#urza

he just has an uniquely real way to be awful. somehow he's not like trying to be a cunt but he hurts people worse by just being unthinkingly callous then other, actively villainous or cruel people would do on purpose, but that also leads people to stick around him hoping that he can be fixed and his many positive qualities will actually mean something one day- and he can.

he can be fixed! he can learn. he can acknowledge when he makes mistakes, and he can come in clutch when you need him. but ultimately he just twists all of that into more ways to be awful because his issue is that he lives in a world where he is the chosen one, where he is the only one who can do something about the state of the world and as such nothing anyone says or thinks actually matters all that much. that would be a problem but a manageable one. what makes it so devastating is that the universe keeps validating this kind of belief

respecting the choices of other people was always a problem for him but it ballooned out of control completely since he was handed godlike power after deciding to go down in a blaze of glory (validating all his worst impulses) and then given reason to believe everything that ever went wrong in his life was actually the fault of an outside actor and that his mistakes were actually good decisions (it wasn't and they weren't) and that his brother was not an equally shitty person and merely manipulated (equally untrue, Mishra was also a massive staggering piece of shit). and after this he just doesn't really get to ever learn the right lesson. Xantcha was probably the only person to really push back against him in a consistent manner. this was what he always needed, Urza's greatest improvements and the periods of his life where he truly is doing good are when someone can tell him to shove it and he has to listen. Tocasia was this for him once, and then Kayla for a very brief momet, and then Xantcha was the good influence on him, and he truly goes to hell when he has no one left to do this for him. when no one can push back.

after Xantcha, Urza gets Barrin. Barrin is unfortunately kind of an enabler to him by virtue of being the type of person who feels bad about doing bad things but quickly convinces himself they're necessary or not worth pushing back on. Barrin is and always was an enormously kind person but ultimately he can't be what Urza needs, which is someone with a spine of steel and a stubborn streak a mile wide. it is unfair to everyone and to Barrin especially that Urza would need this kind of support to not be a living poison, but it's kind of a natural consequence of him having both a spark and his unresolved issues.

He has this constant cadence of like, being fundamentally unsuited for something thrust upon him, doing it anyway because of his stubbornness and misguided sense of responsibility ,failing and creating a huge problem, being horrified and dismayed at how bad he fucked up, becoming damaged and depressed, vowing to do better, but then starting the cycle over when the consequences of his actions come home to roost and the mental damage from his last mistake make him unsuited for truly fixing anything.

Magic continuity was ruined forever when they went out of their way to never depict Urza wearing any of his things