#kh3 analysis

[holleighgram]

GUYS I found another mistranslation!!! I've recaptioned the subtitles to more closely reflect the original Japanese lines

[blowingoffsteam2]

Pooh Parallels/Analysis

From the moment Merlin brings Pooh’s book out, something about Sora’s reactions feel off.  He is uncharacteristically subdued, especially at the thought that he’ll get to see his old friends.  Compare his reaction in KH3 to his much more enthusiastic reaction in KH2:

In KH3 he almost looks...sad (remind you of another certain scene?).  At first you might just write this off as him being worried about Pooh- and I’m sure some of it is that- but this vibe from Sora continues through the entire segment.

When Sora finds Pooh, the first thing Pooh says is “You’re home.”  Such an odd thing too say, and it even confuses Sora for a moment:

“You’re home.” “Uh...huh?  Good to see you, Pooh.”

Why would they have Pooh say something that even Sora finds strange (so that the audience takes notice)?  Later Sora realizes that Pooh meant “home” as in his heart, but it also serves as a reference to the well known final line of KH2:

Pooh uses the same exact phrase as Kairi in both English and Japanese versions.

Then we get more moments of Sora being strangely unenthusiastic (considering he’s usually up for anything, especially when visiting friends he hasn’t seen in a long time- again, compare to his reaction in KH2 when Pooh invites him to do “stoutness exercises” with him)

“Now, the garden if you please?  You can help too, Sora.” “What? Me too?”

Afterwards, Sora is all ready to leave, with no intention to stay and visit:

“Well, looks like your problem’s solved.  Guess I’ll be on my way.” “Solved? Oh it’s far from solved.  We still need to harvest the fruit!” (Sora even groans a little here!)

“Won’t you stay Sora?  For the sake of honey?” “Uh..okay!”

While Sora is of course happy to see Pooh and everyone, it’s apparent that Sora saw this visit to Pooh’s world more as a job than a social visit: get in, solve the problem, and get out.  It’s only when Rabbit tells Sora that he has a surprise for Pooh that Sora seems genuinely happy about staying to help- because if it’s a chance to make his friends happy, Sora will do what it takes.  This is a trait that’s also very important to remember while watching the paopu scene. Sora often sets aside his own feelings and wishes to make others happy.

After all the harvesting is done, we come to the scene that confirms what we had been feeling the entire time: Sora’s connection with Pooh has weakened.

“You used to be right here. (pats heart) Why is it that you went away?” “Away? Oh, that’s what you meant by ‘you’re home.’“ “Yes. You see, when I get a rumbly in my tumbly, it gets very hart to think of anything but honey.  So I was worried that I might have forgotten you away.” “Silly bear, I’d never.” “Oh, good, because I want us to be together forever.”

Did that last line remind you of anything?

“I want to be a part of your life no matter what.”

Back to the Pooh cutscene: In this moment Sora realizes this weakened connection, but he doesn’t understand it.

“Pooh, we are together. There isn’t a second that we’re not.” Sora thinking: Except, I can feel it. Our connection’s weaker. Why is that? “What’s wrong, Sora?” “Oh, It’s nothing. What matters is I’ll be here from now on. No going away.”

Interestingly, while Sora and Pooh both seem to think the problem is that Sora faded from Pooh’s heart, from the audience’s perspective it’s apparent that it’s Pooh that faded from Sora’s heart.  Similarly, in Sora and Kairi’s relationship there’s this feeling that Kairi senses Sora’s weakening connection with her, and offers the Paopu in an attempt to hold onto it.  But just like we know Sora’s fading connection with Pooh is a natural part of growing up that can’t be stopped by force of will, so is his connection with Kairi.  This doesn’t mean their connection will be lost, but it’s unlikely to be the same as it was before.  It’s exactly as Nomura said: Sometimes we have a good group of friends when we are young, but as you grow older things change and it doesn’t always stay the same. 

When Sora returns, he is clearly upset:

“Something’s happened to me that made me vanish from Pooh’s heart.  Merlin, I don’t ever want to lose my friends.”

The poor boy can’t stand the thought of the connections he has with his friends being lost.  But Merlin reminds him that even though connections can fade, they can also be remade in new ways.  Maybe not the same as before, but not lost:

“There’s no need to fret, lad.  Whatever’s lost can be found again.   There are always new paths between hearts for us to discover and traverse.” 

And finally, as several people have already pointed out, the cover of Pooh’s storybook seems to be a direct allusion to the ending:

While Sora is there, it’s still day.  When he’s gone, the light fades and turns to night.  It’s noteworthy that with the storybook, Sora reappears, while in the ending, it’s the reverse. As I have said before, I view the ending as a goodbye, in more ways than one.  While Sora was able to rebuild a connection with Pooh, we also know that it will never be the same as it was before, and that’s okay. It’s a difficult thing to realize, and it is sad, but it’s also part of growing up.

Personally speaking, this whole topic is something that’s near to my heart, and it’s so rarely portrayed with care in media.  It’s something that I struggled a lot with accepting in the closest friendship I had growing up, so to see this being something Sora is also learning is very important to me.

[tapioca-puddingg]

Back on my bullshit part 2: Talking about the Master of Masters and Young Xehanort

Yo! I'm back with another KH3 Re:Mind hot take. This time, i wanna talk about the cutscene with the Master of Masters and young Xehanort. There's a lot to unpack in this scene, so this post may be long as well. Just for convenience's sake, I'm gonna be referring to the Master of Masters as 'MoM' and young Xehanort as 'YX'.

I think i may have said this before, but the fact that two such powerful characters are even talking to each other so casually is crazy to me. In both cases they're meeting someone extraordinary; MoM's eye can see into the future, so he knows exactly who Xehanort is and knows that he's the one that's gonna initiate the next keyblade war. And for YX, he's meeting one of the lost masters, or rather the very master of those masters. On top of that, Xehanort unknowingly works with Luxu himself many years later, whom also happened to be there when old man nort recalls the moment in hindsight. I just wonder; was MoM supposed to be here at this point in time to talk to Xehanort or did he just insert himself in the situation? How'd he even get here?

As the scene starts, MoM is casually sitting on a rock, waiting for YX to arrive. As I said in my analysis of the very first Re:Mind trailer, they have most definitely spoken before, and probably in the exact same spot, too. This isn't anything important, but it's a little funny to me how smol YX looks as he's standing in front of MoM, whom is still sitting.

Then we get the part from the trailer where MoM asks YX how his tour of the worlds went, and he goes on to elaborate his observations. I'm gonna do my best to summarize his beliefs cus if I quoted him word for word, we'd be here all day. As of right now, it's unclear what worlds he went to or, more importantly, what he saw, but I'm sure we'll get more information in Kingdom Hearts: Dark Road. For those of you who might be unaware, Dark Road is an upcoming KH mobile game that is supposed to be going more detail about Xehanort's backstory.

Back on topic, YX makes 2 observations:

People live their lives and believe that they are moral and virtuous, when they're really fooling themselves.

Those that are weak take power from the strong ones and try to justify their actions to say that they've earned that power, and repeat this cycle. Thus, darkness is created.

The whole time YX is speaking his observations, MoM never outright confirms or denies them and chooses to stay neutral. This is probably to ensure that he doesn't interfere too much with the future. Or rather, to not directly influence YX's decision. He does repeat his words back to him to make sure they're on the same page, and does make comments here and there to challenge his beliefs. All the while, YX knows that he doesn't agree with this 'false light' concept but doesn't know what he should do about it. And he knows that if left alone, the world would go to shit, so he's kinda going in circles with himself.

The last point of interest in their exchange is the reveal of MoM's name. Well, the reveal to YX anyways, we don't get to hear what he says. As expected, it's never that easy is it? It's perfectly hidden too, since the audio is cut off on top of the fact that we can't read his lips because of a lack of a face. So his name is completely up in the air. But because of YX's shocked expression, some have speculated that MoM's real name is Sora. There's a reason as to why I don't think it is:

Xehanort, at this point in time, had not yet been corrupted by darkness. I didn't mention this earlier, but he has his original grey eyes in this scene. This is years before he enacts his plan of starting the keyblade war, decades before Sora or the BBS trio are even born. Well, Aqua and Terra that is. If you've been keeping up on Union X, you already know the deal with Ventus. Then again, the logic I've been telling myself is that if they're going out of their way to keep his name a secret, it must be the name of someone we already know.

But who knows with Nomura? This could be some kind of bait to make us think he's someone we already know just to throw us for a loop Demyx. Or maybe he's a completely new character and just wants to save his identity reveal for later. He can't give us all the answers, after all.

As always, thank you for reading this far. If there's anything I said that was incorrect, be sure to let me know. Feel free to share any thoughts you have. See guys you in the next post o/

[libbybleu]

@ anyone who says that Kairi should have defended herself when Xemnas grabbed her...

She physically couldn't have.

Now I don't claim to have much knowledge in terms of self defense, but I do know some of the limits of the human body as an artist, so let me break this down for you.

Xemnas was very deliberate in how he grabbed Kairi and how he positioned HIMSELF thereafter. For one, he was sure to grab the wrist of her dominant hand (which at this point was holding her keyblade). Now I don't know how many of you have had your wrist grabbed like that, but I can say first-hand that your options of movement in that hand/arm are INCREDIBLY limited, and if they're holding hard enough, it is nearly impossible.

To make matters worse, he was twisting her arm behind her head and back. This makes movement even more limited and also causes EXTREME pain. During the course of the cutscene, he continues to twist her arm TWICE, which we can see makes her whole body physically wince. It breaks my heart to see her like that because I know that pain and it is awful. Xemnas was 100% in a position to break her arm in some way and it SHOWS.

We can also see by how her toes seem to be the only thing touching the ground that he is holding her aloft. Even minimally, this adds distress to the arm socket. Accounting for everything else in this scene, I wouldn't be surprised if he completely dislocated Kairi's arm.

Moving on to how he was positioning himself, we can see that he seems to be standing a step behind Kairi, not IMMEDIATELY behind her. Based on her arm length, I don't think she'd be able to reach him with her free hand for any sort of counter attack. If she summoned her keyblade to this non dominant hand, any reach she did have wouldn't change the fact that her position would make it impossible for her to add enough strength for her attacks to do anything. She could try channeling magic maybe, but that feels like it still wouldn't help much. Because of how he's holding her up, any attempt at kicking would be wild and still wouldn't have any real weight behind it.

Anything she could have done, I doubt it would have delayed the inevitable of her being taken to Xehanort. I'm sure she spat in that old coot's face the second she got, but after that I have no doubt in my mind that Xehanort placed a sleep spell on her so she could make no other effort at defending herself or escaping until his plan came to fruition.

I wanted her to save herself just as much as the next person, but unfortunately no matter how I spin it while I look at the frame-by-frame, I can't see how she feasibly could have, but hey! If I'm wrong about any of this, feel free to correct me.

[nyctospoilers]

The Power of Waking and how I believe it affects Sora, Young Xehanort, Luxu, the Master of Masters and destiny.

So I was GOING to say all this in an answer to an ask. But I decided to post it as it’s own so that I can cover more topics then the question itself. And then, I’ll go back to questions in my inbox and answer them with reference to this post.

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Sora and the Power of Waking

Before I say anything, I want to list off the rules of time travel stated by Young Xehanort in Dream Drop Distance

First, you must leave your body behind to do it.

Then, there must be a version of you waiting at the destination.

Upon arrival, you can only move forward as per the laws of time.

And you cannot rewrite the events that are destined to happen.

The Power of Waking has let Sora reverse time and change events that were fated to happen. This goes directly against the fourth rule. Young Xehanort has always been able to travel with his body intact, and that goes against the second rule. So how are these laws, these restrictions, able to be broken? I believe that the Power of Waking is a power that allows you to break the restrictions of time travel, and it is a power that Young Xehanort has used (or still uses) himself (and possibly forgets about when he returns to his own time to grow into Master Xehanort, as MX never mentions it once ever). Let’s see word for word how Young Xehanort describes the Power of Waking after Sora fights the Lich:

“It’s for traversing hearts to reach worlds, not for traversing worlds to reach hearts.”

Something we need to ask ourselves is- how does YX know this? Even Yen Sid describes the Power of Waking as simply that- the power to awaken people’s hearts. But YX clearly knows more about how it works and how it can affect other things.

Let’s take a look at each technique. “Traversing worlds to each hearts” is what Sora had just done before this conversation. He traverses the Stations of Awakening of worlds to reach his friends’ hearts and recovers them. That in turn, saves them from the destiny of “light expiring” like the prophecy states. I think it’s important to note that the worlds he arrives in may not actually be those worlds though, but rather something similar to say, the world revisits in The End of the World in KH1. I’ll expand more about KH1 in the next paragraph.

Now let’s take a took at “Traversing hearts to reach worlds”. In my opinion, this is like Sora opening a portal in Master Xehanort to reach Scala ad Caelum. But I don’t think that was actual Scala ad Caelum, but rather a memory or dream of it. Similar to Riku opening a portal in Sora to reach his memory/dream of Destiny Islands. [[ And I also think this is similar to another instance of KH1: Sora having a flashback to Kairi in Hollow Bastion with her grandmother. I recognized instantly from KH3 the Sora gliding through the star field sort of thing. I said “Hey this is like when he see’s Kairi’s memory in KH1!” and sure enough, later he does it and once again is joined by Kairi herself. My point here is, these two scenes of Sora gliding through that space in KH3, I believe is Nomura trying to hint at us that Sora traversed through Kairi’s heart to reach her memory/dream of Hollow Bastion in KH1. In other words, Sora’s been able to use the Power of Awakening since KH1 ]]

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The Master of Masters and Destiny

Before I said that the Power of Waking has let Sora change events that were fated to happen. Sora changed destiny, and supposedly there were repercussions to that. But why? Let’s look at what Kingdom Hearts defines destiny as. One of the best examples is Xehanort during his final speech in KH3:

“The World needs someone to stand up and lead. Someone strong, to stop the weak from polluting the World with their endless darkness. Someone to dictate their destiny.”

This connects to Xehanort’s past revelations in his reports:

Xehanort’s Report IV excerpt: And when Kingdom Hearts is complete, it is said the one who opens its door will bring about the creation of the Next World. Such a feat is above any human. Or, to put it a different way: whoever opens that door will be reborn as something far greater than human.

Xehanort’s Report VI excerpt: And, as stated before, opening this door arguably gives that person control over all worlds and all people.

Xehanort’s statements say that the person who opens Kingdom Hearts will give them supernatural powers, allowing them to oversee the World and it’s destiny.

Now tell me, who does that sound like to you?

I could be wrong, but at the moment I believe that long ago, the Master of Masters was the last person to open Kingdom Hearts, and since then has overseen destiny. This is backed up by various lines of KHX, Ava asking Luxu if this was all the Master’s “intentions” the whole time. In Luxu’s Observation excerpts, asking “Are these new events just another phase in the Master’s grand plan?”

Taking this into account, Sora defying destiny and changing it is seen differently. Sora isn’t defying some insentient force. Sora is defying a person- a person with a plan that they desire to come to fruition.

And I think that is the repercussion. I believe, that Sora won’t just fade away because it’s the law of the universe that if you disobey destiny too many times you’ll be punished. I think that when the MoM returns, he himself will punish Sora for defying his will. That is what Young Xehanort is playfully warning him about.

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Young Xehanort and Luxu

So what about Young Xehanort? He’s able to time travel with his body. He knows about the potential of the Power of Waking, and he warns Sora about repercussions [not to help Sora, but more to amuse himself], and not at all worried about himself.

I think Young Xehanort is purposely following the Master’s destiny rather than defying it like Sora. I think somehow, Young Xehanort has a piece of vital information that he forgets when he returns to his time. So there is something that Young Xehanort knows, that Master Xehanort does not. And I believe it is Luxu who tells him, possibly during the time that YX traveled with him during DDD.

I think for this, it’s good to refer back to Luxu’s Observation excerpts form KH3:

Observations excerpt 2 “Somewhere in this cyclical history of bequeathings, a chosen one will appear and reenact the Keyblade War. When this scapegoat arrives and takes my Keyblade in hand, that will be the time to take the stage and finish my role.”

Observations’s third excerpt is interesting to me, as it seems to be written at different points of time. Here is the entire excerpt. I will bold important words.

Observations excerpt 3 It seems this body, this name will be my last. The lives I have lived over the ages could fill volumes, but for now I must focus on what matters most.     The Keyblade has been successfully passed down, generation to generation, and it seems a Keyblade Master devoted to the darkness may finally arise. Until now, I have watched over the course of events from a distance. Perhaps the time has come to intervene. I need only play the role of a fool desirous of the Keyblade’s power. I will don the mask of his ally in order to keep watch over my Keyblade from close by.      The Gazing Eye: a Keyblade forged from the eye of the Master of Masters. He passed it to me, as I have to others, and through it he can see the future – all that will ever come to pass. Spanning the ages in body after body, life after life, my task has been to keep vigil over the Eye as it passes from hand to hand. It has been a long time. Longer than I can express.     But now at last the Keyblade War has begun, and Kingdom Hearts will open – a true and complete Kingdom Hearts, born of the clash between darkness and light. I will soon be reunited with my old companions, and in that moment my long vigil will reach its end. He will return…

Excerpt 3 starts off sounding like it’s written during BbS, when Braig meets Xehanort. But then it says the Keyblade War HAS begun. Perhaps Braig is only referring to when Terra, Ven, and Aqua are fighting in BbS’s ending. But I think Luxu knows better, I think he knows it’s the next battle at the Keyblade War that reunites him with his old companions.

I think this Observation was written around the time of Re:Coded’s secret ending, titled ‘Destiny’. That cutscene takes place during DDD, before Lea and the others wake up as somebodies again. However, the Braig we see is his BbS appearance, not his DDD appearance as Xigbar. So we know this Braig time traveled, and being accompanied by Young Xehanort, we can assume they traveled together (notice neither had to give up their hearts). I believe that is why Young Xehanort appears in Birth by Sleep as the Mysterious Figure, to visit Luxu during the time of BbS. And it is AFTER Young Xehanort’s visit in BbS is when ‘Destiny’ takes place.

Why do I say after and not before? Because in BbS Young Xehanort does not use a keyblade (We are given a keyblade when beating him, but it is noticeably different). In ‘Destiny’ Young Xehanort says him having MoM’s No Name is yet to be a reality. BUT, Young Xehanort DOES have a keyblade in DDD, which, like I said, takes place soon after ‘Destiny’. And not only that, his keyblade (notably also named No Name) in DDD is the one we recieve from him in BbS- but now has decorations similar to that of the MoM’s No Name- a goat head and the gazing eye. After ‘Destiny’ Luxu (as BbS Braig, not DDD Xigbar) gives Young Xehanort that keyblade.

THAT is when Luxu writes Observation 3. “Keyblade Master devoted to the darkness may finally arise.” Refers to Young Xehanort, even if he’s in modern times. “I need only play the role of a fool desirous of the Keyblade’s power.” Refers to the way he behaves in ‘Destiny’ and in BbS when he returns. And “But now at last the Keyblade War has begun” refers to the situation of all 12 darkness being assembled (think back to his line in Destiny when he says “The party’s already begun, huh?”).

This is what leads me to believe that whatever Young Xehanort learns that Master Xehanort does not, he was taught to it by Luxu. And what was Young Xehanort taught? We see in KH3 he now knows about the Power of Waking, he continuously teases Sora about his dark fate. I believe Luxu tells Young Xehanort about The Master of Masters and the role he gave him. Even if Luxu returns back to the time of BbS, YX remains with this new information until Sora defeats him near the end of KH3.

We MUST remember this however: Young Xehanort was still able to time travel to BbS in the first place as the mysterious figure. Which means there is an event during the times of Young Xehanort and Young Eraqus at Scala ad Caelum that sets all these events in motion, as Ansem the Seeker of Darkness did not make it so YX could time travel like fan speculation suggests. I believe all Ansem did was give YX the opportunity to cross worlds, leaving Destiny Islands and arrive in Scala ad Caelum.

We must also remember that Xigbar (not BbS Braig) says in DDD that he is already half Xehanort, with an emphasis on his golden eye. We never completely defeated Xigbar in KH3, and he still has his golden eye in KH3′s epilogue. So, Young Xehanort could very well be able to travel forward past KH3. If we find out that he for sure does, it will explain why YX knows so much about Sora’s tragic fate that he warns him about many times in KH3.

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The conclusion 

I practically spent all day writing this post. I understand that the Young Xehanort/Luxu part is by far the longest, and for that I apologize. I wrote the other two sections a couple times before in drafts (now deleted) so I already had a better idea on how to condense all that important information. I was realizing things about YX and Luxu while writing this, and that’s why those details seem much longer.

I have a headache now so I’m not really in the mood to properly close this off, I hope you’ll forgive me :’) but now, i WILL answer other asks about this. So if you want more, look at my tag #analysis 

[soranort-headcanons]

If Demyx didn’t die and he has gold eyes...

Are you telling me there’s a shard of Master Xehanort still alive somewhere ?!?

[chikoriita]

Young Xehanort as we know him, is younger than Chess Xehanort. Ansem supposedly gave him the power to travel time while he was still on Destiny Islands. So at the time of the immortal Woody roasting, he might not have known love.

He wanted to leave Destiny Islands, paradise to some, but a prison for him. Isn't it possible that before his time in Scala ad Caelum, he wasn't exposed to true love? He somehow makes it to Scala one day. Then he met his fellow pupil Eraqus, and there he finds what love actually means. He promises one day to be there for Eraqus, only to turn against him one day.

Later, we find out that he was being groomed to be the scapegoat by Luxu. The one to gather darkness, the one to be the fall guy. Luxu needed someone to use No Name to open Kingdom Hearts for his own goals. Xehanort learned manipulation from the best; look how he turned out.

And so despite learning how to love from his friend, Xehanort fell to darkness in his drive to prove himself to everyone and accidentally fulfilled Woody's prophecy of him ending up alone.

[veilya]

Between KH2 and KH3 which game did you prefer and why?

I feel like this is a hard question to answer as I genuinely love both games but I know which one I would replay if I had to make a choice.

I would replay KH2. I like the way the story is told better in KH2 than any other game, it also has the most balanced combat system of all of the games. It’s very fun, I’m not going to go into it too much since I have an entire write up on it.

That isn’t to say that KH3 wasn’t fun or enjoyable. Honestly I think it’s more mindless fun than the other games are. Some of the mechanics are so interesting but unfortunately overshadowed by well the Disney land attractions. Like I really love the fact that you can use focus to move from place to place now! If it wasn’t for the Attractions I think it would have been a decent blend of all of the games.

The story for KH3 was also an ending, but it wasn’t a strong ending for me. It was nice and incredible to see all of the characters we interacted with in past games come together to possibly beat this great evil. Except they didn’t really do anything, and we didn’t really get to see them interact as much as I’d like. Despite this I enjoyed a lot of the worlds(tangled land and toy story land are definitely favorites).

I know it seems like I’m being negative about KH3 but I really do love the game. There were so many fun moments in it and I did enjoy playing it but in Comparison to KH2 it just falls flat. I hope this makes sense to you and that it answered your question. :)