[Spoilers] Why Zenos is the most important character moving forward

[Jaywalker]

The problem with Zenos is that we never see him earn his power. It is effectively a form of Diabolus ex Machina, the counterpart to the Warrior of Light's Deus ex Machina (blessing of light) which are tropes of bad writing. If Zenos has all this power because the writer says so, and the Warrior of Light has all this power because the writer says so, then we're effectively entered a story equivalent to a 5 year old banging hero/villain figures together.

In fairness, there is at least one short story about young Zenos training under a non-Garlean who could wield aether and going to increasingly extreme lengths to win. Can try and refind it.

I kind of have mixed feelings about lore not being shown in the game itself so I do get you there, but for what it's worth there is canon material covering him earning his strength.

I also saw a thing recently reviewing floor plans in I thiiiink Castrum Abania (need to double check) that might be implying some kind of weird experiment was done on Zenos with trying to combine souls. It's not super clear, but I suspect we'll get an explanation at some point.

No, he is not our antithesis. If the WoL gave into bloodlust and might-makes-right, at the very least the WoL worked for it from the ground up and earned that might through countless trials and tribulations. Zenos also has no arc. He became the strongest villain without sacrifice or confronting any personal demons, his character has remained static the entire time.

I agree and disagree here haha. I agree that WoL going "might makes right" would not become Zenos. If anything, he'd become Gaius. I don't think right even enters the equation for Zenos. Morality is irrelevant for him. If we are going to go into antitheses (which he is, but Zenos is hardly the only antithesis) the way Zenos foils the Warrior of Light comes from the ability to connect with and draw strength from others versus an entirely selfish and isolated strength. One involves being nurtured into power through connection, the other treats others as fuel.

Frankly, I could compose a whole analysis on why Vauthry is the antithesis of WoL/D, and particularly plays off of themes involving Fray and Sephirot. You can have more than one character doing this sort of thing. It's pretty standard if the storytelling is good.

TV tropes is for superficial craft elements in storytelling and does not reflect good or bad storytelling on a structural level in any consistent way. Most of what I'm typing here is purely shooting the shit with fellow fans, but on this one point in particular seriously. It's actually a pretty big craft problem in writing right now that people keep latching onto surface elements without necessarily knowing underlying reasons for why something does or doesn't work. It's the difference between say, a top tier mangaka who has studied everything from anatomy to paneling to graphic design and so forth versus an amateur who tries to copy the mangaka without understanding those things at all and just sees "big eyes".

Having a character as a chosen one or with a remarkable ability, whether good or bad, doesn't automatically become bad storytelling. The Echo occurs within worldbuilding, isn't exclusive to one person, and comes with costs. The WoL has been incapacitated by it multiple times, Fordola who couldn't turn it off got hit worse. Zenos operates the same way a good chunk of real life people do and even the concept of him artificially implanting something that would put him in another person's point of view is crazy unpredictable and kind of revolutionary. We have no idea what this will do long-term for Zenos' character development.

Not every character needs to be driven by angst and personal demons. This includes villains. I'm saying this as someone who loves angst, personal demons, and villains. I'll even go a step further--there are ways to tell stories where characters remain static and the drama comes from seeing how they impact those around them. There are even ways to tell stories with no conflict at all, and the most prominently successful cases of this method come from Japan.

Zenos undergoes an arc from being directionless and desperately seeking purpose for himself to finding that purpose in an opponent capable of overcoming him. Someone who can truly challenge him and make him strive. He went from valuing no one to valuing someone for the role they fulfill in his life. It's a very, very simple arc, which fits with the fact that he has huge elements of human identity missing from his personal development. This is not missing in the sense of "writers couldn't be bothered to fill it in" but in the sense of "some people lack the ability to conceptualize X and have to fill and adapt to that in other ways".

I do suspect we'll see Zenos get confronted with humanity at some point. He probably won't understand it or will find it unpleasant. Frankly, while I do get the critiques people mentioned on wanting to see him react more to having an artificial Echo and body hopping--I think that's a combination of not wanting to disrupt pacing for the story of the First and needing to really hammer home who Zenos is, how he operates, and how he doesn't operate. Varis accusing him of being a spoiled princeling who couldn't handle the responsibility of a nation only for Zenos to turn around all "I really don't care but if you use Black Rose my hunt is over" is a big deal. There have been tons of people who until that point had been looking at Zenos as if he was a prince above all else and kept trying to push standard evil prince motives on him. It was a point that needed to be clarified more explicitly, and it was there.

And with all this, seriously no one's gotta personally like Zenos but being a kind of character you don't prefer doesn't make him a technically ineffective character. Liking or disliking something is totally divorced from whether that thing is good craftsmanship. He's actually within a character type that is rarely done well and the level that the team has managed to do this consistently right is a very rare exception in media.

Tone with the internet doesn't always translate great, so tryin' to be clear here--not fussing, no shade from me against players who hate Zenos. Zenos is gonna be whatever he'll be and it's normal for fans to just plain not like some characters. There are apparently people who think the guy's hot too, which I find kind of funny. Me chiming in is more because on a technical front the team really isn't dropping the ball with him and has been doing a solid job pretty consistently. I just think it's important to recognize that the devs aren't being incompetent or lazy or anything like that. Have had plenty of experience with actual incompetent, lazy storytellers and the difference here is staggering.

All this stuff they're doing is coming from a very meticulous and deliberate place. If this isn't your favorite kind of character, don't worry there'll be others and he won't be in the spotlight forever. I just think it's important to give a little respect to the devs here, same way I'd give respect to say Bladerunner even though I can't seem to sit through it lol.

[Edax]

I agree and disagree here haha. I agree that WoL going "might makes right" would not become Zenos. If anything, he'd become Gaius. I don't think right even enters the equation for Zenos. Morality is irrelevant for him. If we are going to go into antitheses (which he is, but Zenos is hardly the only antithesis) the way Zenos foils the Warrior of Light comes from the ability to connect with and draw strength from others versus an entirely selfish and isolated strength. One involves being nurtured into power through connection, the other treats others as fuel.

I've seen this story told better in Bleach. Zaraki Kenpachi fights with his own strength while Ichigo fights using the strength of his allies and his zanpakuto. Zaraki starts off bored because he's reached the top but becomes excited at the prospect of confronting the protagonist because it's about the first real confrontation he'll have in a long time. The big difference in execution here is that Zaraki makes a serious effort to advocate his own ideology and try and convince the protagonist that he is correct. After the confrontation, Zaraki loses but he isn't necessarily shown to be incorrect since we are shown enough of his backstory to see that he clawed his way to the top from nothing using only his own strength. He earned his position and he's one of the most powerful characters in the series so at least we understand there is merit to his words and that he cannot be outright dismissed. He even follows a kind of warrior's code so you can understand why Zaraki has loyal followers whereas you cannot with Zenos. Zenos is rude, uncharismatic, dismissive, selfish, indulgent and seemingly nihilistic. Who would follow this guy? Even the Nihilists from the The Big Lebowski would loath this guy.

And wisely, Tite Kubo did not make Zaraki the villain. Zaraki is not the type of character that can handle the master villain role. He's not a planner or administrator and his philosophy of person strength just means he's work alone. Carrying out any kind of master plot would just run counter to his character. And this is the problem with Zenos. The moment Zenos became Emperor, is the moment all his failings as a leader and administrator destroy his ability to execute any plans to confront the Warrior of Light without it contradicting his character or common sense. Heck, using Black Rose would contricit his character because he wants to fight.

TV tropes is for superficial craft elements in storytelling and does not reflect good or bad storytelling on a structural level in any consistent way. Most of what I'm typing here is purely shooting the shit with fellow fans, but on this one point in particular seriously. It's actually a pretty big craft problem in writing right now that people keep latching onto surface elements without necessarily knowing underlying reasons for why something does or doesn't work. It's the difference between say, a top tier mangaka who has studied everything from anatomy to paneling to graphic design and so forth versus an amateur who tries to copy the mangaka without understanding those things at all and just sees "big eyes".

While tropes in of themselves are not bad, using Deus ex machina and Diabolus ex Machina are very poor ways to drive a conflict. Take the most famous duel in Japanese history: it was between Musashi and Kojirō, a contest of their own swordsmanship skills. That story could easily be ruined by giving Musashi the holy powers of the Archangel Gabriel and Kojirō given the powers of demon Mephistopheles. The problem here is that Musashi and Kojirō are no longer fighting using their own skills nor are there character experiences having any kind of impact on the outcome. It has essentially become a fight whose outcome is dictated at random by the writer since there no metric for holy/demonic powers, much like an anime beam struggle. If the story was about Musashi and Kojirō, then the writer has ruined it by making it a confrontation between Gabriel and Mephistopheles instead.

Having a character as a chosen one or with a remarkable ability, whether good or bad, doesn't automatically become bad storytelling. The Echo occurs within worldbuilding, isn't exclusive to one person, and comes with costs. The WoL has been incapacitated by it multiple times, Fordola who couldn't turn it off got hit worse. Zenos operates the same way a good chunk of real life people do and even the concept of him artificially implanting something that would put him in another person's point of view is crazy unpredictable and kind of revolutionary. We have no idea what this will do long-term for Zenos' character development.

I do have a problem with "chosen one" narratives, it robs characters of the agency. It is bad writing because it's the cheapest way to make an ordinary person special and to be given special treatment. Often times you can just rename chosen one narratives as "the good guy wins".
The problem with Zenos having the Echo now is that the writers have essentially made Zenos immortal. Zenos for some reason cares only for the thrill of the fight...but he cannot die and therefore his fight has no personal stakes. On top of that, the Warrior of Light cannot kill Zenos and thus cannot resolve the situation until the writer says so. Classic Diabolus ex Machina: they can't let the villain die so they just made him immortal to prolong the story. We have to wait for the writer to invent some Deus Ex Machina to kill Zenos.

Not every character needs to be driven by angst and personal demons. This includes villains. I'm saying this as someone who loves angst, personal demons, and villains. I'll even go a step further--there are ways to tell stories where characters remain static and the drama comes from seeing how they impact those around them. There are even ways to tell stories with no conflict at all, and the most prominently successful cases of this method come from Japan.

Zenos undergoes an arc from being directionless and desperately seeking purpose for himself to finding that purpose in an opponent capable of overcoming him. Someone who can truly challenge him and make him strive. He went from valuing no one to valuing someone for the role they fulfill in his life. It's a very, very simple arc, which fits with the fact that he has huge elements of human identity missing from his personal development. This is not missing in the sense of "writers couldn't be bothered to fill it in" but in the sense of "some people lack the ability to conceptualize X and have to fill and adapt to that in other ways".

You are absolutely right, not every character (and by extension the villain) needs a character arc. Frieza being a famous example. The problem here is that Frieza had no staying power, once he was defeated in DBZ, he no longer had a place in the story. When Frieza gets revived as robo-Frieza, he was only useful as a dps-check. If a villian never changes, if a villian cannot be reasoned with and if the villain doesn't even have a viable idology to try and convert people with, then they are one dimensional. Batman's Joker doesn't need an arc because he's driven by ideology. He's trying to prove a fundamental point about society and to change it. Zenos isn't trying to prove anything or change anything, he just wants to experience "fun".

Zeno's only arc it seems is that he went from complete inaction to confronting the protagonist. Generally speaking confronting the protagonist is the bare minimum that an antagonist must do. His ideology is: fight is fun. It's almost caveman in its lack of dimension. We might as well be fighting a immortal caveman.
Grynewaht

And with all this, seriously no one's gotta personally like Zenos but being a kind of character you don't prefer doesn't make him a technically ineffective character. Liking or disliking something is totally divorced from whether that thing is good craftsmanship. He's actually within a character type that is rarely done well and the level that the team has managed to do this consistently right is a very rare exception in media.

He's not a well written character. As I've said, he has no real ideology or philosophy to push, he has no strength that can be explained and he goes through no real arc. There's no reason for the WoL to listen to him because he's insane. He doesn't even make other characters go through arcs either. He's about as effectual as a Grynewaht. He's just a boss to confront that gets to live because the cut scene says so despite all logic.

All this stuff they're doing is coming from a very meticulous and deliberate place. If this isn't your favorite kind of character, don't worry there'll be others and he won't be in the spotlight forever. I just think it's important to give a little respect to the devs here, same way I'd give respect to say Bladerunner even though I can't seem to sit through it lol.

Hey at least I can acknowledge that Bladerunner jump started a new genre of film. A whole generation of films can after that can be attributed to Bladerunner cinematography. But we can still acknowledge that Bladerunner had very poor writing, they couldn't even agree on whether Decker was a replicant, which just created chaos in the story. If Decker was a replicant, it's a bad story and if Decker wasn't a replicant, it's still a bad story. It comes down to the writer, director, studio execs and actors not even agreeing with what story they were trying to tell, so they ended up not really telling a story that says anything.

You honestly know what would make my day?

if when the story continued we got a cut scene with Gaius just lopping off Zenos head completely so we were through and done with the most overwhelming one dimensional villain since the Emperor of Final Fantasy II Hrrm... wait maybe thats it Everyone pull out your blood swords..

The problem of that of course is that the writers have made Zenos immortal and they also setup an Imperial Cloning Facility. Killing Zenos is meaningless to the narrative now.

[Jaywalker]

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The confrontation in Bleach wasn't better. You liked it more. These are completely different things. Frankly, I find it weird, less believable, and less human that someone who supposedly lives for the challenge of a fight specifically because the rest of reality is unfulfilling would be invested in ideology or converting others to it. Reality being unfulfilling extends to other people.

Zenos commands loyalty because he leads people in combat and rewards people based on merit. He does not care if his soldiers are Ala Mhigan, or Doman, or Garlean, or anything else. They could be purple people eaters for all he cares. If they can fight well, take direction, and strive for better the way he does then they have a place by his side. This is not something that can be taken for granted in Garlemald and the gesture goes a long way, particularly with people like Fordola and Asahi. Having the heir to the empire itself treat you like an equal to any other soldier based on your abilities is a huge deal when others of status would have denied opportunity out of hand.

Warriors code does not by itself make a good character, a good leader, or a good villain. Being morally or philosophically correct doesn't either. Those both fall under things you like rather than things that are technically good. Given that Zenos is a serial killer and has no empathy, of course regular nihilists like characters from the Big Lebowski wouldn't like him. And frankly, not all nihilism is the same either.

The story about Zenos undergoing training as a kid comes from The Chronicles of Light, in book form. It is canon. You keep referencing him not working for power. The story literally shows him doing just that.

Neither Deus ex Machina nor Diabolus ex Machina were even employed in Stormblood unless you count Hildabrand, which was for absurd humor. I was referring to the very practice of using shortcut terminology to articulate a critique, which gets very sloppy very quickly and hinders communication through vagaries.

Deus ex Machina and Diabolus ex Machina both require a random event that is not in keeping with normal functions of the narrative universe to dramatically change the outcome of a situation. The sole explanation for their occurrence comes from the storyteller going "because I said so". This is not the case even remotely for either the Warrior of Light or Zenos. Both use established in-universe mechanics that apply to characters outside of themselves and reach positions of influence as a result of choices made, with said choices coming from clear motives that stem from life experiences. Dramatic and unusual events do not qualify by themselves. The example you provided would involve breaking dramatically with the terms of the narrative universe established while involving zero motive for Gabriel and Mephistopheles. If there was a battle occurring in a world where angels and demons were established previously, where it was understood as possible to share power in the way described, and there was some means or motivation behind the occurrence--there is zero issue between two human warriors having a Gabriel versus Mephistopheles fight. It could even have a historical bent to it for something weird and campy as long as the rest was built up adequately.

Dismissing chosen one narratives actually limits human experience and agency. They can be executed well or poorly, but when executed well they can offer unique insight to how being forced into a position of tremendous responsibility can wear a person down and what it takes to endure despite that. It also offers a look at how the chosen one manages free will and how their personality and choices ultimately make being a chosen one less something imposed from outside and more something that they choose because the alternative isn't acceptable in their own eyes. They are chosen because their identity, personality, and values have shaped them into the person who feels driven to carry out the role despite obstacles and sometimes terrible costs. The Warrior of Light qualifies for this.

A well done character would be able to display agency even locked alone in a cell for the entire story with no means of escape. A good writer could execute that.

Zenos will probably need to be dealt with like an Ascian and/or he will encounter character development that pushes him to removing his artificial Echo himself. Alternatively, the Resonant can be defeated using means that haven't been explored in the plot yet. We don't know everything about how he even got an artificial Echo, let alone the mechanics of aether in Eorzea. We only just learned about the souls of dead children lingering as pixies.

You're not correct about Joker or about staying power in static villains. Joker tries to push an ideology in Christopher Nolan's series. This is not his primary or entire existence. Sometimes Joker is light and campy. Sometimes Joker remembers his past differently moment to moment, has the same lingering emptiness and lack of direction Zenos has, and tries to both find meaning by becoming a symbol. The way he treats Batman in these incarnations is essentially the same way Zenos treats the Warrior of Light: Bruce Wayne is irrelevant and doesn't matter. He doesn't want to know about Bruce Wayne, he wants a fellow symbol in Batman. Likewise for the personal identity of the Warrior of Light. Some versions of the Joker just don't care about other people and think it's fun to commit horrible acts in funny ways and see how people freak out about something he sees as not a big deal.

The Joker stays because he is very good at foiling against Batman both personally and symbolically when there is an overarching theme within Batman about the relationship between being a person and being a symbol. For FFXIV the WoL is developing a gallery too, and the villains we've encountered frequently look at different pieces of the WoL's character or WoL's mission. How things could go wrong with different priorities or circumstances.

You still miss the point of Zenos and what he's trying to do.

It's not about fun. It never has been. He doesn't need to try to change the world or society. Sometimes stories are about people trying to connect to others. Sometimes those people fail.

Zenos, again, is someone who has zero value for personal connection. He doesn't care if he gets sung a lullaby every night by a mother trying to love him. The lullaby accomplishes nothing and he doesn't even see a person looking at his mother. He doesn't see someone with as much consciousness as him, and even if she does have that it doesn't really matter to his life except that she thinks to feed and take care of him while he's an infant who can't take care of himself.

Zenos does not get fulfilled by receiving praise and it doesn't upset him to be reprimanded. That requires investing in another person's identity. He is a purely self-oriented and physical creature. Nothing else is necessarily real to him. There is nothing to do and no direction in that. He does like challenging himself, but if the challenges are all predictable then it's easy to finish and the challenge goes away. At least with a challenge he's working toward something, he has a goal. The reason it's combat for him is because combat offers stakes, unpredictability, a possibility of death. Suddenly, instead of nothing and certainty there's suspense. He has to actually try, and if he fails there are consequences that could change things irrevocably. That tension plus adrenaline and the need to push himself toward a goal offer direction. More than fun, it's an escape from an existence he considers empty.

And again. There are people like that in the real world.

If you need a look at the world according to Zenos, life is empty and meaningless in itself. People fade and die and there are no threads tying one person's experience to another. The only meaning that can be found comes from the challenges you find for yourself. Some of these challenges take the form of beasts. Some take the form of people, who are essentially the same thing. And if a beast can give him the gift of meaning and direction, that's something to be treasured.

How caveman.

He literally pushes both Asahi and Fordola through insane development arcs, and he is indirectly responsible for the arcs of countless others from the witness to his slaughter of an entire Doman resistance squadron to Ilberd and Yotsuyuu.

Bladerunner is well-written and has a tremendous amount of thought poured into it on both literal and non-literal levels. This spans not only the world but the characters themselves. It isn't remembered only for being first or for an aesthetic only. I'm completely astounded you don't see the relevance or shift in meanings between Decker being a replicant or not a replicant given he spends the whole movie killing replicants who seem more human than him. Do you not realize that there are statements to made in stories told through ambiguity and that "can't decide" is a deliberate open-ended question to the audience?

Based on your response to Khalithar, you seem to actively want to put down anyone who sees something in a character you personally don't like. It doesn't help your case, especially since you don't seem to understand that non-intellectual and sometimes humorous characters like Grynewaht can also be tragic and horrifying.

[Edax]

I've seen this story told better in Bleach. Zaraki Kenpachi fights with his own strength while Ichigo fights using the strength of his allies and his zanpakuto. Zaraki starts off bored because he's reached the top but becomes excited at the prospect of confronting the protagonist because it's about the first real confrontation he'll have in a long time. The big difference in execution here is that Zaraki makes a serious effort to advocate his own ideology and try and convince the protagonist that he is correct. After the confrontation, Zaraki loses but he isn't necessarily shown to be incorrect since we are shown enough of his backstory to see that he clawed his way to the top from nothing using only his own strength. He earned his position and he's one of the most powerful characters in the series so at least we understand there is merit to his words and that he cannot be outright dismissed. He even follows a kind of warrior's code so you can understand why Zaraki has loyal followers whereas you cannot with Zenos. Zenos is rude, uncharismatic, dismissive, selfish, indulgent and seemingly nihilistic. Who would follow this guy? Even the Nihilists from the The Big Lebowski would loath this guy.

And wisely, Tite Kubo did not make Zaraki the villain. Zaraki is not the type of character that can handle the master villain role. He's not a planner or administrator and his philosophy of person strength just means he's work alone. Carrying out any kind of master plot would just run counter to his character. And this is the problem with Zenos. The moment Zenos became Emperor, is the moment all his failings as a leader and administrator destroy his ability to execute any plans to confront the Warrior of Light without it contradicting his character or common sense. Heck, using Black Rose would contricit his character because he wants to fight.

The confrontation in Bleach wasn't better. You liked it more. These are completely different things. Frankly, I find it weird, less believable, and less human that someone who supposedly lives for the challenge of a fight specifically because the rest of reality is unfulfilling would be invested in ideology or converting others to it. Reality being unfulfilling extends to other people.

I objectively explained why that confrontation and character is better. To dismiss all that and just claim I subjectively "I like it more" is awfully dismissive and disrespectful.

Zenos commands loyalty because he leads people in combat and rewards people based on merit. He does not care if his soldiers are Ala Mhigan, or Doman, or Garlean, or anything else. They could be purple people eaters for all he cares. If they can fight well, take direction, and strive for better the way he does then they have a place by his side. This is not something that can be taken for granted in Garlemald and the gesture goes a long way, particularly with people like Fordola and Asahi. Having the heir to the empire itself treat you like an equal to any other soldier based on your abilities is a huge deal when others of status would have denied opportunity out of hand.

This is nearly non-existent in the story. Zenos also does not treat anyone as an equal.

Warriors code does not by itself make a good character, a good leader, or a good villain. Being morally or philosophically correct doesn't either. Those both fall under things you like rather than things that are technically good. Given that Zenos is a serial killer and has no empathy, of course regular nihilists like characters from the Big Lebowski wouldn't like him. And frankly, not all nihilism is the same either.

I never claimed warrior codes made good characters.

The story about Zenos undergoing training as a kid comes from The Chronicles of Light, in book form. It is canon. You keep referencing him not working for power. The story literally shows him doing just that.

Which makes that a different story, outside of Stormblood and Shadowbringers. Perhaps if I engaged in the story outside of FFXIV he becomes a well written character, but as presented in the story of FFXIV itself he is poorly written.

Deus ex Machina and Diabolus ex Machina both require a random event that is not in keeping with normal functions of the narrative universe to dramatically change the outcome of a situation. The sole explanation for their occurrence comes from the storyteller going "because I said so". This is not the case even remotely for either the Warrior of Light or Zenos. Both use established in-universe mechanics that apply to characters outside of themselves and reach positions of influence as a result of choices made, with said choices coming from clear motives that stem from life experiences.

No, they do not require a random event. The Ulitma Weapon was destroyed through the result of Deus ex Machina. The goddess Hydaelyn literally stripped the Ultima Weapon of its power to let the WoL win the fight, when he/she could not do so with their own established powers or life experience. God in the machine resolved the conflict of AAR and it was never established that Hydaelyn could rip god powers out of machines.

Zenos reached his position by being born. To say Zenos "reached positions of influence as a result of choices made" is not true.

If there was a battle occurring in a world where angels and demons were established previously, where it was understood as possible to share power in the way described, and there was some means or motivation behind the occurrence--there is zero issue between two human warriors having a Gabriel versus Mephistopheles fight. It could even have a historical bent to it for something weird and campy as long as the rest was built up adequately.

That would still be bad writing, the character with development are being sidelined for a fight using the power of characters with no development. To bring it into the FFXIV world, Hydaelyn and Zodiark don't have characters, they aren't well developed and their powers are entirely nebulous, so to use their powers in the a conflict between the WoL and the Ascians would be bad writing. This robs the protagonist and antagonist of their agency and the fight's outcome is no longer dictated by either of them.

Dismissing chosen one narratives actually limits human experience

No it doesn't. Destinies don't exist in actual human experience.

You're not correct about Joker or about staying power in static villains. Joker tries to push an ideology in Christopher Nolan's series. This is not his primary or entire existence. Sometimes Joker is light and campy. Sometimes Joker remembers his past differently moment to moment, has the same lingering emptiness and lack of direction Zenos has, and tries to both find meaning by becoming a symbol. The way he treats Batman in these incarnations is essentially the same way Zenos treats the Warrior of Light: Bruce Wayne is irrelevant and doesn't matter. He doesn't want to know about Bruce Wayne, he wants a fellow symbol in Batman. Likewise for the personal identity of the Warrior of Light. Some versions of the Joker just don't care about other people and think it's fun to commit horrible acts in funny ways and see how people freak out about something he sees as not a big deal.

The Joker being light and campy during certain scenes didn't change his role in The Dark Knight. You don't know if Joker is misremembering his past, he could be lying about his past. You don't know if he has the same lingering emptiness, he never says that in the Dark Knight. By saying "he treats Batman in these incarnations" implies that you mean the Joker in different stories. The Joker is physically a different person depending on what Batman series you are watching. What Jared Leto does has no bearing on the writing of The Dark Knight.

The Joker stays because he is very good at foiling against Batman both personally and symbolically when there is an overarching theme within Batman about the relationship between being a person and being a symbol. For FFXIV the WoL is developing a gallery too, and the villains we've encountered frequently look at different pieces of the WoL's character or WoL's mission. How things could go wrong with different priorities or circumstances.

The Joker is the antithesis of Batman. They have opposite ideologies and the both actively try to shape Gotham.
Zenos is not the antithesis of the Warrior of Light. Zenos is entirely passive, waiting to react to events.

You still miss the point of Zenos and what he's trying to do.

It's not about fun. It never has been. He doesn't need to try to change the world or society. Sometimes stories are about people trying to connect to others. Sometimes those people fail.

Zenos, again, is someone who has zero value for personal connection. He doesn't care if he gets sung a lullaby every night by a mother trying to love him. The lullaby accomplishes nothing and he doesn't even see a person looking at his mother. He doesn't see someone with as much consciousness as him, and even if she does have that it doesn't really matter to his life except that she thinks to feed and take care of him while he's an infant who can't take care of himself.

Zenos does not get fulfilled by receiving praise and it doesn't upset him to be reprimanded. That requires investing in another person's identity. He is a purely self-oriented and physical creature. Nothing else is necessarily real to him. There is nothing to do and no direction in that. He does like challenging himself, but if the challenges are all predictable then it's easy to finish and the challenge goes away. At least with a challenge he's working toward something, he has a goal. The reason it's combat for him is because combat offers stakes, unpredictability, a possibility of death. Suddenly, instead of nothing and certainty there's suspense. He has to actually try, and if he fails there are consequences that could change things irrevocably. That tension plus adrenaline and the need to push himself toward a goal offer direction. More than fun, it's an escape from an existence he considers empty.

And again. There are people like that in the real world.

If you need a look at the world according to Zenos, life is empty and meaningless in itself. People fade and die and there are no threads tying one person's experience to another. The only meaning that can be found comes from the challenges you find for yourself. Some of these challenges take the form of beasts. Some take the form of people, who are essentially the same thing. And if a beast can give him the gift of meaning and direction, that's something to be treasured.

How caveman.

What you describe is a person, not a well written antagonist. An well written antagonist cannot merely meet the criteria "There are people like that in the real world." to be well written. My Grandmother had Alzheimers. It crippled her before she died. Yes, "There are people like that in the real world.", but that does not mean she could suddenly be included in a story and be a well written antagonist. An antagonist must perform critical functions in a story, something my beloved Grandmother could not do due to her incapacitation. Being realistic is not the primary metric of being a well written antagonist.

Bladerunner is well-written and has a tremendous amount of thought poured into it on both literal and non-literal levels. m completely astounded you don't see the relevance or shift in meanings between Decker being a replicant or not a replicant given he spends the whole movie killing replicants who seem more human than him.

Because Bladerunner is badly written. If Decker is a replicant, then his learning that his entire life was a lie via the unicorn origami provokes no reaction. Apparently Decker just doesn't care that he's a Replicant. Or he's human and for some reason his partner can see Decker's dreams for unexplained reasons. Then you have the cut of the movie that doesn't even have the unicorn scene, which changes the context of the entire film. And why sent a Replicant to hunt a Replicant if he is so human like as to be a complete disadvantage? And if Decker is a Replicant, it just becomes a story of Replicants fighting Replicants, loving Replicants and escaping with Replicants, completely detached from the human audience. Because they did not commit, the story loses meaning. Filmmakers and audience members can't even agree on what's canon with all the different film versions.

There is too much to be said about Amazing Spider-Man 2. What I'll leave that point at is that Electro was never the reason that movie struggled.

This is a red herring. Electro is a badly written character. The film's success is completely unrelated to that objective fact. Or are we to consider the Transformers movies as masterpieces of writing because those movies did well?

Based on your response to Khalithar, you seem to actively want to put down anyone who sees something in a character you personally don't like. It doesn't help your case, especially since you don't seem to understand that non-intellectual and sometimes humorous characters like Grynewaht can also be tragic and horrifying.

I didn't put down Khalithar. I asked him a question so that I may better understand his position. I do not like your insinuations about my personal character.

You are too narrow-minded and inexperienced to have a realistic grasp on what would be an effective objective evaluation of storytelling technique. It's a shame you've cut yourself off at the knees that way.

I've been seriously trying to be nice to you with this.

You have failed yourself.

The standard of even employing a test like the Bechdel test, for anyone, is nonsense. Having two women in a movie isn't inherently a problem. Having two men in a movie isn't inherently a problem. If there are two movies about women or made by women when more women than that are capable and interested in making movies, that's a problem. Derailing conversations and plots from what they otherwise might have been focusing on just so you can tell everyone you passed the Bechdel test is ridiculous and does a disservice to the work. The idea that female characters who are otherwise fully fleshed out and well-developed are somehow diminished because they didn't talk to each other about something other than a man is absolutely sexist. Men who are under those same circumstances in reverse, Star Wars or otherwise, would not be considered diminished in that manner.

I disagree. Like I said, the Bechdel test is not a hardline test of quality. I REPEAT: it is a measure of the representation of women in fiction. It asks whether a work features at least two women who talk to each other about something other than a man. It has nothing to do with diminished characters, it is a representation metric.

Lol you're not talking to the chef and you're not getting cockroaches. You're literally complaining that you don't like your perfectly executed soufflé to a professional food critic as a random customer who likes desserts but has never had a soufflé and certainly doesn't know how to make them.

What I had been trying to tell you gently before was that you are coming across as inexperienced and are talking to someone who has moved well past your level and has managed to use that to get a position of some rank through the merit of my work. This is my job, which I earned over a long period of time after extensive study that covered and went beyond the points you're referencing.

I did not literally "complain that I didn't like a perfectly executed soufflé to a professional food critic." You are being dishonest and you have thrown your own professional credentials into doubt.
Attacking my personal character using fictional scenarios is not the conduct of a professional.

[Jaywalker]

You have failed yourself.

Lol hardly. There's a thing called "past tense" you should look into. I changed my mind about being nice well into our conversation because you established yourself as rude, closed-minded, sloppy, and ignorant. And I'm not sorry I changed my mind either.

Good luck!

[LineageRazor]

Zenos undergoes an arc from being directionless and desperately seeking purpose for himself to finding that purpose in an opponent capable of overcoming him. Someone who can truly challenge him and make him strive. He went from valuing no one to valuing someone for the role they fulfill in his life. It's a very, very simple arc, which fits with the fact that he has huge elements of human identity missing from his personal development. This is not missing in the sense of "writers couldn't be bothered to fill it in" but in the sense of "some people lack the ability to conceptualize X and have to fill and adapt to that in other ways".

I wouldn't say Zenos was at all directionless. He knew all along EXACTLY what he wanted. Dialogue in the game indicates that this was exactly why he appointed Yotsuyu to Doma, why unleashed the Skulls on Ala Mhigo. He oppressed the people in order to try to dig out someone willing to fight back, to force the emergence of a hero. The Hunt long predated the Warrior of Light. His entire life was a fruitless search for a worthy opponent. Directionless implies that he did not know what he wanted, but he very much did.

Really, the extent of his character arc was going from "looking for a worthy opponent" to "FOUND a worthy opponent". In fairness, this DID result in a radical policy change for the guy, wherein he lost all interest in paying lip service to Garlean high command and was far less interested in prodding the downtrodden in the hopes that one would rise up and try to bite him.

The moment Zenos became Emperor, is the moment all his failings as a leader and administrator destroy his ability to execute any plans to confront the Warrior of Light without it contradicting his character or common sense. Heck, using Black Rose would contricit his character because he wants to fight.

I don't think Zenos's goal was to become emperor, nor do I think he HAS become Emperor. His goal was to stop his father from unleashing the Black Rose and possibly killing Zenos's quarry, not to take the throne himself. It's also very unclear that Garlean rules of succession would just hand the throne over to the guy - there was a civil war the last time an emperor died, after all.

Now that Varis is dead (if he's dead), that goal has likely succeeded. I doubt Zenos cares at all about what becomes of Garlemald at this point, whether they declare a new leader or destroy themselves through civil war. In fact, I'd guess he's all about the civil war - with no clear leader, the Garleans would be focused on themselves and far less likely to deploy chemical weaponry elsewhere.