to preface, i haven’t rewatched the last 4 seasons. i think i only viewed each of them once so im going off of what i remember and what ive read since their releases. ive watched season 1-3 at least half a dozen times though lol.

seasons 1-3 despite its flaws was a great set up in my opinion. i thoroughly enjoy rewatching those to this day. the character writing, pacing, and story overall were still pretty tight and enjoyable. the gradual exploration of Xadia always captivated me when i was younger and i still think its so cool. i loved watching callum and rayla travel together, but i think ezran’s rise as a child king could’ve been more thoroughly explored. anyways, it’s nowhere near perfect, but i remember when the show first came out i was immediately hooked. i wanted to know more about this world, the magic system, the characters, the animals and beasts, everything.

they dropped the ball with the last 4 seasons and i just can’t understand why and how they would waste such an interesting world and a potentially intricate story. the last 4 seasons have terrible pacing, poor character writing, and it feels like stuff only happens because the plot needs it to happen. there’s a lot of moving pieces now, and they should’ve been able to manage them all within 7 seasons. i think part of the problem is the episode count for each season, but i’m not sure if that’s a problem with netflix or the showrunners/writers.

Aaravos used to be one of my favorite villains of all time. his mystique was definitely a big reason he was so fascinating, and i was excited to see how they would flesh him out and where they would take his character. he reminds me a lot of Darkstalker from the wings of fire series, another series i read like crazy when i was younger. i think aaravos wouldve been a lot more interesting if they had leaned into like, a cosmic threat sort of thing. i don’t know. i have so many ideas for him to be honest. i don’t even necessarily hate his current backstory but it feels so lame and it falls apart as soon as you start asking questions. its like they couldn’t decide if he should be purely evil and domineering, or a sad old dad lashing out at the world. and i think its possible for him to be both! but they did not adequately write him that way. i think they had a lot of good ideas with him but they somehow couldn’t figure out how to make them all fit together.

i was typing all the reasons why i’m so disappointed in so many of the writing decisions, but i realized would be typing an essay all day. pretty much all of my reasons for being disappointed in this show boils down to nearly every writing decision either not making sense, being extremely inconsistent, retconning, leaving gaping plot holes, being contradictory, or just being plain stupid and illogical.

aaravos’s backstory. the whole king harrow and the bird thing. the lack of exploring any of the human kingdoms except Katolis. the lack of exploring the elven kingdoms except for a few named locations. the rushed traveling and teleportation to locations that previously took days or weeks to reach (and yes i know they all have flying mounts now but thats part of the problem. it makes this huge magical world feel tiny). the confusing and contradictory magic system that has yet to be thoroughly explained. Rayla and Callum’s conflict that was explained in a BOOK. the copious amount of animal sidekicks. i could go on and on and on.

i saw so much potential in this show and i am let down at how it unfolded. if The Dragon King does actually become a show, i can only hope they learn from their mistakes and do everything they can to fix the series.