CONFESSION:

Honestly, my one big problem with Ander’s’ chantry plan is that he never asked anyone. By that I mean, I’m convinced that any true act of revolution should be collaborative. But the Circle was just as devastated as the Templars, because they weren’t asked if this is the path they wanted the mages to take. What kinda person just makes that choice for their people, all by themself?

I know it’s popular to call Varric a spineless centrist mouthpiece with no center of morals bc he doesn’t like Anders and he does like Solas or whatever but…it actually makes a lot of sense? It’s a composed point of view that is neither spineless nor uncentered.

Varric is an imperfect character (shocking) but the reasons he talks about disliking Anders and yet liking Solas are consistent. He doesn’t like Anders bc Anders is rude to the majority of the DA2 party, because Anders runs ahead with revolutionary tactics without consulting constituents of those groups, and—now this is crucial—because by the time Inquisition rolls around, Anders has ALREADY caused intense strife and destruction in the city Varric calls home, the city where Varric becomes viscount. Kirkwall is a place Varric loves deeply. Of course he would be resentful?

Solas, in many ways, represents a redo of Varric’s relationship with Anders. He isn’t all that likable for Varric initially. He’s rude and he doesn’t consult constituents of his actions. Just like Anders! Except Varric enjoys their verbal sparring. He sees some evidence of Solas’s doubt. And there is room still to change Solas’s mind. There’s time. And maybe as Varric grows older and time passes, he sees a chance to change the things he couldn’t change before.

That’s…not inconsistent writing. That’s a tragic cycle.

it’s so funny seeing people say “anders fans will love gale” because i’m very charmed by gale but i HATE anders.

why are so many da fans supposedly against Islamophobia but the second Muslim fans and other fans of colour say that Chantry bombing jokes make them uncomfortable or aren't okay they're 'overreacting' and 'it's only a joke' and 'Anders was right stfu' like please I am begging for you to have some fucking decency and braincells.

Anders blew up a religious building, killing hundreds of people (not only from the explosion but the subsequent debris raining down on the city). It's not fucking funny?? What is wrong with you 😭😭

How about you actually listen to Muslim fans for once, shut your damned mouth and stop making shitty chantry bombing jokes

I will say, I think a lot of people make the Anders-Gale parallel for the wrong reasons and consequently a lot of people are angry at these people for the wrong reasons.

These two characters are similar, but not because of the "ohoho magic man+explosions" narrative. No, not at all; they have very different stories behind their explosives and I think comapring them from this specific angle does BOTH their stories a huge disservice. It erases huge chunks of their characters.

What they both have in common is being condescending (sometimes deliberately, sometimes not, but condescending all the same) and throwing themselves at you quickly and willingly (which every single other love interest does in BOTH games but only these two seem to be getting shat on for it). These characters are the exact same flavour in this regard, and that is why a lot of people see the similarities. The bomb-wizard parallel is obsolete due to the reasons behind either narrative and their possible resolutions.

These characters ARE similar and people are not superficial or obtuse for seeing these similarities (all the while acknowledging the differences between them, of which there are just as many). Just very much not for the most discussed reasons.

Sebastian Vael: *had, at the very minimum, neglectful if not outright emotionally abusive parents, was basically kidnapped and sent to the chantry against his will, decided to stay in the chantry bc Elthina actually gave him a choice which no other figure in his life had done to that point, found peace and belonging in the chantry, then found out his entire family was murdered, leaving him with massive survivor’s guilt and a throne he’s not even sure it’s right for him to reclaim, breaks his vows to the chantry to chase revenge which he immediately feels even more guilt about, finds out it was an old family friend that ordered his family’s deaths so that’s a fun betrayal he has to deal with, is torn between the peace of the chantry and his loyalty to Elthina or his duty to his home city and people of Starkhaven, despite all the trauma tries to stay optimistic and genuinely wants to help people, never preaches to a unwilling audience and instead engages in actual dialogue about his faith, seriously homeboy even acknowledges the chantry’s flaws but has hope it could be made better, opts to stay in Kirkwall to protect his pseudo-mother figure Elthina from a potential mage rebellion, only for her to die in a catastrophic explosion along with several of his brothers and sisters in the faith, whom he likely knew longer than he’d ever known Hawke and Co., and the chantry that he called home for more than a decade is also lost, and the guy who did it is literally right to next to him ranting about how he had no other choice but to commit wholesale murder, so he is understandably consumed by rage and grief and isn’t in the best state of mind, but if you kill the guy who murdered his chantry family he’s basically a ride or die no matter side of the mage-templar war you choose*

Y’all: ugh what a boring character. i hate his dumb temper tantrum at the end of the game. wish we could kill him.

This is a *slightly* Anders critical post! If that bothers you, do your thing. Scroll on, block, etc

But! I’ve seen at least three of my mutuals declare confusion as to why people find Anders’ actions in act three upsetting or a betrayal and the answer is super simple: dragon age is a game.

People don’t generally experience games the same way they do a book (and even then look at the way people treat characters like Skylar from Breaking Bad). When people play games they often have a high amount of transference/bleed to the character they are controlling. When we play games we often say ‘I beat Meredith’ not ‘Hawke beat Meredith.’ So when Anders says he needs help with something for Justice and it’s a bomb people are rightly pissed.

Because Anders didn’t lie to *just* Hawke he lied to the player too. It’s absolutely justified from his point of view and if Anders lied to a different character or roped the player in or we played from his POV, etc you wouldnt see this reaction.

DA2 is a fascinating game precisely because it restricts/violates player agency in a way almost no other BioWare game does. Any other game would let you ‘win’ Kirkwall but the player very much ‘loses.’ It makes perfect sense why most non fandom players hate Anders. I can’t think of another NPC in an RPG that lies to the player like he did. Maybe Kreia from KOTOR 2? And she was a straight up villain!

And yeah man if you want to talk about go ahead! I’ve been on tumblr forever but I don’t get fandom etiquette lol

🔥 anders

Send me a “ 🔥 “ for an unpopular opinion.

well...

i think... sometimes... i have ended up with a little bit more of a utilitarian take on anders than most (but not all) anders fans do? i mean, yes, the chantry boom happened because the circle was going to be annulled anyway, and yes, the mages were going to die anyway, and yes, if it was going to come to violence in any case, anders didn't really have a choice.

but. but. the idea that he did it with the intention of saving the kirkwall circle is what makes me go hmmmm sometimes. i've talked abt it with other people on here (u know who u are, i wont tag u in case u dont wanna get dragged into this) but anders repeatedly states that his ultimate goal here is the freedom of all mages, everywhere. and even with a romanced, pro-mage hawke, he's still unsure whether or not hawke would continue to side with him, or help him, or help the circle. so i actually kind of think that pushing the circle and the templars into open & violent conflict with each other - he tried to set it up so mages could still win either way. if the mages successfully defended the circle from the templars, it would serve as an inspiration to other circles to rise up. but i think he calculated and accepted the possibility that the kirkwall mages wouldn't successfully defend themselves from the templars. especially if he was convinced hawke wouldn't side with the mages. he considered and accepted that the circle would be annulled, for nothing. and it would serve as a warning to mages everywhere - you are not safe. i think he considered the potential loss of the kirkwall circle, weighed it against the potential freedom of every single mage in southern thedas, and decided it would be an acceptable loss. which is cutthroat, admittedly, but. well. justice is hard, as anders says.

One of my biggest issues with Anders in DA2 will always be that he was a stand in for Valena and plot points weren't fully rewritten with him in mind. Allow me to give examples.

If you're just nice to Anders, he assumes there's romantic intentions and is angry if you reject the idea. What we know about Anders in Awakening means this doesn't make sense. He's a flirt. But for Valena this would make sense. A calous elf who trusts no one is shown complete kindness and understanding? It would totally track for her to be angry at rejection. This moment made me dislike Anders a lot during my first playthrough, it didn't fit him.

Next is just in general how he acts and how departed from awakening he is. If awakening and 2 had more time between them then sure we could argue that the years just changed him. But it hadn't been years. The awakening timeline is a mess but da2 Anders appears barely months after (if that). Valena being introduced as untrusting, slightly uptight, and immediately reactive fits perfect though.

With that said: if they ever were to remake da2 these are some story changes I'd make to Anders to allow the plot to flow better with him.

1. He flirts with everyone. For Fenris it could be done to get a rise out of him. The hatred between them is still clearly there just not as volatile as it can get. He could grow feelings for hawke but it's never brought up until act 2 when he wants to know where the relationship is going. You can't sleep with him without forming a romance but if the player opts for a "I'm just friendly flirting" Anders let's it go. In act 3 when we see him at his lowest he doesn't friendly flirt with anyone.

2. Justice and him are on bad terms at the start of 2. In the book for anders he was kicked out of the wardens after eating people. I want him to have a problem with that and actually be thinking letting himself be possessed is a mistake. It's Hawke's response in act 1 that begins his journey to either reconciling with justice, or attempting to be free from justice. This would also shape how he turns out in act 3. If you support him we see him how he is in game. If you tell him to separate we see him become less of himself as he becomes desperate to avoid what justice plans.

3. The scene with fenris being sold needs to change. That scene honestly should be the thing that causes companions to abandon hawke. Only reuniting in the final to defend the city because everyone is home there. The only exception is if we have vengeance by this point who thinks fenris is getting his justice for hating mages. But even then it's iffy.

4. Again I want to see anders change over the game depending on hawke. If a hawke constantly encourages him and justice to stay together and work through things we see him become more radical and willing to do whatever it takes to gain mage freedom. Even if some must die. The anders we knew is no longer there, but for many this anders is what's needed. What's right. For players who reject what anders could be we see him become almost a shell of himself. Still unrecognizable but also fighting best he can against what's to come. Maybe in this version he tries to warn circle mages, tries to tell hawke, heck maybe even attempts to tell thrask since he's one of the better templars. But he's incapable of doing so. He still wants mage freedom but he's so caught up in his own struggle he can't really fight for it. Still not a great outcome.

I've been thinking on these for a minute. Dragon age 2 is both a loved and hated game for me. Because I feel like it did a lot of damage to the dragon age story but also gave us such good parts as well.

i hate 95% of a/nders takes on here

CONFESSION:

Y’all I don’t even like Anders and I’m tired of hearing about him approving of giving Fenris to Danarius. Do I think it’s out of character or bad writing? Not really Act 3 him is in a bad place in a ton a ways so him being a weird myopic asshole in this specific instance doesn’t seem that wild to me. Also, it’s a game with an approval system and at some point the writers are just filling out the options.

Even more importantly though, nobody fucking does it. Outside of the evilest of evil runs and embarrassing edgelords no one is giving Fenris back, this isn’t some common occurrence on every playthrough and we don’t need to bring it up in every single discussion of Anders’ character. Like shit there are plenty of other reasons not to like him we don’t have to sift through shit nobody actually does

“Why did BioWare decide Anders is a villain” because he is. He’s a racist babes. He paints Isabela as a whore and calls Fenris a wild dog. He treats Merrill like a pariah and makes fun of Seb’s faith and goads Aveline on her dead husband.

I’ve said this before but his writing is not a bug it’s a feature and the feature is asshole. Of course characters don’t like him.

Y'all need to be giving Anders' Fenris is a dog and Fenris deserves to be sold back into slavery stands the same amount of energy y'all give Sebastian's musing of turning in the violent possessed mage who'd threatened to murder his motherly figure

“Anything awful Anders says is the fault of his writer and not him as a character. Anything Sebastian may say, however, is a personal character flaw.”

Anders said he and Justice only disagree on a few things and one of them is definitely Anders’ racist tendencies (especially since Justice disapproves if you talk smack about the Dalish in Awakening)

Whenever Anders says some racist bullshit I take comfort in the fact Justice is probably tearing strips off him in their shared brain

well, made a tier list: dragon age companion edition

naturally, this is all in good fun, i don’t think less of people who like characters that i don’t because i’m a normal person, etc. etc.