☯ Who is their foil (character contrast) !! o:
Who is their foil (character contrast)?
By leaps and bounds, Marth’s character foil has to be Hardin! They both possess more iconic titles for themselves, between Hero-King and Coyote, but their secondary epithets of ‘Prince of Light’ and ‘Dark Emperor’ spell out the contrast between them pretty darn clearly. In addition; Hardin wielding the Darksphere and Marth being given the Lightsphere to beat him.
Their key contrast boils down to how differently their lives panned out in comparison to one another. The Fire Emblem and Parthia being bestowed on Marth marked the start to his glory, but this act was reversely a source of envy and negativity for Hardin that would later ruin him. In that stride, there’s also the parallels between their forefathers; with Hardin’s ancestor Duke Cartas wielding the Fire Emblem and Marth’s ancestor, Anri, wielding the Falchion. The fact that Marth wields the shield in place of Hardin means that their ancestral roles are reversed.
Even their respective love lives showcase their relationship as foils. Marth found happiness by successfully marrying the woman who adored him. Hardin, on the other hand, found himself in an utterly loveless and unreciprocated marriage. Both of these outcomes were indirectly due to Nyna.
Hardin is of course his main foil, but some other honorary mentions are Michalis and Kris. Michalis is coined as the second coming of Iote, whereas Marth is called the second coming of Anri. The contrasting identities of their kingdoms also come to mind with Macedon being famous for its wyvern riders, or dragon tamers, and Altea’s major claim to fame being its dragon-slaying blade. As a product of Gharnef’s machinations, they also both lost their fathers; Michalis being manipulated into killing the Macedonian king for his ambitions, and Marth’s father being murdered by the underhanded tactics of Grust and Gra.
Even with less evidence, Kris as Marth’s foil is more obvious than Hardin or Michalis. As Marth’s shadow, he’s referenced alongside him in the very title of FE12: Heroes of Light and Shadow. They have contrasting legacies as well, with Marth taking to the history books as Archanea’s messiah and Kris being the anonymous hero remembered only by those who knew him.