Hi! Yesterday I was rewatching Maleficent and suddenly I started wondering about Diaval's life expectancy.
Do you think he still has a raven's life span, which means he's going to age prematurely and die in no more than twenty years at most? Or is he going to live as long as normal humans do?
I personally suspect Maleficent has made him immortal, potentially without Diaval himself knowing, out of both affection for him and the desire not to lose her trusted servant. I'd really like to know what you think!
Sorry I took ages to answer! >_<
Realistically, taking the canon into account, I think Diaval is not aging the same way ravens do anymore. Obviously it's hard to tell, because ravens don't change much visually once they've reached maturity (and from what I've read, they don't decline much cognitively either, good for them!)
(And also, I'm thinking about the fact that ravens have different life spans in the wild and in captivity, with the former sometimes reaching 20 years and the latter being nearly twice as long. Would you consider Diaval a raven in the wild or in captivity? XD Like, he's a wild animal sure, I bet he hunts and forages for his own food -- but also I reckon some of his needs are taken care of, as the Moors are lavish and comparatively safe for animals, so he stands a good chance of living a long life even as a raven with no meddling of magic).
He looks to be aging somewhat, as he has some gray hairs in the second movie, and generally his character design looks aged up from the first movie to the second -- so I wouldn't say he's been made immortal by Maleficen't magic (unless it's a type of immortality wherein he still looks older with time? which defeats the purpose to my mind ahah). What I see realistically is that Maleficent's magic did have an effect on him, slowing down his aging and life span's to something close to a human's -- so, say, for the Middle Ages that would be about 60 years old or even longer, considering he can get his injuries and ailments fixed by magic and doesn't do grueling manual labour -- or maybe even a Dark Fae's?
I personally don't have a strong headcanon, but yours sounds sweet to me because you make Diaval's lenghened life a conscious decision on Maleficent's part *-* I guess in my sorta-headcanon, her magic gives him a life as long as a Dark Fae's. If Maleficent does have control over it, then why stop at humans? She doesn't even like them that much and I doubt she sees Diaval as a man/needing to have a specifically human-length life only because she turns him into a man a lot. So why not let him get as old as the Dark Fae like her get? (now mind you, the Phoenix being immortal makes her special among the Fae, so I've figure they must be mortal but have a looong life span, surpassing humans').
In Ornithology specifically, I'm going for something like this: Diaval is 4 he meets Maleficent -- he's a mature raven and therefore looks like a young adult man. Over the years he does grow older, but slower than a raven would, as Maleficent's magic affects him and he spends considerable time as a human/other creatures. Eventually he gets quite old for a regular ravens (both a point of lighthearted pride and a discomfort for him) but looks like a middle-aged man (and feels like... well, better not ask him). By the end of the events of M:MoE he'll be in his mid-twenties (he should be at the clubbbb) and I predict he's got another good half a century in him at least ahah
I hope this answer is not too late and not too meandering!
