The Black Mage in the Opening Cinematic

[Tanama]

Hello everyone.

A little over a year ago, Fernehalwes wrote this:

the Midlander male, Miqo’te female, Roegadyn male, Elezen female, and Lalafell female in the recent trailers are in fact the same ones that appeared in the 1.0 trailer! (Yes, the black mage is the Elezen female from the morbol party, not the snooty male from the Midlander’s party. The robe & hat conceal some of her more distinguishing features, and we all know there was no bust size adjustment feature back in 1.0).

Upon reading this a few weeks ago I scratched my head as well as many others that thought the black mage from the 2.0 was a man. After repeatedly watching both opening scenes and carefully analyzing them closely with still-frames and slow motion I came to the conclusion that the Black Mage is definitely a male.

One of the first clues that I and pretty much everyone else sees is during the scene when the heroes appear in the woods, the black mage leads them to the light. If you pay close attention to the BLM's movements they look incredibly masculine when compared to the female elezen's majestically feminine movements in the 1.0 cinematic.

Take a look at these screens I captured.






Yeah. That looks absolutely nothing like the female elezen.


The black mage looks a lot more like this fellow:

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Now let us take a closer look at the featured Black Mage CG Wallpaper available from the FFXIV Fan kit which displays the same BLM from 2.0's opening cinematic.


Original image

If you glance closely you can see his eye and nose are pretty much identical to the male elezen's. You can tell especially from the bit nose that we can see.



So what it boils down to is the black mage is clearly a male. Further backed by him not looking anything like the female elezen in the face shots we see of him and his masculine movements. Below, I will post a series of images in spoiler tags of the male and female elezen so that you can inspect further.

If the talented team at Visual Works didn't use the male elezen from the 1.0 cinematic, then they created another male. As hard as I tried to see the Black Mage as the female elezen, it just never stuck with me. So much that it lead to this thread.

I cannot really make a case for the eye color because they changed the 1.0 Miqote's eye color from brown to blue in the 2.0 cinematic. But for reference you can see the female elezen's eye color is green and the male's is blue like in the CG Black Mage wallpaper.

So what do you think?

[Tanama]

Here are a series of images of the Male and Female elezen I captured for further inspection.

Female Elezen:

Male Elezen:

Even the male's skin tone more closely matches that of the Black Mage's face. Though, the nose difference is what really gives it away.

[Enkidoh]

The BLM looked female to me, you can see a hint of a bust shape under that weird mantle thing BLM AF has - the BLM's AF robe also has a narrow waist too, much narrower than what I'd expect a male elezen to have. And besides, the quote you posted from Ferne, word-of-God basically stated that BLM is the female GLA from Derplander's Echo-vision in the original opening movie - Ferne is the head lorewriter for the game - whatever he says actually happened in the game. Therefore, he said that BLM is the female elezen, so it is the female elezen. End of story.

If there is a discrepancy in the CG graphic of the BLM in the opening, blame Square Enix Visual Works for not cross-referencing, as they're the ones who made the trailer, not the FFXIV Development team.

[YunieAura]

The cheekbone/cheek/jaw difference between the two makes the 2.0 cutscene BLM look a little more masculine to me, but still hard to tell.... @_@

[Nahara]

The shape of the cheeks of the BLM also matches the shape of the male elezen. They have an inward curve while the female's face is more rounded.

[BobbinT]

Let's also not forget that we're missing a dragoon and monk from that end of era movie. The female elezen would be considered for either role.

Still haven't got the foggiest why those jobs and that particular person were omitted.

And remember the original 1.0 opening where these group were inspecting their leves, which consist of male hume, male elezen, and female mi'qote. When this male hume gazing upon this particular leve card (which resembles a farmer pointing to some sort of hurricane), he suddenly jumped consciousness into another realm (or a dream) which he parties with different group that consist of female lalafell, male reoqgadyn, and yes: female elezen.

I guess in the end the rest of jobs were deemed not fitting into the end of era climax or something, and that female elezen were kinda out of job suited for her role. Who knows? Would love some shed of lights if it's possible.

And finally, here's a move that some of us dreamed having it realized and never did: back in 1.0 opening cinematic where this female lalafell cast a fire spell into this male hume's arrow and he proceed to shoot it toward the giant monster and cause it engulfed in flames.

BTW, think most of us already knew that BLM is in fact a male elezen. No female b**bs remember? lol

[axemtitanium]

The female Elezen used a phial of fantasia. Problem solved.

[Enkidoh]

Let's also not forget that we're missing a dragoon and monk from that end of era movie. The female elezen would be considered for either role.

Still haven't got the foggiest why those jobs and that particular person were omitted.

Simple, MNK and DRG are both DD Jobs - already reached the four member light party limit sorry - DRG and MNK got the short end of the stick.

And remember the original 1.0 opening where these group were inspecting their leves, which consist of male hume, male elezen, and female mi'qote. When this male hume gazing upon this particular leve card (which resembles a farmer pointing to some sort of hurricane), he suddenly jumped consciousness into another realm (or a dream) which he parties with different group that consist of female lalafell, male reoqgadyn, and yes: female elezen.

It was clear Derplander was using the Echo to jump into someone's memories - that original quote Tanama mentioned from Ferne was from a thread on the old Lodestone forum talking about this very subject. Ferne basically stated outright the Echo sent Derplander back into someone, or something's, memories of the Battle of Silvertear Skies, which is where he first 'met' the female elezen (who was GLA at the time), female lalafell (then a THM) and male roegadyn (who was MRD). The Guildleve is a 'Resolve' type by the way, but I'm not sure if it's available in the game though (either 1.0 or ARR).

I guess in the end the rest of jobs were deemed not fitting into the end of era climax or something, and that female elezen were kinda out of job suited for her role. Who knows? Would love some shed of lights if it's possible.

As I said, they were probably just trying to render a standard four member 'Light Party' and just decided to go with BLM and BRD, there's probably no real reason behind it other than just plain pragmatism.

And finally, here's a move that some of us dreamed having it realized and never did: back in 1.0 opening cinematic where this female lalafell cast a fire spell into this male hume's arrow and he proceed to shoot it toward the giant monster and cause it engulfed in flames.

A number of spells used in both the original opening and several other scenes in 1.0 (like Papalymo's 'magitek bullet absorbing spell' during the 'Future's Perfect' scene) never actually appeared in 1.0 - it's likely Tanaka was planning on eventually introducing it, but when Yoshi took over, that, like a lot of things about 1.0, never eventuated. Anyway, we've gone way off track here.

[Tanama]

If there is a discrepancy in the CG graphic of the BLM in the opening, blame Square Enix Visual Works for not cross-referencing, as they're the ones who made the trailer, not the FFXIV Development team.

This.

I know Ferne is the loremaster of FFXIV though I bet if Ferne himself unmasked the CG BLM in the SE Visual Works department, he'd find a male under the veil. The only official image of BLM that actually looks feminine is this one.

[Altimis]

I never see that BLM in movie as female

Never

Its obvious "he" is male and I was right since start

Wat? there peoples serious think that BLM is female? lol