Back at it to praise Shadow of the Erdtree, the DLC for Elden Ring (FromSoft) some more. At the end of the last post, I was talking about
*SPOILER WARNING*
Mohg’s body and Sir Ansbach being concerned as to what Miquella wanted with it. This would have been very important to know in real time because it has implications for the final boss. This is another thing that has split the community–whether the last boss is brilliant (in design/lore/story) or terrible. Let’s talk it out because I have mixed feelings about it.
Here’s the basic story: Miquella the Knd (yeah, right. I mentioned yesterday that if you have to say you’re kind, you probably aren’t. Any time you apply a label to yourself and think that’s a core component of your personality, you are protecting an image of yourself rather than truly being about that). Someone who is kind doesn’t have to say it because other people will see it for themselves. It’s like the self-proclaimed nice person. They are too invested in being perceived as nice.
I have never liked Miquella. Even the little we were given in the base game made me suspicious. The fact that he was considered charming and could sway anyone to his side was a big reason I side-eyed him. I have lived my whole life with two narcissists, and I can tell you that no matter how well-meaning they appear or want to appear, they are, ultimately, in it for themselves. In what, you ask? In anything. That’s how I feel about Miquella. He keeps emphasizing how kind he is (as do his acolytes), and that makes me supremely wary of him.
I was right to be wary of him, it turns out. He had a supreme plan for a better world, and it’s a plan that was horrifying in isolation. In order to get to the DLC, the player had to kill Radahn and Mohg. The lattel was implied very early on, and it made sense. Mohg snatched Miquella and put him in an egg (yes, an egg. Go with it), so it made sense that you would have to go back to this egg to get to the DLC. But Radahn? Why would you have to beat him?
Turns out you have to beat him because he’s integral to the DLC story. And this is where people are split on whether the idea is brilliant or terrible. See, Miquella is a frail and physically weak being. All his charm is for naught in the realm of fighting. Miquella wants to be a god. In order to do so, he needs someone who will be his blade. Now. Why wasn’t it Malenia? No idea. She was the Blade of Miquella in the base game, after all. I briefly went down a rabbit hole about this very question and found some interesting theories. One that made me roll my eyes, though, was that ‘the Elden Lord can’t be female.” Um. Really? *Glances at all my characters*. Given that the Elden Lord is where the character player ends up if they finish the game, that is a terrible theory.
People were saying that Godwyn was not a choice, which I assumed was because while his body was still intact, his soul/mind was gone. Ironically, I saw a brief mention of Godwyn that implied he was the final boss (with his death knights by his side), which upset me for a few days. I also saw spoilers about Radahn, but not that he was the final boss–just that he was in the DLC.
I’m meh about it, honestly. I’m not someone who goes deep into the lore, so I can’t comment about whether it makes sense or not within the greater story. If we take the premise that Miquella wanted to be a god and needed someone as his consort, then it doesn’t really matter who it is. Which is both a positive and a negative. If it can be anyone, then yeah, it feels like it was just slotted in at the end. It could be him, it could be Malenia, it could be God…frey? It could be anyone!
Here’s another thing I don’t understand. Why did Miquella need a body AND a soul, as it were. We killed Mohg just as we killed Radahn. Why use the body of Mohg (and one move) to house Radahn? I kind of feel as if FromSoft wanted to tie Mohg in because he was the one who took Miquella, and it would be cool from a thematic sense. There is no reason there should be a different body, but I can forgive that.
I dunno. It’s just that Miquella was the last character I wanted to learn anything new about. We knew it was going to be him pretty early on, and I was trying to theory craft ways it could not be about him. Or that it could be about someone in addition to him. I really wanted Melina to be involved somehow. My theory was that she was actually Messmer, which turned out to not be true. In fact, none of my theories were true. The blue-hooded figure in the trailer was not related to Roderika at all or of any import. The dancing lion was not, in fact, Margit/Morgott, which was my pet theory. But they were related as to both being horned beings.
I think the story was good for what it was. I appreciated it being told in a more linear fashion and was not mad about that. I do wish that it was more about other people, but I get that they wanted to focus on one being. I just am curious as to why it was Miquella who might literally be the most uninteresting character in the game. That may or may not be fair, I know, because there was little about him in the base game. That’s part of my problem, though. Who the hell is Miquella and why the hell should we care about him? The only thing I knew about him from the base game was that he was the brother of Malenia, they were both Empyreans, and that Mohg stole him and put him in an egg.
Ok, I also knew that both he and Malenia were cursed with different afflictions. Malenia with rot and Miquella with eternal youth. Miquella built the Haligtree to be like the Erdtree, but it wasn’t quite there. The Scadutree is the polar opposite of it. Also, I don’t get the timeline. This is supposed to be at the same time as what is happening in the main game, but a different world? That’s the best I can come up with.I do like that the base story is easy-ish to follow and you can learn more about it if you want.
I have to give a shoutout to the music. The new tracks are fire. There are some that are from the base game, and some of those are odd choices. Like the Golden Hippo has the Erdtree Avatar music, but in general, the new music is terrific. I don’t think FromSoft gets enough credit for their music, I must say. I mean, people say it’s good, but don’t really rave about it.
That’s it for today, so I’ll be back tomorrow.