#eoa analysis

Like, there's the case of certain spells tending to be certain colors, regardless of who is performing them. Conglari is usually green when cast, with a few exceptions (orange when Mateo (& Olivia) first use it in "Wizard-in-Training" and pink when Olivia uses it in "Team Isa"), and mitsomo ticarsi's blue overrides both Mateo's orange and the royal guards' red. And like. I have no clue what to make of the implications of that. Like is there something inherent to the spell? What decided those colors? The wizards that first performed the spells? The magic itself? I do love the idea of "living" magic and wizardry as an act of communication with it but there's not really enough examples of these specific-color spells in the show to make any concrete statements about them.

And then there's the case of how Victor's magic stays the same indigo color even when he changes alignment. This case pretty handily dismisses the idea of magic color being defined by alignment as any sort of in-universe rule and makes me lean more toward the idea of the color being intrinsic to the caster. It could be a personality factor, which could help explain in a correlation vs. causation kind of way why so many malvagos have colors in the purple/dark blue range. I.e., whatever trait they have that makes their magic color trend toward purple is also the trait that makes them more inclined to turn to dark magic in the first place. It explains why those colors would be so common among that group while also accounting for cases like Ash's white magic - even if she has the "purple" trait, maybe her "white" trait is just more strongly expressed. This could also explain why all the royal guards have red magic in "Crash Course" - if they've all got the types of personalities that could lead them to joining the guard, maybe that type of personality just manifests as red.

(On the note of "Crash Course", the one thing I'll say for sure is that the magic color probably doesn't come from the tamboritas, since Bronzino's magic is yellow while casting from that same wand. Similarly, when Alacazar uses Mateo's tamborita in "Spirit of a Wizard", his own magic is still yellow instead of Mateo's orange.)

(Also on the note of "Crash Course", that episode shows us what I think is the only example in the show of a wizard actively taking control of someone else's spell. Mateo pulls the wand out of Rico's hands and is able to carefully set Miguel back down from being levitated. The magic stays red instead of turning orange, which I guess is somewhat relevant here? It at least tells us that the caster has a strong influence on the color. But I mostly bring it up because holy shit Mateo took direct control of someone else's spell. Like. Is that. Is that something any wizard could do? Is that significant? Look, I know the writers probably weren't trying to make a statement about Mateo or his relative magical strength there but in-universe I feel like that should be noteworthy. What in the heck.)

But I think the most interesting edge cases are the ones where someone's base magic color actually changes over the course of the show. The two examples I can think of are Elena, whose tamborita magic changes from purple in "Not Without My Magic" to orange in the "Spring Cleaning" short, and Olivia, whose magic changes from orange in "Wizard-In-Training" and "Movin' On Up" to pink in "Team Isa". Elena's kind of a weird case because her own magic does have specific color associations - both her scepter powers and her emotion magic. It's possible that her tamborita magic changing colors implies that the mental state of the caster can influence it as well as (or instead of) personality. While Elena certainly grows and changes over the show, "Not Without My Magic" and "The Magic Within" and associated shorts aren't really all that far apart in the timeline, so such a dramatic change seems unlikely, and like, other magic users grow and change too without their magic changing. But Elena's anxiety magic post-TMW manifests as purple, so maybe her stress about not having her scepter in "Not Without My Magic" is affecting her magic color there?

I don't think tamborita magic color is always indicative of emotion (unless Mateo is just pissed off 24/7 which. not an accurate read of his character, but admittedly a funny one), but I can actually think of one other example in the show that suggests it might contribute in extreme cases. Because while I fully admit it could just be the color settings on my computer or the lighting in the episode or my own perception, I swear to God that Mateo's magic is yellow specifically during "By My Side".

Like. Am I losing it? Am I cherry-picking too much? That's a different color, right? Like I can see a bit of an orange ring around the outside but his magic is usually so much darker/more uniform. Is it just the location/lighting? Like, it's gotta just be that, but the fact that there are butterflies there too makes me wonder if it's a deliberate choice to make his magic lighter for this song. Dude's in such a good mood he temporarily hijacked Elena's emotional symbolism.

Although another possibility here is that his magic is more yellow in that song because he's specifically learning from Alacazar, whose magic is yellow - in both Elena and Olivia's cases, their magic is orange like Mateo's when he's instructing them, but purple and pink respectively when they're casting without him around. If all that's intentional, the Doylist explanation is just Symbolism™, but in-universe it could suggest some sort personal influence - like if you're trying to do magic Like Someone Else, you may mimic their magic color, whether intentionally or not. Although that doesn't really track with the guards' magic being red to Bronzino's yellow. Still, there's room for exploration there, I think.

Expanding on this with Olivia's case, it could be something like, a wizard starts out with magic colors influenced by how they're learning it, and as they get more experience and come into their own as a spellcaster, their own colors start to show through. And this cycles us back around to it potentially being something deeper to their identity, like their personality or something tied to their spirit. It could be a form of self-expression, tying it in with how Shuriki banned magic alongside music and dancing. There's a lot of possibilities here.

I think having worked my way through this post, I really like the idea of it being influenced by a combination of things - personality, emotion, the people you look up to, intent, etc. In that vein, I also really like your comment about wizards potentially stereotyping each other based on their magic - if they perceive their magic as being one color for one reason, it could be easy to assume another wizard's magic is the same, even if another factor is behind it. I wonder if magic color is something wizarding communities even understand in universe.

Isabel starts the show as a clingy little kid - from her perspective, she just lost her parents, and she doesn't understand that her sister's new responsibilities mean that she can't spend as much time with her as she used to. A lot of her episodes involve her learning to act independently of Elena. She must develop and defend her own identity, even as she reckons with the limitations of her age.

She goes to school for the first time in "Crystal in the Rough" and struggles to make friends her own age, so she smothers her own identity and tries to just fit in instead. She has to learn to be herself and rely on her own strengths - her skills with math, science, and invention. This episode also gives Isabel her own friend group, independent from Elena and the other amigos. Later, in "Science Unfair", she has to learn to rely on those friends for help. Her sister gives her some advice, but ultimately, she and her new friends finish their project themselves.

Later still in "Class Act", Isabel has to learn to recover from her own mistakes and work with even more people outside of her family, to the point where she's able to teach Elena a lesson about working with difficult personalities in "Norberg Peace Prize". By "Shooting Stars", she's totally confident in her role as a scientist and her ability to give directions related to that role. And in Isa's final focus episode, "Heart of the Jaguar", Elena is literally taken from her, and she must learn to stand up for herself and solve her problems entirely alone.

But even as she learns to become a more independent and confident leader in her own right, she has to deal with the fact that she is still fundamentally Different from her sister. At first, this is largely framed as a function of her age. In "Blockheads" and "Three Jaquins and Princess", she is ignored and doubted because of her youth, though it's her knowledge and ingenuity that solve the problems of the day.

Still, she tries to be one of the "big kids", and in "Sister of Invention", she makes her plea again to be treated as an adult and seen as part of the team. She's ultimately allowed to join the amigos, but it's not because they see her as being like them. In fact, they explicitly say that Isabel can't do what they do... but that they can't do what she does, either. She's allowed to work with them because of her inventions and mathematical skills - that is, because of her differences.

(Arguably, "Science Unfair" has a similar conclusion. Isabel is invited to go to college - that is, invited to join a group of adults - specifically because of her skills with science. Beyond just being her hobby, those skills are at the core of her identity, and they are what tie her to being recognized as a grown-up.)

The point is hammered in further in "Team Isa", where Cristina outright tells her that "you're not Elena and you never will be." Isabel was trying to be a "leader like Elena" and failed, only succeeding when she utilized her and her friends' own unique skills instead of trying to just be like her sister. Isabel and Elena have distinct skill sets, and episodes like "A Gecko's Tale" and "The Family Treasure" emphasize this. Their differing skills allow them to complement each other and give them opportunities to learn, but throughout the show, it's made clear that they are not each other and cannot fully fill each other's roles.

Because again, it's not just that Isa can't do exactly what Elena does. It's also that Elena can't do what Isa does. She tries to handle invention plans in "Sugar Rush", but it only adds to her anxieties, and at the end of the episode, she hands the responsibility off to Isabel, the expert. Elena has to learn to delegate what she can't handle herself.

That's what the Royal Inventor title means. It's respect for Isabel's unique skills. It's an acknowledgement that she's a part of the team. And it's not an act of subordination, but rather a delegation of authority.

So the narrative comes together there. Isabel has gone from a clingy little kid that would hide her interests to fit in to a confident young lady that knows where her skills lie and can be trusted with the responsibility to use them for the kingdom's benefit.

The promotion scene at the end of "Coronation Day" exists primarily for these narrative reasons rather than for making perfect logical sense in-universe. It's meant to showcase how the character arcs have developed - most of them fall apart if you put them under the slightest bit of realistic scrutiny - but if we do want to look at them through that logical, in-universe lens, then frankly, Isabel's promotion probably makes the most sense.

There is a precedent of members of the royal family still working for the royal family. Esteban was chancellor for most of the show and both he and the abuelos were on the Grand Council. None of those three may have had a claim to the throne like Isabel could, but even her claim is pretty meaningless at this point in the timeline.

The only reason Elena had any governing authority as Crown Princess was because there was Literally No Other Ruler at the time. Current heir or not, Isabel won't actually be expected to lead the kingdom unless something happens to Elena, and if Elena ever has kids, then Isa's practically off the roster entirely. So... what's a princess to do in the meantime? Being named Royal Inventor gives her a degree of authority within Elena's court that she may never have otherwise and gives her something to do for the kingdom other than wait around until Elena dies. It's even a job that's in her wheelhouse.

Mateo's explanation of the Codex in Spellbound is:

"The kind of magic we need can only be found in the Codex Maru. [...] It's an ancient Maruvian spell book passed down through generations of royal wizards. It contains the most ancient and powerful magic in the kingdom."

Note that Mateo doesn't say that this spell can only be found in the Codex, but that this "kind of magic" can. Personally I didn't interpret this as strictly meaning "the Codex is the only thing that will have this information" but rather "only something like the Codex will have this information." Only a powerful spellbook would have that info, and the Codex is the most powerful spellbook that Mateo, at the time a relatively inexperienced (and honestly pretty naive) wizard, can think of and knows is in the palace. It's also an incredibly lucky guess - Mateo hasn't seen the Codex at this point, he only knows of its existence. He has no way of knowing that akatok and its reversal potion will be in there for sure, but the amigos have no other leads to go off of.

I find the latter two sentences more interesting than the first, honestly. It's an "ancient Maruvian spellbook", but it's not written entirely in Maruvian, since the cover and akatok pages are written in modern Avaloran. And it's clearly not the most "powerful magic in the kingdom" when we consider the secret library of master level spells from season 3, containing spells that even the Codex didn't cover.

Since the Codex was "passed down through generations", written in multiple languages, and not kept with the other advanced magic in the palace, I like to headcanon it as a collaborative work that's added to by each Royal Wizard in turn rather than an ancient relic that's been preserved in that exact state for centuries. It's not necessarily the most powerful spellbook, but it includes whatever each Royal Wizard thought was most important to write down for the next one. A lot of times that will happen to include more powerful or obscure knowledge, since more commonplace spells could be easily learned elsewhere. This could include spells, potions, or relics they learned about elsewhere, justifying why other people might know about them without having ever seen the Codex, and it could include things they figured out themselves during their research that no one else would likely know in advance.

Mateo, of course, would have little to no context for that, and it would be easy for him to assume otherwise without anyone to fill him in.

(I hope he at least jots down that akatok is, in fact, reversible after the next sunrise.)

Re: the Scepter of Night - I feel like that's probably one of the more obscure tidbits of info contained in the book, but we do see it depicted on a mural in Tepet Muul, so we know there are some other places Ash could have learned about it.