Is grimdark changing?

[Vermintide]

If you go back and actually read the old 1e-early 2e lore, modern 40k is if anything, more grimdark. The star child plot wasn't really am ambiguity, but a solid part of late 1e lore; the Emperor was going to return as the Star Child at some point, the question was when, not if, as the Sensei were quite numerous and trying to bring about the Emperor's return.

Yup, 3e is definitely where the real grimdark started in earnest. It's also the edition I started with, and therefore the best ;)

 

I remember the old Space Hulk videogame nailing it too, which predates 3rd slightly AFAIK.

Edited April 29, 2020 by Vermintide

[MegaVolt87]

 

 

I owe you an apology then, for I misconstrued that earlier part as your opinion also. I apologize and it was definitely not my intention to be rude or misrepresent your position on this.

 

I do still think that rejecting all change is a reactionary position which will only lead to a shrinking player base and is not a healthy direction for any fanbase to take (or a company catering to that fanbase). Additionally in the case of GW in general and WH40k specifically the lore and the tone have always been very varied and constantly changing so trying to claim a personal interpretation of it as the only true one is a bit ignorant of the history of the brand and the universe. To me the biggest risk to splitting the fandom comes from parts of the fandom itself being too fanatical about their interpretation being the only true one, not anything that GW has done up to this point.

 

 

Good point. There should hopefully/ ideally be more content that would appease older fans as well, such as a better supported HH, historical style campaigns such as Tyranic wars in Ultramar that can sit in a current edition like Vigilus did (eg. a new pre-rubicon Calgar re-sculpt). Its possible for GW to make all of the money if they are savvy about it without anyone feeling pushed out. 

[MARK0SIAN]

My own opinion on the matter is that the setting is definitely feeling a lot less grimdark. But I don’t blame the children’s books or any one particular thing. I think it’s mainly a result of them advancing the storyline.

 

For me at least, Grimdark isn’t about all the unpleasantness. Lots of people are citing recent examples of horrible deaths and gory happenings in the story but things like exterminatus etc are never what made it grimdark for me in the first place. Mass deaths etc are not the mark of it, in Avengers literally half the galaxy is killed and no one would call those films grimdark.

 

Grimdark for me isn’t about the horror, it’s entirely about the lack of hope and the inevitability of mankind’s destruction. That most citizens are lucky if they survive their day to day jobs let alone the myriad of alien/heretical threats that are preying upon them. There’s no happy ending.

 

Now I accept this is probably just my opinion but advancing the storyline didn’t feel like they took the clock closer to midnight, it actually felt the opposite like they pushed it back an hour. I’m not saying the imperium is in a good spot or they aren’t going to their inevitable doom. But before they advanced it, it felt like the imperium had nothing left, one more twig would’ve broken its back and everyone could see hundreds of twigs flying at it.

 

Guilliman etc changed that. They injected a figurehead where none had been. They injected hope and because of the Legend/mythology around Primarchs, it’s a hope that has changed the setting to make it less grimdark.

 

TL:DR Grimdark comes not from violence/gore/horror but from lack of hope, seeing mankind’s inevitable demise with nothing that can be done to stop it. Despite everything that has happened with the rift, it no longer feels to me like that demise is inevitable.

Edited April 29, 2020 by MARK0SIAN

[Scribe]

 

Grimdark for me isn’t about the horror, it’s entirely about the lack of hope and the inevitability of mankind’s destruction. That most citizens are lucky if they survive their day to day jobs let alone the myriad of alien/heretical threats that are preying upon them. There’s no happy ending.

 

That has not changed. It really, factually, actually, has not changed.

 

The Imperium lost with the Heresy. Its been bleeding out for 10K years. It will not win, cannot win, and the entire point of the setting from the 'heroic' perspective is spitting back hate and defiance in the face of that inevitable end.

 

The most tragic thing to me about the hobby, is that there is a critical lack of exploration and thought into the setting itself, and what it says about us, humanity, and the things we call 'other'.

 

In the end though, Humanity IS FACTUALLY DAMNED.

 

See ya in the Warp. ;)

[jaxom]

 

 

As I started subscribing to the White Dwarf magazine it had a head editor named "Fat bloke" who joked about game designer Tuomas Pirinen downing a bottle of vodka to calm his nerves as he is writing an after battle report. 

 

 

As a young person in the US, I remember having to pre-Internet find a way to figure out what a Bacon Butty was why someone would want so many of a thing containing the word butt. Also, who Roy Orbison was to try to figure out why he was so important to Jervis Johnson.

 

 

I'm playing devil's advocate here and I largely agree; but some would argue that the grimdark tone is not just an aesthetic or the fact lots of people die. Those things are just regular dark. Grimdark is about the seeming absence of hope. Humanity facing near inevitable extinction under countless threats, but fighting bitterly to the last regardless.

 

Acknowledging the Devil's Advocacy, I'd say the latter half is the important part and in its own way such struggles creates hope, or at least examples of behavior worth reading about. I think, if one wanted to have a serious discussion on where a setting falls in some sort of Grimdark spectrum, the important part isn't how bleak a setting is, but how much impact an individual can have on the setting as a whole. Localized hope versus non-localized hope?

 

TL;DNR: Nope. Still plenty of Grimdark, but people may not understand was “Grimdark” was supposed to be.

 

Is GW getting rid of grimdark? No. I don’t think releasing books aimed at younger audiences makes the setting over all less “Grimdark”. I think the idea of coming up the books for people to introduce children to the hobby is great. They have also introduced horror and crime novels which have been awesome (the horror ones at least IMHO).

 

Star Wars and its Legends book line is a great example of this in many regards. It's a huge universe with lots of room to have different types of stories for different audiences. They don't have to tread on each other's toes. 

 

People saying "the Imperium is NobleBright now" are really missing the fact that half the Imperium is cut off from all outside aid, drawing what local forces they can to defend themselves from the monsters circling in the darkness, and that sure, Guilliman is back and has Primaris Marines, but despite all these new advantages the Imperium is just barely holding together. They got a better fire-extinguisher, but it's still just a few of them and the entire neighborhood is engulfed in a roaring inferno, while there's a chasm that stops you getting to half of it. Sure, there's a rickety bridge across the chasm, but there's also the arsonists trying to set fire to that too, and they and their friends are trying to beat up everybody going across it.

 

Sure, Dante's now Warden of the Imperium Nihilus, but that's not exactly saying much when all Imperial forces are pretty much stranded where they are thanks to the lack of the Astronomican and any astropathic communication is all but meaningless.

I mean, the only reason Guilliman is even back is because the Eldar are manipulating the Imperium for their own ends, to help buy time for Ynnead to properly wake.

 

Exactly. The problem is where the information is from. The anti-Imperium material is all fairly broad from descriptions of the setting so it's harder to keep in mind compared to the more detailed information received from the Imperium POV books. The only one I can recall off-hand which does express how hard it is would be Blood of Baal (the Blood Angels and their allies can barely hold three systems) and Spear of the Emperor (which has its own problems in cementing this truth because of how it's narratively structured). I think the problem is that we need= a Chao POV version of Dark Imperium or the Space Marine Conquests series. 

 

Now I accept this is probably just my opinion but advancing the storyline didn’t feel like they took the clock closer to midnight, it actually felt the opposite like they pushed it back an hour. I’m not saying the imperium is in a good spot or they aren’t going to their inevitable doom. But before they advanced it, it felt like the imperium had nothing left, one more twig would’ve broken its back and everyone could see hundreds of twigs flying at it.

 

Guilliman etc changed that. They injected a figurehead where none had been. They injected hope and because of the Legend/mythology around Primarchs, it’s a hope that has changed the setting to make it less grimdark.

 

TL:DR Grimdark comes not from violence/gore/horror but from lack of hope, seeing mankind’s inevitable demise with nothing that can be done to stop it. Despite everything that has happened with the rift, it no longer feels to me like that demise is inevitable.

 

I think the intent was for Guilliman and the Primaris to be just enough to keep the Imperium overrun, that even a Primarch and all these new, great troops and weapons, was barely enough to stem the tide. I don't think the execution on it was great, but then again, I keep thinking there's got to be a major Chao release coming which will coincide with stories of 200 years of Abaddon and company rampaging along right up until Vigilus and then how Chaos bounced back from that.

[Lexington]

[...] ever since the times of recently re-released "Marge Uruk Thatcher"

 

Love the post, Krieg, but I'm gonna put on my incredibly insufferable pedant hat and note that Gav Thorpe himself took to Facebook a while back to confirm that, no, this particular "joke" wasn't intended.

[Scribe]

 

[...] ever since the times of recently re-released "Marge Uruk Thatcher"

 

Love the post, Krieg, but I'm gonna put on my incredibly insufferable pedant hat and note that Gav Thorpe himself took to Facebook a while back to confirm that, no, this particular "joke" wasn't intended.

 

 

I find that hard to accept. :p

[Vermintide]

Supposedly the Thraka/Thatcher thing is an unfounded urban myth.

But I can only shake my head when someone tries to argue 40K, a product of the same counter-cultural era as Alan Moore, Dredd and 2000AD etc, isn't at least slightly lefty...

Edited April 29, 2020 by Mazer Rackham
Politics removed

[Lexington]

I find that hard to accept.

...damnit, I'm gonna have to go searching through, like, three years of phone photos to find it again, aren't I? You monster??? :p

[MARK0SIAN]

 

 

 

Grimdark for me isn’t about the horror, it’s entirely about the lack of hope and the inevitability of mankind’s destruction. That most citizens are lucky if they survive their day to day jobs let alone the myriad of alien/heretical threats that are preying upon them. There’s no happy ending.

That has not changed. It really, factually, actually, has not changed.

 

The Imperium lost with the Heresy. Its been bleeding out for 10K years. It will not win, cannot win, and the entire point of the setting from the 'heroic' perspective is spitting back hate and defiance in the face of that inevitable end.

 

The most tragic thing to me about the hobby, is that there is a critical lack of exploration and thought into the setting itself, and what it says about us, humanity, and the things we call 'other'.

 

In the end though, Humanity IS FACTUALLY DAMNED.

 

See ya in the Warp. ;)

You’re absolutely right in a way but it kind of just hits the nail on the head for me about the changes.

 

The Imperium maybe/is factually damned and it’s demise is factually inevitable. But it no longer FEELS like it is, to me at least.

 

That’s obviously super subjective and might be just me who feels like that. Before they brought back RG there was nothing really to stop Chaos, it felt like humanity’s end would come soon. Even in the real world, the way they ended Fantasy meant it wasn’t impossible (still extremely unlikely) that the end would come for 40k. It added an extra bit of tension to the setting almost.

 

But now, RG is back and (whilst I hate this phrase) his plot armour kind of negates any real risk to the Imperium.

 

Like I said before, I don’t think the Imperium is in a good place or it will even survive. But they just seem to have taken the tension/risk out of it for me.

[Mazer Rackham]

=][= Despite some very thought-provoking replies, it appears we can't all get along, nor can we have nice things. =][=

=][= Several warnings were given and active Moderation has occurred in this thread already, and so... =][=

 

=][= In the Grim Darkness of the Far Future, This thread is Closed. =][=

 

Ave Imperator.