This is the Chosen One. Sorry.
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- Опубліковано 9 лют 2025
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"What do you mean maybe??? Is this the chosen one or not?? Ugh, fine. Send it into battle, there's a hundred more waiting if this one fails".
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I think it'd be really cool if you took a look at "Alan Wake". The first game is my favourite vg story of all time. 💜
Ok
You should do video about the most evil villain.
I do love your videos but .... isn't 5 min of a 18min video being Ads a lot? I was hoping you'd at least talk on the hilarious morrowwind bugs you were showing lol
Lol, pipi!
Emmet from "The Lego Movie" is another great example of this. He didn't mean to find the Piece of Resistance and at the beginning everyone is constantly like "this is the guy!" All excitedly and then soon after they're like "this... this can't be the guy, can it?"
“Now I know what you’re thinking, ‘he is the least qualified person in the world to lead us’ and you are right”
@@AlmightyTimeGod that sentence has been in my head for a decade.
I was thinking the same thing
commenting to boost this. Amen.
Lloyd garmadon
The game “Wandersong“ has a concept like this, you’re the protagonist trying to save the world but “The Hero“ goes against that, and literally tries to kill you
me no understand but it is relatable to me
came here to post this. it's such a good game, and a good subversion of the trope
Your are my favorite person for today! Thank you for talking about wandersong! Have a great day!
@@theanonymousunknown1949 thanks but people hate me i only reply becuase it is real to me becuase i tell everyone i will be king soon people say it is impossible
@@freyamehrab I don't think he meant you...
the chosen one? the guy that gets chosen? that guy?
Yes kronk that one
The chosen one. The one who was specifically chosen for greatness. The one of choice
Yes. By Azura. Yes,again.
Yes. The opposite of the one who gets picked last in dodge ball.
Boa tarde, amigo! 🦎🦎🦎
Morrowind starts with you getting killed by a rat, and ends with you killing a God. Such a great journey ❤
You made it to the rat? I keep getting filtered by the scribs
Same goes with Daggerfall, except you Dont kill a god unfortunately, but I believe they are capable
how can you kill a god? What a grand and intoxicating innocence!
In my defence, it was two rats in a cellar and I still hadn't reached level 2.
@omarbarakaeden5608 You could _make_ a god (Mannimacro)
Dagoth Ur still has to be one of my favorite villains in a video game, dude treats you like an old chum rather than a nemesis, he makes me feel genuinely bad for killing him due to how charming he is. Almost makes me wish there was an ending where you could actually join him instead of killing him.
Saame, I have to play with a 6th house mod whenever I replay. Granted they can be janky to get working. I wish they were able to flesh it out originally. All the hints at 6th house culture are super interesting.
that's cause you guys are old chums.
I can't wait to see how Wayward Realms turns out myself it will be interesting with no main questline...
i think that ended up getting scrapped. which is a shame.
unless you play argonian
*Welcome, Moon-and-Star. Come to me through fire and war. I'm a god! How can you kill a god? What a sweet and intoxicating innocence. Shame on you sweet Nerevar.*
Come Nerevar-come and look upon the heart!-upon the heart~
Dagothwave is the best genre of music
@@TheAechBombWhat's Dagothwave?
Oh oh ooooooh!
@@hannahmetzger4880 Search about it on youtube? You'll love it
Other chosen one mentors - a bit silly at times like a doddering old grandpa but wise and collected
Caius Cossades - takes a hit from his skooma pipe, throws money at you and tells you to get a job
Caius is the kind of wise and supportive mentor I could have benefited from IRL.
caius: yeah you can use my house to rest, don't touch my shit, here's 200 drakes, go shopping
The Legend of PiPi !
I THOUGHT THE SAME!
Me too!
Will forever be one of my favorite pieces of animated media
PEEPEE!!!! KITTIE PEEPEEII!!!!
heheheehe sooo goooood!!! and glad someone else saw it toooo!
The idea of becoming the Chosen one has a broader in universe concept: Mantling, when you walk as a being so thoroughly that even the universe itself can’t tell you apart. It happened in the next game’s dlc, with the main character taking on the Mantle of Sheogorath.
This.
More strongly supported by the fact that Almelexia, who was at that point still God-Tier, recognized you as the reincarnation of Nerevar by the end of the Tribunal DLC, at least to the point that she, well, does that one thing that's probably not what the people who haven't played it are assuming without context.
I don't necessarily think that just means that this just validates the Prophecy, but that the Quests of the main game and Tribunal are absolutely in line with the acts of Nerevar, to the point one doing them would Mantle him. (And contrast this to the relative irrelevancy of the Bloodmoon DLC- you're a hero of a place, but not THE GUY, with these specific, existing bonds to the Gods. Its definite Mantling)
The AlmSiVi Gods were powerful enough to just retcon their own backstory, (Vivec in particular, among their other insane escapades) so its not like Almelexia is just playing around.
From a meta perspective, though, the point is still relevant, and I think applies as a storytelling concept to a lot of stuff. But Morrowind has so many great examples, like the failed Nerevarine ghosts, the shitty skooma Yoda, Dagoth Ur's banger lines, and the delightfully derpy Colovian Fur/Kaijit combo, to boot.
@@Birdsflight44 does she apologize?
Mantling is different from incarnation though. “Mantling and incarnation are separate roads; do not mistake this. The latter is built from the cobbles of drawn-bone destiny. The former: walk like them until they must walk like you.”
I love how hollow knight subverts the trope of the chosen one.
When you have already been playing for some hours you actually get to know that you AREN'T the hollow knight. The hollow knight was the chosen one but he is failing at his job and you, one of the random discarded vessels (the not chosen ones that were left trapped) have to either follow the hollow knights path and stall the evil god for some time or actually commit to defeating it. It's such a good story.
Yup. You are just oen of many other vessels, and werent even deemed worthy of the job. You arent the chosen one, you are just maybe the only one left that can do anything. Another exemple of that is Dark Souls 3's Ashen one. Again one of many, and at the start of the game, a hero that reached the first flame but wasnt strong enough to sustain it. You arent the chosen one, you are a failed hero, and the world just has no one better left to save it anymore, as all others great heroes are already long gone, having completed their own journeys (and died for it) before yours begins.
This example fits this topic better than I think most Hollow Knight players will ever realize. Consider the Broken Vessel and, potentially, Nosk's disguise. Any Vessel with the willpower to do so can crawl out of the Abyss and begin its journey, and several have in between the Hollow Knight and the playable Knight. Until the player takes over, they were all miserable failures.
What separates the Knight from their predecessors is simple: it caught a glimpse of the Pale King taking the Hollow Knight out of the Abyss, before falling to its temporary death. The implication is that this experience created the exact sort of emotional core that the Pale King was trying to avoid in the "Hollow" Knight (and failed due to his own familial instincts, but I digress), and that core drove the Knight to not only crawl back out of the Abyss years later, but fight its way *out of Hallownest entirely, while dazed and amnesic, and with only a common Nail at its side.*
Ultimately, the Knight proves to be everything the King tried to prevent in a Vessel: as much of a person as anyone else, to the point of allying with the Radiance's one conscious follower in a mutually beneficial relationship. It's the Knight's inherent drive and assimilation of a hero's virtues that allow it to not only beat the Hollow Knight, but defeat the Radiance in a way the King could never have planned for. Hollow Knight's Knight overcame everything from circumstances, to history, to nigh invincible opposition to become the chosen one, and it makes their victory all the more satisfying for the player making it happen.
It feels like Chosen Ones these days are more often subverions of the trope than straight interpretations. I am not complaining however, as it's always interesting to watch the discussions of this story element play out.
I feel like this cycle always happens with all hero tropes, like cowboys went through the same thing, white hat, to gritty hero, to anti-hero, to ironic anti-trope cowboy. I am sure its happened with many genres.
Not really. It's more like it's getting commented more often that being the chosen one sucks
Lost of DnD campaigns have done something similar with the Chosen One. Everyone makes the players the Chosen Ones and then often realize “these are the idiots destined to save us” I’m doing a campaign right now where in a party do freaks and weirdo’s I’m unironically the most normal man, a very generic looking human being who happened to become a thief and fell backwards into becoming a war hero.
Keeping in line with that I joined the party simply for some excitement and in the first real mission I watch in horror as my party charges forward and slaughters a camp of comically inept Bandits. Every time I enter a room it’s nothing but charred meat and gore and my character thinks “what have I gotten myself into?”
@@Broomer52That sounds Hella fun. 😁. I'm going through my very first DnD campaign right now (I'm a newbie, LOL;I've always wanted to play DnD, as I'd heard _many, MANY GREAT_ things about the game, but I just haven't had the chance to do so until now). 😁. I'm playing as a human Paladin named Lamros. He's cool and funny. :3.
The last time I've seen it played straight, it was also parodied with the main character literally named Chosen One in Kung Pow: Enter The Fist.
It is suggested in-game that the Emperor may simply have sent the protagonist into Morrowind as a ‘decoy’ Nerevarine: someone who fits the initial specifics of the prophecy enough to cause political turmoil within Morrowind, and destabilise the Tribunal Temple opposing Imperial rule and religion.
This possibility is intimated by your mentor Caius Cosades, who runs the Main Quest as a Blades Operation (with the Blades being a secret intelligence organisation answering only to the Emperor). The mission is to make your character LOOK like the Nerevarine, enough to cause trouble. He sees it as a simple Black Ops political destabilisation affair… at first.
Of course, the Emperor’s intentions are never confirmed, and he does have a noted gift for mystical foresight (as established in the sequel Oblivion), so he may well have had good intentions. But we also know from the previous game Daggerfall that Emporer Uriel Septim is perfectly happy to send secret agents to meddle in provincial affairs behind the scenes.
Fundamentally, I just love the idea that it was all just a False Information Black Op, that went too far…
"Your mission was to pretend to become their messiah figure."
"Copy that, became their messiah."
"Yeah, no, this is just to sabotage their theocracy."
"Sorry, I don't hear as well after surviving an incurable plague, getting every dunmer faction to chant my name and then struck the heart of the world to kill a dream-walking anathema."
Speaking of decoy "chosen ones", check out Jennifer Nielsen's book The False Prince! Our orphan protagonist is plucked from obscurity by a conspiratorial nobleman to act as the dead king and queen's long-lost son, but things get complicated.
yeah ive held that theory for ages, near the end of his involvement he does say something along the lines of "im beginning to think you actually are the nerevarine"
@@awaredeshmukh3202 oh wait i think ive actually read that in school, it was an interesting book
I'm also under the impression Cosades isn't just a druggie, he's probably organizing a substantial smuggling ring to cause an Opium Crisis in Morrowind.
Also, there's a substantial benefit for the prophesied hero of Morrowind being in the pocket of Uriel, so he's probably not that worried about you actually enacting the prophecy.
I don't know who originally said it, but this (paraphrased) quote I came across a while ago is one of the best takes on the tropes of prophecy and chosen ones: "A prophecy is not a prediction of things to come, it's a play looking for actors." Morrowind (and much of the rest of the Elder Scrolls series, to some extent) illustrates this idea beautifully.
@@hestiathena4917 Sounds Pratchetty, perhaps Sandersonesque.
I like that! I'm rereading a series I enjoyed growing up called Gregor the Overlander, which plays with prophecies, and holds some of this tension both at the beginning and end. While aimed more at middle grade readers, t's actually still a really good series as a young adult now, I see things I didn't notice before, and I have to say Suzanne Collins is really quite a skillful author! The pop culture success of the Hunger Games partially highlighted but partially led to overlooking that for many.
@@roecocoa Also I have quite enjoyed some books from both of those authors :D I enjoy seeing them mentioned
No way.. Pipi reference in the thumbnail?? 😮 This made my day, thank you to the thumbnail artist and lovely video!! :)
Thanks for all the hard work that went into Pipi! That video is a masterpiece!
-Benji, showrunner
Another example of having to earn your "chosen-one"-ness is the Link from Wind Waker. No special destiny. He had to prove he had the stuff before he got the OK from the gods of Hyrule.
The most interesting part is that he isn't a chosen hero at all. As the soul of link doesn't exist in the wind waker timeline.
ua-cam.com/video/Qoo1HSX8qYk/v-deo.html
He IS a special Link- and anyone who likes Zelda really should look into his lore in particular, especially in relation to the likes of OoT Link and BotW Link.
More specifically, which Links are born bearing the Triforce, and if they somehow otherwise have some kind of power. (OoT Link was chosen by the Master Sword and aged up for more strength, BotW Link's Flurry Rush seems diegetic, most 2D Links just have the Triforce on their hand)
WW Link seems to have gotten the least Divine Intervention and external support, despite having to straight up fight Ganondorf and do all the main line hero stuff.
Oh, and if you ever felt like the start of TotK felt off, that Link never had the Triforce of Courage- so while he had the sword, he ONLY had as much divine power as was in the Master Sword. Most Links have both.
Paints him in a different light, doesn't it? He was still chosen in some respects, but no triangle for him.
@@Birdsflight44 ...huh. that's a good point. maybe the reason the master sword breaks so easily in botw and totk isn't because it's gotten weaker, but because it doesn't have the backing power of the triforce of courage behind it anymore.
Now that's a theory.
@@Birdsflight44 Another note on OoT Link, he's the only one that gets a separate timeline for being a Chosen One that fails. I personally think that most other Zelda games can pretty easily be given a similar treatment of segueing into one of the various civil wars or downfalls in Hyrule's history should you fail, but even so the idea that the Chosen One can either fail or simply not show up at all is pretty cool.
@@BeaglzRok1I subscribe to the "abandoned timeline" theory. The Fallen Timeline is one where child Link goes through his adventure in Ocarina of Time, but doesn't return from the future to stop Ganondorf because Zelda broke the flow of time.
6:23 Scribs aren't even hostile, what have you done 😭
scribs are friends not food
When I first played, the shocking twist was finding out that scrib jelly I'd been stealing and eating isn't "jelly made by scribs" (like honey) but "jelly made of scribs." 😨
14:00 One small problem with that: Azura got everything she wanted. The prophecy was created by Azura as a means to spite the people who killed her champion (Nerevar), usurped divinity and then lessened her influence over the dunmer. She spends the story framing the prophecy as divine guidance, as restoring the natural order. Vivec dispels those notions, Dagoth Ur has simply gone insane and destroying the source of divinity is what was needed. Which means that, by the end, Azura's prophecy is fulfilled, her worship is restored by the time of Skyrim (seen in the Dawnguard DLC), the Tribunal is dead and the dunmer punished (with a large chunk of Morrowind being buried by an eruption of Red Mountain). Not my favorite twist, all things considered.
I mean I would, but wont criticize. Best opinions and looks - mostly looks to subsume
Does it matter? She IS basically aligned with general best interests and the AlmSiVi wind up being more or less your opposition.
You don't have to do the opposite of a prophecy to defy it, just take ownership of your Destiny.
Like Shoto Todoroki from My Hero Academia- his arc is how he didn't come into his own until he stopped avoiding using half of his super powers.
He had a good reason, in that he was the result of eugenics, and he resented it, but he could never fulfill his own personal goals until he used his full power. (Which they illustrate with some nicely animated and extremely Manime sequences)
I don't usually watch anime, but I've been watching with a family member and this has been pretty good. Worth at least watching a video essay on.
The whole burning down of morrowind is actually very relevant to them as a culture and is, well according to Azura, boethia and maphala, a good thing.
The foundation of dunmer culture is to overcome, to achieve transcendance through hardship, the psijic endeavour, the doom driven path of Lorkhan. That's why they live in well Morrowind. A harsh yet beautiful land, a land where from all corners are surrounded by enemies(nords to the west, lizard and cats south, akaviri east and harsh cold sea to the north). Vivec weakened the dunmer by essentially giving them everything, they no longer seek hardship, Vivec mentions this himself. The return of Azura and co is a return to form, a return to a stronger dunmeri culture. Though they must suffer first, it's in the long run a net positive, in Azuras eyes.
The daedra basically always win in TES, even when it doesn't seem like it.
Come Nerevar, friend or traitor, and let us look upon the tale foundry video.
The lil scrimblo in the thumbnail looks like Pipi!!!
I know right?! I gasped when I saw the little dude
That’s what I was thinking
I was wondering if anybody said this cause I thought the same thing
Same thought
woo
I like how your drawings are a reference to the Legend of Pipi animation. That short film has many of the same themes you are talking about, plus it is hilarious!
The name of this trope is "The Unchosen One", a Hero that through sheer will manages to turn the tides of the world and fate.
If the only way is to forsake someone else, He will Make another way.
If the world is to be destroyed by the gods he will prevent it.
If a child will be a ruthless monster, He will raise a compassionate soul.
They do everything the Chosen One can, Without any of the powers.
absolutely this is the kind of protagonist I'd like to write. generally with some kind of chaotic edge. not necessarily in being a little goblin, but in having some motives or ways of thinking that serve as spanners in the works. I like characters who can't be bribed or corrupted by power not because they're incorruptible saints, but because they have PRIORITIES. look. it's all about their boo. or their stamp collection. maybe they saved the world in the process of finding the rarest stamps. could work. either way, the villain is like 'ULTIMATE POWER', and the Unchosen One is like 'hmmm yes but then it'd be too easy to get all the stamps"
Omg orange Pipi
That short was so funny!
lol that’s what I thought
orang pipi :3333
The Google translations for these coments are gold.
And he has a diamond sword like he got it from Minecraft
Honestly I feel like the unlikely 'chosen one' is yet another trope 'Kung Fu Panda' made actually work and nailed on so many levels (I will die on this hill)
EXACTLY
The Nerevarine is such an awesome concept to put on a videogame, you basically make your own way on top. I always loved what Morrowind did with its story
Isn't that most rpgs?!
@@Raximus3000Yes, every single one
@@clowncargaming8046
So, isn't the point of this video kinda wrong? Every rpg starts you from the lowest possible chosen one or not, hell even the "inversion" is not as well done as in Bard's tale.
@@Raximus3000 Every RPG starts you with low stats sure. But not every RPG says you're the chosen one, maybe most, but not all. In VTMB you're just a human turned into a vampire, there is prophecy and you're involved in it, but it's all revealed to be untrue nonsense. In KCD you're just the survivor of an attack on your village, but you don't survive because of some prophecy, you survive from the skin of your teeth. You also don't even get to avenge your parents/village.
@@clowncargaming8046
Yes, and every one that you are, you start from scratch. Mana series and a dragon quest are like that.
In an rpg setting the "chosen one" is not powerful from the start is pretty standard by definition.
What a grand and intoxicating innocence. I am a god how can he kill a god?
The thing that a lot of representations of prophecies that I've come across tends to get very specific about a chosen one.
The Neravarine prophecy, however, is more a collection of signposts guiding you to a desired outcome.
That makes the story of Morrowind somewhat analogous to the trials of Hercules. Sure, he was the son of Zeus and all that, but he essentially became a hero under his own effort. For the Neravarine, they may not be a demigod but they definitely have a divine betting pool going on whether they succeed or not with plenty of interference on all sides.
ZuEs 😂
@@johannesstephanusroos4969 Look at you, trying to write Ζεύς with your infantile alphabet. What a grand and intoxicating innocence.
"Ah yes the chosen one. My eter-... what is that?"
"BOA TARDE AMIGO"
This reminds me of my understanding of the Elder Scrolls lore of mantling: a power that you can gain by emulating a being that is already divine and once you do, then it will retroactively have always been yours to claim.
I hope I'm understanding this correctly. Sorry to the scholars if I got mantling wrong.
they dont have to be divine, it can genuinely be anyone. you have to be so uniquely like them that the universe forgets you are two separate people. if the person isnt really unique, then its about mimicking their exact quirks, which is incredibly hard to do, and is why mundane people dont really get mantled. if the only difference between john the farmer and bill the farmer is that john blinks twice after sneezing where most people either do it once or three times, and bill says the word "elemental" a little funny, then its really hard to mantle them, because its really hard to get their unique aspects correct enough for it to happen.
BUT, if a person is extremely unique, then its easy to mantle them simply by following in their footsteps. crazy, weird, unusual, and abnormal people are easy to mantle because they do many things that nobody else ever would. the only problem is, you also have to do those things. for exceptional people, this requires exceptional actions, which makes mantling powerful people very complicated, because many of the things they did were extremely hard to do.
you and the person merge in existence, making you similar to a reincarnation, but also at the same time still being your own unique you. this allows you to be unique and different in your own ways from the person you are mantling, allowing you to change the very nature of the being that comes out of it. you dont have to be them exactly, meaning you can change their attitude towards something or how they treat certain people, how they respond to certain things. you can make a person a racist, or make them not a racist, or you can be the race they were racist towards if you hit the other unique qualities well enough. and this is just an example.
I believe mantling more than one being is possible as well, and a previously mantled entity can be mantled again, both forming a mantling of three or more separate beings into one.
@@aidenaune7008 Do they have to be dead before you can mantle them or can there be two of the same guy?
@@PilesOfRulebooks they dont have to be dead. if they are both alive, they merge into one physical being. this is exactly what happened in the sheogorath DLC of oblivion.
9:29 "... Arthur was the only one allowed to try or something."
This line is actually incredibly impactful, if you think of any person of status, such as gods, kings, etc.
How different would these stories or tales be if other people were also given the chance before these "chosen ones"?
I played an imperial and role-played as a stoic British legionair from a Monty python sketch. Taking a vacation to visit death mountain, donating Dagoth Urs corpse and some giant beating heart to the British museum.
IS THIS HOW YOU CHOOSE TO HONOR THE SIXTH HOUSE AND THE TRIBE UNMOURNED?
oh im gonna have to tell my friend bout that thumb, they made Pipi
The idea of making the neravar argonian, just to fuck with dagoth ur. Is my favorite thing that's been done recently
My Navarene kept a barrel full of shackles he pulled off from people after killing slavers.
My Hero of Kvatch had a hidden crypt behind the wine celler full of evil wizard robes, necromancer staffs, and would make the museum curator in Skyrim collaspe if he was allowed in the wine celler.
"the rest of us just live here" is perhaps my favourite book of all time, it basically says "these guys over there, they are the chosen ones. You are not. You should be happy about this. Go to school and pray your family isnt caught in the crossfire"
There is something similar between all "chosen ones" from the 3 TES games (haven't played Daggerfall yet) is that they ALL start as prisoners.
They have no past to speak of, nor any future, completely "fateless" until they are given a chance at freedom and ultimately become a Legend.
You get to choose your own new self, and your fate.
Hear me out, in The Elder Scrolls you attain godhood by learning with absolute certainty that you are part of a dream of a greater being, but still manage to somehow justify your own existence. If you can't you zero sum and are erased from the timeline. As the hero we know the world isn't real, but justify our place as a player.
And that's why the save system, command line access, and mods are canon.
Get the Agent Smiths. Someone has broken their knowledge inhibitors.
WHAT?! When you say "save system, command line access and mods are canon" is that like officially factual or just lore speculation?
@@MrBern-ex3wq Speculation, but it is canon that that is how someone becomes a god, because they're practically in a lucid dream.
Dagoth Ur is called the False Dreamer in the game because he learned about the dream, but his mind was so fractured he thought he was the dreamer.
According to Michael Kirkbride, a key designer behind Morrowind and author of the 36 Sermons of Vivec (which is likely what we're referring to), "official" and "canon" in Elder Scrolls is meant to be very open to individual interpretation. This is why most of the lore is deliberately provided through in-universe narrators, who can be unreliable or disputed as needed for the game or the fans.
@@Eowar The series will never be the same without that guy
Vivec offers an interesting explanation through the not very well explored in-series concept of mantling, that is, becoming so very much like a divine entity or historical hero that the two of you become indistinguishable from one another. He says as much when he tells you to "Walk like him until he must walk like you" meaning that you have come so far in the Quest of the Nerevarine because you are just so Nerevar in action and thought that it can only be you going forward.
There was a meme about two fae constantly sending children to die in hopes that one of them will be the chosen one. I feel like the book Half Sick of Shadows by Laura Sebastian encapsulates this. In it, the fae in question is Nimue, the current lady of the lake, and her pawns in her game against Merlin are Arthur, Morgana, Guinevere, Lancelot, and the Lady of Shallot, whose gift of prophecy allows her to see all the different ways in which her friends will die and betray each other. It's honestly really depressing. "You weren't raised to be safe. You were raised to be heroes."
I like the whole idea of "Mantling" which is the act of becoming what you want to become in the Elder Scrolls setting. Like as an example the Champion of Cyrodiil (the hero of Oblivion) becomes the Sheogorath by acting as him. The Nerevarine becomes the Nerevarine by fulfilling things only the Nerevarine can or would.
I wish there was a similar story beat in Skyrim, alas.
I mean you could argue that the Dragonborn mantles Miraak by the end of the Dragonborn DLC. Not good news for him as he is now the new puppet of Hermaeus Mora to be collected at a later date but still XD
Walk like them until they walk like you
DB mantles Miraak.
@@antonakessonexcept the Dragonborn does things even Miraak couldn’t. You kill Vahlok and Alduin. Why mantle someone considerably weaker than you?
There is a theory that the LDB 'mantled' Shor, simply because he could sit in Shor's throne, something that the Hero of Kvatch couldn't do in the Shivering Isles until he mantled Sheogorath
TF: "With glowing letters of recommendation from the local wise old mentor figure."
Anakin: "LIAR!"
Qui-Gon Jinn is who then?
@@davidlz830 Qui-Gon is a wise mentor figure, but his "letter of recommendation" was trashed immediately by the other masters, so much so that Anakin became a padawan only because Obi-Wan played the "you don't want me to dishonor my master's last wish, don't you?" card.
My absolute favorite anime that nails this trope is The Irresponsible Captain Tylor. Why did the main character join the military? He wanted a desk job. There was a war kicking off, but heck, he gets his wish and starts out in the pension department-- from which he continues to fail upwards until he's leading an entire fleet and is trying the end the war by...not fighting. He's a great character, and the way the show is a piss take on what the Japanese military was at the time really helps build that "yeah, uh, sorry, he's it..." vibe (even as his own higher ups try to actively murder him and the rest of his crew because they know he's the 'last person' the military needs at the time.) He was very much based on a popular comedic character of the time who was this lazy office worker who fails up by solving problems unconventionally and charming the people around him. If you've never seen it, it's excellent. It makes for a great story when the hero tries to run from what others come to see as his 'destiny' and constantly remind those around them that they're the opposite of special in every way. There's a huge emphasis on never losing sight of the humanity of those around you, and even helping those people rediscover their own after years of being seen as nothing more than weapons of war.
This is why I love the Link from 'Windwaker' so much.
Yeah, other Links have come before, but even if he knew that, the Triforce of Courage isn't in him like it was for most others. It's debatable whether he even _is_ a reincarnate, but his sister and then his friend get in trouble, so he goes out to _solve the problem._ Along the way, he _Enmantles_ himself as the hero by finding the scattered remnants of that ancient power. Even wearing the Hero's Tunic was just a tradition of his home island. Whether he was 'The Link' or not is immaterial, he _became_ a hero not because he was told to or the world demanded it, but because his sister got kidnapped and it just kept snowballing until he was saving the world.
Honestly, I like Link; we the player know Link is 'The Chosen One' because he's the main character. But, quite literally, the Link from Zelda II: Link's Adventure was _literally just a dude with a sword._ Not even a guard, just picked up some stuff and went to save the princess.
"Moon and star? More like moonsguar and star. I assume you can understand me, take those clown feet of yours and lumber out of here"
The concept of the gods throwing a bunch of Nerevarines at the wall and seeing which one sticks is brilliant. The Elder Scrolls world is inherently uncertain and a little mad. The gods aren't omniscient neither are they purely good or evil. They are powerful but their sight is far more limited than they let on. They are all schemers and amoral (by of definition). They are simply trying what they think we will work.
This is a universe where the God of Time can get concussed if he's hit hard enough by magic, at which point the laws of causality and time break down until he recovers enough to sort it out, after all.
Probably my favorite D&D game I’ve ever run is where the characters were the chosen ones, and led to believe they needed to defeat a classic big bad, but when they got to the big bad it turned out he had already been defeated by the previous attempt at a Chosen One, who had then decided to just take the big bad’s place. Lots of fun.
I remember this book series I read.. Wings of Fire, which covers the whole “chosen one” themes.
Spoilers ahead!
These five characters are raised to end some war. They didn’t choose to live in a cave their whole life.. And it’s revealed that they were supposed to do certain things. They weren’t actually supposed to save the day (for everyone at least). But they still fulfilled the prophecy, they chose to save the world.
EDIT: Oneshot also follows these themes.. But I do suggest playing through the game, it’s amazing.
And to make it all the better, the "Chosen Ones" actually twist the prophecy in their favor and against the desires of the Seer, uniting the world in...relative...peace.
*Spoilers for any reading further!!*
All cuz the Seer gets flash fried in a pyroclastic wash, and can't say shit against the Dragonets of Destiny.
And one of the dragons wasn’t even the "correct" kind. They couldn’t get an egg for the one from the prophecy, but they could go steal one from the dragon hippies that live in the rainforest.
SPOILERS Yeah, their prophecy was an absolute scam.
Idk why but UA-cam keeps deleting my comments.. Third time’s the charm
All my homies HATE morrowseer
Add to that the fact that only 2 of the main 5 are into the whole prophecy thing anyway, and one of the two sees it as an impossible burden.
The other two want to revel in the freedom of not being bound by a prophecy anymore but agree that stopping the war is necessary, and the last one doesn't really care about the prophecy other than that peace means no one wants to invade her tribe's territory anymore.
"Many fall, one remains" actually refers to the single most important quality of the Nerevarine. They can seek out divergent timelines to find the one where they succeed. The player character dying, reloading their save to before their death, and trying again is canon to the story. There's even at least one character i know of that recognizes this in game.
Brandon Sanderson does this kind of thing actually pretty well in his novels in my eyes.
In Mistborn, the supposed 'Chosen One' dies 2 times (Vin and Alendi) before the real Hero Of Ages claims the powers of the 2 gods.
In his 'sequels' for the Mistborn-saga, Wax is semi-helped by the Hero of Ages, but eventually, even Harmony can't help him, and he has to do it all on own.
In the Reckoners series, there isn't even a chosen one, but David manages to cleanse the world of evil Epics through his willpower alone (and a few friends who may or may not be Epics themselves, but they wouldn't have accomplished anything if not for David).
the Prophecy is more of an instruction manual or sheet of requirements by Azura than any real foresight.
"damn, ok I need some Mortal and they need to fit these criteria and get these tasks done... time to throw some mortals at the wall and see which one sticks."
I'm a GOD! How can you kill a God? What a grand and INTOXICATING innocence. How could you be so naive?
To be fair, the emperor who sends you to the island in the beginning has some sort of divine connection, thus probably having some sort of vision of us being the nerevarine. That is literally what happens in the next game of the installment: He sees you and goes: Oh, I have seen you in my dreams!
On the topic, there's another self-willed character that works for their title, even though they were never supposed to have it. The Wind Waker iteration of link.
There is no indication that you are the "Hero". The only reason you leave outset is that a giant bird kidnaps your sister! But across the game, you show your courage, traveling across hyrule to collect things, fight boss monsters and conquer deadly dungeons, and deal with godly trials to prove your worthiness to BE the hero.
This link has to PHYSICALLY FIND the shattered pieces of the triforce of courage, One of the main things that allows evil to be defeated in many games. He does it mostly on his own. There was no prophecy in that game as well. You just kinda come out of nowhere. I love that game for that.
This reminded me of that meme video where AI Dagoth Ur is surprised and confused about the Nerevarine being a lizard xD
I have actually read a few books where most of the population is involved in the prophecy in some way.
Thanks
I adore this video's regular reference to the Legend of Pipi while talking about this particular brand of unlikely hero.
Reminds me of Himmel the Hero. Went on a journey with barely any support from his kingdom, had only a fake sword and a dream, wasn't even able to pull out the real hero's sword, and still slayed the demon king.
He was a fake, he knew it, his companions knew it, and he didn't care. He had a dream and he achieved it.
Wish I could have dropped this comment in the Nebula version:
This story reminds me of the 2010 Tim Burton adaptation of Alice in Wonderland. In Tim Burton's telling, everyone is telling Alice that, "She's THE Alice who's going to fix everything and defeat the Jabberwocky". Well, almost everyone. At the start of the film, the Cheshire Cat tells Alice she's "an Alice, but not THE Alice". And he continues to taunt her until she makes the one character development growth she needed to assume the mantle of being THE Alice. It's a neat way of playing with the chosen one trope.
It’s the caterpillar that says that.
@@intergalactic92 Oh, you may be right. Been YEARS since I've watched that with my daughter.
_This_ reminds _me_ of the Finnish comedy skit "Aliisa ihmemaassa" (the usual Finnish translation of Alice in Wonderland being "Liisa ihmemaassa)
The people of wonderland are waiting for a person called Liisa to come and defeat the queen, and get really excited by Aliisa's arrival, only to be disappointed when they realize the name is one letter off. Aliisa hates being surrounded by the weirdos of wonderland and says she'll do the quest anyways just to get home.
("Oh no, she's not Liisa, she's A-Liisa! Might as well be B-Liisa."
"But what if A-Liisa is Liisa?"
"I can be Ö-Liisa if it helps me get home.")
Through some shenanigans she eventually does defeat the queen, but turns out the last part of the prophecy was false and there's no way for her to get home lol
Thanks!
One of my most favorite recent examples of this trope is Laios from Delicious in Dungeon.
Awesome video! I totally thought this video was going to be about the animated short film “The Legend of Pipi,” based on the thumbnail. Coincidentally, the character design you chose to represent the chosen one really resembles the protagonist in that short film. It also follows the protagonist who is not fit to be the hero, and only succeeds in his quest through selfish ambitions. It’s a pretty funny watch, highly recommend.
I’d love to try and make a chosen one like the Nerevarine. I imagine it’s something I could use in a post apocalypse story I want to write where anyone could have taken the powers of the long dead gods to ascend to divinity, but no one has tried yet for any number of reasons.
@@runningthemeta5570 You. You are the one from my dream. I have seen you write that which you describe: imperfect, true, but complete. So it must come to pass.
My favorite chosen one was in a friend's D&D campaign that I wasn't playing in. They had a player who what often get bored and make insane decisions either because he thought it was funny or because he was sleep deprived. They set him up to be roommates with the chosen one who died in the first session. After that, the angel Inebrial showed up and declared him to be the new Chosen One. What was funnier was that he made the insane decision not to take the special amulet from his dying roommate.
Come, Nerevar, friend or traitor, come. Come and look upon the- Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't realize you were an Argonian. No, no, it's not a problem, I had just expected a Dark Elf. No, it's not because I think they are more capable or anything, it's just because yo- No dude, I don't have an issue with reptiles. Some of my best slaves were Argonian. Alright, that came out wrong.
Listen, what I'm trying to say is that- What? I'm sure you come from a very fine swamp; very good with a spear. Assuming? I'm not assuming anything, that's just what you people do-the royal you. As in-look, we got off on the wrong foot. Together, we shall speak for the law, and the land, and shall drive the mongrel lizards of the Empire-dogs, I meant dogs.
Look, I'm sorry, I just really expected a Dunmer. What, why? Because you were a Dunmer the last eight fucking times. I don't know what the hell Azura's playing at making you an Argonian, but I assume it's a joke. No, I don't think Argonians are jokes, can we just fight? This is making me very uncomfortable. Is this how you honor the Sixth House and the Tribe Unmourned?
Morrowind mentioned! I expected it was one of many examples pulled for the thumbnail, what a delight to have you devote to it an entire episode!
Glad you covered this
I am literally writing an Elder Scrolls fanfiction right now about prophecy and how it doesn't always work, so this video was perfect.
a legitimate strategy in this game is to stand facing a corner, put a weight on the W key, and step away from your computer for a bit. Cuz that levels up your movement stat and it'll let you run faster. You don't need no stinkin mentor, just a sturdy wall to run into. (could also use cheat codes to save time)
What I love about this concept is it tackles the idea that a hero isn't born, it's built. And it teaches us that any one can be a hero they simply needed to work hard for it.
Didn't expect Pipi being referenced today
This reminds of that one episode of The owl house where the main character, luz, gets tricked by someone who convices she was some kind of chosen one. At the end of the episode luz's mentor Eda tells her: "Look kid, everyone wants to believe they're "chosen" but if we all waited around for a prophecy to make us special, we'd die waiting, that's why you need to choose yourself".
The ever brilliant goldmask!
in blade and sorcery (its a vr game), the entire chosen one trope gets flipped on it's head. the lore is kinda something you have to actively search for to learn, and its pretty intricate and complicated, but it's super fun to piece stuff together. (spoilers for that game ahead btw)
An ancient civilization of people tell tales of the Khemenet, a powerful sorcerer whose ghost chooses someone every ten thousand years to be its vessel. That vessel is destined to rule over all sorcery on the world for the rest of their life, bringing unity to the world (that part may be innacurate i forgot). The Khemenet's vessel also gets a mystical weapon, the Sword of Naa, a potent blade with the capabilities of a mage's staff, from a massive tower on an island surrounded by storms. Throughout the game, you become more and more powerful, leading some to believe that *you* are the next Khemenet, and others that you're simply a power-hungry maniac. In the ending, you reach the tower that has been looming in the distance throughout the entire game, and inside is the mythical Sword of Naa. You approach the sword, pick it up, and learn something.
The Khemenet was a myth. There *is* no chosen one. After you take the sword, you're held in place by magic and shot at by turrets until you die. Powerful sorcerers enter this tower simply as a sacrifice. Throughout the game, you can see a massive blue star in the sky, and the closer that star gets to the planet's core in its orbit, the more powerful sorcery becomes. However, if it gets too close, it can cause apocalyptic effects on the planet due to an overflow of magic. The tower was created for people to sacrifice themselves in order to vent magic out of the world, preventing this from happening. After your death, people will eventually forget about you, and the cycle will continue when it is time for it to do so.
Also, there's a secret ending where you destroy the tower, steal the sword for yourself, and doom the world to apocalypse in the far future.
RISE ALL PIPIHEADS
I subverted that trope before. Had a story where someone had huge plot armor and was 'the chosen one'.
He had a friend, not very lucky but oddly resilient. At the end of the short story of about nine chapters. The 'Hero' tries putting on the gauntlet that would rule the kingdom, only for the gauntlet's guardians to cleave his arm off below the elbow. The sidekick grabs the gauntlet and challenges the guardians while putting it on and they bow to him.
Turns out the prophesy was readable in two ways.
He who is destined shall not know death. (one never was harmed, the other survives everything with some damage),
locks of the dawn (hero had blonde hair while sidekick had more crimson but kept it under black soot because the people that raised him uses it to keep lice at bay.)
Voice like a bird (Hero had a good singing voice while sidekick's injuries causes him to make tweeting sounds while speaking.) and will soar with the eagles. (Hero uses a makeshift glider that the sidekick put together before he's snatched up by a Roc Eagle and is taken to the nest)
So the real phophesized chosen one wasn't the kid they spoiled and cheered for, it was the woodman's son who they looked down upon for not being like the knight to be.
In Morrowind, you mould yourself to the expectations put on the hero, your prophesy is vague, a little nonsensical, and pretty irrelevant to what you're tasked with at the end of it.
In Oblivion, you are the right hand of the true hero, the Emperor might have seen you in his dreams, but it was his son who saved Tamriel. All you did was run around Dagon's feet until Martin sacrificed himself to become an avatar of the God if Time.
In Skyrim, for all the ways you are quite literally hand-picked by the gods from birth to have a hand-crafted special soul and special soul powers, you are not actually named a hero in any prophesy. You're named a menace at best. The prophesy just says "this person will fight Alduin," and that's that. It doesn't even say you'll win or lose. It just says you exist. Even the characters involved with the main quest are more like: "Eh, so you're in a murder cult and executed the Emperor, so what? You're not exactly the first to be nutty, Dragonborns be like that sometimes. Anyway, go find this word of power on the off-chance you feel like winning your fight against the World Eater..."
Interestingly, the Dragonborn DLC kind of suggests that Miraak was "supposed" to have been the "Chosen One" who defeats Alduin, but he chose not to.
In Morrowind you don't even have to follow the prophecy at all
Reminds me of Remedy's game “Control” there is a moment in the first ~ten minutes or so where the protagonist acquires a powerful relic/weapon/tool from a divine/otherworldly/bureaucratic force that happens to be in a bind at the moment. So its explained that to wield the relic is to be King/CEO by right that you have the relic, and since there is no one else around capable of interacting with it, they offer this new job opening/vacancy/vacuum to you, if you would agree to it. To quote:
*“You must choose to be chosen.”*
I'd highly recommend Josh Strife Hayes playthrough of Morrowind. Very thorough and entertaining. 11:18 He also obtains that same hat and turns it into a parachute.
Moonring has something similar. If you follow the quest to become the Archon you learn some things. If you follow a different path you learn something else. Won't spoil it.
Love the references to Legend of Pipi
I havr a couple of ideas for ways to play off the chosen one concept. My favorite is a pathological introvert who gets named the chosen one in front of a large crowd of people, freaks out, and goes AWOL, forcing their SO - and one of the few people they can comfortably talk with - to lead a manhunt to find them, while also battling the army of doom whose leader the Chosen One was prophecised to slay.
Just once, I'd love a story where a chosen one actively refuses to play ball, and the whole story is just them being bothered by people getting them to go on the big quest and making them increasingly frustrated in the process 😅
Something like that happens in Neon Genesis Evangelion.
SPOILERS FOR A 30 YEAR OLD SHOW BELOW, PUTTING THIS WARNING HERE JUST IN CASE.
The hero isn't exactly "the chosen one," but he's close enough, one of a small handful of Chosen. Since the series is (at least partially) about how much it would suck to be a mecha anime protagonist in real life, he's eventually left so traumatised and depressed that he just stops engaging with the plot at all. He spends most of the last third of the show in his own head, refusing to get involved in the story.
Reminds me of the way megaman X acts in some of the later games. Bro just did not want to participate.
If you’re into podcasts, Absolutely No Adventures is exactly this premise. It’s short, only like eleven episodes, but it’s very fun and very sweet. The chosen one just wants to run a bakery with his friends
tvtropes "Refusal of the Call"?
You can also just play that way. The one thing elder scrolls has always done right is the ability to tell everyone to basically piss off while you go do your own thing. They kinda botched this up in Skyrim unfortunately, but hey at least you still don't have to do said quests, Dragons be damned.
I noticed that Pipi is in the thumbnail. Loved the character and the animated short to death ever since it first came out
Always thought that all of Morrowind plot is a reference to Dune. And in this context, outlandish nature of both nerevarin and Paul Atreides makes really interesting tension between protagonists and local tribes.
It’s great that Morrowpeak is getting the recognition it deserves. How grand and intoxicating!
I decided to turn this one around in one of my stories and have the concept of "the chosen one" be a misconstrued interpretation of the tile "one who has chosen"; people that, rather than being special because they were chosen to do a great deed, are special because they chose to act and performed a great deed. Instead of receiving the favor of higher powers "to do", they receive favor because"they have done".
Is that Xavier Renegade Angel
And that's not even mentioning the two alternate paths through the game, which allow you to bypass many of the trials in favor of skipping right to the end.
Anyone else thought the thumbnail was Dagoth Ur? 😂
.... How do I tell you this...
What a grand and intoxicating innocence.
Something about Fallout 2 is how it handles the Chosen One trope, specifically if your chatacter has the lowest intelligence possible, in the game having the lowest intelligence makes your chafacter so dumb to the point where you can't even form proper words and even making it impossible to complete certain side quests or hire companions
And with the Chosen One trope, what i love is how some of the NPCs will react to this like "This IDIOT is the Chosen One? The one who will save us all? God, we're doomed"
Ah, i miss old Fallout humor.
0:08 EMPEROR IF MANKIND MENTIONED!!!
...my guy that is King Arthur. He's holding Excalibur and everything.
Frieren beyond journey’s end has a character just like this and it’s awesome. Obviously with Frieren the world is already saved at the start but you find out the hero was not some chosen one and I loved that about it.
The Neravarine actually reminds me a lot of Christ. Jesus didn't stand out with his looks, came from a regular home, wasn't the warrior king the Jews wanted or expected, and was disliked by the very people who wait on the prophecy about him. The main difference is that he is the only chosen one candidate ever.
So you could say that the Neravarine is a Christ-like figure in theory?
If by "only candidate" you mean the only one to attempt, that's not really accurate. It's pretty well attested among historians and Bible scholars that multiple people claimed to be the Jewish messiah before and after Jesus of Nazareth.
@@Eowar Right, many people claimed and still claim to be the Messiah, but none of them ever had the possibility of being the actual, chosen Messiah. That was always going to be Jesus.
I like your thinking but Jesus was literally the son of God. From a story standpoint that would be like saying Hercules was just an average person.
@localvega688 yes, thar is true, but for most of Jesus's ministry, the Jews didn't know that. Everybody thought he was just some small-town guy doing crazy miracles
Another good take on the whole "chosen one" concept is the recently completed web comic "The Storm Stained" by Crystal Yates. It's about a society of fairies that lost their magic wings generations ago when magic-draining storms started appearing. Naturally, there's a prophecy about a chosen one who will contain the storms and give everyone their wings back - but is the prophecy true? That question is the core of the story. Actually, while I'm throwing reading suggestions your way, I'd like to recommend a lesser known SciFi author from the 50s and 60s named Zenna Henderson; particularly her short story collections "The Anything Box" and "Holding Wonder." My mother shared these books with me as a kid and I still love them as an adult. They might be a little hard to get hold of these days since they're out of print, but they're well worth it, trust me.
1:28 is that an italian cold steel cinquedea?
It appears so
Look up legend of Pipi you will probably find out there
I see you, drawfee fan
4:40 I agree that it sounds like they are saying that you aren't the first choice, but I disagree that you won't be the last, because as you previously said they said "many have fallen, one remains" so it sounds like you are the *last* one left that meets the criteria so if you failed to there wouldn't be another
One of my favorite examples of A Chosen One is probably Jim Lake from Trollhunters: Tales of Arcadia. He, and everyone around him, at first hate the idea of him being the chosen one, but he slowly grows into the role. But he does it his own way, and kinda makes his team Chosen alongside him. But my absolute favorite moment(and one of my favorite examples of visual story telling and metaphors) is when he must truly Become the Chosen One, the scene looks like a suicide, Jim staring into a mirror contemplating life as the bathtub fills, his friends a mother hearing it fill and think about everything that happened so they rush up stairs and start calling for him and banging and pulling on the locked door, and inside Jim climbs into the bathtub(after pouring a potion inside(long story)) and he lays down on his back and as he slowly sinks the light fades and the sounds quiet; Jim had to literally give up his humanity to be The Hero. (I also love how they deal with the aftermath of the final battle, and the consequences Jim must face)
There's actually a secret way that you can beat the game despite severing the thread of prophecy, and you can skip even that route if you exploit the mechanics of the game to either survive using keening improperly or to kill the heart without it. Morrowind intentionally lets you break the god's prophecy over your knee and still become the hero if you're clever enough.
Man I love that game.