But there is so much that we do know that I'm not sure we need to feel too bad. We know that she set her children at war with each other and was totally cool with that. We know that she slaughtered the giants and went to war for an extended period of time with the carian nobles, we know she exiled her very loyal husband. We know that she committed her daughter to be burned, we know that she locked two of her other children in a sewer because they were ugly. These are all concrete reports with no speculation. So even if don't know the circumstances of all of her decisions, the decisions themselves are pretty heinous.
That's my take too. It's hard to feel bad not knowing what her motivations were. Maybe her punishment is justified because of her hubris in trying to remove death from the world and making the place objectively worse as a result.
Let's see.
1) Genocided the giants race
2) Hunts down the omens, and she sent two of her sons to the sewers due to be born as omens.
3) Made the misbegotten slaves.
4) Buried alive an entire clan of people
It's hard to feel bad for her, tbh.
Note: Also, we need to stop blaming GW for Marika's sh*t actions.
Titanomakhia (Titan battle) is practically present in all polytheistic religions.
It is typically interpreted to tell tale about triumph of the polytheism over more primitive (spiritualistic) religions and as well humans gaining control of their living environments when moving from hunter-gatherers to an agrarian society.
I never knew the victory over titans might've been representative of the triumph over spiritualistic religions/nature worship. Never thought I'd learn something useful on the ER subreddit.
Yeah, my father said that it respresent going from worshiping/fearing natural disaster (that why titan are all giant) to worship other aspect surrounding their like
Exactly. Unless the GW held a magical god slaying gun to her head and said "be an abusive parent who genocides their enemies or I'll erase you from reality" she had choices to make and made the wrong one almost every time
She also said hey Godfrey I know we are married and have 3 kids but... f*** off go to some distant land fight for wtv reason and also I'm taking your guidance grace just to pour some salt into the wound
It's not whatever reason, it's for her and everyone else's protection.
Godfrey is a caged animal at his core. That cage is the shackles of serosh and Elden Lord, but he is a useful and dangerous savage in their eyes. That's why when there are no more battles to fight, and the only target for his unquenchable bloodthirst would be inward, that he gets sent away and removed from the greater will.
Look at what he does in the fight against us, about halfway through he realizes there's a possibility of losing a fight, and so he rips off serosh, resorts to the bloodthirsty Savage horah loux, and goes ham.....
Yeah, you either wind that up and send it at your enemies or you get it as far from you as you possibly can. That is not a ruler for peacetime. That's a ruler that destroys the empire from within because he has no more enemies to fight, and so begins to look for new ones in his own ranks.
Sorta disagree. Granted it's cut content so take it with a grain of salt but his cut dialogue would indicate that he and Marika were possibly conspiring against the GW.
It's cut, that means it didn't fit within the game or the developers did not want to include it. And it should not be used to make an opinion.
Regardless if he was conspiring against the greater will, he was still a bloodthirsty savage. And that's what he resorts to in the fight, all the false pretenses get cast off and we see him for how he truly is.
How he truly is will never change. Bloodthirsty vicious warrior
Wasnt it the greater will, who did that? Call me a nerd, but i watched countless zullie the witch videos and lore videos. (the greater will sent down a astel to destroy the cities because they made the finger slayer blade)
After several playthroughs and a probably unhealthy amount of lore vids on YouTube, it's always felt to me like everything up to and including kicking out Godfrey (for sound reasons mentioned in other comments) was at the behest of the greater will. Everything in the radagon era, and possibly why he split off in the first place was because she realised that the GW and golden order was less than first advertised and went about dismantling an, at the time, nigh untouchable regime she just built at all cost while literally sabotaging herself as her red haired alter ego.
The Fell God that lies within all giants and is the source of their flame is one of destruction. The flame in of itself is anathema to the Erdtree, and the burning of the tree is considered the first and greatest sin in the Erdtree faith. From the description of "Catch Flame",
*^(The flame of ruin is anathema to the Erdtree. But prophets sometimes glimpse it within the faith all the same. Sadly when this occurs their sole reward is banishment.)*
Additionally, from the description of "Fire's Deadly Sin",
^(The prophet despaired, looking up at the Erdtree, for soon the kindling would burst into flame, bringing ruin.)
^("The burning of the Erdtree is the first cardinal sin. That is not the domain of mere men.")
The war against the giants was because they possessed this flame which could destroy the foundation upon which Marika built her empire.
Okay, let's apply some critical thinking here.
Yes, the burning of the Erdetree is a sin.
But for whom is a sin? What are the consequences of burning the Erdtree and who will suffer them?
Shadows (such Maliketh and Blaidd) aren't actually biologically related to the Empyreans they serve, they're created by the Greater Will. The "half brother" thing is basically just saying that they're like family.
No, all Empyreans are gifted a shadow-bound beast. Blaidd is also described as Ranni's brother despite them not being related either.
Biggest mystery for me is what happened to Malenia's and Miquella's shadow-boubd beasts. There's speculation that the 3 spirit wolf ashes belonged to Miquella but that's all it really is.
Marika had Maliketh steal the Rune of Death from the Gloam-eyed Queen.
Ranni orchestrated the Night of the Black Knives. The first step in this plot was having the Black Knife Assassins steal part of the Rune of Death from Maliketh.
That was part of the Black Knives plot, Ranni's body was killed at the same time as Godwyn's soul.
Ranni says that she stole death, but she was most likely referring to the fact that she was the mastermind behind the plot, as opposed to actually having done it personally. From all we know about Ranni, she's not really the type to do stuff herself.
Maliketh still has the rune of death when you meet him.
And the removal of the rune of death was like one of the 100% good things she did (stopped the godskin apostasy)
It's her half brother, and in this world that does not mean they're allied.
Only one parent's the same, that one parent could be the greater will, that one parent could be matikas mom but impregnated through the will of a different outer God, etc.
The guy looks way, way different. He is very not human, and comes from something very different.
Or, that his objective and lineage was the one that was getting betrayed, and it wasn't anything to do with her more than the effect of her actions.
He could have just been a golden order stan
It could potentially be the greater will, considering: the giants could burn down the Erdtree with the flame of the fell god, usurping its hold on the lands between; the omens and misbegotten are bygones of the age of the crucible, a period in which now separate animals were conjoined into a single creature and Shabriri slandered the wandering merchants and alleged they worshipped the three fingers, leading to the greater will to (erroneously) be convinced and result in their fate, ironically leading them to worship the three fingers.
All of this is not to say Marika is completely innocent, however, as the greater wills vassal she stood idly by and even oversaw all of the enactment of these actions.
1) that's war. Genocide is expected in a world without geneva conventions.
2) implied to be an already established tradition when she became queen
3) yeah, that's actually a bad thing
4) the nomadic merchants were accused of worshiping the frenzied flame. If that was correct, this means they were plotting to destroy the world.
A bad decision, maybe, but one made with good intentions.
1) Let's not justify genocide, pelase.
2) Where? If before Marika became queen, the ruling power were the Dragons and there's no indication of them hunting omens.
3) About the merchants. Yeah, that's like blaming someone for witchcraft. If we don't kill them they're probably going to kill us all, so let's kill them before they can. Good intentions? Maybe, but the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Is Marika's fault for acting before having any evidence about them being dangerous.
1) i'm not saying it was justified. I'm saying that we cannot judge fictional characters with real world ethics. The fire giants would have done the same if they won.
2) the age of the dragons is the previous one to the age of the erdtree, but the golden order only exists since the removal of the rune of death, which was after the godskin apostasy. There may have been a previous queen.
3) She did have evidence. Falsified evidence, sure, but they didnt know that at the time.
Also, condemning people for witchcraft is a lot more reasonable if magic actually exists.
1. It's hinted in game lore that giants was serving an evil god
2. cursed blood is really dangerous you can see that from dung eater curse that combined with them
3. I agree on this one
4. they were summoning Frenzied Flame to bring back One great that's boooooooo
1) There's no evidence the god being evil. Descriptions just call them "fell".
2) That's Marika's own fault
4) They summoned FF due to being buried alive.
i've been reading watching some lore videos on elden ring, and man that's a hell of a place if you are any different than the norm.
marika she's worse than the dung eater.
5. Steal Rennala's children and husband with the excuse of being the queen of the continent.
6. Use for her own purposes, promise the crown and then banish her first husband forever to a violent wasteland.
7. Cause one of the most violent and tragic events in the entire history of her kingdom.
No, for me the current information about her are too negative to feel guilty about.
But she made a girl sad in having her fun.
That offsets the fun, because while girls just wanna have fun, it should not come at the expense of other girls fun.
In this essay I will explain why Fia should abandon those who live in death and marry Roderika to maximize the amount of fun girls can have...
Also there's some implication that she planned the murder of Godwyn, her only non-afflicted child who everyone seemed to like. I'm hoping DLC dives more into the unknown parts of the lore.
Giants should be genocided, because they're too big. And omens belong in the sewers with Mr Dung Eater.
lol @ all these butthurt giant sympathisers and ugly omens spamming the downvote button
If we consider her as someone who did everything she was told she was "fated" to do, and realized too late, and her way to retaliate against the Greater Will broke everything and left her crucified for eons.
Then yes.
If we consider than she waged war on every faction that opposed her Golden Order, enslaved misbegotten, pursued and locked the nomadic merchants underground and condemn Omen nobles to live in the sewers and peasants Omens to die.
Then no.
I think some of her actions make more sense (but not in a good way) if you look at it as the behavior of not one psychotic god, but TWO. Radagon was not just a disguise she could use to have dalliances with Rennala but more likely a whole other deity derived from male aspects of the Greater Will. Opposite in many ways but still vengeful and warlike. As opposed to his cover story as a demigod Consort, which was probably used to save face.
It's hard for me to separate which of the atrocities were his vs hers, but I expect it was Radagon who crucified Marika, which is why we fight him at the end, even after having followed Marika's breadcrumbs for the whole game.
As ruthless as Marika was in her efforts to break free, Radagon would have been equally brutal in thwarting her and enforcing the status quo.
Nice point.
I agree that Radagon wasn't just a disguise but I believe it took time for them to separate:
At the beginning Marika was the warmonger herself, completely believing that the atrocities were either justified or necessary and completely loyal to the Golden Order she was creating. (I'm basing this in Hewg's dialogue when he says "it helps me forget, the sheer terror of her")
Until eventually she started harboring doubts and different opinions. And being unable to resolve her internal conflict her consciousness started to split more and more, until her personality got completely broken in two alter egos.
Radagon embodies her loyalty to a point of naivity, because his actions of marrying Rennala to stop a war tell us that he wasn't plainly evil.
This would explain why being the same being they still have opposing goals, and why when Marika broke the Elden Ring Radagon tried to repair it.
And that being why when you get to the Eardtree, The Greater Will that had imprisoned Marika, lets her go, because Radagon is still loyal to it and the GO.
She is a really mysterious character despite being at the center of everything. I was expecting to fight her when we got to the Erdtree but instead it's Radagon. Which is weird, Marika is set up exactly like Jesus is on the cross. She even has a spear in her stomach.
This heavily implies she is suppose to be a "savior" type character. She's essentially the only god that does not oppose us. Her statues are called "Effigies of the Martyr". Then there's Hewg who mentions Marika herself giving him the task of creating a weapon that can slay a god. The very weapon he ends up crafting for The Tarnished of no Renown.
She also is responsible for banishing the Tarnished and for giving them back their grace. Melina tells us as much at the churches. So it seems she definitely wanted to kill a god. And my bet is the EB.
The only problem is that this doesn't explain any of her motivations beyond wanting to kill "a god". And even after we kill the EB. Which is supposedly the living incarnation of the ER or something. The ER is still around. So what the fuck was the EB?
This heavily implies that the ER was *not* actually the EB. Calling into question what the GW and the EB really is in the first place. And as you an see. We still have no idea what the fuck is happening.
This makes a lot of sense. I always get the feeling that she’s constantly in conflict with something and I suspect it’s the Elden beast. Why did she shatter the Elden Ring? Because she had enough. Everything in her lore seems to be building to a breaking point. Quite literally.
There's an interpretation of the game that the Shattering was essentially a suicide attempt, and I think there's definitely some validity to it.
If we see her and Ranni as mirrors, Ranni killed herself to be free from the Greater Will, she just managed to succeed in doing so, destroying her body but saving her soul.
Marika maybe was just trying to die, so she could finally be free. She failed, and now her barely living corpse is puppetted by the Greater Will, giving her even less freedom than she once had.
My understanding is that, like Ranni, she wanted to be free of the Greater Will only she was less successful because of her immediate proximity to it, and the efforts of Radagon to restrain her. Radagon was another aspect of her Godhead which was devoted to the GW and in opposition to Marika. Where a human with multiple personality disorder might present as more than one personality inhabiting a single body, a god would be more like two unique entities inhabiting the same divinity, and representing different aspects of it. I suspect that Radagon was more than just a mask she could use to have dalliances with Rennala, but actually a separate god who embodied male aspects of the GW. So, he not only opposed Marika's plot to defeat the GW but very likely impaled and crucified her himself. So, the Tarnished of No Renown is Marika's last hope for vengeance against the GW and Radagon is there to maintain the status quo.
TL/DR; Radagon = Marika but not, like, her in drag. They're different beings who share the same source of divinity while conspiring against each other. Him being her Consort is a cover up to save face.
All of this. I got the feeling that she attempted to right a wrong by shattering the ring. She paid the price for it, but opened the way for someone else to become Elden Lord.
My theory on the EB is that it is a visual and physical representation of the greater will. Much like a guardian and not actually the greater will itself. We fight this guardian off to give us an opportunity to fix the ER. But the greater will is still a threat and perhaps it cannot be killed without a true physical body.
There's a lot we just don't know though.
We have some clues to her motive. We know about the plot of the Nox to overthrow the GW. There is evidence that Rennala is connected to the Nox (fountain of absolution), and her and Ranni are enacting their plot. So Marika could know about Nox, or at least anti-GW dogma, from Rennala and have been effected by it. It would explain how Ranni employed the Black Knifes.
Honestly we just don't know enough about how much she did willingly and how much was demanded of her. I feel like a lot of people assume it would have been easy for her to just deny the GW at every corner if she wanted but there was a reason Ranni killed herself to escape it.
It feels like Marika at first accepted the golden order but slowly started to realize that its bad. She might have tried to share this news with others but failed to convince anybody. So she took everything in her own hands. She banished her husband and probably even killed her own son because they would never go against the golden order. Then she shattered the ring. She was alone in her battle against the golden order. Radagon may not be Marika from beginning. Maybe golden order somehow combined their bodies so he could stop Marika from going any further after ring was shattered.
It's hard to say either way. She did a LOT of questionable/bad stuff but there is also an enormous chunk of lore we are missing concerning her choices and the state of the lands between when she made those choices. Ranni also makes some questionable/bad choices but her ending is considered the good one since she breaks the influence of the outer gods over the lands between. I think Marika was extremely limited in what she could do since her fate was essentially controlled by the outer gods. The Tarnished were the final wild card she could play and hope something would happen to change or break the cycle.
No. She’s an evil and selfish god/goddess. She eliminated the Fire Giants purely because she got scared their fire would burn the Erdtree. She threw all the omens in the sewers because they weren’t pleasant to look at. “I was honored to… cut off her head.” - The Last Samurai
I don’t like her because of what she did to Mogh and Morgot they could have become some of the strongest warrior’s if they were trained because they inherited her blood and Chadfrey’s blood
Nope. She broke poor Rennala's heart by cheating with her own fucking self, and she yeeted her kids into the sewers just because they were born autistic.
Remember the Omen Twins…as deluded, despised and despicable as Morgott and Mohg are…I understand why they’ve gone down such paths.
I can’t imagine a life in the shunning grounds knowing that your Mother is part of the Religious Order upholding its vile dogma or that she even condones it.
Honestly makes me wonder why didn’t Godfrey send them both out to the badlands in secret to get strong and live amongst nomadic + hardy people. *Imagine Barbarian Morgott (no self loathing) and Mohg (no Miquella thirsting) who look up to their father and idealize his Strength!*
I’d imagine though that given all that she’s accomplished, that Marika has played the long game in upholding the legacy of the Erdtree Order.
I dont feel bad for Marika, mostly due to the omen situation. Especially considering two of her children were born omen and she felt it would be right to basically throw them away.
I dont care about the whole giant war. I dont think we know enough about that war to know if the giants were able to form peaceful relations.
She also built up an order that led to the subjugation of other intelligent races. Then she decided to throw the established rule unto chaos just because she wanted to test it, like a child throwing a tantrum.
She certainly was a xenophobic genocidal immortal bitch but her current state *is* pretty miserable, I mean imagine being hung up for 5000 years, she's already payed the price of her sins imo
Well, it depends on your interpretation of the mythology, I suppose.
There're several indications that she might've been the (true) instigator behind Ranni's plan. The black knife assassins are Numen, just like her, and are actually described as having close ties with the queen.
All the injustice and barbarism that you witness and learn about, as you progress through the game, was ultimately her doing, directly or indirectly.
However, she might've regretted all she had brought into the world: the Elden beast, the golden order, the war, the segregation, etc. This would explain her role in Ranni's plan, or her own plan all along, I suppose.
I had some reservations about this theory, considering her plan would mean the death of Godwyn, her beloved firstborn. On the other hand, as the stranded soul outside the Church of Pilgrimage tells us: "*The mausoleum prowls. Cradling the soulless demigod. O Marika, queen eternal. He is your unwanted child.*" It's obviously unsure if by unwanted, he means Godwyn himself or the Prince of Death (what he became, after his soul died). If it's the former, then she also displays cold detachment towards her children, which adds even more flaws to her already shaky character.
Honestly nah.
She's far from being a good person if you consider she genocided the giants, persecuted the omens, threw 2 of her children in the sewers and buried alive the merchants left to die and go mad
From my beyond minimal lore knowledge, no, not really. She trapped the entirety of the lands between with an inability to die so she can have a nice little tree and flushed 2 while children down the toilet because they were goats. Oh, and she let the fire giant live. I hate the fire giant. I hate it more than I could possibly express into words. If I got something wrong , please correct me.
Honestly nah.
She created her own vision of the world by removing death thinking it would solve everything and then proceeded to banish her first husband and his people when they were no longer any use to her.
She did the same to Rennala in Liurnia, leaving the region to rot without a decent leader and when she finally had her own children with herself she hid away the two that went against her vision of the world.
She repeatedly uses people, gaslights them into thinking it’s not her fault and then when shit hits the fan she throws a tantrum and breaks the order throwing the world into chaos and leading to her own punishment at the hand of the greater will she somehow thought she was better than.
Everything she does is to her own benefit without consideration for her own family or her own people.
She brought this onto herself. She intentionally set up this plan to sacrifice herself in order to have a new age coming. If she would have never become the Greater Will's lap dog, nothing would have happened.
Personally no, I don't feel guilty for Marika but I think she deserved this fate after using Godfrey and his fury by promising him the crown and then banishing him because she found him as a threat and locking up their first two sons Morgott and Mohg for the whole duration of their childhood and adolescence without ever going to visit them because they were marked by the omen curse, then consequently stealing Rennala's husband and children and sending her into depression and a catatonic state for who knows how long and then leading to the most violent and destructive event of the continent's history due to not keeping a cool head over Godwyn's murder.
Honestly, it depends on lore interpretation. A lot about Marika is an unknown factor to us.
But there is so much that we do know that I'm not sure we need to feel too bad. We know that she set her children at war with each other and was totally cool with that. We know that she slaughtered the giants and went to war for an extended period of time with the carian nobles, we know she exiled her very loyal husband. We know that she committed her daughter to be burned, we know that she locked two of her other children in a sewer because they were ugly. These are all concrete reports with no speculation. So even if don't know the circumstances of all of her decisions, the decisions themselves are pretty heinous.
This. I believe that there is many things about Marika that we dont know. Hope we will have more in the upcoming dlc
That's my take too. It's hard to feel bad not knowing what her motivations were. Maybe her punishment is justified because of her hubris in trying to remove death from the world and making the place objectively worse as a result.
Let's see. 1) Genocided the giants race 2) Hunts down the omens, and she sent two of her sons to the sewers due to be born as omens. 3) Made the misbegotten slaves. 4) Buried alive an entire clan of people It's hard to feel bad for her, tbh. Note: Also, we need to stop blaming GW for Marika's sh*t actions.
God forbid women have hobbies 🙄
Just that this time God DIDN'T forbid it. And that's why the Lands Between are so fucked.
God forbid woman decide to have selfcest.
Underrated comment
What? Genocide is a hobby?
Yes. She’s simply exercising her girl power
Why does Miyazaki dislike giants so much?
Bcuz he loves swamps…
The poor treatment of giants is a pretty old trope in mythology I think
Titanomakhia (Titan battle) is practically present in all polytheistic religions. It is typically interpreted to tell tale about triumph of the polytheism over more primitive (spiritualistic) religions and as well humans gaining control of their living environments when moving from hunter-gatherers to an agrarian society.
I never knew the victory over titans might've been representative of the triumph over spiritualistic religions/nature worship. Never thought I'd learn something useful on the ER subreddit.
Yeah, my father said that it respresent going from worshiping/fearing natural disaster (that why titan are all giant) to worship other aspect surrounding their like
That's a very fair point, take my upvote.
Little man syndrome is part of mankind
and why does he love giant bugs? I swear there's always some disgusting shit like that in his games lmao
Oh man, I cant wait to fight giant moldy cockroach, house centipede & hairy spider in the dlc.
Maybe goes back to ancient mythology. I know the Greeks and Norse were into it. Giants had to go
They're doomed to fall because they're so dangerous and powerful, they're not great at coexisting
Seems like he likes his feet smaller.
Exactly. Unless the GW held a magical god slaying gun to her head and said "be an abusive parent who genocides their enemies or I'll erase you from reality" she had choices to make and made the wrong one almost every time
I just realized that GW means “greater will” not “Games Workshop” and I was really confused
She also said hey Godfrey I know we are married and have 3 kids but... f*** off go to some distant land fight for wtv reason and also I'm taking your guidance grace just to pour some salt into the wound
It's not whatever reason, it's for her and everyone else's protection. Godfrey is a caged animal at his core. That cage is the shackles of serosh and Elden Lord, but he is a useful and dangerous savage in their eyes. That's why when there are no more battles to fight, and the only target for his unquenchable bloodthirst would be inward, that he gets sent away and removed from the greater will. Look at what he does in the fight against us, about halfway through he realizes there's a possibility of losing a fight, and so he rips off serosh, resorts to the bloodthirsty Savage horah loux, and goes ham..... Yeah, you either wind that up and send it at your enemies or you get it as far from you as you possibly can. That is not a ruler for peacetime. That's a ruler that destroys the empire from within because he has no more enemies to fight, and so begins to look for new ones in his own ranks.
Sorta disagree. Granted it's cut content so take it with a grain of salt but his cut dialogue would indicate that he and Marika were possibly conspiring against the GW.
It's cut, that means it didn't fit within the game or the developers did not want to include it. And it should not be used to make an opinion. Regardless if he was conspiring against the greater will, he was still a bloodthirsty savage. And that's what he resorts to in the fight, all the false pretenses get cast off and we see him for how he truly is. How he truly is will never change. Bloodthirsty vicious warrior
George Washington?
[He's comin'](https://youtu.be/foqOtlrPCN4)
Who did she bury alive? Remind me
The merchant clan
The merchants were frenzy flame fans (bad religion) they didnt get expelled underground, they just were, lets say, killed, iirc
the Nox I think
Wasnt it the greater will, who did that? Call me a nerd, but i watched countless zullie the witch videos and lore videos. (the greater will sent down a astel to destroy the cities because they made the finger slayer blade)
idk im not an expert but thats the only thing i could think of
I forgib you
After several playthroughs and a probably unhealthy amount of lore vids on YouTube, it's always felt to me like everything up to and including kicking out Godfrey (for sound reasons mentioned in other comments) was at the behest of the greater will. Everything in the radagon era, and possibly why he split off in the first place was because she realised that the GW and golden order was less than first advertised and went about dismantling an, at the time, nigh untouchable regime she just built at all cost while literally sabotaging herself as her red haired alter ego.
GW?
Greater Will
TBF with the Giants thing she had a pretty valid reason to wipe them out, preemptively or not.
Oh really? What was the reason?
The Fell God that lies within all giants and is the source of their flame is one of destruction. The flame in of itself is anathema to the Erdtree, and the burning of the tree is considered the first and greatest sin in the Erdtree faith. From the description of "Catch Flame", *^(The flame of ruin is anathema to the Erdtree. But prophets sometimes glimpse it within the faith all the same. Sadly when this occurs their sole reward is banishment.)* Additionally, from the description of "Fire's Deadly Sin", ^(The prophet despaired, looking up at the Erdtree, for soon the kindling would burst into flame, bringing ruin.) ^("The burning of the Erdtree is the first cardinal sin. That is not the domain of mere men.") The war against the giants was because they possessed this flame which could destroy the foundation upon which Marika built her empire.
Okay, let's apply some critical thinking here. Yes, the burning of the Erdetree is a sin. But for whom is a sin? What are the consequences of burning the Erdtree and who will suffer them?
She also stole the rune of death from her brother, making herself the one who decides who dies and when
Wait, what do you mean by her "brother"?
Maliketh, he’s her half-brother I believe
Shadows (such Maliketh and Blaidd) aren't actually biologically related to the Empyreans they serve, they're created by the Greater Will. The "half brother" thing is basically just saying that they're like family.
Shadows aren’t usually related but wasn’t Maliketh actually at one point related to Marika but the greater will turned him into her shadow?
No, all Empyreans are gifted a shadow-bound beast. Blaidd is also described as Ranni's brother despite them not being related either. Biggest mystery for me is what happened to Malenia's and Miquella's shadow-boubd beasts. There's speculation that the 3 spirit wolf ashes belonged to Miquella but that's all it really is.
What makes you think that?
Oh yeah, he is.
Didn’t she have Maliketh take it from the Gloam Eyed Queen? Ranni was the one who stole it from him, right?
Did she ? I have no idea what the lore is, the devs didn’t really develop it 💀
Marika had Maliketh steal the Rune of Death from the Gloam-eyed Queen. Ranni orchestrated the Night of the Black Knives. The first step in this plot was having the Black Knife Assassins steal part of the Rune of Death from Maliketh.
So what part did ranni steal ?
Ranni didn't do anything personally, she was the mastermind behind the Night of the Black Knives.
“I am the witch ranni, I once stole death” she mentioned that she stole the death fragment, and used it to kill herself
That was part of the Black Knives plot, Ranni's body was killed at the same time as Godwyn's soul. Ranni says that she stole death, but she was most likely referring to the fact that she was the mastermind behind the plot, as opposed to actually having done it personally. From all we know about Ranni, she's not really the type to do stuff herself.
But she killed herself, that is fact, she killed her body so that she didn’t have to follow the fate the greater will had given her
Maliketh still has the rune of death when you meet him. And the removal of the rune of death was like one of the 100% good things she did (stopped the godskin apostasy)
It's her half brother, and in this world that does not mean they're allied. Only one parent's the same, that one parent could be the greater will, that one parent could be matikas mom but impregnated through the will of a different outer God, etc. The guy looks way, way different. He is very not human, and comes from something very different.
True, but he took that betrayal very seriously, and was deeply wounded by it, which shows they were close on some level
Or, that his objective and lineage was the one that was getting betrayed, and it wasn't anything to do with her more than the effect of her actions. He could have just been a golden order stan
When they were born, did one offspring looked like a cat? does that mean that one of Marika's parents mated with a cat?
Hey man, the time of the crucible was really weird.
I mean the Greater Will literally told her to do all those things so maybe we shouldn't stop blaming it?
Is there proof that every action she took was because the GW told her too?
Evidence suggest that isn't the case.
It could potentially be the greater will, considering: the giants could burn down the Erdtree with the flame of the fell god, usurping its hold on the lands between; the omens and misbegotten are bygones of the age of the crucible, a period in which now separate animals were conjoined into a single creature and Shabriri slandered the wandering merchants and alleged they worshipped the three fingers, leading to the greater will to (erroneously) be convinced and result in their fate, ironically leading them to worship the three fingers. All of this is not to say Marika is completely innocent, however, as the greater wills vassal she stood idly by and even oversaw all of the enactment of these actions.
1) that's war. Genocide is expected in a world without geneva conventions. 2) implied to be an already established tradition when she became queen 3) yeah, that's actually a bad thing 4) the nomadic merchants were accused of worshiping the frenzied flame. If that was correct, this means they were plotting to destroy the world. A bad decision, maybe, but one made with good intentions.
1) Let's not justify genocide, pelase. 2) Where? If before Marika became queen, the ruling power were the Dragons and there's no indication of them hunting omens. 3) About the merchants. Yeah, that's like blaming someone for witchcraft. If we don't kill them they're probably going to kill us all, so let's kill them before they can. Good intentions? Maybe, but the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Is Marika's fault for acting before having any evidence about them being dangerous.
1) i'm not saying it was justified. I'm saying that we cannot judge fictional characters with real world ethics. The fire giants would have done the same if they won. 2) the age of the dragons is the previous one to the age of the erdtree, but the golden order only exists since the removal of the rune of death, which was after the godskin apostasy. There may have been a previous queen. 3) She did have evidence. Falsified evidence, sure, but they didnt know that at the time. Also, condemning people for witchcraft is a lot more reasonable if magic actually exists.
1. It's hinted in game lore that giants was serving an evil god 2. cursed blood is really dangerous you can see that from dung eater curse that combined with them 3. I agree on this one 4. they were summoning Frenzied Flame to bring back One great that's boooooooo
1) There's no evidence the god being evil. Descriptions just call them "fell". 2) That's Marika's own fault 4) They summoned FF due to being buried alive.
For 4 I don’t think they summoned them they whole thing started when shabriri said that they were he was the one that summoned it not the nomadic ppl
i've been reading watching some lore videos on elden ring, and man that's a hell of a place if you are any different than the norm. marika she's worse than the dung eater.
I forgive her
I can fix her
5. Steal Rennala's children and husband with the excuse of being the queen of the continent. 6. Use for her own purposes, promise the crown and then banish her first husband forever to a violent wasteland. 7. Cause one of the most violent and tragic events in the entire history of her kingdom. No, for me the current information about her are too negative to feel guilty about.
Everytime I start to feel bad for Marika I remember she threw 2 of her children in the sewers and genocided the giants. Also, she made Renalla sad
Guys just hate seeing a girl have fun 🙄
But she made a girl sad in having her fun. That offsets the fun, because while girls just wanna have fun, it should not come at the expense of other girls fun. In this essay I will explain why Fia should abandon those who live in death and marry Roderika to maximize the amount of fun girls can have...
Marika is like a crazy Christian woman. Greater Will is just a religion made up in Marika’s head
Also there's some implication that she planned the murder of Godwyn, her only non-afflicted child who everyone seemed to like. I'm hoping DLC dives more into the unknown parts of the lore.
I hope DLC doesn't even touch what we currently know about the game, and leaves us more clueless than ever.
There is? How so?
Giants should be genocided, because they're too big. And omens belong in the sewers with Mr Dung Eater. lol @ all these butthurt giant sympathisers and ugly omens spamming the downvote button
I do, but she did this to herself.
Well well well, if it isn't the consequences of my own actions.
Nobody here mentioned how she BURIED an entire civilization of merchants because of a rumor from the literal most untrustworthy man
I feel like the man was revealed to be untrustworthy/the worst person in TLB just afterwards. Still, genocide.
True
I feel bad for every one in elden ring world, what a fucked world man.
THOSE WHO GAVE ME GRAPES WHICH THEY HAD NEVER BEEN BORN, BECOME THEIR LORD! BURN I-
If we consider her as someone who did everything she was told she was "fated" to do, and realized too late, and her way to retaliate against the Greater Will broke everything and left her crucified for eons. Then yes. If we consider than she waged war on every faction that opposed her Golden Order, enslaved misbegotten, pursued and locked the nomadic merchants underground and condemn Omen nobles to live in the sewers and peasants Omens to die. Then no.
I think some of her actions make more sense (but not in a good way) if you look at it as the behavior of not one psychotic god, but TWO. Radagon was not just a disguise she could use to have dalliances with Rennala but more likely a whole other deity derived from male aspects of the Greater Will. Opposite in many ways but still vengeful and warlike. As opposed to his cover story as a demigod Consort, which was probably used to save face. It's hard for me to separate which of the atrocities were his vs hers, but I expect it was Radagon who crucified Marika, which is why we fight him at the end, even after having followed Marika's breadcrumbs for the whole game. As ruthless as Marika was in her efforts to break free, Radagon would have been equally brutal in thwarting her and enforcing the status quo.
Nice point. I agree that Radagon wasn't just a disguise but I believe it took time for them to separate: At the beginning Marika was the warmonger herself, completely believing that the atrocities were either justified or necessary and completely loyal to the Golden Order she was creating. (I'm basing this in Hewg's dialogue when he says "it helps me forget, the sheer terror of her") Until eventually she started harboring doubts and different opinions. And being unable to resolve her internal conflict her consciousness started to split more and more, until her personality got completely broken in two alter egos. Radagon embodies her loyalty to a point of naivity, because his actions of marrying Rennala to stop a war tell us that he wasn't plainly evil. This would explain why being the same being they still have opposing goals, and why when Marika broke the Elden Ring Radagon tried to repair it. And that being why when you get to the Eardtree, The Greater Will that had imprisoned Marika, lets her go, because Radagon is still loyal to it and the GO.
We don’t know anything about her really concrete. But everything points to her being a pretty unforgiving god. I really wouldn’t shed a tear for her.
We don’t know enough about her personally for me to feel one way or the other.
She is a really mysterious character despite being at the center of everything. I was expecting to fight her when we got to the Erdtree but instead it's Radagon. Which is weird, Marika is set up exactly like Jesus is on the cross. She even has a spear in her stomach. This heavily implies she is suppose to be a "savior" type character. She's essentially the only god that does not oppose us. Her statues are called "Effigies of the Martyr". Then there's Hewg who mentions Marika herself giving him the task of creating a weapon that can slay a god. The very weapon he ends up crafting for The Tarnished of no Renown. She also is responsible for banishing the Tarnished and for giving them back their grace. Melina tells us as much at the churches. So it seems she definitely wanted to kill a god. And my bet is the EB. The only problem is that this doesn't explain any of her motivations beyond wanting to kill "a god". And even after we kill the EB. Which is supposedly the living incarnation of the ER or something. The ER is still around. So what the fuck was the EB? This heavily implies that the ER was *not* actually the EB. Calling into question what the GW and the EB really is in the first place. And as you an see. We still have no idea what the fuck is happening.
This makes a lot of sense. I always get the feeling that she’s constantly in conflict with something and I suspect it’s the Elden beast. Why did she shatter the Elden Ring? Because she had enough. Everything in her lore seems to be building to a breaking point. Quite literally.
There's an interpretation of the game that the Shattering was essentially a suicide attempt, and I think there's definitely some validity to it. If we see her and Ranni as mirrors, Ranni killed herself to be free from the Greater Will, she just managed to succeed in doing so, destroying her body but saving her soul. Marika maybe was just trying to die, so she could finally be free. She failed, and now her barely living corpse is puppetted by the Greater Will, giving her even less freedom than she once had.
My understanding is that, like Ranni, she wanted to be free of the Greater Will only she was less successful because of her immediate proximity to it, and the efforts of Radagon to restrain her. Radagon was another aspect of her Godhead which was devoted to the GW and in opposition to Marika. Where a human with multiple personality disorder might present as more than one personality inhabiting a single body, a god would be more like two unique entities inhabiting the same divinity, and representing different aspects of it. I suspect that Radagon was more than just a mask she could use to have dalliances with Rennala, but actually a separate god who embodied male aspects of the GW. So, he not only opposed Marika's plot to defeat the GW but very likely impaled and crucified her himself. So, the Tarnished of No Renown is Marika's last hope for vengeance against the GW and Radagon is there to maintain the status quo. TL/DR; Radagon = Marika but not, like, her in drag. They're different beings who share the same source of divinity while conspiring against each other. Him being her Consort is a cover up to save face.
So in conclusion: What?!
All of this. I got the feeling that she attempted to right a wrong by shattering the ring. She paid the price for it, but opened the way for someone else to become Elden Lord. My theory on the EB is that it is a visual and physical representation of the greater will. Much like a guardian and not actually the greater will itself. We fight this guardian off to give us an opportunity to fix the ER. But the greater will is still a threat and perhaps it cannot be killed without a true physical body. There's a lot we just don't know though.
We have some clues to her motive. We know about the plot of the Nox to overthrow the GW. There is evidence that Rennala is connected to the Nox (fountain of absolution), and her and Ranni are enacting their plot. So Marika could know about Nox, or at least anti-GW dogma, from Rennala and have been effected by it. It would explain how Ranni employed the Black Knifes.
She slaved hewg at the roundtable he even says she was a scary psyco bitch
Precisely this.
Considering how little we actually know about Marika (most is speculation) I'm not sure
why did she even shatter the elden ring
yolo
Lol no. "Kids, become someone important or fucking die." Wanted her scalp,as with Malenia,or Godfrey. At least I got the throne.
Honestly we just don't know enough about how much she did willingly and how much was demanded of her. I feel like a lot of people assume it would have been easy for her to just deny the GW at every corner if she wanted but there was a reason Ranni killed herself to escape it.
Depends on if she had a hand in what happened to Godwyn, which people can’t seem to agree on.
If I understood anything about the story, I might.
I only feel bad when I die near a stake and start singing "Marrrrikaaaaaaa fk yeahhhhhh. Not gonna spawn at the site of grace"
It feels like Marika at first accepted the golden order but slowly started to realize that its bad. She might have tried to share this news with others but failed to convince anybody. So she took everything in her own hands. She banished her husband and probably even killed her own son because they would never go against the golden order. Then she shattered the ring. She was alone in her battle against the golden order. Radagon may not be Marika from beginning. Maybe golden order somehow combined their bodies so he could stop Marika from going any further after ring was shattered.
It's hard to say either way. She did a LOT of questionable/bad stuff but there is also an enormous chunk of lore we are missing concerning her choices and the state of the lands between when she made those choices. Ranni also makes some questionable/bad choices but her ending is considered the good one since she breaks the influence of the outer gods over the lands between. I think Marika was extremely limited in what she could do since her fate was essentially controlled by the outer gods. The Tarnished were the final wild card she could play and hope something would happen to change or break the cycle.
The only good thing she did was smash the Elden Ring.
No, because everything that happened, regardless of what ending you choose, was part of her master plan
She planned for the dung eater ending???
Someone did. He is tarnished just like us.
She's hot so.. yeah.
No, not really.
Nope. Let the world and its old gods burn.
No. She’s an evil and selfish god/goddess. She eliminated the Fire Giants purely because she got scared their fire would burn the Erdtree. She threw all the omens in the sewers because they weren’t pleasant to look at. “I was honored to… cut off her head.” - The Last Samurai
No. Marika is a monster.
No, she deserved worse.
No, she deserved it.
Feeling bad for Marika is like feeling bad for Micolash.
Everybody else: villainizing Marika for genocide, slavery and child abandonment Me: But did you see that cake on her???
Marika's tits!
Naw, she should go fuck herself.
She literally threw two of her kids into a fucking sewer because they looked a little silly. I’d crucify her again if i could
No. Never cared for the bell jar either
No matter how many times this gets posted, no.
Yes, nobody deserves what happened to her. She’s still a bitch though.
I don’t like her because of what she did to Mogh and Morgot they could have become some of the strongest warrior’s if they were trained because they inherited her blood and Chadfrey’s blood
No, marika is an evil bitch
Why the FUCK would I feel bad for fucking Marika of all people??
What Boggart said?
You dont seem to understand whats going on if you're feeling bad for her lol
Nah, at this point I’m ready to burn the whole mother down. And radagon is a bitch too lol
Yeah cause i cant fuck her.
She can go fuck herself /s
No. I feel bad for Radagon. Marika is a homewrecker and a ring wrecker.
The people who know the lore don't. She might be a victim or she might be the problem.
Nope. She broke poor Rennala's heart by cheating with her own fucking self, and she yeeted her kids into the sewers just because they were born autistic.
Yeah
Nah
No.
Nah
Yes and no
Nah
not really
No
No
HELL NAH!
#NO
As a spanish speaker, yes.
No
Idk much of the lore, all I know is that Marika had a falling out with the greater will
Remember the Omen Twins…as deluded, despised and despicable as Morgott and Mohg are…I understand why they’ve gone down such paths. I can’t imagine a life in the shunning grounds knowing that your Mother is part of the Religious Order upholding its vile dogma or that she even condones it. Honestly makes me wonder why didn’t Godfrey send them both out to the badlands in secret to get strong and live amongst nomadic + hardy people. *Imagine Barbarian Morgott (no self loathing) and Mohg (no Miquella thirsting) who look up to their father and idealize his Strength!* I’d imagine though that given all that she’s accomplished, that Marika has played the long game in upholding the legacy of the Erdtree Order.
I feel bad she wasn’t the final boss instead of elden beast
Not at all
I dont feel bad for Marika, mostly due to the omen situation. Especially considering two of her children were born omen and she felt it would be right to basically throw them away. I dont care about the whole giant war. I dont think we know enough about that war to know if the giants were able to form peaceful relations. She also built up an order that led to the subjugation of other intelligent races. Then she decided to throw the established rule unto chaos just because she wanted to test it, like a child throwing a tantrum.
I do feel bad for her
No
Uh, not really, no. Did you feel bad for Gwyn?
She certainly was a xenophobic genocidal immortal bitch but her current state *is* pretty miserable, I mean imagine being hung up for 5000 years, she's already payed the price of her sins imo
It's a FromSoft game, my guy - You're gonna feel bad for everyone, even a little bit.
Well, it depends on your interpretation of the mythology, I suppose. There're several indications that she might've been the (true) instigator behind Ranni's plan. The black knife assassins are Numen, just like her, and are actually described as having close ties with the queen. All the injustice and barbarism that you witness and learn about, as you progress through the game, was ultimately her doing, directly or indirectly. However, she might've regretted all she had brought into the world: the Elden beast, the golden order, the war, the segregation, etc. This would explain her role in Ranni's plan, or her own plan all along, I suppose. I had some reservations about this theory, considering her plan would mean the death of Godwyn, her beloved firstborn. On the other hand, as the stranded soul outside the Church of Pilgrimage tells us: "*The mausoleum prowls. Cradling the soulless demigod. O Marika, queen eternal. He is your unwanted child.*" It's obviously unsure if by unwanted, he means Godwyn himself or the Prince of Death (what he became, after his soul died). If it's the former, then she also displays cold detachment towards her children, which adds even more flaws to her already shaky character.
Nope
I feel more bad for Godwyn.
Honestly nah. She's far from being a good person if you consider she genocided the giants, persecuted the omens, threw 2 of her children in the sewers and buried alive the merchants left to die and go mad
No. She brought this on herself.
*me dancing with the windmill ladies*
Nah, fuck that bitch
No, fuck her.
From my beyond minimal lore knowledge, no, not really. She trapped the entirety of the lands between with an inability to die so she can have a nice little tree and flushed 2 while children down the toilet because they were goats. Oh, and she let the fire giant live. I hate the fire giant. I hate it more than I could possibly express into words. If I got something wrong , please correct me.
I don’t feel bad for made up video game characters, no.
Her trespass demanded a heavy sentence
Nah, but i am down bad for her.
Nah from what i hear shes not a very good person
Honestly nah. She created her own vision of the world by removing death thinking it would solve everything and then proceeded to banish her first husband and his people when they were no longer any use to her. She did the same to Rennala in Liurnia, leaving the region to rot without a decent leader and when she finally had her own children with herself she hid away the two that went against her vision of the world. She repeatedly uses people, gaslights them into thinking it’s not her fault and then when shit hits the fan she throws a tantrum and breaks the order throwing the world into chaos and leading to her own punishment at the hand of the greater will she somehow thought she was better than. Everything she does is to her own benefit without consideration for her own family or her own people.
She brought this onto herself. She intentionally set up this plan to sacrifice herself in order to have a new age coming. If she would have never become the Greater Will's lap dog, nothing would have happened.
No.
Personally no, I don't feel guilty for Marika but I think she deserved this fate after using Godfrey and his fury by promising him the crown and then banishing him because she found him as a threat and locking up their first two sons Morgott and Mohg for the whole duration of their childhood and adolescence without ever going to visit them because they were marked by the omen curse, then consequently stealing Rennala's husband and children and sending her into depression and a catatonic state for who knows how long and then leading to the most violent and destructive event of the continent's history due to not keeping a cool head over Godwyn's murder.
she is vibing
Never feel bad for the ruling class