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[Xeranx]

Flamewielder wrote...

Neil Gaiman's Death is a creature of infinite compassion, willingly embracing the sad necessity of dying alone so that all other sentient creatures will have someone to take them beyond. Morinth, however, has NONE of Death's compassion, being a slave of her nature: a sociopathic psychic vampire who is addicted to the "high" it gives her of draining her victim's experiences as a proxy to an empathy she is denied by her condition.

This is, I think, the problem I have with people stating absolutes about a character like Morinth.  While I understand how people view her (grudgingly), I think it's a bit out of line because there's a lot of context that is missing (which is why I understand the view, but can't reconcile my distaste of it).  We have an idea that what she suffers from is compulsion.  We're told that (or at least the narrative leads us to be believe) she's able to choose who she goes after, but we aren't able to see who she goes after.  I find that unfortunate because I believe she can be easily redeemed if we're given context to who she goes after and the reasons for doing so.  Still it doesn't make her a monster outright.  She could have been so, but there's nothing concrete.  The only thing that gives way to cementing the belief that she's rotten to the core is Nef and if we're to take anything Samara said about Morinth to heart then Nef completely goes against the profile she initially established about who Morinth chooses.  And if she can get that wrong what's stopping her from getting 40%, 50%, 75%...everything(?) wrong?

In regards to Morinth, apart from other areas in the game, the narrative is all over the place.  It's been discussed at length and I know that many would rather avoid it or maybe I would like to avoid it so I won't bring it up.

Flamewielder wrote...
"A tragic figure, but not a sympathetic one" indeed...

Morinth is an interesting character, but suffers from being essentially an accessory to Samara's story. The fact that all she cares to talk about once you bring her onboard is how unfairly her daughter (and the universe) treated her doesn't help: she comes across as an ungrateful adolescent, blaming all her troubles on the outside world and never acknowledging her own faults. That doesn't speak too well regarding any intent Morinth might ever have of "atoning" somehow for the lives she took.

Interestingly, Samara speaks lovingly of her deceased daughter. It's the generational gap spun out of control...

This is mainly what I hate about the direction taken with Morinth.  Considering she only serves to prop up Samara (who I feel says a heck of a lot to bring herself down anyway) I would rather they didn't write Morinth at all.  The only thing I find more useless than any character introduced with a lack of context for the things they do (though that is huge) are throwaway characters who are given important introductions, but don't do anything as a result to show they're alive.  If someone is to be a red shirt then they don't need blue or gold shirt intros and/or exposition.

[Flamewielder]

Xeranx wrote...
This is, I think, the problem I have with people stating absolutes about a character like Morinth.  While I understand how people view her (grudgingly), I think it's a bit out of line because there's a lot of context that is missing (which is why I understand the view, but can't reconcile my distaste of it).  We have an idea that what she suffers from is compulsion.  We're told that (or at least the narrative leads us to be believe) she's able to choose who she goes after, but we aren't able to see who she goes after. I find that unfortunate because I believe she can be easily redeemed if we're given context to who she goes after and the reasons for doing so.  Still it doesn't make her a monster outright.  She could have been so, but there's nothing concrete.

We DO know what she goes after: artists and creative people, either in the creative arts like Nef, alpha-dog personalities like Shepard, young innocent asari daughters like those of the village she seduced/dominated into providing her with victims... all of which Samara explicitely states beforehand in conversations on board the Normandy. Bottom line, she chooses victims that catch her fancy, demonstrating no particular moral qualm about this selection.

The only thing that gives way to cementing the belief that she's rotten to the core is Nef and if we're to take anything Samara said about Morinth to heart then Nef completely goes against the profile she initially established about who Morinth chooses.  And if she can get that wrong what's stopping her from getting 40%, 50%, 75%...everything(?) wrong?

I would point out that enlisting/seducing/dominating a village into a cult to oneself and getting them to offer their daughters as living sacrifices, then setting these fanatics upon the justicar who shows up to stop it does not help Morinth raise any sympathy towards her...

This is mainly what I hate about the direction taken with Morinth.  Considering she only serves to prop up Samara (who I feel says a heck of a lot to bring herself down anyway) I would rather they didn't write Morinth at all. The only thing I find more useless than any character introduced with a lack of context for the things they do (though that is huge) are throwaway characters who are given important introductions, but don't do anything as a result to show they're alive.  If someone is to be a red shirt then they don't need blue or gold shirt intros and/or exposition.

Then you'd be ruining two characters instead of just the one. Fictional characters, in any media, will only be effective in creating sympathy/antipathy if they ARE treated as blue/gold shirts and not as red shirts. Even villains work best when they are given screen time... that's how we identify him as the villain. Morinth was set up as a foil, a plot element in Samara's story. Make no mistake: making Morinth a monster does not make Samara a saint; Samara's moral struggle would have no meaning if Morinth's character was not so tragic. I am saddened by Morinth and Samara's story, but Morinth is still a killer of children, artists (and yes, perhaps some evil people too, which doesn't excuse children or Nef).

"...a tragic figure, but not a sympathetic one."

Modifié par Flamewielder, 01 février 2011 - 04:12 .

[Xilizhra]

I would point out that enlisting/seducing/dominating a village into a cult to oneself and getting them to offer their daughters as living sacrifices, then setting these fanatics upon the justicar who shows up to stop it does not help Morinth raise any sympathy towards her...

Actually, going by pure logic and not instinct, the cult setup was the least morally reprehensible way for Morinth to feed. I mean, if it's an accepted and even welcomed part of life, it would be the least pain-causing alternative for everyone, yes? Depending on your views on the afterlife, it might even cause less net pain than simply killing Morinth (though that may be going a bit far).

"...a tragic figure, but not a sympathetic one."

Is it so unusual that I can still find her sympathetic?

[GuardianAngel470]

Xilizhra wrote...

I would point out that enlisting/seducing/dominating a village into a cult to oneself and getting them to offer their daughters as living sacrifices, then setting these fanatics upon the justicar who shows up to stop it does not help Morinth raise any sympathy towards her...

Actually, going by pure logic and not instinct, the cult setup was the least morally reprehensible way for Morinth to feed. I mean, if it's an accepted and even welcomed part of life, it would be the least pain-causing alternative for everyone, yes? Depending on your views on the afterlife, it might even cause less net pain than simply killing Morinth (though that may be going a bit far).

"...a tragic figure, but not a sympathetic one."

Is it so unusual that I can still find her sympathetic?

I think you're missing the distinction. Morinth would be a sypathetic figure if she hadn't behave in such a downright evil manner at times. As such, she's a tragic figure. She's almost like Saren in that respect.

Saren was downright evil, even before the Indoctrination. He did things just because he wanted the bloodshed, as evidenced in Revelation. However, he had a redeeming quality in that he allied with the Reapers because he wanted to save the galaxy, call it a change of heart at the sight of his own mortality.

Morinth is the same way. She hunts because she enjoys it. She could easily just soul suck beggars on the street and criminals but she chooses to target Artists in a sociopathic way. However her forced exile at childhood is her redeeming quality (something many people can identify with), which makes her tragic.

[Xeranx]

Flamewielder wrote...

I would point out that enlisting/seducing/dominating a village into a cult to oneself and getting them to offer their daughters as living sacrifices, then setting these fanatics upon the justicar who shows up to stop it does not help Morinth raise any sympathy towards her...

Of course we know this because Morinth told us, correct?  It wasn't someone whose intent was to kill her, right? I'm sure it's safe to assume that The Eclipse Sisters on Illium were also brainwashed to protect her as well.

Then you'd be ruining two characters instead of just the one. Fictional characters, in any media, will only be effective in creating sympathy/antipathy if they ARE treated as blue/gold shirts and not as red shirts. Even villains work best when they are given screen time... that's how we identify him as the villain. Morinth was set up as a foil, a plot element in Samara's story. Make no mistake: making Morinth a monster does not make Samara a saint; Samara's moral struggle would have no meaning if Morinth's character was not so tragic. I am saddened by Morinth and Samara's story, but Morinth is still a killer of children, artists (and yes, perhaps some evil people too, which doesn't excuse children or Nef).

"...a tragic figure, but not a sympathetic one."

Then if you're going to make an antagonist for someone there should be plenty of evidence --that we get to see-- that allows us to make a decision about said antagonist.  The narrative regarding Morinth's character comes from one point of view and one point of view only up until Nef's mother.  That it comes from the very individual who is trying to kill her doesn't make me feel good about the whole thing.  It's backing me up into a corner which is exactly what happened no?  We had to choose between Morinth and Samara without any further information.  

Now I'm not going to say that Samara is a con artist, but in any con job the con has to sell you the story.  They do that by giving you some good, but mostly bad.  That's what we got.  We got drips and drabs of Morinth's character for the purpose of getting us to a confrontation (that Morinth would have tried to avoid -- have to remember that) in order to kill her.  I don't know if you've glossed over it, you don't care, or you're fine with it, but make no mistake that your purpose is to get Samara in a position to corner Morinth so that Samara can end her life.  That's it.  And miles before we get there we're given scraps of sad stories with many helpings of nice juicy horrible stories to give Morinth this sort of hue so that we are interested in at least getting Samara to her objective.  And while making Morinth a monster doesn't make Samara a saint it does, however, make her less of a monster herself (lest we forget that Samara has no impulse control resulting in how many deaths?  One right in front of us of an unarmed former combatant no less).

Also, in regards to the bold: There is no evidence there to support that statement.  The topic of artists and such I'll touch on in response to:

GuardianAngel470 wrote...

I think you're missing the distinction. Morinth would be a sypathetic figure if she hadn't behave in such a downright evil manner at times. As such, she's a tragic figure. She's almost like Saren in that respect. 

Saren was downright evil, even before the Indoctrination. He did things just because he wanted the bloodshed, as evidenced in Revelation. However, he had a redeeming quality in that he allied with the Reapers because he wanted to save the galaxy, call it a change of heart at the sight of his own mortality.

Morinth is the same way. She hunts because she enjoys it. She could easily just soul suck beggars on the street and criminals but she chooses to target Artists in a sociopathic way. However her forced exile at childhood is her redeeming quality (something many people can identify with), which makes her tragic.

The problem is Morinth being evil isn't a clear, cut given.  Samara telling us who she goes after is so ham-fisted.  I couldn't help but to roll my eyes at that.  It reeked of desperation.  "I'm so close.  I need to tell Shepard something so that they'll continue."  Nevermind that Morinth is 440 years old and if she is evil her tastes might have changed within that time.

This is also something that I feel adds to many possibilities concerning Morinth.  At the very least it's the reason I say anything regarding her because of how undefined she is:

Tasha vas Nar Rayya wrote...
And she may not be sadistic. It is specified that Ardat-Yakshi become addicted to the killing. She may appear to enjoy it, but that may also be her coping mechanism.

Point being that if we can still speculate about Morinth then there are no facts to speak of as to what Morinth does or anything like that.  Making the claim that Morinth is 'a killer of children' is justifying your dislike of her character.  I should also point out that the ability to make that claim illustrates how undefined Morinth is as well.

Fact of the matter is we have an idea of what drives her, but we don't actually know what drives her.  Stating any reasoning for Morinth being evil as fact is no better than saying Saren wants to wipe out all human life in the galaxy when he joined up with the Reapers in order to try and save the galaxy's inhabitants which includes said humans.

[Xilizhra]

Of course we know this because Morinth told us, correct? It wasn't someone whose intent was to kill her, right? I'm sure it's safe to assume that The Eclipse Sisters on Illium were also brainwashed to protect her as well.

Actually, it was someone who'd already killed her. That conversation is post-loyalty-mission.



Other than that, I do agree with your post and am fairly sure that Bioware will touch on absolutely none of it, which is making me want to write another damned piece of fanfiction when I haven't even started the first one, you cruel, cruel man.

[Xeranx]

Xilizhra wrote...

Actually, it was someone who'd already killed her. That conversation is post-loyalty-mission.

If that is truly the case then the question becomes why was that not discussed earlier?  Why would I be hearing about (in the context of Samara using this to assuage Shepard's guilt) a heinous action conducted by the now deceased target after we've done our best to kill her?  It makes me imagine this scenario:

Samara: "You did a good thing Shepard."
Shepard: "Then why do I feel like crap?"
Samara: "Trust me you did a good thing.  I wouldn't steer you wrong."

That would make me feel like I'd just been had.

[Xilizhra]

I think it's because Samara didn't want to talk about Morinth until she had the closure of killing her.

[ZeroDotZero]

I think Morinth, growing in power with every kill, is kind of a parallel to the reapers, growing in power with every harvest. Except Morinth is not all bad (making the common assumption that the reapers are). She is a psycho serial-killer, but she is addicted to murder, and it is not entirely her fault as a result. There are real-life drugs which can only be harvested from the vital organs of living people - i.e., if you become addicted, to satisfy the addiction, people must die.



No matter, Morinth was the one who pulled my Shepard up when he made the jump from the Collector Base to the Normandy. Can't be all evil if she saved Shepard, who expressed no desire to get killed by her snu snu.

[Xilizhra]

I was the one who saved her from the falling platforms on one playthrough... both of those moments, I feel, would be quite powerful (and since Thane never pulls Shepard onto the Normandy for some reason, if I brought Morinth and Thane to the final battle, I could get both). Either Morinth being saved by someone who isn't enthralled by her, or her saving another person's life for possibly the first time...

[ZeroDotZero]

I always disliked Samara. For someone who was supposedly just, her actions were extremely renegade, murdering most likely thousands of people just for petty crimes and such. Even going as far as threatening to kill the Illium police. The two of them were just as bad as each other - killing innocents for a definite benefit, or killing almost-innocents for evading taxes or whatever. Morinth enslaving a whole village to make sacrifices, and then Samara arriving and murdering everyone who would have become a sacrifice. Either way, you get a crazy killer on your crew, and Morinth is clearly the more interesting individual.

[Xilizhra]

More interesting, perhaps, but sadly much less fleshed-out. Of course, then we can construct her in our imaginations (I've got a theory that she's quite into the asari religion siari, seeing herself as a kind of unhappiness sink, destroying lives in moments of perfect pleasure to cause their more positive-aspected energy to recirculate to someplace else in the universe) and that may be more interesting anyway.



Though I think Samara would only kill relatively petty criminals if they criminal'd right in front of her; the justicars are only called in to stop the extremely nasty people.

[ZeroDotZero]

I think we should get some interesting repurcussions depending on whether Morinth or Samara lived during ME2. It is quite possible that she will be cured of the Ardat-Yakshi genetics if Thane is cured of Kepral's.

[Xilizhra]

I sort of doubt it, considering Morinth's throwaway character status, but if it did happen, it would be extremely nice.

[Barquiel]

I agree.



It would be interesting to see if she wants to be cured.

[Xilizhra]

I find it unlikely, unless she somehow became an LI and wanted to stay with Shepard without killing her.

Which would mean I'd need to make yet another playthrough to romance her without cheating on Liara.

[ZeroDotZero]

Seeing as Bioware seem to have made it so that no matter how many characters you have butchered, you will always have enough to have a ME3 squad, I think that all the 'throwaway' characters like Kasumi, Zaeed and Morinth should still be returning. After all, ME2 was all about the team. If the characters just disappear for ME3, that would be super anti-climactic.

[Xilizhra]

I agree, and sort of think that none of them should have died in the first place...



I doubt Samara and Morinth will have significantly different roles, but we can still hope, yes?

[ZeroDotZero]

I doubt any ME2 character will have a huge role to play in ME3, but they should definitely have different companion missions, should the game take that format. Morinth has an almost 100% chance of surviving the Suicide Mission though, as she will always be loyal for it, just depends on Samara's mission really. Maybe if it is left uncompleted, both Samara and Morinth will be back for ME3.

[Xilizhra]

I wouldn't want to do that, even though I want to keep them both alive... I'll probably stick with one and go with it.

[Commander Waha]

I'm Commander Shepard and this is my favorite LI on the Citadel.

[Radahldo]

Very clever

[Xeranx]

Xilizhra wrote...

I find it unlikely, unless she somehow became an LI and wanted to stay with Shepard without killing her.
Which would mean I'd need to make yet another playthrough to romance her without cheating on Liara.

Honestly, I hate the implication that all ails can be fixed once someone's bedded or if the possibility exists.  I would much rather have it be a friend that brings the change about and then if it were going to happen then the romance would follow.  

One of the many things I wish occurred in games that involve romance arcs is the friendship. The part that allows people to suss each other out (motives, what makes them tick: what makes them mad, laugh, cry).  The friendship is that place to allow for one to get comfortable with themselves within that level of intimacy before moving on to the romantic level of intimacy.  I'm not saying get rid of the "I have the engine room ready" moments, but in addition to that add the bits that allow for real growth.

[Rusty Pabst]

Here's a favorite Morinth image:



http://masseffectscr...011/02/28/3542/

[Xilizhra]

Xeranx wrote...

Xilizhra wrote...

I find it unlikely, unless she somehow became an LI and wanted to stay with Shepard without killing her.
Which would mean I'd need to make yet another playthrough to romance her without cheating on Liara.

Honestly, I hate the implication that all ails can be fixed once someone's bedded or if the possibility exists.  I would much rather have it be a friend that brings the change about and then if it were going to happen then the romance would follow.  

One of the many things I wish occurred in games that involve romance arcs is the friendship. The part that allows people to suss each other out (motives, what makes them tick: what makes them mad, laugh, cry).  The friendship is that place to allow for one to get comfortable with themselves within that level of intimacy before moving on to the romantic level of intimacy.  I'm not saying get rid of the "I have the engine room ready" moments, but in addition to that add the bits that allow for real growth.

That's what I've come to believe. Sort of. I've heard the opposing argument that Morinth can only be cured by receiving a melding-related shock to her system when someone finds a way to survive the Union with her. That makes sense too. On the other hand, I do think that the story of the first would be better. Hmmm.

Also, you may find this interesting: http://social.biowar...542/blog/14106/

Modifié par Xilizhra, 01 mars 2011 - 02:12 .