#Dragon Prince Spoilers

[sunfire-shield]

I can’t believe Janai and Amaya got back from the battle and literally just put their wedding clothes back on and picked up exactly where they left off. like “oh yeah we just had to go and deal with the haters outside the church who didn’t want us to be married. now where were we.” icons

[sarahth2]

Well people the ones who theorised Aaravos being a giant from season 5.

Your absolutely right

HE'S FRICKEN HUGE!!!!!!!!

[catchingdaydreams]

Dragon prince season 6 spoilers

Idk if I'm onto something here but did they make Aaravos's daughter autistic? Like the hand flapping and covering her ears at the trial. Also how she lines her toys up instead of actually playing with them. Fuck did they just straight up kill an autistic kid?

[thegurlwhoisntthere]

It’s really interesting to me that— and spoilers for those who haven’t seen season 6—

Rayla tells Callum to choose the greater good, to sacrifice her instead of doing dark magic, but she’s never actually been in that position, so she literally doesn’t know how hard it’s going to be.

Like, Callum’s had to make the choice to save her life 3 times at this point. The first time he did Dark Magic when the dragon was chained, the second time when he followed her off the cliff, and the third time when he did dark magic again. Each time Callum was faced with losing her and came to the conclusion that he couldn’t do it, so made the choice to save her no matter what.

Rayla, on the other hand, has not yet been put in this position. She’s been put into the position of sacrifice, yes, but each time the only person in danger is her. She is the one who would die protecting the dragon. She is the one who would die taking out Viren. So when Callum tells her that he should let her die, it seems like just another sacrifice for her to make, not him.

In doing this she is unintentionally validating his motives and reciprocating them, because of how she argues against it. Unlike back in season 2 when he did dark magic, here she argues that it hurts him, that it leaves him vulnerable to what he is afraid of, and she would die to make sure he doesn’t have to do that. And while she doesn’t really pick up on this, Callum does, at least a little bit.

Because there is another time Rayla was faced with sacrificing Callum for the greater good and didn’t even consider doing it. She outright said no when he asked, but in her mind it doesn’t even cement as plausible. And that honestly makes it worse.

Because if she’s incapable of even considering the option of killing him when it’s just a hypothetical scenario, then she’s definitely going to break her promise when the time comes, just like he would.

[mjbarrosart]

My Dragon Prince Boards season 6, episode 605

Ok folks, It is time to go trough the next episode of season 6 I worked, episode 605.

When you are working on an episode as a storyboard artist you, usually, want to choose how to approach your sequences. Most of the time your will get instructions from your director and supervisor to do things in certain ways, making sure that things aligning between episodes and general season arcs; but most of details of your sequences are up to you.

In this episode I had the huge privilege to tackle most of Soren and Viren interactions, and a big question for my, from the beginning, was "what will be my approach?"

Because, how I see it, there are 2 big forces, struggles, arcs- or whatever you want to call it- in conflict during this sequences. In one hand, you have Soren and his pain, and in the other hand, you have Viren and his desire for forgiveness.

I decided to approach this sequences from Viren's, because 2 reasons mainly:

The first one, is the most obvious one, is that- at least for me- Soren's arc is already resolved, of course he is in real pain, and he is a victim of abuse and there is a lot of trauma that he needs to heal, but his overall arc resolved in season 3. He is one of the goof guys now, and he knows where he stands. This is an important moment for his healing, for sure, but it is more relevant to Viren's arc that is still incomplete at this point.

The second reason is more personal. While I am a daughter, I have the blessing of having a really good relationship with my parents, so while I understand Soren's trauma, I have not a lot of personal experience to pour into. But, I am also a mother, and from that point of view, I deeply understand Viren. I still think that he is a villain, and what he did was wrong in all levels, but I can absolutely connect with the idea of "parents sacrifice for their children, not the other way around".

Parenting is the eternal struggle between being able to do anything for your children well being, and understanding that they are their own person, and their have the right to make their own mistakes and live their own life.

So yeah, that is what was in my mind during this episode, now let's check sequence by sequence!

My first sequence is a sweet one, between Ezran and Soren. I usually don't have a lot of sequences with the young king, so it is always fun to work with him

Overall, it is a simple and sweet moment between this two, I love how much Soren respects Ezran but at the same time tries to keep it casual, haha. I love the idea of friends loving and supporting each other.

My next sequence is when Soren goes to visit Viren for the first time. This is a big one. In one hand, Viren wants to talk and express everything he has to say, in the other Soren holding up his feelings, dealing with confusion and anger.

The sequence opens with the shot of Viren in the cell and the fly on the spider web. It's a pretty on the nose metaphor that we used through the full episode.

A less on the nose metaphor I tried to build during the sequences was using the bars as a framing devise to show emotional states. When Viren is talking with guilt and resentment, he is usually framed behind the bars. When he is talking from a place of love, taking into consideration Soren's feelings and acknowledging the damage ha has caused, he usually is framed without the bars.

This is a sequence where they fail to connect, and by the end, Viren tries to follow Soren, but the chains stop him. There is still a huge division between both of them.

Next sequences is another interaction, This time, they will talk, but it will not be good. We start with Viren, still trapped, suffering. He is a little calmer now. He tries to connect with Soren, but it is still hard, the bars are between them, and the pain is keeping them apart.

But then, Viren starts to talk more freely, to recognize his mistakes, the damage that he caused to Soren, to Claudia. The ways he was a bad parent and hurt them both. So we flip the framing, now Viren is free, Soren is behind the bars.

Soren's pain is stopping him from healing and is coming out as rage.

he has a hard time believing whatever his father is telling him. In the past, Viren manipulated him, why now would be different. It is so hard to break cycles of abuse, and it is hard to forgive, too. Some people don't deserve forgiveness, to be honest. And I am not sure if Soren ever will forgive Viren.

So Soren burst into rage. I wanted to create a pretty visceral reaction. Talking with his hands and body, almost like puking out his feelings, so much pain that he can not hold anymore. But this is not necessarily what he needs. He screams at Viren, he hits the bars, he leaves in rage, and the wound is still open.

And Viren is defeated again. Forgiveness will not be something easy to get.

My next sequences is a short silly one, hahaha. Rayla and Callum going to fight the beast. I swear to god i have the "Slash, Slash, Swirly dash" line stuck in my head until today ><

Well, back to the drama.

My last sequence of the episode is when Viren wakes up, and Soren is there.

This time, there is no confrontation between them. Viren understands that no matter what he says, he may never be never forgiven. So he stops trying to "convince" Soren that he is sorry, and just tell him what he thinks Soren needs to hear.

And after that Soren leaves, maybe for the first time ready to start the path to healing.

And that was my work on episode 605!!

Thanks for reading this long post, again!

If you have any questions about the board process on Dragon prince, please feel free to ask! Also, I always read all the comments you put in the tags, they always make me smile :) Thank you!!!

Soon I'll post about my work on 608!

[cannonball5]

I think just figured out why Aaravos created Dark Magic. In season 2 Claudia describes the way Dark Magic works as “taking things born with magic and squeezing it out of them.” Aaravos didn’t create Dark Magic just as a way to expand his influence, he created it as a way to kill Startouched Elves. We learn in season 6 that Startouched Elves are virtually immortal, the only known death being Leola, though some kind of ritual of some kind that caused a massive crater. So how does Aaravos plan to kill the Startouched Elves as vengeance? The only way is to strip them of their power and immortality, and the best way to do that is to “squeeze” the power out of them for spells.

[raylatdp-astridhttyd]

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Legend or korra

Dragon prince

Evolution of bloodbending

[thowawayuntilfurthernotice]

TFW you realize that Callum is going to be the one who ends up freeing Aaravos because Aaravos has been manipulating him from the start.

[bat-snake]

So here's how it's looking for me following two fandoms wherein the villains are highly powerful mysterious beings who have had their horrific backstories revealed at last

Six hours later, they were seen screaming at each other about the motifs of The Great Gatsby*

*Aaravos has absolutely no historical context for what's going on, but good god is he trying. "Oh right, I forgot you're from a Fantastical Dimension that hasn't even invented a light bulb!"

[venice-1987]

Girl, I dont want to know what "invert life and death" means. All I want to know is if Soren makes it out 1) alive and 2) with a boyfriend

[sunfire-shield]

“Do you think it’s edible??” “NO, and PLEASE don’t find out” YOUR HONOUR I LOVE THEM

[sarahth2]

[catchingdaydreams]

🌌 'We are, all of us, stardust, held together by love...for an instant' 🌌

[thegurlwhoisntthere]

Hey y’all

I’ve been seeing a lot of post that are like “oh it’s kinda fucked up that the Dragons imprisoned Aaravos in the sea of the castout where (insert tdp s6 spoiler)” and yeah that would be fucked up… if that’s what happened.

But it seems that we all either forgot the plot of the last two seasons or literally weren’t paying attention (looking at you season 4 haters) because at least 70% of the plot revolved around the fact that no one knew where or what Aaravos’ prison was.

The only person that knew what the elf that built and hid it. That’s it. The dragons had pieces of the puzzle, but they literally did not know. Not even Aaravos himself knew where his prison was, or he’d have manipulated his way out sooner.

The fact that the sea of the castout was where she died may have been nothing more than a coincidence or it could’ve been the “merciful one” offering some bullshit “mercy” letting his prison lie in her final resting place.

But yeah, the archdragons, Elves and humans were not being especially cruel with that, the writers were

[mjbarrosart]

My Dragon Prince Boards season 6, episode 608

Hello, everyone!

Finally I have some time to write this! You can not imagine how demanding is to work making television shows, everything is for yesterday, haha!

Complains about work aside, it is time to talk about my last episode of season 6, episode 8. This one was... special.

I can say without a doubt that this was one of the most emotional episodes I have ever worked on. I cried every time I watched the animatic, and I cried again watching the final episode a few days ago.

I think is a lot of things together: a lot of important things happens, characters die, Katolis is destroyed, one of the quasars is fake! Aaravos!!! ... but also because I witnessed my team bring together their A game, telling this story in such a beautiful way.

I learned a lot from this episode, specially from my Unit Director, Mike Jones, who was in charge of boarding the "Hearts of Cinder" spell sequence; what a masterclass of emotion, storytelling and cinematography! I love Jason Simpson's performance during the show, but in particular in that sequence, and I think the boards took everything to a new level.

Now, let's go back to my sequences.

My first one was Soren going down to Viren to ask him to perform the spell. It was good to have this last interaction between both of them after all the work I did with the characters in 605.

There is a lot of subtle staging in this one. The way the light is hitting over their heads, how present in the screen the staff is; Viren's hesitance is something that I remember was important for me to portrait properly.

One of the things we talked a lot during this sequence was in how to use the light as narrative element. I was not interested in the classical reading of going into the light as "good" and shadows as "bad".

But light as hope, options, forgiveness, etc.

Viren walks away from the light when he gets offered the staff not because he is going "bad" but because he doesn't feel capable to do what he is being asked to do.

Soren is coming directly to him, removing his chains, giving him back his staff, asking him for help. But Viren hesitates.

And I think that that was a genius think for the script to call. Viren is not a man looking for the first chance to "redeem" himself. I am not even sure that he believes that he deserves that possibility.

But they are running out of time. The situation is dire, and as the light get blocked by the falling debris, the options are becoming clearer. Hope is dim, but there is something to do: Hearts of Cinder.

Viren, still full of doubts, explains to Soren why the spell is so hard to perform: the price is a human heart. A price that the Viren of the past would have pay with not second thought, but not the current one, no the one who understands the weight of dark magic.

But Soren has no doubts: "Take mine" I still have chills listening to the delivery of that line. And I think here is the moment Viren decided to sacrifice himself. While he is being consumed by doubt and fear, his son will is clear, Soren will do the right thing, even if that cost him his life.

And that is what Viren never had before. The willingness to sacrifice himself for the greater good. He looked at his reflection in Soren's golden heart and saw and answer, saw love, hope.

I just think is beautiful that Soren's conviction gave him the chance to do the right thing for once. Soren taught him the ultimate lesson.

I love this two so much.

My next sequence is a simple one, Terry and Claudia arriving to Katolis. I liked to draw Claudia's new hair. I wish I had more sequences with her in this season.

After this is Moon nexus time!

After all the drama with Viren and Soren the massage sequences felt a little silly, hahaha. but was fun to make.

I added the little detail of Rayla having issues landing, while Callum is just so good at it, haha. Fun to have their roles reversed for one, and Rayla being the clumsy one.

I like the moment when Lujanne ask them if they are a couple again and they exchange this nice look. I know that Rayllum is a huge thing in the fandom, and while they are not my type of ship (I am into the sapphics, you know) I think that they are pretty cute together, and Is always fun to make moments between them.

I just wanted to share with you this silly face, lol. Sometimes you draw things in boards that don't translate that well into the final show, but It is fun anyway, you want to inspire the animators to push the performance as much as they can.

Back to serious business. I love the shift when our heroes realized that there is only 2 quasars and 3 coins. Callums turn into Raylla knowing that this will destroy her. I really enjoy how the use of the lens to blur Lujanne in the Background creates this efect of hyperfocus on Callum and Rayla.

She is facing a terrible decision, who to save. So we move the camera to focus only on them. Is an intimate moment.

I like this framing, Rayla is in pain, crying, Callum is listening, but by the framing we can se that he is holding her. Callum is there for her, always.

And that is how I finished my last sequences of season 6, with Rayla crying.

Working on this season was one of the honors of my life. And I can wait to share with you how was making season 7, because was... A LOT, for sure! hahahaha.

Hope you like this! And feel free to ask if you have questions about the storyboard process!

And thanks for all the notes, comments and support! It is truly appreciated!

A little bonus:

Look a the cool crew jacket that Bardel gave us when we wrapped seasons 4 to 7! (Finally I can show it without making it an spoiler of the name of season 7!!)

[cannonball5]

You know, we still don’t know what exactly happened with King Harrow the night of the assassination, and we have one Quasar Diamond left.