How BOTW’s Zelda is a real female character — until Nintendo chickens out
There’s something almost painfully real about Zelda in Breath of the Wild, something that hangs like a noose around the player’s heart and tugs until it’s too tight to breathe. In a game where our stand-in protagonist character, Link, doesn’t speak a word and rarely expresses an opinion, Zelda is so disgustingly, amazingly flawed and herself in such a way that the contrast stays at the back of your mind.
All of Zelda’s emotional arch is told through the Lost Memories, of course — completely optional parts of the game. They add nothing to the actual gameplay except an unlocked ending if you find them all, which is why so many may have missed them and only know Zelda as a disembodied voice, a lovesick Princess in a ceremonial dress. That is a fact I am bitter about, believe me.
The reason why Zelda is fascinating is that she despises Link. As Urbosa so succinctly puts, he is a reminder of her failure to access the sealing power that should be hers according to her destiny. Because he is being sent by her father, it is particularly painful for her to see him, since it is her father who is most disappointed in her, her father who mocks and scolds her with unnecessary cruelty for a teenage girl.
Princess Zelda is written as a character that is wildly out of place in her own environment. Her biggest interests are architecture, history and the observation of nature. She resists having to depend on anyone, especially her ‘protector’ Link. In Memory 8, she confesses in a choked voice, through the example of Link, her feelings about not truly fitting in where destiny has placed her. She is the last broken puzzle piece that messes up the big picture, the dissident, the unworthy.
This changes, thankfully. Through Link saving her life, she begins to allow herself to befriend him and she grows into someone deeper and more pleasant with the company that brings. Zelda teases and displays shy self-awareness, she reprimands Link for being too careless, she falls asleep on Urbosa’s shoulder. By accepting a found family and help, she can shoulder a burden that has unjustly fallen on her.
There is one thing I dislike intensely about Zelda’s story: the awakening of her power.
Zelda’s sealing power (necessary to keep away the main enemy, Ganondorf) is unlocked when Link is attacked after Ganon’s return brings chaos and madness to Hyrule, after the Champions have been murdered and the Guardians been turned against them — the object of Zelda’s fascinated wonderings becoming deadly, emotionless weapons. Though there is a lovely moment of complete vulnerability as Zelda sobs in Link’s embrace, wracked with guilt, it is ruined by the fact that in the memory after, Zelda is the one who saves Link and becomes instantly all-powerful.
I’ve heard quite a lot about ‘Mary-Sues’ in recent media. Rey, from Star Wars is a Mary-Sue (a perfect female character, without any discernible flaws and adored by everyone) according to many male viewers who think that her immediate access to the Force is unlikely and ‘over-powered’ (though they don’t seem to think the same about Luke’s own sudden Force powers). However, as far as I know, no male fans have accused Zelda’s extremely convenient unlocking of her powers and thus, eliminating her main vulnerability, as being ‘unrealistic’. Perhaps it’s because of the fact that she does it for love (presumably for Link), or maybe some of them just haven’t watched the memories at all.
Personally, I think this scene does a great disservice to the lovely if simple storytelling in previous memories. I knew, because of video game logic and the fact that you’re told Zelda is fighting Ganon, that she eventually got her power, but I resisted against it. For me, Zelda’s story would have been infinitely more valuable if she simply just couldn’t do it. If she truly wasn’t meant to be what everyone else told her to. I realize the meaning Nintendo is trying to communicate is more akin to “the way to achieving your potential is through love and not pushing”, but I still resent it. Zelda is a gorgeous character without her power, not because of it, and it stings to watch her characterization be reduced to a mechanic to make the game make sense, and to reward the player with a beautiful princess fluttering her eyelashes.
This is redeemed slightly by the secret ending. In it, Zelda muses: “I suppose it would make sense if my power had dwindled over the past 100 years. I’m surprised to admit it…But I can accept that.” That open self-reflection, the realization that she does not need power to be her own person and love herself, is much more valuable to me.
In the end, I connected with Zelda because she was a real person, a real female character, that slowly overcame her flaws. It seems Nintendo isn’t completely ready to accept her as such, seeing as her growth is optional and secondary to the game’s needs. Hopefully, one day, Zelda can even be our main character in the series that bears her name.
