Artificial Characters & Humanity — Full Breakdown & Transcript

[00:00] One of the most profound moments in  Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood goes   you just need to know that Edward and Alphonse  are brothers, very early in the show a flashback  

[00:14] reveals that the boys try to use alchemy to  bring their late mother back to life… but   the transmutation horribly misfires and Al  loses his body in the process. To save him,  

[00:26] Ed tethers his soul to this suit of armor and now…  This is Alfonse. The show follows their journey to   find a way to get Al’s body back. And in episode  8, we find him throwing hands with another suit  

[00:39] of armor, a former serial killer called Barry the  Chopper. Barry is like Al, he was killed on death   row and his soul was bonded to this suit.  After learning that Al is just like him,  

[00:52] Barry poses an interesting question:  "Are you sure that you're not a puppet,   created and controlled by your so-called brother?"  "Were you ever even a real person to begin with?” This shakes Alfonse to the core…  wait… how can he be sure… but hang on,  

[01:09] he has memories! Barry: "And who's to say those  memories aren't made up?" Al: “But Winry and   granny… they know me…” Barry: “That’s easy,  they’re in on it too!” What if Barry’s right?  

[01:21] How can Al know for sure… does he bring this up  to Ed? An existential storm rolls in for Alphonse,   how can he be sure that anything he  has ever known about himself is real?

[01:37] This small arc of the show paints a particular  color of panic that you find across all of   fiction. Characters that are artificial in  some way and contemplate their existence.  

[01:50] The swelling of confusion and fury that Mewtwo  feels upon discovering that he was created in   a lab, the horror Vivi feels in Final Fantasy  IX at the revelation that he was built to be a   killing machine, Vision in Marvel, Andrew in  Bicentennial Man, Edward Scissorhands from…  

[02:08] Lies of P. These characters are fascinating to  us… AS humans because in some way we do relate   to the questions they ask, right? We have all  contemplated our own existence; our own purpose.  

[02:20] We have struggled to understand why other humans  interact and behave in the way that they do,   maybe we have felt robotic in social situations  when others seem to take to it so naturally…   We can probably all agree that there is also  something fascinating about exploring where that  

[02:36] line between human and imitation truly resides…  is it the ability to do harm for a just cause? Is   it the ability to lie out of empathy? Is it true  altruism? Is it affection? Is it something else…  

[02:54] But I think we, as sluts for good storytelling,  get bogged down in these components of the fake   human character trope. After all, as humans,  we UNDERSTAND what it is to be human and enjoy  

[03:06] watching something carry all of the crosses we  bear… there is something to delight in seeing   something synthetic or unnatural take up the  weight of all that is… us. But I’m here to  

[03:19] tell you that there is another part of these  characters that we lose when we simply focus   on the “I think therefore I am” aspect of them.  There is something a little more tender at play,  

[03:31] something subtle that I think makes us want to  protect Vivi at all costs, that makes us yearn   for Data to be happy, that makes us want to give  Al a hug and let him know that he is, in fact,  

[03:44] real. So, I invite you to take a deep seat and  allow me to guide you on a tour through one of   my very favorite character tropes and a few  stories that I have been YEARNING to talk to   you about. There will be spoilers, some small,  some big, but I’ll mark them with timestamps  

[04:00] like always. Most of these narratives serve the  same point, so it is okay to skip here and there.   Grab a snack, let me knock out this  sponsor read, then we will dive right in. As I get older, I find myself enchanted  by learning more and it’s kind of that  

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[05:43] been looking for. A huge thanks to boot for  the sponsor, now let’s get back to the video. Sophia: “One more thing I should mention. The  hotel security excludes puppets like you. So  

[05:57] you’ll have to lie to get inside. You’re a special  puppet, after all.” The first real decision you   make in Lies of P is whether or not you… lie  to this hotel security system. You see puppets  

[06:15] in Krat cannot lie, it’s how they are wired. It  goes against something called The Grand Covenant,   a series of rules made by Geppetto, the  puppets original creator, that dictate how   these animatronic people behave. Hotel Krat’s  security system simply asks if you are human,  

[06:31] and since puppets can’t lie… well they tend  to stay out. But your puppet is a clever one…   and on his behalf… you do lie to get into the  hotel. In case you couldn’t tell from the title,  

[06:45] lying is the axis that this game’s narrative  and themes revolve around. Yes, you fight stuff   and gain something called Ergo which makes you  stronger… but the character of the clever one   here is really explored through his interactions  with others and how you manage his choices. One  

[07:01] of my favorite examples is how you handle this  request from someone named Belle. She asks if you,   when you go to Krat central station, could  look for her partner Atkinson. Unfortunately,   when you find him, he has been infected by  the petrification disease and… there is no  

[07:17] cure. When you return to her, you can be honest  and say that he has become a monster… or you can   spare her pain and tell her that he died with  honor. Though heartbroken, she takes solace in  

[07:29] the closure and genuinely thanks you. Something  inside of the clever puppet reacts. Another one   that really stuck with me was a conundrum you  face regarding a woman who is dying of the   petrification disease. You have a treatment that  will keep her alive for longer… but ultimately, it  

[07:46] will prolong her suffering… is it better to save  her life… at least for now? Or is it more humane   to allow her a natural death? Would she really  be living if you kept her around? What these  

[08:03] moral dilemmas do is present complex emotionally  taxing questions to our puppet and it’s because   of them that his humanity grows. Initially his  springs react to the “more human” responses, but  

[08:16] soon the ergo in his heart whispers, eventually  he FEELS warmth, the language used to describe   these stirrings grows as he does.The hotel cat,  once cold and indifferent, eventually warms up to  

[08:31] the clever one… the game does a wonderful job of  reflecting your humanity in subtle ways like this. And something that you can’t help but notice is  that beyond the ergo that you get from taking on   basic enemies, is that there is special ergo as  well that you get from bosses. Unique veins of  

[08:49] Ergo... that’s… curious. It’s also curious when  you find excerpts about a puppet named Camille,   the first automaton to ever develop an ego. Like  the clever one… she once acted altruistically and  

[09:03] empathetically: catching a baby who fell from a  crib. Upon further research, the order found that   nothing was really wrong with her… she was acting  completely on her own. She even spoke defensively,  

[09:16] motherly… Send me back to my child. Just outside  of the Opera House, you can find a statue of a   woman named Camille, someone who is dearly  missed… Without saying too much here, these  

[09:28] matching names are likely not a coincidence and  as you piece these things together, you get the   sense that ergo may be more than a power source…  it may contain the memories of those who are no  

[09:40] longer with us. Perhaps Camille’s ergo, like Al’s  soul… became tethered to this maid automaton.   And if that’s how it works… if the  humanity of the puppets comes from  

[09:54] someone’s ergo… that begs the question…  who is the clever puppet’s ergo from?

[10:06] Fullmetal Alchemist is much less cryptic early  on. If you’ve seen the show, you know that it   wastes very little time showing you the dark side  of alchemy, what can go wrong if you recklessly   ask too much of it, the truly horrifying  COST of tampering with the divine. Early  

[10:21] in the first arc of the show, Ed and Al read  about something called the philosopher stone,   a legendary artifact that is said to allow  you to bend the rules of alchemy to your   will. No equivalent exchange, no following the  rules of nature, simply transmute whatever you  

[10:36] like… and THIS is their first real lead  in reclaiming Al’s body and Ed’s limbs.   However, they quickly discover that the stones  are crafted using human lives. Ed: “This is  

[10:48] the devil’s research… it should have been  destroyed. Dr. Marco was right, it’s evil. The stones are calcified souls, coagulated  memories, that fuel advanced alchemy. And if you  

[11:01] watched the Lies of P section just now, you may  go… hmmm that sounds familiar. The use of these   stones becomes this moral compass that separates  the good guys from the bad guys, right? Ed and   Al deeply wrestle with the possibility of using  these people as fuel for their own desires… Ed  

[11:17] knows from experience that souls can be salvaged  and have value. Al knows what it’s like to be   trapped in something OTHER than his own body… how  could they possibly condone the use of these evil  

[11:30] gems? … The villains really don’t give a shit.  But the existence of these Philosopher’s Stones   creates an interesting question that weaves  itself into the story… When is someone truly  

[11:42] gone? Are these suits of armor really people?  Brother: “With bodies like these, are we really   even people?” Ed: “I consider you people whether  you have physical bodies or not” Do these lost   spirits who have no hope of returning to their  bodies have value? Or is this the equivalent of  

[11:59] keeping someone on life support when they aren’t  truly living anymore? . After all, it’s that kind   of thinking that got the boys into this mess.  If the people truly are gone now… is it morally   correct to now use their souls as … gunpowder to  save the people that are still with us? Is that  

[12:17] a better way to honor them? Heinkel: “Don’t use  it for yourself, use it to save the entire world   instead. Even though they’re trapped in stone,  they still want to fight to protect what matters  

[12:30] to them.” Fullmetal Alchemist, like Lies of P,  is a narrative that cannot escape the ghosts of   its past. In the former, memories shape identity  and choices, in the later, memories torment and  

[12:42] cling to the characters like a curse. Greed wants  to forget his comrades because the memory of them   hurts too much to bear. Whereas Al desperately  clings to his past like freshly shredded strips   of paper, terrified to lose what he once was…  after all, without them… he is only a puppet.

[13:04] Music: Lies of P OST - Far East Princess If you ask anyone who has played Final  Fantasy IX who their favorite character is,   I’d put money on them saying Vivi. Even if  you haven’t played, odds are you recognize  

[13:17] this little guy. The striped pants, the patchy  mage hat, the adorable little glowing eyes,   the… incredibly broken magic the gathering card  it’s an iconic character design but what makes   him so instantly intriguing in this narrative is  that he… doesn’t really know much about himself.  

[13:34] We find him basically wandering in traffic at  the start of the game for goodness sake. But   for much of the first act, Vivi is searching  for answers about his existence. Where did he   come from? Why is he different from everyone  else? And over time, he gets those answers.

[13:49] We learn that he’s been manufactured,  we find others like him but they… don’t   speak to him… we find other others like  him… and they… are instruments of war.  

[14:02] Is this all he was meant to be? Why does  he think for himself whereas the others   seem to be mindless killing machines? Is  there a chance he could become that again?

[14:16] Just as Ergo powers Krat in Lies of P, the Mist  on this continent fuels each industrially booming   kingdom. Airships fly with its power, machinery  breathes it and converts it into energy, even Vivi  

[14:28] himself and all of the other black mages are made  using this mysterious Mist. And early in the game,   you kind of dismiss that. We don’t know much  about the mist other than the fact that it's   fuel and it’s causing the animals in the  lowlands to morph and act violently. But  

[14:43] it does complicate your theories about Vivi… this  is what he’s running on, so what exactly is it? But eventually, in the gang’s search to find  answers… you’ll happen upon an entire village  

[14:56] of mages just like Vivi… mages that are no longer  weapons but instead… docile, kind, contemplative,   caring… and just as lost as Vivi. It’s here  that he learns that other mages have… stopped  

[15:13] moving. He must now grasp, for the first time,  what it means to… die. Apparently, most of the  

[15:25] mages live for about a year before they expire…  and this haunts him. It keeps him up at night…   And in one of my favorite scenes of the game,  he asks Mage number 288 what he feels about  

[15:38] the idea of death. And 288 replies, “I don’t  know… fear? I don’t want to stop. And maybe I   want to run away from it all. But living in the  village with everyone fills me with joy. The joy  

[15:54] of living with them far outweighs the fear of  death.” This gives Vivi a glimmer of purpose,   a shred of solace to hang onto. And it drives him  to continue his journey with the gang, eventually  

[16:07] leading them to the Iifa tree, the source of the  mist. And when you scale it and dive into this… Look, as an aside, this is one of the most  unbelievable locations I’ve ever been in a   game before like… I don’t have adjectives  or fair comparisons to describe what this  

[16:22] place looks and feels like… I mean, my god why  don’t we as a society talk about FF9 more??? At the root of the tree, we get answers.  The mist itself is the spirits of the  

[16:34] deceased that cannot return to the planet  because of the Iifa tree’s interference,   the mist’s presence is causing war  among the continents. And Vivi,   being fully aware that this gaseous lifeblood  has allowed him and his brothers to exist,  

[16:51] decides it is best to destroy the tree’s  core and free the kingdoms of its wrath.   It’s a decision that echoes the Elric brother’s  refusal to use the Philosopher’s Stones selfishly.  

[17:04] This idea that yes, Vivi could potentially extend  both his lifespan and keep his kind alive well   into the future… but he cannot allow more weapons  to be made, he cannot greedily pick himself or  

[17:17] his brothers over peace. It is the most altruistic  and… human thing he could possibly do… right down   to feeling massively guilty about it afterwards.  Like Alphonse, like the clever puppet, Vivi’s  

[17:33] humanity is explored in his ability to move beyond  his existential fears, beyond the ghosts of the   past, and make a decision that prioritizes those  that are still with us. Even at his own expense.

[17:52] Something I’ve been trying to divert your  attention to in all of these stories is this   strange commonality they all have. Yes, we have  characters that aren't human discovering what   it means to be human in each of them but…  we also have this bizarre narrative tool  

[18:06] in play. Crystalized memories in the form  of Ergo, coagulated human souls in the form   of the Philosopher’s Stones, stagnant ghosts  of the past looming in the form of the mist.  

[18:18] Why would each of these stories choose to use  something like this instead of just using…   electricity or steam to create artificial life  and explore humanity in that fashion?Why is it   also necessary that humanity or memories be used  as a… a battery for these characters to tell their  

[18:36] story? And furthermore, why does each power source  also cause just as much pandemonium as it does   wonder? Why have this in each of these narratives?  And I think there are two answers. The first is  

[18:51] because each one provides us a moral dilemma to  give our heroes a chance to prove they’re human.   Vivi’s selflessness, the clever one’s choice to  spare pain, Ed and Al’s insistence on ANOTHER way.   But the second answer might be a bit more subtle  and I think the best way to explore it is to talk  

[19:08] about a story that DOESN’T have this narrative  tool… which I realize sounds counterproductive,   but I want you to see how the story feels  WITHOUT the ghosts of the past haunting it.

[19:20] Seeing Mewtwo Strikes Back in theatres  as a child was… magical. This was when   pokemon was exploding onto the scene  in the late nineties and this movie,   my goodness. Visually, the animation was  so crisp. The hand painted backgrounds,  

[19:35] the attention to detail and genuine care that  you get from 90s anime. It’s stunning to look   at in moments, even today. But watching it  as an adult, narratively, it's kinda flat.

[19:48] Mewtwo wakes up, he’s upset that he’s been  created in a lab as a clone of Mew… so he   blows the place to smithereens. Giovanni  finds him and attempts to befriend him,   tentatively earning Mewtwo’s trust. But of  course, Giovanni is a dick and just sees Mewtwo  

[20:02] as a slave. This doesn’t sit well with Mewtwo.  So he blows the place to smithereens. He kidnaps   and brainwashes Nurse Joy and invites a ton of  trainers to this island where he has somehow…   built an entire mansion and pokemon stadium… and  also he makes a storm that the trainers have to  

[20:17] get through to prove their worth. Ash enlists  the help of Team Rocket, disguised as vikings,   to get across. Brock: “I didn’t know vikings  still existed!” Ash: “They mostly live in   Minnesota.” Minnesota is canonically a location  in pokemon. They arrive and then Mewtwo appears,  

[20:32] claiming to be the world’s greatest pokemon  trainer. Meanwhile Team Rocket stumbles upon   this pokemon cloning machine in the  back. This all culminates in several   pokemon battles between Ash and the real  Pokemon and Mewtwo and his cloned Pokemon.

[20:47] There are more than a few things that don’t  work about the movie. There is of course the   message that fighting is wrong when the clones  and the originals are stripped of their powers   by Mewtwo. The biting and clawing just… oh man  it’s sad to watch But also… the entire idea of  

[21:06] pokemon is that they fight? And this is different  somehow? The other BIG thing is that Mewtwo is   kind of horrible in this movie. His motivation  after the first two betrayals that start the   film are that Pokemon and humans… suck? Like  he almost becomes Frieza, just listen to this:  

[21:24] “...and purge this planet of all who oppose me.  Human and Pokemon alike.” Mewtwo in this movie  

[21:39] is a stock bad guy. He was wronged a handful of  times and now generalizes this to everyone and is   essentially motivated by revenge. And that’s fine,  it kind of works and it was still a fun movie… but  

[21:51] it makes his eventual moment of redemption just…  sort of… “oh I’m sorry y’all. Maybe not everyone   is so bad.” The pokemon cry, ash is revived,  Mewtwo has learned his lesson and is “good” now,  

[22:03] we forgive the abduction and attempted murder.  When you compare this character to the ones we've   talked about leading up to this point, Mewtwo  is kind of hollow because there is no attempt   to understand himself. There is no moral dilemma  he must face. He doesn’t seem like he’s searching  

[22:19] for answers, he is just… lashing out. And the  question I’d like to pose to you is… would a   narrative tool like Ergo, or the Mist, or the  philosopher’s stones make his story a more  

[22:32] profound one? Would Mewtwo be more interesting…  if he too was powered or motivated by a memor- Girl: “I didn’t know a pokemon could talk  like a person! Mewtwo: “Pokemon…? Which  

[22:45] one am I?” Girl: “Maybe it makes a difference to  you if you’re a pokemon or a person, but not to   me.” The western release of Mewtwo strikes back,  the version I saw in theatres as a kid, the one   you’ve likely seen does not include the first 10  minutes of the original cut of the film. We open  

[23:02] on a scientific expedition to find Mew’s DNA and  subsequently a shot of a young mewtwo in the lab.   Inside of Mewtwo's consciousness, he is not alone.  A voice comes to him; a young girl named Ambertwo  

[23:18] and other pokemon clones join him. It becomes  clear that she is the consciousness of Dr. Fuji’s   late daughter Amber, the source and catalyst of  his research… The endeavor all began because he  

[23:32] wants to bring her back. This immediately changes  the tone of the film. To know that the pain of   loss is the spark that ignited this research  adds a somber filter to the narrative. And it’s  

[23:46] only bolstered as Ambertwo teaches mewtwo what  living is like. Humans, pokemon, wind, the sun,   the stars, the moon, happiness… sadness… the  other clones are not surviving, they are failed  

[24:01] experiments and mewtwo has to process all of this  in a very short amount of time. Saying goodbye   to his first real friend causes an insurmountable  amount of pain and to keep their investment alive,  

[24:13] the scientists wipe his memories… leading us  to the start of the film that we all recognize.   The confusion, the anger, the hint of something  lost… all begins to make total sense. You suddenly  

[24:28] sympathize strongly with not only mewtwo but also  Dr. Fuji. It’s not evil scientists making an evil   pokemon… it’s broken people creating something  that is just as lost and tormented as they are.

[24:45] And when you apply this knowledge to the rest  of the film, it completely recontextualizes   Mewtwo’s actions. The shots of him watching  Ash and his pokemon don’t read as him looking   for powerful pokemon trainers, they read  as him longing for that companionship and  

[24:59] not fully understanding why. Giovanni’s betrayal  becomes less about humans enslaving pokemon and   more about his heartbreak that Giovanni won’t  be his friend. His first three clone attempts   are the fully evolved forms of his first  friends… And this WAS the vision by the way,  

[25:17] the western script diverts STRONGLY  from the japanese one. Takeshi Shudo,   the chief writer for the film says that the story  was meant to be much more existential and present   tough questions… questions that Mewtwo is meant  to struggle with. The original script’s direct  

[25:34] translation reflects this, you find in it the  threads of what the film was meant to feel like.   Mewtwo isn’t this cruel tyrant, he doesn’t say  tiny human brain, he doesn’t proclaim himself   ruler of the world. His actions are less driven  by power but instead the need to… validate his own  

[25:52] or not, Mew is kind of the confirmation of this  fear. In our version, Meowth translates Mew as   saying that true strength comes from the heart  but… the japanese mew is a little more extreme,  

[26:07] it proclaims that the true pokemon will beat the  copies if you take their powers away… and that in   some translations, it can’t forgive the existence  of the copies… that little xenophobic shit!

[26:20] THIS is what leads to the big battle and THIS is  what leads Joy to say… What is this fighting? Both   the real ones and copies are alive now. Everyone  is a living thing. Though they were created,  

[26:34] they are living beings that live in this world… A  very different message than Joy: “pokemon weren’t   meant to fight, not like this.” The dilemma  in question wasn’t THAT they were fighting,  

[26:47] it was WHY are they fighting? They both have  every right to exist. It’s not about heart,   it’s about acceptance. There is no need to fight  for your worth… your worth is inherent because you  

[27:01] live… Amber: “And don’t cry Mewtwo, you should  be happy! You’re alive, and life is wonderful!” All of that to say, the movie takes on a whole  new meaning when you add that initial component  

[27:15] of Dr. Fuji trying to bring Amber back to  life. It does the same thing for Mewtwo   strikes back that the Elrics trying to bring  back their mother does for Fullmetal Alchemist.   The foundation of these stories is rooted in the  pain of loss… a supernatural attempt to undo that  

[27:31] loss… and the suffering that follows that attempt.  How being unable to move on lingers and festers   inside of you. Each tale is a grand metaphor.  Broken memories become a puppet frenzy and an  

[27:45] incurable disease. The trapped souls of the past  fuel killing machines and stir nations to war. A   ruined man’s research to clone his late daughter  sets loose one of the most unstable and dangerous   creatures the world has ever seen. And left there  to pick up the broken pieces are these creations.  

[28:04] Now faced with the very same dilemma as the ones  that created them… “where do I go from here?” The true tragedy of Lies of P is revealed in the  closing moments of the game. If you were paying  

[28:23] by a G.G. - most likely being the clever one’s  creator, Giuseppe Geppetto. The implication,   if you piece all this together, I think  is that Camille is Geppetto’s late wife.  

[28:38] I think he placed her Ergo in a puppet and when  her memories eventually came leaking through and   influenced her behavior… This gave him an idea.  Perhaps, he can revive his late son Carlo… just  

[28:52] as Mr. Fuji attempted to bring back Amber. And  I won’t pretend to know EXACTLY Geppetto’s plan   here; beautiful as it is, this game is cryptic in  some of its details so what I’m about to tell you   is my best understanding. But Geppettoo built the  clever puppet using Carlo’s heart which contained  

[29:10] Carlo’s Ergo. By giving him time to get to  know his father, time to build friendships   with everyone at the hotel, time to experience  the guilt of taking a life, the consequences   of telling the truth, the sensation of lying to  spare someone’s feelings, the chance to understand  

[29:26] what it is to be human… Geppetto essentially  prepared Carlo’s heart through this puppet. And before the final boss, Geppetto asks you for  Carlo’s heart back. If you say no, you will fight  

[29:41] Carlo’s rotting reconstructed body. Part of  him is there, part of him is inside you… It’s   a viscous encounter, a mirror match, but in the  end, Geppetto’s son is too much, the clever one  

[29:56] is overwhelmed and *severe coughing* - Geppetto:  “Were you… going to… destroy Carlo’s… heart?!”

[30:09] Carlo wasn’t fighting to get his heart back… he  was fighting to destroy it so he could finally   rest. Seeing his father killed, in a fit of  rage, the clever one finishes off Carlo. And  

[30:24] as the puppet holds him in his arms, bleeding and  angry, Geppetto hesitates as he sees the puppet   shed a tear. The tragedy of this game is that  in this moment, in his final moment, Geppetto  

[30:42] realizes that he HAD in fact revived his son.  He just couldn’t see it until it was too late.   It’s no coincidence that TWICE in this  game you are faced with the moral dilemma  

[30:58] of letting someone rest instead of trying to  revive them. It’s no coincidence that Carlo   was trying to destroy his own heart. Lies of  P, ultimately is whispering to you that loss,  

[31:10] though it does sting… cannot be allowed to  rot and fester while you bargain for ways   to undo what is already done. You must,  eventually, move forward. If you don’t,  

[31:25] you miss the beauty of what is right in front  of you, what has been right in front of you   this whole time. Geppetto was so obsessed with  reviving his own flesh and blood, that he failed  

[31:38] to see that his family was there all along.  That there is more than one definition of… son. Music: Final Fantasy IX OST - Unforgettable Sorrow

[31:54] Something that I couldn’t help but notice in my  time playing Final Fantasy IX is that most of   our heroes are… in one form or another, adopted.  Zidane cannot remember where he comes from or who   his parents are, he refers to Baku, the leader  of this theatre group as his father because Baku  

[32:10] took Zidane in. Eiko is one of the last of her  kind, her parents and grandparents are gone,   but the moogles watch over her. Vivi obviously  cannot remember his origins, but he calls Quan   his father because Quan is the one that took  him in and cared for him. Dagger is treated  

[32:27] as a princess, but it’s eventually revealed that  her real mother gave her life trying to save her.   FF IX uses its characters and their interactions  in a very dynamic way because although we have  

[32:39] a lot of questions about where each of them comes  from and how exactly they ended up here… it takes   the time to make us care for them as people first  before we start digging into origin stories. Note   how despite Vivi’s crisis on this airship,  he is the only one that calls into question  

[32:54] his merit to be here. Even Steiner, the resident  stick-in-the-mud, immediately speaks up and says,   “why would those mages be the same as you? And  why would it matter if they were?” Dagger never  

[33:07] questions if Zidane can help her in the first  act of the game, she kind of… recklessly trusts   him. One of the reasons the cast is so strong is  because they pick each other up in dark moments,   especially Zidane who never hesitates to lend a  kind word. Because so many of them HAVE no past…  

[33:25] There is an unspoken understanding that I think  they all share. Judge me based on who I *am*,   not where I come from… And this message is  further bolstered when we get answers about   each character’s past. Again, no matter how much  we learn about the black mages, Vivi never loses  

[33:43] the gang’s trust. Each and every time, they choose  to see their friend, not this… manufactured thing.   When it’s revealed that Queen Braune is starting  a war or when Dagger fails to save Alexandria,  

[33:56] in both cases, everyone stands by her. Zidane,  in each of these instances stands resolute in his   belief that the past does not define a person.  Which makes his origin all the more impactful.

[34:17] Zidane, we discover, is a genome clone, created  by someone named Garland. Garland's mission,   in a way, like Dr. Fuji’s goal on a much larger  scale… was to revive his home planet of Terra.  

[34:31] By creating these shells that he calls genomes…  he will recirculate the planet of Gaia’s souls,   its mist, with the mist of Terra. Then, these  genomes will inherit the planet, the souls of  

[34:43] Terra filling each of them in a cataclysmic  planetary event. He wants to absorb this   world to revive his people. And Zidane, as well as  Kuja, have been sent to the planet to facilitate  

[34:57] that. But Zidane lost his memory of this and  grew up on Gaia naturally like everyone else. However, upon fully grasping this… he spirals.  His philosophy crumbles from underneath him.  

[35:14] How can he believe anything he has said to his  friends this entire journey about the past being   irrelevant? He was sent to kill them. He was  sent to prepare this world to be absorbed. He  

[35:27] is their enemy, he is dangerous, a threat to all  he loves, he doesn’t deserve their kindness, he… One by one, his friends intervene. One by  one, they show him the same understanding  

[35:44] and comfort that he showed them. In probably  the most beautiful sequence of the game,   his friends remind him that his existence  is valid. That the past and the WAY he  

[35:58] found his way to them does not matter.  That how he was created does not make   him any less their family. They  remind him… that he is not alone.

[36:13] To close this out, I want to tell you about  my favorite scene from FF9. The one we just   discussed is tender and moving but… this one  I think best ties all of this together. And  

[36:26] is less spoilery. There is a moment in the  Mage Village when Vivi is wandering restless   and Dagger is worried about him. Zidane says he’s  just trying to figure something out for himself,   clearly understanding what it’s like to  not know everything about his own past.  

[36:41] Zidane says… maybe he’ll find what he’s  looking for. A place to call home… And to me,   that is the unifying thread that ties all of  these stories together and what tethers them  

[36:55] to us… Because while it is fascinating to watch  as these characters slowly earn their humanity,   it’s even more deeply and emotionally fulfilling  to see them learn the lessons that their creators  

[37:10] never did. That replacing someone you’ve lost is  a fool's errand. That your value or validity does   not come from the circumstances of your birth, but  what you do with your life. That a heart fullmetal  

[37:25] can love just as deeply as one of flesh and blood.  That family is not always genetic and that home   didn’t die with the one you lost… it can be found  again in the people you still have. These stories  

[37:42] gently proclaim that it’s in people that you find  your greatest strength, that you find a place to   call home… It’s okay to want to run away from it  all. But maybe, but it’s through them that you  

[37:57] can find joy. Perhaps, the joy of living with them  far outweighs the fear of death. You aren’t alone.

[38:14] Hello there, it’s good to be back. I feel  like it’s been awhile, has it been awhile?   It has been a bit of a creative slump for me in  the past few months but with this one I hope to   break out of that funk. If you enjoyed this,  give it a like and let me know down below what  

[38:26] character absolutely belonged in this video.  And if you want to see more videos like it,   hit that subscribe button down below! Maybe even  the bell too if you want to know when I post   something new. And of course, if you REALLY want  to support the show and help make this possible,  

[38:40] join me over on Patreon. For one single dollar a  month, you can get access to bonus content like   creative input, regular updates, bloopers, editing  and behind the scenes livestreams and your name  

[38:52] in the credits like you see here. You might even  get a shoutout like this month’s featured patrons: Apollyon Yufufuvt  parad0x3D Stanley Lam 

[39:07] Hans-Florian lohse Arya and Calcifer  Starbird Hackattack242 Thanks again my friends, take care of yourselves  and please… have yourself a damn good one. You  

[39:25] like that new outro screen? That’s pretty nice  huh? That’s pretty clean! A buddy of mine made it.   If you want animations like that done, hit him up  here. His details are here and in the description.