Time for me to talk (alot) about one of my favorite topics again: the modern fable known as Shadow of the Colossus. Potentially massive spoilers ahead so if you've never played it... GTFO.
Still here?
Good.
I've talked at length before about my theories on what is actually happening in SotC. Ueda beautifully left so many questions unanswered that practically anyone can invent their own story line but I feel like mine is pretty solid: Wander and Mono were in love (pretty much the only reason why he would sacrifice so much just to bring her back) and Mono was sacrificed by Emon, the village spiritual leader, for having an amorphous "cursed fate." (more on that later.) Wander and Emon were connected; I believe Wander was clearly a warrior from a spiritual order, that's why his tabard bore the mystical symbol (the same that sealed Dormin's power inside the colossi) and why he knew the legend. Also remember Emon said "So it was you after all. Have you any idea what you've done?! Not only did you steal the sword and trespass upon this cursed land, you used the forbidden spell as well..."
So I have it pretty well nailed down about who Wander, Emon, and Mono were and what transpired that set this self-fulfilling prophecy in motion. But who was Dormin and what was his relation to Emon's people? Dormin, when He confronted Emon, said "Thou severed Our body into sixteen segments for an eternity in order to seal away Our power. We, Dormin, have arisen anew." Clearly Dormin was a being of immense spiritual power, arguably an evil power, but definitely one of colossal strength. Dormin is identified by and associated with the following:
1) Horns
2) Gigantic size
3) Great power
4) That immense tower
5) Male/Female dichotomy
6) Being divided into 16 parts
7) Death and Rebirth
Okay, classic primordial evil god/spirit stuff, right? Sure, it fits the (ugh) trope. It also matches someone else pretty conveniently. Someone in the Bible.
Meet Nimrod. That lovely lady beside him is Semiramis. She's kind of important so we'll get back to her in a minute. Who was Nimrod? Good question since in modern English the name is associated with buffoonery. The Bible describes him as the great-grandson of Noah and the King of a land called Shinar, aka Mesopotamia and later known as Babylon. Dig a little deeper outside of the Bible and you'll find all manner of religious texts that continue his tale. He is described as a "Mighty hunter before the Lord... who began to be Mighty in the Earth."
Oh yeah, and he is the alleged builder of the Tower of Babel.
Another point; see that horn he's wearing? According to apocrypha it's from a bull he killed with his bare hands. He took to wearing it as a symbol of his strength; the first king to even wear a crown they say. Oh, another point; remember when I said a "Mighty hunter before the Lord?" The actual Hebrew word is "×œ×¤× ×™ יהוה," which literally translates to "in the face of the Lord" that meaning "in opposition to the Lord." In short Nimrod considered himself such a bada** he began to see God as his rival. It seems he sought revenge on God, "if he should have a mind to drown the world again; for that he would build a tower too high for the waters to reach. And that he would avenge himself on God for destroying their forefathers."
I should also reveal that Nimrod was referred to as a giant of a man. Virtually every depiction of him displays him as powerful and tall. Take a look.
Yeah, that's a deer... with antlers. Even small deer with antlers would be the size of large dogs so yeah, pretty big guy. Also take note of the wings; that's common for Babylonian depictions. I'll touch on that later too. So let's look at what we have so far: looks like we've checked off 4 characteristics already; horns, size, strength, and the tower. Not bad. But what about the other two?
Remember Semiramis? I told you not to forget her. She was Nimrod's queen. Also recall how I said Nimrod considered God his rival? According to Tidus Flavius Josephus (first century Jewish scholar and historian) he had his people worship him as a god, and his queen as a goddess. There's your male/female dichotomy. Admittedly that seems weak, but give me a minute; I'm getting to it. See that pic above? That all springs from a nineteenth century Scottish minister named Alexander Hislop who theorized that the Catholic Church (of course) was secretly a continuation of Babylonian Paganism; misidentifying Nimrod with the Mesopotamian sun-god Ninurta and Semiramis (an actual documented historical figure) with Ishtar (not a moon goddess but the Goddess of Heaven.) I put it up there for the reference to Tammuz, their son. You see, after Nimrod was killed by Abraham (yes, that Abraham; forefather of all Jews) his body was torn into pieces and scattered (Not unlike tearing it into 16 pieces, eh?) but Semiramis gave birth (Hislop says immaculately) to a son, Tammuz... Nimrod's reincarnation.
Okay. So now we've satisfied those last three; Male/Female dichotomy, being torn into pieces, and being reborn/surviving death. I could get into Hislop's connection between Catholicism/Christianity and Babylonian deities but why? This is about Dormin and SotC, not one of the umpteen pre-Jesus religions that Christianity copied. Let's take a closer look at Semiramis, shall we?
Cute little baby, huh? That's her. She was the child of a deity and a mortal and was abandoned by the goddess in the woods for the royal shepherd to find. See the doves fed her until he found her and doves were associated with her forevermore. Hmm, doves. That seems significant...
Interesting. Yes, doves around Mono, but there were also deer, a squirrel, that eagle... oh but wait; after every colossus you kill a new dove appears around the alter where Mono lies. Sixteen in total. That's a convincing coincidence, right? Hmm, wait a minute. Mono also picks up the horned baby from the pool, mother to a child she did not conceive, a child which many already assume to be reborn Wander or even Dormin. Something else you might have missed: Does Dormin always speak with that male/female voice? To Wander yes, but after the fall of Malus (the final colossi) He speaks only in his male voice. Where did the female part of Dormin go? Hmm, "Souls once lost cannot be recovered. Is that not the Law of Mortals?" That's what Dormin said to Wander in the beginning, if Mono's soul cannot be recovered then how can Dormin bring her back to life if not to give part of His own essence? Like say, his feminine side. It would explain why Mono accepts the horned baby without question or apprehension; she, as part of Dormin, expected it.
Now let's look at Dormin's exclusively male form.
Not an official rendition, I know, but I chose it for a reason. Take a look at him; horns, check. Gigantic size; check. Immense strength; double check. What the hell are those four tendrils coming off of his back? Two kind of go up and two kind of go down. Kind of like...
I told you to take note of those wings. There they are. Kind of dark and tendrily but in wing positions nonetheless. You see, Dormin is dead. Emon said of Wander "He is possessed by the dead." So it makes sense that he is all shadowy and featherless. He's composed only of his dark, defiant will that was contained within the colossi. His true rebirth had to come with a sacrifice... Wander's sacrifice.
Still not convinced? Well take a look at this easter egg, found in Dormin's hidden chamber in the Shrine of Worship. (The place where you can obtain the Sword of Dormin.)
If that doesn't look familiar then scroll up to that first pic of Nimrod I posted. Too lazy? Here.
How about now? Still not convinced?
Okay.
Spell "Dormin" backwards.
Eh? EH?? Mind f-in blown, huh? But wait I'm not done with this long post yet. Let's take what we've learned and list all that out.
1) Dormin is Nimrod, torn asunder by the righteous and sealed into sixteen colossi.
2) Mono's cursed fate is that she is Semiramis, mother and consort to Dormin.
But being reborn with an evil god's soul (or at least a very vain and self-centered god's soul) sure must have a negative effect on pure, innocent Mono... right?
Take a look at her face.
Sweet, innocent, pure, young. Mono is a teenager here. Probably 15 or 16.
This is the Queen from ICO.
Okay. Now you think I'm stretching it, eh? Well what do we know about ICO? We know it takes place in the same world many years after Shadow. The opening dialogue of ICO reveals that a horned boy is born once a generation and that the people, fearing the curse will bring bad luck, take the child to the Castle of the Queen and leave them there as a sacrifice.
If you count the "sarcophagi" in the opening area they number 50.
Counting a generation as once every 25 years that means this has been going on for 1250 years.
Well again let's think about what we know from Shadow, the predecessor.
1) Mono is revived with Dormin's feminine spirit.
2) She and the horned baby (Dormin's reborn male essence) live in the garden (the Hanging Garden... of Babylon?)
3) The Forbidden Land is now sealed off by Emon; neither Mono nor the baby can escape.
So Mono is alive again but carries within her Dormin/Semiramis' spirit. Dormin was a vain being that rebelled against the divine and was cursed for it. So it makes sense that Mono becomes vain and self-centered now too.
What if she found a way to use the power of the horned baby's essence to prolong her own life?
Isn't that what the Queen is doing?
In ICO Yorda is the Queen's newest vessel. How she creates these vessels is a mystery but the Queen seems to hold complete power over Yorda in her presence; even being able to turn her to stone (an ability she cannot use on Ico.) As the Queen ages she prepares one of these vessels to transfer her essence in to. Hmm, let's look at the Queen one more time.
She's mostly shadow. All that's left of 'her' is her face and part of her chest. You know who was all shadow? Male Dormin. Maybe, just maybe, The Queen, as Semiramis, is trying to stave off reunification with male Dormin. Maybe the Queen, as Mono, is doing it to stop Dormin from being reborn. After all, when Wander kills a colossi there is a brief part (the black tunnel) where we can begin to hear Mono's heartbeat, her breathing, and even her voice. And although it isn't subtitled or translated Mono sounds concerned, afraid even. The impression I get is "Wander, what are you doing??"
The "Mono is the Queen" theory has been around for a while. Most of these theories believe that the horned boys are the descendants of Mono and reborn Wander, but I don't think so. For one I don't believe Wander was reborn. The horned boy contains the essence of Dormin. Dormin betrayed Wander, just like Emon knew He would. He used Wander as a sacrifice to fuel his rebirth. The plan was Female essence goes into Mono, Male essence is reborn from Wander's demise, the union of the two and BAM: instant fleshy Dormin.
But what if enough of Mono remained that she interfered with his grand design? What if she collects the horned boys, kills them and enslaves their essence, and creates new vessels to stave off Dormin's influence, making her all but immortal, just to stop Dormin? What if Mono's cursed fate was actually to become Dormin's new jailer... the 17th Colossus.
So what does all this mean for Ico and Yorda? We do not know the means by which Queen Mono creates her simulacrums but I suspect it has something to do with her original innocence. Perhaps she draws such innocence from the horned sacrifices; after all they are all children when they are brought to her. She draws out Dormin's black essence, creating her servitors, and distills the purity into a new form; one as yet uncorrupted by Dormin's influence. When the corruption threatens to overcome her Mono transfers her consciousness into the new form, prolonging her life and her mission as Dormin's foil. But at the end of ICO Ico defeats the Queen, finally ending Mono, and sending bolts of energy from the sacrificial sarcophagi into Yorda, turning her into a shadow being (filling her with Dormin's essence.) Later his unconscious form is carried out by the shadow-consumed form of Yorda and placed into a boat as the newborn form of Dormin stays in the castle as it crumbles all around him. When Ico awakens on the beach later he finds Yorda there.
But where are they? Who are they?
Yorda clearly did not go with Ico, so how did she get to the beach? After the fall of Queen Mono what happened to newborn Dormin. I do not know the answer but I suspect this:
1) Dormin was reborn - We practically saw it happen with the fall of the Queen.
2) The 'new' Yorda is the reborn form of Mono's innocence - Give me a second, I'm getting there.
3) Ico really is Wander reborn - His heroism and devotion are very reminiscent of the single-minded devotion Wander presented.
4) They are both dead.
On that last point; that beach appears to be inescapable. Their own private Limbo. It is also located in the Forbidden Land as many others have shown over the years. (You can find it in Shadow but you can't get to it.) There really isn't another way for poor Ico to get a happy ending. We know Yorda didn't go with him. We know Yorda, the simulacrum, turned into a shadow being and, with the last of her will before Dormin manifested, pushed Ico out to sea in an effort to save him. That leaves really only one logical conclusion to their reunion; it takes place in the afterlife. I choose to believe that Ico and Yorda are Wander and Mono reborn; that the story of their undying love transcended time and space to be reborn into them.
And their death makes a beautiful, classic tragedy.
Lord Emon's parting words (the last words spoken in Shadow of the Colossus) were "Poor ungodly soul... Now, no man shall ever trespass upon this place again. Should you be alive... If it's even possible to continue to exist in these sealed lands... one day, perhaps you will make atonement for what you've done."
Ico's heroism and death could be interpreted as fulfillment of that atonement, but I believe the opposite. Instead I believe all that was fulfilled was their beautiful, undying love and **** the rest of the world. The rest of the world got a sorta-reborn Dormin, or Nimrod, who may well be the main antagonist of The Last Guardian, a shadowy being known as the Master of the Valley who uses young, sacrificed boys to sustain his immortality. (Sound familiar?)
So that's depressing, right? But I can think of one bright point; following ICO there is no evidence that horned boys were born again. So Ico's efforts, and Mono's final death, did do one thing: it broke the Curse of the Horns, and it seems that, somehow, it also robbed Dormin of his ability to return to life as he wished. The Master cannot speak and has no human form. Perhaps this was some final effort by Yorda? Perhaps the 'rebirth' she experienced left her, Yorda, as the new jailer of Dormin... only she isn't strong enough to stop his evil (he still commands Armored Knights and armored Tricos) and he has terrorized the world for a long time... with child sacrifice.
Which is just like...
Wait a minute! Did this just come full circle? I think it did. That bull-god is Molach who, according to Hislop, is actually Nimrod! Flavius Josephus went on: "A portent in the stars tells Nimrod and his astrologers of the impending birth of Abraham, who would put an end to idolatry. Nimrod therefore orders the killing of all newborn babies. However, Abraham's mother escapes into the fields and gives birth secretly. At a young age, Abraham recognizes God and starts worshiping Him. He confronts Nimrod and tells him face-to-face to cease his idolatry, whereupon Nimrod orders him burned at the stake. In some versions, Nimrod has his subjects gather wood for four whole years, so as to burn Abraham in the biggest bonfire the world had ever seen. Yet when the fire is lit, Abraham walks out unscathed."
Oh, so that's why Abraham and Nimrod threw down! Nimrod got into child sacrifice.
Just like Dormin.
Bam.
Oh, and as a parting gift remember the Tower of Babel? What if we all spoke Shadow's fictional language before Dormin built his tower? XD
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