thexdfacedgamer2306: "Miquella, The Tickler..."
Zhtrik: Miquella: “Step one…we get rid of the horse.”
Malenia: “Brother that is unwise.”
Miquella: “Silence Sister, I have a genius 58 part plan that cannot fail.”
Malenia: “That’s what you said about Godwyn…and the Haligtree…”
Miquella: “Sister go sit in the corner.”
Malenia: “Okay…”
threemeters1425: Great video as usual Smough! But you may also be missing one crucial reason why Radahn was chosen by Miquella: he can hold the stars in stasis, which is crucial in keeping out foreign influence, keeping the world “unalloyed”.

We know that the Greater Will was primarily able to exert power through its agents Metyr and the Elden Beast. Radahn has the power to block their entry and even routinely slay beasts like Astel, and I think his primary motivation as a character is to seek greater and greater glory through his battles against the heavens. Meanwhile, Miquella’s age without causality cannot be maintained with alien orders involved.

So, I believe that Radahn’s war as Miquella’s consort will not be directed towards the Lands Between, but will instead be directed towards the very heavens themselves, going toe-to-toe with the avatars of the Outer Gods and the Greater Will.

Miquella will have his eternal peace on earth; Radahn will have his eternal war in the cosmos.
itzamedio5427: Welp time to set aside all the frivolous nonsense, be a responsible adult and watch smoughtown lore videos!
ElMasCaporo99: Radagons fate is worse than death. His corpse is turned into a sword by the Elden Beas to later be used by us to rune-farm albinaurics.
josiahcmiller: >Miquella wants a world free from the influence of outer gods
>Uses the body of someone tainted by The Formless Mother for his consort
arg_9584: HE’S BACK!!!!!!
I finally beat Consort Radhan last week and was shaking with joy. However, I quickly felt annoyed/sad that you can’t do anything afterwards.

No interacting with the gate directly above the arena. No talking with any characters outside the Shadow Lands about your journey. Can’t even tell Gideon All Knowing, he just ignores me with no dialogue options.
vagrant2863: I still think it makes more sense that Radahn agreed initially but later changed his mind. Why else go through all the effort of changing all his equipment and fighting Malenia. Even if you are an honorable warrior who seeks an honorable death, it'd make no sense to fight your own allies in a brutal war of conquest. Throwing away the lives of your own soldiers for your pride is not something a compassionate person would do. If he just wanted a duel he would have just had one. I think it makes more sense thematically that Radahn rejected his part of the vow at some point, paralleling Radagon's own abandoned vow and the ensuing fallout. Miriel says the consequences for breaking a vow are most dire, and what could be a more dire consequence than the near complete destruction and tainting of Caelid. A place which Radahn must have been at some level fond of considering he defended Selia and had his own fortress in the region.
mitchryan257: If Mohg has MIquella’s body, which for some reason is twice Mohg’s size, then how was it that Miquella was in the Land of Shadow discarding parts of his body?
unrandomman3946: Miquella used to be a golden order fundamentalist. So it’s possible that Radahn made the vow to him turning that time, before Miquella started trying to make his own order.
ladonglejones6930: I love how you framed Ranni's ending as semi-canonical. It always felt most in the spirit of a From Software game with its Nietzschian roots glorifying personal achievement and self-determination. The physical and philosophical clash between "killing God" and "perfecting God" is a very fitting climax for Elden Ring's greater themes.
ReddAngry: Can I get a Hell Yeah for engagement?!
aroudingo: Yesssss Smough is back with the bedtime stories! Gonna rest well tonight fellas!
mattsherman4964: You make some good points but I’m still not entirely sold on the theory of Radahn fully accepting this vow. For one, why would he have made the honorable death pact with Jerren if he was expecting to die from Malenia, that seems a little redundant. I just feel like this whole vow and Radahn’s involvement and motives, if he had any, are way to important of a plot point for FromSoft to simply leave out, I just find it frustrating
JackisaMimic: I am glad to see a consensus forming that Miquella DID NOT bewitch Radahn. Frankly, it isn’t necessary. All he had to do was give his a horse and a whistle do his bidding
generalgrieeevious: Great video as always but I am still not convinced that Radahn was privy to the vow. If not then at least Malenia wasn't. It would just be out of his character from what we know to sacrifice the lives of all those soldiers just for selfish reasons. And even if we say that, I heavily doubt a man as honorable and chivalrous as Radahn would be happy about Malenia using biological warfare against him and his people. Perhaps initially he was down for it but It just makes more sense with the story that he was charmed as well.
tyco1649: I think people are needlessly complicating this one element of the story. The ONLY terms of the vow we know of and should believe exist are Revival of Radahn=Lord Consort, that’s all.

These are easily abusable terms. From Radahn’s perspective he gets what he wants with no downsides; from Miquella’s, he gets a lord consort and his age of compassion as soon as Radahn dies.

So simply kill him yourself. There are no rules against that in the vow. Malenia was brought in as a third party and champion to execute Radahn, forcing him to fulfill his part of the vow upon his revival. Of course there may be additional elements of Radahn welcoming a worthy opponent, being open to waging war against the Haligtree, and so on. But ultimately I think the moment Malenia murmurs in Radahn’s ear is supposed to be a reveal and revelation to him as well as us when he may have mistakenly misattributed their intentions to waging war as we all initially did; “Miquella awaits thee” being the moment he understood what they had done by making the deal with him and now coming to collect via his death.
305bj: Loved the video, but I do have a differing opinion about why Melania fought Radahn.

There is a reason why we fight Consort Rhadahn pre- starscourge. Radahn did accept the vow, but then he changed his mind. He then dedicated the rest of his life to prevent his death. He stops the stars to hold his fate. He invades the Capitol city to become Elden Lord of Marika. He moves away as far as possible from the north where Miquella reigns. Being killed by "a good fight" just seems too uninteresting to me.
wh1pla5h: I think it's pretty obvious that the bodies in the stone barges were NOT burned in ghostflame - that is why it is not ash. It's the decomposed and rotted bodies that were never given true death because (if you follow TA's interpretation) they were waylaid by the lava flood event that left them embedded in rock.
Gvjrapiro: I like this video! If I'd point out anything, I think that his abandoning of St. Trina was something of a combination of a vast amount of factors.

Something not gone into here is how the other halves of these God-figures seem to embody certain concepts. For Radagon this was Order, and for St. Trina, it seems to be Love, and potentially, Doubt. This is heavily hinted at both by the crosses, but also by Thiollier, Leda, and Ansbach, who all closely associate Trina with adoration and love. Thiollier even more or less openly says Trina is to Love as Miquella is to Kindness. I can see a good argument as for why Miquella felt he needed to discard Doubt to do what he had to do, and discard Love to accept all, graceful and malign.

In short, Trina's conflict with Miquella was absolutely a contributing factor, even a tragic one given how it seems he tried to 'save' or sway her - but I think there were a lot of factors to it, that both fueled his reasoning and justify just why it seems to have been seen as so horrible.
guighee7310: A lot of people are not gonna be ready for this video since they were fed for so long that Miquella is this evil incarnate being. Also, can we stop this poor thing Mohg bullshit? He was an evil demigod with horrific visions for the world with his Age of Blood. Mohg kidnapped Miquella with plans to use and transform him into his God of Blood, but ended up being hit with an uno reverse card and was used himself instead. Another thing, I find it SO ironic that people will bash Miquella for using Mohg while simping for Ranni when she proudly says she's the one who orchestrated the Night of Black Knives that ASSASSINATED Godwyn in a horrific ritual that submitted Godwyn to a fate worse than death to achieve her own goals. To me, Miquella's means were less worse than Ranni's while achieving a better end goal than Ranni.
bio1804: Before watch this video i want to ask you Something. What was your favorite piece of lore, the one you spend the most good time to work on? Also, would you join Miquella, and why?
ellec3747: I still believe the most straightforward answer is that Radahn never gave his consent to the vow. The contextual clues lean heavily this way: the cutscene in which Miquella speaks to him, but he's not even there. The fact that he doesn't speak a word in his new form or seem to have a single thought of his own. Learning that Malenia only fought him to fulfill the requirements for the ritual. And of course, watching how Miquella seem to work his magic over everyone he meets, to the point where you even start to wonder whether his own sister was allowed to freely chose to follow him or not.

Aside from which, Radahn's character doesn't seem to align well with the idea of him agreeing to an insurance policy. A noble warrior like him, negotiating himself into an advantageous position where he wins no matter what? This is a man so absolutely stubborn that he would rather harness enough power to hold the stars themselves
AstonishingRed: Shadow of the Erdtree was the closest we ever got to major events playing out while we’re on our journey. Instead of all the important events happening before.
Brinkalski: There are 3 characters with a similarity; Miquella, Ranni, and Melina all wear a ring on their right hand ring finger. From what I can find, a ring on this finger represents a vow.
23Raind: Couldn't the 'our' in the promise simply be Trina? Miquella only abandoned the golden order once he realized it could do nothing to free his sister from rot. Miquella created the 3 ring of light incantation, a golden order incantation. As an emperyean, loyal to the golden order or not, Miquella needs a Lord to ascend to godhood. Why wouldn't Radahn accept the offer to be Miquella's/Trina's consort within the Golden order?

Radahn's resistance likely came later because Miquella rejected the golden order and sought a new order. Radahn vowed to be consort in a very different context, and thus Malenia tried killing Radahn to force him to become Lord and 'honor the promise'. Miquella is Trina. Referring to himself in the plural makes sense up until removing Trina.

I believe this is the case. Miquella made this offer before abandoning golden order fundamentalism, and Radahn backed out after Miquella now demanded he become the Lord of a different age, a new order.

Marika did not create her Lord. Radagon became Lord much later. Godfrey was the 1st Lord, meaning she agreed to marry him, with the promise of him being king of a new order, thus allowing her to become a god. However, clearly while a Lord is needed to ascend, the god can replace the Lord with someone else later. If Radagon was created to be Lord, then Godfrey would never need to be in the mix. We see how strong Radagon is, even when crippled and crumbling. She wouldn't have needed Godfrey at all unless Radagon was for some reason not ready to be a Lord.

Side note, the new interpretation of the Greater Will you put forward seems inconsistent with Metyr waiting for a signal from the microcosm to relay to the 2 fingers. In order for Metyr to receive messages and share these with the fingers, it tells us clearly that the Greater Will is a conscious entity that has a goal for order, an active agenda to share with his daughter so it can be enacted but that this order can tolerate a large degree of variation, this doesn't mean the Greater Will doesn't care what the order is like, simply that the Greater Will isn't micromanaging every facet of the order, and simply requires certain criteria be met (ie so long as you do X,Y, and Z, but don't do K, B, and T; then go crazy).

The idea Malenia did that to Radahn as part of a challenge, a neccessary 'evi' on Miquella's part gives 2 issues. Why make this deal with Miquella for a resurrection, if he wanted Malenia to try to kill him (arguably the only demigod who could)? I ask for a bonus life only to play russian roulette?

In addition, the lore suggest Miquella wanted Radahn not just for his strength but also for his kindness, if Miquella was forced to do something so horrible to get Radahn as a Lord, then is Radahn the kind of Lord Miquella would even want? A huge war, mass casualities, the very probable death of Malenia, all just so Radahn could have a good fight? That doesn't sound like the kindness Miquella saw in Radahn at all.
Marco1995Mega: I personally strongly fall under the camp that, while Radahn might have initially agreed to form a vow, he changed his mind later on, maybe due to some disagreement with Miquella or an initial misunderstanding of his goals. To me, everything points to Radahn not being a willing participant at the end.
From the battle of Aeonia; to Radahn's mostly open devotion to his father, Godfrey, and the Golden Order; how his red aura transforms to Miquella's gold in the mid-fight cutscene and his eyes are clouded when Miquella is present; his complete absence in Miquella's final cutscene; the thematic importance of the DLC story and Miquella's character (especially his mental childishness, his shallow view of consent in particular); even the music briefly transitioning to a darker, more somber bridge after his initially glorious theme, before it's entirely overtaken by Miquella's ascendant one, with the male choir still occasionally trying to push through. Yes, I'm including the music, because From DOES use musical storytelling.

Also, the loyal blade is Leda, not Malenia. Leda was actually present in the DLC and defined by his devotion to him. Also, Malenia is his sister, so why wouldn't he refer to her as such?
TSpoon823: I am, admittedly really focused on Miquella's character right now and really believe he's completely misunderstood in the ER community so I'm really interested to see where you take this, Smough. It'll be a banger either way.
MathisR412: I’ma need some more Fear & Hunger content from you, gang
Etticos.: SmoughTown shrives clean my attention span from the work I am supposed to be doing rn

Sep 29 2024

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