We need to talk about Garland.

[VanuriaFellspar]

Maybe not need - but definitely a discussion.

For the time, I definitely think, on a home computer console in any case, FF1's story is absolutely tremendous. That's not to say it's layered with meaning and has complex characters and themes that stand the test of time, but I do think it is a touch above its contemporaries.

I think the ultimate fate of the WoL at the conclusion of FF1 is pretty melancholic, too, and a good depiction of outright heroism - doing something for goodness' sake without expecting a reward; what could encapsulate that better than remembering you saved the world from sure destruction while everyone else has pretty much forgotten?

It's also a good entry point, I think, into the stories the franchise would later tell, even in spite of the looming bankruptcy. It's not the best RPG on the system, and definitely not the best RPG story of that time, but it is unique and - I think - done really well. What about you guys? Do you think it's a good plot or do you feel as if the time loop plot offers up more plotholes than it does a satisfying conclusion?

 

[Lex]

Wasn't the plot expanded upon from the original game in all the remakes?

Forgive me, my FF1 knowledge is woefully inadequate. I've completed it before but I didn't find it to be all that memorable if I'm honest.

 

[VanuriaFellspar]

It might have been, though not to the point of FF3 or FF4. If anything, they definitely touched up the translation and added in a scene or two. I know the Dawn of Souls release added a secret dungeon (which was kept for the PSP version which I think added one or two more) but I couldn't tell you if they were plot relevant. It's been a looooong while.

 

[Makoeyes987]

I'm confused... What do we need to talk about regarding Garland?

I mean, the title and OP don't quite match up here.

 

[Roger]

Maybe not need - but definitely a discussion.

For the time, I definitely think, on a home computer console in any case, FF1's story is absolutely tremendous. That's not to say it's layered with meaning and has complex characters and themes that stand the test of time, but I do think it is a touch above its contemporaries.

I think the ultimate fate of the WoL at the conclusion of FF1 is pretty melancholic, too, and a good depiction of outright heroism - doing something for goodness' sake without expecting a reward; what could encapsulate that better than remembering you saved the world from sure destruction while everyone else has pretty much forgotten?

It's also a good entry point, I think, into the stories the franchise would later tell, even in spite of the looming bankruptcy. It's not the best RPG on the system, and definitely not the best RPG story of that time, but it is unique and - I think - done really well. What about you guys? Do you think it's a good plot or do you feel as if the time loop plot offers up more plotholes than it does a satisfying conclusion?

Certainly thinks it's a good ending for a game with such a simple story otherwise.

 

[VanuriaFellspar]

I'm confused... What do we need to talk about regarding Garland?

I mean, the title and OP don't quite match up here.

I meant to expand on that, but I hadn't slept and was hammering out a post without thinking, my bad!

It was also a tongue in cheek reference to the book / 2011 psychological thriller film, WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN, more than anything; but I feel as if Final Fantasy's first villain should be talked about more within the context of FF1 as opposed to his appearance in Dissidia. Heck, FF1, as much as it's been rereleased, should be talked about more I think.

 

[lithiumkatana17]

I'm confused... What do we need to talk about regarding Garland?

I mean, the title and OP don't quite match up here.

Attention getter bruh

 

[Ite]

So, is there a paradox?

-The troubles (land rotting, sea boiling etc.) are caused by Chaos. He started this shit 1000 years ago.
-The members of the party are born and grow up while Chaos plots and/or lays the foundation for his master plan.(1)
-While the troubles are happening, Garland kidnaps Sarah.(2)
-The party defeats Garland, accidentally hurling him back 1000 years.(3)
-In the past, Garland becomes Chaos and starts the troubles.

So far no paradox, a very neat static timeline. Then...

-The party learns of the Garland-Chaos connection.
-The party leaves the Present to go back 1000 years to stop Chaos before he can begin the troubles.
-They succeed.

With success comes the paradox. If they had failed, nothing would have changed. Now, we have to deal with this:

-The troubles do not happen.
-The party is born and grows up without the troubles. Little is known about their journey. Perhaps they never found the orbs, or met each other, or became adventurers. Perhaps Garland never kidnapped the princess and remained a respected general.
-The party returns from the past to the Present without the party ever having left the Present, therefore each member must now have a duplicate.

So some questions:
1. What exactly was Chaos’s plan? Was boiling seas and four monsters the culmination of 1000 years of plotting, and if so, why did it take 1000 years?
2. What was Garland’s plan in kidnapping the princess? Did he know of his destiny? Why the princess?
3. How did whacking Garland with a sword or low level fire spell send him back in time?

tl;dr - FFI makes no sense

 

[VanuriaFellspar]

From what I remember - it wasn't the party defeating Garland that sent him back in time . . . okay, it was but it wasn't the physical act of defeating him. After the WoL defeat Garland, the Four Fiends are the one who send him back in time. He creates the time loop (and becomes Chaos through the stolen energy of the crystals) so he can live forever. As for Garland kidnapping Sarah, he does so in hopes that he could conquer the kingdom - he tells the king to hand over control of Corneria in exchange for her life.

...at least, according to later releases. In the original and MSX version, he kidnaps her because he's a bad guy. According to Theatrhythm, he kidnapped her because she didn't reciprocate his love for her. That seems to be the plotline they're going for, as it's kept in the 20th anniversary Ultimania guide for the franchise.

So to answer your questions more directly:

1. Chaos is Garland and Garland created the time loop to live forever - the rotting of the land is a result of him stealing the energy from the crystals to become Chaos. Sort of, anyway. It's Lich's doing, as the only rotting of the land is near Melmond where the Cavern of Earth is. It took 2000 years because that was when Garland was alive - Chaos sends the Four Fiends to the present so they can send Garland to the past whenever he is defeated by the heroes. This is what creates the time loop initially.

2. In the original release, we're just supposed to gather that he's a knight that went rogue and kidnapped Princess Sarah. Presumably for some sort of control or bargaining chip as that is usually the case in fantasy. This is then confirmed (and then deconfirmed) in later releases of the game. TL;DR bad guy doing bad things ends up becoming ultimate bad guy.

3. The WoL defeat Garland but don't kill him - he is near death when the Four Fiends send him back in time, whereupon he absorbs the power of the crystals and becomes Chaos. Which leads into question / answer 1 and the time loop itself.

As far as the paradox goes - though I could explain it away with my own interpretation of the tale, it won't be what actually happened because ... that's just the nature of most, if not all, time travel tales to begin with. Especially those that deal with traveling back in time to meet someone who is influenced by the time traveler to create the thing the time traveler was influenced by in the first place - a recent example was in Legends of Tomorrow when the gang travels back in time to save George Lucas (or someone else, but Lucas was there). Ray was inspired to become a scientist after seeing Star Wars in theaters, but the fight that occurs with Damien Darhk (or, again, someone else but it was a villain of some kind) pushes Lucas to not want to direct SW. Which thus erases Ray (as we know him) from existence - becoming a regular person instead, essentially. But the paradox is that - if Lucas never directed SW, Ray doesn't become a scientist - which means the team inevitably isn't formed to begin with to go back in time which means that Lucas should still direct SW which means Ray should still become a scientist which means --

TL;DR, most time travel doesn't make sense on a logical level and always has some sort of paradox. There are very few time travel stories out there that don't present some sort of paradox in the tale.

 

[Roger]

From what I remember - it wasn't the party defeating Garland that sent him back in time . . . okay, it was but it wasn't the physical act of defeating him. After the WoL defeat Garland, the Four Fiends are the one who send him back in time. He creates the time loop (and becomes Chaos through the stolen energy of the crystals) so he can live forever. As for Garland kidnapping Sarah, he does so in hopes that he could conquer the kingdom - he tells the king to hand over control of Corneria in exchange for her life.

...at least, according to later releases. In the original and MSX version, he kidnaps her because he's a bad guy. According to Theatrhythm, he kidnapped her because she didn't reciprocate his love for her. That seems to be the plotline they're going for, as it's kept in the 20th anniversary Ultimania guide for the franchise.

So to answer your questions more directly:

1. Chaos is Garland and Garland created the time loop to live forever - the rotting of the land is a result of him stealing the energy from the crystals to become Chaos. Sort of, anyway. It's Lich's doing, as the only rotting of the land is near Melmond where the Cavern of Earth is. It took 2000 years because that was when Garland was alive - Chaos sends the Four Fiends to the present so they can send Garland to the past whenever he is defeated by the heroes. This is what creates the time loop initially.

2. In the original release, we're just supposed to gather that he's a knight that went rogue and kidnapped Princess Sarah. Presumably for some sort of control or bargaining chip as that is usually the case in fantasy. This is then confirmed (and then deconfirmed) in later releases of the game. TL;DR bad guy doing bad things ends up becoming ultimate bad guy.

3. The WoL defeat Garland but don't kill him - he is near death when the Four Fiends send him back in time, whereupon he absorbs the power of the crystals and becomes Chaos. Which leads into question / answer 1 and the time loop itself.

As far as the paradox goes - though I could explain it away with my own interpretation of the tale, it won't be what actually happened because ... that's just the nature of most, if not all, time travel tales to begin with. Especially those that deal with traveling back in time to meet someone who is influenced by the time traveler to create the thing the time traveler was influenced by in the first place - a recent example was in Legends of Tomorrow when the gang travels back in time to save George Lucas (or someone else, but Lucas was there). Ray was inspired to become a scientist after seeing Star Wars in theaters, but the fight that occurs with Damien Darhk (or, again, someone else but it was a villain of some kind) pushes Lucas to not want to direct SW. Which thus erases Ray (as we know him) from existence - becoming a regular person instead, essentially. But the paradox is that - if Lucas never directed SW, Ray doesn't become a scientist - which means the team inevitably isn't formed to begin with to go back in time which means that Lucas should still direct SW which means Ray should still become a scientist which means --

TL;DR, most time travel doesn't make sense on a logical level and always has some sort of paradox. There are very few time travel stories out there that don't present some sort of paradox in the tale.

Not really. Some time travel stories tell of stable timeloops, some tell of time being changed through timetravel. These are not paradoxes. People that only existed because of time travel stopping existing because of timetravel however is real problematic. The rotting exists. Therefore the Chaos in the past exists. Therefore Garland and the Warriors of Lights battle, and subsequent timetravel took place, yet also didn't, because the Warrior of Lights victory hadn't happened. Terminator does not have these problems, Prisoner of Azkaban does not have these problems. Even the subsequent Terminator installments don't, they speak of iterative changes. rather then loops

 

[Ite]

FF8, Harry Potter, 12 Monkeys, all perfectly stable and static time loops.

 

[Blade]

I was just playing FF1 again on PSP and reading the dialogue about what the King says about Garland:

Apparently he was a pretty well-known Knight in Cornelia, but much of that fame and prestige went to his head and his desire for more power changed him. When you first confront him about Princess Sara's kidnapping, he says something to the effect that "kidnapping her was just the first step in his plan to rule the Kingdom".

It's speculated (at least in the game) that Garland went back to his old "Knightly" self when the loop was broken.

The "key" to breaking that loop was to access the Temple of Chaos and the Black Crystal... for some reason the Temple of Chaos was linked to the Four Fiends and the Four Light Crystals (Light Crystals and Black Crystals as lore were explored later on in Final Fantasy III). Even Princess Sara's Lute instrument held a connection to that ancient temple.

The 20th Anniversary story implies that a being called "Chronodia" was also sealed in the Temple of Chaos, but you had to access other seals from other sealed places to get to it.

 

[Kain424]

People that only existed because of time travel stopping existing because of timetravel however is real problematic.

Huh?

Terminator does not have these problems,

John Connor only exists because his father traveled through time to impregnate his mother. But he only did so to stop a machine going back and killing his mother because Connor would eventually defeat the machines.

I think these kinds of plotlines can only exist if time does not function in a linear way. Instead, it would fractal out in loops and branches, all connected and neverending. in that way, time could be traversed along a path that never ends and never has a beginning, only turns and corners that may or may not intersect. Imagine not a line, but a sort of three dimensional fractal image. An infinite, always expanding outward fenceline of enigmatic geographic shape.

 

[Ite]

Kain you misunderstand Terminator’s sensible and stable logic, at least the first film. Nothing changes in the Terminator universe, the time travel involved was always there, so that John Conner could be sired by Reese and the T800’s arm could help Cyberdyne increase the development of technology, paving the way for Skynet. The T800 always failed, John was always born, Sarah always went into hiding, and the war always began in 1997. Reese always goes back in time as does the T800, both ignorant of their destinies (apparently the robots were able to create a time machine but not figure out that time travel wouldn’t help at all.) This is static time, meaning that the continuum of our universe was printed like a roll of film, and the present is simply the projector light illuminating one frame at a time.

Then T2 came out and followed the Back to the Future rule of time travel (the rule being “if it’s cool, don’t worry about it”). So they manage to change the future, which, okay? I prefer my trafalmadorian philosophy but T2 was admittedly very fun. The third movie wasn’t fun nor sensible and I haven’t seen any Terminator stuff since.

Azkaban also seems to follow static time. Buckbeak was never killed, Hermione always threw the rock, Harry always cast the patronus, etc. Only the perspective of the characters is changed. A static time model also allows for prophecy to be real, which comes into play in Book 5. Strangely, I’m not sure Rowling quite understood the implication here, because a static time model precludes free will (practically speaking at least) and that is a fundamental theme to Harry Potter as a whole, so it’s either an intentional subversion or an oversight. If it IS intentional, that means that the illusion of choice, rather than choice itself, is the most powerful magic. “Of course it’s happening inside your head, but why should that mean it isn’t real?”

I believe FF8 works on static time, with no real evidence to contradict my position. Laguna and friends probably survived only because of Ellone’s junctioning, and efforts to prevent things by meddling (on Ellone’s, Squall’s and ultimately Ultimecia’s part) met with failure, or like Azkaban, a broadening of perspective rather than a real change.

FFI might operate similarly to what you describe, a kind of warbling continuum that’s held up by nothing and requires no causation for the events therein. Or it might take place in a pocket dimension like Donnie Darko, where effectively anything that transpired past the split-off point (Donnie leaving his bedroom to meet the rabbit, or Garland escaping death by going back in time) didn’t happen, so the story is a big fat What If. Unfortunately for FFI, the split off point affects things elsewhere in the continuum — for example, the land starts to wither *before* Garland’s jump-off point. So when the heroes return to the Present, the land isn’t withering and has never withered? And we can assume that the lack of Chaos and the fiends has had zero ripple effect besides the lack of recent troubles, Garland actually dies when the party rescues the princess.

If you were to print *this* continuum like a film, at some point in the early days of civilization a guy flash-appears out of nowhere, becomes the devil, then some other guys come out of nowhere, kill him, and flash away. It never comes up in the timeline again, although identical people are born, live, and die completely unrelated lives 1000 years afterwards.

 

[Roger]

T1 can be interpreted as a single stable timeloop, Kyle Reese always went back to the past. Always died after his son John Connor was conceived. I prefer it that way but T2 still works because it doesn't need to be that way. Sarah Connor doesn't need to be knocked up by Kyle Reese to be capable of producing a son by the name of John Connor. She had a boyfriend already. Comparatively Garland definitely always needed to be send back in the past, but the Warriors of Light, who definitely always do go on their journey do not always defeat Chaos before the effects of Chaos existence can be seen a 1000 years later. Yet no indication of what is responsible for the change is in evidence. T2 is pretty straightforward. John Connor was the leader of the resistence, but now was prepared for their arrival since birth and gets mad machine reprogramming skills, the technology of the T-800 being found gives Cyberdyne a headstart and rather then be wiped out by John Connor, sends back this advanced new Terminator. Here like with Dragonball Z, there was timeline without timetravel, then every trip into the past changed the timeline a bit. FFI doesn't really accomplish this, there's no indication of what made your Warriors of Light different and more successful then the Warriors of Light that had always defeated Garland. Doesn't really make sense.

 

[Kain424]

The universe of Terminator is driven by the theme of "no fate", which would indicate all possible timeline possibilities. There is likely a timeline in which SkyNet wins. Somewhere along the way people used time travel to go back to change things. This would just be a series of time loops, circling in on one another until we get the story we see in the first film and maybe even the next (it assumes the T-1000 was always there, waiting to be unleashed by a panicking SkyNet).

Final Fantasy's time issue has maybe more in common with Rowling's work. It was always ancient legend and prophecy, so it likely always happened the way it plays out in the narrative. Hermione always throws the rock, and Garland always gets defeated. It's all magic anyway.

 

[Roger]

The universe of Terminator is driven by the theme of "no fate", which would indicate all possible timeline possibilities. There is likely a timeline in which SkyNet wins. Somewhere along the way people used time travel to go back to change things. This would just be a series of time loops, circling in on one another until we get the story we see in the first film and maybe even the next (it assumes the T-1000 was always there, waiting to be unleashed by a panicking SkyNet).

Final Fantasy's time issue has maybe more in common with Rowling's work. It was always ancient legend and prophecy, so it likely always happened the way it plays out in the narrative. Hermione always throws the rock, and Garland always gets defeated. It's all magic anyway.

Garland always gets defeated, which is why Chaos always exists but Chaos does not always get defeated, which is why we see the timeline change at the end. That's what I'm saying, Final Fantasy I does both and therefore has no internal logic. Terminator and Prisoner of Azkaban and many other stories do have a workable set of timetravel rules.

 

[Kain424]

I see what you're saying, but I think you are understanding time in way the game's narrative doesn't necessarily support. Time moves forward, then back a ways, then forward again with different events. But it was always meant to do so, because of the magic of fate. Or destiny. Whatever you want to call it. There is a logic there. Maybe not one you could apply IRL, but it's there in the universe of this fantasy game.

 

[Blade]

The Loop as I understand it:
-----
Garland gets sent to the past by the Four Fiends via the power of the Crystals' Energies and Garland is revived as Chaos.

The Four Fiends were originally "from the past" and get sent to the Future to absorb the Crystals' power via Chaos.
-----

There's problems with this though:

1. We don't know for how long the Crystals existed or if they even existed before Chaos was created.
2. Destroying Chaos doesn't end the loop... what destroys the loop is destroying the "past versions of the Four Fiends".
3. Even assuming that destroying the "past fiends" does nothing to affect the "future fiends" (assuming Chaos has the power to revive the Four Fiends from death), the fact is the point in time in which the Warriors of Light destroy the Four Fiends in the Past is intended to take place INSIDE the Temple of Chaos... that means that Chaos hasn't sent them to the Future YET.
4. If it were a true loop, Chaos would have already sent the Fiends to the future before the Warriors of Light could touch them. Unless we're talking about a second loop in a cycle where they simply appeared at an "earlier point" in the past timeline of events.
5. Chaos has no actual power over when Garland was born... he is just simply "Garland corrupted/sent to the Past". If someone killed Garland before he began his training as a Knight, the loop would have ended right then and there.

6. This STILL doesn't explain the Black Crystal's connection to the other Four Crystals, or the 2000-year-old Lute that had the power to open the inner portions of the Temple of Chaos that somehow fell in to Princess Sarah's hands.

7. Even assuming the Black Crystal was the cause of the other Four Crystals sending "energy" in to the past... it would have been an even easier matter if the Warriors of Light simply smashed the Black Crystal and closed the gateway to the past in the first place, thus cutting off Chaos' energy source.

 

[Kain424]

This assumes time works in a straightforward fashion. But if instead the black crystal works regardless its time or place, it could be that the magic incurred would flow once a spell was cast without the barrier of time interfering.

 

[Blade]

Based on what I've read about Dark Crystals, they act as a power that "mirrors" the Light Crystals. Either as a counterpart or as a reflection OF that power.

The Emperor in Dissidia suggested using Dark Crystals to "stay alive" once the Gods of Harmony and Discord were killed as a form of self-preservation so that his role as a "Pawn of Chaos" would no longer apply to his existence... There's also a Battlegen element called "Blackcrystal Silver" found only in the Shrine of Chaos stage in Dissidia that references the substance.

I haven't seen any mention of Black Crystals having any influence over the "rules" of Time.

It's only suggested that those who have an affinity for Chaos can travel through Time (or at least the Historia Crux as referenced in FFXIII-2).

But even then, the likes of Noel Kreiss and Serah Farron couldn't bend the rules of time as they wished. The only one who could do that was Lightning because of her affinity with the Goddess Etro's powers.

But, assuming the FFXIII saga has no connection with the "rules" of FF1, most likely there isn't anything that says Black Crystals can still function regardless of what time period they exist in... And, assuming they did, then FF1's Ending would have been impossible and the Loop could never have been broken, and yet it was.

Basically it's a Chicken and Egg Paradox. The Loop wouldn't exist without the Black Crystal, but if the Black Crystal was "truly immune" to the effects of destroying the Loop, then the Loop couldn't actually be broken.

So you could say the "Ending" of Final Fantasy 1 is "Schrödinger's cat". Either the ending happened, or it didn't.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Unless we're talking about a second loop in a cycle where they simply appeared at an "earlier point" in the past timeline of events.

Dissidia.

Any attempt at understanding FFI's time loop is going to require taking the other cycle closely associated with the WoL and Garland into account.

Dissidia's ending leads directly into FFI's opening, with -- let's check off all the beats to the opening premise -- the WoL walking toward Cornelia (check), crystal in hand (check), with no memory of his own origin (check; he came to life during the early Dissidia conflict and no longer remembers his own first turn in the cycle).

Any enduringly puzzling aspects of this time loop or what allows it to work can probably just be chalked up to this secondary element.

With regard to Garland's black crystal, by the way, I've long suspected that this was Jecht's crystal from Dissidia. We're told there were two crystals created when he fought with Tidus, as Jecht was actually a stolen warrior of Cosmos who was simply re-filled with Chaos's power.

If this genuinely is the origin of that crystal, then it's a manifestation of Chaos's power -- the same as the other crystals were manifestations of Cosmos's power -- and it begins to become a lot easier to imagine why it might take him where he needed to go to become Chaos.

 

[Blade]

I should also add that the ending of Lightning Returns (FFXIII-3) is left ambiguous because of the Time-reversing Crystal and the element of New Game Plus.

Basically any game that has New Game Plus is technically a LOOP.

And so long as people continue to play said game, said game never actually "truly" ends!

 

[Blade]

Also, I think this is one of those moments where you could argue the validity of Dissidia's connection with FF1. While it's implied they are connected, that's only if you accept Dissidia as canon to FF1 (and in lots of cases most do not).

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

When it comes to FF, there's all kinds of crap that most fans don't want to acknowledge.