In the trailer for Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (ToTK), released earlier this year, something *weird* is happening with Link’s arm. After following Zelda down into the dark crypts below Hyrule Castle, Link makes a startling discovery: the preserved corpse of Ganondorf. In flashbacks throughout the game we learn about this iteration of the villainous Gerudo king, the man who desperately sought to control the kingdom of Hyrule. But in the beginning of the game, when we first meet Ganondorf’s skeleton, we don’t quite know what to think. (Slight spoilers for ToTK, Adventure Time, and Full Metal Alchemist ahead)
When the trailer first dropped Zelda fans flocked to Reddit to discuss theories regarding the mystery arm atop Ganondorf’s skeleton. Was it Link’s arm? Why, in a different shot in the trailer, did it look like Link now had arm tattoos? The game quickly lets you know that the arm is that of former Hyrulian king Rauru; Rauru, according to Zelda lore, was a peace-bringing ruler, but ToTK adds another layer to Rauru. He was the descendant of the Zonai, a sky-god people whose relics can still be found around Hyrule (especially in Breath of the Wild). In memories that follow, a beautiful story unfolds: Rauru and his Hyrulian wife Sonia falling in love and ruling over a peaceful Hyrule; Rauru and his people bringing new technology to Hyrule in the name of cohabitation and friendship; Ganondorf growing power-hungry in the west, manipulating Rauru’s kindnesses against him. Eventually Rauru is forced to imprison Ganondorf by sacrificing himself. His god arm holds Ganondorf in place, holds him for centuries as Hyrule advances forward in time, forgetting the sacrifice of Rauru.
Zelda and Link’s curiosity leads to Ganondorf reawakening. The arm of imprisonment breaks, releasing Ganondorf’s essence back into the land (Voldemort book 1 style). I won’t give away exactly what happens, but Link eventually comes to wield Rauru’s arm instead of his own. Link’s right arm becomes Zonai-powered, enabling Link to learn impressive new powers. For the rest of the game Link battles with one arm and one foreign entity on his body. He temporarily enters the pantheon of one-armed warriors.
I delight in finding connections between things I love. Legend of Zelda and Adventure Time (AT) are perhaps my two favorite things period (as written about previously), and while I do see similarities between the heroes in both properties, I’m more interested in how Link and Finn differ. The most well-known facet of Link’s personality is his silence; while Link listens and doesn’t speak, Finn sometimes speaks and doesn’t listen. Finn is headstrong and curious, motivated more by an inner desire to explore than a moral quest to save a person or a land. To put it in terms the girlies will get, Link is an earth sign (I don’t have proof of this but it feels right to me), quiet and subdued and patient, and Finn is a water sign, (Finn’s birthday is March 14, PISCES BABY!) intuitive and emotional and sometimes blind to anything outside of his own feelings.
AT’s end of season five/beginning of season six includes some of my favorite episodes in the series. Finn and Jake are crossing different universes in search of Finn’s human father Martin Mertens, previously thought to be dead. Finn is also on the hunt for a new sword given that his previous sword is broken. Toward the end of season five Finn comes into contact with the grass sword; it’s hawked to him by a sketchy salesman and although Finn tries abandoning the sword, it keeps returning to his side. The sword appears when Finn is in danger, shooting out of his right wrist. It’s with this context that Finn, belligerent with his desire to know his father, winds up causing a rupture in the multiverse, the results of which are catastrophic.
Finn’s father is a POS. We all know it before Finn can accept it. Martin isn’t interested in knowing Finn, he isn’t outwardly or obviously sad about the time he’s missed with his son. But Finn being the Pisces baby that he is tries his hardest to force his father into love. There’s a five-ish run of episodes that feels like someone digging their nails into the back of someone’s flesh willing them to stay, a feeling I know too well. Finn tries forcing so hard, tries holding on for so long that his arm snaps completely.
Finn hits the ground changed. For me it’s the moment Finn grows up. He learns true devastation, and, maybe even harder for him to comprehend, he learns that wanting something hard enough won’t always make it real. Jake comforts his best friend, now without a right arm, and we notice a small flower growing out of what’s left of Finn’s arm.
Finn, as the flower begins to bloom into a grass arm, becomes friendly with the arm. But still the grass remains unwielding at times that Finn cannot predict. The arm’s desires eventually diverge so much from Finn’s that the arm becomes its own person: Fern, a Finn doppelgänger that hangs around for the final two seasons of AT. Fern is a presence Finn sometimes hates, sometimes loves, but is forever astounded by. The two don’t seem to understand one another’s motivations or desires; they always seem to be missing each other, despite being mirror versions of one another.
Eventually Princess Bubblegum engineers a new arm for Finn. It’s a great device, similar to Link’s in ToTK; Finn can use different devices on the arm in battle or in exploration. Finn is forever scarred by the pain of wanting too much, and there are physical reminders of it everywhere: in Fern, the pest he can’t get rid of, and in his missing arm that he never stops feeling the pang of.
I also won’t spoil the end of Adventure Time because YOU ABSOLUTELY NEED TO WATCH IT RIGHT FUCKING NOW, but I will say the storyline of Finn/Fern is one of my favorites. Finn’s arm and the many iterations it takes throughout the series work so well as a metaphor for Finn’s growth as a hero. A true warrior doesn’t flinch at the weak parts of the self. Finn learns that to be his truest, most powerful self, he has to accept the parts of him self he is most ashamed of.
So, the one-armed warrior. The trope. It’s elsewhere, too, in things I haven’t yet become obsessed with: Auron in Final Fantasy, Shanks in One Piece. It’s in some of my other watches, too. Edward Elric, one of the protagonists of Full-Metal Alchemist, loses an arm and a leg as a child due to his attempts to resurrect his dead mother. It’s even in Dragonball Z, when Gohan’s arm gets blasted off in a battle against the androids. In that scene Gohan displays heroic strength in still finishing his task but the scene also speaks to Gohan underestimating his enemy. This is a commonality: Link messed up by underestimating a sleeping Ganondorf, Finn messed up by underestimating the rules of multiverse travel, Edward messed up by underestimating the repercussions of human transmutation. It’s almost a 1:1— you lose your arm you gain wisdom otherwise unknown.
But I think it’s deeper than that, especially in Adventure Time. These characters cannot forget their maiming. Who are they after the loss? They are warriors who have fucked up, warriors who have been to the edge of their limits and looked into the pit of what comes next. In this world and forever in the world of who they were before.
For what it’s worth I think Gohan is an air sign and Edward is most definitely a fire sign (he’s an Aries, I just know it).
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