#and i'm thinking about some of brave chrom's lines in feh...

[the-priestess-of-dawn]

"This is not your— your fault..."

"I told you, I'm Robin. The Robin that murdered you and became the fell dragon, Grima."

"Promise me you'll escape from this place..."

"Please, return to the Table! It's too dangerous!"

Not only did Chrom's dying wishes not come true, the exact opposite did. Robin blames themself for everything to the point of embracing it, and the site where their heart was shattered becomes their only shelter.

[the-priestess-of-dawn]

Hello! I was wondering if you've ever posted about the Robin Hel resplendents? I couldn't find it and I'm curious about your take. I love your analyses.

Hmm... I definitely HAVE, because I have interpretations lol, but mmmm my tags are so inconsistent asdfghjkl so sorry to everyone who's ever tried to find anything on my blog (not to mention, tbh, I'm not sure I didn't exclusively post about this on Twitter...). So... let's just do a full writeup right now, shall we?

Basically, uh... Hel M!Robin is "covert Grima" but Hel F!Robin is just wearing edgy clothes.

So the thing is, M!Robin got his resplendent pretty early on, back in 2020. Now, I'm not going to break into a full analysis here because it's a tangential point, but I would argue that FEH's treatment of Robin/Grima/Robin-as-Grima has actually changed over time, with them shifting from "this is literally just Robin gone wrong" to a more... (I can't pretend to be unbiased about this; you KNOW how I feel about Grima = Robin)... genericized "evil entity snatched the body" take (which I can't help but feel is a result of the developers no longer having Awakening fans on staff. I mean look at Rearmed Grima's Forging Bonds. They just straight up forgot that it's a plot-important detail that Lucina doesn't know Robin is Grima. Or look at the Forging Bonds for either of the Brave Robins. The entire premise is flawed because Chrom only takes the title of Exalt postgame, meaning that for Robin to be advisor to the EXALT they must have already defeated Grima and regardless of ending they should NOT be worried about being taken over by Grima.) Anyway, I digress, but the point is that back in 2020 they were still hitting hard on Grima being a Fallen Robin. We hadn't gotten Halloween F!Grima yet and frankly I'm not sure anyone thought that a fallen alt could get alts or resplendents of their own, so... I sort of suspect that's why they wanted to bring in elements of Grima to Hel Robin.

And here's what's really interesting... Hel Robin is the ONLY Hel Resplendent that is implied to ACTUALLY be dead. It's... subtle. "These are the raiments of Hel, the realm of the dead. Don't read too much into that." is... a little bit suspiciously specific in its denial, isn't it? Like, saying NOT to read too much into it is basically an invitation to start scrutinizing it asdfghjkl. And then you have "I may look a little scary, but I'm still the same Robin underneath. Have no fear." And just WHY do you feel the need to assure us of this, Robin? Nobody thinks the Resplendent alts are changing personalities...

But maybe it's because, idk, his eyes get a little redder in his special art?

Again, it's SUBTLE. And if you only look at the special art, you could easily say it's just brown. But, then... why make this change berween normal attack and special? Robin has certainly been portrayed with inconsistent eye colors before, but not in the SAME alt.

And then let's actually look at his special activation lines...

UM... What's that one in the middle there??? "Accept your fate!" ???

Does that not cinch the deal? Do we not know enough about Robin to be able to conclude definitively WHICH Robin would say THAT (and which Robin would reject that kind of thinking outright)?

(I think "Death can be a mercy!" is also very consistent with Grima's worldview and their belief in their power of destruction as "the one true equalizer")

And if all of that wasn't enough, there's also his page on the FEH Pass website, which includes a short introduction written in-character by Sharena. M!Robin's says

Robin's wearing attire from Hel, the realm of the dead! Ohhh, I hope he's OK... Even if he's not feeling like his normal self, this new outfit keeps the black-and-purple theme from his classic look and adds some spooky flair with new patterns and a stylishly frayed hem!

So yeah, Sharena is worried about him and thinks he isn't feeling like his "normal self." Again, M!Robin is the ONLY Hel Resplendent who has any indication of a personality change coming with the clothes. Resplendent F!Robin, despite sharing the outfit's design, doesn't share ANY of the "covert Grima" features. Not the lines, not Sharena's concern, and absolutely not the changing eye color. Honestly, it was a little disappointing to me, because the little details with m!Robin are just so brainrot-worthy, but idk, F!Robin got the better glowup art-wise (seriously, her Respledent is some of my favorite Robin art out there) and when you think about it, it IS extremely funny to imagine the two of them interacting while M!Robin has to keep pretending he's not the one who went back in time and got his ass kicked.

Because I mean... that's sort of the obvious inference, isn't it? That he's Original Timeline Robin who became the fell dragon, followed Lucina back in time, and was killed by Good Timeline Robin. Lol I really wish more fanfic authors would take this alt and run with it, because is that concept not just totally ripe with potential?

Anyway, thank you for coming my TED Talk today. I will tag it as Grima Studies this time and add it to my masterpost for any of you who might like to one day find it again asdfghjkl.