I've seen you mention that there is an important distinction between an antagonist and a villain, so what is this distinction and is Edelgard an antagonist, villain or both?
Itâs about literary terminology and itâs semantic but well - semantics do matter.
Antagonist - The force that a protagonist is up against. Protagonist is the âmain characterâ that a story focuses on, the antagonist is their main obstacle. Â
Ie - in Breath of the Wild, Link is the protagonist, Ganonâs Malice / Calamity Ganon is the antagonist. In FE7, Lyn, Eliwood, and Hector are the protagonists of their routes with Nergal / the Black Fang as the antagonists. Â
The thing about protagonists and antagonists is that these are neutral terms. They arenât moral judgments, itâs just figuring out the focal point. In How the Grinch Stole Christmas, the Grinch is the protagonist even though heâs openly malicious 3/4s of the story. In Untitled Goose Game, the goose is the protagonist even though your goal is to terrorize an English town.  The Joker in 2019 movie is the protagonist and Thomas Wayne / Society are the antagonists.
Hero-Villain is a much more subjective dichotomy but well, you can still get a feel for who the hero of a story is supposed to be by the acts they take, the morals they use, etc. Same with villains.
In a broad sense, Fire Emblem draws from the same story each time when it creates its heroes and villains. Heroes tend to be the âlordâ characters and those associated with them - ie Marth, Sigurd/Seliph, Alm, Roy, Elincia-Ike, Chrom-Lucina. Villains tend to be the Red Emperor ie Hardin, Arvis, Rudolf, Zephiel, Ashnard, Walhart.
So this entire distinction came about because certain groups of Redditors, shockingly enough, conflate the two to argue that Edelgard CANâT be the bad guy because sheâs a protagonist and protagonists are never bad!! and/or that sheâs only a villain 3/4 of the time because villainy isnât a default when you are the main character.
And... this is not how this works.
Whatâs going on is that Edelgard is the protagonist in one route (Black Eagles -White Clouds into Crimson Flower) and the antagonist 3/4 of the post-timeskip routes. This is not a value judgment, whether sheâs right or not, etc. Itâs just what the term means.
Now this is where I go full value judgment and argue that sheâs always the villain - her route just wants to play coy about it. I had someone argue once that âvillainâ is an icky term and âantivillainâ works better but like, Iâm not entirely sure what else to call advocating genocide of a nearly-distinct race as well as invading two countries for your own gain here. You can dress it up how you want but at the end of the day, in pure Fire Emblem language, Edelgardâs your villain and, per the developers themselves, serving as the Red Emperor with all the attached connotations.
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