The Life List: Dragons flying high on TV and in movies

SINGAPORE – Be they big or small, evil or good, silent or speaking, the world of popular entertainment has always embraced dragons.

There is nothing like the only mythical creature in the Chinese zodiac that puts the stamp of fantasy on a show. Nothing except for unicorns, of course.

People like dragons so much, they are often disguised as something else. What was the entire Jurassic Park franchise (six movies from 1993 to 2022), if not humans-versus-dragons stories cloaked in science?

In the West, dragons are sometimes wyverns, which have two legs, two wings and tails. Or they can be drakes, which are four-legged and wingless.

In the movies, they can act as friend or foe to humans, and are mortal creatures that can be slain with arrows and spears.

Asian dragons tend to be wingless, with long, snake-like bodies. In stories from the region, they are divine beings with the power over rivers, seas and the weather.

In keeping with the Chinese New Year season, during which the Year of the Dragon will be ushered in, The Straits Times pays tribute to the most famous ones.

Live action movies

Dragonheart (1996)

The first movie to feature a realistic digitally drawn dragon, this mediaeval fantasy took a step that would open a path for other on-screen dragons to follow.

Audiences liked the film and made it a commercial success, but critics were mostly unmoved by the story of the dragonslayer, Sir Bowen (Dennis Quaid), and his hunt for the last dragon, Draco (voiced by Sean Connery).

The look of Draco owes a lot to Jurassic Park (1993). The release of the Steven Spielberg picture and its realistic digital dinosaurs convinced the studio to make the switch from animatronics and puppets to computer graphics.

Draco, a wyvern, was said to have been based on the Chinese guardian lion, the stone protection statues seen guarding building entrances. In a break with film dragons of the past, Draco’s face was made to look more like that of an ape, with lips that could move to fit his dialogue.

Pete’s Dragon (2016)

In movies, kids in danger have been helped by all kinds of non-human protectors – aliens, giant robots and jungle cats among them.

In Pete’s Dragon, the guardian is a dragon. Adapted from a 1977 animated movie of the same name, the action comedy starts with the boy Pete (Oakes Fegley) getting lost in a forest and befriending a dragon he names Elliot.

Elliot, unlike the movie dragons that have come before, is huggably furry, not scaly. He has the power of invisibility, which explains why he has remained unseen.

Animators from New Zealand’s Weta studied animal videos to give Elliot the clumsy charm of a panda who communicates with purrs.

The NeverEnding Story (1984)

The beloved classic celebrates its 40th anniversary in 2024 and cinemas are likely to hold screenings of the children’s fantasy, adapted from German author Michael Ende’s 1979 book of the same name.

Those who watched the movie when they were kids will remember two things: The traumatising scene of the horse Artax drowning in a swamp, and Falkor, the furry, dog-like “luck dragon” that saves the life of the hero Atreyu (Noah Hathaway) and then aids him in his quest to find a cure for the ailing Childlike Empress before the villainous Nothing destroys the magic kingdom of Fantasia.

Ende, a Japanophile, derived Falkor’s name from Fukuryu, the Japanese phrase for “luck dragon”.

German director Wolfgang Petersen decided to make Falkor look like a cross between a golden retriever and a dragon – a concept that disappointed Ende, who in his book described the creature as having a leonine head with a body covered in pearly white scales.

Petersen’s instinct was correct – the movie version of Falkor has become a beloved character.

The 1980s were a time before digital effects, so every creature, from the wolf-like Gmork to Falkor to the turtle Morla had to be puppeteered or mechanical. The Falkor model measured more than 13m in length.

The Hobbit: The Desolation Of Smaug (2013) and Battle Of The Five Armies (2014)

The dragon Smaug, unlike most of the dragons on this list, is thoroughly evil. He is an old-school fire-breathing destroyer of cities based on ancient European myths.

In his 1937 children’s fantasy The Hobbit, author J.R.R. Tolkien made Smaug a human-like villain – the creature was cunning, greedy and vain.

In the film trilogy, Smaug appears in the second and third films as a four-legged wyvern, an idea that New Zealand director Peter Jackson took from Smaug’s voice actor Benedict Cumberbatch, after the British star was seen performing his dialogue on his hands and knees.

Smaug’s vanity leads to his undoing. Believing himself to be invincible, the dragon taunts Bard the Bowman (Luke Evans), exposing the weak spot in his scaly arrow-proof skin. Bard kills him with the fabled black arrow.

Television

Game Of Thrones (2011 to 2019) and House Of The Dragon (2022 to present)

Game Of Thrones, the first eight-season fantasy series based on the A Song Of Ice And Fire fantasy novels by George R.R. Martin, captured the public imagination, not least because of its dragons.

The fire-breathers had names, but not much by way of personality. Drogon, Caraxes and Syrax differed in colour and size, but in the books and shows, they took on the role of weapons that gave the Targaryen royal family a war-winning edge. Following the conquest of Westeros, they gave the masters of the air the means to keep the realm pacified.

The prequel series House Of The Dragon happens in an age when dragons were large and powerful. By the time of the events of Game Of Thrones, the creatures that made the Targaryen dynasty invincible are extinct.

Through a combination of luck, magic and foresight, the exiled princess Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) revives the breed. Among the highlights of the show are the moments when those who underestimate her find themselves bested by the Mother of Dragons.

The second season of House Of The Dragon is expected to be released some time between May and September. As the family tensions ramp up and the outbreak of civil war becomes more inevitable, dragon action is to be expected.

Fans will be curious to see what will become of Vhagar, the series’ largest living dragon, after the Season 1 finale. Will its fatal attack on Lucerys Velaryon, who was riding Arrax at the time, be the incident that tears the kingdom apart?

Animated films

Raya And The Last Dragon (2021)

This Disney fantasy caused a brief stir when it was released because of its unique and deeply researched South-east Asian characters and themes, but its spotlight was stolen later the same year by another Disney work, the musical Encanto.

The dragon of the title is Sisu, a lithe creature based on Asian concepts such as the serpent-like Naga from South and South-east Asia and dragons of China.

From the Naga, Sisu gets its mystical connection to water, as found in rivers and seas.

From Chinese dragons, Sisu takes on animal-hybrid traits, such as carp scales and fins on her back, a hairy mane, the claws of a tiger and a snake-like body.

But Sisu, voiced by Awkwafina, has a quality no Asian dragon has: a sense of humour.

Sisu and warrior princess Raya (voiced by Kelly Marie Tran) together drive back the demonic Druun, creatures who turn people to stone.

Spirited Away (2001)

Japan’s Studio Ghibli has featured dragons in several films, in addition to this Oscar winner for Best Animated Feature.

But the European-style dragons of Tales From Earthsea (2006) and Castle In The Sky (1986), and the Asian ones in Pom Poko (1994) and The Tale Of Princess Kaguya (2013) have minor appearances compared with the creature in Hayao Miyazaki’s supernatural fantasy Spirited Away.

Inside a spirit realm, Haku is a shape-shifter who alternates between the forms of a kind-hearted teenage boy and a white dragon which is depicted in the flowing Asian style.

He helps a human girl, Chihiro, break the curse that turned her parents into pigs, but he himself is the prisoner of a witch who has placed a spell on him.

Haku is revealed to be a river god whose home has been destroyed by men. The sibling-like bond between Chihiro and the tragic Haku gives the film an emotional weight that few works of animation possess.

How To Train Your Dragon franchise (2010 to present)

British author Cressida Cowell’s series of children’s books, on which the movies are based, features a world in which dragons are like horses – wild creatures that, if met with trust and gentleness, can become lifelong friends and powerful allies.

Like the books, the dragons in the three films released thus far – in 2010, 2014 and 2019, with a fourth planned for 2025 – are human-like in their intelligence and behaviour, with lives that are often featured as secondary storylines.

Like horses, the dragons come in different breeds, each with unique strengths and weaknesses.

The first film reveals that the Viking world of central human character Hiccup (voiced by Jay Baruchel) is one in which humans and their livestock are preyed upon by dragons.

The kind-hearted Hiccup meets and rehabilitates an injured Toothless, a member of the smart and speedy Night Fury dragon breed. Together, they convince humans and dragons that peaceful coexistence is possible.

Mulan (1998)

The dragon in this retelling of a Chinese legend is a Hollywood comic relief character of a style popular in Disney animation in the 1990s and 2000s. The pocket-size guardian dragon Mushu, voiced by American comedian Eddie Murphy, has the same high-energy zaniness as the Genie from Aladdin (1992) – voiced by Robin Williams – among others.

In contrast to the typically large and powerful dragons seen in Disney films such as Sleeping Beauty (1959) and Pete’s Dragon (1977), Mushu is a pipsqueak. But like all Disney comic sidekicks, his stout heart and good intentions see him through the toughest challenges.

The Shrek franchise (2001 to 2010)

It has been said that Dragon in the four Shrek movies by DreamWorks is a cheeky mirror image of the traditional scary Disney dragon, as seen in films like Sleeping Beauty (1959).

In the first film, Dragon looks large and threatening, but turns out to be female and susceptible to wooing by Shrek’s companion Donkey (voiced by Eddie Murphy).

The interspecies romance between the average-sized Donkey and the enormous Dragon – one that results in offspring in later films – is played for laughs in a story set in a surreal fairy-tale world, where a donkey-dragon union would be considered unusual but possible.