CEO of Chen the Cheerleader

Oddly enough I see this happening especially frequently with fansongs. Like even I’ve encountered a situation where I mentioned that seeing everyone dogpiling on this one creator’s voice and calling it “annoying” was weird to me (because the ONLY things I’d seen people post about them were baseless personal insults and making fun of how they sounded), and it’s only after I said that did someone mention they were racist and had done some other horrible shit.

He was indeed not a member of the alliance but, in fact, the very threat it was formed to take on! It’s very brief but in the movie’s flashback of Garmadon and Koko meeting, we see some kind of war happening where Garmadon is commanding a Skulkin army. In my version of the movieverse this the war the alliance fought in, not The Serpentine War (which was resolved peacefully thanks to a chance meeting between Arcturus and a young Koko). Fittingly it’s called The Skeleton War, which is not only where Koko made her proper debut as Lady Iron Dragon, but involved many of the other previous elemental masters, including ones not part of the alliance in the show!

So it goes unexplained within the movie how on earth (or- how on Ninjago I suppose) nobody knew Koko was Lady Iron Dragon, and while you could chalk it up to the Clark Kent effect (that being nobody in their right mind would ever think to accuse the infamous ex-wife of Garmadon who now works in an office building for being a renowned war hero and at most just assume she kinda resembles her in the way of a celebrity lookalike)- I have another headcanon on the matter.

So, I’ve posted before how I like to imagine the movieverse Time Twins aren’t evil and work as the curators of Ninjago City’s museum together. Now, I also happen to HC they knew Koko in the days of the Elemental Alliance, of which all of them were in. In the time since, the twins have worked meticulously to make sure every record, picture, visage, whatever have you, of Lady Iron Dragon and any member of the alliance is either altered to not be recognizable, or, in the case of pictures, the face is “conveniently” damaged or obscured. Similar principle for any records containing identifying information.

- Koko’s dragon form is big. Not as big as an arc dragon but definitely a LOT bigger than a normal dragon. I made this quick rough size comparison some years back using a shoddily edited screenshot of the Matriarch of the Mountain Dragons for a visual-

- Speaking of arc dragons, Koko’s raw power is roughly equivalent to one. She even has some relatives that are arc dragons themselves back in her home continent.

- The reason Koko has so much raw power is because she’s a direct descendant of the first dragon (and I don’t just mean Firstbourne- nah, I mean an actual, literal goddess).

- Koko’s friends from the alliance (aka the other parents of the ninja) are completely aware of Koko’s dragon form.

- Her dragon form is a western dragon with silver, almost metallic scales, and multiple sets of horns, a few of the smaller ones are golden dragon ivory. This is also where she got her name “Lady Iron Dragon” (which started as a mid-battle quip from Lilly after someone shouted about an “iron dragon” and she responded “That’s Lady Iron Dragon to you!”).

- Koko takes out her Lady Iron Dragon gear sometimes to visit her parents on her home continent and help out with the growing dragon hunter problem.

What was your initial reaction to the Lego Ninjago Movie? Did you like it? Hate it? Somewhere in between?

I was like in 5th grade(ish I can’t remember exactly and I’m too lazy to do the math) when it came out so I was all over it. Of course when I rejoined the fandom after a several year hiatus I was… well about as critical of the movie as the stereotype of a Ninjago poser gets-

Honestly I gotta give credit to my friend @kittydemon9000 and their fic “Same People, But Not Really” for really getting me into the movieverse and seeing it in a new light (plus their Discord server is what connected me to who are now my two closest friends in the world!). Nowadays I hold the opinion that, as an adaptation the movie obviously fails in a comical number of ways, but viewing it through the lens of an offical high school AU and just having fun with it because, for all the critiques I have for some of the writing choices, it’s a good time! Plus like every Lego movie the humor is top-notch.

I’ve got some more unsolicited movieverse headcanons.

One of the really fun thinks me and Imp like to brainrot about is the differences in how elements manifest in the showverse vs the movieverse. Some such example is the element of Earth, which is usually utilized as pillars of rock, boulders, etc. in the showverse, while in the movieverse it’s a lot more focused on shockwaves and earthquakes. That part is actually just analysis from the actual canon source material, but one thing we drew from that is show!Earth being focused more in the hands and arms while movie!Earth is focused in the feet and legs.