Only seeing him in posed photographs, or hearing about his legendary exploits in Willard’s drawl of a narration cranks the tension, before the myth is turned upside down by having both Martin Sheen and the audience see that beyond the tales is a mumbling, insane and chronically ill (if still menacing) wizard behind the curtain. Coppola pulled the same trick in Apocalypse Now: showing Kurtz as his persona had been billed (he’s only visible in file photos before the big reveal): a young-ish, handsome, and officious Marlon Brando. For Min to work, his reputation must precede him, not the other way around. Min is at his best when he’s heard and not seen, or more accurately that you only see the devastation he’s wrought before you meet the man himself.
#FAR CRY 4 CHOICE HOW TO#
He’s not meant to be seen out in the wild, running around awkwardly as his collision detection tries to work out how to get around trees. Not convinced? The game gives you all the evidence you need when you kill his impersonator, a cheap double bluff that is saved by, yes, the actual Min talking on the radio about how much money they’d spent on making poor Bruce, an Australian, actually look like him. But Far Cry 4 implements it far better than a lot of other games, entwining mechanics around it in such a way that for Min to turn up any more than he actually does would actually destroy its design (and as such, its superb endgame). This is not a new narrative, in any medium. Less Batman, striking fear both mentally and then very physically, more Kurtz: a ghostly presence that (adjusts wank hat) controls the physical world. Instead, his presence is meant to be felt elsewhere, through radio broadcasts, strongholds, and the self-perpetuating myth that both his forces and yours contribute to. Despite apparently having the same tailor, his role is not to be a version of Nicholson’s Joker. Like The Jackal in Far Cry 2 before him, Min isn’t meant to be a Robotnik-style end of level boss, nor even a direct thorn in your side.
Surely he should have shown up more, strutting around in that pink suit and troll hair, stabbing people in the throat, demanding more of your careful attention, like a Kyrati Beat Takeshi in Battle Royale. Howls of derision filled certain message boards, complaining that he didn’t have as much screentime as befits a man who so confidently appears on both the boxart and in the main marketing campaign. Or, more precisely, the supposed lack of it. The week of Far Cry 4’s release saw some interesting reactions to Pagan Min’s presence in the game. Note: The following is so spoiler heavy that if you read it without having finished Far Cry 4 you may very well explode with fury, like John Cassavetes in a middling De Palma thriller, or Arsenal fans in general.
0 kommentar(er)
