#the pentarchy

While we don't get a ton about Del Bar in canon materials and equally not a ton about Lissa, the picture we do get of the two put them somewhat clearly at odds. In Tales of Xadia, we learn that in Del Bar:

A new ruler shall be determined following a traditional Del Barian Gladiatorial Moot, wherein seekers of the throne engage in combat and the mightiest hand rises [to be monarch].

Centuries ago, the largest mountain in Del Bar was devoid of people, and its slate-cliffed confines contained the lair of a vile dragon. Del Barians say their first king slew the foul beast and hurled it down the mountain. 

The people of Del Bar are varying degrees of warrior poet, from boastful barbarians to blithe bards and everything in between. Competitive tall tales keep them warm during the cold taiga nights. Most central to their culture is The Great Hunt, wherein great beasts are hunted and slain.

which all paints Del Bar as a very action-oriented, burly, strength based culture with an emphasis on physical prowess. We don't know what kind of occupation or station Lissa had, but she's notably never described as a warrior in any kind of way. Now, TDP's action/adventure fantasy show genre naturally skews characters towards having combat skills, with only a couple of exceptions for characters who are decidedly non-warriors (Gren seems to work entirely as an interpreter rather than as a soldier, but is a grey area; Terry seemingly has no combat training, but still ends up killing Ibis), with Lissa being one of them despite seemingly hailing from a culture that would really like her to be. Although wearing perfume and playing piano doesn't automatically make her a non-warrior, it does indicate a kind of femininity we don't see, comparatively, as much in TDP, particularly when these tidbits come from Claudia's POV of emphasizing that she is — seemingly — 'strong' in ways her mother was not.

(Del Bar's emphasis on songs/stories also make me think maybe the parts of her culture she did/could appreciate were things she found in Viren, since he often speaks in flowery/prettier language like a poet and can be quite the storyteller, but I'm getting off topic...)

What this means, then, is that both Viren and Lissa presumably grew up under a certain amount of social expectations — to remain X, never become Y — they then promptly abandoned within the confines of their relationship and their lives as individuals during the time they knew each other. Viren 'escapes' his station and is elevated (though they married probably a decade before he was high mage or Harrow ascending as king) the same way that Lissa escapes a warrior culture in favour of something decidedly different. Katolis may be militaristic, but a life at court with a mage (powerful, but an emphasis on mental fortitude/cleverness, not physical strength the way a warrior would have) is not.

Berto got the intro voice! I guess it's more the recap voice, it's the 'previously on' thing.

It still gets me in the heart that Harrow even says he's done terrible things, and he's not sure they were justified. He has regrets.

Avizandum having ragged spots in his wings reminds me of some real world science. So it's not unrealistic for him to be able to fly with the level of damage he has, the holes are fairly isolated and relatively small. If we're going to accept that a creature as heavy as a dragon could fly with wings that aren't double its own size, it's fine; bats also fly regularly with equivalent damage.

It does remind me of the Real Science of horns, though, and how the Moonshadow elves' horns canonically defy that science in multiple directions. I get why they didn't have Runaan's broken one bleed in the first episode, because of the rating, but he absolutely should have been bleeding. Also, in Lunabloom he makes reference to Rayla's horns sharpening (normal horn development) and says they'll be Fully Grown within a few years, which isn't a thing, per se, with real horns. Horns typically continue to grow for the entire life of the creature that has them. That said, sometimes we use the term "fully grown" to just mean "has reached adult form", and it doesn't mean they've stopped growing entirely, so that could also be all Runaan meant.

Back into the current episode; "Dismount, disarm, and proceed alone to the meeting point" just reminded me of that scene from The Two Towers book where the Three Hunters and Gandalf are heading into a meeting with . . . I wanna say it was Theoden? It's been a while since I read it, and Gandalf fussed about giving up his staff because He's An Old Man, Haldir, He Needs It, and Haldir is just like I don't get paid enough for this. Please just cooperate. and Gandalf was ready to argue until Aragorn started roasting him for being a petty bitch.

The monarchs interest me so much, honestly. I appreciate how Ahling, Fareeda, and . . . god I forget the other king's name. The three who were already there were talking and laughing comfortably until Viren showed up, and then Ahling tried for sympathy and kept getting Interrupted by Viren.

I fucking love Aanya's introduction. Her interactions with Viren in this episode are pure fucking gold. She goes hard-faced when Viren initially asks after her regent, and clearly assesses the situation while he's talking, and then he starts to bend over all condescending to say "these matters require an adult perspective." And she just goes Cute to reply, "It seems then that I am a crown without an adult, and you are an adult without a crown. Let's just begin." And she just turns her back and strides to HER throne, because fuck this guy. The power of this little girl. Viren gets verbally murdered by a 12 year old.

I just wanted to look longer at the elven silhouettes that Viren summons here to scare the other rulers. Runaan's there in the center, Callisto and Andromeda to the right of him. The hair sort of looks like Skor to the left, but there's no weapons and the build is too vague to be sure. What I find interesting is that the elf furthest to the left in the highlighted section is Rayla's silhouette, an elf Viren shouldn't have even known was there. There's also the figures to Ahling's left, which are slightly faded, but who I can't identify for certain as elves.

this is just gonna be an image heavy post, sorry.

I find it intriguing that even Viren's false shades have the binding on their wrists, and Rayla doesn't seem to be one of these. Andromeda, Skor, Callisto, and Ram are the only ones he's summoned as more than silhouettes on the walls. He has them shuffling like zombies too.

So he adds feral snarls and shambling to the Moonshadow elves, to make them creepier. He adds spikes to the portrayal of Sunfire elves, and height, to make them more intimidating. All of his elves have blood red eyes. This is such blatant fearmongering. I also appreciate how the other monarchs are clearly moved by this display, but Aanya sees the manipulation for what it is, because she's been dealing with it for years as a child ruler.

FLORIAN that was the last dude's name.

That is not exactly the kind of name I would have expected from a Viking analogue lmao, fantastic.

I had a friend who was deep into RWBY the first time I watched this and I cannot unsee RWBY's Pyrrha when I look at Queen Fareeda.

See here it is again, this thing with Viren, strength is more important than goodness. He snaps when Aanya is undecided, because her decisions aren't strong enough for him. Meanwhile, it's actually a much stronger position (as she points out!) to actually stop and think about this situation rather than just taking the word of some random Guy from another kingdom and committing her entire country to a war effort.

She has SO MANY fair points, Ahling.

He really just roasts his own kid in the middle of a royal meeting huh lmao. I do think it's interesting that he doesn't die later - I'm pretty sure he's the one they said survived but was in a coma or something. What happened to his kingdom in the time lapse? Was Kasef's mother in charge of the kingdom? Did he have younger siblings?

Would it even be a mercy for Ahling to wake up and find out what happened to his son?

I love how unimpressed Aanya is with Viren's offer of a story.

OKAY I NEED TO WRITE THIS SHIT DOWN, TIMELINE TIME, FIRST USEFUL THING VIREN'S EVER DONE, JESUS

Okay so this is interesting, Ezran is 10, but Harrow only became king 9 years ago. So Sarai married Prince Harrow. And he took the throne telling Sarai he wanted to make a difference from how his father ran things, which has implications for what Katolis used to be like.

Fellas, is it gay to call your best friend "beautiful" in wistful tones while staring at him getting his family portrait done, and only mention his beautiful family as an afterthought?

Also Viren telling them they could move without consulting the artist, who was clearly still working on the family portrait, was rude AF and if I was the painter (not that I can paint) I would have splattered his pretty clothes with the ugliest yellow on the palette. The best part is Harrow would have thought it was so funny I wouldn't even be in trouble for it.

Viren's account of the history does include Harrow inviting him to stand with him in the portrait, but it is just his retelling, even if it's animated as a flashback. We already know from Rayla's flashback earlier that characters' memories/stories aren't necessarily how things actually went in this universe, and it still bothers me that Harrow was frowning in his official portrait with Viren where Viren wasn't. I suspect he wasn't the one who suggested it after all.

Harrow and Sarai were such tender parents, my heart hurts watching them cuddle with baby Ezran. I like that Harrow's so acutely aware of the class distinctions in his country. It makes me think that's maybe what bothered him about his father's reign; that's what he's so dedicated to changing.

"Lady Justice?" His little smirk when he leaned back and told her "She was wearing her robes." He knew that's where her mind was going to go and he was so fond about it. "Ah, so a boring dream." She says while snacking. I love how casually supportive she is, while also trying to bring lightness to a situation that's clearly distressing him.

I do think it's intriguing that Harrow does mention skin color in his list of things that would affect a person's position in the system, given we don't really see evidence of that in the systems we witness. The races that matter are elf and human; colors within those divides don't have nearly as much of an effect on the story. Maybe I missed or forgot something - or maybe most of the story takes place after this, and Harrow just really succeeded in addressing the inequality.

Amaya standing beside Sarai on her throne is such a good little background detail. She was crownguard before she was a general, it seems. I wonder if Sarai was too, and that's how she met Prince Harrow. I saw a post point out a while back that Callum's three parents are Soldier (Sarai), Poet (Damien), King (Harrow), and now I can't get that out of my head as I think about them.

Says something about Viren's arrogance that he's telling Aanya this story of her parents' sacrifice as if she didn't grow up hearing it.

Poor Bait.

I love the background reactions to Harrow's offer of help to Annika and Neha. Sarai and Amaya are on his side. The reaction of the public doesn't seem to be poor - and realistically, most of the common people wouldn't know at that point how badly this offer of help might affect them. They would just know that their king is offering help to people in need. Viren's the only one who reacts with anger or dismay, and his reasons are fundamentally selfish. It's better to let others die when you can help, just to avoid sharing in their suffering, in his mindset, and Harrow just disagrees.

I wonder if Callum ever accidentally reminded Harrow of Viren. Carrying around stacks of books, bright-eyed and intellectual.

I wonder if he'll remind Harrow of Viren even more, as an adult mage, and how that may affect their relationship in Arc 3.

Viren just randomly having a piece of the magma titan supports my running theory that he just randomly goes on trips to Xadia to "harvest ingredients", likely stoking the fires of Xadian aggression.

His bitter af tone mentioning that he wasn't Harrow's closest advisor is telling. I'm so fucking suspicious.

The guards watching over this sparring match just standing stock still even as their monarchs bicker, and then throw a spear between them, and then exchanging money about it, give me life. I love those little details.

"Is it intelligent?" "What? What do you mean?" "Does it think? Does it feel? Does it have a family?" I like this moment so much because it frames Sarai as someone who values life, all life, right away. "Then is it the last of its kind?" We know she's a soldier. We also know that she doesn't fight because she hates what's in front of her; she doesn't even fight just to defend what's behind her. She fights when she believes she's minimizing harm.

She would have gotten along with Runaan, if they'd met in good circumstances, and that hits, for me personally.

It's interesting that Sarai is already so suspicious of Dark Magic. I wonder what experiences she's had with it up until now to make her so solidly convinced it's a bad idea. "You said you wanted to build a better world, to really change things. That's going to take decades of hard work. There's no monster you can slay and solve all your problems! There's no shortcut! This is going to be a very slippery slope! Harrow, tell me you won't do this."

"It's our only chance."

Something about how when Harrow did something Sarai vehemently disapproved of, she fought with him about it, and she never changed her position, but she stood by him anyway to keep him safe, contrasted with how when Harrow did something Viren disapproved of, he fought with him about it and trapped his soul in a bird and tried to murder his sons to stage a coup.

Amaya was going to go on this mission whether Sarai did or not. I like that, the contrast between them.

Funny how Viren said the Magma Titan lived near the Xadian border, but after he got Harrow to agree to the mission, turns out it's actually on the Xadian side of it. Which makes this significantly more dangerous.

Interesting. The hidden outpost from a couple episodes ago isn't new, which was the impression I got from how Fen and Amaya talked about it; it's where Harrow and his group are planning the assault on the Magma Titan. I wonder if that's true or a plot device for Viren's story. Or just because the animators didn't want to or didn't have time to make a new background site.

Harrow "talks with his hands", a lot, just gestures a lot while he talks, and Amaya cracking a joke about how "look he's signing" to make Sarai laugh was adorable, but it also makes my heart ache because. Callum does that. That's a bit of Harrow's mannerisms in Callum. Ezran doesn't do that as much, he's more like Sarai.

Funny how Viren's so confident about how they just need to "open it up and take what we need", but he doesn't make a move to actually assist in doing that. He leaves that to Amaya and Neha.

Callum talking to Bait about Harrow's letter made me cry again. This poor kid.

Okay, but the story telling choice of framing breaking the seal of Harrow's letter with breaking the shield of the magma titan was so powerful.

Maybe it’s obvious or maybe it’s just stupid. But has anyone else thought about Human Kingdoms mirroring the types of elves?

I skipped the Startouch Elves, since they’re so few. But maybe they could be mirrored by Dark Mages or something, since they are so different (due to their longevity, they have a detached perspective, etc.). Idk.

Now, it’s hard to say if there’re more ways to connect those two sides because we haven’t really met all the peoples, but both the Sunfire Elves and people of Neolandia seem to be big on their military force. Creatures connected to the Earth are patient, sometimes stubborn, and care deeply about the history and balance of the natural world - and that seems quite a lot like Aanya. The people of Evenere are cut off from the other kingdoms and perhaps the Tidebound Elves are also more independent, compared to the other elven types. Harrow and Runaan mirror each other in a lot of ways; the whole situation takes place because Katolis can’t let go of the past, past filled with death and wishes for revenge - while Moonshadow assassins bring death (much like the Dark Mages poaching Xadian creatures) and are all about justice; Moonshadow Elf assassins (presumably) have a record of invading Katolis specifically, and Claudia and Viren venture into the Xadian lands to replenish their supplies.

I don’t know if the humans’ and elves’ general features will align but I think so far they have, and quite a lot.

So after watching Season 2 of The Dragon Prince, finding out all the names of the five human kingdoms, and checking the wiki and the website for additional information on them, I was able to make this map of all five kingdoms in the Pentarchy. I hope you like it because I’m pretty sure maps are the only type of digital art I’m any good at. Digital art is the real magic.

(Katolis: Orange; Duren: Light Blue; Evenere: Dark Green; Del Bar: Greyish Green; Neolandia: Brownish Green)

I’ve got a bunch of headcanons about the Pentarchy, all of which are detailed here if you want to give them a look

Hopefully, Season 3 is going to show off more of Xadia so I can add the elves to the map of the continent. Right now I don’t even know for sure if the elves have concrete borders like the human kingdoms do

It’s perfectly on brand to me that the humans, likewise, are the ones wanting to solve and fix problems together, whether in their interpersonal and political relationships, such as the main cast or in the cases like the Queens of Duren coming to Katolis at all

whereas Xadia, either out of love or hatred, insist on pruning the tree / sticking to their own, etc.

and it’s a worldview divide that is also most reflected in the humans who are most like the Xadians they despise 

Re: this post regarding that it's thematically important for Xadia to have failed Rayla.

So TDP demonstrates by and large what is required for a 'both' (or triple pronged) sides conflict to work, if we have the dragons, the elves, and the humans loosely on their own sides, with 90% more collaboration between elves and dragons. You need a good reason for each side to have beef with each other, even if those things are also flawed in their own ways and perspectives (the assassins were wrong that Harrow was someone who would do only harm to the world, but that doesn't mean he hadn't done genuine harm and, as far as he knew, let an actual newborn baby be murdered for the exact same preventative measure).

But the other important thing is that all the sides also have to have ways that they fail their own people. Otherwise it's too heavily tilted in a "well this one side is Much Much Better than the other" and leaves everything lopsided, which is the exact opposite of what you want.

After all, genuine both sides conflicts do exist in real life. When it comes to TDP, I always think about xenophobia / antiblackness in Asian communities and anti-asian sentiment in Black communities. This intracommunity racism doesn't help anyone except structures of white supremacy, it ruins opportunities for solidarity, and it leaves interracial partnerships and Mixed race kids out in the cold in particular. Intracommunity racism is equally wrong on both sides, at the very least, and it's fucking complicated, for a variety of reasons. (I've also heard from a lot of Eastern European people that TDP's handling of issues resonates with them as well). Either way, you are failing your own people, as well as others.

This is why Xadia has the magical moral high ground - primal magic over dark magic - and why the Pentarchy as the well, moral, moral high ground: introducing breaking the cycle to their Xadia counterparts, wanting to solve issues together over hyper independence. The Pentarchy - Katolis specifically - embraces imperfection and asymmetry ("It's okay to be afraid of things" / the uneven towers of Katolis). Xadia maintains perfection and rejects anything less, covering it up in a variety of ways ("If she is not useful, get rid of her" / "Moonshadow elves aren't supposed to show fear, ever"). We see this carry wholeheartedly into S4 where the Orphan Queen was, most likely, the only one to criticize and question Aaravos, at least at first; "It was a human who saw through the Fallen Star's schemes" as he was "respected and beloved by all" previously.

The Pentarchy is flawed because it relies so heavily on having and letting kings solely make decisions (everything in S2 and S3 with Viren and Kasef; this is why it's actually a good thing that Ezran has the means and encouragement to leave in S4). A lack of magic means it is understandable why they turn to dark magic, because resource sharing has broken down across the kingdoms, never mind with Xadia, when it comes to things like famine. But Harrow heavily fails his children because of dark magic, his actions of revenge resulting in instigating a war, leaving his children as orphans, and susceptible to a world of grief, pain, and fear. Sending them away from the fray is already too late, no matter how much Callum posits "Can't you just make peace with them? It seems pretty simple to me!"

We see this in two of our primary antagonists, working against Callum and Ezran, being human. In order to write a conflict like this, you must have antagonists on all sides, and Viren and Claudia (and councilman guy / Kasef) primarily fill those roles. And they specifically have to go after other humans (Ezran, Callum, Aanya for Viren, as well) to show the flaws in the systems Viren is manifesting.

If humans don't fail other humans, all you have is humans failing elves - and that's precisely what the elves believe is going on. It means "this system fails only your enemies" which doesn't seem like a problem. Again, can't have one side be Too Good, or it doesn't work, and if a system works for you (dark magic) you will have no reason to reject it, even if you probably should.

But Rayla isn't sent away from the fray. She's sent right into it, and more than that, she's there because she wants to be. At the beginning of the series, Rayla has fully bought into the Cycle; not without good intentions, but disastrous consequences for both herself and others, even before she spares Marcos. And again, this is important: Rayla is a Believer. Until she isn't.

While certain individuals fail Callum and Ezran in particular, generally, we see that they were raised in a pretty happy, emotionally safe home. While both have their own issues of self esteem, neither have strong issues of persistent self loathing. It is the societal history of dark magic and lingering fear/paranoia getting in their way, bolstered by the military surrounding them being unable to consider a life without war.

Likewise, Rayla was also raised and surrounded by assassins who were heroic protectors, in a world at war. But what if you weren't at war? What if you didn't have to be at war? Runaan can't fathom this, just like her village can't fathom a world where Rayla was captured or injured or just delayed, or countless other reasons that would've meant she survived and nobody else did. Instead, they deem Rayla guilty and flawed by association; she isn't just banished for her survival - which, just Survival is worthy of a punishment, when you are supposed to act like you are "already dead" - but specifically because she's seen as her parents' daughter. "They thought I ran away. Just like my parents."