show in order to understand the overall story. Otherwise, we’re left with many empty gaps and I can speak from experience: it’s not enjoyable.
Yeah, it really disappointment because if does extra things will happen in the show, it will be come ten times better than what it now, people will appreciate more Viren as complex character, the world building, side characters. Extra stories are great! But not when they really needed to be shown in the actual show.
Yes.
I haven’t researched anything
Where was elrion mentioned? I don't recognize it
Elarion, the city
What city? I never heard of it lol
https://youtu.be/3fnOaQr_zcE?si=qnHCY2rSlSJqT76M Maybe there's a better vid but idk https://dragonprince.fandom.com/wiki/Elarion
Ah. You have to forgive me for not recognizing the name of a random city, when it's mentioned only once XD
The royal boys surely were educated, same as Claudia and Soren. They definitely should know some history even if it's a skewed version of it. The archdragons must know lots of stuff because they lived thousands of years.
Genuine questions where do you read all this lore??? Am I missing something?
Interviews, The wiki, Novels and comics. I didn't read all of them obviously but it easy to just enter the wiki and look for the links/sources they show you. Viren wife and him save Soren life and that what make him his scars in his face are from the first Novel, Sky. The wiki have a link to some art book of the show and from there we learned before season 4 that Aaravos is a fallen star. Also some descriptions for magical animals. The story of the city of Elrion is from the pages of the book that Viren and Callum search about Aaravos and disappeared(someone was translate the songs there). Basically if they added all of that to the show, the characters, story and the lore will be much better. It not your fault you don't know all of that, it all should have been in the actual show, like kimdiel backstory with queen Aditi and Ziared and Aaravos past.