I confess whole-heartedly: I am excited to see How to Train your Dragon this weekend. It just looks fun and cute and like something I won't have to think about very hard.
But oddly enough, it DID get me thinking...you know, considering how much we associate dragons with Asian culture, there aren't really that many out and out dragons in anime. When I started trying to think of some, the ones I came up with were mostly less than inspiring. Here:
Slayers (Filia Ul Copt)
This golden dragon originally attempted to conscript Luna Inverse-- yes, Luna; Lina's older sister --into joining her on her quest to prevent the resurrection of an evil lord. Luna passed the job on to younger sister Lina, resulting in a party that included both the Gold Dragon Filia and the Mazoku, Xellos, and they didn't get along very well. Although very loyal and honorable, Filia was mostly pretty annoying, and easily annoyed. Whenever Xellos pissed her off she'd either turn into her dragon form, or pull a mace out and try to squash him.
Dragonaut: The Resonance
In this...unique take, dragons are in fact aliens who came to the earth. One was captured, allowing humans to create dragons that they can control. When not in human form, these dragons are less the reptiles you'd imagine and more...space jets. That you ride in. And fight with. Whatever.
Blue Dragon
An attempt to create a Big New Franchise, Blue Dragon launched with a video game and an anime, and character designs by Dragon Ball Z's Akira Toriyama. The story revolved around a bunch of kids who gained the power to summon dragons (or other creatures) from their shadows. Kind of like a less imaginative, more merchandised-to-hell version of Okage: Shadow King. I played a bit of the game and found it pretty dull.
Dragon Drive
A cute Digimon-meets-YuGiOh ripoff, Dragon Drive was about kids playing a game in which you generate a dragon via your own consciousness and battle them. Our lead character Reiji manages to create an awesome-looking dragon, which in fact was lazy and sleepy. D'oh!
Dragon Half (Mana)
Let me say first and foremost that Dragon Half is AWESOME, or at least the pitiful two episodes that got animated were. (They never made any more of it, which is tragic.) That said, the one full-blooded dragon we saw-- lead character Mink's mum --was kinda lame. She gave up being an awesome dragon for being a housewife, even if she did beat her husband what for.
Not that there aren't occasionally cool dragons, like Dragon Ball Z's Shenron, but it feels like they're hard to come by. Can you think of any cool dragons? Or just more lame ones?
But oddly enough, it DID get me thinking...you know, considering how much we associate dragons with Asian culture, there aren't really that many out and out dragons in anime. When I started trying to think of some, the ones I came up with were mostly less than inspiring. Here:
Filia
This golden dragon originally attempted to conscript Luna Inverse-- yes, Luna; Lina's older sister --into joining her on her quest to prevent the resurrection of an evil lord. Luna passed the job on to younger sister Lina, resulting in a party that included both the Gold Dragon Filia and the Mazoku, Xellos, and they didn't get along very well. Although very loyal and honorable, Filia was mostly pretty annoying, and easily annoyed. Whenever Xellos pissed her off she'd either turn into her dragon form, or pull a mace out and try to squash him.
Dragonaut
In this...unique take, dragons are in fact aliens who came to the earth. One was captured, allowing humans to create dragons that they can control. When not in human form, these dragons are less the reptiles you'd imagine and more...space jets. That you ride in. And fight with. Whatever.
Blue Dragon
An attempt to create a Big New Franchise, Blue Dragon launched with a video game and an anime, and character designs by Dragon Ball Z's Akira Toriyama. The story revolved around a bunch of kids who gained the power to summon dragons (or other creatures) from their shadows. Kind of like a less imaginative, more merchandised-to-hell version of Okage: Shadow King. I played a bit of the game and found it pretty dull.
Dragon Drive
A cute Digimon-meets-YuGiOh ripoff, Dragon Drive was about kids playing a game in which you generate a dragon via your own consciousness and battle them. Our lead character Reiji manages to create an awesome-looking dragon, which in fact was lazy and sleepy. D'oh!
Dragon Half
Let me say first and foremost that Dragon Half is AWESOME, or at least the pitiful two episodes that got animated were. (They never made any more of it, which is tragic.) That said, the one full-blooded dragon we saw-- lead character Mink's mum --was kinda lame. She gave up being an awesome dragon for being a housewife, even if she did beat her husband what for.
Not that there aren't occasionally cool dragons, like Dragon Ball Z's Shenron, but it feels like they're hard to come by. Can you think of any cool dragons? Or just more lame ones?
