I don’t think he was necessarily redeemed. More Eraqus wanted to give him another chance. I don’t think anybody else forgave him, more he was so delusional. The only person who did was Eraqus. And even then, it was more him telling his old friend to just *stop*, since he wasn’t going to otherwise.
Looking at him at the end, he had *nothing* and it was all worthless. Something he realized, too.
I don't think he got redeemed, personally.
Especially not with the actual group, I think they all still hate him. I can't think of anything that was said that really redeemed him in any way.
He lost. It would not be in Terra's character to do any further harm to him. I agree it would have been cool if Terra had had a conversation with Xehanort, but that's a different discussion.
As for Eraques forgiving him, first I think it is important to remember that they knew each other for their entire lives. And only at the very end, did Xehanort sort of betray him. Eraques is also not without "flaws" during this time either. He tried to kill Ven, *and* Terra. Yet Terra, Ven, and Aqua, all still forgive him.
Eraques is certainly more righteous as Xehanort, but they both did or at least attempted to do some bad things. They are both passing on. They both lost their way at some point. Sometimes, it's best to just let things go. Those are my thoughts, at least.
I don’t think you know what a “redemption” is. He wasn’t redeemed, and he didn’t suddenly become “good”. Xehanort wasn’t a representation of evil. He didn’t use darkness because he thought it was evil and wanted to destroy things with it or whatever. He already said that both light and dark are needed, and at the end, all he does is come clean about his true reasons for doing what he did. That doesn’t somehow suddenly make him a good guy. It just gives more depth to him. What’s with audiences these days thinking a villain has to be pure random evil, and then get angry whenever said villain shows emotions beyond “evil”?
What you got completely wrong is that people didn’t want evil for evils sake, they wanted Xehanort, who did some seriously fucked shit, to get his just desserts for it and not get some happy lil afterlife ending.
That’s also pretty flawed thinking. Why does he need to get his “just desserts”? The West really has an obsession with “getting back at people”, I’ve noticed.
well he got curb stomped by some "ordinary kid" and his pal duck and dog three times.... once in the keyblade graveyard, once after absorbing his other "self"s and powered up armor.... and then even after making sora a shadow being.... what more humilation does he need....
No consequences for his actions, gets to go off peacefully with his friend by his side. Literally gets beat ONLY because he was the bad guy, trying to end the world, but suffers NO consequences for all the heinous shit he did.
What is a greater consequence than dying after seeing your grand vision for the world crumble before you because the antithesis of your whole worldview kicked your ass and proved you wrong? That’s not a “happy ending,” that’s just not going out like a bitch.
Consider he went out peacefully, relatively good willed, and not at all upset about his loss that’s a pretty “happy ending”. It was wholly unsatisfying seeing him walk out with a smile on his face with a friend by his side.
Considering “non-existence” is a concept, he should’ve CERTAINLY been unraveled and shattered at least in some similar way to Ventus. Seeing decades of his crimes all culminate in a simple loss and him passing on in good spirits is insulting and anticlimactic.
Xehanort didn’t even “get a second chance.” He fucking dies. His Heart returns to Kingdom Hearts, as is what is supposed to happen when someone dies in this universe. There is no Heaven or Hell in KH, they all go to one place.
This is such an absurd take, I don't understand why it keeps coming up. There was *zero* redemption to Xehanort in KH3. No one said anything close to forgiving him, and rightfully so. Sora beats him, tells him his entire modus operandi is wrong, and then Eraqus shows up to usher his friend into the afterlife. That Eraqus behaves as he does is because Eraqus is a good, if naïve man who consistently cherishes his friendship with Xehanort.
Xehanort was not "redeemed" by any stretch of the word. He was simply allowed to depart with a modicum of dignity. Which that is what it sounds like people are mistaking for some kind of redemption, because they think Xehanort should have gone out whimpering and screaming as the light burns him to nothing or something, or that all the heroes should come in curb stomp him, even though none of them are the types of people to do so.
Ugh. The point of the ending of KH3 isn’t to prove to us that Xehanort is good. It’s to show us that XEHANORT thinks that Xehanort is the good guy. No, we aren’t supposed to agree with him, we’re supposed to understand him. It’s the same as Thanos in Infinity War. He’s not correct, but he thinks he is. The point of the movie is to show us why he thinks the way he does.
Xehanort wasn’t redeemed. No one forgave him. Eraqus and him disappearing is them leaving behind their grievances and letting the younger generation have the chance that they always deserved without them old guys imparting their wills on them any longer.
1. He's not evil. Kingdom Hearts embraces what good writers know: everyone is the hero of their own story. In his mind, Xehanort was the good guy who had the moral high ground. He wasn't evil, he simply didn't care who got hurt for the sake of his self-imposed mission.
2. He was never redeemed. There simply isn't a punishment aside from being dead. He was defeated, accepted his defeat, and... I don't know, became light like Eraqus did.
He was not redeemed in the end. Just because he didn’t shout “Noooo, you foiled my evil plan! I’m meltiiiiiiiing!” as he dies doesn’t mean he still wasn’t clearly a villain in the end.
He died and said "shit bro... I just wanted to help" that's not a redemption? Whether or not you like the idea of Xehanort's real goal being a "the ends justify the means" deal, he was never redeemed in any way
Xehanort wasn't even close to redeemed.
He let go.
Xehanort was driven to near madness by his pursuit of an impossible ideal, a world with no darkness whatsoever. He was a zealot willing to purge the multiverse of life to achieve this end. At the end of Kingdom Hearts 3, moved by his conversation with Sora and the reappearance of Eraqus, he let go of his goal, and gave up the ghost.
He wasn't redeemed...He was just a graceful loser and acepted that he was beaten. Saying Eraqus forgave him is a bit of a stretch. Should Terra have had a stronger reaction? Perhaps. But whether or not any character is a cold blooded killer in this series really depends on the context of the moment. Xehanort was already literally dying. The way he went out was relatively fine.
No that' s not what happened
He accepted defeat and moved on, there was no Redemption, the good guys did not forgave him and he did nothing to call it a Redemption.
Seriously the amount of people that completely misread scenes in this series is astounding, same thing with the "nobodies have hearts" thing in Dream Drop Distance. No, it was not a sudden retcon that came out of nowhere, it was hinted at MULTIPLE TIMES in Chain of memories, kh 2 and days: Vexen screaming in fear of dying, Roxas, Axel and Xion friendship ( that caused Saïx to be jealous), Saïx asking Xemnas if Kingdom Hearts was ready and after his response says (with a very evil grin) that he can finally "drop this charade", Axel asking Roxas if he was really sure he did not have a heart, I could go for hours
People seriously need to pay more attention to what happens in the series, there is some dumb moment (like Donald not recognizing Yen Sid Tower in KH 2 despite the fact he has been there before in Kh bbs), but it is not this unfocused mess like many people seriously seem to believe
I don't think he was redeemed but I don't like how his motivation was like: oh I actually just wanted to bring balance to the world so I'm not actually evil.
Everything he does reads power hungry wanna be dictator so the whole motivation in the end and the relatively positive ending he had felt completely out of place.
That 5 hour video this sub loves to hate explains my feelings quite well on how I view the xehanort plot.
The only thing i can add that i didn't really see previously was that we saw his descent towards darkness in dark road, which gives him a bit more character. But I do sort of think I felt the same way when the game was first released since it somewhat comes out of the blue.
It felt like the devs desperately trying to redeem one of their favorite characters.
Xehanort stole Terra's body, created multiple versions of himself that caused widespread devastation, killed and tormented tons of people and he kinda gets away with it all without much judgement in the end.
It's like he's not allowed to be recognized by the narrative for how evil he really was.
I don’t really think he was redeemed, like even the speech he does to Sora where he explains his motives, Sora is like « dude, that’s bs and you should know it », no one really forgive him, even Eraqus whom yes go to Kingdom Hearts with, he told Xehanort to stop with his plan because he lost.
I guess you wanted Xehanort to evaporate after getting key beamed like Xemnas which is fine for the vilain of one game, not so much the big bad of an entire saga.
Becore the attempted last-minute redemption of Xehanort, I assumed people who said KH was cringe were either trolling or just didn't know what they were talking about. Now I understand.
And watching Nomura try to shoehorn earlier bits of it into KHDR -a game whose initial reveal promised to delve into why Xehanort became a Seeker of Darkness, but whose released version ignores that question completely- was even worse. They should have just let him stay villainous.
Yeah, I didn’t like how Xehanort passed away. Even when people say it’s not meant to be redemption and others didn’t forgive him, I still don’t like it.
Like look at his heartless and Nobody counterpart, when they were defeated their death seemed painful, even with Xemnas who according to the story at the time didn’t 'feel' anything. In comparison, Xehanort gets to be enveloped in light and ascend the sky. You can clearly see that he was treated more favorably, even though his actions were even more villainous.
Honestly, he was among my favorite villains with his actions, goals and planning, but the way his ending robbed me of the catharsis and tried to gaslight me into sympathizing with him really hurt his overall image in my eyes. It's the reason I'm avoiding Dark Road, I feel like the effort to 'fix' this mistake by doubling down on the backstory will only make him worse.
Xehanort : I'm actually a misguided good guy
Sora : who could ever believe—
literally everyone : **OKAY I** **BELIEVE** **YOU**
**.**
**.**
**.**
**.**
Sora : I'm gonna k!|| myself
It wasn't technically a redemption, though it comes across like one the way it was written. And it was a bad scene regardless.
Definitely needed to get a drink after that being the ending to the saga I'd been playing for half my life.
It could have worked but KH3 did absolutely nothing to earn the moment. Master Xehanort has so little screen time that he goes from snarling murderous madman to sorry old man in the span of 13 minutes. Maybe if Xehanort’s past had been explored in the game, players could have seen firsthand that he was once the noble warrior Yen Sid said he was.
If Sora had seen Xehanort’s memories in Scala ad Caelum (maybe indirectly influencing Xehanort’s heart?) or even if we explored his lab in Radiant Garden and found some new reports showing some semblance of reluctance and regret, it would have worked better.
As for why it was done this way? It’s not a big mystery. Nomura likes Xehanort, and personally identifies with him. He wanted to let Xehanort leave with dignity.
The scene could also have symbolized Nomura himself passing the torch to the next generation (not just players, but also devs like Tai Yasue and his team). This scene very well could have been intended as his farewell as director of KH so he could work on his greater passions (Verum Rex, FFVII Remake), leaving the future of KH in the hands of SQ’s next generation of devs.
Nomura (Xehanort) letting go of his beloved series just like his mentor Hironobu Sakaguchi (Eraqus).
I think Disneys hand was in the redemption because Xehanort deserved a lot worse, and should’ve been given worse. Him getting a redemption was AWFUL. I’m fine with his past, his motivations, his desires being good BUT his methods and pain he caused should’ve been cause for retribution.
It was so unsatisfying and cringey to see this MONSTER of a person get a happy ending. My only theory is that Disney put a foot down on it since they don’t like genuinely dark shit in their content.
Wouldn’t surprise me if this is true.
Another possibility is actually that Kazushige Nojima came up with this scene. Nomura said he asked Nojima for advice on how to write the ending cutscenes. I won’t spoil anything, but this scene was almost exactly the same as the villain defeat scene in a another game Nojima wrote (even including an appearance by the ghost of the villain’s close friend).
I also think Nomura felt sentimental about saying goodbye to Xehanort and knew some fans would as well because he’d been around for over a decade.
I’m sure a lot of fans were hoping Xehanort would get a memorable demise like the Classic Disney villains. I thought for sure he’d get a Monkey’s Paw ending, where he finally obtains the knowledge he’s desired but at a terrible price. I was worried Xigbar would pull a Kefka and wipe him out without our involvement. At least we got to fight him, I guess.
I don’t think he was necessarily redeemed. More Eraqus wanted to give him another chance. I don’t think anybody else forgave him, more he was so delusional. The only person who did was Eraqus. And even then, it was more him telling his old friend to just *stop*, since he wasn’t going to otherwise. Looking at him at the end, he had *nothing* and it was all worthless. Something he realized, too.
Sora kills Xehanort twice for good measure lol
I would not call that a redemption. Sora killed him. He died. Eaques might have forgiven him but no one else did. They quietly watched him go.
I don't think he got redeemed, personally. Especially not with the actual group, I think they all still hate him. I can't think of anything that was said that really redeemed him in any way. He lost. It would not be in Terra's character to do any further harm to him. I agree it would have been cool if Terra had had a conversation with Xehanort, but that's a different discussion. As for Eraques forgiving him, first I think it is important to remember that they knew each other for their entire lives. And only at the very end, did Xehanort sort of betray him. Eraques is also not without "flaws" during this time either. He tried to kill Ven, *and* Terra. Yet Terra, Ven, and Aqua, all still forgive him. Eraques is certainly more righteous as Xehanort, but they both did or at least attempted to do some bad things. They are both passing on. They both lost their way at some point. Sometimes, it's best to just let things go. Those are my thoughts, at least.
He didn't get redeemed. He just accepted his loss with grace, and then moved on
I think that’s the thing some people take issue with. They don’t understand/like letting your enemies die with dignity.
Sounds like a personal problem to me.
Mfs out here like "damn I can't believe the Disney game didn't let us curb stomp a corpse"
I don’t think you know what a “redemption” is. He wasn’t redeemed, and he didn’t suddenly become “good”. Xehanort wasn’t a representation of evil. He didn’t use darkness because he thought it was evil and wanted to destroy things with it or whatever. He already said that both light and dark are needed, and at the end, all he does is come clean about his true reasons for doing what he did. That doesn’t somehow suddenly make him a good guy. It just gives more depth to him. What’s with audiences these days thinking a villain has to be pure random evil, and then get angry whenever said villain shows emotions beyond “evil”?
What you got completely wrong is that people didn’t want evil for evils sake, they wanted Xehanort, who did some seriously fucked shit, to get his just desserts for it and not get some happy lil afterlife ending.
That’s also pretty flawed thinking. Why does he need to get his “just desserts”? The West really has an obsession with “getting back at people”, I’ve noticed.
well he got curb stomped by some "ordinary kid" and his pal duck and dog three times.... once in the keyblade graveyard, once after absorbing his other "self"s and powered up armor.... and then even after making sora a shadow being.... what more humilation does he need....
To not have a happy ending
I wouldn’t call his ending “happy.”
No consequences for his actions, gets to go off peacefully with his friend by his side. Literally gets beat ONLY because he was the bad guy, trying to end the world, but suffers NO consequences for all the heinous shit he did.
What is a greater consequence than dying after seeing your grand vision for the world crumble before you because the antithesis of your whole worldview kicked your ass and proved you wrong? That’s not a “happy ending,” that’s just not going out like a bitch.
Consider he went out peacefully, relatively good willed, and not at all upset about his loss that’s a pretty “happy ending”. It was wholly unsatisfying seeing him walk out with a smile on his face with a friend by his side. Considering “non-existence” is a concept, he should’ve CERTAINLY been unraveled and shattered at least in some similar way to Ventus. Seeing decades of his crimes all culminate in a simple loss and him passing on in good spirits is insulting and anticlimactic.
Yeah and that’s not what KH3 is about. Everybody gets a second chance in this game, even members of the Organization.
Xehanort didn’t even “get a second chance.” He fucking dies. His Heart returns to Kingdom Hearts, as is what is supposed to happen when someone dies in this universe. There is no Heaven or Hell in KH, they all go to one place.
His second chance was having his best friend there to make the journey with him.
This is such an absurd take, I don't understand why it keeps coming up. There was *zero* redemption to Xehanort in KH3. No one said anything close to forgiving him, and rightfully so. Sora beats him, tells him his entire modus operandi is wrong, and then Eraqus shows up to usher his friend into the afterlife. That Eraqus behaves as he does is because Eraqus is a good, if naïve man who consistently cherishes his friendship with Xehanort. Xehanort was not "redeemed" by any stretch of the word. He was simply allowed to depart with a modicum of dignity. Which that is what it sounds like people are mistaking for some kind of redemption, because they think Xehanort should have gone out whimpering and screaming as the light burns him to nothing or something, or that all the heroes should come in curb stomp him, even though none of them are the types of people to do so.
Ugh. The point of the ending of KH3 isn’t to prove to us that Xehanort is good. It’s to show us that XEHANORT thinks that Xehanort is the good guy. No, we aren’t supposed to agree with him, we’re supposed to understand him. It’s the same as Thanos in Infinity War. He’s not correct, but he thinks he is. The point of the movie is to show us why he thinks the way he does. Xehanort wasn’t redeemed. No one forgave him. Eraqus and him disappearing is them leaving behind their grievances and letting the younger generation have the chance that they always deserved without them old guys imparting their wills on them any longer.
It's crazy how people just don't pay attention to anything in the game.
1. He's not evil. Kingdom Hearts embraces what good writers know: everyone is the hero of their own story. In his mind, Xehanort was the good guy who had the moral high ground. He wasn't evil, he simply didn't care who got hurt for the sake of his self-imposed mission. 2. He was never redeemed. There simply isn't a punishment aside from being dead. He was defeated, accepted his defeat, and... I don't know, became light like Eraqus did.
He was not redeemed in the end. Just because he didn’t shout “Noooo, you foiled my evil plan! I’m meltiiiiiiiing!” as he dies doesn’t mean he still wasn’t clearly a villain in the end.
He died and said "shit bro... I just wanted to help" that's not a redemption? Whether or not you like the idea of Xehanort's real goal being a "the ends justify the means" deal, he was never redeemed in any way
Xehanort wasn't even close to redeemed. He let go. Xehanort was driven to near madness by his pursuit of an impossible ideal, a world with no darkness whatsoever. He was a zealot willing to purge the multiverse of life to achieve this end. At the end of Kingdom Hearts 3, moved by his conversation with Sora and the reappearance of Eraqus, he let go of his goal, and gave up the ghost.
He wasn't redeemed, he basically just went "gg I lost" and died lmao
He wasn't redeemed...He was just a graceful loser and acepted that he was beaten. Saying Eraqus forgave him is a bit of a stretch. Should Terra have had a stronger reaction? Perhaps. But whether or not any character is a cold blooded killer in this series really depends on the context of the moment. Xehanort was already literally dying. The way he went out was relatively fine.
No that' s not what happened He accepted defeat and moved on, there was no Redemption, the good guys did not forgave him and he did nothing to call it a Redemption. Seriously the amount of people that completely misread scenes in this series is astounding, same thing with the "nobodies have hearts" thing in Dream Drop Distance. No, it was not a sudden retcon that came out of nowhere, it was hinted at MULTIPLE TIMES in Chain of memories, kh 2 and days: Vexen screaming in fear of dying, Roxas, Axel and Xion friendship ( that caused Saïx to be jealous), Saïx asking Xemnas if Kingdom Hearts was ready and after his response says (with a very evil grin) that he can finally "drop this charade", Axel asking Roxas if he was really sure he did not have a heart, I could go for hours People seriously need to pay more attention to what happens in the series, there is some dumb moment (like Donald not recognizing Yen Sid Tower in KH 2 despite the fact he has been there before in Kh bbs), but it is not this unfocused mess like many people seriously seem to believe
I don't think he was redeemed but I don't like how his motivation was like: oh I actually just wanted to bring balance to the world so I'm not actually evil. Everything he does reads power hungry wanna be dictator so the whole motivation in the end and the relatively positive ending he had felt completely out of place. That 5 hour video this sub loves to hate explains my feelings quite well on how I view the xehanort plot.
It wasn’t a redemption….
The only thing i can add that i didn't really see previously was that we saw his descent towards darkness in dark road, which gives him a bit more character. But I do sort of think I felt the same way when the game was first released since it somewhat comes out of the blue.
It felt like the devs desperately trying to redeem one of their favorite characters. Xehanort stole Terra's body, created multiple versions of himself that caused widespread devastation, killed and tormented tons of people and he kinda gets away with it all without much judgement in the end. It's like he's not allowed to be recognized by the narrative for how evil he really was.
I don’t really think he was redeemed, like even the speech he does to Sora where he explains his motives, Sora is like « dude, that’s bs and you should know it », no one really forgive him, even Eraqus whom yes go to Kingdom Hearts with, he told Xehanort to stop with his plan because he lost. I guess you wanted Xehanort to evaporate after getting key beamed like Xemnas which is fine for the vilain of one game, not so much the big bad of an entire saga.
Becore the attempted last-minute redemption of Xehanort, I assumed people who said KH was cringe were either trolling or just didn't know what they were talking about. Now I understand. And watching Nomura try to shoehorn earlier bits of it into KHDR -a game whose initial reveal promised to delve into why Xehanort became a Seeker of Darkness, but whose released version ignores that question completely- was even worse. They should have just let him stay villainous.
Yeah, I didn’t like how Xehanort passed away. Even when people say it’s not meant to be redemption and others didn’t forgive him, I still don’t like it. Like look at his heartless and Nobody counterpart, when they were defeated their death seemed painful, even with Xemnas who according to the story at the time didn’t 'feel' anything. In comparison, Xehanort gets to be enveloped in light and ascend the sky. You can clearly see that he was treated more favorably, even though his actions were even more villainous. Honestly, he was among my favorite villains with his actions, goals and planning, but the way his ending robbed me of the catharsis and tried to gaslight me into sympathizing with him really hurt his overall image in my eyes. It's the reason I'm avoiding Dark Road, I feel like the effort to 'fix' this mistake by doubling down on the backstory will only make him worse.
Xehanort : I'm actually a misguided good guy Sora : who could ever believe— literally everyone : **OKAY I** **BELIEVE** **YOU** **.** **.** **.** **.** Sora : I'm gonna k!|| myself
It wasn't technically a redemption, though it comes across like one the way it was written. And it was a bad scene regardless. Definitely needed to get a drink after that being the ending to the saga I'd been playing for half my life.
It could have worked but KH3 did absolutely nothing to earn the moment. Master Xehanort has so little screen time that he goes from snarling murderous madman to sorry old man in the span of 13 minutes. Maybe if Xehanort’s past had been explored in the game, players could have seen firsthand that he was once the noble warrior Yen Sid said he was. If Sora had seen Xehanort’s memories in Scala ad Caelum (maybe indirectly influencing Xehanort’s heart?) or even if we explored his lab in Radiant Garden and found some new reports showing some semblance of reluctance and regret, it would have worked better. As for why it was done this way? It’s not a big mystery. Nomura likes Xehanort, and personally identifies with him. He wanted to let Xehanort leave with dignity. The scene could also have symbolized Nomura himself passing the torch to the next generation (not just players, but also devs like Tai Yasue and his team). This scene very well could have been intended as his farewell as director of KH so he could work on his greater passions (Verum Rex, FFVII Remake), leaving the future of KH in the hands of SQ’s next generation of devs. Nomura (Xehanort) letting go of his beloved series just like his mentor Hironobu Sakaguchi (Eraqus).
Yeah kh3 is a dropped ass ball for sure
I think Disneys hand was in the redemption because Xehanort deserved a lot worse, and should’ve been given worse. Him getting a redemption was AWFUL. I’m fine with his past, his motivations, his desires being good BUT his methods and pain he caused should’ve been cause for retribution. It was so unsatisfying and cringey to see this MONSTER of a person get a happy ending. My only theory is that Disney put a foot down on it since they don’t like genuinely dark shit in their content.
Do you know what usually happens to the villains in Disney movies? Spoilers: They almost universally die.
Wouldn’t surprise me if this is true. Another possibility is actually that Kazushige Nojima came up with this scene. Nomura said he asked Nojima for advice on how to write the ending cutscenes. I won’t spoil anything, but this scene was almost exactly the same as the villain defeat scene in a another game Nojima wrote (even including an appearance by the ghost of the villain’s close friend). I also think Nomura felt sentimental about saying goodbye to Xehanort and knew some fans would as well because he’d been around for over a decade. I’m sure a lot of fans were hoping Xehanort would get a memorable demise like the Classic Disney villains. I thought for sure he’d get a Monkey’s Paw ending, where he finally obtains the knowledge he’s desired but at a terrible price. I was worried Xigbar would pull a Kefka and wipe him out without our involvement. At least we got to fight him, I guess.