Your actions in the thread makes that hard to believe.
Nothing is impossible for wild, baseless speculation. This very thread proves that.
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I can find an idea amusing or interesting without actually thinking it is true. Not sure why Iâd lie about it.
The vast majority of my posts in this thread were about Varian helping rip off the Stonemasons.
I didnât say it was impossible. Just not equivalent.
The prose is a bit flowery, but that is the clearly intended meaning of the line about him turning down Taretha and others, combined with the line about Jaina. Thatâs his own internal monologue. We saw the scene with Taretha earlier in the book, and he didnât just turn her down, he was completely clueless about what she was alluding to initially.
Itâs one of the most popular Warcraft novels ever published. It made #16 on the New York Timesâ Best Sellers: Fiction list.
Anduinâs had doubts because heâs human, but I donât remember any of them ever being particularly concerned about his bloodline. His doubts about being able to fit into Varianâs shoes are focused on the position of being King of Stormwind, not whether heâs Wrynn enough.
Back to the initial hair color genetics issue: Llane Wrynn has been portrayed as having blond hair at times, such as in the Karazhan chess event. The simplest explanation for why Anduin has blond hair when Varian had dark hair is that Varian inherited a recessive gene for blond hair from Llane, that when combined with Tiffinâs blonde hair genes resulted in their child, Anduin, having blond hair.
I think your other points are fair. My only other comment is that just means it sold 5,000+ in a week. I still donât really think out of the millions of players that many read it.
It also lost to HANDLE WITH CARE, by Jodi Picoult. (Atria, $27.95.) A woman whose daughter has a dangerous birth defect must decide whether to sue her obstetrician, an old friend.
Many WoW players donât care about the lore, let alone read story media outside the game. That doesnât mean that Blizzard shouldnât try to make a good story.
Yes, Blizzard could retcon the Arthas novel, but they havenât so far, so I donât see the value in speculating if they did. I already acknowledged that significant rewrites and retcons would be necessary to allow Anduin to be Arthasâ son unless time travel was involved in my first post in the thread.
Yeah, my contest was they wouldnât have to be very significant. Itâd be one book that I donât think many players read. Thatâs the only point I was trying to state.
The Arthas novel was a major tie-in to Wrath, and my point is that itâs one of the most popular Warcraft novels yet published. If itâs on the table for being retconned wholesale, then nothing is safe. Even retconning just the parts that bar Anduin from being Arthasâ son would be a massive change to Arthasâ entire character. Part of the tragedy of his downfall is that he deeply cares about his people and takes his responsibilities as prince extremely seriously. If heâs off having trysts with Tiffin (and thereby betraying Varian and courting diplomatic disaster) or sowing wild oats, that would severely undermine the tragedy of his character arc.
Which isnât much of a feat or relevant in my eyes.
And I think nothing is truly safe. They said Chronicle was definitive they retconned various large parts. They once had tons of lore via the RPGâs that they entirely decanonized. I can go on about retcons, but generally most anything is on the block.
I donât think a young man having one tryst makes that character as someone who doesnât care about his people. And he can well still take his responsibilities seriously, but people are flawed. They can make mistakes. Most of his arc is about making mistakes and failing his people, really. This one error doesnât severely undermine that in my eyes.
That doesnât mean that it would be a good idea, or that Blizzard should be encouraged to continue such behavior. If your premise is ânothing is safe,â then why are you here, playing devilâs advocate for such a terrible idea?
I think you fail to grasp how much that behavior would specifically run against Arthasâ characterization as it has been presented for the last twenty years.
If my recent theory based on Xalâatathâs statements in the Ansurek Raid is accurate there is another possibility for Anduinâs resemblance to Arthas:
Itâs actually Arthas forced to dream he is Anduin while being drowned by the 1st Harvester of Wrath(posing as Tyrande) with Sylvanas taking on the role of Jaina Proudmoore to watch over him and Jaina herself(after either getting killed rushing to fight Xalâatath in Dalaran or getting killed by Talanji while no one was looking) taking on the role of Alleria.
The first Harvester of Wrath of course will be informed by the Winter Queen(who was playing the role of Vyranoth while guiding us and attempting to aid Fyrakk-Iridikronâs redemption) that she needs the Mortals for Rebirth to stop Xalâatath only for her to vehemently refuse only to get frozen exposing her true form as she is thrown into the water and drowned by the Stonewright(who uses the Model of âXalâatathâ) who is elated to get the World Soul of Azewrath(why else would the Legion version of Azeroth be called Azewrath if not for her being the Harvester of Wrath?!) into her clutches!
Arthas of course wonât seek to revive nor would Sylvanas(who having looked at Arthas through the eyes of Jaina now understands him as someone whose sins got his Soul captured and reduced to a prisoner watching itâs body commit even worse crimes of itâs own volition while the Soul is unable to stop it) but Jaina will be encouraged to revive at Khaz Algar where GâHanir(which looks like the Ardenweald sitting on top of a Shalaânir-esque place with the real Ardenweald looking like a Winter Wonderland) is connected to with the reveal that the Khaz Algar we visited was the real one even though everywhere else is a flashback.
Vyranoth(who was brainwashed into being Raszageth) has her memories bluntly restored by the Winter Queen who apologizes for allowing the 1st Harvester of Wrath to treat her as being in the wrong for disagreeing with Iridikron and dying in a mutual fight. Vyranoth(who uses the Model she used as âRaszagethâ but with Ice Effects) now has reason to want Denathrius dead and joins us in reviving!
We get into contact with Anduin who is now an old man and is surprised by Jaina coming back and needing our help to join society with us being former Arathi Souls caught in that storm.
Ardenweald(a Winter Wonderland) and GâHanir will be the Zones of Patch 11.1 coming without a Raid while Kezan and Undermine will be 11.2 coming with a Raid.
Azewrath escapes into Reality through the Stonewrightâs Dream(after we beat the 11.2 Raid in Undermine)'s connection to Khaz Algar and attacks Azerothâs Core as War Withinâs Final Boss.
The real Xalâatath/Remornia uses the broken Dark Heart(stolen from the Stonewright) on the Sunwell and starts Midnight. Vyranoth spearheads the assault against her through the Protodrakes!
Arthas who has been Anduin to us for far too long and Sylvanas who has been Jaina to us for far too long are left in the Shadowlands never to be seen again.
Such a ridiculous possibility! Serves to smooth over retcons while not getting rid of the events of the Expansions despite changing how they exactly happened! Even so it is almost as likely as the affair the OP is suggesting! Which is to say incredibly unlikely!
Even so I should put this post on Favorites just in case I need to say âCalled it!â
Fantastic claims oughta require at least SOME evidence.
Sorry but this idea is actually awful.
and i think itâs why story ideas of a whole in IPs suffer.
We get writers that, may not agree with this on a 1:1 bases but at least agree in concept of going back and rewriting things to âmake it more interestingâ.
Itâs like a marvelization of writing and theory that everything has triple meanings anyone can come back from the dead, ect.
Like, if they knew a head of time arthas would be as popular as he is they probably would have milked him for 20 years and revived him in someone rather than making new big bads and advancing the story,
Another example of this unrelated to WoW is, In the Fallout universe the very first game establishes in itâs opening cutscene that The USA annexed canada and the US propaganda shows it as a âgood thingâ and âthe boys are really giving it to the rebels!â
Then, in the cutscene we see war correspondent film footage on a news reel two big metal dudes and a struggling bound man the Power armored soldier then executes the bound man, the two power armored troopers laugh and then wave to the camera to establish the grim dark world with the whole âleave it to beaver 1950sâ twist on things.
Years in 2015 fallout 4 would come out and introduce a character named Nate who is the player character who was a verteran of war who survives the world ending nukes and we take control of him for the setting of fallout 4.
Years later in 2024 the writer for fallout 4 tweets on twitter that the power armor metal man seen laughing in the intro of the first game that was made in 1997 âWAS ACTUALLY NATE AND THATS CANON!â
This writer had NOTHING to do with the 1997 game, didnât even work in the industry at that point and then decided his character was referenced in a cut scene as far back as 1997. It was then pointed out our loveable character protagonist was actually a warcriminal if he was participating in the murder of PoWs. The writer than back peddled and whined.
My point to anyone still reading is, we should really stop with this âWELL AKTUALLYYYYâ brainrot marvelizing of all our IPs. Let characters be legends, let them die, let them retire let them BE who they are and were.
No redeeming arthas and saying âWELL ACKTUALLY IT WAS THE JAILERRRRâ
âWell ACKTUALLY anduins father is arthas becuz uh star wars was cool and it worked for thatâ
âWell ACKTUALLY, i know i was 15 years old in 1997 but my character i made in 2016 was AKTUALLY this person in the lore and i decided that part nearly 10 years after on a whim, itâs canon now deal with it!â
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Anduin was born when Arthas was in Lordaeron getting his vows as Paladin. It is impossible to catch this on.
You know, a father doesnât have to be around when a child is born. Only when they are conceived nine months prior.
they were really long Vows, okay?
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Really though, if this was a thing (its not), Blizzard missed the only real marks to make it matter more than a salacious story that gets some buzz before being written off as stupid shortly after by most.
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Didnât come up in Wrath, when Arthas was chewing scenery and Varian was being introduced
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Didnât come up in Legion when Varian was writing to his son at the very start and when Anduin was struggling with taking up his fatherâs legacy
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Didnât come up in SL when Anduin was possessed by his supposed father
What would Arthas being Anduinâs bio father actually add to his story at this point? âI just realized I didnât have to be my father, but now I really do not want to be my father?â âAnduin is now the rightful king of Loraedon according to royalists, which is a marginal upgrade from Calia?â
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It would tie up the mess of the story on why Anduin is consistently compared to Arthas if he actually had some connection to the man. Jaina being his biological mother as well would certainly fix that relationship.
All they need to do is have it be that she had the child in secret and passed the child to Varian to raise and then had someone/something strip her memories of that time.
Making Anduin the true heir to Lordearon, also to inherit the kingdom of kul tiras from his mother and the foster son on Stormwind as Varian had no other heir. Then simply have him marry Tess and he basically is leader of all the current human nations other than Arathi but that will probably goto Faerin who he could also marry instead of Tess.
Though it is a bit late to reveal all this now as the perfect time would have been shadowlands/BFA to explore this, but they wasted the opportunity.
But why?
Why do two characters NEED to be related in order to compare and contrast each other?
Why canât two characters just have the same or similar character arcs and not be related? Like Catra and Glimmer in She-ra (2018). Or Aang and Zuko from Avatar: The Last Airbender.
Hell by your logic Garrosh and Arthas need to be related because Garrosh literally compares himself to Arthas in War Crimes.
Son of a leader of a Kingdom / Clan, threw away a weapon that symbolized their family legacy for a âpower beyond reckoningâ. Led astray by their emotions, mainly anger and pride. The key difference though is that Nerâzhul needed to lure Arthas to Frostmourne, Yâshaarj didnât need to do anything to bring Garrosh to his heart.
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Anduins parralel with arthas is incredibly forced anyway, the only thing they share is blond hair and blue eyes
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if anything Anduins arc is similar to Thralls.
Just replace Garrosh with domination.
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