People don't talk enough about the similarities between Messmer and Malenia for me. There's definitely something to it!
Things they have in common:
Abandoned by family. Malenia was abandoned by Miquella, and Messmer by Marika.
Blind - which seems to come from their respective curses.
Both were born cursed. Messmer with his fire and snakes, Malenia with the Scarlet Rot.
Both were given sacred gold items by their (later estranged) family members to stave off their afflictions. Malenia was given the golden needle by Miquella, Messmer was given his golden eye by Marika. This one feels the most significant to me.
Famously fearsome fighters. Particularly after their famous battles - the Scarlet Bloom in Caelid and Messmer's crusade.
Significant transformations once they release their inner curses. Malenia becomes the Goddess of Rot, Messmer becomes Base Serpent Messmer.
Same parents (theoretically). Maybe an obvious point but worth noting.
I'm hoping someone has an idea of what this could mean in terms of storytelling, possibly outside the usual 'repeating cycles' thing, or if it provides any further insight. It's just super interesting to me that two characters in the same generation would have so many similarities.
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If Melina and Messmer are children of Marika, that could be two of her kids that have closed left eyes. What if the “gloam-eyed queen” was another consort of Marika and her children share that trait? Gloam means dusk, what if that doesn’t mean color, but closed?
This guy has always intrigued me because he's a complete non-presence in the lore. There's only one line of text in the entire game that mentions him. But he feels like he should be more important. Here's a literal demigod just stuck in an evergaol, and we're supposed to overlook that??
First off: Yes, of all the copy-paste bosses, he's the most copypasted. He is literally an exact copy of Godrick, just with a blue glow. He even has less moves than the original. If I had my druthers, he'd at least look a little different. Maybe give him a beard or something, IDK.
While he's not the only copy-pasted Runebearer boss, he's the only one who is clearly meant to be a different character and not just an illusion or summon or whatever. Yet unlike the copies of Mohg and Morgott, he's not guarding something important. He's stuck in some out of the way area, holding a mediocre talisman. There is literally no reason for him to exist unless he's supposed to tell us something.
But what?
When there's very little to go on, we have to look at connections. That presents a problem in Elden Ring because the world is far more interconnected than any other From Souls game. You can spin out into madness following the web of connections. Not only is it complex, a lot of things we take for granted are contradicted later because what we thought we believed was just hearsay and propaganda. Propaganda is everywhere in the Lands Between, and that perhaps gives us our first clue:
Godefroy has been erased.
Whatever his role was in the past, he's been memory holed, just like Mohg and Placidusax. An Omen demigod who doesn't hate himself and won't play ball? An Elden Lord that predates the supposed First Elden Lord Godfrey? That's inconvenient. It messes up the clean narrative of the Golden Order. He's never mentioned because he has been unpersoned, and unlike Mohg, he's not still around to cause trouble.
But I think I can do better than that. I think I can figure out why.
Was really happy to see our Golden Lord's axe being recreated im reality to near perfection through a long forging process, but this had me wondering exactly how did Godrick get his hands on such a well crafted weapon. In the video it took them well over probably a month to man with machines and technology for assistance, yet in-game it's medieval times and to craft something so durable yet perfectly shaped and engraved must've token probably many months or even a year to complete this thing. It's creation must've been made for a reason, maybe it was in Lyndell and like I said probably in a past post maybe Godfrey or Godwyn had it requested before Godrick was born. Maybe when he was escaping Lyndell he ordered fleeing soldiers to wrap up the weapon and haul it away while Godrick took the evacuation route. Taking it as one of the many treasures he claimed from Lyndell, probably having it displayed somewhere in Stormveil while he was frail and u grafted. After his defeat from the "battle" of Malenia, he was pushed over the edge and took up grafting to finally build his strength. Building up to finally lift this weapon made for him, to finally show his family he can fight as a warrior and not flee like a coward.
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I had to make a BIG post going over everything that's got my brain whirring after watching the story trailer - it's all my speculation and personal opinion so don't take it as fact yada yada IT'S FUN SPECULATION TIME
(I'll put it under the cut bc this is gonna be a LONG one)
“Miquella the kind spoke of the beginning. The seduction. And the betrayal. An affair from which Gold arose. And so too was Shadow born."
My interpretation of this scene is that we are seeing the creation of the Golden Order by Marika. She plucks grace from something dead and fleshy, and holds it up to the Greater Will, beckoning in her new age. It would make sense to me, considering the voiceover, that this is a dead god that has been betrayed by Marika so she can pursue her Order and claim power. It does like quite reminiscent of Kos from Bloodborne to me. The fleshiness of the corpse also reminds me of the godskins/snakeskin. However, I don't believe this is the Gloam Eyed Queen. From my understanding of the timeline (mainly thanks to @eldenringslut) the GEQ didn't come about until later on during Marika's reign - if we are seeing the creation of the GO, and my understanding of the timeline is correct, I don't think it would make sense for this to be the GEQ. I can't deny different aspects of this do allude to things related to her though - the dusky sky, the godskin-like flesh. But I almost think that would be too 'perfect' for it to fit together like that, especially with how much people want to know more about the GEQ, I think fromsoft would want to keep us in the dark and surprise us. Whatever we are seeing here, Gold and Shadow seemingly came about at the same time.
We get our first look at what appears to be Messmer's army. They appear to all wield spears which ties into Messmer's whole Impaler thing, along with the shot of the person(?) impaled on the steps. I wonder who these people were, if they had to stay in the Shadow Realm after the battle was done (if it is?). I find the design on the helmet interesting - at first glance I thought it could be a tree or roots, but actually doesn't it kind of remind you of the black tendrils that shoot out of Messmer's flame? I think it could be either, or both, or maybe it's a chicken and egg situation and they're related somehow... my first thought when the initial gameplay trailer came out was that the dark tendrils in Messmer's flame could be deathroot or something similar to that. Maybe I wasn't far off?
We get our first shot of Messmer here. His pose pretty much solidifies to me that this is his army - this is the pose of a character commanding an army. It's so classic fantasy, the composition and everything, I love it. Messmer is awesome. I'm obsessed with the snake-like flames flying above the carnage.
"What followed was a war unseen. One that could never be put to song. A purge without Grace, or honour. The tyranny of Messmer's flame."
My take on this is that once Marika had won her battle/betrayed the God we see her pluck Grace from, she had her opponents banished and/or wiped out at the hands of Messmer. I have to say, it does surprise me that it seems Messmer was around and fully grown at the creation of Marika's Order. The implications there leave me with so many questions. Who is his other parent? Marika is Numen, and they seldom give birth. This is not an insignificant thing for her to have a child, especially if the theory of births being governed by the Erdtree/Golden Order is to be believed, and this must have came about before then. It would also go against the idea that Messmer is the full brother/secret triplet of Miquella and Malenia, considering that Miq + Mal were not born until Marika had left Godfrey for Radagon. I find that detail so intriguing... especially because I was so on board with the butterfly theories.
No idea who this is, but they're cool and that definitely looks like the kind of weapon we'd be able to pick up. It just looks like a PVP weapon, know what I mean? Very reminiscent of Vyke as well imo, similar pose to the box art of him along with the billowing cape. This reminds me, I'm noticing an emphasis on hair in this trailer too - I never took much note of Marika's hair before but in this trailer there was a lot of emphasis put on how long it is, how similar it is to threads of Grace, and Miquella's hair too. It's making me think of the bible story of Samson but let me not go too off the rails
Here we have some of the coolest shots in the trailer imo. This posits the Lion/Omens as enemies of Messmer to me - which to me supports the view that Messmer is aligned with Marika. The Lion/Omens always came off to me as if they were making a mockery of the GO - positioning themselves as enemies to Marika/the GO. We get another good look at his Flame, with the tendrils. They almost remind me of thorns actually. That final shot looks like a victory scene to me. It also really hammers home the Impaler thing. The man knows his brand!
Then we pan up to see what hangs above this burned city - this 'shadow tree'. THIS IS MARIKA'S RUNE.
I think we are seeing the origins of her rune as part of the modern Elden Ring here - Grace/blessings dripping from the bough of this tree. I have to say given the imagery relating to motherhood on the run up to the DLC, the rune does look vaguely yonic, especially on the seals. I think references to motherhood are in this trailer too - Marika taking something from a fleshy orifice with a voiceover talking about seduction, I can't imagine that wasn't intentional. So far the main character we have seen is her child, after all. The whole story of Elden Ring revolves around Marika's children. I have a feeling Marika's relation to motherhood and childbearing is going to be a big theme in the DLC.
I remember when the first gameplay trailer dropped, people theorised that this was Ranni's rune, and I was happy to believe that because of the similarities to Rennala's rune. But now I believe it's Miquella's rune, for several reasons, one being it reminds me of Malenia's rune, and they are twins after all. Although Rennala and Malenia's runes are oddly similar, it just makes more sense to me that it would be Miquella's, considering we are following in his footsteps. I think these rune spikes are going to be our DLC equivalents of sites of grace.
"And so kindly Miquella would abandon everything. His golden flesh, his blinding strength..."
Abandoning his flesh is very reminiscent of Ranni... but why would he need to abandon his flesh? Perhaps after Mohg stole him away? Though I have to say, I'm warming up the idea that Mohg never actually had Miquella, he just thought he did. That might not make sense considering that body in Mohg's palace is how we get to the Shadow Lands, but I don't know, something about it doesn't sit quite right with me for some reason. The line 'his blinding strength' is a bit odd. I can't take credit for this next idea, I saw it on twitter, but someone suggested that this is referencing him potentially abandoning Malenia - his strength, his blade. For Miquella to abandon Malenia though, it doesn't exactly align with what we know of his character. This is the person that turned his back on the GO because it could do nothing for Malenia's sickness. He'd need a really good reason to do that to her. Maybe it was his only option? I'm so intrigued about why Miquella is even in the Shadow Lands to begin with. What are his motivations? Perhaps it's something to do with his proclivity to want to welcome all, especially those outside of Grace, I suppose those in the shadow lands fall under that mantle.
"Even his fate."
Now THIS is super interesting - our first look at St. Trina! In her usual purple - associated with sleep. It does also look like she's sleeping here, sinking... What on earth does it mean to say that Miquella abandoned his fate as we are shown an image of St. Trina? Was he meant to eventually become Trina fully? We don't know much about her, but we do know Trina is an aspect/alter-ego of some sort of Miquella. Considering his parents were one in the same body, it's not a stretch to assume this could be the same case here. But in Marika/Radagon's case, it doesn't seem completely intentional - with the Ring shattering, I always got the impression they each fought to be in control of their singular body. Perhaps Miquella/Trina worked together rather than against each other? The queer part of me can't help but think of some kind of allegory to transition and Miquella having to walk away from it for whatever reason... but I really don't know enough to figure anything out from this.
I saw someone point out that this shot of Trina looks like Trina's lilies too, which is super cool (sorry I don't remember who that was).
"But we are not deterred. We choose to follow. Will you walk with us?"
I'm honestly surprised to see all these characters that we saw in the previous trailer just hanging out, I assumed they'd all be enemies of different factions. But here they look like allies, and from the voiceover they sound like it too, asking if we will join them. I think the voiceover is one of these NPCs. Seeing the fighting guy second on the left has got me super excited, what if he teaches us the hands-on combat we saw him do in the first trailer? I also think the crouching character on the right is the one we saw sleeping in the purple area (Trina?) from the last trailer:
Anyway, these are my thoughts, I hope they resonate in one way or another. I can't wait to come back in a couple months and see how wrong I was <3 yayyy
Last reblog got me thinking, I wonder if Marika ever even wanted Miquella and Malenia. We don't really know when she started questioning TGO and hating Radagon, but the fact they had children together feels more like a tactic or strategy rather than something born out of love. Especially considering they both ended up being chosen to be Empyreans. Maybe they knew children born of a single god would have a greater chance of being Empyreans. Maybe it was a plot to try and keep the power in the hands of the current Order's camp, and block Ranni from becoming the next god and threatening their rule. Clearly it didn't turn out that way, given both Miquella and Malenia turned their backs on the Golden Order, but that could've been the motivation.
Whether this was a joint decision or a decision that was somewhat forced upon Marika somehow is another story. There's a lot in Elden Ring about bodily autonomy, so it wouldn't surprise me if that was a part of it. I wonder if that was the point where she started questioning how much control she really had as a god. Trina does tell us that godhood is a prison.
1- Stormveil was originally Godwyn the Golden's castle, and Godrick the Grafted is his only living (when the game begins) descendant. This is why Godwyn's corpse is taking over the place with deathroot and the creepyface in the basement. I think this face location is likely where his soul was killed. I don't expect the DLC to confirm or elaborate on this sadly. I hope for a Godwyn appearance but won't hold my breath.
2- The painting of Ouchlord Vivaldi and a pregnant woman are Marika's father and mother, and this location is their original home when they sailed to the lands between. Related- Others have noticed this part before but I think the thing he is impaled on is a candlestick:
3- The castle with the Solomonic columns belongs to the Gloam Eyed Queen, who Marika banished to the Shadow Land. The lion dancers Miyazaki mentioned being part of that culture is likely the midpoint boss here. The only place we see these columns in the base game is the altar of the Temple of Eiglay, where the Godskin Noble is on loan to Rykard.
Eiglay is a snake so maybe the Gloam Eyed Queen is as well? Maybe she's Eiglay? Maybe she's Messmer? Maybe Messmer is within us all? Maybe I'm a man, maybe I'm a lonely man who's in the middle of something that he doesn't really understand?
4- The DLC's physical location isn't in the middle, but to the left of the main map. I think this because of reasons.
