Your lack of lore counterarguments and just personal attacks is telling.
You have every right to believe as such. I’m arguing for Calia Menethil, because I’ve been convinced otherwise that she’s a good decision going forward.
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I made my lore counter argument. She’s an alliance character. Her closest association is with Anduin. She was raised by the force that is antithetical to the Forsaken’s very being. That causes physical harm to them. She’s a white savior trope introduced in the worst WoW novel of the last decade. Forsaken do not need her. I don’t even think Forsaken need to be hyper evil as that was a direction started in Cataclysm that was out of line with Vanilla-Wrath’s characterization of the race. But thinking Calia is the answer just shows your lack of understanding for the race and its history.
By that logic the Forsaken who died in the scourging, and even the Forsaken who were from Gileans are invalid. Oh wait…almost all Forsaken in canon lore originally come from Alliance Kingdoms…guess that means Forsaken are now all invalid because they were once in the Alliance while alive.
It’s not like people can change political factions or anything.
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Forsaken who were raised from enemies like the Gilneans were have ALWAYS been a lore abomination that made zero sense no matter how many times they tried to justify it in C/dev Q&As. And comparing Forsaken who were killed in Warcraft 3 and spent time as actual scourge to Calia Menethil who’s associated solely with Alliance characters is a laughable argument.
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Calia is stuck in a place where it isn’t possible for her to satisfy her intended portrayal because she was nowhere to be seen in the period of time her beliefs would have demanded her participate in the story. She doesn’t show up or do anything until Anduin, High King of the Alliance, views The Forsaken as basically just humans. So brave. What a leader!
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Calia sucks anyway you slice it. She takes away from the core fantasy that 99% of forsaken players want. She would’ve been better suited running a alliance aligned undead faction. 
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Like I said, she’s a white savior trope. Probably the most blatant one other than Anduin teaching those dumb smelly orcs honor during BFA.
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So, basically, she didn’t care about the Forsaken until recently. Cool. So…
I’ll put on my “reading way too far into this” hat for a moment.
- Calia is a “Light-Infused” zombie, pristine, and even golden-colored (especially in comparison to other Forsaken).
- She’s besties with the Human Leader (who represents everything good and virtuous).
- She’s “perfectly” resurrected as opposed to the “imperfectly” attached souls of the Forsaken.
- She’s resurrected via “Light” magic, associated with Holy, as opposed to the “Others” associated with “Bad” (via the Lich King and/or Jailer and/or realms of Death and/or Shadow).
- Her power actually hurts the “Other” zombies (reminiscent of the effects of Holy Water on Demons).
- They’re going to put her as a leader of the “Other” zombies.
I think we’ve seen this approach in history, predominantly in the Americas and in Africa by colonialist powers.
I truly don’t believe that Blizzard folks are actively trying to promote that narrative. I just think they haven’t recognized how tone-deaf this storyline comes across. Quite plainly:
It’s pretty off-putting and gross.
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Tbf, I don’t think that is Golden’s intent with her, but it certainly comes off that way. If Calia had been an ordinary Forsaken(or even a pretty one like Sylvanas was) raised in the normal way and had an experience with undeath that was identifiable to normal Forsaken rather than just being Anduin’s friend that gets rezzed by a naaru, then I wouldn’t really mind her as a potential leader. As things stand now, the character basically needs a radical change in direction for her to be anywhere near acceptable as the forsaken racial leader.
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They probably didn’t intend Sylvanas to run headlong into another victim/abuse story, but here we is be.
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I concur.
Honestly, I don’t really care which of the “other” choices it is.
Voss could be interesting. Belmont, Faranell, heck even the Black Bride. Sure. Why not?
//I like Velonara for some reason (probably because she’s been a garrison follower) but I think she’s a bit too close “stylistically” (model, dark ranger, etc) to who she would be replacing, even though her character is different.
Yeah … I mean there’s no denying they have a tendency to swerve into hitting those cringe notes almost every chance they get.
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That’s why blizz fumbling so hard with the new forsaken leadership is well…it’s baffling to me. The forsaken have a whole roster of awesome characters blizz literally could’ve chose from and they picked the most alliance aligned character they could find instead.
Forsaken quests are often dark and cruel at times, but that’s what fans of the race enjoy the most about them. In between the dark quests, there’s that sense of a people legitimately trying to make the best of their situation in a world that wants to put them in a grave permanently
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What if Calia takes charge but mid way realizes that… you know monarchy is bad and we need a council but one that involves all the people not just a few…
Maybe something called democracy? And then every patch we see Forsaken citizens campaigning to be given a mandate of supreme executive power derived by the masses.
This thread is pretty eloquent on what I find positive about Calia, and while I too, dread this softness being brought upon our already broken and beloved Forsaken, I can appreciate where you’re coming from despite disagreeing with the motion.
I would’ve accepted Calia without the resurrection arc, without her overshadowing Natalie and Faol…
We’ll see in the future I imagine, thanks for this thread it was an interesting read.
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I think it is so baffling because the bar was never set particularly high. None of the characters or setting stuff was ever complicated, it was just heavy on style and maybe too heavy on certain themes, but it worked. Gallows humor mad science zombiepunk is delightfully quirky, but it isn’t difficult to do justice. I don’t even really have the energy to articulate my thoughts well atm. I’ll just settle for saying I miss having Metzen working on Warcraft.
Hopefully they land some quality hires soon who know how to translate their passion into something that reinforces the world instead of eroding it.
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You mean… what if the Forsaken’s white savior sacrifices her power to save them from tyranny? That would be so pure and noble. They would totally do that. It would be horrible.
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No I mean the Forsaken just become a democracy. That way no more Calia and no more evil people running the show because democracy can’t be evil. (in fantasy)
How about she lives among “her people” and respects their right to rule themselves. Let her acclimate to the Forsaken experience as a citizen and go from there. Calia isn’t bereft of potential, I think, but I’ll echo a previous sentiment and restate that the people authoring her story seem to view the Forsaken as something along the lines of “Aw, you poor broken things, let me fix you.”
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Honestly, I do not want to see the Forsaken become soft. I love the grit, and the angst. All the same, it’s become an empty narrative. We need depth injected back into the pain.
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