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| “ | Rise. Rise, my servants. Sweep over Hyrule with the power I have granted you. Eliminate this kingdom and her allies. Leave no survivors! | „ |
| ~ Ganondorf summoning his army to destroy Hyrule and wipe out any who opposes him and his ideal world |
| “ | How disappointing... This world should be shrouded in darkness, not bathed in insufferable light. All these weak, peace-loving cowards running rampant... It would have been more... Satisfying to overcome a worthy foe. Regardless... I will re-shape this world as it was meant to be. I will crush any opposition. I will rule. That is what a king must do. Do not look away. You witness a king's revival. And the birth of his new world! | „ |
| ~ Ganondorf before he fights Link. |
| “ | I will yet rule this land... You will not stop me! A mere mortal... will not stand in my way! (rips out Secret Stone from forehead) My body... My mind... Everything! I'll sacrifice it all to destroy you... and cast this world into eternal night! | „ |
| ~ Ganondorf's villainous breakdown and last words before turning himself into a dragon to defeat Link |
Demon King Ganondorf, also known as the Demon Dragon in his final form, is the main antagonist of the Era of the Wilds saga within Nintendo's The Legend of Zelda franchise.
Once the king of the Gerudo, Ganondorf's lust for power drove him to murder the Queen of Hyrule and become the Demon King, granting him the power to wipe out all opposition and conquer Hyrule. After being imprisoned by King Rauru, his malice would take the bestial form of Calamity Ganon, an inhuman monstrosity that would rise to destroy Hyrule again and again. When Rauru's seal inevitably breaks, he rises up again, intending to finish what he started.
He is voiced by Kosuke Takaguchi in Japanese and Matthew Mercer in English, who also voiced Kirby in There Will Be Brawl, Orthax and Umbrasyl in The Legends of Vox Machina.
What Makes Him Pure Evil?[]
In General[]
- Unlike the Ganondorf seen in Ocarina of Time and The Wind Waker he possesses no true care for his people, as he immediately slaughters towns in his own home after obtaining his own army and intentionally threatens his own people's safety and well-being multiple times afterward. He too sought the green lands of Hyrule out of jealousy, greed and ambition as well as a desire for domination, power and supremacy for his own benefit.
- He shows no care to even his own minions, telling the archfiends that he won't revive them if they fail him or die in battle, hence why they're replaced by the new generation of archfiends in the Era of the Wilds.
- Unlike previous iterations this one's desire for a dark world is not characterised as coming from an honor and duty perspective. He deems the world to be incorrect in his eyes and desires to correct it into something that is ideal, a world of darkness that represents the demon tribe's main traits and desires and follows it's core tenets.
- Unlike his counterpart from the Adult Timeline, Ganondorf lacks any respect for Link (although he demolished the Hero of time's statue and used his name as an explanation to cope with the fact that another kid is so strong against him). While he did look forward to fighting him, this was later revealed to be the case solely because he likes testing his strength and proving his superiority, and when Link does beat him, he rages about how a "mere mortal" will not stop him, so this is not redeeming.
- In general, Ganondorf rants (subtly touched in the English localization and confirmed by the Japanese texts) that his contempt for Rauru and the light is robbing the world of its courage and how nobody truly is fighting to survive and earn his respect, but it's only a thinly veiled excuse for Ganondorf to get some satisfaction in crushing and defeating everyone through challenges, as whenever Ganondorf actually has to face defeat at the hands of a superior opponent, he'd scream in fury on going down and would rather see the world destroyed.
- He is a vicious conqueror who lacks any restraint, moral or pragmatic, to delight in the suffering of everybody around him.
- While he's having a tantrum he is willing to sacrifice his remaining humanity for the sake of his own Social Darwinist order.
- His magic is themed around his heart which is rotten to the core. His magic is his blood which his emotions have tainted into demonic life force. It is pollution itself. Through the power of the stolen secret stone his magic becomes a lot more powerful, even capable of shattering the Master sword until the Master sword too has received a secret stone's power. In A Link to the Past and Skyward Sword we learn that the Master sword can oppose the Triforce's powers as it was forged via the divine flames which uses the same divine energy as the Triforce, the secret stones being described as legacies of the gods like the Triforce.
- All in all, this version of Ganondorf is simply a power-hungry madman who seeks to destroy the world and remake it in his image, and overall the worst remnant of the old savage order of "fighting to survive" that plagued the world until Rauru brought peace to the region through Hyrule's foundation, having huge contempt for wasting the god-like powers he coveted for so long for such benevolent actions.
- It is very evident why the Gerudo refuse to claim him as one of their own and believe he is a demon in disguise. It ends with them cutting ties with their former king and atoning for their actions by actively making peace with the Hyrulean Royal Family and engaging in foreign trade with the rest of the tribes. Even then, they only permit vai (girls and women) to enter town while forbidding voe (boys and men) under the belief that letting a male individual into their town would bring them great disaster.
- Within both the "Era of the Wilds" saga and the franchise as a whole, Ganondorf is easily one of the most heinous villains in the series, with not only millennia worth of death and misery tied to him directly or indirectly, but seeking to render the world a wasteland so that people can only to struggle to survive under his crushing grip.
Age of Imprisonment[]
- Abused the Gerudo's pride and their attachment to their laws whenever someone questioned his decisions.
- He attempted to conquer Hyrule by having his Gerudo soldiers summon a swarm of Molduga to invade the land and secretly sent Ardi's clan in an attack against Hyrule castle while Rauru was distracted with the Molduga in case the Molduga failed. Ardi's attack was however meant to fail so that Ganondorf could wipe out the clans who showed compassion and a desire for peace. He later sent Koume and Kotake to kill Ardi and her clan and they managed to take out most of it and would've eventually succeeded had not the Knight Construct intervened.
- After the attack against Hyrule castle, he blamed Ardi's clan for the attack in order to fake showing fealty to King Rauru to get closer to obtaining the Secret Stone.
- He had Phantom Ganon activate one of the constructs that almost ended the Zonai race. This construct became the Forbidden Construct and started to cause trouble around Hyrule. Ganondorf willingly let it do its worst to witness the power that almost destroyed the Zonai. This construct would become one of his minions and later cause a lot of trouble around the kingdom, including murdering the Zora king, burning down the entire Great Hyrule Forest, and forcing the Knight Construct to sacrifice himself to destroy it.
- He sent some shades around Hyrule and falsely claimed to Rauru that he would've taken case of them, making sure that Rauru would've left the castle so that he could enact his plan to steal the secret stone.
- He attempted to kill Queen Sonia using Phantom Ganon in the form of Zelda, but when that failed, he mortally wounded the Queen himself and took her Secret Stone. He would then go on to sadistically laugh at Zelda's distress over Sonia's condition.
- Used the Secret Stone to summon an army of monsters and demons throughout the land and transform into the Demon King. He created four deadly and powerful demons, the archfiends, that caused a lot of trouble among the population.
- Many monsters would remain after his sealing and continue to plague Hyrule for tens of thousands of years to come.
- When Rauru arrived to find his wife dying, Ganondorf would mock the former for trying to control him and failing, saying that he had taken the powers of the Secret Stones for granted and wasted their potential, and that Sonia would be the first of many victims due to Rauru’s actions.
- He would then try to kill both Rauru and Zelda with a surge of Gloom after this.
- Unleashed his army to have his army wipe out all life in Hyrule and allying kingdoms who opposes him so he could rule, planning to spread this to the world and revert the world to it's savage ways where people had to fight monsters to survive.
- Countless died as the monsters overruled the lands, not even his own people were spared from Ganondorf's conquests.
- Among the Gerudo even those who were truly loyal weren't safe, as he attempted to kill them too.
- When Rauru and the Sages confronted him at Hyrule Castle, he mocked Rauru and would've killed him hadn't the Knight Construct attacked him.
- When the Knight Construct attacked him he defeated him, inflicting damage that would eventually lead to the construct's destruction.
- When the Sages attempted to stop him, he proceeded to create hundreds of monsters in an attempt to kill them. After the sages defeated the monsters, he summoned Phantom Ganon in another attempt on their life.
- After the sages defeated Phantom Ganon, he confronted them directly and mercilessly beat all of them, including mortally wounding Mineru, Rauru's sister, who later dies. This forced Rauru to sacrifice himself to seal Ganondorf, leading to the extinction of the Zonai race considering they were the last survivors.
The Great Calamity era[]
- While his body and magic were sealed, his emotions bridged into the physical world and manifested, taking the form of the disembodied vengeful spirit fragment known as Calamity Ganon, who would attempt to destroy all of Hyrule again and revive in a new physical body. This also makes him indirectly responsible for all of the horrible events that Calamity Ganon had caused, including the Great Calamity that would see most of Hyrule destroyed with only few surviving villages.
Tears of the Kingdom[]
- When Link and Zelda discover the awakened Ganondorf, he immediately destroys the Master Sword, corrupts Link's arm with Gloom to the point that it needs to be replaced, and then triggers the Upheaval, which rained down destruction across Hyrule, nearly killed Link and Zelda, and empowered many of the monsters across the land.
- He disguises Phantom Ganon as Zelda and uses it to seal off access to the ruins in Kakariko Village (which nearly crushed the entire village thanks to the Upheaval) and prevent them from discovering the Spirit Temple.
- By impersonating Zelda and giving misinformation to trick people, he also incriminates her for many of his misdeeds.
- He then has Phantom Ganon summon monsters to wipe out all the races in Hyrule and prevent the Sages' descendants from obtaining the Secret Stones by:
- Colgera summoning a blizzard to bring famine to the Rito Village and starve the entire race to death.
- Mucktorok polluting all the water in Zora's Domain to poison all the Zoras.
- Marbled Gohma introducing the Gorons to Marbled Rock Roast, which they got addicted to and became lazy to the point of not wanting to do anything other than eat it, slowly crashing Goron society in a manner similar to city blocks getting ruined to drug epidemics.
- Queen Gibdo causing a sandstorm and summoning the undead to wipe out the Gerudo.
- Uses Link's protectiveness of Zelda for a cruel trap by having Phantom Ganon disguise himself as Zelda, mockingly asking if his puppet entertained him before having Phantom Ganon dispatched to cut him down. He then attempts to personally kill Link using a powerful gloom attack should Link defeat Phantom Ganon.
- After Link is saved by 4 of the new Sages, Ganondorf reveals his plan to again summon an army of monsters to wipe out all in Hyrule who opposes his world once he reaches his full strength, gleefully taunting them on how they will die together with their world steeped in darkness.
- Ganondorf once again uses the Secret Stone to turn into the Demon King and attempts to kill Link and the Sages.
- What makes this even worse is that three out of five Sages are minors; Tulin, the Sage of Wind, is a preadolescent child, while Riju, the Sage of Lightning, and Yunobo, the Sage of Fire, are both teenagers.
- Upon losing, Ganondorf swallows his Secret Stone to turn into the Demon Dragon (In Japanese, a symbol of pollution), willing to sacrifice his mind and sanity simply to destroy Link, drag him to Buddhist hell and cast the world into "eternal night" (i.e. waste the entire world and all life in it), out of spite for being defeated by a "mere mortal".
- Even as the mindless Demon Dragon, he specifically targets Link during the final battle and attempted to take a bite out of the Light Dragon (a draconified Zelda), showing the Demon Dragon still possesses Ganondorf's hatred for Link and Zelda. And when the Demon Dragon is on the verge of defeat, he forcefully brings out the Blood Moon, turning the sky to instant night.
External Links[]
- Ganondorf on the Villains Wiki
- Ganondorf on the Legend of Zelda Wiki
- Ganondorf on the Nintendo Wiki
- Ganondorf on the VS Battles Wiki
- Ganondorf on the Main Light Horse Wiki
- Ganondorf on the Ultimate Evil Wiki
- Ganondorf on the Entertainingly Detestable Wiki
[]
 Pure Evils
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