Hello, i am dragging you into the corner with me, you live here now. I wanted to add more screenshots but alas I moved to my phone so this gets less hinged the longer it goes on.
Pre and Post FTUE changes Duncan will haunt me forever, ESPECIALLY given the fact that his appearances in arc 3 come BEFORE the ftue change and still handle his interactions with a level of gravity that is...missing. At current.
We are presented with two semi distinct versions of Duncan Grimwater.
and Post-FTUE + Selenopolis
Pre-update Duncan is distinctly meaner, and also intelligent in a less grating way. He is genuinely willing to help search for Artur (despite thinking there's probably nothing wrong and Artur is just a coward), and seems to do some of the research on his own while he sends the wizard on a runaround doing his own homework.
He's presented as incredibly independent (Suzie remarks he has never asked for her help/and somewhat implies he rarely if ever asks for help from anyone) and good at thinking on his feet. Learns the undead are using storm magic, is incredibly confused by it, and yet has a plan on how to determine where that power is originating not ten minutes and a single duel later.
He's able to channel the storm magic from the medallions into the crystals created by the triton mill to create a vision showing him where Artur is (kidnapped, hi Artur) and that's the end of it.
Aside from this offhand little quest (and im blatantly thieving the screenshots from @shining-scion because i swear to fuck i cannot find the quest page anymore)
(side note putting those side by side really does throw the skin color change into SHARP relief goddamn)
Duncan is ambitious and confident despite the fact that he is being dissuaded from continuing to learn his chosen magic, despite the fact that his perceived place as the best student of Necromancy is obviously patently a false one given Malorn's position as interim/acting professor. But this kid does not give up.
This quest is important too because it is a reminder that Duncan is used to being counted as a favorite of Malistaire's. He doesn't just look up to this man for no reason, he was clearly praised and doing well in his classes and took pride in that.
But you know, that is the last we see of him until his unceremonious return in arc 3.
But lets pause for a second.
Imagine you are fourteen years old.
You are intelligent and an enthusiastic student and a bit of a dick but you are fourteen and who isn't a bit of a dick at fourteen.
Imagine you are fourteen years old and the man who has been your mentor and icon and who DOES consider you one of his favorite students blows up your school.
Pre-update, you know he's alive, you know this, and yet for reasons no adult around you will properly explain your professor is now the PARAMOUNT EVIL in the world. And you, understandably, do not believe this. Because why would you. What reason could you possibly have for believing the man who taught you and your friends' magic is suddenly trying to kill you all (and this post is not about Malistaire Drake but we cannot talk about Duncan without him so alas here we are). Multiple classmates and friends are missing (Artur has been kidnapped, Marla has been MIA since the school went down, teachers and guards are half relying on students to do legwork because there is too much chaos) and you are trying to determine the source of misplaced magic on your home street.
In walks some prodigal fucking twelve year old happily on board the Malistaire is evil boat because well he supposedly attacked them in golem tower. You find your school again, but things are still broken, your professor is still gone, the headmaster thinks you should try and look into different schools of magic, he thinly implies you are conspiring (along with your friend Malorn--your friend who is now a professor, interim, acting, whatever, does it matter? he is above you now, he is more important now, so why should you bother) with Malistaire on the grounds that you were close, and suddenly other students have wary eyes on you, on your classmates, on the new girl from Marleybone who just seems not to notice.
But life goes on. You do not abandon your chosen school because how could you, you may not be the best--but who could blame you when you no longer have a competent teacher--who could blame you for the upheaval--and all the while you hear little whispers about the kid who came flying in out of nowhere, gaining title after title and never actually bothering to show up to class until:
That stupid kid who showed up so eager to help is, with the help of Ambrose, with the help of the other Professors, with the help of countless adults, is responsible for the murder of someone who was integral to your teaching, your life, someone who made you feel proud of what you were capable of, someone whose memory it seems just gets more and more twisted as the years go on--
--he is dead, and the kid is praised for it.
And how are you meant to be anything but angry and confused?
Years go by. You continue your studies. You draw away from your peers. Backhanded comments you used to brush off start to hurt more. It's fine though, you don't need any of them. You are smart enough to handle this on your own.
And here we get into conjecture.
Because there is no perfect example to point to saying "This is how Gretta got Duncan involved in the Doomsday Cult." there just isn't. The content isn't there and it will never be there so we just have to connect dots and make shit up.
But how do you take a disillusioned teenager/barely young adult (personal timelines depending) and convince him that the world he knows has been lying to him?
You prey on the things he is already wary of.
The demonization of Malistaire.
The discounting and downtalking of Necromancy.
And, of course, the Wizard.
Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on your perspective--the schism, or more specifically Gretta, do not particularly want or like Duncan. He is a warm body in the pile, he is a voice among their masses, and little else. Cog in the machine.
But he fights to be there. Pushes himself, proves himself able to learn and wield Shadow, and proves to be an apt choice both when you want to acquire something, and when you want to get rid of him. Because what is it to send someone after the Wizard if not to send them to inevitable defeat?
And why wouldnt he agree? Why WOULDNT he want to face off against the thing that killed his mentor. Against the person he has likely been fed lie after lie about saying they are a dangerous threat to the world in which he lives. A pawn for Ambrose and nothing more. Delaying the inevitable return of paradise.
So he shows up with his new gear and his newfound power and still holding that same arrogant confidence we see when we first meet him.
We joke about Duncan being a frankly terrible boss set up, but from the perspective of knowing THIS IS ANOTHER STUDENT OF RAVENWOOD, that he has likely been training less time and KNOWING he has less experience than the wizard—his abilities, his actions, it’s *impressive*. It continues the through line that he WANTS to be the best he can be, he works HARD for the shit he manages to achieve and it SHOWS.
And despite the fact that he loses he doesn’t GIVE UP. Despite losing his shot at joining the schism he continues to try. After Gretta denounces him as a “dingbat” after admitting that he is all but entirely alienated from both sides in a Spiral he currently believes to be doomed—
—he still maintains some aspect of his old self. He LAUGHS at the wizard for having even considered him as the schisms agent that they are after. And while he lets slip who that is—it doesn’t seem to bother him any.
But that too i think is a deliberate choice. If he believes the Spiral is doomed, if he believes he has lost his place among Spider’s “favored” or whatever bullshit the schism decided to lie about in order to keep their underlings a mixed amount of both fearful and believed protected. Who better to get him back OUT of that situation? Who better to send running to stop the end of the world than the same stupid *lucky* kid who managed it the first time.
So his “slip” of fire cat alley. Is more a deliberate sell out. to me. does it do him harm in the long run? Absolutely, the person we see at the beginning of SL and the person we see during Mirage are NOT the same and I wholeheartedly am going to take the route that the schism was *cruel* and humiliatory in their secondary (tertiary?) recruitment of him that leads to where we find him at present.
But that is another person.
So let’s talk about the updated FTUE.
We start. Similarly. With a missing Gryphonbane. Why we swapped from Artur to Suzie i will pretend not to know. If Mike and Sam have no haters I am dead in the dirt.
But here we see an immediate change.
Artur doesn’t ask for Duncan’s help. Duncan, rather annoyingly intruding, offers it with a backhand of calling both Artur and the Wizard stupid. He knows magic we couldn’t possibly fathom! He can track an aura via Suzie’s wand! All we have to do is the grunt work, he will handle the thinking.
It isn’t too far off, he’s still intelligent. Still mean. But it’s DIFFERENT. it’s a JOKE. He is a nerd turned playground bully and it bleeds through every word out of his mouth.
He is also, somewhat strangely, obsessed with Malistaire in a way his original counterpart was NOT. What was genuine grief and confusion and admiration is played for a laugh here. Both Artur AND Suzie dismiss him when he tries to speak of Malistaire, Ambrose has that fucking “ode to” piece around his desk, and beyond that as we see within the haunted cave quest, Duncan is at a *loss*. His belief, his understanding that the Malistaire HE KNEW that all the death students were familiar with wouldnt do this, is shockingly unpresent.
In its place we get a strange fanboy attitude and all the weight of someone crying over their favorite television character turning out to be played by a shitty actor.
While I LIKE what his new side quest offers, it feels deeply dissonant to him as a character. His faith in malistaire pre update isn’t blind, and his reactions are far more subtle, as like everyone else in wizard city, he is trying to deal with the fallout.
While it seems like they were trying to make the grounds for his inevitable turn more obvious, all they did was turn the dial too far and further cement the idea that if Duncan had ever had an inkling that the schism set Malistaire on his path to the Titan—he would never have given them a second glance.
Which brings me to Selenopolis. And we will gloss over the abject irritation of a white man poorly voicing a character of color with the same knockoff joker voice he has given to everyone he has voiced since the quizzler. Because I do not have the energy to get into that at 11PM on a work night. But Mike Sears. You and i have PROBLEMS.
Duncan is. Very nearly unrecognizable if you place him beside his pre-ftue self. The self important arrogance is played so high it is grating, and his awareness of that is nonexistent. While it alone is upsetting to see him still with the schism after what he said during mirage (that we ruined his chances of joining? Do any of you read your own lore???) it is worse to see that this character. this fellow child turned solider who mirrors the wizard in SO MANY WAYS has been turned into nothing more than comic relief. We’ve taken what is genuinely and unconditionally a cult survivor and played his experience for LAUGHS.
That isn’t to even touch on how the fandom outside wizblr treats him. The consistency of jokes about him wanting to be sexually involved with Malistaire make me want to eat fucking GLASS. I shouldn’t be able to find so many within MINUTES.
Yes, I know we all like the game of bully Duncan Grimwater. Because it’s easy. Because LOOK at him. Look at what he came from. Tell me there wasnt a good portion of the student body who would readily call him pathetic. But the character we STARTED with. And frankly the one we maintain in Mirage. Is genuinely SO interesting and such a good look into how young people can be alienated and preyed upon by those around them in power. It HURTS.
What he goes through runs side along with so much of what happens to the wizard, is it any WONDER Ambrose suggests with those initials that he might be the schism agent? If he has had to default to a child savior child soldier. Why should he assume any better of the villains? Why shouldnt they too have had their own errand dog passing notes to the powerful?
Duncan Grimwater. The man you are. You deserve better and canon is dead to me. I really hope you keep cropping up, but I hope more than that for any further returns to be handled more seriously than Query.
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