A story about overcoming the past. An analysis of awakenings story

[Ottservia]

So I've been playing through awakening again for about the umpteenth time though this time I've really started to truly dig into this story and really try and see what exactly this story is about and after a lot of thought, I think I have my answer. Awakening's story is a story of failure and defiance. It's about being pushed passed the point of failure but being able to pick yourself back up and try again. It's a story about overcoming failure and every single arch in awakening centers around this idea in some way. It's a story about overcoming the past. Learning from the past and those that came before in order to forge a better future. This analysis will be broken up into parts that I'll update periodically over the next couple days so anyway hope you guys enjoy.

Part 1: Plegia-War

Spoiler

The first arch of awakening centers the idea of failing to understand and protect the ideals you wish to cherish and uphold. Emmeryn is everything to Chrom. She is his older sister. His light and guardian. Someone he looks up to and strives to be. She is a kind soul that lives selflessly for her nation and those she cares about. She detests violence and wants nothing but peace. Emmeryn believes that all people desire peace deep down no matter who they are. No one likes war and pointless bloodshed. Violence will only breed more violence. No one wants to be stuck in that endless cycle which is why Emmeryn will almost always opt for a peaceful solution even if she knows it likely will not work. She will not resort to violence because she hates it and knows it will only breed more hate.

 

How this relates to Chrom is that he doesn’t understand this. Chrom is a very typical shounen hero. He’s hot-headed, reckless, quick to act without thinking, and somewhat irritable.  He sees how selfless and kind his sister is and doesn’t want to see her suffer more than she already has. He doesn’t understand why she opts for the peaceful solution when it so obviously isn’t going to work. If Gangrel wants a war, He says they should give him one. To hell with peace, if someone is hurting you, you should put a stop to it. An eye for an eye. If they punch you, you have the right to punch them back. Which in a way mirrors what Gangrels says in chapter five about Chrom’s father and how all this is out of revenge for what he did to plegia. In that sense, he’s almost as bad as Gangrel(which is kind of flushed down the toilet due to some outside information). Almost as bad as his father. It is in this way that he fails to understand his sister’s ideals. Hate will only breed more hate. Only kindness and understanding will bring about a true end to this conflict. Chrom fails to understand the ideals he says he strives to protect. This failure to understands wraps the entire continent into a war which he starts. The war that forced Emmeryn to sacrifice herself. It is only after that sacrifice and seeing the impact it has on the plegian army that he begins to truly understand what his sister stood for. He realizes the mistakes and faults in his old ideals which makes him feel unworthy to the ideals of his sister. It was his failure to understand those ideals that lead them down this path. In the aftermath of Emmeryn’s sacrifice, he’s distraught now realizing the consequences of his actions and philosophies. At this moment Chrom has failed. He failed to understand the ideals he himself willed to protect and it’s because of that he failed to save his sister. He failed to overcome the scars of the past left by his father. He failed to change fate. How could someone like that ever be worthy to be exalt. How could he live up to the person he failed to understand. How can he be worthy of her ideals.

 

“I was powerless once, too, remember? And yes, alone, I don't think either one of us is half the person your sister was. But together...maybe we can be something more. If you fall, I'll be there to pull you back up. When you fight for your sister's ideals, I'll be by your side. You don't have to become your sister, you know. You can still be true to yourself. You just have to give people hope in whatever way you can.”

 

“And what if I can't? What if I'm not worthy of her ideals? Robin, what if I drag you down with me?”

 

“If you aren't worthy, you'll keep at it until you are. And if we both fall down, well, that's what friends are for, isn't it?”

 

Well maybe he alone is not worthy of her ideals but he’s not alone he has Lissa, Robin, and everyone else in the shepherds. If he falls, he can count on his comrades to help him back up. That’s what friends are for, after all, they’re there to help you even in the darkest of times. When you fail, there are other people you can talk to who can help you. People who care about you and will do whatever they need to so that you can succeed. Every time you fail just get back up until you succeed.

 

Edited May 28, 2019 by Ottservia

[Dinar87]

Sounds interesting, and yeah, the first act of awakening was the part I enjoyed the most about the game.

[Rose482]

Ottservia continuing to spread the good word about FE13's story <3 Which makes me happy as someone who got very into it.

Edited May 25, 2019 by Rose482

[Hanes]

The first arc was the best part, I wish the game was about it all though since stories of war-torn families and continents are really the more interesting thing, maybe the Valm thing can be added there too as an outsider who is taking advantage of the war andyou and Plegia take a small aliance to throw back the elite Valmese troops and then resume the fighting but realize, "hey this is pointless, we just fought as brother we can't fight each other"   + evil dragon Grima was tricking Gangrel we recrit Gangrel and the end. 

Anywaqy let's see where this goes...

[Ottservia]

Part 2: Valm(this was a long one)

Spoiler

This arc centers on the failure to unify. This entire arc is all about unification in general and the different ways one can unify a group of people either through conquest or diplomacy. We saw in the previous arc that people want peace. Everyone wants peace and people no matter where they hail from will unify towards that cause and that war and bloodshed will only divide. However, this arc presents an interesting contrast to that ideal. Walhart is a conqueror as he states himself. He is trying to unify Valm/Valentia through war and conquest which is in direct opposition to Emmeryn’s(and by extension Chrom and Robin’s) ideals of unity through peace and from what we learned from the previous conflict it should not work right? Peace is the true unifier while war will only split people apart except strangely that doesn’t seem to be the case. Walhart is succeeding in unifying the continent with strength and war alone. He has generals who legitimately respect him for his strength and showcase undying loyalty to him. Again, it’s strange because well it’s a direct contradiction to what we’ve seen previously regarding the ramifications of needless war and bloodshed. However, it isn’t all that clear cut. When you land on Valm, you learn that there are people that resent Walhart’s tyranny and wish to put a stop to it. There’s even a resistance movement in place though they have yet to make any meaningful moves against Walhart. They’re failing to unify against him out of fear. Walhart and his generals have proven themselves to be a monster of an army in terms of pure strength. how could any of them hope to stand up to an army as vast and mighty as that even if they were to work together? They resent Walhart but due to fear, they fail to unify against him. They want peace but fear seems to be the stronger motivator here. It is that fear that eventually leads to the resistance defecting to Walhart’s army. Again proving that conquest and tyranny can unite people and not just divide them. It begins the blur the line and question if Emmeryn was wrong.

 

However, the resistance doesn’t fully support Walhart as shown when they allow the ylissean army to escape the fortress because ultimately they are still on the same side. They want the same thing which is to bring down Walhart. It’s a subtle way of showcasing the fragility of loyalty through fear. Unity through fear is not true unity as the dynasts continuously show. This is further exemplified when Yen’fey is taken down. Yen’fey also serves Walhart out fear. Fear for his sister’s life but she doesn’t know that and in that sense fails to understand the true motivations of her brother. She only realizes it after it is already too late. It is this fear and failure to understand that ultimately divides the two siblings. Unity through fear is not true unity. That is the message being conveyed. At the moment Yen’fey is taken down the iron grip of fear Walhart has over the dynasts seems to slip away. His army is no longer as big of a threat as it once was and once that is confirmed the dynasts switch sides. Showcasing once again that unification through fear is not true unification. It’s very fragile and can break at the slightest touch. True unification is through peace, diplomacy, and understanding as the dynasts only truly unify after Yen’fey’s sacrifice and learning of the meaning behind it. This scene, in particular, happens just after Walhart’s first defeat at the hands of the ylissean army. Once that fear is shown to be weak people will rally against it in favor of peace. Showcasing that in the end Emmeryn is right.

 

Walhart, himself, is a rather interesting villain in all of this. When you engage with Chrom in chapter 19 he says the following:

 

“I would end the reign of the gods, and you object on moral grounds?! Blood is spilled in any new birth, Prince. And in many a just cause, as you know…”

 

“By whose laws do you judge me? Yours? Your sister's? The gods'?”

 

“Look at you! Are you not ashamed? Your mind is filled with nothing but secondhand beliefs. You dance upon the stage of your gods like a mindless puppet! THAT is what I reject: being a slave to tradition, to obligation. The old ways. Damn the gods! Damn their fates and their destinies! I will have true freedom! And man who offers less is my enemy.”

 

This dialogue here is very interesting as it makes Walhart out to be a direct foil to Chrom and Emmeryn. Essentially what he is saying here is that he hates gods for mankind have become slaves to them and would rather fight for the will of the gods rather than their own conviction. Humans are strong they don’t need gods to be strong. Humans are just as strong on their own and he sets out to prove that. He doesn’t want to be a slave to the gods. A slave to the past. A slave to tradition and the old way. He would rather discard the past entirely and forge a new future with his own hands. The most interesting part of this ideology is that it is a twisted reflection of Alm and Rudolf’s ideals from gaiden/SoV who did the same thing on the same continent 3000 years ago. As Grima, himself, once said:

 

 “The future is built upon the past...But your kind shall never see it.”

 

You don’t grow by discarding the past. You grow by accepting it and learning from it. It is in learning from the sacrifices and mistakes made by your predecessors that one can truly move forward and change. Those who discard the past are doomed to repeat it. Chrom understands this as he, himself, was only able to change and grow due to the sacrifices made by his sister. Emmeryn was only able to create such change through the mistakes made by her father. Walhart does not understand this and in trying to discard the past, he only ends up repeating it. In that way, it ties directly into the themes of overcoming the past to which this narrative is trying to explore.

 

Edited May 28, 2019 by Ottservia

[Rose482]

Nice post, I'm a bit impressed honestly. I always found this "arc" (Or whatever you want to call it) to be my least favorite story wise when it comes to FE13. But that post of yours might make me look at it in a different light. Also I always liked Walhart btw, I always found him interesting for some reason.

Also...I love how passionate you are about this lol, it reminds me of myself but for FE10 instead. If I was a better writer, I might have made a thread similar to this myself. But anyway, keep it up ^_^ 

[Ottservia]

55 minutes ago, Rose482 said:

Nice post, I'm a bit impressed honestly. I always found this "arc" (Or whatever you want to call it) to be my least favorite story wise when it comes to FE13. But that post of yours might make me look at it in a different light. Also I always liked Walhart btw, I always found him interesting for some reason.

Also...I love how passionate you are about this lol, it reminds me of myself but for FE10 instead. If I was a better writer, I might have made a thread similar to this myself. But anyway, keep it up ^_^ 

Thanks and I’m glad you feel that way. honestly, I initially thought that about the Valm arc as well but playing through it again recently it all just made sense. You just gotta really try and understand what idea the writer’s were trying to get across. What points of commonality exist within the different characters, villains, world building elements, and plot points? Just gotta ask, what ties everything together? At least that’s how I go about it and I’ll admit the Valm arc isn’t exactly clear on what it wants to do but it’s there if you look hard enough anyway. Regardless I do intend to keep going as the next arc is probably the most interesting of them all.

Edited May 25, 2019 by Ottservia

[Emperor Hardin]

14 hours ago, Ottservia said:

So I've been playing through awakening again for about the umpteenth time though this time I've really started to truly dig into this story and really try and see what exactly this story is about and after a lot of thought, I think I have my answer. Awakening's story is a story of failure and defiance. It's about being pushed passed the point of failure but being able to pick yourself back up and try again. It's a story about overcoming failure and every single arch in awakening centers around this idea in some way. It's a story about overcoming the past. Learning from the past and those that came before in order to forge a better future. This analysis will be broken up into parts that I'll update periodically over the next couple days so anyway hope you guys enjoy.

Part 1: Plegia-War

  Reveal hidden contents

The first arch of awakening centers the idea of failing to understand and protect the ideals you wish to cherish and uphold. Emmeryn is everything to Chrom. She is his older sister. His light and guardian. Someone he looks up to and strives to be. She is a kind soul that lives selflessly for her nation and those she cares about. She detests violence and wants nothing but peace. Emmeryn believes that all people desire peace deep down no matter who they are. No one likes war and pointless bloodshed. Violence will only breed more violence. No one wants to be stuck in that endless cycle which is why Emmeryn will almost always opt for a peaceful solution even if she knows it likely will not work. She will not resort to violence because she hates it and knows it will only breed more hate.

 

How this relates to Chrom is that he doesn’t understand this. Chrom is a very typical shounen hero. He’s hot headed, reckless, quick to act without thinking, and somewhat irritable.  He sees how selfless and kind his sister is and doesn’t want to see her suffer more than she already has. He doesn’t understand why she opts for the peaceful solution when it so obviously isn’t going to work. If Gangrel wants a war, He says they should give him one. To hell with peace if someone is hurting you, you should put a stop to it. An eye for an eye. If they punch you, you have the right to punch them back. Which in a way mirrors what Gangrels says in chapter five about Chrom’s father and how all this is out of revenge for what he did to plegia. In that sense he’s almost as bad as Gangrel(which is kind of flushed down the toilet due to some outside information). Almost as bad as his father. It is in this way that he fails to understands his sister’s ideals. Hate will only breed more hate. Only kindness and understanding will bring about a true end to this conflict. Chrom fails to understand the ideals he says he strives to protect. This failure to understands wraps the entire continent into a war which he starts. The war that forced Emmeryn to sacrifice herself. It is only after that sacrifice and seeing the impact it has on the plegian army that he begins to truly understand what his sister stood for. He realizes the mistakes and faults in his old ideals which makes him feel unworthy to the ideals of his sister. It was his failure to understand those ideals that lead them down this path. In the aftermath of Emmeryn’s sacrifice, he’s distraught now realizing the consequences of his actions and philosophies. At this moment Chrom has failed. He failed to understand the ideals he himself willed to protect and it’s because of that he failed to save his sister. He failed to overcome the scars of the past left by his father. He failed to change fate. How could someone like that ever be worthy to be exalt. How could he live up to the person he failed to understand. How can he be worthy of her ideals.

 

“I was powerless once, too, remember? And yes, alone, I don't think either one of us is half the person your sister was. But together...maybe we can be something more. If you fall, I'll be there to pull you back up. When you fight for your sister's ideals, I'll be by your side. You don't have to become your sister, you know. You can still be true to yourself. You just have to give people hope in whatever way you can.”

 

“And what if I can't? What if I'm not worthy of her ideals? Robin, what if I drag you down with me?”

 

“If you aren't worthy, you'll keep at it until you are. And if we both fall down, well, that's what friends are for, isn't it?”

 

Well maybe he alone is not worthy of her ideals but he’s not alone he has Lissa, Robin, and everyone else in the shepherds. If he falls, he can count on his comrades to help him back up. That’s what friends are for after all, they’re there to help you even in the darkest of times. When you fail, there are other people you can talk to who can help you. People who care about you and will do whatever they need to so that you can succeed. Everytime you fail just get back up until you succeed.

 

The problem is Emmeryn's father is an abandoned plot point that is ultimately vindicated.

Gangrel later reveals his motivation was entirely unrelated to Emmeryn's father.

Chrom ends up repeating his father's actions. Not only does he engage in a destructive war against Plegia, taking from its treasury and then leaving the country to fall into chaos rather then help it rebuild, but he also wipes out the Grimleal by the final arc.

Speaking of the Grimleal, the portrayal of every single one of them as incurably vile, renders Emmeryn message moot. 

[eclipse]

Much as I'd love to read the Valm part (as everything past Plegia is something I take issue with), it's entirely unreadable on Night Forest.  If you're copy-pasting from somewhere, please remove whatever formatting you put in first!

[Ottservia]

4 hours ago, eclipse said:

Much as I'd love to read the Valm part (as everything past Plegia is something I take issue with), it's entirely unreadable on Night Forest.  If you're copy-pasting from somewhere, please remove whatever formatting you put in first!

Will do when I get the chance

edit: @eclipse I think I fixed it I dunno. I checked it for myself on night forest myself to be sure but you tell me

Edited May 25, 2019 by Ottservia

[Flere210]

I disagree on some point.

As i mentioned in abother thread, Emmeryin ideal are ultinately proven wrong by the narrative. Sure, part of it is that this is a strategy RPG and not a more open game, but in fact you have to face Gangrel on the batlefield and Kill him(xenalogues are fanfiction). When on the other side there are Gangrel and Validar you have no option but fight. Even if Emmeryn words pursuade most of te Plegia army to stop fighting, a final battle was still needed.

What she really accomplished is simply to mellow Chrom vision, as he at the beginning was too eager to take arms and did not even try another way. 

The first arc established trying to find a peaceful solution while keeping one hand on the hilt of the your sword as the golden mean between Emm's uncompromising pacifism and Chrom's tendency to jump on the gun.

 

[Ottservia]

1 hour ago, Flere210 said:

I disagree on some point.

As i mentioned in abother thread, Emmeryin ideal are ultinately proven wrong by the narrative. Sure, part of it is that this is a strategy RPG and not a more open game, but in fact you have to face Gangrel on the batlefield and Kill him(xenalogues are fanfiction). When on the other side there are Gangrel and Validar you have no option but fight. Even if Emmeryn words pursuade most of te Plegia army to stop fighting, a final battle was still needed.

What she really accomplished is simply to mellow Chrom vision, as he at the beginning was too eager to take arms and did not even try another way. 

The first arc established trying to find a peaceful solution while keeping one hand on the hilt of the your sword as the golden mean between Emm's uncompromising pacifism and Chrom's tendency to jump on the gun.

 

Personally I view that more as a fight of conviction and as an argument of ideals than an actual battle cause that’s really what a fight scene is at the of the day. You killing/defeating Gangrel is more so winning the argument so to speak at least that’s how I view it.  Cause he’s presented as the unmoving ideal and force here. He represents that side of the argument so you defeat him. You defeat that argument. That’s how I view it. Other than that you bring up some good points that I kind of agree with.

Edited May 25, 2019 by Ottservia

[Ottservia]

3 hours ago, Emperor Hardin said:

The problem is Emmeryn's father is an abandoned plot point that is ultimately vindicated.

First of all the bit about emmeryn’s father is not a plot point. it’s a piece of backstory there’s a difference. It’s there to help you better understand the conflict and story.

3 hours ago, Emperor Hardin said:

Gangrel later reveals his motivation was entirely unrelated to Emmeryn's father.

Even so, he still uses that as a way to unite the plegian people so it’s still relevant. It also ties really well into the theme of unity of Valm(his true motivation anyway) in that he tries to unify the continent via bloodshed and hate where as Emmeryn tries to unify through peace and love.

 

3 hours ago, Emperor Hardin said:

Chrom ends up repeating his father's actions. Not only does he engage in a destructive war against Plegia, taking from its treasury and then leaving the country to fall into chaos rather then help it rebuild, but he also wipes out the Grimleal by the final arc.

I’m not necessarily gonna disagree with you here because we don’t know a whole lot about Chrom’s father to be fair. From what little we do know about him, he was very anti-plegian to the point of enacting genocide. He was a ruthless man at least towards plegia in all its forms. That is not Chrom. Chrom is not his father(hell three prominent members of his army are plegian one of them being his head tactician). He fought plegia because they attacked first(at least as far as the final arc is concerned) he didn’t do it for the reasons his father did technically(though again we don’t know the full story) so his father isn’t necessarily vindicated. As for your point on the grimleal well just wait til I post part 3.

Edit: apologies for the double post but I’m on mobile atm and am so for some time.

Edited May 25, 2019 by Ottservia

[Hanes]

7 hours ago, Ottservia said:

This arc centers on the failure to unify. This entire arc is all about unification in general and the different ways one can unify a group of people either through conquest or diplomacy.

PreuBens Gloria starts playing on the background.

[Emperor Hardin]

3 hours ago, Ottservia said:

First of all the bit about emmeryn’s father is not a plot point. it’s a piece of backstory there’s a difference. It’s there to help you better understand the conflict and story.

Yet he never receives a name and the conflict is never mentioned again unlike other FE games which do similar plots. Him not receiving any name anywhere, in contrast to other minor background characters, shows how unimportant he was to the game.

3 hours ago, Ottservia said:

Even so, he still uses that as a way to unite the plegian people so it’s still relevant. It also ties really well into the theme of unity of Valm(his true motivation anyway) in that he tries to unify the continent via bloodshed and hate where as Emmeryn tries to unify through peace and love.

No Plegian or even Grimleal(the direct targets of the Crusade) caring about it really hurts the narrative. Manfroy mentions the crusades against the Loptyrians shaping him into the man he was, yet Awakening does nothing like that in its repeat of that plot from Genealogy of the Holy war.

Not even Validar, who was inspired by Manfroy, or Aversa, who grew up during that time, make any mention of it. Aversa's spotpass backstory even establishes that the Grimleal were her sole persecutors, which sure feels like the writers abandoning that plot to make sure Ylisse was 100% right even in the crusades.

3 hours ago, Ottservia said:

I’m not necessarily gonna disagree with you here because we don’t know a whole lot about Chrom’s father to be fair. From what little we do know about him, he was very anti-plegian to the point of enacting genocide. He was a ruthless man at least towards plegia in all its forms. That is not Chrom. Chrom is not his father(hell three prominent members of his army are plegian one of them being his head tactician). He fought plegia because they attacked first(at least as far as the final arc is concerned) he didn’t do it for the reasons his father did technically(though again we don’t know the full story) so his father isn’t necessarily vindicated. As for your point on the grimleal well just wait til I post part 3.

Artbook directly says Chrom's father was trying to stomp out the Grimleal rather then Plegia as a whole(this is taken from Genealogy of the Holy War's backstory). Gangrel's dialogue also clarifies it was a religious war. T

he narrative also establishes the Grimleal had been committing crimes stuff for generations, going as far back as Validar's grandpa at the very least, so you could also argue the Grimleal provoked him by trying to bring about Grima's return in addition to being involved in various criminal endeavors. Chrom's father clearly caused more harm then good, but the narrative does seem to vindicate his intentions at the very least.

Neither any of the Plegians in Chrom's army are established as ever worshipping Grima. Chrom ultimately allies with Walhart who is frequently compared to his father in motivation and even as an antagonist was painted in a sympathetic/noble light unlike the Grimleal(Validar, Excellus, ETC) who were never anything but villainous caricatures.

Chrom abandoned Plegia to ruin out of negligence and never even bothered to check who succeeded Gangrel, thats laziness not intent but the similarity is still there. As for the last bit, Chrom makes war against the Grimleal by the third arc because they were trying to bring back Grima.

Edited May 25, 2019 by Emperor Hardin

[Ottservia]

11 minutes ago, Emperor Hardin said:

Yet he never receives a name and the conflict is never mentioned again unlike predecessors.

Then that’s just a case of bad world building not like it really matters in the grand scheme of the overall narrative cause it isn’t really necessary to tell the story the game wants to tell cause his name isn’t all that important.

14 minutes ago, Emperor Hardin said:

No Plegian or even Grimleal(the direct targets of the Crusade) caring about it really hurts the narrative. Manfroy mentions the crusades against the Loptyrians shaping him into the man he was, yet Awakening does nothing like that in its repeat of that plot from Genealogy of the Holy war.

I mean who’s to say that the plegians don’t care about it. I mean just because we don’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not happening. That is a logical fallacy on my part I’ll admit but you can’t argue against it either cause there’s no evidence to support either case(unless there’s something in supplementary material I’m missing). Again it’s a matter of bad world building which I will knock awakening for cause it’s world building could’ve used more work. I never said awakening was perfect.

20 minutes ago, Emperor Hardin said:

Artbook directly says Chrom's father was trying to stomp out the Grimleal rather then Plegia as a whole(this is taken from Genealogy of the Holy War's backstory). Gangrel's dialogue also clarifies it was a religious war. The narrative also establishes the Grimleal had been committing crimes stuff for generations, going as far back as Validar's grandpa at the very least, so you could also argue the Grimleal provoked him by trying to bring about Grima's return in addition to being involved in various criminal endeavors. Chrom's father clearly caused more harm then good, but the narrative does seem to vindicate his intentions at the very least.

Chrom abandoned Plegia to ruin out of negligence and never even bothered to check who succeeded Gangrel, thats laziness not intent but the similarity is still there. As for the last bit, Chrom makes war against the Grimleal by the third arc because they were trying to bring back Grima.

An interesting point and one I’ll keep in mind. Will have to do more research then.

[Emperor Hardin]

9 minutes ago, Ottservia said:

Then that’s just a case of bad world building not like it really matters in the grand scheme of the overall narrative cause it isn’t really necessary to tell the story the game wants to tell cause his name isn’t all that important.

Yeah, thats what I mean its bad world building that Chrom's dad and the First Exalt of Ylisse, are just ChromDad and First Exalt. FE1 names Marth's father and ancestor, Cornelius and Anri respectively.

I'd say if they wanted those characters to have meaning, they have to give them names.

9 minutes ago, Ottservia said:

I mean who’s to say that the plegians don’t care about it. I mean just because we don’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not happening. That is a logical fallacy on my part I’ll admit but you can’t argue against it either cause there’s no evidence to support either case(unless there’s something in supplementary material I’m missing). Again it’s a matter of bad world building which I will knock awakening for cause it’s world building could’ve used more work. I never said awakening was perfect.

You can have your opinion, but I'll note Genealogy of the Holy War and Thracia 776, which Ylisse's crusade is directly taken from, did show many people in the evil cult affected by the crusades and angry mobs against them. The Proto Validar himself, mentions his revenge scheme being fueled by all the suffering he went through. There were also mention of good sects of the evil cult that were also persecuted and civilians in the evil cult. It was far from perfect, but the writers tried.

The writers never did any of that in Awakening where neither Validar nor any of the Grimleal, seemingly solely composed of old men and bandits, make a single mention of their persecution.

9 minutes ago, Ottservia said:

An interesting point and one I’ll keep in mind. Will have to do more research then.

Do you want some links?

Edited May 25, 2019 by Emperor Hardin

[B.Leu]

I think you are putting waaaaaaaay too much thinking about it. Much more than the writers actually did. And I disagree too, Chrom did not develop, he was never a shounen hero, whatever he is, he was that from start to finish. And sometime he was bipolar as hell at times.

To be fair, it's a great read. I don't believe it was ever intended, but it's good to dream, but I don't believe it, at all.

Btw, big up for the feroxian, who suceed at confusing the heir of Ylisse, possessing the one and only Falchion, accompanied by people who are clearly not bandits... for bandits. I'm just leaving that there, as an example as why I can't take the story seriously.

But crap, if that's how you see the story and enjoy it... who am I to tell you otherwise ? There's a genuine passion in your analysis, and if that's how you see truly see it, it's cool. I disagree, I think it's wrong, but it's cool.

11 hours ago, Emperor Hardin said:

Not even Validar, who was inspired by Manfroy, or Aversa, who grew up during that time, make any mention of it. Aversa's spotpass backstory even establishes that the Grimleal were her sole persecutors, which sure feels like the writers abandoning that plot to make sure Ylisse was 100% right even in the crusades.

It would have been awesome if the reason why Validar have such a hard on for destiny was because he was proven time and time again in his life that no, he couldn't just fight it, and just decided to roll with it before eventually taking a mask of  'pleasure', fake or true, upon seeing the same despair he faced before, it would have been so interesting, as while the shepherd had it ridiculously easy in doing everything, coffee included, he never did. (Fanfic writers, bring some salt into your stories, use this idea, it's free !)
But even if they did that in the original, they would have probably demonized him or something.

Edited May 26, 2019 by B.Leu

[eclipse]

@Ottservia yep, it works!  So, my thoughts:

This ignores the dynamics between Excellus and Cervantes, both of which interact with Our Heroes.  Excellus uses trickery to ensure loyalty, while Cervantes breaks enemies against himself (but will also engage in less-than-honorable tactics, a la Chapter 16).  Yet Walhart keeps both under his employ.  This shows that Walhart cares only about his goal, and not the means to said goal.  Think of Walhart as a "results matter, how you get them is irrelevant" type of boss.

Yet to beat Walhart, Robin had do things like burn a bunch of ships to defeat Walhart. . .so in the end, even if Chrom claims the moral high ground, it's a blurry line.  And since it was Plegia that pledged the ships. . .perhaps this could tie into the third part. . .

I'm not keen about anything past Plegia, and while that was a lot of effort, it didn't do much to change my opinion of the Valm arc.  All it shows, IMO, is that there was way too much going on at once.

[Interdimensional Observer]

8 hours ago, eclipse said:

Yet to beat Walhart, Robin had do things like burn a bunch of ships to defeat Walhart. . .so in the end, even if Chrom claims the moral high ground, it's a blurry line.  And since it was Plegia that pledged the ships. . .perhaps this could tie into the third part. . .

 

I think the ships were emptied just before they struck Walhart's fleet, so few if any Plegians died whose souls would be magically claimed by Grima, if that was at all possible.

This said, Walhart can be defined as a self-centered dominating radical humanist atheist warlord. Hater of Naga and Grima alike. Validar would have definitely wanted him gone, and Chrom was willing to be the Blue-Footed Booby with an army to get rid of him.

Although to be fair, Marth without knowing it because he was doing it for his own necessity, by taking out Camus and Michalis, was helping Gharnef. According to the Dark Pontifex himself, who called them "competition".

And Walhart struck the Ylissean continent first, with that big fleet you burn being the second wave he was going to send. They were no cruise ships with olive branches and pools of liquid gold to sell in port. A defense war would have meant his own lands and allies' lands would be wrecked with lives still lost, so why not bring it to the enemy instead? Chrom's hand was forced. Plus there was this Roseanne place where Virion lives to save, and it's located......................... my FEPS isn't working.

 

10 hours ago, B.Leu said:

But crap, if that's how you see the story and enjoy it... who am I to tell you otherwise ? There's a genuine passion in your analysis, and if that's how you see truly see it, it's cool. I disagree, I think it's wrong, but it's cool.

Agreed.

Let people interpret as they wish, a creative product (to not call video games "art") belongs not exclusively to the author. Authors can try to sway how things are interpreted by others, and some interpretations will lack for more "empirical" evidence compared to others- Dr. Zhivago being about the delicious of a banana split would be veeeeeerrrry hard to see. Yet, once a creator's product is put out there into the public sphere, its meaning will no longer be exclusively theirs', even if the physical form and content are.

And this is just entertaining fiction, not holy scripture or a national constitution. Things where some interpretations can be seriously problematic if followed with action, and should hence be curtailed with hard and or soft measures. I don't recommend throwing milkshakes as one of them, give me your Black & Whites instead.

[Ottservia]

42 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

I think the ships were emptied just before they struck Walhart's fleet, so few if any Plegians died whose souls would be magically claimed by Grima, if that was at all possible.

9 hours ago, eclipse said:

Yet to beat Walhart, Robin had do things like burn a bunch of ships to defeat Walhart. . .so in the end, even if Chrom claims the moral high ground, it's a blurry line.  And since it was Plegia that pledged the ships. . .perhaps this could tie into the third part. . .

Plegia provided only ships and supplies but not any soldiers and as IO said the ships were emptied right before the collision so no ally lives were lost. Speaking of my part 3 analysis I'm working on it. I'm liking the discussion so far though.

 

9 hours ago, eclipse said:

This ignores the dynamics between Excellus and Cervantes, both of which interact with Our Heroes.  Excellus uses trickery to ensure loyalty, while Cervantes breaks enemies against himself (but will also engage in less-than-honorable tactics, a la Chapter 16).  Yet Walhart keeps both under his employ.  This shows that Walhart cares only about his goal, and not the means to said goal.  Think of Walhart as a "results matter, how you get them is irrelevant" type of boss.

An interesting take away. I think when you think about it like that it still ties into the idea that Walhart wants to discard the past. He'll discard whatever is irrelevant to him if it means achieving his goal. In that sense He personally views the past as irrelevant so he chooses to discard it in order to move forward.  I touched on excellus(though not directly) when I talked about loyalty through fear. Excelleus is like of extension of that theme in that sometimes raw strength is not the only means to in still fear and create loyalty out of it. Lies and deception are very powerful tools and Excelleus uses those tools to generate fear among the dynasts and yen'fey to ensure loyalty but that loyalty is very fragile again tying into what I said about unity through fear not being true unity because of how frail it actually is. Cervantes is an interesting character that I didn't really take into much consideration. I'll keep him in mind.

[Ottservia]

Part 3: Overcoming doubt

Spoiler

This arc is interesting or at the very least the villain this arc centers around is very interesting cause Grima in essence at this point in the story acts a sort of subversion of the major villains that came before him. Gangrel and Walhart both tried to overcome the past in some way. Gangrel used the past as a way to instill hate in the plegian populace in order to help him complete his own agenda. What this resulted in is letting the scars of the past consume both him and plegia, he acknowledged the past but never learned anything from it unlike Emmeryn and Chrom, therefore, he lost the thematic conflict. Walhart tried to overcome the past by discarding the past but in doing so only ended up repeating it which is something you don’t do by acknowledging the past and learning from it which caused him to lose. Grima is different because he is a villain who has already overcome the past and is, in fact, fighting to prevent our heroes from doing exactly that. It’s an interesting role reversal I find. But before we dig into Grima, let’s talk a little bit about Robin cause you can’t talk about Grima without Robin.

 

This entire arc mostly centers around Robin and the mysteries surrounding his(note I will be referring to Robin as ‘he’ for the remainder of this post for the sake of convenience but know that everything I say is applicable to female Robin as well) past. The central villains(Validar and Grima) in this arc aside from Aversa anyway are, to me, better viewed as forces of nature in that they represent something core to the themes of the story and Robin’s character. Let’s start with Validar who is very typical as far as the gharnef archetype is concerned anyway. As far as I can tell he is pretty much just a lesser version of Grima. A stand-in for for the dark god and a prelude of what’s to come. Validar very strongly represents the idea of being unable to escape your past or lineage. He is a prominent figure of Robin’s past as he is the boy’s father after all and it is due to this connection that allows him to somehow influence Robin’s actions through some kind of mind control. It’s a powerful thing and it showcases how powerful a grip both bloodline and one’s past has on a person. No matter how much you try and deny it you can’t escape your past because well it is your past. It’s a part of you. You can’t escape your lineage because again it’s a part of you whether you like it or not. Then we get to one of the most iconic scenes in the game where Lucina decides to kill Robin. This scene acts as a sort of extension of that theme of being unable to escape one’s bloodline and past. It’s a scene that presents both doubt and belief. Do you truly believe that you can overcome the past and succeed or don’t you? Lucina and Chrom represent both choices presented to the player. I’ll go more in-depth into Lucina at a later point but here she represents doubt. The doubt in one’s self to overcome what has been done. Lucina is living proof of the failure that is most likely going unfold at the dragon’s table. She most certainly believes that Robin cannot shake his bloodline and overcome Validar’s control. She doubts Robin’s ability and the bonds he’s forged. Chrom in this scene represents belief and trust. If there’s one thing that Chrom has learned throughout all he’s been through in this story, it’s that it’s the bonds they’ve forged that has given them the strength to overcome any doubt or setback. It was his bonds with his friends that allowed him to overcome the doubt in himself after Emmeryn’s sacrifice. It is through the sacrifices and struggles that his friends made for him that they were able to defeat Walhart and prove how strong a unified force can be when against such a seemingly insurmountable foe. It is bonds and the faith in them that has allowed them to overcome all that and get them this far. He and Robin are two halves of a greater whole. He believes Robin can overcome this as they have overcome the trials they faced before. It plants that seed in your head and creates an uneasy tension in the battles to come. Pragmatically Lucina is right but something makes you hesitate to admit that. Again if you fail once, your friends are there to pick you back up. You can overcome this just because you failed to do it once before you won’t fail again. This whole point is further expanded upon in the chapters to come where the resolve to overcome that doubt with belief is tested. In the very next chapter Aversa and Validar arrogantly taunt you with the fact that this whole thing is futile and that you should just give up. Chrom fires back with the victories that came before to which Aversa responds with:

 

“Your victory over sad little Gangrel? Or perhaps Walhart's defeat? Those were meant to happen. They were preordained. You are just another fool in motley, capering on the stage!”

 

She’s saying that those victories don’t matter. They were pre-ordained. You can’t change fate no matter how hard you try and whatever success you had before meant nothing and in fact fate had its way in the end anyway. Again it’s emphasizing doubt. The doubt one feels when faced with an almost impossible task. The successes you have had mean nothing in the face of such a supreme failure looming overhead. It’s already happened so why fight it? Doubt is a powerful thing and is hard to overcome. This scene is supposed to emphasize that doubt and weaken your belief. The belief that is to be tested in the chapter to follow.

 

Chapter 23 starts exactly as the prenomination does at the start of the game with Robin and Chrom facing off against Validar. Validar once again raises the doubt by laying out the facts and truth that Robin is the vessel for Grima. It shakes our heroes but once again Chrom reinstills belief within you to keep fighting. It is the “final” battle where the duality of belief and doubt is tested. It all falls on Robin and if he can overcome doubt and succeed through belief or will he ultimately succumb just like in Lucina’s future. The latter seems to happen at first only to be revealed that because of Lucina’s warning Basilio Survived and helped orchestrate this elaborate ruse to catch Validar off guard. It was faith in Lucina’s words that allowed him to survive. It was Robin’s trust in both himself and friends that allowed for this to happen. Now I’m not gonna be the first to admit that this part of the story is by far the weakest. The plan is explained well enough where Basilio faked his death in order to help enact the plan of securing the gemstones and planting fake ones in the emblem. Though I will admit it does come a little bit out of left field and more information could’ve been added to really get a grasp on how the plan was supposed to work and who was in on it. As it stands it’s not a huge deal but it could’ve used a little more nuance and thought I feel as well as a couple of dashes of foreshadowing. Now with that our heroes are able to overcome their doubts and with renewed belief and passion they are finally able to take down Validar and win the day or so they think.

 

So yeah I was gonna talk about Grima but yeah that went a little longer than I thought it would and talking about about Grima as well would've made it twice that length.

Edited May 28, 2019 by Ottservia

[eclipse]

Please do talk about Grima, because I see Grima as "this is what happens when you fail to learn from history".

[Ottservia]

8 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Please do talk about Grima, because I see Grima as "this is what happens when you fail to learn from history".

Oh I will and I have a looot to say about him trust me on that

[Ottservia]

Part 4(maybe finale): Grima

Spoiler

“THE FUTURE IS BUILT UPON THE PAST, BUT YOUR KIND SHALL NEVER SEE IT!”

 

Let’s talk about Grima. Grima is by far the most powerful and imposing villain in this entire game and he needs to be, cause he’s the final boss. Grima is an interesting villain and as a final boss is basically a culmination of all the other themes present within this story. As I said before one of the most interesting thing about Grima is that unlike previous villains who tried to overcome the past, Grima already has and is fighting to prevent our heroes from doing exactly that. Let’s start by breaking down that quote from the cutscene “Dire Future II”. It’s a pretty straight forward line but that doesn’t mean there aren’t some nuances here we can dig out. The first half is really straight forward cause he’s right. The future is built upon the past. It is learning from the sacrifices and mistakes of the past that one can truly grow and move forward. This is shown within the story time and time again with the previous two arcs. The children themselves can also be a reflection of this idea cause most, if not, all of them are a physical representation of the failures of the first generation. Brady, Kjelle, Noire, and to a lesser degree Yarne all represent the failure of their parents to teach and pass on knowledge. Lucina, Cynthia, Owain, Severa, Inigo, and Gerome all represent the idea of failure to keep a promise and prep the later generation for the hardships they are going to face. Gerome, Nah, Yarne, and Laurent represent the failure of their parents to be there for them and help them grow. Now, these themes aren’t mutually exclusive and can overlap between characters but regardless it’s there. The supports these kids have with their parents have them overcoming those struggles and trauma. The parents may have failed before but now they have another chance to do what their future selves could not. Again it’s reinforcing that theme of overcoming the past by learning from it. Grima himself knows this as he is a physical manifestation of that idea or at the very least the failure to do so. This brings us to the second part of that line, “but your kind shall never see it” It’s a very simple line but it pretty much solidifies what he believes. Grima believes humans can never learn from their mistakes as they’ve shown time and time again. This belief is further solidified by his level 40 confession dialogue in heroes both of them(Which I might get to later). This belief marks his motivation to eradicate humanity cause if they can never grow then why bother keeping them alive? Why bother trying if it’s never going to work? If all you experience is failure upon failure, then why not just end it all?

 

Grima is like that little voice in the back of your head that constantly just says stuff like “why not just give up?” “the end result will be the same anyway, so why bother trying?”. This brings us back to the idea of “everyone wants peace” that Emmeryn so heavily advocated in favor of. There’s more than one way to bring about peace in this world and Grima’s ideals are a very twisted notion on that. You can’t have conflict when there’s no one to conflict with. Humans are constantly at conflict for one petty reason or another and in a world where the concept of winners exist there must always be losers. History is often written by the victorious after all. Grima’s reign of destruction as he puts it in his own words the true equalizer.

 

This isn’t Grima’s first attempt at wiping all of the human race. He first rose 1000 years prior to the start of the game but was stopped by the first exalt with the help of Naga. Bitter and defeated he slept for another thousand years but he wasn’t just sleeping. Grima is no fool and he certainly isn’t stupid enough to fall into the same traps that the so-called “Humans” fall into. Grima uses those thousand years to plan, think, and ponder what his mistakes were and truly correct them. Which is exactly what he does when he rises again in Lucina’s timeline. He made sure to take out his biggest threats in Chrom and Tiki and one of the gemstones to make certain the awakening could not be done. What did he gain from all of this? He won. There was no conceivable way of defeating Grima within Lucina’s timeline which is why they had to travel back in time in the first place. He overcame the mistakes of his past and achieved absolute victory because of it. This furthers the idea of learning from the past. You can only grow and succeed by acknowledging and learning from the mistakes of your past which Grima understands but believes humans are incapable of it.

 

How this all relates to Robin is that Grima is a literal and physical reminder of all the mistakes and failures of Robin’s past. It acts as an extension of that idea of “you cannot escape your past” except this time it is very much so literal. Robin and Grima are one and the same. You could say that Grima is a literal past version of Robin. A literal past version of yourself. We all have things we’ve done in our past we are not proud of. Mistakes we’ve made that we’ve since corrected and learned from. If you were to go back in time and look at your past self, you’d most likely want to slap yourself in the face for being a dumb person for making those mistakes. Thing is again you can’t escape those things. Our past makes us who we are. We learn from the mistakes we make and grow from that. We are not the same person we were back then. Grima, however, disagrees with that notion. Him and Robin being the same is a very literal way of saying “you are still that same idiot teenager who decided it was a good idea to play video games all day instead of studying for that test you severely bombed” which is a reflection of the idea that he believes that humans can never learn from their mistakes. In a way that can be viewed as a contradiction. Because Robin isn’t Grima, Robin is a different Robin that chose to become Grima just like you, yourself, isn’t the same person who made all those mistakes in your past. You’ve learned from them. You’ve grown from them but no matter how much you do grow well there’s that voice in the back of your head that says you didn’t. Grima is that voice. The idea that Robin is the only one who can defeat Grima is symbolic in that way as well. Only you can truly kill your past self and the mistakes you’ve made. Friends can help of course but that would just be running away from the problem. You have to face mistakes of your past and prove that you truly have grown past those mistakes. If you haven’t well, then you’ve just killed yourself(metaphorically obviously) and your “new” self probably won’t come back because they never existed. If you can do that, however, then you’ll truly be reborn as a new person freed from the shackles of your past(which is symbolically represented by the brand being removed from Robin’s hand in the final cutscene) so you can finally move forward. That is what awakening’s story is all about. It’s a story about overcoming the past to form a brighter future. You must acknowledge your past and all the mistakes of it to truly move past it and towards a future, you can be proud of.

 

 

I had a lot to say about Grima maybe I could cover future past. Eh I might. I know I have a lot to say about ID purpose.

Edited May 28, 2019 by Ottservia