FILM REVIEW: THE DARK CRYSTAL

I watched The Dark Crystal for the first time since I was a small child. The first time I watched it, I was too young to understand what was going on. However, I have a greater appreciation for this film now that I am older. It is a story of life and death, light and darkness, and the balance between it all. The puppetry was masterfully done and the world building was very imaginative. This Friday, Netflix will be releasing a prequel series to The Dark Crystal called Age of Resistance, which will depict the Skeksis at the zenith of their power and the near extinction of the Gelfling race. I would recommend this film to anyone who is seeking a good fantasy film that does not have a single human character.

FILM REVIEW: DRAGONSLAYER

I recently rewatched one of my favorite fantasy films, Dragonslayer! I like this film because it portrayed a unique fantasy world that reacted to the presence of a dragon in various ways. A sorcerer regards the dragon as one of the last remnants of magic, a boy sees it as a chance to prove himself a man, a kingdom regards it with fear, and a king regards it as a monster to appease at all costs. This film depicted one of the best dragons in cinematic history. The story and world building were wonderful. You just don’t get films like this anymore.

MASTER OF THE IMPOSSIBLE

This is the magician my mother and I will be seeing on our first night in Las Vegas: Mat Franco. Apparently, he competed in the show America’s Got Talent, which is one of my mother’s favorite shows. Before watching this video, I did not know he existed. Now, I am convinced that he truly is a master of the impossible and sorcerer supreme. I am eager to see what else this wizard is capable of when I see him up close and personal.

MEDIEVAL ROBOTICS

In some of the medieval documentaries I watched, I discovered some of the earliest forms of both robotics and prosthetics. There was one case in which a man lost his nose in a trial by combat and replaced it with a prosthetic made of solid gold. I therefore had the idea of including a form of medieval robotics in my fantasy series. These robotics would be fueled by both magic and the souls of human beings.

SORCERER ARMY

For the past few days, I have been building a potential idea to include in my third fantasy book. With magic returning to the world with a vengeance, a new army would be required in the new age. This army will consist of not knights, but warrior sorcerers. I am thinking of drawing inspiration from both the Knights Templar and Shaolin Monks when creating this mystical army.

RESURGENT MAGIC

I am planning to include a very big plot line to my third fantasy book. After the Dark Death plague ravaged the Empire and the Sword of Power was lost, magic mostly disappeared and most of the bloodlines of Druid sorcerers lost their power. Only two Druid bloodlines kept their power, but they were shadows of their former selves. This absence of magic had been going on for over three hundred years until the Sword of Power was rediscovered in Numen the Slayer. This along with other factors will lead to a resurgence in magic and the Empire will never be the same again. I will be seeing a magic show in Las Vegas in two weeks so that should give me some ample inspiration.

THE DRAGON PRINCE: AARAVOS

I have binge watched the first two seasons of the Netflix show known as The Dragon Prince. As a medieval history buff and fantasy enthusiast, I could not resist watching this show. It exceeded my expectations and is one of the most intriguing fantasy stories I have ever encountered. It featured a fantasy world that was inhabited by a very diverse collection of characters.

Among those characters was this mysterious elf known as Aaravos. I cross examined various aspects of the show’s lore and I believe I have a good idea of what kind of character Aaravos is. Aaravos was an archmage who mastered all six forms of magic as well as dark magic.

Strangely, whenever someone tries to read about him in books and scrolls, the pages that mention him fade away. I have seen this happen at least twice in the fantasy genre. It happens when someone is so intolerably evil that their very name and existence is banished from history. The first case was in the Inheritance Cycle where the Forsworn and their dragons had their names wiped from the history books of Alagaesia. The second case was in Game of Thrones when the 13th Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch allied himself with the White Walkers and did things that were so horrid that his name was purposely forgotten.

With Aaravos, I definitely get this powerful feeling that he is an incarnation of evil. He looks more like an unholy demon than an elf. It is clear that he was sealed in his mirror for a reason. Before the texts mentioning his name faded, I was able to translate them from Danish and Arabic languages. They mentioned that at some point in history, Aaravos gave a gift to mankind and may have fallen in love with a human woman. It is obvious that humanity did not discover the secrets of dark magic on their own, which means someone must have given them the secret. That someone must have been Aaravos.

If Aaravos had an affair with a human woman and they had children, it is possible that their descendants might be the main character Callum and Ezran. That would explain why the magic cube was passed down through their mother’s side of the family for generations. Also, it could explain why they could naturally wield magic without the assistance of dark magic or archaic stones. Aaravos could be the ancestor of both Callum and Ezran.

Once the dragons and elves of Xadia witnessed the unnatural magic humans were wielding, they banished all humans out of Xadia. As for Aaravos, I assume he was sealed in his mirror as punishment for showing humans how to wield dark magic and possibly falling in love with one of Xadia’s hated human enemies.

If this is the case, then Aaravos’s story greatly resembles the story of the titan Prometheus, who gave fire to humanity to give them even footing with the gods. For this, he was punished by Zeus by being chained to a rock and having an eagle rip out his liver day after day. The previous Dragon King was a storm dragon with power over lightning, which is a clear symbolism to Zeus. Also, according to legend, Prometheus was eventually freed by Hercules, the son of Zeus. The Dragon Prince is the son and heir of the Dragon King, which could make him the Hercules of the story and Aaravos’s ticket out of his mirror.

Overall, I get the feeling that Aaravos is an incarnation of chaotic evil. Chaotic evil is a type of evil that just wants to watch the world burn. This could be his motivation for helping Viren start a war between humanity and Xadia. I look forward to seeing how the story will unfold when the next season comes later this year.