I’m replaying Origins because it’s been a while, and I got to the part with the Dalish, and I’ve been noticing the similarities between Solas and Zathrian. Yes, they are both bald elven mages who lived a long time. But no, go deeper than that.
Zathrian talks about the pain he carries, how he’s lived for so long that pain has become ingrained in him, and he’s not certain he’s even capable of letting it go anymore.
And there’s a conversation between Solas and Cole to similar effect:
Cole: You are quiet, Solas.I don’t hear your hurt as much. Your song is softer, subtler, not silent but still.
Solas: How small the pain of one man seems when weighed
against the endless depths of memory, of feeling, of existence.
And that’s just really interesting to me, personally. And then I’m watching the cutscene between Zathrian and The Lady and I notice something else.
You know that scene in Inquisition where Solas leads you to Skyhold and he always has the same staff no matter what you have him equipped with?
And I’ve always thought that was strange. Why would the devs to that? Like, “We need him to have this staff in this scene. No, we’re not going to tell you why. Just do it.”
GUYS! IT’S ZATHRIANS FUCKING STAFF!
I’ve always been interested in the parallels between Solas and Zathrian, specifically their tragic backstories.
Zathrian was devastated by a violent event that stole his children from his arms. He took his vengeance by placing a curse on the perpetrators, locking them away from their bodies and forcing them to live separate from society. But what happened in the end? It all backfired on him, and the curse he had placed on his enemies long ago was now killing his own people.
It’s all rather familiar, in that respect, isn’t it? The question is: Will Solas, too, be forced to sacrifice his life in order to break the curse he also placed, inadvertently or not, on his People?
;__; I’m playing Origins for the first time and am on the Zathrian quest and I’m like hmmm. So interesting, the parallels.
I am going to break some hearts here, but I have thought about this a lot, too, and I think that Zathrian’s fate foreshadows Solas’ too.
Like Zathrian, Solas is very attached to his decision, believing he is doing the right thing in the end. Like Zathrian, he questions his thoughts when an empathetic person questions him, but he still does not waiver.
For Zathrian we are given the choice to a.) kill the werewolves (what Zathrian wants), b.) kill the elves (what the werewolves want) or c.) convince Zathrian to sacrifice himself for the sake of his clan – those he cares about.
I think that by choosing whether to redeem or stop Solas we are choosing between an option similar to a & c. Stopping Solas entails hunting him and his followers down, stopping them at all costs. Redeeming Solas, at least in my opinion, is not going to mean convincing him to drop everything and return to the Inquisitor or whatever. Solas is too old and overcome with feelings of remorse for killing his people. He would not be happy remaining in the world as it is when the world he knew before was so much better in his eyes. He could adapt, but he won’t.
I think that after a long battle where he is defeated, he will have a change of heart and choose to sacrifice himself to prevent or reverse something he has started. He will still die.
The difference between the two options will not be whether or not he does, but rather if he dies alone or in the company and service of those who care about him.
What they said^^^^^^^^^^^ that last line, seems far too hinted at ingame.. and i know its a verrry strong possibility.. the thing i wanna know is,, why the hell would weekes act like theres hope, if the best we have is, he dies surrounded by his friends? lmao thats a kick in the guts for alot of us.
Foolishly, I hope it goes somewhere along the lines of :
Solas starts to believe in the ex-inquisitor, his friend/lover/or both, Perhaps he can let his plans go, perhaps there is another way?. but then his friend/lover is cut down (much like andraste was, either stabbed or burned at a stake) he, overcome with grief will go back to his plans, sacrificing his own mortal life to be in the fade where the spell must be broken from the golden city perhaps?
but alas, a spirit of hope has made their way there and it is non other then his friend/lover , who convinces him to stop.
Therein hes died, but he isnt alone. They remain with him.
I may be wrong but on the war table in inquisition Solas gives you the quest to find Zathrian’s staff.
While I think it’s entirely possible that Solas will just be Zathrian on a higher scale, I feel like that’s also ignoring a crucial point:
We’ve seen Zathrian’s story.
`I know it’s not uncommon for writers to echo larger plots within smaller ones as foreshadowing, but typically speaking, you also don’t want to just rehash the exact same outcomes over and over again. Part of the appeal of exploring the same theme multiple times lies in examining different possible outcomes and variations on it.
So again, while I see this as highly possible, it’d also be the… how to put it… boring way to go?
Like, take DA2 for example. DA2 likes to examine no-win scenarios and the limitations of heroes. So we get stuff like the inevitable qunari attack on Kirkwall mirroring the inevitable destruction of the chantry at the end. In both cases, with the Arishok and Anders, there are two characters whose destructive courses cannot be reversed, who have been provoked and left in situations they see as impossible to resolve without violence.
Just like Zathrian and also just like Solas. But within these categories, while you can boil things down to ‘do they live or not’, there is also still plenty of variation in the actual scenarios and outcomes. For example, you have to sacrifice a companion – Isabela – in order to spare the Arishok’s life. But you don’t have to sacrifice anything to spare Anders. In Zathrian’s case, he cursed the humans who had attacked his clan and his children in revenge. But so far, what we’ve gleaned from Solas is that he was acting more from necessity, to stop the evanuris in their tracks.
We can also refer to Loghain, on that front. In DA:O, Loghain also believes that he is acting from necessity to stop a greater threat, because he’s underestimated the darkspawn and fixated on Orlais. Not… entirely unreasonably, given the history of the Wardens, but certainly unrealistically for the world around him. I think it’d be fair to guess that, with his limited understanding of the future he’s created, a lot of what Solas sees as necessary action may also be unrealistic to his actual intentions, and operating on past trauma and fixations.
And Loghain, despite doing some pretty heinous shit (see: the alienage) can actually find satisfaction in working with the Wardens, if you choose to spare him.
So basically what I’m getting at is that this is all fascinating and the parallels are definitely real, but don’t count your chickens before they’ve hatched.
funeral-biscuit 