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This looks like a Talking Heads album cover (It’s a blurry shot of Donald Rich with Robotron at a convention of inventors.)

(Ralph Morse. 1958?)

#Life #Donald Rich #Robotron #inventors #Stop Making Things

Dragon Age and Norse Mythos Parallels part 1

This section (part one, I hope to have more up in a week or so) deals primarily with the Inquisitor and Solas, and their parallels with Tyr and Fenrir. This is mostly just the parallels I’ve noticed since playing DA (including their various nods towards Norse mythology particularly in regards to Solas and the JOH DLC), and I’m sure these various comparisons have been made and discussed at length much better than what I’m offering below, but...I haven’t seen them, and wanted to get my opinion out of my system.

Comparisons between the roles of the Inquisitor and Tyr, and Solas and Fenrir are under the cut below. (it’s long sorry not sorry)

Tyr is the god of War, Justice, and Law - similarly we see the Inquisitor in more or less the same light; the Inquisition is only brought about as a neutral enforcer against the chaos. The Inquisitor in game is involved in political matters spanning across countries (Tevinter, Orlais, and Ferelden primarily). The Inquisitor is also seen as the primary judge/arbiter - they sit in judgment, pass on punishment despite the fact that some prisoners could be (perhaps should be) given to the country they committed a crime in (which, yes, is done for RPG gameplay, and to show that the Inquisition is thought of as powerful, and an entirely separate entity from other countries).

While Tyr, like the role of the Inquisitor, is associated with war, he was not the only god of war, and he was not quite associated as a primary war god (although admittedly sources debate about this, it does boil down to the fact that he had other roles besides a god of war, and other gods shared that particular trait). He was associated first and foremost with upholding the law and justice (which at its core, the Inquisition was created for the first time as well as this time as is mentioned in DAI, and above).

The tale Tyr is most famous for is the Binding of Fenrir. Fenrir the “dreadful wolf” was growing rapidly, and due to a prophecy that had been relayed earlier, the gods sought to bind him because they feared their own destruction at his hands (er paws?). No one stepped up but Tyr himself - he offered to put his hand in Fenrir's jaws in a show of good faith. When Fenrir was bound - with a chain called gleipnir forged from the sound of a cat’s footsteps, the beard of a woman, the roots of mountains, the breath of a fish, and the spittle of a bird (things thought impossible and nonexistent, so it would be impossible to break the chains like Fenrir had done earlier) - he bit Tyr’s hand off.

With the sacrifice of Tyr’s hand, Fenrir’s rise to perform Ragnarok is postponed at least for a time, and the gods are safe.

However - if we’re looking at Solas filling the role of Fenrir (which I'm looking at rather flexibly), then we’re playing the game in the aftermath of Ragnarok. After all, Fen’Harel already brought about the fall of the “gods” (Evanuris) although he didn’t kill them he did lock them away thereby eliminating the presence of “gods” in Thedas (and possibly even making the Titans sleep with the creation of the Veil, as the last recorded event of them being awake was before the Fall of Arlathan).

Technically speaking...Ragnarok has already happened; Fenrir brought about chaos due to the fallout, and some time has passed since “the undoing of creation” (which I equate to the fall of the Elvhen empire, the separation of spirits from the physical world, and the loss of immortality among elves). But even Ragnarok doesn’t continue on forever - in the tale, Baldur returns from the underworld (after he’d been murdered by Loki) and then the gods and humans are returned to a bright new world.

Technically, we haven’t and likely won’t see “Ragnarok” in the purest sense - we’ve seen the aftermath, and the people living in Dragon Age in realtime live in the “new world”. Here, I’m taking the easy route and just assuming Baldur, in Dragon Age, just represents life adapting and continuing after a cataclysmic event.

So there’s the most obvious setup for the parallels between the Inquisitor and Tyr, and Solas and Fenrir, respectively. I could assume that right now Ragnarok is happening because Solas has admitted he’s not sure if the current world will die, but will continue on with his plans. However, being that I liken Ragnarok to the fall of the gods and varying immortal, primordial forces, I’m assuming the Ragnarok event parallel is the fall of Arlathan and the fall of the titans.

That isn’t all though; in the Binding of Fenrir, Tyr loses his hand to "the dreadful wolf”, and as I mentioned above, the sacrifice of his hand makes the binding honorable since he gave something in return for lying and binding him.

In DA the Inquisitor loses the hand to the anchor then to Solas (technically) - but the sacrifice of their hand gives everyone more time; from Corypheus, the Breach, and even Solas himself. Often in a lot of ancient cultures, it’s held as a universal belief that there’s a lot of power in sacrifice and this holds pretty tight in the DA-verse as well (blood magic, in DAO with the final choice against the archdemon, etc).

While the Inquisitor didn’t mean to bind Solas he's more or less stuck by your side because you hold his power (mimicking a binding - you hold all of his power in your hand and he says he’d thought it was impossible (re: see the ingredients for Fenrir’s binding above)). No matter how you play as the Inquisitor, there is at least some amount of honor and even selflessness to their character; they stay and try to fix things - necessary or not, the Inquisitor sticks around and tries to “put things back in order”, even functioning under the yoke of leadership when they really only need to be around for rifts and the Breach, but all Inquisitors undertake and enormous amount of responsibility. Meanwhile, the entire time the anchor gets stronger (during Inquisition) and then powerful but somewhat out of control (Trespasser), thereby following the evolution of Fenrir growing large enough to break even the “impossible” chains he was bound in.

Then, Solas takes the Inquisitor’s hand, mimicking Fenrir biting off Tyr’s hand almost literally, and Fenrir/Solas is free of the “binding”, which could be interpreted as the power perhaps eventually returning to him somehow in the future, or perhaps it’s just the responsibility he felt towards the Inquisitor and their condition.

So this also boils down to my theory that in DA, Ragnarok is being enacted, by Solas, in reverse (where: the gods die → undoing of all creation → “the green time”/life adapts and moves on/Spring) so we're going from the green time to the undoing of all creation where it could be mass chaos and death as Solas himself believes it's possible (and also the destruction/fall of the Veil) and perhaps the rise of the gods again.

So – yes, Solas does take quite a few cues from Loki (as a trickster and liar), I think that's essentially it. Loki (in Norse mythology don't come for me MCU fans) isn't as sympathetic or compassionate as Solas; he is closer to a consummate villain who does things because he's covetous, jealous, and basks in chaos. Like a lot of things in DA, Solas's character and motivations don't stem entirely from one inspiration – although I am certain his role is closer to Fenrir (and admittedly, perhaps a bit of inspiration from Baldur, thought of a compassionate god since Solas had good intentions although now they seem more muddled), the wolf god, than it is Loki.

Part two will be featuring Flemeth/Mythal and possible clues DA has left and her/their parallels (hopefully up next week.)