On the deck, looking out over the ocean and not even at Razril, Keneth declares he is happy to be home. Paula and Chiepoo are also here, and perhaps happy? We’ll never know, I guess. When the ship pulls into port, Jewel calls out, “Hey!” as she and Meathead run up to greet them. That one word is probably the last bit of voice acting she’ll get in the game, and yet it still sent me down a rabbit hole on IMDB–not to figure out who voices her, as it is plainly Wendee Lee, but to figure out which exact other Wendee Lee character Jewel sounds like. Results: inconclusive!
More on Jewel, if you care (you don’t): seeing her now reminds me that she has the same marking on her forehead Axel does, and is therefore from Na-Nal. It should go without saying this does not make me regard her with more affection. Meathead tells them, “We were disorganized after we lost the Commander, but to think Razril would be beaten down so badly…” Dude, Slowe was at least temporarily in charge. You knew what would happen. Keneth awkwardly uses this as a launch point to a recruitment pitch: “I have a favor to ask of all of you. We want to join Marvy’s fight against Kooluk.” Beyond how dumb it is that Marvy is STANDING RIGHT THERE and just letting Keneth be his hype man, is he recruiting…himself? Keneth, you are in that fight already, dog. I have to assume this was a translation issue. He adds, like he said nothing strange at all, “I’m going now to gather up everyone who agrees, and I’d like your help. Would you mind?” Nah, they’re gonna stay out of this fight against a country that occupied their island and was their enemy even before that. Why is he even asking this?
Oh wait, I know why. So Marvy can litigate The Commander Scruffy Incident for the 90th goddamn time. Jewel joins up with no hesitation, but Meathead has something to get off his chest first. “Say… Marvy, can I ask you something? About Commander [Scruffy]…” Marvy barely has the energy to be angry anymore. He just responds, “I didn’t kill him,” and I’m worried he’s had to say this so many times already that it now sounds canned and Meathead won’t fucking believe him. “That’s enough for me,” he thankfully replies. “I’m sorry, Marvy. I’ll join you.” I should have known this was how Marvy’s glorious return to his home would go. No swell of triumphant-but-bittersweet music, no relieved smile at being greeted like a hero. Jewel acts like he never even left, Meathead reveals he’s secretly been stewing over his friend being a murderer this entire time, and Chiepoo is also here. Of course.
‘And if you find any unwilling people, IN THE BRIG WITH THEM.’
With their friends secured in the Seaward’s ranks, Keneth says they should gather any other willing conscripts at the knights’ training hall. This is given as instruction to Jewel and Meathead, but Paula also says she and Marvy should assist in recruitment. Again in the “I don’t know what I expected” department, in practice this means Marvy is doing all the work, and in a runaround way has just been ordered by his underling to recruit people to his own army. And while Marvy has certainly allowed other people to take point here and there, or even just stood by as they did so without his blessing, Lido, it is a new low to get bossed around by his own sidekick. My main takeaway from this is an urgent desire to set Keneth adrift.
Marvy is now free to move around Razril again, with the caveat that he is tasked with finding citizens who want to live an all-expenses-paid life of luxury on the Rudderless. A big ask! Marvy does not mention that he has already brought aboard the man who oversaw their enemy occupation, mostly because he still isn’t sure why he did that. That scene is shrouded in a silver-haired fugue state blackout of some kind. The people who don’t take Marvy up on his offer at least have well wishes and sometimes even lame presents for him (ooh, a Window Set, thanks), so he at least gets the gratification that nobody in Razril ever really saw the sense of exiling him on the basis of one traitorous idiot’s testimony. A few people ask Marvy what’s going to happen to Razril and if independence is on the table, understandably making the mistake of thinking Marvy gives the most minute fuck.
This doesn’t seem ADA compliant.
Outside the inn, Marvy finds the first of his old Razril pals, Basil, the Beyblades kid with the cute haircut and off-the-shoulders sweater. I am suddenly desperate to try out this entire look myself, perhaps minus the Hammer pants. Either way I would still look like an undercover cop at a high school. Basil is telling Marvy it’s been hard “running from those Kooluk guys everyday,” like he didn’t just hang out in the inn and sell plays of his minigame to marks. Why would the Kooluk soldiers even want to chase him down? Are those Beyblades actually WMDs he was secreting to the Resistance? Anyway, it goes without saying that Basil is delighted to join the ranks of the Seaward, since Marvy tells him neither about Helmut nor the other minigame purveyors he’ll have as competition. Ooooops, guess he’ll just have to hang out in Marvy’s room 24/7 instead!
Marvy heads inside the inn to see what leavings of Razril he can dredge up there, and unexpectedly finds Marceline the Vampire Queen, last seen beating Marvy’s ass for no reason. Marcy straight-up asks Marvy, “Do you intend to make me a part of your group?” I wish she wouldn’t put it in such a non-consensual way. Marvy’s not going to recruit anybody who doesn’t want to be a proud Seaward. If anything, he would like to have maybe half the people on his boat that he currently does, and way more of them should know how to make a croquembouche. Nonetheless, Marvy’s like, “Uh, yes?” and Marceline immediately joins up. Could she have maybe done that without fighting Marvy twice? And how did she even get here before the Kooluk siege was lifted? Wait, I don’t care.
Filed away for later: Grizzly McGee, Scruffy’s brother in my stupid recap canon only, is also hanging out in the inn, and it’s possible he literally has not left this bar since the beginning of the game. But he wants to see Katarina, his “student,” so I’ll have to circle back. Was it not enough to just recruit her, game? I have to put her in my party, too? I object. This is objectionable. And inside the item shop, Marvy meets a woman named Frederica, wearing a fashionable enough blue North Face jacket, long red hair fashioned into a sensible ponytail. Between her winter-sportsy look and the quiver on her back, Marvy is convinced she’s training for the biathlon. “Do you want something? I’m a bit busy,” Frederica says. She’s intently inspecting a shelf with empty bottles on it, like all busy people do. She adds, “I’m looking for a certain man…” Unless there are men in those bottles and she’s explaining what she’s doing in this building, I don’t see the relevance. She doesn’t even tell Marvy who this man is. Is he going to have to drag one of his Seawards in here to get yelled at and maybe trapped in a bottle? Marvy leaves this terrible mystery for another time.
Even you seem to know this is a joke, so I won’t bother telling you.
In all, not counting the Portrait People he picked up, Marvy secures the services of nine people to the cause, including two women who are meandering about the knights’ headquarters but still needed to be told to go to the training hall, through a door maybe 50 feet away. I’m sure they’re both going to be vital contributors. After making the rounds through his old home–Commander Scruffy’s chamber door is still locked, I have to imagine from the outside–Marvy enters the training hall to see precisely how sad their resistance band is.
Someone doesn’t know what game he’s in!
There are, to Marvy’s surprise, way more than nine people in here. Either every person he signed up brought five friends, or–gasp–Jewel, Meathead, and Keneth managed to accomplish something without his supervision. (It has to be the first one.) Up on the same stage where Commander Scruffy got weirdly personal about Joe Bishounen a lifetime ago, Elenor paces in between Marvy and Lido. WHY IS LIDO EVEN UP HERE. EITHER SURRENDER YOUR POWER OR DON’T, DOG. I, like Selma earlier, may have picked the wrong hill to die on, but here I remain. Elenor is telling Marvy how impressed she is with his big…numbers of recruits. “Let our leader declare his intentions…” she goes on, and I am waiting for her to turn back to Lido and give him the floor, but just this once everybody remembers who the fucking boss is. The music swells dramatically and the camera pulls away from Marvy so we appreciate the dozens of Suikoclones in attendance, only to zoom back in at speed for Marvy’s big moment: “Everyone, let us fight against Kooluk!” Stirring.
Clearly someone was out here warming up this crowd in advance (I’m picturing Louise and Dario doing some kind of Punch and Judy routine, but without puppets) because by Suikoden standards, they go hog fucking wild for this single line. Many people are fist-pumping. One lady looks like she is about to throw her panties at Marvy’s head. Elenor walks over to him and they stare out at the crowd together, Elenor’s face reading as plainly as a newspaper headline, “Come on, bozos, Churchill this kid ain’t.”
Marvy and Lido walk out of the knights’ fortress side by side (sigh), with Elenor trailing behind them, as more crowds of people cheer them on. This is at least twice as many people as I thought lived in Razril. But as the three of them stop and stare at something, the crowd turns and starts grumbling, booing, and jeering. The object of their scorn, it turns out, is Lord Fingerbang, whom we were earlier led to believe scarpered from this island before he could be beheaded in the town square. He also has two Gaien Knights bodyguarding him, and what the hell were they doing all this time? Playing Ritapon while their lord was under witness protection? Did Slowe set them up in a posh panic room? The elder Fingerbang issues a toothless threat his son would be proud of: “Just what do you think you’re doing on my land? I hope you ungrateful rogues are fully prepared to die here and now…” C’mon, even Lido could probably solo these chumps. Marvy’s party takes out his former future father-in-law’s cronies with no trouble.
Demonstrating how close that shithead apple fell from its tree, Slowe’s dad tries to leverage his bargaining power now that his guards have been knocked flat, still somehow in denial of the fact that he has no power at all. “I-If you people really want this land, then let’s make a deal,” he begs. “How much will you pay? I’m a reasonable man!” Does he even own this land? “Lord” does connote that, but he’d been treated as more of a regional governor up to this point. I mean, even if he doesn’t, it’s still totally in character for him to offer to sell it. The crowd yells at him some more, one extra shouting in an unmistakable attempt at a New York accent, “Keep walkin’!” and another screeching like Billy Eichner, “Go AWAY!” I am living for the feisty citizens of Razril and their zero tolerance policy for any further Fingerbang Family Bullshit. Lord Fingerbang tries to retreat with his injured ARM men, but we only get to watch Marvy, Lido, and Elenor react to this as he slinks away offscreen. Nobody even threw a tomato at him! I feel robbed. Lido, meanwhile, has this frown on his face that seems to be one of pity, but it’s possible he is just self-aware enough to realize he is five years away, at best, from the good people of Obel rising up against his dumb ass, too. It’s not too late for tinkerers from five generations to independently invent the guillotine.
For the second time this recap, we interrupt this live broadcast of the actual plot for a drop-in with the Kooluk Evil Mustache Twirlers’ Council. It’s like the game is offering me a bathroom break. The Council is down a member today, as the still unnamed Governor is not at the head of the table. A Kooluk ironhead comes in, thumps his arm to his chest in salute, and tells them, “The Seaward… Sir! It’s them! They’ve returned to Razril and reclaimed it!” At least, that’s what’s in the text box–the voice-acted version leaves out my incredibly great army name, which makes it oddly non-specific for a military report. Cray dismisses the soldier, which is strange, since he’s the only person in here not in the military chain of command, but we’ll see about that. Old Man River identifies the Seaward, or “them” if you prefer, as “the group that’s apparently been uniting the islands.” Is that what Marvy’s been doing? I mean, I guess so. “Getting them to temporarily stop banging rocks together and grunting” is how I would have put it.
When OMR asks what they should do, Cray tells them to forget Razril, because they have the real prize of the Island Nations: Obel. Ha. Hahahahahahaha. “If we just keep Obel and its surrounding areas secure, the Rune won’t get that far,” he explains. Wait, do they still think the Rune of Punishment is on Obel? Forgive me if I’m missing something here–in my defense, I am high on Dayquil–but these geniuses definitely know: 1) Marvy has the Rune of Punishment, 2) if Marvy were still on Obel he must have a really good hiding place, 3) a stupendously large boat escaped Joe’s siege of Obel, and 4) a band of ruffians on a stupendously large boat have been liberating the various other Island Nations. How could they possibly, with all of this in their intelligence briefing, think the Rune of Punishment did not escape on that fucking boat?
No one present will bother to reconcile any of these problems, but Joe does have other concerns. Namely: “Is the True Rune such an important thing?” Cray replies, “I assume you have never seen it then,” and when Joe doesn’t take his meaning because he has aquarium gravel between his ears, Cray elaborates, “You would have to see it in person to realize its full potential.” Which, yes, it is well and good to suggest that the raw power of the True Murder Rune has to be seen to be believed, but Joe and Old Man River have seen it. Perhaps not with their own eyes (and the timeline of their arrival off the coast of Obel was a bit fuzzy, as it was), but they definitely know what Marvy’s rune did to Kooluk’s third fleet. They could not have failed to notice how all their boats were fucking vaporized, right? But Cray decides to appeal to the pair’s sense of duty to country if not their common sense, telling them that securing the Rune of Punishment is the will of their king. “His Majesty wishes to offer the Rune to Harmonia… Probably in exchange for military backup.” Those fucking True Rune hoarders. Where is this one even going to go, Hikusaak? You can’t buy another marble bust, you barely spend any time with the ones you have!
Joe is very salty about his precious time being used to hunt True Runes, like this is the Kooluk navy version of desk duty. “What of the Governor’s policy of advancing southwards?” he asks. Listen, Joe, we all want to advance southward, but if you don’t devote some time and attention to seeking True Runes first, it ends up feeling cheap and perfunctory. Cray is basically like, “We’re doing both,” and yet again, nobody points out the obvious, that Obel serves as a perfectly good foothold for advancement. There have to be maps in this room they could stare at until they realize this is a non-problem. I mean, other than for the fact that the Rune of Punishment totally isn’t on Obel and they’re wasting their time entirely. A minor detail!
‘Like sitting at this table having boring meetings, and fly fishing.’
Cray finishes by repeating his request that they keep Obel on lockdown. OMR asks, “So the Rune’s whereabouts will determine how we treat the Kingdom of Obel… Is that what this means?” …No? Not one word said in this entire scene suggests that? Am I delirious? It feels like every person at this table is having a different conversation. On that note, Cray entirely ignores OMR’s question and throws in a last, vague threat: “Oh, yes. The Governor is apparently under the weather. He has given me the right of command for now. I expect much from both of you in the field. I would like to avoid any more losses to our fleets.” I would say this leaves no room for doubt as to who is in charge here, but I thought Marvy giving Lido a public ass-whooping accomplished that too, and look where that landed me.
Joe and Old Man River depart the meeting together, and Joe has some stuff to get off his sculpted chest about their apparent new boss. “Is this truly…what His Majesty had in mind?” Joe asks OMR as they pedeconference down the marble-tiled hallway. Joe’s despondence at this new direction for his country would land a lot better if I knew anything at all about Joe other than that he’s handsome and good with a sword, or if I’d seen “His Majesty” even once. OMR warns Joe not to flap his gums in this dark hallway where anybody could be eavesdropping. Joe stops, OMR stops too, and after they look around for a moment and we can very clearly see someone standing in the shadows around the corner, Joe throws a knife at the wall near the spy’s head, and the mystery person scampers off in the other direction with a frightened “Hunhhh!” sound. Well, that’s all the spies, now to carry on having this sensitive conversation!
Now, this is normally the part where I would say, “I kid,” as Joe and OMR depart for their ship or at least go outside where it is marginally less likely they will be overheard. But Joe Bishounen, Kooluk’s Best and Brightest, and Old Man River, Wily Veteran, think they’re good in here. After muttering, “Hmm. Is it all right now?” and neither of them looking around for nosy maids or listening devices or anything, OMR goes on, “Between you and me, I’m worried about the Governor. Cray said he was ill, but I have a feeling Cray may have done something.” It’s bad enough that this confab is even happening in this unsecure location, but this level of stupidity is difficult to fathom. OMR was worried when Joe was simply voicing his displeasure with their new strategic direction–something he’d already said to Cray’s face!–but he has no problem saying out loud with no assurances of their privacy that he thinks Cray basically murdered the Governor. Forget trusting these two with military command or state secrets–I’m not sure I would trust them with anything sharper than a butter knife.