Fun Fact: In the should be required side quest called "Freya's missing Peace" she mentions that Odin asked her to cast the spell she cast on Baldur onto him. She refused having seen what it did to Baldur. (Also I think it should be required because of how it really changes Kratos and Freya's view on each other.)
Baldur was at peace in his last moments, ironically, because he could feel the snow on his skin, he went on about food, drink and women but that, that was his final thought. That last word, a small drawn out "snoooow", shows us that the simple pleasures really are the things we miss the most.
@@JMarchelI like that a lot actually. Saying the name of the last thing he felt "snow" brought so much of it to the realms because of the lifetime of desire he felt.
⚠⚠ 18:00 It's important to note that Baldur *mistook* Kratos for Faye. As she's a Giant, he thought that Kratos was Faye or at least a Giant. Hence the whole "I thought your kind was supposed to be more enlightened than us", that's because Giants were more artisans than warriors like the Aesir. It's just that, they played it up for us to think Baldur knew who Kratos *really* is, as an audience, because *we* know who he is.
@@newhybrid101well they changed it for the last game, because I remember she was HUGE when they were burning her. They made her smaller to fit the story
It was such a cool reveal too. Baulder even said “I thought you would be bigger” since he was already a huge guy, never thought of it in my first play-through. Also the part where Baulder said that “ I thought you’re kind supposed to more enlightened than us. So much smarter” I legit thought he said that because he knew he was Greek/Spartan and the whole philosophical culture Greece was known for, not the Jotnar angle.
I just noticed that at no point, Freya does not apologize. She's too prideful in her intentions to truly admit how she's wrong, despite the fact she's realized what she's done to her son.
As far as I can tell, Freya never actually apologizes to Baldur at any point. She recognizes his suffering and even offers up her life to him, but she never says she's sorry.
That's cause she isn't that sorry. "I was just trying to protect you!" (41:58) - she truly believes in that. She's doing it for herself and knows it. She knows it was a mistake, but she'd do it again. It really is callous.
His arc is a really good metaphor for the results of overbearing parenting. Sure, he’ll be safe, but he won’t feel anything, literally. It’s crazy how specific this was.
no fr. They didn't pay attention to carrie so I hope a few dads/moms out there that played this game or seen it, see what sheltering a kid too much can do.
I find it poetic that Baldur's role in the story is bookended by a neck snap, literally the most crippling injury short of dismemberment. Those seven vertebrae are a bottleneck for all neural activity in the body, and breaking that connection shuts down all movement and sensation below that point. This is exactly how Baldur feels after realizing how deep Freya's spell runs: unable to feel anything and unable to fight against it. That first snap does the intended outcome, Kratos neutralizes Baldur for long enough to get his feet back under him, but also locks Baldur into a kind of obsession, trying to find what makes this stranger tick. The ending snap though is what finally frees him from everything that was tormenting him. Even as he is rendered as helpless as he felt for his whole life, those snowflakes still give him everything he wanted if only his mother would just let him, and now he will never have to see Freya ever again. "Death is freedom" is a dark thought.
@@KingKori_2x I am a father of young boys. While Kratos is not an absolutely model father, I have definitely started changing my parenting style to be more guiding than absolutely directive. I still give clear "You should/shouldn't do this/that", but I also try to do so in a way that will (hopefully) develop their ability to, instead, answer "WHAT should/shouldn't you do?".
I think one of the most messed up things about this, is Freya *knew* how to reverse the curse. She freaks out, and takes away Atreus' mistletoe arrows when she sees them, meaning at SOME point, Freya could have, at any point, reversed the curse, and freed Baldur, maybe even helping him reform as a result, but she chose never to do that.
she just didnt want to. she even told mimir. but since she knew mimir knew the moment she revived his head she placed a curse so he wouldnt speak or remember it
@@H0LL0WHearteD The way I understand it is that Mimir found out himself at some point in the past and she placed the curse on him then, rather than when she revived him. I get the feeling that he'd have been entirely down to tell Baldur how to get rid of the curse while he was stuck in a tree, since it would weaken Odin.
@@AstolfoGayming if i remember correctly krathos said he was bewitched. And mimir said i am?! I am! I wonder since when. When i found out or when she had my head
@@AstolfoGayming i was just rememberig wrobg when i thought freya told mimir ua-cam.com/users/shorts5DZwyDNjjyc?si=dPjWzu3yknRjzYk4 in this link is the part i said mimi question since when he was bewitched by freya and kratos figured mimir was cursed
What's heartbreaking is you can tell Baldur loved his mother so much. She even says Atreus reminded her of him. Imagine a young boy, who was desperate for adventure, but always told no because it was too dangerous. Then one day, she says yes. And you can finally see the world. But...there's nothing. No sensation, no joy. And to find out the one person in the world took it from you and COULD have saved you, but wouldn't for selfish reasons, combined with sensory deprivation, it's no wonder he went mad.
As someone who is prone to sensory deprivation, I really understand Baldur. He may be fucked up beyond all belief, but he was put through something that would probably drive 99.99% of humanity insane. I wish he had been able to walk away after the mistletoe, find a new area, a new pantheon where he isn’t in constant mental anguish. It worked for Kratos, and it could’ve worked for Baldur
@@TheSuicune7 It took the complete death of the Greek pantheon and total destruction of Greece itself for Kratos to move on and who knows how much time has passed between GoW3 and GoW4 for him to become as chill as he is.
The truly twisted thing is that Freya knew how to break the curse and lied to his face about it for her own selfish desire to avoid feeling hurt without any regards for the torture this level of sensory deprivation did to him.
I was thinking this as I read your comment, due to the scene where it shows a vision in Hel where he BEGS her to fix her. It’s so….sad. She even takes the arrows away from Atreus, stealing the one chance he would have had by random to learn the truth. So it culminates in him finding out moments before he forces his own death.
@@GDKF0238 And yet, despite all of that, she has the gull to hate and blame Kratos for murdering Baldur, knowing damn well that she practically sent him to his death 😂. What a bitch 😠.
THISSS is how you write protagonists. STRONG FEMALE PROTAGONISTS! She is extremely powerful, compassionate, badass, but most importantly HAS FLAWS! She’s not perfect. What she did to Baldur is actually pretty sick and twisted. In her mind she was protecting her son at any cost which costed her everything she cared about. And in her arc she loses that son and eventually realizes that his death happened in large part due to her actions and decisions. Hence why she is not a Mary Sue. Santa Monica’s writers are god tier at what they do and I wish all media involving strong female roles were done this well. Sucks that most don’t have a clue on how to write a character even half as well as Freya is written
@@jasonnewbery Totally agree. Freya is a good person, as we can clearly see from the sequel. But she's beyond broken. In this game, she's just as mad as Baldur. She knows what's she's doing to him, torn apart by it, but she can't face the alternative. I understand why. She had everything taken away from her, her autonomy, her freedom, her kingdom, her family, her hope. She held Baldur as the one good thing that came out of all the horror of her life. So she was blind to the fact that he wasn't good at all. She had to believe that she could somehow salvage him. And that meant protecting him from his prophesied death. That hope was all she had left. And yet, to believe it was even a possibility was madness. So yeah, she's mad. And that makes her story in Ragnarok all the more powerful, because it's her literally clawing her way out of madness. God tier writing indeed.
The worst thing about Freya is she knew mistletoe would lift the spell from Baldur and she refuses to tell him despite his anger towards her and his explanation of how he doesn't want the spell to continue ruining his life.
I also think Odin knew that Mistletoe would cure Baldur’s invulnerability spell but decided not tell him because of the fact that Baldur’s invulnerability and not being able to die was a useful weapon to him.
It shows that even at the end she still think she made the right choice for his sake, and still believes that her sons safety matters more than baldur does.
@@newhybrid101 I highly doubt that the spell can so easily be reapplied, if it could why didn't she just recast it after baldur got pierced with the mistletoe? In myth, its not even a spell, she just went around to everything in existence and got everything to agree not to harm baldur. I think in order to prevent the story from departing too much from myth, the game implies the spell can't be recast.
The Norns actually did tell Freya how to save her son, they said “there is nothing you can do to save your son”, but that’s clever wordplay, because if she had done nothing her son would’ve been saved, so there was nothing she could’ve done, but she chose to do something which was why her son died a needless death
Like the Norns say in the next game. "We do not see the future. That you are so predictable merely makes us seem prescience" So, they KNEW if they told her nothing, it wouldn't happen. And by telling her about his death, they caused it to happen. Makes me wonder what their motivations are. They could have lied. Said he died old and happy and surrounded by family. Instead, they said how he dies if she fears for his death.
Cute try, but there’s a *distinct* difference between “There is nothing you can do” and “All you can do-is nothing”. Don’t take so many liberties with language unnecessarily. It often doesn’t work and makes you look and feel goofy.
Watching this reminded me how awful Freya was as a mother, she stood there as her son pleaded to her to reverse the curse she placed upon him and feigned ignorance, I genuinely felt no sympathy for her at the end and in Ragnarok. She fully broke Baldur to the core of his soul, and ironically her actions probably killed him more then a normal death would have.
Exactly. Also, she remained selfish to the very end. By simply accepting her fate at the hands of Baldr, she took away his choice *again.* It became _her_ decision to die. She clearly viewed herself as a sort of martyr. The way she spread her arms made her pose resemble the position of the messiah on the cross. If she had pretended to fight back-or simply let her son leave without trying to reconcile with him-he might have been able to let go.
She could have, at any point. Told him to break the curse. Just poke himself with some Mistletoe. He doesn't die instantly when it ends. It just breaks the spell so he can fell and be hurt again. And he's still a god. So its not like he'll die from falling down stairs. She could have given him a sprig of mistletoe to poke himself with, and he would be free again. But she was too terrified of his death. The thought that he could die. Was too much. No matter how miserable he is, or how much he hates her. She can't bear the thought of him dying. So she deny's him any way to end the curse, and makes him think he's doomed to this fate of nothingness
Every father who tries to stop his daughter from having a sex life is being similarly over protective and harmful. You can't stop your kids from making mistakes. But somehow the dudebros who play this game see nothing wrong with being overly protective towards a daughter, but heavily judge a woman for doing the same to her son.
I never though that Baldur knew who Kratos was. He was send there to find a giant and mistook Kratos for said giant and hoped that the "giant magic" would be enough to make him feel something. If Baldur knew who Kratos was and thought he was hiding Faye then why was he confused by the "two bedrolls"; he wouldn't unless he thought that the giant he was send to find was living alone and Kratos being there would disproof that unless he thought that Kratos was the giant.
Absolutely. The game is actually incredibly smart in making you _think_ he means Kratos, "I thought you'd be bigger..." since you're a scary god and titan slayer, "...your kind is so enlightend..." since you're Greek, who were known for that sort of attitude. But the game reveals that no, he meant Kratos's wife (cannot for the life of me spell her name. Is it "Laufey"?) and he was expecting a literal giant.
you're right, Brett just wanted this to be true. In reality, he thought he was another giant. He doesn't understand why he can't kill Kratos and he doesn't act like he is a god, he thinks kratos is another all knowing smug giant.
It’s really clever writing. Both Kratos and the audience are meant to think that Baldur knows that he’s a Greek god, but on a second run of the game you realize that he believed Kratos was a Giant and had no idea about his past. While Baldur was mistaken, we spend most of the game thinking that he knows who Kratos is when he really he was completely in the dark about it.
Yea, honestly I think that makes Baldurs story more tragic since he went on this entire mission ordered by his father, the man who is supposed to know everything, that ended up getting him killed over a mistaken identity.
You calling him “a little insane” is an INCOMPREHENSIBLE understatement. He has been unable to feel ANYTHING for AT LEAST a century. His mind is completely gone. His reaction to pain once his curse is lifted is ECSTASY. He’s not a horrible, irredeemable monster, he’s a raving madman with a shattered psyche who cannot be saved. He’s less of a wretched killer who must be stopped and more of a rabid animal that must be put down, for both its sake and everyone else’s.
Correction, 100 years, a century, Modi said that he "wasn't straight for years", and that's true, bein' inmortal without having the sense of feeling is fucked up. Freya is the only one to blame for this, and Odin for lying to him that he could remove the spell.
@@nomado.3855 I know. What I meant was that Baulder was cursed before Mimir was trapped based on a conversation in ragnarok, and since Mimir was trapped for more than a century, that means Baulder was cursed for more than a century as well.
Just imagine that, after he regains his senses and can feel everything, he just runs away laughing like a crazy person finding and touching everything he can find for stimulation, first jumping head first in the river.
That moment when Baldur tells Freya she needs to pay and she answers so plainly "I have paid." is gut wrenchingly relatable. We've all been wronged at some point in our life, and it can end in many different ways. But that moment right there, those words, they made me ache for I know how Baldur feels hearing Freya claim she has paid. I've been wronged by a parent, a father who sacrificed me on the altar of his own search for happiness. A parent who now laments over how lonely he is, claims he knows he made mistakes but never apologize. He, like Freya claims he has paid, that he has suffered but never ask how his mistakes affected others, never acknowledge the pain he has caused. Only rambles on how miserable he is, wallowing in self-pity. To hear someone who has caused you so much suffering say that they have "paid" but never say they're sorry... It one more twisting of the knife in the wound, but it feels maybe worse than anything that came before.
@@isauldron4337 Not really, it's cowardly. She'd rather die than be truly accountable and apologize or live to face the consequence of her choices. It's the easy way out...
Yes, but she did pay in the end. Karma got her good. She had to watch him die in front of her own eyes, the very thing she was the most afraid of. The thing that hurt her most, she got it.
@@NaGa5hnot just that, but after she ended up fulfilling the very prophecy she sort to avoid, in her own actions leading to the death of her son, right away she goes right to deflecting blame on others, looking for a scapegoat to direct her anger towards instead of accepting all this was her own doing. It's only until Ragnarok comes across she seems to start realising her actions had consequences and she has to live with what her choices lead to.
Just imagine this from Asgard's perspective. The giant stave protection finally breaks for whatever reason, but they don't really know what they’ll find within. Presumably something giant related, hopefully even Fey. But, as we know from Ragnarok, Fey has already fought Thor to a standstill. So, Odin can either go himself, or send Baldur. Naturally, he sends his 'tracker, his closer' instead of himself. Baldur goes. But he doesnt find Fey. He finds a large, obviously not human man, clearly hiding something. He attempts to provoke him and fails. He escalstes, demonstrating his strength, speed and invincibility. The mysterious stranger is ummoved, matching him blow for blow, strength for strength. Even though hes clearly old, he's suprisngly fast too. And then Baldur rips a giant cavern through the area, taunts the man that he feels nothing, and heals all the damage the man has done so far. The stranger shrugs, AND HEALS HIMSELF. Then he begins to utterly outclass Baldur, eventually wrestling him to the ground and snapping his neck. ... So far as we know from canon, that's the first time ANYONE has won in a straight fight against Baldur, and the stranger wasn't even really trying, was unarmoured and utterly unprepared. He then vanishes into Midgard, and whilst Asgard panics and starts wondering about what to do next, the Raven Keeper sidles up to Odin and quietly says someone is wiping out ravens. The rest of the game is nothing but a long running nightmare of things going from bad to worse for Asgard, culminating in both Baldur, and Thor's sons, none of which are supposed to be CAPABLE of dying, are murdered by this mysterious guy. And then at some point post game, Odin figures out exactly who he is dealing with and start to really panic.
I agree with most of this other than the stranger "not trying"..... Do you remember the walk back to the cabin after the first Baldur fight.... Kratos needed an adult😂
Actually, Odin was not panicking in the slightest, the entire second game he treats Kratos like he does Thor, a chore an an annoyance to deal with, his goal was Atreus the whole time, Thor was only meant to distract Kratos an have fun while doing it, an lets not forget that the entire first fight Kratos has with Thor AND Baldur both basically treat him like a plaything.
Mimir eventually pieces together Kratos was the “bloody Ghost of Sparta” so even gods from other realms pay attention when a whole pantheon disappears.
@@matthewriley7826yes, but BALDUR specifically doesn't know. Odin and Mimir and Thor and Tyr and few others do but not baldur. Remember centuries have passed since God of War 3. The information is kind of scattered
yes you're right, When Kratos cut the last marked tree of faye, it removed the protection stave around their hosue and Odin sent Baldur telling him that that giant has the answer he's looking for. That's why he said i thought you'd be bigger, thought it would be obvious for the maker of this video.
Baldur didn't need to die, he just needed more time. Kratos had hundreds of years to cool off, find a wife and have a son for him to grow. It's unreasonable to think he'd let go that quickly.
I definitely agree, I feel had baldur had time to actually go sit and think and live after becoming vulnerable he could’ve changed, this is like saying kratos was irredeemable if he refused to forgive ares if just got on his knees and said he made a mistake in the original god of war
Still there is no telling what he would have done in the time it took for him to even want to change. Kratos knows the damage a god that sadistic could do and letting him kill freya probably would have sent him spiraling down an even darker path because he wouldn’t have had regret or a change of heart like kratos did he probably would have tried to take out his anger on everyone else because now freyas dead but his anger isnt gone and he doesnt have a single person to focus it on
I agree. It is just that he needed to be physically held to prevent him from killing Freya and also away from Odin's influence (which is a very hard thing to do in this realm)
@@Diogolindir Without being invincible he was helpless against kratos. His mother should have left and kratos should have taken him prisoner. Let him have some time to cool off and actually feel life. With a positive roll mode like kratos, I think he had a chance. Would have helped kratos too. If you want to truly master something, teach it to someone.
@@TuxedoMedia yep. He was just too angry at that moment. Even if he cool it off, it is not realistic to expect him to want to have Freya around. There is people that hurt our trust so deep that we dont wish them ill but we don't want them around
It’s worth noting that the Thor we meet in Ragnarök is a man working to change for the better. Based on Mimir’s tales, Thor was probably just as much of a murderous villain as Baldur was during the events of the first game. Even Mimir was surprised when Atreus told him that Thor and Sif don’t drink anymore.
Yeah it’s a good way of showing that he has little reverence for anything. Sure freya said Baldur always preferred his father’s love, but at the same time, he doesn’t give a shit about anything by the time of god of war 2018 and is clearly on a path of self-destruction
The muscles in a person's body are constantly restrained because if they moved at full force, they could injure the person. For instance, if all your back muscles clenched at once with full force, your spine would shatter. If Balder cant feel or be injured, it makes sense that his body would lose this restraint which is why he is so freakishly strong.
Freya at the end experiences what Baldur went through, having your choice robbed from you and living with the anger and resentment that comes with it. Such a beautifully written game
Thing thats the most sad about baldur, is that hes the God of JOY. He is the most sad and emotionally broken character in the game, but hes supposed to be the embodiment of happiness. Thats always been so sad to me
@@mb2001 fimbulwinter i think means "forever winter" or something along those lines. Until ragnarok happens, the winter wouldnt end. Maybe its the world itself crying
I feel so bad for Baldur. He never asked to become immortal and never able to feel pain. Hell he can’t even feel anything like the snow. He is a truly tragic character but a very well written one
correction. fustration, anger and hatred are emotions. he didnt lack emotins. he lacked specific emotional traits. such as pleasure, happiness, sorrow, sympathy. basically half of the emotional spectrum.
@@dendrien like how the Lyngbakr was trapped and got used to its imprisonment Baldurs emotional traits got locked away somewhere deep enough within him that he effectively lost any sight of them.
@@dendrienHe had emotions, he was just numb to reality. Can’t feel the coldness of snow, the heat of fire, the pleasure of romance, the impact of a punch, can’t even get himself wasted, the joy of a great meal, the smells of flowers. He is essentially locked in a vessel that can’t experience the world around it, only physically interact with it.
@@dendrienhe could feel emotions, he simply had no feelings of the flesh. Food does not taste, sex does not give pleasure, his body does not feel cold of heat he was loked out of all those things. But he could be sad, happy and so on
My favorite line from Bauldur is right after he regains his senses and decides to fight, once Freya restrains him he yells "NOOO! MOTHERRR!". ( 38:50 ) It comes off so childish, resembling a temper tantrum. But then you hear the desperation in his voice begging her to stop controlling his fate. It's truly sad and the actor delivered the line perfectly.
Well like most children he doesn’t get what he wants, I’d also like to bring attention to his last word “snow” i never really understood it until i replayed the game a second time and watched this video. I initially mistook his being unable to feel anything as just can’t feel pain pleasure taste thirst and texture, for some reason only later I realized the ramifications of truly being unable to feel anything, so I noticed that baulder only on his death bed, after all the fighting had stopped and he can no longer here his mothers voice is when he can if only a little, finally appreciate the feeling of the cold as his eyes turn red and he’s put to rest
It’s a shame we never see Baldur interact with the rest of his family (there was so much more story potential in the Norse Saga), but we do get a tiny hint after Atreus and Thor’s first mission together. When Odin says what a great team he and “Loki” make, and Thor shoots back “Kinda like you and Baldur?” I feel like the meaning here is two-fold; first, Thor is disgusted that his father is so chummy with the giant who killed his little brother, and second perhaps a warning to Atreus. Baldur was Odin’s favorite, until he wasn’t. So don’t get too comfortable being his number one.
Baldur was looking for the last giant to learn how to undo the spell, he wasn’t looking to fight. He thought kratos was the last giant, hence why he said I thought you’d be bigger and talked about how intelligent his species is. He didn’t know about kratos, they even said at the end of the game that he was looking for Faye
I really like the contrast to this Baldur and who he is in the original myths, in the myths he is said to be a force of good and the god of pretty much every positive force. That might have been who he was before Freya’s “blessing”
It makes sense, because the Baldr from the myths never gets to "enjoy" his new way of life as he gets immediately killed by an arrow made by Loki. This version of Baldr got to see the bad on what his mom did, while the one in the myths didn't.
Baldur in the actual mythos, wasn't immortal for long. They were at the party celebrating it, throwing things at him.for fun. Then Loki did a sneaky, learned that Mistltoe can hurt him, and gave some to a blind god. Who threw it, and killed Baldur. So likely he could have ended up the same, but never got to experience any side effects
@@JoshuaAndres didnt mimir have a story where this event sortof happened where the aesir kept taking bets on how many arrows would cause baldur to fall over from the weight?
I wanna point out that at the end, Freya goes: ''your'e free now, you have what you want. try and find forgiveness and we can build something new!'' that is Freya at her most desperate and pitiful. up until that very moment, she had tried to avoid him from getting his freedom, including participating in that final boss fight. I don't think Baldur could have ever forgiven Freya.
Freya never earned Baldur's forgiveness. She never even apologized. Instead, she watched him be overwhelmed with joy after being stabbed by the twig, and her reaction was to shout, "NOOO," like Darth Vader, proving she learned nothing. Even Kratos does not say Freya deserves forgiveness; he asks Baldur to forgive her _even though she doesn't deserve it,_ because vengeance will not bring him peace.
@@ferrishthefish Heck, I dont even think Kratos cared if he forgave her or not, just that he walked away from his path of vengeance, as he knew first hand that vengeance would demand more blood after her death
Agreed, that right there just showcases Freya's delusional mindset. She thinks that because Baldur's curse has been broken, everything can go back to normal, completely ignoring her son's full century of emotional and psychological suffering. It also demonstrates the difference between her and Kratos, who sees Atreus' dark turn and tries to actively help him better himself. Freya loved Baldur but only as her child. She sure as Hel didn't respect him.
Baldur and Mimir have a funny similarity: They both accepted death in lieu of a life of suffering. Both were immortal against their will and from another's selfishness. But one was tempered by wisdom and a fulfilling life. The other was broken by foolishness and an empty existence.
In all seriousness, I noticed when Baldur confronted Freya at no point during, even when she says she loves him, did Freya take responsibility for how she hurt him.
@@captainahab2518yes,I said that before in other comments and people got mad at me saying, but kratos has done worst, freya should have died in ragnarok.
@@captainahab2518 I don't agree with this. She doesn't take responsibility in GoW4, but they do pay that off in Ragnarok. The entire sequence with the weavers is meant to be Freya finally having to be outright told that she is directly responsible for Baldur's death. "No one can kill me boy... except for me!" In acknowledging that illusion she is finally admitting that fact. And while she can't fix her relationship with Baldur by that point, she can "choose to be better than this."
@@xzenitramx666 I agree. In fact, in order to tie into the whole theme of defying fate, it would've been more clever if Freya was killed by Surtr instead of Frey, her last act being one of pure selflessness.
Actually - Baldur has no idea who Kratos is when they first meet. Kratos is mistaken for the giant. It's the mistaken identity as the Directors said :)
Pretty sure at the end of the game in Jotunheim when the find to big mural, Kratos say "Baldur was never looking for me, he was searching for Faye." or something along those lines.
For a channel that makes a shit ton of essays and analysis, he gets a shocking amount of stuff wrong but obviously speaks factually in the moment. I try to enjoy these videos but it's hard to take the whole thing seriously when there's objectively wrong things being said, kinda kills the atmosphere
@@drewwhitingyea he said that but that was after he seen the prediction of the journey thay went on all Boulder wanted was to kill the last giant when he seen Kratos he assumed he was the giant when he said "a long way from home aren't you" was ment for a giant but on first play through it makes it seem like he is talking about Kratos to a a T
I think there was another mistake that Freya made when it came to Baldur, and that was failing to help him cope with the negative of the decision she made for him. Baldur can no longer derive emotion from physical sensations, but he can still experience the world around him through sight and hearing, and Freya very well could have done plenty of good to him on that account, sense all of nature bends to her will. How tragically ironic it is that this overbearing mother is absentee in the worst way possible.
26:49 This scene was a gut punch. It was the first time we ever saw Baldur with a hint of vulnerability, even if it wasn't literal. If he weren't invincible I could see him succumbing to despair in Helheim like anyone else sent here. For a Norse god, the guy has Greek Tragedy down to pat. I wasn't even afraid I'd be caught because of how bad I felt for Baldur here.
Baldur's dialog in his first meeting with Kratos is supposed to be ambiguous. Does he think he's talking to the last Giant? Does he know for sure who the last Giant IS? "I thought you'd be bigger" - a play on the reputation of Giants, but also on Kratos's reputation "oh, you already have the answer to that" - Kratos doesn't, but the last Giant *would*...and so on. It's never meant to be clear if he knew he had found Kratos Godkiller at this point or if he thought he had found the Gaurdian of Midgard (Laufey). It's brilliantly scripted. He's a great character. It's a brilliant take on Baldr the Beautiful.
He did think he was a giant, this is evident by Odin saying 'we know who we're dealing with now' (something roughly like that right at the start of Ragnarok)
If he knew it was the ghost of Sparta or God killer, I think he would have asked mimir more directly about those names instead of 'tattooed man and a boy'. Odin probably knew about kratos and who he was, but he probably didn't bother telling Baldor. He isn't known for being smart after all. Let's be honest how much does the question about a tattooed one and a child actually reduce the possibilities to? Narratively, Baldor would want to egg on kratos about his nature much more than he hints at should he have known kratos true nature. If he *wants* to die, why would he not bother with trying to get the GHOST OF SPARTA to end his suffering.
@@felipeguidolin1055OMG thank you.some jerk in the above comments was arguing til he was blue in the face that baldur already knew,assuming baldur would inform him
@@felipeguidolin1055The fact that 'they were looking for Faye' does not mean for sure that Baldur mistook who Kratos is. Just like FatBrett said, Baldur for sure was told to 'find the last Giant in Midgard'. He could a) know from Odin (if he told him) that it's Faye and she lives with Kratos, so he tracked their house to find Faye but also have a fight with Kratos and see if this can change anything b) not know and mistook Kratos as a Giant and start a fight anyway to see if a Giant with Giant's knowledge and magic can change his condition. I think the truth doesn't really matter and we should not call each other 'jerks' cause A or B more suits us. Let it be subjective interpretation. I guess more 'canon' option is B, but personally, I like A more.
That moment Baldur is on the ground repeating "No, no, no" over and over is fantastic. On first viewing, both Kratos and the audience think that Baldur's realizing he messed up and is panicking, like someone who's drunkenly picked a fight they thought they could win but are actually way in over their heads, and have just realized the ass whooping they're about to receive. But in reality, Baldur's lamenting and somewhat panicking over the fact he still feels nothing after that punch. And that moment where he winds a punch and says "fine, my turn" is such a shock. Couple all that with all the moments where he mistakes Kratos for a Giant when both Kratos and the audience think he's referring to Kratos literally, and you've got a great recipe for properly subverting audience expectations. I also love that Baldur thought picking a fight with a Giant would help break his curse in some way. There are so many really clever bait and switch moments and foreshadowing going on in this introduction, and re-watching the scene again with later information is really a treat. What a masterclass in narrative writing.
I wonder if Baldur can even sleep. Considering he can’t feel anything, he probably didn’t feel fatigue either so his mental instability was probably even worse because of lack of sleep.
Always found it maddening that Freya constantly says "I don't need your protection"...take your own advice, stop trying to protect Baldor, he didn't need her protection. She didn't protect him, she ensured his demise.
I feel sorry for Baldur both in mythology and in this game. Loki in mythology killed him because he envied his beauty and was more loved. Loki basically had a Bitchy/mean girl moment and killed Baldur.
Correction: Baldur does not know who Kratos is at the start of the game. That’s why he later is seen asking Mimir who the tattooed man with the child is. When he goes “I thought you’d be bigger, but you’re definitely the one,” that’s because he believes Kratos to BE the giant he’s looking for. When he goes “You could’ve just told me what I wanted,” that’s in reference to Odin wanting access to Jotunheim. The twist of the intro is the WE as the players think that Baldur knows who Kratos is. If he knew who Kratos was, why wouldn’t he call him by his name to Mimir? When he tells Kratos “You know what I’m looking for,” it’s because he thinks that Kratos IS a giant!
That and also since he's never seen a joulten before. Like Kratos he takes the word literally. Expecting someone who is giant. I also thought he probably knew who Faye was cause in GOW: ragnarock it's shown that Thor and Faye fought before. It could be that they were looking for Feya and Baldur assumed it was Faye in disguise. Which is why he never asked any direct questions and just made demands.
Correct. This is also why he says "turns out the boy is the brains", as he's realized that Kratos is in fact not a giant, but the boy is. And it makes sense that since the giants are known as seers and incredibly attuned with the magic of this world, they'd know how to break Baldur's spell and hurt him. And that's why Baldur is immediately picking a fight with Kratos.
I think something was overlooked. Video states time and time again that Baldur chose this path of violence and such and chose to be a badguy...and in a way it makes sense. He had all his other senses taken. The insanity that would bring is one thing, but anger? That's self-generated. It's internal. And since he can actually FEEL anger, he latches onto it to keep going in a world where he's numb to everything else.
Even after all of Baldur's explanations to his mother, she still screams "NO" when the spell is broken. Obviously she didn't want it broken, however, it's what he wanted. I don't know how much more a person can explain "what you're doing/did makes me unhappy" and she still doesn't listen.
Its worth noting that in the original Norse Mythology, when Balder was granted invulnerability, there was little implication that Balder grew into a hateful and psychopathic person, instead kinda prideful of his abilities. This might be because he had such powers for a short period of time, up until Loki ultimately tried to indirectly cause Balder's murder by a stray mistletoe arrow. In the God of War universe, it appears that Balder's spell was casted hundreds of years before Loki was even born, if not before Kratos even met Fae. Because of this extensive length of time, alongside the lack of characters that would have shorten Balder's time as an invulnerable super god, Balder was allowed to continue his story longer than the original myth might have implied. This could explain why Balder eventually grew to see his mother's spell as a curse, since he possibly began to analyze the side effects of the spell and realize the misery of the situation.
Also I disagree that Balder died because he couldn't make a different choice. I think its Freya's fault that he died the way he did. When Freya casted the spell, her selfishness blinded her to that was really important to her son's success and growth, that being, her son's own choices. Because of the spell, Balder suffers greatly, and can greatly explain why Balder is such an evil guy. Whats worse is that for someone who really protective of her son, Freya is completely ignorant to the situations her son is putting himself into. Like wasn't it concerning that archers were raining arrows on him according to Mimirs tale? Wasn't it concerning that Balder was riding a "tamed" dragon even though these creatures are terrifying and shunned by others? Or heck, wasn't it a problem that Balder was deciding to pick a fight with Kratos, a well experience god killer who, with his son, found a way to break the invincibility spell and nestle crunch his neck? It's also pretty ironic, That when Freya stole Balder's choice to live normally, Freya's choice to be killed by her own son was stolen when Kratos killed Balder
Doesn't the game establish that Freya cast her spell on Baldur when he was very young? I seem to recall that the story went that Freya learned Baldur would "die a pointless death" right when he was born, so she cast the spell on him to try and prevent that, which resulted in him basically growing up without ever being able to feel anything.
From what the Fates say in Ragnarock, and the information we get from these norse games, that is true. Balder did die a pointless death. Had Freya never casted that spell, Balder could have lived a life that had meaning, alongside learning many lessons and contributing to something in the Norse World.@@LoganSLRLockwood
I wonder if it's due to Kratos somehow breaking the chains of fate and... crossing over to the Norse Pantheon's realm messed up what was supposed to have been the original mythos? Thusly instead of Odin adopting a Frostgiant's child and naming it Loki.... Kratos ended up fathering that very half-giant WAY later, perhaps Kratos popping into the realm or ended up fated to do so, is what changed things.
I find Freya being the real villain in this story. Baldur can be Asgardian asshole, but this curse can make any man mad and violent over the hundreds of years. If he wasnt cursed, he could be kinda "good" in asgardian way. But the sad thing is, that Odin would kill Baldur the second he learns that he is not invincible anymore. Its interesting that both sons of Odin are very intimidating the first time Kratos meets them, but are actually emotionally and mentally destroyed for years.
And that Freya yells "NO!!" when the spell gets broken says that her apology was hollow, even though she claims to be sorry and want to make ammends, she never intended for him to get what he wanted, what she could readily admit that she stole from him. In fact, she is pretty much the whole reason he dies.
At the beginning, Baldur was saying he thought Kratos would be bigger because he thought he was Faye(a giant). And that his kind is so enlightened because the giants were known for their intellect
@zalitosway8419 It's unclear. There is a possibility that Baldur could've gone to the Norns and they might've told him. If he did find out its likely Odin told him about who Kratos was
It’s all in her language. I PAID! MY BOY! The self victimization and the unwillingness to work for atonement! She just said „ i did nothing wrong an I will die before I really admit a mistake“
Freya told baldur that there was no way to revert it, even though she knew about missiletoe and even destroyed some of it, freya cared more about her feelings for baldur rather than baldurs feelings for living
The moment with Baldur when he says "I can't feel... ANY of this!". That was the chef's kiss moment for me too. Baldur's introduction alone got me really amped, but this moment sealed the deal for me. So magnificent. Unfortunately (in terms of getting some Baldur screen time), we then spend a rather significant portion of the game before we have any more meaningful or direct contact with him again. Though in actually, I think this pacing was PERFECT, as it really makes what we do eventually get that much more impactful. I cant believe the timing of this video release. I only *just* played and finished 2018/GoW 4, and was in desperate need of some further discussion on it as it was one of those games where I was left so wanting for more before I hopped into Ragnarok. Then literally the EXACT day that I did, this video was released (like 2 days ago now or something). So pumped. I'mma go watch the rest of this video now.
I thinks it’s very easy to miss but baulder wasn’t looking for kratos . He was looking for Faye. A giant with an axe. When he says , you already know the answer to that’s, he’s implying that as a giant, kratos should have foreseen this event.
Baldur didn't know who Kratos was. In Ragnarok, Odin says that he NOW has "a better understanding" of who he's dealing with, implying that he and the thoes he leads didn't know or atleast didnt care to know.
Freya is also a great example of how people see things as either black or white, no grey area. She interpreted the prophecy as just black so she visited the opposite spectrum, which ultimately sealed Baldur’s fate. Which takes us back to what the Norns said: “There is no destiny, only the choices you make. Yet your choices are so predictable that it merely makes us seem prescient” if she had only considered the possibility of another path forward could’ve avoided the character Baldur became.
I always figured the line "have you any idea what you cost me" was about how Odin was possibly going to punish him, or already did, for his failure so far to capture our protagonists. Or that it was taking too long for Odin's liking
Atreus talks about it after the fight, Mimir speculated that Odin probably promised him the secret to feeling again as a reward. I honestly don't know what dude was talking about but yeah
Baldur came to pick a fight and die, 100 percent. I think Baldur reacts weirdly to the punch, because Kratos doesn't want to fight. He can tell there is no real fury in the attack. Well, restrained fury. Throughout the fight, you can see him taughting Kratos trying to get his rage going. I feel like that is why he tells Kratos he cant feel anything. Its like a signal that Kratos better ramp it up or he WILL die. Its like Baldur will make Kratos pay for not being able to kill Baldur.
Ooh, good one! I felt that Baldur, thinking that Kratos was this near-mythical Guardian of Jotanheim, was expecting and even giddy about the thought of an actual challenge. He then continues to goad Kratos into stepping up his game, to unleash his full "Jotann" fury on him but is then disappointed by Kratos holding back. In his mind, Baldur was expecting who he thought to be a Giant would be full of fury at seeing an Aesir god show up at his doorstep and would be eager at getting some payback.
@@GeminibBornReally? I was under the impression that Baldur thought Kratos was a Giant. At first glance, he appears to be talking about Kratos' Greek background but later on it becomes apparent that he was searching for Faye or any other surviving Giants.
I was going to say that Baldur is very inaccurate. He's kind, forgiving, wise, cheerful, loving, and pacifistic; and this is NOTHING like him. But with the integration of his invincibility spell by his mother being flipped on its head with him being invulnerable to all his senses and emotions, it would be IMPOSSIBLE for him to stay that way. The vision in Helheim was the Baldur we knew and loved, consumed by depression, turned cold. And the "No Forgiveness" tattoo is perfect, this is truly proof that Baldur is no longer the God of Forgiveness. This is GENIUS writing, a great way of using creative liberty while staying true to the source material. I'm loving this so far!
I always read it as Baldur being disappointed Kratos couldn't hurt him. But it makes sense he'd be upset the God Killer couldn't kill him if he wanted to die in that confrontation
@@Castiel335He mentally feels misery. No pleasure, no temperature, not even taste! Baldur wanted to live life and die normally. But because of freya. Baldur just lives in Misery and really wants to die.
The difference between Kratos and Baldur is the person they had by their side when they were at their lowest. Freya denied Baldur the choice of his own destiny; meanwhile Faye, although setting a clear path for Kratos' journey, left the final choice for Kratos to make. I will always say that, even though the protagonists of these two games are both male, the role of a female character in their story is immeasurable. That's how you place a woman in a men's story: you make her an overwhelming influence on them, whose existence itself leads to their growth and changes their ways - to *be better.*
Like Thor, Baldur also mirrors Kratos: A man who got tricked into doing something he didn't want, hates his parent and seeks revenge against said parent.
@@blackmanwithcomputer Damn, you're right. The fact that Kratos was emotinally empty (instead of being hell-bent on vengeance, like Baldur) when he met Faye certainly helped - he was more open to her changing his perspective.
I think it's interesting that Freya goes through a similar arc as Baldur (understanding what it's like for someone to make a life changing decision for you without your consent.) You can draw the comparisons between the two, but Freya eventually does forgive and let go, something Baldur does not, a trait he unfortunately shares in common with Father.
To be fair, it is really hard to let it go when you still living the hell. And when you is finally free, the person you hated the most wanted you to finish her.
Just a little extra detail, Baldur actually has a wife (Nana) and at least one child. (Forseti). Besides the general sensory deprivation, imagine how heartbreaking it would be not to be able to feel kissing your wife or hugging your son.
I love this series because I see and hear everything Freya says and does to/for Baldur in my mom and the exact same justifications given to me my entire life by my own mom. And the more I try to explain, the more she digs in and waves it all away because her love/obsession for me clouds her judgement. I know she does it out of love, but the older I get, the more worn down I feel by it. I know the only escape is to leave and cut her out entirely, but it would kill her. But, contrary to Baldur, I found solace in my friends and chosen family instead of poisonous hatred :)
There is a saying in buddhism: True love is letting the other person go. Goind against the free will of another and lot letting them make their own choises is not love, it's selfishness.
I always thought the kind of spell Freya put on Baldur was a blessing and that he should've been grateful for what she did but after playing the game and seeing how not only could he not get hurt, but even FEEL anything, it made me reconsider what I thought was good/bad and at the end, his death both shocked me but made me glad he died feeling satisfied
I mean he suffered sensory deprivation for over 100 years, anyone in his life would become meaningless as he’d never be able to physically connect with them. All that would leave him to a path of self destruction
Looking back at Baldur's history, you know who he reminds me of? Tai Lung from King Fu Panda. Both characters grew bitter, hateful, and vengeful (as they rightfully should), because they got screwed over by their parents.
I like how Baldur not being able to feel is treated as a curse. In any other piece of media it would be portrayed as a superpower and the character would revel in it whereas Baldur would do anything to feel again. Like he says to Freya when she asks "you would rather die?" to which he responds "Than never feel again? Yes, I would rather die". It's so human, and you can really empathise with him. That's what I love so much about Ragnarok and GOW 2018, it's the human element, it makes the characters, their conflicts and their struggles so incredibly compelling.
I'm wondering if it's possible that, because we feel our emotions physically (sometimes to the point of being sick), that Baldur's emotional sensation was dulled too. If so, he might not have been capable of "feeling" much except his immeasurable rage, which would make it so much harder to let it go. It would be hard for him to be empathetic in that case.
That's entirely plausible. Maybe Baldur's rage over his condition and his hatred towards his mother were the only things keeping him from fully going insane, almost like a sick incentive driving him forward.
Even though that Baldur was blessed with invulnerability to all threats physical or magical he truly hated that spell he couldn't eat or taste or smell anything or feel nothing I see now why it drove him to the brink of insanity in broken him I see why Baldur is called unforgiving son and not being able to have sex or feel the beautiful feeling goodness of sex is true heartbroken 💔
Indeed. Sensory Deprivation on THAT level can and will have an impact on you even with the smallest of things that most people don't really put much attention or value into in life. No wonder he went crazy.
No sense of touch, smell or taste is awful and he’s lived for hundreds of years without those senses. I understand why he had all that rage against his mother and went insane with glee when he got them back.
@@MR.LMR1996 yeah, he said he couldn't even feel the temperature of the rooms he is in. he couldn't feel it at all. even texture is something he doesn't know.
@@halfknight2310& that he played a game in asgard where people would shoot arrows at him & see how many he could withstand until he toppled over from the weight
I really like the scene in Helheim between the past versions of Baldur and Freyja. Baldur not only sounds sane but also emotionally distraught, like he is constantly on the verge of either screaming or sobbing. He sounds oddly sympathetic, which is also helped by Freyja's line of "Trust me, in time you will thank me", which strikes me as something an abuser would say after giving their victim a nasty beating or taking something precious away from them. This is further strengthened by the fact that Freyja not only actively lied to Baldur but also by her flat-out refusal to even acknowledge his pain and distress. She was more concerned with HER feelings than HIS and this led to his mental deterioration. Baldur was most likely a POS like Heimdall before the curse but a full CENTURY of long-term sensory deprivation, one where he was unable to enjoy even the simplest of life's pleasures, certainly would and clearly did a huge number on his psyche, making him even more unhinged. As for his relationships with his family, I have my theories: -Odin: Judging by how useful Baldur was and how important he was made out to be in "Ragnarok" (i.e. the "best tracker"/"closer" line), my guess is that Odin treated Baldur much in the way he did Atreus, using praise, rewards and trust to bolster Baldur's ego in order to make him more effective. He also "promised" to help Baldur, dangling the prospect of a cure over him, which likely endeared Baldur to him and not only increased his resentment towards his mother but also made Baldur more loyal to Odin, more willing to follow any and all orders. Just based on his overall demeanor, I don't think Baldur would act like a weak-willed sycophant similar to Heimdall, but at the same time, he wouldn't be outwardly defiant. Personally, I'm of the opinion Baldur would be a bit chatty with Odin, cracking jokes and acting nonchalant but also loyal as well as eager and willing to carry out his missions. -Thor: I think Thor would resent Baldur for the preferential treatment that Odin gave him, as evidenced in "Ragnarok" when he bitterly said, "Like you and Baldur" in response to Odin's claim that he (Odin) and Atreus made a good team. I also think that Baldur's invulnerability would also cause him to crack jokes at Thor's expense, since he wouldn't be afraid of being crushed by the God of Thunder and it just fits his personality. Plus, given the fact that Thor didn't really strike me as a consciously malicious or actively sadistic person, Thor would also just hate being around Baldur period. However, it might also be possible that the two might've enjoyed some level of camaraderie with one another; Baldur mentioned how much he loved drinking before the curse and his love of fighting is evident so those are two things the pair might've bonded over when they overall would've stayed out of each other's way. What I find especially curious is that in his first battle with Kratos, Thor talks about the Spartan's blood-debt and brings up Baldur's name first before his sons. It really is possible Thor had some level of respect for Baldur, even if he was jealous and didn't particularly like him. -Heimdall: He would've HATED Baldur. First off, given his desire for recognition, especially from his father, Heimdall would despise Baldur for being Odin's "favorite" and for all of the attention he would've received as the Allfather's right-hand man. In "Ragnarok", Atreus brings up Baldur's feat of taming a dragon and based on Heimdall's tone ("Baldur had the luxury of not caring whether he got burnt"), it sounded like Heimdall resented hearing about his half-brother. A guy that can't get hurt and is always carrying out Odin's orders would likely get a lot of attention and despite his best efforts, Heimdall just couldn't compete. It's also very likely that Heimdall wished he could personally hurt and/or kill Baldur and that would've added fuel to the fire. Given Heimdall's ego, it would've pissed him off to no end to know that his mind-reading would and could do nothing against someone that he can't harm. It's entirely possible that Heimdall got pleasure from reading Baldur's tormented thoughts, to know that he is suffering from his inability to touch and enjoy things like beer and women but he also would've "seen" Baldur's pride at being Odin's top man and "reading" his memories of their interactions, making Heimdall's powers in this situation a blessing and a curse. As for Baldur and Heimdall's meetings, I think the two would take turns making snide remarks and put-downs, with Heimdall using the no-touch thing to get under Baldur's skin and Baldur reminding Heimdall that not only is he Odin's favorite but the Watchman can't actually physically bully or humiliate him the way that he does others (which I firmly believe given his treatment of both Thrud and Atreus/Loki). Perhaps that also would've given rise to a kind of begrudging mutual respect since Heimdall can't hurt Baldur and Baldur can't lay a finger on Heimdall; it's the case of an unstoppable force meeting an immovable object.
I just love how Baldur is willing to get choked out by Kratos. He’s fine with it because, without this adventure, he wouldn’t have died. I mean image of Kratos never came to Norse Myth, or Baldur went to the wrong house, or hell if Freya never gave Atreus the mistletoe, Baldur would have never reached his end.
I love that baldur's story is simultaneously a dark reflection/path that atreus can go down if he is corrupted by his godhood, but also a foil to kratos since he was in a similar position to baldur. The gods swaying /changing their lives however they see fit, manipulating them, lying to them, and having things being forced upon them without their consent in any way, and then being forced to live their lives with it, only for them to despise their parents more and more to the point where the only thing on their minds was murdering the parent that cursed them to this hell that they now live.
One of my favorite things about Baldur’s gaunt appearance is the implication that the reason he appears to be as strong as Kratos is that he can fight without caring about hurting himself. Maybe a bit of a stretch, but it’s possible that he can use all of his strength rather than a fraction of it like everyone else because he not only feels none of the pain of tearing muscles or breaking bones with the force of the exertion, he heals any any of the damage almost immediately.
Part of me was predicting (And hoping that) Freya wound become a very unconventional villain for Kratos and Atreus, though her redemption arc in Ragnarok is really great too.
I live with the opposite feeling of chronic pain and at first I was always angry and on edge. I can understand very well how much pain and rage he's feeling at the end. even lashing out on innocent people feels self justified when you're under that kind of situation. with time i got used to and can work around it but I can see a alternate reality where I just got destructive. not a pretty or pleasant place to be
I don’t think Baldur can work out in any conventional way. He can’t be damaged in any capacity with a mistletoe. Meaning he can’t get “shredded” during a workout and his muscles can’t recover without an injury
It’s really interesting how they changed one aspect of his Lore and it totally turned him into a villian. Not being able to experience the sense of touch. In the Norse Myths, he is just invulnerable it never says anything about him feeling anything or not.
I've just noticed that Freya's response of "I had every right, I am your mother" parallels Odin in Ragnarok demanding Thor follow his orders because "I am your father." And just... wow. Also, I love that when Freya claims that she can't undo the curse but still wants to preserve her relationship with her son despite lying to him and robbing him of pretty much all that is good in his life, Baldur's response is basically 'If you say you can't fix this curse, then I say we can't fix "us."' And I think that was exactly what she deserved.
I believe Baldur was actually looking for Faye in the first encounter. He says, I thought you'd be bigger, as in a giant. Remember Odin says there was some "misunderstandings" because we know Odin did not want to provoke Kratos and wouldn't have sent Baldur if he knew Kratos was there. In addition, Baldur says "your kind is supposed to be so much better than us" because the giants were noble and opposed the Aesir vanity and tyranny. Baldur would search for giants because giants had magic that the Aesir did not know, magic that could perhaps cure Baldur.
Accordin to what the game says, everyone in the 9 realms did NOT know who Kratos was, except Faye and later Mimir. Baldur went looking for a giant, he engages Kratos thinking he is the one. We realize that at the end, Kratos himself tells that to Atreus when they finally reache Jottunheim
I find it strange that the games never bother to flesh out Baldurs relationship with his son Forsetti, despite mentioning him in Ragnarok. Kinda seems like it couldve been an interesting addition to this whole story!
One thing I thought about was if baldur lacked all physical feelings, he couldn't feel the ground under his feet, the air filling his lungs, if he evens remembers how to breathe. His existence would be just a void. The existential dread would be maddening , how would he know what is real or not. The disconnection from the material leaves you questioning so much. The only things anchoring you to your reality are your anger and drive to feel something. I can imagine Baldir trying every horrible or thrilling thing to himself just to find something to feel. The worst part of all of this is that it was forced onto you, and you can't even end it yourself. You just exist, yet you dont feel it. You're disconnected because what is there that could physically connect you?
Ooh yeah, that's a great interpretation. Ever seen the movie "Darkman"? The main character also experiences total sensory deprivation and it, coupled with several other tragedies, takes a huge toll on his psyche.
There actually is dialogue, though not a lot, in Ragnarök that goes into small detail between Baldur and Thor’s relationship. I don’t recall the specifics but I think if you talk to some characters or interact with items as Atreus.
I can't remember anything specifically, but Thor loved his brother Baldur, trusted him a lot (2018 game) and called Odin out for treating Atreus like him (Ragnarök). And obviously his 'first' blow to Kratos in their fight: "THAT was for Baldur!" and he actually managed to land a powerful hit.
I hadn't realized we were missing a Baldur analysis XD I struggle when writing villains; I struggle with consistency in general. It is hard for me to achieve what they achieved with Baldur: an evil, symphatetic person that you can't save from himself.
The fact that Kratos held back from killing Baldr in the exact same way he killed Heimdall says a LOT about how much the latter disturbed Kratos. They were both a danger to him and Atreus, but Baldr wasn't maliciously trying to get to Atreus and Kratos knew that.
Baldur was always, and still is, my favorite character in the God Of War Norse series. From his overall character design, to his voice, his behavior, and his style of fighting in terms of gameplay and character writing. When he first appeared in the 4th game, I was instantly hooked when it was revealed he was a type of "Judging a book by its cover" kind of character. Despite his slim and small figure, saying he's able to hold his own against Kratos would be an understatement. He punches Kratos through the mans own roof, supplexes him without struggle, speed rams him into a boulder getting him stuck inside, and even splits the mountains of Midgard in two just by entering a game of "strength-pushing" with Kratos. He's definitely the character that stuck out the most to me in the Nordic arc.
I thought Baldurs first few lines like "I thought you'd be bigger" were in reference to Faye but are written in a way that makes the audience think he's talking about kratos to maintain the mystery around Faye. The reference to being "enlightened" works for both the giants and Greeks and "I thought you'd be bigger" works as a reference to Faye being a giant and how kratos actually shrunk between 3 and 4 (apparently going from 7'6 to 6'4 according to Google)
I like the way that Baldur’s first scene is recontextualised once you know the full story. When he says things like “long way from home aren’t you” “here I thought your kind were supposed to be so enlightened, so much better than us” and “I thought you of all people might be able to make me feel something” Kratos (and the player) assume this means Baldur knows Kratos’ past with the Olympians in Greece. Then at the end you realise that he actually thought Kratos was an Ice Giant, and that he was hoping some Jotunnar magic might be what could break his curse
The neck tattoo translating to “I mark the sunset of the Gods” is a genius decision, as Baldur’s death in Norse Mythology marks the beginning of Ragnarok. And what do you know, the sequel to this game takes place during Ragnarok.
First time I played the game I did it on hardest difficulty. baldur's fight took me over an hour I think. And I gotta tell you out of all the soundtracks to lose to for over an hour this is definitely the best
I completely agree with your point about Baldur being a parallel for Atreus. He suffered because of Kratos's choices as a parent, and it was only by choosing to trust Atreus with the truth and not keeping it to his chest any longer that Atreus could finally heal and really become himself. Baldur is what happened when another parent in that same position chose to keep doing the selfish thing, at the expense of the child.
Funny how much more Baldur’s issues make sense once you meet Odin
Ong
Fun Fact: In the should be required side quest called "Freya's missing Peace" she mentions that Odin asked her to cast the spell she cast on Baldur onto him. She refused having seen what it did to Baldur. (Also I think it should be required because of how it really changes Kratos and Freya's view on each other.)
you saying Fraye is any better? Odin wasnt the guy who broke him. Fraya was and she had no intention to fix the problem she created.
@@dendrien this is gonna piss you off but *Freya
No kidding
Baldur was at peace in his last moments, ironically, because he could feel the snow on his skin, he went on about food, drink and women but that, that was his final thought. That last word, a small drawn out "snoooow", shows us that the simple pleasures really are the things we miss the most.
It was actually about fimbulwinter starting. After you kill baldur, the game map starts snowing bc ragnarok is on its way
@@clarinethro1695two things can be true
@@clarinethro1695 He very clearly reacted to the snowflake landing on his cheek cuz he could finally feel it again.
@@JMarchelI like that a lot actually. Saying the name of the last thing he felt "snow" brought so much of it to the realms because of the lifetime of desire he felt.
@@afroangel9334That’s quite a beautiful interpretation.
⚠⚠ 18:00 It's important to note that Baldur *mistook* Kratos for Faye. As she's a Giant, he thought that Kratos was Faye or at least a Giant. Hence the whole "I thought your kind was supposed to be more enlightened than us", that's because Giants were more artisans than warriors like the Aesir.
It's just that, they played it up for us to think Baldur knew who Kratos *really* is, as an audience, because *we* know who he is.
Also when we see Faye get carried out in the opening scene of the game she's legit giant. Girl can play defense for the Nuggets.
@@davidpagan8559 LMAO 🤣🤣
@@davidpagan8559 She was about 2 inches shorter than Kratos who is 6'4.5
@@newhybrid101well they changed it for the last game, because I remember she was HUGE when they were burning her. They made her smaller to fit the story
It was such a cool reveal too. Baulder even said “I thought you would be bigger” since he was already a huge guy, never thought of it in my first play-through. Also the part where Baulder said that “ I thought you’re kind supposed to more enlightened than us. So much smarter” I legit thought he said that because he knew he was Greek/Spartan and the whole philosophical culture Greece was known for, not the Jotnar angle.
I just noticed that at no point, Freya does not apologize.
She's too prideful in her intentions to truly admit how she's wrong, despite the fact she's realized what she's done to her son.
Most gods in most mythologies don't apologize for what they do.
@@davidpagan8559
And their creations - humans - do the exact same thing, unfortunately.
Your double negative confused the hell out of me
As the intro to “Mother Knows Best” from Tangled starts to play
She never apologizes! Not to her sisters, not to her son, not even to Kratos. On the one hand, fuck yeah, feminist, but on the other? No, fuck her.
As far as I can tell, Freya never actually apologizes to Baldur at any point. She recognizes his suffering and even offers up her life to him, but she never says she's sorry.
How callous.
That's cause she isn't that sorry.
"I was just trying to protect you!" (41:58) - she truly believes in that.
She's doing it for herself and knows it. She knows it was a mistake, but she'd do it again.
It really is callous.
Because she never saw it as a mistake or curse. Even when she bewitched Mimir his words were Baldur was “blessed” when that was clearly not the case.
@@matthewriley7826 good point. I hadn't considered the phrasing of that programmed response.
Or dispelled the spell. Which she could have done. At any time.
His arc is a really good metaphor for the results of overbearing parenting. Sure, he’ll be safe, but he won’t feel anything, literally. It’s crazy how specific this was.
no fr. They didn't pay attention to carrie so I hope a few dads/moms out there that played this game or seen it, see what sheltering a kid too much can do.
Funny thing is i also read it as living vs *living*
Basically he would just want something to hurt him so he can understand how it feels kinda like saitama after he became one punch man
I find it poetic that Baldur's role in the story is bookended by a neck snap, literally the most crippling injury short of dismemberment. Those seven vertebrae are a bottleneck for all neural activity in the body, and breaking that connection shuts down all movement and sensation below that point. This is exactly how Baldur feels after realizing how deep Freya's spell runs: unable to feel anything and unable to fight against it. That first snap does the intended outcome, Kratos neutralizes Baldur for long enough to get his feet back under him, but also locks Baldur into a kind of obsession, trying to find what makes this stranger tick. The ending snap though is what finally frees him from everything that was tormenting him. Even as he is rendered as helpless as he felt for his whole life, those snowflakes still give him everything he wanted if only his mother would just let him, and now he will never have to see Freya ever again. "Death is freedom" is a dark thought.
@@KingKori_2x I am a father of young boys. While Kratos is not an absolutely model father, I have definitely started changing my parenting style to be more guiding than absolutely directive. I still give clear "You should/shouldn't do this/that", but I also try to do so in a way that will (hopefully) develop their ability to, instead, answer "WHAT should/shouldn't you do?".
I think one of the most messed up things about this, is Freya *knew* how to reverse the curse. She freaks out, and takes away Atreus' mistletoe arrows when she sees them, meaning at SOME point, Freya could have, at any point, reversed the curse, and freed Baldur, maybe even helping him reform as a result, but she chose never to do that.
she just didnt want to. she even told mimir. but since she knew mimir knew the moment she revived his head she placed a curse so he wouldnt speak or remember it
@@H0LL0WHearteD The way I understand it is that Mimir found out himself at some point in the past and she placed the curse on him then, rather than when she revived him. I get the feeling that he'd have been entirely down to tell Baldur how to get rid of the curse while he was stuck in a tree, since it would weaken Odin.
Nah bro... it were the maggots
@@AstolfoGayming if i remember correctly krathos said he was bewitched. And mimir said i am?! I am! I wonder since when. When i found out or when she had my head
@@AstolfoGayming i was just rememberig wrobg when i thought freya told mimir ua-cam.com/users/shorts5DZwyDNjjyc?si=dPjWzu3yknRjzYk4 in this link is the part i said mimi question since when he was bewitched by freya and kratos figured mimir was cursed
What's heartbreaking is you can tell Baldur loved his mother so much. She even says Atreus reminded her of him. Imagine a young boy, who was desperate for adventure, but always told no because it was too dangerous.
Then one day, she says yes. And you can finally see the world. But...there's nothing. No sensation, no joy. And to find out the one person in the world took it from you and COULD have saved you, but wouldn't for selfish reasons, combined with sensory deprivation, it's no wonder he went mad.
As someone who is prone to sensory deprivation, I really understand Baldur. He may be fucked up beyond all belief, but he was put through something that would probably drive 99.99% of humanity insane. I wish he had been able to walk away after the mistletoe, find a new area, a new pantheon where he isn’t in constant mental anguish. It worked for Kratos, and it could’ve worked for Baldur
@@TheSuicune7 It took the complete death of the Greek pantheon and total destruction of Greece itself for Kratos to move on and who knows how much time has passed between GoW3 and GoW4 for him to become as chill as he is.
After that revelation it seems really liked freya was a selfish shit
@@concept5631 That is such a strange thing to undergo: unleashing hell/wrath upon others just to finally reflect on life and find true wisdom.
@@littleshadow2707 Vader and Kratos are two notable characters who do this. Whether they deserve that redemption or not is up to the viewer.
The truly twisted thing is that Freya knew how to break the curse and lied to his face about it for her own selfish desire to avoid feeling hurt without any regards for the torture this level of sensory deprivation did to him.
I was thinking this as I read your comment, due to the scene where it shows a vision in Hel where he BEGS her to fix her. It’s so….sad. She even takes the arrows away from Atreus, stealing the one chance he would have had by random to learn the truth. So it culminates in him finding out moments before he forces his own death.
@@GDKF0238 And yet, despite all of that, she has the gull to hate and blame Kratos for murdering Baldur, knowing damn well that she practically sent him to his death 😂. What a bitch 😠.
THISSS is how you write protagonists. STRONG FEMALE PROTAGONISTS! She is extremely powerful, compassionate, badass, but most importantly HAS FLAWS! She’s not perfect. What she did to Baldur is actually pretty sick and twisted. In her mind she was protecting her son at any cost which costed her everything she cared about. And in her arc she loses that son and eventually realizes that his death happened in large part due to her actions and decisions. Hence why she is not a Mary Sue. Santa Monica’s writers are god tier at what they do and I wish all media involving strong female roles were done this well. Sucks that most don’t have a clue on how to write a character even half as well as Freya is written
@@jasonnewbery Totally agree. Freya is a good person, as we can clearly see from the sequel. But she's beyond broken. In this game, she's just as mad as Baldur. She knows what's she's doing to him, torn apart by it, but she can't face the alternative. I understand why. She had everything taken away from her, her autonomy, her freedom, her kingdom, her family, her hope. She held Baldur as the one good thing that came out of all the horror of her life. So she was blind to the fact that he wasn't good at all. She had to believe that she could somehow salvage him. And that meant protecting him from his prophesied death. That hope was all she had left. And yet, to believe it was even a possibility was madness. So yeah, she's mad. And that makes her story in Ragnarok all the more powerful, because it's her literally clawing her way out of madness.
God tier writing indeed.
I don't remember who besides the fates (Probably Gná), but someone calls Freya out on her victim complex and I think that's so good
The worst thing about Freya is she knew mistletoe would lift the spell from Baldur and she refuses to tell him despite his anger towards her and his explanation of how he doesn't want the spell to continue ruining his life.
Yeah, this is why I hate her so much. She's written pretty well, but whenever she came on screen, I just wanted to slap her, ESPECIALLY in Ragnarok!
I also think Odin knew that Mistletoe would cure Baldur’s invulnerability spell but decided not tell him because of the fact that Baldur’s invulnerability and not being able to die was a useful weapon to him.
It shows that even at the end she still think she made the right choice for his sake, and still believes that her sons safety matters more than baldur does.
She should have given him mistletoe whenever he wants to enjoy his life and put the curse on him when he went into combat
@@newhybrid101 I highly doubt that the spell can so easily be reapplied, if it could why didn't she just recast it after baldur got pierced with the mistletoe? In myth, its not even a spell, she just went around to everything in existence and got everything to agree not to harm baldur. I think in order to prevent the story from departing too much from myth, the game implies the spell can't be recast.
The Norns actually did tell Freya how to save her son, they said “there is nothing you can do to save your son”, but that’s clever wordplay, because if she had done nothing her son would’ve been saved, so there was nothing she could’ve done, but she chose to do something which was why her son died a needless death
Like the Norns say in the next game.
"We do not see the future. That you are so predictable merely makes us seem prescience"
So, they KNEW if they told her nothing, it wouldn't happen. And by telling her about his death, they caused it to happen.
Makes me wonder what their motivations are.
They could have lied. Said he died old and happy and surrounded by family.
Instead, they said how he dies if she fears for his death.
Fkn normies love “mid”gard. Kratos all about that “as”
Call that Norn McDonald with his clever wordplay. Loki be like “do you own a doghouse?” Lmaoooooooo
Cute try, but there’s a *distinct* difference between “There is nothing you can do” and “All you can do-is nothing”. Don’t take so many liberties with language unnecessarily. It often doesn’t work and makes you look and feel goofy.
Hyuck hyuck
Watching this reminded me how awful Freya was as a mother, she stood there as her son pleaded to her to reverse the curse she placed upon him and feigned ignorance, I genuinely felt no sympathy for her at the end and in Ragnarok.
She fully broke Baldur to the core of his soul, and ironically her actions probably killed him more then a normal death would have.
Exactly. Also, she remained selfish to the very end. By simply accepting her fate at the hands of Baldr, she took away his choice *again.* It became _her_ decision to die. She clearly viewed herself as a sort of martyr. The way she spread her arms made her pose resemble the position of the messiah on the cross. If she had pretended to fight back-or simply let her son leave without trying to reconcile with him-he might have been able to let go.
@@ghostrights9314 Exactly.
She could have, at any point. Told him to break the curse. Just poke himself with some Mistletoe.
He doesn't die instantly when it ends. It just breaks the spell so he can fell and be hurt again.
And he's still a god. So its not like he'll die from falling down stairs.
She could have given him a sprig of mistletoe to poke himself with, and he would be free again.
But she was too terrified of his death.
The thought that he could die. Was too much.
No matter how miserable he is, or how much he hates her. She can't bear the thought of him dying. So she deny's him any way to end the curse, and makes him think he's doomed to this fate of nothingness
@@ghostrights9314 So well said. Freya was a truly selfish and terrible mother.
Every father who tries to stop his daughter from having a sex life is being similarly over protective and harmful. You can't stop your kids from making mistakes. But somehow the dudebros who play this game see nothing wrong with being overly protective towards a daughter, but heavily judge a woman for doing the same to her son.
I never though that Baldur knew who Kratos was. He was send there to find a giant and mistook Kratos for said giant and hoped that the "giant magic" would be enough to make him feel something. If Baldur knew who Kratos was and thought he was hiding Faye then why was he confused by the "two bedrolls"; he wouldn't unless he thought that the giant he was send to find was living alone and Kratos being there would disproof that unless he thought that Kratos was the giant.
Yeah. “I thought you’d be bigger.” Maybe a throwaway line but by the end of the game. Likely a subtle reference to Faye being a Giant.
Absolutely. The game is actually incredibly smart in making you _think_ he means Kratos, "I thought you'd be bigger..." since you're a scary god and titan slayer, "...your kind is so enlightend..." since you're Greek, who were known for that sort of attitude. But the game reveals that no, he meant Kratos's wife (cannot for the life of me spell her name. Is it "Laufey"?) and he was expecting a literal giant.
you're right, Brett just wanted this to be true. In reality, he thought he was another giant. He doesn't understand why he can't kill Kratos and he doesn't act like he is a god, he thinks kratos is another all knowing smug giant.
It’s really clever writing. Both Kratos and the audience are meant to think that Baldur knows that he’s a Greek god, but on a second run of the game you realize that he believed Kratos was a Giant and had no idea about his past. While Baldur was mistaken, we spend most of the game thinking that he knows who Kratos is when he really he was completely in the dark about it.
Yea, honestly I think that makes Baldurs story more tragic since he went on this entire mission ordered by his father, the man who is supposed to know everything, that ended up getting him killed over a mistaken identity.
You calling him “a little insane” is an INCOMPREHENSIBLE understatement. He has been unable to feel ANYTHING for AT LEAST a century. His mind is completely gone. His reaction to pain once his curse is lifted is ECSTASY. He’s not a horrible, irredeemable monster, he’s a raving madman with a shattered psyche who cannot be saved. He’s less of a wretched killer who must be stopped and more of a rabid animal that must be put down, for both its sake and everyone else’s.
Correction, 100 years, a century, Modi said that he "wasn't straight for years", and that's true, bein' inmortal without having the sense of feeling is fucked up. Freya is the only one to blame for this, and Odin for lying to him that he could remove the spell.
@@nomado.3855 oh right, I thought I remembered it as 209 winters, not 109.
@@LadyGendercide That was Mimir, not Baldur.
@@nomado.3855 I know. What I meant was that Baulder was cursed before Mimir was trapped based on a conversation in ragnarok, and since Mimir was trapped for more than a century, that means Baulder was cursed for more than a century as well.
Imagen. After 100 Man would Go into town , no woman would be safe.
Just imagine that, after he regains his senses and can feel everything, he just runs away laughing like a crazy person finding and touching everything he can find for stimulation, first jumping head first in the river.
The good ending I guess?
@@fbiman9643 I could just imagine him hitting trees over and over again just to feel pain
Making snow angels and running to hot springs, screaming about the difference.
I would have loved that and fully accepted it as part of the story
That moment when Baldur tells Freya she needs to pay and she answers so plainly "I have paid." is gut wrenchingly relatable. We've all been wronged at some point in our life, and it can end in many different ways. But that moment right there, those words, they made me ache for I know how Baldur feels hearing Freya claim she has paid.
I've been wronged by a parent, a father who sacrificed me on the altar of his own search for happiness. A parent who now laments over how lonely he is, claims he knows he made mistakes but never apologize. He, like Freya claims he has paid, that he has suffered but never ask how his mistakes affected others, never acknowledge the pain he has caused. Only rambles on how miserable he is, wallowing in self-pity. To hear someone who has caused you so much suffering say that they have "paid" but never say they're sorry... It one more twisting of the knife in the wound, but it feels maybe worse than anything that came before.
Freya is willing to let baldur kill her to be fair
@@isauldron4337 Not really, it's cowardly. She'd rather die than be truly accountable and apologize or live to face the consequence of her choices. It's the easy way out...
Yeah, the sad thing is she didn't know she needed to apologize
Yes, but she did pay in the end. Karma got her good. She had to watch him die in front of her own eyes, the very thing she was the most afraid of. The thing that hurt her most, she got it.
@@NaGa5hnot just that, but after she ended up fulfilling the very prophecy she sort to avoid, in her own actions leading to the death of her son, right away she goes right to deflecting blame on others, looking for a scapegoat to direct her anger towards instead of accepting all this was her own doing.
It's only until Ragnarok comes across she seems to start realising her actions had consequences and she has to live with what her choices lead to.
Just imagine this from Asgard's perspective. The giant stave protection finally breaks for whatever reason, but they don't really know what they’ll find within. Presumably something giant related, hopefully even Fey. But, as we know from Ragnarok, Fey has already fought Thor to a standstill. So, Odin can either go himself, or send Baldur. Naturally, he sends his 'tracker, his closer' instead of himself.
Baldur goes. But he doesnt find Fey. He finds a large, obviously not human man, clearly hiding something. He attempts to provoke him and fails. He escalstes, demonstrating his strength, speed and invincibility.
The mysterious stranger is ummoved, matching him blow for blow, strength for strength. Even though hes clearly old, he's suprisngly fast too.
And then Baldur rips a giant cavern through the area, taunts the man that he feels nothing, and heals all the damage the man has done so far.
The stranger shrugs, AND HEALS HIMSELF. Then he begins to utterly outclass Baldur, eventually wrestling him to the ground and snapping his neck.
...
So far as we know from canon, that's the first time ANYONE has won in a straight fight against Baldur, and the stranger wasn't even really trying, was unarmoured and utterly unprepared.
He then vanishes into Midgard, and whilst Asgard panics and starts wondering about what to do next, the Raven Keeper sidles up to Odin and quietly says someone is wiping out ravens.
The rest of the game is nothing but a long running nightmare of things going from bad to worse for Asgard, culminating in both Baldur, and Thor's sons, none of which are supposed to be CAPABLE of dying, are murdered by this mysterious guy.
And then at some point post game, Odin figures out exactly who he is dealing with and start to really panic.
Well said
And Thor waking up from his drunken stupor, realizes both his sons and brother are dead, and Odin denies him vengeance for a time.
I agree with most of this other than the stranger "not trying"..... Do you remember the walk back to the cabin after the first Baldur fight.... Kratos needed an adult😂
@@elijahspeller6796
I know right? lol
Kratos could barely walk/stand after dealing with Baldur.
Actually, Odin was not panicking in the slightest, the entire second game he treats Kratos like he does Thor, a chore an an annoyance to deal with, his goal was Atreus the whole time, Thor was only meant to distract Kratos an have fun while doing it, an lets not forget that the entire first fight Kratos has with Thor AND Baldur both basically treat him like a plaything.
I don’t think Baldur knows who Kratos is. Not even Mimir knew that.
Baldur thought Kratos is the giant he’s looking for.
In the end of the game Kratos makes that clear... He even says something like "they were looking for her all along"
Mimir eventually pieces together Kratos was the “bloody Ghost of Sparta” so even gods from other realms pay attention when a whole pantheon disappears.
@@matthewriley7826yes, but BALDUR specifically doesn't know. Odin and Mimir and Thor and Tyr and few others do but not baldur. Remember centuries have passed since God of War 3. The information is kind of scattered
@@ItsOver9000Productions Thor only knows during Ragnorok Odin likely briefed him like "This guy's dangerous even you shouldn't rile him up too much"
yes you're right, When Kratos cut the last marked tree of faye, it removed the protection stave around their hosue and Odin sent Baldur telling him that that giant has the answer he's looking for.
That's why he said i thought you'd be bigger, thought it would be obvious for the maker of this video.
Baldur didn't need to die, he just needed more time. Kratos had hundreds of years to cool off, find a wife and have a son for him to grow. It's unreasonable to think he'd let go that quickly.
I definitely agree, I feel had baldur had time to actually go sit and think and live after becoming vulnerable he could’ve changed, this is like saying kratos was irredeemable if he refused to forgive ares if just got on his knees and said he made a mistake in the original god of war
Still there is no telling what he would have done in the time it took for him to even want to change. Kratos knows the damage a god that sadistic could do and letting him kill freya probably would have sent him spiraling down an even darker path because he wouldn’t have had regret or a change of heart like kratos did he probably would have tried to take out his anger on everyone else because now freyas dead but his anger isnt gone and he doesnt have a single person to focus it on
I agree. It is just that he needed to be physically held to prevent him from killing Freya and also away from Odin's influence (which is a very hard thing to do in this realm)
@@Diogolindir Without being invincible he was helpless against kratos. His mother should have left and kratos should have taken him prisoner. Let him have some time to cool off and actually feel life. With a positive roll mode like kratos, I think he had a chance. Would have helped kratos too. If you want to truly master something, teach it to someone.
@@TuxedoMedia yep. He was just too angry at that moment. Even if he cool it off, it is not realistic to expect him to want to have Freya around. There is people that hurt our trust so deep that we dont wish them ill but we don't want them around
It’s worth noting that the Thor we meet in Ragnarök is a man working to change for the better. Based on Mimir’s tales, Thor was probably just as much of a murderous villain as Baldur was during the events of the first game.
Even Mimir was surprised when Atreus told him that Thor and Sif don’t drink anymore.
It’s interesting that Baldur is the only one of Odin’s children still loyal to him who refers to him by his name rather than “All-Father”
Yeah it’s a good way of showing that he has little reverence for anything. Sure freya said Baldur always preferred his father’s love, but at the same time, he doesn’t give a shit about anything by the time of god of war 2018 and is clearly on a path of self-destruction
And it's sad that In Ragnarok Odin never refers to or calls baldur his son. He just calls him his best tracker
The muscles in a person's body are constantly restrained because if they moved at full force, they could injure the person. For instance, if all your back muscles clenched at once with full force, your spine would shatter. If Balder cant feel or be injured, it makes sense that his body would lose this restraint which is why he is so freakishly strong.
Also him being a god probably also helps that along
@@ntfoperative9432Yeah i think him being a god might be a small reason for his supernatural strength. Just maybe a little though.
Breaking the curse made him stronger
@@frozenfoxgames5300 i dont think he actually got stronger, i think he was so excited to feel things that he kind of mentally amped himself
He's also a god, so, you know, that might help
Freya at the end experiences what Baldur went through, having your choice robbed from you and living with the anger and resentment that comes with it. Such a beautifully written game
Thing thats the most sad about baldur, is that hes the God of JOY. He is the most sad and emotionally broken character in the game, but hes supposed to be the embodiment of happiness. Thats always been so sad to me
So when Baldur dies, joy in the world die, or at least suffers greatly, to the point of leaving the world in a three-year winter?
Oh, man.
@@mb2001 fimbulwinter i think means "forever winter" or something along those lines. Until ragnarok happens, the winter wouldnt end. Maybe its the world itself crying
@@xanderdoss5665
In the original myth, after Ragnarok ends, Baldur is resurrected.
So yeah, when he dies, joy leaves the world.
I feel so bad for Baldur. He never asked to become immortal and never able to feel pain. Hell he can’t even feel anything like the snow. He is a truly tragic character but a very well written one
correction. fustration, anger and hatred are emotions. he didnt lack emotins. he lacked specific emotional traits. such as pleasure, happiness, sorrow, sympathy. basically half of the emotional spectrum.
@@dendrien like how the Lyngbakr was trapped and got used to its imprisonment Baldurs emotional traits got locked away somewhere deep enough within him that he effectively lost any sight of them.
@@fiyahquacker2835 Mimir was playing oil tycoon with that one
@@dendrienHe had emotions, he was just numb to reality.
Can’t feel the coldness of snow, the heat of fire, the pleasure of romance, the impact of a punch, can’t even get himself wasted, the joy of a great meal, the smells of flowers.
He is essentially locked in a vessel that can’t experience the world around it, only physically interact with it.
@@dendrienhe could feel emotions, he simply had no feelings of the flesh. Food does not taste, sex does not give pleasure, his body does not feel cold of heat he was loked out of all those things. But he could be sad, happy and so on
My favorite line from Bauldur is right after he regains his senses and decides to fight, once Freya restrains him he yells "NOOO! MOTHERRR!". ( 38:50 ) It comes off so childish, resembling a temper tantrum. But then you hear the desperation in his voice begging her to stop controlling his fate. It's truly sad and the actor delivered the line perfectly.
There’s also the fact that he would rather Kratos kill him than have her intervene
Well like most children he doesn’t get what he wants, I’d also like to bring attention to his last word “snow” i never really understood it until i replayed the game a second time and watched this video. I initially mistook his being unable to feel anything as just can’t feel pain pleasure taste thirst and texture, for some reason only later I realized the ramifications of truly being unable to feel anything, so I noticed that baulder only on his death bed, after all the fighting had stopped and he can no longer here his mothers voice is when he can if only a little, finally appreciate the feeling of the cold as his eyes turn red and he’s put to rest
It’s a shame we never see Baldur interact with the rest of his family (there was so much more story potential in the Norse Saga), but we do get a tiny hint after Atreus and Thor’s first mission together. When Odin says what a great team he and “Loki” make, and Thor shoots back “Kinda like you and Baldur?” I feel like the meaning here is two-fold; first, Thor is disgusted that his father is so chummy with the giant who killed his little brother, and second perhaps a warning to Atreus. Baldur was Odin’s favorite, until he wasn’t. So don’t get too comfortable being his number one.
Because that just makes it all the more easy for him to kill you when you stop being his number 1.
Baldur was looking for the last giant to learn how to undo the spell, he wasn’t looking to fight. He thought kratos was the last giant, hence why he said I thought you’d be bigger and talked about how intelligent his species is. He didn’t know about kratos, they even said at the end of the game that he was looking for Faye
I really like the contrast to this Baldur and who he is in the original myths, in the myths he is said to be a force of good and the god of pretty much every positive force. That might have been who he was before Freya’s “blessing”
It makes sense, because the Baldr from the myths never gets to "enjoy" his new way of life as he gets immediately killed by an arrow made by Loki. This version of Baldr got to see the bad on what his mom did, while the one in the myths didn't.
Baldur in the actual mythos, wasn't immortal for long.
They were at the party celebrating it, throwing things at him.for fun.
Then Loki did a sneaky, learned that Mistltoe can hurt him, and gave some to a blind god. Who threw it, and killed Baldur.
So likely he could have ended up the same, but never got to experience any side effects
@@tale7955 yes, I’m also pretty sure that all the Aesir were throwing whatever they could at Baldur to see what bounced off and what didn’t
@@JoshuaAndres Thor: **Casually throws mjhölnr at him** It's even funnier the second time! AHAHAHAHA
@@JoshuaAndres didnt mimir have a story where this event sortof happened where the aesir kept taking bets on how many arrows would cause baldur to fall over from the weight?
I wanna point out that at the end, Freya goes: ''your'e free now, you have what you want. try and find forgiveness and we can build something new!'' that is Freya at her most desperate and pitiful. up until that very moment, she had tried to avoid him from getting his freedom, including participating in that final boss fight. I don't think Baldur could have ever forgiven Freya.
Hell, even I hadn't forgiven Freya!😂
Freya never earned Baldur's forgiveness. She never even apologized. Instead, she watched him be overwhelmed with joy after being stabbed by the twig, and her reaction was to shout, "NOOO," like Darth Vader, proving she learned nothing. Even Kratos does not say Freya deserves forgiveness; he asks Baldur to forgive her _even though she doesn't deserve it,_ because vengeance will not bring him peace.
@@ferrishthefish Heck, I dont even think Kratos cared if he forgave her or not, just that he walked away from his path of vengeance, as he knew first hand that vengeance would demand more blood after her death
You know with all her words and wisdom she never told him probably the most effective one.
"I'm sorry."
Such a parent thing.
Agreed, that right there just showcases Freya's delusional mindset. She thinks that because Baldur's curse has been broken, everything can go back to normal, completely ignoring her son's full century of emotional and psychological suffering. It also demonstrates the difference between her and Kratos, who sees Atreus' dark turn and tries to actively help him better himself. Freya loved Baldur but only as her child. She sure as Hel didn't respect him.
Baldur and Mimir have a funny similarity: They both accepted death in lieu of a life of suffering. Both were immortal against their will and from another's selfishness. But one was tempered by wisdom and a fulfilling life. The other was broken by foolishness and an empty existence.
I love how Baldur speaks like he hasnt quite got full control of his mouth, like he cant feel his tongue in there
In all seriousness, I noticed when Baldur confronted Freya at no point during, even when she says she loves him, did Freya take responsibility for how she hurt him.
For real, how she got no retribution for what she did to baldur or get called out for it.
@@captainahab2518yes,I said that before in other comments and people got mad at me saying, but kratos has done worst, freya should have died in ragnarok.
@@captainahab2518 I don't agree with this. She doesn't take responsibility in GoW4, but they do pay that off in Ragnarok. The entire sequence with the weavers is meant to be Freya finally having to be outright told that she is directly responsible for Baldur's death. "No one can kill me boy... except for me!" In acknowledging that illusion she is finally admitting that fact. And while she can't fix her relationship with Baldur by that point, she can "choose to be better than this."
@@xzenitramx666 I agree. In fact, in order to tie into the whole theme of defying fate, it would've been more clever if Freya was killed by Surtr instead of Frey, her last act being one of pure selflessness.
Nope she didn't
Actually - Baldur has no idea who Kratos is when they first meet. Kratos is mistaken for the giant. It's the mistaken identity as the Directors said :)
Pretty sure at the end of the game in Jotunheim when the find to big mural, Kratos say "Baldur was never looking for me, he was searching for Faye." or something along those lines.
Makes sense, Odin might not have known what Faye looked like, because some Giants are shapeshifters.
True, when Baldur saw the axe he probably thought he was the giant who had been causing them problems.
For a channel that makes a shit ton of essays and analysis, he gets a shocking amount of stuff wrong but obviously speaks factually in the moment. I try to enjoy these videos but it's hard to take the whole thing seriously when there's objectively wrong things being said, kinda kills the atmosphere
@@drewwhitingyea he said that but that was after he seen the prediction of the journey thay went on all Boulder wanted was to kill the last giant when he seen Kratos he assumed he was the giant when he said "a long way from home aren't you" was ment for a giant but on first play through it makes it seem like he is talking about Kratos to a a T
I think there was another mistake that Freya made when it came to Baldur, and that was failing to help him cope with the negative of the decision she made for him. Baldur can no longer derive emotion from physical sensations, but he can still experience the world around him through sight and hearing, and Freya very well could have done plenty of good to him on that account, sense all of nature bends to her will. How tragically ironic it is that this overbearing mother is absentee in the worst way possible.
26:49 This scene was a gut punch. It was the first time we ever saw Baldur with a hint of vulnerability, even if it wasn't literal. If he weren't invincible I could see him succumbing to despair in Helheim like anyone else sent here. For a Norse god, the guy has Greek Tragedy down to pat. I wasn't even afraid I'd be caught because of how bad I felt for Baldur here.
Baldur's dialog in his first meeting with Kratos is supposed to be ambiguous. Does he think he's talking to the last Giant? Does he know for sure who the last Giant IS? "I thought you'd be bigger" - a play on the reputation of Giants, but also on Kratos's reputation "oh, you already have the answer to that" - Kratos doesn't, but the last Giant *would*...and so on. It's never meant to be clear if he knew he had found Kratos Godkiller at this point or if he thought he had found the Gaurdian of Midgard (Laufey). It's brilliantly scripted.
He's a great character. It's a brilliant take on Baldr the Beautiful.
He did think he was a giant, this is evident by Odin saying 'we know who we're dealing with now' (something roughly like that right at the start of Ragnarok)
If he knew it was the ghost of Sparta or God killer, I think he would have asked mimir more directly about those names instead of 'tattooed man and a boy'.
Odin probably knew about kratos and who he was, but he probably didn't bother telling Baldor. He isn't known for being smart after all.
Let's be honest how much does the question about a tattooed one and a child actually reduce the possibilities to?
Narratively, Baldor would want to egg on kratos about his nature much more than he hints at should he have known kratos true nature. If he *wants* to die, why would he not bother with trying to get the GHOST OF SPARTA to end his suffering.
In the end of the game Kratos makes that clear... He even says something like "they were looking for her all along"
@@felipeguidolin1055OMG thank you.some jerk in the above comments was arguing til he was blue in the face that baldur already knew,assuming baldur would inform him
@@felipeguidolin1055The fact that 'they were looking for Faye' does not mean for sure that Baldur mistook who Kratos is. Just like FatBrett said, Baldur for sure was told to 'find the last Giant in Midgard'. He could
a) know from Odin (if he told him) that it's Faye and she lives with Kratos, so he tracked their house to find Faye but also have a fight with Kratos and see if this can change anything
b) not know and mistook Kratos as a Giant and start a fight anyway to see if a Giant with Giant's knowledge and magic can change his condition.
I think the truth doesn't really matter and we should not call each other 'jerks' cause A or B more suits us. Let it be subjective interpretation. I guess more 'canon' option is B, but personally, I like A more.
That moment Baldur is on the ground repeating "No, no, no" over and over is fantastic.
On first viewing, both Kratos and the audience think that Baldur's realizing he messed up and is panicking, like someone who's drunkenly picked a fight they thought they could win but are actually way in over their heads, and have just realized the ass whooping they're about to receive. But in reality, Baldur's lamenting and somewhat panicking over the fact he still feels nothing after that punch. And that moment where he winds a punch and says "fine, my turn" is such a shock. Couple all that with all the moments where he mistakes Kratos for a Giant when both Kratos and the audience think he's referring to Kratos literally, and you've got a great recipe for properly subverting audience expectations. I also love that Baldur thought picking a fight with a Giant would help break his curse in some way.
There are so many really clever bait and switch moments and foreshadowing going on in this introduction, and re-watching the scene again with later information is really a treat. What a masterclass in narrative writing.
I wonder if Baldur can even sleep. Considering he can’t feel anything, he probably didn’t feel fatigue either so his mental instability was probably even worse because of lack of sleep.
Always found it maddening that Freya constantly says "I don't need your protection"...take your own advice, stop trying to protect Baldor, he didn't need her protection. She didn't protect him, she ensured his demise.
I feel sorry for Baldur both in mythology and in this game.
Loki in mythology killed him because he envied his beauty and was more loved. Loki basically had a Bitchy/mean girl moment and killed Baldur.
smh i cant believe lowkey killed boulder
@@WonkingMyWilly585Loki lowkey bouldered baldur
@@DiaomBayet I cant believe lowkey would start loki'ing all over boulder 😥
Yeah at least crate OS had a much better reason to kill boulder because owed him sent him after them.
@@xdan- I must agree, if owed him send high dorm instead of boulder Owed him would likely get the answers he wanted from crate os
Correction: Baldur does not know who Kratos is at the start of the game. That’s why he later is seen asking Mimir who the tattooed man with the child is. When he goes “I thought you’d be bigger, but you’re definitely the one,” that’s because he believes Kratos to BE the giant he’s looking for. When he goes “You could’ve just told me what I wanted,” that’s in reference to Odin wanting access to Jotunheim. The twist of the intro is the WE as the players think that Baldur knows who Kratos is. If he knew who Kratos was, why wouldn’t he call him by his name to Mimir? When he tells Kratos “You know what I’m looking for,” it’s because he thinks that Kratos IS a giant!
That and also since he's never seen a joulten before. Like Kratos he takes the word literally. Expecting someone who is giant. I also thought he probably knew who Faye was cause in GOW: ragnarock it's shown that Thor and Faye fought before. It could be that they were looking for Feya and Baldur assumed it was Faye in disguise. Which is why he never asked any direct questions and just made demands.
He was asking where they are not who they are
Correct. This is also why he says "turns out the boy is the brains", as he's realized that Kratos is in fact not a giant, but the boy is.
And it makes sense that since the giants are known as seers and incredibly attuned with the magic of this world, they'd know how to break Baldur's spell and hurt him. And that's why Baldur is immediately picking a fight with Kratos.
I think something was overlooked. Video states time and time again that Baldur chose this path of violence and such and chose to be a badguy...and in a way it makes sense. He had all his other senses taken. The insanity that would bring is one thing, but anger? That's self-generated. It's internal. And since he can actually FEEL anger, he latches onto it to keep going in a world where he's numb to everything else.
Even after all of Baldur's explanations to his mother, she still screams "NO" when the spell is broken. Obviously she didn't want it broken, however, it's what he wanted. I don't know how much more a person can explain "what you're doing/did makes me unhappy" and she still doesn't listen.
Its worth noting that in the original Norse Mythology, when Balder was granted invulnerability, there was little implication that Balder grew into a hateful and psychopathic person, instead kinda prideful of his abilities. This might be because he had such powers for a short period of time, up until Loki ultimately tried to indirectly cause Balder's murder by a stray mistletoe arrow. In the God of War universe, it appears that Balder's spell was casted hundreds of years before Loki was even born, if not before Kratos even met Fae. Because of this extensive length of time, alongside the lack of characters that would have shorten Balder's time as an invulnerable super god, Balder was allowed to continue his story longer than the original myth might have implied. This could explain why Balder eventually grew to see his mother's spell as a curse, since he possibly began to analyze the side effects of the spell and realize the misery of the situation.
Also I disagree that Balder died because he couldn't make a different choice. I think its Freya's fault that he died the way he did. When Freya casted the spell, her selfishness blinded her to that was really important to her son's success and growth, that being, her son's own choices. Because of the spell, Balder suffers greatly, and can greatly explain why Balder is such an evil guy. Whats worse is that for someone who really protective of her son, Freya is completely ignorant to the situations her son is putting himself into. Like wasn't it concerning that archers were raining arrows on him according to Mimirs tale? Wasn't it concerning that Balder was riding a "tamed" dragon even though these creatures are terrifying and shunned by others? Or heck, wasn't it a problem that Balder was deciding to pick a fight with Kratos, a well experience god killer who, with his son, found a way to break the invincibility spell and nestle crunch his neck? It's also pretty ironic, That when Freya stole Balder's choice to live normally, Freya's choice to be killed by her own son was stolen when Kratos killed Balder
Doesn't the game establish that Freya cast her spell on Baldur when he was very young?
I seem to recall that the story went that Freya learned Baldur would "die a pointless death" right when he was born, so she cast the spell on him to try and prevent that, which resulted in him basically growing up without ever being able to feel anything.
From what the Fates say in Ragnarock, and the information we get from these norse games, that is true. Balder did die a pointless death. Had Freya never casted that spell, Balder could have lived a life that had meaning, alongside learning many lessons and contributing to something in the Norse World.@@LoganSLRLockwood
@@jakevelasco4072 yea that's true. I was just trying to speculate that she cast the spell on him shortly after he was born.
I wonder if it's due to Kratos somehow breaking the chains of fate and... crossing over to the Norse Pantheon's realm messed up what was supposed to have been the original mythos? Thusly instead of Odin adopting a Frostgiant's child and naming it Loki.... Kratos ended up fathering that very half-giant WAY later, perhaps Kratos popping into the realm or ended up fated to do so, is what changed things.
I find Freya being the real villain in this story. Baldur can be Asgardian asshole, but this curse can make any man mad and violent over the hundreds of years. If he wasnt cursed, he could be kinda "good" in asgardian way. But the sad thing is, that Odin would kill Baldur the second he learns that he is not invincible anymore.
Its interesting that both sons of Odin are very intimidating the first time Kratos meets them, but are actually emotionally and mentally destroyed for years.
I absolutely disagree with you on Odin murdering Baldur. Baldur, invulnerable or not is still a powerful warrior and Odin's best tracker
And that Freya yells "NO!!" when the spell gets broken says that her apology was hollow, even though she claims to be sorry and want to make ammends, she never intended for him to get what he wanted, what she could readily admit that she stole from him. In fact, she is pretty much the whole reason he dies.
Let's also not forget that in his culture, the ultimate honor is to die in combat, but Freya denied him that.
At the beginning, Baldur was saying he thought Kratos would be bigger because he thought he was Faye(a giant). And that his kind is so enlightened because the giants were known for their intellect
In the end of the game Kratos makes that clear... He even says something like "they were looking for her all along"
So does he ever realize who Kratos really is?
@zalitosway8419 It's unclear. There is a possibility that Baldur could've gone to the Norns and they might've told him. If he did find out its likely Odin told him about who Kratos was
@@zalitosway8419
I don't think Baldur really cares.
It’s all in her language. I PAID! MY BOY! The self victimization and the unwillingness to work for atonement! She just said „ i did nothing wrong an I will die before I really admit a mistake“
To be honest it hits to close to home for me, but I really dislike that she isn’t punished for her bullshit.
Freya told baldur that there was no way to revert it, even though she knew about missiletoe and even destroyed some of it, freya cared more about her feelings for baldur rather than baldurs feelings for living
missile toe is going in the hall of fame
The moment with Baldur when he says "I can't feel... ANY of this!". That was the chef's kiss moment for me too. Baldur's introduction alone got me really amped, but this moment sealed the deal for me. So magnificent.
Unfortunately (in terms of getting some Baldur screen time), we then spend a rather significant portion of the game before we have any more meaningful or direct contact with him again. Though in actually, I think this pacing was PERFECT, as it really makes what we do eventually get that much more impactful.
I cant believe the timing of this video release. I only *just* played and finished 2018/GoW 4, and was in desperate need of some further discussion on it as it was one of those games where I was left so wanting for more before I hopped into Ragnarok. Then literally the EXACT day that I did, this video was released (like 2 days ago now or something). So pumped.
I'mma go watch the rest of this video now.
I thinks it’s very easy to miss but baulder wasn’t looking for kratos . He was looking for Faye. A giant with an axe. When he says , you already know the answer to that’s, he’s implying that as a giant, kratos should have foreseen this event.
It's only easy to miss if you didn't end up finishing the game.
Baldur didn't know who Kratos was.
In Ragnarok, Odin says that he NOW has "a better understanding" of who he's dealing with, implying that he and the thoes he leads didn't know or atleast didnt care to know.
Ikr how does he get THAT wrong 😂
Freya is also a great example of how people see things as either black or white, no grey area. She interpreted the prophecy as just black so she visited the opposite spectrum, which ultimately sealed Baldur’s fate. Which takes us back to what the Norns said: “There is no destiny, only the choices you make. Yet your choices are so predictable that it merely makes us seem prescient” if she had only considered the possibility of another path forward could’ve avoided the character Baldur became.
If Baldur went back to living after he lost in his invulnerability, I can see him becoming a masochist.
I always figured the line "have you any idea what you cost me" was about how Odin was possibly going to punish him, or already did, for his failure so far to capture our protagonists. Or that it was taking too long for Odin's liking
Nah he was referring to being able to live. Not being able to feel anything was the cost
Well he went back to Asgard empty handed and Odin, being the petty manipulative a-hole he is, told him that he’s not going to undo his “blessing”.
@@ArlecchinoAKAFatherhe didn’t know Freya was there at that point
How do you punish somebody who can not fell anything and care about nobody?
Atreus talks about it after the fight, Mimir speculated that Odin probably promised him the secret to feeling again as a reward. I honestly don't know what dude was talking about but yeah
Baldur came to pick a fight and die, 100 percent.
I think Baldur reacts weirdly to the punch, because Kratos doesn't want to fight. He can tell there is no real fury in the attack. Well, restrained fury.
Throughout the fight, you can see him taughting Kratos trying to get his rage going.
I feel like that is why he tells Kratos he cant feel anything. Its like a signal that Kratos better ramp it up or he WILL die. Its like Baldur will make Kratos pay for not being able to kill Baldur.
I enjoy this outlook
Ooh, good one! I felt that Baldur, thinking that Kratos was this near-mythical Guardian of Jotanheim, was expecting and even giddy about the thought of an actual challenge. He then continues to goad Kratos into stepping up his game, to unleash his full "Jotann" fury on him but is then disappointed by Kratos holding back. In his mind, Baldur was expecting who he thought to be a Giant would be full of fury at seeing an Aesir god show up at his doorstep and would be eager at getting some payback.
@@shadowking9739 Baldur knew who Kratos was. He makes that remark about being ‘enlightened’. That was a comment about him being Greek, not a Giant.
@@GeminibBornReally? I was under the impression that Baldur thought Kratos was a Giant. At first glance, he appears to be talking about Kratos' Greek background but later on it becomes apparent that he was searching for Faye or any other surviving Giants.
@@GeminibBorn he thought kratos was a giant he had no idea that kratos was wel kratos
I was going to say that Baldur is very inaccurate. He's kind, forgiving, wise, cheerful, loving, and pacifistic; and this is NOTHING like him.
But with the integration of his invincibility spell by his mother being flipped on its head with him being invulnerable to all his senses and emotions, it would be IMPOSSIBLE for him to stay that way. The vision in Helheim was the Baldur we knew and loved, consumed by depression, turned cold.
And the "No Forgiveness" tattoo is perfect, this is truly proof that Baldur is no longer the God of Forgiveness.
This is GENIUS writing, a great way of using creative liberty while staying true to the source material.
I'm loving this so far!
I always read it as Baldur being disappointed Kratos couldn't hurt him. But it makes sense he'd be upset the God Killer couldn't kill him if he wanted to die in that confrontation
The Only Thing Baldur can feel is Misery, thanks to Freya
But Baldur is blessed with invulnerability to ALL threats. Physical AND magical.
@@Castiel335but he can't feel pussy tho.
@@Castiel335He mentally feels misery. No pleasure, no temperature, not even taste! Baldur wanted to live life and die normally. But because of freya. Baldur just lives in Misery and really wants to die.
@@Castiel335and? Doesn’t mean shit when you can’t enjoy things in life
The difference between Kratos and Baldur is the person they had by their side when they were at their lowest. Freya denied Baldur the choice of his own destiny; meanwhile Faye, although setting a clear path for Kratos' journey, left the final choice for Kratos to make.
I will always say that, even though the protagonists of these two games are both male, the role of a female character in their story is immeasurable. That's how you place a woman in a men's story: you make her an overwhelming influence on them, whose existence itself leads to their growth and changes their ways - to *be better.*
Meh. If the character has enough sense, they can do it on their own. Solid Snake never simped for anyone. Period.
Like Thor, Baldur also mirrors Kratos: A man who got tricked into doing something he didn't want, hates his parent and seeks revenge against said parent.
@@jorgebersabe293 Like Thor? I don't remember Thor wanting revenge against Odin. Did I misunderstand?
Kratos also got to kill the source of his rage, so that it no longer blinded him.
@@blackmanwithcomputer Damn, you're right. The fact that Kratos was emotinally empty (instead of being hell-bent on vengeance, like Baldur) when he met Faye certainly helped - he was more open to her changing his perspective.
I think it's interesting that Freya goes through a similar arc as Baldur (understanding what it's like for someone to make a life changing decision for you without your consent.) You can draw the comparisons between the two, but Freya eventually does forgive and let go, something Baldur does not, a trait he unfortunately shares in common with Father.
To be fair, it is really hard to let it go when you still living the hell. And when you is finally free, the person you hated the most wanted you to finish her.
ONE HUNDRED YEARS!
Just a little extra detail, Baldur actually has a wife (Nana) and at least one child. (Forseti). Besides the general sensory deprivation, imagine how heartbreaking it would be not to be able to feel kissing your wife or hugging your son.
I love this series because I see and hear everything Freya says and does to/for Baldur in my mom and the exact same justifications given to me my entire life by my own mom. And the more I try to explain, the more she digs in and waves it all away because her love/obsession for me clouds her judgement. I know she does it out of love, but the older I get, the more worn down I feel by it. I know the only escape is to leave and cut her out entirely, but it would kill her. But, contrary to Baldur, I found solace in my friends and chosen family instead of poisonous hatred :)
as your internet stranger i’m very proud of you & hope to b as successful when i do the same :)
Beautiful.
There is a saying in buddhism: True love is letting the other person go. Goind against the free will of another and lot letting them make their own choises is not love, it's selfishness.
I always thought the kind of spell Freya put on Baldur was a blessing and that he should've been grateful for what she did but after playing the game and seeing how not only could he not get hurt, but even FEEL anything, it made me reconsider what I thought was good/bad and at the end, his death both shocked me but made me glad he died feeling satisfied
I mean he suffered sensory deprivation for over 100 years, anyone in his life would become meaningless as he’d never be able to physically connect with them. All that would leave him to a path of self destruction
@@markgreenway7651 Not only that but with the bags under his eyes he likely doesn't sleep much if at all since he can't feel exhaustion/tired
Looking back at Baldur's history, you know who he reminds me of? Tai Lung from King Fu Panda. Both characters grew bitter, hateful, and vengeful (as they rightfully should), because they got screwed over by their parents.
I like how Baldur not being able to feel is treated as a curse. In any other piece of media it would be portrayed as a superpower and the character would revel in it whereas Baldur would do anything to feel again. Like he says to Freya when she asks "you would rather die?" to which he responds "Than never feel again? Yes, I would rather die". It's so human, and you can really empathise with him. That's what I love so much about Ragnarok and GOW 2018, it's the human element, it makes the characters, their conflicts and their struggles so incredibly compelling.
I'm wondering if it's possible that, because we feel our emotions physically (sometimes to the point of being sick), that Baldur's emotional sensation was dulled too. If so, he might not have been capable of "feeling" much except his immeasurable rage, which would make it so much harder to let it go. It would be hard for him to be empathetic in that case.
That’s an interesting theory! That makes it so much worse
That's entirely plausible. Maybe Baldur's rage over his condition and his hatred towards his mother were the only things keeping him from fully going insane, almost like a sick incentive driving him forward.
Even though that Baldur was blessed with invulnerability to all threats physical or magical he truly hated that spell he couldn't eat or taste or smell anything or feel nothing I see now why it drove him to the brink of insanity in broken him I see why Baldur is called unforgiving son and not being able to have sex or feel the beautiful feeling goodness of sex is true heartbroken 💔
Baldur
Indeed. Sensory Deprivation on THAT level can and will have an impact on you even with the smallest of things that most people don't really put much attention or value into in life. No wonder he went crazy.
No sense of touch, smell or taste is awful and he’s lived for hundreds of years without those senses. I understand why he had all that rage against his mother and went insane with glee when he got them back.
@@MR.LMR1996 yeah, he said he couldn't even feel the temperature of the rooms he is in. he couldn't feel it at all. even texture is something he doesn't know.
@@halfknight2310& that he played a game in asgard where people would shoot arrows at him & see how many he could withstand until he toppled over from the weight
"he's been so angry for so long that it's made him physically and mentally ill"
He's just like me fr fr
I really like the scene in Helheim between the past versions of Baldur and Freyja. Baldur not only sounds sane but also emotionally distraught, like he is constantly on the verge of either screaming or sobbing. He sounds oddly sympathetic, which is also helped by Freyja's line of "Trust me, in time you will thank me", which strikes me as something an abuser would say after giving their victim a nasty beating or taking something precious away from them. This is further strengthened by the fact that Freyja not only actively lied to Baldur but also by her flat-out refusal to even acknowledge his pain and distress. She was more concerned with HER feelings than HIS and this led to his mental deterioration. Baldur was most likely a POS like Heimdall before the curse but a full CENTURY of long-term sensory deprivation, one where he was unable to enjoy even the simplest of life's pleasures, certainly would and clearly did a huge number on his psyche, making him even more unhinged. As for his relationships with his family, I have my theories:
-Odin: Judging by how useful Baldur was and how important he was made out to be in "Ragnarok" (i.e. the "best tracker"/"closer" line), my guess is that Odin treated Baldur much in the way he did Atreus, using praise, rewards and trust to bolster Baldur's ego in order to make him more effective. He also "promised" to help Baldur, dangling the prospect of a cure over him, which likely endeared Baldur to him and not only increased his resentment towards his mother but also made Baldur more loyal to Odin, more willing to follow any and all orders. Just based on his overall demeanor, I don't think Baldur would act like a weak-willed sycophant similar to Heimdall, but at the same time, he wouldn't be outwardly defiant. Personally, I'm of the opinion Baldur would be a bit chatty with Odin, cracking jokes and acting nonchalant but also loyal as well as eager and willing to carry out his missions.
-Thor: I think Thor would resent Baldur for the preferential treatment that Odin gave him, as evidenced in "Ragnarok" when he bitterly said, "Like you and Baldur" in response to Odin's claim that he (Odin) and Atreus made a good team. I also think that Baldur's invulnerability would also cause him to crack jokes at Thor's expense, since he wouldn't be afraid of being crushed by the God of Thunder and it just fits his personality. Plus, given the fact that Thor didn't really strike me as a consciously malicious or actively sadistic person, Thor would also just hate being around Baldur period. However, it might also be possible that the two might've enjoyed some level of camaraderie with one another; Baldur mentioned how much he loved drinking before the curse and his love of fighting is evident so those are two things the pair might've bonded over when they overall would've stayed out of each other's way. What I find especially curious is that in his first battle with Kratos, Thor talks about the Spartan's blood-debt and brings up Baldur's name first before his sons. It really is possible Thor had some level of respect for Baldur, even if he was jealous and didn't particularly like him.
-Heimdall: He would've HATED Baldur. First off, given his desire for recognition, especially from his father, Heimdall would despise Baldur for being Odin's "favorite" and for all of the attention he would've received as the Allfather's right-hand man. In "Ragnarok", Atreus brings up Baldur's feat of taming a dragon and based on Heimdall's tone ("Baldur had the luxury of not caring whether he got burnt"), it sounded like Heimdall resented hearing about his half-brother. A guy that can't get hurt and is always carrying out Odin's orders would likely get a lot of attention and despite his best efforts, Heimdall just couldn't compete. It's also very likely that Heimdall wished he could personally hurt and/or kill Baldur and that would've added fuel to the fire. Given Heimdall's ego, it would've pissed him off to no end to know that his mind-reading would and could do nothing against someone that he can't harm. It's entirely possible that Heimdall got pleasure from reading Baldur's tormented thoughts, to know that he is suffering from his inability to touch and enjoy things like beer and women but he also would've "seen" Baldur's pride at being Odin's top man and "reading" his memories of their interactions, making Heimdall's powers in this situation a blessing and a curse. As for Baldur and Heimdall's meetings, I think the two would take turns making snide remarks and put-downs, with Heimdall using the no-touch thing to get under Baldur's skin and Baldur reminding Heimdall that not only is he Odin's favorite but the Watchman can't actually physically bully or humiliate him the way that he does others (which I firmly believe given his treatment of both Thrud and Atreus/Loki). Perhaps that also would've given rise to a kind of begrudging mutual respect since Heimdall can't hurt Baldur and Baldur can't lay a finger on Heimdall; it's the case of an unstoppable force meeting an immovable object.
Thor literally crushed in the skull of a giant with the mind of a child over a joke, so I would say he's definitely malicious by intent
@@Think_PigeonI don't think he took that fact into consideration, just killing a guy over what he perceived to be an insult
@@Think_Pigeonwait when was this?
@raptordoniv6779 it's just one of the stories Mimir tells throughout the game
I'd say those might be pretty accurate.
When Kratos said that Atreus shouldn't have to experience spartan training made me really appreciate this franchise's writing.
I just love how Baldur is willing to get choked out by Kratos. He’s fine with it because, without this adventure, he wouldn’t have died.
I mean image of Kratos never came to Norse Myth, or Baldur went to the wrong house, or hell if Freya never gave Atreus the mistletoe, Baldur would have never reached his end.
I love that baldur's story is simultaneously a dark reflection/path that atreus can go down if he is corrupted by his godhood, but also a foil to kratos since he was in a similar position to baldur. The gods swaying /changing their lives however they see fit, manipulating them, lying to them, and having things being forced upon them without their consent in any way, and then being forced to live their lives with it, only for them to despise their parents more and more to the point where the only thing on their minds was murdering the parent that cursed them to this hell that they now live.
One of my favorite things about Baldur’s gaunt appearance is the implication that the reason he appears to be as strong as Kratos is that he can fight without caring about hurting himself. Maybe a bit of a stretch, but it’s possible that he can use all of his strength rather than a fraction of it like everyone else because he not only feels none of the pain of tearing muscles or breaking bones with the force of the exertion, he heals any any of the damage almost immediately.
Part of me was predicting (And hoping that) Freya wound become a very unconventional villain for Kratos and Atreus, though her redemption arc in Ragnarok is really great too.
She’s a villain, until the second game
The theory that Baldur wanted Kratos to kill him at the beginning is supported by the fact he was holding back when starting the confrontation.
I live with the opposite feeling of chronic pain and at first I was always angry and on edge. I can understand very well how much pain and rage he's feeling at the end. even lashing out on innocent people feels self justified when you're under that kind of situation. with time i got used to and can work around it but I can see a alternate reality where I just got destructive. not a pretty or pleasant place to be
Another reason Baldur isn't muscular is that his power doen't come from himself, but from the Curse.
I don’t think Baldur can work out in any conventional way. He can’t be damaged in any capacity with a mistletoe. Meaning he can’t get “shredded” during a workout and his muscles can’t recover without an injury
Baldur's surprisingly such a good character. Love his voice performance.
It’s really interesting how they changed one aspect of his Lore and it totally turned him into a villian. Not being able to experience the sense of touch. In the Norse Myths, he is just invulnerable it never says anything about him feeling anything or not.
I've just noticed that Freya's response of "I had every right, I am your mother" parallels Odin in Ragnarok demanding Thor follow his orders because "I am your father." And just... wow. Also, I love that when Freya claims that she can't undo the curse but still wants to preserve her relationship with her son despite lying to him and robbing him of pretty much all that is good in his life, Baldur's response is basically 'If you say you can't fix this curse, then I say we can't fix "us."' And I think that was exactly what she deserved.
As someone who had covid and couldn't taste anything for a while, yeah i can see why Baldur would be so upset.
I believe Baldur was actually looking for Faye in the first encounter. He says, I thought you'd be bigger, as in a giant. Remember Odin says there was some "misunderstandings" because we know Odin did not want to provoke Kratos and wouldn't have sent Baldur if he knew Kratos was there. In addition, Baldur says "your kind is supposed to be so much better than us" because the giants were noble and opposed the Aesir vanity and tyranny. Baldur would search for giants because giants had magic that the Aesir did not know, magic that could perhaps cure Baldur.
Or at least kill him
Accordin to what the game says, everyone in the 9 realms did NOT know who Kratos was, except Faye and later Mimir. Baldur went looking for a giant, he engages Kratos thinking he is the one. We realize that at the end, Kratos himself tells that to Atreus when they finally reache Jottunheim
I find it strange that the games never bother to flesh out Baldurs relationship with his son Forsetti, despite mentioning him in Ragnarok. Kinda seems like it couldve been an interesting addition to this whole story!
Exactly i think the reason why is because next game hes gonna have some appearances
One thing I thought about was if baldur lacked all physical feelings, he couldn't feel the ground under his feet, the air filling his lungs, if he evens remembers how to breathe. His existence would be just a void. The existential dread would be maddening , how would he know what is real or not. The disconnection from the material leaves you questioning so much. The only things anchoring you to your reality are your anger and drive to feel something. I can imagine Baldir trying every horrible or thrilling thing to himself just to find something to feel. The worst part of all of this is that it was forced onto you, and you can't even end it yourself. You just exist, yet you dont feel it. You're disconnected because what is there that could physically connect you?
Ooh yeah, that's a great interpretation. Ever seen the movie "Darkman"? The main character also experiences total sensory deprivation and it, coupled with several other tragedies, takes a huge toll on his psyche.
There actually is dialogue, though not a lot, in Ragnarök that goes into small detail between Baldur and Thor’s relationship. I don’t recall the specifics but I think if you talk to some characters or interact with items as Atreus.
I can't remember anything specifically, but Thor loved his brother Baldur, trusted him a lot (2018 game) and called Odin out for treating Atreus like him (Ragnarök).
And obviously his 'first' blow to Kratos in their fight: "THAT was for Baldur!" and he actually managed to land a powerful hit.
Odin: "don't we (him and Atreus) make a great team?"
Thor: "Like you and Baldur?"
I hadn't realized we were missing a Baldur analysis XD
I struggle when writing villains; I struggle with consistency in general. It is hard for me to achieve what they achieved with Baldur: an evil, symphatetic person that you can't save from himself.
Don’t feel bad, it took a whole team of professionals to write Baldur. It’s not wrong to take inspiration.
The fact that Kratos held back from killing Baldr in the exact same way he killed Heimdall says a LOT about how much the latter disturbed Kratos. They were both a danger to him and Atreus, but Baldr wasn't maliciously trying to get to Atreus and Kratos knew that.
Baldur was always, and still is, my favorite character in the God Of War Norse series.
From his overall character design, to his voice, his behavior, and his style of fighting in terms of gameplay and character writing.
When he first appeared in the 4th game, I was instantly hooked when it was revealed he was a type of "Judging a book by its cover" kind of character. Despite his slim and small figure, saying he's able to hold his own against Kratos would be an understatement. He punches Kratos through the mans own roof, supplexes him without struggle, speed rams him into a boulder getting him stuck inside, and even splits the mountains of Midgard in two just by entering a game of "strength-pushing" with Kratos.
He's definitely the character that stuck out the most to me in the Nordic arc.
I thought Baldurs first few lines like "I thought you'd be bigger" were in reference to Faye but are written in a way that makes the audience think he's talking about kratos to maintain the mystery around Faye. The reference to being "enlightened" works for both the giants and Greeks and "I thought you'd be bigger" works as a reference to Faye being a giant and how kratos actually shrunk between 3 and 4 (apparently going from 7'6 to 6'4 according to Google)
"Thor doesnt strike me as a child murderer"
Thor in Niflheim when Sif gives him a little pep talk: 👁👄👁
I like the way that Baldur’s first scene is recontextualised once you know the full story. When he says things like “long way from home aren’t you” “here I thought your kind were supposed to be so enlightened, so much better than us” and “I thought you of all people might be able to make me feel something” Kratos (and the player) assume this means Baldur knows Kratos’ past with the Olympians in Greece. Then at the end you realise that he actually thought Kratos was an Ice Giant, and that he was hoping some Jotunnar magic might be what could break his curse
The neck tattoo translating to “I mark the sunset of the Gods” is a genius decision, as Baldur’s death in Norse Mythology marks the beginning of Ragnarok.
And what do you know, the sequel to this game takes place during Ragnarok.
First time I played the game I did it on hardest difficulty. baldur's fight took me over an hour I think. And I gotta tell you out of all the soundtracks to lose to for over an hour this is definitely the best
My favourite villain in the series, he's so good. Also glad to see more GoW videos!
I completely agree with your point about Baldur being a parallel for Atreus. He suffered because of Kratos's choices as a parent, and it was only by choosing to trust Atreus with the truth and not keeping it to his chest any longer that Atreus could finally heal and really become himself. Baldur is what happened when another parent in that same position chose to keep doing the selfish thing, at the expense of the child.
I just appreciate how well written this video is. This video does a great job incapsulating the nuances of the storytelling of the game. Thank you!