The Three-Headed Dragon in 'Tears of the Kingdom' Could Be From the First 'Zelda' Game

Leading up to its May 12 release, Nintendo has dropped a few trailers teasing new enemies and a terrifying Ganondorf appearing in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.

Players can expect Bokoblins and Lizalfos from the game's predecessor, Breath of the Wild, in the sequel but also some surprising scuffles with stone titans, mechanical Constructs, and even a three-headed dragon.

According to some longtime fans, that three-headed dragon may be an old foe returning to the franchise.

First revealed in a Tears of the Kingdom trailer published in Feb., the three-headed dragon stood on an old bridge with a volcano in the background. From a distance, viewers could see its heads were on fire.

Lore hounds started to assume the three-headed dragon was Gleeok from the first Zelda game or at least a reference to the old creature all those years ago.

"It's a boss that was in the original Zelda," theorized one poster on Reddit, another user mentioning it may be "a new boss, kinda like the Molduga/Hinox/Talus."

Fans got an even closer look at the three-headed dragon in the latest Tears of the Kingdom trailer on April 13, seeing Link prepare himself to fight the flaming-headed creature near the end of the footage.

On closer inspection, fans on Twitter drew comparisons between the three-headed dragon and the NES-era Gleeok.

"Gleeoks in the NES art are depicted with three heads, and if the Lynel is anything to go by, they usually take NES art and just make it bad-ss," said one Twitter user.

"Who else could it be except Gleeok?" stated another fan on Twitter. "BotW and TotK have been holding a torch of classic enemies finally seeing justice in full 3D."

As of this writing, we don't have any official confirmation from Nintendo that the three-headed dragon is Gleeok, but it does have a pretty strong resemblance to the old enemy.

Aside from the three-headed dragon, plenty of new enemies are debuting in Tears of the Kingdom.

For instance, a stone titan resembling the Stone Talus from Breath of the Wild may be a boss fight or a rare enemy type that players will encounter in the sequel.

A gargoyle-inspired flying enemy has also appeared in trailers while carrying Bokoblins into battle and will require Link's bow and arrow to defeat.

Lastly, we've seen mechanical constructs that have some connection to the Zonai people. Judging from gameplay footage shown recently, these enemies are lingering on the sky islands, but we don't know too much about them yet.

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom launches on May 12 for Nintendo Switch.