;____; i. really love that and i wanna fic it, but i’m knee-deep in balvaan nanowrimo hell, and i’d be surprised if someone hasn’t written that already but if they did, it’d be a balfran fic and i don’t read balfran so i wouldn’t knowwww. sad. but i really love that as a moment and now i wanna write my own take on it.
Étiquette : bagamnan
Love letter to Penelo
We, fans of Final fantasy XII, have read too many times how Vaan is a “weak” character, a useless hero. This is wrong in many ways. But I am not writing today to speak about Vaan. Vaan is not such an unloved character. Not from a marketing point of view. He is FFXII’s image, marketed character.
Today, I want to shout my love for another and even more underrated character. I’m talking about Penelo.
Penelo is not as physically strong as Tifa.
She is not the main character’s love interest like Rinoa or Aerith. We could argue that Vaan and Penelo are seen as futur lovers and it seems canon in Revenant Wings, but romance does not lead FF12’s plot, and Vaan and Penelo being a couple or not is not relevant to the story.
Penelo is not the central character, the story does not evolve around her unlike Yuna, or Ashe.
I’m part of those who think FF12 doesn’t have a main character. The central character, story-wise is Ashe. Vaan is the relatable character, the gamer grows along Vaan’s development. Basch is essential to the plot. Balthier is charismatic and everyone’s favorite. Fran is also charismatic and she brings knowledge.
What about Penelo ? Who is she ?
Penelo looks like the typical cute white mage of a rpg team. This is not completely wrong. She is cute, and white magic suits her.
Penelo is mentally strong. Her parents died from illness. She became an orphan. And yet she is capable and works as much as possible. She is reasonnable and mature.
Penelo is intelligent. When Vaan is stuck at the doors of Rabanastre. Migelo appears and eases the guards. But who is behind him ? Penelo. No doubt she knew Vaan would be in trouble again, so she fetched Migelo, a powerful ally in such situation.
Penelo is gentle, peaceful and optimistic. Vaan and Penelo both want to get rid of the Empire. But Vaan is spontaneous and seek revenge (at the beginning). At first he sees things in black&white. While Penelo only wants peace. She doesn’t like the Empire, but she doesn’t see it as one bad entity. When Penelo meets Larsa, she does not judge him. He is not an enemy. Even when she learns he is the little brother of the opressor, she talks with him. They share their point of view. I think Penelo would be a great diplomat.
Penelo is gentle, but not naive. I’ve just said Penelo is open minded and she sees good in people even if they should be enemies. However, she still speak up for what she believes in. Larsa is a Solidor, but she doesn’t think twice, she is honest, telling Larsa how she feels about the Empire and Vayne. This is courage. She would be a great diplomat.
Penelo is supportive. She is so helpful to the team during the game. She has her own dream (most likely it involves dance) and yet she wants to help Vaan to become a skypirate. She tells him to work, to earn money. Because, war or not, he won’t fly without buying an airship first.
She follows Vaan after she got kidnapped because she has her own beliefs and she deserves to be involved. She may be a commoner, and an orphan, but she is a Dalmascan. What will happen to Dalmasca and Rabanastre matters to her.
So it doesn’t matter if she is not physically strong, if she is not a leader, if she knows nothing about nephicites. She is part of Ivalice and she deserves to be part of the team.
Ashe is rosy-cheeked as she stares down at the cards fanned in her elegant hands. The liquor has softened her features–all but her brow, which is, perhaps, more furrowed than usual as she gazes into the cards she was dealt. How very like her. She plays the game well, her face a solid mask of anonymity. Basch swigs what can only be a fine Nabradian mead as he peers over her shoulder; princess and knight share a seamless bond here. It is enough to curve the edges of Balthier’s lips as he takes note of them both. Basch, bless the sod, is smiling – no teeth, never teeth, but a grin nonetheless lifts his features as Ashe runs her fingers along the edges of her cards. If she isn’t giving her hand away with her face, Basch certainly is.
Balthier eyes Ashe’s naked ring finger and thinks in nothing short of smugness that it’s a rather becoming look on her – it would have never done to have her fidget still over the smooth silver this far into their journey like a pining fishwife contemplating mass genocide a la nethicite in blind vengeance. Balthier applauds his foresight now; watching her hands wring about it even that early into this folly had been tiresome enough then.
Ashe’s eyes flit up, to the collection of cards on the table, and she stares at them contemplatively for a moment before her eyes shift to Balthier’s. They linger on his, and in that quick instant he can tell – she has misunderstood his gaze. Within hers, now, is a quiet promise and a threat all the same. Balthier doesn’t waver – what Leading Man would in the eyes of royalty? – and merely holds the tension for a second longer, allowing her to be the one who breaks it. Ashe’s attention returns to her cards, and with a graceful surety she draws and flips a card onto the well-loved wooden table, pitted as it is with nicks and chips. Her eyes do not return to him.
She thinks she’s playing hard to get.
She has misunderstood much, and still yet misunderstands, dancing a sparring dance with his shadow as her unwitting partner to a tune only she can hear. He will let her. A princess of her stature does what she wills. Everything surrounding them now is evidence enough of that.
He can’t deny he’s thought of it before. A story of a pirate and princess would be a fun one to tell, oh, to be sure! The trope is a tired one in fiction, but in reality? That would certainly be one for the books and taverns adding, as it would, further rumour to the whispers of his conquests echoing through Ivalice. Yet Balthier will not indulge. They both have baggage enough. He cares not to rummage through hers for the sake of a bullet point on a bucket list – the Strahl hasn’t enough room for the unpacked baggage of them both anyhow. Were he to do so, it would be purely for the tale, and Balthier prides himself on his foresight; it would simply not be worth it, comely enough though she is with all her ruthless Dalmascan grit. And, as if all that isn’t a deterrent enough, he’s doing just fine without his head on Basch’s sword.
Her curiosity of him is a quiet guarded thing, and has been for some time. She expects, he thinks, that he will pursue her. But the pirate harbors no intent. A nasty tangle all this is in itself. He doesn’t want a fallen princess in his bed, nor a reclaimed Queen, and she – she may think she wants him, but she is wrong. Ashe doesn’t know what she wants. Only what she does not.
Balthier can say the same of himself. They are not so different, though she is braver, stronger. This, he knows. He would not be this far into their little pilgrimage for someone he deems unworthy of the goal. Balthier is a man who cares not for wasting time. This endeavor has proved, thus far, to be worth his while enough.
He has not forgotten his promise to her; the ring sits, cradled in a handkerchief inside his left belt-pouch, collateral – only to remind her of her duty, nothing more. He is a pirate, for Faram’s sake. Must he remind her of that? There is business to his line of work, though she may turn her pretty nose up to it all she likes.
Without that blasted ring, she seems lighter, now. When she finds what she wants, she may wear it again, along with her crown.
Long has their journey been. Long will it continue to be. And when it is over for them, it will be only just the beginning for her. Ashe was never meant to rule, but she is well on her way. And Ivalice will be all the better for it. They’ll make sure of that.
For now, they drink. It’s all they can do with the night they are given.
excerpt, Singe.
I’ve firmly headcanoned the pendant and ring motif as Vaan and Reks’ family emblem.
@vivisucre submitted:
I wanted to answer to your post and give my opinion on the end of the game, but I ended up writing too much again so I submit it.
I don’t know about the song, I never really listen to it. But for me the ending is lacking something.
Maybe because the all story is more realistic and less dramatic than the other FF. Of course there is Basch and Noah’s arc but I could never be emotionally attached to them, so Noah’s end seemed almost normal story-wise to me. The objective of the story is to bring peace to Dalmasca, it happens, there is no big plot twist nor really emotional scene. The plot twist (according to me) is the existence and purpose of the Occurias, but it happens way before the end of the game. I love the philosophical reflection about destiny and fate and who should control your own path, but that is for the analyse of the game, not what we feel watching the ending scene.
I just feel that the end is too similar to the purpose at the beginning of the game. If you think about FFX, the end is the contrary of what should have happened. Same goes for FFXV. But in FFXII ? No big surprise really. The characters had really good development arcs, but the general plot didn’t change that much.
It doesn’t make me love less of the game, it has other qualities, but it is a thought I had a long time ago.
thanks for your submission and your interpretation comparing this ending to some other FF’s! i know a lot of fans really do love basch and noah so it all depends on how you connect with the characters! it’s so interesting how different folks attach themselves to certain characters for whatever reasons just as complex as people themselves.
for me it is hard to place why the ending feels odd–after all, my favorite boy is vaan and the final shot is of him flying off to the sky in his airship. i’m not sure if the ending makes me feel weird or bad or any negative thing, it just. makes me feel sad maybe because it’s over? but like. seeing that shot of vaan, his smile, his airship, it’s like the best feeling for me as someone who spends the whole game in support of him. so maybe it’s just i’m not used to things ending since i don’t consume much media–i don’t read or watch movies or anything really so, it might just be that the fact it ends makes me feel all. funny ‘nd stuff.
@bagamnan zoom on another present from my amazing bestfriend 😉
Final fantasy XII &co 