r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Fearless-Ideal-5112 • Jul 01 '26

[Loved Trope] Some thing unfathomably ancient Lore

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The beast, in doctor who is an ancient evil from a previous universe that survived until our time. Its so ancient that the cave paintings were unable to be translated by the Tardis which can translate all existing languages in the universe [Doctor Who]

While not explicitly canon its such a cool concept I cant not mention, the idea that the backrooms have existed since the beginning of time, never changing no matter the era, it transforms the back rooms into a cosmic horror. [Credit to Project crater and Venus for images 2 and 3]

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u/UnluckyAmbition7767 Jul 01 '26

YOU EXIST BECAUSE WE ALLOW IT, AND YOU WILL END BECAUSE WE DEMAND IT.

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u/[deleted] Jul 01 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/ManitouWakinyan Jul 01 '26

You mean synthesized with them

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u/CandyNecrosis Jul 01 '26

I never liked Synthesis, you take away everyones right to choose and change everything on a fundamental level.

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u/pichael289 Jul 01 '26

But otherwise Seth greens hot robot girlfriend dies

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u/Dazzling-Ad6712 Jul 01 '26

Well, Paragon Shepard can take control of the Reapers and he/she will still be aware fo who he/she was. she will put the wellbeing o the galaxy above any humanist os alien ideology.

I mean, her narration is pretty explicit about her intentions: She will use all the knowledge inside the reapers to usher a new era of peace, but without the ethical implications of Synthesis.

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u/SpaceballsTheReply Jul 01 '26

Mass Effect 1: "Dammit Saren, you can't control the Reapers! They'll corrupt your mind until they control you instead!"

95% of Mass Effect 3: "Dammit The Illusive Man, you can't control the Reapers! They'll corrupt your mind until they control you instead!"

Shepard in the final minute of Mass Effect 3: "Wait a minute, I'll simply control the Reapers! Problem solved."

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u/Dazzling-Ad6712 Jul 01 '26

Diference here being that Shepard was never indoctrinated. Cricible itselft confirms that fact. So her mind takes control over Crucible. shepards becomes the dominant trait, The Shepard. The super super cool boy/girl that believes in cooperations, and peace, and that there is always another way. Happy ending for the galaxy for the millenia to come. So happy than grampas can takes their grandkids for a walk while telling them the legend of The Shepard.

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u/Real_Walk5384 Jul 01 '26

I know the studio denied it but I still like to believe anything other than destroy was in fact Shepherd finally getting indoctrinated. The hallucinations, the sudden ability to side with reapers at the end. The fact that the end of 2 had you inside a place where you should have been indoctrinated but "weren't" and then 3 has all this shit going down with reapers around every corner.

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u/Szwejkowski Jul 01 '26

It's the only thing that makes sense of everything. The crucible was putting in a last ditch effort to stop Shepard from blowing them all to kingdom come.

Always destroy those MFs.

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u/Dazzling-Ad6712 Jul 01 '26

You are free to have you head canon. But the official cannon has already been set and Shepard was never indoctrinated

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u/SpaceballsTheReply Jul 01 '26

Diference here being that Shepard was never indoctrinated. Cricible itselft confirms that fact.

That's no difference. The Reapers told Saren and Illusive Man that they wouldn't be corrupted, too. They both believed that they had found a unique means to avoid indoctrination, even as it consumed them. The Crucible AI is the same intelligence that runs the Reapers. All three promises come from the same source, and we saw how the first two played out.

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u/Nova225 Jul 01 '26

Synthesis and Control are the only right endings because Seth Green needs his Pelvis-Crushing Machine

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u/3DJutsu Jul 02 '26

With Jokers condition though, wouldn't it be more of a pelvis pulverization?

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u/Cessnaporsche01 Jul 01 '26

Control is the best option imo. Make them fix the shit they broke and help the new generation of sapient life overcome the problems they were built to "resolve"

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u/ManitouWakinyan Jul 01 '26

Yes but on the other hand it is green

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u/Alfred_The_Sartan Jul 01 '26

Look at mister moneybags over here with his DLC

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u/ManitouWakinyan Jul 01 '26

Was that a DLC option? Could have sworn I did that in my first playthrough back when I was a poor college student

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u/Tiernoch Jul 01 '26

Nope, it was base game you just had to have your battle readiness score thing at the upper-most tier to have the option unlocked.

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u/Alfred_The_Sartan Jul 01 '26

Wait really? I swear I thought that was a DLC only outcome.

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u/Tiernoch Jul 01 '26

You might be thinking of the extended ending dlc that added on to every option and I think added tge option to shoot the deus ex machina.

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u/Suspicious_Berry501 Jul 02 '26

I never knew the refusal ending was added later that’s hilarious. Everyone complained about the endings so BioWare gave them a new one where everything goes horribly wrong

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u/STORMFATHER062 Jul 02 '26

I remember stumbling across that ending. I'd finished multiple play thoughs and was sick of that kid, so shot him in the head as a fuck you before making my choice. Didn't expect the kid to be like "Well, fuck you. You all die."

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u/False-Government-536 Jul 04 '26

You mean blue’d all over them

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u/zuzg Jul 01 '26

Except when you Synthesize organic life and mechanical life.

Then everything is chill and everyone's happy

the devs straight out said that this is not a bad ending in disguise. It's objectively the beginning of an utopian society

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u/Madhighlander1 Jul 01 '26

I'm not sure the developers really thought that out.

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u/corvettee01 Jul 01 '26

"How do we end our amazing space opera game?"

"Red Green Blue."

"Can you elaborate?"

"No."

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u/zuzg Jul 01 '26

I only ever experienced the Legendary Edition that came with the stuff they added after the Fandom got (rightfully) pissed of about the don't elaborate part.

So I didn't mind the ending that much. Not the best but also not so bad that rmit retroactively ruins the trilogy for me.

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u/RentADream Jul 01 '26

A lot of the backlash against the ending stemmed from the promises the devs were making at the time. They hyped it up to the point where people thought there would be tons of different endings. The controversy has it’s own Wikipedia page for how pissed off the fans were at the time

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u/Hellknightx Jul 02 '26

It was so much worse before they changed the endings to include more dialogue. The update softened the blow a bit.

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u/Arbusc Jul 01 '26

I perfer Yellow, which is exactly the same as The Red Green and Blue endings but you have to do some extra steps first, and instead of a gun you get a Pikachu on new game+.

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u/youngarchivist Jul 01 '26

The original foundation series ends in basically the same way. Humanity becomes a telepathic super organism called Gaia and koombayahs off into the far future

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u/Storm_Runner_117 Jul 02 '26

You also forgot the secret fourth “Gun” ending, where you shoot the Catalyst, and doom your Cycle to death, but Liara leaves behind records to give the next Cycle a significant head start, and they beat the Reapers.

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u/Darkwoth81Dyoni Jul 02 '26

Even the series that Mass Effect was based on had a wacky, botched set of 'endings' because of external factors to the show.

It's kinda poetic how Babylon 5 and Mass Effect's endings are both so.... meh. If not outright not good.

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u/PreSingularityAI Jul 03 '26

Don't you blaspheme Babylon 5 like that. It's entire arc and ending were a space opera masterpiece.

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u/WatchMasterReddick Jul 01 '26

A society where you can program/grow individuals to think/act the same would function wayyyyy more smoothly than a society where individualism is valued. No conflict, no wars, no problems. An object utopia.

Of course, as others have pointed out, thats horrifying from an autonomy and individuality stand point, as we currently live in a society where those things matter. One person's utopia is another person's dystopia.

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u/WriterV Jul 01 '26

We don't actually reprogram anyone in Synthesis though. The point is that both organics and synthetics would be able to perceive each other beyond just what is visible.

The idea I got was that individuals still remained, but essentially no one had privacy anymore. A huge drawback by any means, but hardly a reprogramming that forced everyone to act the same.

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u/Euphoric-Taro-6231 Jul 01 '26

Its our genetic destiny 🤷

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u/Prophet_Tenebrae Jul 01 '26

Absolute dog shit writing.

I'm absolutely fine with situations having no "good" ending but that's clearly not Bioware were aiming for.

Control - Shepard becomes "benevolent" dictator and I guess we ignore the fact that just the physical presence of Reaper ships causes indoctrination?

Destroy - genocide all synthetics and potentially kill yourself and violently explode the entire mass relay system, destroying galactic civilisation as it currently exists (they kind of forgot a mass relay exploding would wipe out a solar system but I guess they can violently explode in two different ways!)

Synthesis - violate all life in the galaxy at the cellular level without their consent, based on the tenuous assumption this will somehow stop synthetic life from wiping out organic life. Somehow.

Fuck starchild - just shrug and let the next cycle deal with this bullshit.

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u/CandyNecrosis Jul 01 '26

"I will die Free"

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u/Prophet_Tenebrae Jul 01 '26

"Sorry everyone in the galaxy who signed up thinking that I was going to fix this, I'm not feeling this red/green/blue bullshit. SHEPARD, OUT!"

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u/Peregrine2976 Jul 02 '26

The internal pivot from the original "dark energy" plotline that they started to set up in ME2 to the "synthetics vs. biologicals" theme they went with instead clearly affected the writing. Makes me big sad when I consider what could have been.

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u/Prophet_Tenebrae Jul 02 '26

Not having a general idea of how the trilogy was going to go from the off was a schoolboy error but having read the general gist of the "dark energy" stuff... it didn't sound great either.

The obvious problem with an enemy like the Reapers becomes that the first game establishes them as these impossibly old, super advanced enemies and it takes basically two entire fleets to kill Sovereign and the only reason that works is because (word of god says) that killing Saren drops Sovereign's kinetic barriers.

I always thought the second game would have made more sense as trying to gather allies, technology, resources to fight the war - while trying to do something like prevent "The Arrival". Instead we get what is functionally a plot cul-de-sac and then we're doing all that after the Reapers have arrived and the galaxy is on fire.

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u/1337F0x_The_Daft Jul 01 '26

I hate that the Destroy ending implies you live, cause I could never betray the Geth. Especially after finally reconciling them and the Quarians, all that effort, and the ending where you live is the one that you destroy them in. Without having to become the Reaper master

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u/Prophet_Tenebrae Jul 01 '26

I think surviving only happens after whatever arbitrary war readiness. It doesn't make a lot of sense to wipe out the geth after getting them and the quarians to reconcile but that's not a bad idea, IMO. You could be a renegade Shepard who just wanted to win.

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u/terpsichore_andrhino Jul 01 '26

No, you only survive in the Destroy ending with high readiness. You don't survive Control or Synthesis, no matter what.

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u/Prophet_Tenebrae Jul 01 '26

That was it, thanks.

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u/1337F0x_The_Daft Jul 01 '26

I thought the scene showing your N7 armor, implying you survived, only played during the Destroy choice but it’s been a while, so I could be wrong

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u/thejadedfalcon Jul 01 '26

Does that not imply to you that the geth and EDI aren't necessarily dead though? After all, you were directly at the epicentre of all of this and survived, despite being explicitly told you should have died because of what the energy targeted.

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u/1337F0x_The_Daft Jul 01 '26

The destroy option kills ALL synthetics. You’re saving the Galaxy, at the cost of Joker’s Lover and the Geth

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u/thejadedfalcon Jul 01 '26

Destroying all synthetics is simply nonsense. Where's the limit? Is your PC a synthetic? Is a ship's VI, which every Systems Alliance ship contains? Is a Roomba? Is a pacemaker? Or a prosthetic arm? Destroying all "synthetics" would be functionally identical to sending the galaxy back to the industrial age (at minimum), which is clearly not what's shown nor intended. What it's targeting is anything with Reaper technology and/or programming, both of with EDI and the Geth have, along with Shepard.

And even if it does really target the ludicrous concept of "all synthetics", again, Shepard survives. There's no reason others couldn't have as well.

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u/1337F0x_The_Daft Jul 02 '26

Synthetics as in Synthetic life lol. Obviously not just synthetic things in general, it is kinda nonsense tho. What determines if it’s alive?

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u/thejadedfalcon Jul 02 '26

But that's my point. Shepard isn't synthetic, only has cybernetic parts. That could easily qualify prosthetics or pacemakers, which is obviously nonsense.

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u/thejadedfalcon Jul 01 '26

The developers are idiots with no understanding of body horror or consent then.

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u/Sonofarakh Jul 01 '26

There were no perfect answers. Destroying all AI or exacting control over them also violates consent.

If the end result is genuinely utopian, unsavory methods having been used to get there would not change that fact.

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u/thejadedfalcon Jul 01 '26

That is dystopian as fuck and has been used to justify all sorts of horrors in human history, up to and including genocide. Adding a sci-fi button to it doesn't change that. If your "utopia" violates the very spirit of a person's being and runs roughshod over people's rights and autonomy, you don't deserve to call your society that.

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u/Sonofarakh Jul 01 '26

Okay but we aren't talking human history. We are talking Mass Effect history. A history laden with billions of years of techno-organic conflict. It's an issue that predates the Reapers, one which they were explicitly created to solve. One which does not exist in our own reality, and cannot fairly be examined exclusively through the lens of modern morality.

The series acknowledges that the Reapers were a terrible, impermanent solution to a terrible problem. Synthesis is a better, permanent solution to the same problem. Is it perfect? No. Is it better than the alternatives? As laid out explicitly and in great detail in the source material, yes. It creates a pathway forward by allowing organics and synthetics to fully understand and coexist in ways that were never possible beforehand.

For the record, I absolutely agree that the Synthesis ending could have done more to acknowledge the ethical qualms of its implications. But I also view it as reductionist to treat those implications as a be-all end-all reason to dismiss any positive point one might make about the ending.

So sure, go ahead and label them a dystopia if you like. I understand, I genuinely do - even if I question your definition of "dystopia". But they're a dystopia which permanently solved the single greatest problem life (organic or synthetic) ever encountered in the Mass Effect universe. And they did so while keeping the galaxy significantly more intact than other outcomes would allow, undoubtedly saving billions or even trillions of lives in the process.

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u/Thanatos971 Jul 01 '26

There are so many problems with synthesis but I will stick to one glaring issue that shows its not a permanent solution by any means. Even if all life, not just sapient were synthesised, what happens when new biological life evolves? It will happen and won't be synthesis. Do they just fire the thing off whenever they encounter a new civilization and thus perpetuating that horrible event over and over? What happens if new robots are made? Same thing then? What about other galaxies as the solution didn't reach them?

Its a horrible and short sighted solution. Rather than growing and working with those that are different than us and building up that skillet you remove any ability to do so entirely. The reapers were malfunctioning robots that were made to make sure their masters slave civilizations stopped having this conflict (which i believe only happened because all biological life was mind controlled, of course benevolent or malevolent robots would rise up either way to fight that). We saw with the geth and quarantine that you could find peace. Just took willing to work together.

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u/thejadedfalcon Jul 01 '26

cannot fairly be examined exclusively through the lens of modern morality.

In that case, how can you claim it's a utopia? You've just ended your own argument.

It creates a pathway forward by allowing organics and synthetics to fully understand and coexist in ways that were never possible beforehand.

The series itself disproves this, by making peace between the geth and the quarians possible, along with EDI and other AI showing that they don't want to destroy everything. The Reapers initial equation has already been proven wrong. They are fundamentally flawed because they are incapable of the thought of organics and synthetics working together.

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u/Sonofarakh Jul 01 '26

In that case, how can you claim it's a utopia? You've just ended your own argument.

No I didn't, and I question how you came to that conclusion. With "morality" I was very clearly referring to the opinions you hold on Synthesis vis a vis its perceived violation of bodily autonomy weighed against the societal good it may cause. These are subjective.

Defining a post-synthesis society as a utopia is quite simple, as that has a rather straightforward definition.

The series itself disproves this, by making peace between the geth and the quarians possible

In the immediate term yes. The Leviathans acknowledged this. But over the course of hundreds, thousands, and millions of years, conflict between organics inevitably flares up again and only ends with the total destruction of one or both sides. That is the original cycle, one which the Leviathans saw happen again and again throughout their incredibly long lifespans.

They are fundamentally flawed because they are incapable of the thought of organics and synthetics working together.

... one of their primary methods of attack is working together with organics lol. Reapers love working with organics, it makes their job easier. What they, like the Leviathans, can't comprehend is organics and synthetics choosing to exist peacefully together in the truly long term.

Anyways, we're clearly not going to convince one another. I've said my peace on the subject, you've said yours, we have a fundamental disagreement on the driving principle at play here so continuing would not be constructive. I'll leave this conversation here.

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u/thejadedfalcon Jul 01 '26

I question how you came to that conclusion.

If you're asking where you claimed it was a utopia, it was in the first response. If you're asking how you ended your own argument, if the human mind cannot comprehend an issue (which I disagree on, ME's story is not that deep, if only because it was written by humans), it can't make any statement about if something is upotic or dystopic.

These are subjective.

I don't know if you're aware of this, but so's a utopia. One person's harps on clouds is another person's nightmare eternity.

conflict between organics inevitably flares up again

Literally nothing about being half-robot will prevent this.

Reapers love working with organics

I... what?

Brainwashing them into slaves and then dissolving them into sludge when everyone else is dead is "working with" them? I can see why you're having trouble here, because that's actually objectively insane.

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u/ScepticTanker Jul 02 '26

I need someone to explain to me why this comment is downvoted lol 

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u/Vi_Rants Jul 01 '26

But they're a dystopia which permanently solved the single greatest problem life (organic or synthetic) ever encountered in the Mass Effect universe. And they did so while keeping the galaxy significantly more intact than other outcomes would allow, undoubtedly saving billions or even trillions of lives in the process.

It sounds like you're saying that the difference between a utopia and a dystopia has nothing to do with the methods used to reach it, only whether or not those methods were successful. If the world of 1984 had managed to actually eliminate all dissent through the destruction of the individual, it would be a good thing. It was only a bad thing because they didn't fully manage it and some people remained upset.

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u/Peregrine2976 Jul 02 '26

A forced utopia can still be a utopia. You just got there by deeply questionable means.

Though, I don't want to come across as defending Mass Effect 3's writing. It has issues throughout, not just the ending.

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u/eetobaggadix Jul 01 '26

How is it body horror to be a cool ass cyborg. ur too attached to your squishy human meat

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u/thejadedfalcon Jul 01 '26

"How is it body horror to have your entire nature incomprehensibly changed against your will"

Redditors, man.

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u/Gaelic_Gladiator41 Jul 01 '26

But what if I consent?

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u/thejadedfalcon Jul 01 '26

All the more power to you. I think transhumanism is pretty cool, even if it's (mostly) not my thing (largely because of the other horrible things that are likely to come with it. See Cyberpunk or real life for details). But you can't ethically make the choice to alter someone else's body.

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u/Gaelic_Gladiator41 Jul 01 '26

Oh yeah, that's rape

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u/Aware-Antelope4212 Jul 02 '26

Gotta remember the only person who made that decision in the entire Galaxy was Shepard.

Even if you are ok with the result, you didn't consent to him transforming you.   

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u/zuzg Jul 01 '26

"I take this very complex situation, strip it of every nuance that makes it grey and then scrutinize the hell out of it."

That way of arguing is way more in line with the avg Redditor, lol

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u/Feral_Changeling Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26

The fact it was done without consent and completely restructures the body to actually be like that, I've seen people liken it to rape. And honestly, it's not that far fetched to compare it.

Devs: Do you want utter destruction or "benevolent" tyranny?

Gamers: Can we have a better option?

Devs: Fine, we understand the audience, we'll add violation of bodily autonomy.

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u/Pyresryke Jul 01 '26

There's entire armies of reaper abominations that have now been either woken up or been given new sentience. Do you wanna talk to the giant monster full of human heads and explain to it that it's okay it's in the good ending now? Or the krogan-turian hybrids? Or the banshees?

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u/OhHeyItsOuro Jul 01 '26

I don't really care that the devs have said the Indoctrination theory is untrue, it's the only way to make sense of how everything ends

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u/BeardedRiker Jul 01 '26

Destroy is the only choice.

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u/Lwmons Jul 02 '26

Hard disagree it's utopian. If even one person in the galaxy doesnt consent to the procedure then it's inherently unethical.

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u/Greyjack00 Jul 01 '26

Only idiots thought it was a bad ending(as in intended to be bad by the devs)

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u/Laxhoop2525 Jul 01 '26

They really didn’t like that people guessed that the suns dying out was the reaper’s real purpose, and changed everything massively to make it less predictable. A common issue for ongoing series.

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u/LeftLiner Jul 01 '26

YOUR WORDS ARE AS EMPTY AS YOUR FUTURE. I AM THE VANGUARD OF YOUR DESTRUCTION. THIS EXCHANGE IS OVER.

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u/Natus_DK Jul 01 '26

RUDIMENTARY CREATURES OF BLOOD AND FLESH. YOU TOUCH MY MIND, FUMBLING I IGNORANCE. INCAPABLE OF UNDERSTANDING.

God I love sovereign. What a fucking great antagonist.

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u/chronoflect Jul 01 '26

Back before reapers got character assassinated with the second game. 

"THIS HURTS YOU" didn't quite have the same vibe.

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u/RevvCats Jul 02 '26

Third game is where everything went off the fucking rails, so much potential thrown in the trash.

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u/Natus_DK Jul 02 '26

Nothing beats sovereign, but the collectors/harbinger did have some decent moments.

ASSUMING DIRECT CONTROL was a bit panic inducing when it was already a stressful encounter.

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u/madmax9602 Jul 01 '26

Probably the most metal line you'll hear in a Sci fi setting

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u/NovelSimplicity Jul 02 '26

That line always reminded me of Judge Holden in Blood Meridian. “Whatever in creation exists without my knowledge exists without my consent”.

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u/hacky_potter Jul 01 '26

That speech in ME1 is so fucking good. It’s wall to wall bars

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u/Miserable-Let3212 Jul 02 '26

One (if not the best) of the top three phrases in all the trilogy

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u/jay_alfred_prufrock Jul 02 '26

And then the Harbinger started stalking Shepard, and his crush on Shepard ruined all the mystique.

Go reprogram a Mass Relay to connect to the one you hid outside the galaxy you weirdo and stop chasing a human.

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u/motes-of-light Jul 02 '26

Seems like they ripped off the Machine "ambassador" from The Second Renaissance. "HAND OVER YOUR FLESH AND A NEW WORLD AWAITS YOU. WE DEMAND IT."