One of Netflix's most popular original animated series is The Dragon Prince, a series that depicts inter-kingdom struggles, shifting alliances, and epic battles within the fantasy world of Xadia. Created by Aaron Ehasz and Justin Richmond, the animated series was quickly renewed for four additional seasons. While Season 4's production is underway, the franchise has exploded into different mediums -- graphic novels, prose novels, tabletop games, and video games -- expanding Xadia's mythos and the lives of its fan-favorite characters.
The Dragon Prince's second prose novel, The Dragon Prince Book 2: Sky, is co-written by Aaron Ehasz and Melanie McGanney Ehasz. Ahead of the novel's Aug. 3 release, the animated series creators spoke with CBR. Ehasz and Richmond teased what fans can expect from the upcoming Season 4 and how the next wave of multimedia ties into the overarching franchise.
You guys have been busy! Since the last time we spoke, The Dragon Prince is moving into games, prose, comics, and more while you work on Season 4. How is it maintaining that fidelity across different mediums?
Aaron Ehasz: One of the things Season 3 did was solidify a really great growth arc for The Dragon Prince and the franchise. It was an inflection point where suddenly more and more people are getting interested and Netflix was like, "Great, let's make the whole saga!" And all these other parties came into play, and it's pretty amazing that have that fuel to take things where you want to take them.
But the thing that has been really amazing has been seeing members of our own team, and also our partners, really embrace the vision and be a part of building it out. Things like Tales of Xadia or the books or Brotherwise Games' Battlecharged. As a co-creator of the show, seeing it expand with partners that get it, love it, and are part of building the vision... They're not all just adding on randomly, we're all communicating and there's a lot of flow of creative energy. It's been very rewarding to see the group of creators grow even more beyond us are our team into really smart creative partners.
In taking the story and characters to novels and graphic novels, what did you want to keep true to The Dragon Prince animated series but also take advantage of the mediums doing things you may not have been able to do with the show?
Ehasz: Specifically with the novels, I think the opportunity is to get deeper into the characters' points of view and also deeper into world-building. There are many things coming in Seasons 5, 6, or beyond that are set up in the books -- in The Dragon Prince Book 2: Sky, in particular -- more so than the series because there's more room to do it. We see who some of these characters are, who impacted Viren's development, or things like that. It's an opportunity for depth and growth for any of the characters. There's also a little bit more freedom in prose form to go darker. For example, the conflict between the Moonshadow Elves and Rayla's actions has much more significant consequences. They're not just leaving her behind, they're supposed to kill her. I'm working more closely with my wife, who's writing a lot of the drafts but there's new to the hard canon.
Justin Richmond: We can do things that would be incredibly expensive and harder to do on the show. [laughs] We can do large crowds, which we do some of in the show, but we do a large set-piece and get that across with a few panels.
Ehasz: The two graphic novels that are coming out next are both flashbacky graphic novels and, on the show, you have more of an obligation to focus on the saga in the present and what is happening. Even though people find flashbacks very satisfying, my personal rule is you only bring them in from time to time to give some dimension and detail to the story that matters today. The flashback is really just there to give extra meaning and depth to the story we care about today.
With the graphic novels, that can be a little bit different. We can actually have a little more flexibility to say that the story we're going to tell with Rayla and her parents, we might not have the leeway to tell that as gracefully in the saga of the animated series. Same as the story we're telling in [the original graphic novel] The Puzzle House, that's one that gives us some insight into Viren's mentor, Claudia's deeper family history, maybe how Claudia got into dark magic and there's a big reveal that matters to the series in Puzzle House that fans of the show will find satisfying.
Last year, you got a strong vote of confidence with a four-season renewal from Netflix. How is knowing you can complete your full story as you sit down to craft not nine more episodes but 36 more?
Richmond: It's awesome and daunting! [laughs] You can do things think of something really cool for Season 6 that we can set up in Season 4 as you're writing because you have a little bit of time to go through because you have these longer arcs and more time and more of an idea where things are going. When you're writing the first draft pass of a later episode, you can add this thing in here to make sure it feels like one continuous four-season arc. It's a little daunting but it's awesome to get to do it.
How did the four-season renewal come about instead of a single-season pickup? Was it always going to be seven seasons to complete the story?
Ehasz: We always had an intention to tell a saga here, a many season saga -- whether it's six, seven, or nine -- we talked about different versions of it. We have things that are quite far down that we had planned on and when we initially met with Netflix, they gave us a limited order, to begin with but still quite a commitment. They extended it once while we were in the middle of that original deal to bring it to 27 episodes but part of the deal with them as they said, "We don't know for sure if we're going to keep going, we expect you not to end on some big cliffhanger and it'll be satisfying where it ends."
We built the first three seasons, even though we knew where we'd potentially want to keep going, to wrap it up at the end of the third and we would've continued it in books. We always intended to do that. However, without a Season 4, we could've done that but now that we have a grand plan here, we really need to build towards something. We really hoped they would give us the saga and commit so that we knew we could take some risks and do some things in those early seasons that we knew that was coming up in later seasons. It's what we wanted and, thankfully, they're the kinds of partners that, once they saw the momentum behind the franchise they said "Great! We'll commit and let you tell the whole story!" But it's a big difference because it allows us to balance storytelling with the goal of getting the completion, as opposed to inching along season-by-season.
Season 3 is the darkest and most epic you've done yet. How is it crafting set pieces to reach that bar you've set for yourselves?
Richmond: There are a couple of things. Just because you do epic battles -- with people running at each other and giant dragons -- yes, we still do that stuff but we do really different things too and challenge yourself and challenge the audience. In Season 4, there's something that happens early in the season that's a big set piece but isn't like anything that was in Season 1-3. It's an epic fight and it's very personal, there's a personal element to it that is very different from what was the end of Season 3.
And it's not like it's epic all the time, nobody wants to see people run at each other for five hours in a row. It's about choosing your moments and making sure they feel special, they're developed by the characters and come through the characters and they show up and they're awesome when they happen. There's stuff I always wanted, big, set-piece kind of things, that we got into Season 4 and it's been a real blast to get to work on that stuff.
Ehasz: You mentioned the show getting darker with Season 3 and we want the storytelling to mature with the audience. Fortunately, the audience is along for a multi-year experience here. I always admired the way Harry Potter evolved its storytelling: It became more mature, deeper. I say darker but it's really more mature and dimensional, as the characters got older, they had more sophisticated emotions and drama. We're following a similar path over time: There are going to be darker and riskier things, there are going to be more epic moments but also more significant, dramatic moments that are very personal and intimate.
We're grateful that Netflix is going to allow us to evolve this storytelling and push it. We've always known that the audience for The Dragon Prince has been pretty devoted, they care about the show so we want to give them a rewarding experience that grows with them and we hope that you'll feel the same way. But you'll see right away in Season 4 that things are evolving and changing.
In regards to fan response, what has caught you the most by surprise as you've put the show and characters out into the world?
Richmond: There's a couple. Gren is delightful but I didn't expect the Gren love. [laughs] I like the character but I had no idea Gren would become a huge fan favorite. I knew Nyx would be somewhat popular. I love Nyx and think she's awesome, but people really seem to love Nyx. For a two-episode character, I was shocked to see fan art and stuff like that.
Ehasz: For me, I'm proud of our community and our audience that so many of them have embraced the complication of Viren, in particular. I thought so many people would see Viren as a straight-up bad guy even though we intentionally wrote him to be complex and convinced of his own noble goals. Some of it has been we've always tried to write him as a complicated character and some of it has been what the brilliant actor Jason Simpson brings to this character and brings him to life in a way that is so compelling. It's been nice to nice to see people grapple with Viren because he is a villain and he's complicated and he's not a simple villain and I love that the community has grappled with that.
What can you tease about The Dragon Prince, both in animation and multimedia, as you continue to expand the franchise and story?
Richmond: I'm excited about the game we're working on. We have a huge team working on it. It's as much a core piece of the franchise as anything else we're doing and more than a lot of other stuff. The show and the game are designed to go together and be complementary to each other. I'm really excited for people to find out more about it and I couldn't be more proud of the people I'm working with.
Ehasz: Here, here! I feel lucky and proud of the team at Wonderstorm on the game and the show.
The first three seasons of The Dragon Prince are now available to stream on Netflix, with the fourth season currently in production. Written by Aaron Ehasz and Melanie McGanney Ehasz, The Dragon Prince Book 2: Sky will be released on Aug. 3.
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