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the-au-collector · 5 months

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Scalan Names

So something I've noticed about Missing Link is the names. It's very interesting that they're Roman myth names when the rest of the times we've seen Scala, we've only seen Scalans having Norse names. Especially since we have characters like Freya, whose name does come from Norse Myth, walking around with characters like Remus (and Neptune). I doubt Nomura did this on accident, so I'm curious about the implications of the Norse vs Roman names in Missing Link.

So I went back through Dark Road and Union X and gathered up all the characters with mythological names (yes this includes Missing Link beta content and theorizing). It's a long post, but stay tuned for the end where I've thrown all my Remus thoughts:

Skuld

So in Norse Myth, Skuld is a Norn. Specifically, the Norn of the future. The Norns also closely resemble the Fates from Greek myth, which is interesting. I find it really interesting that Skuld is named specifically after the Norn of the future when her game takes place in the distant past. Obviously all the Union Leaders travel to the future--so why is Skuld the only one named after a myth figure that specifically has to do with that? I can't wait to see how this all lines up later, since so far we've only had one game with her in it.

Baldr

He's the important guy, both in Myth and in Dark Road. In myth, he's the son of Odin that's deceived and killed by Loki, however it is Hod who deals the fatal blow. I feel like his name lines up with his myth inspiration very nicely--he's tricked by darkness, which ultimately leads to his death. However, one really interesting thing is that Baldr is said to survive Ragnarok, so does that mean we'll be seeing Baldr again someday?

Bragi

So Bragi is interesting. In myth, he's actually a poet who was diefied as the god of poetry. He's also known for his wisdom. The really interesting thing though is that myth Bragi's wife, Idunn, had a tree with the apples of youth, which keep the gods from aging. Really interesting that Dark Road's Bragi is actually Luxu, a guy who does not die... Clues lying in plain sight, really.

Vor

There really isn't much to find about Norse Myth's Vor, other than Vor was a minor goddess of wisdom. I just think it's cool that Vor's name is based off of a goddess of wisdom, since Vor's whole arc in Dark Road is figuring out who's right and what she wants to do.

Hermod

So in Norse myth, Hermod is the messenger god and a son of Odin. He also uses magic. In one particular myth, Hermod tried to rescue Baldr from the underworld, but ultimately failed. He has other myths where he acts like a messenger too. I don't really have much to say about Hermod's name inspiration and how it ties to Dark Road, but it is interesting how Hermod dies immediately after visiting the Underworld trying to find Baldr.

Urd

I... I have the least to say about her (at least about the main DR cast). In myth, Urd is a fate like Skuld, but she's the fate of the past. It's just weird she's named after the fate of the past and not the present. Or maybe not since this game is technically Xehanort's past...

Odin

Can you tell he was based off of Odin? He has the long beard, he's old, he's got a long coat, and a wide-brimmed hat (those are how Odin is usually represented). In myth, Odin is the god of war and also poets. He's got a horse named Sleipnir and was a magician. I know there are also theories floating around about Yen Sid potentially being Master Odin and honestly? Yen Sid fits the description.

Heimdall

In myth, Heimdall is the protector of the rainbow bridge and the entrance to Asgard. He also had heightened senses and didn't need to sleep. He and Loki actually ended up killing each other in myth as well. I have even less to say about the upperclassmen, honestly, especially ones like Heimdall who are only in a few scenes anyways. It is ironic that Heimdall was killed by darkness, though (and darkness, in my eyes, takes up a very Loki-like roll).

Helgi and Sigrun

I'm merging these two since their myths are very connected. So basically, Helgi was a Norse hero figure that is the son of Sigmund. He fell in love with a woman named Sigrun and ends up getting killed by her brother, Dragr. Sigrun eventually dies of sadness, but both she and Helgi are reborn. Sigrun is reborn into a Valkyrie named Kara whereas Helgi gets to keep his name. It's very interesting that their myths have aspects of reincarnation tied to them, which isn't true for any of the other DR characters. It's also very curious that Sigrun got a new name... and DR Sigrun looks like Strelitzia...

But that's just a theory a--

Vala

So Vala isn't an actual mythological figure, though they do show up in myths a lot. Basically, a vala is a priestess/shaman. In myth, they could use magic, see the future, and influence battles. I don't have much to say about Vala despite her being one of the more interacted with members of the upperclassmen, but she does appear to be the most wise/level-headed of the group.

Vali

I could have sworn Vali was a girl but Vali is, indeed, a guy in Dark Road. Anyways, in myth Vali is the son of Odin who was born to avenge Baldr and killed Hod. Vali does survive Ragnarok as well. It's just interesting how he has a reverse to his myth inspiration, considering be dies to Baldr and Darkness, though he does try to avenge Hod's death.

Hoder

The blind god of the night in Norse myth and son of Odin. Hod was actually tricked into killing Baldr and so was told by the other gods to avenge Baldr's death by fighting Vali. Vali won, Hod died, but when Ragnarok happened, both Hod and Baldr returned and survived Ragnarok. Very interesting implications when it comes to Kingdom Hearts...

Vidar

In myth, he's the son of Odin and was also fated to survive Ragnarok. He killed the wolf Fenrir, who's Loki's son who ate Odin. That's about all that's known about Vidar from myth. I do think it's very ironic that DR Vidar died to a Heartless when his myth inspiration killed Fenrir. Also interesting that his is the name of someone fated to survive Ragnarok despite him dying in DR...

Sigurd

I nearly forgot him but here he is! His name in myth is Siegfried. He's a hero figure who fought a dragon and awakened a valkyrie from sleep. In some stories, he's of noble blood but was an orphan. He's also associated with the ancient Germanic princess, Brunhild, who had Old Norse origins. Basically the story of Brunhild is that she vowed to marry the man who could beat her in strength, and Siegfried was able too, but he won her for another person. Brunhild got vengeful, and Siegfried died. Not every story of Brunhild leads to his death though.

He's a lot more interesting than I thought, especially for a character who shows up for like 2 lines in Union X's secret ending lol. Likelihood is, he's from another Society or the people in charge, and he welcomed Brain in Scala ad Caelum (this we know). Judging from his myth and what we already know about him, he's likely of noble or blue blood and is probably a Keyblade wielder. I wonder if we'll see any grand feats like fighting a dragon or if he'll die in Missing Link, though?

Freya

I can't really say much for Freya either since she's so new and her game isn't even out yet. She is the sister of Freyr in Norse Myth and is the goddess of love, fertility, battle, and death. So just keep in mind that she's an option for the tragic siblings trope.

Now for the really interesting guys!

Nept

I've decided to start with Neptune since Remus is a whole can of worms. So Neptune is the Roman god of the sea, and used to be just the god of freshwater until the Romans identified him with Poseidon. His myths are the same as Poseidon's: get eaten by his dad, get vomited out, draw sticks to see which realm he gets, yada, yada, yada. He was loyal to the Roman Zeus, Jupiter, and married Salacia, though he had many affairs. He also created horses and bulls!

We really don't know much about Nept since he only has a few released scenes so far, but the fact that he's probably named after the Roman god of water is interesting (i've said it before but Aqua's ancestor??? Perhaps???). I'm a little worried about the loyalty aspect though...

Remus

This. This fucking can of worms. Remus do you even know the implications of your own name?

So the myth of Remus and Romulus! Their mother, Rhea Silvia, was the daughter of the king of Alba Longa, Numitor. Numitor got removed from the throne by his brother, Amulius, who forced Rhea to take a vow of chastity by becoming a Vestal Virgin. Well she ended up having the god of war's, Mars', twin children: Remus and Romulus. They were cared for by Mars' sacred animals (she-wolf and woodpecker) and taken in by farmers, Faustulus and Acca Larentia. When the twins grew up, they killed Amulius and restored their grandfather to the throne. The twins then went on to found a city, and after Romulus built some walls around it, he killed Remus, and the city was named Rome after Romulus.

So this myth is interesting for a number of reasons. First and foremost: the siblings thing. Tragic siblings being a staple of the KH mobile games and all leaves Remus and Romulus perfect candidates for being the tragic siblings. This is also why I'm so worried about Remus being late to showing Player the Astral Realm because--is he already dead? His mythological self dies! It's practically written in the Book of Prophecies at this point!

However the second most important thing about the Remus and Romulus myth is how Remus and Romulus are the grandsons of a king who got overthrown. What if, somehow, the Baroque Society is the very last remnant of Ephemer's line/society? Somehow, what if Ephemer's line gets usurped and its last remains of his society dwindles down to at least 4 people (the question is if there's 5 members considering Freya's "another one" line)? After all, the scientists do say the founders' societies. Who are these other founders? Are they even real? What is going on with Scala ad Caelum's governing situation? We already know that it can't be good, but we don't know how bad it is.

Another really interesting thing is that Player specifically, very weirdly, reaches out to Remus when they're by Ephemer's statue. That scene was all shades of odd. Which begs the question--is Remus somehow connected to Ephemer? Is Remus is the descendant of Ephemer, and all these silver-haired characters are just there to throw us off? Did Ephemer's bloodline somehow get usurped? Is Missing Link going to be about reinstating his family line, or watching it all fall to ruin? Is Remus going to get killed by his own brother?

It's just. It's all shades of interesting and worrying at the same time. And I'm not even mentioning Remus' similarities to Lea!

Conclusion

Remus nearly made me forget this post had a point: the differences between Roman and Norse names. I thought maybe there was a connection between the "sons of Odin" thing going on, but no. Baldr and Hermod both are sons of Odin, but Baldr has a gold Master's symbol and Hermod doesn't. Even for the non-sons, Heimdall has a gold Master's symbol but Bragi doesn't.

It's also too early to really tell anything distinct about the new Missing Link characters, since a) we don't see much of them and b) the naming doesn't differentiate them either. Freya is a member of the Baroque Society alongside Remus and Nept. There's no distinction there either. There is no visual disctinction between Freya, Nept, and Remus except for their underclothes, and I'd say those design choices are more geared toward their personalities than anything else. They also don't have Master's symbols (which is another interesting thing. Sigurd doesn't have one either. Do they not exist yet? Are they the symbol of another society?). Even if they did, we still don't really know the difference between silver and gold ones, though one theory is gold = blue blood, silver = non-blue blood.

There is definitely a naming convention going on here, though. It's no coincidence that all of Dark Road's characters have Norse-inspired names, but not all of Dark Road's do. I just really want to crack why there's this distinction. I'm betting it has something to do with these noble houses/blue blood families, though (I'm willing to overlook Xehanort and Eraqus as they existed long before these concepts were even thought up.). For now I'll leave it at that and post this so that we have a bit of a collection of all the name inspirations for our myth-inspired Kingdom Hearts characters in one place.

Also, if anyone knows more about ancient myth than what Google could tell me, please let me know! I absolutely could have missed something!

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shitpostingkats · 2 years

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Mythological References in KH:DR (Pt.1)

All of the names, inspirations, and references to norse mythology I saw in the new dark road chapters, with a little bit of my own poetic license thrown in, because that’s half the fun with these roundups :D

This post WILL contain spoilers for the Dark Road finale.

PART ONE - The Characters

When the character designs for dr first dropped, featuring the key class that trained with Xehanort and Eraqus, a lot of people were quick to point out how they all take their names from norse gods/goddesses. They’ve already been covered in other excellent posts, plus, I’ll be talking about them more in my part two. But! With the update, we finally got to meet the eponymous upperclassmen, who also take their names from mythological figures

Vidar - The Silent God. Víðarr is the son of Odin, mostly attested as a god of vengeance, he killed Fenris wolf at ragnarok in response for the doggo devouring Odin. This fits the student leader we see in dr; broody, stern, and occupied with avenging the loss of his classmates. Some scholars propose his epithet of “silence” is specifically a part of his mourning, a part of the ritual retribution he takes part in. (More on that later)

Vala - Seer, sorceress. Not a god or goddess, Vala, or völva, is a northern germanic term for prophetess, which relates to Vala’s analytical predictions, as well as her references to her “vision” and it being unclear if she means her glasses, or a real ability to see the future. Interestingly, she is not named for the norn who sees the future. That honor goes to Skuld. So far, we’ve actually seen two norn names: Urd, meaning “That which has happened”, and Skuld, meaning “That which shall be”. I’ll let the Subject X = Skuld theorists do with that what they wish.

Vali - The Chosen. Not to be confused with Váli, the son of Loki. Váli is another son of Odin (Almost every male student is named after a god that, at some point or another, is attested as a son of Odin. The exceptions are Xehanort, Eraqus, and Helgi.) Váli, however, is a special kiddo, being born specifically to avenge the death of Baldr. According to the poetic edda, he grows to adulthood in a single day. “[He] will kill when one night old – he will not wash hand, nor comb head, before he bears to the pyre Baldr's adversary.” This not washing hand or hair is linked by some scholars to Víðarr’s silence, likely some lost ceremony of keeping a stoic lifestyle until one has delivered justice. He’s also described archer, which is probably where they got the ninja motif. An excellent marksman, he shoots the god who killed Baldr, killing them in return.

Hoder - The Battle Warrior. You may be wondering: who killed Baldr? Well, in the mythology, it’s his brother Hǫðr (Helped by Loki). In most myths said to be blind, (though this is disputed) Hǫðr unknowingly shot Baldr with the one thing that could kill him. And while she doesn’t cause his actual death in the game, it could be said that Hoder was the catalyst for Baldr being overcome by his darkness. They are said to both be reborn after ragnarock, finally free to live together in the peace they could not have in their first life. You know, like....

Ahem.

Heimdall - World-brightener. Now, sadly we’re starting to get to the three upperclassmen we know the least about. From the few lines they have, Heimdall does seem to be cool, levelheaded, and forward thinking, which matches with the watchman of the gods. Also, Heimdall is often referred to as “the whitest of gods”, probably where the character designers came up with the silvery hair and pale outfit. Other than that, we sadly don’t have enough information to make many connections.

Sigrun and Helgi - The valkyrie and the hunter. I grouped these two together because, again, we don’t know much about them, but also, their mythological counterparts are a pair. They’re kind of of the odd ducks. First off, they’re the only upperclassmen not named after gods. Sigrun was a valkyrie who fell in love with a mortal, Helgi Hundingsbane. However, she was betrothed to another man, and Helgi ended up going to war over the whole mess and dying at the hand of her brother. Heartbroken, Sigrun curses her brother and spends the rest of her life mourning and tending Helgi’s tomb. The second interesting thing is their story doesn’t end there. The original editor of the poetic edda notes that Sigrun and Helgi are actually the second incarnation of this pair; before, they were a married couple by the names of Sváfa and.... Helgi. And then, after their second lifetime, are reborn as Kára and *pinches nose* Helgi. (Seriously man, how do you keep getting reborn with the same name?!?) These two are the only that don’t bear a very strong resemblance to their original counterparts. Aside from being a male and female fighter, I don’t think they even exchange a single line of dialogue. In the downtime where everyone’s napping in the clearing, Sigrun isn’t sitting with Helgi, she’s curled up with Vala (Which I WILL be interpreting for my own purposes, thank you very much. Harold, they’re lesbians) I think the real character inspirations here are meant to be these ideas of reincarnation and rebirth. The cycle of lives, over and over. The memories of past lives and past love. Important themes they start pushing in this game.

That’s the upperclassmen, though! I’ll be making a part two where I cover more general norse inspirations, as well as just little details I noticed, and some theories on what we could potentially see in Missing Link!

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