Not sure if its THAT much of a hot take but:
I genuinely believe Eli was intended to be a non-white protaganist. For starters his 3d render's skin tone is tan. The way lighting is done during the run of slugterra sometimes makes him look whiter than he actually is but when you colour pick from his official render he is tan. Then there is the concept art. If you look at some of the earliest concept art of the characters, specifically the one with Concept stage Eli on a horse mecha vs thin legged concept blakk, concept Eli has those specific type of eyes that we see slugterra use for its asian characters(like junjie) Also Slugterra was made at a time when it wasn't THAT unusual for kid's shows to try to add representation in the main cast(even if it was horribly done in some cases).
And now my end point: This fandom white washes him alot in alot of fanworks.
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I saw the other blog and feel the need to clarify
This was submitted on the 26’th of June. Sorry the queue took a while anon