What's the point with that quite lackluster story in Endwalker?

[Lauront]

- I thought this expansion was going to be about Hydaelyn and Zodiark? As it turns out, it's about Hydaelyn and The Sound. Zodiark was literally just an afterthought, a plot device to usher in the real plot. I keep seeing people say that making Zodiark more of a presence at all (or even just a more glorified fight than the level 83 trial, but I digress) would have been "predictable" and that they "subverted expectations", to which I would ask: is "subverting expectations" supposed to be a good thing when you hype something up for years? Does "predictable" have to mean bad and boring rather than a logical and satisfying climax? Perhaps people who argue this simply do not care this much about Zodiark and the Ascians. Fine enough, we all have different opinions on characters, but I just wish the writers did care more.

Something that may have sat better with me and done a better job subverting expectations would have been to see them come together and draw on both their power to ultimately save the world. They also had an excellent opportunity with the origins of the High Seraph from Orbonne for a potential backstory to the sound, considering the traits of this mysterious otherworldly being... I think the theme of despair worked, but it could've been woven better into something like the Creator from IV: The After Years.

- As a conclusion of sorts, I will bring up this anecdote of my reaction to getting the Endsinger in trial roulette: it's undeniably epic and gorgeous, and it feels good as a fight. It feels unambiguously good and awesome, because you are literally kicking the personification of cosmic despair in the face with the power of hope, love, friendship and Calvinball. It's a much more fist-pumping moment than watching a man desperately flail at you because you are using against him the power that broke his world, erased his entire civilisation from History and in-all-but-name killed everyone he knew and loved, then quietly accepts defeat and asks you, the barely-recognisable remnant of his veryveryvery good friend (polite cough), to remember them as he fades away. It's also a much more fist-pumping moment than mercy killing the little brother figure neither you nor he remembers, as he dies remembering all the people that put their faith in him whom he could never save.
It just feels shallow.

I personally hated it. It just felt like a parody fight that was trying way too hard, almost like gcbtw: the trial, especially with her flailing impotently for 35% or so of the fight. At least it suggests dynamis isn't all it's cracked up to be, especially since she had swallowed multiple worlds' worth of despair. But you're right, at least it sits differently because for me, there's zero real regret involved with bringing her low. Just wish her creator could be scrubbed out of the art at the end.

It feels like the story is gaslighting me about Venat and Hermes in particular to sweep under the rug the balanced, shades-of-grey Hydaelyn/Zodiark conflict presented in Shadowbringers to not-so-subtly present Live-Laugh-Love's genocide in a much better light, like the writers are telling me "see? The Ascians didn't have this much of a point, because they were pretty bad and never had any hope against Meteion". We wouldn't want to feel too bad for them after all, would we?

If they thought that'd work, they are very mistaken.

(Just finished your post... it resonates a lot with me in terms of the aspects of EW I disliked...)