I REALLY don't like the idea of Radahn letting everything happen willingly, a lot of his loyal men died for just a "duel", not to mention how it ended in an endless amount of suffering in the Wailing Dunes. Why fight to tooth and nail, why sacrifice so many lives, if he is completely willing to die for Miquella. It just doesn't make sense. I believe there was a vow, but something must have changed that made Miquella to send Malenia to kill Radahn. Also I don't know how he would be ok with just throwing away his beloved steed. Considering how he learned gravity magic just to keep him around.
The vow has always intrigued me. Nothing like a SmoughTown video to break it down! I love how your detail-oriented self can find lore-relevant information with in-game dialogue and item descriptions. Cheers mate great work
Honestly, I don't think we should put too much stock in the Japanese to English Localization being a bad translation. And here's why I think so. George R. R. Martin writes in English and we know that he help set up the base for this game. Yes, I understand Miyazaki and Team did alter the "original work" to fit the game, but the core concepts were written in English. Therefore, I think GRRM would say something akin to "Original Sin" and it would be translated to the closest thing in the Japanese mindset, being "Causality." If anyone has a reason this is not the case I'd love to hear it, but I personally don't find the Causality Angle to be something I agree with. Especially since it seems like we're dealing with Queen Marika being a type of Eve, the mother of all in the Bible. This is even further enhanced by the snake skin being so close to the Oh Mother Guesture. We definitely are treading on the Garden of Eden story, but I don't quite know what to make of it. But all of that leads me to think "Original Sin" is not a bad translation. But instead a returning to the original for us native English speakers.
you've been putting in extra work and going extremely hard here as of late back to back drops love content and your hard work shows through the quality of your content thank you
I don't even think Radagon is even alive when we first meet him or he's at least about as alive as like Robert Strong from ASOIAF is. Something about the way he moves in complete silence. It's like he's on puppet strings but he falls apart
>(potentially) purges the formless mother from the body in the form of the red aura (bloodflame?) when he returns as a god (something he can do considering his needle)
@@TroyeMackenzie his needle was incomplete. it only works in the storm beyond time. and the formless mother's influence is clearly still present considering how Radahn continues to use bloodflame in second phase
Miquella: “Step one…we get rid of the horse.” Malenia: “Brother that is unwise.” Miquella: “Silence Sister, I have a genius 58 part plan that cannot fail.” Malenia: “That’s what you said about Godwyn…and the Haligtree…” Miquella: “Sister go sit in the corner.” Malenia: “Okay…”
I dunno if you saw the animation that was done over Taylor Swift's Mastermind recontextualizing Miquella making his plan as a kid drawing in crayon, but it is very good and fits your comment :'')
Great video as usual Smough! But you may also be missing one crucial reason why Radahn was chosen by Miquella: he can hold the stars in stasis, which is crucial in keeping out foreign influence, keeping the world “unalloyed”. We know that the Greater Will was primarily able to exert power through its agents Metyr and the Elden Beast. Radahn has the power to block their entry and even routinely slay beasts like Astel, and I think his primary motivation as a character is to seek greater and greater glory through his battles against the heavens. Meanwhile, Miquella’s age without causality cannot be maintained with alien orders involved. So, I believe that Radahn’s war as Miquella’s consort will not be directed towards the Lands Between, but will instead be directed towards the very heavens themselves, going toe-to-toe with the avatars of the Outer Gods and the Greater Will. Miquella will have his eternal peace on earth; Radahn will have his eternal war in the cosmos.
Shadow of the Erdtree was the closest we ever got to major events playing out while we’re on our journey. Instead of all the important events happening before.
I don't know, delaying/triggering the apocalypse or ascending to godhood seem like major events to me, and that is what the Fromsoft PCs usually are up to.
@@sinisterwombat3128yeah but the dark souls characters usually exist in a world that is already aged and all the main players in the worlds events are old and washed up.
I think a critical piece of Miquella's story that many of us aren't talking about is how he likely lost control of himself over the course of his discarding across the land of shadow. After all, we know he abandoned his doubt so that it would not restrict him from his ascension regardless of how painful it was. I suspect there was a sort of snowball effect where the more of himself he cast aside, the less of himself was left. To sacrifice everything to become a god is to become a god left with nothing. So people calling Miquella a villain are I think missing some crucial, albeit subtle undertones that really highlight what his story is really trying to do. Miquella's curse, I think, was not as simple as eternal youth. This was but a symptom. His curse was to be eternally on the precipice of budding into something greater. As in his youth, as in the failure of the Haligtree and the failure of his plans with Godwyn, and finally as in his fate to achieve godhood but be left utterly alone and empty in it. Stripped of the qualities that would have defined his order. And this shell of his consort stripped of the very qualities that Miquella first admired in him. He had discarded all that would have guided him through his godhood, and when we hear St. Trina call godhood his prison, this is meant to tell us that Miquella has suppressed (with the physical metaphor of the fissure), his subconscious knowledge that his curse to forever aspire for greatness but forever fail would be his demise. In a sense all of this, the tragedy of Miquella the Kind, was fated to happen from the start. His age of compassion could never have come. And if you're still reading, I think this is why Miquella led us here. Not so that he could challenge Marika's lord, but so that we could free him from this prison. We were his last hope. I think this is why there are Nascent butterflies just out of reach at the very beginning of the game, why Varre (a follower of the enchanted Mohg, and therefore likely operating under Miquella's influence) is the first character we meet in the game, why we ended up with Torrent, and why Miquella left so many of his crosses right next to sites of grace. With the hope that we might, if we grow strong enough, show up just in time to free him from a fate he never had any control over to begin with. Miquella's eyes are both shut, his body fading into nothingness, and the memory at the end of the DLC rendered darkened, empty, and frail. I also think this is why the only dialogue we ever get from Miquella is about Radahn as his consort which feels off putting. It's because the idyllic, impassioned vow he made as an adoring and hopeful child is all that is left to guide him. Like something that needs to be let go of, but can't be. None of it ever should have gone this way, but all of it was fated to.
beautifully put. To me, killing Miquella at the end of the DLC always seemed like putting him out of his misery. As at that point, he is uable to judge what is even right or wrong anymore.
@@kellispees911 I fully agree. And it's such an interesting way of telling that story, because it's not just that be became misguided or immoral naturally, he quite literally discarded his doubt and his love. So what was left was less of himself, god or not.
@@seamusdempster miquella is probably the most morally complex character in all these games, and they tackle his morality in such an interesting and novel way. I just think people find a difficult time distinguishing him from other popular characters from other series’ that may share similar aesthetics to Miquella (ehm… like Griffith), that are infinitely less interesting and complex than miquella. So they end up bringing Miquella’s character down to their level, simply because they don’t really understand what Miyazaki is trying to say with miquella. A similar situation happened with Radahn. Radahn is a story about Glory, War, a kindness unparalleled, the Blood of the ancient roots of the World’s Origin - a child of prophecy (kinda like Miquella too), a death of a body that brings one’s soul closer to Divinity (Valhalla), and so much more that makes his character thematically compelling…. Yet , all the fanbase sees in him: “OMG HE’S SUCH A CHAD BECAUSE HE LIKES HIS HORSE!!” Lmao
@HeevaEgo lmfao morally complex, but yet he is literally infecting everyone he comes across with basically Stockholm syndrome, to me that seems pretty cut clear and crystal to me the guy is forcing people to live by his way or no way at all, there's is no complexity it's pretty straight forward that miquella is a "monster" who is controlling everyone to get his way, you can argue that he isn't inspired by Griffith from berserk but you are absolutely wrong he is obviously inspired by Griffith, his face and hair are even kind of reminiscent of Griffith, he sacrifices his blade malenia, he uses people like tools, and he is even tunnel visioned into his goal like Griffith was, imo it's pretty obvious that he isn't as all glorious and innocent as he wants to seem
There's even more similarities when you look at radahn as if he is a combination of guts and zodd, and malenia being casca, Griffith wanted guts to stay with him against his will, he even forgets about malenia and stops caring for her much like how Griffith basically throws her to the wolves when he ascends to god hand status. Theres way too many similarities for it not to be the case tbh
Miquella used to be a golden order fundamentalist. So it’s possible that Radahn made the vow to him turning that time, before Miquella started trying to make his own order.
the cutscene we get after beating them at the end of the dlc is being misinterpreted by pretty much everybody I've seen talking about it. Radahn never made the vow with Miquella. Miquella has his own ideas about being a god and in his obsession chose Radahn to be his consort because in him he saw all of the traits he wanted to use. that cutscene is Miquella making a vow to his own obsession.
@@Shizn0idFreyja literally says Miquella made a vow WITH Radahn. And as mentioned in the video, Miquella had his own part of the vow he needed to honor for Radahn.
@@Rusty_SpyFreyja never says that. She hypothesizes that Radahn would welcome resurrection because he would be able to fight wars again, which is a sentiment at odds with Miquella's Age of "Compassion".
@@Rusty_Spy Fraya also says "..General Radahn's soul met an honourable end. But Kindly Miquella wishes to revive it... Which is fine by me. I know it would pain old Jerren... " why would that pain Jerren and why would Fraya have to soul search in the first place if her master truly made that vow. I left another comment saying this, but that dialogue alone suggests not all the Redmane soldiers would have been automatically okay with Miquella's plan. As Smough literally states, you do not need mutual consent amongst two parties to make a vow. With Consort Radahn being the ending to the DLC players have been forced to rearrange and add numerous steps to their idea of how the chronological history of Elden Ring played out. The idea that Radahn WAS in on Miquella's plan from the start but then changed his mind at some point adds even more steps to that already somewhat convoluted timeline and in my opinion is a little bit thematically contrived. I believe Miquella making the vow to himself that he WILL have Radahn as his consort (no matter what.. even if hes gotta die then fuck it) adds the kind of sinister layer to Miquella's character that the writers intended
*Miquella:* "Will you marry me and help me overthrow the Golden Order as my Consort?" *Radahn:* "Over my dead body." *Miquella:* "Excellent, then we have an agreement." *Radahn:* "Wait, what?"
There are 3 characters with a similarity; Miquella, Ranni, and Melina all wear a ring on their right hand ring finger. From what I can find, a ring on this finger represents a vow.
I think people are needlessly complicating this one element of the story. The ONLY terms of the vow we know of and should believe exist are Revival of Radahn=Lord Consort, that’s all. These are easily abusable terms. From Radahn’s perspective he gets what he wants with no downsides; from Miquella’s, he gets a lord consort and his age of compassion as soon as Radahn dies. So simply kill him yourself. There are no rules against that in the vow. Malenia was brought in as a third party and champion to execute Radahn, forcing him to fulfill his part of the vow upon his revival. Of course there may be additional elements of Radahn welcoming a worthy opponent, being open to waging war against the Haligtree, and so on. But ultimately I think the moment Malenia murmurs in Radahn’s ear is supposed to be a reveal and revelation to him as well as us when he may have mistakenly misattributed their intentions to waging war as we all initially did; “Miquella awaits thee” being the moment he understood what they had done by making the deal with him and now coming to collect via his death.
I still think it makes more sense that Radahn agreed initially but later changed his mind. Why else go through all the effort of changing all his equipment and fighting Malenia. Even if you are an honorable warrior who seeks an honorable death, it'd make no sense to fight your own allies in a brutal war of conquest. Throwing away the lives of your own soldiers for your pride is not something a compassionate person would do. If he just wanted a duel he would have just had one. I think it makes more sense thematically that Radahn rejected his part of the vow at some point, paralleling Radagon's own abandoned vow and the ensuing fallout. Miriel says the consequences for breaking a vow are most dire, and what could be a more dire consequence than the near complete destruction and tainting of Caelid. A place which Radahn must have been at some level fond of considering he defended Selia and had his own fortress in the region.
Agree. I personally also think he broke off his part of the vow after halting the stars to protect Sellia, since that singular act also inadvertently halted the fate of all Carian's, and Radahn by that point was probably already fated to become Miquella's consort. It's just gonna end up as another FromSoft-Dead End, since too much can be interpreted into it, and we don't know what actually holds any importance or relevance to the discussion. Another example of (maybe?) interpreting too much: Why should we believe Miquella, when he talks about upholding his part of the vow? It could be another coercion, one he maybe also could've used on Radahn to make the "vow" (what it may have entailed, we obviously don't know) SEEM mutually beneficial. Another interpretation, which would basically derail half this video. This of course only goes off of the fact Miquella was a well known master manipulator, as told to us by npc's and descriptions, without any further evidence, but the game also lacks anything to disprove my theory, and therefore we find ourselves back at square one.
@@vagrant2863 theres another thing...theres so much items that refered radahn "in his youngest years"....this, its indirectly the proof that he change mind and opinión after he becomes starscourge....the stars, guide de fate of man, alter the fate of carian family, and the amber stars, guide the fate of gods... Radahn, becoming starscourge, put in stop the fate of everyone...even, his fate was altered, cause he is a carian demigod....then, he breaks the vow, and becomes the strongest demigod warlord we see in the base game, tailers, etc...malenia, fought him, cause miquella choose him and needs him, to bring his order and make him his lord...but we know, radahn wanted to be like his father and his idol, godfrey...he wanted the rune of godrick (kenneth says that radahn siege the stormveil castle, and that happened in shattering, when the demigods claimed the power and the right to the throne of elden lord) So, radahn, the starscourge adult radahn, wanted to be elden lord along with marika, not the lord of miquella
What I think is this: Radahn gave his consent to the vow of being Miquella's consort if Miquella resurrects him if he ever fell in battle, hoping that he had earned an extra life. But all he earned was a certain death sentence from Miquella. Basically Miquella decided to _force_ the circumstances where Radahn would need to be resurrected.
Thank you so much for the shout-outs! Another amazingly thorough video, like always! And I never noticed the Misbegotten casting the Rings of Light incantation at 44:40 (they've always been felled by gravity whenever I explored that area). It's really interesting that the Misbegotten guarding St. Trina makes the same pose as the Misbegotten Crusader does when the latter uses the Ash of War for the Golden Order Greatsword, which was once Radagon's.
HE’S BACK!!!!!! I finally beat Consort Radhan last week and was shaking with joy. However, I quickly felt annoyed/sad that you can’t do anything afterwards. No interacting with the gate directly above the arena. No talking with any characters outside the Shadow Lands about your journey. Can’t even tell Gideon All Knowing, he just ignores me with no dialogue options.
In fairness, we were TOLD explicitly that there would be no interaction between the DLC and base game NPCs and that there would be no further Endings provided by the DLC
Thank you for this video. Never did it occur to me that the reason for Miquella's divesting of St. Trina was that St. Trina resisted his ascension to godhood. It was so obvious, but I missed it. 😅
One of the things I most appreciate about your videos is that you consistently and pointedly shout out and recommend other lore creators across all the platforms. You don't just plug your work, you hold up others' and say "this is good stuff guys, go check it out." That, and you're almost always audio-jump-scare free, so I can add your stuff to my 'lore to sleep to' list without second thought. That's a close second favorite thing!
@SmoughTown Absolutely, you're welcome! You're how I first heard about people like Garrolous Goldmask. And the more I find and listen to/watch other lore people, the less junk I don't care to watch winds up in my YT feed.
Couldn't the 'our' in the promise simply be Trina? Miquella only abandoned the golden order once he realized it could do nothing to free his sister from rot. Miquella created the 3 ring of light incantation, a golden order incantation. As an emperyean, loyal to the golden order or not, Miquella needs a Lord to ascend to godhood. Why wouldn't Radahn accept the offer to be Miquella's/Trina's consort within the Golden order? Radahn's resistance likely came later because Miquella rejected the golden order and sought a new order. Radahn vowed to be consort in a very different context, and thus Malenia tried killing Radahn to force him to become Lord and 'honor the promise'. Miquella is Trina. Referring to himself in the plural makes sense up until removing Trina. I believe this is the case. Miquella made this offer before abandoning golden order fundamentalism, and Radahn backed out after Miquella now demanded he become the Lord of a different age, a new order. Marika did not create her Lord. Radagon became Lord much later. Godfrey was the 1st Lord, meaning she agreed to marry him, with the promise of him being king of a new order, thus allowing her to become a god. However, clearly while a Lord is needed to ascend, the god can replace the Lord with someone else later. If Radagon was created to be Lord, then Godfrey would never need to be in the mix. We see how strong Radagon is, even when crippled and crumbling. She wouldn't have needed Godfrey at all unless Radagon was for some reason not ready to be a Lord. Side note, the new interpretation of the Greater Will you put forward seems inconsistent with Metyr waiting for a signal from the microcosm to relay to the 2 fingers. In order for Metyr to receive messages and share these with the fingers, it tells us clearly that the Greater Will is a conscious entity that has a goal for order, an active agenda to share with his daughter so it can be enacted but that this order can tolerate a large degree of variation, this doesn't mean the Greater Will doesn't care what the order is like, simply that the Greater Will isn't micromanaging every facet of the order, and simply requires certain criteria be met (ie so long as you do X,Y, and Z, but don't do K, B, and T; then go crazy). The idea Malenia did that to Radahn as part of a challenge, a neccessary 'evi' on Miquella's part gives 2 issues. Why make this deal with Miquella for a resurrection, if he wanted Malenia to try to kill him (arguably the only demigod who could)? I ask for a bonus life only to play russian roulette? In addition, the lore suggest Miquella wanted Radahn not just for his strength but also for his kindness, if Miquella was forced to do something so horrible to get Radahn as a Lord, then is Radahn the kind of Lord Miquella would even want? A huge war, mass casualities, the very probable death of Malenia, all just so Radahn could have a good fight? That doesn't sound like the kindness Miquella saw in Radahn at all.
Firstly, Freya's words should not be given greater importance than Jerren, since Freya was charmed by Miquella. Jerren knew Radahn since he was probably a child. And they swore an oath for honorable deaths. Radahn VALUED an honorable death in battle. I seriously doubt he would agree to cheating an honorable death by letting himself get resurrected by Miquella. Freya does not know what she is talking about by saying that Radahn would be ok with being resurrected to continue fighting. Radahn simply would not be ok with cheating death. Secondly, Miquella can throw around words like "compassion", "vow" and "honor" all he wants, but his actions in the dlc show that Miquella only cares about the ends. To him, the ends totally justifies the means. He freely uses his ability to compel loyalty from others to get what he wants, and Miquella goes so far as to betray his other half, whom he loved sincerely. I don't believe that Radahn agreed with Miquella at all, and that the vow Miquella is shown making at the end is only to himself, deluding himself that Radahn and Malenia will follow along anyway, because that is how lost that Miquella is in his own delusion. Miquella believed he could usher in an age of compassion by ridding himself of compassion. He had gone crazy and didn't even know it.
ya i dont take freyja's words over jerren's, she only knew him from the battlefield, while jerren was close with him and the carian royal family personally
the thing is she isn’t under Miquellas charm when speaking them, second he didn’t rid himself of compassion but of love. I am somewhat astounded by how many seem to equate the two. Like you can be compassionate to one without loving them. If you see a stranger crying you feel bad not because you love them but because you feel part of what they feel and it doesn’t feel good not because you love them. Compare that with how Varre speaks of love in Elden Ring, how Thiollier tries to kill you out of jealousy because he loves Trina or how Morgott loves the Eardtree. A Miquella has a lot of Buddhist inspirations and so separation from the worldly does entail that. I feel like a lot of people including you are going backwards from the conclusion that Miquella is just evil. I can put in all the Ranni comparisons back in but well she is the only one actually puppeteering people but no no no she ain’t lying never and our tarnished also has no choice but to fulfill his destiny and become a lord the thing is she isn’t under Miquellas charm when speaking them, second he didn’t rid himself of compassion but of love. I am somewhat astounded by how many seem to equate the two. Like you can be compassionate to one without loving them. If you see a stranger crying you feel bad not because you love them but because you feel part of what they feel and it doesn’t feel good not because you love them. Compare that with how Varre speaks of love in Elden Ring, how Thiollier tries to kill you out of jealousy because he loves Trina or how Morgott loves the Eardtree. A Miquella has a lot of Buddhist inspirations and so separation from the worldly does entail that. I feel like a lot of people including you are going backwards from the conclusion that Miquella is just evil. I can put in all the Ranni comparisons back in but well she is the only one actually puppeteering people but no no no she ain’t lying never. All the hate is probably because Ansbach is the most BASED blood cultist I can imagine.
Yeah, honestly smoughs take on that was a HUGE misread imo. It's waaaaaay to simple a solution by itself for it to be the answer, and honestly kinda felt a bit lazy/ass pully from him. Especially given everything we know about the character of Radahn it should have been easy for smoughtown to see through the bs in his own words lol
I love how you framed Ranni's ending as semi-canonical. It always felt most in the spirit of a From Software game with its Nietzschian roots glorifying personal achievement and self-determination. The physical and philosophical clash between "killing God" and "perfecting God" is a very fitting climax for Elden Ring's greater themes.
@@schmuck_nugget9003 You can't kill her like every other demigod you meet Can instantly kill you with just a thought if you do try attacking her Is immune to Seluvis's amber draught for some reason and that whole side quest just serves to give the player the middle finger for daring to try and betray her Basically can't do anything against her in any way that matters She gets the only other unique ending and is the only Empyrean that you can let ascend to godhood Is the one to give out the games MLGS Is an empyrean despite how that flies in the face of how empyreans are described everywhere else i.e being born of a single god
Thanks for this man. The stuff surrounding Miquella/Radahn and some of the confusion/criticism surrounding that whole aspect of the story was something I never understood. This was very thorough as always.
I really like this theory, but I do see some issues that still leave me on the side of Radahn not consenting to it. If Radahn had truly consented to vow why wasn't his model in Miquella's cutscene? Surely its not that hard to simply place his model there and obscure it? As you said a vow simply means to make a promise. It doesn't have to be mutual. Also why move as far as possible away from Miquella? The Redmanes and Cleanrot Knights still are at war with eachother even after the dlc. If this was a mutual vow then why are they still fighting and not joining forces? That and not even one Redmane is present at the Heilgree Tree. Jerren and Freyja are stated to be directly opposed to each other in what they believe Radahn would have wanted. It is Freyja alone who asserts that Radahn would agree. Freyja herself loves war and is indebted to Miquella. It is also important to note that Freyja ONLY finds out about the vow from Miquella not Radahn. And if we are bring in deleted content, I suggest you look into BanditGame's video named Radahn's Murder. In deleted content, Radahn prays to the God of Vengeance that punishment be brought upon Malenia. Why would he do this if the deal was "if you can beat me"? There is also only a single-line cut dialog from Radahn in the DLC, and all he does is announce who he is and that he is "bred for war." Nothing else. To me, it strikes me as less Radahn introducing himself and more him playing the part of what Miquella sees him as. It's also important to note that Radahn thematically is supposed to show resistance to change. It would sense if he was being dragged kicking and screaming into Miquella's new age. Again though, overall a great theory!
Radahn is in Caelid because Selia and his castle are there. “Radahn” and “afraid” are two words that don’t fit together in the lore and aren’t backed up by what we see in the trailer. Radahn and Miquellas vow clearly is made with Radagons and Rennalas vow as a foil. The memory also simply doesn’t show Miquella vowing to Radahn but saying the vow to himself/ making the wish, his phrasing still implies he and Radahn made the vow because “our end” just doesn’t make sense any other way.
@@ichdu-fk6xc Still tthere is no reason why malenia would've mounted a full invasion into Caelid and destroyed it. If Radahn truly made the vow with consent then him protecting Selia is a lie, because it quite literally was nuked by Malenia. So I dont really se Miquella as a good guy in any shape or form. His goals might be good, but his actions are terrible.
If Mohg has MIquella’s body, which for some reason is twice Mohg’s size, then how was it that Miquella was in the Land of Shadow discarding parts of his body?
The body he used was a proxy molded by mind-controlled Mogh's copious amount of gathered blood. The Lord of Blood's Exultation reveals that the Bloody Fingers were unleashed to bring a ton of blood for Miquella's cocoon, which it had an unquenching thirst for, which we also see is successful in its goal of growing more flesh for Miquella. So Miquella's old body remained in the Lands Between, allowing him to pull a Ranni and dislodge his soul as a "death by technicality" to go the Shadow Lands, but unlike Ranni he inserted his soul into a new flesh body made by all the blood he used the Bloody Fingers to get rather than a doll one so that he could undergo the godhood ascension process of shedding off the form he inhabited. However, what he didn't account for was the need to shed much more than just flesh, as he also had to shed aspects of himself as a person which would ultimately lead to his downfall.
I though Mogh took Miquella, who left his arm (as seen in the Radahn bossfight) and then started to disregard the rest of him in the Land of Shadows. Miquella controlled Mogh to make him enter another realm basically. What we find in Mogh's bossfight is the arm he's missing during the final battle.
Thank you so much for your video it brought peace to my heart. In my mind Miquella when choosing Radahn was a child who grew too early, disappointed in the ways of his parents, feeling the responsibility over his scarlet rot afflicted sibling, wanting to help those who were rejected. He just needed someone strong and kind who he could share his responsibilities with. And for me there is something endlessly lonely in this desire for the protector in his life.
It's still bizarre to me though that the DLC has Miquella be present in the aftermath of Aeonia, and not re-needle Malenia. Like, healing her is supposed to be his most important motivation but his behaviour here is bizarre, and honestly still very sloppy writing-wise. Like, to even get back to the Haligtree and Cocoon, he'd have to cross multiple Geographic chokepoints and pass Malenia and Finlay. It's pretty absurd. Cocooning while you know for a fact your sister is rotting and not seeking her out still feels like a bad character contradiction, honestly. There's no time-table on his plan, and he also knows Radahn survived. It costs him nothing to seek out and re-needle Malenia here, and it would've also prevented the Haligtree from rotting AND given him a way to finish off Radahn thousands of years ahead of schedule. Why exactly doesn't he heal her? It feels incredibly contrived and Miquella is left kinda holding it Idiot ball. Miquella being at Aoenia at all is a pretty dumb addition to the lore honestly.
lol i do agree. maybe at the end of the day, its indicative of the fact that this wasnt a carefully thought out plan like ranni, but the haphazard plan of a child who using his gifts, can manipulate pieces to his bidding but then circumstances create unknown variables he can't control showing the flaws in his mindset.
@@ShadeStormXD The main issue is that, it it would've take all of five minutes to hunt down Malenia (or tell someone to do it for him) to re-needle her. It's just, really really dumb behaviour honestly and not in a "Child's naivety" kind of way. Like, Malenia's rot also spreads to the Haligtree and destroys a huge part of his life's work; It would've cost him nothing to stop this and he basically massively self-sabatoges himself and his plans for no reason. Like, immediately cocooning instead of waiting for your sister or seeking her out is a huge dick move that doesn't really fit even the DLC lore about miquella. Miquella's main motivation in the base game is to heal her, and he just... doesn't help her at her darkest hour when he easily could It's just a dumb writing contrivance that makes Miquella's behaviour feel odd and needlessly stupid without really connecting to the themes of the story. Malenia basically gets shafted for no reason at all. Even an evil interpretation of Miquella would still want to keep a powerful demigod weapon (who could quickly finish of a mind-rotted Radahn) like her around and in fighting shape. We can make up our own headcanons and theories about it, but at the end of the day its a pretty noticeable character contradiction that I'm honestly just gonna chalk up to sloppy writing and perhaps an oversight when writing Freya's backstory (since she's the only source of info about Miquella being at Aeonia). Honestly, I haven't found a compelling theory that explains Miquella's behaviour here that doesn't make him seem like a huge moron. It feels like when Fromsoft wrote Freya's backstory they just didn't consider that Miquella being at Aeonia and not re-needleing his sister has pretty negative implications on his personality and calls into question a lot of basic assumptions about his character and intelligence.
@ThebutterChamps I assume the needle can halt Malenia's Rot, but not reverse it. Perhaps after she gave in and bloomed, she was fully at the whim of the god of rot, and the outer god had to much of a foothold to be warded away by an incomplete needle.
@@superdoombro I like your theory but it’s something that’s never stated/hinted in the game though, so it’s just speculation. Nothing really indicates the needles would become instantly useless. Even halting the spread somewhat post-Aeonia would’ve been more than what he did in canon. Plus, Miquella using one of the Needles to try after Aeonia to help and ward off the outer gods couldn’t exactly hurt. Again, it’s the complete lack of attention given to Miquella’s most important relationship that’s bizzare. Fromsoft should’ve provided a basic explanation of why Miquella seemingly left his sister to rot for no reason. I’m all for vagueness and ambiguity most of the time , but I think this is a bridge to far, players really shouldn’t be asked to have to create really elaborate and complicated theories to make basic character motives not seem contradictory. Even the older souls games were better at telling players basic character motives without requiring such elaborate theories to explain their decisions.
@@ShadeStormXDeither Ranni planned on creating deathblight killing Iji and Blaith losing Carian control of Raya Lucaria and having her mother imprisoned while waiting for some random shithead to safe this train wreck or her plan ain’t more carful.
I just noticed that the image at 12:36 from the trailer shows the most loyal followers of Miquella closest to the stake and clearest in view, with the less loyal further away and tougher to view. Nice detail!
The problem I have with people thinking Miquella mind control other people is that the quote that he is a monster. The way I interpret Miquella's compelled love is just like Cuthulu's aura of madness. I believe the longer your in proximity to Miquella, your compelled to devote your love to him. Which makes him a monster because he can't turn it off. It is just natural to him.
Some alternative interpretation: 20:48 For Miquella Charm and rune, he still has this power during the boss fight after breaking his great rune so I think this makes it his own power. His followers are no longer under his charms after his rune is broken because the power inside the great rune was purity, or the power to ward of influences, and once it's broken its pieces flew out everywhere (notice the particle effect) purifying people from his Charm. The purity of Miquella could be shown by fact that he was never affected by rot despite his close contact with Malenia, he doesn't have red hair despite being Radagon's child and he only grows older once he breaks his rune and becomes a god. What's more you can use the broken rune to ward off his Charm but you cannot use it to Charm others. I also think Miquella's Charm his trickier than people think. Ansbach said he "uses love to shrive clean the heart of man", and I think its literal : Miquella uses kindness and love to make people love him and steal their hearts". All the people we meet who are under his Charm not only personally met Miquella but were also shown kindness/love from him : - Freyja met Miquella and he kissed her scar and drained the poison. - Thiollier met Miquella as St Trina and he put Thiollier to sleep, giving him respite from his suffering. - Ansbach met Miquella in battle and his heart was "artfully stolen" which, for me, could implies seduction. - The tarnished met Miquella in battle during which he hugs us several times and whispers sweet nothing in our ear until we are under his charm. Now this is pure speculation but I think he needs to do those acts of love because he needs people to love him to Charm them, he was the god abondance in cut content and I think he needs a seed of love to make it bloom into full devotion and Charm. 29:30 I think there could be another interpretation for St Trina and Miquella as just one being. -While Miquella has a long history and interacts with a lot a Demigods, St Trina's history and existence was quick and fleeting. Her story is more of an urban legend, people do not know if she is a boy or a girl and she is even depicted as an adult. And we cannot put that on her being a secondary personality since Radagon also has a long history in parallel of Marika's own so we would expect Trina to be more than a blip in history. -The theory for two personalities also tends to use the relationship between Radagon and Marika as being inherited specifically by Miquella but none of their other childrens, despite their inheritance of other traits like Radagon's red hair for example. It also slightly (but not wholly) hinges on the fact that Marika/Radagon's condition is a birth defect, but in my eye it is the result of Marika's ascension. The ritual needs a body and two spirits, the spirit of the lord who will be the first to return and possess the body and then call for the spirit of the god to return in a spiritual/godly form. The reason Radagon and Marika are one could be because Radagon was Marika's lord. A final step to the ritual could be for the god to fuse with their lord to become one and for the god to gain a physical form. This could also explain why the dragon lord has multiple head: some for the lord and others for the god, and it could explain where his god went, since some of his head were ripted out and are still stuck inside Bayle. This final fusion is a step we prevent Miquella from taking, ending is age before it truly began. - There is the fact that we meet a St Trina during the DLC, but it is not the first time that we have met an aspect of a demigod after they have discarded a part of themselves. During her fight with Radhan, Malenia discarded one of her defining trait: her Pride, breaking her needle and using her rot to beat Radhan. This gave birth to Millicent and her sisters, plant like clones of Malenia who had her knowledge and could use her power whose purpose were to return Malenia her pride. Here Miquella discarded an important trait of his: his Love of other and himself. This trait incarnated in a plant like clone of hismelf who wants to return his self love (by killing him): his St Trina persona, his fate, who he was supposed to become if he didn't become a god. A Saint offering a balm to the suffering of the world, but unable to fix the roots of this suffering. A persona free from duty and expectation. This is why as you said, Miquella has to get rid of his doubts about becoming a god, to throwaway his Love, he had to choose between freedom and duty and he chose the latter. - There is also the question of Trina's power over sleep. In Elden ring it seems that such power either comes from an outer god (Rot, frenzy) or an understanding of the world (fundamentalism, gravity, glintstone). To me, this power seems more like an understanding of the world than an outer god type power. And we know that Miquella studied a lot of different subjects in order to ease the suffering of Malenia. We know that sleep is used by St Trina to ease the suffering of those afflicted with frenzied flame (merchant) and birth defects (Thiollier). Two conditions which could maybe not be heal by conventional means mirroring Malenia's condition and maybe showing Miquella experimenting with sleep as a possible treatment for her. But discarding it when sleep proved to be addicting and only giving a small respite from suffering hence why the history of St Trina was cut short, he knew then that he had to become a god to help Malenia. - Finally, why Trina? Who gave her her name? If it was her parents, you would expect her to have a Mxxx name like all of Marika's children (even the rejected Mhog and the forgotten Melina follow the convention), and I don't think Marika would be oblivious to Miquella being two people. But she is named Trina. The same as the flower, did she take on the name of the sedative plant or did she gave it her own? If Miquella did not give his name while performing is sedation the people might have given him the name of a plant famous for its similar effect (kinda like orange gave the name to orange). After all the St Trina from the DLC never gave us her name either. 57:00 The vow is a little bit fuzzier but there could be two alternative interpretations for the vow and what Miquella says during the boss fight. It could be that the vow was for Miquella to become a God. As such the vows exchanged between Miquella and Radhan could be closer to wedding vows: "If you become a God, I'll be your Lord" hence why he reiterates the fact that he will become a God in the flashback. The only problem with this interpretation is the use of "We honour" since Miquella refer to himself with "I" in the rest of the flashback but It could be because both Miquella and Malenia are part of the vow or that Miquella is using the royal "we" maybe the japanese version could help in detremining which it is. About the loyal blade and champion of the festival, this could alternatively point to the fight between Malenia and Radhan being part of an older Radhan festival (he loved fighting afterall) which devolved into full out war when Malenia released her rot. Another interpretation could then be, like you said, that winning the festival by defeating Radhan was Miquella's part of the vow. He would then be thanking Malenia for both of her deed, being is loyal blade and winning the festival.
Important note on the putrescence; most physical objects, when burned, will leave behind portions that could not be burned. So, it's likely that the coffins would get filled, burned, and then sealed.
I find it fascinating that miquella and st trina have the opposite disagreement of marika and radagon. St trina wants to prevent miquella from becoming a god whereas radagon tries to keep himself and Marika as the reigning god after she appears to no longer want this. "Hear me demi gods. My children beloved. Make of thineselves that which ye desire. Be it a lord, be it a god" She's entirely open to and encouraging her own replacement in addition to radagon's. Whereas he seals the erdtee and manipulates gideon and possibly morgott. Allowing the stalemate of the shattering to persist in any way possible. Marika accepts the end of their era and radagon fights it.
I loved the lore and every chaotic moment of the DLC. I brushed aside my head cannon (almost nonexistent outside what I learn in your vids) and just soaked it all in. I was not a huge fan of Radahn in the base game but I loved the curveball thrown in the DLC. Great video.
42:18 The putrescence could also of come about because they stopped burning the dead with ghostflame. As the practice died out, I think more and more "tainted flesh" would pile up and eventually rot, festering among the ashes of the burnt, eventually giving rise to a being who "lives within death" but has never been apart of the Golden Order so they lack the direct tie to the Erdtree burial rites and thus Godwyn's influence.
One aspect I really like about Radahn as the final boss is he slots in within Hornset culture very directly. A Lion that is covered in horns descends from the Heavens to lead them to their salvation. "Horn-decked beast from higher spheres delivered". Thematically it's on-point and poetic.
On your Marika point, I’ve been convinced for a while that the seduction and betrayal was to do with Radagon I just can’t see anything concrete to say “yes that’s it”. I suspect that at the height of the ritual, Marika killed Radagon to try to ascend to power as her own lord and her own god but “a lord requires a vessel” and there weren’t many other valid options judging by the story trailer. On Miquella and Radahn I like it and it put a lot of what Miquella promised in the base game to various people onto a whole new context. I think he was trying to bring back Godwyn as a trial run for bringing back Radahn, I think he was trying to cure Malenia’s rot knowing that he was sending her to kill Radahn and may need to cure him. If he was planning on Mohg’s body as a vessel the whole time then he’d need to ward off the influence of an outer god so he experimented with the needles. I also believe the Haligtree was supposed to be a big bewitching branch but that’s a whole other rabbit hole 🤣 Everything Miquella did was in service to the vow and how he was going to uphold his end of it. His age of compassion would have been the perfected Golden Order ending on even more steroids in terms of a lack of free will.
It is also interesting how Miquella stands for Compassion, which is basically an expanded level of conscience while Saint Trina stands for Sleep which is a reduction of conscience. This further reflects they are halves of the same thing "Peace/Freedom", with Miquella beign able to bring enlightment to others while St. Trina is able to put them to Sleep.
I am, admittedly really focused on Miquella's character right now and really believe he's completely misunderstood in the ER community so I'm really interested to see where you take this, Smough. It'll be a banger either way.
Miquella is the most mischaracterized character I've ever seen. The community jumped the gun on judging Miquella too fast and started to propagate LOTS of nonsense about him, with some even believing he's a r**ist and trying to label him as Griffith. Lots of nonsense
Absolutely. And now you can't even debate with people online without being thrashed and insulted. I think I found the key that we have all missed, at least here in the Western lore community. Miquella is an exact representation of the Buddhist deity Avalokiteshvara (Kannon in Japan), who represents "Infinite Compassion". Miquella isn't just trying to become a god. He is undergoing the process of Enlightenment, entering Nirvana, and seeking to become a Buddha in order to heal the world of suffering. Of note are his four (3.5) arms, desire for compassion to relieve the world of suffering, and the fact that his arrival into this new transcendent status being heralded by his Lion's roar, on whom he then sits. All of these are word for word ties to Buddhism and this particular Bodhisattva.
@@guighee7310He is just like Griffith though. Griffith had a supernatural ability to make people love him? He is extremely feminine, with many people seeing hints that he may be gay? And in the end he is crippled, like Miquella's "curse" to be a child, and then he ascends to Godhood. It's right there bro
@@LSB44446 ''He is just like Griffith though.'' Quit being disingenuous. You know damn well what people are really saying when they say Miquella is like Griffith and the baggage that comes with that.
I like this video! If I'd point out anything, I think that his abandoning of St. Trina was something of a combination of a vast amount of factors. Something not gone into here is how the other halves of these God-figures seem to embody certain concepts. For Radagon this was Order, and for St. Trina, it seems to be Love, and potentially, Doubt. This is heavily hinted at both by the crosses, but also by Thiollier, Leda, and Ansbach, who all closely associate Trina with adoration and love. Thiollier even more or less openly says Trina is to Love as Miquella is to Kindness. I can see a good argument as for why Miquella felt he needed to discard Doubt to do what he had to do, and discard Love to accept all, graceful and malign. In short, Trina's conflict with Miquella was absolutely a contributing factor, even a tragic one given how it seems he tried to 'save' or sway her - but I think there were a lot of factors to it, that both fueled his reasoning and justify just why it seems to have been seen as so horrible.
My thoughts on this are still jumbled and less clear than I'd like, but for me Miquella deliberately does not 'embrace the whole of it' and we see this in who he abandons in-game. St Trina *and* Malenia are left behind and this in itself is rather an oversight for Miquella's supposed compassionate Order by any means. It seems to be a War for Masculine Purity, casting away the alloyed, rebus aspects of the Feminine within the World and within Miquella, leaves one crucial mistake Marika made in-tact; doing away with Destined Death. And this sullies a grander perfection Miquella aspires to in the DLC. Smough's analysis of Trina is thorough, and on-point especially re: her power to provide eternal sleep akin to Death for those who imbibe Trina's nectar, or to paraphrase Thiollier, providing relief for those too burdened by the state of the world. It's a salve of kindness. But what's worse for me is the contradiction in curing Freya's rot affliction while abandoning Malenia at the foot of the Haligtree--this is betrayal, especially considering her integral part in fighting Radahn in Aeonia. Sure, we're bid by Millisent to give the repaired needle to Malenia, and she gives us no choice but to kill her. But the timeline Smough proposes in this video negates our role in Miquella forsaking Malenia in his quest for Godhood. Metyr's discussion of our own physical, cosmological origins is relevant here too. If the Big Bang, and I assume the rest of the natural ecological processes we exp hold in TLB/SR, Death and rot are essential for life. We see this in failed Erdtree burials--without Death we don't become the grass for the antelope to eat (Mufasa, 1994) so to speak. Is Miquella just trying to be the eternal font of dew for TLB? The Erdtree couldn't be this under Marika, and while this doesn't make ecological sense it would represent a self-imposed prison for Miquella. Forever giving of himself in the place of Death Decay and Rebirth? I'm sure dude would want some foreversleep at some point. Woven into this is the push and pull between stasis and movement; Radahn's bloodlust could be sated under Miquella, but compassionate war is obv some doublethink bullshit. Like Malenia, he only fully thrives in war, and in Miquella's order this ambiguous stasis could be a divine prison of sorts, esp if the vow is so one-sided as Smough says here. There's more to unpack, obv.
@@_UrethraFranklin I honestly wonder how much of Miquella's healing, and his ability to soothe, was Trina. We always seem to see examples surrounded by her flowers after all. I also agree with your view of Trina and Malenia. I can't help but remember Marika's own hometown - she returned, and none remained to see it. Will Miquella mirror this too, failing to save those he did it all for?
One of the main reasons I love Radahn as the last boss, is that the Hornsent adored the Lion Warriors, which horns were used to evoque divinity. And the last boss is exactly that, a horned lion who summons a god at the top of the divine tower.
If Miquella’s timeline now has him at the battle in Caelid, which I fully agree with I have a wild idea to have it make sense with Mohg. I now think the Mohg with Miquella in the opening cutscene we see is before the battle of Caelid. During the Shattering, Miquella used his power to start the Haligtree and was embedded in it. Malenia is in the tree when we find her, and it’s reasonable she reside there, but let’s say she didn’t. Miquella is growing, demigods are doing their things, Mohg takes Miquella with plans to have him be the Blood God. While ripppes out, the Haligtree dies and Miquellas blood becomes tainted and he slips into the Shadowrealm. He figures all the shit out, can freely leave the cocoon by using Trina to sleep Mohg (maybe Mohg is 4th in the vow) and that’s when he sees Freya at the battle. Yeah he’s that weird gross form cause of Mohg, who wouldn’t want to abandon that flesh? Then the events play out as we know. I think either Mohg agreed because maybe he thought being the vessel would be following in moms footsteps or whatever or he didn’t and they used him as revenge for ruining the Haligtree and being all over weird. Allegations reinstated. 😂
Generally speaking, the contrast, yin yang nature of both Radhan, a symbol of war, and Miquella, a symbol of compassion, just makes so much sense to the game.
That doesn’t really track. Radahn was extremely passionate. Miquella divested himself of his loving side. How can one be compassionate without love? Children’s brains learn super fast and likely why Miquella was so smart, but he also seems quite naive. A very child like trait. Saint Trina is said to have an adult form in some Of her items and she tried to warn naive Miquella. Even Ansbach mentions how naive he is (when he remarks how he seems to fail to understand the implications of discarding mogh’s soul just to use his body as a meat puppet). Miquella is a child and childran can be quite selfish. Especially when they don’t know the meaning of “no”.
@@TroyeMackenzie the game uses He/They pronouns for Miquella. As an example, in the Remembrance of a Lord and a God (the english text at least) in the same paragraph it uses THEIR for Miquella twice, then HE for Radahn, and then HE(HIS) for Miquella as well in the last sentence. They are interchangeable. And I think this is due to the Miquella/Trina rebus more than Miquella maybe considering himself non-binary in gender. If the english text of the game uses He/They, then Miquella can very reasonably use I and Our interchangeably as well. (this is why I made note that it's not because the game considers Miquella non-binary, because if it was due to gender then Miquella would still refer to himself as "I" and not Our. He uses Our, and the game uses They because of Trina, but the point is that there are other instances in-game where those pronouns are interchangeable)
This was an extremely good video and cleared up so many things that I could not figure out about Miquella's story. To me, this makes perfect sense. Especially Radahn agreeing to become Miquella's consort if he and Malenia could defeat him in the field of battle. Considering he greatly admires Godfrey, it makes sense he would have a "Might makes right" viewpoint when it came to lordship as well. All the pieces fall neatly into place taking all your points into account!
If Miquella needed Mohg to strip himself away of his Grace, why would he still literally tear himself apart to renounce everything related to Marika? Wouldn’t he be already graceless? And how does Miquella leave his body in the cocoon but still manages to leave part of it in the Land of Shadow? Something is clearly missing, folks lol
In the haligtree there encased albinaurics within similar cocoons. Albinaurics have silver blood and silver is a medium for rebirth and creating mimics. I believe the haligtree body was a trick for Mohg to pick up on as it seemed to be a huge unprotected vessel of empyrean blood, but may have been a laid out trap in reality i.redd.it/9p0jgbpq38ya1.png
Miquella used Mohg to strip his grace and enter the shadow realm. He was still an empyrean with ties to Marika though, even after entering Scadu. He then had to remove all ties to Marika and his empyrean form so he can become an entirely new God instead of just Marikas replacement. Presumably for the same reason that Ranno destroyed her Empyrean body.
Per his idealization of his father/golden order, I could easily see Rhadan having a 'might makes right' mentality. He follows the golden order because of honor/loyalty - but if something stronger was to supplant it, he'd readily follow that too. In some ways, it's a foil to Ansbach's obsession with Mogh - loyalty to the person vs the ideal. Which echoes the whole Goldmask sentiment of Marika vs Order you pointed out as well.
While watching this I realized the real genius thing about the Consort Radahn fight is that its you fighting all of Merika's different children groups at once. Its the soul of a son of Rennala inhabiting the body of a son of Godfrey being empowered as the consort of a son of Radagon. Having Radahn be the final boss of the DLC makes a lot more sense if you look at it that way.
What I LOVE about this lore is the conflicting horrible feeling I have of needing to destroy the very god that wanted a better world for everyone and everything, just the way he wanted to do it all is more demonic than any hellion could have devised. I wanted to happily subject myself to Miquella before I knew what he did and how he went about it. Did the ends justify the means? We will never know as when we dispose of Miquella and Radagon both and even if we choose to rule under a better golden order...We wont get to see these fruits fall from the new tree. The concept of this DLC was simply breathtaking and I wish it was longer and even bigger! It also begs the question, should we all have free will? Miquella's powerful charm captures all the hearts if he is to reign, but so too will wars end and divisions of species and animosities. These seem to even IRL still be the great divisions of mankind, left versus right and all that. I'm deeply conflicted on all these things cause I'd love a world where we can all be one under a benevolent power and lack the need to fight and bleed. But also free will is the whole point of life.. Do we not make mistakes to better ourselves after? Are we not to learn from what we create? Its the brilliant flaw even Miquella himself was not perfect and thus perfection cannot exist and neither can his order. This is simply my take on this fabulous lore.
Radahn is not a mindless beast when we fight him the first time. Not only does he perform spells (which require Intelligence literally) but he has been devouring friend and foe alike, but has the wherewithal to avoid devouring Leonard. When Radahn is losing he performs his meteor crash attack, but pushes Leonard under the earth before he does it, in order to protect him. This indicates awareness, as does his last ditch effort of crushing the player as a shooting star, for he is aware enough to know he is losing the fight. I think Radahn knew what Miquella had planned for him and, so, resisted death. I have said it before and I will say it again: Miquella is just like the Waith-Callers in Liurnia and the Shaded Castle. As a god he has (nearly) four arms like they do, he summons and manipulates spirits/wraiths (putting Radahn's soul in Mohf's body, as well as bewitching people), and he has a bunch of Royal Revenants in his basement (at the bottom of Elphael). Radahn did not want to be Miquella's puppet. That is not only why he fought off the Scarlet Rot, but learned to control the stars (and thus Fate). Miquella is not a tragic hero. He is not really a villain, either. He is a child who is "unalloyed", which is to say, he does not know right from wrong (ironically). He is both a genius and a simpleton. Brilliant and naive. A monster and an angel. He is like "The Mysterious Stranger" as written by Mark Twain. He has not partaken of the Fruit of Knowledge and, so, is a kid with a toychest full of toys he wants to manipulate, but the toys are other people who have not given consent. It is almost like people forget that he has ALWAYS been manipulative (Bewitching Branches, for example). The reason he wants to rid the LB of the Outer Gods is so he can play with his toys without interference from anyone else. Radahn is the Buzz Lightyear that wants to decide his own destiny
I agree i fully agree that miquella has always had a manipulative naturee the whole game from mohg, radahn, ansbach, thollier, malenia even the people of castle sol. Him and ranni does similar actions bcuz they both know the the greater will is the issue
Like for everyone being so smart on lore, they literally show no prove Radahn agreed to this vow. There no descriptions or anything from his perspective that states he agreed to it. It's pure silence. As if the writers are trying to say something about what he really wanted.
55:59 I believe you have unreasonably drawn the conclusion that it’s Miquella’s part of the vow that’s being honored here. "Now the vow will be honored, and my lord brother’s soul will return" Miquella says "the vow", referring to it in its entirety. I believe that what is being honored here is Radahn’s part of the vow, becoming Miquella’s consort, as his soul is being resurrected. This would imply that Miquella has already upheld his part of the deal, as otherwise the choice of the word "honored" makes way less sense if it’s only one party who completed their part of the vow. Also, it makes no sense, for Radahn’s character to bargain for his own resurrection, not only Radahn is depicted as someone who sees great honor in dying on a battlefield, but also his vow to Miquella basically costs him his life at the hand of Malenia, basically canceling out any benefits Radahn gets from this deal. I believe Radahn would anticipate something like this, he isn’t stupid, being as capable of sorcery as he is. I believe Miquella’s part of the vow was already upheld before Radahn’s battle with Malenia, her word to him, "Miquella awaits thee, o promised consort" imply that she is basically serving a lore of a debt collector, killing Radahn so he can honor his part of the vow. That’s why she specifically calls him a *romised* consort.
Loved the video, but I do have a differing opinion about why Melania fought Radahn. There is a reason why we fight Consort Rhadahn pre- starscourge. Radahn did accept the vow, but then he changed his mind. He then dedicated the rest of his life to prevent his death. He stops the stars to hold his fate. He invades the Capitol city to become Elden Lord of Marika. He moves away as far as possible from the north where Miquella reigns. Being killed by "a good fight" just seems too uninteresting to me.
@@305bj even he siege stormveil castle to take godrick rune (dialogue from kenneth haight) so, radahn was a golden order warrior who wanted to be elden lord in his adult years...he refused to be lord of miquella, breaking the vow, and begin to archive power to become elden lord and husband/consort of marika
I’ve been pondering this more today, and I’d like to add that some of the most important cannon lore for the game are the trailers. The few trailers that there were hold vital information found nowhere else. The fight between Radahn and Melania not only was featured in the main story trailer, but even in the original teaser itself. This is such a pivotal moment in the timeline with massive characters that to accept regression and causality of this disaster in Calied would be robbed and cheapened with Radahns only desire was to have a pact for eternal war. Radahn is noted to have a kindness to him, and hold a great rune of the elder ring. Before Miquella left the golden order was when the vow was made, hence the throne. Once Radahn rejected his fate and did all that he did to prevent it was when the Blade of Miquella was released. The Bloom of Aeonia was a desperate last attempt by Melania to kill Radahn. I doubt that he wanted to be killed that way. Some unorganized thoughts there. Also follow the flowers. Miquella Lillies are a clue to where the namesake may have been. There is one at Redmane Castle for instance
@@305bj theres another thing interesting in your theory (theory that i support) and, the fact is, that, when you have a compromise with someone, you give him/her gifts....theres nothing, and i repeat, NOTHING that suggest that radahn gifted a tjing to miquella...the only posible thing i initially think, was loretta, a war knight who served the carian family, but, the items says she went after miquella by personal desires, pretending to help the albinaurics...radahn has bonds with the alabaster lord, ohga, freya, jerren, rykard, etc...nothing, never, show us a gift from the general to the empyrean...i suppose we need to consider that too
Fantastic video! I love your insight and by bringing I'm the collective ideas and lore from other creators, you've concisely explained the answers to so many questions that have puzzled me. Thanks for doing what you do!
You make some good points but I’m still not entirely sold on the theory of Radahn fully accepting this vow. For one, why would he have made the honorable death pact with Jerren if he was expecting to die from Malenia, that seems a little redundant. I just feel like this whole vow and Radahn’s involvement and motives, if he had any, are way to important of a plot point for FromSoft to simply leave out, I just find it frustrating
Maybe he didn't expect anyone or Malenia to actually be able to kill him, he didn't expect Malenia to nuke entire caelid just to kill him. But now he died and has to accept the vow.
Awesome video! Your contextualization of the vow and the relationships between Miquella, Melenia, and Radahn made me appreciate the ending and the lore of the DLC a lot more as someone who initially found it frustrating! Also random note, it’s funny to think if Miquella was at the battle of Aeonia he made that one Cleanrot Knight carry his heavy a*s sister all the way back to the Haligtree all by herself, and then die. Like didn’t lend her Torrent or anything😂
Thanks for the video! One thing to point out, there's a typo at 1:01:22 : it says "Earsome" instead of "Fearsome", unless this is confirmation that Miquella has the biggest ears haha
A banger as usual Geoff, your take on Radahn’s condition for him to be Miquellas Lord is so on character with Radahn, only submitting to miquella if he eas able to kill him, which in theory, we could even say that Malenia failed in her part of the vow by stalemating with Radahn and not killing him. Can’t wait for your next craft. Have a good week my friend and don’t you dare go hollow.
1:02:00 there’s another important aspect to why Malenia fought Radahn that I think is worth mentioning. The Promised Consort Greatswords say in their description that Radahn was a champion that used more than just gravity and swords to hold back the stars. The vast majority of the time Radahn was holding back the stars, he wasn’t holding on his own-he was infected with the power of rot, and seeing as how the stars don’t crash down until Radahn was defeated, it doesn’t seem like the rot was hurting his ability to fend off the stars. I think the swords point to the fact that Radahn needed a source of power to hold back all of fate, and Malenia’s connection to a god served as a power source. But this would obviously ruin Radahns body and mind, if he made this sacrifice to embrace rot in order to hold back the stars. So he would need to cast aside that body and be reborn, hence the vow
Are there any plans for a reevaluation of Godfrey? (Even if it were just a short thing).It might feel redundant due to his lack of presence in the DLC but there is a pretty interesting video by the channel "GamePlus | The alchemist" posing the idea that Hoarah Luox might've been one of the highland warriors as well as an important figure to the hornsent. Boiling it down they theorize that: Rather than just fighting bears (whose attacks mirror his own) he defeated Serosh, a feat that brought him the favor of the hornsent, despite his lack of horns, and inspired their lion dances. Then, according to this theory Marika would've seduced Hoarah Loux to gain access to the devine gate. This theory obviously somewhat clashes with the idea of the seduced serpent, but there were a lot of details they pointed out which were quite intriguing.
According to the secret rite scroll, the ascension ritual needs these things: a God, a Lord & a Vessel -- Marika, Godfrey & Hoarah Loux / Miquella, Radahn & Mogh Marika also had to discard her other self Radagon, like Miquella discarded St. Trina
i'm personally of the belief that radahn and miquella made that vow with a different understanding of how it would come about, and that some mind control was necessary in order to have radahn continue to play the part, hence miquella descending on him in a manner visually similar to serosh suppressing hoarah loux. the vow likely happened before miquella abandoned the golden order, of which we know radahn was a believer, and probably sparing the incredibly important detail that miquella used the body of a demigod omen to resurrect radahn. while we unfortunately don't have any canon content to go off for that, something tells me that radahn, golden order adherent, would not be cool with coming back as a graceless omen.
I personally strongly fall under the camp that, while Radahn might have initially agreed to form a vow, he changed his mind later on, maybe due to some disagreement with Miquella or an initial misunderstanding of his goals. To me, everything points to Radahn not being a willing participant at the end. From the battle of Aeonia; to Radahn's mostly open devotion to his father, Godfrey, and the Golden Order; how his red aura transforms to Miquella's gold in the mid-fight cutscene and his eyes are clouded when Miquella is present; his complete absence in Miquella's final cutscene; the thematic importance of the DLC story and Miquella's character (especially his mental childishness, his shallow view of consent in particular); even the music briefly transitioning to a darker, more somber bridge after his initially glorious theme, before it's entirely overtaken by Miquella's ascendant one, with the male choir still occasionally trying to push through. Yes, I'm including the music, because From DOES use musical storytelling. Also, the loyal blade is Leda, not Malenia. Leda was actually present in the DLC and defined by his devotion to him. Also, Malenia is his sister, so why wouldn't he refer to her as such?
I agree. I suspect the vow was made before the Shattering, when Miquella and Radahn were raised as step-brothers. But everything changed when Marika and Radagon disappeared, the Elden Ring shattered and great shards of it were claimed by the demigods. Enia states: "Tainted by the strength of their runes, her children warred." Emboldened by the corrupting power of their Great Runes, the demigods refused to bend the knee or cooperate, each instead deciding that they themselves must rule. The only shardbearers we know of who didn't lead armies to fight for their rulership are Malenia and Ranni. Ranni is said to have physically discarded her Great Rune, while Malenia was stuffed full of unalloyed gold, deeply indebted to Miquella and possibly subject to Miquella's supernatural charm.
''agreed to form a vow, he changed his mind later on, maybe due to some disagreement with Miquella or an initial misunderstanding of his goals. To me, everything points to Radahn not being a willing participant at the end. '' Nice fanfic, 50 shades of gray worthy
Malenia literally refers to herself as "The blade of Miquella." While Leda is devout I don't think she has that kinship with Miquella. Also when Miquella is saying this in context he is introducing Consort Radhan and thanking those who made it possible, by defeating him previously. That's why I am convinced it's Malenia at least.
I'm of a mind that while Miquella technically held up his part of the agreement, he did not honor the spirit of it. Radahn probably agreed to serve in exchange for resurrection, but didn't think to stipulate Miquella couldn't facilitate his demise. An extremely slow, painful and grotesque demise at that. Possibly that's why Miquella brought back a younger version of Radahn, maybe he also only has the memory of his younger self and thus only knows that the vow was honored, not the circumstances that ended him.
From the phrasing, I get the impression that Miquella fulfilled his part of the vow in the past, and resurrecting Radahn was part of Radahn's end--the resurrection was as Miquella's lord, which was what Miquella wanted. So Miquella's part was in the past--which I think was killing Radahn. More specifically, I think Radahn wanted an honorable one on one fight with the other revered warrior among the demigods, to test her might against his, and if Miquella's blade won, he'd be happy to lend his power to claim the gentler world Miquella spoke of. That falls in line with Jerren wanting Radahn to have an honorable end and Freya's talk about Radahn loving warfare and being able to fight strong opponents. I almost positive that the ruination of Caelid was unintended and ruined everyone's plans. Miquella didn't want that to happen, and neither did the other two. Malenia's flower blooming was an unexpected disaster than Miquella regreted, Malenia suffered, and Radahn was left alive but only technically in a horrible way. Miquella would've wanted Radahn dead and his plan wouldn't come to fruition as long as the big guy was roaming the wastelands eating corpses. The thing that might be worth making a video on is covering how the Elden Ring controls the very law of the world and how each ending is about changing (or maintaining) those laws. A lot of people argue that Miquella's 'age of compassion' was about brainwashing the whole world to make everyone get along. But it's way more likely that he intended to become god and literally change how the world works so violence, hatred, and oppression wouldn't be the way of things and instead love and caring would reap the most benefits over cruelty. Not through mind control but by altering the laws of nature, like Marika removing the concept of death, but more precisely since Miquella is working to remove the influence of the outer gods that seem to thrive on suffering. If I'm missing something there, I'd love to see a breakdown.
About what you said at 1:06:05, the first look we get at the Shadow of the Erdtree is a single image of Miquella riding on Torrent in the Gravesite Plains. So I believe it's safe to say that that is all but confirmed by FromSoft
I still believe the most straightforward answer is that Radahn never gave his consent to the vow. The contextual clues lean heavily this way: the cutscene in which Miquella speaks to him, but he's not even there. The fact that he doesn't speak a word in his new form or seem to have a single thought of his own. Learning that Malenia only fought him to fulfill the requirements for the ritual. And of course, watching how Miquella seem to work his magic over everyone he meets, to the point where you even start to wonder whether his own sister was allowed to freely chose to follow him or not. Aside from which, Radahn's character doesn't seem to align well with the idea of him agreeing to an insurance policy. A noble warrior like him, negotiating himself into an advantageous position where he wins no matter what? This is a man so absolutely stubborn that he would rather harness enough power to hold the _stars themselves_ from moving against him. ....all for the sake of his favorite horse. Nothing short of the godess of rot herself and the machinations of a bewitching demigod could force him to do anything.
Most definitely Malenia didn't get a choice not to love him; I think that's why it's so bad Miquella divested himself of the one person who probably chose to love him, romantic or otherwise, it was made of their own consent and not his.
Entirely agree. The idea that Radahn wanted to be resurrected as part of a two-way vow just does not fit at all with any of the narrative- Kinda came out of nowhere in the video as a bit of a wild speculation.
There's just no possibility that Radahn has not consented to the vow. It would be one thing if Miquella vowed to make Radahn his consort, but the way it's phrased on the evidence we have is that this is Radahn's vow, he is the "Promised Consort" and Miquella can't promise the consort to himself, only Radahn can make that promise, and by extension, that vow.
@@SolitasRuisu Why can't Miquella promise himself Radahn? The way the scene is posed and phrased (and again, the fact that Radahn himself has never been shown speaking of the vow even indirectly, as none of his followers seemed to know about it), it seemed to me that Miquella was having a moment to himself, speaking as if Radahn was there (reminder: we don't see or hear him), and making a promise to himself that if he upheld the torment he was to undergo to cast away everything, he could have Radahn as his reward. Like he was promising himself a nice treat if he was a really good boy.
@@ellec3747 Because there's no evidence to suggest Miquella would make a one sided vow like this when he might as well just use his charm on Radahn from the start. It makes no sense to talk about "our part of the vow" if the other person never agrees to their part of the vow, especially when you consider what Miriel says about the power a vow has. Besides, this isn't out of character for Radahn. He swore an oath of honorable death with Jerren, but he also fought to stop fated change. Did he actually desire rest or just the glory of death in battle? Freyja has the impression that Radahn wouldn't be opposed to coming back to life and wage more war. That is just another way to challenge his fate, much like how he did challenging the stars. Radahn is most defined by his refusal to let go. His initial reason for learning gravity magic was so he wouldn't let go of his tiny horse, even though it still struggles to keep up with him and is clearly damned alongside him in the wailing dunes. You think a man like that would have no interest in being brought back to life? At some point he could have resisted honoring his part of the vow (probably at the point Miquella abandoned the Golden Order, since Radahn was loyal to the status quo of it), and that would explain why Miquella sent Malenia to kill him. But that would still mean Radahn had agreed to it, at least at first.
Before watch this video i want to ask you Something. What was your favorite piece of lore, the one you spend the most good time to work on? Also, would you join Miquella, and why?
It's a good question - I think I generally really like the 'cosmic' elements of the games; I.e. the Elden Ring, the Greater Will, the outer gods etc. I often come back to these elements and revise my ideas on it. Other than that GEQ and Godskins! What about yours?
Great video! You make such good lore long form videos. I do think there is more going on there with Radhan and Miquella. The reasons suggested are very shallow for why he would team up.
I'd like to chip in here. The way I see it, the "god slain" text comes up because we defeated Radagon, not the Elden Beast. After all, we do know that the Elden Beast=Elden Ring. You'd need to completely destroy the ER in order for the Beast to die truly. As long as the Elden Ring exists so does the Elden Beast.
There are a few potential reasons. - She isn't actually slain, she vanished through a portal and her true fate is unknown - She, unlike the Elden Beast which would prune the cruicible to become the modern Elden Ring, was never handed true power - The "God Slain" bit is referring to Radagon - Metyr is well and truly abandoned by the Greater Will and either was never handed true power by it or lost it as it the Greater Will cut off contact and so on.
I can't remember who, but a TH-camr had a theory on the vow between Miquella and Radahn that makes more sense. Radahn agreed to be Miquella's Lord Consort, but when he found out how Miquella was going to go about creating a gentler world, he changed his mind because it goes against his warrior and compassionate nature. So to stop Miquella, and to save the world, Radahn held back the stars to stop Miquella's fate. Which is why Miquella sent Malenia to kill him so he could reach his destiny and put Radahn's soul into a body he could control. Radahn is a legend of a Chad. Bro resisted the rot so he could stay alive to save humanity and ride his beloved horse. 😥
@SmoughTown it's been nice reminding myself what I loved about it now that I've come back, oddly enough despite how different they are in terms of gameplay I think alot of what I love about it is shared with ER, the music, the environments and characters just stay with you. Glad I've got more of your vids to watch now lol
Your comparison between Ranni and Miquella (and how perhaps Ranni may be influencing the tarnished on behalf of Miquella, or she is being influenced herself) makes the strange '1000 year voyage' double occurrence very interesting.
If miquella was in caelid, why did that one cleanrot knight finlay carry melania back to the haligtree alone and when does he go back to be taken by Mogh, and if miquella promised to resurrect radahn doesn’t this imply he already planned to kill Mogh? What’s up with that?!
Genuinely excellent video on Miquella and the vow. I think he's one of the most interesting characters we've seen fromsoft create and I think he's become underrated due to a lack of nuance in analyzing his character by some fans. The ideas in your video are really sound and consistent, amazing summary of the content 👏
I think Miquella Ranni and Melina are all connected. All 3 have goals that align at least to the extent of dismantling the old order and restoring death/balance to the world
I know there’s plenty of theories of the three of them having some part in the NoBK or planning some other conspiracies but none of them sat quite right with me. Honestly, I think the simplest answer is that, despite how they think it needs to be fixed, they agreed the current order needed to go. So, when a strong tarnished showed up, they’d work together help them. Miquella would give us Torrent, Ranni gave us a means to summon help in battle and Melina would offer guidance and, hopefully, deter us from falling into the hands of the frenzy flame. I think that’s about as far as their cooperation went. Interestingly enough, they also seem to stay out of each other’s way. Ranni and Miquella are direct competition with each other but neither of them try to stop the other. Melina doesn’t push you to help/not help the others (not that she cares for any particular order anyways). The girls seem to have some vested interest in Torrent’s well-being. With the Shattering war and the demi gods turning on each other, it’s interesting to think that some of them might’ve made a truce for the sake of the world
A lot of people are not gonna be ready for this video since they were fed for so long that Miquella is this evil incarnate being. Also, can we stop this poor thing Mohg bullshit? He was an evil demigod with horrific visions for the world with his Age of Blood. Mohg kidnapped Miquella with plans to use and transform him into his God of Blood, but ended up being hit with an uno reverse card and was used himself instead. Another thing, I find it SO ironic that people will bash Miquella for using Mohg while simping for Ranni when she proudly says she's the one who orchestrated the Night of Black Knives that ASSASSINATED Godwyn in a horrific ritual that submitted Godwyn to a fate worse than death to achieve her own goals. To me, Miquella's means were less worse than Ranni's while achieving a better end goal than Ranni.
God its u at it with the miqaganda. Ppl haven’t been ‘fed for so long’ that miq is pure evil. Infact, before dlc release (which was 2 half months ago) any signs of miquella and his ability to compel affection was brushed off as berzerk goon bait and you would be bashed for holding this opinion. Also a reminder that it has not been confirmed that Mohg kidnapped miquella pre charm, but you know what has been confirmed? That bro is violating mohg’s corpse…in support of another brother that he likes. Castle sol (functioning under his name) has tortured albinaurics locked in Rykard degeneracy level cages. Also, the blood and gore is a horrific vision only to those lacking vision. Sorry but the black and murder adds to aesthetic. Best dynasty instantly
Claro que nego vai ter dó do mog lol Ele provavelmente não ia ser dono dum culto satânico de sangue se não tivessem tacado ele no esgoto E ele é honesto o cara só quer sangue mesmo sem essa palhaçada de paz ai desse moleque do carai satisfação pura matar deuses em souls pqp.
I really do think st. Trina represent “love” and not they were romantic. Like Siamese twins. Conjoined yet they think differently share the same body and organs. However miquella is an empyrean, So when he dispose of his love it is st Trina that represents that love aspect. That’s the way I view it. I also believe st Trina was first to go. In the trailer she is shown whole yet when we meet her she clearly missing parts of her. Also when Miquella dies so too does st Trina. I believe they are still linked but physically separate.
She is his other half and does personify his love. I think the side quest with Thiollier is intended to be a commentary on what kind of love she is and he needed to divest her. Also, yes I think when he first arrived he went south to cast off his doubts and "love" before anything else.
@@TSpoon823 I don't think that quest is as much "what kind of love she is," and more the different kinds of love in general. Love can be both nurturing and obsessive.
In Miquellas attempts at righting the wrongs of his heritage, he ultimately does the exact same thing Merika does; push everything else aside except for your goals
If people arent convinced about base game connections then they should consider: 1) on Radahns cape (both starscourge AND consort) both the tree is reminiscent of the haligtrees depiction AND the lion on the cape on either side of the tree has a swirl mid way up its tail and droops at the end, just like a Miquella lilly 2) either end of radahns bow has a Miquella Lilly on either side, fashioned to be like a marriage of the lilly and tail of a lion (and no it isnt the tail of the lion in the midle of the bow as that has a separate tail on the lower half of the bow) PS. Glad you finally put in the unalloyed needle ♡
@@ScumMageInfa thats not true...the lion has the same motif like the lion depicted in the walls in the colloseums.(even ancient dynasty has two lions with a tree, its not exclusive from miquella)...look carefully and you will notice that...same for the greatbow...the lion of the golden order, who radahn are simbolized, has a flourished tail....radahn watched the fights in the colloseums, where he met freya. And the war and the lion are the simbols of godfrey, his idol...i know you are making a video where you will say that lilly thing, but i think its not true...plus, starscourge armor depicts a lion, and speaks of godfrey, elden lord of golden order...if you unite all, radahn wanted to become the perfect warrior as sometime godfrey was...i think youre looking what you want to see, but the items speaks different, and thats the point of the question...radahn was interested in miquella??? or was an adult interested in the war and the ways of godfrey, the gladiators and the golden order???...i beg you to look carefully the walls of the colloseums, the lions has the same tail...and even, the statue of marika who reveals "radagon is marika " has the same two lions with the flourished tail, even the decapitated marika statues un the shadowlands has the lions...look carefully...that simbol is from the golden order, not for miquella
@Thrasher-92 That depiction with the lions is representing the crucible of life, where in you see a mixing of animals and plants- so it makes complete sense the appendages of the lion are merging with the tree. Like the ones on the Godrick Soldiers outfit across from a tree having branching tails. Whereas the lion on Radahns outfit and his bow do not have a tail branching multiple times like a tree, but instead take a shape more akin to a lilly.
@SmoughTown Great video! However, while I agree with your general interpretation of the vow, I believe that the vow wasn't successfully upheld by all parties due to the influence of their Great Runes. From what I can tell, the vow between Miquella, Malenia, Radahn was made before the Shattering. Evidence for this is in how Radahn appears in his "Young Lion" form, which looks extremely similar to his appearance in the Starscourge Heirloom, even down to having the same braided hairstyle (as opposed to his unbraided look during the Shattering). Since it's likely the Starscourge Conflict happened before the Shattering, I believe that the vow was made either shortly after or before Radahn became the Starscourge. With that in mind, none of the three demi-gods were under the influence of the "mad taint" of the Great Runes pre-Shattering, so the vow was made when they were all "untainted". In my interpretation, I think that a vow was made between the three of them, but Malenia and Radahn betrayed their ends of the vow during the Shattering. - Malenia unleashed the Scarlet Rot, which goes against Miquella's goal of becoming a god--as it effectively puts Malenia on the path of Godhood herself, turning her into a rival. - Radahn refused to die (as Freyja says, Radahn wants "endless war", which sounds a lot like the Shattering if it had never ended). I think this breaking of vows is related to their Great Runes, and how the runes corrupted them. The immense strength and mind inherent in Radahn's Great Rune tempted him to battle endlessly, while Malenia fails to uphold her "spirit of resistance" and gives in to the Scarlet Rot as per her Great Rune. It's only Miquella who upholds his end of the bargain, even if his methods of upholding it are twisted and influenced by the power of his own Great Rune. As Leda states "Kindly Miquella never betrays a vow."
Now we making progress...... Oh I can't wait for the greater will video, a few perspectives I don't see voiced much about such things go as follows..... First off we make the start of universe sounds like the big bang... Everyone seems to do this but the big bang had nothing to do with gods ect ect so what is actually happening? In the beginning there was one entity then there were fractures.... I interpret this to mean that the great one shattered its self into the many gods we see today. What remained was a husk... The flame of frenzy and what does the flame of frenzy say? "What was borrowed must be returned" (this is a common "origin of the gods" in a lot of fiction by the way) now moving on isn't it weird that the mother of the two fingers uses sorceries... No gold, no incantations, her micocosum looks like a consolation, stars are the gods. My view the prime evil current is the greater will, reclaimed by the flame of frenzy, the greater will is dead, this is what the great glintstone masters see the death of the greater will, and with such a death the flame of frenzy wins, its only a matter of time before all existence is consumed. The golden order then forbids study of the prime evil current to hide what has happened. As a topper, who uses golden incantations in the dlc? The hornsent... A culture that has no direct connection to sorceries or the greater will
underrated comment! i havent heard this perspective before. if it true and the greater will is dead, and the frenzied flame is all thats left like a heat death of a universe thats genually terrifying.
Hmm I'm still not entirely convinced that the vow was to be resurrected in case of his death. I have yet to see any evidence in game that the vow between Miquella and Radahn was not stated in childhood, when Miquella had yet to reject Golden Order Fundamentalism and thus, begin his true opposition to Marika/Radagon. Of all the children of Marika/Radagon, it is Radahn who styles himself after his father. Rykard, Ranni, Miquella, Melania all go to extreme lengths to distance themselves from their heritage. Ranni could have had a doll constructed in line with her previous body, Rykard seems all to willing to cast himself towards the serpent etc. Radahn would have witnessed all of these siblings and I find it hard to believe he would keep such an image if he truly opposed the Golden Order under Marika/Radagon. Also, his fight in Aeonia makes little sense with his characterisation as a good, honourable warrior. Your theory would see the General throw hundreds, if not thousands, to their deaths just for the sake of it, just to sate his ego. I find it hard to imagine Radahn as he has been characterised up to this point, risking the lives of his men by having them come into contact with the Scarlet Rot just because he wanted a challenge. Such foolishness seems unlike the General who was not just martially impressive but also a sound strategist. Miquella and Melania are never far from one another and so it would mean a clash between the two of them eventually. If such a fight was to happen, I think Radahn would try and ensure that he and his men fought and died for a cause they considered worthy, not just because Radahn wanted a challenge from an Empyrean of all things. I am inclined to align with Ansbach in terms of his disgust and distaste for what has happened to Mogh/Radahn. This is demeans both of these men who are honourable in their own ways, and perhaps even misguided in their own ways too. Would Radahn have consented to be a Consort if it meant his soul would inhabit the body once tainted by that which he would have been taught to reject and if it meant his original body/mind would have been so corrupted by Scarlet Rot that it meant instead of an honourable duel, we instead administer was is for all intents and purposes a mercy killing? To give him back some dignity I think our theories pre-DLC are not invalidated. Melania tried to kill Radahn and was not capable of doing so. She held herself back and only bloomed when it became clear they were matched too well. She was sent to kill him on Miquella's orders but could not follow through with them. When she bloomed she may have expected it to kill him, as it has killed so many others. Maybe that is why she is so desponsent when we meet her. She failed and she knows Miquella cannot follow through with his plans due to that fact. She is his blade, his sister, his most loyal disciple as it were. Such a failure, even if rectified by us, would be a cast of shame against her. I think Radahn MAY have made a promise to be a God's Consort, but such a promise was revoked before the Shattering when Miquella abandoned the Golden Order to chart a new course, one which saw him in opposition to all Radahn valued and modeled himself on. Who is to say that such a vow was said in all seriousness? And not some childish indulgence that Miquella took too seriously? Bearing a child's face has to cause a level of disconnect in people from what you look like vs his actual age/competence etc. Much like Messmer, Radahn has a "Might means right" mindset. Such ideals puts him closer to Marika than it ever would to Miquella. Miquella's gentler world would have little use for warriors. What "endless battle to invigorate the soul" would he find in such a world order? By holding back the stars Radahn prevented Ranni's usurpation and ascension to godhood and was a powerful rejection of his Carian heritage. So, what else is there? Marika/Radagon. All this to say, by not hearing Radahn's own thoughts on the Vow, I think that speaks volumes. If not even Freyja knew of such a promise, who is to say that he intended to follow through with it? Or that he did not consider it null and void? Miquella demonstrates through this DLC that his aims, whilst admirable, are put into practise with a child like level of understanding. He is not stupid, but by divesting himself of that which made him him, he has cast away all consideration for others. Radahn is humiliated, as is Mogh. Melania is forced to bloom and expose so many others to that which festers within her. Those we saught his guidance or even those who challenge his plans face having their hearts ensnared, like Ansbach. He, like a child, thinks that compelling compassion he can fix lifes problems. He does not seek mutual understanding. He commands compliance through compulsion, which as you said in video is applied unilaterally rather than individually. If Miquella truly wished for a gentler world he could have instead promised to become OUR God. As one ending proves, the Tarnished can welcome in to the Order those who had been cast out. But he doesn't because he, like so many of the demi-gods, wants to be the one to enact change. ANYWAY! amazing video as always and thanks for shouting out other content creators as I now have even more lore videos to consume 👍
This- I think Smough is overlooking that Miquella's ideals, though well intentioned, are a horror in reality. Everything you've laid out is entirely consistent with this. Miquella is not "good", and Smough's interpretation seems to, for lack of a better term, "run defence" for Miquella, despite the narrative VERY clearly being contrary.
Such a well-crafted and insightful video! The biblical parallels you highlight-twisting the narrative so that the serpent is betrayed by Eve (Marika) and giving rise to Radagon (Adam)-are absolutely fascinating! If the god Marika betrayed was indeed a serpent, it raises many questions about her firstborn's affliction with the base serpent and the existence of the God-Devouring Serpent in Volcano Manor. Your theories always do such an amazing job of piecing together this expansive and captivating lore. Keep up the fantastic work!
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Thanks everyone for watching my take on Miquella and the Vow.
Please let me know your thoughts in the comments below!
I REALLY don't like the idea of Radahn letting everything happen willingly, a lot of his loyal men died for just a "duel", not to mention how it ended in an endless amount of suffering in the Wailing Dunes. Why fight to tooth and nail, why sacrifice so many lives, if he is completely willing to die for Miquella. It just doesn't make sense. I believe there was a vow, but something must have changed that made Miquella to send Malenia to kill Radahn. Also I don't know how he would be ok with just throwing away his beloved steed. Considering how he learned gravity magic just to keep him around.
The vow has always intrigued me. Nothing like a SmoughTown video to break it down! I love how your detail-oriented self can find lore-relevant information with in-game dialogue and item descriptions. Cheers mate great work
thanks for sharing this! My popcorn is popped and im ready for +1h of #metime
Honestly, I don't think we should put too much stock in the Japanese to English Localization being a bad translation. And here's why I think so. George R. R. Martin writes in English and we know that he help set up the base for this game.
Yes, I understand Miyazaki and Team did alter the "original work" to fit the game, but the core concepts were written in English. Therefore, I think GRRM would say something akin to "Original Sin" and it would be translated to the closest thing in the Japanese mindset, being "Causality." If anyone has a reason this is not the case I'd love to hear it, but I personally don't find the Causality Angle to be something I agree with.
Especially since it seems like we're dealing with Queen Marika being a type of Eve, the mother of all in the Bible. This is even further enhanced by the snake skin being so close to the Oh Mother Guesture. We definitely are treading on the Garden of Eden story, but I don't quite know what to make of it. But all of that leads me to think "Original Sin" is not a bad translation. But instead a returning to the original for us native English speakers.
you've been putting in extra work and going extremely hard here as of late back to back drops love content and your hard work shows through the quality of your content thank you
Radagons fate is worse than death. His corpse is turned into a sword by the Elden Beas to later be used by us to rune-farm albinaurics.
Dont forget it also allows for efficient gathering of the greatest item in game, the Albinauric bloodclot.
@@aceundead4750 amen.
Perhaps the true worst fate was the albinaurics we killed along the way.
The Golden Order wasn't a fan of the albinaurics anyway
I don't even think Radagon is even alive when we first meet him or he's at least about as alive as like Robert Strong from ASOIAF is. Something about the way he moves in complete silence. It's like he's on puppet strings but he falls apart
>Miquella wants a world free from the influence of outer gods
>Uses the body of someone tainted by The Formless Mother for his consort
We got him!
>(potentially) purges the formless mother from the body in the form of the red aura (bloodflame?) when he returns as a god (something he can do considering his needle)
i see you have an issue with the current system, clever of you to have complained via your iphone!!
not to be that guy, but he was never able to finish making his needle, so he could not do it@@TroyeMackenzie
@@TroyeMackenzie his needle was incomplete. it only works in the storm beyond time.
and the formless mother's influence is clearly still present considering how Radahn continues to use bloodflame in second phase
Miquella: “Step one…we get rid of the horse.”
Malenia: “Brother that is unwise.”
Miquella: “Silence Sister, I have a genius 58 part plan that cannot fail.”
Malenia: “That’s what you said about Godwyn…and the Haligtree…”
Miquella: “Sister go sit in the corner.”
Malenia: “Okay…”
Cringe
Ignore the guy above me. This is funny and that person needs some whimsical in their lives.
And she never got up from the corner until you came along
Oh no. Miquella and Malenia are just Pinky and the Brain
I dunno if you saw the animation that was done over Taylor Swift's Mastermind recontextualizing Miquella making his plan as a kid drawing in crayon, but it is very good and fits your comment :'')
Great video as usual Smough! But you may also be missing one crucial reason why Radahn was chosen by Miquella: he can hold the stars in stasis, which is crucial in keeping out foreign influence, keeping the world “unalloyed”.
We know that the Greater Will was primarily able to exert power through its agents Metyr and the Elden Beast. Radahn has the power to block their entry and even routinely slay beasts like Astel, and I think his primary motivation as a character is to seek greater and greater glory through his battles against the heavens. Meanwhile, Miquella’s age without causality cannot be maintained with alien orders involved.
So, I believe that Radahn’s war as Miquella’s consort will not be directed towards the Lands Between, but will instead be directed towards the very heavens themselves, going toe-to-toe with the avatars of the Outer Gods and the Greater Will.
Miquella will have his eternal peace on earth; Radahn will have his eternal war in the cosmos.
That's a really great description! 💪🏾😎
Great observation!
Truly a great idea.
OMG I love this! I don't think I've seen anyone else describe Radahn's motivations this way. It fits him so well.
@@SmoughTown Welp, looks like you have to start over
Shadow of the Erdtree was the closest we ever got to major events playing out while we’re on our journey. Instead of all the important events happening before.
I don't know, delaying/triggering the apocalypse or ascending to godhood seem like major events to me, and that is what the Fromsoft PCs usually are up to.
Yeah, SotE and Sekiro. I like the story feeling more involved like this.
@@sinisterwombat3128yeah but the dark souls characters usually exist in a world that is already aged and all the main players in the worlds events are old and washed up.
And it's ass. I feel like my intelligence is being insulted and I'm being made fun of for ever caring about the story.
@@2Quick4You100 wait what's ass? SotE?
I think a critical piece of Miquella's story that many of us aren't talking about is how he likely lost control of himself over the course of his discarding across the land of shadow. After all, we know he abandoned his doubt so that it would not restrict him from his ascension regardless of how painful it was. I suspect there was a sort of snowball effect where the more of himself he cast aside, the less of himself was left. To sacrifice everything to become a god is to become a god left with nothing.
So people calling Miquella a villain are I think missing some crucial, albeit subtle undertones that really highlight what his story is really trying to do. Miquella's curse, I think, was not as simple as eternal youth. This was but a symptom. His curse was to be eternally on the precipice of budding into something greater. As in his youth, as in the failure of the Haligtree and the failure of his plans with Godwyn, and finally as in his fate to achieve godhood but be left utterly alone and empty in it. Stripped of the qualities that would have defined his order.
And this shell of his consort stripped of the very qualities that Miquella first admired in him. He had discarded all that would have guided him through his godhood, and when we hear St. Trina call godhood his prison, this is meant to tell us that Miquella has suppressed (with the physical metaphor of the fissure), his subconscious knowledge that his curse to forever aspire for greatness but forever fail would be his demise.
In a sense all of this, the tragedy of Miquella the Kind, was fated to happen from the start. His age of compassion could never have come.
And if you're still reading, I think this is why Miquella led us here. Not so that he could challenge Marika's lord, but so that we could free him from this prison. We were his last hope. I think this is why there are Nascent butterflies just out of reach at the very beginning of the game, why Varre (a follower of the enchanted Mohg, and therefore likely operating under Miquella's influence) is the first character we meet in the game, why we ended up with Torrent, and why Miquella left so many of his crosses right next to sites of grace. With the hope that we might, if we grow strong enough, show up just in time to free him from a fate he never had any control over to begin with.
Miquella's eyes are both shut, his body fading into nothingness, and the memory at the end of the DLC rendered darkened, empty, and frail.
I also think this is why the only dialogue we ever get from Miquella is about Radahn as his consort which feels off putting. It's because the idyllic, impassioned vow he made as an adoring and hopeful child is all that is left to guide him. Like something that needs to be let go of, but can't be. None of it ever should have gone this way, but all of it was fated to.
beautifully put. To me, killing Miquella at the end of the DLC always seemed like putting him out of his misery. As at that point, he is uable to judge what is even right or wrong anymore.
@@kellispees911 I fully agree. And it's such an interesting way of telling that story, because it's not just that be became misguided or immoral naturally, he quite literally discarded his doubt and his love. So what was left was less of himself, god or not.
@@seamusdempster miquella is probably the most morally complex character in all these games, and they tackle his morality in such an interesting and novel way. I just think people find a difficult time distinguishing him from other popular characters from other series’ that may share similar aesthetics to Miquella (ehm… like Griffith), that are infinitely less interesting and complex than miquella. So they end up bringing Miquella’s character down to their level, simply because they don’t really understand what Miyazaki is trying to say with miquella.
A similar situation happened with Radahn. Radahn is a story about Glory, War, a kindness unparalleled, the Blood of the ancient roots of the World’s Origin - a child of prophecy (kinda like Miquella too), a death of a body that brings one’s soul closer to Divinity (Valhalla), and so much more that makes his character thematically compelling…. Yet , all the fanbase sees in him: “OMG HE’S SUCH A CHAD BECAUSE HE LIKES HIS HORSE!!” Lmao
@HeevaEgo lmfao morally complex, but yet he is literally infecting everyone he comes across with basically Stockholm syndrome, to me that seems pretty cut clear and crystal to me the guy is forcing people to live by his way or no way at all, there's is no complexity it's pretty straight forward that miquella is a "monster" who is controlling everyone to get his way, you can argue that he isn't inspired by Griffith from berserk but you are absolutely wrong he is obviously inspired by Griffith, his face and hair are even kind of reminiscent of Griffith, he sacrifices his blade malenia, he uses people like tools, and he is even tunnel visioned into his goal like Griffith was, imo it's pretty obvious that he isn't as all glorious and innocent as he wants to seem
There's even more similarities when you look at radahn as if he is a combination of guts and zodd, and malenia being casca, Griffith wanted guts to stay with him against his will, he even forgets about malenia and stops caring for her much like how Griffith basically throws her to the wolves when he ascends to god hand status.
Theres way too many similarities for it not to be the case tbh
Miquella used to be a golden order fundamentalist. So it’s possible that Radahn made the vow to him turning that time, before Miquella started trying to make his own order.
Very true!
the cutscene we get after beating them at the end of the dlc is being misinterpreted by pretty much everybody I've seen talking about it. Radahn never made the vow with Miquella. Miquella has his own ideas about being a god and in his obsession chose Radahn to be his consort because in him he saw all of the traits he wanted to use. that cutscene is Miquella making a vow to his own obsession.
@@Shizn0idFreyja literally says Miquella made a vow WITH Radahn. And as mentioned in the video, Miquella had his own part of the vow he needed to honor for Radahn.
@@Rusty_SpyFreyja never says that. She hypothesizes that Radahn would welcome resurrection because he would be able to fight wars again, which is a sentiment at odds with Miquella's Age of "Compassion".
@@Rusty_Spy Fraya also says "..General Radahn's soul met an honourable end. But Kindly Miquella wishes to revive it... Which is fine by me. I know it would pain old Jerren... " why would that pain Jerren and why would Fraya have to soul search in the first place if her master truly made that vow. I left another comment saying this, but that dialogue alone suggests not all the Redmane soldiers would have been automatically okay with Miquella's plan. As Smough literally states, you do not need mutual consent amongst two parties to make a vow.
With Consort Radahn being the ending to the DLC players have been forced to rearrange and add numerous steps to their idea of how the chronological history of Elden Ring played out. The idea that Radahn WAS in on Miquella's plan from the start but then changed his mind at some point adds even more steps to that already somewhat convoluted timeline and in my opinion is a little bit thematically contrived. I believe Miquella making the vow to himself that he WILL have Radahn as his consort (no matter what.. even if hes gotta die then fuck it) adds the kind of sinister layer to Miquella's character that the writers intended
*Miquella:* "Will you marry me and help me overthrow the Golden Order as my Consort?"
*Radahn:* "Over my dead body."
*Miquella:* "Excellent, then we have an agreement."
*Radahn:* "Wait, what?"
Being a god’s lord doesn’t mean marriage in Elden Ring
@@Draconian930 Me and Ranni disagree.
@@Draconian930 Godfrey, and Radagon seem to take issue with that.
Welp time to set aside all the frivolous nonsense, be a responsible adult and watch smoughtown lore videos!
I hope you enjoy!
Who needs work when you have an hour long elden lore video
There are 3 characters with a similarity; Miquella, Ranni, and Melina all wear a ring on their right hand ring finger. From what I can find, a ring on this finger represents a vow.
Surely if it's shared by ranni, miquela and maleinia then it's a ring for empyreans no?
@@finlaytemple1744
Melina, not Malenia. Malenia’s right arm is her prosthetic, and she only has finger braces on her left.
@goroakechi6126 ah good point, mb, was melina not an empyrean though? (Assuming shes the gloam eyed queen)
I think people are needlessly complicating this one element of the story. The ONLY terms of the vow we know of and should believe exist are Revival of Radahn=Lord Consort, that’s all.
These are easily abusable terms. From Radahn’s perspective he gets what he wants with no downsides; from Miquella’s, he gets a lord consort and his age of compassion as soon as Radahn dies.
So simply kill him yourself. There are no rules against that in the vow. Malenia was brought in as a third party and champion to execute Radahn, forcing him to fulfill his part of the vow upon his revival. Of course there may be additional elements of Radahn welcoming a worthy opponent, being open to waging war against the Haligtree, and so on. But ultimately I think the moment Malenia murmurs in Radahn’s ear is supposed to be a reveal and revelation to him as well as us when he may have mistakenly misattributed their intentions to waging war as we all initially did; “Miquella awaits thee” being the moment he understood what they had done by making the deal with him and now coming to collect via his death.
Yeh I more or less agree - basically what Miquella says during the boss intro
Thank you for that, this part was not making sense for me until I read your comment.
It’s crazy how iconic “CURSE YOU BAYLE!” is. If you didn’t summon Igon for that fight, just do it. It’s so great.
I still think it makes more sense that Radahn agreed initially but later changed his mind. Why else go through all the effort of changing all his equipment and fighting Malenia. Even if you are an honorable warrior who seeks an honorable death, it'd make no sense to fight your own allies in a brutal war of conquest. Throwing away the lives of your own soldiers for your pride is not something a compassionate person would do. If he just wanted a duel he would have just had one. I think it makes more sense thematically that Radahn rejected his part of the vow at some point, paralleling Radagon's own abandoned vow and the ensuing fallout. Miriel says the consequences for breaking a vow are most dire, and what could be a more dire consequence than the near complete destruction and tainting of Caelid. A place which Radahn must have been at some level fond of considering he defended Selia and had his own fortress in the region.
Agree. I personally also think he broke off his part of the vow after halting the stars to protect Sellia, since that singular act also inadvertently halted the fate of all Carian's, and Radahn by that point was probably already fated to become Miquella's consort. It's just gonna end up as another FromSoft-Dead End, since too much can be interpreted into it, and we don't know what actually holds any importance or relevance to the discussion.
Another example of (maybe?) interpreting too much: Why should we believe Miquella, when he talks about upholding his part of the vow? It could be another coercion, one he maybe also could've used on Radahn to make the "vow" (what it may have entailed, we obviously don't know) SEEM mutually beneficial. Another interpretation, which would basically derail half this video. This of course only goes off of the fact Miquella was a well known master manipulator, as told to us by npc's and descriptions, without any further evidence, but the game also lacks anything to disprove my theory, and therefore we find ourselves back at square one.
He may have also made the vow when Miquella was a golden order fundamentalist, then renounced it after Miquella renounced the order
@@vagrant2863 theres another thing...theres so much items that refered radahn "in his youngest years"....this, its indirectly the proof that he change mind and opinión after he becomes starscourge....the stars, guide de fate of man, alter the fate of carian family, and the amber stars, guide the fate of gods...
Radahn, becoming starscourge, put in stop the fate of everyone...even, his fate was altered, cause he is a carian demigod....then, he breaks the vow, and becomes the strongest demigod warlord we see in the base game, tailers, etc...malenia, fought him, cause miquella choose him and needs him, to bring his order and make him his lord...but we know, radahn wanted to be like his father and his idol, godfrey...he wanted the rune of godrick (kenneth says that radahn siege the stormveil castle, and that happened in shattering, when the demigods claimed the power and the right to the throne of elden lord)
So, radahn, the starscourge adult radahn, wanted to be elden lord along with marika, not the lord of miquella
What I think is this: Radahn gave his consent to the vow of being Miquella's consort if Miquella resurrects him if he ever fell in battle, hoping that he had earned an extra life. But all he earned was a certain death sentence from Miquella. Basically Miquella decided to _force_ the circumstances where Radahn would need to be resurrected.
We'll never know because they almost certainly didn't know what to do with the DLC
The Dryleaf Dane slight is crazy. That guy isn't under the effect of the charm at all. He believes in Miq even more than Leda does
Thank you so much for the shout-outs! Another amazingly thorough video, like always!
And I never noticed the Misbegotten casting the Rings of Light incantation at 44:40 (they've always been felled by gravity whenever I explored that area). It's really interesting that the Misbegotten guarding St. Trina makes the same pose as the Misbegotten Crusader does when the latter uses the Ash of War for the Golden Order Greatsword, which was once Radagon's.
My pleasure mate! Thanks for all the quality work and content!
17:10 "One cannot simply WALK into the land of shadow" 🤔🤔🤔🤔🤔
Glad I’m not the only one who caught that possible reference😂
Aspiring Lord of the old... Rings 🤔
Literally read this comment as he said it 😂
Bravo 👏 you my friend bow to no-one
If we survive the Grafted Scion in the prologue, a nascent butterfly lures you to your death. Miquella has definitely been guiding us from the start.
HE’S BACK!!!!!!
I finally beat Consort Radhan last week and was shaking with joy. However, I quickly felt annoyed/sad that you can’t do anything afterwards.
No interacting with the gate directly above the arena. No talking with any characters outside the Shadow Lands about your journey. Can’t even tell Gideon All Knowing, he just ignores me with no dialogue options.
Same.
Like, come on, FromSoft. You guys could've easily adjusted the dialogue of vanilla NPCs to reference the DLC.
Yeah there’s just nothing inside or outside the DLC. It’s just over.
In fairness, we were TOLD explicitly that there would be no interaction between the DLC and base game NPCs and that there would be no further Endings provided by the DLC
Visit St. Trina’s location.
I mean yeah dude. The game is over lol
Thank you for this video. Never did it occur to me that the reason for Miquella's divesting of St. Trina was that St. Trina resisted his ascension to godhood. It was so obvious, but I missed it. 😅
*_"Miquella, The Tickler..."_* 💀💀💀💀💀
Dr Miquelespect
Miquella, Lord of Tickella.
He's gounna miquellesta ya
brainrot section of the comments
@@guighee7310 sounds like you have something up your ass bud. You might want to get that checked out.
One of the things I most appreciate about your videos is that you consistently and pointedly shout out and recommend other lore creators across all the platforms. You don't just plug your work, you hold up others' and say "this is good stuff guys, go check it out."
That, and you're almost always audio-jump-scare free, so I can add your stuff to my 'lore to sleep to' list without second thought. That's a close second favorite thing!
Thank you so much for the feedback and kind words! Really means so much that you like my approach and it keeps me motivated! Thanks so much
@SmoughTown Absolutely, you're welcome! You're how I first heard about people like Garrolous Goldmask. And the more I find and listen to/watch other lore people, the less junk I don't care to watch winds up in my YT feed.
@@Xanthelei So pleased to hear that - GG is a great creator and cannot get enough of his content tbh!
Couldn't the 'our' in the promise simply be Trina? Miquella only abandoned the golden order once he realized it could do nothing to free his sister from rot. Miquella created the 3 ring of light incantation, a golden order incantation. As an emperyean, loyal to the golden order or not, Miquella needs a Lord to ascend to godhood. Why wouldn't Radahn accept the offer to be Miquella's/Trina's consort within the Golden order?
Radahn's resistance likely came later because Miquella rejected the golden order and sought a new order. Radahn vowed to be consort in a very different context, and thus Malenia tried killing Radahn to force him to become Lord and 'honor the promise'. Miquella is Trina. Referring to himself in the plural makes sense up until removing Trina.
I believe this is the case. Miquella made this offer before abandoning golden order fundamentalism, and Radahn backed out after Miquella now demanded he become the Lord of a different age, a new order.
Marika did not create her Lord. Radagon became Lord much later. Godfrey was the 1st Lord, meaning she agreed to marry him, with the promise of him being king of a new order, thus allowing her to become a god. However, clearly while a Lord is needed to ascend, the god can replace the Lord with someone else later. If Radagon was created to be Lord, then Godfrey would never need to be in the mix. We see how strong Radagon is, even when crippled and crumbling. She wouldn't have needed Godfrey at all unless Radagon was for some reason not ready to be a Lord.
Side note, the new interpretation of the Greater Will you put forward seems inconsistent with Metyr waiting for a signal from the microcosm to relay to the 2 fingers. In order for Metyr to receive messages and share these with the fingers, it tells us clearly that the Greater Will is a conscious entity that has a goal for order, an active agenda to share with his daughter so it can be enacted but that this order can tolerate a large degree of variation, this doesn't mean the Greater Will doesn't care what the order is like, simply that the Greater Will isn't micromanaging every facet of the order, and simply requires certain criteria be met (ie so long as you do X,Y, and Z, but don't do K, B, and T; then go crazy).
The idea Malenia did that to Radahn as part of a challenge, a neccessary 'evi' on Miquella's part gives 2 issues. Why make this deal with Miquella for a resurrection, if he wanted Malenia to try to kill him (arguably the only demigod who could)? I ask for a bonus life only to play russian roulette?
In addition, the lore suggest Miquella wanted Radahn not just for his strength but also for his kindness, if Miquella was forced to do something so horrible to get Radahn as a Lord, then is Radahn the kind of Lord Miquella would even want? A huge war, mass casualities, the very probable death of Malenia, all just so Radahn could have a good fight? That doesn't sound like the kindness Miquella saw in Radahn at all.
Firstly, Freya's words should not be given greater importance than Jerren, since Freya was charmed by Miquella. Jerren knew Radahn since he was probably a child. And they swore an oath for honorable deaths. Radahn VALUED an honorable death in battle. I seriously doubt he would agree to cheating an honorable death by letting himself get resurrected by Miquella. Freya does not know what she is talking about by saying that Radahn would be ok with being resurrected to continue fighting. Radahn simply would not be ok with cheating death.
Secondly, Miquella can throw around words like "compassion", "vow" and "honor" all he wants, but his actions in the dlc show that Miquella only cares about the ends. To him, the ends totally justifies the means. He freely uses his ability to compel loyalty from others to get what he wants, and Miquella goes so far as to betray his other half, whom he loved sincerely. I don't believe that Radahn agreed with Miquella at all, and that the vow Miquella is shown making at the end is only to himself, deluding himself that Radahn and Malenia will follow along anyway, because that is how lost that Miquella is in his own delusion.
Miquella believed he could usher in an age of compassion by ridding himself of compassion. He had gone crazy and didn't even know it.
ya i dont take freyja's words over jerren's, she only knew him from the battlefield, while jerren was close with him and the carian royal family personally
the thing is she isn’t under Miquellas charm when speaking them, second he didn’t rid himself of compassion but of love. I am somewhat astounded by how many seem to equate the two. Like you can be compassionate to one without loving them. If you see a stranger crying you feel bad not because you love them but because you feel part of what they feel and it doesn’t feel good not because you love them. Compare that with how Varre speaks of love in Elden Ring, how Thiollier tries to kill you out of jealousy because he loves Trina or how Morgott loves the Eardtree. A
Miquella has a lot of Buddhist inspirations and so separation from the worldly does entail that.
I feel like a lot of people including you are going backwards from the conclusion that Miquella is just evil. I can put in all the Ranni comparisons back in but well she is the only one actually puppeteering people but no no no she ain’t lying never and our tarnished also has no choice but to fulfill his destiny and become a lord
the thing is she isn’t under Miquellas charm when speaking them, second he didn’t rid himself of compassion but of love. I am somewhat astounded by how many seem to equate the two. Like you can be compassionate to one without loving them. If you see a stranger crying you feel bad not because you love them but because you feel part of what they feel and it doesn’t feel good not because you love them. Compare that with how Varre speaks of love in Elden Ring, how Thiollier tries to kill you out of jealousy because he loves Trina or how Morgott loves the Eardtree. A
Miquella has a lot of Buddhist inspirations and so separation from the worldly does entail that.
I feel like a lot of people including you are going backwards from the conclusion that Miquella is just evil. I can put in all the Ranni comparisons back in but well she is the only one actually puppeteering people but no no no she ain’t lying never.
All the hate is probably because Ansbach is the most BASED blood cultist I can imagine.
Yeah, honestly smoughs take on that was a HUGE misread imo. It's waaaaaay to simple a solution by itself for it to be the answer, and honestly kinda felt a bit lazy/ass pully from him. Especially given everything we know about the character of Radahn it should have been easy for smoughtown to see through the bs in his own words lol
@@josiahgerrish8014 Explain what you mean with Radahns character
@@ichdu-fk6xc I'm not the guy making the hour long lore vids, if you want to know what I mean, I think smoughtown has some good vids on Radahn :)
I love how you framed Ranni's ending as semi-canonical. It always felt most in the spirit of a From Software game with its Nietzschian roots glorifying personal achievement and self-determination. The physical and philosophical clash between "killing God" and "perfecting God" is a very fitting climax for Elden Ring's greater themes.
Considering Ranni is none too subtly Miyazaki's Mary Sue, it may as well be the canon ending
@@Rusty_Spy She is VERY far from a Mary Sue. You will need to back that up if you go round telling people that.
@@schmuck_nugget9003 You can't kill her like every other demigod you meet
Can instantly kill you with just a thought if you do try attacking her
Is immune to Seluvis's amber draught for some reason and that whole side quest just serves to give the player the middle finger for daring to try and betray her
Basically can't do anything against her in any way that matters
She gets the only other unique ending and is the only Empyrean that you can let ascend to godhood
Is the one to give out the games MLGS
Is an empyrean despite how that flies in the face of how empyreans are described everywhere else i.e being born of a single god
@@Rusty_Spy damn lol well said. ranni is low key my least favorite character. i wish we got better ending outside of her ending
@@elibrainless90Frenzied Flame. Everybody get's what they have coming for them, then everything ends.
"Come and have a go if you think you're hard enough."
What a legendary line lmao
Thanks for this man. The stuff surrounding Miquella/Radahn and some of the confusion/criticism surrounding that whole aspect of the story was something I never understood. This was very thorough as always.
Cheers Max - always appreciate you being here, and means alot coming from yourself!
I'd really like to hear your two cents on miquella/ SOTE
I really like this theory, but I do see some issues that still leave me on the side of Radahn not consenting to it.
If Radahn had truly consented to vow why wasn't his model in Miquella's cutscene? Surely its not that hard to simply place his model there and obscure it? As you said a vow simply means to make a promise. It doesn't have to be mutual.
Also why move as far as possible away from Miquella?
The Redmanes and Cleanrot Knights still are at war with eachother even after the dlc. If this was a mutual vow then why are they still fighting and not joining forces? That and not even one Redmane is present at the Heilgree Tree.
Jerren and Freyja are stated to be directly opposed to each other in what they believe Radahn would have wanted. It is Freyja alone who asserts that Radahn would agree. Freyja herself loves war and is indebted to Miquella. It is also important to note that Freyja ONLY finds out about the vow from Miquella not Radahn.
And if we are bring in deleted content, I suggest you look into BanditGame's video named Radahn's Murder. In deleted content, Radahn prays to the God of Vengeance that punishment be brought upon Malenia. Why would he do this if the deal was "if you can beat me"? There is also only a single-line cut dialog from Radahn in the DLC, and all he does is announce who he is and that he is "bred for war." Nothing else. To me, it strikes me as less Radahn introducing himself and more him playing the part of what Miquella sees him as.
It's also important to note that Radahn thematically is supposed to show resistance to change. It would sense if he was being dragged kicking and screaming into Miquella's new age.
Again though, overall a great theory!
Radahn is in Caelid because Selia and his castle are there. “Radahn” and “afraid” are two words that don’t fit together in the lore and aren’t backed up by what we see in the trailer. Radahn and Miquellas vow clearly is made with Radagons and Rennalas vow as a foil. The memory also simply doesn’t show Miquella vowing to Radahn but saying the vow to himself/ making the wish, his phrasing still implies he and Radahn made the vow because “our end” just doesn’t make sense any other way.
We can't use cut content as evidence; it was cut for a reason after all. I agree with everything you said here overall though
@@ichdu-fk6xc Still tthere is no reason why malenia would've mounted a full invasion into Caelid and destroyed it. If Radahn truly made the vow with consent then him protecting Selia is a lie, because it quite literally was nuked by Malenia. So I dont really se Miquella as a good guy in any shape or form. His goals might be good, but his actions are terrible.
@@danielcristianescobar8157 Bold of you to assume Radahn knew of the Scarlet Aeonia
@@danielcristianescobar8157 in a story with litteral genocidal gods, ur hating on the guy trying to bring peace. top tier take :D
If Mohg has MIquella’s body, which for some reason is twice Mohg’s size, then how was it that Miquella was in the Land of Shadow discarding parts of his body?
Yeah that’s been a big thing that’s bothered me since the DLC came out. It makes no sense.
The body he used was a proxy molded by mind-controlled Mogh's copious amount of gathered blood. The Lord of Blood's Exultation reveals that the Bloody Fingers were unleashed to bring a ton of blood for Miquella's cocoon, which it had an unquenching thirst for, which we also see is successful in its goal of growing more flesh for Miquella.
So Miquella's old body remained in the Lands Between, allowing him to pull a Ranni and dislodge his soul as a "death by technicality" to go the Shadow Lands, but unlike Ranni he inserted his soul into a new flesh body made by all the blood he used the Bloody Fingers to get rather than a doll one so that he could undergo the godhood ascension process of shedding off the form he inhabited. However, what he didn't account for was the need to shed much more than just flesh, as he also had to shed aspects of himself as a person which would ultimately lead to his downfall.
I though Mogh took Miquella, who left his arm (as seen in the Radahn bossfight) and then started to disregard the rest of him in the Land of Shadows. Miquella controlled Mogh to make him enter another realm basically. What we find in Mogh's bossfight is the arm he's missing during the final battle.
@@enman009People have clipped through the cocoon and seen it was more than just an arm
@@enman009Also it' the left arm Miquella is missing, but peeking through the cocoon the right arm is seen.
Thank you so much for your video it brought peace to my heart.
In my mind Miquella when choosing Radahn was a child who grew too early, disappointed in the ways of his parents, feeling the responsibility over his scarlet rot afflicted sibling, wanting to help those who were rejected. He just needed someone strong and kind who he could share his responsibilities with. And for me there is something endlessly lonely in this desire for the protector in his life.
It's still bizarre to me though that the DLC has Miquella be present in the aftermath of Aeonia, and not re-needle Malenia. Like, healing her is supposed to be his most important motivation but his behaviour here is bizarre, and honestly still very sloppy writing-wise.
Like, to even get back to the Haligtree and Cocoon, he'd have to cross multiple Geographic chokepoints and pass Malenia and Finlay. It's pretty absurd.
Cocooning while you know for a fact your sister is rotting and not seeking her out still feels like a bad character contradiction, honestly. There's no time-table on his plan, and he also knows Radahn survived. It costs him nothing to seek out and re-needle Malenia here, and it would've also prevented the Haligtree from rotting AND given him a way to finish off Radahn thousands of years ahead of schedule. Why exactly doesn't he heal her?
It feels incredibly contrived and Miquella is left kinda holding it Idiot ball. Miquella being at Aoenia at all is a pretty dumb addition to the lore honestly.
lol i do agree. maybe at the end of the day, its indicative of the fact that this wasnt a carefully thought out plan like ranni, but the haphazard plan of a child who using his gifts, can manipulate pieces to his bidding but then circumstances create unknown variables he can't control showing the flaws in his mindset.
@@ShadeStormXD The main issue is that, it it would've take all of five minutes to hunt down Malenia (or tell someone to do it for him) to re-needle her. It's just, really really dumb behaviour honestly and not in a "Child's naivety" kind of way. Like, Malenia's rot also spreads to the Haligtree and destroys a huge part of his life's work; It would've cost him nothing to stop this and he basically massively self-sabatoges himself and his plans for no reason.
Like, immediately cocooning instead of waiting for your sister or seeking her out is a huge dick move that doesn't really fit even the DLC lore about miquella.
Miquella's main motivation in the base game is to heal her, and he just... doesn't help her at her darkest hour when he easily could
It's just a dumb writing contrivance that makes Miquella's behaviour feel odd and needlessly stupid without really connecting to the themes of the story.
Malenia basically gets shafted for no reason at all. Even an evil interpretation of Miquella would still want to keep a powerful demigod weapon (who could quickly finish of a mind-rotted Radahn) like her around and in fighting shape.
We can make up our own headcanons and theories about it, but at the end of the day its a pretty noticeable character contradiction that I'm honestly just gonna chalk up to sloppy writing and perhaps an oversight when writing Freya's backstory (since she's the only source of info about Miquella being at Aeonia).
Honestly, I haven't found a compelling theory that explains Miquella's behaviour here that doesn't make him seem like a huge moron. It feels like when Fromsoft wrote Freya's backstory they just didn't consider that Miquella being at Aeonia and not re-needleing his sister has pretty negative implications on his personality and calls into question a lot of basic assumptions about his character and intelligence.
@ThebutterChamps I assume the needle can halt Malenia's Rot, but not reverse it.
Perhaps after she gave in and bloomed, she was fully at the whim of the god of rot, and the outer god had to much of a foothold to be warded away by an incomplete needle.
@@superdoombro I like your theory but it’s something that’s never stated/hinted in the game though, so it’s just speculation. Nothing really indicates the needles would become instantly useless. Even halting the spread somewhat post-Aeonia would’ve been more than what he did in canon. Plus, Miquella using one of the Needles to try after Aeonia to help and ward off the outer gods couldn’t exactly hurt.
Again, it’s the complete lack of attention given to Miquella’s most important relationship that’s bizzare. Fromsoft should’ve provided a basic explanation of why Miquella seemingly left his sister to rot for no reason. I’m all for vagueness and ambiguity most of the time , but I think this is a bridge to far, players really shouldn’t be asked to have to create really elaborate and complicated theories to make basic character motives not seem contradictory. Even the older souls games were better at telling players basic character motives without requiring such elaborate theories to explain their decisions.
@@ShadeStormXDeither Ranni planned on creating deathblight killing Iji and Blaith losing Carian control of Raya Lucaria and having her mother imprisoned while waiting for some random shithead to safe this train wreck or her plan ain’t more carful.
I just noticed that the image at 12:36 from the trailer shows the most loyal followers of Miquella closest to the stake and clearest in view, with the less loyal further away and tougher to view. Nice detail!
From the quality to the contents the amount of time and thought that goes into these videos is clear! Thank you!
My pleasure my friend! Hope you enjoy the content
The problem I have with people thinking Miquella mind control other people is that the quote that he is a monster. The way I interpret Miquella's compelled love is just like Cuthulu's aura of madness. I believe the longer your in proximity to Miquella, your compelled to devote your love to him. Which makes him a monster because he can't turn it off. It is just natural to him.
Some alternative interpretation:
20:48 For Miquella Charm and rune, he still has this power during the boss fight after breaking his great rune so I think this makes it his own power. His followers are no longer under his charms after his rune is broken because the power inside the great rune was purity, or the power to ward of influences, and once it's broken its pieces flew out everywhere (notice the particle effect) purifying people from his Charm. The purity of Miquella could be shown by fact that he was never affected by rot despite his close contact with Malenia, he doesn't have red hair despite being Radagon's child and he only grows older once he breaks his rune and becomes a god. What's more you can use the broken rune to ward off his Charm but you cannot use it to Charm others.
I also think Miquella's Charm his trickier than people think. Ansbach said he "uses love to shrive clean the heart of man", and I think its literal : Miquella uses kindness and love to make people love him and steal their hearts". All the people we meet who are under his Charm not only personally met Miquella but were also shown kindness/love from him :
- Freyja met Miquella and he kissed her scar and drained the poison.
- Thiollier met Miquella as St Trina and he put Thiollier to sleep, giving him respite from his suffering.
- Ansbach met Miquella in battle and his heart was "artfully stolen" which, for me, could implies seduction.
- The tarnished met Miquella in battle during which he hugs us several times and whispers sweet nothing in our ear until we are under his charm.
Now this is pure speculation but I think he needs to do those acts of love because he needs people to love him to Charm them, he was the god abondance in cut content and I think he needs a seed of love to make it bloom into full devotion and Charm.
29:30 I think there could be another interpretation for St Trina and Miquella as just one being.
-While Miquella has a long history and interacts with a lot a Demigods, St Trina's history and existence was quick and fleeting. Her story is more of an urban legend, people do not know if she is a boy or a girl and she is even depicted as an adult. And we cannot put that on her being a secondary personality since Radagon also has a long history in parallel of Marika's own so we would expect Trina to be more than a blip in history.
-The theory for two personalities also tends to use the relationship between Radagon and Marika as being inherited specifically by Miquella but none of their other childrens, despite their inheritance of other traits like Radagon's red hair for example.
It also slightly (but not wholly) hinges on the fact that Marika/Radagon's condition is a birth defect, but in my eye it is the result of Marika's ascension. The ritual needs a body and two spirits, the spirit of the lord who will be the first to return and possess the body and then call for the spirit of the god to return in a spiritual/godly form. The reason Radagon and Marika are one could be because Radagon was Marika's lord. A final step to the ritual could be for the god to fuse with their lord to become one and for the god to gain a physical form. This could also explain why the dragon lord has multiple head: some for the lord and others for the god, and it could explain where his god went, since some of his head were ripted out and are still stuck inside Bayle. This final fusion is a step we prevent Miquella from taking, ending is age before it truly began.
- There is the fact that we meet a St Trina during the DLC, but it is not the first time that we have met an aspect of a demigod after they have discarded a part of themselves. During her fight with Radhan, Malenia discarded one of her defining trait: her Pride, breaking her needle and using her rot to beat Radhan. This gave birth to Millicent and her sisters, plant like clones of Malenia who had her knowledge and could use her power whose purpose were to return Malenia her pride. Here Miquella discarded an important trait of his: his Love of other and himself. This trait incarnated in a plant like clone of hismelf who wants to return his self love (by killing him): his St Trina persona, his fate, who he was supposed to become if he didn't become a god. A Saint offering a balm to the suffering of the world, but unable to fix the roots of this suffering. A persona free from duty and expectation. This is why as you said, Miquella has to get rid of his doubts about becoming a god, to throwaway his Love, he had to choose between freedom and duty and he chose the latter.
- There is also the question of Trina's power over sleep. In Elden ring it seems that such power either comes from an outer god (Rot, frenzy) or an understanding of the world (fundamentalism, gravity, glintstone). To me, this power seems more like an understanding of the world than an outer god type power. And we know that Miquella studied a lot of different subjects in order to ease the suffering of Malenia. We know that sleep is used by St Trina to ease the suffering of those afflicted with frenzied flame (merchant) and birth defects (Thiollier). Two conditions which could maybe not be heal by conventional means mirroring Malenia's condition and maybe showing Miquella experimenting with sleep as a possible treatment for her. But discarding it when sleep proved to be addicting and only giving a small respite from suffering hence why the history of St Trina was cut short, he knew then that he had to become a god to help Malenia.
- Finally, why Trina? Who gave her her name? If it was her parents, you would expect her to have a Mxxx name like all of Marika's children (even the rejected Mhog and the forgotten Melina follow the convention), and I don't think Marika would be oblivious to Miquella being two people. But she is named Trina. The same as the flower, did she take on the name of the sedative plant or did she gave it her own? If Miquella did not give his name while performing is sedation the people might have given him the name of a plant famous for its similar effect (kinda like orange gave the name to orange). After all the St Trina from the DLC never gave us her name either.
57:00 The vow is a little bit fuzzier but there could be two alternative interpretations for the vow and what Miquella says during the boss fight. It could be that the vow was for Miquella to become a God. As such the vows exchanged between Miquella and Radhan could be closer to wedding vows: "If you become a God, I'll be your Lord" hence why he reiterates the fact that he will become a God in the flashback. The only problem with this interpretation is the use of "We honour" since Miquella refer to himself with "I" in the rest of the flashback but It could be because both Miquella and Malenia are part of the vow or that Miquella is using the royal "we" maybe the japanese version could help in detremining which it is.
About the loyal blade and champion of the festival, this could alternatively point to the fight between Malenia and Radhan being part of an older Radhan festival (he loved fighting afterall) which devolved into full out war when Malenia released her rot. Another interpretation could then be, like you said, that winning the festival by defeating Radhan was Miquella's part of the vow. He would then be thanking Malenia for both of her deed, being is loyal blade and winning the festival.
Important note on the putrescence; most physical objects, when burned, will leave behind portions that could not be burned. So, it's likely that the coffins would get filled, burned, and then sealed.
I find it fascinating that miquella and st trina have the opposite disagreement of marika and radagon. St trina wants to prevent miquella from becoming a god whereas radagon tries to keep himself and Marika as the reigning god after she appears to no longer want this.
"Hear me demi gods. My children beloved. Make of thineselves that which ye desire. Be it a lord, be it a god"
She's entirely open to and encouraging her own replacement in addition to radagon's. Whereas he seals the erdtee and manipulates gideon and possibly morgott. Allowing the stalemate of the shattering to persist in any way possible.
Marika accepts the end of their era and radagon fights it.
Ranni says as much as to, “That I might one day upend the whole of it,
and rid the world of all that came before.” She cast off her Empyrean flesh.
I loved the lore and every chaotic moment of the DLC. I brushed aside my head cannon (almost nonexistent outside what I learn in your vids) and just soaked it all in. I was not a huge fan of Radahn in the base game but I loved the curveball thrown in the DLC. Great video.
i liked him in base game, the whole festival buildup, the kickass music, the essence of being fromsoft's first raid boss, all positives for me.
42:18 The putrescence could also of come about because they stopped burning the dead with ghostflame. As the practice died out, I think more and more "tainted flesh" would pile up and eventually rot, festering among the ashes of the burnt, eventually giving rise to a being who "lives within death" but has never been apart of the Golden Order so they lack the direct tie to the Erdtree burial rites and thus Godwyn's influence.
One aspect I really like about Radahn as the final boss is he slots in within Hornset culture very directly. A Lion that is covered in horns descends from the Heavens to lead them to their salvation. "Horn-decked beast from higher spheres delivered". Thematically it's on-point and poetic.
and on the top of Belurat/Enir-Illim as well, nice touch lol
On your Marika point, I’ve been convinced for a while that the seduction and betrayal was to do with Radagon I just can’t see anything concrete to say “yes that’s it”. I suspect that at the height of the ritual, Marika killed Radagon to try to ascend to power as her own lord and her own god but “a lord requires a vessel” and there weren’t many other valid options judging by the story trailer.
On Miquella and Radahn I like it and it put a lot of what Miquella promised in the base game to various people onto a whole new context. I think he was trying to bring back Godwyn as a trial run for bringing back Radahn, I think he was trying to cure Malenia’s rot knowing that he was sending her to kill Radahn and may need to cure him. If he was planning on Mohg’s body as a vessel the whole time then he’d need to ward off the influence of an outer god so he experimented with the needles. I also believe the Haligtree was supposed to be a big bewitching branch but that’s a whole other rabbit hole 🤣 Everything Miquella did was in service to the vow and how he was going to uphold his end of it. His age of compassion would have been the perfected Golden Order ending on even more steroids in terms of a lack of free will.
Oh the haligtree being one big bewitching branch is a wild idea
It is also interesting how Miquella stands for Compassion, which is basically an expanded level of conscience while Saint Trina stands for Sleep which is a reduction of conscience. This further reflects they are halves of the same thing "Peace/Freedom", with Miquella beign able to bring enlightment to others while St. Trina is able to put them to Sleep.
I am, admittedly really focused on Miquella's character right now and really believe he's completely misunderstood in the ER community so I'm really interested to see where you take this, Smough. It'll be a banger either way.
Miquella is the most mischaracterized character I've ever seen. The community jumped the gun on judging Miquella too fast and started to propagate LOTS of nonsense about him, with some even believing he's a r**ist and trying to label him as Griffith. Lots of nonsense
Absolutely. And now you can't even debate with people online without being thrashed and insulted.
I think I found the key that we have all missed, at least here in the Western lore community. Miquella is an exact representation of the Buddhist deity Avalokiteshvara (Kannon in Japan), who represents "Infinite Compassion". Miquella isn't just trying to become a god. He is undergoing the process of Enlightenment, entering Nirvana, and seeking to become a Buddha in order to heal the world of suffering.
Of note are his four (3.5) arms, desire for compassion to relieve the world of suffering, and the fact that his arrival into this new transcendent status being heralded by his Lion's roar, on whom he then sits. All of these are word for word ties to Buddhism and this particular Bodhisattva.
@@guighee7310He is just like Griffith though. Griffith had a supernatural ability to make people love him? He is extremely feminine, with many people seeing hints that he may be gay? And in the end he is crippled, like Miquella's "curse" to be a child, and then he ascends to Godhood. It's right there bro
@@LSB44446 ''He is just like Griffith though.'' Quit being disingenuous. You know damn well what people are really saying when they say Miquella is like Griffith and the baggage that comes with that.
@@LSB44446Very surface level reading of both characters, tsk tsk.
Yesssss Smough is back with the bedtime stories! Gonna rest well tonight fellas!
rest easy brother
I’ma need some more Fear & Hunger content from you, gang
Will defo come my friend - pleased you enjoyed it. Love F&H
@@SmoughTown Niiiiice! Def lookin forward to it, I loved ya last vid on the game. Keep doin ya thing bro! 💪🏽💪🏽
@@MathisR412 Thanks my friend! Will do and appreciate the words of support
I like this video! If I'd point out anything, I think that his abandoning of St. Trina was something of a combination of a vast amount of factors.
Something not gone into here is how the other halves of these God-figures seem to embody certain concepts. For Radagon this was Order, and for St. Trina, it seems to be Love, and potentially, Doubt. This is heavily hinted at both by the crosses, but also by Thiollier, Leda, and Ansbach, who all closely associate Trina with adoration and love. Thiollier even more or less openly says Trina is to Love as Miquella is to Kindness. I can see a good argument as for why Miquella felt he needed to discard Doubt to do what he had to do, and discard Love to accept all, graceful and malign.
In short, Trina's conflict with Miquella was absolutely a contributing factor, even a tragic one given how it seems he tried to 'save' or sway her - but I think there were a lot of factors to it, that both fueled his reasoning and justify just why it seems to have been seen as so horrible.
Yeh agreed - defo a confluence of different factors!
My thoughts on this are still jumbled and less clear than I'd like, but for me
Miquella deliberately does not 'embrace the whole of it' and we see this in who he abandons in-game. St Trina *and* Malenia are left behind and this in itself is rather an oversight for Miquella's supposed compassionate Order by any means. It seems to be a War for Masculine Purity, casting away the alloyed, rebus aspects of the Feminine within the World and within Miquella, leaves one crucial mistake Marika made in-tact; doing away with Destined Death. And this sullies a grander perfection Miquella aspires to in the DLC.
Smough's analysis of Trina is thorough, and on-point especially re: her power to provide eternal sleep akin to Death for those who imbibe Trina's nectar, or to paraphrase Thiollier, providing relief for those too burdened by the state of the world. It's a salve of kindness.
But what's worse for me is the contradiction in curing Freya's rot affliction while abandoning Malenia at the foot of the Haligtree--this is betrayal, especially considering her integral part in fighting Radahn in Aeonia. Sure, we're bid by Millisent to give the repaired needle to Malenia, and she gives us no choice but to kill her. But the timeline Smough proposes in this video negates our role in Miquella forsaking Malenia in his quest for Godhood.
Metyr's discussion of our own physical, cosmological origins is relevant here too. If the Big Bang, and I assume the rest of the natural ecological processes we exp hold in TLB/SR, Death and rot are essential for life. We see this in failed Erdtree burials--without Death we don't become the grass for the antelope to eat (Mufasa, 1994) so to speak. Is Miquella just trying to be the eternal font of dew for TLB? The Erdtree couldn't be this under Marika, and while this doesn't make ecological sense it would represent a self-imposed prison for Miquella. Forever giving of himself in the place of Death Decay and Rebirth? I'm sure dude would want some foreversleep at some point.
Woven into this is the push and pull between stasis and movement; Radahn's bloodlust could be sated under Miquella, but compassionate war is obv some doublethink bullshit. Like Malenia, he only fully thrives in war, and in Miquella's order this ambiguous stasis could be a divine prison of sorts, esp if the vow is so one-sided as Smough says here. There's more to unpack, obv.
@@_UrethraFranklin I honestly wonder how much of Miquella's healing, and his ability to soothe, was Trina. We always seem to see examples surrounded by her flowers after all.
I also agree with your view of Trina and Malenia. I can't help but remember Marika's own hometown - she returned, and none remained to see it. Will Miquella mirror this too, failing to save those he did it all for?
One of the main reasons I love Radahn as the last boss, is that the Hornsent adored the Lion Warriors, which horns were used to evoque divinity. And the last boss is exactly that, a horned lion who summons a god at the top of the divine tower.
Ah, George R.R. Martin and his prophecy twists.
If Miquella’s timeline now has him at the battle in Caelid, which I fully agree with I have a wild idea to have it make sense with Mohg. I now think the Mohg with Miquella in the opening cutscene we see is before the battle of Caelid. During the Shattering, Miquella used his power to start the Haligtree and was embedded in it. Malenia is in the tree when we find her, and it’s reasonable she reside there, but let’s say she didn’t.
Miquella is growing, demigods are doing their things, Mohg takes Miquella with plans to have him be the Blood God. While ripppes out, the Haligtree dies and Miquellas blood becomes tainted and he slips into the Shadowrealm. He figures all the shit out, can freely leave the cocoon by using Trina to sleep Mohg (maybe Mohg is 4th in the vow) and that’s when he sees Freya at the battle. Yeah he’s that weird gross form cause of Mohg, who wouldn’t want to abandon that flesh?
Then the events play out as we know. I think either Mohg agreed because maybe he thought being the vessel would be following in moms footsteps or whatever or he didn’t and they used him as revenge for ruining the Haligtree and being all over weird. Allegations reinstated. 😂
Generally speaking, the contrast, yin yang nature of both Radhan, a symbol of war, and Miquella, a symbol of compassion, just makes so much sense to the game.
That doesn’t really track. Radahn was extremely passionate. Miquella divested himself of his loving side. How can one be compassionate without love? Children’s brains learn super fast and likely why Miquella was so smart, but he also seems quite naive. A very child like trait. Saint Trina is said to have an adult form in some
Of her items and she tried to warn naive Miquella. Even Ansbach mentions how naive he is (when he remarks how he seems to fail to understand the implications of discarding mogh’s soul just to use his body as a meat puppet). Miquella is a child and childran can be quite selfish. Especially when they don’t know the meaning of “no”.
55:40 If we honour (our part) Miquella is using the royal plural. In the sense that if he becomes a God, Rabahn must be the consort.
miquella uses “i” in the same breath just before. odd that the tense would switch up.
@@TroyeMackenzie the game uses He/They pronouns for Miquella. As an example, in the Remembrance of a Lord and a God (the english text at least) in the same paragraph it uses THEIR for Miquella twice, then HE for Radahn, and then HE(HIS) for Miquella as well in the last sentence. They are interchangeable. And I think this is due to the Miquella/Trina rebus more than Miquella maybe considering himself non-binary in gender.
If the english text of the game uses He/They, then Miquella can very reasonably use I and Our interchangeably as well.
(this is why I made note that it's not because the game considers Miquella non-binary, because if it was due to gender then Miquella would still refer to himself as "I" and not Our. He uses Our, and the game uses They because of Trina, but the point is that there are other instances in-game where those pronouns are interchangeable)
@@Lovyenn They/their - Miquella and Malenia
This was an extremely good video and cleared up so many things that I could not figure out about Miquella's story. To me, this makes perfect sense. Especially Radahn agreeing to become Miquella's consort if he and Malenia could defeat him in the field of battle. Considering he greatly admires Godfrey, it makes sense he would have a "Might makes right" viewpoint when it came to lordship as well. All the pieces fall neatly into place taking all your points into account!
If Miquella needed Mohg to strip himself away of his Grace, why would he still literally tear himself apart to renounce everything related to Marika? Wouldn’t he be already graceless?
And how does Miquella leave his body in the cocoon but still manages to leave part of it in the Land of Shadow?
Something is clearly missing, folks lol
In the haligtree there encased albinaurics within similar cocoons. Albinaurics have silver blood and silver is a medium for rebirth and creating mimics. I believe the haligtree body was a trick for Mohg to pick up on as it seemed to be a huge unprotected vessel of empyrean blood, but may have been a laid out trap in reality
i.redd.it/9p0jgbpq38ya1.png
Miquella used Mohg to strip his grace and enter the shadow realm.
He was still an empyrean with ties to Marika though, even after entering Scadu.
He then had to remove all ties to Marika and his empyrean form so he can become an entirely new God instead of just Marikas replacement.
Presumably for the same reason that Ranno destroyed her Empyrean body.
Per his idealization of his father/golden order, I could easily see Rhadan having a 'might makes right' mentality. He follows the golden order because of honor/loyalty - but if something stronger was to supplant it, he'd readily follow that too. In some ways, it's a foil to Ansbach's obsession with Mogh - loyalty to the person vs the ideal. Which echoes the whole Goldmask sentiment of Marika vs Order you pointed out as well.
Can I get a Hell Yeah for engagement?!
Hellll yeah!
Let's goooooo!!!!
Hell yeah!
Hell Yeah!
Hell yeah brother
While watching this I realized the real genius thing about the Consort Radahn fight is that its you fighting all of Merika's different children groups at once. Its the soul of a son of Rennala inhabiting the body of a son of Godfrey being empowered as the consort of a son of Radagon. Having Radahn be the final boss of the DLC makes a lot more sense if you look at it that way.
What I LOVE about this lore is the conflicting horrible feeling I have of needing to destroy the very god that wanted a better world for everyone and everything, just the way he wanted to do it all is more demonic than any hellion could have devised. I wanted to happily subject myself to Miquella before I knew what he did and how he went about it. Did the ends justify the means? We will never know as when we dispose of Miquella and Radagon both and even if we choose to rule under a better golden order...We wont get to see these fruits fall from the new tree. The concept of this DLC was simply breathtaking and I wish it was longer and even bigger! It also begs the question, should we all have free will? Miquella's powerful charm captures all the hearts if he is to reign, but so too will wars end and divisions of species and animosities. These seem to even IRL still be the great divisions of mankind, left versus right and all that. I'm deeply conflicted on all these things cause I'd love a world where we can all be one under a benevolent power and lack the need to fight and bleed. But also free will is the whole point of life.. Do we not make mistakes to better ourselves after? Are we not to learn from what we create? Its the brilliant flaw even Miquella himself was not perfect and thus perfection cannot exist and neither can his order. This is simply my take on this fabulous lore.
Wonderfully explained as always.
This is the first time I noticed that the "OUR part of the vow" was in relation to Miquella and Melania's part.
Radahn is not a mindless beast when we fight him the first time. Not only does he perform spells (which require Intelligence literally) but he has been devouring friend and foe alike, but has the wherewithal to avoid devouring Leonard. When Radahn is losing he performs his meteor crash attack, but pushes Leonard under the earth before he does it, in order to protect him. This indicates awareness, as does his last ditch effort of crushing the player as a shooting star, for he is aware enough to know he is losing the fight.
I think Radahn knew what Miquella had planned for him and, so, resisted death. I have said it before and I will say it again: Miquella is just like the Waith-Callers in Liurnia and the Shaded Castle. As a god he has (nearly) four arms like they do, he summons and manipulates spirits/wraiths (putting Radahn's soul in Mohf's body, as well as bewitching people), and he has a bunch of Royal Revenants in his basement (at the bottom of Elphael). Radahn did not want to be Miquella's puppet. That is not only why he fought off the Scarlet Rot, but learned to control the stars (and thus Fate). Miquella is not a tragic hero. He is not really a villain, either. He is a child who is "unalloyed", which is to say, he does not know right from wrong (ironically). He is both a genius and a simpleton. Brilliant and naive. A monster and an angel. He is like "The Mysterious Stranger" as written by Mark Twain. He has not partaken of the Fruit of Knowledge and, so, is a kid with a toychest full of toys he wants to manipulate, but the toys are other people who have not given consent. It is almost like people forget that he has ALWAYS been manipulative (Bewitching Branches, for example). The reason he wants to rid the LB of the Outer Gods is so he can play with his toys without interference from anyone else. Radahn is the Buzz Lightyear that wants to decide his own destiny
I agree i fully agree that miquella has always had a manipulative naturee the whole game from mohg, radahn, ansbach, thollier, malenia even the people of castle sol. Him and ranni does similar actions bcuz they both know the the greater will is the issue
Raahns rune quite literraly claims he is fighting off Malenias rot. So I completely agree
Like for everyone being so smart on lore, they literally show no prove Radahn agreed to this vow. There no descriptions or anything from his perspective that states he agreed to it. It's pure silence. As if the writers are trying to say something about what he really wanted.
55:59
I believe you have unreasonably drawn the conclusion that it’s Miquella’s part of the vow that’s being honored here.
"Now the vow will be honored, and my lord brother’s soul will return"
Miquella says "the vow", referring to it in its entirety. I believe that what is being honored here is Radahn’s part of the vow, becoming Miquella’s consort, as his soul is being resurrected. This would imply that Miquella has already upheld his part of the deal, as otherwise the choice of the word "honored" makes way less sense if it’s only one party who completed their part of the vow. Also, it makes no sense, for Radahn’s character to bargain for his own resurrection, not only Radahn is depicted as someone who sees great honor in dying on a battlefield, but also his vow to Miquella basically costs him his life at the hand of Malenia, basically canceling out any benefits Radahn gets from this deal. I believe Radahn would anticipate something like this, he isn’t stupid, being as capable of sorcery as he is.
I believe Miquella’s part of the vow was already upheld before Radahn’s battle with Malenia, her word to him, "Miquella awaits thee, o promised consort" imply that she is basically serving a lore of a debt collector, killing Radahn so he can honor his part of the vow. That’s why she specifically calls him a *romised* consort.
Loved the video, but I do have a differing opinion about why Melania fought Radahn.
There is a reason why we fight Consort Rhadahn pre- starscourge. Radahn did accept the vow, but then he changed his mind. He then dedicated the rest of his life to prevent his death. He stops the stars to hold his fate. He invades the Capitol city to become Elden Lord of Marika. He moves away as far as possible from the north where Miquella reigns. Being killed by "a good fight" just seems too uninteresting to me.
I can totally buy this tbh
@@305bj even he siege stormveil castle to take godrick rune (dialogue from kenneth haight) so, radahn was a golden order warrior who wanted to be elden lord in his adult years...he refused to be lord of miquella, breaking the vow, and begin to archive power to become elden lord and husband/consort of marika
I’ve been pondering this more today, and I’d like to add that some of the most important cannon lore for the game are the trailers. The few trailers that there were hold vital information found nowhere else. The fight between Radahn and Melania not only was featured in the main story trailer, but even in the original teaser itself. This is such a pivotal moment in the timeline with massive characters that to accept regression and causality of this disaster in Calied would be robbed and cheapened with Radahns only desire was to have a pact for eternal war. Radahn is noted to have a kindness to him, and hold a great rune of the elder ring. Before Miquella left the golden order was when the vow was made, hence the throne. Once Radahn rejected his fate and did all that he did to prevent it was when the Blade of Miquella was released. The Bloom of Aeonia was a desperate last attempt by Melania to kill Radahn. I doubt that he wanted to be killed that way. Some unorganized thoughts there.
Also follow the flowers. Miquella Lillies are a clue to where the namesake may have been. There is one at Redmane Castle for instance
@@305bj theres another thing interesting in your theory (theory that i support) and, the fact is, that, when you have a compromise with someone, you give him/her gifts....theres nothing, and i repeat, NOTHING that suggest that radahn gifted a tjing to miquella...the only posible thing i initially think, was loretta, a war knight who served the carian family, but, the items says she went after miquella by personal desires, pretending to help the albinaurics...radahn has bonds with the alabaster lord, ohga, freya, jerren, rykard, etc...nothing, never, show us a gift from the general to the empyrean...i suppose we need to consider that too
Fantastic video! I love your insight and by bringing I'm the collective ideas and lore from other creators, you've concisely explained the answers to so many questions that have puzzled me. Thanks for doing what you do!
You make some good points but I’m still not entirely sold on the theory of Radahn fully accepting this vow. For one, why would he have made the honorable death pact with Jerren if he was expecting to die from Malenia, that seems a little redundant. I just feel like this whole vow and Radahn’s involvement and motives, if he had any, are way to important of a plot point for FromSoft to simply leave out, I just find it frustrating
Totally fair mate! Glad you enjoyed the video regardless of that and I do agree that we should have got something that explained some motivations
Jerren could've easily been a fallback plan.
Maybe he didn't expect anyone or Malenia to actually be able to kill him, he didn't expect Malenia to nuke entire caelid just to kill him. But now he died and has to accept the vow.
Maybe Radahn said "over my dead body".
Awesome video! Your contextualization of the vow and the relationships between Miquella, Melenia, and Radahn made me appreciate the ending and the lore of the DLC a lot more as someone who initially found it frustrating!
Also random note, it’s funny to think if Miquella was at the battle of Aeonia he made that one Cleanrot Knight carry his heavy a*s sister all the way back to the Haligtree all by herself, and then die. Like didn’t lend her Torrent or anything😂
Thanks for the video! One thing to point out, there's a typo at 1:01:22 : it says "Earsome" instead of "Fearsome", unless this is confirmation that Miquella has the biggest ears haha
Hahah thanks for pointing it out!
A banger as usual Geoff, your take on Radahn’s condition for him to be Miquellas Lord is so on character with Radahn, only submitting to miquella if he eas able to kill him, which in theory, we could even say that Malenia failed in her part of the vow by stalemating with Radahn and not killing him. Can’t wait for your next craft.
Have a good week my friend and don’t you dare go hollow.
Thanks as always for being here my friend, so pleased you enjoyed my take and I can't wait for the next video!
1:02:00 there’s another important aspect to why Malenia fought Radahn that I think is worth mentioning. The Promised Consort Greatswords say in their description that Radahn was a champion that used more than just gravity and swords to hold back the stars. The vast majority of the time Radahn was holding back the stars, he wasn’t holding on his own-he was infected with the power of rot, and seeing as how the stars don’t crash down until Radahn was defeated, it doesn’t seem like the rot was hurting his ability to fend off the stars. I think the swords point to the fact that Radahn needed a source of power to hold back all of fate, and Malenia’s connection to a god served as a power source. But this would obviously ruin Radahns body and mind, if he made this sacrifice to embrace rot in order to hold back the stars. So he would need to cast aside that body and be reborn, hence the vow
oh wow. great theory! in a way that would connect all 3 of them together even more
54:35 thank you for that jump scare 😂😂
Are there any plans for a reevaluation of Godfrey? (Even if it were just a short thing).It might feel redundant due to his lack of presence in the DLC but there is a pretty interesting video by the channel "GamePlus | The alchemist" posing the idea that Hoarah Luox might've been one of the highland warriors as well as an important figure to the hornsent.
Boiling it down they theorize that: Rather than just fighting bears (whose attacks mirror his own) he defeated Serosh, a feat that brought him the favor of the hornsent, despite his lack of horns, and inspired their lion dances. Then, according to this theory Marika would've seduced Hoarah Loux to gain access to the devine gate.
This theory obviously somewhat clashes with the idea of the seduced serpent, but there were a lot of details they pointed out which were quite intriguing.
In addition, the horned warriors wear armor that resembles the unclothed form of a hero from older times.
According to the secret rite scroll, the ascension ritual needs these things:
a God, a Lord & a Vessel -- Marika, Godfrey & Hoarah Loux / Miquella, Radahn & Mogh
Marika also had to discard her other self Radagon, like Miquella discarded St. Trina
i'm personally of the belief that radahn and miquella made that vow with a different understanding of how it would come about, and that some mind control was necessary in order to have radahn continue to play the part, hence miquella descending on him in a manner visually similar to serosh suppressing hoarah loux. the vow likely happened before miquella abandoned the golden order, of which we know radahn was a believer, and probably sparing the incredibly important detail that miquella used the body of a demigod omen to resurrect radahn. while we unfortunately don't have any canon content to go off for that, something tells me that radahn, golden order adherent, would not be cool with coming back as a graceless omen.
I personally strongly fall under the camp that, while Radahn might have initially agreed to form a vow, he changed his mind later on, maybe due to some disagreement with Miquella or an initial misunderstanding of his goals. To me, everything points to Radahn not being a willing participant at the end.
From the battle of Aeonia; to Radahn's mostly open devotion to his father, Godfrey, and the Golden Order; how his red aura transforms to Miquella's gold in the mid-fight cutscene and his eyes are clouded when Miquella is present; his complete absence in Miquella's final cutscene; the thematic importance of the DLC story and Miquella's character (especially his mental childishness, his shallow view of consent in particular); even the music briefly transitioning to a darker, more somber bridge after his initially glorious theme, before it's entirely overtaken by Miquella's ascendant one, with the male choir still occasionally trying to push through. Yes, I'm including the music, because From DOES use musical storytelling.
Also, the loyal blade is Leda, not Malenia. Leda was actually present in the DLC and defined by his devotion to him. Also, Malenia is his sister, so why wouldn't he refer to her as such?
I agree. I suspect the vow was made before the Shattering, when Miquella and Radahn were raised as step-brothers. But everything changed when Marika and Radagon disappeared, the Elden Ring shattered and great shards of it were claimed by the demigods. Enia states: "Tainted by the strength of their runes, her children warred." Emboldened by the corrupting power of their Great Runes, the demigods refused to bend the knee or cooperate, each instead deciding that they themselves must rule. The only shardbearers we know of who didn't lead armies to fight for their rulership are Malenia and Ranni. Ranni is said to have physically discarded her Great Rune, while Malenia was stuffed full of unalloyed gold, deeply indebted to Miquella and possibly subject to Miquella's supernatural charm.
''agreed to form a vow, he changed his mind later on, maybe due to some disagreement with Miquella or an initial misunderstanding of his goals. To me, everything points to Radahn not being a willing participant at the end. '' Nice fanfic, 50 shades of gray worthy
Malenia literally refers to herself as "The blade of Miquella." While Leda is devout I don't think she has that kinship with Miquella. Also when Miquella is saying this in context he is introducing Consort Radhan and thanking those who made it possible, by defeating him previously. That's why I am convinced it's Malenia at least.
I'm of a mind that while Miquella technically held up his part of the agreement, he did not honor the spirit of it. Radahn probably agreed to serve in exchange for resurrection, but didn't think to stipulate Miquella couldn't facilitate his demise. An extremely slow, painful and grotesque demise at that.
Possibly that's why Miquella brought back a younger version of Radahn, maybe he also only has the memory of his younger self and thus only knows that the vow was honored, not the circumstances that ended him.
a smoughtown video after my hospital shift?
what a way to start my weekend... thank you, as per usual, geoff!!!
From the phrasing, I get the impression that Miquella fulfilled his part of the vow in the past, and resurrecting Radahn was part of Radahn's end--the resurrection was as Miquella's lord, which was what Miquella wanted. So Miquella's part was in the past--which I think was killing Radahn. More specifically, I think Radahn wanted an honorable one on one fight with the other revered warrior among the demigods, to test her might against his, and if Miquella's blade won, he'd be happy to lend his power to claim the gentler world Miquella spoke of. That falls in line with Jerren wanting Radahn to have an honorable end and Freya's talk about Radahn loving warfare and being able to fight strong opponents. I almost positive that the ruination of Caelid was unintended and ruined everyone's plans. Miquella didn't want that to happen, and neither did the other two. Malenia's flower blooming was an unexpected disaster than Miquella regreted, Malenia suffered, and Radahn was left alive but only technically in a horrible way. Miquella would've wanted Radahn dead and his plan wouldn't come to fruition as long as the big guy was roaming the wastelands eating corpses.
The thing that might be worth making a video on is covering how the Elden Ring controls the very law of the world and how each ending is about changing (or maintaining) those laws. A lot of people argue that Miquella's 'age of compassion' was about brainwashing the whole world to make everyone get along. But it's way more likely that he intended to become god and literally change how the world works so violence, hatred, and oppression wouldn't be the way of things and instead love and caring would reap the most benefits over cruelty. Not through mind control but by altering the laws of nature, like Marika removing the concept of death, but more precisely since Miquella is working to remove the influence of the outer gods that seem to thrive on suffering. If I'm missing something there, I'd love to see a breakdown.
About what you said at 1:06:05, the first look we get at the Shadow of the Erdtree is a single image of Miquella riding on Torrent in the Gravesite Plains. So I believe it's safe to say that that is all but confirmed by FromSoft
I still believe the most straightforward answer is that Radahn never gave his consent to the vow. The contextual clues lean heavily this way: the cutscene in which Miquella speaks to him, but he's not even there. The fact that he doesn't speak a word in his new form or seem to have a single thought of his own. Learning that Malenia only fought him to fulfill the requirements for the ritual. And of course, watching how Miquella seem to work his magic over everyone he meets, to the point where you even start to wonder whether his own sister was allowed to freely chose to follow him or not.
Aside from which, Radahn's character doesn't seem to align well with the idea of him agreeing to an insurance policy. A noble warrior like him, negotiating himself into an advantageous position where he wins no matter what? This is a man so absolutely stubborn that he would rather harness enough power to hold the _stars themselves_ from moving against him. ....all for the sake of his favorite horse. Nothing short of the godess of rot herself and the machinations of a bewitching demigod could force him to do anything.
Most definitely Malenia didn't get a choice not to love him; I think that's why it's so bad Miquella divested himself of the one person who probably chose to love him, romantic or otherwise, it was made of their own consent and not his.
Entirely agree. The idea that Radahn wanted to be resurrected as part of a two-way vow just does not fit at all with any of the narrative- Kinda came out of nowhere in the video as a bit of a wild speculation.
There's just no possibility that Radahn has not consented to the vow.
It would be one thing if Miquella vowed to make Radahn his consort, but the way it's phrased on the evidence we have is that this is Radahn's vow, he is the "Promised Consort" and Miquella can't promise the consort to himself, only Radahn can make that promise, and by extension, that vow.
@@SolitasRuisu Why can't Miquella promise himself Radahn? The way the scene is posed and phrased (and again, the fact that Radahn himself has never been shown speaking of the vow even indirectly, as none of his followers seemed to know about it), it seemed to me that Miquella was having a moment to himself, speaking as if Radahn was there (reminder: we don't see or hear him), and making a promise to himself that if he upheld the torment he was to undergo to cast away everything, he could have Radahn as his reward. Like he was promising himself a nice treat if he was a really good boy.
@@ellec3747 Because there's no evidence to suggest Miquella would make a one sided vow like this when he might as well just use his charm on Radahn from the start. It makes no sense to talk about "our part of the vow" if the other person never agrees to their part of the vow, especially when you consider what Miriel says about the power a vow has. Besides, this isn't out of character for Radahn. He swore an oath of honorable death with Jerren, but he also fought to stop fated change. Did he actually desire rest or just the glory of death in battle? Freyja has the impression that Radahn wouldn't be opposed to coming back to life and wage more war. That is just another way to challenge his fate, much like how he did challenging the stars.
Radahn is most defined by his refusal to let go. His initial reason for learning gravity magic was so he wouldn't let go of his tiny horse, even though it still struggles to keep up with him and is clearly damned alongside him in the wailing dunes.
You think a man like that would have no interest in being brought back to life? At some point he could have resisted honoring his part of the vow (probably at the point Miquella abandoned the Golden Order, since Radahn was loyal to the status quo of it), and that would explain why Miquella sent Malenia to kill him. But that would still mean Radahn had agreed to it, at least at first.
58:19 the trade offer pic made me actually laugh out loud. Thank you for this.
Before watch this video i want to ask you Something. What was your favorite piece of lore, the one you spend the most good time to work on? Also, would you join Miquella, and why?
It's a good question - I think I generally really like the 'cosmic' elements of the games; I.e. the Elden Ring, the Greater Will, the outer gods etc. I often come back to these elements and revise my ideas on it.
Other than that GEQ and Godskins! What about yours?
@@SmoughTownI love everything cosmic horror so the outer gods are so interesting to me!
@@SmoughTown I just imagined you panic rolling away from that last question 😂
The cosmic entities and abstract ideas are some of the greatest things FromSoft gets us to think about
Great video! You make such good lore long form videos. I do think there is more going on there with Radhan and Miquella. The reasons suggested are very shallow for why he would team up.
in a future video , can you please touch upon why metyr isnt classified as a "god" as elden beast is, since it doesnt say "god slain" after she dies.
Great shout - I will revisit that
I'd like to chip in here.
The way I see it, the "god slain" text comes up because we defeated Radagon, not the Elden Beast.
After all, we do know that the Elden Beast=Elden Ring. You'd need to completely destroy the ER in order for the Beast to die truly. As long as the Elden Ring exists so does the Elden Beast.
It’s because she doesn’t, as far as I understand it. She teleports away.
There are a few potential reasons.
- She isn't actually slain, she vanished through a portal and her true fate is unknown
- She, unlike the Elden Beast which would prune the cruicible to become the modern Elden Ring, was never handed true power
- The "God Slain" bit is referring to Radagon
- Metyr is well and truly abandoned by the Greater Will and either was never handed true power by it or lost it as it the Greater Will cut off contact
and so on.
I'm pretty sure it says God Slain for Beast because we also kill Radagon/Marika
I can't remember who, but a TH-camr had a theory on the vow between Miquella and Radahn that makes more sense. Radahn agreed to be Miquella's Lord Consort, but when he found out how Miquella was going to go about creating a gentler world, he changed his mind because it goes against his warrior and compassionate nature. So to stop Miquella, and to save the world, Radahn held back the stars to stop Miquella's fate. Which is why Miquella sent Malenia to kill him so he could reach his destiny and put Radahn's soul into a body he could control. Radahn is a legend of a Chad. Bro resisted the rot so he could stay alive to save humanity and ride his beloved horse. 😥
Finally got my warframe account back after a few years of issues only to find some of your old videos, as always the quality is stellar
Glad you enjoy the WF stuff, still a universe I hold dear to my heart
@SmoughTown it's been nice reminding myself what I loved about it now that I've come back, oddly enough despite how different they are in terms of gameplay I think alot of what I love about it is shared with ER, the music, the environments and characters just stay with you.
Glad I've got more of your vids to watch now lol
@@SmoughTown I didn't even know you did warframe stuff! I was intrigued, now I'm a fan.
Your comparison between Ranni and Miquella (and how perhaps Ranni may be influencing the tarnished on behalf of Miquella, or she is being influenced herself) makes the strange '1000 year voyage' double occurrence very interesting.
If miquella was in caelid, why did that one cleanrot knight finlay carry melania back to the haligtree alone and when does he go back to be taken by Mogh, and if miquella promised to resurrect radahn doesn’t this imply he already planned to kill Mogh? What’s up with that?!
Genuinely excellent video on Miquella and the vow. I think he's one of the most interesting characters we've seen fromsoft create and I think he's become underrated due to a lack of nuance in analyzing his character by some fans. The ideas in your video are really sound and consistent, amazing summary of the content 👏
I think Miquella Ranni and Melina are all connected.
All 3 have goals that align at least to the extent of dismantling the old order and restoring death/balance to the world
I know there’s plenty of theories of the three of them having some part in the NoBK or planning some other conspiracies but none of them sat quite right with me.
Honestly, I think the simplest answer is that, despite how they think it needs to be fixed, they agreed the current order needed to go. So, when a strong tarnished showed up, they’d work together help them. Miquella would give us Torrent, Ranni gave us a means to summon help in battle and Melina would offer guidance and, hopefully, deter us from falling into the hands of the frenzy flame. I think that’s about as far as their cooperation went.
Interestingly enough, they also seem to stay out of each other’s way. Ranni and Miquella are direct competition with each other but neither of them try to stop the other. Melina doesn’t push you to help/not help the others (not that she cares for any particular order anyways). The girls seem to have some vested interest in Torrent’s well-being. With the Shattering war and the demi gods turning on each other, it’s interesting to think that some of them might’ve made a truce for the sake of the world
Beautiful conclusion mate, well done.
Thanks bud, really appreciate that
A lot of people are not gonna be ready for this video since they were fed for so long that Miquella is this evil incarnate being. Also, can we stop this poor thing Mohg bullshit? He was an evil demigod with horrific visions for the world with his Age of Blood. Mohg kidnapped Miquella with plans to use and transform him into his God of Blood, but ended up being hit with an uno reverse card and was used himself instead. Another thing, I find it SO ironic that people will bash Miquella for using Mohg while simping for Ranni when she proudly says she's the one who orchestrated the Night of Black Knives that ASSASSINATED Godwyn in a horrific ritual that submitted Godwyn to a fate worse than death to achieve her own goals. To me, Miquella's means were less worse than Ranni's while achieving a better end goal than Ranni.
Together, we work. Together for Miquella the Kind ✊
Comentário sensato!!
God its u at it with the miqaganda. Ppl haven’t been ‘fed for so long’ that miq is pure evil. Infact, before dlc release (which was 2 half months ago) any signs of miquella and his ability to compel affection was brushed off as berzerk goon bait and you would be bashed for holding this opinion. Also a reminder that it has not been confirmed that Mohg kidnapped miquella pre charm, but you know what has been confirmed? That bro is violating mohg’s corpse…in support of another brother that he likes. Castle sol (functioning under his name) has tortured albinaurics locked in Rykard degeneracy level cages.
Also, the blood and gore is a horrific vision only to those lacking vision. Sorry but the black and murder adds to aesthetic. Best dynasty instantly
@@queenbee7266 ''God its u at it with the miqaganda.'' 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Claro que nego vai ter dó do mog lol
Ele provavelmente não ia ser dono dum culto satânico de sangue se não tivessem tacado ele no esgoto
E ele é honesto o cara só quer sangue mesmo sem essa palhaçada de paz ai desse moleque do carai satisfação pura matar deuses em souls pqp.
Color theory was honestly one of if not the most inspirational video ive seen
It's a fundamental video for me ngl!
I really do think st. Trina represent “love” and not they were romantic. Like Siamese twins. Conjoined yet they think differently share the same body and organs. However miquella is an empyrean, So when he dispose of his love it is st Trina that represents that love aspect. That’s the way I view it. I also believe st Trina was first to go. In the trailer she is shown whole yet when we meet her she clearly missing parts of her. Also when Miquella dies so too does st Trina. I believe they are still linked but physically separate.
Radagon was similar, in terms of representing a core concept that he seemed to define himself by, and his other self seemed to reject.
She is his other half and does personify his love. I think the side quest with Thiollier is intended to be a commentary on what kind of love she is and he needed to divest her. Also, yes I think when he first arrived he went south to cast off his doubts and "love" before anything else.
@@TSpoon823 I don't think that quest is as much "what kind of love she is," and more the different kinds of love in general. Love can be both nurturing and obsessive.
Always a pleasure to see a new upload from you man, and now I know what I'll put for me to listen to sleep tonight haha
2 videos within 10 days, Mother marika bless the Erdtree🙌🏽
Thanks so much my friend! Hope you enjoy!
In Miquellas attempts at righting the wrongs of his heritage, he ultimately does the exact same thing Merika does; push everything else aside except for your goals
If people arent convinced about base game connections then they should consider:
1) on Radahns cape (both starscourge AND consort) both the tree is reminiscent of the haligtrees depiction AND the lion on the cape on either side of the tree has a swirl mid way up its tail and droops at the end, just like a Miquella lilly
2) either end of radahns bow has a Miquella Lilly on either side, fashioned to be like a marriage of the lilly and tail of a lion (and no it isnt the tail of the lion in the midle of the bow as that has a separate tail on the lower half of the bow)
PS. Glad you finally put in the unalloyed needle ♡
@@ScumMageInfa thats not true...the lion has the same motif like the lion depicted in the walls in the colloseums.(even ancient dynasty has two lions with a tree, its not exclusive from miquella)...look carefully and you will notice that...same for the greatbow...the lion of the golden order, who radahn are simbolized, has a flourished tail....radahn watched the fights in the colloseums, where he met freya. And the war and the lion are the simbols of godfrey, his idol...i know you are making a video where you will say that lilly thing, but i think its not true...plus, starscourge armor depicts a lion, and speaks of godfrey, elden lord of golden order...if you unite all, radahn wanted to become the perfect warrior as sometime godfrey was...i think youre looking what you want to see, but the items speaks different, and thats the point of the question...radahn was interested in miquella??? or was an adult interested in the war and the ways of godfrey, the gladiators and the golden order???...i beg you to look carefully the walls of the colloseums, the lions has the same tail...and even, the statue of marika who reveals "radagon is marika " has the same two lions with the flourished tail, even the decapitated marika statues un the shadowlands has the lions...look carefully...that simbol is from the golden order, not for miquella
@Thrasher-92 That depiction with the lions is representing the crucible of life, where in you see a mixing of animals and plants- so it makes complete sense the appendages of the lion are merging with the tree. Like the ones on the Godrick Soldiers outfit across from a tree having branching tails.
Whereas the lion on Radahns outfit and his bow do not have a tail branching multiple times like a tree, but instead take a shape more akin to a lilly.
@@ScumMageInfa see the colloseum...
54:33 Best time stamp of all time for lore and cinema
Actual best comment here
@SmoughTown Great video! However, while I agree with your general interpretation of the vow, I believe that the vow wasn't successfully upheld by all parties due to the influence of their Great Runes.
From what I can tell, the vow between Miquella, Malenia, Radahn was made before the Shattering. Evidence for this is in how Radahn appears in his "Young Lion" form, which looks extremely similar to his appearance in the Starscourge Heirloom, even down to having the same braided hairstyle (as opposed to his unbraided look during the Shattering). Since it's likely the Starscourge Conflict happened before the Shattering, I believe that the vow was made either shortly after or before Radahn became the Starscourge. With that in mind, none of the three demi-gods were under the influence of the "mad taint" of the Great Runes pre-Shattering, so the vow was made when they were all "untainted".
In my interpretation, I think that a vow was made between the three of them, but Malenia and Radahn betrayed their ends of the vow during the Shattering.
- Malenia unleashed the Scarlet Rot, which goes against Miquella's goal of becoming a god--as it effectively puts Malenia on the path of Godhood herself, turning her into a rival.
- Radahn refused to die (as Freyja says, Radahn wants "endless war", which sounds a lot like the Shattering if it had never ended).
I think this breaking of vows is related to their Great Runes, and how the runes corrupted them. The immense strength and mind inherent in Radahn's Great Rune tempted him to battle endlessly, while Malenia fails to uphold her "spirit of resistance" and gives in to the Scarlet Rot as per her Great Rune.
It's only Miquella who upholds his end of the bargain, even if his methods of upholding it are twisted and influenced by the power of his own Great Rune.
As Leda states "Kindly Miquella never betrays a vow."
Thanks bud - glad you enjoyed it. I do defo like this interpretation as well, and it was very much a theory I have held at certain points!
Whenever you upload, it's the highlight of my day
Too kind, really appreciate that - hope you enjoy this one!
Now we making progress...... Oh I can't wait for the greater will video, a few perspectives I don't see voiced much about such things go as follows..... First off we make the start of universe sounds like the big bang... Everyone seems to do this but the big bang had nothing to do with gods ect ect so what is actually happening? In the beginning there was one entity then there were fractures.... I interpret this to mean that the great one shattered its self into the many gods we see today. What remained was a husk... The flame of frenzy and what does the flame of frenzy say? "What was borrowed must be returned" (this is a common "origin of the gods" in a lot of fiction by the way) now moving on isn't it weird that the mother of the two fingers uses sorceries... No gold, no incantations, her micocosum looks like a consolation, stars are the gods. My view the prime evil current is the greater will, reclaimed by the flame of frenzy, the greater will is dead, this is what the great glintstone masters see the death of the greater will, and with such a death the flame of frenzy wins, its only a matter of time before all existence is consumed. The golden order then forbids study of the prime evil current to hide what has happened. As a topper, who uses golden incantations in the dlc? The hornsent... A culture that has no direct connection to sorceries or the greater will
underrated comment! i havent heard this perspective before. if it true and the greater will is dead, and the frenzied flame is all thats left like a heat death of a universe thats genually terrifying.
He just doesn’t miss. Thank you again, these videos are blessings for my sleep ❤🫡🤝🙌
Too kind Benis!
Hmm I'm still not entirely convinced that the vow was to be resurrected in case of his death.
I have yet to see any evidence in game that the vow between Miquella and Radahn was not stated in childhood, when Miquella had yet to reject Golden Order Fundamentalism and thus, begin his true opposition to Marika/Radagon. Of all the children of Marika/Radagon, it is Radahn who styles himself after his father. Rykard, Ranni, Miquella, Melania all go to extreme lengths to distance themselves from their heritage. Ranni could have had a doll constructed in line with her previous body, Rykard seems all to willing to cast himself towards the serpent etc. Radahn would have witnessed all of these siblings and I find it hard to believe he would keep such an image if he truly opposed the Golden Order under Marika/Radagon.
Also, his fight in Aeonia makes little sense with his characterisation as a good, honourable warrior. Your theory would see the General throw hundreds, if not thousands, to their deaths just for the sake of it, just to sate his ego.
I find it hard to imagine Radahn as he has been characterised up to this point, risking the lives of his men by having them come into contact with the Scarlet Rot just because he wanted a challenge. Such foolishness seems unlike the General who was not just martially impressive but also a sound strategist. Miquella and Melania are never far from one another and so it would mean a clash between the two of them eventually. If such a fight was to happen, I think Radahn would try and ensure that he and his men fought and died for a cause they considered worthy, not just because Radahn wanted a challenge from an Empyrean of all things.
I am inclined to align with Ansbach in terms of his disgust and distaste for what has happened to Mogh/Radahn. This is demeans both of these men who are honourable in their own ways, and perhaps even misguided in their own ways too.
Would Radahn have consented to be a Consort if it meant his soul would inhabit the body once tainted by that which he would have been taught to reject and if it meant his original body/mind would have been so corrupted by Scarlet Rot that it meant instead of an honourable duel, we instead administer was is for all intents and purposes a mercy killing? To give him back some dignity
I think our theories pre-DLC are not invalidated. Melania tried to kill Radahn and was not capable of doing so. She held herself back and only bloomed when it became clear they were matched too well. She was sent to kill him on Miquella's orders but could not follow through with them. When she bloomed she may have expected it to kill him, as it has killed so many others. Maybe that is why she is so desponsent when we meet her. She failed and she knows Miquella cannot follow through with his plans due to that fact. She is his blade, his sister, his most loyal disciple as it were. Such a failure, even if rectified by us, would be a cast of shame against her.
I think Radahn MAY have made a promise to be a God's Consort, but such a promise was revoked before the Shattering when Miquella abandoned the Golden Order to chart a new course, one which saw him in opposition to all Radahn valued and modeled himself on. Who is to say that such a vow was said in all seriousness? And not some childish indulgence that Miquella took too seriously? Bearing a child's face has to cause a level of disconnect in people from what you look like vs his actual age/competence etc.
Much like Messmer, Radahn has a "Might means right" mindset. Such ideals puts him closer to Marika than it ever would to Miquella. Miquella's gentler world would have little use for warriors. What "endless battle to invigorate the soul" would he find in such a world order?
By holding back the stars Radahn prevented Ranni's usurpation and ascension to godhood and was a powerful rejection of his Carian heritage. So, what else is there? Marika/Radagon.
All this to say, by not hearing Radahn's own thoughts on the Vow, I think that speaks volumes. If not even Freyja knew of such a promise, who is to say that he intended to follow through with it? Or that he did not consider it null and void?
Miquella demonstrates through this DLC that his aims, whilst admirable, are put into practise with a child like level of understanding. He is not stupid, but by divesting himself of that which made him him, he has cast away all consideration for others. Radahn is humiliated, as is Mogh. Melania is forced to bloom and expose so many others to that which festers within her. Those we saught his guidance or even those who challenge his plans face having their hearts ensnared, like Ansbach. He, like a child, thinks that compelling compassion he can fix lifes problems. He does not seek mutual understanding. He commands compliance through compulsion, which as you said in video is applied unilaterally rather than individually.
If Miquella truly wished for a gentler world he could have instead promised to become OUR God. As one ending proves, the Tarnished can welcome in to the Order those who had been cast out. But he doesn't because he, like so many of the demi-gods, wants to be the one to enact change.
ANYWAY! amazing video as always and thanks for shouting out other content creators as I now have even more lore videos to consume 👍
This- I think Smough is overlooking that Miquella's ideals, though well intentioned, are a horror in reality. Everything you've laid out is entirely consistent with this. Miquella is not "good", and Smough's interpretation seems to, for lack of a better term, "run defence" for Miquella, despite the narrative VERY clearly being contrary.
Such a well-crafted and insightful video! The biblical parallels you highlight-twisting the narrative so that the serpent is betrayed by Eve (Marika) and giving rise to Radagon (Adam)-are absolutely fascinating! If the god Marika betrayed was indeed a serpent, it raises many questions about her firstborn's affliction with the base serpent and the existence of the God-Devouring Serpent in Volcano Manor. Your theories always do such an amazing job of piecing together this expansive and captivating lore. Keep up the fantastic work!