I started out really liking Senya. I loved the idea that a Knight would have interests, and like to sing, and have her own opinions and such. I loved that she's an older woman, when we so rarely get older women in stories like this. It's usually super young hot romancable women which is fine? But I wish there was a bit more variety, so I loved that we kinda got two sides of the Zakuul equation. Koth, representing the people, and Senya, representing the Knights. AND they don't like each other. Excellent

It was really disappointing, in a way, to find out that it's actually just that she's a mom. She's older and she's gentler and she sings and she's also a mother, and those are all traits that people automatically give mothers. So now it doesn't feel like a subversion of anything at all, just playing into a different trope than expected... and that disappointed me.

Plus, it didn't make much sense at ALL to me how Senya could have possibly been involved with the literal Sith Emperor. What little we know about the early years of Arcann, Thexan, and Vaylin's life, I really find it difficult to understand how Senya fits into that.

I'm sure she could, and I'm sure it's possible to make sense of that, but honestly the backstories and arcs and things just make more sense to me if you don't involve a random Knight who also is their mother who also apparently loves Valkorian?? except we never see them together EVER

I especially find it hard to believe that the Sith Emperor, this being of ultimate evil and Dark Side power, also had a somewhat functional and occasionally loving relationship with a random woman. Why????

So. For me, personally, I liked Arcann and Vaylins' stories better when Senya wasn't involved at all, so I prefer to just stick with that rather than doing a huge amount of mental gymnastics trying to make Senya make sense with the larger story.

More importantly: from what I understand, Senya's whole thing was that more than anything, she just wants her children to be alright. So she'll say other things, she'll do what she needs to, but it's all with the end goal of saving her kids. For example, she promises she'll do what it takes when she gets to Arcann, but then. well. she straight up disobeys direct orders to save Arcann and escape with him. She fights Vaylin, and could have killed her, but doesn't.

And that's... all well and good. But I felt like it had a detrimental effect on Arcann's arc for a couple reasons.

First of all, Senya taking over and having the whole confrontation with Vaylin and Arcann... it was really good! But it also felt out of place. It felt like Senya was taking the spotlight away from the Outlander, and kind of taking the choice of it all into her own hands.

I thought it was really cool that Senya couldn't bring herself to kill Vaylin, but also... this isn't her story! That would have been amazing in a movie, but in a story where I want the main focus to be on my characters and how they are reacting/interacting with the characters and world, having decisions made by an NPC doesn't feel the best. It feels like agency over the narrative is being taken away.

I had all sorts of ideas for my own characters to interact with Arcann and Vaylin! And so when Senya had all the big emotional character moments, and the Outlander wasn't even there... it felt like they were kinda getting left out. Like this isn't their story. And YES I know that it kind of isn't. But that's why I am here, is to play a story that my character can engage in. And if my character can't engage, that's a problem.

More importantly (and I think this is actually the thing that irked me more than everything else above): Senya rescuing Arcann and taking him to a healing center and doing a ritual that makes him magically "good" again is really not something I like. The vibes are troublingly similar, in my mind, to a parent taking their grown child to conversion therapy, or a parent otherwise deciding for their grown child that they know best and taking away that child's ability to choose for themselves.

And... I dunno. I know a lot of parents who grieve over their child's decisions, and many parents who are right! Where the child does something and it really is bad for them, and the parents are right that it's bad for them! But that doesn't change the fact that it is wrong for the parents to step in and force their grown, adult child to do the right thing. I think to have someone step in and force you to do what they want, and tell you that your opinions and instincts are wrong... that makes you lose something very important.

So. It makes sense to me that Senya would want to depose Arcann, because he's hurting millions of people. But for her to save his life, when he seemed like he honestly was ready to die? For her to subject him without his consent to a ritual that fundementally changed his view/personality?? It feels, to me, like even if her methods were effective, it takes away something very important from Arcann's story, especially when he was so insistent that he wanted to choose his own destiny.

Arcann tried for years to escape his father's shadow, to establish his own path. For his mother to then do the same exact thing, and force him into this thing that she believes is good for him? How is that any different? Isn't that just the same exact thing? I think the message that it's okay to force someone to follow your vision of their life as long as you're on the "good side" is a really really problematic message. Even letting Arcann choose to go out fighting, and refuse to stand down... at least then, he died by his own choice.

Top: Valkorian Arcann A'la'zena

Middle: Periflynn Ffeud Shae'zena

So many choices in the past, for this game, are "do the right thing and things work out" or "do the wrong thing and needlessly lose people". It rewards you for doing the "correct" choice, even when it doesn't always make sense. And you could argue that's another bit of the game that doesn't make sense, but for Galen I choose to believe it's that he's guided by the Force. He gets little nudges to do things that don't necessarily make sense, but due to factors out of his control it'll work out.

This is my explanation for Galen's "plot armor" - he can't die because the Force still needs him alive. so he gets out of ludicrous situations somehow, and makes decisions that somehow work out..

Anyway. But there's always a plan C, or a way out, or some way to get out of things in a way that helps everyone. Nearly always. So it just doesn't sit right with me that suddenly, there IS no option C. it's flat out, one or the other. It feels manufactured... maybe because it IS manufactured. It's Valkorian taking a situation and making it a no-win situation. "See how hard being a leader is? Admit it, you can't keep your morals all the time."

Worse for Galen specifically, here, because he is firmly against choosing who lives and who dies. He doesn't feel like he has the authority to do it. In KOTFE, with the choice of which escape pod to eject and who to save? He told Theron not to look at who was in which pod, and just eject them at random. The Force would decide who lived.

And Valkorian, I think, is trying to get him away from that. Valkorian has been working at Arcann for a while, trying to get him to be "worthy" as well, and Arcann believes in fighting fate. In doing whatever he wants, in direct opposition to fate. The Emperor did the same thing, by cheating death and essentially trying to make himself god of two different societies. If Galen has to violate his personal convictions and choose someone to die anyway, and he has to live with knowing he did that? now that's one step closer to where Valkorian wants him.

BUT! Arcann is there (I HC it's just the two of them) and here's a bit of foreshadowing about how Valkorian eventually meets his end - Arcann is there, and Arcann has experience fighting fate and refusing to just take the situation he's handed. So Galen is resigning himself, and hating himself, and resolving to rescue Vette. And this is not a good thing, for him. He has always had a certain overprotectiveness around Vette, that makes him emotional and reckless. But he's gonna do it.

And then Arcann says, "I'll rescue the Mandalorian, then" and UGHGHH. Galen is thrown. So thrown. He has been the single person who's had to carry everything all the time and he just dropped something, the burden got too large, and he was all prepared to give up. And.. Arcann just caught the thing that fell. And. that's something someone can do. he's stunned.

BUT WAIT IM NOT DONE YET

so they split up. and arcann rescues Torian, and galen sneaks over to find vette. and he's there, he sees her. and Valkorian, who set this up to make things worse and instead accidentally taught a lesson on working together... Valkorian is mad. And so he takes his revenge, and electrocutes Galen right as he's about to save Vette. and he's on his knees, and in huge amounts of pain, and watching as Vette gets captured and taken away.

(side note on the whole electrocution thing: the first time that happened was in kotfe fighting Arcann on the spire. Valkorian says hey! I can kill him for you :) and Galen says no. And Valkorian tries to take control, and unleash the lightning storm, but Galen isn't gonna let that happen. So he grits his teeth and keep all of the lightning inside himself, so he's getting severely electrocuted but it's not hurting anyone else. He refuses to let the Emperor hurt people, and he'll put himself in the way if need be. So Valkorian has never managed to take complete control. But he can make Galen sorely hate his life, if he wants to.)

and then Valkorian says something like, "clever workarounds only delay the inevitable. if you cannot learn that, you will be crushed by someone stronger."

I think if it had been left up to him alone, he would have been so frozen that he would have run out of time, and they both would have died. But, well. Arcann was there for the call and he's there for Valkorian's taunting, and he's like no. Sometimes you can save everyone.

So they divide and conquer. Galen goes after Vette because well. As I said, her being danger makes him a little crazy and he NEEDS to see that she's alright... Arcann goes to get Torian. just noticed: Galen sees Torian as a reflection of himself, and Arcann saved Torian. HMMM

Anyway. Galen sneaks through the battlefield to find Vette and get here out. Gets to a spot where he can see the situation, takes stock, makes a plan. He can see her, she's going to be fine --

Salty that his original plan failed, Valkorian strikes. Channels a crapton of lightning power through Galen's body, similar to what he does at Asylum... and just like before, Galen manages to block the blast from escaping his body, at the cost of taking the full force of the lightning himself. It isn't nearly as bad as Asylum because Valkorian is still a bit weak from Nathema and kinda out of juice, but it's still enough to incapacitate him... So he's kneeling on the grass, trying not to pass out and inflict a flood of death on everyone within a mile, and meanwhile, the Skytroopers are getting closer to Vette. Time is running out, and he's incapacitated and in horrible pain, unable to do a thing except watch.

Vette tries to make a break for it once they're close and she can't hide anymore. Good effort, but a skytrooper gets a good shot into her back and she falls to the ground, critically injured. The troopers move on... the lightning attack passes. The last thing Galen feels before passing out is Vette's life force, weak but still present. She'll survive as long as she gets healing in time..

Arcann finds him soon afterwards -- heals him a little, wakes him up. The first thing Galen feels after waking up is a horrible absence. He can't sense Vette at all--in the two minutes he was unconscious, she died.