The fall of Deathwing (and internal consistency)
As a WarCraft II player, the fall of Deathwing is a story point that has been driving me for a dozen years. Betrayal of the best and brightest is a standard literary trope, and one that tends to resonate well with me; add in some incomprehensible cosmic horrors and it’s basically a hardwired switch straight to the centers of my DO WANT story-consuming brain.
And then the actual raid: reused boss models, entire reused environments, just incredibly disappointing atmospherically. But that’s okay! Because that’s not what I’m here for, right? It doesn’t have to be pretty, you know, it’s the story! The end of the story! That’s so incredibly exciting!
So! The Fall of Deathwing. “Finally, some closure!” I thought.
And oh my friends, how very very wrong I was.
If you have not yet been to kill Deathwing, be warned: this contains spoilers. And, as per usual from me, some tremendous NERDRAEG!!11. But y’all should expect that by now.
As with Wrath and the Lich King encounter in ICC, there is a huge cutscene at the end of Dragon Soul. Also like ICC, this shit is completely incomprehensible. But unlike Icecrown, which merely provoked a brow-furrowed “wait, what? why?”, the finale of Dragon Soul made me so actively, ragingly angry I needed to walk away and have a little liedown.
The fuck is this shit, you guys.
I don’t — I — what.
There are so many things in there that are stupid, wrong, and STUPIDLY WRONG that I have no idea how they managed to put them all in a ninety second video.
1) Every goddamn Aspect is still a mostly-naked motherfucking blood elf. I hate this. You know I hate this. I have gone on record over and over and over about how much I hate this. But hey, at least Nozdormu is half-dressed too! It’s small, but it’s a start. Thanks for that, character design team! But still: look into pants.
2) Why is Aggra even there? I know some people think she is an okay character! Those people are wrong, but that’s fine, they can go ahead and be wrong all they like. But she has no business being here, especially since she wasn’t anywhere else in the entire fucking instance. She just appears there at the end, shoehorned in for no good reason just like every other appearance she has ever made ever. I am trying very hard to stick to standard story bitching here and not get into how offensive her presence and her role make me just because I am totally disinterested into getting into a Grr Feminism comment war, but seriously you guys: this is so bad. It is so bad and so out of touch on so many levels that when I try to formulate eloquent words for how I feel about it my brain goes BZZT SPANG and blood comes shooting out my eyes.
3) Here is a thing that is apparently a surprise to the writing staff, and has been for most of the expansion: the point of Deathwing is not Grr Evil. Neltharion was the wisest of the Aspects; it is not his fault that Unspeakable Horrors From Beyond ate his brain any more than it was Arthas Menethil’s fault that a demon ate his soul. Sure, Arthas could have left Frostmourne behind; Neltharion could have maybe, I don’t know, lived on a mountain rather than under it. Regardless, these acts of evil and destruction were not the conscious choices of evil-doers, but the corruption of potential and greatness, which is imho WAY MORE INTERESTING than a simple GRR SMASH. Leaving that out of the story (as they did in both expansions, with a few very tiny notable exceptions in WOTLK’s case) is selling the world they’ve spent so much time and effort building short, and it makes me sad.
But all of the above pales in relation to this one eensy tiny little detail that I am admittedly remarkably sensitive to, and that is this:
HOW IS THE WORLD ANY DIFFERENT AFTER THE EXECUTION OF NELTHARION THAN IT WAS AFTER THE EXECUTION OF MALYGOS?
This is what makes me so very angry, and I am totally up-front here and owning that a lot of that is because Malygos is my favorite character, but this betrayal of his story is so thoughtless and so useless that alskdfjlklsfd ARO SMASH.
It’s not because the world is left (momentarily) without an Aspect, because Malygos didn’t leave one either and Kalecgos had to fight for it. It’s not because there aren’t other black dragons to take Neltharion’s place, because there are; most of them are in the Blade’s Edge Mountains in Outland and everyone wants to forget about them, but they exist (and also are AWESOME). It’s just sheer, unadulterated, writerly laziness and a cheap way to usher in a new expansion that flows not at all from the original world. Either they forgot or they just don’t care that they’ve been through this whole Kill The Aspect thing already, and that inconsistency frustrates me so much that I find it difficult to enjoy the world anymore. How can I get attached to the story when god knows when they’ll throw out something else I find interesting? It’s why I don’t read comics.
And maybe it’s just me, but I am of the belief that when the gods give you the job of watching over the world and keeping it together, quitting whenever you feel like it is kind of a dick move, Alexstrasza.
)
To answer the bold question, I believe the Aspects channeled more of their power into the Dragon Soul to make it strong enough to bring down Deathwing. They are of course interrupted by Ultraxion atop Wyrmrest Temple and have to defeat him before shooting Deathwing. Most of their power is gone I guess at this point, but they do have enough to aid during Madness…
Aggra is an incredibly weak character whose only existence is to further Thrall's character development. This isn't just a feminist issue, it's also poor writing. The overused and corny trope of "new life" is absolutely nauseating.
I can sort of see where you're going there and I could accept hedging a little that way were it not for Alexstrasza's dialogue specifically about releasing their Aspect-y power (HA HA KALECGOS YOU SNOOZE YOU LOSE) for "the Age of Mortals." It comes across so cheap and lazy, like Metzen just got his shiny new bluray copy of Return of the King and had it on repeat while he was approving the scripts.
The business model of an MMO is predicated on pushing the reward lever at regular intervals to keep people paying, and for a story-driven player like me the lack of respect given to the story in this expansion (just from the typos alone you can tell no one cared) makes it feel like they've bait-and-switched the treat that comes from my reward lever and think I'm too stupid to notice.
The fun thing about Aggra is that according to the awful Cataclysm novels, she's actually retarding Thrall's development instead of forwarding it. She constantly belittles everything he does, thinks, and feels, and it's so degrading and traditionally emasculating I'm shocked it not only got approved but that the writing staff is still touting her as a strong female character. I guess that's what they think strong means?
First time reading, first time commenting, Cyn clued me in. :)
From the book The Shattering, I gather that Aggra stuck around at first as Thrall's teacher, then his lover, then his mate. Like her or loathe her, she as a character has a right to be there in that respect. But, yeah, out of nowhere to have her tummy tapped by Alex is a little surreal.
The most frustrating thing for me on the passing of the Aspects is this; I never really felt the mattered for what they were. In-game they have always felt like props, maguffins, dwarven NPCs with wings, whatevar. There was no unique dragon-ness there for me to care. So they're mortal now. And this changes things for us HOW? Anytime an aspect would have mattered, we mortals have stepped in and took the brunt. Replace Alex with Brann Bronzebeard and I imagine it'll play out the same.
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I'm not saying Aggra doesn't have a right to be there, I'm saying she wasn't there before. She's not in the NPC stack on top of Wyrmrest, she's not on the airship, she wasn't there for the opening to Madness, she's just suddenly there with the group at the end. It's strange and distracting; when did she get there? I think they just missed writing her into any of the previous sequences, which goes back to the lazy thing. They're not using their inbetweeners the way they should.
What I would have liked to see, if the dragon aspects were all "retiring," was to continue the trend with Thrall as the Aspect of Earth and have mortals take over everywhere. Malfurion or Hamuul in the Dream, Tyrande for life, Jaina for magic, Brann for time. Leaving those roles unfilled seems like an extremely bad idea since the Old Gods, whom they were created to oppose, haven't been defeated.
From the little bit I read of the Thrall novel (before Aggra just irritated the fuck out of me and I put it away), she was was actually present at the Maelstrom with the other shaman sooo… I dunno. But yeah I totally agree with you, I hate her character and just what they've done with Thrall overall. Could've toned it down a bit I think. And then to not even really have him play an active role in the Madness encounter, or one that the player's could see…. lame. I hate where they went with the Aspects in the cinematic as well, but I can see how the storyline led to it justifiably. I know how you love the DARGONS, so my heart goes out to ya. :)
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But the other shaman aren't there in Madness (or the cutscene) either, so I have no idea what's going on there. Seriously, just so LAZY. :(
It's true that my broken-hearted rage is predicated entirely on my dragon-love; without that I'd probably just be kind of meh about it, the way I have the rest of Cataclysm. XD I don't even mind so much that they've gotten rid of the Aspects so much as they're just handwaving it and not bothering to give us any story that makes sense. Maybe if I'd been a comics fan I'd be okay with it, since I understand they undergo these huge sweeping editorial retcons all the time, but I have this thing where I like all pieces of my narrative to fit together and make sense. Even the Star Wars EU at least TRIES to fit stuff together, and that's when they KNOW Lucas is going to change the backstory around behind them! :)
In a way, Aggra HAS always been there…at the Maelstrom, anyway. She is there in the 4.2 trailer, and also in the Thrall novel with the other Shamans. Which OF COURSE doesn't make a lick of sense for her to be there after Deathwing's fall, but it seems like she's spent the entire expansion – except for the "Save Thrall" questline – hanging out there, waiting for this moment.
One possible explanation is that, like in the Thrall book, there is actually a bunch of Shamans there with like a camp, in charge of monitoring/channeling nature magic into the Maelstrom. They just aren't ever SEEN. It's still very sloppy, but it is at least a somewhat tolerable reason as to why she suddenly shows up?
As for Alexstrasza's quitting, I interpreted it not as her giving up and saying "welp I'm done" but rather a subtly layered congratulations mixed with warning. Like, it's not the Age of Mortals now because the Aspects are tired and retiring, but because they're outta juice. When she tells us that the future of the world is in our hands, I don't think it's a reward or prize so much as it is a new responsibility – whatever happens to Azeroth now, it's up to US to save the day, since the Aspects aren't able to step in and rescue us anymore. Sure, it sounds all glowy and warm – it's in our hands, we're so awesome! – but it's rather foreboding, especially considering we KNOW that in Mists, we keep going to war and being all stupid. In other words, the Age of Mortals is about to begin, and this isn't necessarily a good thing.
I wish I had more words for this, but really what it comes down to is that you always make me feel better when I rage about lore, Rades. XD
I think so many of my problems with this whole sequence could have been solved with just some better, tighter writing; I know there are ways to present the sequence of events they're trying to present without completely screwing the entire narrative pooch because you just did it. XD
Actually rades, the other shaman can be seen on the far pillars both during the deepholm intro, and during the dreams of isorath phase in TH. In the TH scene, Thrall even mentions them by name when deathwing smashes their pillar.
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Really enjoyed the post and the rest of the blog – my first time here. :)
I can't agree with you enough that there's really a lot of wasted potential in Deathwing's storyline by portraying him as "Grr Evil," rather than giving him any kind of character depth. Maybe that depth was there in WC II – it's certainly not anywhere in Cataclysm. I was really hoping that we might get something more of that story in the Dragon Soul raid and it just never came to fruition.
Aggra is .. hmm. Well I wouldn't have a damn clue who she was if I hadn't read The Shattering, but that's a rant for another day. And while I can see the points of Rhades and Grimmtooth above in terms of her importance to Thrall, I'm just not convinced that I understand why she needs to be at Deathwing's fall. Sure, she's Thrall's teacher / partner / mate / manic pixie dream girl*, but none of the other aspects have their partners / consorts / children present. This is a fight between the aspects and Deathwing, and your lucky raid group who gets to see this thing go down. Unless Aggra is there as a part of OUR group, I don't see how she belongs – and, as you point out, she hasn't been with our group for the rest of the instance, so why does she show up at the end?
*Note: I'm not actually trying to make an argument that Aggra's a manic pixie dream girl as that would be stupid. I'm just being an asshole. :P
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Disclaimer: I have not read the novels.
As a person who has not read the novels, if you were to ask me to tell you ONE THING about Aggra other than "she shagged Thrall," I would not be able to do so.
I did enjoy her role in putting him back together when he was discombobulated, mostly when she was all, "YOU DID NOT JUST," when he told her to be patient. But none of that really told me anything about Aggra except: she shagged Thrall.
Conveniently, here is a long, spammy reviewnalysis for Twilight of the Aspects.
It is so, so terrible.
I hate 'Having a baby SQUEEEE!' as an ending to a story about prying off some dragon's back scales and slicing through its tendons while its still alive and bleeding lava on you.