Arthas Menethil is the most iconic villain in Warcraft.
Yes, yes, that's an opinion, not a fact, but he's got several things going for him: he has a tragic fall from grace, he has an iconic look - actually multiple iconic looks, between the deranged Frozen Throne cover art appearance and the Lich King armor (which, to be fair, is very much a play on Sauron's armor from the Lord of the Rings trilogy.) It also doesn't hurt that Wrath of the Lich King is generally considered to be WoW's golden age.
While Blizzard promised to do something more with Illidan well before the announcement of Legion, due in large part to how Illidan barely appeared in Burning Crusade despite theoretically being its main antagonist, when it came to Arthas, the Metzen and co said, more or less, that his story had been told, and his death felt not only earned but also something they didn't want to reverse given how bad of a guy he was.
To go on a brief (maybe) tangent, I do think there's room for debate on how evil Arthas was. Naturally, everything he does from the moment he takes up Frostmourne is pure evil (though there is a mention in Chronicle Volume III that suggests that there was a somewhat altruistic element to his schemes given that he believed only lockstep unity could defeat the Burning Legion.) But if being soulless for all of that means it wasn't really Arthas, but rather the will of the Lich King, and thus an embodiment of primal death, just using Arthas as a vessel, you really have to then just look at his actions before that.
Arthas definitely does some bad things, but they all have some moral justification. Purging Stratholme is probably his most extreme action, and an evil one, but is it Gul'dan-style mustache-twirling evil? Not exactly. He's not, like, happy to do it. Likewise, his actions in Northrend, like framing and betraying the mercenaries he had hired to destroy his own ships, was ultimately in service of trying to stop Mal'ganis and thus, he thought, prevent the Scourge from infecting Lordaeron again. Indeed, the only reason the plan fails is because he doesn't consider that the curse Frostmourne might put on him will actually make him the agent of the very thing he's trying to prevent.
There's no question that Gul'dan goes to the Maw. But does Arthas deserve it? Frankly, at this point, I actually think that Sylvanas has done more evil with her free will restored than Arthas ever did with his. That might be a bad example, as Sylvanas is clearly in league with the Jailor and the Maw. But compare Arthas, to, say, Garrosh - or better yet, Kael'thas, whom we know is not, in fact, in the Maw, and you wonder how to judge him. I mean, Kael'thas willingly sided with the Burning Legion even when he had Illidan as an ally.
Still, it seems as if Arthas is being judged on his actions even during the Frostmourne period. And if he does bear responsibility for that, well, yeah. I mean, he wiped out an entire kingdom and nearly wiped out another, plus he tried to kill and then enslave everyone in the world. It's, you know, bad.
While I don't think we need to see him brought back as a threat, and I'd also be a little wary of giving him a redemption plot, it also seems as if it'd be a real oversight to not have us find Arthas within the Shadowlands.
But what role might he play?
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