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Discussion on a r/ffxivdiscussion post
In terms of pure plot, he is the major force behind the fall of Garlemald (beyond its natural causes of death) and later a background character on his own journey that culminates with Ultima Thule. He is a slow-burn fakeout villain deceived by Fandaniel, launching us into the meat of Endwalker.
Thematically, he is one of the most central characters of the game, albeit representing different things at different times.
In Stormblood he’s the logical endpoint of Garlean fascism: an unfeeling monster with unquestioned authority second only to the Emperor, distributing violence for the Empire swiftly and absolutely with no mind for petty morality. The flipside is that Zenos is only capable of and defined by that violence, there’s nothing personal about anything he does whether it be to his victims or his “allies.” It doesn’t even sate a natural cruelty, its boring work he does in absence of any kind of goal or joy. In fact, when he does act for himself it’s often to the direct detriment of Garlemald, Stormblood only happened because he allowed the Eorzean forces to keep the Wall in hopes of facing the WoL, later letting them live and assist the revolutions to cultivate a worthy adversary. The reason someone like Gaius or Fordola can even be considered for redemption is that there is a human heart behind their actions and beliefs, misguided and harmful as they were. No such for Zenos, he fires on his own men without much thought beyond logistics, if that.
Of course he’s Mr. Postcredits for most of Shadowbringers, but you see the above ideas reach their logical conclusion in the 5.0 content. He kills himself after achieving what he believes to be the apex of his existence, he has in losing satisfied his own definition of self and therefore has no reason to continue. But Zenos continues anyway, and now tries to recapture his moment, actively refusing to redefine himself. For the first time in years, Zenos has something he’s looking forward to. But the empire and the Ascians are now obstacles to that, and Zenos is only violence, so he moves to destroy them and reclaim his body. The evil Garlemald birthed came home to roost; and an unfeeling monster killed their leader, plunged them into civil war, and enslaved the remnants of the people to reconstruct its unattainable ideal.
That, as already discussed, ends the way it does and Zenos’ thematic purpose changes wildly. I believe the plan was always for Garlemald to self-destruct, the sensationalized Garlemald expansion was still theoretically going to end with Anima as the final boss, so a smoking husk of a city was always what we were going to find ourselves in. Endwalker was likely little more than a post-it note when Stormblood was in production, so its hard to say just how much of Zenos’ arc was planned ahead, but he was, in a way, always an existentialist. And it just so happens that they wrote EW to deal directly with existentialism.
Zenos exists in EW for 3 main things: to get the plot going, to be a hype pop-off for the grand finale (ymmv), and to give his speech to Julius on finding meaning. EW is about choosing to find meaning even in the face meaninglessness, hope in the face of despair, and Zenos is the character who lays it out plainly. Even at the end, he balks at the idea of despair being any kind of threat, he personally ascribes so little meaning to it. Obviously he isn’t a paragon of virtue, but he ends up is a weird way representing this moral core of the story. And at the climax of the story... he’s kinda whatever you want him to be? If you always resonated with his vision of the glory of combat, this battle is pure catharsis and the culmination of 4 years of edging. If you always thought he was an irredeemable sociopath who needed putting down, or just fucking annoying, well here’s your chance to bury him and move on. I think the only people underserved are those who would choose to walk away, but you can’t get everyone and, hey, cool fight either way.
Zenos is often summarized as an “endgame raider” which isn’t... entirely inaccurate but I don’t think it really captures what Zenos is. Zenos is, in my obvious opinion, a deep character defined so much by his environment and his goals (or lack thereof). Hell, I haven’t even gotten into his warrior poet schtick, there is so much people bulldoze over. You don’t have to agree with my points or interpretations, but here they are.
Also he’s a tall, dommy, blonde, morally bankrupt hunk with money and power. Did I mention he’s tall?
I appreciate the time of a well put together response. I hate Zenos, hated him since he came out, but I could appreciate what they were pulling off and I think his ending in Stormblood was well done, and good curtain call to put that chapter to the end and offing yourself off the stage after a “brilliant performance” fit so well.
I just think they simultaneously wanted to put him on the front stage while were desperately trying to keep him off it as well in EW. This weird dance of does he matter or not felt like such confusing and CONFUSED writing. He felt more like a post-it note to stick in.
I get why some people like him due to his simplicity, his VA (Who is amazing) and his golfbag carrying ass, but I think even that simplicity could’ve been handled much better without sacrificing so many juicy moments that could’ve come from that which I feel again are a symptom of that “We need to wrap this shit up” mentality in EW that the writers had.
I just don’t buy into the “he had a goal all along and he would do anything to go to it” when a simple talk down from ALISAIE manages to make him go “Doihhh.. Okay.” Even Krile’s dumb decision to send him TO US feels like writer clairvoyance because the writer whispered to her ear that everything will end up just fine and we needed to have a cool moment at the end. When it goes completely against her former experiences.
Well, here’s my interpretation.
Zenos’ whole arc in EW is, in part, about him struggling to be relevant. He wants to be the centerpiece of a grand conflict between the forces of good and evil that shakes the foundations of all creation. It’s the only reason he tolerates Fandaniel’s presence, Fandango wants to kill all life in a spectacle much like what I just described, so by helping him Zenos can become the villain of the tale, gain unfathomable strength, and have his epic duel with the sufficiently motivated WoL. Things of course go wrong when Fandaniel, or rather Amon, takes over Zodiark and gets the WoL to accidently do an apocalypse. Zenos genuinely is surprised at the betrayal, blinded by his enthusiasm at almost achieving his dream.
This is the major turning point of the whole plot, but to focus on Zenos, he is immediately made irrelevant. There are bigger fish to fry, and he knows it too. Any battle at this point isn’t some grand conflict as much as a scuffle, and that’s not *the point.* It needs to be big, important, climactic. Because Zenos Yae Galvus is a fucking cringe nerd.
Zenos spent much of his childhood reading heroic tales, and other than that there is no indication of why he is... himself. But what you do see, or more accurately hear, is that those stories stayed with him. FF14 has always been flowery in its language, but Zenos is a step above, second only to Urianger in unnecessary verbosity. However, his flavor is less Shakespeare and more Beowolf. He will say shit like “I will drink a sea of souls and *gorge* myself on the darkened moon” to no one, on his own. When we face him in the menagerie he goes on an unhinged rant waxing philosophical on the nature of your relationship and is borderline horny in his description of us tearing open his neck and drinking his blood. Zenos nigh exclusively speaks in poetry, weaving reality into a tale for the bards eons in the future (not to imply vanity, more a vibe).
He doesn’t *just* want to fight the WoL, it has to be more than that. He could have at any time walked into the Rising Stones and demanded a runback, and the WoL would be glad to answer no matter their opinion of Zenos because of the situation. He wants, as I said, a grand conflict between the forces of good and evil that shakes the foundations of all creation, with him and the WoL as centerpieces. And he fucks it up.
When the WoL meets Zenos after the Moon he’s aimlessly wandering the plains of Garlemald killing Blasphemies... out of boredom? To “hone his blade”? He’s killing time and pouting, he didn’t get his grand clash and likely never will at the rate the world is going. He stops to lecture Julius on social constructs (which is weirdly kind but likely just because, again, bored) and makes to leave. Alisaie calls out to him.
I doubt that Zenos cared much at all about anyone giving him “the time of day”, but Alisaie points out that he will be alone if he doesn’t change. This is where it gets interesting. If we go back to Stormblood, to that final battle in Ala Mhigo in the short span of time of the final dungeon boss to the aftermath of fighting him as Shinryu, Zenos actually does change. He starts out referring to the WoL as a beast, a savage, just a new bit of sport to make his existence less numb if only for an instant. But he shifts. After our first battle he calls us friend, he builds up a mythology of both of you as godslaying titans. I think he starts to see the WoL as a person.
Zenos doesn’t seem to see people as people generally, even his own flesh and blood father is easily disposable when inconvenient or transformed into a doomsday device. None of that is true of the WoL post-Stormblood; sure he technically wants to fight to the death, but the death isn’t as important as the fight, the part where we meet again. We become his obsession, a hyper-fixation. To Zenos Yae Galvus, we may be the only other person in the world. It isn’t a coincidence that, after Alisaie’s remark, he returns to the menagerie and wonders what exactly he sought in the WoL. Meaning? Sport? Companionship but in a fucked up Hegelian Dialectics kinda way?
Zenos has to do what he bluntly refuses to in the past: redefine himself. He shifts his dreams and goals to include helping others in the name of his ultimate satisfaction. And at the very end, he lays himself bare as a man that can only enjoy combat, and earnestly invites us to partake. No tricks, no grand conflict, just two people at the very edge of creation (ok maybe he still kinda got his big epic showdown but still). *And yet he seems to die with regrets, unlike in Stormblood.*
What did you discover within yourself on the other side of satisfaction Zenos?
Anyway, the Krile thing is kinda handwavy and not lingered on. I can imagine a scenario where Zenos offers aid and considering the apocalypse she makes a snap decision that she later regrets considering she seemed pretty frazzled when meeting her after Ultima Thule, but that’s just something I invented that’s plausible, not hard canon. (EDIT: New but just as dubiously canon theory, on first meeting Krile remarks on how soulless Zenos’ eyes are, could have been different after his soul searching) You could say the same about everything I wrote here, but this is what was going through my mind for most of EW. Make of it what you will.