Gloom, Malice, and the Presence of Grudge in the Wild Era of The Legend of Zelda
Breath of the Wild was not the first game in the series that introduced Malice in The Legend of Zelda series, but it’s probably the most prominent. It’s name-dropped multiple times, and is impossible to miss. In fact, pretty much every enemy in the game is dripping with the stuff. Tears of the Kingdom is set a few years later, and one of the changes it made was that what was once Malice is now Gloom. This has left some people puzzled why this decision was made and some even consider this to be a negative change. Before I get into that though, it would probably be best to briefly summarize what Malice is.
In the context of Breath of the Wild, Malice is a purple-pinkish substance that causes damage to Link. While what exactly Malice is isn’t elaborated upon much in Breath of the Wild, that’s because the original name in the Japanese text is a bit more on the nose. The Japanese name is 怨念 On’nen, or grudge. In concepts like Buddhism and Shintoism, heavy influences on The Legend of Zelda series, On’nen is evil feelings of hatred and resentment which, while not necessarily exclusively tied to the dead, are almost always used to represent the lingering feelings of resentment and regret of those who have died. For example, those who died with strong feelings of resentment may turn into an 怨霊 Onryo, which is a spirit that can manifest into the physical world through its sheer hatred and resentment. (Importantly, I am not trying to tar these religious beliefs and mythologies with a broad brush, but I am trying to speak in regards to how their influences can be found in the Zelda series.)
An example of this influence in The Legend of Zelda series would be Poes - or, at least, certain Poes, such as the ones seen in Ocarina of Time. They’re described as “spirits of concentrated hatred” by the Poe Collector, who “hate the world.” In a sense, they would be an Onryo, remaining attached to the world through their hatred. In games like Breath of the Wild and Skyward Sword, we see a similar situation, where Cursed Bokoblins in both entries are able to revive as corpses through “Malice” and their “hatred of this world,” respectively. Skyward Sword even introduces the Evil Crystal, which is described as a crystallized form of a 魔物の 悪しき心が wicked heart of a monster.
However, the more significant representation of Malice in the series and the one people usually think of is Demise, the main antagonist of Skyward Sword. With his dying breath, he tells Link that the 権化が incarnation of his 憎悪と怨念が hatred and On'nen will pursue the successors of Link and Zelda in an endless cycle. Importantly, in the Japanese text, he specifically mentions this cycle as 輪廻 Samsara, the cycle of death and rebirth in Buddhism.
In Breath of the Wild, Demise’s speech is flat-out referenced with Dark Beast Ganon’s title being 憎悪と怨念の権化 the Incarnation of Hatred and On'nen in the Japanese text, effectively harkening back to the point of Skyward Sword being an origin of the series, and connecting the whole continuity front-to-back, tied together with a neat bow.
This makes the change Tears of the Kingdom introduced with Gloom even more strange. Malice is no longer the focus, and instead the emphasis is on Gloom. This seems like a pretty significant thing to just disrupt in the series, so that begs the question: what purpose does it serve?
As I’ve mentioned thus far, Malice, or On’nen, is a concept primarily tied to lingering resentment for those no longer among the living, or - at least - those who have already “died” in some fashion. Because, while some people may not be aware, Malice is mentioned in Tears of the Kingdom, in areas where it makes logical sense for it to be mentioned. For example, when describing the Calamity in Tears of the Kingdom, it is described as being the Demon King that 怨念と化して復活した姿 revived as a vengeful spirit through its hatred.
In this way, Calamity Ganon could be described as an Onryo, similar to Poes in Ocarina of Time. The Calamity was a vengeful spirit, and through that vengeance, it was revived through lingering emotions and regret. It’s worth noting that Ganondorf is for all intents and purposes dead while being sealed underneath Hyrule Castle - after all, his heart stops, and his spirit, revived by his lingering emotions and regret, is separated from his body. It is those same lingering emotions and regrets that give birth to enemies like Cursed Bokoblins in Breath of the Wild. This is interesting, because in Skyward Sword, Demise explicitly synonymises his 憎悪 hatred with 魔族の呪いは the curse of the Demon Tribe. In essence, Demise’s hatred is the Demon Tribe, and vice versa. This would mean that Ganon’s Malice - as Ganon is in essence the heir of Demise - is also the curse of the Demon Tribe, demonstrating why demons revive through Malice in the same way that Ganon does and why Malice is representative of the entire Demon Tribe in the eras where Calamity Ganon is a spectre.
One could even argue that the change from Malice to Gloom is a depiction of Ganondorf’s body coming back to life - while he’s a vengeful spirit in Breath of the Wild, with Malice representing particularly the lingering regrets of a spirit removed from his dead body, this would turn into Gloom as Rauru’s seal waned and Ganondorf began to return to the world of the living once more. In essence, Gloom is the “blood” of the Demon Tribe and of Ganondorf himself, as seen in the description of Phantom Ganon, where it is described as being 血肉より生み出され born of Ganondorf’s flesh and blood, further explaining why Gloom would begin to enter the world as Ganondorf’s heart began to pump and blood - or Miasma - flowed through his veins.
This is also why Gloom can revive enemies in the same way that Malice can; while Malice allows demons to revive due to their sheer hatred and attachment to the world, Gloom allows for revival because it’s the lifeblood of demons. If I was going to oversimplify it, one could interpret Gloom as the “life” of the Demon Tribe, while Malice is death; or, more accurately, “un-life.” It is those lingering feelings of resentment that allow them to continue interacting with the world in the form of a spectre or other undead entity. This is also why Ganon is described as refusing to give up on reincarnation in the final battle of Breath of the Wild; by assuming a form of pure Malice, he is attempting to cling onto his attachment to the physical realm in a last desperate bid, resulting in him becoming the full embodiment of his hatred and resentment that keeps him attached to the world in the first place.
It’s important to keep in mind that Gloom and Malice are not foreign to each other, but instead refer to the same general concept of deep-seated hatred and negative emotions that can have a physical impact on the world. The issue is simply that On’nen is a particularized form of this kind of hatred, as it carries a connotation of specifically and solely being associated with the lingering hateful emotions of the dead, as opposed to being a general “hatred.” The only other time it’s been used in the series in relation to Ganon specifically is in Twilight Princess, where he, similar to Breath of the Wild, is also demonstrated to take the form of a disembodied spirit that would need to revive into the world.
While one may say that this still weakens the connection to Skyward Sword as it recontextualizes the Malice in Breath of the Wild to be tied more to Ganon specifically rather than Demise, it’s worth pointing out that Ganon is still an incarnation of Demise’s On’nen regardless; the fact that Ganondorf himself is alive, however, causes that hatred to manifest in a way that actually fits with Ganondorf’s state of being in Tears of the Kingdom. For example, Ganondorf is also not mentioned as utilizing On’nen in Ocarina of Time or The Wind Waker, despite both games mentioning his evil energy, so it would be rather strange for Nintendo to randomly interject On’nen back into the series in a way that contradicted every other game thus far rather than strengthen the chronology, while also making the traditional understanding of the term meaningless for Japanese audiences.
Simply put, Tears of the Kingdom ensures the connection to Demise still holds fast while also ensuring that Ganon’s association with On’nen actually makes sense within the context of Breath of the Wild rather than using it as a catch-all term for Ganon’s evil energy, which would create larger narrative issues in the wider series. While Ganon will always be an incarnation of Demise’s On’nen, it doesn’t make sense to say that the primary evil energy that Ganon always utilizes is On’nen - Demise is no longer the true Demon King heading the Demon Tribe. Ganon is, and Ganon generating On’nen as his evil energy while he was alive wouldn’t make sense.
This also explains why, as the dungeon bosses are dying, they spew On’nen rather than Gloom. As mentioned, On’nen is the last lingering thoughts and resentments of something that has died given form. As the bosses are dying, their lingering resentment is represented as leaving their bodies, and will persist in the world after they have died.
However, why this somewhat justifies why they moved on from Malice, since Ganondorf is hearty and healthy in Tears of the Kingdom rather than a disembodied wraith, it doesn’t really explain why they chose the term “Gloom.” What is Gloom, what is its connection to the wider series, and was it worth replacing On’nen as the main evil energy from Breath of the Wild?
Similar to Malice and On’nen, “Gloom” is not the actual canonical name for the substance. The Japanese name is 瘴気 Shōki, or Miasma. In traditional stories, it could be understood to refer to negative vapors that cause illness, but has also been associated with and can be caused by demons. In Tears of the Kingdom, the point of Miasma is it’s an energy that emanates from Ganondorf’s body as the seal placed by Rauru is nearing failure, and it causes people to get sick, which is why Link and Zelda went to investigate it in the first place.
While some may assume that the decision to replace On’nen with Miasma was made carelessly and with little regard for the series chronology, that is not the case. Those who are intimately familiar with The Legend of Zelda series may notice recurring trends and storylines, such as ancient wars where a great evil was sealed at a significant cost, or an ancient people with advanced magic who no longer exist. Many of these tropes can be traced back to The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. In A Link to the Past’s manual, we learn about the Imprisoning War - not the one from Tears of the Kingdom, mind you, but the original Imprisoning War that inspired the conflict from Tears of the Kingdom.
In this original war, Ganon is stuck in the Sacred Realm turned Dark World, but he’s able to release his evil into the world of Hyrule nonetheless. Part of this evil is in the form of 邪気 Jyaki, which refers to the same concept of an evil air caused by negative emotions and demons. It’s also capable of making people sick, as seen by the Bug-Catching Kid in Kakariko Village who gives you his Bug Catching Net, after he’s fallen ill due to the 魔物の気 demon’s evil air that is stemming across the land of Hyrule, hence why after Ganon’s defeat he’s seen recovered.
The point of “replacing” - and I use that term loosely - On’nen with Shōki is to harken back to A Link to the Past’s own usage of Jyaki. In both games, they are an evil vapor that stem from Ganon and the Demon Tribe that surrounded the castle of Hyrule and are capable of making people fall ill. In the same way that On’nen was used to harken back to Skyward Sword, Shōki not only makes more sense as Ganondorf is no longer a disembodied spectre, as mentioned it calls back to A Link to the Past and pulls the whole series together. While Shōki and Jyaki aren’t the exact same term, mind you, they could be understood as covering the same general concept, the same way that Breath of the Wild’s 大厄災 Great Calamity is a clearly harkening back to A Link to the Past’s オオイナル ワザワイ Great Catastrophe.
The difference in function - On’nen merely causing harm while Shōki outright drains life energy - can also be seen as harkening back to the wider series mythology. In Four Swords Adventures, for example, it’s demonstrated that Ganon is explicitly draining the energy from the land of Hyrule to grow stronger. In this same way, draining the energy from Link (and the world) in Tears of the Kingdom is Ganondorf’s way of restoring himself, as seen by him using the Gloom to restore his original form at the conclusion of the game.
To summarize, both Malice and Gloom - 怨念 On’nen and 瘴気 Shōki - are representative of the same general concept of evil energies and auras caused by negative emotions and demonic forces, a particular example being the Demon King. However, On’nen is more particularized in this regard, as it refers to the lingering emotions and regrets that a person (or in this case, a demon) leaves upon death. This makes sense for the context of Breath of the Wild, as Calamity Ganon is a vengeful spirit revived by lingering emotions and regrets whose body is currently dead under Hyrule Castle. It also ties into Skyward Sword, as Ganon is the incarnation of Demise’s hatred and resentment.
However, as Rauru’s seal begins to wane, that On’nen instead takes the form of Shōki - an evil aura that can also be caused by demons and can make people sick - because Ganondorf is no longer taking the form of a vengeful spirit, and is returning to life. It has taken a more generalized form of evil energy that can be found in Japanese literature that is not specifically tied to the lingering regrets of individuals, as On’nen is. This furthermore clarifies why the only other appearance of On’nen in the series regarding Ganon is Twilight Princess, another game where he’s a disembodied spirit who must be revived, and doesn’t introduce canonical inconsistencies regarding On’nen and its associations with Ganon into the series. Furthermore, Shōki ties into the very closely related concept of 邪気 Jyaki from A Link to the Past, which also fills the role of being an evil energy stemming from Ganon that surrounds Hyrule Castle and can make people sick.
