Tdp Claudia - Blog Posts

The Dragon Prince

‪ is SO GOOD. I finished it today feeling so happy and inspired. Everything about it is amazing- the characters, the writing, the humor, & refreshing diversity that’s handled respectfully and organically. Here’s to another fandom I’ve gladly buried myself in 👍👍‬

The beauty girl🥰 what TDP does well is making the audience like and support its antagonists.

How far can a person bend before they break and how long can the broken be wielded before they turn double edged?

This season was so devastatingly beautiful, but ironically, the metaphorical crown wouldn't be heavy if the gemstones didn't dig into the head of the wearer.

Sometimes, the line between mercy and cruelty can be thin.

The reason WHY Claudia resonates so deeply with Aaravos' story is because it's a mirror that she finds herself in. She IS the daughter in the story but not the one who pays the price. No, that was paid by her father... her father, who was brave enough to do what Aaravos couldn't. What's heartbreaking is that she doesn't even realize what she's discarding is the same thing Viren chose to embrace in death; his humanity.

The loss portrayed was so unsettling...

To even the loss we felt as the audience, seeing what made Viren who he was... his own son, to seeing what he made himself and the loss of what could've been and how his death proved the one thing we didn't want him to show... him having a human heart. And that's what this show did magnificently... it made this audience root for people against our will.

From the unfinished story of the lovers forever frozen in time to the mournful ballad rayla sang to console the stormbringer.

The only thing left to see is how these weapons charecters are to be utilized.

How callum will embrace his darkness and if Rayla will be able to kill him if need be. Or if promises will not be the only things to be broken next time.

This wasn’t supposed to get any notes

I’ve made a terrible discovery

Remember in the Dragon Prince episode when Rayla was pretending to be human.

She joked about how humans have shorter life expectancies. And then realized

Elves have longer life spans than humans

Rayla is going to outlive Callum and Ezran and she’ll watch them die while she has to live on without them…

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DRAGON PRINCE

thank you for creating iconic characters and a wonderful story!

Reblog if you'll be keeping the TDP fandom alive with me after s7 release, even if we don't get Arc 3

I am officially announcing that I will adopt Claudia and Soren because their father is truly useless in his role.

They are too precious to stay with him. Who's with me?

Claudia... Claudia... leave the leaf boy alone!

Fr tho, manic Claudia makes me so excited for season 6!!

In the dark, the stars show their faces. Season 6 of The Dragon Prince arrives in 2024 only on Netflix. #GeekedWeek #thedragonprince

Since Aaravos went back to the heavens when he died and the other Startouch Elves up there can watch all the life on earth, I’m assuming Aaravos can do the same so like do you think he keeps an eye on Claudia from up there till the seven years are up?

"How does Aaravos care about Claudia when he’s manipulating her?" The thing is that Aaravos, for as much as he clearly does care about her and views her like a daughter, is way too blinded in his revenge for Leola to not continue having Claudia as his pawn in his grand scheme of things like he does care for her but his vengeance for Leola will always be his topmost priority.

Aaravos has even said that Claudia is his only light in this world and I do think that since he was trapped in a mirror for THREE CENTURIES without anyone nor knowing when anyone would come and find him plus his clear longing for wanting his daughter back plus the fact that everyone else hates him and fears him would make him desperate enough to the point that he literally drove Terry away from Claudia to make her dependent on him so she– really the only person he has left– wouldn’t leave both because he’s genuinely attached to her and because she’s an important pawn besides it’s clear that the father daughter dynamic had caught him by surprise/wasn’t planned and you can tell from the early seasons that she was always meant to be a pawn that he can’t afford to lose.

I was pondering a lot recently on why arc one Aaravos and arc two Aaravos had such different vibes (disregarding the fact that we as the viewers have tended to view him with more sympathy and pity since his backstory dropped because that can tend to make us think vibes have changed when it’s just our point of view that’s changed) and it literally just hit me. The entire point is that the vibes ARE different because Aaravos is focused on manipulating a whole new person in arc two.

In arc one Aaravos is manipulating Viren, a man who wants power. In this case, Aaravos doesn’t have to rely too much on trust (even stating that Viren shouldn’t trust him just yet at the very beginning) and needs to focus more on showing the power he has and the power he has to offer. And because of that, we see him as a very graceful and powerful man, someone who exudes extreme mystery because why wouldn’t he when there’s no reason to tell a man who doesn’t trust him anything super important/personal about himself and therefore we, as the viewers who know as much as Viren does, also view him the same way as Viren: a powerful Startouch archmage who’s knowledge is extreme and is immensely shrouded in mystery.

And because Viren doesn’t require a whole lot of trust for Aaravos to manipulate him, they never actually form a friendly bond together that’s more than just a few jokes and respect and you can tell that Viren doesn’t hold much of an emotional bond towards him at all when he gets annoyed at the "has our relationship truly escalated to this new height?” line because Viren does not feel that their relationship is more than acquaintanceship with how little trust is required amongst them.

But in arc two however, Aaravos is manipulating Claudia, an entirely different person who is so love-driven (and therefore so much more emotion-driven than Viren was) and has been alone (her dad dying and being dead for two years, assuming Claudia didn’t meet Terry till around the like one year of Viren being dead mark) for so long that Aaravos needs to rely on trust and emotional bonds more than just power (although that’s important too because he got introduced to her when Viren died) to manipulate her. And because of that, he has been so much more 'soft' and caring towards her that we no longer just see the all powerful and mysterious archmage, we see a man who has formed a bond with Claudia that goes past acquaintanceship that we never got to see with him and Viren.

That’s what made everything click for me, because I had asked myself 'why would Aaravos tell Claudia his backstory and not Viren when they have so many similarities with them both being fathers who would do anything for their kid(s) and it would make Viren trust him more?' It’s because Viren and Aaravos’ relationship never relied too heavily on trust and emotions while Claudia and his did because she’s a character who is so loving that she can’t seek out power (subsequently not follow anything Aaravos had said during his manipulation) without it being for love.

So in arc one, we only see one side of Aaravos, one that’s powerful and mysterious. In arc two, we see another side of Aaravos, one that’s caring and can be trusted by Claudia. The only times we really see arc one Aaravos in arc two is his conversation with Viren, his talk with Ezran, and the final battle because he’s no longer with people who are so emotion and love driven.

Expanding upon the idea I put in the tags of this post on my main blog.

Viren saw the monstrous part of himself in Claudia when she killed to revive him, and abandoned her because of it. Mostly I think because he saw it as a hurt he was causing and ran away. The same way he emotionally abandoned Soren as a child because seeing his son reminded him of the hurt he caused for his family. He COULD HAVE been on a path to forgiving himself. I think his attempts to reconcile with Soren and apologize (however poorly managed) were brought on by the realization of what he’d done to Claudia.

And we see him let go of the shame he was feeling (writing out the events that occurred, burning the letter when he realized he couldn’t put that burden on Soren). But he does not see himself as worthy of another chance. He views himself as a monster, and he views Claudia as a monster. That’s the part of himself he left behind for her.

He also left behind the part of himself that we saw in his dark magic fever dreams. The younger version of himself that believed there is always hope, that there is always another path forward. That people can change. We see that reflected -

(oh hey mirrors/reflections as a symbol: Leola and the sea of the cast out reflecting the night sky, the reflection of the full moon in the water of the nexus when Rayla went to rescue her parents from the coins, Ethari seeing Rayla in the reflection of the sword when she’s a ghost, the reflection of Soren in his sword when he “kills” Viren ((mmm I love these Soren Rayla parallels)) also YALL I think Claudia’s gonna die like WHYS Soren alone in his reflection!)

in Soren’s character arc.

Harrow, Runaan, and Viren were all prepared to accept death as justice for their actions. They all knew they were guilty of continuing the cycle of violence. Harrow stopped being ashamed and felt remorse for the actions he took and their effects. We can see this in his letter to Callum. He has regrets, but he believes the justice he deserves is death, not forgiveness.

Viren is finally coming to terms with his guilt and shame when he writes his letter to Soren. And he never delivers it because he sees it for what it is. But that doesn’t mean he’s fully prepared to let go (he never tries to reconcile with Claudia and I’d have to watch it again because it’s hard to tell at that point if he’d even want to. That man really just threw her to the wolves). His death is his final cycle into violence. Falling back onto the crux of dark magic - even if it’s to save people - and the dark magic literally requiring him to die. He’s running away into what’s safe and comfortable instead of overcoming that fear and trying a different solution even if it would be harder. He could have left with Soren and found an alternative (this is a narrative, he made this choice for. a. reason). His life to save Soren’s was not the only option, it was his choice.

Runaan was ready to accept death until Claudia decided he’d be better used for information. Which ends with him trapped in a coin (very similar to the way Aaravos is trapped in the prison for eternity). He had an opportunity to overcome the violence and listen to Rayla and Callum about the egg. But he chooses the cycle of violence again. And it’s what consumes him in his limbo. And then having the second chance to overcome that violence and accepting it is what saves him.

This is getting rambley and it’s getting late, but like - do you see my vision? Do you see the parallels? The themes? And so on and so forth