Duchess Swan Actually Has the Most Tragic Destiny in Ever After High

Explore Duchess Swan's tragic destiny in Ever After High, her Swan Lake fate, and why her story is darker than other royals'.

Key Takeaways

Duchess Swan's destiny is notably tragic compared to other Ever After High royals.
Her character is more complex than just a villain; her actions are motivated by jealousy and pride.
The show avoids detailing her dark destiny to keep content kid-friendly.
Books and fan theories provide richer context about her Swan Lake-related fate.
Duchess's story highlights the darker side of fairy tales within the Ever After High universe.

What the video covers

Duchess Swan's true love is destined to die young, making her fate one of the most tragic in Ever After High.
The show barely mentions Duchess's destiny due to its dark nature, but her special power is dancing on water.
Duchess is portrayed as jealous and prideful, often antagonizing other characters like Ashlynn because she lacks a happy ending.
The books provide deeper insight into Duchess's character and her internal struggles with her destiny.
Duchess's destiny is linked to the Swan Lake fairy tale, with ambiguity about whether she is the White Swan or the Black Swan.
Her story reflects themes from Swan Lake, including tragic love and transformation, which are darker than typical Ever After High tales.
The video discusses various Swan Lake adaptations and how they relate to Duchess's character and her family legacy.
Duchess is sometimes seen as a villain, but her motivations stem from frustration over her lack of a happy ending.
The video also touches on fan theories and interpretations of Duchess's role and destiny within the Ever After High universe.
Overall, Duchess Swan represents a complex character with a fate that challenges the usual happily ever after narrative.

Chapters

Why is Duchess Swan's destiny considered tragic?

Duchess Swan's destiny is tragic because her true love is destined to die young, and she is likely to be stuck in a swan form, unlike other Ever After High royals who have happy endings.

What is Duchess Swan's special power in the show?

Her special power is the ability to dance on top of water, which is linked to her Swan Lake destiny.

Why doesn't the Ever After High show explain Duchess's destiny in detail?

The show avoids discussing her dark destiny because it is too mature and tragic for the kid-friendly tone of the series and its focus on promoting toys.

Full Transcript — Download SRT & Markdown

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Did you know that Duchess Swan's true love is actually destined to die young? Let's talk about Come Back theories and castle dwellers. My name is Ainsley from Fairytale Vibes, and yes, Duchess Swan might actually have the most tragic

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destiny in all of Ever After High, and she is probably one of the only royals who doesn't actually have a happily ever after. So, yes, in today's video we are going to be talking about what Duchess Swan's Swan Lake destiny actually

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entails, and this is going to include going through things from the books and the show, but also just talking about what the fairytale of Swan Lake is in general since I know some of you may be unfamiliar with it and you may be

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wondering what actually goes down in Swan Lake. So, first of all, let's talk about how Duchess Swan is actually portrayed in the show because actually really interestingly in the show they don't actually really mention her destiny too much, which is why I think a

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lot of you guys have had questions for me about like what her destiny is. Like some of you guys have been asking me like is she the white swan? Is she the black swan? What even is the difference

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between the white and black swan? Because like yes, in the show they barely ever mention her destiny. They don't even really talk about what it is.

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In the show we do get to see her special power, which her special power because of her destiny is that she is able to dance on top of water. Um, so that's something that's really interesting. But yeah, in the show they don't really get

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too much into her destiny, which is sort of, you know, a red flag because that sort of means that they think her destiny is actually too dark to talk about in the show because again, the show, especially the webisodes, they're

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supposed to be fun little things for kids to watch and they're supposed to encourage kids to buy toys. So, if all of a sudden in the middle of one of the episodes Duchess is like, yeah, and then I'm going to be stuck as a swan forever.

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My true love's going to die. Like, I don't think parents would like that. They do talk about it a bit in the books, which we're going to get into, but yeah, in the show they don't really mention her destiny too much, presumably

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because it's actually too dark for Ever After High, which is kind of interesting. But what we do actually see of Duchess in the show is very telling.

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Basically in the show, Duchess is kind of constantly hating on everybody else, specifically Ashlynn and Hunter. In the True Hearts Day special we sort of see how jealous um Duchess is of Ashlynn.

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Duchess like really wants to steal Ashlynn's destiny because again, like I said, Duchess is one of the only royals who doesn't have happily ever after. But instead of just admitting to herself that she's a rebel and just saying,

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"Hey, I don't really want to follow my destiny. My destiny sucks." Duchess has too much pride. So instead she basically tries to steal the other princesses' destinies and she's specifically very jealous of Ashlyn. And then she gets really mad when like Hunter and Ashlyn

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come out as dating cuz she's like, "How is this fair? How can Ashlyn still have her destiny and date Hunter? And then I have to be stuck with this horrible destiny." And like it's kind of funny cuz in the show Duchess never explains

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like what her bad destiny is. So again, a lot of people who watch the show without like the context of the books or the context of knowing what her destiny is maybe like, "Okay, Duchess is kind of just hating on people for no reason."

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But no, Duchess is literally hating on people. And I'm not saying like Duchess, you know, has the go-ahead for me to be a bad person. Like I said, I think Duchess should just come out as a rebel if she doesn't want to follow her

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destiny. Um but no, Duchess, like I said, has too much pride so she just takes her anger out on everyone else and is basically really mean to Ashlyn and a lot of the other princesses because she's just kind of annoyed that they

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have the happily ever after and she doesn't. Hey guys, it's Ainslee from the future and before I continue talking about Duchess, I just want to remind you all that if you are enjoying this video and you want to help support the

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channel, make sure to go down below and leave a comment and leave a like. And also if you are not subscribed, you definitely should subscribe and also hit the bell if you want to be notified. But yeah, in the comment section be sure to

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tell me what you think of Duchess and also what you think of this video so far. Anyway, let's get back into the video.

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But anyway, how is Duchess Swan portrayed in the books? Because I do think the books kind of allow us to understand her character better. And similar to a lot of the other characters that are featured in the books, we kind

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of get to see their internal thoughts and we get to see more of their character development and it just sort of better helps us understand their actions in the show. I also think this is especially true for Apple. People

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really misunderstand Apple. But the interesting thing about Duchess is a lot of times in the show she is just like seen as this like quick villain like whenever they need a villain for a but she does have motivations behind what

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she's doing. She's not just being mean to be mean. So, let's talk about it. And the other interesting thing about the books is while they don't get into the darkness of her destiny too much, which like I said, we will be discussing this

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Swan Lake destiny later in this video. Um but what they do get into is questioning whether or not she is going to become the White Swan or the Black Swan. So, we will talk about that. But first, I want to mention her first

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appearance in the books because this is the very first Ever After High book, the Storybook of Legends. This came out in 2013. I literally like read this as soon as it came out, and this is what got me

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hooked on Ever After High. And this is basically, I want to read you sort of a little caption, not a caption. I want to read you sort of a quote from what Apple thinks about Duchess when Duchess is

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first introduced in the books because this is what really sets up Duchess as the character for the rest of the series. So, basically, what this quote says is it says, "Apple knew that Duchess desperately wanted a happily ever after. And any reminder that she

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wasn't getting one always ruffled her feathers." And like I like what I've talked about with Duchess in the show and what I'm going to say about Duchess in the other books, that really sets up Duchess and her character. Basically,

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like I said from the beginning, Duchess was already really annoyed that all the other Royals had happily ever afters and she did. So, then the one book where we really get to see sort of Duchess's character develop, and this book is sort

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of actually about Duchess, and this book is actually from Duchess's POV, [music] is Next Top Villain. So, this book is very interesting cuz it's called Next Top Villain. And Duchess isn't a villain, right? Like she's destined to be the next Swan Queen, which that's

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another confusing thing. They call her like the Swan Queen, but her destiny's Swan Lake, but technically, there's different fairy tales called Swan Queen.

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That's a whole thing. But technically, they just say her destiny is the Swan Queen. I think maybe they didn't want to say that her destiny was Odette because not as like if you say Cinderella, people know who's who like Cinderella

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is, but I feel like unless you're a super big Barbie fan or a big ballet nerd, like if I say Odette, you're not going to know who Odette is. Like so, I feel like that's why they just say her

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destiny is the Swan Queen cuz it's easier to understand than saying her destiny is Odette because then people are going to be like, "Who's Odette?" Anyway, so Duchess is destined to either be Odette from Swan Lake or the next

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Swan Queen. And basically in Next Top Villain, she's kind of annoyed cuz she's like assigned...

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Grimm to get out of it. She tries to talk to Mr. Badwolf to get out of it and they're like, "No, you need to be in this class." And Duchess is like, "Oh my gosh, why am I in general villainy? I am

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supposed to be the white swan. I'm not a villain." And then the other thing about Duchess that you probably know if you've seen the show though is that she can transform into a swan. So one day when Duchess is transformed into a swan, she

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overhears Milton Grimm and Mr. Badwolf talking. And guess what they're saying? Milton Grimm is basically telling Mr.

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Badwolf that if Raven Queen doesn't follow her destiny, they need a backup, they need a replacement. And Milton Grimm is like, "I think Duchess kind of has an evil spark in her." And then like Duchess overhears this and Duchess is

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like kind of really in like offended by it, which again is so funny especially when you know the context of the show, which is like in the context of the show she keeps trying to steal like Ashlynn's destiny. But like Duchess is like, "Oh

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my gosh, I'm a royal. I could never follow Raven's destiny." Girl, you just She just wanted a nice princessy destiny. She didn't want to be the Evil Queen. She didn't like her destiny either. But yeah, Duchess is kind of

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annoyed with it, but she does eventually go along with it because Duchess is like the type of student who's like, "I need to get straight A's." So she's like, "Okay, even though I don't want to be a villain, I'm going to try really hard in

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general villainy." And that's kind of like the the plot of like what this book is and stuff and it's kind of funny. But the other interesting thing that we learn in this book is that Duchess was actually originally a white swan. So

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whenever we see Duchess in the show, she's this black swan. However, like whenever we see Duchess show up in the Ever After High show, that's after this book takes place. So prior to this book taking place, Duchess just looked like a

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white swan. And we know this because they actually make a point of talking about it in this book. Basically, throughout this book as Duchess Swan transforms into her swan form and back, she starts to like find like black feathers appearing on her.

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Like she transforms back into a human, she pulls a black feather out of her hair. So also presumably originally Duchess Swan's hair was probably just white and then those black streaks came when she started transforming into a black swan, allegedly. Um because that's

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kind of how they describe it in the book. They describe it as originally she was just a white swan and then she started getting black feathers. But then by the time we see her in the show, she fully has black feathers. And I know

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people on Tik Tok were fighting about this in my comments. There was a whole like argument thread. And what I want to say is I know the swan kind of looks purple. I know it is tinted purple, but

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in Swan Lake you got a black swan and a white swan. You ain't got a purple swan.

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And what I'm going to say is I think it's black, but it's just like tinted purple or like the it's like a black hue purple like either way it's dark. Either way it's dark. Like if you're if you

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give me a picture of the swan you say is this a white swan or a black swan, I'd say it's a black swan. So basically I think basically what happened is she took general villainy and started doing like more evil stuff and also just was

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becoming a nastier person, I think Duchess Swan slowly started becoming black swan. Now I know some of you guys are going to say, oh did that mean her her destiny was always the black swan?

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No, I actually do think Duchess was born with sort of the um white swan destiny from Swan Lake, which again is the Odette destiny. The black swan is Odile.

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We're going to talk about that when I get to talking about Swan Lake at the end of this video. But yeah, I do think Duchess, you know, she was born with the the white swan destiny. But similar to

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what I've said in my other videos, I talked about this in my video about Dexter and Darling's destinies if you want to go check this out. Um I talked about it more in depth in that video, but in that video I kind of explained

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that I think people can sort of you know, change their fates by how they act. And I actually sort of used Darling as an example for this because originally if you know about Darling Charming, originally her destiny was

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just to be a a damsel in distress. But by the end of her story we see her becoming the Princess Charming. We see her becoming the White Knight. And some people say like, oh was Darling originally destined to be the White

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Knight and Apple's Princess Charming. No, I do actually think Darling's original destiny was to be a damsel in distress. However, because Darling was so heroic, because she was so brave, that's how she was able to become the Princess Charming because she basically

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became all the qualities that the prince in Snow White is supposed to have. That's how she was able to wake Apple, right? Basically, Darling changed her fate. And I think a similar thing is happening for Duchess, except it's not

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on purpose. But because Duchess, you know, does not have the qualities of the White Swan, because Duchess keeps acting nasty and mean towards everyone, I think Duchess is unwillingly changing her destiny. So, like I said again, I think

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her original destiny was the White Swan, but I think because of her actions, she's becoming the Black Swan. And I also briefly want to mention Duchess's diary, cuz this is also mentioned in Duchess's diary. Um, we're like, basically, in Duchess Swan's diary, she

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is sort of having this conversation with Faybelle. [music] And then Faybelle's like, "Are you sure you're not the Black Swan?" And then Duchess is like, "No!" But then Faybelle's like, "The White Swan is supposed to be like humble, modest,

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vulnerable." Which like Duchess is none of those things. But throughout the whole diary, Duchess is kind of struggling cuz she's like, "No, I I I I am good. Like, I am the White Swan. I'm not a villain." Like, Duchess is having

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a whole identity crisis cuz Faybelle's like, "You act a bit like a villain." Like, Faybelle's trying to tell Duchess like, "You know, come on, come over to the villain side, Duchess." Like I I I kind of said this before, but Duchess

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and Faybelle do give me like similar energy. They're They're both just kind of nasty people. But it's funny that Faybelle's like trying to encourage it.

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Faybelle's like, "It's fine, Duchess. Be a villain. Come with me." And then Duchess is like, "No, I'm good." And it's like, "Duchess, when have you ever been a good person?" The other funny thing with the diary, though, is that

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Duchess gets very close to mentioning like what happens to her prince in this destiny, but you can kind of tell Mattel made the writers of the diary censor it cuz it's like too dark for kids. But basically, in this diary, Duchess is

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talking with the White Queen. Sorry, Mrs. Her Majesty the White Queen about her destiny and Duchess is basically like explaining to the White Queen like, "Yeah, I don't really have a happily ever after." And this is what Duchess

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says. She goes, "Actually, he gets tricked into falling in love with the wizard's daughter, the Black Swan. The prince realizes his mistake, but it's too [music] late. The evil wizard forces him to keep his word, but my prince

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would rather be with me forever. Even if it means even if" and then tears start rolling down her face. But yeah, they basically like cut Duchess off and it just has like a dot dot dot. Um and presumably like Duchess is too upset to

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say what happens to her prince, but I'm like, "Yeah, like low-key they did get dark there for a second, but like Mattel wouldn't let them finish the sentence." But that's that's the darkest thing that we get in the actual Ever After High

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canon with Duchess talking about her destiny. But I think it's crazy because also Mattel is like the same people who, you know, made Barbie Swan Lake and Barbie Swan Lake like is the Swan Lake fairytale except it does have a happily

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ever after. Like um spoilers if you've never seen seen Barbie Swan Lake, but at the end of Barbie Swan Lake Barbie transforms back into a human and the prince doesn't die, which is not what happens in the original fairytale or the

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original ballet. Cuz again, it's confusing. Like there's there's other swan fairytales and then there's the ballet which we're going to talk about in a second. But yeah, I think it's very funny that with most of the other Ever

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After High fairytales like even for like Michelle's destiny with like the Little Mermaid fairytale they kind of changed it so that the Little Mermaid lives in the end. Um but again, in the original Little Mermaid fairytale like the

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mermaid dies. Um but I think it's funny that with Duchess's destiny they said, "No, her prince is going to die and she's going to be stuck a swan forever." And yeah, I think it's just funny that they went there. But basically, what

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happens in the story of the Swan Lake ballet? Cuz that's the version of like the Swan Queen or Swan Maiden fairytale that Duchess's destiny is based on. But what happens in the Swan Lake ballet is that there's all these swan maidens. And

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these swan maidens are cursed by the evil wizard Rothbart um to be stuck as swans. But then there's this prince, he's looking for a wife. And then one day the prince basically meets Odette who is this one swan maiden and I forget

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how they do it in the ballet but in the Barbie in the Barbie movie they have it so that after sunset like the swan lady or the swan maidens can turn back into humans so I think somehow in the ballet the

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swan maidens are able to turn back into humans for like short periods of time and basically like the prince meets Odette and but he he sort of knows she's stuck as a swan but basically the way to break the swan curse is that like has to

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declare his true love for Odette so then the prince basically says okay my mom wants me to get married and there's going to be all these princesses at this ball you need to come to this ball and I'm going to declare my love for you and

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then you can be be no longer stuck as a swan and then we can get married and then my mom will be happy cuz I'll be married cuz it was a whole thing like his mom was trying to get him to find a

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wife but then Odette's like yeah that's great I'll meet you at the ball and then you can declare your love for me however Rothbart the evil wizard finds out about this so then Rothbart basically sends his daughter Odile who's the black swan

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to the ball instead of Odette and how they do this in the Barbie movie it does a really good job of explaining it probably because the Barbie movie is made for kids but basically how they do it in the Barbie movie is that basically

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Odile goes to the ball but Rothbart puts a spell on Odile so to the prince Odile looks exactly like Odette but to everyone else like Odile looks like Odile and how they sort of explain it in like the written version of the ballet

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that I read cuz also again it's confusing cuz ballets have no words it's kind of just interpretation but how they explain it in the written version like the summary of the ballet that I read is that basically like Odile just has this

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like spell on her like that tricks the prince into like thinking that she's Odette somehow or just like he falls in love with her somehow I don't even know but basically the prince what ends up happening at the ball is Odile tricks

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the prince with Rothbart's help and the prince declares his love for Odile which again he was supposed to declare that for Odette, not Odile. And then after the prince realizes that he freaks out. And in the Barbie version, it's all

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good. Like Odile or sorry, Odette and the prince get together and they like kill Rothbart, whatever. Actually, they probably don't kill him cuz it's a Barbie movie, but they basically like defeat Rothbart in the Barbie version, right? That's not what happens in the

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original Swan Lake. What happens in the original Swan Lake is the prince is so upset, he like goes back to the the lake, but then Rothbart's like, "Oh my gosh, like Odette is still under my control. She's still stuck as a swan.

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Like she's still mine. You didn't save her in time because you declared your love for Odile and like you can't undo it or whatever." So then the prince gets so upset and then the prince drowns himself. That's what Duchess was like

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getting upset about. The prince drowns himself in the Swan Lake. But then apparently, the prince's sacrifice of drowning himself freed Odette, so then Odette was no longer like Rothbart's prisoner. Cuz that was the other thing like like Odette was supposed to be like one of

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the prisoners that Rothbart had captured. So then Odette's no longer Rothbart's prisoner. She's free, but she's free, but she's stuck as a swan forever.

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So like but it still sucks because then her prince dies. So that's basically what happened. The prince basically drowns himself in the lake and then that frees Odette, but then she's stuck as a swan forever. So that's the tea of the

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original Swan Lake Destiny and that's the version that they went with for Ever After High. I know they never directly say the prince died. For some reason, I don't know if I just can't find the quote. I feel like when I was younger, I

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remember reading this and I thought it like literally said the prince died in this, but I feel like maybe that was just like a Mandela effect cuz I don't think it says that. If I find the quote later, I'll insert it here because I did

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find that one quote about just like Apple being like, "Oh, Duchess is upset." But yeah, anyway, that's what happens in the Swan Lake Destiny. So now let's talk about again exactly what the the white swan versus the black swan means for Duchess cuz I

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do think something very interesting that no one really talks about too much is that actually typically in the ballet, Odette and Odile are played by the same person. Now you guys are going to be like, what? Well, cuz technically in the

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ballet, whenever Odile is on stage, Odette's not on stage. So, technically, usually it's the same ballerina who plays both of them. And I always wondered if that had something to do with Duchess. Like, cuz if you notice in

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Duchess's design, like, she has both white and black like streaks in her hair. And I always wondered, like, is it because she she has both the qualities of the white and black swan? I don't know if that's a thing. And I also don't

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know how that would work in Ever After High cuz in Ever After High, they have to literally like play out the fairy tale. So, I don't know how Duchess could be both at once. Like, that just doesn't really make sense. And again,

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presumably, whoever is Odile, the black swan, would have to be Rothbart's daughter. And clearly, um Duchess is not Rothbart's daughter. Um but like I said, I do think it's possible that Duchess could be switching her fate and becoming more of a black

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swan character. And I don't even know if Duchess like becoming a black swan and turning into a black swan literally means she's going to follow the Swan Lake destiny as the black swan. Because like I've mentioned in my Ever After

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High videos, basically, once Raven destroyed the Storybook of Legends, basically, all bets were off. Darling became the Princess Charming. Um Daring Well, I think Daring was always going to become the Beast, but my point is basically, I think in the current

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generation of Ever After High, basically, now that the rebels are deciding to do whatever they want, it kind of can it kind of just messes with the general balance of the universe, which I guess is what Apple is afraid

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of. Um but I think it messes with the balance of the universe in a good way in that it allows people to do whatever they're going to do. And like, it allows the stories to play out naturally cuz I

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don't again naturally think Duchess is literally going to play out the Odile destiny cuz then again, who would be the white swan? Nobody. Um but basically, I think what might happen is that Duchess is just ending up becoming more of a

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villain and her becoming a black swan is just like more symbolic of her taking on a more villainous role in Ever After High. I don't know that she's necessarily literally going to do the Odile or the black swan destiny. I also

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want to point out another theory about Duchess being the black swan that a commenter brought to my attention on one of my previous shorts about Duchess. But basically, someone told me, "Hey, what if Duchess is the black swan not in

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terms of her like literally being Odile and you know, trying to mess with Odette? But what if she's like the black swan in terms of her trying to take the other princesses' destinies? Cuz again, you have to remember in the original

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Swan Lake fairy tale, what was Odile trying to do? Odile was basically trying to steal Odette's destiny. She was basically taking the place of Odette at the ball to basically win the prince's heart, not really win the prince's

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heart, but basically trick the prince into declaring his true love for her. And then basically low-key Odile stole Odette's destiny. Like that was the original story of Swan Lake. And that makes you think, "Hmm, what Duchess is trying to do? Steal Ashlyn's destiny."

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So, maybe it's not that Duchess is literally the black swan in terms of following the Odile destiny and you know, facing off against Odette. Maybe it's not that. Like maybe there is no Odette. Maybe it's just like similar to

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Darling how Darling became the white knight and how Darling became the Princess Charming and kind of made her own amalgamation of like a new destiny.

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Maybe it's like Duchess is creating a new destiny, but it's kind of similar to the black swan in that she is trying to basically steal the other princesses' destinies like Odile was trying to steal Odette's destiny in the original Swan

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Lake deal. But now I also want to talk about Duchess's family for a second and what that means because basically it's said in like Duchess's diary. I think I don't know if it says it in her diary, but it says it

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somewhere in Ever After High that basically Duchess was raised by her grandma cuz again, Duchess's mom was stuck as a swan, which also begs the question. Like did Duchess's mom have Duchess when she was a swan? Like Like [laughter]

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Like this is going to sound so dumb. Like did Duchess's mom give birth to Duchess before she became a swan or did did Duchess's mom like lay an egg and then Duchess like came out of the egg? Let me know what you think in the

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comment section down below. But anyway, either way because like Duchess's mom is stuck as a swan, even though Duchess probably still spends time with her mom in her swan form. Like she like a swan it's hard kind of hard for a swan to

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like raise a literal human child. So, Duchess was mainly raised by her grandma, but then that also brings up the other question. Why is Duchess's grandma not also stuck as a swan? And that gives me two options. Either

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um Duchess's grandma is her dad's mom, so then that probably means that Duchess's dad had to be human, so that probably means like Duchess's mom had to have her before she became a swan forever. Um so I don't know. But or

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perhaps Duchess's grandma is a swan but from a different swan maiden fairy tale. Which now we're going to get into talking about the variations of swan maiden fairy tales because there was this one point in time on TikTok where I

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got into arguments with people about what Duchess's destiny actually was. And I will say now that I reread like Duchess's diary and and I've listened to all the Duchess stuff, it is pretty obvious that Ever After High was

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definitely intending her destiny to specifically be based on the Swan Lake version of the fairy tale. However, it always confused me cuz in the books they're like, "Her mom's the Swan Queen." And remember how I said I just

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think they kind of say her mom's the Swan Queen cuz it's easier than saying her mom's Odette cuz not everyone knows who Odette is.

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Um but I think basically yeah. Like literally in Ever After High, who like the destiny that Duchess's mom followed was the Swan Lake destiny, and the destiny that Duchess is supposed to follow is the Swan Lake destiny. However, like I said, there's

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different variations of swan maiden fairy tales. And I think it's possible that Duchess's grandma actually maybe followed a different variation of the Swan Queen or Swan Maiden fairy tales.

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And like I have said in some of my other videos, I think that Ever After High is supposed to reflect the real world and how fairy tales change and adapt over time in the real world as they're retold

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to each generation. So again, a lot of these earlier swan maiden and swan queen fairy tales would eventually be adapted into becoming Swan Lake, but originally they are very quite different. So I think it's possible that Duchess's grandma was a swan maiden from one of

Speaker A

these swan maiden fairy tales, but her fairy tale was different than the Swan Lake that we see, wherein I think the version of the Swan Queen that Duchess's grandma is from is the version where she gets stuck as a human, whereas the

Speaker A

version of the Swan Queen fairy tale that Duchess's mom followed is the Swan Lake version where she gets stuck as a swan. So, let's talk about it because when I was doing research for the for this video, again, I've seen a million

Speaker A

different Swan Maiden fairy tales online, but the one Swan Queen version of the fairy tale that sort of stuck with me, I'm going to tell you about this, is kind of the opposite of Swan Lake. So, basically, in one of the

Speaker A

original versions of the Swan Maiden fairy tales, they basically have it so instead of the woman being cursed by Rothbart to be stuck as swans, the women are just swan women. And this is a common thing you'll actually see in some

Speaker A

other European mythology, but sometimes you'll see like these women who are like disguised as animals. You'll see this like with selkies. Like there's this idea I think in Ireland in Celtic um folklore and Celtic mythology that selkies are basically women who disguise

Speaker A

themselves as seals, and then if they take off their seal coats, they'll become women, but then if you like take away their seal coat, they can't go back to the sea, they can't become a selkie again. So, then they'll be they'll be

Speaker A

stuck as a like a immortal woman. But, basically, there's something similar in these Swan Maiden fairy tales where there's this idea that these women they were swans and they could transform into women, they would take off like their

Speaker A

feathers and their swan wings, and they would become women. So, in this one version of this fairy tale, like there's this woman and she was a swan woman and she was like living in the woods, and then she would take off her like swan

Speaker A

skin and she would like clean this one family's house, and then one day the family like realizes like, "Oh, there's a swan woman." And they kind of try to get her to stay, and then eventually I think one of them like throws and like

Speaker A

either throws away or like burns her feathers so like her wings and her feathers so she can't like put it back on and transform back into the swan. And then basically like this prince finds her and the prince is like, "Oh, she's

Speaker A

very beautiful." So, then like the prince like marries her whatever. And then she has this kid with the prince. And then um the the other swan maidens come back to like that swan princess or the swan queen or whatever who married the

Speaker A

prince. I think that then he eventually becomes the king. I don't even know. But, so this is either like a swan queen or swan princess fairy tale. But, then the the um the other maidens come back, and they give the swan princess um a new

Speaker A

set of swan skin, or swan feathers, whatever. So, then she turns back into a swan. And then she's trying to stay as a swan cuz she doesn't want like all these men to come back and try to force her to

Speaker A

be a human woman again. But, then of course, like the swan princess had this kid with this prince. So, then she keeps going back and visiting the kid. And then one day, like her husband and like these other guys, they spring a trap,

Speaker A

and they grab her, and then they again take off her swan wings and turn her back to human. Again, they take away her swan skin. And then basically at the end of the fairy tale, she's like stuck as like a mortal woman forever. And

Speaker A

that's how she becomes like the swan queen cuz again, that prince he would eventually become the queen or the king, and then she would become the queen.

Speaker A

But, then it's kind of sad. Like, either way, why are all of these stories tragic? Like, either she is stuck as a swan against her will by Rothbart, or either she is like forced by like all these men to be a human woman because

Speaker A

like this this like this king wants her to be his queen, or like this prince wants her to be his princess. Like, what like what? Anyway, um so, yeah. That's that's the one of the original versions of the swan queen

Speaker A

fairy tale. So, it's also possible that was like Duchess's grandma's version of the fairy tale cuz like that's sort of like the version that precedes Swan Lake. Um So, there's [snorts] the tea. Now you know you now you know about Duchess's

Speaker A

destiny. But, either way, whether Duchess had the Swan Lake Swan Queen Swan Princess whatever destiny, most of these swan maiden fairy tales are very tragic. Like I said, there's a bunch of different variations. You can go look up

Speaker A

them online. But, I told you the Swan Lake variation. I told you one other Swan Queen variation of the fairy tale.

Speaker A

So, hopefully you're satisfied. But, just know in Duchess's version of the fairy tale, her true love, the prince, is supposed to drown himself in the lake, and then Duchess gets stuck as a swan forever. So, So ever wondered why

Speaker A

Duchess is so nasty, that's why. Um another thing that I briefly wanted to mention though is Duchess's crush on Daring in um Next Top Villain um cuz this is not This is something that's not mentioned too much in the show, so I thought it

Speaker A

was it was worth mentioning here in case you haven't read the books, but yeah.

Speaker A

In In Next Top Villain, Duchess is pretty obsessed with Daring, which I mean is pretty standard. A lot of the royal girls are obsessed with Daring cuz they think he's a super hot prince, but I always wondered like did Duchess think

Speaker A

Daring was her true love? And then that's kind of sad. Did she think she was going to he was going to die? Or was Duchess just obsessed with Daring cuz she didn't she thought Daring was good-looking, but she didn't really care

Speaker A

too much about him? So like if he became her prince and died, like Duchess wouldn't care? Or did she just want to be with Daring cuz she was trying to steal another princess's destiny like maybe like someone like Apple and she

Speaker A

was like, "Hey, maybe if I get with Daring like I'll end up being Snow White." I don't know. I just always thought her being obsessed with Daring was was very interesting.

Speaker A

But yeah, that's the tea. So let me know if you guys have any questions about this.

Speaker A

Um I also may be releasing merch soon. So if my merch is ready by the time I upload this video, I'll insert something here about it, but if not, keep an eye out for it. Also check out my other

Speaker A

business, The Doll Catcher Marketplace. It's the only online marketplace made for doll collectors by doll collectors.

Speaker A

Um so if you're interested in buying used dolls, custom dolls, selling your dolls um go check it out. Um and then also just again, if you enjoyed this video, make sure to comment, like, and subscribe. If you watched till the end of the video,

Speaker A

go down below and comment a black heart emoji for the black swan. I don't know.

Speaker A

I would say comment a swan emoji, but that's a little obvious. a black heart emoji cuz I guess Duchess is very emo because her destiny is very tragic. And this is why I say I think Duchess has the most tragic destiny. Um and then

Speaker A

also like I said, make sure to subscribe and hit the bell notification if you want to be notified the next time I post. Anyway, bye, guys.

Topics:Duchess SwanEver After HighSwan Laketragic destinyfairy talesWhite SwanBlack Swancharacter analysisfan theoriesstorybook characters

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