#well i do have a soft spot for rebel types and supposed trickster deities but that's a different story

[blind-alchemists]

you ever sit and think about how Solas, by his very nature, is just ... very far from fitting into the trickster archetype. and the Evanuris used exactly that to paint him as a scheming liar whose only goal is destruction, mayhem, and chaos until he had to fit himself into that role because he was left with no other choice if he wanted to accomplish his goals.

like. Solas is honest. even when he shouldn't be. it would have been much easier to lie to the Inquisition so he'd seem less suspicious, or just to cover his tracks. it would have been easier lying to the Inquisitor. so that no one would ever know his true character, his goals, his motivations, but he just - didn't. (yeah, yeah, lying by omissions still lying, yes, but also some sort of compromise the way I see it.)

and, yes, he knows how to play political games. he's enjoying them. he can hide the truth in plain sight, in a way that doesn't make you question him, but that's because he managed to survive in Elvhenan. you can't tell me he didn't get directly involved with the Evanuris and their court antics at one point and did not learn how to imitate them.

but, also, he's compassionate. he truly wants to help people in need. he doesn't approve of cruelty/violence when there is another solution. all of his emotions are genuine: his sorrow, his guilt, his anger, the appreciation he has for a high approval Inquisitor, the disdain he has for a low approval Inquisitor. he cares about his friends.

he's stubborn and prideful but he's open to change and reflection - evident by basically all of his banters. (Cassandra, Varric, Bull (if you save the Chargers), Blackwall. Sera, at times. given more time and opportunity I can totally see how he'd grow close with Dorian and Vivienne (+ Sera) as well if their character development got reflected in their banters. or if they went through as major an arc as Bull or Blackwall can. Cassandra too, kind of.)

my point is: for all his flaws and strengths, he's not the fool he believes himself to be. he's capable of getting along well people who are extremely different from him, he's capable of accepting their differences and embrace their similarities (as long as they're reasonable). Solas' fatal flaw isn't that he's too proud to ask for help or too foolish to look for another option; he knows he's not doing the right thing. but he does it anyway. his fatal flaw is his sense of duty (and his heart he could never harden enough).

and, yeah, he can be charismatic (proof being several scenes in his romance route) but it strikes me as something profoundly natural because he falls apart just as easily in Trespasser. I don't read him as charismatic in a way that leaders are often described, more in a raw way in which some people just draw others to themselves because they shine so brightly. the kind of people who make friends easily. (this also plays into my 'Solas is an extrovert' hc, which makes everything worse if you think about his fear and his line about betrayal and how lonely he is, but anyway-)

he's smart and passionate, like all people are about the things they love, without any ill intentions. he's calm (if he isn't about something upset) and gentle with the world (do you hear how soft his voice becomes when he talks about the Fade. the emotion. the feelings.).

but people remember his figure as a beast with slavering jaws that wants to swallow the world, as a trickster laughing maniacally about the demise of gods, as a liar and a cheat and a threat - as someone he never was, and never can be, without corrupting himself.

because. yeah. I sometimes make myself sad thinking about it.

#dragon age #dragon age inquisition #solas #rambling #dragon age meta #low-effort character analysis #because this has been bothering me for a while #solas doesn't fit the trickster archetype that much #he's a rule-breaker and truth-teller and he'd lay out flaws and prove people wrong #but not maliciously or through trickery #he's not a comedic character #you still can argue that he's a trickster #because some elements do fit him #but you know what role is more fitting? #the rebel #solas is a rebel #and that's a hill i'm willing to figuratively die on #well i do have a soft spot for rebel types and supposed trickster deities but that's a different story