I like the theory that Sylvanas' last line is "Cannot let him reach the... [Sunwell]" as that was likely her last thought before her soul was splintered.
Imagine when she wakes up, she momentarily lost her memory, and reacts with everyone like when she was still alive. And everyone remembers how she was before, and only gradually does she remember the things she's done since Arthas killed her
@@GuardianOfMoon Having recently done the belf heritage questline, I was amazed as to how I didn't see the parallel between Arthas seige of Quel'thalas and Sylvanas attack on Teldrassil.
This. I don't think Sylvanas knows where she is or what's happening any more after the soul-chuck. She's back in that nice field of tulips in front of Silvermoon from the Warbringers cinematic. Perhaps, as she sees it, she's fatally wounded and is giving a last order to her rangers. But it's nicely ambiguous.
I think you're missing the obvious explanation why Sylvanas was surprised, she actually just couldn't understand a word the jailer said and put her own interpretation into everything.
Sylvanas couldn't understand the Jailer (?) no really? xD I guess this must have been her Karma speaking. She was "beyond understanding" for at least two expansions. And as usual... *the male Chad is always the one in control.* Feminism failed yet again. :D
You can read the compass in two ways - 1) He drops it on purpose to show the way because there's a sliver of himself left inside (your interpretation) or 2) It drops out of his pocket symbolising him leaving behind the last sliver of his true self and becoming completely dominated. I read it the 2nd way but your interpretation is definitely more :) positive and hopeful and we all know we'll save Anduin at the end of the day.
Don't know, I feel like the whole "leave more questions then answers" type of strategy they are doing in cinematics isn't working for WoW when the wait-time for the next patch is so long, especially when it's used as much as they use it. If the next part was a week from now, or even a month maybe two, it wouldn't feel as bad when they leave so many things unanswered (or more maybe more specifically starts a whole bunch of new questions without answering much). But when you leave more questions then answers and then make players wait almost a year, then we are just left with an awful feeling after a cinematic. Shows does this a lot, just look at Disneys latest, Loki. But difference here and why it doesn't feel bad in Loki is cause we know we are getting the next episode next week. And I know very well we can't get next patch in a week or a month, that's not the solution when it comes to game development ofc. I'd say a better solution is (as mentioned in the video early on) to leave us with some more clarity, at the very least on the level with the Argus one, a clear "next objective". Show us it, tell us it or do whatever. In this cinematic, they could have let Sylvanas finish her sentence and at least name the place we don't want the Jailer to reach, or the camera could have followed in a few seconds in the portal, seeing but not knowing anything about what and where we are, just see a quick glimpse of it to hype us. I don't know, there are thousands of options to leave us a little more hype for what is coming, instead of leaving us with "haha, you don't know shit do you?". And hey, even tho' I'm pointing this out as a flaw right now, I'd say sometimes it's even okay to do this type of storytelling. Cause sometimes it benefits a story if you want to surprise the audience on whats next, both in place and action. Doing that every now and then is okay and can be good, but doing it as often as WoW does lately doesn't feel great to a player.
I think the issue here is that *we never got to see Sylvanas' introduction to or descent into her relationship with The Jailer.* We're just asked to believe that a giant hulking shirtless man with all the subtlety and moral ambiguity of a Captain Planet villain was able to convince one of the _(apparently)_ greatest tactical minds and schemers in the Warcraft universe that he could definitely be trusted with borderline infinite power. It's impossible to relate to Sylvanas holding onto the hope that he's definitely a good person, when none of us were even slightly convinced or even able to see why _anyone_ would ever think he was a good person. _(and I don't just mean that rhetorically, ignorance is one of the hardest things for human beings to relate to each other about. if sylvanas is convinced the jailer is a good guy, we NEED to see the deception he used to make her believe that, because if we don't, we just believe she's ignorant of the obvious and the natural end result is "well, if you're ignorant of something that should be obvious and that made you hurt other people, I hate you", no different than an antivaxxer)_
This exactly! It really only makes her look like a giant dumbass. I can't even feel any pity for her since she's genuinely a horrible character morality wise.
see I get that we should learn this, and I think the Sylvanas book is going to dig into her relationship with the jailer, but yes the order is a little wrong.
You're misinterpreting something. She wasn't "convinced", she was coerced/frightened. You can still rightly call it bad & unsatisfying writing, but she "served" because as she said, the system is unfair and there is no free will. You have no choice alive or dead as a soul in the Shadowlands. Remember one of the ealier cinematics? She was about to say "You can't even choose who you […]" and that missing part was "serve" (even though many people thought it would be "love" for some reason), as she looked right at Zovaal. The jailer, Zovaal, was about to break that system and change that. The "Life/Death mechanism arc" is over and brought to completion. That's why she's free to oppose him now.
I don't disagree with anything you say. I just wonder what role the missing half of Sylvanas the jailer returned to her will play. I feel like that isn't going to be used to hand wave away much of the criticism & that seems very unfortunate.
@@laurennightingale4752 It reminds me a bit of TBC, where Illidan was out of character and it was years later thanks to book retcons that Blizzard were able to align his character arc again. To be honest, it _kind of_ feels like some of that retroactive continuity might've already been happening with Sylvanas. I have no claim over how far Blizzard do or don't write ahead _(aside from the pretty safe guess that no, they did not have the Jailer plot thought out from the moment she jumped off Icecrown)_ , I just think it's felt odd how she went from _"I have valid tactical reasons for starting this morally grey war, rooted in my mistrust of others and pragmatism"_ to *"BURN IT"* to _"Nah I just wanted to kill people lol, so I could help the jailer, this is part of my master plan"_ to _"Wait part of my soul was missing so those character breaks were due to my actual character being broken, sorry, and no I didn't really have a plan, whoops my bad"_ I will say that I don't think anything about her arc _inherently_ is out of character for her, so I think it is ultimately a matter of execution that has made it _feel_ this way.
Based on another comment: The Jailer (Who we don't really know much about but don't worry) Got all the sigils (Which we don't really know much about but don't worry) to open the way (We don't really understand how, but don't worry) to the Sepulcher of the First Ones (Who we don't really know about, but don't worry) to utilize some First Ones technology (Which we don't know anything about, but don't worry) to unmake reality (We have no idea what this means or what that entails, but don't worry)
Bro this shit is boring af. Blizz should just hire some random dude off the streets to write the story, I'm sure the end result would be at least 10 times better than this drivel.
I'll add some how or when the Arbiter (Who we don't really know much about but don't worry) was constructed and what was really that red beam/soul that caused her to stop working (which we don't know much about but don't worry)
After watching it the first time my first thought was "There has to be something I'm missing or not remembering". After having you lay out all the info I forgot about it made more sense. They've been building up her story for so long, and keep being subtle and secretive about everything, that it seems like a story thats better to read once its all out. I know comics and movies do the same thing essentially with giving out story bits by bit over a long period of time, its just not something I'm really use to in Wow yet. Like in One Piece, its been running for about 20 years now and will leave plot points dangling for over 5 years at a time before they get back to them. But I'm just use to it after reading it for so long so it doesn't bother me none. Hell after 20 years we still dont actually know what the One Piece is, even though its the name sake of the series. In Wow this is the first time they've tried to tell a story that spans multiple expansions. They started the hint drops in Legion, which was in 2016, 5 years ago. And then all of BfA was basically just setting up her story for Shadowlands. I think people are just use to stories largely being contained to an expansion, and this is new territory with storytelling.
lmao no FF14 does multiple expansion spanning plots and as someone who only started playing that game a month ago after playing WoW since BC, I have no problem "getting used" to longer spanning storylines as long as they arent actually total garbage, so keep digging more to defend your neo-WoW.
oh btw, have you done another video about how "toxic" negativity in the WoW community is? You've only done 3 videos on that one same topic this year, keep em coming! you'll get those mindless consoomer upvotes guaranteed!
Just look at america today. No matter which side you're on, they're absolutely certain that about half the country are mindlessly following an awful person who lies constantly. And at least half of them are right. That's ENTIRELY realistic.
@@daniellucas5522 There is a big diff between Sylvanas and amarica. She was never born into it, she died to the The lich king (jailers puppet) and she had no reason to listen and believe him. Think of it like an alien came to earth and started murdering everybody and you get killed trying to defend earth, but the alien ress you and mindcontrol you. after some time you break free from the mindcontrol and get your revenge (sylv and lichking story), just to find you there is a bigger and more powerfull Super saiyan alien, that made the first alien. Is there in any way you could see yourself trust the new super alien?
@@WelwerrinDrakx If they had very strong evidence that they weren't murdering people, but freeing them from a matrix like existence. Which he did. You're looking at this all from a very simple "killing people bad" idea which is true irl but not even close to always true in a world with an eternal afterlife.
she knew there is a chance he is lying but because her soul was damned and she hated life so much she still took his offer. he also gave her a ton of power and that boosted her confidence in their plan. only when he revealed he wants a reality where all will serve him it triggered her. she was so selfish and evil that she took that chance just to destroy current reality
Blizzard needs to stop trying to shock or be mysterious with the story. They need to take a class on exposition. They can't create epic moments unearned. They have to build up to them. For this to work they needed to explicitly show us the journey Sylvanas took to be persuaded by the Jailor. They can't just leave that blank for us to fill in because it makes her look really foolish. Since we know from the start that the Jailor was bad news and it seems incredibly obvious from our perspective. They don't actually show us enough for us to really see it from her perspective. Sure there are clues all along, and with the benefit of hindsight you can cobble them together into a coherent story, but if most of the viewers don't get it, I think it's clear that they need to do more to explain their story beats.
It's not that people don't get, most people just don't buy it. If blizzard wants to show someone tricking one of the oldest and most experient spy Master in the game, they better make a villain that is even more dishonest, charismatic and complex than Zovaal.
Well said. I expected Sylvanas to turn on the Jailer eventually but not like this. Her timing and the way she did it is stupid to say the least. A better way to present her having second thoughts without blowing her cover would be if she, not Anduin, dropped the compass in order to give us another shot at stopping Zovaal. It feels more forced than earned the way its presented here.
Sylvanas: "the jailor will give us real freedom"; Jailor: "every soul must do something specific and predefined"; Sylvanas: "now that's sounds nice, innit?"
What he says is never important. What matters is how the star of the show reacts and responds. And that person is Sylvannas. And Blizzard will never let her go.
24:26 THE COMPASS - possible interpretations. There is something that you might have missed that casts a very different light. (Both interpretations are plausible.) When Anduin dropped the compass, you took that as a positive sign of him doing it deliberately as a breadcrumb sort of thing, as a sign that he's still in there trying to stop all this. But it could also be seen as a contrast to ARTHAS, who after all still kept Jaina's locket. So it could be seen as him losing his last bit of humanity, more than even the Lich King did.
I don't think that's gonna be the case. We're going to save Anduin in the end. Arthas was turned into Lich King because of his own choices, he walked the path he laid for himself. Anduin was forced and is now a slave basically, it was Sylvanas' choice to make him their puppet. I don't think Blizz would go and make him a lost cause, when all that happened to him wasn't his choice to begin with. We also saw him struggling, regaining himself even if for a second, after he took down the whatever-her-name Kyrian leader. I expect him to have a Jessica Jones moment, when eventually he breaks free from the domination. Maybe the compass will be the key. Maybe his father's soul will be. Dunno, we'll see.....
@@roninjustin not sure. But there are hints of another realm not shown in the cosmology chart, and time is the only major force not represented in that chart. But I'm willing to see how it plays out without insisting on predicting it.
@@cappm4201 question just comes to my mind What would be then the opposite of time Fel - arcane Void - light etc. Then time should also have it counterpart, right?
I have no investment at all in the Jailer as a villain. We have no real idea what his motivations are and, in fact, the only motivations we ever really see are those of the people under him. On top of that, the Jailer never "wins" because he never competes. He always turns up from nowhere, does a deus ex machina, then immediately fades into the shadows with whatever he was after. We spend all of our time fighting the Jailer's forces in the Maw but there is no connection between the success or failure of the Jailer's forces and the Jailer himself. The two may as well not be related to each other at all. His forces are just there to give us something to do while we wait for him to get around to the next deus ex machina. Which all just wraps around to: We don't have any interaction with the Jailer. We're just an audience to him doing whatever he wants. I like it when villains occasionally win. It establishes stakes and makes us take them more seriously next time. The problem is, it doesn't feel like we ever fought the Jailer to have lost. We weren't mercilessly beaten back, we weren't tactically out-maneuvered and we didn't narrowly let victory slip from us after fighting/racing ferociously. We just turned up, were told we lost and then sent back home. Nothing we've done contributed in any way to the outcome.
This is a sentiment that I've had about the whole of Shadowlands. I have no idea what we, the heroes, have actually accomplished this entire expansion. We fight and fight and fight and, as you said, the Jailer shows up and tells us we've lost. I don't feel like I've accomplished anything in the 7-8 months I've played this expansion. Every step we take in defeating the Jailer is matched with the Jailer taking a step as well. Because of that, we never get closer in our goal. And my issue with Sylvanas is that I can buy everything that he has said about her motivations in Shadowlands. The issue is that we can't judge her solely on Shadowlands. Sylvanas's writer specifically said that Sylvanas's motivation has been the same since the Fall of the Lich King. That means that since the 1st time she has been to the Shadowlands, Sylvanas has been on this quest to get everybody united in Death. Destruction of Gilneas, Night Elf Genocide, having her own people slaughtered has ALL been at the command of the Jailer. So the idea of 'I'll never serve' is stupid when that is what she has been doing since forever.
@@sweetsleeperagent I 100% agree with you good human being and you one a heavy finger on that Sylvannas plot point, some people know and recognize about it but that everyone is trying to justify the "change" and those "moments" where Sylvannas seems to care about others and the part where she was supposed to have her soul split shenanigans when she died by frostmourne is like BS. Just be consistent Blizz have Sylvannas be Ruthless or an Anti-Hero or something that defines her as a good character, if I'm honest I don't remember Frostmourne having the capacity to fragment souls just to steal them whole Blizz relies too much on Deus Ex Machinas to progress the story or maybe I'm wrong at this point IDK anymore,. Now I understand why WotLK was the best of the best of WoW because they had good foundations on the previous game to make that happened. After that expansion I think they didn't know what to do and the cycle for them of 2 years is not enough to create a solid story to keep going on to the future. Sorry for the long complain and correct me if I'm wrong open, calm and smart discussions are always welcome.
@@CBenMar I just disagree I feel like the story is just a continous plot that slowly unveils more nd more as it goes on and sometimes that let's us understand things we had no way of knowing.
So long story short: Sylvanas has visited the barber shop, got her blue high elf eyes back but didn’t have enough gold for skin tone or hair colour. Any thoughts on her new transmog?
I think it would be nicer if the Jailer brought her back to life to her whole non vengeful high elf form again. It would not only freak her out but bring a whole horizon of opportunities to develop the story
@@marcoprezotto honestly I wouldnt be surprised if the way they remove her is her staying behind to help clean up her mess because her shame but basically pulling a illithan and sharing an apology that she expects not to be compelted accepted as she knows she doesnt completely deserve it, probably will fun when she talks with the elf the most angry at her.
It is simply a gesture supporting the following statement. She knows she can do nothing except making a choice, the very thing that she ultimately stands for. Ultimately is the most important part of it, because only once the goal is reached, all the horrible stuff that served towards reaching it will be worth it and/or erased. So as long as the goal remains reachable, every action and decision made that gets her closer to that goal is acceptable. That's the mentality.
@@nightfan1983 poor example. Games, and shows throughout time has the lesser being use powers given by the greater being to defeat the greater being. Your logic is flawed sir.
Great analysis. You said a lot of the things I've been saying. I'd just add 2 things: 1. The portal has a fractal design, which a new ingame book mentions the First Ones are way into. 2. Loremasters like us may have picked up on all these details. But I do think the cinematic really suffered from the mystery Blizz keeps creating about Sylvanas' motivation and what the Jailer promised her.
This. The big problem I have with this cinematic is the meaning and reasoning is -too- hidden. 85% of the playerbase isn't going to understand the nuances here.
The portal design kinda reminded my about some broker stuff, especially in Tazavesh. The design made me think especially of the last boss with the lines shooting away from the stars in the second phase. So I am kinda unsure if those stars are actually somehow related to the broker, which would kinda mean the Jailor has some connection to them, or maybe they did outright steal from the Jailors home plane. Which, honestly, would fit them quite well and would be hilarious.
It's not really a mystery but rather a retcon. We knew Sylvanas' motivations in Legion and in BfA because they were revealed to us through inner monlogue in both Before the Storm and the Three Sisters comic (which also revealed to us that she wants everyone to *serve* her in undeath). Blizzard just decided on a whim that Sylvanas motivations should be something else entirely and then did it. You can't really care about "mysteries" in a universe where characters constantly get rewritten to be a completely different person.
I assume this class will farm boots of travel and a blink dagger and be all around very annoying to deal with in pvp. Also you might want to bring some true strike items
@@russianpwnage If you don't like it, then don't play it or watch things about it. Simple fix to a simple problem. And by simple problem, I mean you, bud. You're both simple and a problem. Only explaining because you're probably too much of a simpleton to understand that.
My thoughts: It’s really fun to watch Raiders of the Lost Ark and see the story happen around Indy while nothing he does stops anything from happening. But it sucks being Indy in that scenario. I feel like we’ve been Indy since the end of Legion.
At least DW got to the point he could be KSed thanks to our efforts. Since Legion though it just feels like the over arching plots have had fuckola to do with our efforts.
Raiders of the Lost Ark may be unique among movies. It’s the only one I can think of where the hero defeats the bad guys by literally closing his eyes and turning away.
It goes along with how everyone gets mad at **everything** Blizzard does. I guarantee you that, no matter what happens to Sylvanas in the end, there will be people screaming about it.
@@NinjaFlibble Because it is awful. Last xpac was bad writing but this one makes her full stupid for full stupid sake. She has the intelligence of plot.
Blizz needs to stop with the whole being secret about what's happening next. It worked for bfa because we didn't know what was happening with Sylvanis. But I agree we needed an argus in the sky. Especially when you have a villain who wants to reset the whole universe.
Being a secret what happens next isn't the problem, it's that there's literally no pay off because it's not even a fleshed out story to begin with. Ending an expansion on a cliff hanger can and has worked as long as there's internal logical consistency. It's illogical that we haven't returned to our factions to keep them in the loop as to what is happening, it's illogical for two faction leaders to just "hangout" in Oribos if they can travel back. How strong is Anduin? We haven't even fought him yet just to get our asses kicked (like a "you lose" fight scripted fight), give us a gauge please Blizzard.
@@DisappointedBuddha Yeah i agree here. His affinity over the light to heal everyone was so great that he did it to a whole army in the BFA cinematic. Why not show us how he can drain the life out of an entire army and be like the Lich King on steroids or something, and show how the Jailer is even more powerful than that?
@@fraser7211 or just have a mission where Jaina or Baine ask you to inform the leaders of the your respective faction. For the alliance, there's a cutscene that plays showing Turalyons dogmatism bulling the alliance leaders to take actions they don't want. Velen is incredibly concerned. Shaw tells you that 2 years have passed since you entered the Shadowlands. An emissary from the Dark Portal has arrived, clad in gold and light, willing to help Turalyon with eliminating the new Cult of the Damned threat. They request you hurry with your Shadowlands conflict and return before everything goes tits up. Bolvar held this information from you because the Jailer is the bigger threat and this knowledge would have distracted you. That's off the top of my head
They have been very explicit that time in the SL flows exactly like time in Azeroth, which is supposed to be more or less like time in real life. That is, it has been about 6 months since we first left Azeroth and created the portals between Azeroth and Oribos.
Many players are still angry at Sylvanas and want vengeance for all the heinous actions she has done. But it was pretty much confirmed that she is getting an "redemption" arc, making a lot of players feel frustrated. They are basically doing another Kerrigan. Add onto this the fact that after years we still don't know Sylvanas motivations, her relationship to the jailor or the jailors ultimate goal. Just more vague shit and more cliff hangers.
@@julieramsey1017 she needs to be as ash in torgash. Her story should have ended in woltk and not been forced to be relevant as they were trying to do but because she is thicc and been popular because necrophilia (idk).
idk, Arthas managed to hold onto all his trinkets that reminded him of people until the day he died. Anduin drops his compass like a couple weeks into being evil.
@@Gcsmith12 well you're right, he wasn't dominated but replaced with an evil version of him who wanted to rid himself of his ties to humanity going far gas as to cut out his own heart, but not throw away things that reminded him of jaina and others. However anduin has broken free when exactly?
@@EsotericSanity the first time he goes to get a key (i havent played in forever so idr what place it was; the one with the angels) when he kills their leader he breaks free for a second. theres also a lot of indicators that the sword he has has arthas' soul in it, like how frostmourne was made with a soul in it (though idk if we know whose soul that was?)
@@lucasdude she lives. It seems more like he's possessed by Zovaal who after does the deed himself through Anduin, leaves the body and then turns it on auto-pilot and we just see Anduin in between this.
The least talked about thing in the cinematic is probably the most important. He gave her back her soul, from a crystal, the kind he put into kingsmourne, one would assume some soul was put into frostmourne as well. But who was the soul that went into kingsmourne? And if your answer isn't arthas, you are fooling yourself.
@@slymcfly123 We know that the very use of Frostmourne also splits the soul. It is why Arthas lost himself the moment he took up Frostmourne. We also know the Jailor has a vault of souls and fractured souls that would be useful to him that he has been hoarding since forever. If he intended Arthas to claim Frostmourne from the beginning he would absolutely hoard his soul for some future purpose.
@@MrUltracet he was making bad decisions and going down a dark path but he was still himself until he picked up Frostmourne and lost part of himself to it. It’s described in the book.
One other thing. In the No More Lies cinematic she kept using words like "WE" and "OUR" when referring to what her and Zovaal were up to. Also when she informed Zovaal of what happened to Denathrius, asked "What's 'OUR' plan" about freeing him. Then of course in the raid cinematic she told Zovaal "WE" already have what "WE" need. People keep dumping on the line "I will never serve" and saying she's dumb and already has been, but it's obvious that she truly feels as if they were partners in this plan, until as you said she can no longer ignore what's going on.
"... it's obvious that she truly feels as if they were partners in this plan, ..." That's the dumb part. You spelled it out. Of all people, she should know better than to think that.
@@harbhub Why? Do you know what Zovaal told her? It's obvious by her speech to Anduin and Denathrius's speech to Renathal that he lied to her about his intentions, so why wouldn't he lie about her seat at the table? You think a manipulator is just gonna half ass their manipulation tactics?
@@harbhub I mean, maybe, yeah, but I think there’s an argument to be made that it’s Sylvanas’s arrogance leading her to believe she’s partnered with the Jailer rather than just his tool. Certain of her own cunning and all that.
I wonder how Calia Menethil is going to factor into this. I know that's odd, but why else have her conveniently in Orobos with a defeated Sylvanas? Perhaps Calia's story might lead to an interaction that would help explain Sylvanas's story and the arbiters judgment.
You know what? I legit forgot Sylvanas was the one who killed Calia.. probably because it really hasn’t been talked about in game since it happened lol
It'll be interesting to see how Calia interacts with Sylvanas after she was technically killed by Sylv's orders. Further complicated by the 'fully restored' Sylv potentially battling with the guilt of her split-soul actions.
Re: Your early point about movies being good when not knowing what's happening next: I think that it's actually closer to what you're saying about Argus. Stories are best when we have an idea of what's gunna happen next but discovering the details are what's fun, with the occasional subversion of those expectations to keep things from getting predictable
A part of the story is missing - how and why did Sylvannas become convinced that a shirtless giant with a gaping chest wound was the right guy to remake reality and free everyone from the shackles of life and death? I don't have an issue with the idea that she was convinced but... Without that information, it just feels like the writers decided this was the story and are asking us to just accept this maddening descent into obvious hypocrisy at face value. It does not feel like a genuine development for Sylvannas, who is portrayed in the past as the most skeptical and ruthlessly intelligent character in any room she occupies. I could even accept that she only joined the Jailor because he offered to return her soul chunk to her if she helped him. She probably thought she could extract herself from the deal after getting her soul long before she would have to do anything too unsavory. But no, we are not even given that kind of selfish justification.
If I had to guess, before seeing her book...because he was the first and only choice she had when ending up in the Maw after flinging herself off of ICC. At that point her choices were...go with the plan or suffer forever in the Maw. Can't really blame her for going along with it.
Well because you have to remember when she contacted him : After she killed herself at the end of Wrath of the Lich King. Even though the Jailer wasn't described yet she jump from Icecrown Citadel, dies and arrives in what is now known as The Maw, where she feels only pain, torture, and horror. And that scares the hell out of her. Then she meet the Valkyrs and presumably the Jailer. So this one actually started to work with her by saving her, offering her a way to return to the world of the living. And another thing he offered her : A goal. Because she had nothing to do anymore, and thats exactly why she killed herself. And remember that she never properly met him before Shadowlands, and when she did and started to see the "little" problems with his plan, she was already far too engaged in the process and the plan. She already had committed mass slaughters, already left the Horde, already killed Saurfang and betrayed all of her old allies. She couldn't return anyway. Even if she had doubts with the Jailer's plan, which had surely no problem to manipulate her by explaining his plan to reshape reality, she couldn't do much.
@@Brby1 they are not saying that the jailer is going to the sunwell. The last thing that part of sylvanas' soul remembers before it was locked away is arthas killing her before marching to the sunwell. So in a state of confusion and near-blacked outness she merges the two images of zovaal and arthas (as both are bad guys of death trying to reach something). Its not about the jailer going to the sunwell, but sylvanas' soul reliving her death and how it has parallels to the situation now.
I think it's tough to argue a villain has come into his own when we don't really understand his motivations or perspective; all we know is he wants to destroy reality cuz he doesn't like it much. That's a pale shadow of the Lich King.
Can't say Lich King has had much depth exactly. He wanted to kill and raise everyone on Azeroth...why, exactly? Like, the characters who became Lich King had some interesting stories, sure, but Lich King, within the game is...saturday cartoon villain. Haha, I will kill everyone because I am evil! Zovaal's bitterness fostered during his imprisonment, and his need for control are more than the Lich King got. Even Illidan and Kael'thas, as butchered as they were during TBC, had their own twisted version of seeing themselves as heroes. But the Lich King is just...evil...because... Arthas and Ner'zhul are tragic characters, but their stories culminated in losing themselves to the entity of the Lich King.
They made an *old God* a fucking joke of a villan last expansion. I can guarentee you the end with the jailer will be anticlimactic so we can move on to a new big bad for next expansion. Whole thing reminds me of the show supernatural and how it had an insane amount of seasons and the show would just keep ramping up every season. And eventually the show ended a season involving *God* *Lucifer* and *darkness* almost wiping out reality. Good time to end right? no they end the episode with sam getting shot thinking that will leave us with anticipation of 'will he survive?!'. The motherfucker is bff with GOD. SMH. Some things just don't know when to quit.....can't wait for wow's next expansion and which previous expansions will be retconned for it.
Personally, I was disappointed by the cinematic. "You lose, again" was not something I was keen on seeing (comparing to previous storyline in the patch). That doesn't mean a complete victory was in order, of course not. But in the mentioned Legion cinematic, we managed "something". Here, we are given more and more serving of the bitter ash of defeat, and we are going to be dining on it for months to come. Here, we may as well not have been there; the outcome would've been the same (apart from being privy to Patty Mattson's voice work; I may dislike Sylvanas, but I will never deny she is voiced awesomely). It feels like there is zero sattisfaction in it (apart from possible purple pixel loot, but I am currently not raiding, alas). And I really, REALLY worry that they are setting Sylvanas up to be Kerrigan 2.0. Honestly, though, I do not know how I would've made it "better". I am not a major gaming company story writer (and I don't even know what it entails - one thing is to write a story, another one is to write a game story and yet another one, a good story for a game). I just know that this left me feeling... Disappointed. I am glad I saw this video, though. Prior to it, one of my complaints about it all was "was Sylvanas so oblivious to what Jailer and his forces were doing to souls, ALL souls - and how was his treatement of Anduin not a dead giveaway already?", but... The explanation given here was spot on. People deny, lie to themselves and convince themselves to high heavens and back, to keep the facade of their preffered reality intact. It is visible in both current day and history books. It makes quite a lot of sense that someone like Sylvanas would suffer from the very same.
I'm glad somebody mentioned this. It actually truly pissed me off how we have almost never lost a fight with a big baddy when it came down to a raid boss. But we fight Sylvanas, and this is quite possibly the very first time we have ever 100%, truly LOST the battle. The first time the adventurers could not defeat the villain. That pisses me off. That's the one thing you never do. It erases the whole point of the raid. It tells us that we came here for nothing, and that the power of our own characters cannot be trusted over that of the waifu of Blizzard, and by extension, whatever other shitty plot they intend to forge.
Nothing in wow’s story feels solid anymore. They’ve made everything in the story feel so ambiguous and nihilistic, that it may as well not exist. You can’t even be sure of what to believe by reading the chronicles because it was written from “titans’ POV”. Story is all about cliffhangers and surprise material in wow...
The different perspectives are what makes this interesting. The story has long since legion been set in stone that all cosmic powers are selfish and none consider us as a priority in the slightest while they fight over our planet's soul.
I kind of like the way they are doing things, we are figuring things out AT THE SAME TIME the characters are figuring out. Does it make for the best story telling? No definitely not in the release schedule its been going at, but when it's over and we make alts and binge through it it will more or less (I HOPE) feel right.
>does it make for the best storytelling? no uhh, then why defend it? Are we playing the expansion and experiencing the story now or are we experiencing it when 10.0 has launched? what a bizarre argument
Remember when Chronicles were advertised as the DEFINITIVE lore only fot them to come around like two years later and say they they are just the Titan POV? These writers do not want to be constrained by anything, because they don't have the creativity to work within established rules.
@@huslainemaxwell9866 I said that's why I like it. You don't have to agree. Gee, it's almost like we are 2 completely different people. 🤔 hmmmmmmm odd And its almost like we ARE experiencing it now. Just in fragmented parts. Almost like some other popular mmo out there during their expac updates... hmmm (ffxiv)
guarantee everyone saying they can't hear what he's saying didn't watch it in game, and is instead on a cellphone in a bathroom stall looking for something to watch
@@hironobu64 AAAAHAHAHAHAAA 🤣 when you are sitting on the toilet and think that Silvanas has some digestive problems until you realise the strange noises come out of YOUR ass 🤣
For me, I'm just really tired of losing and seemingly being stupid. I felt like Sylvanas was an idiot for believing the jailor and doing the 'end justifies the means', but honestly, it's no worse than how stupid and ineffective they have written our characters. "Oh, wait, we lost three sigils and this fourth one is hidden really well, but hey, let's just take it out of it's secure place and run it over to The Jailor so he doesn't have to work to get it!" That was just the latest. Every time someone in game talks about what a great Hero my character is, I think of how stupid and ineffective she actually is in the game. That's one of two big problems for me. The second one is that I'm also tired of ambiguity and evil being the way of it all. The way the world is right now, I need stories where I can believe good exists and triumphs. And if Blizzard and the rest of the community prefers the Game of Thrones style of story telling... maybe I should move on.
24:50 interesting take! i read it as "he has lost his way and is no longer able to find his way back", like a breaking of the final straw. i don't think anduin will actually wind up being dead dead but as a symbol it felt like him being fully out of our reach since his lost his (moral) compass. Then again, he was entirely passive this entire cinematic so i might be way off :D
but why was sylvanas on the jailors side in the first place, again? her downfall was cuz of arthas who was put into place because of the jailor. awkward
indirectly though. We already know the Jailer didn't make arthas do anything, he got corrupted by the power, and made his own decisions. The jailer was responsible in the same way that someone who built a gun that killed someone is.
@@laurennightingale4752 Well, if that gunmaker intended for and hoped that that gun would be used in a mass-murder. The Jailer is banking on Frostmourne leading its bearer down the corrupt path towards his own freedom.
@@abydosianchulac2 its not a perfect metaphor lol, basically Sylvanas agreed with the Jailer's goal of freedom, and understands that Arthas did nothing the Jailer wanted, so in her mind Arthas killing her was against the Jailer's wishes. Ergo, she doesn't blame the Jailer.
From a story-crafting standpoint, I was hoping for more. I wanted to understand more about Sylvanas' motivations and get some moral resolution. That didn't happen. What we came away with was that she finally realized The Jailer was just using her, and that's about it. It's a plot point, but one we've waited an awfully long time for, and so it didn't seem like enough. It's just a turning point for the next act.
So... at the end of the day, what was the bargain Sylvanas did with Helya? Where did the black lantern she wanted to use came from? Despite all of defense Taliesin managed to make for this cinematic, I still can't believe that Sylvanas waited for this moment when Zovaal got what he wanted to act against him, when she indeed must've known he was the one who was behind her death and transformation into a banshee in the first place. Granted, she likely never knew he was holding onto part of her soul, and she somehow wasn't aware Nathanos had been killed off (like she never tried to contact Nathanos since she crossed the broken veil in Icecrown...), but she must've seen Kel'thuzad and all the runes everywhere. Her being all about vengeance (AS her mount description points out), you'd think she would've wanted to take revenge on Zovaal for this.
This is why I like watching these "cinimatic breakdowns". You explain stuff so well that you explain stuff that i was unaware needed expalining. Thats why you have my sub.
thank$ for $ticking up for the poor opre$$ed Kotick Yacht Fund LLC Inc. Im tired of these toxic entitled gamers complaining that one 2 minute cinematic every 8 months doesn't make for an engaging narrative!
That imo is a better conclusion, I doubt it was the inner anduin leaving a bread crumb trail because we wouldn't need that plot wise, we have sylvanas to give us that information.
I find that more likely. Which is a shame, because I hate it when that's part of a storyline. I would have preferred Anduin really getting his mind changed versus mind control to make a character evil. But wow gonna wow.
@@andrewrenshaw2741 lol why not at this point. There was a quest in the Ghostlands Ehre you find a necklace that was gifted to sylvanas when she was still alive, you return it to her and there's a little tearful moment as she remembers being alive, I'd be happy if honestly it was just that, we somehow return anduin to some humanity with a meaningful trinket from his life. Idk
Yeah but no. He didnt lost the path, they forced him to walk that path loosing his mind(conscience) and as someone said in other comment arthas died having jaina's locket and other stuffs. They may use the compass to try to bring him back but using it right now in the cinematic as we lost him now is denying the fact that he is not doing it by himself
I loved it, the detail on the jailer's damaged armor that still shows the wound after the punishment that the other eternals did, I like to think that that arrow fired by Sylvanas was just a gesture of disgust after not receiving what was promised, it had no other intention than to show anger, and I love the detail of making her "mortal" again just for the purpose and waiting for the rest of Azeroth to judge her and end up blinded to death for her crimes. Maybe just to experience death again. Cheers from Chile Tali ❤
Yeah I noticed the same, that he still has this hurt of it being ripped from his chest. I think we will honestly get to how all this has happened in the next patch
A big Gray guy who is basically a god, who's peers strip him of his power, who's powers come off as chains, servitude... possibly order? Who's goes back to his home realm? Who also was never known of before this... expansion? Jyggalag seems like an inspiration at this point
The risk to me is that, following the events in this cinematic, the Primus, the Winter Queen, and the Archon really need to open up and fill us in on Zovaal's identity and history. If we get that payoff, this cinematic will be a wild success to me. If we don't, it'll probably feel crushingly disappointing to me, in the end. Of course, the cinematic itself is extremely well-done and is something Square-Enix and ArenaNet should aspire to. Frankly, cinematics like this seem to be the part of the game Blizzard does best.
Might aswell just do a voice over from Rita Repulsa from Mighty Morphing Power Rangers: - Gaaaah! After ten thousand years I'm free, It's time to conquer earth(Azeroth)! Zovaal simply ain't established as a main villain, even Sylvanas with all her faulty or rediculus writing had more going for her. Given how story tends to be delivered in WoW I unfortunately don't see that change in just a few patches. I'm basicly just dissapointed they have thrown major lore antagonists at us the last few expansions and they have been beaten within a patch(Azshara, N'zoth, Sargeras etc.), just to be replaced with something shallow and poorly established.
I thought it was a good cinematic, a pretty great Sylvanas cinematic, and I agree with pretty much everything you’ve said here. The surprise for me is that it seems I do have something in common with Sylvanas after all. Since BfA pre-launch I’ve been waiting for the game to pay off that investment they worked so hard to get from Alliance players with the pre-xpac quests, especially the night elf players. They made me care a lot, and they made it a gut punch, and yeah, I was 100% invested. I wanted war with the Horde, I wanted to fight for kaldorei lands, I wanted justice for the lives taken on Teldrassil. And we just keep doing other stuff. I’m not in the camp that wants us to kill Horde civilians or even the camp that’s calling for Sylvanas to die - that’s just unrealistic, they’re not going to kill her unless they can give her a heroic death. But I’ve needed that investment to pay off. And whenever someone says that, here comes the chorus of “the story isn’t over yet, there’s going to be something great for nelfs, just shut up and wait” (or the ones who just hate nelf players and double down on the idea that we’ll never get that payoff, or the ones who say we got it in the warfront or with Lordaeron or with that stupid attack in the trolls before they even allied with the Horde and if that didn’t satisfy us then obviously nothing ever will, etc etc, you know how that all goes). I’ve kept waiting. I’ve kept hoping. Honestly it wasn’t this cinematic that was even the breaking point for me, it was the Ardenweald one. There were so many ways they could have accomplished what they needed to with that and shown the strengths and motivations of both Sylvanas and Tyrande, but instead they gave Tyrande another humiliating defeat and Sylvanas more snark and sass. And if it had happened outside the context of everything that’s come before, it would have been a great cinematic, full stop. But it didn’t. It came on top of every other time that as a night elf player I’ve been psyched for an awesome moment, a story beat that shows night elves are powerful, that we have a meaningful, important place in the story and aren’t just there to be killed and the butt of stupid dev jokes. So instead, it was a great cinematic that finally convinced me the writers don’t care about the kaldorei story and I’m never getting that payoff. And I want so much to believe in the promise, I want so much to believe that I’m going to get that, that the little greyed-out quest name in the quest pop up in your video, “The Power of Night,” slated for who knows when in the future, is almost enough to keep me believing. But not quite. I canceled my sub today. It had just renewed, so I’ve got six months for Blizzard to convince me I’m wrong and that payoff is coming. I hope they will. I’m more sad about canceling than I thought I’d be. I’m still invested in my character and her story - but between the endless grind and a story that feels like the devs are just trolling and laughing…obviously it’s time for me to stop.
replying just to agree and validate the long passionate text you wrote before it inevitably drowns in the sea of other comments because it wasnt written literally 10 minutes after the video got uploaded.
its happened to me when I try to write longer comments and i always get a bit bitter about it when it goes ignored so I felt like doing a good deed today ;^)
What a wholesome thread really. I like that. Have you thought about trying another race? Maybe even try horde just to shake things up completely. If you are not resubbing: take solice in the knowlegde that I haven't had a subscribtion to wow since before the last patch in bfa. Shadowlands is the first expansion I haven't played. But I still watch all Taliesin & Evitel video's and keep up with the story and such. I'm still invested in ways even though I'm not playing
And the Compass is going to be used to Find Anduin , The Jailer will not snap his fingers and half of everyone on Azeroth won't die, they will be in chains like zombies, and we chase Zovall to the Sepulcher on Azeroth and we again loose to him as he is Titan ++, but then wait, every Warcraft Character will join forces and rush to defeat the Jailer and he will lift his hand and say " mrglmrlgmrlgmrlg"!!
As to your remark about the minefield. I have no idea how they are going to reconcile the Tyrande/Sylvanas issue. Despite all this, there is the looming issue of her still committing genocide against an entire race. And their leader wants nothing more than her head. The night elves have very much been getting the short end of the stick and I, and I think a lot of others, believe that there isn't going to be a good resolution here.
Probably something like Anduin saying "if you are going to judge sylvanas, you must judge me for the atrocities I have done under the jailor control" and Bolvar/Jaina/Thrall/Baine/Calia/etc being like "we can't do that Anduin" then Tyrande leaving the alliance or just dissapear into the horizon...
@@marioelias4267 tyrande would rather kill everyone there than leave sylvanas alive, even when malfurion wss kidnapped in legion she said ill kill you if we were too late. She doing the walkaway will be just an out of character for her heck even in bfa was you dont wanna help me? Then im doing it on my own
@@sorrowday838 I mean... I dont have high hopes in the writing at this point, and they are setting up the redemption arc for sylvanas so hard atm that it wouldn't suprise me that them just throw away this whole vengance thing or just have sylvanas helping the night elces souls and be like "yeah, we good now"
Yeah, I've about given up that there's ever going to be any accounting for the destruction of the night elves. It'll probably go down just as mentioned: Anduin will say you can't blame Sylvanas unless you also blame me, the story will say to Tyrande 'if you are a good and reasonable person, you have to accept it and move on because no one's _really_ at fault here, right?' and I just nope. I could - MAYBE - accept forgiving Sylvanas if she really does a huge character turnaround now that she has her full soul again and basically chooses to spend her unlife making amends. But the average fully-ensouled Horde soldier knew what they were doing every step through Ashenvale and Darkshore. I don't need revenge, but I need justice. If that justice comes in the form of the Horde building a new city for the nelfs and worgen, that's fine. But brushing it off as 'Sylvanas was half soulless and the Horde was just following orders so we're cool right' is a big nope.
Great video. Thank you for being such a voice of reason in the midst of a community addicted to outrage no matter what outcome or revelation it receives. Thank you for pointing out the details and the nuance so easily forgotten in explaining how Sylvanas arrived at the decision to show defiance after working under false pretenses or even fooling herself for so long. Thank you for pointing out the bias that leads to so much anger in the community and so eloquently refuting it with concrete evidence and sound logic. Well done!
Yeah, clearly you are someone with low standarts about quality. Blizz taught its audience to consume simplistic, generic and predictable content, there is no hidden logic as you suggest. If anything, Taliesin is the one who is known to be biased towards Blizzard.
Well. I dislike most narratives that hinge on "she is just lying to herself" or "convincing herself she is in the right". To me thats just something to avoid in good storytelling alltogether. This came way too late, was way too predictable and it did not in fact leave me excited, satisfied, interested or happy. The only good thing in this cinematic, for me, is the armor of the jailer. He looks amazing. But honestly I would have loved to see him simply destroy Sylvanas right then and there. Maybe keep her soul-shard with her Yin side safe. So as to not have her completely out of the story. Maybe in a way of "poetic justice" he could have destroyed her in a blast of shadow/death magic like Saurfang. Overall I have only been playing this for 15 years so its not like I would like to be invested or anything. The Sylvanas storyline for me has always been kind of eh. It doesn't excite me. Its too predictable. "Oh my god we get a new Sylvanas cinematic!" - "Great, she will say something edgy, refuse to see reason, and team rocket away with her 999999 IQ plays." Its not in fact fun. Then again I don't read the books, I just play the game. So my interest is purely based on in-game storytelling. Which is a shame that the context apparantly is "in the books"...
When you play Tazavesh, the final boss uses a Relic of the First Ones that have that same glowing gold latticework spell effect as Zovaal's portal. I don't think we're going to Zovaal's original zone, I think we're going to the Sepulcher of the First Ones that gets mentioned here and there in the lore. Specifically, I think this is the Sepulcher that the Primus mentions in the Maldraxxus leveling quests.
Personally, it makes enough sense to me- Sylvanas has been desperately trying to grasp onto control since Arthas killed her and then even more so once seeing what would happen to her when she died. Allying herself with the being that would be in control of her eternal torture in the Maw makes a lot of sense- she figured staying on Zovaal’s good side was her only real chance to avoid that torture. Slowly, though, you can see how she began to question whether or not it was worth it- in the cinematic with Anduin, she’s obviously conflicted but she chooses to follow orders because at least she’s not on the receiving end. Zovaal not giving a shit about Denathrius’ defeat disturbed her a little, but again, it wasn’t /her/ getting thrown aside. In the Battle for Ardenweald cinematic, she’s shocked to hear Nathanos is dead, likely because she was promised that he’d be by her side in the Maw, showing that Zovaal had no qualms with betraying her specifically. When he says all will serve, she can’t convince herself anymore that he sees her as anything else but a pawn, and that’s why she finally snaps out of it. Perhaps she knows attacking him is useless, suicidal even, but maybe she was hoping he’d just destroy her instead of making her kneel as well. We have been getting hints of hesitation and humanity from Sylvanas since WotLK despite the atrocities she has committed and in Shadowlands so far, we’ve seen a LOT of hesitating and questioning. I am disappointed that we didn’t see more of an exponential increase in her uncertainty, we didn’t get to see the discontentment grow every time she felt something was off. We also didn’t get to see what exactly the Jailer promised her (or threatened her with) to get her on his side which I hope we do get a flashback to because it could retroactively make things work a little better.
Great breakdown! I don’t think Craftenium is Zoval’s original covenant though. I think its much more likely it’s the realm where the First Ones crafted reality, crafted the Titans to watch over it, and thus will connect the dots between the world souls, the Light/Void, and the shadowlands. We still haven’t gotten an explanation as to the red beam that disabled the Arbiter that started everything in this expansion, and as the last content drop I think it’ll have to bring the story back around to Azeroth and setup the next expansion. It’s possible Zoval was the first arbiter, began making biased choices of where souls should go and developed his god complex so was replaced by a construct that would objectively follow the First Ones’s wishes.
She should’ve finished her line with, “Don’t let him reach the Sunwell.” to illustrate more clearly where she was mentally, I feel like it would’ve gone a long way towards making this moment feel like a major change in a major character. Since she doesn’t finish the line it can be interpreted that she was trying to warn them about the Jailor, which is idiotic considering she was his ally a few minutes earlier.
I don't think it's idiotic; who knows what happens mentally when part of your severed soul is returned? Maybe it was all the good sense she had as a ranger returned in that shard, and she _was_ trying to warn them. I do really like the Sunwell option, though. I'm just not sure that's where Blizzard was going with it. I'm not one to rag on the story writers much, but the story reveals do tend to be much more straightforward and obvious than the ideas the community thinks up.
I personally have been enjoying shadowlands a lot more than cata and bc. I enjoyed swapping around my covenant and unlocking different legendaries without any rng. There is so much more rngless gameplay that I wanted for this game since I started it and especially the fact we get so many conduits and abilities that I keep swapping and having fun with. But whenever I open any social media platform I keep seeing a chain of negativity and even though I understand their concerns (kinda) I just wanna see people mirror my enjoyment of the game I am having fun with. I actually got a bit depressed and started thinking I may be exhibiting fake enjoyment. You guys remind me that I’m not the insane one here and so far I am just depressed of coming home and having to watch another news show about how the things are like are bad now. You guys are the only ones I have actually been left happy after watching and excited for the next video release! Thank you so much for existing!! P.S sorry if it’s cringey but I really can’t express how glad I am to watch you guys with every upload
hey man im in your boat. life is too short to get mad over somthing i enjoy. even if theres something i dont like storywise, the game itself is and has always been fun for me. It makes me sad hearing people complain nonstop about anything and everything- even people who have no idea what theyre talking about are mad at something that some random youtuber told them to be mad at. sigh. i had to explain to a friend the other day that he could make a new legendary in 2 weeks. he didnt believe me...so i made an extra one today for my main...and now hes complainging about wc3reforged lol(cause that has everything to do w wow). people just want to hate something smh
Tali, you're saying the music when Zovaal regains his OG form sounds clock-like, but taking into account the text about Craftenium (I didn't even know it existed!), it sounds more to me like crafters/blacksmiths. I like the bit in the text about how that covenant is about trapping souls into games of chance (mazes and complex traps/cages I assume?) in order to rid souls of their smug superiority. And if his power is Domination... isn't Domination basically trapping the soul within an empty shell? I find that passage interesting because essentially Zovaal's been doing that in the Maw / Torghast. So I think you're onto something! I'm kind of confused about Craftenium vs Maldraxxus though, and why Zovaal need the Primus to craft the Helm of Domination, for example. Could it be that Craftenium didn't have the know-how to trap souls into objects and make the latter sentient? Because that passage only talks about crafting architecture and cages, so hmm, maybe I'm onto something here haha. BTW, I have a feeling Sylvanas is gonna have to suck it up and get Arthas's help to stop Zovaal. Somehow. I dunno. But it would be an interesting part to her "redemption" arc. (I say redemption loosely, not sure what my opinion is regarding her becoming a goodie)
So the Sylvannas arc is representative of WoW players - we want Warcraft to be good so badly we look past the obvious flaws that Blizzard/Activision KEEP DOUBLING DOWN ON!
You helped me so much enjoy the cinematic x10000. This is so nice. I wasn't a big fan of Sylvanas move but with that I love it. I want to see the next steps. Thank you so much ! I busy with a new born so I can't enjoy the game as I want but thank you for helping me enjoy it from a smartphone ♥️
@@Pironesia " i understand i ruined... so many lives.. all of yours' But if you let me... tell you everything you need to know, free your king, and let me see my Two Sisters one last time... then i will accept whatever punishment you ask of me..." Tyrande: I accept... Genn: as do i... Jaina: I'll allow it. Thrall: ok. Every Forsaken: FUCK YOU.
The way Zovaal is holding up that orb when Sylvanas shoots at him, isn't that also the way the Lich King was holding up Frostmourne as you defeat him in the raid, before tirion hits him?
I just realized they ripped of Thanos. The Jailer went around collecting keys that, when collected, would allow him to remake reality however he chooses. Totally ripped off Thanos.
@@austinm5630 the latter lol, If it makes people feel better Thanos ripped off like 90 other things.... oh who am i kidding that doesnt make anyone feel better... a rip-off is still a rip-off.
i have no hope whatsoever that "A Worldsoul Reborn" aka WoW 2 would not be just as bad if not even worse if the people designing modern WoW are the ones doing it.
The issue with that is that I don't think that works with World of Warcraft. WoW is a "theme park MMO" that kinda perpetuates itself _because_ of its size. Its only real _special_ appeal to fans of the genre is world class dungeon/raiding content. For everyone else, WoW's main appeal is the theme park aspect, the fact that due to all the accretion from previous expansions, there are a bajillion quests to do, gear to get, mounts/transmogs to finish, things to grind, and pet battles to complete, to the point where you can play it for years without needing to play current content. Meanwhile, if you make WoW 2 and start from scratch, the franchise's reputation, something Activision aren't exactly good at preserving, is the _ONLY_ immediate selling point to the casual consumer. Blizzard would need to do something that other MMOs aren't offering _(including WoW and WoW Classic)_ to convince people to jump ship from WoW into a sequel, and if they *still* stick to their purchase + subscription + cash shop model, even that might not be enough. Of course, they could always pull an Overwatch 2 and essentially make a super-expansion for the original game branded as a sequel, but in that case you don't get the presumed advantages that come with a sequel, like being able to finally overhaul the game's foundations.
Well, whatever her motivations were, she still decided to burn Teldrassil and murder thousands of innocents just to spite someone, lol. I simply wish to see her pay for all of her sins, and while I so badly wanted it to be by my hands, I will settle for almost anything at this point. She CANNOT simply be forgiven after all she has done, and I will be pissed if there is any redemption arc for her next patch. She doesn`t deserve redemption, imo.
Sylvanas didn't burn down Teldrassil to spite someone. It had nothing to do with spite, it was orders from the Jailer. She burned it to give him souls.
@@nyezarec No, that is incorrect, proven false by the very cinematic in which it occurred. She had every intention of invading and occupying Teldrassil, she even says as much. She brought the armies and the resources to do so. But upon hearing Dalaryn`s words, chose instead to destroy the tree in an effort to snuff out Dalaryn`s and the Night Elves` hope. Do not replace real canon with headcanon. Sylvanas is a monster in that moment, plain and simple.
It's hard for me to feel bad for her. She's been willfully ignorant this whole time. Glad she got her soul back though I guess. Maybe she'll be less of an asshole. Sorry, I'm still mad about the world tree. 🤷🏻♀️
None needed. A genocide is not something you get over easily, even in fiction. And the absence of that part of her only lessens her responsibility, but it doesn’t come close to absolving her.
So, one has to thing about this, because being an elf, and being the queen of the undead, Sylvanus has a very long game view on things. We have speculated well that she had set on this path at the end of Wrath of the Lich King, when she seeked oblivion, and didn't like where she ended up. She for the next two expansions where she plays parts in the lore (Cataclysm and Legion), she does her best to control the situation, and place everyone into undeath. She starts a new plague to add to her forces, swallowing up Gilnaus. She attempts to get control of the Valkire (Or whatever they are called), and bargains with Hela, to gain control of the passage of the dead, and we mess that up. Part of that struggle we can speculate is driven by fear. She knows what happens after death, to her limited capability, and she doesn't like it. She would rather everyone live in undeath, under her ... well, maybe not compassionate, but under her rule, where they can be free to pursue whatever unlife they want. However, with Greymane destroying the only device that could give her control of the flow of souls, and the bargain with Hela maybe dependent on that, she has only one plan left. One that was set into motion by other schemers well before she reaches that decision point. Her only hope is to change the system, and maybe, just maybe, if she can divert the nature of the Jailer, she might get what she wants. Of course, this works out badly. The cards were against her way before she started her plan, and even now, she might not have given up completely on her plan. She knows that the Heroes, the Maw Walkers, can still get her what she needs. The problem now is that she has her heart back. That part of her that fought for the life of her people. Let us be clear, Sylvanus has always been a protector, even when she was going around killing ranks and ranks of people, soldiers and civilians alike. Her aim moved and got more corrupted, but she always was looking to protect her people. Being given a choice, to not have everything tied to destiny, that is an ultimate freedom, one that was denied her and her people, and one that she is desperate to get. The Jailer did her a service by giving her her other half of her soul back, because she will have more drive than ever before. She's still going to be a selfish. She's still... I mean, if anyone remembers Sylvanus from WC3, she's an arrogant piece of elf to begin with. That'll never change. The question that remains, if she lives through this, is will she have learned any humility to let it go? To let go of the dream, and just concede that she can't have what she wants? The Sylvanus that can let it go would be the ultimate character growth, and a satisfying conclusion to her story arc, and I am kinda excited to see if she lives long enough for us to see that.
Literally this! People seem to forget about the whole her dying in the past and trying to change the aspect of what happens to her in the afterlife. Smartest person alive or not, when a all powerful being tells you a plan to essentially abolish the system that puts her in the unwanted version of her death, then yeah.... you know they have the power to do so, they've given you no reason to doubt them (at that time). Essentially take the offer and see how it plays out. When things arent playing out the way you would like, remember... there is an end goal. Now for her betrayal, yeah.... he literally just spilled the beans that he isnt going to do what he promised. Did we the player know that? Yeah of course no shit we do! We know almost everything going on in the world, that doesnt mean that the actual characters do.
Great analysis as always. I was looking forward to it! What I'm not looking forward to see on the other hand, is how Blizzard will make her "a" victim. What I will hate to see, is her sisters (vereesa to be precise, for being the youngest of the three, ranged general like her sister and having no significant part in the story since Rhonin died) to try to be understanding and all "touchy feely".
“Denying obvious truth to yourself so that what you want to be true can still stay true and doubling down on that if anyone points out that you are wrong”. This is so META I am not sure if he’s talking about Sylvanas and the Jailer or himself and WOW.
The betrayal seems so out of character for her, because it was a heroic moment for a character that is supposed to be cunning. Doesn't it seem like she would play along until she could actually have a chance to stop him? Also, the cinematic did make it seem like she was trying to protect Anduin, Thrall, Jaina, and Bolvar which also seems out of character. I think it's hard to argue otherwise.
Rather than protect them, I think it was more of a "Portal is finally open, let's get to work and not waste any more time on them" and Zovaal's response was a petty child-like "Nah I'm gonna play a bit more"
I didn't go into the cinematic with any expectations and I really enjoyed it. I genuinely was excited while watching it and thought it was very cool. I'm not a "Sylvanas Loyalist" but I've always liked her as a character (despite some of the irrational stuff) and I think "completing" her soul is a necessary development to hopefully make her story more interesting.
I mean Sylvanas can talk a big game about how she thought "the Jailer would set us all free" and how convinced she was of that.. *But his name is The Jailer.*
I think Elune spared Sylvanas life when fighting Tyrande because she knew that the Jailer will get his orb no matter what and maybe she will need her later when Elune is arriving to shadowlands and she will fight Zovaal
I love your enthusiasm, Taliesin, and your extremely detailed analysis of this story. Also, this could almost be a good story. The problem is and has always been from the moment they decided to have Sylvanas be the baddy is that this is not the Sylvanas that I have loved ever since Warcraft III. The Forsaken have always worked in the grey area, where we're not sure if they are working towards good or bad ends. Sylvanas, herself, had plausible storylines like using the Val'kyr to attempt to expand the Forsaken. Is that a completely good thing to do? Obviously not, but it made sense. She also always gave new undead the choice to join the Forsaken willingly. When she was chosen to be the new Horde Warchief it made sense, because she made a noble choice to defend the Horde Leadership against the Burning Legion. Once the writers decided to make her a baddie and she burned down Teldrassil, her choices didn't fit the character that had been portrayed previously. Now, of course, all of the events in BFA have been retconned that she was working with the Jailer all along and that the destruction of Teldrassil and the war campaign was meant to ferry as many souls to the Jailer and bolster his forces. Now, in Shadowlands, Sylvanas has been a pawn of the Jailer the entire time. The way you try to explain her actions by comparing them to the ones that normal humans make in the real world is understandable and I'd agree that it could be a believable story if it wasn't Sylvanas making these choices. If she was selfish this whole time, then why did she even lead the Forsaken in the first place? If she turned more selfish at some point, when did this happen and what made her that way? The obvious answer is that the writers wanted her to be the bad guy so they stumbled making her have unbelievable choices to get reactions out of players. At this point I just want Sylvanas' story wrapped up so we can move on to an entirely new story in the next expansion. Also, you don't think that things have changed now that Sylvanas got the part of her soul back? The writers are obviously setting up that she was only bad this whole time because she was missing that part of her soul and now she will see the errors of her ways just like what happened with Uther. Come on. This isn't rocket science. I like the Shadowlands story overall, I'm just disappointed in the way Sylvanas plays a part in it and I don't see any way the writers could make a satisfying conclusion to her story at this point.
I have a weird theory about this ending. I think after getting her soul back Sylvanas has forgotten everything she has done since Arthas took her soul and the "cannot let him reach the.." comment is her wanting to stop Arthas from reaching Silvermoon. This would reset her character.
So I asked nobble a question I’ll ask you, seeing as how we know those crystals hold souls including us when we go to the maw to save them; we see that the sword that Anduin has had one forged in it who soul do you think that is and do you think that is important
I like the theory that Sylvanas' last line is "Cannot let him reach the... [Sunwell]" as that was likely her last thought before her soul was splintered.
Lets hope she didn't mean Sunwell again or something else, because next year or two players with spend looking for Sepulcher.
Oh damn, there's a powerful parallel I didn't consider!
Imagine when she wakes up, she momentarily lost her memory, and reacts with everyone like when she was still alive. And everyone remembers how she was before, and only gradually does she remember the things she's done since Arthas killed her
@@GuardianOfMoon Having recently done the belf heritage questline, I was amazed as to how I didn't see the parallel between Arthas seige of Quel'thalas and Sylvanas attack on Teldrassil.
This. I don't think Sylvanas knows where she is or what's happening any more after the soul-chuck. She's back in that nice field of tulips in front of Silvermoon from the Warbringers cinematic. Perhaps, as she sees it, she's fatally wounded and is giving a last order to her rangers. But it's nicely ambiguous.
I especially like when the jailer says: "Brhfaufruf brarrfbrofpf ach". Epic!
😆🤣😂😃😄
Music volume: 100%
Speech volume: 10%
Thats how this cinematic felt to me
Best part of the cinematic tbh
Best part!
truanana shada depressure
I think you're missing the obvious explanation why Sylvanas was surprised, she actually just couldn't understand a word the jailer said and put her own interpretation into everything.
Doing what Sargeras was trying to do, only quicker.
Only if she found finally how to turn on subtitles.
Sylvanas couldn't understand the Jailer (?) no really? xD
I guess this must have been her Karma speaking.
She was "beyond understanding" for at least two expansions.
And as usual... *the male Chad is always the one in control.* Feminism failed yet again. :D
Sylvanas: Why the f*** Zooval is talking about serving burritos?
Sylvanas: I’ll never serve
@@marcoprezotto Zovaal: You will serve at my Taco Hut.
The jailer’s voice actor did a very good job, when he sais “Pity” he nailed it.
You can read the compass in two ways - 1) He drops it on purpose to show the way because there's a sliver of himself left inside (your interpretation) or 2) It drops out of his pocket symbolising him leaving behind the last sliver of his true self and becoming completely dominated. I read it the 2nd way but your interpretation is definitely more :) positive and hopeful and we all know we'll save Anduin at the end of the day.
Either way, we'll probably use the compass to track them or something
Regardless, it’s most certainly a callback to Arthas, who always kept Jaina’s locket.
Perhaps there is a Splinter of his Father within it and it will be Varian who shows us the way in the future.
Aye, we're gonna save Anduin just like we saved Arthas :)
Don't know, I feel like the whole "leave more questions then answers" type of strategy they are doing in cinematics isn't working for WoW when the wait-time for the next patch is so long, especially when it's used as much as they use it. If the next part was a week from now, or even a month maybe two, it wouldn't feel as bad when they leave so many things unanswered (or more maybe more specifically starts a whole bunch of new questions without answering much). But when you leave more questions then answers and then make players wait almost a year, then we are just left with an awful feeling after a cinematic. Shows does this a lot, just look at Disneys latest, Loki. But difference here and why it doesn't feel bad in Loki is cause we know we are getting the next episode next week.
And I know very well we can't get next patch in a week or a month, that's not the solution when it comes to game development ofc. I'd say a better solution is (as mentioned in the video early on) to leave us with some more clarity, at the very least on the level with the Argus one, a clear "next objective". Show us it, tell us it or do whatever. In this cinematic, they could have let Sylvanas finish her sentence and at least name the place we don't want the Jailer to reach, or the camera could have followed in a few seconds in the portal, seeing but not knowing anything about what and where we are, just see a quick glimpse of it to hype us. I don't know, there are thousands of options to leave us a little more hype for what is coming, instead of leaving us with "haha, you don't know shit do you?".
And hey, even tho' I'm pointing this out as a flaw right now, I'd say sometimes it's even okay to do this type of storytelling. Cause sometimes it benefits a story if you want to surprise the audience on whats next, both in place and action. Doing that every now and then is okay and can be good, but doing it as often as WoW does lately doesn't feel great to a player.
It would work, but only if the main story was decent and character choices made sense.
@@Lmwpitt The choices make sense...
i agree- still stuff from bfa unexplained....
I absolutely agree!
We know what Sylvanas wanted to say: „the sepulcher of the first ones“ but we don’t know what it is ^^
I think the issue here is that *we never got to see Sylvanas' introduction to or descent into her relationship with The Jailer.* We're just asked to believe that a giant hulking shirtless man with all the subtlety and moral ambiguity of a Captain Planet villain was able to convince one of the _(apparently)_ greatest tactical minds and schemers in the Warcraft universe that he could definitely be trusted with borderline infinite power.
It's impossible to relate to Sylvanas holding onto the hope that he's definitely a good person, when none of us were even slightly convinced or even able to see why _anyone_ would ever think he was a good person.
_(and I don't just mean that rhetorically, ignorance is one of the hardest things for human beings to relate to each other about. if sylvanas is convinced the jailer is a good guy, we NEED to see the deception he used to make her believe that, because if we don't, we just believe she's ignorant of the obvious and the natural end result is "well, if you're ignorant of something that should be obvious and that made you hurt other people, I hate you", no different than an antivaxxer)_
This exactly! It really only makes her look like a giant dumbass. I can't even feel any pity for her since she's genuinely a horrible character morality wise.
see I get that we should learn this, and I think the Sylvanas book is going to dig into her relationship with the jailer, but yes the order is a little wrong.
You're misinterpreting something. She wasn't "convinced", she was coerced/frightened. You can still rightly call it bad & unsatisfying writing, but she "served" because as she said, the system is unfair and there is no free will. You have no choice alive or dead as a soul in the Shadowlands.
Remember one of the ealier cinematics? She was about to say "You can't even choose who you […]" and that missing part was "serve" (even though many people thought it would be "love" for some reason), as she looked right at Zovaal. The jailer, Zovaal, was about to break that system and change that.
The "Life/Death mechanism arc" is over and brought to completion. That's why she's free to oppose him now.
I don't disagree with anything you say.
I just wonder what role the missing half of Sylvanas the jailer returned to her will play. I feel like that isn't going to be used to hand wave away much of the criticism & that seems very unfortunate.
@@laurennightingale4752 It reminds me a bit of TBC, where Illidan was out of character and it was years later thanks to book retcons that Blizzard were able to align his character arc again.
To be honest, it _kind of_ feels like some of that retroactive continuity might've already been happening with Sylvanas. I have no claim over how far Blizzard do or don't write ahead _(aside from the pretty safe guess that no, they did not have the Jailer plot thought out from the moment she jumped off Icecrown)_ , I just think it's felt odd how she went from _"I have valid tactical reasons for starting this morally grey war, rooted in my mistrust of others and pragmatism"_ to *"BURN IT"* to _"Nah I just wanted to kill people lol, so I could help the jailer, this is part of my master plan"_ to _"Wait part of my soul was missing so those character breaks were due to my actual character being broken, sorry, and no I didn't really have a plan, whoops my bad"_
I will say that I don't think anything about her arc _inherently_ is out of character for her, so I think it is ultimately a matter of execution that has made it _feel_ this way.
Based on another comment:
The Jailer (Who we don't really know much about but don't worry) Got all the sigils (Which we don't really know much about but don't worry) to open the way (We don't really understand how, but don't worry) to the Sepulcher of the First Ones (Who we don't really know about, but don't worry) to utilize some First Ones technology (Which we don't know anything about, but don't worry) to unmake reality (We have no idea what this means or what that entails, but don't worry)
He is going to recreate reality so that we can play through patch 9.0 again.
Lol great sum up.
Haha, this comment is awesome. Blizzs approach to the expan reminds of JJ Abrams' shitty "mystery boxes" he likes to throw into things.
Bro this shit is boring af. Blizz should just hire some random dude off the streets to write the story, I'm sure the end result would be at least 10 times better than this drivel.
I'll add some how or when the Arbiter (Who we don't really know much about but don't worry) was constructed and what was really that red beam/soul that caused her to stop working (which we don't know much about but don't worry)
After watching it the first time my first thought was "There has to be something I'm missing or not remembering". After having you lay out all the info I forgot about it made more sense. They've been building up her story for so long, and keep being subtle and secretive about everything, that it seems like a story thats better to read once its all out.
I know comics and movies do the same thing essentially with giving out story bits by bit over a long period of time, its just not something I'm really use to in Wow yet. Like in One Piece, its been running for about 20 years now and will leave plot points dangling for over 5 years at a time before they get back to them. But I'm just use to it after reading it for so long so it doesn't bother me none. Hell after 20 years we still dont actually know what the One Piece is, even though its the name sake of the series.
In Wow this is the first time they've tried to tell a story that spans multiple expansions. They started the hint drops in Legion, which was in 2016, 5 years ago. And then all of BfA was basically just setting up her story for Shadowlands. I think people are just use to stories largely being contained to an expansion, and this is new territory with storytelling.
You read One Piece? That's awesome!
lmao no FF14 does multiple expansion spanning plots and as someone who only started playing that game a month ago after playing WoW since BC, I have no problem "getting used" to longer spanning storylines as long as they arent actually total garbage, so keep digging more to defend your neo-WoW.
oh btw, have you done another video about how "toxic" negativity in the WoW community is? You've only done 3 videos on that one same topic this year, keep em coming! you'll get those mindless consoomer upvotes guaranteed!
@@huslainemaxwell9866 It's pretty incredible that you come to watch this video and walk out of it with this dumpster fire take lol
@@huslainemaxwell9866 This guy needs to calm down
“You mean Lord Murderlife, Grand Torturer of the Pain Dimension wasn’t honest with me?!”
Just look at america today. No matter which side you're on, they're absolutely certain that about half the country are mindlessly following an awful person who lies constantly. And at least half of them are right. That's ENTIRELY realistic.
@@daniellucas5522 There is a big diff between Sylvanas and amarica. She was never born into it, she died to the The lich king (jailers puppet) and she had no reason to listen and believe him.
Think of it like an alien came to earth and started murdering everybody and you get killed trying to defend earth, but the alien ress you and mindcontrol you. after some time you break free from the mindcontrol and get your revenge (sylv and lichking story), just to find you there is a bigger and more powerfull Super saiyan alien, that made the first alien. Is there in any way you could see yourself trust the new super alien?
@@WelwerrinDrakx If they had very strong evidence that they weren't murdering people, but freeing them from a matrix like existence. Which he did.
You're looking at this all from a very simple "killing people bad" idea which is true irl but not even close to always true in a world with an eternal afterlife.
Traitoro was a traitor?!
she knew there is a chance he is lying but because her soul was damned and she hated life so much she still took his offer. he also gave her a ton of power and that boosted her confidence in their plan. only when he revealed he wants a reality where all will serve him it triggered her. she was so selfish and evil that she took that chance just to destroy current reality
I’m not the only one who can’t understand a single thing the jailer says unless I have subtitles turned on lmao!
"Now, Neil.."
I had to turn on subtitles :)
No one would have guessed that he would have something in common with donald duck
TOTALLY my reaction. 1st time around "what did he say?" where are the sub titles ? ah there . Turns on subtitles... so this is what he said.... !!!!!
I am surprised anyone CAN tbh, it's just grumbling lmao which is just as well not like it was much important what he said besides the serving
Blizzard needs to stop trying to shock or be mysterious with the story. They need to take a class on exposition. They can't create epic moments unearned. They have to build up to them. For this to work they needed to explicitly show us the journey Sylvanas took to be persuaded by the Jailor. They can't just leave that blank for us to fill in because it makes her look really foolish. Since we know from the start that the Jailor was bad news and it seems incredibly obvious from our perspective. They don't actually show us enough for us to really see it from her perspective.
Sure there are clues all along, and with the benefit of hindsight you can cobble them together into a coherent story, but if most of the viewers don't get it, I think it's clear that they need to do more to explain their story beats.
Yes! Absolutely.
It's not that people don't get, most people just don't buy it. If blizzard wants to show someone tricking one of the oldest and most experient spy Master in the game, they better make a villain that is even more dishonest, charismatic and complex than Zovaal.
EXACTLY. They make us do the bulk of the work and are genuinely surprised when we don't come to the same conclusions they expected for us. :(
Well said. I expected Sylvanas to turn on the Jailer eventually but not like this. Her timing and the way she did it is stupid to say the least. A better way to present her having second thoughts without blowing her cover would be if she, not Anduin, dropped the compass in order to give us another shot at stopping Zovaal.
It feels more forced than earned the way its presented here.
Oh no no they do you just have to buy all the books. If you were expecting to play a game and get a story from the game itself this isn’t the one.
"what is zoval even saying half the time?" Got me. I watched this cinematic so many times because i couldn't understand him.
i'm glad i'm not the only one who has a hard time understanding him
Turn on subtitles
Haha, I couldnt understand him either. I understood Dustin Hoffman when he played Mumbles in Dick Tracy more than ole Zovy.
@@dscarmo lol if viewers need to turn on subtitles to watch a cinematic, they should look into turning down the effects on his voice.
get off your cellphone, play the game, do the raid
Sylvanas: "the jailor will give us real freedom";
Jailor: "every soul must do something specific and predefined";
Sylvanas: "now that's sounds nice, innit?"
Loki was right.
Jailer
@@bazejkrawczyk7523 I couldn't remember which one it was, at least it is a synonym word xD www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/jailor
when the jailer said 'hfgefjkhdvudfhe' i really felt that
What he says is never important. What matters is how the star of the show reacts and responds. And that person is Sylvannas. And Blizzard will never let her go.
24:26 THE COMPASS - possible interpretations. There is something that you might have missed that casts a very different light. (Both interpretations are plausible.)
When Anduin dropped the compass, you took that as a positive sign of him doing it deliberately as a breadcrumb sort of thing, as a sign that he's still in there trying to stop all this.
But it could also be seen as a contrast to ARTHAS, who after all still kept Jaina's locket. So it could be seen as him losing his last bit of humanity, more than even the Lich King did.
I don't think that's gonna be the case. We're going to save Anduin in the end.
Arthas was turned into Lich King because of his own choices, he walked the path he laid for himself.
Anduin was forced and is now a slave basically, it was Sylvanas' choice to make him their puppet. I don't think Blizz would go and make him a lost cause, when all that happened to him wasn't his choice to begin with.
We also saw him struggling, regaining himself even if for a second, after he took down the whatever-her-name Kyrian leader. I expect him to have a Jessica Jones moment, when eventually he breaks free from the domination. Maybe the compass will be the key. Maybe his father's soul will be. Dunno, we'll see.....
Vh z h
That portal reminds me of the colors of the bronze dragons, and time magic. Just saying.
TIME??? So you agree with the clock stuff? Lol
Also there's a time drake in the mega dungeon
@@roninjustin not sure. But there are hints of another realm not shown in the cosmology chart, and time is the only major force not represented in that chart. But I'm willing to see how it plays out without insisting on predicting it.
@@cappm4201 Also Time would be the perfect power for Ending Reality and starting everything over, just saying... >.>
@@cappm4201 question just comes to my mind
What would be then the opposite of time
Fel - arcane
Void - light etc.
Then time should also have it counterpart, right?
I have no investment at all in the Jailer as a villain. We have no real idea what his motivations are and, in fact, the only motivations we ever really see are those of the people under him. On top of that, the Jailer never "wins" because he never competes. He always turns up from nowhere, does a deus ex machina, then immediately fades into the shadows with whatever he was after. We spend all of our time fighting the Jailer's forces in the Maw but there is no connection between the success or failure of the Jailer's forces and the Jailer himself. The two may as well not be related to each other at all. His forces are just there to give us something to do while we wait for him to get around to the next deus ex machina. Which all just wraps around to: We don't have any interaction with the Jailer. We're just an audience to him doing whatever he wants.
I like it when villains occasionally win. It establishes stakes and makes us take them more seriously next time. The problem is, it doesn't feel like we ever fought the Jailer to have lost. We weren't mercilessly beaten back, we weren't tactically out-maneuvered and we didn't narrowly let victory slip from us after fighting/racing ferociously. We just turned up, were told we lost and then sent back home. Nothing we've done contributed in any way to the outcome.
This is a sentiment that I've had about the whole of Shadowlands. I have no idea what we, the heroes, have actually accomplished this entire expansion. We fight and fight and fight and, as you said, the Jailer shows up and tells us we've lost. I don't feel like I've accomplished anything in the 7-8 months I've played this expansion. Every step we take in defeating the Jailer is matched with the Jailer taking a step as well. Because of that, we never get closer in our goal.
And my issue with Sylvanas is that I can buy everything that he has said about her motivations in Shadowlands. The issue is that we can't judge her solely on Shadowlands. Sylvanas's writer specifically said that Sylvanas's motivation has been the same since the Fall of the Lich King. That means that since the 1st time she has been to the Shadowlands, Sylvanas has been on this quest to get everybody united in Death. Destruction of Gilneas, Night Elf Genocide, having her own people slaughtered has ALL been at the command of the Jailer. So the idea of 'I'll never serve' is stupid when that is what she has been doing since forever.
They wanted go make Thanos but they didn't pay attention to the main thing people liked about Thanos. His motivations
Shit, Harry's got this awful content pegged. He def gave me another reason to loooathe the Maw.
@@sweetsleeperagent I 100% agree with you good human being and you one a heavy finger on that Sylvannas plot point, some people know and recognize about it but that everyone is trying to justify the "change" and those "moments" where Sylvannas seems to care about others and the part where she was supposed to have her soul split shenanigans when she died by frostmourne is like BS. Just be consistent Blizz have Sylvannas be Ruthless or an Anti-Hero or something that defines her as a good character, if I'm honest I don't remember Frostmourne having the capacity to fragment souls just to steal them whole Blizz relies too much on Deus Ex Machinas to progress the story or maybe I'm wrong at this point IDK anymore,.
Now I understand why WotLK was the best of the best of WoW because they had good foundations on the previous game to make that happened. After that expansion I think they didn't know what to do and the cycle for them of 2 years is not enough to create a solid story to keep going on to the future. Sorry for the long complain and correct me if I'm wrong open, calm and smart discussions are always welcome.
@@CBenMar I just disagree I feel like the story is just a continous plot that slowly unveils more nd more as it goes on and sometimes that let's us understand things we had no way of knowing.
So long story short: Sylvanas has visited the barber shop, got her blue high elf eyes back but didn’t have enough gold for skin tone or hair colour. Any thoughts on her new transmog?
Hunter players just rob her of her bow and quiver. How much money do you expect her to have after that? 😂
I think it would be nicer if the Jailer brought her back to life to her whole non vengeful high elf form again. It would not only freak her out but bring a whole horizon of opportunities to develop the story
Maybe they will change her apparence in the next patch, more high elfy like , who knows
its ok i guess, but i wont vote for it during the comp.
@@marcoprezotto honestly I wouldnt be surprised if the way they remove her is her staying behind to help clean up her mess because her shame but basically pulling a illithan and sharing an apology that she expects not to be compelted accepted as she knows she doesnt completely deserve it, probably will fun when she talks with the elf the most angry at her.
Sylvanas fighting with Bolvar: shooting 1000 arrows, uses banshee powers
Sylvanas betraying the Jailer: pew
Against Bolvar she used the powers the Jailer gave her. Not sure you can attack him using his own powers against him 🤔
It is simply a gesture supporting the following statement. She knows she can do nothing except making a choice, the very thing that she ultimately stands for. Ultimately is the most important part of it, because only once the goal is reached, all the horrible stuff that served towards reaching it will be worth it and/or erased. So as long as the goal remains reachable, every action and decision made that gets her closer to that goal is acceptable. That's the mentality.
I dont think she was trying to hurt him, much less kill him
Because the game has to happen
@@nightfan1983 poor example. Games, and shows throughout time has the lesser being use powers given by the greater being to defeat the greater being. Your logic is flawed sir.
I love how you make sense of the story. I despise that it needs such a detailed explanation, but it does feel better after your analysis!
Great analysis. You said a lot of the things I've been saying. I'd just add 2 things:
1. The portal has a fractal design, which a new ingame book mentions the First Ones are way into.
2. Loremasters like us may have picked up on all these details. But I do think the cinematic really suffered from the mystery Blizz keeps creating about Sylvanas' motivation and what the Jailer promised her.
This. The big problem I have with this cinematic is the meaning and reasoning is -too- hidden. 85% of the playerbase isn't going to understand the nuances here.
The portal design kinda reminded my about some broker stuff, especially in Tazavesh. The design made me think especially of the last boss with the lines shooting away from the stars in the second phase. So I am kinda unsure if those stars are actually somehow related to the broker, which would kinda mean the Jailor has some connection to them, or maybe they did outright steal from the Jailors home plane. Which, honestly, would fit them quite well and would be hilarious.
@@Schilani Those "stars" are the relic of the first ones so if Jailer is using some kind of first one portal it makes sense why they are so alike.
It's not really a mystery but rather a retcon. We knew Sylvanas' motivations in Legion and in BfA because they were revealed to us through inner monlogue in both Before the Storm and the Three Sisters comic (which also revealed to us that she wants everyone to *serve* her in undeath). Blizzard just decided on a whim that Sylvanas motivations should be something else entirely and then did it. You can't really care about "mysteries" in a universe where characters constantly get rewritten to be a completely different person.
We’re going to Craftenium? Tinker class confirmed!
Tinker class, yes please!!!!
I assume this class will farm boots of travel and a blink dagger and be all around very annoying to deal with in pvp. Also you might want to bring some true strike items
@@MoonTurky hopefully they will abandon this sorry ass game very soon and spare us with the tinker class and whatnot
@@russianpwnage MMO in general is trash. Does not respect your time at all
@@russianpwnage If you don't like it, then don't play it or watch things about it. Simple fix to a simple problem. And by simple problem, I mean you, bud. You're both simple and a problem. Only explaining because you're probably too much of a simpleton to understand that.
My thoughts: It’s really fun to watch Raiders of the Lost Ark and see the story happen around Indy while nothing he does stops anything from happening. But it sucks being Indy in that scenario. I feel like we’ve been Indy since the end of Legion.
We were Indy before Legion. Remember Thrall kill-stealinh Deathwing?
At least DW got to the point he could be KSed thanks to our efforts. Since Legion though it just feels like the over arching plots have had fuckola to do with our efforts.
Raiders of the Lost Ark may be unique among movies. It’s the only one I can think of where the hero defeats the bad guys by literally closing his eyes and turning away.
I miss when people would watch these and get stoked. now its just "lets look for when blizzard fucks this up"
It goes along with how everyone gets mad at **everything** Blizzard does. I guarantee you that, no matter what happens to Sylvanas in the end, there will be people screaming about it.
@@NinjaFlibble Because it is awful. Last xpac was bad writing but this one makes her full stupid for full stupid sake. She has the intelligence of plot.
@@NinjaFlibble Oh I'm 100% sure there will be.
@@hopelessearth Shattered soul, look at Uther and how he acts with his soul shattered. That's the answer.
Blizz needs to stop with the whole being secret about what's happening next. It worked for bfa because we didn't know what was happening with Sylvanis. But I agree we needed an argus in the sky. Especially when you have a villain who wants to reset the whole universe.
Being a secret what happens next isn't the problem, it's that there's literally no pay off because it's not even a fleshed out story to begin with. Ending an expansion on a cliff hanger can and has worked as long as there's internal logical consistency. It's illogical that we haven't returned to our factions to keep them in the loop as to what is happening, it's illogical for two faction leaders to just "hangout" in Oribos if they can travel back. How strong is Anduin? We haven't even fought him yet just to get our asses kicked (like a "you lose" fight scripted fight), give us a gauge please Blizzard.
@@DisappointedBuddha Yeah i agree here. His affinity over the light to heal everyone was so great that he did it to a whole army in the BFA cinematic. Why not show us how he can drain the life out of an entire army and be like the Lich King on steroids or something, and show how the Jailer is even more powerful than that?
@@fraser7211 or just have a mission where Jaina or Baine ask you to inform the leaders of the your respective faction. For the alliance, there's a cutscene that plays showing Turalyons dogmatism bulling the alliance leaders to take actions they don't want. Velen is incredibly concerned. Shaw tells you that 2 years have passed since you entered the Shadowlands. An emissary from the Dark Portal has arrived, clad in gold and light, willing to help Turalyon with eliminating the new Cult of the Damned threat. They request you hurry with your Shadowlands conflict and return before everything goes tits up. Bolvar held this information from you because the Jailer is the bigger threat and this knowledge would have distracted you.
That's off the top of my head
It didn't work with BFA. BFA's plot was shite. Shadowland's plot has also been shite.
They have been very explicit that time in the SL flows exactly like time in Azeroth, which is supposed to be more or less like time in real life. That is, it has been about 6 months since we first left Azeroth and created the portals between Azeroth and Oribos.
Many players are still angry at Sylvanas and want vengeance for all the heinous actions she has done.
But it was pretty much confirmed that she is getting an "redemption" arc, making a lot of players feel frustrated.
They are basically doing another Kerrigan.
Add onto this the fact that after years we still don't know Sylvanas motivations, her relationship to the jailor or the jailors ultimate goal. Just more vague shit and more cliff hangers.
"join us, or be made to serve" -Sylvanas to Anduin like a week before "I will never serve"
Did you miss the lich king whisper about serving?
uhhhm and? lol
She's the worst, I really hope we never have to hear from her after this expac.
@@julieramsey1017 sorry but blizz cares only about her in the story.
@@julieramsey1017 she needs to be as ash in torgash. Her story should have ended in woltk and not been forced to be relevant as they were trying to do but because she is thicc and been popular because necrophilia (idk).
"The jailer is definitely lying to one of them.." - por que no los dos?
idk, Arthas managed to hold onto all his trinkets that reminded him of people until the day he died. Anduin drops his compass like a couple weeks into being evil.
Because Arthas wasn’t dominated in the same way, we’ve already seen Anduin break free once.
@@Gcsmith12 well you're right, he wasn't dominated but replaced with an evil version of him who wanted to rid himself of his ties to humanity going far gas as to cut out his own heart, but not throw away things that reminded him of jaina and others.
However anduin has broken free when exactly?
@@EsotericSanity the first time he goes to get a key (i havent played in forever so idr what place it was; the one with the angels) when he kills their leader he breaks free for a second. theres also a lot of indicators that the sword he has has arthas' soul in it, like how frostmourne was made with a soul in it (though idk if we know whose soul that was?)
@@EsotericSanity We see him break free for a second after he stabs the Kyrian leader.
@@lucasdude she lives. It seems more like he's possessed by Zovaal who after does the deed himself through Anduin, leaves the body and then turns it on auto-pilot and we just see Anduin in between this.
The least talked about thing in the cinematic is probably the most important. He gave her back her soul, from a crystal, the kind he put into kingsmourne, one would assume some soul was put into frostmourne as well. But who was the soul that went into kingsmourne? And if your answer isn't arthas, you are fooling yourself.
Arthas was never killed by Frostmourne. He was whole when he was cast down.
@@slymcfly123 We know that the very use of Frostmourne also splits the soul. It is why Arthas lost himself the moment he took up Frostmourne. We also know the Jailor has a vault of souls and fractured souls that would be useful to him that he has been hoarding since forever. If he intended Arthas to claim Frostmourne from the beginning he would absolutely hoard his soul for some future purpose.
@@TheSattocs where does it say Using the sword splits your soul? You're making stuff up now.
@@TheSattocs Arthas was already lost prior to picking up the sword. Still it's an interesting bit about the soul of arthas as the mourneblade gem.
@@MrUltracet he was making bad decisions and going down a dark path but he was still himself until he picked up Frostmourne and lost part of himself to it. It’s described in the book.
One other thing. In the No More Lies cinematic she kept using words like "WE" and "OUR" when referring to what her and Zovaal were up to. Also when she informed Zovaal of what happened to Denathrius, asked "What's 'OUR' plan" about freeing him. Then of course in the raid cinematic she told Zovaal "WE" already have what "WE" need.
People keep dumping on the line "I will never serve" and saying she's dumb and already has been, but it's obvious that she truly feels as if they were partners in this plan, until as you said she can no longer ignore what's going on.
This is a great point. To be honest. And one I didn't thought about.
"... it's obvious that she truly feels as if they were partners in this plan, ..." That's the dumb part. You spelled it out. Of all people, she should know better than to think that.
@@harbhub Why? Do you know what Zovaal told her? It's obvious by her speech to Anduin and Denathrius's speech to Renathal that he lied to her about his intentions, so why wouldn't he lie about her seat at the table? You think a manipulator is just gonna half ass their manipulation tactics?
@@harbhub I mean, maybe, yeah, but I think there’s an argument to be made that it’s Sylvanas’s arrogance leading her to believe she’s partnered with the Jailer rather than just his tool. Certain of her own cunning and all that.
I wonder how Calia Menethil is going to factor into this. I know that's odd, but why else have her conveniently in Orobos with a defeated Sylvanas? Perhaps Calia's story might lead to an interaction that would help explain Sylvanas's story and the arbiters judgment.
You know what? I legit forgot Sylvanas was the one who killed Calia.. probably because it really hasn’t been talked about in game since it happened lol
It'll be interesting to see how Calia interacts with Sylvanas after she was technically killed by Sylv's orders. Further complicated by the 'fully restored' Sylv potentially battling with the guilt of her split-soul actions.
Your breakdowns and analysis are out of this world. Hats of to you Tali!
Truly are good I look forward to these wow break downs.
Re: Your early point about movies being good when not knowing what's happening next: I think that it's actually closer to what you're saying about Argus. Stories are best when we have an idea of what's gunna happen next but discovering the details are what's fun, with the occasional subversion of those expectations to keep things from getting predictable
A part of the story is missing - how and why did Sylvannas become convinced that a shirtless giant with a gaping chest wound was the right guy to remake reality and free everyone from the shackles of life and death? I don't have an issue with the idea that she was convinced but... Without that information, it just feels like the writers decided this was the story and are asking us to just accept this maddening descent into obvious hypocrisy at face value. It does not feel like a genuine development for Sylvannas, who is portrayed in the past as the most skeptical and ruthlessly intelligent character in any room she occupies.
I could even accept that she only joined the Jailor because he offered to return her soul chunk to her if she helped him. She probably thought she could extract herself from the deal after getting her soul long before she would have to do anything too unsavory.
But no, we are not even given that kind of selfish justification.
I would say the book will delve into this
If I had to guess, before seeing her book...because he was the first and only choice she had when ending up in the Maw after flinging herself off of ICC. At that point her choices were...go with the plan or suffer forever in the Maw. Can't really blame her for going along with it.
Well because you have to remember when she contacted him : After she killed herself at the end of Wrath of the Lich King. Even though the Jailer wasn't described yet she jump from Icecrown Citadel, dies and arrives in what is now known as The Maw, where she feels only pain, torture, and horror. And that scares the hell out of her. Then she meet the Valkyrs and presumably the Jailer. So this one actually started to work with her by saving her, offering her a way to return to the world of the living. And another thing he offered her : A goal. Because she had nothing to do anymore, and thats exactly why she killed herself.
And remember that she never properly met him before Shadowlands, and when she did and started to see the "little" problems with his plan, she was already far too engaged in the process and the plan. She already had committed mass slaughters, already left the Horde, already killed Saurfang and betrayed all of her old allies. She couldn't return anyway.
Even if she had doubts with the Jailer's plan, which had surely no problem to manipulate her by explaining his plan to reshape reality, she couldn't do much.
@@astralp4292 Reading this just made me realise, have we actually seen any Valkyr in the Maw or have they all been Mawsworn?
@@val7885 Which book are you guys talking about?
"You can not let him reach the...sunwell" most likely sylvannas last words
Edit: before arthas killed her
Why would the Sunwell be important to him? It doesn't have the power to shatter reality.
@@xX1infinityedge1Xx
That still doesn't explain why the Jailer would want to go to the Sunwell.
@@Brby1 they are not saying that the jailer is going to the sunwell. The last thing that part of sylvanas' soul remembers before it was locked away is arthas killing her before marching to the sunwell. So in a state of confusion and near-blacked outness she merges the two images of zovaal and arthas (as both are bad guys of death trying to reach something). Its not about the jailer going to the sunwell, but sylvanas' soul reliving her death and how it has parallels to the situation now.
@@Brby1 bro can't you read? This isn't about the Jailer wanting to go to the sunwell
@@veselinrankov7322
Thanks, that would make sense now.
I think it's tough to argue a villain has come into his own when we don't really understand his motivations or perspective; all we know is he wants to destroy reality cuz he doesn't like it much. That's a pale shadow of the Lich King.
Yeah, that and that he likes enslaved servants. Someone else described it as "the depth of a Captain Planet villain".
he wanted to destroy reality because he knew in advance how terrible 9.1 would be. The Jailor was the good guy all along.
Not to mention that he said the Jailer's new armor looks sick...looks like a dollar store version of some generic wotlk plate gear.
Can't say Lich King has had much depth exactly. He wanted to kill and raise everyone on Azeroth...why, exactly?
Like, the characters who became Lich King had some interesting stories, sure, but Lich King, within the game is...saturday cartoon villain. Haha, I will kill everyone because I am evil!
Zovaal's bitterness fostered during his imprisonment, and his need for control are more than the Lich King got. Even Illidan and Kael'thas, as butchered as they were during TBC, had their own twisted version of seeing themselves as heroes. But the Lich King is just...evil...because...
Arthas and Ner'zhul are tragic characters, but their stories culminated in losing themselves to the entity of the Lich King.
They made an *old God* a fucking joke of a villan last expansion. I can guarentee you the end with the jailer will be anticlimactic so we can move on to a new big bad for next expansion.
Whole thing reminds me of the show supernatural and how it had an insane amount of seasons and the show would just keep ramping up every season. And eventually the show ended a season involving *God* *Lucifer* and *darkness* almost wiping out reality. Good time to end right? no they end the episode with sam getting shot thinking that will leave us with anticipation of 'will he survive?!'. The motherfucker is bff with GOD. SMH. Some things just don't know when to quit.....can't wait for wow's next expansion and which previous expansions will be retconned for it.
Personally, I was disappointed by the cinematic. "You lose, again" was not something I was keen on seeing (comparing to previous storyline in the patch). That doesn't mean a complete victory was in order, of course not. But in the mentioned Legion cinematic, we managed "something". Here, we are given more and more serving of the bitter ash of defeat, and we are going to be dining on it for months to come.
Here, we may as well not have been there; the outcome would've been the same (apart from being privy to Patty Mattson's voice work; I may dislike Sylvanas, but I will never deny she is voiced awesomely). It feels like there is zero sattisfaction in it (apart from possible purple pixel loot, but I am currently not raiding, alas).
And I really, REALLY worry that they are setting Sylvanas up to be Kerrigan 2.0.
Honestly, though, I do not know how I would've made it "better". I am not a major gaming company story writer (and I don't even know what it entails - one thing is to write a story, another one is to write a game story and yet another one, a good story for a game). I just know that this left me feeling... Disappointed.
I am glad I saw this video, though. Prior to it, one of my complaints about it all was "was Sylvanas so oblivious to what Jailer and his forces were doing to souls, ALL souls - and how was his treatement of Anduin not a dead giveaway already?", but... The explanation given here was spot on. People deny, lie to themselves and convince themselves to high heavens and back, to keep the facade of their preffered reality intact. It is visible in both current day and history books. It makes quite a lot of sense that someone like Sylvanas would suffer from the very same.
I'm glad somebody mentioned this. It actually truly pissed me off how we have almost never lost a fight with a big baddy when it came down to a raid boss. But we fight Sylvanas, and this is quite possibly the very first time we have ever 100%, truly LOST the battle. The first time the adventurers could not defeat the villain.
That pisses me off. That's the one thing you never do. It erases the whole point of the raid. It tells us that we came here for nothing, and that the power of our own characters cannot be trusted over that of the waifu of Blizzard, and by extension, whatever other shitty plot they intend to forge.
There's being irrational, and then there's just being blindingly stupid. Sylvanas has been irrational plenty, but never an outright moron.
Everyone was thinking Sylvanas is playing some 4d chess game, at the end she's just a fool.
I love it.
Sylvanas execution in 9.2
yup, although whether or not she was a fool because of her soul being splintered or if she just a complete idiot is up to debate.
Nothing in wow’s story feels solid anymore. They’ve made everything in the story feel so ambiguous and nihilistic, that it may as well not exist.
You can’t even be sure of what to believe by reading the chronicles because it was written from “titans’ POV”.
Story is all about cliffhangers and surprise material in wow...
The different perspectives are what makes this interesting. The story has long since legion been set in stone that all cosmic powers are selfish and none consider us as a priority in the slightest while they fight over our planet's soul.
I kind of like the way they are doing things, we are figuring things out AT THE SAME TIME the characters are figuring out. Does it make for the best story telling? No definitely not in the release schedule its been going at, but when it's over and we make alts and binge through it it will more or less (I HOPE) feel right.
>does it make for the best storytelling? no
uhh, then why defend it? Are we playing the expansion and experiencing the story now or are we experiencing it when 10.0 has launched? what a bizarre argument
Remember when Chronicles were advertised as the DEFINITIVE lore only fot them to come around like two years later and say they they are just the Titan POV?
These writers do not want to be constrained by anything, because they don't have the creativity to work within established rules.
@@huslainemaxwell9866 I said that's why I like it. You don't have to agree. Gee, it's almost like we are 2 completely different people. 🤔 hmmmmmmm odd
And its almost like we ARE experiencing it now. Just in fragmented parts. Almost like some other popular mmo out there during their expac updates... hmmm (ffxiv)
Why has everyone such a hard time understanding what the jailer is saying? Turns out my years of brutal death metal experience finally pays out 🤘🏻🤣
guarantee everyone saying they can't hear what he's saying didn't watch it in game, and is instead on a cellphone in a bathroom stall looking for something to watch
Same
@@hironobu64 AAAAHAHAHAHAAA 🤣 when you are sitting on the toilet and think that Silvanas has some digestive problems until you realise the strange noises come out of YOUR ass 🤣
For me, I'm just really tired of losing and seemingly being stupid. I felt like Sylvanas was an idiot for believing the jailor and doing the 'end justifies the means', but honestly, it's no worse than how stupid and ineffective they have written our characters. "Oh, wait, we lost three sigils and this fourth one is hidden really well, but hey, let's just take it out of it's secure place and run it over to The Jailor so he doesn't have to work to get it!" That was just the latest. Every time someone in game talks about what a great Hero my character is, I think of how stupid and ineffective she actually is in the game.
That's one of two big problems for me.
The second one is that I'm also tired of ambiguity and evil being the way of it all. The way the world is right now, I need stories where I can believe good exists and triumphs. And if Blizzard and the rest of the community prefers the Game of Thrones style of story telling... maybe I should move on.
24:50 interesting take! i read it as "he has lost his way and is no longer able to find his way back", like a breaking of the final straw. i don't think anduin will actually wind up being dead dead but as a symbol it felt like him being fully out of our reach since his lost his (moral) compass. Then again, he was entirely passive this entire cinematic so i might be way off :D
That's it folks! Tune in in 3 to 12 months for the next 3 minutes of mildly interesting lore.
"Interseting?" You're setting the bar for Blizzard pretty low there.
I highly doubt Tyrande can be convinced of Sylvanas' usefulness.
I've yet to be convinced Tyrande has ever been useful. Especially since Legion.
Tyrande will be the new warmongering villain
Easy: "we all, including Sylvanas, have at best a couple of weeks left to exist anyway so what gives"
@@pixiesnakes4293 "And I'm gonna cut that down to a few SECONDS to exist!" *stab stab stab*
Fuck Tyrande,she picked the tree hugger instead of the uberchad
but why was sylvanas on the jailors side in the first place, again? her downfall was cuz of arthas who was put into place because of the jailor. awkward
indirectly though. We already know the Jailer didn't make arthas do anything, he got corrupted by the power, and made his own decisions. The jailer was responsible in the same way that someone who built a gun that killed someone is.
@@laurennightingale4752 more like drugging someone and then making them sign your contracts.
A gun doesn’t usually steal people’s souls, lol.
@@laurennightingale4752 Well, if that gunmaker intended for and hoped that that gun would be used in a mass-murder. The Jailer is banking on Frostmourne leading its bearer down the corrupt path towards his own freedom.
@@laurennightingale4752 I agree, just like the Jailer is responsible for Sylvanas' death so-to are gun manufacturers for the deaths they cause.
@@abydosianchulac2 its not a perfect metaphor lol, basically Sylvanas agreed with the Jailer's goal of freedom, and understands that Arthas did nothing the Jailer wanted, so in her mind Arthas killing her was against the Jailer's wishes. Ergo, she doesn't blame the Jailer.
From a story-crafting standpoint, I was hoping for more. I wanted to understand more about Sylvanas' motivations and get some moral resolution. That didn't happen. What we came away with was that she finally realized The Jailer was just using her, and that's about it. It's a plot point, but one we've waited an awfully long time for, and so it didn't seem like enough. It's just a turning point for the next act.
So... at the end of the day, what was the bargain Sylvanas did with Helya? Where did the black lantern she wanted to use came from?
Despite all of defense Taliesin managed to make for this cinematic, I still can't believe that Sylvanas waited for this moment when Zovaal got what he wanted to act against him, when she indeed must've known he was the one who was behind her death and transformation into a banshee in the first place.
Granted, she likely never knew he was holding onto part of her soul, and she somehow wasn't aware Nathanos had been killed off (like she never tried to contact Nathanos since she crossed the broken veil in Icecrown...), but she must've seen Kel'thuzad and all the runes everywhere. Her being all about vengeance (AS her mount description points out), you'd think she would've wanted to take revenge on Zovaal for this.
The Lantern was Helya's. it let her make more val'kyr. Genn breaks it no more Val'kyr. that's where it came from.
This is why I like watching these "cinimatic breakdowns". You explain stuff so well that you explain stuff that i was unaware needed expalining. Thats why you have my sub.
Cant wait for 9.2 to drop 8 months from now so we can find out what happens next.
nice copypasta you have there
thank$ for $ticking up for the poor opre$$ed Kotick Yacht Fund LLC Inc. Im tired of these toxic entitled gamers complaining that one 2 minute cinematic every 8 months doesn't make for an engaging narrative!
@@theoriginalsp33dey I mean i guess if i had copied it it would be.
What if anduinn dropping the compass is showing how he has lost the ability to stay true to his path?
That imo is a better conclusion, I doubt it was the inner anduin leaving a bread crumb trail because we wouldn't need that plot wise, we have sylvanas to give us that information.
I find that more likely. Which is a shame, because I hate it when that's part of a storyline. I would have preferred Anduin really getting his mind changed versus mind control to make a character evil. But wow gonna wow.
Or a breadcrumb to locate Varian, the only one who can save him?
@@andrewrenshaw2741 lol why not at this point. There was a quest in the Ghostlands Ehre you find a necklace that was gifted to sylvanas when she was still alive, you return it to her and there's a little tearful moment as she remembers being alive, I'd be happy if honestly it was just that, we somehow return anduin to some humanity with a meaningful trinket from his life. Idk
Yeah but no. He didnt lost the path, they forced him to walk that path loosing his mind(conscience) and as someone said in other comment arthas died having jaina's locket and other stuffs. They may use the compass to try to bring him back but using it right now in the cinematic as we lost him now is denying the fact that he is not doing it by himself
I loved it, the detail on the jailer's damaged armor that still shows the wound after the punishment that the other eternals did, I like to think that that arrow fired by Sylvanas was just a gesture of disgust after not receiving what was promised, it had no other intention than to show anger, and I love the detail of making her "mortal" again just for the purpose and waiting for the rest of Azeroth to judge her and end up blinded to death for her crimes. Maybe just to experience death again. Cheers from Chile Tali ❤
Yeah I noticed the same, that he still has this hurt of it being ripped from his chest.
I think we will honestly get to how all this has happened in the next patch
A big Gray guy who is basically a god, who's peers strip him of his power, who's powers come off as chains, servitude... possibly order? Who's goes back to his home realm? Who also was never known of before this... expansion? Jyggalag seems like an inspiration at this point
Can't wait to defeat him and become Sheogorath
The risk to me is that, following the events in this cinematic, the Primus, the Winter Queen, and the Archon really need to open up and fill us in on Zovaal's identity and history. If we get that payoff, this cinematic will be a wild success to me. If we don't, it'll probably feel crushingly disappointing to me, in the end. Of course, the cinematic itself is extremely well-done and is something Square-Enix and ArenaNet should aspire to. Frankly, cinematics like this seem to be the part of the game Blizzard does best.
When we hand in the quest to bolvar (for 50 gold mind you) that we killed sylvanas everyone in the room shoukd spill the beans
Might aswell just do a voice over from Rita Repulsa from Mighty Morphing Power Rangers:
- Gaaaah! After ten thousand years I'm free, It's time to conquer earth(Azeroth)!
Zovaal simply ain't established as a main villain, even Sylvanas with all her faulty or rediculus writing had more going for her. Given how story tends to be delivered in WoW I unfortunately don't see that change in just a few patches. I'm basicly just dissapointed they have thrown major lore antagonists at us the last few expansions and they have been beaten within a patch(Azshara, N'zoth, Sargeras etc.), just to be replaced with something shallow and poorly established.
I thought it was a good cinematic, a pretty great Sylvanas cinematic, and I agree with pretty much everything you’ve said here. The surprise for me is that it seems I do have something in common with Sylvanas after all. Since BfA pre-launch I’ve been waiting for the game to pay off that investment they worked so hard to get from Alliance players with the pre-xpac quests, especially the night elf players. They made me care a lot, and they made it a gut punch, and yeah, I was 100% invested. I wanted war with the Horde, I wanted to fight for kaldorei lands, I wanted justice for the lives taken on Teldrassil. And we just keep doing other stuff.
I’m not in the camp that wants us to kill Horde civilians or even the camp that’s calling for Sylvanas to die - that’s just unrealistic, they’re not going to kill her unless they can give her a heroic death. But I’ve needed that investment to pay off. And whenever someone says that, here comes the chorus of “the story isn’t over yet, there’s going to be something great for nelfs, just shut up and wait” (or the ones who just hate nelf players and double down on the idea that we’ll never get that payoff, or the ones who say we got it in the warfront or with Lordaeron or with that stupid attack in the trolls before they even allied with the Horde and if that didn’t satisfy us then obviously nothing ever will, etc etc, you know how that all goes).
I’ve kept waiting. I’ve kept hoping. Honestly it wasn’t this cinematic that was even the breaking point for me, it was the Ardenweald one. There were so many ways they could have accomplished what they needed to with that and shown the strengths and motivations of both Sylvanas and Tyrande, but instead they gave Tyrande another humiliating defeat and Sylvanas more snark and sass.
And if it had happened outside the context of everything that’s come before, it would have been a great cinematic, full stop. But it didn’t. It came on top of every other time that as a night elf player I’ve been psyched for an awesome moment, a story beat that shows night elves are powerful, that we have a meaningful, important place in the story and aren’t just there to be killed and the butt of stupid dev jokes. So instead, it was a great cinematic that finally convinced me the writers don’t care about the kaldorei story and I’m never getting that payoff.
And I want so much to believe in the promise, I want so much to believe that I’m going to get that, that the little greyed-out quest name in the quest pop up in your video, “The Power of Night,” slated for who knows when in the future, is almost enough to keep me believing.
But not quite.
I canceled my sub today. It had just renewed, so I’ve got six months for Blizzard to convince me I’m wrong and that payoff is coming.
I hope they will. I’m more sad about canceling than I thought I’d be. I’m still invested in my character and her story - but between the endless grind and a story that feels like the devs are just trolling and laughing…obviously it’s time for me to stop.
replying just to agree and validate the long passionate text you wrote before it inevitably drowns in the sea of other comments because it wasnt written literally 10 minutes after the video got uploaded.
@@huslainemaxwell9866 That’s really sweet of you, and I appreciate it a lot.
its happened to me when I try to write longer comments and i always get a bit bitter about it when it goes ignored so I felt like doing a good deed today ;^)
Agreed 100%. I applaud your honesty and cognitive consistency!
What a wholesome thread really. I like that.
Have you thought about trying another race? Maybe even try horde just to shake things up completely.
If you are not resubbing: take solice in the knowlegde that I haven't had a subscribtion to wow since before the last patch in bfa. Shadowlands is the first expansion I haven't played. But I still watch all Taliesin & Evitel video's and keep up with the story and such.
I'm still invested in ways even though I'm not playing
So Thanos has the infinity stones and is going to remake the universe?
OMG so you mean to be saying its time for a time heist!?
Except thanos finished the job and left this dude is probably will be on tiktok so we can gear up and stop him in 8-10 months lol
And the Compass is going to be used to Find Anduin , The Jailer will not snap his fingers and half of everyone on Azeroth won't die, they will be in chains like zombies, and we chase Zovall to the Sepulcher on Azeroth and we again loose to him as he is Titan ++, but then wait, every Warcraft Character will join forces and rush to defeat the Jailer and he will lift his hand and say " mrglmrlgmrlgmrlg"!!
@@plnorm9106 Confirmed: Zovaal is a Murloc!
You know the "bad guy wants to remake reality" is a pretty common trope right?
As to your remark about the minefield. I have no idea how they are going to reconcile the Tyrande/Sylvanas issue. Despite all this, there is the looming issue of her still committing genocide against an entire race. And their leader wants nothing more than her head. The night elves have very much been getting the short end of the stick and I, and I think a lot of others, believe that there isn't going to be a good resolution here.
Probably something like Anduin saying "if you are going to judge sylvanas, you must judge me for the atrocities I have done under the jailor control" and Bolvar/Jaina/Thrall/Baine/Calia/etc being like "we can't do that Anduin" then Tyrande leaving the alliance or just dissapear into the horizon...
“Sure, you’ll be next on the block then Anduin, we have Turaylan now anyway’l
@@marioelias4267 tyrande would rather kill everyone there than leave sylvanas alive, even when malfurion wss kidnapped in legion she said ill kill you if we were too late. She doing the walkaway will be just an out of character for her heck even in bfa was you dont wanna help me? Then im doing it on my own
@@sorrowday838 I mean... I dont have high hopes in the writing at this point, and they are setting up the redemption arc for sylvanas so hard atm that it wouldn't suprise me that them just throw away this whole vengance thing or just have sylvanas helping the night elces souls and be like "yeah, we good now"
Yeah, I've about given up that there's ever going to be any accounting for the destruction of the night elves. It'll probably go down just as mentioned: Anduin will say you can't blame Sylvanas unless you also blame me, the story will say to Tyrande 'if you are a good and reasonable person, you have to accept it and move on because no one's _really_ at fault here, right?' and I just nope. I could - MAYBE - accept forgiving Sylvanas if she really does a huge character turnaround now that she has her full soul again and basically chooses to spend her unlife making amends. But the average fully-ensouled Horde soldier knew what they were doing every step through Ashenvale and Darkshore. I don't need revenge, but I need justice. If that justice comes in the form of the Horde building a new city for the nelfs and worgen, that's fine. But brushing it off as 'Sylvanas was half soulless and the Horde was just following orders so we're cool right' is a big nope.
Great video. Thank you for being such a voice of reason in the midst of a community addicted to outrage no matter what outcome or revelation it receives. Thank you for pointing out the details and the nuance so easily forgotten in explaining how Sylvanas arrived at the decision to show defiance after working under false pretenses or even fooling herself for so long. Thank you for pointing out the bias that leads to so much anger in the community and so eloquently refuting it with concrete evidence and sound logic. Well done!
I regret that I have but one like to give for this comment.
Yeah, clearly you are someone with low standarts about quality. Blizz taught its audience to consume simplistic, generic and predictable content, there is no hidden logic as you suggest. If anything, Taliesin is the one who is known to be biased towards Blizzard.
@@owleyes8600 As that comment won't get more than that ;)
Well. I dislike most narratives that hinge on "she is just lying to herself" or "convincing herself she is in the right". To me thats just something to avoid in good storytelling alltogether. This came way too late, was way too predictable and it did not in fact leave me excited, satisfied, interested or happy. The only good thing in this cinematic, for me, is the armor of the jailer. He looks amazing. But honestly I would have loved to see him simply destroy Sylvanas right then and there. Maybe keep her soul-shard with her Yin side safe. So as to not have her completely out of the story. Maybe in a way of "poetic justice" he could have destroyed her in a blast of shadow/death magic like Saurfang.
Overall I have only been playing this for 15 years so its not like I would like to be invested or anything. The Sylvanas storyline for me has always been kind of eh. It doesn't excite me. Its too predictable. "Oh my god we get a new Sylvanas cinematic!" - "Great, she will say something edgy, refuse to see reason, and team rocket away with her 999999 IQ plays." Its not in fact fun.
Then again I don't read the books, I just play the game. So my interest is purely based on in-game storytelling. Which is a shame that the context apparantly is "in the books"...
When you play Tazavesh, the final boss uses a Relic of the First Ones that have that same glowing gold latticework spell effect as Zovaal's portal.
I don't think we're going to Zovaal's original zone, I think we're going to the Sepulcher of the First Ones that gets mentioned here and there in the lore. Specifically, I think this is the Sepulcher that the Primus mentions in the Maldraxxus leveling quests.
Zovaal's armor makes me think each part is inspired by the covenant sigils he stole. Chest is ardenwierd, helm maldraxi, ect
I love the part where you say "etc" because you can't find anything for the other two lol
His leg guards look like bones for Maldraxxus, even
Personally, it makes enough sense to me- Sylvanas has been desperately trying to grasp onto control since Arthas killed her and then even more so once seeing what would happen to her when she died. Allying herself with the being that would be in control of her eternal torture in the Maw makes a lot of sense- she figured staying on Zovaal’s good side was her only real chance to avoid that torture. Slowly, though, you can see how she began to question whether or not it was worth it- in the cinematic with Anduin, she’s obviously conflicted but she chooses to follow orders because at least she’s not on the receiving end. Zovaal not giving a shit about Denathrius’ defeat disturbed her a little, but again, it wasn’t /her/ getting thrown aside. In the Battle for Ardenweald cinematic, she’s shocked to hear Nathanos is dead, likely because she was promised that he’d be by her side in the Maw, showing that Zovaal had no qualms with betraying her specifically. When he says all will serve, she can’t convince herself anymore that he sees her as anything else but a pawn, and that’s why she finally snaps out of it. Perhaps she knows attacking him is useless, suicidal even, but maybe she was hoping he’d just destroy her instead of making her kneel as well.
We have been getting hints of hesitation and humanity from Sylvanas since WotLK despite the atrocities she has committed and in Shadowlands so far, we’ve seen a LOT of hesitating and questioning. I am disappointed that we didn’t see more of an exponential increase in her uncertainty, we didn’t get to see the discontentment grow every time she felt something was off. We also didn’t get to see what exactly the Jailer promised her (or threatened her with) to get her on his side which I hope we do get a flashback to because it could retroactively make things work a little better.
Great breakdown! I don’t think Craftenium is Zoval’s original covenant though. I think its much more likely it’s the realm where the First Ones crafted reality, crafted the Titans to watch over it, and thus will connect the dots between the world souls, the Light/Void, and the shadowlands. We still haven’t gotten an explanation as to the red beam that disabled the Arbiter that started everything in this expansion, and as the last content drop I think it’ll have to bring the story back around to Azeroth and setup the next expansion.
It’s possible Zoval was the first arbiter, began making biased choices of where souls should go and developed his god complex so was replaced by a construct that would objectively follow the First Ones’s wishes.
She should’ve finished her line with, “Don’t let him reach the Sunwell.” to illustrate more clearly where she was mentally, I feel like it would’ve gone a long way towards making this moment feel like a major change in a major character. Since she doesn’t finish the line it can be interpreted that she was trying to warn them about the Jailor, which is idiotic considering she was his ally a few minutes earlier.
I don't think it's idiotic; who knows what happens mentally when part of your severed soul is returned? Maybe it was all the good sense she had as a ranger returned in that shard, and she _was_ trying to warn them. I do really like the Sunwell option, though. I'm just not sure that's where Blizzard was going with it. I'm not one to rag on the story writers much, but the story reveals do tend to be much more straightforward and obvious than the ideas the community thinks up.
I personally have been enjoying shadowlands a lot more than cata and bc. I enjoyed swapping around my covenant and unlocking different legendaries without any rng. There is so much more rngless gameplay that I wanted for this game since I started it and especially the fact we get so many conduits and abilities that I keep swapping and having fun with. But whenever I open any social media platform I keep seeing a chain of negativity and even though I understand their concerns (kinda) I just wanna see people mirror my enjoyment of the game I am having fun with. I actually got a bit depressed and started thinking I may be exhibiting fake enjoyment. You guys remind me that I’m not the insane one here and so far I am just depressed of coming home and having to watch another news show about how the things are like are bad now. You guys are the only ones I have actually been left happy after watching and excited for the next video release! Thank you so much for existing!!
P.S sorry if it’s cringey but I really can’t express how glad I am to watch you guys with every upload
hey man im in your boat. life is too short to get mad over somthing i enjoy. even if theres something i dont like storywise, the game itself is and has always been fun for me. It makes me sad hearing people complain nonstop about anything and everything- even people who have no idea what theyre talking about are mad at something that some random youtuber told them to be mad at. sigh. i had to explain to a friend the other day that he could make a new legendary in 2 weeks. he didnt believe me...so i made an extra one today for my main...and now hes complainging about wc3reforged lol(cause that has everything to do w wow). people just want to hate something smh
Tali, you're saying the music when Zovaal regains his OG form sounds clock-like, but taking into account the text about Craftenium (I didn't even know it existed!), it sounds more to me like crafters/blacksmiths. I like the bit in the text about how that covenant is about trapping souls into games of chance (mazes and complex traps/cages I assume?) in order to rid souls of their smug superiority. And if his power is Domination... isn't Domination basically trapping the soul within an empty shell?
I find that passage interesting because essentially Zovaal's been doing that in the Maw / Torghast. So I think you're onto something!
I'm kind of confused about Craftenium vs Maldraxxus though, and why Zovaal need the Primus to craft the Helm of Domination, for example. Could it be that Craftenium didn't have the know-how to trap souls into objects and make the latter sentient? Because that passage only talks about crafting architecture and cages, so hmm, maybe I'm onto something here haha.
BTW, I have a feeling Sylvanas is gonna have to suck it up and get Arthas's help to stop Zovaal. Somehow. I dunno. But it would be an interesting part to her "redemption" arc. (I say redemption loosely, not sure what my opinion is regarding her becoming a goodie)
So the Sylvannas arc is representative of WoW players - we want Warcraft to be good so badly we look past the obvious flaws that Blizzard/Activision KEEP DOUBLING DOWN ON!
Only the completely addicted braindead casual players look past the issues. Most players quit months ago.
@@OWlsfordshire lol ok
You helped me so much enjoy the cinematic x10000.
This is so nice. I wasn't a big fan of Sylvanas move but with that I love it. I want to see the next steps.
Thank you so much !
I busy with a new born so I can't enjoy the game as I want but thank you for helping me enjoy it from a smartphone ♥️
Now she has her (full?) soul back, I assume she's going to feel everything she's done. How's she going to handle the "Oh crap, I did genocide."?
I hope so. With some good writing I don't think she can be redeemed per se but her end story can make some sense.
@@Pironesia Yeah. Not redeemed. She still knew what she was doing was wrong. As long as they remember to let her have the guilt.
@@Pironesia " i understand i ruined... so many lives.. all of yours' But if you let me... tell you everything you need to know, free your king, and let me see my Two Sisters one last time... then i will accept whatever punishment you ask of me..." Tyrande: I accept... Genn: as do i... Jaina: I'll allow it. Thrall: ok. Every Forsaken: FUCK YOU.
The way Zovaal is holding up that orb when Sylvanas shoots at him, isn't that also the way the Lich King was holding up Frostmourne as you defeat him in the raid, before tirion hits him?
Sure is! good eye
Oh, yes. Holding up your arm is such a rare gesture in this universe.
Massive reach
Bolvar already did that before he hurled the Saronite pillars at Sylvanas. I doubt its even a reference. It's just a casting animation.
It’s a standard casting move in Warcraft.
You’re over analyzing
I just realized they ripped of Thanos. The Jailer went around collecting keys that, when collected, would allow him to remake reality however he chooses. Totally ripped off Thanos.
Yep
After 3 expansions spent ripping off Game of Thrones I'm not sure if this is better or worse.
@@austinm5630 the latter lol, If it makes people feel better Thanos ripped off like 90 other things.... oh who am i kidding that doesnt make anyone feel better... a rip-off is still a rip-off.
I want the Jailer to win. Remaking reality is just the hard reset WoW needs.
A great Segway to create WoW 2 with updated graphics! (Prepares for scorn)
i was thinking that lol
i have no hope whatsoever that "A Worldsoul Reborn" aka WoW 2 would not be just as bad if not even worse if the people designing modern WoW are the ones doing it.
The issue with that is that I don't think that works with World of Warcraft.
WoW is a "theme park MMO" that kinda perpetuates itself _because_ of its size. Its only real _special_ appeal to fans of the genre is world class dungeon/raiding content. For everyone else, WoW's main appeal is the theme park aspect, the fact that due to all the accretion from previous expansions, there are a bajillion quests to do, gear to get, mounts/transmogs to finish, things to grind, and pet battles to complete, to the point where you can play it for years without needing to play current content.
Meanwhile, if you make WoW 2 and start from scratch, the franchise's reputation, something Activision aren't exactly good at preserving, is the _ONLY_ immediate selling point to the casual consumer. Blizzard would need to do something that other MMOs aren't offering _(including WoW and WoW Classic)_ to convince people to jump ship from WoW into a sequel, and if they *still* stick to their purchase + subscription + cash shop model, even that might not be enough.
Of course, they could always pull an Overwatch 2 and essentially make a super-expansion for the original game branded as a sequel, but in that case you don't get the presumed advantages that come with a sequel, like being able to finally overhaul the game's foundations.
I will admit, "The Jailer wins, all of reality is unmade, The End" would be pretty goddamn ballsy of Blizzard.
21:43 "The Jailer is still inevitable" ... i see what you did there! :-D
Well, whatever her motivations were, she still decided to burn Teldrassil and murder thousands of innocents just to spite someone, lol. I simply wish to see her pay for all of her sins, and while I so badly wanted it to be by my hands, I will settle for almost anything at this point.
She CANNOT simply be forgiven after all she has done, and I will be pissed if there is any redemption arc for her next patch. She doesn`t deserve redemption, imo.
obviously, she burned Teldrassil only because Jailer needed more fresh souls in the Maw
Rather than the player tyrande deserved it... and is funny cuz they denying tyrande the revenge and... they denied us the revenge with garrosh in wod
Sylvanas didn't burn down Teldrassil to spite someone. It had nothing to do with spite, it was orders from the Jailer. She burned it to give him souls.
@@nyezarec No, that is incorrect, proven false by the very cinematic in which it occurred. She had every intention of invading and occupying Teldrassil, she even says as much. She brought the armies and the resources to do so. But upon hearing Dalaryn`s words, chose instead to destroy the tree in an effort to snuff out Dalaryn`s and the Night Elves` hope.
Do not replace real canon with headcanon. Sylvanas is a monster in that moment, plain and simple.
Didn't think it'd be Blizzard to give us a Sylvanas Ahegao Face, but they did.
How do I delete some else's comment?
@@Usagi33353 Same. I looked that up and now I hate everything.
Curse of the internet boys.
It's hard for me to feel bad for her. She's been willfully ignorant this whole time. Glad she got her soul back though I guess. Maybe she'll be less of an asshole. Sorry, I'm still mad about the world tree. 🤷🏻♀️
None needed. A genocide is not something you get over easily, even in fiction. And the absence of that part of her only lessens her responsibility, but it doesn’t come close to absolving her.
So, one has to thing about this, because being an elf, and being the queen of the undead, Sylvanus has a very long game view on things. We have speculated well that she had set on this path at the end of Wrath of the Lich King, when she seeked oblivion, and didn't like where she ended up. She for the next two expansions where she plays parts in the lore (Cataclysm and Legion), she does her best to control the situation, and place everyone into undeath. She starts a new plague to add to her forces, swallowing up Gilnaus. She attempts to get control of the Valkire (Or whatever they are called), and bargains with Hela, to gain control of the passage of the dead, and we mess that up. Part of that struggle we can speculate is driven by fear. She knows what happens after death, to her limited capability, and she doesn't like it. She would rather everyone live in undeath, under her ... well, maybe not compassionate, but under her rule, where they can be free to pursue whatever unlife they want.
However, with Greymane destroying the only device that could give her control of the flow of souls, and the bargain with Hela maybe dependent on that, she has only one plan left. One that was set into motion by other schemers well before she reaches that decision point. Her only hope is to change the system, and maybe, just maybe, if she can divert the nature of the Jailer, she might get what she wants.
Of course, this works out badly. The cards were against her way before she started her plan, and even now, she might not have given up completely on her plan. She knows that the Heroes, the Maw Walkers, can still get her what she needs. The problem now is that she has her heart back. That part of her that fought for the life of her people.
Let us be clear, Sylvanus has always been a protector, even when she was going around killing ranks and ranks of people, soldiers and civilians alike. Her aim moved and got more corrupted, but she always was looking to protect her people. Being given a choice, to not have everything tied to destiny, that is an ultimate freedom, one that was denied her and her people, and one that she is desperate to get. The Jailer did her a service by giving her her other half of her soul back, because she will have more drive than ever before.
She's still going to be a selfish. She's still... I mean, if anyone remembers Sylvanus from WC3, she's an arrogant piece of elf to begin with. That'll never change. The question that remains, if she lives through this, is will she have learned any humility to let it go? To let go of the dream, and just concede that she can't have what she wants?
The Sylvanus that can let it go would be the ultimate character growth, and a satisfying conclusion to her story arc, and I am kinda excited to see if she lives long enough for us to see that.
Literally this! People seem to forget about the whole her dying in the past and trying to change the aspect of what happens to her in the afterlife. Smartest person alive or not, when a all powerful being tells you a plan to essentially abolish the system that puts her in the unwanted version of her death, then yeah.... you know they have the power to do so, they've given you no reason to doubt them (at that time). Essentially take the offer and see how it plays out.
When things arent playing out the way you would like, remember... there is an end goal. Now for her betrayal, yeah.... he literally just spilled the beans that he isnt going to do what he promised. Did we the player know that? Yeah of course no shit we do! We know almost everything going on in the world, that doesnt mean that the actual characters do.
Great analysis as always. I was looking forward to it!
What I'm not looking forward to see on the other hand, is how Blizzard will make her "a" victim.
What I will hate to see, is her sisters (vereesa to be precise, for being the youngest of the three, ranged general like her sister and having no significant part in the story since Rhonin died) to try to be understanding and all "touchy feely".
“Denying obvious truth to yourself so that what you want to be true can still stay true and doubling down on that if anyone points out that you are wrong”. This is so META I am not sure if he’s talking about Sylvanas and the Jailer or himself and WOW.
Cinematics need to be longer. Or at least have more of them to tell these stories
I think they are to expensive for them. They are at the end pre rendered cinematics and not done by their super crappy In-Game Engine.
like the hour long ffxiv cinematics + cutscenes lmao i would not be opposed
The betrayal seems so out of character for her, because it was a heroic moment for a character that is supposed to be cunning. Doesn't it seem like she would play along until she could actually have a chance to stop him?
Also, the cinematic did make it seem like she was trying to protect Anduin, Thrall, Jaina, and Bolvar which also seems out of character. I think it's hard to argue otherwise.
@toychristopher: Sylvanas also didn't kill Bolvar. I think she doesn't want to do the cycle of hatred and killing anymore.
Rather than protect them, I think it was more of a "Portal is finally open, let's get to work and not waste any more time on them" and Zovaal's response was a petty child-like "Nah I'm gonna play a bit more"
So, what about the most important cinematic since the Legion finale cinematic?
Where's the Garrosh analysis?
Garrosh unsubbed from WoW.
I didn't go into the cinematic with any expectations and I really enjoyed it. I genuinely was excited while watching it and thought it was very cool. I'm not a "Sylvanas Loyalist" but I've always liked her as a character (despite some of the irrational stuff) and I think "completing" her soul is a necessary development to hopefully make her story more interesting.
I mean Sylvanas can talk a big game about how she thought "the Jailer would set us all free" and how convinced she was of that..
*But his name is The Jailer.*
I know it’s late for you but thank you for staying up so late to drop this!!
I think Elune spared Sylvanas life when fighting Tyrande because she knew that the Jailer will get his orb no matter what and maybe she will need her later when Elune is arriving to shadowlands and she will fight Zovaal
Sylvanas will become the night warrior
Elune could die this expansion tho... I hope not, but she is the one who really could help us, considering tyrande's power we saw
@@marioelias4267 imagine that!
@@Voidload
Something is also telling me that we will see her or her true powers
The magic the Primus used to lock his Sigil looks just like the portal
First ones technology.
They both actually look very similar , right? Hmmm... 😏
The abilities of the last boss in Tazavesh also look exactly the same as the portal
and the raid boss guardian of the first ones.
There's a striking similarity between the gold elements of Zovaal's portal and the gold details when we empower the gateways in Oribos.
Sylvannas is saying "Don't let them reach the unsubscribe button."
Easiest solution: We kill sylvanas and have the smurfs bring her back to the vampire dudes that get info out. Then when we re done maw her.
Or we kill her and save the good side of her but she's tied to the maw somehow. A new ve'nari
Blizzard doesn't have the balls.
21:44 Asmongold was right. The Jailer is Thanos.
No Thanos is a far better character.
@@hopelessearth Nathanos replaced with Not-Thanos. Ok.
I love your enthusiasm, Taliesin, and your extremely detailed analysis of this story. Also, this could almost be a good story. The problem is and has always been from the moment they decided to have Sylvanas be the baddy is that this is not the Sylvanas that I have loved ever since Warcraft III. The Forsaken have always worked in the grey area, where we're not sure if they are working towards good or bad ends. Sylvanas, herself, had plausible storylines like using the Val'kyr to attempt to expand the Forsaken. Is that a completely good thing to do? Obviously not, but it made sense. She also always gave new undead the choice to join the Forsaken willingly. When she was chosen to be the new Horde Warchief it made sense, because she made a noble choice to defend the Horde Leadership against the Burning Legion. Once the writers decided to make her a baddie and she burned down Teldrassil, her choices didn't fit the character that had been portrayed previously. Now, of course, all of the events in BFA have been retconned that she was working with the Jailer all along and that the destruction of Teldrassil and the war campaign was meant to ferry as many souls to the Jailer and bolster his forces. Now, in Shadowlands, Sylvanas has been a pawn of the Jailer the entire time. The way you try to explain her actions by comparing them to the ones that normal humans make in the real world is understandable and I'd agree that it could be a believable story if it wasn't Sylvanas making these choices. If she was selfish this whole time, then why did she even lead the Forsaken in the first place? If she turned more selfish at some point, when did this happen and what made her that way? The obvious answer is that the writers wanted her to be the bad guy so they stumbled making her have unbelievable choices to get reactions out of players. At this point I just want Sylvanas' story wrapped up so we can move on to an entirely new story in the next expansion. Also, you don't think that things have changed now that Sylvanas got the part of her soul back? The writers are obviously setting up that she was only bad this whole time because she was missing that part of her soul and now she will see the errors of her ways just like what happened with Uther. Come on. This isn't rocket science. I like the Shadowlands story overall, I'm just disappointed in the way Sylvanas plays a part in it and I don't see any way the writers could make a satisfying conclusion to her story at this point.
I really enjoyed this cinematic and am excited to see where the story goes next in 9.2 :)
That clinging clock noise in the music is Anvils, which are normally used in classical music like Wagner to indicate Giants or powerful weaponry.
I have a weird theory about this ending. I think after getting her soul back Sylvanas has forgotten everything she has done since Arthas took her soul and the "cannot let him reach the.." comment is her wanting to stop Arthas from reaching Silvermoon. This would reset her character.
I like this one!
so this way they don't only scrap systems they implement from expansion to expansion/patch to patch
They now also scrap the characters buildup
So I asked nobble a question I’ll ask you, seeing as how we know those crystals hold souls including us when we go to the maw to save them; we see that the sword that Anduin has had one forged in it who soul do you think that is and do you think that is important
It's Arthas. In Legion they brought out Crystallized Illidan™©® to pump up the player numbers. Now they're bringing out Crystal Arthas™©®.
@Urazz But Varian dies before the engine is death broke. It has to be Arthas if the soul used to forge Sharlamourne is going to be important.
I suppose there are three options, really: a) Arthas, b) Nathanos, c) Sir Never-mentioned-before-in-the-lore-but-suddenly-a-very-big-deal-indeed.
Yeah, Arthas or somehow Varian tho he is most likely a maldraxxus guy. Or I thought or Argus... but I dunno, maybe titans have their own deathworld
It's funny, all the things that seemingly excited Taliesin made me roll my eyes.
That’s because they’re bliz simps through and through and no matter how shit it gets they will always defend it.
You can't compare to Tali's simp powers
When you believe the ends justify the means you can justify a lot
So you're expecting me to believe Sylvanas thought a guy named the JAILER would.... free us all....?