Major Zero

[NTB]

I was just playing through Chapter 5 again, and it occurs to me that Peace Walker was the perfect opportunity for Kojima to expand upon Major Zero's character and motivations. The only times we actually saw Zero on-screen were in MGS3, where he was the lovably dorky mission control with various fixations on British ephemera, and at the end of MGS4, when he was a 100-year-old vegetable in a wheelchair. The rest was only referenced by other characters; even the conversation between Zero and Ocelot at the end of Portable Ops only includes the latter's voice.

And yet, the exact same thing happens again in Peace Walker, leaving the characterization of the series' arch-villain to what we hear from others. In this case, it's Paz referencing the "two young men who idolized the Boss", apparently forgetting that Zero was in his 50's during MGS and thus older than both Naked Snake AND the Boss. And there's the secret conversation between Miller and Zero, which again only includes Miller's voice.

On the one hand, it's good to know that Zero was a clever enough villain not to waste time with on-screen monologuing, and an interesting change of pace to see only the positive parts of his character. On the other hand, I feel kind of annoyed that the series' Big Bad remains just a background character, without any meaningful screentime regarding the several decades during which he was evil.

Were we supposed to contrast what we know of Zero's character arc with what we see of Big Boss' fall from grace? Or did Kojima want to preserve evil-Zero's anonymity?

[dfsdaf]

This may be elitist, but I enjoy having the primary villain in the dark. When discussing crap, you can see who is a retarded fanboy and who knows something of relevance by who they thing represents the bad side.

I mean, all in all almost everyone was a bad guy in some way or another. Big Boss wanted to throw the world into chaos, and Zero wanted to lock it down. They are both huge evils in the scheme of things. The only people that were doing right were Philanthropy as a group. Even then though, they were too in the dark for most of the time to do anything truly meaningful. But their heart, minds, and ideals were correct and aligned with The Boss's.

Also....Raiden barely plays into this at all. I see him STILL in A5 as a broken kid trying to be relevant to his hero.

[NTB]

I wouldn't use the R-Word to describe fanboys, as they're obnoxious not due to cognitive impairment, but willful ignorance.

And I get that there are a lot of different flavors of evil in Metal Gear, but at least with Big Boss we got to see his evolution from optimistic young soldier to embittered anarchist. With Zero we go from Bond-geek comic relief in MGS3 to the true arch-villain in MGS4 (as it was his AIs that created the War Economy). Everything in-between is just told, not shown. Was this Kojima's attempt to sidestep the usual arch-villain monologuing by having the Patriots' founder do EVERYTHING behind the scenes, or was he just being spiteful towards people who liked MGS3 and hated MGS2?

[dfsdaf]