Something I really love about these games is everyone gets a little something different. I personally tend to see themes of addiction in a lot of the souls games because I've battled with it for so long and others see things they have personal experiences with way more than others. I love sitting down and seeing how other people are able to put everything together through their own lens.
This video has made the last hour and a half ish wait for my CE of SotE that little bit more bearable. So thank you. Also very insightful and will give me food for thought once I get playing.
Crunchy, this was amazing. Probably the most relevatory Elden Ring lore video I've seen since your one on alchemy. Please please bring Centered Tarnished back on after the DLC drops.
Both of you guys have successfully put into words my feelings on Elden Rings' lore better than I ever could have. Haven't even started this yet but I am super excited to get started. Much admiration to the both of you.
It's great to see Centered Tarnished get the recognition he deserves. He's one of the only creators who slices through the general confusion in the lore community. Rather than accept elements of the game at face value, he approaches Elden Ring from a wider, psychological perspective. This perspective has allowed Centered to create a kind of grand unifying theory of what is really going on in the game. I'm surprised more people haven't picked up on his approach. Out of all the creators, I feel he's the closest to unravelling the story.
Good discussion, like the ideas brought in. I think the analysis would be strengthened by a more sociological analysis, still from the same ideas of parable and not looking too closely into facts. In this view you can see Marika as civilization as a whole, the “trauma” as an inevitable result of imbalances in forces or pervasive ideas or understanding or ways of living in that civilization. Flowing from this, and focusing on eras, the elden lord becomes the pervasive idea or force of cohesion through an era. First came Godfrey, speaking to cohesion and creating a society through the idea of strength and pure force of will. Then comes radagon who is more about “tradition”/“faith”/“religion”. The alchemical themes of colors are shown here, in the triangle of gold (tradition), silver (innovation) and red/copper (strength). Then you can look at Marika’s kids as “dipoles” that come out and are exaggerated under each of those frameworks for living/operating in a society. E.g. Marika and Radagons kids have gold/gold parents so represent what happens to a society under more strict adherence to tradition. In line with the themes of Sekiro, Malenia is rot/stagnation - a result of lack of progress and circulating ideas and getting fresh water/ideas into the system. Miquella is the strive for purity that comes out of strong ideas of tradition, and then ties into the lotus that blooms from the rot. Gold/silver/copper can be seen in the parents of Marika’s kids and all her kids can be viewed this way. Renalla is silver and Godfrey is copper. Then we can see different philosophies coming out of this world (e.g. the endings, the mending runes) as ideas about how to better or “fix” society - in the context of its growing imbalance and harms. A lot of the endings speak to a certain incrementalism, where we tweak aspects of the current order to better society. Miquella’s work can be kinda seen in this light, but I think more closely tied to “optimising”/“purifying” the society as a whole. Then you have Ranni’s ending which seems to be about breaking away and doing a different thing (Ranni being tied to silver/innovation). And then we have the frenzied flame which is more of a, we gotta break the whole thing all the way down to address the active harms in society. I feel like a lot of the lore could be read through this perspective - e.g. the Nox being banished underground because its innovation (silver) was becoming a threat to tradition (gold) - much like what often occurs in history around the suppression of ideas by the dominant faction for the purpose of preserving the dominant ideology. Another example - Radagon coming after Godfrey as Elden lord referencing that one of the common ways to keep a society cohesive/keep power as the dominant faction after a period of conquest/war is through the establishment of order, tradition or homogeneity. Sorry - long one but I hope it makes some sense. I don’t think this conflicts with the psychological view, I think there’s likely an assumption through the themes that there is a macro-micro convergence - that the “psyche” of a society/common understanding of the people comes out of or matches in some way the psychology of the individuals in that society
Love that you guys are doing this! Y'all are expanding lore scholarship into literary analysis of characters, and that's a great enrichment of the community and the tools we use to understand these amazing games
it was only a matter of time centered tarnished got in collaboration with other elden ring theorists. he's probably the only creator (that i know) that goes really deep into the psychology of the game instead of the other parts (alchemy, mythology, etc)
I love how right Tarnished was about Marika being severely traumatized. In a way, there was a miscarriage, or... there were multiple ones, with all the other Shamans dying in the jars, instead of being reborn as gods. They were divine miscarriages.
I had started writing an essay about how Marika seemed like someone suffering from MDD or some kind of depression, whether the kind that is a normal response to tragedy or not. I never finished it, but this video is pretty validating, she’s suffered a lot of loss & the change in reactions to it over time make sense. Depression is just one stage of grief, & the stages aren’t always in order
When crunchy said “there should be something terrible that happened to marika that explains why she did this” is so insanely prophetic because of the whole shaman lore from the dlc.
Really solid discussion here, will definitely check out TheCenteredTarnished after this. I definitely think there’s something to the Jungian approach given how popular that framework (or at least allusions to it) is in Japanese RPGs.
Few random ideas to throw around until June 21st: -Did Marika have a 'psychotic episode' after Godwyn's death (and the many other nameless demigods that night)? Or was she more controlled and calculated about why she shattered the Elden Ring? Obviously any parent that loses a child (or children) isn't going to be completely level headed but some are totally devastated. The game leads you to believe that is was more calculated, but to what degree? -What role did Radagon play in Marika frantically shattering the Elden Ring? Losing Godwyn (the golden child) was devastating but fighting against oneself is even more daunting. Through (I believe) Melina's recounting of Marika's words about Radagon, she addressed him in words directly that he was not yet her, not yet a god. Addressing yourself (other self) openly is (I think) in and of itself a psychotic break. Reaching the point where your actions are now predicated on what you think your other self is going to do, is clearly not a stable state of mind, leading to erratic decisions not calculated ones. -I also feel that understanding where in the timeline Radagon comes in at is a Major topic that isn't brought up enough. If he was always part of Marika from birth then this psychotic back and forth has its fingerprints on the whole story and we need to look at it from Radagon's perspective too because right now we only bring him up where his name appears... Could lead to more thoughts here... -Curses: Speaking of Radagon, I've heard a few people believing that he spawned after Marika cursed the last Fire Giant. How or what caused this needs to be looked into more if we're trying to understand Marika. Also, I have a theory about the Elden Ring and how it is a curse. I am a believer that absolute power corrupts absolutely and that the Elden Ring is this absolute power. How this power affects (or is it effect, ugh anyway) those in contact with it is very near sighted. Lets start with... Rennala: Possessor of the Great Rune of Rebirth (how Radagon gave her this before the shattering makes no sense but that's another topic) loses her damn mind and is completely transfixed with one thing and nothing else (the curse) and delves completely into it, losing all awareness for anything else. Godrick: Want's more power to return his lineage back to the Golden days and will do any disgusting thing to do so, again losing all awareness for anything else. Rykard: I mean, why else would you let a giant snake feed on you?? Gotta be cursed lol. Malenia: Why she travels down to Caelid is debatable.. but refusing to lose to Radahn and throwing away your sanity by pushing out your unnalloyed golden needle and blooming is very near sighted and in a fight her ego would be the only thing on her mind leading to her desperate actions. -I started to ramble there (tired) but I'll leave it hear. Tell me your thoughts everyone.
The dynamic between Marika and Miquella always reminded me of the classic fairytale stories about changelings, as well as the folklore that inspired the fairytales. Miquella never ages, yet is a prodigy of intellect and scientific/religious meddling, almost like an old man pretending to be a child (like a changeling). Moreover, the Ainsel River is literally named after a fairytale about a child outsmarting a fairy, and Siofra means "changeling". It is almost like post-partum mania where the mother falls prey to a paranoia about her newborn not being her actual child. Miquella even has "fairy wings" or diaphanous insect wings, so what if he is NOT Marika's child? What if he is her child, but she never embraced him as such. Most item descriptions speak of him and his father.
@@CenteredTarnished I also wanted to add that my fiancee had made an interesting observation about Miquella and Peter Pan. When I told her about how Miquella never grows from his static child state, she said that his "never growing up" reminded her of Peter Pan. This intrigued me because the more I thought about it, the more parallels I saw. One, we must take Miquella's hand to travel to Never-Never Land (the Shadowlands). Two, Peter Pan has a Shadow with a will of its own (St Trina, perhaps, or Malenia, who has a NEEDLE to stitch the Scarlet Rot in check, much as how Peter must stitch his shadow to his feet to keep it under his control, or it could be his shadowbound beast that we never see). Three, there are fairy associations with Miquella, much like with Peter Pan and Tinker Bell. Miquella is a tinker himself, and like Tinker Bell is a "Whitesmith" or maker of things, such as bells and needles. A tinker literally makes things of tin, which helps prevent corrosion. Other parallels are JM Berrie himself, a man who was a friend of William Sharp (aka Fiona Mcleod). The whole William Sharp/Fiona Macleod account is a fascinating read because he was a man who embraced his Anima (to borrow a Jungian concept) as his writing persona. Miyazaki evidently read Macleod's poetry for Deracine, and it made an impression. Not to be too unhinged, but Berrie, Sharp/Macleod, Arthur Machen and many other Celtic Rennaissance peoples were members of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, people who tried to find spiritual meaning in the works of Hermes Trismegistus. Anyhow, Barrie named Wendy after the young daughter of a fellow writer (Margaret Henley) who died at the age of five from meningitis, dedicating Peter Pan to her and the Davies boys. Like the Water Babies, a lot of children books were inspired by child mortality rates. Since Miyazaki became a father the fear of losing a child is obviously on his mind.
0h how i LOVE listening to this after the latest fromS pic dropped... ovo you two have def inspired me to throw out another #justiceformarika take 🐉🚬🌚🔥 love to listen to you two Devas togetha ❤🔥my fav otolawgical therapy.
Extremely preemptive comment here, but I just wanted to say I’ve been thinking about the split you guys are trying to describe between people who focus on assembling the “facts” of these games’ narrative aspects and the people who are coming at things with a comparatively holistic PoV - holistic in the sense that the interpretations are utilizing systems of thought external to the internal narratives. I think a good way of describing this difference of approach is in terms of exotericism vs. esotericism. These approaches can and should coexist, just as science is balanced against poetics, but I do really prefer the latter, because I think the esoteric approach reveals deeper facets of the world we inhabit, which constitutes its own sort of mystery.
Phenomenal discussion. The alchemical influences have been known for so long, but no one's really gone into the spiritual and psychological meaning behind alchemy. Hope you guys do a part 2 soon!
Godwyn is also a special case though. he is pretty much the only god-child that remains unafflicted by any ailments (until that one fateful night, of course). he is also Godfrey and Marika's firstborn, which is very important to consider once you remember that G.R.R.M is the author of the story, and he is very obsessed with heritage and lineage.
I think also the fact that the elden ring being the thing that shapes the world. it being an esoteric... yet almost physical representation of the the values and beliefs of the world. with the way it can be constructed by the god/elden lord. then those values, beliefs, and stuff are made manifest. i don't find the world itself being a representation if marikas psyche (broken, stuck, and in disrepair) all that hard to fathom. I am not sure i fully agree, but i think its definitely in line. i think there is definitely gusts of that. i think the world is real, but i think those factors as listed above actually contribute to it. The age of plenty is youth, and not seeing the harshness of the world. then the end of it is that reality setting in (teenage to early 20s). adjustments are made (going into 30ish) where you get radagon, and a new age that is fine for a while. then if his miscarriage theory is right then you have the shattering, and everything from there with the exact way the world is.
Well, it now makes sense why the continent of the lands between looks like a brain being viewed on the right side, as the right hemisphere is supposed to be dominant over the left. Right controls the left side of the body, and vice versa. Heck, the tree is in the direct center of the continent.
Speaking of Godfrey. I noticed that the Beastclaw Hammer's ash of war is Regal Claw, the AoW of Axe of Godfrey is Regal Roar and the pattern on his axe looks like the ones on the Beastman weapons. So Axe of Godfrey was given to him by Serosh and his beastman the moment he was taken on Hoarah Loux's back.
I agree. But I also want to add an interpretation, that TA came up with, that I agree with, where Godfrey actually defeats Serosh (A lord of the prior age of beasts) with his own weapon (which went on to symbolise the union of the Golden Lineage). Godfrey’s whole character is of taking a crown by strength of battle. This is something Godwyn also does with Fortissax, but it’s very interesting that Godfrey would’ve popularised this practice with his defeat of Serosh with his own Axe (there’s a giant scar on Serosh) before befriending him - which I also think that went on to symbolise the Golden Lineage AND popularise the act of having a shadowbeast I also think, because of the culture in the past, that Serosh admired that Godfrey defeated him - because, back then, a defeat would be less bitter, and more honourable
Messmer and Melina are twins; Melina died in childbirth, Marika shattered the Elden Ring and somehow brought Melina back to guide the Tarnished. Source: I made it up
This is going to be way longer than I planned and it feels a bit unhinged and disorganized to me. But these are my thoughts on the lore after listening to the discussion in this video. It rest a lot on the hypothesis that Marika's psychology affects the Lands Between and the characters, and the idea that she lost a child. More specifically, she had to sacrifice a twin in the womb to save the other one, or lose both. It starts when Radagon was sent to Liurna to conquer the Lands Between through war, but eventually united with them, showing growth from the previous attitude of Godfrey (Unification through alliance instead of conquest). The reason for his departure is said to be Godfrey's Banishment (Radagon left Rennala to become the second Elden Lord) but he did leave the Amber egg with her at the same moment. I believe the Amber Egg represent that lost child (the egg also containing the rune of the Unborn), and is the reason Radagon(Marika) left. After all, it can be very hard for couples to stay together after something like a miscarriage. Out of their 3 children (Radhan, Rykard and Ranni), only Radhan and Rykard have shards. Ranni doesn't (she had one but got rid of it as far as the game tells us), but the Amber egg does. Ranni is also the only empyrean born of 2 different parents (exceptions to Queen Marika and the Gloam-Eyed Queen... if Rennala doesn't turn out to also be Marika, somehow...) as opposed to Miquella and Malenia. After Radagon left to join Marika, they had Malenia, representing rot and decay, and Miquella, representing eternal youth. 2 opposite concepts which I think Marika had to deal with after losing her child, both born from herself. Malenia's Scarlet Rot drives people to act like beast and eats at their memories, similar to a depression mixed with anger (anger at the gods, greater will, fate or even herself for the lost of an unborn child) but also a regression from the evolution we see in the Lands Between (in the beastmen of Farum Azula becoming more civilized). In a way, the Scarlet Rot reflect the lost of your ability to repress the worst parts of yourself. The rot is resisted thanks to Miquella's needle (to me, Miquella is a representation of Marika's hope for her lost child that never was, making them eternally alive as a child. The gender of Miquella being unclear might also be due to the fact that they died in the womb, in a state between the shift from female to male). Miquella might also represent a denial of what happened, able to stop the spread of the Scarlet rot (depression) for a moment, but not able to cure it, before it becomes too much and is eventually released in Caelid, and later infect Miquella's Haligtree. The tree being infected might also represent how, of the two options, the rot is winning. The blooming of Malenia against Radhan, the "last" main event of the shattering before we arrive in the Lands Betweens, represent to me Marika giving in to her depression. I used to think that Marika was imprisoned in the tree by the Greater Will after shattering the Elden ring, but I now think that she is her own captor. She has locked herself in her grief, leaving the lands between to rot. If no one is able to gather the shards and bring them to back together, the scarlet rot will spread and eventually consume everything. Radagon is the part of her still trying to fix things and move on, but he is also stuck inside the tree by his own thorns, missing the essential parts of the ring but unwilling or unable to go get them himself. Maybe he is the part that still believes in the greater will or what they believed before, but it is not enough anymore, the Elden ring he has left is missing too many parts that he can't replace on his own. When the Night of Black Knives happens, Ranni (the only child without a rune) kills her body and the mind(spirit) of Godwyn. With the hypothesis of Marika having twins and then having to chose to save one over the other. I believe Ranni is the twin that was saved and the egg represent the sacrifice. The rune of the Unborn mentions "Great Rune of unborn demigods." with an emphasis on demigodS, plural. I believe Ranni was "born anew" by the Rune after "murdering Godwyn", making her "frail and short-lived. Imperfect beings". She is stuck as s spirit possessing dolls and falling asleep for long periods of time. For Godwyn: The Golden Order starts with Godwyn's birth and it last unimpeded until his death, when everything starts to fall apart. In a way, Godwyn seems to represent the Golden Order itself, or Marika's faith in the Golden Order. Marika having to chose one twin over the other leads to her losing her faith. In this interpretation, the endings (spoilers) represent the possible paths for Marika: the Age of Order is her going back to her previous faith (maybe with an even stronger belief than before), the Age of Stars (according to the Japanese text) is the opposite, a departure from that previous faith and order and moving on to something completely new and far away. The Age of the Duskborn is her accepting the death of her child and moving on (Godwyn becoming the god of death), living in peace with her faith and the destined death. And finally the Lord of Frenzied Flame ending is Marika giving in to anger and losing everything (a complete Ego death). The Age of Fracture, where no "choice" is made, is denial of the problem itself, going back to what once was without actually dealing with was happened or the consequences which will eventually lead to the Scarlet rot taking over. I think Melina's quest of freeing destined death and burning the Erdtree (her locked cell) is what's left of Queen Marika will to move on. She hasn't totally given up yet, but she isn't actively trying to fix things. Instead she is waiting on someone else for help. I doubt this hypothesis will hold when the DLC comes out and we learn more about Marika's past and Miquella, but I would love to hear people's opinions (constructive or not).
Also the loss of faith/will is much more clearly attributed to the omen births than some contrived sacrifice/miscarriage plot and or the golden wills desire to feed godwyn to the dying erdtree
I wonder if the miscarriage thing could be about her having omen children or cursed children, rather than a literal miscarriage. Maybe even Godwyn dying had that impact
It’s definitely possible. She could view her womb as this accursed place and no matter the attempts, fails to conceive a healthy child. But then you have to ask yourself, where normal prior to the shattering when they found the shards and that is in fact what curses them? Also, it seems very likely that Marika had a hand in the NoBK so her going into mourning after that seems unlikely. But then again, she could have seen it as a necessary evil for the betterment of the world. Haha too many damn what if’s
The world of the "Shadow"-- and by extension the worlds that COULD have been... are theoretically just as real as the world that IS. I firmly believe Marika and Miquella both came to this realization and divested themselves of their corporeal forms in order to traverse to this alternate branch in reality. The stories we form ourselves are far more meaningful than any singular version of the truth the author can hope to tell themselves, and I think no one pulls this off better than Miyazaki and his signature approach to storytelling. I hope the DLC delves deeper into these themes of "Free Will"-- or lack thereof, the relation between the conscious, the unconscious, and consciousness itself, and the metaphysics of reality that I've noticed Miyazaki has been trying to explore within these games.
I'm only about a half hour in, so sorry if it was already brought up: I was listening to Smoughtown's summary of the story and suggestion that the death of Godwyn the Golden was the big catalyst for Marika shattering the Elden Ring. What if Godwyn was the twin of the child which Marika had lost? Whether it was an accident or sacrifice, that might embitter her to the Greater Will, and the symbolism of losing the other child would easily be the final nail in the coffin. Of course with the actual DLC, there could be revelations which make that unlikely but it just came to me and fun to speculate on.
The "map is a womb" theory is so spot-on. It's so obvious now-now that someone has said it. The Erdtree being at the womb's center represents its life-giving power; the "Weeping Peninsula" perhaps represents the vagina; the Elden Ring is the genetic material that defines life. What the Shattering means is that Marika has lost her ability to produce healthy children-Godwyn perhaps being her one and only. The real-life event that inspired this metaphor may even have been an ectopic pregnancy that led to miscarriage, with Caelid representing the inflamed fallopian tube where it occurred. And the crater at the center of the landmass represents the absence of the child-which I'm thinking is Messmer, who's perhaps the twin brother of Godwyn.
All of marikas kids came out cursed. While all of radaghons kids without her came out fine. Even though shes the same person, i bet she was so jealous.
i think that the DLC will show that Merica the Eternal means far more than we think. i think she is not so much real but a "concept" i think she is the polar opposite of the glome eyed queen in a very literal way. so try to follow my logic, obviously we know the G.E.Q is the aspect of death and Merica is Birth and life, but what does that mean? how is Merica also Radigan? she is MUCH deeper into the concept of rebirth... she DOESNT die... she is reincarnation... she doesnt die because she isnt alive, she is CONSTANT life .. i believe she Is Radigan as much as she is also Merican ... but also Astel... and Miquela.. these are ALL Merica and not as 'A child of Merica but she is Merica re-encarnet she is a "child" of her own cycle of being reborn. and the newest trailer has a pile of bodies as she takes from them her golden hair ..... isnt something she DID but rather the bodies ARE her bodies of previous versions of herself which is why they are melting into eachother . it was how she is "asending"
In my humble opinion Marika's "original problem" is the lack of bodily autonomy. Ranni talks about it, i think, because she saw and possibly talked to Marika. Her body is quite literally not her own. She has the power of god but no free will, no real choice. She has to have a dude by her side and carry his children and still those children are often messed up by powers outside of her influence. Girl must be so angry. No wonder Ranni would rather kill herself and her half brother than go through it
Elden ring seems to be, on a very fundamental level, about bodily autonomy and birth. I don't really get why that part is so easily overlooked by the fandom. I will not attempt to put it into words because my English is horrible, but still.
That perfectly explains why she is so aggressively against being under the view or control of the order. I mean, she more or less reviles it. Makes it clear she won't be puppet to the fingers or order they represent. It just isn't immediately obvious how deep that runs. I know I used to just assume that she was more generally referring to the whole "Empyrean Pipeline" where your whole life is decided for you, or more specifically about severing her own fingers. But what she's really thinking of is godhood a'la greater will then, isn't she? It would make perfect sense that seeing what becomes of an empyrean who ascends to true godhood would be why. It also makes Marika's and Ranni's actions being so uncannily parallel at different points in the main plot make more sense. I've suspected for a while now that a lot of Marika's apparent hypocrisy is due to a lack of full agency in things. Just on its face, it is kinda obvious that her role wouldn't permit that. When I think back on the key events, we kind of see a picture of Marika's agency crumbling over the course of failures catching up to her. When she failed to hold her Golden Order and fulfill her pact with the ring, it was all stripped of her. I can't think back to prove it but I think that loss was always creeping up on her and neither she nor us were made privy to it. The more you serve the Greater Will, the more it seems to consume of you. I think the most likely general explanation is that there were glimmers where Marika did get her own will across. I wonder, would she shatter the ring just to set in motion her escape attempt? Did Ranni perhaps also understand this about Marika? This takes out the need for them to directly conspire, where there have been questions of that in the past. She might've just understood Marika's predicament and thus enacted her own plan with the benefit of understanding what Marika would likely do because of her own situation.
@@differentbutsimilar7893 you cooked so fucking good right now. So much of Marika's character to me is paradoxical in relationship to power and control. To be above all else, control of life, birth, death and destiny, to have killed/imprisoned all other deities, to be a living god/emperor/queen... Yet, your children are malformed, what you birth is destined to flame, rot or something worse. Marika has an unparalleled agency as a supreme being, but as a person? As a mother? She is completely helpless. I'm not saying she and Ranni are good, innocent people, but everyone can understand what it is like to be imprisoned and desperate, trying to break the chains, even if it has to be with your teeth.
I always wondered how renalla and radagon got their hands on the great rune of the unborn before the shattering. Maybe Godwin was this unborn child and that's what first caused her to tamper with the cycle of life and death, years before the shattering Edit: I also feel like elden ring is really just a magical divorce. Like radagon is the ultimate divorced dad but she just doesnt want him anymore. He wants to trap or control her so his devotion is meaningless to her. Also final question. If marika is this sympathetic character who lost a child and loves her children, why does she tell them all to fight each other or they will all be sacrificed? Or is that Radagon speaking with her voice?
part of me wish we never figure out whats truly going on in the lore of this game. its the mystery that makes it all so appealing, and solving the mystery would be less fulfilling than the hunt itself. its the thrill, that there is more to learn. that we can't say for sure we have all the answers... we have clues and leads, but ultimately nobody knows the truth, and that's what keeps us all chasing the dragon, so to speak. btw no pun intended, but the game even features dragon hunting as an essential part of the lore, and despite our best efforts we have not yet fought the greatest of them all - Placidusax is strong, but he is not the strongest... its like poetry; just like the mystery itself, we're very close to the strongest dragon (he is literally petrified in Leyndell) yet so far from actually securing that trophy... him being petrified (thus denying us access to his heart) may also be symbolic here, as it represents us - as players - literally never figuring out the true answer to the riddle... but we'll keep guessing (thus chasing the dragon we know we can't catch) won't we?
Centered Tarnished is dead-on with his analysis, I think as much hitting things that make evrything else make sense: like Bloodborne being about the evolution of surgery and anasthesia usage in Edinburgh, CT provides the necessary threads that being in the game alone cannot, because ER isn't just about the fictional entities within the game, but the world the game is begotten from
I saw the centered tarnished a few months ago for the first time. At first I was like "wtf" but then it all clicked and his take on elden ring started to make the other lore videos I watched make more sense. Thanks for having him on!
It is interesting that you guys brought up the idea that the ruler of the world conjures forth the world from their mind. It is a theme in other Fromsoft games, namely Demon's Souls and Dark Souls 2. It would make sense to apply it to Elden Ring as well
he clearly has far more personal influence on the story than i first thought. initially i only got the obvious clues like castle morne (the sword of morne) which serves as an obvious reference to game of thrones, but after 2 years of "scholarship" its obvious he has much more to do with the intricate parts of the story. it goes beyond the mere "cameo" type of influence i thought he had at first.
Aw man, I'll probably get off work the moment this is over. (Edit: lol, Oh, I thought this was live. Nevermind. Still, my comment is the same.) I have to say, I always thought Marika/Numen are just like humans, with perhaps slightly different physiology, namely longevity. However, mentally, they may also seem similar at first, but they have a more insect-like way of thinking. This leads to some incredibly cold and logical actions by Marika, willing to sacrifice not just herself, but her own children as pawns. Perhaps anyway, it's one interpretation. There are signs of genuine love and affection that we as humans view as healthy from Marika, but even then it could be more of a general, evenly spread love for the civilization she's built, like a hive or nest, not her own direct offspring. Of course much of this I've gathered from the in game placement of Numen related things, alongside giant ants and the pests, but I would argue it's more like Bees and their hierarchical structure, especially how new "Queens" are chosen/created.
Hey Crunchy am i crazy or is the theme song for the DLC trailer almost the same as the Elemer of the Briar boss song? They sound so similar. Could be a clue for Eochaid
Something I really love about these games is everyone gets a little something different. I personally tend to see themes of addiction in a lot of the souls games because I've battled with it for so long and others see things they have personal experiences with way more than others. I love sitting down and seeing how other people are able to put everything together through their own lens.
Glad you made it through dude ✌️
Thanks for having me on! I loved the conversation and hope we can continue it sometime soon. Can't wait for the DLC!
This video has made the last hour and a half ish wait for my CE of SotE that little bit more bearable. So thank you. Also very insightful and will give me food for thought once I get playing.
Crunchy, this was amazing. Probably the most relevatory Elden Ring lore video I've seen since your one on alchemy.
Please please bring Centered Tarnished back on after the DLC drops.
Yeah, bring me back!! :)
Both of you guys have successfully put into words my feelings on Elden Rings' lore better than I ever could have. Haven't even started this yet but I am super excited to get started. Much admiration to the both of you.
It's great to see Centered Tarnished get the recognition he deserves.
He's one of the only creators who slices through the general confusion in the lore community. Rather than accept elements of the game at face value, he approaches Elden Ring from a wider, psychological perspective. This perspective has allowed Centered to create a kind of grand unifying theory of what is really going on in the game.
I'm surprised more people haven't picked up on his approach. Out of all the creators, I feel he's the closest to unravelling the story.
Thanks for the kind words!
Totally agree
Good discussion, like the ideas brought in.
I think the analysis would be strengthened by a more sociological analysis, still from the same ideas of parable and not looking too closely into facts.
In this view you can see Marika as civilization as a whole, the “trauma” as an inevitable result of imbalances in forces or pervasive ideas or understanding or ways of living in that civilization.
Flowing from this, and focusing on eras, the elden lord becomes the pervasive idea or force of cohesion through an era. First came Godfrey, speaking to cohesion and creating a society through the idea of strength and pure force of will. Then comes radagon who is more about “tradition”/“faith”/“religion”. The alchemical themes of colors are shown here, in the triangle of gold (tradition), silver (innovation) and red/copper (strength).
Then you can look at Marika’s kids as “dipoles” that come out and are exaggerated under each of those frameworks for living/operating in a society. E.g. Marika and Radagons kids have gold/gold parents so represent what happens to a society under more strict adherence to tradition. In line with the themes of Sekiro, Malenia is rot/stagnation - a result of lack of progress and circulating ideas and getting fresh water/ideas into the system. Miquella is the strive for purity that comes out of strong ideas of tradition, and then ties into the lotus that blooms from the rot.
Gold/silver/copper can be seen in the parents of Marika’s kids and all her kids can be viewed this way. Renalla is silver and Godfrey is copper.
Then we can see different philosophies coming out of this world (e.g. the endings, the mending runes) as ideas about how to better or “fix” society - in the context of its growing imbalance and harms. A lot of the endings speak to a certain incrementalism, where we tweak aspects of the current order to better society. Miquella’s work can be kinda seen in this light, but I think more closely tied to “optimising”/“purifying” the society as a whole. Then you have Ranni’s ending which seems to be about breaking away and doing a different thing (Ranni being tied to silver/innovation). And then we have the frenzied flame which is more of a, we gotta break the whole thing all the way down to address the active harms in society.
I feel like a lot of the lore could be read through this perspective - e.g. the Nox being banished underground because its innovation (silver) was becoming a threat to tradition (gold) - much like what often occurs in history around the suppression of ideas by the dominant faction for the purpose of preserving the dominant ideology. Another example - Radagon coming after Godfrey as Elden lord referencing that one of the common ways to keep a society cohesive/keep power as the dominant faction after a period of conquest/war is through the establishment of order, tradition or homogeneity.
Sorry - long one but I hope it makes some sense. I don’t think this conflicts with the psychological view, I think there’s likely an assumption through the themes that there is a macro-micro convergence - that the “psyche” of a society/common understanding of the people comes out of or matches in some way the psychology of the individuals in that society
I love the horah loux serosh duality going on. You need both for Godfrey to exist and be elden lord.
Love that you guys are doing this! Y'all are expanding lore scholarship into literary analysis of characters, and that's a great enrichment of the community and the tools we use to understand these amazing games
it was only a matter of time centered tarnished got in collaboration with other elden ring theorists. he's probably the only creator (that i know) that goes really deep into the psychology of the game instead of the other parts (alchemy, mythology, etc)
Thanks!
I love how right Tarnished was about Marika being severely traumatized. In a way, there was a miscarriage, or... there were multiple ones, with all the other Shamans dying in the jars, instead of being reborn as gods. They were divine miscarriages.
I had started writing an essay about how Marika seemed like someone suffering from MDD or some kind of depression, whether the kind that is a normal response to tragedy or not. I never finished it, but this video is pretty validating, she’s suffered a lot of loss & the change in reactions to it over time make sense. Depression is just one stage of grief, & the stages aren’t always in order
When crunchy said “there should be something terrible that happened to marika that explains why she did this” is so insanely prophetic because of the whole shaman lore from the dlc.
Really solid discussion here, will definitely check out TheCenteredTarnished after this.
I definitely think there’s something to the Jungian approach given how popular that framework (or at least allusions to it) is in Japanese RPGs.
Few random ideas to throw around until June 21st:
-Did Marika have a 'psychotic episode' after Godwyn's death (and the many other nameless demigods that night)? Or was she more controlled and calculated about why she shattered the Elden Ring? Obviously any parent that loses a child (or children) isn't going to be completely level headed but some are totally devastated. The game leads you to believe that is was more calculated, but to what degree?
-What role did Radagon play in Marika frantically shattering the Elden Ring? Losing Godwyn (the golden child) was devastating but fighting against oneself is even more daunting. Through (I believe) Melina's recounting of Marika's words about Radagon, she addressed him in words directly that he was not yet her, not yet a god. Addressing yourself (other self) openly is (I think) in and of itself a psychotic break. Reaching the point where your actions are now predicated on what you think your other self is going to do, is clearly not a stable state of mind, leading to erratic decisions not calculated ones.
-I also feel that understanding where in the timeline Radagon comes in at is a Major topic that isn't brought up enough. If he was always part of Marika from birth then this psychotic back and forth has its fingerprints on the whole story and we need to look at it from Radagon's perspective too because right now we only bring him up where his name appears... Could lead to more thoughts here...
-Curses: Speaking of Radagon, I've heard a few people believing that he spawned after Marika cursed the last Fire Giant. How or what caused this needs to be looked into more if we're trying to understand Marika.
Also, I have a theory about the Elden Ring and how it is a curse. I am a believer that absolute power corrupts absolutely and that the Elden Ring is this absolute power. How this power affects (or is it effect, ugh anyway) those in contact with it is very near sighted. Lets start with...
Rennala: Possessor of the Great Rune of Rebirth (how Radagon gave her this before the shattering makes no sense but that's another topic) loses her damn mind and is completely transfixed with one thing and nothing else (the curse) and delves completely into it, losing all awareness for anything else.
Godrick: Want's more power to return his lineage back to the Golden days and will do any disgusting thing to do so, again losing all awareness for anything else.
Rykard: I mean, why else would you let a giant snake feed on you?? Gotta be cursed lol.
Malenia: Why she travels down to Caelid is debatable.. but refusing to lose to Radahn and throwing away your sanity by pushing out your unnalloyed golden needle and blooming is very near sighted and in a fight her ego would be the only thing on her mind leading to her desperate actions.
-I started to ramble there (tired) but I'll leave it hear. Tell me your thoughts everyone.
The dynamic between Marika and Miquella always reminded me of the classic fairytale stories about changelings, as well as the folklore that inspired the fairytales. Miquella never ages, yet is a prodigy of intellect and scientific/religious meddling, almost like an old man pretending to be a child (like a changeling). Moreover, the Ainsel River is literally named after a fairytale about a child outsmarting a fairy, and Siofra means "changeling". It is almost like post-partum mania where the mother falls prey to a paranoia about her newborn not being her actual child. Miquella even has "fairy wings" or diaphanous insect wings, so what if he is NOT Marika's child? What if he is her child, but she never embraced him as such. Most item descriptions speak of him and his father.
Hmmm interesting thoughts
@@CenteredTarnished I also wanted to add that my fiancee had made an interesting observation about Miquella and Peter Pan. When I told her about how Miquella never grows from his static child state, she said that his "never growing up" reminded her of Peter Pan. This intrigued me because the more I thought about it, the more parallels I saw. One, we must take Miquella's hand to travel to Never-Never Land (the Shadowlands). Two, Peter Pan has a Shadow with a will of its own (St Trina, perhaps, or Malenia, who has a NEEDLE to stitch the Scarlet Rot in check, much as how Peter must stitch his shadow to his feet to keep it under his control, or it could be his shadowbound beast that we never see). Three, there are fairy associations with Miquella, much like with Peter Pan and Tinker Bell. Miquella is a tinker himself, and like Tinker Bell is a "Whitesmith" or maker of things, such as bells and needles. A tinker literally makes things of tin, which helps prevent corrosion.
Other parallels are JM Berrie himself, a man who was a friend of William Sharp (aka Fiona Mcleod). The whole William Sharp/Fiona Macleod account is a fascinating read because he was a man who embraced his Anima (to borrow a Jungian concept) as his writing persona. Miyazaki evidently read Macleod's poetry for Deracine, and it made an impression. Not to be too unhinged, but Berrie, Sharp/Macleod, Arthur Machen and many other Celtic Rennaissance peoples were members of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, people who tried to find spiritual meaning in the works of Hermes Trismegistus. Anyhow, Barrie named Wendy after the young daughter of a fellow writer (Margaret Henley) who died at the age of five from meningitis, dedicating Peter Pan to her and the Davies boys. Like the Water Babies, a lot of children books were inspired by child mortality rates. Since Miyazaki became a father the fear of losing a child is obviously on his mind.
0h how i LOVE listening to this after the latest fromS pic dropped... ovo
you two have def inspired me to throw out another #justiceformarika take 🐉🚬🌚🔥
love to listen to you two Devas togetha ❤🔥my fav otolawgical therapy.
Extremely preemptive comment here, but I just wanted to say I’ve been thinking about the split you guys are trying to describe between people who focus on assembling the “facts” of these games’ narrative aspects and the people who are coming at things with a comparatively holistic PoV - holistic in the sense that the interpretations are utilizing systems of thought external to the internal narratives. I think a good way of describing this difference of approach is in terms of exotericism vs. esotericism. These approaches can and should coexist, just as science is balanced against poetics, but I do really prefer the latter, because I think the esoteric approach reveals deeper facets of the world we inhabit, which constitutes its own sort of mystery.
Phenomenal discussion. The alchemical influences have been known for so long, but no one's really gone into the spiritual and psychological meaning behind alchemy. Hope you guys do a part 2 soon!
Thanks, Marmott!
I love this stuff. However, I sometimes get the feeling that most people are overthinking this story. I feel like it’s not as complicated as we think.
As a woman who has had a miscarriage, I can state for a fact that it is absolutely devastating.
Sorry 😞
Godwyn is the only child of Marika without a twin...Messmer? Golden boy and Shadow boy
Godwyn is also a special case though. he is pretty much the only god-child that remains unafflicted by any ailments (until that one fateful night, of course).
he is also Godfrey and Marika's firstborn, which is very important to consider once you remember that G.R.R.M is the author of the story, and he is very obsessed with heritage and lineage.
I think also the fact that the elden ring being the thing that shapes the world. it being an esoteric... yet almost physical representation of the the values and beliefs of the world. with the way it can be constructed by the god/elden lord. then those values, beliefs, and stuff are made manifest. i don't find the world itself being a representation if marikas psyche (broken, stuck, and in disrepair) all that hard to fathom. I am not sure i fully agree, but i think its definitely in line. i think there is definitely gusts of that. i think the world is real, but i think those factors as listed above actually contribute to it. The age of plenty is youth, and not seeing the harshness of the world. then the end of it is that reality setting in (teenage to early 20s). adjustments are made (going into 30ish) where you get radagon, and a new age that is fine for a while. then if his miscarriage theory is right then you have the shattering, and everything from there with the exact way the world is.
Good interview/topic discussion 👏
Well, it now makes sense why the continent of the lands between looks like a brain being viewed on the right side, as the right hemisphere is supposed to be dominant over the left. Right controls the left side of the body, and vice versa. Heck, the tree is in the direct center of the continent.
Speaking of Godfrey. I noticed that the Beastclaw Hammer's ash of war is Regal Claw, the AoW of Axe of Godfrey is Regal Roar and the pattern on his axe looks like the ones on the Beastman weapons. So Axe of Godfrey was given to him by Serosh and his beastman the moment he was taken on Hoarah Loux's back.
I agree. But I also want to add an interpretation, that TA came up with, that I agree with, where Godfrey actually defeats Serosh (A lord of the prior age of beasts) with his own weapon (which went on to symbolise the union of the Golden Lineage).
Godfrey’s whole character is of taking a crown by strength of battle. This is something Godwyn also does with Fortissax, but it’s very interesting that Godfrey would’ve popularised this practice with his defeat of Serosh with his own Axe (there’s a giant scar on Serosh) before befriending him - which I also think that went on to symbolise the Golden Lineage AND popularise the act of having a shadowbeast
I also think, because of the culture in the past, that Serosh admired that Godfrey defeated him - because, back then, a defeat would be less bitter, and more honourable
Messmer and Melina are twins; Melina died in childbirth, Marika shattered the Elden Ring and somehow brought Melina back to guide the Tarnished.
Source: I made it up
This is going to be way longer than I planned and it feels a bit unhinged and disorganized to me. But these are my thoughts on the lore after listening to the discussion in this video. It rest a lot on the hypothesis that Marika's psychology affects the Lands Between and the characters, and the idea that she lost a child. More specifically, she had to sacrifice a twin in the womb to save the other one, or lose both.
It starts when Radagon was sent to Liurna to conquer the Lands Between through war, but eventually united with them, showing growth from the previous attitude of Godfrey (Unification through alliance instead of conquest). The reason for his departure is said to be Godfrey's Banishment (Radagon left Rennala to become the second Elden Lord) but he did leave the Amber egg with her at the same moment. I believe the Amber Egg represent that lost child (the egg also containing the rune of the Unborn), and is the reason Radagon(Marika) left. After all, it can be very hard for couples to stay together after something like a miscarriage.
Out of their 3 children (Radhan, Rykard and Ranni), only Radhan and Rykard have shards. Ranni doesn't (she had one but got rid of it as far as the game tells us), but the Amber egg does. Ranni is also the only empyrean born of 2 different parents (exceptions to Queen Marika and the Gloam-Eyed Queen... if Rennala doesn't turn out to also be Marika, somehow...) as opposed to Miquella and Malenia. After Radagon left to join Marika, they had Malenia, representing rot and decay, and Miquella, representing eternal youth. 2 opposite concepts which I think Marika had to deal with after losing her child, both born from herself. Malenia's Scarlet Rot drives people to act like beast and eats at their memories, similar to a depression mixed with anger (anger at the gods, greater will, fate or even herself for the lost of an unborn child) but also a regression from the evolution we see in the Lands Between (in the beastmen of Farum Azula becoming more civilized). In a way, the Scarlet Rot reflect the lost of your ability to repress the worst parts of yourself. The rot is resisted thanks to Miquella's needle (to me, Miquella is a representation of Marika's hope for her lost child that never was, making them eternally alive as a child. The gender of Miquella being unclear might also be due to the fact that they died in the womb, in a state between the shift from female to male). Miquella might also represent a denial of what happened, able to stop the spread of the Scarlet rot (depression) for a moment, but not able to cure it, before it becomes too much and is eventually released in Caelid, and later infect Miquella's Haligtree. The tree being infected might also represent how, of the two options, the rot is winning. The blooming of Malenia against Radhan, the "last" main event of the shattering before we arrive in the Lands Betweens, represent to me Marika giving in to her depression. I used to think that Marika was imprisoned in the tree by the Greater Will after shattering the Elden ring, but I now think that she is her own captor. She has locked herself in her grief, leaving the lands between to rot. If no one is able to gather the shards and bring them to back together, the scarlet rot will spread and eventually consume everything. Radagon is the part of her still trying to fix things and move on, but he is also stuck inside the tree by his own thorns, missing the essential parts of the ring but unwilling or unable to go get them himself. Maybe he is the part that still believes in the greater will or what they believed before, but it is not enough anymore, the Elden ring he has left is missing too many parts that he can't replace on his own.
When the Night of Black Knives happens, Ranni (the only child without a rune) kills her body and the mind(spirit) of Godwyn. With the hypothesis of Marika having twins and then having to chose to save one over the other. I believe Ranni is the twin that was saved and the egg represent the sacrifice. The rune of the Unborn mentions "Great Rune of unborn demigods." with an emphasis on demigodS, plural. I believe Ranni was "born anew" by the Rune after "murdering Godwyn", making her "frail and short-lived. Imperfect beings". She is stuck as s spirit possessing dolls and falling asleep for long periods of time. For Godwyn: The Golden Order starts with Godwyn's birth and it last unimpeded until his death, when everything starts to fall apart. In a way, Godwyn seems to represent the Golden Order itself, or Marika's faith in the Golden Order. Marika having to chose one twin over the other leads to her losing her faith.
In this interpretation, the endings (spoilers) represent the possible paths for Marika: the Age of Order is her going back to her previous faith (maybe with an even stronger belief than before), the Age of Stars (according to the Japanese text) is the opposite, a departure from that previous faith and order and moving on to something completely new and far away. The Age of the Duskborn is her accepting the death of her child and moving on (Godwyn becoming the god of death), living in peace with her faith and the destined death. And finally the Lord of Frenzied Flame ending is Marika giving in to anger and losing everything (a complete Ego death). The Age of Fracture, where no "choice" is made, is denial of the problem itself, going back to what once was without actually dealing with was happened or the consequences which will eventually lead to the Scarlet rot taking over. I think Melina's quest of freeing destined death and burning the Erdtree (her locked cell) is what's left of Queen Marika will to move on. She hasn't totally given up yet, but she isn't actively trying to fix things. Instead she is waiting on someone else for help.
I doubt this hypothesis will hold when the DLC comes out and we learn more about Marika's past and Miquella, but I would love to hear people's opinions (constructive or not).
Also the loss of faith/will is much more clearly attributed to the omen births than some contrived sacrifice/miscarriage plot and or the golden wills desire to feed godwyn to the dying erdtree
sounds interesting, but I think drawing parallels and making assumptions about miyazaki's personal life is going a bit too far sometimes :"D
I wonder if the miscarriage thing could be about her having omen children or cursed children, rather than a literal miscarriage. Maybe even Godwyn dying had that impact
It’s definitely possible. She could view her womb as this accursed place and no matter the attempts, fails to conceive a healthy child. But then you have to ask yourself, where normal prior to the shattering when they found the shards and that is in fact what curses them? Also, it seems very likely that Marika had a hand in the NoBK so her going into mourning after that seems unlikely. But then again, she could have seen it as a necessary evil for the betterment of the world. Haha too many damn what if’s
The world of the "Shadow"-- and by extension the worlds that COULD have been... are theoretically just as real as the world that IS.
I firmly believe Marika and Miquella both came to this realization and divested themselves of their corporeal forms in order to traverse to this alternate branch in reality.
The stories we form ourselves are far more meaningful than any singular version of the truth the author can hope to tell themselves, and I think no one pulls this off better than Miyazaki and his signature approach to storytelling.
I hope the DLC delves deeper into these themes of "Free Will"-- or lack thereof, the relation between the conscious, the unconscious, and consciousness itself, and the metaphysics of reality that I've noticed Miyazaki has been trying to explore within these games.
I'm only about a half hour in, so sorry if it was already brought up: I was listening to Smoughtown's summary of the story and suggestion that the death of Godwyn the Golden was the big catalyst for Marika shattering the Elden Ring.
What if Godwyn was the twin of the child which Marika had lost? Whether it was an accident or sacrifice, that might embitter her to the Greater Will, and the symbolism of losing the other child would easily be the final nail in the coffin.
Of course with the actual DLC, there could be revelations which make that unlikely but it just came to me and fun to speculate on.
Let's go!!
The "map is a womb" theory is so spot-on. It's so obvious now-now that someone has said it. The Erdtree being at the womb's center represents its life-giving power; the "Weeping Peninsula" perhaps represents the vagina; the Elden Ring is the genetic material that defines life. What the Shattering means is that Marika has lost her ability to produce healthy children-Godwyn perhaps being her one and only. The real-life event that inspired this metaphor may even have been an ectopic pregnancy that led to miscarriage, with Caelid representing the inflamed fallopian tube where it occurred. And the crater at the center of the landmass represents the absence of the child-which I'm thinking is Messmer, who's perhaps the twin brother of Godwyn.
All of marikas kids came out cursed. While all of radaghons kids without her came out fine. Even though shes the same person, i bet she was so jealous.
How was Godwin cursed?
How was Godwin cursed?
Listening to you smart people is nice 😅. I learn things 😁
i think that the DLC will show that Merica the Eternal means far more than we think. i think she is not so much real but a "concept" i think she is the polar opposite of the glome eyed queen in a very literal way. so try to follow my logic, obviously we know the G.E.Q is the aspect of death and Merica is Birth and life, but what does that mean? how is Merica also Radigan? she is MUCH deeper into the concept of rebirth... she DOESNT die... she is reincarnation... she doesnt die because she isnt alive, she is CONSTANT life .. i believe she Is Radigan as much as she is also Merican ... but also Astel... and Miquela.. these are ALL Merica and not as 'A child of Merica but she is Merica re-encarnet she is a "child" of her own cycle of being reborn.
and the newest trailer has a pile of bodies as she takes from them her golden hair ..... isnt something she DID but rather the bodies ARE her bodies of previous versions of herself which is why they are melting into eachother . it was how she is "asending"
Psychology is a scam but this was a good podcast
In my humble opinion Marika's "original problem" is the lack of bodily autonomy. Ranni talks about it, i think, because she saw and possibly talked to Marika. Her body is quite literally not her own. She has the power of god but no free will, no real choice. She has to have a dude by her side and carry his children and still those children are often messed up by powers outside of her influence. Girl must be so angry. No wonder Ranni would rather kill herself and her half brother than go through it
Also, wondering about real persons possible dead/unborn children is next level messed up ._.'
@@ienottThat’s fair, I kind of regretted voicing the thought as soon as I said it.
Elden ring seems to be, on a very fundamental level, about bodily autonomy and birth. I don't really get why that part is so easily overlooked by the fandom. I will not attempt to put it into words because my English is horrible, but still.
That perfectly explains why she is so aggressively against being under the view or control of the order. I mean, she more or less reviles it. Makes it clear she won't be puppet to the fingers or order they represent. It just isn't immediately obvious how deep that runs. I know I used to just assume that she was more generally referring to the whole "Empyrean Pipeline" where your whole life is decided for you, or more specifically about severing her own fingers. But what she's really thinking of is godhood a'la greater will then, isn't she? It would make perfect sense that seeing what becomes of an empyrean who ascends to true godhood would be why.
It also makes Marika's and Ranni's actions being so uncannily parallel at different points in the main plot make more sense. I've suspected for a while now that a lot of Marika's apparent hypocrisy is due to a lack of full agency in things. Just on its face, it is kinda obvious that her role wouldn't permit that. When I think back on the key events, we kind of see a picture of Marika's agency crumbling over the course of failures catching up to her. When she failed to hold her Golden Order and fulfill her pact with the ring, it was all stripped of her. I can't think back to prove it but I think that loss was always creeping up on her and neither she nor us were made privy to it. The more you serve the Greater Will, the more it seems to consume of you.
I think the most likely general explanation is that there were glimmers where Marika did get her own will across. I wonder, would she shatter the ring just to set in motion her escape attempt? Did Ranni perhaps also understand this about Marika? This takes out the need for them to directly conspire, where there have been questions of that in the past. She might've just understood Marika's predicament and thus enacted her own plan with the benefit of understanding what Marika would likely do because of her own situation.
@@differentbutsimilar7893 you cooked so fucking good right now.
So much of Marika's character to me is paradoxical in relationship to power and control. To be above all else, control of life, birth, death and destiny, to have killed/imprisoned all other deities, to be a living god/emperor/queen...
Yet, your children are malformed, what you birth is destined to flame, rot or something worse.
Marika has an unparalleled agency as a supreme being, but as a person? As a mother? She is completely helpless.
I'm not saying she and Ranni are good, innocent people, but everyone can understand what it is like to be imprisoned and desperate, trying to break the chains, even if it has to be with your teeth.
For the love of Pete & Pete, haven't you ever represented a client whose children committed suicide?
I always wondered how renalla and radagon got their hands on the great rune of the unborn before the shattering. Maybe Godwin was this unborn child and that's what first caused her to tamper with the cycle of life and death, years before the shattering
Edit: I also feel like elden ring is really just a magical divorce. Like radagon is the ultimate divorced dad but she just doesnt want him anymore. He wants to trap or control her so his devotion is meaningless to her.
Also final question. If marika is this sympathetic character who lost a child and loves her children, why does she tell them all to fight each other or they will all be sacrificed? Or is that Radagon speaking with her voice?
part of me wish we never figure out whats truly going on in the lore of this game. its the mystery that makes it all so appealing, and solving the mystery would be less fulfilling than the hunt itself.
its the thrill, that there is more to learn. that we can't say for sure we have all the answers... we have clues and leads, but ultimately nobody knows the truth, and that's what keeps us all chasing the dragon, so to speak.
btw no pun intended, but the game even features dragon hunting as an essential part of the lore, and despite our best efforts we have not yet fought the greatest of them all - Placidusax is strong, but he is not the strongest... its like poetry; just like the mystery itself, we're very close to the strongest dragon (he is literally petrified in Leyndell) yet so far from actually securing that trophy... him being petrified (thus denying us access to his heart) may also be symbolic here, as it represents us - as players - literally never figuring out the true answer to the riddle... but we'll keep guessing (thus chasing the dragon we know we can't catch) won't we?
Centered Tarnished is dead-on with his analysis, I think as much hitting things that make evrything else make sense: like Bloodborne being about the evolution of surgery and anasthesia usage in Edinburgh, CT provides the necessary threads that being in the game alone cannot, because ER isn't just about the fictional entities within the game, but the world the game is begotten from
I think you are getting two CT's mixed up? Charred Thermos is the Bloodborne medical metaphor fella, and he is still, IMO woefully underappreciated.
@@billycaldwell39th I am comparing Centered Tarnished contributions to Charred Thermos
@@ethanrumley746 gotcha! Just wanted to clarify and give some exposure to Thermos in case your comment piqued some folks' interest
That's a humbling comment, thank you.
I saw the centered tarnished a few months ago for the first time. At first I was like "wtf" but then it all clicked and his take on elden ring started to make the other lore videos I watched make more sense. Thanks for having him on!
It is interesting that you guys brought up the idea that the ruler of the world conjures forth the world from their mind. It is a theme in other Fromsoft games, namely Demon's Souls and Dark Souls 2. It would make sense to apply it to Elden Ring as well
This guy and Charred Thermos (from bloodborne theories) kinda ruined Vaati for me… wow, it makes so much sense.
Do you guys know how much George R R psychology went into the story and where it may be spotted in the story
he clearly has far more personal influence on the story than i first thought.
initially i only got the obvious clues like castle morne (the sword of morne) which serves as an obvious reference to game of thrones, but after 2 years of "scholarship" its obvious he has much more to do with the intricate parts of the story. it goes beyond the mere "cameo" type of influence i thought he had at first.
Aw man, I'll probably get off work the moment this is over. (Edit: lol, Oh, I thought this was live. Nevermind. Still, my comment is the same.)
I have to say, I always thought Marika/Numen are just like humans, with perhaps slightly different physiology, namely longevity.
However, mentally, they may also seem similar at first, but they have a more insect-like way of thinking. This leads to some incredibly cold and logical actions by Marika, willing to sacrifice not just herself, but her own children as pawns.
Perhaps anyway, it's one interpretation. There are signs of genuine love and affection that we as humans view as healthy from Marika, but even then it could be more of a general, evenly spread love for the civilization she's built, like a hive or nest, not her own direct offspring.
Of course much of this I've gathered from the in game placement of Numen related things, alongside giant ants and the pests, but I would argue it's more like Bees and their hierarchical structure, especially how new "Queens" are chosen/created.
Grrm did write sandkings...
tldr: woman moment
TCT IS AMAZING, AND I AM SO GLAD HE IS GETTING RECOGNITION FINALLY!
Much love, my friend!
Hey Crunchy am i crazy or is the theme song for the DLC trailer almost the same as the Elemer of the Briar boss song? They sound so similar. Could be a clue for Eochaid
I don’t think it’s similar enough to be connected. Probably just the same composer.
Not gonna lie im too damn tired of psychobabble about identity to care about this vid
What if Mesmer is a combination of godwyns body sent back in time to be a vassal for an outer god. Like a holy Frankenstein with respect
The Centered Tarnished would Love Max Derret .