Post — Aaron Ngo

Mild Spoilers are included in this review. Read with Caution.

I finished the short first season over the weekend. It was only 9 twenty-minute episodes and by the end, I can honestly say it was worth watching. It was funny, action-packed with compelling characters, and the animation was beautifully layered. Although some of the scenes do not look the best, especially in the earlier episodes. The animation budget clearly went to the fight scenes because all of them look amazing.

While a worthy Avatar: The Last Airbender successor, it is definitely not as good. However, it has the potential to become something amazing in its own right. But it is hard to ignore the strong similarities between the two shows as both were created by the same head writer Aaron Ehasz.

The story is set in a world called Xadia. Humans and elves are at war with each other because the humans used dark magic to kill the Dragon King and his egg known as the Dragon Prince. The main characters: Ezran, Callum, and Rayla discover that the egg was not destroyed but stolen by the humans, setting them on a quest to return the Dragon Prince to its mother and stop the war.

The first three episodes (1/3 of the season) centers on setting up the world, characters, and the story. The prologue section of the first episode established the conflict, the elements of magic, and how it affects our current set of characters: Callum, Ezran, Bait (the animal companion) and Rayla.

Callum (Jack DeSena) is essentially Sokka from Avatar. Sharing the same voice actor definitely strengthens my assessment. The guy fires inappropriate jokes left and right, has insecurities about his abilities (HE IS A MAGE!), and makes the battle plans (light, zap, slash). He is the older step-brother of Ezran and the step-prince of Katolis, one of the human kingdoms.

Ezran is the innocent child of the series, the “true” heir to the throne, and the one who bonds with Rayla the most, the moonshadow elf assassin who has never taken a life. This friendship is at the heart of Rayla’s journey who took a magical bind to take the young prince’s life before they met. Seeing this contrasted with her growing trust in them was a truly satisfying arc.

Rayla is the most compelling character out of the three. She is a warrior and every fight sequence with her is badass to say the least. Her dynamic with Callum is also entertaining whenever he breaks the tension with his “Sokka humor”.

The human villains: siblings Claudia and Soren are also in the humor department. While villainous, they are also complex characters unlike their father Lord Viren, who is a combination of LittleFinger and the Night King from Game of Thrones. The latter character is toward the end of the season.

This show also has a lot of similarities to Game of Thrones. I mean, the king even declares “winter is coming” in the first episode.

The racial tension between humans and elves is also made evident whenever Rayla encounters any other human besides Callum and Ezran, and in the way everyone talks about elves. There is good diversity in the series as well, with everyone having distinct skin tones.

The adult characters in the first three episodes (looking at King Harrow and Lord Viren scenes) can sometimes dig too deep into the exposition, but the writers do somewhat of a good job of inserting humor into those scenes to make it a bit lighthearted. I loved King Harrow hating on Lord Viren for using “dark magic” to solve the problems caused by “dark magic”.

But this problem essentially goes away after the focus goes back on the main trio.

The cliffhanger at the end is too good! These writers had the utmost confidence that Netflix will renew this series for a second season. I hope the second season gets more episodes, maybe not like twenty-ish episodes, but more around 10-13 range would be appropriate.

Overall, I enjoyed this series, Avatar is better, but the show has the potential to reach the same level that Avatar did if it keeps doing what it’s doing.

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