The concept of a dark magic dragon prince holds a mysterious and captivating allure. Conjuring images of power, danger, and enchantment, this mystical figure embodies a merging of two distinct forces - the dark arts and the majestic world of dragons. Dark magic, often portrayed as an opposing force to light or white magic, is frequently associated with malevolent intentions and forbidden knowledge. It taps into the untamed aspects of the supernatural realm, harnessing its untold potential to achieve desired outcomes through unconventional means. The dark magic dragon prince, therefore, becomes an embodiment of this forbidden power. Dragons, on the other hand, are mythical creatures that have long captivated the human imagination.
Magic is the mystical supernatural force that exists within the world of The Dragon Prince. It exists everywhere in the lands of Xadia. All magical creatures in Xadia are born connected to one of the six Primal Sources of magic, and as such, have certain powers and abilities based on their respective Primal Source.
The understanding of that secret becomes a spark , the smallest flicker of a Primal Source deep inside one s very being, but enough to forge an unbreakable connection with the Primal Source itself, allowing one to access its power and ignite the world with its magic. They can use it if they are in possession of an artifact that can provide them with primal energy, such as Primal Stones, but they are extremely rare.
Dragons, on the other hand, are mythical creatures that have long captivated the human imagination. Known for their immense power, wisdom, and graced with awe-inspiring beauty, dragons have been depicted in various cultures as guardians or bringers of destruction. They symbolize strength, dominance, and sovereignty.
Aaravos and the Purpose of Dark Magic (It’s Control)
So here’s the truth, or some shape of it based on what we have so far seen: before dark magic, even before the dragon monarchy, Elarion had become a thriving city. Humans were on the rise–they had access to magic, though the path to being a primal mage was long and arduous.
Eight hundred years after the founding of Elarion, the dragon monarchy was put in place–and given the subsequent pattern of escalation, I would not be surprised if Aaravos had his fingers in that. Then 200 years after that, Aaravos was involved in the creation of dark magic, whether he created it entirely himself or influenced its creation. Everyone then freaked out, humans were driven from Xadia, Elarion was (maybe) destroyed, etc. etc.
We still don’t know what Aaravos’s goal in all his manipulations is, but it seems to heavily involve humanity and Xadia being pitted against each other. He spends the 700 years after the expulsion of humanity apparently playing both sides, presumably in escalating conflict. It’s almost certain that he was responsible for both Luna Tenebris’s death and Queen Aditi’s fate, either to create chaos in Xadia that humanity could take advantage of, or possibly even introducing a third front in the conflict if dragons and elves could be turned against each other.
So simply by introducing dark magic when he did, Aaravos was definitely escalating the frictions between humanity and elves. He surely knew that the mechanics of it would be repulsive to the other peoples of Xadia. He probably knew that the staff would further escalate the conflict when it came to a head. And ultimately, even if everything after the creation of dark magic was by chance, Aaravos could not have gotten a better result if he planned it: the world is split into two explicitly enemy factions that he can play against each other at his leisure, and as a bonus, humans have been destabilized in a way that makes them reliant on dark magic to survive for the next few hundred years.
That second part is important, because we also know that dark magic is a means of control. It opens you to Aaravos’s influence–up to and including total erasure of your free will.
Therefore, Aaravos grows more powerful the more dark magic propagates. Zubeia says he targeted mages as being susceptible to manipulation, but I think, in the case of dark mages, it was more than that. He deliberately made dark magic to be this way, and we can see it in how dark magic affects people.
To start with, we’ve been told that dark magic attracts a certain personality profile–this actually could be said to be one of the earliest things established about the setting, given the concept pilot and the way proto-Claudia leans in to the magic while proto-Soren shrinks away from it. This is mostly a similar profile to the way Zubeia describes mages Aaravos’s targets: insatiable thirst and fascination with magic, etc. However, with the introduction of dark magic, you get an additional facet–a person pursuing dark magic instead of primal magic is one who wants something badly enough to take shortcuts and make tradeoffs, and to continue to do so as long as what they want is held in front of them. Whether that is a desire driven by greed, fear, pride, or whatever doesn’t matter, the desire itself is a shared attribute that Aaravos can easily exploit.
We are also told that dark magic then amplifies the emotional traits of its users. So whatever fears or desires, whatever insatiable thirst initially lead someone to dark magic are only going to intensify–Viren’s pride and persecution complex, Claudia’s fear of loss and desire to prove herself, etc. These are features, not bugs. The vector for manipulation already exists, and the dark magic persistently reinforces it.
Viren’s spiral through the first arc is a good illustration of this: he gets progressively more and more… like that, because his grief and anger and paranoia are in a full feedback loop. But in addition to his emotions and desires being amplified, he’s drawn more and more into Aaravos’s influence. Even given that Viren must already have been compromised on some level to even consider doing something as dumbass as an unknown blood ritual offered by someone he knows nothing about and can’t speak to, that Viren of season one would be asking a lot of questions that the Viren of season three does not.
In my opinion, this is not because Aaravos has actually done very much in the way of earning his trust. It’s because his influence has wormed (ha) its way deep enough that he can just say shit like this:
That is not the face and words of someone who thinks he needs to be subtle. He knows that at this point, he could literally punch Viren in the dick and Viren would be like “yeah, great idea, thanks.” I won’t say that Viren would be making good decisions without Aaravos nudging him, but I don’t think he’d be making the same decisions–by fairly early in season three, it’s clearly Aaravos’s plan that’s being implemented and Viren is just along for the ride as a figurehead and eventual fall guy (ha).
We even have a visual marker for the progression of Aaravos’s influence over Viren–Viren’s corruption. Now, my belief is still that the visible physical effects of dark magic corruption are basically magic overdose to the point of tissue damage. Corruption explicitly builds up and gets more severe with continued dark magic use, producing effects like being able to sense magic and cast small spells without primal reagents. But we are told explicitly that Viren is corrupted “inside and out,” so there is also an internal, mental/spiritual effect of consistent, repeated dark magic.
This internal corruption isn’t “evil”–this isn’t a setting where “good” and “evil” are absolute, tangible forces, for one–it’s Aaravos’s influence. Sympathy, trust, receptiveness… it’s all laid in with the dark magic corruption. One very subtle but also quite explicit place we see this is when Claudia and Soren argue in season 4–Claudia describes the belief that humans have always been and will always be persecuted by elves (and that Aaravos is a savior) in terms of generational trauma, and as something she knows to be the truth on a physical, bone-deep level. And Soren doesn’t get it:
The dark magic corruption that Claudia carries is enough to make her instinctively believe Aaravos’s version of the narrative so deeply she’s not capable of questioning it. Soren, unaffected, is able to step back and say, “that sounds fake, but okay.”
So the use of dark magic is emotionally cyclical, and the corruption builds with its use, and Aaravos’s potential hold over every dark mage only increases. This is all by design, laid out by the one who designed it. It’s serving its purpose.
But back to the possession for a moment: “Callum only used dark magic the one time and that still left him vulnerable to full possession by Aaravos!” I hear you cry, “Why doesn’t Aaravos ever possess Viren the same way?”
Well, he almost definitely does, he just goes to some effort to keep Viren from realizing it. We have two occasions where Viren exhibits the same eye-glow effect as Callum does while possessed:
One is here, where Aaravos has Viren very blatantly resist arrest, basically eliminating any chance he has of talking his way out of Opeli’s treason charges. Viren explicitly thinks he’s still in control here, that Aaravos is just offering up his power and knowledge to him. He argues with Aaravos that he can continue to fight, and even win the battle–but that doesn’t suit Aaravos’s purposes as well. Viren alone and on the run is a lot less useful than Viren positioned within range of the throne, even if he’s imprisoned.
And the other time is at the top of the Storm Spire, where Viren is in so deep that he still thinks all of this is somehow for his benefit:
There’s actually a close-up shot of Viren’s eyes going from dark magic purple glow to Aaravos blue/iridescent. They very specifically and deliberately showcase the moment it happens. But Viren still believes he’s the one steering.
So why does Aaravos handle Viren differently from Callum? Well, to put it simply, you don’t need to kick someone’s legs out from under them if they’ll kneel when you ask. Furthermore, one of Viren’s strongest personality traits is that his pride makes him crave control–so removing a level of control as basic as his own bodily autonomy would be an incredibly hostile act in what is ostensibly a friendly relationship. Aaravos maintains the illusion that Viren is the one in control all the way to the end, because forcibly puppeting Viren the way he does Callum is probably one of the only things that could actually turn Viren against him.
Callum, on the other hand, is already hostile. Aaravos knows that he can’t manipulate Callum the same way he did Viren–Callum’s personality and desires are too divergent. The only way he’ll bring Callum to do his bidding voluntarily is through fear, anger, or despair. (CHET fans insert your own meta here.) Forcibly possessing Callum then actually serves that goal, in that it’s a demonstration that a) he has total power over Callum and can do whatever he wants (fear), b) there’s nothing Callum can do to stop it (despair), and c) he’s a massive asshole to everyone Callum loves (anger). It’s a little appetizer, so that when it’s time for the main course, Callum will know what the stakes are.
And where does Viren fall in this at the end of season 4? Well, in this recent interview, Aaron Ehasz describes Viren as having been “forced to make the decision to use dark magic.” This is an interesting phrasing, because it specifically suggests both agency and lack thereof.
Viren spends most of season 4 making the choice not to use dark magic–I’m not going to dig into why, at this time, but between the start and end of the season’s arc he refuses to either use dark magic or even touch either of the staffs. This is most dramatic when Claudia tries to defer to him for the chrysalis-opening spell since he is (in her mind) the more powerful and experienced mage, but he also explicitly refuses the staff when Claudia brings it back from the Storm Spire, and from that point on it is generally Terry lugging it (and frequently the Sunforge Staff, as well) around.
And then this happens:
I need to think about this line for another hundred years or so, because it’s just… so much. So, so much. But a couple immediately notable things:
- This the last clear, full line Viren speaks in the season. His only other voice line after this is his “You!” when recognizing Rayla.
- The length of the shot in which he reaches to pick up the staff, combined with the music cue, is really over-the-top dramatic. Some of that is due to the drama from the other side, with Rayla suddenly encountering her two-year fixation, but it’s not a coincidence.
And from there, he’s casually melting their way out of the mountainside. He’s back to full-drama magic use–Claudia could certainly have gotten them out of the mountain, if she had to, but now he’s the one taking the lead on magic, again. He’s apparently all-in on freeing Aaravos, given his satisfaction with Claudia’s summary of next steps. And, of course, he’s got his corruption face back on, after us having not seen it all season. In short, while he doesn’t have the posession eyes, he’s still firmly back on his Aaravos’s bullshit.
This also brings in a factor that I haven’t talked about yet–the staff.
The Staff of Ziard, the Relic Staff, whatever you want to call it. (Personally, I’m going to stick with Relic Staff, just because I think focusing on Ziard muddies things too much.)
The Relic Staff, we can pretty much assume at this point, was crafted by Aaravos to be given to Ziard, the first dark mage. And in the same way that Aaravos set up dark magic to his own advantage, he definitely has shit going on with the staff. It has seemingly unique properties related to dark magic, in terms of spells it’s able to act as a power source for–most notably the spirit entrapment (coin) spell, and the massive magic drain spell cast by both Ziard and later Viren. It’s specifically required to open the chrysalis. (According to Aaravos, that is–it could very well be that it will be necessary for something else that he doesn’t want to reveal, and isn’t related to the chrysalis at all.)
At the very least, it makes sense for the staff to enhance Aaravos’s influence over its bearer–it’s a powerful relic, passed down from the first dark mage (even if, as I suspect, history no longer remembers that). People are going to fight over it. It’s going to naturally wind up in the hands of the most powerful person around… who is then firmly in Aaravos’s thrall.
One interesting thread here is, if we work with the assumption that Aaravos is on some level directing both Claudia and Viren’s impulses toward his own ends, is that Claudia spends the whole season trying to give the staff back to Viren. Even after he won’t take it, she prefers using the corrupted Sunforge Staff. Granted, she’s been using that one for two years now and so probably likes it quite a bit, but given the Relic Staff’s nature and properties, I would have expected it to also have the effect that once you’ve got it, you’re extremely reluctant to let it go. In the end, Claudia doesn’t even stop at just pushing the staff back on Viren, she straight-up leaves it behind on the floor.
And Viren–to go back to the interview quote–both makes the choice to pick it back up, and is forced into all that entails. He’s also explicitly not picking it up for Claudia, but for himself. It’s a choice he makes with as much agency as any he has ever made.. but it’s definitely a choice Aaravos wanted him to make.
There was a lot of speculation before season 4 came out that Aaravos would be discarding Viren in favor of Claudia, but at this point I think the opposite is true–Aaravos wants Viren’s hands on that staff, so Claudia isn’t as compelled by it. Claudia is, as Aaravos noted, a valuable asset, but she’s still just a secondary piece being moved around in order to get his real goals back on track. Viren is still central, and there’s some reason for that we have yet to see.
Anyway, both the Relic Staff and dark magic itself were built from the ground up by Aaravos specifically to allow him to easily influence/control humanity and have that control both propagate and filter to the people who would be most useful to him as pawns. Thanks for coming to my TED Talk about how humans are fucked.
There was a lot of speculation before season 4 came out that Aaravos would be discarding Viren in favor of Claudia, but at this point I think the opposite is true–Aaravos wants Viren’s hands on that staff, so Claudia isn’t as compelled by it. Claudia is, as Aaravos noted, a valuable asset, but she’s still just a secondary piece being moved around in order to get his real goals back on track. Viren is still central, and there’s some reason for that we have yet to see.
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Reviews for "The Dark Magic Dragon Prince: Bringer of Doom or Salvation?"
1. Sarah - 2 stars: I was really disappointed with "Dark Magic Dragon Prince". The plot felt disjointed and rushed, with too many undeveloped characters. The animation was also lacking, and the overall world-building felt incomplete. Moreover, the dialogue was often clichéd, and it failed to create any emotional connection with the audience. I had higher expectations from this series, and unfortunately, it fell short in many aspects.
2. Alex - 1 star: "Dark Magic Dragon Prince" was a complete waste of time for me. The storyline was predictable and lacked any originality. The character development was minimal, and the dialogue felt forced and unrealistic. The animation was subpar, with choppy movements and overall lacking in detail. I was hoping for a captivating fantasy series, but instead, I was left incredibly disappointed.
3. Emma - 2 stars: I couldn't get into "Dark Magic Dragon Prince" at all. The pacing was all over the place, with seemingly important moments rushed through, while other less significant scenes dragged on. The plot was confusing and convoluted, with many unanswered questions. The character interactions felt shallow and lacked depth, leaving me uninvested in their journey. Overall, it was a frustrating and unsatisfying viewing experience for me.
4. Liam - 3 stars: While "Dark Magic Dragon Prince" had its moments, I found it to be underwhelming. The concept had potential, but the execution fell flat. The animation was decent, but the character designs lacked originality. The writing was average, with some clichéd dialogue and predictable plot twists. I struggled to fully engage with the story and found myself losing interest as it progressed. It had its flaws, but it might still appeal to some fantasy animation enthusiasts.