Listen, I don’t do “Pain Olympics” ~ I’ve always hated these debates about who is more pitiful and deserving of love and compassion. That I had to read with my own two eyes that people truly believe Anduin had it worse than Sylvanas just because she had a family in her childhood and had “more years of happiness” and he didn’t actually disgusts me.
But hey, I’ll humor the Pain Olympics and participate in the race with that same flawed and gross logic. We can justify anything through the lens we want to look through, after all.
Let’s get this out of the way: we are talking about two very privileged characters. People treat Anduin like he’s some homeless orphan who had it rough. As if he’s had to raise himself. Even his servants loved him and were nurturing to him. You can absolutely be very rich and miserable, but let’s not pretend like Anduin was a Thrall level orphan.
(You see why Pain Olympics is stupid? There will always be people who had it worse. It’s a constant invalidating loop. You can’t measure pain. One year of suffering for Person A can feel like the 20 years of suffering from Person B. It’s insulting and invalidating to say Person B is more worthy of compassion just because they “suffered longer.”)
The other wild take I’ve seen in the Pain Olympic race is that Sylvanas has family that lovers her now. LOL, bitch where? They specifically chose to make Sylvanas that “survivor who lost everything and everyone, repudiated/shunned/outcast” because it was fun to Blizz. Very fitting for a Horde aligned character. Need to have lots of misery to later turn into a villain because Horde things.
Her only surviving sister at that time was Vereesa and not once was she written to care for Sylvanas after undeath. When they finally remembered she existed they chose to use her to drive a dagger of “you’re unworthy and unlovable” through Sylvanas in that awful book “War Crimes” where Anduin was also written to be more than willing to be listen and be super compassionate toward this other genocidal orc who actually tried to kill him.
In “Three Sisters” Vereesa and Alleria leave the awful meeting together because obviously Sylvanas is a terrible monster now who can’t sit with them. There we have Alleria, corrupted by the void up the ass, but Vereesa is totally okay keeping her around because she’s aligned with her precious Alliance.
(And the narrative later proves they were right to think of Sylvanas as a monster because that’s what they wrote her to become.)
Finally, in “Shadows Rising” Alleria is written to be practically salivating to hunt Sylvanas down while employing the same questionable methods the self-righteous Alliance has always condemned the Horde for and no one gave a fuck about it, not even Anduin—the guy who was written to denounce all the atrocities Sylvanas was capable and willing to commit to justify the ends. Guess it’s only reprehensible when the enemy does it, no? Whatever.
Her sisters have been written to be awful. Whatever retcon they pull now about them caring for her doesn’t change the years where that wasn’t the case in canon. You can’t expect the fandom to just embrace such retcon now when they’ve been shit for years, building resentment in the audience.
Sylvanas’ story in Warcraft has always been about isolation, abandonment, and darkness, yet finding the strength to go on in spite of it—even when all she knew and loved was taken from her. To rebuild and forge ahead. Of course, Blizzard is retcon central, so who the fuck knows what’s canon anymore.
Now, let’s shift to Anduin while still participating in the Pain Olympics race. You know what he’s had? A support system. He has people who love him, who went to literal hell for him, and who will be there to help him overcome this new trauma. When he has flashbacks and nightmares about all he did while subjugated, he can reach out to literally anyone and find some comfort. He won’t be outcast or shunned or deemed a total monster for the things he did or what’s happened to him. He will never get to experience that isolation. He got the good end. And we can’t pretend like that’s solely his merit. He’s even given his father and surrogate orc dad to help him beat the domination magic in the end.
You know who didn’t have that when it happened to her? Sylvanas. You know who won’t ever have that because now she’s done “mass murder” and lost all rights to compassion because of it? Sylvanas. And it is the consistent Blizzard narrative. Unless you’re like Anduin or Calia, processing trauma like a doormat, Blizzard writes characters as unworthy. Their intention works when you have so many people saying Anduin is more pitiful than Sylvanas because his 19-20 years of life have all been awful compared to her who at least knew happiness and family in her childhood and simply threw it all away for revenge. Yes, that’s a genuine take I’ve seen thrown out there. Not even joking.
When Anduin comes back home to his castle/city/people after being dominated, he will be surrounded by people who love and support him. Because that’s the kind of character Blizzard writes as worthy of all that ending.
This has been painful. Participating in Pain Olympics to write all the above sickens me. Trying to quantify misery made me want to puke. In the end, both are characters who suffered. Both have gone through pain and loss and I don’t think it’s fair to try and measure it and use the results to weigh who deserves compassion. But that’s what Blizzard wants. That’s why they made Anduin the listener of Sylvanas’ life story.
This is the reaction they live for and thrive on. They want to further vilify her under the guise of “look, we’re giving you her back story to explain what we couldn’t put in the game for five years” while uplifting yet another precious Alliance NPC because they’re the only ones worthy of squishy feelings and sympathy in this franchise. It doesn’t matter how the book ends or what he ultimately thinks of her. If you are agreeing with “Anduin is more pitiful” you’re playing precisely into the kind of thing Blizzard/Golden want you to think. Congrats.
Edited with Lightroom and/or Photoshop CC. Photo(s) are not mine; it/they are the property of the photographer/magazine etc. This is a non-commercial fan work only.
Edited with Lightroom and/or Photoshop CC. Photo(s) are not mine; it/they are the property of the photographer/magazine etc. This is a non-commercial fan work only.
Edited with Lightroom and/or Photoshop CC. Photo(s) are not mine; it/they are the property of the photographer/magazine etc. This is a non-commercial fan work only.
Edited with Lightroom and/or Photoshop CC. Photo(s) are not mine; it/they are the property of the photographer/magazine etc. This is a non-commercial fan work only.
Edited with Lightroom and/or Photoshop CC. Photo(s) are not mine; it/they are the property of the photographer/magazine etc. This is a non-commercial fan work only.
Edited with Lightroom and/or Photoshop CC. Photo(s) are not mine; it/they are the property of the photographer/magazine etc. This is a non-commercial fan work only.
Edited with Lightroom and/or Photoshop CC. Photo(s) are not mine; it/they are the property of the photographer/magazine etc. This is a non-commercial fan work only.
Edited with Lightroom and/or Photoshop CC. Photo(s) are not mine; it/they are the property of the photographer/magazine etc. This is a non-commercial fan work only.
