#sometimes i remember we get to meet janai's brother next season and i get so excited

[raayllum]

Tdps poc rep wasnt the BEST rep ive ever seen, i definitely noticed some flaws, but ive got to admit it was pretty nice to watch something that wasnt majority white

i think the search for “best rep” for just about anything is always gonna be futile, tbh. there will always be people left out, or minimally represented, in any work, i.e. a full black cast is amazing, but it also means that asian and hispanic and indigenous peoples are left out (presumably if no one is mixed race). but looking at things that generally handle rep well and are making real attempts / putting in some real effort is always worthwhile to me 

as i honestly can’t think of another show like tdp with

four black and asian interracial couples, two of which are also lgbtq+. it’s so refreshing to see interracial couples where neither is white for once

two of the three main leads being biracial boys who are open with their feelings and never shamed for it and also allowed to be badasses

callum being a viable love interest and also being mixed race / asian

nuanced and varied characterizations for the more minimal rep in the series (i.e. ahling and kasef, and kazi and khessa, are all very different personality wise; no one group of people is just an aggressive stereotype; all the groups are just as militaristic as each other)

callum actually going against the “gifted asian kid” stereotype

sarai and ezran (+ callum and amaya) being jewish coded - when do we ever see jewish characters of colour on screen?

harrow being a loving and very involved father to both of his sons

fan favourite characters like marcos, who has his own little arc from s1-s3, and crowmaster

consistent background diversity for that matter of like, crowd diversity, and also minor roles as well. allen and the vet from 1x07, the doctor and her assistant from 2x08. i think the only white side characters we have that the trio stumble across in their travels is villads 

most of tdp’s girls and women of colour having stories that mostly involve each other (i.e. sarai being defined by her relationship to amaya as her introduction, ellis and lujanne, amaya and janai and khessa, etc.) 

ezran always having his youth respected and protected

queen aanya being another biracial kid and kickass ruler

multiple dark skinned black men (harrow, corvus, ethari, that one councilman in s3) of various ethical and moral sides. like yeah, let characters of colour be messy and make mistakes and also be heroic and caring

and i’m really excited to see what it does next

[notanathleteslungs]

The Dragon Prince and Siblings

As a little sister, I’m really happy, but probably have no special reason to be, with how many siblings are featured in the show.  They’re showing all aspects of siblings, not just Tumblr’s favorite--you know, the ‘I can beat on my sibling but if you do you go through the seven levels of hell’ relationships.  This got pretty long, so if you’re interested in how I see sibling dynamics in TDP, click the Read More.

TLDR; the sibling dynamics in The Dragon Prince are amazing and I’m living for them.

Thick-As-Thieves Siblings

I’ll organize this a bit more from the original rant.  The first pair we’ll go over is Amaya and Sarai.  Yes, we only saw one episode of interaction, but that one episode was enough for me to see parallels between Amaya and Sarai and me and my older sister.

Amaya and Sarai probably had Tumblr’s favorite dynamic as kids.  They seem close enough in age that they probably ran rampant around the house fighting.  They were probably like Sour Patch Kids to each other--throwing fists and insults one minute and the next they’re hugging and playing together like nothing ever happened.  This probably developed into an incredibly close relationship where they’re almost one person, able to read each other super well.  There are probably little to no barriers between the sisters, if the signed conversation between them is anything to go by in 2x06 and 2x07 with the Magma Titan.

This is the kind of relationship I have with my sister now.  We snipe and snap at each other, yes, but those snipes and snaps are outweighed by comfortable silences and cuddles on the couch.  We talk and we laugh and we quote movies at each other.  We talk about what books to read and what books to buy and what band we’re going to see live.  We are super close despite, or maybe because of, our fights when we were younger.

Holier-Than-Thou Older Sibling

Next we’ll tackle Janai and her sister, Queen Khessa.  Khessa seems to me to have a holier-than-thou attitude toward her little sister.  She seems to think that, because she is queen and Janai is a soldier, Khessa is better than Janai, like she’s on a higher level.  I get the feeling that Janai might be sick of this attitude, but she still loves her sister anyway.  The knee-jerk reaction to go fight Aaravos when he kills Khessa speaks to this undying love, along with her agonized wails when Amaya stops her.

This is another dynamic I’m familiar with.  When we were little, my sister went through this phase where she didn’t really want anything to do with me.  Younger than that, she would tell me to walk single file on the walk to school and insist that she walk in front of me.  My sister is four years older than me.  She knows a little of what it’s like to be an only child, but also can barely remember that.  There’s a bit of that only child feeling lingering in the back of her mind, but she is a sister, so that only child feeling translated to a holier-than-thou attitude when we were young.  But we still love each other so much we’d want to do something if the other got hurt or bullied or something.

I remember one day I came home from school and I just started bawling.  My sister grabbed my favorite stuffed animal and put on my favorite movie at the time, Zeus and Roxanne.  She did everything she could to get me to stop crying.  I remember another time where I just got my license.  I was a senior in high school and for some reason the car had to go to the shop.  We just got it back and I went to park the car so I could run in the pharmacy.  I ended up ramming the passenger headlight into a phone pole.  I called my mom, frantic, and said I just wrecked the car.  She comes and gets me, calls the car to be towed, and takes me home where my sister’s waiting.  I’m just on the edge of tears and my sister says, “I think I have something to cheer you up.  I never thought you’d one-up me,” talking about how she put the same car in the ditch on my grandparents’ road (and spawning a perpetual paranoia of driving with her on that road but that’s not the point).  I broke down and she didn’t let me go until my breathing steadied.  One last example is when my mom and sis were dropping me off for my first move-in weekend of college.  I’d never been so far away from home before for any extended length of time on my own without anyone I knew.  We walked up the hill (not so fondly nicknamed Cardiac) to the parking lot and I started crying on Mom and sister’s shoulders.  This time, they let me cry, but stayed there the whole time until they had to leave.

My sister may act better than me sometimes, but I know she loves me and I love her just as much.  If something happened to either of us, we’d act just like Janai.

We’re Not Close But I Still Love You So Much And Don’t Want To Hurt You

Soren and Claudia’s relationship is one I’m not as familiar with, but I still appreciate TDP showing because it’s a very real relationship that I can see in my roommate and her brother.

Soren and Claudia are not as close as Sarai and Amaya, or even Khessa and Janai.  They aren’t very alike in attitudes, senses of humor, or even interests.  Soren is a fighter, willing to protect what he loves with his fists.  That’s why he’s a soldier.  He also makes bad jokes that people get but no one appreciates.  He has an idea of right and wrong.  Claudia is not as strong.  You can tell she’s not a physical fighter.  She’s more intellectual, choosing to read books instead of play fighting dragons.  Dark magic is perfectly suited to this.  She is quirkier, not getting her brother’s jokes really at all and makes jokes that no one seems to understand.  Because of the dark magic, her idea of right and wrong are a little fuzzier.  You can tell that Viren has also played a part in Soren and Claudia’s relationship as he seems to favor Claudia over Soren.  He has more patience for Claudia, who practices dark magic like him, and less for Soren, who is more focused on physical appearance (mentioning he likes the workout from jogging up to high meeting places) and serving the king (asking what to do if he finds the princes alive).

It’s easy to see that these siblings aren’t as close in season 1; but season 2 does a lot to expand on their relationship, showing that although they may not be close, they do love each other a lot.  Claudia mentions in 2x08 or 2x09 that their mother gave her the choice of staying with Soren and Viren or leaving with her to go back to Del Bar.  She then takes back that choice at the obvious grief it’s putting Claudia through.  She takes back that choice because Claudia can’t bear to choose in her family.  In season 3, we see the clear differences between Soren and Claudia’s thinking.  Soren is a soldier, honor and duty bound to serve the king.  He also has a conscience and knows that what Viren is doing is wrong.  So he leaves.  Claudia sees him leave and wonders why.  She doesn’t see what Viren is doing as explicitly wrong; she’s a dark mage, she knows that dark magic can do things that would horrify others.  She still loves her father and is probably a little blinded to his darker side by that love.  So when Soren sees what his offer of leaving is doing to Claudia, he takes it back just like their mother.  They may not be as close as even Khessa and Janai, but he still doesn’t want to hurt his sister, and making her choose between him or Viren would hurt her.  This is a dynamic that is all too real along with hating your siblings or just feeling ambivalent toward them, and it’s one that I can appreciate TDP showing.

Pride and Protection

Callum has a fierce protective streak when it comes to his brother and he’s also super proud of him, probably for his maturity and also his abilities.

I actually had to look up the ages between Callum and Ezran because Callum acts like he’s so much older than Ezran.  Callum is only fourteen (and three quarters) and he is protective of his brother like Ezran is younger than ten years old.  This fierce protectiveness is something I’d expect from someone at least seven years older than their sibling.  However, it might have something to do with the fact that Callum is common-born while Ezran is born a prince.  Callum is more aware of his brother’s position than Ezran, so he knows that he needs to protect him.  Exhibit A: he claims to be Ezran when Rayla comes to assassinate him.  Callum knows that in the eyes of the kingdom, Ezran’s life is more valuable than his own, so when someone threaten’s Ezran’s life, it’s Callum’s job, as his older brother and as not-really-a-prince, to make sure Ezran grows up to be king.  Exhibit B: at some point, Ezran and Callum are separated and when they’re reunited, Callum asks if he’s okay and does a check similar to a parent looking over their kid for open wounds and broken bones.  This kind of care is something I’d expect from a large age gap, not less than five years.  My own sister (four years older) didn’t really act like this with me.  Now she might, but now when we were fifteen and eleven.  When we were eleven and fifteen, my sister would push me to the inside of the sidewalk so she was closer to the road.  She was self-sacrificing, yes, but not parental.

Callum is also extremely proud of his brother.  I think, despite the circumstances, he’s proud that Ezran was able to make the choice to go back to Katolis and take the throne, giving up on the exciting adventure of journeying across the continent into a different country to take care of their people.  This shows a maturity many ten year olds don’t have.  The fact that Ezran, at ten years old, was able to make this decision has to be a point of pride for Callum.  It may have been a joke, but in 3x08 when Ezran goes off with the dragon to find more reptilian backup, Callum says, “Look at my brother, all grown up and riding dragons.”  It probably was a joke, but you know he’s immensely proud of his brother and what he can do.  Ezran is willing to cross a tentative and tense peace and act together with magical creatures that could kill him in an instant to protect Xadia, Zym, and the dragon queen.  Again, for a ten year old, that is bravery beyond imagination.  Callum is almost bursting with pride for his brother.  My sister has told me, only once but that was enough, how proud, but also jealous, she is that I’m going off and getting my degree.  She didn’t bother getting a degree because she’s an animal groomer.  My cousin got her degree, two technically, in business management and culinary; however she stayed at home and went to a local school.  I’m a hundred and twenty-five miles away from home getting a degree in my passion.  My sister is jealous that I was technically the first to leave home but also proud of me for having the courage and determination to do that.  She has the same pride in me that Callum has in Ezran.

In Conclusion the sibling relationships in The Dragon Prince are something I have a huge admiration for in how they’re portrayed and how each one is a slightly different side of real siblings that I can relate to.  I can’t wait to see how this plays out in the future.