My understanding and analysis of the magical system in The Dragon Prince. Part 1 - my first thoughts on it - primal and dark magic aren’t the only kind of magic.
Ok, I promised to several people I would post this today so there it is! (@beautifulterriblequeen, @kotikala, I’m sorry I don’t have all the account... Julia, mama and the others ;_;)
It’s long (so I separated it in two post... but it will be long anyway, especially the second one. So I wish you a lot of courage to go through this until the end...) but it’s because it’s the result of some month of searching and digging. It’s still not complete, however. But if you have some time to lose and in love with this world, maybe this theory (and I insist, it’s a theory, maybe I’m totally wrong) will interest you:
Anyway, let’s just begin!
You can see the magical system in TDP like a diamond with several facets: we saw some of them, and some of us dug to find more.
For me, this theory _ the idea that the magical system in TDP is wider than what we saw_ started from a simple thing in Callum’s spellsbook, the “secret” we can find in the ASL section, the one Sarai repeated when she was alive.
My first reaction was “greeeeaaat! Another show where “love is magic. Yaay! =_=’”
Okay, "love" is an important theme on the dragon prince, yes. But magic ?
But let’s be honest: I don't think they would have placed something like this in the book for nothing. After all, we have to admit that, in this show, NOTHiNG is ever done simply. So maybe this time “love is magic” would be more elaborate than usual?
We do know that the first thing the creators talked about when they started to imagine this world, was the magical system. Not the characters, not the creatures or landscape or anything, but the magical system.
And what do we have so far? Primal magic and dark magic. Is it really that simple? I had to think it through!
1. My first thoughts about dark magic:
Thinking about this above led me to think about dark magic, about how it's "wrong", like Callum said. That point have already been discussed by many of us and a lot disagree, it's too easy to classified it as "wrong" like it’s stated in the show, because the reason you had to use it can be understandable.
Only... the creator of the show have NEVER chose easy/simple road in writing. So why just put dark magic as "wrong" without explanations? Maybe there's something more here too?
I understood dark magic as bad, not for the reason, but for the concept, about what it represents: it's taking (life, will) without asking. It's stealing, it's killing, no matter your excuse. You can invoke righteousness, justice, revenge, self-defence, strengh, power and all, the result is always the same: death. And as you kill to achieve your goal, you pay a heavy price. It staint you, it... "take" something for you (like it was implied in several interview and even in the book, but we’ll talk about this later). (ok, nothing new, here)
But you must have noticed this: those aren't only related to dark magic. It's darkness and everyone can do it. Sol Regem did it, Runaan did it, Harrow did it. They chose to kill and they tainted themselves too, even if it's not in the way pure dark magic does.
So you have the "dark" side with death and all, and opposed to this, the "white" one. Life, forgiveness. love. And all the people have to choose between those white and black sides, between life and death. Only the area they moved in to make their choices is grey. It's the result who, in the end, is more black or white than grey _ but sometimes still a little grey_.
So, it’s absolutely interesting (hehe… hem^^’) but these thoughts are the ground of the theories and analysis that will now follow in this post and the next one!!!!
2. The “reward theory”
As said by Sarai in the image below : "love is magic".
My first question then, was: “…But what is “magic”?” Not Primal magic or Dark magic. Just… Magic. My first thought was: magic is life. Or at least, it should be. Remember the human land deprived of magic who was dying? And look at Primal magic, it’s all life-related at some point. So, yeah, Magic is life!
And so, if magic is life and love is magic, doesn’t this mean that love is life, too?
If that's true, then maybe the opposite is true too? Hate is death.
Why not, after all?! If magic is love, and life… how could dark magic, who's litterally death, came from the same source? How could dark magic… be Magic at all if they’re opposite to each other?
And more importantly : where is this "magical love" in the magic system here ? It's not primal magic, it's not dark magic, but it is magic.
From that point, I assumed Magic is wider than Humans and Xadians (and us, humble fans, obviously) know. It's probably something more... powerful, a more primal form of magic. More subtle but powerful.
Why subtle?
This is the first thing I noticed in the show, the impressive succession of miracles, of “what if” who went just right. “What if Callum left to go to Rayla just one minute later at the storm spire?”, “What if Ethari didn’t saw Rayla in the reflection?”, “what if Viren hadn’t captured Lain and Tiadrin, letting no traces behind so people wouldn’t misinterpret what happened?”, “What if Marcos hadn’t been here?”, “what if Runaan had send someone else to kill him?”, what if…
It gave me the impression that there’s something more. Is it Destiny? Is it something else? Someone? Anything?
But that’s the first layer. There’s another one:
In this show, it's as if every action who implied a choice about doing the right thing, about choosing life over death, love over hate or the opposite, is somehow... repaid? Rewarded?
By... Magic itself? Destiny again? Fate? the world? Some unknown entity? by Magic who is an entity? Why not? “If magic is life, if she brings life to everything, how could she not be alive?”... or something like that. Anyway!
Maybe it’s this, or maybe you’re rewarded by the side you choose?
In both case, when you chose life or love, then you will live. You chose death or hate, then you will die. (I am putting thing in an extreme way, I know... ^^)
In other words, when you choose life/love or death/hate, your act is related to magic. but not the magic we saw until now. It's something else. Just like Dark magic is not Primal magic.
So okay, that’s nice once again, but what could prove it?
Well, just take a look at this:
You use dark magic, it stains you. It "takes" something from you, empties you as if the world itself can't allow you to make others beeing to pay for the choice you made.
Why not? but that's general, let's see more concrete exemples (and my headcanon interpretations) when our characters did the "right" or "wrong" thing:
Zym's egg falls in the frozen lake and Ezran risks his life to save him => Ez (can already talk to animals, yes) got an unusual, powerful bond with our little dragon, so strong the little dragon do the exact same things as him while sleeping, so strong he can see through his eyes and talk with him even when they're separated. As if his self-sacrificing act had been rewarded: you choose to risk your life to save him ? then you two will be linked even strongly than before.
Rayla spares Marcos => our lad is the first one to rebel against Viren, act who instill courage in others who follow him. Marco became a part to the rebellion and was one of those who rallied Duren's forces (I guess) : you spare an innocent even if he was your enemy? Then he will become your ally.
Callum breaks his primal stone to save Zym and, by this, accepts the idea of returning to a "I'm nobody" state. Then he uses dark magic but choose to completely reject it and end up with the sky arcanum. You sacrifice your magic, who was important to you to save a life (and the world btw) ? then you made the choice to use a magic meant to kill but in the end decided to not go on that path ? then you will retrieve what you sacrificed in the first place, in an even stronger way.
Amaya save Janai when she could have killed her, her enemy, Janai end up fighting with her.
Same for Janai, she saved, even trusted Amaya.
In a general way: children, you fought for peace ? you let go of your grudge, your grief and all of your biased jugments ? then peace you'll have (more or less, we know not everyone want peace)
Ezran chose to forgive Soren and Claudia. Soren end up saving him in return and turning to his side. As for Claudia, I'll talk about her in a while.
Callum jump after Rayla to save her, it's love who made him mastered the spell to save them both. You're ready to sacrifice yourself for her? then you will both be saved.
Rayla tackle Viren from the peak of the storm spire. She doesn't search “death”, she's trying to save Zym. She's ready to lose her life to save him. out of righteousness, out of love. Then she get saved by Callum.
Now what about the "dark side" we call the “narrative of strength”?
Avizandum killed many people, especially Sarai who had a pure heart. He got killed by Harrow.
Harrow chose hate and death by killing him, he got killed by Runaan.
Runaan is the most interesting one so far: he had a choice to make too. Two choices. He could have backed up but chose to kill Harrow anyway and so chose “death”. However, even if we’re still not absolutely sure he decided to spare Ezran, he did chose (we know this from the team at Wonderstorm now, so it’s canon) to spare Rayla despite what law and duty said. Killing her was never in his agenda. So Runaan had to choose between life and death, he chose both and ended... between both, literally! "the irony is wonderful"…
Kesha, with all her arrogance (who was so predictable) and her hate toward humanity got killed in a not so soft way.
Viren... I think his many "rewards" have already started. When he chose to kill the magma titan, Sarai (they were friends, it's canon) got killed and Amaya hates him for this (it's canon to, thedragonprince official on tumblr mentionned it once). He lost 2 friends on that day. When he chose to kill Avizandum, he lost his other friend, Harrow. Here in a most terrible way and I will, once again, talk about this later. He inflicted a terrible spell to Rayla's parents but this turned against him. If not for them completely vanished, no one would have thought they had ran away, Rayla _ the only moonshadow elf who had her heart in the right place_ wouldn't have to go to this mission to clear her name. No other assassin would have spared Marcos, or listen to callum, no other assassin would have followed Ezran, found the egg and chose to "make things right" including the humans. Runaan proved it. And I'm not finished with Viren. He lost his son, he will lose is daughter and he's currently in the grasp of a powerful being who's obviously toying with him and he don't even know it. And he's so blind he can't even see it.
Edit: kinda forgot about Sol Regem who torched down a city of hundred of thousand people, who got rewarded by being blinded, losing his throne and being hated and feared by everyone. 1200years later, when he could have change he didn’t. So okay Callum used dark magic. But that wasn’t a reason to kill Zym. Reward? Lux Aurea, the city who had been built to honor him (according to Callum spellsbook) fall, a lot of Sunfire elves seems to have died and, if we believe the summary of the tabletop game, it’s pretty ugly... a city for a city? Maybe.
Claudia is also very interesting, in between love and hate, death and light. Here’s an excerpt from an interview I found:
As for Claudia, she really seems to have committed to this dark path now. Is there any hope for her in the future?
Richmond: Yes! There’s totally hope.
Ehasz: But it might get worse before it gets better.
[...]
Ehasz: Claudia is, ahh…
Richmond: She’s super complicated. She’s a fascinating character. There’s a long way to go with Claudia, she’s super exciting.
Ehasz: But she’s not about power! She’s about **love**. I mean, that’s one thing that’s interesting about her. She’s on a very dark path, but her core motivation is love, and I think that’s going to be very interesting.
She really is the best character to represent that grey area. And if this first part of my theory, about "rewards" is true, it could truly end up good for her. When she had to choose between Soren and Zym, she chose her brother. She chose her father over Soren (I'm talking about the scene in the dungeon, not after Kazef's transformation) not out of malice but out of fear. She loves her family and deceived herself because she's not strong enough to see the truth. I really think she will do the right choice when she will finally see her father for what he truly is (as Richmond said : "there's totally hope").
3. That’s nice and interesting, Lily… but this looks like “destiny” at worst. Is there really another kind of magic than dark magic and primal magic?
If the creators really put so much thoughts and efforts in creating the magical system, it’s really likely this way. But what would be the point in telling how it works right away? We do have to discover it with the characters themselves.
However, the existence of another kind of magic, something deeper, has been implied several time.
We have clues:
Like here (8:29min and especially 9:00min if the link doesn't work correctly), where Aaron Ehasz talked about an earlier and less differenciated kind of magic.
Or like what happened to Ezran in the ice-lake. In the novel, we have an interesting description form his POV, something magical happened (I’ll come back to this in a later part)
And that new or maybe forgotten kind of magic will, maybe… be the magic that will be used to free our dear moonshadow elves from the coins? Because we have some clues :
Question: [...] Runaan got turned into a coin [...] Can they be restored to their original forms?
Ehasz: “My gut is, it seems like the kind of thing that would require incredible and powerful magic to reverse. [...] We do not answer that question in Season Three. I’m telling you, it would take incredible magic and probably dark magic to reverse it, but I don’t know [if that’s going to happen].
(I promise, that last point isn’t here for nothing :3)
Okay, this post is over. The next one will be about the magical system in itself and that “other magic” implied here, about what I found in the show about it.
