Let’s try something a bit new! We’re gonna start what’s hopefully gonna be a series, talking about why specific highlights of FFXIV work as well as they do–well, at least to me. And where better to start than the one time Hildibrand, the big comedy storyline, actually made me laugh.
Section timestamps:
0:00 – Intro
1:03 – Why I don’t find Hildibrand funny
6:08 – The Setup
10:14 – The Joke
17:32 – The Rest of the Joke
38:18 – Outro
Questions, suggestions, ways that I’m wrong about my own sense of humor? Drop a comment here! You can find me on Twitter at https://twitter.com/Cleretic/, or at Cohost at https://cohost.org/Cleretic/ (I promise I’ll use it soon), or on Bluesky (there’s less chance of using this) at https://bsky.app/profile/cleretic.bsky.social!
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I've never been one to get offended by jokes, so on that front I don't think Hildibrand necessarily fails. For me it fails because it essentially uses one type of joke for the entirety of the duration. Sure, it was funny for the first few quests I did, but it stopped being funny after I realized that's all there really was. It's a style of comedy that I can only really enjoy in small bursts every now and then. The relic weapons being tied to these just gave me an excuse to speedrun.
Endwalker was the only one that made me laugh. As Ive told a friend, it literally did not click for me until then. And for the love of goodness, I could not understand why this installation hit the sweet spot for me. Cannot wait to hear your insight!
The "Gentleman of Light" Hildi joke in ARR was an Obvious Japanese pun that isn't translating to the same level of wordplay fun that one familiar w/ Japanese media recognizes, same with all the boke/straightman structure. Sometimes Hildy jokes work for me; sometimes not. But I also immediately caught the lore parody, and that Godbert's trailing off musing setting up that the punchline was that this additive retcon explaining what existed for genre functionality (the Manderville cartoon physics durability) to have in-universe justification (a la the Azem summonstone) was all bait-and-switch.
as a hildibrand enjoyer, i totally understand where you're coming from in not liking it. the fact that nashu's stalker joke is STILL GOING in the year of our lord 2024 makes me feel insane. why is he still here. get him out of here. regardless, i really appreciate you dissecting this joke because it did kind of go over my head a little bit tbh? like, i thought the reveal that actually, no, they're not descended from aliens was the funniest shit but the fact that the larger joke was about lore dumps in ffxiv just went right past me. anyways, im glad you did find some part of hildibrand funny!
At the start of the video: Thanks for the heads up at the start, it helped prep my mind for "it's her opinion, it's ok if she doesn't like what you like" and I knew I was in for a good time when I already started laughing with the best explanation for slapstick: 'man fall down'
At the end: I learned something and I'm so glad for learning to understand an angle of the joke apart from its slapstick that I wouldn't have realized if it weren't for you or other FFXIV lore youtubers! On my end, the slapstick worked for me partly because I thought about how the animators use a play-dough like approach to Hildibrand as a test bed for what they can do for the main story or other animated cutscenes (and that I'm easily amused). Thank you for the video!
I always found Endwalker funny (sans Ultros but this I had expected since whenever he cameos all he is to the devs is a man hating perverted octopus) yet Endwalker did hit the hardest. It ran with its absurdity and even some of the dialogue was funny. That choice where we get to make an excuse about our money problems because we bought a copy of Return to Oblivion is so real especially since it’s STILL one of the most expensive orchestrion rolls to buy in the marketboard.
Pausing the video to comment about how fascinating it is that your opinion about real life vs animated physical comedy is the literal exact opposite of mine! Real life physical comedy has never translated for me into humor because I know it's actual people, and because I know that if a real person was actually experiencing, say, what Mr. Bean goes through on a normal afternoon, they would be incredibly seriously harmed – and since they aren't, it's all very uncanny and strange. Animated comedy is the exact opposite because, given that it's all fake anyway and happening in an implicitly representational medium, it's no great leap to go from "anime isn't real but I like it" to "hahaha anime man fall down, nice." I've never heard an explanation before about why real life physical comedy/stuntwork could work for someone more than cartoon stuff, that's such a cool thing to encounter! (Though I'll note that personally Hildebrand doesn't do it for me and never really has 🤷🏻♀️)
Hi I had to subscribe. I love FFXIV and I love it to know that other trans girls share this love of the fabulous world of Eorzia 🏳️⚧️
I wasn't ob board with Hildibrand at first. The japanese tradition on holde on a strong exaggerated pose never landed for me, even though I get that it's rooted in their theatrical traditions. What eventually won me over was Greg, for what ever reason most of his gags have just always landed for me, and when he's no there, theres usually some good pulp story to fall back on.
As for this set, and this joke in particular, I loved it, especially with how it ties into the relic quest(say what you will about the process, thats not important here). Making this lore dump mandatory for the relic basically casts all the folks doing this just for the shiny toy or the best in slot weapon, are the dead pan elephants, just taking this all in and being so done with it. It would have made it all the better if halfway through the trial they pulled a Yojimbo and turned it into another comedy fight.
My favorite joke is when the villain of Endwalker explain his plan to clone the WOL. Then you can say "wait that not a bad idea. I should do that." and the music stops dead and everyone just stares at you and acts like you were joking. That to us was the best joke in the whole game.