This episode is about race and fantasy more broadly. I use my thoughts on Episode 7 of Dance of the Dragons, "Driftwood" and the Freeform mermaid show Siren to think (and rant) out loud about race, settler colonialism, casting, and fantasy fandoms. This is a different one so hope that folks enjoy. We'll be back more to mermaids in the next one!

⁠My Research⁠ on Fantasy, Science Fiction, and Mermaids

⁠My Review of Skin of the Sea in Los Angeles Review of Books⁠

Caveats and corrections: My comments on Dance of Dragons are meant only to talk about Aemond as a character and not about the actor who plays him. I know the difference between fantasy characters and real life children. The Sharma sisters on season 2 of Bridgerton are Indian-British. I identified them as Southeast Asian but I like to use the most specific descriptors of identity and nationality when known.

Terms Used:

settler colonialism: a form of colonization in which the incoming settlers seek to not only control and extract resources from a colony but displace and replace the original inhabitants of the land

Media Mentions:

Game of Thrones

Dance of Dragons

Bridgerton

Hamilton

Rodger's and Hammerstein's Cinderella (1998) (There were earlier film versions of the musical)

Siren

Shoutouts:

⁠Black Girl Nerds⁠

Book Mentions:

Nalo Hopkinson's The New Moon's Arms

Rivers Solomon's The Deep

N.K. Jemison's The Stone Sky , Book 3 of The Broken Earth Trilogy

Natasha Bowen's Skin of the Sea