New Video Explains the Magical Alternate History of 'Bright'

If Netflix's Bright left you wanting to know a little bit more about the film's unique (and divisive) take on urban fantasy, a new video is here to help.

Netflix recently released a "History of Magic" video on their YouTube account, which explains the alternate timeline of magic-related events prior to Bright. You can check it out above.

The timeline "begins" in 2900 B.C., during which wizards were employed to keep towns safe. From there, magic is used to build the pyramids, and magical beings suddenly take over all civilizations, bringing Sargon the Great into power. Sargon then led to the creation of magic wands, which could only be held by The Dark Lord (a name that vaguely factors into Bright quite a bit).

The Dark Lord grew too powerful, but was ultimately challenged by Jirak the Orc, who founded the Shield of Light. Jirak was able to handle the magic wand, and was heralded as the first Bright.

From there, there's a pretty massive gap in the video, jumping to magic being outlawed in 1852. Magic wands were then allegedly used to create nuclear bombs, leading to the creation of the Magic Task Force, and wands being basically outlawed.

The video takes some pretty interesting creative leaps, aside from having the overall aesthetic of an Ancient Aliens segment. Namely, the video completely skips over a pretty major chunk of time between 2109 BC and 18th century AD, with no explanation as to why. (It's also worth noting that the film's "dramatizations" are just blurred out clips from Bright itself.) The video also provides just a series of footnotes about the magic-related events since then, seeming to gloss over the racial division that can be seen within the actual film.

This video is just the latest installment in Bright's unique promotional campaign, which has included a movie review vlog done by the film's orcs, as well as having an orc compete in an actual UFC fight.

Ultimately, the video does provide some explanation as to how Bright's alternate world came to be, something that will surely please those who are fans of the film. And who knows? Maybe this sort of history lesson will be further explored in Bright's already-greenlit sequel.

Bright is currently available to stream on Netflix.