Emet-Selch, The Brother Hypothesis

[Vyrerus]

I timed the two screenshots so that they werent affected by the eyes opening and closing. I also did account for the pupils moving, as you’ll see in my next post: “To me it looks like he narrows his eyes and he looks away…”

You can also take the picture and overlay the screenshots with my traces. The pupils are in the same spot as they are in the screenshots. Hell, if you want to wait 15 hours I’ll do it for you.

What I'm saying is, he shut his eyes and then opened them. There's a difference in narrowing your eyes, and not opening them as far as they were. There's also the fact that when anyone looks down just by moving their eyes, their eyelids will pretty much automatically shift with the direction of their gaze.

So what I mean when I say the drawings didn't account for this, is that they remove the context of what's in motion in the scene. Basically, Emet blinked into averting his gaze, and the gaze aversion keeps his eyes from fully opening. It would be better communicated if they could more realistically portray how eyelashes shift with eyelid movement, but that's a bit beyond FFXIV's graphics engine.

If you're not sure what I'm on about, or want a more real example, take the guy in this video for instance:

Reading Eyes Guy

He's going on about blink rate and things, but that's not what I care about. Look at his eyes while he speaks. Whenever he needs to find a word, his gaze averts, and it carries his eyelids with it. Most people's eyes function like this.

They somewhat accomplish this in XIV through a partial illusion related to the thick blackness of Emet-selch's eyelashes. His eyes don't actually open less in our scene than they were before. His irises move, being covered by more black and his bottom lids, giving the impression that his eyes are narrowed, but they're not, not really. This is also part of the reason they used the angle that they did.

[Grimr]

azem and emmet both served on the convocation of 14. Azem was the lone dissenter and left going his way. Maybe they were close friends. On a related note more pertaining to hades, now i have mount farming him and i keep on noticing his crystal staff with zodiark at the top which he plunges into himself and yet the same crystals appear on his body later on and appear on the platform the fight takes place on. It is also the same place where we face therion. I can't help but feel maybe its zodiark 's power made manifest. Or i could be thinking to much into it.

[Elladie]

Your interpretation of the Tempest doesn't really fit with what I remember of it (it has been a long time). The notable theme of Shakespeare's play is forgiveness; Prospero wants vengeance, and he is prepared to use whatever means necessary - including magic - but by the end he forgives, repudiates magic, and marries off his daughter to one of those he originally had no compunction about killing. Emet-Selch resembles Prospero very little; I have always taken the references to the play to relate more to the transient and magical existence of Amaurot as it parallels with Prospero's Island. It certainly never provoked any suspicion in me that Elai was once Hades' brother so I feel as though you're clutching at straws here.

That's not to say that Emet-Selch isn't Azem's brother; if that is the relationship between them that works for you, that's fine. I think the true nature of their relationship has been made deliberately fuzzy so that PCs can opt for the one that works for them. In the same way, Azem's name has never been clarified, so that we can pick the name that works for us. In my head canon, Azem's name was Echo (Greek nymph who loved Narcissus) and Hades was her husband. She and he were supposed to be the heart of a Zodiark/Hydaelyn summon, but she messed that up by refusing. She's been trying to put it right ever since. I can produce reams of 'evidence' for this, but it's only my personal theory, and I have no expectation of it turning out to be 'true'.

It's been left vague so that we can all frame it in terms that work for our own WoL

[Vyrerus]

Clutching at straws

That's not the only notable theme. That's the ending, and the main moral of the story. Forgiveness over vengeance leads to true justice and happiness. There's also notable themes around the use of language to exert power over others, exploit them, and/or control them. It is also the backdrop to the play that Antonio cast Prospero down from his position as Duke, leading to the events of the story. This is in the same way that the Hydaelyn faction casts the entire Convocation, including Emet-selch, down from of direct control of the world.

And forget not that it was actually Caliban's(and his departed witch mother's) island first, but Prospero towered over him and took control by manipulating Ariel, dubbing him unfit to rule the island. He goes on to get a mild form of revenge by striking terror into his brother and The King of Naples's hearts. It's only after he's terrified everyone, and had his magical wedding masque cause Ferdinand and Miranda to fall in love and has his title as Duke restored that he opts for peace, buries his staff, and drowns his book.

I'm clutching a lot less than you say I am. Also, keep in mind that they don't need to have every story element parallel, and FFXIV making the allusion is really moreso calling back to Shakespeare as a way to compare the story to something older and greater. It's really more in line with Forbidden Planet, which made similar allusions. In Forbidden Planet, the plot premise is that humans discover the home planet of the ancient aliens, "The Krell." The Krell built a machine that made their intellects so vast that just by thinking, they could create anything, any creature, with the aid of the energy from their great machine. But they didn't take into account their subconscious desires and emotions, and so they were destroyed by, "The Monsters from the Id." In this movie, Dr. Morbius and his daughter Altaira are rough allusions to Prospero and Miranda, and the sci-fi element of the The Krell stands in for Caliban and Ariel, as does the remoteness of the planet from the rest of society depict the island. That's where similarities end, though, and the idea that it was based off The Tempest was something brought about due to loose association and tropes, so that by comparing a newer work to an older, known one, the magnitude of the newer one is enhanced(as well as ticket sales).

As for the idea that it's being left vague on purpose so we can fill in the blanks... yes, that's obvious, but it's moreso that the writers can fill in the blanks later with what they think will work best for the course of the narrative. All I sought to do with this idea was offer insights on what I consider to be a strong possibility(and really to get a translation on the line involving heritage).