#cullen critical

[bikorarey]

Redemption comes from counter acting the wrong action that requires the redemption.

Thom Rainier led an assassination mission during a civil war that killed one noble family before he fled Orlais. After fleeing Orlais he was recruited to be a Grey Warden and when his mentor was killed, he took his name and went around Ferelden and the Free marches fighting Darkspawn and rescuing people. We meet him training farmers to fight Bandits that are harrassing them.

Rainier is redeemed before we even realize he's done something that requires redemption.

Cullen was directly and indirectly involved in the abuse, tranquilization, and murder of dozens of mages in Kirkwall. He is second in command to Knight Commander Meredith and believes in her convictions that all mages are weapons. He plainly says to Hawkes face (possibly a mage themselves) that Mages are not people. He goes along with on and off screen crimes against mages and doesn't change until Meredith makes a move to kill Hawke in the finale, regardless of Hawke's choice on who to support.

In Inquisition, he vehemently argues against recruiting the mages to seal the breach, contradicting the Inquisitor and other advisors at every positive mention of the mages in Haven. He claims to not be a member of the Templar order but pushes to recruit them despite the Lord Seeker telling you to fuck off in Val Royeaux.

He tells the Inquisitor about how templars become addicted to Lyrium and his character arc is fully revolving around his own relationship to taking lyrium for his templar abilities. His "good" ending is helping other templars break their lyrium addiction.

This is not redemption. He does not counteract his behavior from kirkwall. He does not aim to save mages from the abuses he and other templars inflicted on them. He wants the Inquisitor to leave them to their fate with Alexius. At no point does he aim to change how templars operate, just that they won't fall into addiction to a substance they willingly consume for power.

That is not redemption.

#Dragon Age #Blackwall #Cullen Rutherford #Cullen critical

[v-arbellanaris]

PLEASE share about the Cullen Cult Arc

sighs. this is my second time writing this post ;~; literally why does the autosave option exist if tumblr doesnt actually bother to autosave anything, i dont fucking get it.

this is going to be much briefer than the original post i wrote because im still REELING over how tumblr just ate the entire fucking post. its fucking gone. and idk if i have the energy or mental capacity rn to rewrite the whole thing. basically, this arc - which is the arc i developed for him in vee verse - is the arc i think cullen should've had in dai.

firstly, i'm not retconning anything he said or did in dao or da2. this is because those things serve a narrative purpose. cullen is a good templar - that's the entire crux of the problem. he exists in these two games as a narrative tool; he represents the views of the chantry. as such, anything you do with his character arc cannot be divorced from the reality of the mage/templar conflicts, and the glaring issues of the chantry and must, actually, address and involve those things, because cullen is a product of his surroundings. i'm not saying this to minimise or give him excuses for anything he's said or done, but that is made true for him by his very positioning in the narrative as being the chantry's voice. for most of my playthroughs, which lean pro-mage, cullen is an antagonistic force - he has to say and do horrific things, and it would be stupid for me to retcon the horrible things he did.

secondly, my main issue comes from his writing in dai - probably to no one's surprise. i am not unopposed to having a redemption arc for him in dai - this is villain-fucking the blog, sorry not sorry - but the problem is that he does not have one. to have a redemption arc, the following two things needs to happen:

the realisation/acknowledgement/knowledge/whatever that he caused harm to people with his actions/inactions

addressing the False Belief that he has embraced that has previously justified his harmful actions/inactions in order to accept the Truth (this is just basic character narrative construction).

and dai fails to do both of these because the writing team in inquisition is physically incapable of admitting the chantry is wrong and has done wrong and will continue to do wrong. they are physically incapable of looking at fucked up power dynamics and clear cases of oppression and not going "but what if the oppressed people. wanted to be oppressed. NEEDED to be oppressed, even."

which leaves his character arc - whether you want to consider it redemptive or not - confusing. he's trying to shake a lyrium addiction? sure, okay. but why is he addicted to lyrium? why is being addicted to regular ol' lyrium bad? it's not blue lyrium that killed meredith, it's not blue lyrium that corypheus and samson are using.

you get confusing things like cullen's entire character arc being centered around lyrium addiction... but no one seems to give a shit if the inquisitor takes lyrium and becomes a templar, except cullen. you get confusing things like cullen's entire character arc being centered around recovering from lyrium addiction and the templar route in dai and you get to the scene where all the templars get their lyrium draughts. the ceremony and chanting and celebration around getting the lyrium, when barris takes his draught, which is frankly revolting. but it highlights the inconsistency - lyrium, this scene tells us, is good. because the templars are good, and they use it for good. yet cullen's entire arc is about overcoming his lyrium addiction, but don't worry!!!! templars are still good and lyrium is still good. its fucking INCOHERENT!!!!!!

he is addicted to lyrium because that is how the chantry maintains absolute control over its templars. it is a mind-altering substance that causes paranoia, which the chantry specifically takes advantage of and feeds with their all mages are inherently dangerous rhetoric, which is a false rhetoric, as i've pointed out before. but instead of acknowledging any of that, dai's writing goes "lyrium is Bad because [mumble mumble] and its So Important that he doesn't take it so that [mumble mumble]".

because the story is physically incapable of uttering anything even vaguely critical of the chantry.

so, this covers my main issue with his writing in dai. i would ideally try to fix it - without retconning anything he did in dao or in da2. this is what the cullen cult recovery arc is referring to.

i'm not going to go into it in too much detail but the templar order - inclusive of the seekers - fits a lot of the parameters of a cult. specifically, the BITE model, but also this checklist, and a whole bunch of other parameters i found when researching into cults for this specific reason. (which. makes sense. seeing how the orlesian chantry is was also technically a religious cult that becomes the main religion of the lands by actively slaughtering all the other sects)

but what's particularly interesting about it specifically is that, in-world, no one else seems to think it's a cult. for all of cullen's views, he is not the extreme end in da2 - alrik is. meredith is. what's particularly disturbing to me about cullen's point of view is that because he's a product of his environment, because he's a narrative tool representing the chantry's views, cullen's opinions and actions are actually a normality test. people in thedas don't find cullen's views repulsive because most average joes in thedas agree with him. i think it's easy to forget cullen isn't the outlier in-universe - we are.

but, canonically speaking, this is what happens: cullen, like most good antagonists getting a redemption set up, misses his chance to Embrace Change at the end of da2. he sides with meredith too late for it to matter or make a difference - mages (who you learn on the templar route, he's not exactly eager to kill) who he's supposed to protect are already dead. but what happens in kirkwall shakes him to his core and he looks to leave the order entirely - a good step.

the problem is that he leaves the order to join the inquisition. the inquisition, which is headed by the left and right hands of the divine. the right hand of the divine is a seeker herself. the inquisition is spearheaded and justified by the divine, who he has been trained for most his adult life to be subservient to. the divine who formed the inquisition to replace the templar order and hired him to essentially train and recreate the order.

worse, still. no one thinks he did anything wrong. kinloch was not his fault, it was the fault of greagoir and the older templars who were simply not vigilant enough, meredith told him. how he acted to keep order in the circle and the city after the viscount was executed is admirable, cassandra tells him. he was only following orders, leliana admits grudgingly, he stood up for what was right when meredith went too far. no one thinks he did anything wrong, because he is a good templar. because all the atrocities he committed were not committed against people - they were committed against mages, who are not people, not like you and me.

cullen hops from one cult to the next. the inquisition is the exact same thing he's always done and known, just repackaged - quite literally, considering the inquisition's symbol. but canonically, he thinks it's something different. he wants it to be different.

it's not, though.

so, the thought process behind my thoughts for him boils down to this: how does he get the language to describe exactly why this is wrong? how does he get the language to describe why it matters, why it's important, that he hurt real people? how does he get past the Lie that he believes - that he has to be a good templar, to stop anything like kinloch from happening again, since kinloch happened because they weren't vigilant enough, because they were too sympathetic to mages?

his arc shouldn't have just been about overcoming lyrium addiction. his arc should have been a story about recovering from being part of a hate group, a story about recovering from part of a cult.

there's several ways to go about it, i think. and if you want to specifically know how i'm going to do it, you guys should encourage me to write vee verse 😌

#asks #vee rewrites da #admittedly i cheated a bit but i gotta leave SOMETHING for the fic!!!! #cullen critical #just in case #bioware critical #dai critical

[vigilskeep]

scrolled through my writing document to see if i have anything scribbled down already that’s speculative abt inquisition era keir and um

you know what. i rlly don’t know what else i expected

#keir hawke #how am i supposed to tag this #cullen critical #? #is that helpful #theres a few snippets in here nothing much i dont rlly know enough abt the skyhold vibe to go in on detail #scribble tag

[systlin]

Whatever else Cullen Rutherford did and setting aside all of the discourse about his 'redemption arc' and all that, he is a shitty commander send tweet

#Cullen critical #The quartermaster got in on nepotism and these supply lines are horseshit #Why is the Inquisitor personally having to mine ore to support your forward camps #that is poor fucking logistics right there #His biases blind him to properly utilizing magic tactically #I will not forgive him for not having the mountains around haven mapped out #why the FUCK cullen #You should have had a plan about how to abandon haven and fall back in case of an attack ALREADY

[origins-cheese-wheel]

It's strange how hated Loghain is in the fandom but how loved Cullen is.

Loving Loghain elicits disgust from most people, while loving Cullen is generally accepted. Even though both of them have committed horrendous crimes. But the difference is that Cullen is constantly coddled by the fans and the devs.

Whereas Loghain is not, you can give him a punishment that fits his crimes. The "best" case scenario for him is getting forcefully conscripted into the Grey Wardens and getting shipped off to Orlais, of all places. The "worst" - well, you get to literally behead him, in front of everyone attending the Landsmeet and no one will oppose you except Anora who just got sprayed by a gallon of her father's blood.

Meanwhile you can't even be particularly rude to Cullen, let alone call him out on his bullshit. And he is never truly faced with consequences for his genuinely abhorrent actions. Also the "redemption" he gets is frankly nonexistent.

Yeah Loghain was a main villain...but so was Cullen...?? Did his fans collectively forget about that?

Yeah Cullen has a tragic backstory...but so does Loghain? Does that excuse their actions? No, but a whole lot of Cullen fans try to bring all that into a conversation when someone criticises their fave.

So allow me a similar luxury. Not to excuse Loghain's actions of course but to get on even footing with everyone trying to wave away Cullen's crimes via invoking the power of a tragic backstory:

During the Orlesian invasion Loghain's family lost their farm due to increasing taxes, essentially making them homeless.

The resistance they put up was futile in the face of the Orlesian soldiers who easily overpowered them and subsequently made Gareth and Loghain watch them violate Loghain's mother before brutally murdering her.

After fleeing Oswin, they were on the run until Maric unknowingly lead the Orlesians into their camp. Loghain ran away with him, however to buy them time, amongst others Gareth sacrificed himself.

Loghain had no siblings and both his parents were dead at this point.

He had that whole situationship with Rowan that he could not realistically pursue in good conscience as she was betrothed to Maric. This put a strain on Loghain's relationship with them both.

In 9:25 Dragon, Maric disappeared. Loghain tirelessly searched for his closest friend for two years.

Shortly after, in 9:28 Dragon, Loghain also lost Celia, his wife.

I'd say he lived around 80% of his life in utter misery. Not that it nullifies anything vile he has done but since so many people love to bring up Cullen's past while defending him...

So let's not be hypocritical.

Either be hellbent on hating Cullen too- or have mercy for Loghain as well.

#dragon age #dao #da2 #dai #loghain mac tir #anti cullen #cullen critical #its not even just cullen pissing me off atp its this weird fucking attitude the fandom has where most people love cullen #even though he has commited literal atrocities #yet loghain is vehemently hated #im not saying he should be loved by all and he has done nothing wrong but holy shit #most people foam at the mouth when its time to kill him yet protect cully wully with everything they have :| #cw: sa #also im not saying loghain got a redemption arc cause like...he didnt but also he was pretty much written out of the story? #save for a possible cameo in dai

[arimabari]

touching inquisition for the first time in ages and have decided I am going to romance Cullen. I will however be making him much much worse.

#Dragon Age #Cullen Critical #Sort of #I will be crafting my own rivalmance in my head where my cult leader mage Trevelyan goads him into falling in love with her #which she desires for her own perceived protection #no redemption arc we go down hand in unlovable hand

[kaltacore]

one thing that especially irks me about cullen's so-called redemption is the attempts to redeem him through cole's words.

templars' abuses affected cole so badly it damaged his connection to the fade and his own nature. he was a spirit of compassion and witnessing what was happening in white spire turned him into a killer. he murdered lord seeker lambert in cold blood for what he did and most of the time he doesn't regret it — and then he just. drops the "he's not like the other girls" lines about cullen.

and this is such a lazy and annoying move. another thing that is established about cole is that you particularly can't lie to him — about your real feelings and intentions at least. whatever he states about other characters must be true and it is often used as a tool to deepen the characterizations of the main cast and in cullen's case it is just. blatant apologism. there's literally a banter where cole talks about atrocities commited by the templars and then he adds "oh no but cassandra and cullen aren't like that" and never elaborates. the game itself doesn't elaborate either.

like please don't tell me that the spirit who was shaken by knowledge that an innocent boy can die from starving because his jailors simply forgot about him would look in the eyes of a person who used to be meredith fucking stannard's right hand and still thinks that her methods were just a little too harsh but necessary and justified and say yeah. this guy is such a friend of mages. if only there were more templars like him

#this is such an overt bullshit like i don't even know where to start #and my main problem is that. i don't care about cullen. his redemption arc sucks because it's non-existent. but i do care about cole #and i love his cryptic comments so much because they really give you a look into character's head in a weird but interesting manner #and then. this happens. and you can say that “oh but it means that cullen's REAL attitude is compassionate towards mages!” #but the thing about cole's comments is. he does expose characters' thoughts #but you've already had an opportunity to catch whatever cole makes clear in these banters #like. vivienne is afraid and it is shown in the game. dorian struggles with attachment and it is shown in the game #cullen struggles with whatever he's done to mages and ?????? ah yes #and i'm just. so mad. because i love what cole adds to the storytelling. and there's so much potential but he's used for apologism #because whoever wrote cullen was too lazy and/or preoccupied with making a knight in shining armor out of him #you can also point out that cole is used for solas apologism as well. but in solas' case you can catch that he feels conflicted #about his actions and goals. so yeah. it works. at least partially. so my point stays. #cullen's case is like. by the book example of horrendous breaking of 'show don't tell' rule #practically cole breaks this rule constantly. but as i said it doesn't feel off with other characters because of what has been shown alread #cullen critical #dragon age

[crossdressingdeath]

Oh. Right. I'd forgotten about that fun little conversation where Cullen tells Cassandra to nominate a new commander and she refuses. And there's no opportunity to say "No, you don't get to make that call, you will nominate a new commander, that is an order". Genuinely, for all that Quiz is supposedly the most powerful person in Thedas it really does feel like they're trapped under the advisors' and Cassandra's control! This is my organization, Cullen is my commander (against my will, but even so); why the fuck does Cassandra get the final say on whether or not Meredith's right-hand-man currently going through withdrawal stays as commander?! Shouldn't that be the decision of... oh, I don't know, the Inquisitor?!

For once in his entire fucking life Cullen is putting someone else above himself. He looks at himself and his situation and says "No, this is not a position I should be in, it's not good for me or the Inquisition", and Bioware chooses this occasion to not let the player side with their special, special boy? The one time he's actually right? He's going through withdrawal. For five whole seconds it seems to actually be affecting him. He's not in any state to be leading armies and he knows it. And beyond that I reiterate my usual point of Meredith's second-in-command, leader of her death squads already being quite possibly the worst possible choice for a prominent member of the Inquisition if they want to appear even neutral in the mage/Templar conflict, which as a peacekeeping force they really should. He shouldn't be commander, and now he doesn't want to be commander, and if you like him it's also clear that it's getting increasingly unhealthy for him to be commander, so why can't Quiz just tell Cassandra that she doesn't get to just decide that their commander should be a high-ranking Templar going through withdrawal?! She should not have that power! She isn't even one of the Inquisitor's official advisors or seconds-in-command, much less the one in charge! It's not good for Cullen to be in such a high-stress position, it's not good for the Inquisition to have one of the leaders of the atrocities in Kirkwall in such a prominent role, and if your Inquisitor is a mage (or an elf, given the whole thing about Templars being sent in to harass and sometimes slaughter the Dalish for the local lord/the Chantry) it's not good for them to be forced to work so closely with someone who was part of the group largely responsible for oppressing them and who still clearly shares the beliefs of that group! He shouldn't be the commander for so many reasons, and many Inquisitors have good reason not to want him as the commander, so why does Cassandra get to unilaterally decide that he stays?

#dragon age inquisition #cassandra critical #cullen critical #FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU #'you're the most powerful person in thedas! unless you want to do something your advisors or cassandra disagrees with' #'in which case... sucks to be you!' #it REALLY feels like in the original version of dai quiz was supposed to be a chantry puppet #because if they really are In Charge they WOULD be able to just... order cassandra to pick a new commander #or order cullen to stand down when it became clear he shouldn't be in this position #but if they're supposed to be on the chantry's leash then it would make SENSE that they don't get a say

[moontheoretist]

How views change with time

I used to be the type of Cullen stan that insisted that he must have not known about the abuses, must have been blindsided by the others or something similar, but the one that still tried to hold him accountable for his bullshit. I still think it could be possible to some extent for him to be blindsided by his subbordinates when it comes to more vicious abuses that happened in Kirkwall. But I also no longer think he needed to be blinsided, considering all the things he says. At the time I tried not to take people who speak like him as people who would not react if situation called for it (i.e protect someone from the abuse) or join in on the abuse itself, but now I'm older and I know that talking like that is a sign that he may avert his eyes when he happens to see something he can't reconcile with his views or will try to rationalize it as something that "is ok and must happen" in order to not challenge his views. I've done the same many times before too. Cullen and me are both easily manipulated into supporting bad things. I am often in awe and a bit jealous of Alistair that he was able to see through a bullshit that I was not able to do for years in my life (in regard to church and misogyny I was taught, and many more bad stuff). Hence why I keep comparing them. Cullen is past me, and Alistair is who I wish I was as a child.

It was naive of me to insist that he must have not known. And even if he didn't know, it doesn't excuse his behavior, his words and actions. That's also why I keep saying that DAI is not Cullen's redemption arc. He didn't redeem himself in that game, no matter how much it insists he did. He only started to redeem himself. If you choose to romance him as a mage or any other class you are helping him in that journey. Heck, you can even participate in it as a friend, but as a lover you can have a clear view of everything that is happening. It's not ideal as you should not rely on your lover in the same way you would on therapist, but alas DA world doesn't have any psychologists so it is what it is.

I believe that people like Cullen need others to realize how wrong and bigoted they were. Because I also needed them. There was a time in my life when I was deaf to any voice of reason, just like Cullen was in previous games. At that time nobody would be able to convince us that we were wrong. But with time we were both given the chance to reflect, change and open ourselves to those voices. There is no point talking to people like us when we are not in the place where we can even listen to reason, but we are also a perfect example that some of those bigoted people you know can be reached later in their life and at that time they will need help to properly sort through their bullshit.

Inquisitor and Leliana are perfect for that role. Sadly Inquisitor is not actually given many opportunities to call Cullen out on his behavior (if they're given any). We can only be quiet and encourage him to quit lyrium and even that is not how it should be, because this is not how you handle an addiction. Quitting is necessary for him, because if he doesn't he will still be under influence. And we know that in DA world lyrium makes Templars not only more receptive to the indoctrination after they become the Templars, but also controls them like dogs on a leash and drives them mad, further strenghtening their bigotry. It's not ideal but i's the only way for Templars to become free of the Chantry's influence. Without doing that it's even harder to convince them that mages are not evil beings that were born sinners and will die in sin. Yet even then we have people like Samson who saw through all of it even though the deck was stacked against him. We can't expect everybody to be like Samson who helped mages even before he was kicked out or Alistair who bailed out the first chance he got, but we can hold them accountable, and if possible try to create places where they can heal and unlearn all the bullshit they were fed all their lives. They need it.

#dragon age #dragon age 2 #dragon age inquisition #dao #da2 #dai #cullen critical #cullen rutherford #cullen rutherford critical #alistair theirin #raleigh samson #lyrium addiction #indoctrination

[pillowprincessshaxx]

Sitting here, thinking about the fact that, in game, Cole gets more vitriol for his actions against mages than Cullen.

This thought is then often followed by the self-reminder Cole takes more responsibility for his actions against mages than Cullen

#you can deride cole as a murderer but the meanest you can be to the fandom’s aryan dreamboat is moderately stern #anti cullen #cullen critical #dragon age inquistion #dragon age

[merrilldidnothingwrong]

DAI really did lack the teeth that DA2 and DAO had. Cassandra never really get challenged in her views and she doesn't change anything when Divine. The game just tries to trick you into thinking she does by using manipulative language, i.e., "new" templar order and "new" circle of magi. Neither is new, they're both exactly the same. The game just wants you to think change is being made when it isn't.

Then you have her ask an elven Inquisitor if there's no room for another God. Or be very dismissive of any faith that isn't Andrastian. But you can never challenge her on it. Much like how you can't challenge Cullen's shit takes.

Yeah you're so right, they really flopped when inquisition writing backpedaled on the chantry and templars. And you can't fire back on people with their apologism.

That line of Cassandra's pisses me the hell off. Let people, especially elves with their oppression believe in their own gods.

0/10 stars do not recommend (100/10 stars for most of the companions). Shame they made 2 great games and they made the best quality (graphics wise) game but the personality of wet cardboard 😞

#bioware critical #anti chantry #anti templar #cassandra critical #cullen critical #f them all

[squirrelwithatophat]

Did you know that there are whipping posts in the Kirkwall Gallows?

They’re rather easy for players to miss. You can see them in the background during The Last Straw (Act 3), and as early as Act 1 (and continuing into Act 2), Circle mages can be heard complaining, “Don’t talk to me. The templars will give me thirty lashes if they see me speaking to a civilian.” During the quest A Noble Agenda (Act 3), a woman reports seeing a mage cousin “whipped, half-starving” while pleading for mercy from a literal “death squad.”

In-universe, however, the whippings in the Gallows appear to be common knowledge. During Repentance (Act 2), we can see a whipping post (the exact same model observed in the Gallows later on) being used for sexual roleplay in the Harimann Estate in Hightown.

Lord Harimann: Now, you be the naughty apprentice, and I’ll be the Templar torturer.

It’s Played For Laughs here of course, but it really says something that citizens of Kirkwall know about Templar abuses in the Gallows and just how awful conditions are there — including the use of whipping posts. This isn’t even the only instance in the game of random NPCs referring to the severity of the repression and the rampant cruelty.

For example…

During The Destruction of Lothering (Prologue):

Hawke: I heard someone call this fortress the Gallows. Is it a prison?

Guardsman Wright: Used to be, back in the Imperial days. They kept slaves here until the rebellion. Now the templars run it and use it to lock up their mages. Guess not much has changed.

Outside Lirene’s shop, during Tranquility (Act 1):

Refugee: Hey! We heard you in there. Asking about the healer. We know what happens to mages in this town. And it ain't gonna happen to him.

Speaking to the sister of a Templar during Enemies Among Us (Act 1):

Macha: Keran was always so devout, so idealistic. He was so proud when the templars accepted him. I pleaded with him not to join the Order, but he wouldn't listen. You hear dark rumors about the templars and Knight-Commander Meredith. And now my brother is gone.

Hawke: (“Are templars so bad here?”) In Lothering, some templars died protecting villagers. I never heard any dark rumors.

Macha: And those are the stories my Keran adored. But it is not like that here, serah. There is a growing darkness in the order. They prowl the streets in packs. Hunting. And now, they say their duties put them above us, that they have the right to... take people from their homes. It is frightening.

Hawke: (“Tell me about Meredith”) What do people say about Knight-Commander Meredith?

Macha: Oh, she has many admirers. They laud the service she does in keeping the mages in check. But others say she is terribly fierce and utterly without pity. That she sees demons everywhere. It is dangerous even to whisper such things.

During Wayward Son (Act 1):

Feynriel: Look, I know it's different in other kingdoms, but here... no one helps Circle mages. Anything the templars don't like, you get the brand.

During Underground Railroad (Act 2):

Hawke: Helping apostates is dangerous. If the templars caught you...

Mistress Selby: One of my sisters is a mage. A gentle child, so generous. She was made Tranquil last year. Templars claimed she was a danger. Now... it's like she's not there. That shouldn't be forced on anyone.

In Sundermount (Act 3), if Feynriel escapes to Tevinter:

Arianni: I hear the templars have grown more abusive of the mages in Kirkwall. I'm glad Feynriel is no longer subject to their whims.

By the Docks, any Act:

Unnamed Woman: I feel sorry for the mages sometimes, you know? What a terrible thing, to be used by everyone.

Knight-Captain Cullen even admits that the common folk suspect them and have become hostile towards the Templars. There’s this exchange in Act 1:

Hawke: The templars defend us all.

Cullen: That's a surprisingly unpopular viewpoint. It used to be that templars were welcomed wherever they went—for defending people from dark magics. Now the townsfolk are as likely to slam their doors as offer us a bed. The image of the poor, chained apprentice is a powerful one. And one the mages are more than willing to exploit.

Then there’s the codex for the Mage Underground (available in Dissent, Act 2), written by Cullen:

Every Circle in Thedas suffers from individual mages who rebel and attempt to flee… Until now, I have never served anywhere that the populace does not fully cooperate in hunting these rebels. Here in Kirkwall, citizens actually help rebel mages escape.

In World of Thedas vol. 2 (p. 173), from a note dated 9:25 (set between Acts 2-3) from a mage of the Hossberg Circle in the far away Anderfels: 

I have heard that in the Kirkwall Gallows, mages are locked in their cells with barely room to stretch, let alone exercise.  I can promise you that any mage of the Anderfels would be stark raving mad after a week of such treatment... No wonder Kirkwall has such trouble with blood mages.

Even relative newcomers recognize the situation right away. For example, when speaking to Grand Cleric Elthina in the Chantry (Act 1):

Hawke: Why are Circle mages here kept in a Tevinter prison?

Elthina: Ah. So soon you take an interest in our problems. The short answer is, it was a building. A large one. Should it have sat empty? The Chantry found a use for what was once a horror. It is the nature of men to move on and forget the past. Even your Blight will be a distant memory in our lifetimes.

Isabela: “Once a horror?” Yes, I'm sure it's filled with flowers and sunshine and happiness now.

Even Fenris, who supports Meredith’s policies, immediately notices (first entry into the Gallows, Act 1 or 2):

Fenris: I've... heard about the Circle of Magi outside of the Imperium, but I've never been in one. This seems more like a prison. I wonder if it's more effective than the Circle I know.

Given all this, it’s hard to believe that the people in power in Kirkwall don’t know (or at the very least suspect) what’s going on — more likely, they simply just don’t care.

Or perhaps they think it’s acceptable. As Cassandra says of the Seekers of Truth in Inquisition, “We knew what was happening at Kirkwall, where the mage rebellion began. We looked into reports of Knight-Commander Meredith’s harsh treatment of her charges years earlier. But we found so many shocking cases of magical corruption, it was decided her actions were justified.”

#dragon age #dragon age 2 #chantry critical #anti templar #anti chantry #kirkwall #the gallows #kirkwall gallows #lord harimann #da2 #meta #da meta #da2 meta #dragon age meta #cassandra pentaghast #cullen critical #templar critical #circle critical #whipping post #feynriel #mage underground #wayward son #enemies among us #elthina critical #tranquility #rite of tranquility #100 #200 #300

[anneapocalypse]

Not 100% confident on this take because tbh Cullen isn't a character I've dug deep into and I haven't romanced him yet, but I do wonder if some of the dissatisfaction some people feel about his writing and overall arc comes from a dissonance between the game wanting him to have undergone some real change since DA2 while also needing him to play a certain role as an advisor, e.g. Leliana is the designated pro-mage advisor and somebody has to suggest you go to the templars. (It wouldn't be the only place I feel like that dissonance exists--like it's also a little odd to me that Cullen, a Fereldan with family living not that far from the border, favors Gaspard, the guy who would absolute invade Ferelden again if he thought he could win, but he's the commander and the "blunt instrument" advisor so he has to favor the military guy while Josephine favors the diplomatic empress and Leliana salivates over doing blackmail.) So maybe Cullen ends up being Schrodinger's Templar--he's a templar when the structure of the game requires that somebody be the templar, but then his actual arc is about him not being a templar anymore. Hmm.

#idk i'd be interested in hearing what people think who are more into cullen #dragon age critical #dai critical #incidentally i can never ever spell schrodinger right the first time it's terrible #cullen critical #like writing wise #not a hate post! and not inviting hate either pls and thank you

[platoniccereal]

If you could undo any of the retcons in DA, what would you choose and why?

the inquisition.

i mean, this is a short answer, but as time goes by, i understand that this is an honest one. this is a tangent, but i guess dai is just an example of electronic arts' production hell if bioware planned the second game only as a bridge for the inquisition's main conflict, and then we get this regarding the mage uprising. like, it's reasonable to assume that since da2 was supposed to be a preamble, the dai's initial main focus was the mage rebellion? and then it's just one main quest in the beginning of the game, and that's it.

but this is not about retcons, it's just me being annoyed. it's just the dai is the most fruitful regarding the topic.

hawke suddenly hating on blood magic. they tried so hard to push it with leandra's death, and then just decided to take the matter in their own hands, ig.

whatever the fuck hawke and varric say about anders. this is not their point of view, at least not in every case, in da2??

whatever the fuck they did to dalish.

like, vallaslin? i guess it's cool if you get inspired by real-world peoples, and then decide to make vallaslin slave marks.

or make their gods powerful slavers Just Like The Nations that inflicted the genocide on them. nothing about andrastianism, tho.

dalish actually kick out the mages is the obvious one.

the point of view on the red crossing. same reason. i count it as a retcon because of the implications that elves actually did that (i.e. the exalted march) to themselves.

also iirc they changed relationships between dalish and city elves/ made it worse to shit on elves again. stop that wtf!! they won't, ofc.

i dunno if it's a retcon or just conscious disinformation, but the presentation of celene and briala in-game. no spoilers, but did they suddenly decide that celene actually didn't do anything she did in the masked empire?

whitewashing of alistair, fiona and briala. they don't look like that, you fuckers???

make these cullen endgame sliders canon again and work from here, cowards. i actually got them in my playthrough even tho they deleted them, afaik. (the ones where he snaps and kills three mages.)

actually, the whole cullen arc. i won't say anything new here, his story was supposed to end in dao, da2 at most.

and i think there are other sliders from dao they retconned and put aside, like with the circle that mages built near orzammar? do it, cowards! it would make such a good plot point in a normal version of dai where your focus is the mage rebellion.

the ending of dragon age absolution. i'm sorry, did anyone find it satisfying? did anyone go, like, hell yeah finally? or i knew that!

the wardens. of course they're suddenly all that stupid to fall for cory's lap dog's lies and shenanigans!

i dunno if the last one counts as a retcon, but it surely falls into the same line of crimes against the previous lore. suddenly bioware felt an urge to shit on every group da:o players held dear. because grey morality. but, you know, even without "i like diversity and opportunity to be a dick, i don't appreciate when the game tries to push an agenda in defense of the oppressors and you can't fucking escape it", sooner or later one should understand that trying to mix grey with every colour in the picture will lead only to it looking dirty and messy. ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯

thank you for your question! :)

#dragon age inquisition #dragon age #bioware critical #cullen critical #i guess #just should label it #ask

[perkeleen-lavellan]

Didn't wanna coopt someone else's post so making my own.

So, Cullen critical thoughts below

I hesitate to say it, but I would have perhaps actually liked Cullen, if the writers had leaned in to the terrible things he had done, and either shown us that he was now finally truly remorseful, like actually shown the weight of- and value of human life finally hit him. Don't just have him be bitter because the Chantry and the Templars and Meredith fucked him over with lyrium and Kirkwall. I want to see him finally realise that all the people he hurt with his own hands had lives. Families and dreams and feelings of fear and pain and I want to see him weep for the loss of all of it.

Or, show us that he was not remorseful. That he still believed on some level that the fault did not lie in him or the Templar order, it always came from somehwre else. Have him refuse to take that responsibility for his own part in it (Inquisition already kind of does...) It was the Chantry, it was the existence of mages that was the reason he had to do those things. What if he stayed in denial, and what if the game acknowledge that that's... wrong. That's not good.

It could have been interesting to have a character like that and maybe contrast him with a character who did find the faults in himself and the Templar order, like say, Samson. Let's lean in more to his characterisation too, lets take it all the way there!

I feel like in a vacuum it would have been hella cool even, to have a kind of plot twist where it turns out that one of your allies could not overcome the moral and emotional burden of having been a part of atrocities in systematic abuse, but the 'villain' of the story could. What if the 'good guy' was just a dude who had done too much wrong to be able to admit it even to himself. What if he was stuck in this half formed state, never able to fully realise the better person he could be, because the fear of who he is now is too paralysing. Instead he stays in denial, where the world can still make sense and he can still pick up the pieces of himself.

And what if the villain was just a dude, equally too far gone, but the difference there was that he took that weight on himself. He acknowledged what he had done, and maybe it broke him in some ways, but didn't it also make him finally break free from serving those in whose name he hurt people?

Since BioWare seems so obsessed with this whole "but maybe the mages did bad things too" victim blamey questioning who's in the right narratives, well. There it is. There's your "what if" plot twist. There's your story with gray morality, an ultimatum where there truly is no good choice. Your return to the days of Bhelen vs Harrowmont. And what did you do with it?

Nothing.

#bioware just didn't undestand the story it was writing when they were making dai #bioware critical #cullen critical #anti cullen

[vigilskeep]

Oooooh fuck yeah I'm into this ✍️ silent

8 instances but oof the only half-decent dragon age one is... this... from very early dai stuff

Cullen looked like he had been slapped in the face. “You said—you said you had no problem with me.”

“No problem, ser,” snarled Trevelyan. He looked wild. If Lavellan had been given to using the phrase lightly, she would’ve said he looked like a man possessed. “I know how to live with your kind, don’t I? I know how to keep my mouth shut.” He shook his head. “That’s not my life anymore. I’ve been silent long enough. So help me Our Lady, if you lay your filthy fucking hands on Lavellan—”

“Trevelyan,” she snapped. “That’s enough. It isn’t your concern.”

#so my earliest dai concepts were a multi inquisitor worldstate feat. a circle mage trevelyan and a mage lavellan who initially #romances cullen #uhhh #cullen critical #just in case #basically trevelyan who is an arthur variant #tries very very hard to be cool with everything but he has trauma up to here and the moment he hears about #functionally a knight-commander and a mage who doesnt know the full extent of what templars are. he freaks the fuck out #has a little Moment. this is all like public in the skyhold courtyard