(EW Spoilers) Tales from the Dawn #5 - Days Gone By, Days Yet to Come

[jameseoakes]

I think you're projecting stuff that isn't there. I would not characterize Venat's words as "vile hate spiteladen" at all.

The scene in question:



I mean, that literally lays in plain Endwalker's message: "Suffering exists, and we cannot pretend otherwise. [...] If we would live, we must accept it as our constant companion. Let us not seek to forget [...] tragedy. Let us carry it in our hearts, that we may grow stronger and know true happiness." True happiness here being in contrast to the fake happiness that would come from ignoring trauma and pretending bad things didn't happen or can be just waved away. It's not that "constant suffering" forges "better people", rather, pretending that suffering doesn't exist is unhealthy. And the scene goes on to show how Venat's judgement made shit bad for a long-ass time. It literally stains her in black to show she is not blameless for it.

Venat's speech is impassioned, then sad, then resolute. Never hateful or spiteful.

Again, the message and themes of Endwalker are not particularly complex, but they're pretty well defined.



Yeah, that's what I meant by "in a way that causes trauma for generations" and "in a terrible terrible no good way". Ancients are unique in their capacity for inhumanity by the sheer scale of their powers.

I think ranting at people who are standing in the burning ruins ruins of there city and struggling to cope with the loss of there loved ones and then to purge them for not reacting in the way she demands so she can replace them with races she can force to respond in the correct way to be anything other than spite. Also her speach as she kills everyone is worth of a villain and drips with hate and malice, Venat was a monster. Your right the ancients are capable of inhumanly evil acts though the ones we see doing that are Veant and Hermes both extremely evil monsters who the story is very soft on, though given the acts of people like Zenos the people Venat replaces the ancients with are as bad if not worse.

[SannaR]

I think ranting at people who are standing in the burning ruins ruins of there city and struggling to cope with the loss of there loved ones and then to purge them for not reacting in the way she demands so she can replace them with races she can force to respond in the correct way to be anything other than spite. Also her speach as she kills everyone is worth of a villain and drips with hate and malice, Venat was a monster. Your right the ancients are capable of inhumanly evil acts though the ones we see doing that are Veant and Hermes both extremely evil monsters who the story is very soft on, though given the acts of people like Zenos the people Venat replaces the ancients with are as bad if not worse.

I doubt she actually went and did that. Her whole now man will have to walk isn't meant to be taken as how things must have literally played out.

[Zero-ELEC]

*snipped for space*

The scene is clearly allegorical. The Final Days were "over" by the time Venat becomes Hydaelyn, and it is made explicit she fought against Zodiark before the sundering. This is especially clear since we see Hythlodaeus go on to be sacrificed and people being eaten by terminus beasts while at the same time Zodiark exists to be worshiped, which makes it clear it's not an actual point in time. Venat is also not "ranting" at people standing in a burning city, either; it's a dialogue and it's presented in a very clear way. There's no shouting, no wild talking, no tirade from her. Nothing that would qualify as a rant.

And, once again, I must ask you to read the dialogue (or failing that watch the cutscene here). There's no hate or malice in any of the words she says, nor in any of the acting by any of the voice actors. Nothing like that "drips" from any of the dialogue. I would certainly not characterize her speech as one of a villain either. I could see it from an antagonist in another context, mind, but not a villain. Maybe an anti-villain in the right story (i.e. not this one). She's certainly not a villain in a literary sense here. Maybe not in any sense? Layman's terms has villain as opposite of a hero (conflating with antagonist), while villain as a stock character (the blackhat) is nothing close to Venat.

You may consider her a monster because of her actions and that's perfectly valid, but you don't have to make stuff up about her motivations or stuff for your feelings to be true. Your feelings about Venat's actions are perfectly valid. However, Venat, textually did all she did without malice, hate, or spite.

Related, note that I keep insisting that ancients are unique in their capacity for inhumanity by sheer scale of their powers because not because they were "worse" people like you imply I'm saying there (individual ancients are clearly as much people as any other, no worse, no better), but because they were more capable of bringing their "bad" to bear, again, by their sheer power. We see this in Pandæmonium, we see this with the modern unsundered Ascians. They literally are so powerful that a depressed bird breeder made a being that brought about the end of countless civilisations throughout the universe. That a misanthropic theatre devotee manage to set up multiple empires designed to cause untold chaos and orchestrated to literally end 7 worlds full of millions of people. That a scientist with delusions of godhood almost literally became one by sacrificing their child. Modern humanity, at its worse, caused terrible things to happen with the help of the remnants of the ancients, whether their knowledge, direct intervention, or literal remnants of the empires they orchestrated the downfall of. A singular human, even a powerful one like Zenos, can only do so much.

[jameseoakes]

You may consider her a monster because of her actions and that's perfectly valid, but you don't have to make stuff up about her motivations or stuff for your feelings to be true. Your feelings about Venat's actions are perfectly valid. However, Venat, textually did all she did without malice, hate, or spite.

Sorry betraying and wiping out your own race requires malice hate or spite. In almost any other game Venat would be a monster for choice to murder her world, honestly I find her writing evil.

[jameseoakes]

Sorry betraying and wiping out your own race requires malice hate or spite. In almost any other game Venat would be a monster for choice to murder her world, honestly I find her writing evil.

Also I think it was one of the worst bits of writing to do one of the most import event in the world in some bizarre is it real sympathy fest for the main monster of the game. The writers either needed to show it in a clear scene or skip over it. Honestly Endewalkers writing is vile, normalising extremely abusive and controlling love and outright genocidal eugenics

[Zero-ELEC]

Sorry betraying and wiping out your own race requires malice hate or spite. In almost any other game Venat would be a monster for choice to murder her world, honestly I find her writing evil.

Ah, my mistake, I thought we were having a serious conversation. I'll stop derailing this thread. Have a good one!