Man, it's a shame that this is the last time we ever are gonna hear from the Oculus before he tragically and mysteriously disappears and is never heard from again.
@@OculusImperia In seriousness though, I adore the character development Oculus has gone though. Going from a wide eyed cataloguer of propaganda to where he is now would be an abrupt and uncharacteristic turn if it wasn't handled with tact. Tring to imagine Oculus saying those opening lines even a year ago would be out of character, to say the least. Now though it feels like a wholly natural development. You've done a wonderful job weaving his changing worldview through his broadening perspective.
At the risk of coming off as rancid as your standard imperial bureaucrat, I think every person who writes codex lore for the Imperium should have this very video implanted into their brain through those brainwires bionics everyone has. Really though, more of this, less of Space Marine Heroes™, Games of Workshop!!!! This is what makes the Imperium appealing. These endless evils are both poignant as well as liberating. They function as a Make-Your -Own Dystopia playset in the best possible way. It is a form of 'escapism' truly unique to this franchise, and you, my boy Oculus, have made something absolutely fantastic depicting that very thing.
Or is it a template laid down as fantastical dream. Furthermore investigations could prove truthful dialects have been spoken. Heretical to ponder else.
I think it's worth nothing that at the end of the day, and I'm so happy that this was brought up near the end of the video, that endless darkness and evil and murder and horrible nonsense isn't fun either. The tragedy of the Imperium is just that, a tragedy, and a tragedy isn't compelling without someone to identify with. A murdergorefest where everyone is despicable and nobody is worth rooting for isn't a tragedy. It's the template for a reality show. Not that you're asking for that, but it's something I encounter often with fans of Warhammer 40k; any attempt at inserting hope, inserting the possibility of a brighter future, at simply acknowledging that good things can happen, even under the most horrific regimes, is often treated with scorn and ridicule. A middle ground must be struck, one might say, a compelling story must arise from a mixture of all of the elements. Sure, you can't fix it overnight, and that would end the setting and exploration of just what horror it is, but you have to have the possibility, otherwise there's no point other than just reveling in the angst.
if the historitor order was created by gulliman with the intention of learning himself, that means gulliman is officially, in canon, a sub and a patreon of the channel
Yeah.... about that.... subscriber thing.... before long it will turn out that most of subscribers who don't identify as Alpharius, others wear funny hats, leather coats and carry bolt pistols with ....
I loved that one bit about destroying the climate of a planet to allow a moment of sunlight to shine on a Lord Marshal's triumphant march. That was one of the most stark moments in the Eisenhorn books that showcased the awfulness of the Imperium.
They seeded the toxic clouds above the hive to make it rain and create clear skies for the military parade. Flushing that many pollutants into the planet's systems at once caused severe environmental damage.
"a single man on Terra has the boot lifted from his neck just long enough to be able to stand up and look out the window. he weeps for the ignorance he had but moments before is lost to him"
After penning this, his confessional suicide note, the Oculus decided to spend one final day before his untimely demise gazing upon Eternity Gate and singing the praises of He Upon the Throne to the beautifully naïve and the irrevocably zealous. Then, as the Vindicare took aim, Oculus was suddenly whisked beyond that forbidden threshold and brought into the presence of the Master of Mankind himself, who unceremoniously handed him a manual and bid him name the vile engines of the Drukhari. Thus was the Oculus spared one doom and subjected to an entirely new and unintended doom as the expository thrall of the Lord of Lightning and his grating text-to-speech device.
If you really look at how life on Terra is, one would almost think that one was upon a Daemon World. Its so twisted and bent towards hatred, zealotry, and mind numbing indoctrination, one would thing that only devils live there. Even Pilgrims to Terra all die and never return home.
@@OculusImperia I can hear the catharsis in your voice. Writing from the perspective of the Oculus must be so difficult not just because of his perceptual heresy, but because the information he can obtain needs lore support and the imperium is a constant thorn.
I think my most loathed missreading of 40k is that the imperium was good and only fell to ruin when the Empereor fell. It was always a nightmare, removing his direct control revealed the truth of what he had built and the tools he used to build it.
Honestly you could read the whole thing as an indictment of the fascist trope of the strongman leader. Like, even if you had an immortal genius superman capable of uniting all of humanity under a single political block, the inevitable consequence of that would be the slow, agonizing decay of that block once his ability to personally maintain it was inevitably compromised. The Imperium's desperation IS the Emperor's ambition, the same mad grasp at the stars still playing out millennia later, and the fact that they call good what he called necessary evils only indicates a folly on his part just as deep as theirs, a comfort with necessary evils stemming from the basic assumption that he could never be an overall force for evil in the universe, intentionally or accidentally, and nor could his Imperium. He never second-guessed anything he ever did, and a million wailing worlds now pay the price for his egotism and arrogance.
The point of view for the video revolves almost entirely around Terra and lesser hive worlds. In a million worlds, many spend many generations as fairly benign places to live. The Emperor is and was effectively a deity in knowledge and power. Is there a long term plan? Has the Emperor's plan been derailed? He most certainly doesn't match the merely human tyrants he is compared to and criticisms inevitability reduce the Emperor to that merely human standard. GW has purposefully totally obscured many details, retconned absolutely critical lore into its reverse and hinted at the fact that the current state of the Imperium is both a fallen ideal AND just as planned. Also, never discount GW's lack of coherent oversight into lore, which led directly to one known chapter of Astartes being the only one not declared by the Emperor as traitors, later "fixed" by retcon, destroying the entire lore of that chapter other than its name. In the meantime we get the worst of totalitarian regimes, of the modern godless socialist stripe combined with a rather stupid parody of the Roman Catholic Church based on fake mythological tropes of Christianity from the 19th Century (what I call the Century of Myths from all of the pure male bovine excrement being spewed by the intelligentsia of the period). Why? Because it sells better. The history of an agworld that has been peacefully providing food for generations is irrelevant. Look as Gaunt's Ghosts, the Tanith One and Only. Tanith had existed for apparently millenia as a peaceful and nice place to live, but we only see it the night a Chaos splinter fleet decided to exterminatus it in passing for shits & giggles, or maybe an arcane ritual sacrifice, it's really hard to tell.
@@MagusMirificus Part of me feels that it was all intentional, that the Emperor actually wanted the suffering and misery and eternal war. It doesn't really make sense that he was purely well-intentioned. That only seems like an act to deceive in order to achieve what he really wanted; Pure chaos and churning destruction. Contradictions, confusion, despair and misery extended and prolonged like torture to the end of time.
@@inthefade It sure does look like he deliberately sowed seeds of mistrust in all the sons who betrayed him, and he did say to Dorn as he was being fitted into the throne that things had gone "Not as well as I had hoped, but not as bad as I had feared", so the idea that the Horace Heresy was a planned part of the Primarch project and the current degraded Imperium is more or less precisely what He was trying to create does have legs. I'm partial to the view that the Emperor, despite all his insistence upon not being seen as a god, and vocal championing of the supremacy of humanity, does not actually identify with humanity at all and sees them as one of many things which are infinitely beneath him, much like other similarly advanced lifeforms in satirical science fiction, such as Doctor Manhattan or the Tralfamadorians. The fact that most primarchs, custodes, and space marines, all of whom are supposed to be genetic echoes of the Emperor himself once they're made, seem to openly posses this attitude towards the baseline humans they encounter, adds credence to this. He does not conceive of himself as the champion of humanity, but of *order*, and his vision for the galaxy is as absolute as the Chaos gods', and just as unlivable by human standards. The absolute authoritarianism of the current Imperium is not a deviation from the Emperor's vision but merely a pale reflection of it, the crumbling tyranny of a crippled Imperium where the Emperor would have had the absolute tyranny of an unassailable Imperium. The Emperor is a transcendent, multidimensional being who opposes Chaos as absolutely as Chaos opposes the material plane; the body he puppeteered for a while and which now produces the astronomican is likely a very small part of His existence and one which means very little to Him, the entire glorious golden age of the Imperium something He mostly did on autopilot while his attention moved between literal millions of other clandestine aspects of His ultimate plan to enfold all of Being into the order of His will. All of which are presumably going just as poorly as the Imperium project, since 40k is obviously the story of the inevitable entropic process of Chaos, both uppercase and lowercase C, overtaking the galaxy, which is why the image of the Emperor is such a perfect centerpiece to the whole thing: the cold, skeletal grip of Order, revealed in all its nightmarishness against a backdrop increasingly devoid of any ambiguous mix between the two, ever desperately trying to wrench reality back into its clutches. The desire for order does not shrink in response to being rendered impotent by the innate chaos of the universe, it grows to match it; just as all the collective terror of the age of strife coalesced into the towering authority of the Emperor, so all the carnage dealt to the Imperium by Chaos has sharpened the brutality of the Imperium's oppression to a diamond tip. Not to mention likely made the silent Emperor's ultimate vision a thousand times more cruel than the reality at any given moment, as He continues to account for His every failure to keep things under control by setting His sights on an even higher level of authority, His efforts becoming ever more widespread and terrible even as they achieve nothing but giving the enemy more strength. For it is the arrogance of Order that the one thing its all-seeing avatar cannot perceive is the futility of its mission, the way nature absorbs your every effort to master it and turns it back on you, mocking your pathetic attempts to swim against the current of Existence itself. Before Order felt the need to incarnate itself, humanity attempted to collectively impose it upon the galaxy, inadvertently contributing to the conditions for the hemoclysm that followed and almost consumed us, and with the self-inflicted loss of that path towards galactic hegemony Order simply appeared as a great golden man and fashioned the vestiges of humanity into a single-purpose weapon. Order's promises of human supremacy had never been grander, but the conditions of the species had never been worse, and the grandiosity of the endeavor invited the equally grand catastrophe of the Heresy. And in response to THAT, Order transcended its material incarnation to become an eternal, omnipresent symbol of hatred, fear, and ignorance, a scowling skull seered into the collective unconscious of the galaxy, and the cruelty inflicted in its name has never been more widespread, so that presumably suited its purposes just fine. It may not have been His first plan, but Order never had a first plan, it is only reactionary towards chaos, forever making new plans out of the failure of each subsequent one, always attempting to fully encompass the unpredictability of Being, always finding it has grossly underestimated it, always coming back with something vastly bigger and more terrible in a vain effort to finally get the jump on this ungovernable reality.
I love all the talk of the eternal imperium, 10,000 years, millennia of battle with the God Emperor at their back, and quadrillions of humans alive, all put so poetically. Yet you look around the setting, and you have species that are millions of years old, who have numbers far beyond quadrillions, and who have technology, magic, even Gods, well beyond anything humanity currently has. 40k does an amazing job of showing how arrogant humanity is, even with everything crumbling around them. Some things never change.
I love how Oculus call's out people who claim that the Imperium does what it does out of necessity. It's so refreshing to hear. I have listened to this around 5-6 times. Its my favorite video that you have ever done. (so far) :)
Tzinch is false hope, a promise of better world, while in reality what you will achieve is different gray colours on your cage. Also hell being empty implies that hell forces already came to the regular world.
Here's something I remember reading about Tzeentch, an attempt to summarize Warhammer in a single sentence that I'm sure many of us are familiar with: "There's a god of hope, and the god of hope is evil."
I'm astonished by how good this was. The fact that the bitter resentment and resigned sadness comes across so real through your voice alone is a testament to your skill. Bravo.
Ocules finally admitting the horror of the emperium he serves is probably the coolest thing you could have done with his character. Phrases like “the trans human horrer of the custodians” is just so cool to hear.
Presenting grimdark fluff this way is really the right way to do it. It needs to be filled with gaps, conjecture, and hearsay to feel correct. It's masterfully done work, sir. Please keep at it.
@@StarboyXL9 The episode Balder made with the inquisitor discovering Baders servo skull and going "nope! To weird for me, not getting involved if theres is no heresy." had me in stiches. the 100K SUBSCRIBER SPECIAL was awesome, cant take to long before Oculus hits 100K.
It's a piece like this that truly does 40k justice. The observations of one trapped in a world of ruin and slow unmaking trying to form their faculties around that fact and dispairing. This was fantastic to listen to. Thank you
One second in like and comment Edit: holy shit...this is literally a damned near perfect summation of the literal nightmare of the Imperium of Mankind. I will forever point this video to those newcomers who ask me “What is the Imperium of Mankind?” Thank you thank you thank you thank you!
I just discovered this channel. Apparently, he's a character that went from a Propaganda loving Historian to someone who realizes the truth of the Imperium. Basically roleplaying a character arc over 100 videos. An Arc of a person struggling with great realization.
40k has always reminded me of the 1984 quote, "If You Want a Picture of the Future, Imagine a Boot Stamping on a Human Face - for Ever." The fact that people will still go online and play defense for the humanity of the setting as a 'cruel neccesity' is just unfathomably disturbing in a cosmic sense. It should probably tell you something when there are multitudes of people in the setting itself who would rather spend eternity in litteral hell rather than continue serving the Imperium.
This kinda misses out that those very same people are also prioritizing themselves over everyone else by serving hell. They aren't paragons: they, infact, reinforce the Imperium's beliefs. Chaos, and their followers, are not in any way shape or form better than the Imperium. The better conditions they offer are an illusion. The hell followers of Chaos rule is a hell in which everyone is fighting with everyone else, with no bonds except what is beneficial to both parties in that moment.
Man, that bit about the worker ruling the warrior is a throwback to when GW did actual satire of fascism instead of "look at how cool this military dictatorship's spacemen are" lmao, amazing work as always!
To be fair I like a bit of both. The space power fantasy stuff is fun, but it is really held up by this underlying dystopia of every sort mashed into one unendingly hopeless nightmare. I'd even say it makes the space fantasy stuff even more hilarious.
This is either the last time we hear oculus Imperia, or a promotion/protection from Roboute is going to occur. Is this his resume to become Guilliman’s version of Malcador? Unless a certain inquisitor gets to him first.....
“Wait, the Imperium of Man is an impossible nightmare of bureaucracy, a cyclopean edifice of impersonal and unthinking malice, a bottomless pit of the unspeakably grim and the unfathomably dark?” *Raises bolter* “Always has been.”
@@zoeissleepy708 Oddly enough, the characteristics of 40k's Imperium has semblances of elements of Soviet's Patriotism and it's in-wing rival of Trotskyist notion of "permanent revolution" (something which even Stalin abhors lol), this is on top of how The High Lords in the later Imperial Cult periods resembling more of Oligarchic bodies with messy bureaucracy and Neoconservatism along with neoliberal incursion of it's Black Market and Space Pirates commissioned by Imperium through various World systems It's a fuckfest of modern ideology under the facade of Crusader-like imagery and hyper-edgier version Star Wars' Empire, it's ultimately cannot be taken seriously for it's perpetual nature were originally designed for Games Workshop's milking machines (alongside it's less famed and slightly more optimistic sibling of Warhammer Fantasy/Age of Sigmar settings)
@@ohamatchhams mmhm, its a bastard fusion of different kinds of authoritarianism, its a dialogue on just how bad authoritarianism is and how we cant continue on with it
1984, the Salem Witch Trials, Nazism, Stalinism, Mccarthyism, Cointelpro, Jim Crow, and Apartheid. Every campaign of genocide and every disregard for humanity stirred in a pot, left to steep, and served on fire.
There is ONE thing that prove to me that the historian character is a man of INCREDIBLE mental fortitude. I didn't hear a gunshot at the end of this video.
@@Interrobang212 so I’ve heard. Particularly for the kiwi who made “Astartese”. However I like to hope it would be different for the Black Library division. GW has always been clingy with IP going back to Warcraft and Starcraft. With Disney sniffing around GW they have good reason to be terrified. There eating and destroying IP faster than he nids eat planets.
I woke up. Saw the video. Started listening on my phone. Made it less then three minutes in and paused it, grabbed a drink and a snack, and settled into my office. If I am to watch a man's suicide, the least I can do is give it my full and undivided attention. This Oculus has earned that at the very least. Congrats on the big hundo, good sir! Cannot wait to see how you wriggle out of this one and where the channel shall go!
This video evokes such a powerful sense of desolation and grief. With all sincerity I can muster, marvelous work Oculus. I so desperately want to give this poor man a hug and a cookie.
This is horrifying, pure existential dread with a superb narration. The epilogue without music, filled with so much emotion... impeccable ! I love how layered it is. It's both a lore video, a rebuke to fans of the universe who do believe in the "Necessity" of the Imperium's regime, and also a dire thinking piece about our own flawed reality. Damn.
I know this was released 2yrs ago but it is an excellent video. Too many lore youtubers fall into the trap of justifying the monstrosity of the Imperium and its emperor.
Damn, it's pretty impressive that he was able to accidentally slice his own head off with a shaving razor and then tie his hands behind his back before the Inquisition could stop him.
@@BigTylt Not to mention that his razor turned out to have an ancient dark age of technology relic miniaturized melta bomb inside that rather violently destroyed all his records in the blast.
This is utterly superb. I've been playing 40K since Rogue Trader, and this is BY FAR the best examination of the state of humanity I have listened to. And your undertones are evident and pin point accurate. Great work. Only discovered your channel recently, and am very glad to have done so.
When guilleman hears this record, he will only weep, for it shows that the Emperors vision, his dream, was damned from the start. Not by chaos. Not by xeons. Not even by heretics. But my necessity.
Utterly astounding. This is probably your best work yet, captivating and terrifying in equal measure. The Imperium's future is null, but the future of your channel is looking bright indeed. Bravo!
The last few minutes or so encapsulate so perfectly the true horror of being a human in the 40k. To know of imperial tyranny yet to not know how it can be replaced, and unable to remove yourself from it. That mental claustrophobia is beyond horror. I myself see little scope for improving the most lives of ordinary imperial citizens, even if it was Guilliman's first priority. Power in the Imperium doesn't really reside among the high lords, but in the rulers of sectors, sub-sectors, star systems and individual worlds. They govern with minimal interference and have huge scope to order their affairs as they see fit. If their freedom is jeopardize, they rebel. If happened when the tithe was introduced towards the end of the great Crusade and during the Nova Terra Interregnum.
Yup. That's the problem of a feudal system, it's all delegation to tiny scale tyrants. The kind of people who would rather burn everything they rule down than let someone else have it. Useful, while there is an enemy at the gates and your support of them is assured... a grand impediment, when you need to centralize the governing of an empire.
@@Sorain1. Warp travel and astropathic communication, limit the extent to which centralized control can be exerted. Ye another reason why the Emperor was really keen on the webway project.
@@williamfrancis5367 Oh I understand why they went with it, feudal systems have massive issues... but they do function. (after a fashion.) If he'd gotten the Imperial Webway going, the Imperium's administration would be a lot different. (and likely better.)
Perhaps more competent, but certainly not better. The Imperium was created by the emperor, it’s incompetence only exacerbated the issues, it didn’t create them.
Finally, somebody who gets 40k. How do you cope with living in a world that is fundamentally evil? This is a question every religion and philosopher has been trying to answer since the dawn of Humanity. The fact we ourselves feel the echos of this character's sentiments is what make this so powerful.
Occy, you know I always love your scripts but I still feel the need to thank you for sharing this FOR FREE with the world. You are truly a beacon of hope in a world that doesn't seem to be getting better. Everytime I see you have posted a new video I get the biggest smile and from that moment forward I'll look forward to going home, laying down, and just immersing myself. The community here is wonderful as well. ❤ Simply one of my very favorite places on the internet.
An evocative performance and overall summary of the true terror that the Imperium is. I can imagine Oculus being extracted by the Alpha Legion, who would use him to write and deliver scripts showing the blind Imperium to the truth of its existence and thus further damage the crumbling faith/loyalty/submission the common people have in the it.
A few things : First, I do not often comment but I love your content, I discovered your channel a few months ago with the recollection of the Unification wars and it was awesome. The first thing I thought after listening to it was "I think this guy was a student in history in college" and a few video later I heard that was indeed your cursus. So you gained a like and a new suscriber. Second, I love this video in particular - I think it is your best work so far - and it resonated with my own study of political philosophy and has a great relevance with our time with the invocation of necessity, although it is not merely as grimdark as the 41st millenium is. Third, your setence at 55:07 to 55:32 about what attract the best, the average and the worst reminded me of a sentence very similar in Arendt's Imperialism. You have good reads. ^^ I wish you the best ! (ps : love also your voice acting, it is incredibly good)
You are *criminally* undersubbed and while I've yet to be able to support you financially, I will be be damned to not spread the news of the beautiful work you produce in a free space. You're doing masterful work, let no one tell you different and I look forward to seeing your channel spike in subs. I've been devouring WH40K lure for almost a year now and you are among the few who shatter the ceiling of quality on a regular basis. Again, love you, love your work, and personally, cannot wait for more. Top man!
I feel like the Oculus would find a very welcome friend in the Recongregationists within the Inquisition, because they basically agree with most if not all of what he explained here, and the only differences between them are that they decided to act upon it AND have the resources and influence to make their actions EFFECTIVE (to an extent).
I am a little late to your videos, but this is absolutely fantastic. Your writing quality and character portrayal are better than anything I have seen from GW. In a perfect world, I think you'd be an integral writer to any 40k movie or show they develop.
Even after seven months, why is no one talking about how awesome it is that the Oculus said that the Imperium is wrong about some xenos species? I'm a huge proponent of the Imperium under Guilliman allying with some of the other factions against Chaos, the Orks, Tyranids, and Necrons so that was just amazing to hear!
this is a great channel. it is one of my favorites . there are other lore channels that are good but nobody else does it the way occulus does it . most give lore from an outsider perspective but he does it from an inside perspective which makes it completely unique. he does a great job
This is a work of art Oculus. I've been listening your videos while I do renovations and sit with my new born daughter. Your ability to provoke my emotions is palpitate. Thank you for your work, and helping to calm my daughter.
It really is! I don't think GW could come up with something that so genuinely epitomizes the nature of life in the 40K universe if they had 100 years to do it.
Utterly captivating stuff as always, Oculus. Over these past hundred videos, you've taken this massive, unwieldy and oftentimes absurd fictional universe and have truly made it come alive. It's the work of a masterful storyteller, and without a doubt one of the best things on TH-cam. Well done on reaching this milestone. Here's to a hundred more!
This is by far the best and most important 40k video ive ever seen. And it is simultaneously an amazing analysis of the extremes statism, hierarchies and authoritarianism as concepts can lead to. Wow!
I didn't even know we were close to the milestone. Huge congratulations are in order, your writing is truly some inspired stuff and stands out even by the high quality standards of such a large fandom. Here's to a hundred more!
He must be blessed by the emperor if he still lives despite everything he’s ever said and recorded! Or Guilliman lets him live because he agrees in a way.
Oculus Do not bother asking how I learned of this record's existence; It doesn't matter. Your arguments are valid and your points are accurate. Save one... You appear to greatly underestimate what one good man can do. :Was it not One Good Man, that brought a thousand worlds into the Imperial fold in less than a decade? :Was it not One Good Man, who was the spark that saw Vandire's mad ambition cast down in flames, who rose from being a humble priest to being the high lord of THE Ecclesiarchy? :Was it not One Good Man, who saw the plans of the most feared Ork Warlord in Millennia foiled, not once, but twice? :Was it not One Good Man, who turned back the forces of the Despoiler time, and time and time again; To the point that he would sooner smash the world he had sought for ten thousand years to dust, than face the humiliation of being thrown back into to eye AGAIN? : And was it not one good man, that stood between the hated Warmaster and the Emperor; whose sacrifice insured that the loyalists would triumph, the traitors would be broken for a millennium and Horus Lupercal would be destroyed so utterly, all the power of the dark gods could not bring him back? So yes, I do believe One Good Man can make a difference, I believe I have sufficient evidence to support that idea... I suppose it does not matter now. I've taken your record into my custody, it will not be found by anyone less... charitable than I Your friend in high places [DATA EXPUNGED]
This was so poignant. What an amazing piece of writing, well spoken as well, and explained exactly own feelings about the imperium(and i suspect most other sane peoples as well). Well said, very well said.
4th time listening to this one and i have to say, this is probably your best work to date. It legitimately sounds like a hell-bound soul's spite-induced manifesto, though its still riddled with your typically gargantuan, poignant tones and descriptions set against some of your most emotionally charged and and humanizing topic transitions yet (the transition from the Emperor to the Imperial citizenry via Guilliman and the Oculus comes foremost to my mind). If your intent with this was to expound on the Oculus lore while keeping an in-universe focus on an aspect of 40k lore, i dont think you could have done better, either in methodology or execution. Youve really outdone yourself here
This was absolutely incredible. I usually dont get shivers down my spine very often, when I watch or listen to fiction. I listen to many 40K creators here on youtube and without wanting to take away from the quality of their content, your scritps and narration are of such quality and are so genuine, that they stand a big cut above the rest. There are many things that make you great as a creator, but I'd like to talk about one thing I noticed specifically: Many 40k fiction creators fail to convey the grim darkness of the setting properly. The true nightmare and horror that is the essence of 40k. Often times, when I read or listen to 40k fiction it comes of as 'edgy' and when I listen to it, it feels like some teenager is trying to show me his collection of gory comic books, which he only collects, because they are full of gore and he thinks that makes them cool. Their writing feels juvenile and immature. With you I never have that feeling. You interact with 40k in a very mature way. of course it's completly fine to just go "bro look at how crazy 40k is! Have you seen how badass space marines are?!? Dude that shit is so cool", but I think there should always be that awareness behind it, of how truly horrific this universe truly is. That awarenes keeps it from being cringe.
Not even the arch traitor will want him. He is too skeptical to embrace chaos, too broken by the Imperium to subtly support their creed. His only place is to remain in obscurity, his warnings and fears unheeded
Brother, I believe you aren't just talking about the Imperium but about something all together more, let us say local to our individual lives. Your thoughts are wonderful and have been authored by a muse or something approximating my own belief. I hope your rhetoric flies past the ears of the "inquisition" and lands in those that will make use of them.
I decided to put this on while doing some groceries. The last ten minutes I just sat on a bench and stared at the sky with tears in my eyes. The sun was starting to set, so the few clouds were starting to be stained with pink, not the first time I have seen it, but seeing it with more and more colours while your voice trembles with grief and despair was akin to enlightenment.
This is a fantastic comment. I try to look to the sky more and more often these days. There's something beautifully poignant about it. Not to mention it keeps your chin held aloft.. which is, of course, paramount during times such as these.
I was worried about this episode because given the title, PLOT seems likely to happen to the character Oculus. But damn if the exhausted yet impassioned, pitch perfect acting didn't keep me riveted the whole time. Bravo! Here's to one hundred more episodes! Thanks so much for creating this work of art!
Welp. Considering I am probably dammned to heresy by having heard this and other pieces of your work. Know this oculus. The imperium needs people like you. Now more than ever before. Now... I should get back to not tinkering with 100% just archeotech to see how it might be never replicated... And out of charecter, Daaamn. This has been a long running arc hasn't it? From naiieve and optimistic to... fully aware of the horrors of the universe. Bravo man.
@@OculusImperia It honestly sounds like you hate being a citizen of the Imperium. Which credits your voice acting and writing skills. But unfortunately that sounds like Hersey to me! Go to jail (bonk)
"Why do I still live? What more do you want from me? I gave everything I had to you, to them. Look what they've made of our dream. This bloated, rotting carcass of an empire is driven not by reason and hope but by fear, hate and ignorance. Better that we had all burned in the fires of Horus' ambition than live to see this." - Guillman on state of 40K Imperium
@@FaizanMunirKhanRajput the beautifully tragic part: this very state of the imperium was shown to both Horus and Alpharius and was what (in part for Horus) drove them to rebellion to begin with to prevent it.
@@DeHerg It was a self fullfilling prophecy. The actions they took to prevent that future, actually ensured that this dreaded future would indeed come to pass.
Heartfelt congratulations on your first 100! Your writing and vocal performance continues to grow and evolve. Keep at it, you're doing great. Thanks for all your hard work!
there are many War40k channels out there that I enjoy, but none exudes such piety as you do in your videos. you are another unrecognised gem in this digital sea of madness. keep up the good work brother.
Maybe this is obvious, but this video feels more like a reminder to the fandom than a piece of in-universe lore. The Imperium, despite GWs portrayal of them as the flawed protagonists of the setting, are not the "good guys". As stated in the video, the regime of the Emperor isn't "tough but necessary" or "ultimately for the betterment of mankind". It is cruel for the sake of preserving the power of those who already have far too much of it. A better world is possible, but it means that those at the top will have one less world to drain of its wealth. I especially feel like it's a response to those who use the same excuses to justify cruelty in our own world, or worse yet, look at the Imperium and think that our society could stand to look a little more like it.
The Imperium is fascism taken to its ultimate conclusion: horror, death, suffering, ignorance, and stagnation. 40k as a universe is a lot of things. A game, a piece of fiction to be enjoyed, a product to be sold, an experiment in genre, a hobby. But one facet of it I would argue that is often ignored or only lightly explored is 40k’s function as a cautionary tale warning against the specter of fascism.
Perhaps an answer to the "is the Imperium fascist" discussion. And the answer is "sweet naive child, it is oh so, so much worse! And it has been so from its very beginning." And are there places that are exempt from the nightmare, are there places of justice, light and hope it is only because they have avoided the attention of the great and powerfull.
“I have burned entire worlds for less.” _Slams head repeatedly onto Exterminatus Button, firing full salvo of cyclonic torpedoes at __-Terra-__ __-Sol-__ *Segmentum Solar*._
Man, it's a shame that this is the last time we ever are gonna hear from the Oculus before he tragically and mysteriously disappears and is never heard from again.
It was terrible the way he accidentally brutally set himself and his entire hab on fire while cooking is corpse starch.
@@OculusImperia - Was that before or after he slipped, fell and rolled onto 38 bullets that he'd left carelessly lying around?
@@OculusImperia In seriousness though, I adore the character development Oculus has gone though. Going from a wide eyed cataloguer of propaganda to where he is now would be an abrupt and uncharacteristic turn if it wasn't handled with tact.
Tring to imagine Oculus saying those opening lines even a year ago would be out of character, to say the least. Now though it feels like a wholly natural development. You've done a wonderful job weaving his changing worldview through his broadening perspective.
I for one, will miss him.
@@OculusImperia "The Inquisition has conducted an internal investigation and determined that the Inquisition has committed no wrongdoing."
At the risk of coming off as rancid as your standard imperial bureaucrat, I think every person who writes codex lore for the Imperium should have this very video implanted into their brain through those brainwires bionics everyone has.
Really though, more of this, less of Space Marine Heroes™, Games of Workshop!!!!
This is what makes the Imperium appealing. These endless evils are both poignant as well as liberating.
They function as a Make-Your -Own Dystopia playset in the best possible way. It is a form of 'escapism' truly unique to this franchise, and you, my boy Oculus, have made something absolutely fantastic depicting that very thing.
🙏 YOU ARE TOO KIND MY DUDE 🙏
I couldn't help but notice how you misspelled "appalling", an easy mistake to make to be sure.
Or is it a template laid down as fantastical dream. Furthermore investigations could prove truthful dialects have been spoken. Heretical to ponder else.
@@lunaeek9130 That is apt..
I think it's worth nothing that at the end of the day, and I'm so happy that this was brought up near the end of the video, that endless darkness and evil and murder and horrible nonsense isn't fun either. The tragedy of the Imperium is just that, a tragedy, and a tragedy isn't compelling without someone to identify with. A murdergorefest where everyone is despicable and nobody is worth rooting for isn't a tragedy. It's the template for a reality show.
Not that you're asking for that, but it's something I encounter often with fans of Warhammer 40k; any attempt at inserting hope, inserting the possibility of a brighter future, at simply acknowledging that good things can happen, even under the most horrific regimes, is often treated with scorn and ridicule. A middle ground must be struck, one might say, a compelling story must arise from a mixture of all of the elements. Sure, you can't fix it overnight, and that would end the setting and exploration of just what horror it is, but you have to have the possibility, otherwise there's no point other than just reveling in the angst.
if the historitor order was created by gulliman with the intention of learning himself, that means gulliman is officially, in canon, a sub and a patreon of the channel
Does that mean Gulliman has seen this video?
Yeah.... about that.... subscriber thing.... before long it will turn out that most of subscribers who don't identify as Alpharius, others wear funny hats, leather coats and carry bolt pistols with ....
You don't think they have the Tube on all of grand Ultramar?
RIP Oculus, he tragically died by accidentally shooting himself in the back of the head 43 times and falling on a sword shortly after this video
Worst case of suicide I’ve ever seen!
@@tunguskalumberjack9987 did he have dirt on the Clinton's ?
@@randomicus4782 😆
and this was before he tragically stumbled out of his basement window and fell down 30 floors
Then landed on a flyer that collided with another flyer carrying a Dark Angeles traitor
I loved that one bit about destroying the climate of a planet to allow a moment of sunlight to shine on a Lord Marshal's triumphant march. That was one of the most stark moments in the Eisenhorn books that showcased the awfulness of the Imperium.
I haven't read the Eisenhorn ones. Could you give me a spoiler what exactly they did?
They seeded the toxic clouds above the hive to make it rain and create clear skies for the military parade. Flushing that many pollutants into the planet's systems at once caused severe environmental damage.
"a single man on Terra has the boot lifted from his neck just long enough to be able to stand up and look out the window. he weeps for the ignorance he had but moments before is lost to him"
Where is that quote from?
@@DeHerg lol my brain but i appreciate the compliment
stop being a buzzkill. its not writing
@@ac300 i'm very sorry i didn't take your tastes into account when i posted this ten months ago. Also who ARE you again?
Dude that’s evocative as fuuuuck.
After penning this, his confessional suicide note, the Oculus decided to spend one final day before his untimely demise gazing upon Eternity Gate and singing the praises of He Upon the Throne to the beautifully naïve and the irrevocably zealous. Then, as the Vindicare took aim, Oculus was suddenly whisked beyond that forbidden threshold and brought into the presence of the Master of Mankind himself, who unceremoniously handed him a manual and bid him name the vile engines of the Drukhari. Thus was the Oculus spared one doom and subjected to an entirely new and unintended doom as the expository thrall of the Lord of Lightning and his grating text-to-speech device.
His mind is no fortress, it is an empty field ravaged by torment and chicken
"mY mInD iS nO FoRtReSs! iT iS aN OpEn PaStUrE RaVaGeD bY iNtErNeCiNe CoNfLiCt... and chicken *nom*"
Still waiting for the day the Oculus records his dreams of a newly-(TTS)-voiced Emperor.
I KNEW IT!
If you really look at how life on Terra is, one would almost think that one was upon a Daemon World. Its so twisted and bent towards hatred, zealotry, and mind numbing indoctrination, one would thing that only devils live there. Even Pilgrims to Terra all die and never return home.
Good heavens Oculus... the sheer passion in your voice is *chef's kiss*. You worked hard on this and it SHOWS. You have my deepest respect.
Glad you enjoyed it, it was an incredibly rewarding script to write and I'm happy that shows :)
@@OculusImperia I can hear the catharsis in your voice. Writing from the perspective of the Oculus must be so difficult not just because of his perceptual heresy, but because the information he can obtain needs lore support and the imperium is a constant thorn.
Best episode since the Pilgrimage to holy Terra.
Idk why but reading this comment I just imagine a random person kissing oculus on the cheek 😂
This!
I think my most loathed missreading of 40k is that the imperium was good and only fell to ruin when the Empereor fell. It was always a nightmare, removing his direct control revealed the truth of what he had built and the tools he used to build it.
Honestly you could read the whole thing as an indictment of the fascist trope of the strongman leader. Like, even if you had an immortal genius superman capable of uniting all of humanity under a single political block, the inevitable consequence of that would be the slow, agonizing decay of that block once his ability to personally maintain it was inevitably compromised. The Imperium's desperation IS the Emperor's ambition, the same mad grasp at the stars still playing out millennia later, and the fact that they call good what he called necessary evils only indicates a folly on his part just as deep as theirs, a comfort with necessary evils stemming from the basic assumption that he could never be an overall force for evil in the universe, intentionally or accidentally, and nor could his Imperium. He never second-guessed anything he ever did, and a million wailing worlds now pay the price for his egotism and arrogance.
The point of view for the video revolves almost entirely around Terra and lesser hive worlds. In a million worlds, many spend many generations as fairly benign places to live. The Emperor is and was effectively a deity in knowledge and power. Is there a long term plan? Has the Emperor's plan been derailed? He most certainly doesn't match the merely human tyrants he is compared to and criticisms inevitability reduce the Emperor to that merely human standard.
GW has purposefully totally obscured many details, retconned absolutely critical lore into its reverse and hinted at the fact that the current state of the Imperium is both a fallen ideal AND just as planned. Also, never discount GW's lack of coherent oversight into lore, which led directly to one known chapter of Astartes being the only one not declared by the Emperor as traitors, later "fixed" by retcon, destroying the entire lore of that chapter other than its name.
In the meantime we get the worst of totalitarian regimes, of the modern godless socialist stripe combined with a rather stupid parody of the Roman Catholic Church based on fake mythological tropes of Christianity from the 19th Century (what I call the Century of Myths from all of the pure male bovine excrement being spewed by the intelligentsia of the period). Why? Because it sells better. The history of an agworld that has been peacefully providing food for generations is irrelevant. Look as Gaunt's Ghosts, the Tanith One and Only. Tanith had existed for apparently millenia as a peaceful and nice place to live, but we only see it the night a Chaos splinter fleet decided to exterminatus it in passing for shits & giggles, or maybe an arcane ritual sacrifice, it's really hard to tell.
@@MagusMirificus Part of me feels that it was all intentional, that the Emperor actually wanted the suffering and misery and eternal war. It doesn't really make sense that he was purely well-intentioned. That only seems like an act to deceive in order to achieve what he really wanted; Pure chaos and churning destruction. Contradictions, confusion, despair and misery extended and prolonged like torture to the end of time.
@@inthefade It sure does look like he deliberately sowed seeds of mistrust in all the sons who betrayed him, and he did say to Dorn as he was being fitted into the throne that things had gone "Not as well as I had hoped, but not as bad as I had feared", so the idea that the Horace Heresy was a planned part of the Primarch project and the current degraded Imperium is more or less precisely what He was trying to create does have legs.
I'm partial to the view that the Emperor, despite all his insistence upon not being seen as a god, and vocal championing of the supremacy of humanity, does not actually identify with humanity at all and sees them as one of many things which are infinitely beneath him, much like other similarly advanced lifeforms in satirical science fiction, such as Doctor Manhattan or the Tralfamadorians. The fact that most primarchs, custodes, and space marines, all of whom are supposed to be genetic echoes of the Emperor himself once they're made, seem to openly posses this attitude towards the baseline humans they encounter, adds credence to this.
He does not conceive of himself as the champion of humanity, but of *order*, and his vision for the galaxy is as absolute as the Chaos gods', and just as unlivable by human standards. The absolute authoritarianism of the current Imperium is not a deviation from the Emperor's vision but merely a pale reflection of it, the crumbling tyranny of a crippled Imperium where the Emperor would have had the absolute tyranny of an unassailable Imperium. The Emperor is a transcendent, multidimensional being who opposes Chaos as absolutely as Chaos opposes the material plane; the body he puppeteered for a while and which now produces the astronomican is likely a very small part of His existence and one which means very little to Him, the entire glorious golden age of the Imperium something He mostly did on autopilot while his attention moved between literal millions of other clandestine aspects of His ultimate plan to enfold all of Being into the order of His will.
All of which are presumably going just as poorly as the Imperium project, since 40k is obviously the story of the inevitable entropic process of Chaos, both uppercase and lowercase C, overtaking the galaxy, which is why the image of the Emperor is such a perfect centerpiece to the whole thing: the cold, skeletal grip of Order, revealed in all its nightmarishness against a backdrop increasingly devoid of any ambiguous mix between the two, ever desperately trying to wrench reality back into its clutches.
The desire for order does not shrink in response to being rendered impotent by the innate chaos of the universe, it grows to match it; just as all the collective terror of the age of strife coalesced into the towering authority of the Emperor, so all the carnage dealt to the Imperium by Chaos has sharpened the brutality of the Imperium's oppression to a diamond tip. Not to mention likely made the silent Emperor's ultimate vision a thousand times more cruel than the reality at any given moment, as He continues to account for His every failure to keep things under control by setting His sights on an even higher level of authority, His efforts becoming ever more widespread and terrible even as they achieve nothing but giving the enemy more strength.
For it is the arrogance of Order that the one thing its all-seeing avatar cannot perceive is the futility of its mission, the way nature absorbs your every effort to master it and turns it back on you, mocking your pathetic attempts to swim against the current of Existence itself. Before Order felt the need to incarnate itself, humanity attempted to collectively impose it upon the galaxy, inadvertently contributing to the conditions for the hemoclysm that followed and almost consumed us, and with the self-inflicted loss of that path towards galactic hegemony Order simply appeared as a great golden man and fashioned the vestiges of humanity into a single-purpose weapon. Order's promises of human supremacy had never been grander, but the conditions of the species had never been worse, and the grandiosity of the endeavor invited the equally grand catastrophe of the Heresy.
And in response to THAT, Order transcended its material incarnation to become an eternal, omnipresent symbol of hatred, fear, and ignorance, a scowling skull seered into the collective unconscious of the galaxy, and the cruelty inflicted in its name has never been more widespread, so that presumably suited its purposes just fine. It may not have been His first plan, but Order never had a first plan, it is only reactionary towards chaos, forever making new plans out of the failure of each subsequent one, always attempting to fully encompass the unpredictability of Being, always finding it has grossly underestimated it, always coming back with something vastly bigger and more terrible in a vain effort to finally get the jump on this ungovernable reality.
@@inthefade I think he just straight up underestimated the Chaos Gods.
I love all the talk of the eternal imperium, 10,000 years, millennia of battle with the God Emperor at their back, and quadrillions of humans alive, all put so poetically.
Yet you look around the setting, and you have species that are millions of years old, who have numbers far beyond quadrillions, and who have technology, magic, even Gods, well beyond anything humanity currently has. 40k does an amazing job of showing how arrogant humanity is, even with everything crumbling around them.
Some things never change.
"this future is a nightmare, and it is one i would never wake from"
that should be in a freaking 40k novel, incredible work
Look into the "Shape of the Nightmare to Come"
I love how Oculus call's out people who claim that the Imperium does what it does out of necessity. It's so refreshing to hear. I have listened to this around 5-6 times. Its my favorite video that you have ever done. (so far) :)
100 episodes, 66.6k subscribers, and over 10,000 years of history in the grim darkness of the far future! Thank you for all your hard work, Oculus!
Thank YOU for the kind words and support!
lmao, I dropped in and it's got 666 likes and 6 dislikes and still 66.6k subs. I guess OI is the reincarnation of Nero
He is going on vacation to the eye of terror so he should get lots of relaxation... Of his bowels.
@@OculusImperia you're welcome for my service
"Hope is dead and hell is empty"
Tzeeneetch: Is personally offended by that claim
But all his devils are here.
Tzinch is false hope, a promise of better world, while in reality what you will achieve is different gray colours on your cage. Also hell being empty implies that hell forces already came to the regular world.
Here's something I remember reading about Tzeentch, an attempt to summarize Warhammer in a single sentence that I'm sure many of us are familiar with: "There's a god of hope, and the god of hope is evil."
I'm astonished by how good this was. The fact that the bitter resentment and resigned sadness comes across so real through your voice alone is a testament to your skill.
Bravo.
"Necessity is an excuse to disguise the abuses of the powerful..." damn bruh you done did it again
Ocules finally admitting the horror of the emperium he serves is probably the coolest thing you could have done with his character. Phrases like “the trans human horrer of the custodians” is just so cool to hear.
Presenting grimdark fluff this way is really the right way to do it. It needs to be filled with gaps, conjecture, and hearsay to feel correct. It's masterfully done work, sir. Please keep at it.
Oculus was too pure for this galaxy.
At least Baldermort is just a happy servoskull, bopping and humming along throwing dice and moving mini's.
@@erikrungemadsen2081 Nobody charges a servoskull with heresy. Balder was thinking with his galaxy brain
@@StarboyXL9 The episode Balder made with the inquisitor discovering Baders servo skull and going "nope! To weird for me, not getting involved if theres is no heresy." had me in stiches. the 100K SUBSCRIBER SPECIAL was awesome, cant take to long before Oculus hits 100K.
It's a piece like this that truly does 40k justice. The observations of one trapped in a world of ruin and slow unmaking trying to form their faculties around that fact and dispairing. This was fantastic to listen to. Thank you
One second in like and comment
Edit: holy shit...this is literally a damned near perfect summation of the literal nightmare of the Imperium of Mankind.
I will forever point this video to those newcomers who ask me “What is the Imperium of Mankind?” Thank you thank you thank you thank you!
I just discovered this channel. Apparently, he's a character that went from a Propaganda loving Historian to someone who realizes the truth of the Imperium.
Basically roleplaying a character arc over 100 videos.
An Arc of a person struggling with great realization.
I humbly accept responsibility for everything good about this video.
Literally the only way it could have happened.
41:00 "There is no such thing as innocence, only degrees of guilt"
40k has always reminded me of the 1984 quote, "If You Want a Picture of the Future, Imagine a Boot Stamping on a Human Face - for Ever." The fact that people will still go online and play defense for the humanity of the setting as a 'cruel neccesity' is just unfathomably disturbing in a cosmic sense. It should probably tell you something when there are multitudes of people in the setting itself who would rather spend eternity in litteral hell rather than continue serving the Imperium.
This kinda misses out that those very same people are also prioritizing themselves over everyone else by serving hell. They aren't paragons: they, infact, reinforce the Imperium's beliefs.
Chaos, and their followers, are not in any way shape or form better than the Imperium. The better conditions they offer are an illusion. The hell followers of Chaos rule is a hell in which everyone is fighting with everyone else, with no bonds except what is beneficial to both parties in that moment.
If this is not the tone of the show Cavill is making, he is doing a disservice to the entire concept of 40k.
The Druchari couldn't *dream* of making a society as crushingly cruel as the Imperium and they're actively trying.
Man, that bit about the worker ruling the warrior is a throwback to when GW did actual satire of fascism instead of "look at how cool this military dictatorship's spacemen are" lmao, amazing work as always!
To be fair I like a bit of both. The space power fantasy stuff is fun, but it is really held up by this underlying dystopia of every sort mashed into one unendingly hopeless nightmare.
I'd even say it makes the space fantasy stuff even more hilarious.
This is either the last time we hear oculus Imperia, or a promotion/protection from Roboute is going to occur. Is this his resume to become Guilliman’s version of Malcador?
Unless a certain inquisitor gets to him first.....
“Wait, the Imperium of Man is an impossible nightmare of bureaucracy, a cyclopean edifice of impersonal and unthinking malice, a bottomless pit of the unspeakably grim and the unfathomably dark?”
*Raises bolter* “Always has been.”
It's worse than that. It's a fascist war machine that exists so that it may survive.
@@valuebrandmelkor5973 warhammer 40k is the perfect example of how terrible fascism is, it is hatred incarnate
@@zoeissleepy708 Oddly enough, the characteristics of 40k's Imperium has semblances of elements of Soviet's Patriotism and it's in-wing rival of Trotskyist notion of "permanent revolution" (something which even Stalin abhors lol), this is on top of how The High Lords in the later Imperial Cult periods resembling more of Oligarchic bodies with messy bureaucracy and Neoconservatism along with neoliberal incursion of it's Black Market and Space Pirates commissioned by Imperium through various World systems
It's a fuckfest of modern ideology under the facade of Crusader-like imagery and hyper-edgier version Star Wars' Empire, it's ultimately cannot be taken seriously for it's perpetual nature were originally designed for Games Workshop's milking machines (alongside it's less famed and slightly more optimistic sibling of Warhammer Fantasy/Age of Sigmar settings)
@@ohamatchhams mmhm, its a bastard fusion of different kinds of authoritarianism, its a dialogue on just how bad authoritarianism is and how we cant continue on with it
1984, the Salem Witch Trials, Nazism, Stalinism, Mccarthyism, Cointelpro, Jim Crow, and Apartheid. Every campaign of genocide and every disregard for humanity stirred in a pot, left to steep, and served on fire.
I feel this is going to get the attention of the Inquisition again
I hear the Saturnine moon of Mimas is quite lovely this time of year…
Even an ogryn could deduce that
Hopefully it would be a Recongregationist whose attention is caught.
Gee what made you think that? Seems pretty innocuous to me...
That's just another chance to chat up Inquisitor Verity Calendriss.
There is ONE thing that prove to me that the historian character is a man of INCREDIBLE mental fortitude. I didn't hear a gunshot at the end of this video.
The black library should pick you up as a narrator. Hell they could even canonize a certain chronicler if they really wanted.
They really should. Get on that GW!! 🙂
It hasn't turned out great for other community creators they've picked up so far.
@@Interrobang212 so I’ve heard. Particularly for the kiwi who made “Astartese”. However I like to hope it would be different for the Black Library division. GW has always been clingy with IP going back to Warcraft and Starcraft. With Disney sniffing around GW they have good reason to be terrified. There eating and destroying IP faster than he nids eat planets.
@@mikewaterfield3599 What was the issue with the guy who created “Astartes”?
@@Barabel22 basically GW took creative control of his IP under contract.
I woke up. Saw the video. Started listening on my phone. Made it less then three minutes in and paused it, grabbed a drink and a snack, and settled into my office.
If I am to watch a man's suicide, the least I can do is give it my full and undivided attention. This Oculus has earned that at the very least.
Congrats on the big hundo, good sir! Cannot wait to see how you wriggle out of this one and where the channel shall go!
[distant Inquisitor Calendra noises]
Thank you so much for the kind words and support!
This video evokes such a powerful sense of desolation and grief. With all sincerity I can muster, marvelous work Oculus. I so desperately want to give this poor man a hug and a cookie.
Best I can do is corpse dust and a hard mat to sleep on.
You have access to cookies? Made from dough, not corpse starch? What are you, a worshipper of Slaanesh?
In the grim darkness of the far future, there is no time for cookies.
Lmmfaoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
This is horrifying, pure existential dread with a superb narration. The epilogue without music, filled with so much emotion... impeccable !
I love how layered it is. It's both a lore video, a rebuke to fans of the universe who do believe in the "Necessity" of the Imperium's regime, and also a dire thinking piece about our own flawed reality. Damn.
This is one of the best videos in the entire canon and fandom of Warhammer 40,000 and it should be celebrated as such
"What does it mean to be a Just being in an Unjust system?" Truly, a question for our times.
Everything
I know this was released 2yrs ago but it is an excellent video. Too many lore youtubers fall into the trap of justifying the monstrosity of the Imperium and its emperor.
And that is the additional level of horror in every sickening act of the imperium: What if those necessary evils aren't necessary at all?
Glad to see Umberto Eco's writing was saved through the millennia
Glad to see the reference.
RIP Oculus. He accidentally brutally cut off his head whilst shaving
Damn, it's pretty impressive that he was able to accidentally slice his own head off with a shaving razor and then tie his hands behind his back before the Inquisition could stop him.
@@BigTylt still it could have been worse....he could have alleged that the government lied about Saddam Hussein having weapons of mass destruction!
@@BigTylt Not to mention that his razor turned out to have an ancient dark age of technology relic miniaturized melta bomb inside that rather violently destroyed all his records in the blast.
Pity the humans of the Imperium for if they would ever glimpse upon our own world their tears would refill the long lost oceans of Terra.
Depends on what part they glimpse. If it's the internet they'll probably want to Exterminatus us, and I wouldn't blame them.
This is utterly superb. I've been playing 40K since Rogue Trader, and this is BY FAR the best examination of the state of humanity I have listened to. And your undertones are evident and pin point accurate.
Great work. Only discovered your channel recently, and am very glad to have done so.
The slow transition from calmly professional intellectual to mentally and emotionally broken ex-believer in the narration was exquisitely done. Bravo.
Congratulations on 100 episodes Oculus. Hope to see hundreds more
i preffer 10,000 more , not just 100
Citizen, you are doing the emperor's work.
The White Scars include your teachings in their indoctrination ceremony's.
And for the 66,6K subscribers, when releasing this episode
When guilleman hears this record, he will only weep, for it shows that the Emperors vision, his dream, was damned from the start. Not by chaos. Not by xeons. Not even by heretics.
But my necessity.
By humanity. The Emperor tried to turn dirt into diamonds
@@StarboyXL9 all the while being but a fly
what do you expect from a guy who has more in common with the eldar than humanity.
Utterly astounding. This is probably your best work yet, captivating and terrifying in equal measure. The Imperium's future is null, but the future of your channel is looking bright indeed. Bravo!
The Inquisition, I believe, would disagree with your statement. Now report for servitor conversion heretic!
“It is everything, and it is unspeakable.”
I don’t know why, but that line specifically really got me.
For me it was the "I wish to be a good man. I wish to help" line. The sheer sorrow in his voice makes it all the more tear-jerking
The last few minutes or so encapsulate so perfectly the true horror of being a human in the 40k. To know of imperial tyranny yet to not know how it can be replaced, and unable to remove yourself from it. That mental claustrophobia is beyond horror.
I myself see little scope for improving the most lives of ordinary imperial citizens, even if it was Guilliman's first priority. Power in the Imperium doesn't really reside among the high lords, but in the rulers of sectors, sub-sectors, star systems and individual worlds. They govern with minimal interference and have huge scope to order their affairs as they see fit. If their freedom is jeopardize, they rebel. If happened when the tithe was introduced towards the end of the great Crusade and during the Nova Terra Interregnum.
Yup. That's the problem of a feudal system, it's all delegation to tiny scale tyrants. The kind of people who would rather burn everything they rule down than let someone else have it. Useful, while there is an enemy at the gates and your support of them is assured... a grand impediment, when you need to centralize the governing of an empire.
@@Sorain1. Warp travel and astropathic communication, limit the extent to which centralized control can be exerted. Ye another reason why the Emperor was really keen on the webway project.
@@williamfrancis5367 Oh I understand why they went with it, feudal systems have massive issues... but they do function. (after a fashion.) If he'd gotten the Imperial Webway going, the Imperium's administration would be a lot different. (and likely better.)
@@Sorain1 They might have been able to get a functional democracy working (but I doubt the emperor ever desired to do so.)
Perhaps more competent, but certainly not better. The Imperium was created by the emperor, it’s incompetence only exacerbated the issues, it didn’t create them.
Finally, somebody who gets 40k. How do you cope with living in a world that is fundamentally evil? This is a question every religion and philosopher has been trying to answer since the dawn of Humanity. The fact we ourselves feel the echos of this character's sentiments is what make this so powerful.
Occy, you know I always love your scripts but I still feel the need to thank you for sharing this FOR FREE with the world. You are truly a beacon of hope in a world that doesn't seem to be getting better. Everytime I see you have posted a new video I get the biggest smile and from that moment forward I'll look forward to going home, laying down, and just immersing myself.
The community here is wonderful as well. ❤ Simply one of my very favorite places on the internet.
An evocative performance and overall summary of the true terror that the Imperium is. I can imagine Oculus being extracted by the Alpha Legion, who would use him to write and deliver scripts showing the blind Imperium to the truth of its existence and thus further damage the crumbling faith/loyalty/submission the common people have in the it.
A few things :
First, I do not often comment but I love your content, I discovered your channel a few months ago with the recollection of the Unification wars and it was awesome. The first thing I thought after listening to it was "I think this guy was a student in history in college" and a few video later I heard that was indeed your cursus. So you gained a like and a new suscriber.
Second, I love this video in particular - I think it is your best work so far - and it resonated with my own study of political philosophy and has a great relevance with our time with the invocation of necessity, although it is not merely as grimdark as the 41st millenium is.
Third, your setence at 55:07 to 55:32 about what attract the best, the average and the worst reminded me of a sentence very similar in Arendt's Imperialism. You have good reads. ^^
I wish you the best !
(ps : love also your voice acting, it is incredibly good)
You are *criminally* undersubbed and while I've yet to be able to support you financially, I will be be damned to not spread the news of the beautiful work you produce in a free space. You're doing masterful work, let no one tell you different and I look forward to seeing your channel spike in subs. I've been devouring WH40K lure for almost a year now and you are among the few who shatter the ceiling of quality on a regular basis. Again, love you, love your work, and personally, cannot wait for more. Top man!
I feel like the Oculus would find a very welcome friend in the Recongregationists within the Inquisition, because they basically agree with most if not all of what he explained here, and the only differences between them are that they decided to act upon it AND have the resources and influence to make their actions EFFECTIVE (to an extent).
Huh, I interpreted them as blaming a corrupt subversion, as apposed to the consequences of the basic setup.
@@jdcrosier2682 What do you mean?
"Always look at the bright side of life..." *whistles*
My sides 🤣
I am a little late to your videos, but this is absolutely fantastic. Your writing quality and character portrayal are better than anything I have seen from GW. In a perfect world, I think you'd be an integral writer to any 40k movie or show they develop.
Even after seven months, why is no one talking about how awesome it is that the Oculus said that the Imperium is wrong about some xenos species? I'm a huge proponent of the Imperium under Guilliman allying with some of the other factions against Chaos, the Orks, Tyranids, and Necrons so that was just amazing to hear!
This has to be by far the best video i have seen on 40k. The very true explanation of how utterly terrifying the imperium is.
I'm new to 40k but I don't think I could have picked a better channel to binge, this is great
this is a great channel. it is one of my favorites . there are other lore channels that are good but nobody else does it the way occulus does it . most give lore from an outsider perspective but he does it from an inside perspective which makes it completely unique. he does a great job
@@commissaryarrick9670 ...now if only he could finish series lol
This is THE MOST AMAZING, MOST GRIMDARK THING EVER!!!
This is a work of art Oculus. I've been listening your videos while I do renovations and sit with my new born daughter. Your ability to provoke my emotions is palpitate. Thank you for your work, and helping to calm my daughter.
I imagine Klaus Schwab watching this and thinking "What is he talking about? This world is perfect!".
Eat ze corpse starch!
Brilliant assessment of the Imperium’s great flaws, and beautiful recitation.
Imagine a regime so utterly repellent that worship of Nurgle feels like the best escape.
This is the best and most heretical piece of Warhammer lore in existence.
It really is! I don't think GW could come up with something that so genuinely epitomizes the nature of life in the 40K universe if they had 100 years to do it.
Utterly captivating stuff as always, Oculus. Over these past hundred videos, you've taken this massive, unwieldy and oftentimes absurd fictional universe and have truly made it come alive. It's the work of a masterful storyteller, and without a doubt one of the best things on TH-cam. Well done on reaching this milestone. Here's to a hundred more!
This is one of the very finest pieces of fiction I've ever experienced. I'm still struck dumb by it's scope and power.
This is by far the best and most important 40k video ive ever seen. And it is simultaneously an amazing analysis of the extremes statism, hierarchies and authoritarianism as concepts can lead to. Wow!
Isn't this, like, the second bad end for Oculus? Because he fell to Chaos in the Christmas special too. This guy has nine lives.
I feel dumb for having to ask, but which episode was that, again?
@@danielmclellan1522 The Daemon: A Treatise Upon the Nature of the Daemonic
Are you positing that the Lord Oculus is a wretched Felinid mutant?
@@venerablebrothergoriate5844 probably the Emperor's person Felinid friend
I didn't even know we were close to the milestone. Huge congratulations are in order, your writing is truly some inspired stuff and stands out even by the high quality standards of such a large fandom.
Here's to a hundred more!
Yes inquisitor this one right here. God this comment section is just packed full of heretics.
He must be blessed by the emperor if he still lives despite everything he’s ever said and recorded! Or Guilliman lets him live because he agrees in a way.
I mean, all the T’au do is hypnotize you into wanting to help each other. Compared to this, they really are the good guys.
Oh, and also occasionally castrate someone. Still the comparative good guys.
Besides the castration…
(Extremely loud incorrect buzzer)
@@bloodraven1190why do you hate minorities
@@jdcrosier2682pretty sure that isn't completely Canon. Isn't that just a dawn of war thing?
Oculus
Do not bother asking how I learned of this record's existence; It doesn't matter.
Your arguments are valid and your points are accurate. Save one...
You appear to greatly underestimate what one good man can do.
:Was it not One Good Man, that brought a thousand worlds into the Imperial fold in less than a decade?
:Was it not One Good Man, who was the spark that saw Vandire's mad ambition cast down in flames, who rose from being a humble priest to being the high lord of THE Ecclesiarchy?
:Was it not One Good Man, who saw the plans of the most feared Ork Warlord in Millennia foiled, not once, but twice?
:Was it not One Good Man, who turned back the forces of the Despoiler time, and time and time again; To the point that he would sooner smash the world he had sought for ten thousand years to dust, than face the humiliation of being thrown back into to eye AGAIN?
: And was it not one good man, that stood between the hated Warmaster and the Emperor; whose sacrifice insured that the loyalists would triumph, the traitors would be broken for a millennium and Horus Lupercal would be destroyed so utterly, all the power of the dark gods could not bring him back?
So yes, I do believe One Good Man can make a difference, I believe I have sufficient evidence to support that idea...
I suppose it does not matter now. I've taken your record into my custody, it will not be found by anyone less... charitable than I
Your friend in high places
[DATA EXPUNGED]
This was so poignant. What an amazing piece of writing, well spoken as well, and explained exactly own feelings about the imperium(and i suspect most other sane peoples as well). Well said, very well said.
RIP Oculus Imperia, it was so sad how he died by the Ork sniper who somehow snuck on Terra after he killed the Chapter Master of the Celestial Lions
4th time listening to this one and i have to say, this is probably your best work to date. It legitimately sounds like a hell-bound soul's spite-induced manifesto, though its still riddled with your typically gargantuan, poignant tones and descriptions set against some of your most emotionally charged and and humanizing topic transitions yet (the transition from the Emperor to the Imperial citizenry via Guilliman and the Oculus comes foremost to my mind). If your intent with this was to expound on the Oculus lore while keeping an in-universe focus on an aspect of 40k lore, i dont think you could have done better, either in methodology or execution. Youve really outdone yourself here
This was absolutely incredible.
I usually dont get shivers down my spine very often, when I watch or listen to fiction.
I listen to many 40K creators here on youtube and without wanting to take away from the quality of their content, your scritps and narration are of such quality and are so genuine, that they stand a big cut above the rest.
There are many things that make you great as a creator, but I'd like to talk about one thing I noticed specifically:
Many 40k fiction creators fail to convey the grim darkness of the setting properly. The true nightmare and horror that is the essence of 40k.
Often times, when I read or listen to 40k fiction it comes of as 'edgy' and when I listen to it, it feels like some teenager is trying to show me his collection of gory comic books, which he only collects, because they are full of gore and he thinks that makes them cool.
Their writing feels juvenile and immature.
With you I never have that feeling. You interact with 40k in a very mature way.
of course it's completly fine to just go "bro look at how crazy 40k is! Have you seen how badass space marines are?!? Dude that shit is so cool", but I think there should always be that awareness behind it, of how truly horrific this universe truly is.
That awarenes keeps it from being cringe.
Very well put. The awareness of the horror keeps it afloat
"Lol," said the inquisition, "lmao."
(Fantastic writing and performance. Can't believe I wasn't subscribed earlier)
This was an amazing video. Thanks for doing what you do.
The fist humanist in a good...38k years
Congratulations on your first episode! Been following you since the humble 2017 days when your videos were what got me through the late nights.
It's wild to me it's been that long. Thanks so much for sticking with the channel all these years!
Just what we needed on a Friday. Gratz on all 100 episodes, hope to see 100 more in the future
Count on it :D
_Blinks several times_
I, uh... I just found this channel, aaand... I thiiink I just found something special.
I can't bear to listen to this one again right now when my life is so stressful, but what a masterpiece this is.
There exists a certain Wordbearer that has just been waiting for the right time for Occulus to become fertile ground...
Not even the arch traitor will want him. He is too skeptical to embrace chaos, too broken by the Imperium to subtly support their creed. His only place is to remain in obscurity, his warnings and fears unheeded
Muhahahaha.
Amazing work! An hour long monologue of frustrated despair in character could not have been easy and I really appreciate it.
It certainly was a supremely interesting exercise in the writing of it :)
Brother, I believe you aren't just talking about the Imperium but about something all together more, let us say local to our individual lives. Your thoughts are wonderful and have been authored by a muse or something approximating my own belief. I hope your rhetoric flies past the ears of the "inquisition" and lands in those that will make use of them.
I decided to put this on while doing some groceries.
The last ten minutes I just sat on a bench and stared at the sky with tears in my eyes. The sun was starting to set, so the few clouds were starting to be stained with pink, not the first time I have seen it, but seeing it with more and more colours while your voice trembles with grief and despair was akin to enlightenment.
This is a fantastic comment.
I try to look to the sky more and more often these days. There's something beautifully poignant about it. Not to mention it keeps your chin held aloft.. which is, of course, paramount during times such as these.
BEST BIRTHDAY PRESENT EVER! Happy 100th episode!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY CITIZEN!
I was worried about this episode because given the title, PLOT seems likely to happen to the character Oculus. But damn if the exhausted yet impassioned, pitch perfect acting didn't keep me riveted the whole time. Bravo! Here's to one hundred more episodes! Thanks so much for creating this work of art!
Welp. Considering I am probably dammned to heresy by having heard this and other pieces of your work. Know this oculus. The imperium needs people like you. Now more than ever before. Now... I should get back to not tinkering with 100% just archeotech to see how it might be never replicated...
And out of charecter, Daaamn. This has been a long running arc hasn't it? From naiieve and optimistic to... fully aware of the horrors of the universe. Bravo man.
This is the single best work based on the 40k universe that I have ever encountered. Bravo!
God damn dude, you write all this yourself? It's grim dark as fuck. That ending was baller.
I do and I did :) Delighted you enjoyed it so much!
@@OculusImperia It honestly sounds like you hate being a citizen of the Imperium. Which credits your voice acting and writing skills. But unfortunately that sounds like Hersey to me! Go to jail (bonk)
*One has to wonder what Guilliman himself would think if he were to read this.*
"Why do I still live? What more do you want from me? I gave everything I had to you, to them. Look what they've made of our dream. This bloated, rotting carcass of an empire is driven not by reason and hope but by fear, hate and ignorance. Better that we had all burned in the fires of Horus' ambition than live to see this." - Guillman on state of 40K Imperium
He'd probably be like, "finally, a sane person to commiserate with."
"True, but politically inconvenient."
@@FaizanMunirKhanRajput the beautifully tragic part: this very state of the imperium was shown to both Horus and Alpharius and was what (in part for Horus) drove them to rebellion to begin with to prevent it.
@@DeHerg It was a self fullfilling prophecy. The actions they took to prevent that future, actually ensured that this dreaded future would indeed come to pass.
Heartfelt congratulations on your first 100! Your writing and vocal performance continues to grow and evolve. Keep at it, you're doing great. Thanks for all your hard work!
Thank you so much!
Incredible work! You capture 40k like nobody else! Leaves me in awe!
I'm going to assign watching this as homework the next time someone tries to tell me "BuT tHe ImPeRiUm Is NeCeSsArY!!!1!"
there are many War40k channels out there that I enjoy, but none exudes such piety as you do in your videos. you are another unrecognised gem in this digital sea of madness. keep up the good work brother.
Maybe this is obvious, but this video feels more like a reminder to the fandom than a piece of in-universe lore. The Imperium, despite GWs portrayal of them as the flawed protagonists of the setting, are not the "good guys". As stated in the video, the regime of the Emperor isn't "tough but necessary" or "ultimately for the betterment of mankind". It is cruel for the sake of preserving the power of those who already have far too much of it. A better world is possible, but it means that those at the top will have one less world to drain of its wealth.
I especially feel like it's a response to those who use the same excuses to justify cruelty in our own world, or worse yet, look at the Imperium and think that our society could stand to look a little more like it.
The Imperium is fascism taken to its ultimate conclusion: horror, death, suffering, ignorance, and stagnation. 40k as a universe is a lot of things. A game, a piece of fiction to be enjoyed, a product to be sold, an experiment in genre, a hobby. But one facet of it I would argue that is often ignored or only lightly explored is 40k’s function as a cautionary tale warning against the specter of fascism.
Agreed - this a wonderful note.
Perhaps an answer to the "is the Imperium fascist" discussion.
And the answer is "sweet naive child, it is oh so, so much worse! And it has been so from its very beginning."
And are there places that are exempt from the nightmare, are there places of justice, light and hope it is only because they have avoided the attention of the great and powerfull.
“I have burned entire worlds for less.”
_Slams head repeatedly onto Exterminatus Button, firing full salvo of cyclonic torpedoes at __-Terra-__ __-Sol-__ *Segmentum Solar*._