New Thoughts on Ephraim

[mark_asphodel]

IT'S A TROLL, GUYS.  

He admits to being an ex-troll.  He admits to being a trouble maker.  And he comes on with his barrage of bogus facts, his misuse of inflammatory words (Ellen the pedophile?), and his statements that cannot be taken as anything but offensive, and the people who call him out on it can't get a break.  

OTOH, rebuttals to his trolling have stimulated some actual discussion of canon in that Pairing Game thread.

But dammit, if I were a mod I'd have banned his ass by now.  (Greener, not Korean Boron Etc)

-x-

This on emblanon  caught my eye.  Not convinced Ephraim is intended as disinterested in women.  He reacts too strongly to L'Arachel, IMO.  And if you don't think that's a reaction, compare Eph's interactions with L'Arachel to, say, Marth's interactions with any female not named Caeda in any of the Archanea games.  By Fire Emblem standards, "She's rather cute" is practically "I'd hit that."

But I don't see his "support" with L'Arachel as anything terribly deep and meaningful, and I do not for one second believe in his relationship with Tana (and the anons outlined the disconnect in that relationship pretty well).

And Ephraim is kind of... odd, at least as far as his paired endings go.  

Let's recap:

Early FE games presented a One True Love set-up for the main character.  You have Alm/Cellica and Sigurd/Diadora (mandatory canon), Marth/Caeda and Leaf/Nanna (default canon), and that was that.  But FE4 presented the world with Pimpmaster Celice and his harem of eligible women, and that continued with Super Pimp Roy and his gaggle of beauties in FE6.  (The sex appeal of either Celice or Roy utterly eludes me.)  Even so, the game played favorites-- clearly Celice is supposed to go with Yuria Rana, and I think FE6 pushes Lilina moreso than Roy's other options.  Then come FE7, the two male Lords have three marriage options each; in Eliwood's case, the game again is pretty overt about Eliwood/Ninian... and in Hector's case, I personally think that the unlockable Hector/Lyn content was intended as a hint along the same lines.  But, as with Celice and Roy, you cannot say that any of the possible options is True Canon.

Then we get to FE8, wherein Eirika continues the proud pimpmaster tradition by being able to snag Seth, or Saleh, or Innes, and arguably Forde (hey, they have a paired ending, which is more than Rennac gets with L'Arachel).  Her brother, on the other hand, gets two actual marriage options-- Tana (whose support conversations are, IMO, off-putting and cold), and L'Arachel (which the game script doesn't really seem to take seriously).  Of the two, the script seems to be pushing Tana... but Eph's interactions with her just don't sound convincing.

Tana, you're still just a child at heart, aren't you?
No, I meant it as a compliment. Because you're so young, your words have such a simple, honest purity... I do appreciate your affection.

Whoa, my heart is just melting.  :/

Compare that with this: 
We grew up like brother and sister, but you were always the one helping me. I was able to come this far because you were always there for me, to support me and cheer me up. Nanna, once this war ends, I'll go look for Lachesis as well. And when I find her, I'm going to ask her directly...for your hand, Nanna... (Leaf, FE5)

Or this:
I want to see your smile more than your power. (Roy to Sofia, FE6)

Or this: 
Ninian, I love you. That will not change, no matter what may come...
I don’t care what your secret is-- I will still feel the same. If something troubles you, let me sweep it away. (Eliwood, FE7)

Not that there aren't other unromantic supports that end in a marriage, but the issue with Ephraim is that both of his marital options are... unsatisfying.  And as for his other paired endings...

1) With Eirika.  Take that any way you wish.
2) With Myrrh.  Explicitly cast as a big brother/little sister relationship echoing earlier games.

His other supports are with Forde, Kyle and Duessel; none of these come across as epic bromances, much less romances.  But there's more warmth in his supports with these three than there is in his supports with Tana.  Also, please ignore Lyon's corpse behind the curtain.  We don't have time for that tonight.

Anyway, all of this has bothered me for a while, but I'd never really thought of the possibility that there was actually something wrong with Ephraim.  So, I'll be thinking that one over for a while.

All this has made me reconsider the Tana/Ephraim!fail piece I drafted out a while back.  Maybe I will write that one up after all.

Comments

[raphiael]

I'll admit that a lot of my ideas re:Ephraim stem from my feeling that no one comes out of that game unscathed. You don't go from, what was it, 800 years of peace into sudden devastating war (complete with zombies and other hellish beasts) without some kind of consequence. I mean, that can be said for just about any FE, but I just got the feeling that Magvel was more messed up with that massive downeriffic ending. There's no magic Lyon revival, no amazing miracle that saves Grado from doom, and there's no way the amazing broship the countries had before the war is going to remain completely intact. I mean, there isn't a whole lot to back it up (rated E for Everyone, after all), but his chilliness toward Tana and indifference, save for a physical attraction, to L'Arachel, are both things I put toward that for Ephraim.

Even putting Lyon and all his possession antics aside, which are probably enough to royally mess with a guy, I think Orson's madness may have also had an impact on Ephraim, to an extent. Presumably, he was someone Ephraim trusted, given he was taken along with two close friends in his guerilla escapades. Being betrayed by him and then finding out it was for a talking corpse-wife? And then having to deal with said corpse wife? Uhhh yeah, that might screw a bit with your perception of love.

But again. As far as canon goes, Ephraim just goes on to be a super awesome king, and all that.

[mark-asphodel.livejournal.com]

but I just got the feeling that Magvel was more messed up with that massive downeriffic ending

Mm... I think Archanea pretty inarguably wins the "most messed-up" sweepstakes. The war there lasted about ten years, all told, with a tiny break during 606, and at least five of the seven main countries are canonically described as "devastated," ruined, annihilated, and so on. (Also, Archanea appears to be have been a supremely crappy place to start with-- definitely the least desirable FE continent to be beamed into.) And the FE3 ending is definitely a downer compared with the endings pf FE2 and FE4 (5 is a bit different, since you can argue it didn't actually happen). Actually, one of the alternate endings in FE3 is the absolute worst ending in FE that I'm aware of-- not as bad as Chapter 5 of FE4,but seriously not good :/

But-- and this is my sincere opinion-- FE3 was essentially recycled as FE8. Yeah, the dark critters come outta FE2, but the underlying story, point for point, is Monshou no Nazo all the way. FE8's strengths lie in all the subtle things, the characterizations and the little nuances, and yeah that's all new. But the basic foundations of it aren't. And while FE8 introduces some spectacularly dark new things, some of the darker moments again (IMO) have reference points in the earlier game.

Uhh yeah, that might screw a bit with your perception of love.

I'd always thought of that more in terms of its impact of Seth, but you do make an excellent point.

As far as canon goes, Ephraim just goes on to be a super awesome king, and all that.

It doesn't say he's happy, though. Says that for Eirika, but not for her brother.

Anyway, your ideas interest me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.

[raphiael]

Oh no, it's certainly not the most messed up. I'd never stopped playing a game out of sheer distress before I got to chapter five of Seisen, for example. (Actually wait, that isn't true, I stopped FF7 at one point because Sephiroth scared the crap out of me. But that's a different sort of distress.) Can't really speak for Archanea, overall, but from what I've seen/read, I absolutely see the parallels, no question about it, even as a noob to the whole thing.

Yeah, Seth is definitely up there on the messed-up list, after everything. Which is probably why the ~perfect knight~ idea irks me.

Pfffft my ideas are founded largely on sleep deprivation.

[mark-asphodel.livejournal.com]

But that's a different sort of distress.

HEH!

(Oh yeah-- you asked somewhere else if FE3 was rendered unplayable by time. Nope. I think of the Japan-only games, only FE1 is unplayable, as 2 received a nice new translation recently. And if you play 11, you don't really need to play 1 unless you really want to LOL at the NES graphics.)

Which is probably why the ~perfect knight~ idea irks me.

Dunno if you've shared notes with Myaru yet, but she's in this camp as well.

I had something else I wanted to tell you re: your FE8 ideas, but I managed to forget it in the night. I'll probably remember when I'm driving down the freeway or something...

[raphiael]

Ah, excellent. I just set up the NES emulator on my PSP, so I'll probably give it a go when I finish the few I'm partway through, as I'm curious about the comparisons now.

Myaru and I are on the same page about so many things that it isn't even funny. I can't even describe how happy I was with her Lucius fic, given that most of the stuff out there for him is just. . . dreadful.

Pfff I can see it now -- "okay here's the exi-- ZOMG, IT WAS ABOUT GHEB!"