#no this isnt groundbreaking but leave me to indulge in what I enjoy doing on this my DA blog

[felassan]

None of this is particularly new but w/e, it’s sleepy midnight wonderings o’clock, having been thinking about the new WIPs in relation to TN and the DWR teaser (Cut for length). The images are messy caps and a random assortment of sizes and so best viewed individually because the thumbnail doesn’t always focus on the bit/all of the bit that I was trying to point to.

In the EA Play WIPs, the tree in the first shot recalls the tree depicted in the 2018 DWR teaser trailer - both are elfy, dark-barked and have spreading branches devoid of leaves. I feel that this was an intentional callback and contains potent symbolism.

Back to some old hat mural burbling for a sec: The mural is interesting, as depending on how you look at it, the tree is ruined by flames ("burning in the raw chaos" indeed) and is on fire, and the Solas-y figure has passed by it on his way to do his thing (unfortunate unavoidable damage/casualties). Alternately, it’s standing untouched among the flames despite the fire, the rest of the land is burning in the chaos and the Solas-y figure is protecting the tree (placed himself between it and the rest) which is likely representative of the elven People by doing what he’s doing wiith the Veil and standing there w/ that ‘Gandalf you shall not pass’ shtick. What’s interesting is that in this series it’s probably both or a combination of both interpretations which is the truth.

In Tevinter Nights, we of course learn that Solas is in the process of, or intends to soon begin the process of, carrying out a ritual of some kind which will bring down the Veil. With this in mind, looking back at Nick Thornborrow’s mural, the circles don’t just represent the Thedosian ‘layers of creation’ and things associated with these (the barrier of the Veil, the separation of the different worlds, black-and-gold banding [Black City/Golden City], the 7 hemispheres [7 old gods? 7 remaining Evanuris?] and so on). I think they also represent a ritual, or ritual-in-progress; they remind me of the concentric rings and similar sigils often found in old alchemical symbols (alchemy being a practise where people tried to change the nature of materials), and the concentric rings in our world which are sometimes found at places which are often held in popular culture to have been sacred ritual or ceremonial sites (2) in ancient times.

Regarding the mural, there are interpretations that the figure on the left is warding off the encroaching Dread Wolf, or rather, protecting creation - the world - from what the DW is doing. There are also interpretations that the figure is not Solas, and others. These are valid ideas, and the beauty of DA material is in the fact that it sets folk to guessing and generating several different takes on what we’re presented with. For me, given that the figure was confirmed to be bald by the artist and that it appears to have the distinctive pelt slung on its shoulder, I read it to be Solas (I do accept tho that in-game art often depicts ancient elves in general as bald). I also read the whole thing as being both aspects of Solas (Solas the person and Solas the DW) approaching creation/the Veil from both sides in a sort of ‘pincer’ movement (this is not to say that he’s “evil omg”; his designs are intended to save the People, the world that was, and/or maybe the entire world). Lastly, it’s popularly assumed ofc that the mural depicts Solas trying to take down the Veil. 

This particular reading of the mural is old ground and an 0.2 I’ve posted before. I mention it because it brings me to the ritual. Post-TN I wondered about the specifics involved in his ritual, agreeing with the Mortalitasi’s summation that it will involve a lot of lyrium. Here I was struck by the spread and presence of red lyrium in the WIPs. In the mural, you have the figure with red eyes and en-haloed by a sphere of red. You also have the DW, red-eyed and with crackles of red emanating from it. The red lyrium idol is obviously present right in the middle. It’s the very center of everything, and from TN clearly the major key to Solas’ plans. In the teaser, red lyrium crackles all over the idol, but the bit that always gets me most is the part where the camera pans over the spread of red lyrium crackles up the spine of one of the figures depicted in the idol. That figure is bald, and the one being comforted by the other which has the Mythal-esque crown. If the descriptions of the idol and Solas’ supposed-reaction to it in TN are anything to go by, the idol ofc looks to be depicting Mythal, crowned, with Solas.

This is going to sound stupid, but the spine is a key structure in the human body, that encloses and protects a major component of the CNS (which controls a heck of a lot of what we do). This isn’t the first time people have worried about whether Solas is or will be affected by red lyrium. The whole thing interests me because of the nature of red lyrium (ex. veins) as revealed by Bianca; that it’s alive, since Blight only infects living things. Its spread across Thedas is kinda (fantastically) quasi-biological in nature, like cancer in an organism or mold through old food.**

Back to the ritual (all sense of structure in this post is non-existent lol), maybe the Mortalitasi’s assumption needs to be revised or made more specific. Given all the red.. mayhaps Solas’ ritual doesn’t just require lots of lyrium in addition to the use of the idol, it specifically requires lots of red lyrium..? This might make sense in light of all the red in the mural, and considering the fact that red lyrium is more potent and therefore more powerful than the normal form of the substance. Red lyrium like normal lyrium is also noted to be able to thin the Veil. It stands to reason that lots of it might be able to bring the whole thing down. Taking this back to the mural, the red crackles emanating from the DW look to be what is causing the cracks through the circles - which are representative, remember, of a ritual-in-progress as well as the Veil itself - into the inner sanctum. Is red lyrium is what’s breaking the Veil, what’s fuelling and catalyzing the ritual to bring it down? Solas! What are you doing (obviously yh he has his reasons for doing it, to save his people/restore what used to be, and potentially more). What grabs me here is that red lyrium is a double-edged sword. An idol made of red lyrium is key to his plans to bring down the Veil, but the rampant unstoppable spread of red lyrium across modern Thedas also simultaneously appears (and is widely noted by fandom to be) to be one of the serious problems facing the modern world that Solas is implied to be trying to save it from. (desperate times, desperate measures indeed)

** the spread of red lyrium and its effects on people and the land is a whole topic in and of itself

Alt take (equally plausible): the red lyrium crackles in the mural = just the destructive spread of red lyrium across the world of Thedas in general (which is a big threat to everything, including ‘creation’ itself. Solas is concerned with protecting the “sea of dreams”, for instance) and the red coloring in the figure and the DW is the effects on Solas of his using of the idol to stop this (by taking down the Veil and ‘resetting’ reality).

Alt takes on the mural (also equally plausible): It’s Solas vs the DW in that he’s conflicted and at war with himself over what he’s doing; it’s Solas vs the DW in that he’s protecting the world or the People from it or from a threat; it’s not Solas and represents someone else such as the Ink or next PC facing off against the DW; the idol represents the Black City in the center of the Fade; the idol represents the ‘center’ of the red lyrium that’s spreading across Thedas threatening everything / the Origin of the Blight itself [I don’t mean a literal center of it so much as it’s a core problem, although.. maybe that’s the beating mass of red lyrium in the WIPs?] and the mural depicts Solas protecting the world and/or the People from the threat of it; the idol doesn’t represent the physical item but rather the circumstances depicted by the idol (the couple, or the god mourning her sacrifice, or the crowned figure comforting the other - so it’s about the individuals these are, and the event commemorated by it, thus centering them in the plot of the upcoming game and showing that this interaction that transpired between them was a key moment in everything that happened before).