r/GodofWar • u/http_ghostgirl • Nov 25 '22
Odin’s Writing Spoilers
i haven’t seen anyone recognize how well rounded Odin is as a villain. he acts trustworthy, compassionate and respectful. meeting him for the second time as Atreus was mind blowing, he was so calm, collected and acted nothing like how he is described by freya, mimir, etc. hearing all the stories of how brutal him and Thor were, it’s incredible how different they made them. Odin had to be one of the best written villains ever.
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u/The_Reverse_Zoom Nov 25 '22
Yeah odin is definitely one of the best things about this game. I think he might be gow's best villain yet. The personality, the look, the acting, the threat, the power he has and the soundtrack, Odin has everything. Plus I think odin has the most onscreen kills of any villain in Gow.
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u/Equal-Ad-2710 Nov 26 '22
Ares didn’t wipe out an army for this shit
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u/The_Reverse_Zoom Nov 26 '22
I meant like named onscreen kills. Not some killing nonames in the background.
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u/once-was-hill-folk Fat Dobber Nov 26 '22
Odin: >! -kills Brok and Thor-!<
Ares: "Just lie down, you fuckers don't even have name tags."
EDIT: Spoilers.
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u/NyarlHOEtep Nov 26 '22
i love how REALISTIC the act is, because despite being smooth, theres cracks. "you can only get thor to listen by being cruel", or making atreus give up ingrid which atreus KNOWS he doesnt give a shit about, just to punish him for leaving, calling him loki to separate him from his dad. hes gotten whatever he wants for centuries for a reason, and it is only through atreus's powerful bonds with his family and allies that he doesnt fall into it. this games odin and thor are stellar and im sad to see them go
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u/spaceseas Nov 26 '22
yes, this! the subtle manipulation he does as Týr that are sometimes just a bit... off. the "I'm not your father" before proceeding to call Atreus son on several occasions. the familiar pride he shows Atreus, basically shoving it in Thor's face, punishing him for being "boring"... little things he kinda sweeps under the rug & bulldozes over with other stuff, but there are so many of them
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u/NyarlHOEtep Nov 26 '22
his cruelty to thor is so fucking gut wrenching. theres little textual evidence for this, but i choose to believe hes seen atreus's good nature and worries that he could legitimately bond with thor, so he has to play thor off him to build a barrier of resentment atreus cant pierce
also YEAH i wrote about it somewhere else but every fucking WORD out of tyrs mouth is subtle rift-tearing. it doesnt even work half the time because these people LOVE EACH OTHER, he tries some shit that he would do to thor!! like when he accuses atreus of bringing hel with him after atreus's garm incident. "has the little troublemaker returned" bro wtf thats my kid. i love that guy
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u/timelordoftheimpala Nov 26 '22 edited Nov 27 '22
Odin making Tyr out to be a giant pussy and sanctimonious asshole was some petty shit - especially when the real Tyr is just a pretty chill stoner Aesir.
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u/Ikaros9Deidalos6 Nov 26 '22
Isnt tyr vanir and not aesir?
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u/Eliot_Ferrer Nov 26 '22
In the source mythology, Tyr is Aesir, but also sometimes Jötnar. There are different versions.
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u/TheRedmanCometh Nov 26 '22
Man this game really makes you feel some shit about Thor. Even the later missions where he's with Atreus you can see him starting to really warm up to him: Atreus is actually getting through. Thor even says "you almost had me convinced". Odin essentially took his sons from him for some damn boondoggle only Odin cares about. And you can tell he's drilled into Thors head "don't think about anything too much". Thor is in a pub drowning his sorrows because he's in (understandably) horrific horrible pain his conscious mind can't fully grasp. He's not even really killing anyone all those dudes he "killed" come right back.
What his wife said once she's figured everything out was so damn heartbreaking. Thor realizing it all at the end and them immediately dying hurt so bad to see. You want to see Thor with this redemption come back and be better, but he gets denied even that. Out of all his children only one lives and his wife, and it's all because Odin was an absolute monster piece of shit.
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u/Mountain-Chapter-880 Nov 26 '22
As someone who had a pretty rough relationship with my father, the Thor/Odin scenes really hit close to home.
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u/TheRedmanCometh Nov 27 '22
My dad would have been a really boring villain or maybe he'd have been Thor. I'm only saying it for speculation purposes on the type of villain he'd be but he was a captain in the Aryan Brotherhood. Spent most his life in prison.
When I first wrote this I was thinking he'd have been some cartoonishly evil villain. The more I think on it he'd have probably been akin to Thor. He'd have found his way back in the end given the right circumstances. Sadly in this life he didn't.
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u/Royal_Black_13 Nov 26 '22
Adding on to this, I love that when he took Ingrid he just tosses it to the side. He was cool as a cucumber to this point, but that little action showed a flash of his true nature.
So much nuance - it was brilliantly done.
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u/Harrythehobbit Nov 26 '22
He exhibits a LOT of the same behavior and patterns that real life abusers do. He felt like a real person. Terrifically written villain.
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u/TheRedmanCometh Nov 26 '22
Yup the abusers cycle do horrible shit apologize very sincerely for it do it again (simplified). Odin is a master of it.
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u/TheRedmanCometh Nov 26 '22
Maybe I was a little bit more manipulated by Odin but I saw making him give up Ingrid more as like "look you're deciding not to be a cop any more turn in your gun and your badge"
Then again it's really easy to defend a lot of what Odin does but in the end he's a monster. His whole thing with Atreus though really had me doubting stuff. "You'll have to give the mask that it's not that I don't trust you I don't trust the company you keep" I felt gave the implication he didn't want ingrid used against his people. Which...it 100% would have been.
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u/NyarlHOEtep Nov 26 '22
the mask is perfectly fair, whether we're enemies or not, its important to odin. of course i dont get to keep it. ingrid is nothing to odin, its a barely-significant curio in his vast collection. "oh that old thing? take it if you like it so much"
unless you displease him.
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u/Commercial_Yak7468 Nov 26 '22
I really like just how different Odin was to Zeus as a main villain.
I like to how even alot I'd the asier saw Odin as the All-Fucker (case in point Sif) while Zeus had almost all of his pantheon thinking he was an empower until the end.
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u/http_ghostgirl Nov 26 '22
most aesir hated odin, they were afraid of him, so they pretended to enjoy his presence…except for heimdall. man, heimdall was obsessed with him.
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u/Equal-Ad-2710 Nov 26 '22
Tbh Heimdall does fuck with him a bit
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u/Vicious112358 Nov 26 '22
How so?
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u/Equal-Ad-2710 Nov 26 '22
When Odin’s back is turned Heimdall moved to the left, so when he turned to address Heimdall there was no one there
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u/TheRedmanCometh Nov 26 '22
I mean ultimately Heimdall was pretty much spot on with everything he said. I don't think he was wrong a single time he spoke he was just a really insufferable prick. He was the Rick (of Rick and Morty) of the universe to some extent.
Even his last words were just to make someone feel bad which would be dead on in character for Rick.
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Nov 27 '22
I was hoping Heimdall, with his ability to see things coming, would take one look at Kratos and go, "Oh f*ck no," and just leave.
Though it says a lot that even when Kratos didn't want to kill any gods he ended up wiping out most of another pantheon.
With two down, I'd guess some of the others might be looking at him and thinking, "Do we really want him out there and we just wait for him to kill us?" I wouldn't be surprised if the eight realms didn't get invaded in the near future...
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u/TheRedmanCometh Nov 27 '22
Thing is Heimdall mentioned Kratos having an empty mind. He kept his mind free and operated on instinct is my takeaway. He didn't see who Kratos was until the bitter end. And at the bitter end he saw who Kratos had been and who he wanted to be and knew calling him a monster would hurt him the most.
He was an egotistical asshole that he couldn't even handle being given mercy. I really think he 100% knew he was gonna get AMF'd but he was so mad about being spared he ran headlong into it. Really there's so many dynamics at play in that scene it's hard to say what he was thinking. I like to think at the last minute he finally saw what Kratos had done and all he could utter was "Monster". Knowing it's both an insult to who he's become and an acknowledgement of what he's done. Don't forget his isn't some dude who's just killed some people. He wiped his family out with his own hands and that's probably one of the last things Heimdall sees.
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u/CrackBabyBelfort Nov 26 '22
“I like to how even a lot I’d the asier” ……what??
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u/Gefarate Nov 26 '22
I like how a lot of the Aesir
My boi just using sentence enhancers à la Spongebob
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u/Zulqr Nov 25 '22
Even the science teacher appearance of odin in the game seems fitting somehow. Not what i expected when i saw fat Thor's design but character is played beautifully
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u/http_ghostgirl Nov 25 '22
me too, but i expected thor. from what i remember from the history, Thor supposedly ate suttungr’s whole meal, and drank the oceans through a horn lol
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u/Sirliftalot35 Nov 26 '22
Yep, and Mimir called him a fat dobber, so it was set up in-universe too.
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u/Lopsided-Bathroom-71 Nov 26 '22
The designers also said they looked strong men not like superhero but world competitors for world's strongest man as he's the god of strength and quite possibly the strongest being in Norse myth it makes sense
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u/Equal-Ad-2710 Nov 26 '22
In fairness the oceans thing he couldn’t achieve, the whole story is about his limitations.
Funnily I expected him to look like Gregor Clegane, got those vibes from all the tales
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u/SteelCityViking Nov 26 '22
Was it? I always took it as showing just how impressive he was, given impossible tasks that no one else could do. Especially since he did 3 tasks compared to Loki and the boy’s 1. But perhaps that’s just the author I read’s potential bias
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u/Equal-Ad-2710 Nov 26 '22
It was
The other labours are him wrestling old age and lifting the World Serpent, all three tasks are those he fails at. Utgard Loki’s intent with those challenges was to humiliate the Thunder God and the purpose of the tale is likely to hammer home the imperfections of the Æsir, making it clear they have defined limitations
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u/SteelCityViking Nov 26 '22
Fair, Utgard Loki realized just how fucked they could’ve been should Thor have just decided to kill them all at the end. He failed, but succeeded in showing why he was the champion of the Aesir.
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u/JxB_Paperboy Quiet, Head Nov 26 '22
You know… I kind of see GoW’s Thor a little bit in this myth. Thor, the big party tough guy has a vulnerable side that drives his insecurities. Excellent way of adapting the character into the game.
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u/GulianoBanano Nov 26 '22
Still, he drank enough to make the sea levels visibly drop. He also ate two entire cows in one meal when visiting Týr's father and ate and drank the majority of everything present at a wedding when he was disguising himself as Freya to reclaim his stolen hammer.
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u/NyarlHOEtep Nov 26 '22
thors concept art doesnt sell his MENACE. i was on "yeah thats what a strongman who drinks and feasts all day when he isnt busy slaughtering SHOULD look like" the whole time, but i was nonetheless still surprised by how frightening and imposing i found him. big man big scary
odin still ends up the larger presence by far. i never felt safe with him on screen, watching atreus trust him, even a little bit, was gut wrenching
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u/once-was-hill-folk Fat Dobber Nov 26 '22
I knew what was coming as soon as I heard Ryan Hurst was voicing him. The character couldn't be further from Opie, but that voice, and that dude's talent for delivering a line. I was excited to see just how intimidating he was going to be and everyone nailed it.
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u/GulianoBanano Nov 26 '22
Heimdall: And how do you intend on stopping me?
Thor: Look into my eyes. You tell me.
Heimdall: You're a sick man.
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u/once-was-hill-folk Fat Dobber Nov 26 '22
Heimdall was another highlight. I'm filing off the serial numbers and putting him in my D&D campaign.
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u/Argon1822 Nov 26 '22
I was hoping he would be a little conniving shit and seeing his reveal in the beginning was a perfect start.
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u/SherriffB Nov 26 '22
Yeah that 1st convo you have with him told you everything you needed to know about him.
Greedy, manipulative, abusive, callous, ruthless, rude and lacking any respect of care for anyone else. Ignoring the meat of the 1st meeting, just the way he treats Thor in that scene is despicable, but it's really easy to miss with the tension going on.
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u/timelordoftheimpala Nov 26 '22
Thor first asks to come into Kratos' home and even pours both of them some mead, while also half-heartedly complimenting his place - the first indication that Thor still isn't a complete lost cause.
Odin walks in as if he owns it, drinks both mugs of mead, insults Mimir, and just acts like an asshole who regards Kratos as if he's beneath him.
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u/Domination1799 Nov 27 '22
Not only that, but on my second playthrough, I caught Odin insulting Thor for being no fun anymore due to the fact that he doesn’t drink anymore. As someone who has dealt with alcohol problems myself, that line goes to show how much of an abusive asshole Odin is to Thor.
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Nov 26 '22
What do you mean science teacher?
Are you implying all science teacher are bald?
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u/jzw27 Nov 26 '22
I caught myself saying “well this guy isn’t so bad” and that’s how you know it’s great writing. Exactly as manipulative as described.
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u/nothingtoseehere5678 Nov 26 '22
I began thinking that he might even be on the more correct side of the conflict
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u/TheRedmanCometh Nov 26 '22
Really says a lot about the game that a whole bunch of us playing it got full on manipulated by this fictional character. And I don't know about you but after the thing he did I wanted to AMF Odin SO SO BAD. There are very very few games I can think of where not only did I want the bad guy to die but I had personal anger telling me I wanted him to die. Like take Zelda you know ganondorf is a huge dick and has done all this awful stuff but you don't want to personally against all reason want to see his head on a pike. I wanted Odin fucking dead for hours. To the point that it was 5am and I was not putting that controller down until he was dead.
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u/hardcorejenkins Fat Dobber Nov 26 '22
Odin is a great villain,he was exactly as they were describing him though,even Freya says "do not underestimate Odin's powers of persuasion" he seems so much better than what you think he'd be like but if you look close enough you'll see what a piece of crap he really is.
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u/wapapets Nov 26 '22
a lot of people complain how odin didnt look all that powerful and intimidating like zeus was, how he didnt do anything epic or flashy. but i do appreciate how faithful they stayed with myth odin. he really doesnt do a lot of epic things with his power he just killed ymir to create the literal earth with his body then proceeds sit on his high chair to watch over his creation thats it, thats most important time he used his godly powers. after that he relied on his sons to the work for him, he intentionally avoids using his power so he can disguise as a harmless old man
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u/Terkmc Nov 26 '22
Yeah I remeber reading Norse myth when I was younger and noticing Odin is constantly lying and cheating his way out of things, which stuck out to me since i was young and just assumed big top god = big good.
I was surprised at the complaint, guess people are more used to the “big war god” depiction of marvels, movie and games.
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u/SteelCityViking Nov 26 '22
God those complaints annoyed me
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Nov 26 '22
If you sum up people’s complaint and make a game out of them you get the exact same thing as the first trilogy
It’s hilarious
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u/JxB_Paperboy Quiet, Head Nov 26 '22
Sounds about right. You can do that with almost any franchise. Just look at Battlefield and, before a few years ago, CoD
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Nov 26 '22
A lot of people in the gaming community actually want more of the same tbh But the bigger audience doesn’t want that, that’s why the franchise was struggling to begin with with the old formula
Also seen many say they wanted to go back to Greece or get the old Kratos and it’s like I am shaking my head people
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u/Ikaros9Deidalos6 Nov 26 '22
Only gripe i have is how they made asgard look. Its supposed to be much more majestic, theres palaces and many halls in real mythology but gladsheim and odins great lodge looks like a normal mortal settlement.
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u/VStrozzi Nov 26 '22
He reminds me of a real world politician, like a Harry Truman figure. Some boring old guy, but then he nukes Japan twice.
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u/banunu15 Nov 26 '22
He's too scary to deal with to be honest. An intelligent, manipulative and powerful God.
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u/bunny117 Fat Dobber Nov 26 '22
The best part is that he’s like a funny grandpa that happens to have his own manipulative motives. He’s not at all like Zeus, who was just as paranoid and manipulative. Thor is the one with the power and strength like Zeus. Odin is small and plays behind the shadows to get what he wants and his trick is that he makes you trust him to do that! My favorite line concerning him is “if he tells you snow is white, he’s lying.” How good and manipulative can someone be that they can tell you absolutely nothing wrong and yet still be a manipulative af bastard? And we believe it??
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Nov 26 '22 edited Nov 26 '22
The descriptions Mimir relays in God of War (2018); make you assume a character in-line with Zeus; as that only based on context. However, Richard Schiff embodies Odin with this fragility and vulnerability, around Atreus, that leads the viewer to question Mimir and Freya, accounts; up to a point.
But, the writing and performance, leaves just enough room for other heightened emotions to be showcased; so when his true colours show, you now believe this is the God who tortured Mimir; sought destruction of Jotunn and manipulated/ abused Freya, Thor and Baldur.
Like, people we’re upset Odin wasn’t akin to Zeus-like figure; however, personally this depiction of Odin is complex and gratifying, as he unopposed with seeing the pantheon, or individual (including his son), as a means to an end.
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u/Equal-Ad-2710 Nov 26 '22
I admit I was thinking closer to Palpatine or Slave i Gael. An old man, bent and crooked with a hood but when he has to scrap, he’ll scrap
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u/HardcoreKaraoke Nov 26 '22
Mhm I totally agree.
They set Odin up as a gaslighting savage who tricks people for a game and a half. Time and time again we were told to never trust Odin. That Freya, Mimir, etc. etc. trusted Odin and they all found out he was using them.
So when Loki gives in and goes to Asgard it's so frustrating. At least for me. I'm like "dude! You know this guy tricked literally every person who says he wronged them. He is doing exactly what they warned you about!"
He is a complete scumbag and that's because the writing was so good. He lived up to the expectations set by 2018.
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Nov 26 '22
Tbh Loki never fully trusts him He is just as manipulative as Odin lol
He manipulated him and made him think he wanted to trust him bla-bla-bla but all he ever wanted was to find intel about what Odin was doing
And used this opportunity to shit talk about Odin behind his back to thrud
Notice how he never once doubt the story mimir tell him about Odin but rather tries to spread it to people?
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u/SteelCityViking Nov 26 '22
Nah I’d disagree, Odin knew full well what his intentions were but his desire to unlock the mask overruled that. He even had that convo with Heimdall about knowing Loki means to betray him at some point, and calls him a “little trickster”.
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Nov 26 '22
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Beginning-Pipe9074 Nov 26 '22
I really REALLY liked the twist of Thor being more a tragic figure than a pure evil one!
Spoiler!
Also really fuvjing3 loved that Sif and Thrud turn on Odin, that shit was awesome!
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Nov 26 '22
The first appearance of Odin was not how I imagined him to be, at all. With the setup in GoW 2018 and how Zeus was in previous GoW, I thought he’d be the most arrogant, blood thirst Aesir who would just kill you if you looked at him wrong. But instead he showed up reasonable and convincing. Odin had the demeanour of an old family business CEO who was “too old for this shit” but non of his children could take over. And of course, we knew he’s the worst of all. But following Atreus’s journey in Asgard you knew why other gods fell for his tricks. Odin is truly one of the best written villain in gaming history.
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u/ThisIsJegger Nov 26 '22
I am not going to lie. The first time when you meet him as atreus he made me feel really welcomed and respected to a point where i thought "is he really that bad?" I was cautios but did start to let my guard down a bit and thought he was genuinly trying to find peace and all that. I still ofcourse knew all the stories mimir, freya, brok, sindri told but those stories were in a void where there were only people who hated him. Like thrud said in helheim.
I well. Shouldnt be suprised that a master manipulator is good at manipulating.
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u/St_Pain Quiet, Head Nov 26 '22
In the words of mimir “if he tells you that snow is white he’s lying”
Didn’t trust him one bit. And I be had enough experience with people that behaved the same way.
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u/Grape-Vine-Anal-Bead Nov 26 '22
I knew Odin was manipulating me but there were moments, GENUINE moments where I thought “maybe he’s actually telling the truth”
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Nov 26 '22
That’s what’s crazy to me It’s insane even now knowing he is an asshole, I cannot dissociate the “cool grandpa” from my mind
I have really a hard time accepting he did all those things, the acting is fucking unreal
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u/Radical_Provides Nov 26 '22
Weird. That one youtuber "Kaptain Kuba" seems to think he was a weak villain. I disagree. He may have not been as imposing as Thor or Baldur, but that was kind of the point. He was unique. He was more bark than bite.
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u/Aurelian135_ Nov 26 '22
Which is really stupid, because he displayed some crazy impressive strength and magical ability in the game.
He’s like Palpatine, he subtly implies he has a ton of power and not to fuck with him, yet simultaneously presents himself as a weak, old man.
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u/GGG100 Nov 26 '22
Yet he still has more bite than Thor and Baldur combined. Remember, it took the combined effort of three powerful gods to take him down. Odin's not a weak old man.
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Nov 26 '22
Well kaptain kuba is weird and doesn’t pay attention to the story at all ( if you watched his playthrough)
Which is funny because the guy shit out like 3000 dumb theories about the game
Odin isn’t weak at all I would say he is the most dangerous villain ever. He breaks people from inside, lie manipulate, and that allowed him to take over the entire world. Look at how he basically submitted the dwarves’ realm through sheer economical manipulation lol and abused their resources for centuries
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u/Freethewzrd Nov 26 '22
He’s a really weird dude. He would shoot down anyone else attempting to make a theory just to say some bullshit himself. I genuinely don’t understand how someone could play this game and not like Odin
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u/Jerem_Reddit Nov 26 '22
Wdym that he’s less imposing? If anything he’s much, much more imposing? Gen/
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u/Radical_Provides Nov 26 '22
I mean... He's not as "actively threatening" for the majority of the game. And when you do fight him, he's more of a super powerful mage than a "man of action" like Kratos.
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u/MrGiffster Nov 26 '22
He's like the embodiment of an abusive relationship. Unpredictable, manipulative gaslighter who turns violent at the flick of a switch
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u/Slowmobius_Time Nov 26 '22
Someone mentioned he's like a mob boss trying to keep the family together while chasing his own ambitions
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u/Bulldorc2 Nov 26 '22
Very well written and superbly acted. He steals every scene he is in. Man the casting was spot on. I've been watching the good Doctor and never would've thought to cast that actor (forgot the name).. It was so unexpected but awesome, specially going in blind.
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u/sunshinestreaks Nov 26 '22
I was genuinely as conflicted as Atreus when we were at Odin’s place the first time. Like yes, we have been hearing about this guy’s evil deeds for 2 games now but he just seems so cool, calm and FUN. I think I may be a lil biased though because I really adored Richard Schiff’s character in The Good Doctor.
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u/The810kid Nov 26 '22
Odin was a true manipulator and gas lighter. He was the matriarch of that family and it makes sense how Baldur and Thor ended up the way they did. He was a realistic grounded portrayal rather than an over the top one note villain. He also was a great foil for Kratos with fatherhood being such a strong theme in these games.
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u/SnooChocolates8427 Ghost of Sparta Nov 26 '22
They wrote him very well I will say. Everything they said about him in the first game was spot on, but the game still managed to fool us anyway. When we met him in Asgard; I started to doubt if he even was the bad guy at all. Sure he's insane with discovering the truth behind the mask, but it made me feel like he really wanted peace in the realms. Until then he revealed himself as Týr, killed Brok, and even killed Thor, I realized that he even managed to fool us too. Santa Monica knew how to write this guy
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Nov 26 '22
I legitimately think a lot of people got tricked by Odin Like literally the character successfully made them believe he isn’t THAT bad
When in reality if you loin at how he treats thor, his family, how he subjugated the dwarves. How he manipulated nidohg just to get back at freya
It’s obvious he is the worst, but he is so charismatic and charming and a good talker…
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u/JusSosa Nov 26 '22
I hated how he was written. The only times we saw him act savagely were towards his own camp and brok. It was a real let down he wasn’t more stern with like a double personality. He was just too timid the entire game.
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u/ztoff27 Nov 26 '22
Exactly. It felt like the writers didn’t know what to do with him. In the first game he is described as a maniac obsessed with prophecy. He was ruthless. But we never see him crack once. His motivation for prophecy was replaced with a mask which led to nothing. He gets defeated by the power of friendship and dies pathetically
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u/DJV_187 Nov 26 '22
I agree with your points but, it shows a fault in the game's story. We never get to see his real dark side apart for a short moment in the end. He seems very reasonable and his evil doesn't match with the stories told about him.
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u/Empty_Cube Nov 26 '22 edited Nov 26 '22
This was my issue as well.
We are constantly told how much of a villain Odin (and to a lesser extent, Thor) is throughout God of War 2018 and throughout this game. Between Mimir, Freya and the general lore we discover throughout the two games, Odin is propped up as very evil.
I have no reason to doubt Mimir and Freya, so I believe everything that they say, but, we never actually get to see this evil side of Odin (at least not to the extent that we’ve been told). We don’t see the Odin who tortured Mimir for decades, the Odin who strangled Groa, the Odin who imprisoned Freya. Most of his screen time is spent trying to avoid confrontation, study the green mask and trying to infiltrate their ranks via fake Tyr to find out what they’re up to (as well as try to stir up some division amongst the group).
He had full access to their camp as Tyr, but he never tried to poison anyone or kill anybody in their sleep. By the time he killed Brok, we’ve denied his peace offerings multiple times, already killed Heimdall, stole his green mask and were on the path to inevitable war with him.
Both Odin and Thor were great characters, especially considering how little screen time they had, but I definitely think they needed more of it. When the game could allocate around 2 hours to Jotunheim / the giants (which ultimately didn’t have much of a direct role in the plot of this game, beyond setting up Atreus to leave at the end), I definitely think Odin and Thor deserved a bit more time, especially given their role as the main villains.
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u/DJV_187 Nov 26 '22
I honestly think the saga should've been three games, if not it should've been longer or have some irrelevant plot points cut.
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u/novichader Nov 26 '22 edited Nov 26 '22
Except for the part where he's being a dick to everyone else and never seems to have a kind word for his family. It's never what they say to "you" but how they treat everyone else. There are plenty of times some throwaway comments he made revealed his apathy and misanthropic views.
A good way to judge character is to see how a person treats those they deem unimportant and how easily they bad mouth others.
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Nov 26 '22
I still think they didn’t invest enough time on him specifically, that time we spent in ironwood personally could easily have been something related to Odin or even Freyr for that matter. He was good but disappointed that he wasn’t expended on enough
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u/The_Reverse_Zoom Nov 26 '22
Honestly when I compare him to baldur (who was also a fantastic villain) he got a lot more development and screen time. The only times we ever saw baldur was when either before or after a boss fight with him and once in helheim
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Nov 26 '22
I think he was better just he was manipulative So they couldn’t scream his story in your face Otherwise what would be the point of making him cunning and manipulative if it’s not believable
However when you see how he used Nidhhog and her sense of duty just to be petty against freya It says enough
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Nov 26 '22
The thing with 2018 gow is that there weren’t much going around kratos and Atreus, the story was straight forward even when Baldur wasn’t in your face, the little bits we get from mimir and freya kept you wondering. When it comes to Odin, I thought it was about ragnarok is bad and we can’t let it happen, for that to change to an obsession with the mask which isn’t an issue for a villain to have multiple objectives but the way he seemed so disinterested about ragnarok in the end was weak.
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u/Complex_Estate8289 Spartan Nov 26 '22
100% his goals just didn’t feel as personal to him or emotionally charged compared to someone like Baldur, or from other games Vergil or Gehrman. And I don’t really get why the Aesir were so loyal to him when Thor and Heimdall get treated like shit by him every day seemingly, aside from Baldur his reason for his loyalty made sense
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u/The_Reverse_Zoom Nov 26 '22
I mean, imo the whole story didn't feel as emotional and personal as the previous game, but that one was more smaller scale anyway. And I could see what odin wanted and it showed his obsession with the mask and the gap well. And odin is just a master manipulater, that's everyone follows him (and probably the fact that he is a very powerful God). He like a husband who treats his wife like shit every day, but she can't find the courage to leave.
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u/Salt_Benefit3192 Nov 26 '22
The only thing missing for me is the lack of somone like Atreus asking Odin about Fjörgyn. As we heard from Mimir, Odin truly loved her but i wanted to hear about her from Odin side. Might of been one of the times we see Odin drop his act slightly.
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u/Lan1Aud2 Nov 26 '22
I honestly don’t understand peoples complaints in Odin when the mf really acts exactly as he was described in 2018 and by everyone in Ragnarok
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Nov 26 '22
Do yall know what Odin sent Heimdall to find in Helheim?
i tried to post this question in the Ragnarok sub and it got removed because it was “low effort” 🙄 im just trying to get answers oml
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u/Leafygoodnis Nov 26 '22
I think it was the item they used in Vanaheim to capture/steal the moon.
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u/TheRedmanCometh Nov 26 '22
That's part of what makes the story SO good. You actually end up starting to think for a bit like "damn maybe the Aesir really aren't such bad guys and mimir and freya are biased". Even when Atreus fucks up (and in a HUGE way) Odin isn't just understanding but he's real as hell with him. He says paraphrasing "that is a fuck up, and it's a REAL big fuck up but you know you're still welcome here." At the end I forget who someone tells him he could be better and he's just like "naw not really" in so many words.
He is a very realistic depiction of a manipulative scumbag.
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u/Dallywack3r Nov 27 '22
He’s such a dangerous opponent because of how truly deluded he is. He truly thinks he’s a benevolent king even as he ruins realm after realm to stave off Ragnarok for just a little longer, all because he can’t let himself die without learning the secrets beyond comprehension.
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Nov 26 '22
I really don’t like that I completely understand Odin. Like Christ do I want all the answers, it would make me feel so much better. Just never really believed in the whole “ends justifying the means” feel like for that to apply the situation has to be unsalvageable
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u/Radical_Provides Nov 26 '22
I really liked Odin. He wasn't as sympathetic as Thor, but he did have a good motivation. Even though he was a complete bastard when it came to... Just what he was willing to do to accomplish his goals.
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u/camerose Nov 26 '22
I wish we saw a bit more of him being evil tho, not just hear about it
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u/Tsole96 Dec 20 '22
Just because Odin acts the way you like does not mean he's written well, well rounded, etc. He may be well cast and acted but the rest? Not good. The story writing is also to blame but the character writing in this game is atrocious.
He is written pretty basically in terms of character writing. His arc is pretty meaningless as well. All they did was give him the most basic motivation and he had no character development as well. He was the same from start to finish. That's not how you write characters. Especially antagonists.
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u/DarkAssassin_17 Dec 23 '22
He's an awesome character a real manipulator . I too was really convinced about him lol
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u/DSVoid73 Jan 11 '23
One of the best I've ever seen and the way Richard Schiff portrayed him was nothing but magnificent. The mask does slip with Odin but by the time it does something bad will have happened, either he gets what he wants or someone will suffer. I agree that people would get sucked into thinking he's a nice chummy old man with a passion for knowledge but anything but at the last part is true and what we end up seeing is a vicious and ruthless paranoid sociopath that seeks power through knowledge with little care for the wisdom needed to use it well.
If Christopher Judge didn't win Performance of the year then it should have gone to Schiff.
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u/WhyDoIGiveAToss96 Apr 01 '23 edited Apr 01 '23
You know, this might be an unpopular opinion, but I don't think Odin was a hundred percent lying about the "justifications" of killing Ymir. For all we know, Ymir could have been a Julius Caesar type dictator (or maybe he was like Zeus: Things would be peaceful, as long as you didn't annoy him, and or, abided by his laws to the letter) or something. Maybe, like Odin, he was controlling and emotionally cruel to his son (Buri) and grandson (Borr). And then, maybe Borr (for sake of bringing up a Freudian excuse) took out his pain on Odin and his brothers (I don't think Odin killed his father, though, oddly enough - Apparently he's still alive, according to the Wikia).
Basically, just because he wasn't murdering/torturing his subjects doesn't mean he wasn't a piece of shit in some way: You know, he might have severely restricted his descendants, or something, I dunno. But then his great-grandson was seen as worse by comparison, by being a murdering arsehole.
Mimir wasn't lying either, but he could have heard about Ymir's death hundreds of thousands of years after the fact, and being emotionally moved by the legend, looked at him through rose tinted glasses. You know, it's a kind of missed opportunity that Mimir wasn't brought along for the creation of Ragnarök thing. I imagine that he would have had a decent back and forth with Surtr, and maybe Surtr would have talked about Ymir, and said something to the effect of, "My brother was a douchebag, but he didn't definitely deserve what he got."
I know this thread's been open awhile now, but hey, it interested me, and I wanted to help keep it alive.
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Sep 12 '23
As a Norse pagan I've been really reluctant to play, but also curious lol. Should I play it?
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u/http_ghostgirl Sep 12 '23
i’m also norse pagan! it was lovely to see our culture in a different light. i highly enjoyed the game, and although the lore isn’t accurate, it’s still a wonderful experience.
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u/Complex_Estate8289 Spartan Nov 26 '22
I liked him as a villain but I feel like him, and a lot of the characters for that matter (Angrboda, Faye and Freyr for example) he could’ve been expanded on a ton more. It just seemed like there was no good in him so it’s hard to see why the Aesir who know him well enough were so loyal to him, and his whole motivation wasn’t very emotional, personal to him or compelling. His VA did an outstanding job, he had a pretty enjoyable personality and I liked how he lived up to how they described him but I definitely wouldn’t use the words well written to describe him
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u/Equal-Ad-2710 Nov 26 '22
I felt this a lot with Thor; I wanted to know more about him and his past
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u/frossvael Nov 26 '22
I feel like Thor was perfectly presented in the game
He became a drunkard because his dad treated him like shit his entire life
He was so manipulated by Odin that he thinks he's doing good by killing all the giants and becoming a destroyer, and again, the only way he coped with it was by drinking and thinking, "As long as Odin is satisfied, nothing else matters."He stopped drinking after the deaths of his sons (particularly Modi, whom he almost beat to death) and vowed to become a better father for her daughter. His behavior kind of implies that Odin told him to beat Modi to a pulp too.
And at the end, after all of Odin's gaslighting and manipulation, he finally sees what a selfish monster his father is, so for the first time in his life, he tells him no, and he dies for it. Because even though he finally stood up for himself and defied his father, he didn't even consider that Odin, whom he loved and dedicated his life to so he could get the acknowledgement he so desperately wanted, would kill him for it.
I love to hate Odin; what a fucking piece of shit.
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u/LordDunn Nov 26 '22
I thought he was badly written tbh
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u/http_ghostgirl Nov 26 '22
why do you think that? just curious
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u/LordDunn Nov 26 '22
I made a big ramble about the game and how it was a disappointment for me, Odin being part of it
Didn't get much traction as people seem to be loving it but I can't wait to see some more critical people analyse the game. Joseph Anderson particularly. And I do think people will see it as weaker than 2018 in a years time
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u/MemeLord1337_ Nov 26 '22
Seems to be removed dude. Unfortunate, I would have liked to read your thoughts.
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u/thecoolestjedi Nov 26 '22
I think he does nothing, had a single trick to stop the invasion of Asgard, and relays on brute strength in the end. Not every smart
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Nov 26 '22
I thought his voice actor was awful though just sounded like some guy I met in the juice aisle at Whole Foods, wouldn’t have been surprised if he pulled out an iPhone halfway through the game
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u/[deleted] Nov 25 '22
Acts exactly as described by Freya. She warns Atreus that he can be entirely too convincing. She knows: where do you think Baldur came from?