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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 13 มิ.ย. 2024
- Wassup, ItzJoshNv
This video is my reaction to all World of Warcraft Cinematics Excluding Cutscenes (2004-2020)
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Business Email: itzjoshnv@gmail.com
Timestamps:
0:00 - Intro
0:35 - World of Warcraft Intro
3:25 - The Burning Crusade
5:55 - Wrath of The Lich King
9:12 - Cataclysm
11:34 - Mists of Pandaria
15:26 - Warlords of Draenor
19:45 - Legion
23:30 - Old Soldier (CR)
29:33 - Battle for Azeroth (Slight Video Delay)
34:02 - Lost Honor
37:06 - Safe Haven
40:58 - Reckoning
47:26 - Shadowlands
52:27 - Outro
#worldofwarcraft #wow #reaction - บันเทิง
The Wrath of the Lich King cinematic might be among the greatest things to be made for a video game ever.
WoW cinematics are good, but I was always more blown away by the Diablo ones. Blizzard back in the day (and for a long time after) was pretty unmatched in cinematics. From what I remember anyway.
warlords of draenor is even better
this is the truth, but if you want some real high quality shit check out the SWTOR cinematics they should be their own movie tbh
Highly overrated, even the expansion was. Old Soldier is prolly the best one yet, story and cinematic-wise !
@@slashbashful6549 Ofcs it is, the story behind Old Soldier is way to impresive than some cold Boi sitting his ars on a throne that isnt even his and with some dead skeleton Dragon, whatever :D. Athas as a prince sure, great story, but as a Lich King, very boring.
i like how when Sylvanas says "the horde is nothing" her banner carrier, basically one of her most loyal followers, looks at her like "ayo what? pause! i didn't sign up for this shit"
I want to see her get beat up, by a brawler, no magic
The fact they didn’t know what to do her character anymore still ticks me off, the forsaken were like her children and to just turn her back on them is just bad writing
@@Magdalena287 it was even more disappointing that they made her even more powerful than the Lich King.
When the Lich King literally went up against more formidable foes than her.
Such as the players and other heroes.
@@koreancowboy42 i mean the new lich king bolva is much weaker than the old lich king althas
I remember when in the Army. Ft Gordon. Cool place. Home of Signal Corps. We had a 1SG, highest non-commissioned officer in the company. Not counting commissioned officer(IE Cap) When we came down on orders for deployment. He was pissed. He ducked and dodged deployments for almost 15yrs. So, he was flaming out at formation and said he would never take a bullet for any of us. We, the entire company, just walked away. We didn't even bother showing up for work like 4 days. 1-2 never returned to work. I filed order changes and went to Germany. You don't tell your troops that kind of thing. You don't even tell the lowest ranking guy on your team, why they have to be the first to take their mask off in an NBC. A biohazard environment. So, when Sylvanas said that line. It hit me like, she's lost. She's too far gone. You assumed as much from her actions. There, she said it.
'Arthas My Son" will always give me chills up my spine. So inspiring, saddening, an all around moving piece of music and cinematography.
I will never ever tire of watching the WoW cinematics. I don't play any more, but I watch this video from time to time just to get SO HYPED. What a time to be alive during WoW's height.
"YOU ARE NOT PREPARED" sends chills down my spine to this day.
Right?!? I think BC was my definite heyday in game. Here's the one clip I go back to on a regular basis for a revisit. This was back in the day where you had to do long quest chains to get the "key" to unlock a raid zone for you. This was video to get players pumped to get the Black Temple unlocked from themselves and fellow raiders. It does more in 3 minutes to give the back story there than you get over the entire course of the Burning Crusade. I love this video: th-cam.com/video/K6-C-_PJTa4/w-d-xo.html&ab_channel=WorldofWarcraft
og blizzard cinematics are the best! they were top of the notch. (honorable mention: starcraft 2 cutscenes.)
Imagine not playing anymore (classic only, retail is utter trash)
I still get flashbacks to offtanking Black Temple every time I hear that. (Tauren Feral Druid)
Any time I hear someone say 'You are not prepared.' I think of that cinematic.
Best part is that it predates GoT by 10 years. Epic stuff!
Yeah Dumb and Dumber definitely ripped off WoW. Tt became more and more blatant after the 7th season.
@@P4PKing They should had gone all the way and made the Night King as cool as Lich King. Sadly, they were not that smart.
48:46 It's a different Lich King. The previous one was defeated, and one hero, who had been fatally burned by dragon fire (that's why he glows red) volunteered to take the crown, to prevent the undead army from auto-attacking the lands of the living.
Actually, Bolvar was almost killed by blight, but red dragons trying to clear the blight from around the Wrathgate healed him, and because red dragons heal targets by breathing fire on them, his flesh was seared to such an extent where he's barely recognizable, thus making it debatable if getting healed was actually good for him or not, but it happened, so...
He got killed by the plague, burned by red dragons who resurected him, got imprisoned by Arthas who tortured his body and soul as a pass time. Yet, he resisted, and even sacrifices himself to bear the power of the helm of domination in order to restrain the scourge.
Always trusting the Light, never giving up, and sacrifices himself to save everyone, he is the embodiment of what a paladin is. Bolvar is such a badass character !
@@kokojack He wasn't killed... Stop talking.
@@godlygamer911 He is kept in a state between life & death, dying by the blight, living by red dragons' fire.
The cinematic implies he was killed. Also, the official Ultimate Visual Guide states he is dead.
@@kokojack the cinematic does not imply he was killed, the only thing it ever did was make us think he was dead so it would be a big reveal later
Yeah so at 45:00, the sword belonged to Anduin's father. Basically, it is semi-sentient, it splits/duplicates only for those it considers honorable enough.
as i recall its because he himself was split into two people and both were given a sword and then when they fused back into one so did the two swords become one.
@@Ctar99n You're correct.
Vrynn was once split into two, a meek version and a fierce version. The meek version was used as a puppet, while the fierce version was locked away and used as a gladiator. Eventually both halves met and went to fight a dragon, for which both were given elvish blades: Shalanar and Ellemayne. During the fight with the dragon they fused back into one beeing, and so did the swords, which became Shalamayne. One of the most epic swords in the lore.
Yeah, they f*cked that up big time. Saurfang, also known as "The Butcher of Ashenvale". Anduin giving his fathers blade to that genocidal maniac was the worst betrayal ever.
He should have stuck with the vow Varian made at the end of SoO: "If the Horde fails to uphold honor again, we will end you".
Anduin had all the sympathy for Saurfang but none for the genocided nightelves. Incomprehensible.
It is SO interesting, having played the game and lived in the story for 20 years, seeing someone react to the cinematics with little outside information about the storyline. TBH, the cinematics team CARRIES this game so hard, and there's nothing to hype you up like when the cinematics are released. This brings back a lot of nostalgia!
the game is only 19 years old :D
@@onlyncco8126 I was including W3 too, since it's the foundation WoW was built on.
Agreed it’s like the league cinematics like 3 minutes of visual greatness are enough to make me play for another expanison
18:30 “times change” still one of the hardest lines EVER in the Warcraft universe
Also, BFA was the pinnacle of animation for wow. The arts team went wild
@@bubonict9177 bro the bfa cinematic is like a master piece to people who havent gotten into WoW. Showcasing a tid bit of lore with Sylvanus. A war waging between the two sides showcasing multiple races. Then the crazy For the Horde and For the Alliance cutting into the fight starting again.
@@GrimMelvin YES TOTALLY ITS BEAUTIFUL
Man, I really feel Battle For Azeroth would've been great if Sylvanis hadn't picked up the villain ball the whole expansion through.
I feel like she had like 5 different teams writing her character over the years tbh.
Eh, its what the horde is for ig, plot, wonder which horde hero will become a villian this time.. So far garrosh and sylvanas, voljin sacraficed for plot device ofc, im betting on .. Uh.. Whats left.. The goblin ? Maybe one of the orcs again idk, dont even remember whats left of em lol.. Prob not thrall ig hes retired :3
I think they did my Banshee Queen dirty.
We Are Forsaken!
@@TheBunnyb0y next expansion thrall become evil :)
@@Vaporvisionoh god.
Please no
@45:31 You expressed literally how the player base felt about Sylvannas from that point until the end of Shadowlands. Perfect reaction!
You mean the crybaby base. Blizzard is known for not having fans but even worse, crybabies who just want to yell and shout and cry abotu everything no matter what.
If you can't understand the story of Sylvanas or the story of Warcraft in general, no matter how big and deep it is meanwhile, you shoudl maybe stop playing games all together and and so somethign for your general eduaction and intelligence for a while. Because that's really low.
For the video maker:
As in RL, it's part of tactic and strategy to not just show your power. A thousands of years old rule: look strong when you are weak, look weak when you are strong or more general: let the enemy know as little as possible about what you can or can not do, what you plan, what you want.
Afterall: all tactic and strategy becomes pointless up to a trap for yourself, when your enemy learns about it.
She lost her temper - that wasn't exactly good for her, but she had reached enough, so it was no devastating defeat for her.
@@miriamweller812 So because he shares an opinion with the majority of the community he is uneducated , dumb and shouldn't be allowed to play games? Im gonna try to be nice here but this comment is probably the most stupid thing i have seen in any comment section for the past few years on any video. And Honestly if anything your comment paints a good picture of how *ahem* extremely "uneducated" you are, and especially how "low your intelligence" is. you should be ashamed for giving such a toxic response to a guy doing nothing but appreciating how well josh followed the character development of sylvanas (because he understands it very well) during the course of Battle for Azeroth. To me it seems that you are the actual crybaby because your favorite forsaken woman in the game developed in a way that you didn't like. Keep this Toxicity to yourself and touch some grass.
she's still bad
@@thoticcusprime9309 Sylvannas waifu fo life!
What I love about the Warcraft community is that you, not even knowing much if anything about the series, KNEW Arthas' name. You'd heard it before, and knew it was somehow important. You watched the Wrath trailer and caught on to the fact that it was something special. It was the culmination of the Warcraft 3 RTS games, and 2 expansions of WoW. And the lines of his father over top, just helps to sell the solemn sadness that exists around Arthas. You caught on to it from the music. His father thought he would follow in his footsteps, become a great king, and rule with wisdom and strength; but he messed up, HARD. And to finally have the moment come when we know that's what we're finalizing, it's serious. It may just be a game, but its a story that's been years in the making and was such a big deal when it happened. Many people didn't know where the story could go afterward because we'd fought off the 2 major threats of the world, and "made peace" between the Alliance and Horde in order to secure Azeroth's safety. It was the canonical "end" of the Warcraft world for me. Everything they did after, I personally feel should have been done as a new game, and left WoW to be a part of the Warcraft original series, then do the new game as the continued series.
I can't agree enough. I think that Blizzard should move on to make a few single-player games (whether RTS or RPG) and move on from Wow.
The green guys are Orcs! You see a Troll briefly in the 2nd cinematic, riding the raptor at night, and the one with red hair in the 8th one, talking to Saurfang. There are Ogres, but they're more fleshy toned and sometimes have 2 heads, are huge, and they're not... all there; even though some of them can do magic. The Elf in the first cinematic was a Night Elf. The Elf in the 2nd cinematic is a Blood Elf, what many High Elves became after Arthas (3rd cinematic) destroyed his homeland and their Sunwell, which was their magical source of power that they heavily relied upon. Sylvanas (7th and 9th cinematic) is a banshee (former High Elf Ranger General) possessing her High Elf corpse, after breaking free of Arthas' Lich King mind control. She leads other undead that broke free, part of the Horde but... She always had her own plans. Arthas sought too much power to defend his people and is mind controlled by the helmet. He raised an army of the undead; Bolvar (fiery Lich King in the last one) is a "good" Lich King, less mind controlled, keeping the undead at bay. Or Scourge, as they're called. They are endless. The Legion frequently invade the world and cause basically all the problems as they conquer planets. Then there are the Old Gods corrupting everyone...
The lore is insane and so cool. Like Lord of the Rings and GoT but even more fantastical and bringing in alien demons, essentially. There are some good books too.
In defense of sylvanas. It felt like her character was written by like 5 separate teams over the years. She used To have a strong moral compass and then one day things changed… then she became a sort of hero… and then a antihero and then a villain… and then a antihero again
Even while she was evil at some points she still had moments where she did care.
A lot of these changes legit came out of nowhere.
It's because she was. Warcraft lore was pretty consistent between WC2 and Wrath of the Lich King, I am assuming because Metzen and the creative team were pretty much focused on it and SC. Then they began dividing their attention and handing it off to people with less experience, who were not as familiar with the details of the lore, and/or wanted to push their own ideas regardless of consistency. They also clung to the ridiculous idea that the Alliance and Horde *had* to remain at odds for game reasons. So the lore suffered, the characters suffered, and the ongoing story suffered. Warcraft holds a very special place in my heart but, as far as story goes, it is absolutely that TV show that has run an extra 7 seasons too long.
@@CandleLight129 The problem IS the entire koombayah horseshit storyline, the Alliance and the Horde HAVE reasons for being at odds with each other, so much so that a sudden peace out of nowhere after all the warcrimes committed on both sides is undeserved. Like, seriously! I came to play World of WARcraft. The Alliance are evil douchebags that try to hide their dirty nature in shiny armor and pretty slogans, whereas the Horde does its fair share of warcrimes but brand themselves as honorable savages. Both lost much to each other. Especially in the BfA expansions with the new allied races, the Nightborne basically being told to go kill themselves by the Night Elves. The Zandalari having their princess imprisoned, their city invaded, innocent civilians butchered and their king murdered in cold blood. The Vulpera who were hunted, killed and imprisoned for simply doing trade with the Horde and remaining neutral. Etc. But yes, koombayah, there is a reason why they won't bring up Talanji anymore, because trying to write her being okay with this ridiculous peace after the Alliance imprisoned her, murdered her father and butchered her people would just ruin her character like everything else they did.
Sylvanas has pretty much always been a "bad guy" since she became undead. She didn’t have much of a moral compass at all, people just simp for undead elves. She attacked and blighted Gilneas unprovoked, even contrary to Garrosh’s orders, another iredeemably bad character. People just need to suck it up and realize that despite a few "good" characters, the Horde is the "evil" faction at the end of the day, whether people want to admit it or not. And ain’t nothing wrong with that, I’ll still play both factions.
Although Sylvanas got stupid bad from a writing point since Legion and onwards, for sure.
@@LethalOwl garrosh was another example of bad writing. He was honorable and then pulls a complete 180 in his character. Then blizzard retconned his character.
But yeah. Sylv was more of an antihero. But that’s only because her interests aligned with everyone else’s usually. But she did care for the for the forsaken and her sisters… in her own way. It’s hard to gage because she’s not upfront about everything
Then legion happened. And everything went downhill from there. Retcons, bad writing, pulling things out of nowhere.. yeah… blizzard after Wrath of the lich king overall just dropped the ball with a lot of their stories.
Cataclysm. I liked death wing and the other dragons and that’s about it. Rip malygos too. Everyone forgets him.
I wouldn’t say the horde is evil. It’s just that blizzard is too lazy to pull someone from the alliance to be the villain. Easier to make the horde the bad guys. Lol
6:00 Fun (or sad) fact: dragon from third cinematic called Sindragosa, and she were killed by next cinematic dragon - Deathwing (Neltharion)
The Lich King (Blue Guy: Arthas) from the first cinematic is another one than the second Lich King (Red Guy: Bolvar).
I'll break it down, but in Lore it's more complicated: Arthas kinda got the power from the legion. He was a noble prince who got the Crown and the Sword to get undead and ice power, but also getting a tool of death. With those powers, he slaughtered a lot of high elves (including sylvanas) and humans (including his own father and king, i recommend the warcraft 3 cinematics!). He brang Sylvanas back to an undead life as punishment, but she got to break free and got the leader of the free undead, the "forsaken", who later became part of the horde.
Later. in Wrath of the Lich King, Arthas got killed and Bolvar (who is red because he got kinda revived by the flames of the Dragon of Life) made himself the new Lich King, to controll the unfree fraction of undead, so they wouldn't go rampage.
The burning tree (Teldrassil) you were seeing was the "holy" home of the night elves (part of the alliance). And yep, Sylvanas (now leader of the horde) did this, appareantly to this point of the story to "kill hope".
In the shadowlands cinematic Sylvanas is defeating Bolvar, the heir of her punisher, to destroy the Crown and make a brigde to the afterlife, where the crown was forged. At this point I dont want to say more because of spoilers.
I'm happy you understood that much that was shown. Much more than most other reactors! 🙂
Liked that Vid, thank you for taking us with you on this journey! And also on the journey through runeterra (League of Legends) btw 😉
Also the warlords of draenor cinematic ("35 yeary ago") is important. It shows us how the Orcs (you named ogres) were meant to drink deamon blood to become their slaves.
This happend, and so they got to the world of the other poeples als conquerers, but managed to break free later. And thats why the orcs have green skin btw.
however, in this cinematic it didn't happen because its a time travel mindfk thing. but its not very liked and mostly ignored by the community, because... yeh... time travel mindfk thing.
fake news. the first lich king was Ner'zul, an Orc. then Arthas fuse with him. and then both Nerzul and Arthas got banished from the helmet and Bolvar took the helm and became the 3rd lichking.
Let's not forget Sylvanas killed herself after being freed from the LK grasp and when the Valkyr brought her back she was scared shitless of what she saw while being dead.
@@CristianDCure Yehh.. I cutted that information to simplify the story, but you are absolutely right.
@kinofheavymetal I actualy forgot that, true!
Not gonna lie, when I was younger and first saw that cinematic of Arthas, I thought he was reviving a giant whale or some shit… 🤣💀😂
I love your reaction to the Warlords of Draenor one, but if only you knew the details around it, how it was his son that went back in time to tell him the down sides to taking the fel, and that the demon would show, and when his son jumped and pushed him out of the way, that's how his dad would have died originally
Sylvanas' "For the Horde!" will always send chills down my spine despite me maining a night elf. ( night elves lived in that tree she burned down )
Yep, that moment, and "This world is a prison" are both such big moments. Also when Deathwing lands on Stormwind!
Oh yeah, Deathwing landing on Stormwind was a big one for me for a long time. I started playing late WotLK so Cata was my first 'new xpack' experience.
Then later Sylvanas "The horde is nothing!"
Who gives a shit who lived there?
This is war.
People lived in Undercity when the Alliance attacked in BfA as well, but no one gives a shit, it's WARcraft.
Not peacecraft.
The one from the Wrathgate was my favourite, Hers is a close 2nd
Didn’t think I’d spend an hour watching some one watch WoW cinematics but it was refreshing to see someone’s reactions to the scenes of a game I’ve played on and off for 17 years
If you haven't already, you should definitely react to the Warbringers cinematics - Warbringers: Jaina, Warbringers: Sylvanas, and Warbringers: Azshara.
They are extremely well animated (very different style from this), and give a bit more details on their backstories.
While Warbringers: Jaina is spectacular there is no chans hes gonna understand even 10% of it. I have seen probadly around 30-40 different experianced wow players look at that and i can count on 1 hand how many trully understood what was going on in that cinematic. Before the Warbringers: Jaina was released u could go through every single piece of lore that WoW gives u and u still wont fully understand it becouse u have to play an optional bonus campaign from Warcraft 3 Frozen Throne to fully understand it. Everything that happens in the song and around it is a direct reference to that bonus campaign.
@@Shiftry87 I suppose that is true, although that's a bit of a sad statement; while the full story unfolds through the Warcraft 3 campaign and expansion, almost all of the lore exists within WoW itself (or at least WoW Classic), through NPCs telling you about past events... If you bother to read the quest logs, and perhaps some of the books scattered around the world.
Also, the actual lyrics in Warbringer: Jaina tells the story (albeit from a different point of view than we experienced in Warcraft 3)
In any case, I think it would be neat to see a reaction to the 3 Warbringer cinematics - maybe he'll get the gist of what's going on, maybe he'll draw his own conclusions, maybe someone will explain it in the comments. I'm just curious what he'll make of it.
@@Shiftry87 You don't really need to understand the Warbringers shorts to enjoy them. They are really well made. The big wigs at Blizzard try their hardest to destroy their games, but the art teams at the company are the absolute best in the world and make stellar content.
The Afterlives shorts are in a similar style to the Warbringers shorts and are also excellent. I'd watch all of them to just enjoy some great cinema.
@@nicholasgraves3149 Getting the lyrics behind warbringers jaina makes it a lot heavier and cooler. Dont NEED to know it to make it awesome, but it helps a ton.
Jaina's was the BEST! It was a freaking SEA SHANTY, and it was GLORIOUS!
"You are not prepared" still gives me Goosebumps after all these Years.
As someone that's played the game since fairly close to the beginning (I started a little before Wrath of the Lich King came out), these cinematics get me hyped as hell every time.
Even for the expansions that people liked the least, the cinematics always got people insanely pumped.
The world that they built and the insane amount of lore that goes into the Warcraft universe is just absolutely incredible.
Every race and zone has a story for every time period of history.
If you watch JUST the cinematics from in-game combined with the expansion launch ones, it's like a 5-hour video, and that still only gives you a tiny fraction, in small bits and pieces, of the overall story.
at 8:20, that scene is what inspired the ending of season 7 in game of thrones, go back and watch both, this cinematic is way way older.
And this cinematic is the way to bring a dragon back, not what they did in GoT.
@@Sundaymor They did bring the dragon back in GoT?? The night king reanimated it to use against them.
@@dandy0397 They did, I know. I just didn't like the scene. The Lich King from Warcraft did it way better, I believe. It was a more epic scene.
I have always loved the Burning Crusade cinematic for its insanely high quality voice acting. Glad I'm not the only one to think so.
Man, I'm grateful for this video. I played this game for years (2006-2016). Reached quite far into the story. Had a great time with the game, but I lost interest and once Blizzard started shooting themselves in the foot with all the bad pr, I gave up entirely. Still, these cinematics invoke a lot of emotion from the joy I had before. Thanks for bringing nostalgia back to me at a time when the company was great and I could enjoy your reaction of someone unfamiliar with the game/story. It was a pleasure to watch :)
I love seeing non-warcraft players enjoy the cinematics. The confusion they have makes it fun because you want to "uhm actually.." everything they get wrong. xD
The thing about these cinematics though, is on their own they are amazing... but imagine spending over 20 years knowing these characters and their stories. That is the reality for some. I am a 33 year old dude now, and i first encountered sylvanas when i was in elementary school. The amount of investment some of us have in these characters only make these cinematics a million times better.
Whenever the Lich King stomps his foot and Invincible begins to be sung, i STILL get goosebumps all over to this day.
So, for that cinematic in particular, with the Lich King. The first song you hear is called Invincible from Battlecry Mosaic. The second song when the big skeleton dragon (her name is Sindragosa by the way) is called Arthas My Son. The two MOST iconic songs in the entire goddamn game.
Invincible (The song, not the horse/mount) is not in the cinematic as far as im aware
@@zekay_ Correct, the whole song is called Arthas, My Son. Part of it is *in* Invincible.
Battle for Azeroth hits different than the others, played horde since 2007 and hearing Sylvanas shout 'for the horde' in that moment was fucking epic.
The Cataclysm one hits so damn hard. You can feel the goosebumps
YES!!! One of my dearest expansions too!
Right?! Cataclysm does not get near the love it really deserves. Both in this cinematic and in the expansion itself.
@@TheRealCeeJai I played on a Cata private server for a while before returning to WoW retail.
Watch it in German ;)
The cinematic with the undead ice dragon is much older than the Game of Thrones TV show. And the books never described any dragons like that.
Sindragosa rip 😢
also there is a video showing side by side how GoT basically copied this exact piece of cinematography and used it in their show
@@MrColin541 Literally ripped off WoW
Someone like you who has no idea what world of warcraft is makes reactions like this all that more entertaining. thank you !
For the Warlords of Draenor, the context you are missing is that this expansion went back into the past. The real lore had those orcs drink the green stuff, and they went on to do the normal events we know of. The good looking orc came from our timeline through a portal, came back to this moment, and changed it. So this is an alternate timeline where they didn't take it.
45:25 the reason this was such a shock for WoW players is because the mak'gora is a duel *usually* without magical abilities; though magic is allowed, it is frowned upon. However the main thing that felt amazing for horde players is having sylvanas say that the horde is nothing, because finally we don't have to have her as our warchief, thank god.
Really fun reliving the emotions with you that I felt at time of release. While the storytelling in game always had a ton of issues, the art and music teams always hit it out of the park.
God if it's one thing Blizzard has always done right, it's their cinematic trailers! No matter how many times I watch them I never get tired of seeing them, always gives me goosebumps! 🤯I remember a WoW movie was made a while back but it was honestly...disappointing... Blizzard should be the ones to make and release a World of Warcraft movie, I would not hesitate to throw $$$ to see it!😆
@itsJoshNv Will try to keep these concise, but this is about to be a novel. First two cinematics don't have much of any lore aside from the "you aren't prepared" guy. Aside from that, you kind of can see the Alliance and Horde going in circles of short truces between wars throughout the cinematics. The Alliance was started by the humans in response to the orcs (green guys) invading form another world via a magical portal. The Horde is formed by the Orcs, specifically a guy named Thrall, who is basically Orc Moses leading his people to freedom (more on him later) and various other "outcast" races to make a lasting home for themselves.
Wrath of the Lich King: Guy in the armor is Arthas who was prince to the human kingdom. Before he got that armor, his kingdom was being ravaged by the undead and Arthas chased the mastermind to try and end it. He basically goes mad with revenge and ends up getting tricked into taking that sword which steals his soul and he flips over to the undead side and proceeds to genocide his own people; eventually becoming the Lich King when he puts on the Helmet of Domination. He gets taken down by a united Alliance and Horde attack and the red guy in the last cinematic replaces him to act as the "jailer" of the undead. Basically, a Lich King is necessary to control the undead scourge to prevent them from just attacking the whole world.
Cataclysm: Main overall plot relevance is that Thrall steps down as leader of the Horde and installs his protégé Garrosh as the new chief while he deals with the big ass dragon. Queue Garrosh committing various war crimes against the Alliance.
Mists of Pandaria: New continent discovered and Alliance and Horde fight to settle it (while the pandas who lived there to begin with are like "Dude wtf? Chill out man") due to Garrosh being a warmonger and orc supremacist; he's commonly referred to in the fan community as Orc Hitler. Garrosh gets deposed by the end and a troll named Vol'jin becomes new chief.
Warlords of Draenor: Garrosh pulls a Back to the Future to just before the original orc invasion and stops his dad (We will never be slaves guy) from making the pact with the demons (which is why some the OG orcs are green) and then tries to invade his old timeline with side orc supremacy army. (Regarding time bullshit, just think multiverse theory. Garrosh going back in time didn't change the future, it just created a new timeline). The big structure you see at the end is them building the magical portal that was used in the original invasion. Garrosh dies during this expansion in a Mak'Gora duel versus Thrall. Thrall used his shaman powers to call some lightning and lit his ass up like a Christmas tree in order to win.
Legion: Demons invade with their own army and the Horde and Alliance team up again to stop them with their king and the new troll chief being pro-peace. Queue both of them dying during that battle with the crashing air ship. Alliance now hostile against Horde again because they blame the Horde retreating being the cause of their King dying. Sylvanas becomes new chief once the troll chief dies. Instant warmonger.
Old Soldier + Battle for Azeroth: The flashbacks you see Saurfang have with all the fire and screaming (there is no honor in this) was a war campaign led by Slyvanas which was supposed to be a land grab. Surprise twist she orders the burning of Teldrassil (the capital and holy city of the elves who are Alliance members); many dead elves ensue. The still alive elves and their Alliance are obviously big mad about the razing of one of their capital cities. So they declare open war on the Horde again and invade Sylvanas's own capital to bring her to justice.
Lost Honor: Speaks for itself. Saurfang gets taken captive during prior battle and Anduin asks him for help to take down Sylvanas who just cant seem to stop committing war crimes.
Safe Haven: Saurfang goes to recruit Thrall out of hiding (the other green dude). Basically, after Thrall ended Garrosh's war crime spree via lightning bolt, applied directly to the forehead, he went into exile out of shame not only for installing Garrosh in the first place, but also shame because Garrosh had been his best friend's son and he failed to lead him to the right path, and also because Thrall cheated in the Mak'gora to win (lighting bolts and basically all magic are against the rules). Saurfang calls on him to save the Horde again (again because Thrall is basically the only good leader the Horde has had up to this point aside from the troll chief who died so quick his most notable contribution was the power vacuum he left behind for Sylvanas).
Reckoning: Saurfang challenged Sylvanas to Mak'Gora (which was originally an ancient and sacred orc rite that became a part of Horde culture as well) knowing he would lose. However, in doing so, he provoke Sylvanas into cheating since he knew she didn't respect their culture and as he said, she wanted him to suffer. However, while she wasn't a fan, cheating in something as sacred as Mak'gora causes her to lose basically all Horde support instantly while the rebel+Alliance army is on her doorstep. Her realizing this leads to that "you are all nothing" tantrum.
Shadowlands: Sylvanas beats up the replacement Lich King (red guy) to break his helm and opens up the sky into the realm of death; basically the afterlife. Her goal is to break the cycle of life and death because of a lot more in depth lore reasons that stem from her being undead and the truth behind where the Helm of Domination (and the original Lich King) really came from.
I hope this provides some much needed context into the lore while not giving it all away and without being too long. If you liked these cinematics, there are definitely a lot more awesome ones out there. I would definitely recommend the Warcraft 3 cinematics which depicts the events that come before World of Warcraft (such as Arthas becoming the Lich King) as well as some other WoW cinematics like Thrall's Mak'gora duel vs Garrosh.
There are two kinds of people that react to these cinematics: those that are wise enough to respond to Illidan with "Nope, I am *not* prepared." and those that aren't. Thanks for your reaction to these. It's always nice to see another gamer appreciate games or genres they've never played. Enjoy!
the WoW Lore runs pretty deep, its a nice rabbit hole to go down to! however, i recommend the warbringer videos, you gotta love the lore and music!
So im here from the algorithm lol...nice to see you enjoy these reactions. There are two cinematics or 3 you must watch. All were made by the same person, 2 on his own time and the 3rd by him but hired by blizzard to make them.
1. Naxxaramas
2. Black Temple
3. Wrath of the lich king classic trailer
All made by Hurricane
Goosebumps quality, so its a must see! I put them in order as the first 2 are based of raids from the game and follow one another in game AND the trailers. Lastly, enjoy!!
If you're confused about the pendant in the Old soldier piece: his son was made into a death knight forced to serve under the Lich king (3rd cinematic, raising a dragon).
The flashbacks to the burning tree is a character called Sylvanas burning down one of the world trees, sparking an all out war between both factions even though there are a lot of Horde characters strongly disagreeing with her.
If you want more context you can see the other animated works.
As someone who started playing in vanilla this makes me so nostalgic, so glad your video was recommended to me!
Really enjoyed watching your reactions to all of these. It made me feel like I got to watch them again in a new light 😃
Great job in your interpretations bro!
Yeah, mages turning enemies into sheep is an iconic WoW thing, it is a spell called "polymorph" and is quite an important spell to control enemies during fights when there are way too many enemies at the same time
man it still gives me the chills when Illidan shouts "You are not prepared!", thinking of my first time entering the black temple to go through all the horrors there to find him and it wasn't disappointing finally engaging him in battle
Though when Wrath of the lich king expansion was released that changed WoW so much, it went from gaming entirely to gathering, all of the challenge was removed from the lore and instead they added like 5 different difficulty levels to everything so that a 5 year old could fight the same bosses as a veteran gamer, it just felt silly to do any of the content knowing there was a baby version of the legendary bosses 🙂
After that every mmorpg lost the idea of the words "epic" and "legendary", so u could pick up a thousand "legendary" flowers before u were level 10 and then the microtransactions came so u could buy legendaries instead of gaming
Man I miss the days before gaming became shopping 🙂
I am 31 years old, I play this game since just before TBC came out and I still can't believe how good these cinematics look especially in 2004, 2004! And you have all right to compare the dragons with GOT because the series dragons were inspired by these ones. And Kung Fu Panda also was based off of the Pandaria pandas. :)
That last bit just is a straight lie. When Pandaria was announced it got memed on for looking so much like Kung Fu Panda.
@@spaceowl9246 The first pandaren ever mention was in Warcracft 3 back in 2002. He was just a melee unit, nothing special. The first monk/brewmaster was one year later on the bonus campaign of Warcraft 3 : The Frozen Throne where Chen Stormstout (very important character in pandaren lore) helps Rexxar in the "The Founding of Durotar" missions. This is 5 whole years before the release of Kung Fu Panda, so yea no straight lie at all, but it did get memed a lot by people who don't know Warcraft indebt lore.
I should make clear, I'm not saying Kung Fu Panda WAS based on pandaren. I'm just saying it's not outright impossible, then again it was just one character on an extra campaign, so it's very unlikely.
Also, the blue eyes in GoT existed since the '90s, im pretty sure GRRM has been planning an ice dragon since then
@@MrWillsonx Ice dragons have existed in fantasy long before GRRM, don't go down this road. And the White Walkers in the books is nothing like the ones from the show.
If you want the " full " cinematics story, i suggest watching vanilla all cinematics, tbc all cinematics until you hit dragonflight wich just released kinda. Gives you alot more in-depth.
One example is how Wrath of the Lich king you had Arthas as the current lich king, however the lich king sylvanas returns to to break open the way to shadowlands, that lich king is Bolvar Fordragon who chose to take on the task of being the lich king after arthas was defeated. Hence the " there must always be a lich king "
good reaction video enjoyed it ^^
Wow lore is really fun to get into IMO, great reaction as always!
Until Danuser started digging up old lore and pissing on it.
just skip shadowlands and u pretty good lol dragonflight is amazing so far
@@imaran1303 BIG BIG facts
@@Desciple860 Nah, Dragonflight is also annoying, as Ohn-ahran Plains are basically just a repeat of the Highmountain. Stop me if this sounds familiar:
Tribes of hooved indigenous people need to band together to stop a looming threat, the most warlike of these people I stead joins the threat and stages a coup.
The Lich King being red is because it's a different person. The Shadowlands Lich King is Bolvar Fordragon, much weaker and only there to keep the undead under control. The old Lich King was Arthas Menethil, who originally killed Sylvanas and turned her undead, and he almost killed her several more times down the road.
To explain further the Lich King is the title of the person wearing the Helm of Domination (that fancy helmet they wear) and acts as the leader of the Undead Scourge, Bolvar was in fact the third person to hold the title (though only second one with an actual body), the first one was an (ghost) orc called Ner'zhul, Arthas was given the helm at the end of Warcraft 3 (WoW is in fact 4th Warcraft game to have been published) and became the Lich King there (Ner'zhul was essentially dying at that point due to complex story reasons I don't go into here).
I wouldn't say Bolvar is any weaker then Arthas but what he is is unwilling to use the Power of the Lich King as much, als the destruction of Frostmourne (the sword Arthas had) limited the direct power Bolvar could project, there's times Bolvar did more then just keep the Scourge under control but those were not many as he's not interested in killing all the living like the previous Lich Kings and instead acts as the "jailer of the damned" (his own words).
@@cenktuneygok8986 Well according to WOTLK Arthas was in control it was explained in the novel but even during the game it itself it was quite clear it was Arthas in the driver's seat not Ner'zhul. There's certain weaknesses the Lich King has due to involving people Arthas' cared about but Ner'zhul wouldn't there wouldn't be no reason for Ner'zhul to hold back against Jaina or Sylvanas they people who Arthas had loved or had personal beef with.
In fact using Arthas' good side against the Lich King is a plot point in the game, not something that really be worth it if Ner'zhul was in control.
@@cenktuneygok8986 You might dial that "undefiled" WoW back to tbc then as that things I mentioned were from retail Wrath, not post Wrath content
@@cenktuneygok8986 So let me see if I understood you correctly, what you're saying is that Ner'zhul who was established in WC2 to be someone who lead from the rear and pretty much never showed up to battlefield in person spent most of Wrath pretending to be someone who had total control over even responding to taunts Ner'zhul himself wouldn't care about (Wrathgate and ICC trailer) or spare people to whose survival he had no personal stake in (Jaina Proudmore or Sylvanas Windrunner depending on your faction in Halls of Reflection), does this seems logical or in character to you?
If the devs truly wanted to show Arthas as an innocent victim powerless to prevent the Lich King then why not use his spirit in the Lich King fight instead of reconning his father into a Paladin.
@@cenktuneygok8986 There's a story from Wrath that highlights Arthas destroying Ner'zhuls influence while he was hibernating on the frozen throne, as well as willingly removing the remaining good side of him. It was all written through some trippy dream dinner table sequence but the outcome was Arthas being totally in control, with Ner'zhuls soul likely being imprisoned in Frostmourne as a result. The only influences on him after that were Zovaal(which we can ignore), and Yogg'saron(which blizzard never explained so we can ignore it too).
This was reinforced when Sylvanas commit suicide in Icecrown, where she saw the soul of Arthas suffering in hell because he WILLINGLY commit all his crimes as the Lich King.
"Thunder once again" I remember this sentence for 1 lifetime, I have seen this cinematic so many times, and then every inch of me gets chilled when I see Dwarf with the bear and that music underneath it :3 I loved the old wow and Sylvanas is the best :3!
The fact that the first trailer is from 2004... timeless!!❤
Fun to rewatch these through someone else's eyes with no history. Glad you enjoyed them! :)
You should really watch "Warcraft III Reign of Chaos Cinematic 4: Arthas' Betrayal" for the backstory of the lich king arthas, its badass
this was fun to watch with you very nostalgic for me since ive been playing sinc ehte beginning, great video
Bruh...the first cinematic...the beginning...where it all started...oh my god....listening to that aria...feels nostalgic man! You also gotta respect the Horde!
These cinimatics are like a pebble in the ocean when it comes to the lore/story but doesn't degrade their quality and impact on the story
I never played World of Warcraft but I did play the Real time strategy games that came before it, Warcraft 3: Reign of Chaos and Frozen Throne.
Sylvanas, Arthas (the first Lich King), and Illidan (the dude who kept saying you are not prepared in the Burning Crusade Cinematic) are my absolute favorite characters from Warcraft.
It could take like a full hour to explain the story behind each of the trailers, but you've done a decent job of piecing bits together from what you've been given in the trailers.
The context for the Wrath of the Lich King one, is that basically, the dude was the prince of a kingdom and a paladin (holy knight) who tried to stop the undead from destroying his kingdom, and along the way, was willing to put aside more and more of his humanity to save his people. Eventually, it led him to take a cursed sword, Frostmourne, which consumed his soul and made him undead himself. Dude is basically the Anakin Skywalker of Warcraft.
38:40 to give some context. This scene is on literally another world than the one most of the other cinematics are on. In the second expansion we went to the Orcs homeworld, and there's been a constant connection to it. Thrall, the other orc, went into self exile there with his family when he lost his connection with the elements.
it was fun watching someone with limited knowledge on the world and characters react to all of this. you put the pieces together pretty well, although there were a few mis-call outs i had to chuckle at! now worries tho!
idk dude seems fake, def not a first reaction.
@@beathan99 yea i caught that a bit too, wasnt sure. like intentionally calling things the wrong name. stood out a few times.
@@Zhurak Trust me it was my first reaction, didn't even think this vid was going to get attention at all but was told to check it out because i liked the LoL cinematics
Very cool video! I stopped playing WoW last year after starting in 2004. A very long time and many great, but also bad memories. And I find it really exciting to see how someone who has never played the game reacts to the videos. If you play WoW yourself, you don't really realize how fantastic and diverse this world actually is. Thanks for letting me see through this video how someone can be really excited about the lore of this world.
Your reaction to the first one: "What in the WoW!"
😆
How fitting.
Ive been playing WoW since Burning crusade (2007). I enjoyed watching your perspective of the cinematics. One thing i would recommend you watch is "Fall of the Lich King ending" so you understand who the new lich king was. Because that wasn't Arthas in the shadowlands trailer.
hey man, stumbled over your vid, and love the reaction to something I been playing 20 years.......ever want some lore explenattions to the cinematics for this, would be happy to throw in my 2 ccents. keep up the good work, you deserve way more subs
Mindblowing that the first wow cinematic is 18 years old, still top tier animation
I love that you give props to the OST. Warcraft music and specifically WoW music is top tier second maybe only to FFXIV.
42:05 Literally the same thing as Agni Kai you're spot on
Nice reactions mate. Took me back in time when I saw these first time and waited the game to come! Cheers and looking forward to new content :)
I sat and watched it all with you.
I have been playing WoW since Beta early 2004, and this was so much fun to watch.
It might be the fact that I'm obsessed with all things ice-powers, but the WotLK cinematic grips my full attention everytime I see it. The music, Terenas' voiceover, the quality that holds up well to this day, the pacing, everything about it is just perfection. Prince Arthas was a badass.
Getting chills from the music in the warlords of draenor cinematic around when Grommash Hellscream yells "We will never be slaves... but we will be conquerors"
If you want to see Blizzard at their (current) peak of cinematics, check out the cinematic for Diablo 4. An amazing world and story created in like 12 minutes, with some good horror thrown in for good measure.
and thats about it really just the cinematics, art and sound
Hahahahaha Diablo WISHES it was WoW with cinematics
@@godlygamer911 but its literally the same people doing both
@@NonsensicalSpudz no, it's not... Are you kidding? 😂
Same company, not the same people.@@NonsensicalSpudz
In the last few cinematics Sylvanus has this purple shadow magic. It was weird at the time because it kinda came outta nowhere and was strong af for no reason. In shadowlands (the expansion of the last cinematic) we find out that the magic she is using was given to her by the guy who is basically the ruler and the big bad of that “reverse” world, which is actually the afterlife. So she was essentially given powers by the grim reaper
That opening scene of Old Soldier is just sad as hell. Varok Saurfang holding his only son, Dranosh, who was killed by the Lich King and risen as a soldier of his Scourge army, just to be slain again in the raid of Icecrown Citadel.
WoW has an insane lore about it. Unique to itself, however borrows so much from everything in pop culture you have moments where you smile because they've made something you love familiar again, yet in a different way. I love this game, and forever will. My name is Salomaar the bold, Salomaar the righteous, Salomaar, blazing sword of the Sin'dorei!!!
It is so fun as a huge lore nerd to see someone see these for the first time :)
32:54 there's greater meaning to this
Anduin is a Priest - physically weak class, a support magic user/healer. He is using his father's (Varian) sword Shalamayne to honor his fall during the events of Legion, and he was trying to live up to the mantle of Varian, who was a Warrior - magicless physical damage class. Watching Anduin fight with a weapon is like watching a kid swing a stick, he barely has any technique or finesse, he is *bad* at it. And seeing how it didn't work out, he dropped Shalamayne and went back to doing what he knows best - Priest spells, healing and resurrection (in this case, Holy Word Salvation). The sword is more of a "stat stick" to him, later he carries it more as a memento and last resort weapon if he ever runs out of mana
Not gonna lie, that "Yo, he can turn red!" really cracked me up man.
Wrath of the Lich King has always been my favorite. The music and vo is just amazing.
Came here for Wrath, stayed for the rest ! :) Great reaction to our fantasy world! lol
Crazy how you realized Sylvanus was absurd on first viewing of the cutscenes. Took Blizzard years to realize.
Hi! This is the most massive and interesting universe that i see in games. It's my a big part of life, from childhood to nowdays! I have seen these cinematics much time, but all the time i watch with big pleasure and delight. Thank you.
So World of Warcraft has both FANTASTIC music, and to a point amazing lore and worldbuilding. In the last 10 years or so it has been hit or miss, but for the first 8 years it was absolutely amazing. Even if you don't play the game, I highly suggest giving TH-camrs like Hirumadex, Platinum WoW and Nobbel87 a listen as they dump wonderful lore into your ear-holes.
Sorry to say this, I hope I don't get shit on. But, as amazing the wrath cinematic is, the true love for it comes from the history or Arthus and his journey to Northerned, to Frostmourne. It hits so specially in us, me and those who truly love the lore or Warcraft. I think thats why it's so unbelievably loved. The music, is a huge cherry on top. It's a sad story of heroism, romance and sacrifice. I have lost count of how many times I watched the WC3 cinematic stories, yet every time I still love it every single time.
I know this was a year ago. You really need to get the rest of the Shadowlands cinematics and cut scenes, then pick up Dragonflight and then the newest, The War Within. That's the next expansion that comes out in August. I think you'll really love that one.
The big green guys are Orcs. Thrall used to be the leader, but things got to him and his wife got pregnant and so he resigned and went to live on Draenor (which is where the Orcs came from). The older orc, Varok Saurfang has been the War Chief for literally centuries. He lost his son to Arthas, the original Lich King.. He's dead and the one Sylvanas fights for the Shadowlands cinematic is Bolvar Fordring. There has got to be a Lich King to keep the Scourge (brainless undead) in line and when Arthas was killed, Bolvar stepped up to hold it. The troll that goes to Saurfang in the Old Soldier cinematic (the one where Saurfang goes out to die alone) is Zehkan, better known as Zappy Boi. (fan name). He, as you heard, lost his father and Saurfang lost his son, so it became a father/son type relationship until Saurfang died. Zekhan is in Battle for Azeroth later as well. Anduin's father, Varian Wrynn, died at the hands of Guldan (the ugly orc who tried to get the orcs to drink the green blood of that big demon) and Anduin, at about age 18, became kin of Stormwind, which is seen as the leader of the Alliance.
Shadowlands--the place you go when you die. Sylvanas 9a blood elf hunter/Ranger General of the Silvermoon City faction) has a reason for the things she is doing. She was killed by Arthas, her soul taken, and she was turned into a Banshee. She was the leader of the Forsaken, the undead people brought back to "life' by the Val'kyr after Arthas died. She wasn't always that powerful until the end of Legion and through Battle for Azeroth. The purple smoke is an indication of her new power (but none of us knew that at the time). You see where she gets that power during Shadowlands. You also get to see what she does to the leadership of Azeroth (Baine Bloodhoof--the Tauren, or bull person, who is king of the Tauren, Thrall, Jaina Proudmoore, Archmage and Admiral of the Kul Tiras fleet (humans), and Anduin). You get a lot of story about what happened when she burned Teldrissil (the tree that Saurfang said had no honor in happening), and the eventual consequences of her actions. During the Shadowlands, something happens with Anduin, he's controlled by the guy Sylvanas is working with, and he is made to do some pretty nasty things. The ending of Shadowlands sets up things for the War Within. At the end of Legion, a big Titan thrusts a big ass sword into Azeroth, almost killing the planet. That sword is also part of the next expansion.
Meantime, after Shadowlands, we get a bit of fun. the Dragon aspects have been in Azeroth for centuries, taking care of the people. They left their homelands, the Dragon Isles, to do so. They left stone Watchers to hold the island and be there to light the beacon for them to come home when they finish their mission. In the 10,000 years since they left, the watchers have deteriorated. The cinematic for Dragonflight is showing the awakening of the Watcher, the lighting of the beacon, and the return of the Dragons. The big red dragon is Alexstrasza, the Life Bender. There are 5 dragon races and there's a story of how each of them have come home and how they have been during that time away. There's some big storylines with the original dragons, the Primal Incarnates, and what they're doing that is going to continue into The War Within and the next two expansions from there, Midnight and The Last Titan. (Blizzard announced all 3 expansions at once in November 2023). Dragonflight is more of an exploration expansion, with new zones, and the ability to ride actual dragons and fly them (not just sitting passively).
The War Within is going to pick up the story of Azeroth after the Shadowlands. There is also a continuation of some of the story from Dragonflight as well, but we've not had much info on that yet.
So, hopefully that catches you up on things to a point. I've been playing since 2008, I main a gnome mage and my second is a Retribution Paladin (human).
The music in these cinematics ALWAYS gets me dude.
It always amazes me how good that original cinematic looked, even by today's standards "wow" is the reaction people still have when they first see it. And that was from 2004 when the game launched!
48:22 the lich king is a title that is passed onto whoever is wearing the helm of domination. There must always be a lich king or else the scourge (blue zombies) would run rampant and kill everything. This is Bolvar, he took the sacrifice of controlling the scourge after Arthas was killed by players at the conclusion of Wrath of the Lich King. Bolvar is looks like he’s made of lava because he was burned alive during Wrath. So, different kings same title.
Also, originally Sylvanus was a high elf but gets killed and turned into a banshee by Arthas and forced to be his slave. This happened before vanilla World of Warcraft came out.
tldr: different kings + sylvanas was enslaved by first lich king.
Great video! You'll like the overwatch ones too!
There is a lot of lore in all these videos! id recommend to watch the warbringer videos aswell as the harbingers. They are very well made and gives a great insight of the different races and their lore.
AND THIS is why I love the game :)
My favorite, having played it a ton, was and still is the Wrath of the Lich King intro. It almost feels like a forerunner to Game of Thrones white walkers even...
48:25 it's another Lich King, previous one from 7:03 was fallen at end of expansion. You should watch more cinematics for more lore :)
6:40 wows soundtrack has always been top shelf. Anduin's theme from Legion was in wholly my own opinion the finest track of them all.
"We got pandas in here too?!" Literally all of our reactions back in the day LOL
Hey first time finding your channel, I enjoyed watching this. If you're really finding this story that interesting, I STRONGLY encourage you to do a deep dive into the lore. There are lots of books, WoWwiki pages, there's a movie which sadly wasn't well received BUT for Warcraft fans it's a good fun film. There is so much lore, dude. It's so good.
The ICC end boss fight is epic, and wow cinematic has always been top notch.
The safe haven one sure has a lot of Gladiator vibes to it.
The hype for Wrath of the Lich King was insane! And when that cinematic dropped bruh.
Unfortunately, they turned Sylvanas into a Mary Sue near the end and killed off all of the long running established characters because of it. If you watch WWE, she was kind of treated like a combination of Brock Lesnar and Roman Reigns. She could never lose and was pushed as the main character even after people were getting tired of her.
When Saurfang fought Sylvanas in the dual, it's the Orc Mak'gora, which is the honor dual of skill more or less. No magic is allowed, so that's why she wasn't using it at the start. Once he pushed her over the edge and she realized she lost the Horde, Saurfang smirks, and charged her knowing the outcome of the dual would be irrelevant, sense he had succeeded in his goal. He freed the Horde, and got his warrior's death. He died, but still won. He out played her, which would eat at her, because she always considered herself to be a step ahead of everyone else. A poetic end.