r/DestinyTheGame • u/jamer2500 Laser Tag Weekend • 1d ago
Hey Bungie, not every character needs a fucking redemption arc. Lore
Especially one so viscerally hated by almost the entire community. Who’s been writing this shit? The story feels like it’s been ripped from a shitty anime with 30-50 word long titles. Eramis should have been killed the moment she tried that shit with the Warmind, arguably way earlier. I honestly would have been happier if she broke out of her imprisonment and then we fought her for the shard of the traveler. Then at the very least I wouldn’t be asking myself what the fuck we’re doing just letting her go.
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u/ClericOfIlmater 1d ago
I just wanted angry cursed Misraaks to tear off one of her arms in a parallel to her pulling Variks' prosthetic off You get to see the curse affecting him, get to talk about the cultural aspect of docking arms, and get some catharsis from someone who hasn't made a single decision or action we've seen that hasn't damaged humanity or eliksni
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u/examinedulna 1d ago
I feel like Misraaks mutilating another fallen, curse and all, is more of a character assassination. It makes him unworthy to be Kell of Kells and I don’t think it’s a great look for House Light
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u/cuboosh What you have seen will mark you forever 1d ago
Everything about this curse felt like character assassination. He got the curse saving his former mortal-enemy’s partner. That may be the most selfless thing anyone’s done in the whole franchise, and we have to watch him turn into the god of pain
It’s not like there was a metaphor of him conquering demons from his pirate days - there was nothing to it
Now it make sense though, they just needed an excuse to give the echo to Eramis
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u/TheToldYouSoKid 1d ago
That may be the most selfless thing anyone’s done in the whole franchise, and we have to watch him turn into the god of pain
That's not a character assassination; that's a sacrifice.
Nezerec is a being that has existed for thousands of years, in a psychic space. We even found that psions worshipped him in the ancient past. Even as far as Earth's orbit, it started to torment people on Neptune when it was only conscious as a head. It's heartbeat could KILL guardians. It's just as swaddled in the darkness that allowed the Witness to manipulate countless civilizations to destroy themselves, or resign their lives to nothingness; except in a way, it's worse. Because Nezerec doesn't want the suffering to end.
Point is, unlike the witness' proding, Nezerec was occupying Mithrax's mind. There's not a character in the franchise that could ignore that forever. And within the theming of the episode being gothic horror; it's a straight-forward allusion to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. The good and evil within someone separated into two distinct beings in one frame. Everyone could recognize that Mithrax wasn't himself. No one mistook his actions for his own. That's not assassination at all.
And i'll be real; even without Nezarec's curse, it still should have gone to Eramis. She was the one to remember Riis the most passionately. No, she doesn't like humanity, yes she's done awful things, but the lore has been VERY CLEAR that even when blinded by her rage or influenced by the Witness, she thinks about nothing but her people and the Whirlwind. We don't need a working relationship with ALL eliksni; what they need is a home, and she could be the one to provide that, with that echo. All she wants is to be done with us, so i don't understand the offense in that. Why do we need a pound of flesh more?
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u/Stevenstorm505 1d ago
I think it’s just more that Mithrax deserved better than what he’s been given and Eramis, with what she has done and what she helped usher in, doesn’t deserve to just have some sort of happy ending where she provides the Eliksni with a home that she then gets to enjoy. It’s just not very satisfying as a player invested in the characters to see these characters not get what they actually deserve.
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u/Blekker 1d ago edited 1d ago
Yeah and Eramis this character that hasn't done a single kind act (towards humanity) her entire existance in the story is now just going to chill out on her planet. We are supposed to believe that now that she has a shard that gives people immense power she doesn't want any revenge or anything.
They're trying to make her a Thanos after snap without any of the same motives Thanos had.
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u/Different-Set-7022 17h ago
but the lore has been VERY CLEAR that even when blinded by her rage or influenced by the Witness, she thinks about nothing but her people and the Whirlwind
My brother in christ, she tried to unleash the Vex on Europa on her own people in an effort just to kill you. She was a baron of the house of devils. She has been a murderous, genocidal maniac for almost as long as shes existed as a character. Hell, the writing has the audacity for Eramis to reference that she needs to find a place "Safe" from humanity. As if it weren't the actions of the Fallen at Twilight Gap and more that pushed humanity to the brink on their own planet.
Absolutely laughable that the spark went to her.
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u/EmCeeSlickyD 20h ago
She took part in the attempted ending of all existence (including all eliksni) even playing an integral role in it. I feel like that deserves a death sentence at a minimum. There is no redemption from trying to end all existence, it's literally the worst thing you can possibly do.
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u/NothingMonocle 1d ago
I don't want the current bungie writers to even mention Mithrax. Dude came to us as literal space jesus for the Eliksni. His name refers to Mithraism and he seems to be the perfect candidate for the first Eliksni Risen. That's what the narrative built him as. But so far he became a pirate a vessel for Nezarec and became a meme. Bungie's narrative just uses what's convenient when it comes to seasons and it's damaging characters. Best example is Osiris.
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u/tbdubbs 1d ago
Bungie's narrative just uses what's convenient when it comes to seasons and it's damaging characters.
I don't know how many times I've harped on this, but the seasonal model has been so harmful to this game and this is one huge component of that.
Long running TV shows that just keep going and going run into this issue - from one season to the next characters will make decisions and events will happen based on the "flavor of the month" or whatever is popular elsewhere in media.
This is why we have characters that make dramatic 180s and we get shock deaths (and revivals), redemption arcs, and all these things that kinda work in the moment (because many people are just interested in the here and now) but ultimately when you look at the overarching story and world building it just doesn't add up or make sense.
If there had been a very big plan in place that mapped out all these characters and world events in detail, it could have worked - the obvious wrinkle there being the many delays in production and the (alleged, but very likely) splitting up of lightfall and final shape being a good example.
I'm not even sure where the narrative really started to go sour, because there have been good steps forward along with the bad ones - but overall the epic space opera that I signed up for just got infected and really killed my interest in the story and characters.
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u/lightningbadger 1d ago
What if he sticks em back on with glue in his own redemption arc come the final episode?
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u/TheChunkMaster Killer Queen has already touched the dislike button. 1d ago
Yeah, the only time him doing that would make sense would be after Nezarec takes over his body, and Eramis made him taste the rainbow before he could get his pound of flesh.
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u/EcstaticCinematic 1d ago
Lmao taste the rainbow.
Don't talk crap about Eramis' Skittles Staff of Purifying +2 /s
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u/TheChunkMaster Killer Queen has already touched the dislike button. 1d ago
Eramis chose the perfect Ash of War.
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u/CINNA-Senpai 1d ago
Her dialogue after she's left sol is so freaking aggravating too. She's still so hateful towards Earth and humanity like it's our fault the Fallen "became scavengers." Despite the fact we too are on the brink of extinction with ONE FUCKING CITY LEFT TO DEFEND (though we've defeated the main bad so there's that).
Just this really petty, annoying, spitefully written character that needs no redeeming.
She was too hardheaded anyways, should have actually made her face some consequences for her actions, even if they were "for the survival of her people" or whatever.
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u/Different-Set-7022 17h ago
She says it in a way where it sounds like she's almost surprised that the people who live on Earth would defend their home from Alien pirates seeking to pillage and kill them. Like you guys are the ones coming to Sol...to chase...the Traveler...that you wanted to steal back from humanity.
And to have the audacity to say that she needs to be safe from humans.
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u/spectre15 1d ago
Mithrax having his entire multi year character development ripped from him in a single mission is definitely a decision of all time
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u/ready_player31 1d ago
literally T'd up to become the supreme kell (and objectively the most deserving of it too).
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u/TheChunkMaster Killer Queen has already touched the dislike button. 1d ago
He still becomes Kell of Kells. He says it outright in a zoom call.
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u/cuboosh What you have seen will mark you forever 1d ago
The “satisfying conclusion” of the 10 year long Kell of Kells arc is we learn in a zoom call that Eramis let Mithrax be Kell of Kells, after a cutscene that made it look like the unrepentant terrorist got the throne
This was even worse than when they fumbled the big moment when Crow learns we killed him
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u/ready_player31 1d ago
like all my work zoom calls i was completely zoned out, lol! must have missed it
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u/CruffTheMagicDragon 23h ago
Yeah that was so confusing.
Eramis: “The Echo chose me!”
Miisraaks: “I am the Kell of Kells!”
Huh!?
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u/AutisticBBCtwinklove 22h ago
The amount of wasted plot lines in destiny is honestly insane when you think about it
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u/TheChunkMaster Killer Queen has already touched the dislike button. 1d ago
This was even worse than when they fumbled the big moment when Crow learns we killed him
How exactly was Crow’s moment fumbled?
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u/cuboosh What you have seen will mark you forever 1d ago edited 1d ago
For starters, all we got was audio over a text blurb. One of their lowest budget forms of media. This should have been a cutscene
There was absolutely no drama or conflict. He has one sentence where he seemed annoyed, and then all is forgiven in the next line. Compare that to seasons of drama with him and Amanda when she learns he’s Uldren.
And they didn’t even directly have him acknowledge we shot him. It was pretty ambiguous but he seemed more upset about us keeping it secret, not the execution.
We were his role model, he’d be extremely disappointed that we shot unarmed Uldren rather than taking him in. This is the guy who just this season captured Eramis rather than killing her
The reason this was so disappointing is Forsaken is the only time in the whole saga our character actually did something, and for once we’d be in the drama instead of just watching two other people have conflict
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u/TheChunkMaster Killer Queen has already touched the dislike button. 1d ago
And they didn’t even directly have him acknowledge we shot him.
Doesn’t he literally say “And you… YOU… did what you had to do.”? That seems like direct acknowledgement to me.
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u/cuboosh What you have seen will mark you forever 1d ago
In the rest of that he’s complaining about people keeping him in the dark, so with the context it’s probably “even you lied to me!”
Again, something this major shouldn’t get one cryptic allusion
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u/wizardbooms 1d ago
He absolutely acknowledged it!
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u/cuboosh What you have seen will mark you forever 1d ago edited 1d ago
No it’s ambiguous. That’s what I thought at first from the audio, that “you did what you had to do” meant you had to shoot Uldren (and got annoyed since that’s extremely out of character for Crow to say though - again he didn’t shoot Eramis)
But look at the post-audio summary they wrote: You can tell he wants to yell, to scream, to ask why you didn’t tell him the truth. Ultimately, he decides he understands why you and the Vanguard handled his past life the way you did. “I don’t think I would have told me either,” he admits.
From this summary it’s not “I wouldn’t have told me you shot me” it’s “I wouldn’t have told me I murdered a bunch of my own people and killed Cayde”
Bungie usually beats you over the head with a sledgehammer in those summaries. There is zero mention of the end of Forsaken.
In the best case the person who wrote the audio did try to subtly reference Forsaken, but the person who wrote the summary chose to bury it to not confuse new lights or something
And either way, he forgives us and gets over it in 30 seconds. That’s not how a real character would behave. The writers just don’t want our character to be an actual character
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u/n080dy123 Savathun vendor for Witch Queen 1d ago
She was never gonna be Kell of Kells, Echo or not. She's not a Kell anymore and she hasn't been by her own admission since at least the start of Revenant, if not since Defiance.
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u/Bagz402 1d ago
😭 as someone who disengaged with the game after TFS, this is the most bungie thing ever lmao. I recall them saying they were gonna do more cutscenes with the new seasonal structure
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u/Galaxy40k 1d ago
My jaw hit the floor when he said that because I was convinced that him calling Eramis "Eramiskel" in the cutscene and then doing a little bow meant that she was it. Because after all, if being the Kell of Kell means that you're the one and true Kell, and somebody else is referred to as Kell, that means that person would have to be the Kell of Kells, right?
Like is my media literacy in the toilet? Am I the only person here who got confused there?
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u/dukenukem89 1d ago
Every Eliksni character has called Eramis "Eramiskel" in every communication we've heard. Why? Because whether the other characters like her or not, she's a Kell, so the honorific fits.
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u/Galaxy40k 1d ago edited 17h ago
Yes, but the point of my OP is exactly that: That makes her a Kell. And if the "Kell of Kell" requires only one Kell to be standing, then wouldn't that make HER the Kell of Kells?
The other commenter said that apparently this IS an accurate reading and Eramis was Kell of Kell for 5 seconds before acquiescing to Missraks. Who then in a zoom call said he tried to re-acquiese the title back to Eramis. I guess?
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u/dukenukem89 1d ago
She was never Kell of Kells, having the Echo doesn't make you Kell of Kells, otherwise Fikrul would have been that. Mithrax offered the title to both Eramis and Variks (people apparently forget about that part because it doesn't fit their narrative)
And she herself declares to be of no House, which clears the way for that Kell of Kells everyone is so hyped about if you want to see it that way.
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u/Amirifiz I'll blast you to Infinity! 1d ago
Two things, if you're a Kell then you get "Kel" at the end of your name. Variks calls Missraks, "Missrakskel" because he's the Kell of House Light.
The other thing is that she got the Echo so she was Kell of Kells for the 5 seconds until she rejected that notion.
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u/TheChunkMaster Killer Queen has already touched the dislike button. 1d ago
None of it was ripped from him. He’s still Kell of Kells. He offered the title to Eramis and Variks but they refused.
This isn’t even buried in a lore entry. Mithrax tells you this explicitly on the holoprojector.
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u/ItsJackymagig 1d ago
Absolutely nuts we get so much story through facetime instead of actually experiencing it
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u/RezzInfernal Lackey 1d ago
one of the worst decisions this game ever made, and that’s saying something.
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u/Dumoney 1d ago
I would be okay with redemption arcs if they actually put in the work to earn it. Eramis has not shown an ounce of introspection or changed behavior
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u/n080dy123 Savathun vendor for Witch Queen 1d ago
This is why I don't understand why people are even saying she got redeemed. I don't think she did, and I don't think that was Bungie's intention, she's just moved past her need to fight Mithrax and House Light over her vision for the future. Now with the Echo she doesn't need to, she gets to leave and rebuild Eliksni society like she always wanted, and better yet she can do it while not causing problems for us. I think Eramis is positioned for a redemption, but I think this was just the first small step on a centuries long journey for her that we probably won't ever see because yeah- she doesn't deserve redemption in OUR eyes. Only in the eyes of her own people.
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u/dukenukem89 1d ago
She didn't get a redemption arc, people are just shit at parsing the media they consume apparently. She did one good thing because it benefitted her as much as it did us. The Echo choosing her isn't a measure of "redemption" since it had chosen Fikrul before, and before this, the previous Echo had chosen Maya.
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u/AngrySayian 1d ago
we might see the start of it [or some point of it if there is a time skip/time travel], wouldn't discount something in Frontiers having us go to Riis to help her, despite the fact she doesn't like us and the fact she actively doesn't want our help, but maybe because of whatever is going on, she is left with no other option because there is only so much that she alone can do
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u/LickMyThralls 1d ago
I feel like any time a character goes from being a definitive bad guy to like... Not a problem people just lump it in as redemption arcs. Which is eh. I don't think this is really that bad. And people acting like it needs to be "earned" or something. Lol. Like it's the same as movies and books and shows and all where stuff can happen off screen essentially imo. The other one that gets me is that if it's not how someone thinks it should be "it's not believable" even when it's totally in line with how reality plays out with stuff.
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u/amyknight22 1d ago
Didn't she literally show up and tell us not to go into the obvious trap that got amanda killed?
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u/Dumoney 1d ago
I dont even know. She was talking shit to us over our comms that entire season. I eventually just tuned out
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u/AssassinAragorn 2h ago
Yep, she implored us to turn back, and then when the fiery explosion went towards the surface where Misraaks was, Eramis showed up and used stasis to block the majority of the explosion.
I don't understand this post nor most of the comments. If any character has shown hesitation and a possibility to be a neutral party at least, it's her.
It seems like a lot of players with lore comprehension, including myself, have left the game -- as evidenced by the reply to your comment saying "lol idk I didn't listen"
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u/MaraSovsLeftSock 1d ago
I really wanted eramis to die. She’s literally attempted genocide every time we turn around, and tried to serve the fuckin witness. Crows a bitch.
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u/Gfaqshoohaman 1d ago edited 16h ago
MFW when the story is so poorly presented that people are arguing for two different sides because they can't tell the intentions of the writers.
It's surreal how many people are genuinely asking why Eramis is considered "redeemed" as if overlooking her countless past crimes, subverting Mithrax's role as the Kell of Kells, and allowing her to fuck off with the Echo isn't a reward. This is the same character that was responsible for attempting to genocide humanity during the City Age, unleashed the Vex on her own House, and openly sided with the originator of the Whirlwind forcing us to kill Rasputin during Season of the Seraph.
EDIT: thinking about the ending some more, I've come to realize that Eramis being sent off with the Echo to reclaim Riis is basically a form of exile. Something akin to what they had planned for her originally with that lore tab that seemingly got scrapped where she left the system to find her mate. A lot of lore tabs talk about how the Long Drift was hell, so even if the Echo acts as some sort of space compass her journey won't be easy.
Maybe this would have been more clear/satisfactory if she wasn't spewing insults and clinging to the both sides narrative in her final message to us. Or if the unseen apothecary wasn't being a xenophobic asshole every other message.
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u/GundamMeister_874 1d ago
In my case, the biggest contributor to leaving the game was how the story/lore changed over the years. It feels like it's been amateur hour since arrivals (with some exceptions)
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u/-Specx- Certified Tripmine Yeeter 1d ago
I swear the majority of the stories the last couple years have all just been characters taking turns trauma dumping on our guardian. The writers can't seem to come up with anything other than angsty drama and half assed lessons of friendship to form a narrative.
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u/AdorableDonkey 17h ago
Season of the Haunted being a group therapy was so horrendous it killed my interest on the lore
Also 3 of 4 WQ seasons had something related to daddy issues
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u/Angrykiller100 18h ago edited 17h ago
What? You don't want Grandpa Saint and Osiris's relationship issues being a seasonal subplot for the 4th time again?
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u/killer6088 21h ago
Yep, completely agree. While I do believe those types of stories are very good, having them every other season starts to make them less impactful. We need some truly evil villains.
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u/thechefsauceboss 1d ago
Remember when this game had crazy intriguing writing? Forsaken era writing was top tier. Opulence made Calus so cool and almost relatable and the whole Dredgen Yor story was amazing start to end.
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u/HistoryChannelMain 1d ago
Destiny's mid writing is actually one of the things the series is best known for.
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u/thechefsauceboss 1d ago
It started horrible, got good for a brief flash, then went to even more mediocre now that all the mystery is gone.
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u/5partan5582 Drifter's Crew // DK? Drift Krew. 1d ago
Destiny works best when nothing beyond shoot and faction to faction stories is explained. The more they revealed about the Darkness, the Hive Gods, the Worms, etc. has just made the series ring more hollow
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u/Aegiiiss 1d ago
Remember when this game had crazy intriguing writing?
Honestly, no. If we turn the clocks back to D1 we get "i have no time to explain why I have no time to explain"
Destiny writing has largely always been trash. Very brief moments during Taken King, Forsaken, Witch Queen, and Final Shape are written passably. Not "crazy intriguing" or anything like that, just okay. And only for brief moments.
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u/Skater_Bruski Vanguard's Loyal // Victory at all costs 1d ago
Same. The Lakshmi Eliksni thing did it for me. It was lazy writing.
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u/No_Tell5399 1d ago
Same here. I especially couldn't get over the lame raid lore starting from Garden of Salvation.
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u/ienjoymen Reckoner wasn't that bad 1d ago
All of the Beyond Light seasons were great I thought, especially Splicer. They never reached that high again unfortunately, the Final Shape excluded
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u/Angrykiller100 1d ago
Eramis getting a send off with the intention of rebuilding her race's society while STILL holding hatred in her heart towards Humanity and Guardians really rubs me the wrong way.
This character has tried to kill us multiple times while even putting her own people at risk serving the Witness and we just LET her go with an echo because it chose her and she tells us she won't be our problem anymore?
Guess we should invite Savathun to the tower and have a cup of tea together since we're feeling so forgiving. Happy endings for everyone.
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u/n080dy123 Savathun vendor for Witch Queen 1d ago
I stand by the idea that Eramis hasn't been redeemed with this story and I don't think she was intended to be, any more than Savathun. She still hates humanity and wants nothing to do with us, but with the development she's had and the Echo in hand she's free to no longer be our problem to deal with.
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u/grahamev 1d ago
I agree, this wasn't redemption. She did a good thing for Mithrax and then fucked off. She is not Sol's problem anymore, and nor is it her's.
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u/echoblade 1d ago
I dunno how people missed the fact that she just straight up tells us she still hates our entire existence and is glad to just piss off into the universe cursing our next of kin. It's not a redemption in the slightest.
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u/TheChunkMaster Killer Queen has already touched the dislike button. 1d ago
Then at the very least I wouldn’t be asking myself what the fuck we’re doing just letting her go.
We’re doing the pragmatic thing here and letting her willingly exile herself from the system to do something beneficial to her kind for once. She helped us with Fikrul, she cured the Kell of Kells of Nezarec’s influence, and now she’s engaging in some restorative justice far away from here.
Besides, her therapist was asking for a prohibitively high raise.
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u/TheToldYouSoKid 1d ago
I feel like they'd need to hire a specialist; i never got how a human therapist would work for an Eliksni. Human Psychology might be far-flung from that of another being, especially that of a storied history like the Eliksni. Earth is still intact, and while cultures have shifted, there are still remnants in them. There is an entirely different culture between pre-and-post whirlwind, with different pseudo-cultures stemming from different time periods within the extremely chaotic 10 years since our character has been a thing.
The Eliksni are humanity's mirror, but that doesn't mean they'd be the exact same in condition and substance of the mind. They may even have different ways to process information physically.
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u/Cresset DEATH HEALS FOURNIVAL 1d ago
It's Eramis, it's already amazing that they found some people willing to be take her as a client.
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u/Bababooey0989 1d ago
"BuT yOu cAnT dO wHaT mAkEs sEnSe, yoU jUst conTiNiUe tHE cYcLE"
There was a whole ass pretentious fucking lore entry about how you're supposed to just forgive anyways.
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u/Kozak170 1d ago
I loathe this blanket mentality from the writers. Forgiveness arcs have their place and yes, it is not always logical. But fuck me it feels like I’m scrolling through tik tok therapists when it comes to the writing the last few years.
The best way to “end the cycle” would be to glass Eramis and the other Darkness followers and move the fuck on. Can’t wait to hear about how the Hive are actually misunderstood and are now buddies next season.
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u/Bababooey0989 23h ago
You know that's what it's gonna be. Lucent Hive are already here, with lore entries describing how it's such a massive change that they don't need to kill to survive. They are wordless. The moths that fly out is a coping mechanism that the light manifests as a "parasite" since that's all they know.
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u/InterCha 1d ago
The trend is continuing even in lorebooks, Shayura went from an insane guardian killer but then she pressed F to believe in family and now her life is sunshine and rainbows. Forsaken introduced a bit of edge and moral ambiguity but now the writers are nuking that harder than Reach.
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u/Yareakh_Zahar 1d ago
Remember, these are the same people who tried to 'both sides' the Fallen's attempts to genocide humanity. The writing has been shit for years.
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u/Daimyan143 1d ago
Woah, let’s not shit on anime with 30-50 word titles. Their stories are actually semi-interesting sometimes.
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u/Lunokhodd 1d ago
The genocidal alien matriarch who I've personally been at war with on and off for 10+ years can't be this sympathetic!?
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u/ILoveSongOfJustice 1d ago
Misraaks is by far my favorite character in Destiny lore bar none.
I fucking ADORE the Eliksni, I ADORE their designs, their lore, their language. The way they grow into these MASSIVE entities depending on ether supply. Even down to the visors and crests of their armor.
And Eramis has steadily become the antithesis of everything I adore about them. I view her as tragic not because of the Witness, but because she keeps making stupid choices. And she has to be saved from them time and again. She has no agency, and is yet still somehow a more important than the dude we've been following since the inception of House Light as a concept.
Plunder gave Misraaks conflict with not just his past, but the past of the Eliksni as a whole with himself and Eramis as rightful centers of the plot. And by the time that ended, you had a clear divide between the three primary Eliksni factions: The Scorn, House Light, and the Raiders that Eramis still controlled.
I haven't tuned into the story this patch because I'm deathly afraid of going into it and tacking on another thing for me to hate about the game
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u/examinedulna 1d ago
Eramis wasn’t redeemed, she leaves hating us and us hating her. She was called to a higher purpose, one that she’s been fighting for her entire time in the game. She wasn’t forgiven or exonerated, the promise of a potential prosperous future for a dying species outweighs her atrocities in this moment. She spared Mithrax and that’s the only reason she was given a last chance. I feel like I’m crazy bro
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u/lustywoodelfmaid 1d ago
If she wasn't forgiven or exonerated in some way, why was she allowed to leave the City? Because a fancy rock told her she could?
I'm not saying in any way that she is redeemed but she most certainly hasn't been prosecuted.
Eramis: "I plead guilty to the attempted genocide of humanity."
Judge: "Two months in jail. Tops."
The entire Vanguard: "This is perfectly acceptable. Crow definitely isn't using his Eliksni bias."
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u/n080dy123 Savathun vendor for Witch Queen 1d ago edited 1d ago
Because her leaving on her own is a far easier solution than us trying to punish her, especially when we know from experience that if she dies someone like Kridis will just pop up leading Salvation in a warpath against us again.
And honestly what the fuck would putting her in prison for a while do anyway. She was already locked up in the Prison of Elders once, and while that wasn't exactly a rehabilitation center it was far from the only instance of jailed Eliksni leaving worse than they came in.
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u/lustywoodelfmaid 1d ago
Thing is, Salvation bozos can rise up against us again anyway. She left alone, she said so herself. That leaves the idiots of Salvation in Sol. They'll either carry on their stupid revolt or they'll join the House of Light. It's more likely that the House of Light will be tainted with Salvation spies and interlopers.
Also, she did come out of the Prison of Elders better. She was more driven towards making Riis-Reborn. She even told all of her barons to stop strangling Variks because she wanted Riis-Reborn to be for every Eliksni. She was a good person. But then she was corrupted by the Darkness of Stasis, just like Ana Bray and Eris Morn were in the alternate reality which Elsie Bray lived through. This corruption made her bitter and after its effects wore off, she chose to remain bitter. It wasn't because of the prison.
And the solution? Be creative. Prison and death aren't our only options. Alliance is another. I'm not saying keep her in the City but we could definitely send her back to Europa to work on Riis-Reborn under the watch of some House of Light guards. It would also be wise to keep her back for a while so that we can investigate the Echo and find out its properties so that we can contrast, compare and fight back against the new upcoming Echoes we'll have to deal with in the coming years. While we research it, she has time to prove herself at Eido's side. After a while, we can decide whether it is still the corruption of Darkness which governs her actions or her own stupidity. At that point, we can choose her fate or send her off to Europa or beyond.
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u/gooder-than-u I was the Taken Captain in the Drifter picture for FOTL 2019 23h ago
She didn't leave alone! She took as many Eliksni that took her side as she could. Do you think she was just going to rebuild her home planet without any of her people to live there?
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u/Chiefmuffin1 15h ago
She literally tells us that she regrets leaving her people under our rule on her journey but that she is now Eramis with no House. She is literally going alone and leaving them behind
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u/justsubscribed912 1d ago
Saving Mithrax is still attempting to redeem her, and it's emphasized twice that the shard chose her (for some reason), which is seemingly another attempt to legitimize letting her go without having to think about it too much.
Either way, the episode's "climax" was lame, redeemed or not lol
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u/lightningbadger 1d ago
emphasised that the shard chose her
They should've just gone with Life of Brian when they said "he's not the Messiah, he's a very naughty boy!" And stuck her in prison again
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u/helloworld6247 1d ago
Dying species? The only dying species is her own House that’s been on life support since Beyond Light. House Light has been doing just fine alongside all of the refugees that jumped ship from Salvation time and time AND TIME again.
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u/DivineHobbit1 1d ago edited 1d ago
Eramis should've eaten a shotgun blast years ago but she is a writer's pet character so she gets away with everything and now gets a shiny rock that can do basically anything and gets a relatively happy ending after being so evil. Reminder she is still a blood thirsty psychopath that was part of the House of Devils that tried genociding humanity multiple times.
Basically Bungie have turned cool space pirates into lame refugees that didn't do anything wrong and according to Eramis it was us who apparently made them into "scrabbling insects" instead of themselves entering Sol then immediately start trying to genocide humanity for the shiny ball. Better yet is they would attack people and settlements not even remotely close to the traveller (Zavala's old home with his family) or (following the people Saint was with to Mercury where he stated that he witnessed dregs KILL AND EAT HUMAN CHILDREN).
Saint was absolutely correct in everything he did pre-splicer, shoulda blown all those bugs into non-existence.
Basically Bungie writers think genocide is perfectly fine as something to get away with, and that actually you the players/vanguard are evil because... uhhh you defended yourself?
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u/Xelon99 1d ago
What do you mean redemption arc? Eramis has permanently fucked off and is still a negative character. She's no longer our problem. We don't have an alliance or friendship. She clearly said she regrets abandoning her kin under our 'rule'. Just because we didn't kill her doesn't mean she's redeemed.
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u/Chiefmuffin1 15h ago
Her not having to deal with any consequences due to her transgressions against humanity, the traveller and her people as well as leaving to god knows where with a stick of untold power seems like a redemption arc from the writers. Even Mithrax bowed down to her and named her Kell necause she got rid of his affliction (temporarily) which lets be honest...could have probably been done a million other ways. Oh...also the echo chose her, fulfilling the Eliksni prophecy of Kell of Kells (even though she abandoned that title and her people)
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u/BK_FrySauce 1d ago
It really kind of boggles my mind that we’re okay with just letting her keep an echo shard and just take it away to who knows where. Why is everyone so trusting of the shard’s decision to choose Eramis? It literally had just picked Fikrul. Sure she used to purify Misraaks, but who knows what’ll happen if someone decides to attack them at their new home.
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u/SexJokeUsername 1d ago
Do you think savathun had a “redemption arc” in Season of the Witch? Because this is the same thing. We had a common goal, and worked together to achieve it but it doesn’t make everything that happened better
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u/LordSinestro 1d ago
Have we all been playing the same episode? What scene did Eramis redeem herself in? When did she try to redeem herself this episode? Either I'm playing a different game than some of you or you all didn't pay attention to shit this entire episode.
Eramis did not apologize for her crimes, she didn't heroically sacrifice herself to save Mithrax or kill Fikrul, she didn't even say thank you before she left. Where the hell in this episode did she get a redemption arc? Eramis was chosen by Echo over a Nezarec possessed Mithrax then used it to cleanse Mithrax of Nezarec immediately after. Followed by the Echo wanting her to get the hell out of Sol and rebuild a civilization for the Eliskni.
I've never seen a larger collective of people play through a very simple and straightforward story and misinterpret every single second of it. Whoever was writing it definitely succeeded in making a lot of you despise a villain you were meant to despise in the first place.
The writing was mediocre at best, and the Kell of Kells prophecy shouldn't have been a measley episodic story, but some of you have even worse media literacy.
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u/nopers9 Got a bit too Enlightened in the Black Garden 1d ago
I know right! All of her dialogue interactions with us have been hitting us over the head with the fact that she CANNOT STAND US, we killed so many of her people, her friends, and she did the same to ours. This was not a redemption, at most this was her learning that genociding us isn’t worth a bother and that she should be making good for her people by staying the hell away.
But nooo, apparently the fact that she doesn’t rip our throat out on sight means she’s redeemed and all good now!
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u/MarxGT Drifter's Crew // Praxic messages straight to spam folder 1d ago
The fact that she doesn't have a bullet between her eyes and she was allowed to leave means that, in the eyes of the characters of the story, she is "redeemed" enough to be allowed to live. Eramis should have died in beyond light and if not that, she should have died this season for the shit she pulled in seraph.
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u/PossessedCashew 1d ago
Bungie, this is another reason you are losing players out the ass. Poor writing, not giving a shit about character development and payoff. What the fuck are yall even doing up at Bungie HQ?
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u/theganjaoctopus I ain't licking nothing. 1d ago
Y'all mad about Eramis, who personally I think is worth preserving just because she has one of the last direct memories of Riis.
Meanwhile, Spider kills Ghosts for fun, literally enslaved a newly hatched Guardian, who just happened to be the Awoken prince in his first life, by implanting explosives in his Ghost, constantly threatens and undermines the Vanguard and all Guardians, and the list goes on.
Spider is an existential threat to all Guardians and the authority of the Vanguard. Mara should have, based on her character, walked into his little hole and ripped him apart with her bare hands. The fact that not only is he alive, but were actively working directly with him, is a laughably, infuriatingly world-breaking story beat.
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u/TallGuyChris- 1d ago
Fuck Riis, why should I care about the homeworld of them, they came to our solar system and become terrorist
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u/epsilon025 Strive for Honor. Stand for Hope. 1d ago
She wasn't redeemed though?
Her actions haven't really changed, just the extremity. She went from faffing off to Europa and establishing Riis-Reborn while being seduced by the Witness's power in order to try and save her people, to being forced to do its bidding again by finding Nezarec's reliquaries and destroying the Warmind under threat of her people being turned into Scorn, to saving Misraaks to try and save the future of her species, even if it wasn't the way she'd liked them to exist to survive.
She's always acted in her perception of the best interests of her people, and her being the chosen wielder of the Echo was a pretty natural continuation of that. At best, she wouldn't fight us if we ever encounter her in the future. At worst, she's just gone.
Misraaks is Kell of Kells (better than when Variks or Skolas tried), Variks is acting as an advisor and expert on old Riis, Eido can finally go back to her pre-Plunder and Revenant duties of "learn and record", and Eramis is finally both free of the Witness and in possession of a power that can actually help her to re-establish her homeworld.
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u/Darkspyre2 snake lad 1d ago
Eramis's original ending from Wish where she just got sick of everyone's shit and left was much better. Why did they undo this.
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u/packman627 1d ago
Because Bungie is all about bad characters never being bad. They always have to have some sort of humanity or grey area where they could be redeemed.
It's kinda exhausting
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u/TitanWithNoName 1d ago
I swear it's the whole "we were enemies but now we are friends" thing Final Fantasy 14 does. I guess it's just how narratives are now. No consequences, no hard decisions, no drama, just everybody holding hands and singing. I get the game is T for teen, but right now it's S for Soft.
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u/feminists_hate_me69 1d ago edited 1d ago
I mean ff14 has done that with rarely any villains. Zenos doesn't do that, the whole thing with him and the WoL is that you are enemies and a fucked up version of friends, Emet-Selch never becomes your friend even after he dies, you literally only become any form of friendly with him in the ancient past and he doesn't even like you, Gaius is an ally, but nowhere near being redeemed, he did a lot of fucked up shit and now is lucky enough to be with his remaining family, Thordan, Lahabrea and Igeyorhm never get redeemed, Elidibus is a story you're supposed to pity but still oppose, Athena is someone you literally cannot have that chance with at all, Sphene, even being in the dlc with the literal Disney musical song, doesn't have that either, the only villains with any form of real redemption is Meteion and Fordola and it was handled pretty well for both of them. (Fordola's is in the EW Healer role quest)
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u/hemi_red_13 1d ago
I quit during the 2nd “episode”, did we somehow redeem vikrul or something? To me the story was done after the bbeg was defeated for the final time, so i couldnt justify the monotonous grind anymore.
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u/Bababooey0989 1d ago
Nah, Fikrul dies, Mithrax is somehow less worthy than Eramis who gets her 9th "i did a stinky, teehee" card, then she leaves while acting like a victim of the mean humans. Then half the thread is defending that dogshit choice.
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u/Snowchain1 Drifter's Crew 1d ago
Don't know why everyone keeps calling this a redemption arc. The only way she was even redeemed is just in the eyes of Mithrax for purging the curse from him. Mithrax coming to forgive Eramis is something that has been built up since Plunder. However, she isn't redeemed at all in the eyes of humanity and they straight up talk about that in the ending dialogue. She (+her followers) and humanity will just never be okay with each other so she is just leaving Sol forever since nothing can be done to fix that.
I feel like a lot of people here think a bad guy has to either die or be redeemed and since Eramis didn't die then the other thing must have happened. It is more nuanced than that. The fact Eramis is so hated by everyone kinda shows how effective she was as an unapologetic and antagonizing villain to humanity/the player while still being understandable by the rest of the Eliksni.
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u/Prior_Memory_2136 23h ago
Mithrix:
Saved his species from the brink of extinction by working diplomatically with humanity and securing a section of the Last City for the House of Light, the faction he led. He and the House then fought alongside us as unwavering allies while the civilian Eliksni population slowly recovered in the City. He also willingly became cursed in the process of saving one of our closest allies. He led a House of Light detachment in the final battle against The Witness, then got right back to leading and rebuilding once it was defeated despite becoming physically ill from his curse.
Eramis:
A despot who took over Europa after gaining Darkness powers from cooperating with the Witness, forming the other major Eliksni faction in the process. The living conditions she created were terrible enough that civilians started fleeing in droves, even moreso once the House of Light was established in the City. She was put down by us and encased in ice, but some time later she ended up coming back and attempted to form an insurgency of pirates, despite her stated motivation being to rebuild Eliksni society. We put this down even quicker. Having failed twice, The Witness then mind-raped half of the people still under her rule, to which she responded by still cooperating with The Witness and indirectly getting Rasputin killed after she tried to hack into him to shoot down the Traveler. Shortly afterwards, she begins to truly fight against the Witness by getting another major ally killed and barely saving Mithrax from a series of events she easily could have prevented. Then, in her species-saving bravery, she took a few of her loyalists and fled the solar system to make sure she's well out of the way of the incoming war against The Witness. It's worth noting here that we fight against the last of her faction in The Final Shape, meaning she not only ran like a coward, but left her entire army behind in the process.
Bungie writers:
Clearly, Eramis deserves the mandate of heaven, she earned by uh...
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u/LovelyJoey21605 Shaxx; Dark Lord, Husbando of Savathuun and Ruler of the Doritos 1d ago
Dude. I ALWAYS hated the fact that we didn't just fucking shatter her when she was a popsicle at the end of Beyond Light. It was obvious she was going to get out of that, and it was just so fucking dumb to leave her there.
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u/WizardWolf 1d ago
They should execute Eido for treason for letting her escape, as well
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u/DarkLordSTRM 1d ago
The worst part is that she doesn't even feel redeemed. She still hates us and it feels like given the right circumstances would absolutely become our enemy once again. She did one good thing, but not for us. It was for her people, which was always her motivation so no real change was made. The only thing that happened was she became less outwardly aggressive towards humanity, but she still hates us and talks so vitrialiclly towards us.
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u/futurecrops 1d ago
that’s because there wasn’t a redemption arc. she left. she still hates us, and clearly we’re still intended to return that sentiment. anyone saying there was a redemption arc for her isn’t paying attention to the meat and bones of the story
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u/DarkLordSTRM 1d ago
I think what I'm getting at is that it feels like they were going for a redemption arc. Every time she shows up the vibe is that we are supposed to be grateful for her not being awful even though she barely does anything and they just did it so badly that you are right. She doesn't even have an arc, it's just a flat one-note line of being insufferable.
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u/Poopybara 1d ago
They learned it from blizzard's WOW writers. You get redemption ark! You get redemption ark! Everybody gets redemption ark!
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u/elkishdude 1d ago
This is some of the worst story content we have ever seen. I feel bad that Byf has to cover it. Redemption arcs only work if there is a reason to redeem the character. So far, for Eramis, we have none.
She tried to kill humanity by attempting to destroy the Traveler and we had to lose Rasputin to prevent that. I don’t know how Zavala didn’t order us to take her down on sight. He was obsessed with Rasputin.
Speaking of redemption arcs, after replaying the final shape, I realized there’s just absolutely no word from Elsie Bray. Does this mean we didn’t succeed in the timeline? Because you can make an argument on that. There’s just no closure acknowledged there.
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u/AuroraUnit117 Drifter's Crew 1d ago edited 1d ago
I mean, thats not what happened at all. Plunder was the dumbest season ever and her breaking out of the ice and just walking away was stupid, but i thought they turned a fumble into an interesting conclusion to this entire plotline
I feel this ending was one of the better things theyve done in a while. I dont know why the piece of the traveler that is the memories of Riis chosing the person most connected to Riis is crazy. She literally runs away hating us and us hating her. "Machine spawn will be a memory used to scare hatchlings' is great. She gave up the fight against us to actually do her dream properly
Do people think the traveler is just on our side? Is that the thing? Didn't the lucent hive kinda show that's not the case?
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u/Jealous_Platypus1111 1d ago
This wasn't a redemption arc. Eramis still doesn't like us.
I swear to god this community doesn't listen to the story
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u/AlphynKing The Guy Dmg04 called important 19h ago
And are all these redemption arcs in the room with us right now?
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u/SassyAssAhsoka THICK TOGRUTA LEKKU 1d ago
Stand by for the Oryx redemption arc next season