Spoiler warning for The Defenders Season 1. Move over, Game of Thrones. There's a brand new dragon show in town. Calling The Defenders a dragon show may be an overstatement, as dragons are only talked about and rarely seen. However, The Defenders reveals that one of the creatures is actually hiding out underneath New York City, though it's long-dead. In the final two episodes of the season, the action moves to that mysterious hole under an unassuming office building. And Danny Rand and Madame Gao talk about the dragon's bones with an unusual familiarity. Is The Defenders dragon Shou-Lao from K'un-Lun, or do the remains belong to another dragon?
In a superhero show that skews more realism than fantasy, the mythology of the trial of the Iron Fist seems out of place. In order to earns his powers, Danny evidently had to fight a dragon and plunge his fist into its molten heart That sounds pretty wild to Luke and the rest, but the existence of a full dragon skeleton proves that Danny is telling the truth. But when Danny tells Gao that her actions bring shame to the legacy of Shou-Lao, is he implying that the skeleton belongs to Shou-Lao? If Danny Rand fought this dragon sometime in the past decade, how could it be a fossil already? And, the most interesting question: how many dragons are flying around in Netflix's Marvel Universe?
Perhaps in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Dragon's bodies burn up when they die until only bones are left. However, it's more likely that Shou-Lao is one of many dragons in K'un-Lun, especially since there are multiple dragons floating around in various series of Marvel comics. It seems that all different types of dragon bones are useful to the Hand — possibly in relation to the life-extending substance that is readily available in K'un-Lun. Either way, the inclusion of dragon remains means that Marvel is one step closer to bringing actual living dragons to Netflix, and Iron Fist fans may finally get a glimpse of Shou-Lao in a future installment of Iron Fist.
