KeybladeMasterDeadpoolio

On the subject of who this Riku-nort is, I believe that I have an answer: he's the real Riku. But how? The real Riku is standing right there and he's clearly not Norted. But Riku was a Nort for a time, all throughout Chain Of Memories and KH2, Riku had a fragment of Ansem in his heart and during Chain Of Memories, he would frequently black out and Ansem would take over. It's entirely possible that during one of these black outs, Young Xehanort showed up and brought Riku-Ansem to the future to be a Seeker and after getting his butt kicked, is sent back none the wiser. Of course, this contradicts what Master Xehanort said about Riku becoming non-viable as a vessel but it makes a bit more sense than Data Riku or Repliku somehow being alive again despite having been definitively killed.

I apologize if this has already been discussed but in Dream Drop Distance, Xehanort said that he had his eye on Riku to be his Number 13 but how was that possible when Ansem was also planning on completely possessing Riku so that he could also be a Seeker?

So I have to wonder, why were some members of the old Organization unfit to be Seekers again? Because from the looks of the returning members, the possession process seems to do away with any undesirable personality issues. Of course, we've only seen brief clips from the trailers but it's still damn creepy seeing Larxene of all people acting in any way remotely friendly, and all of them in general seem a lot more subdued than they used to be. And if things keep progressing like this, I'm going to be bummed that we never got to see what Braig/Xigbar's "big plans" were.

I'm not denying that in this scenario, yellow eyes equal Xehanort possession. What I'm trying to argue is that these two ways of thinking aren't mutually exclusive. Up until this plot twist, all visual evidence seemed to suggest the Darkness theory. Heartless have yellow eyes and they are incredibly dark beings, Xehanort, Xigbar, Saix, Ansem, Xemnas and Vanitas all have yellow eyes and are incredibly dark beings. It's easy to assume that there is a connection, that extreme exposure to Darkness results in physical mutations. Heck, we all assumed that the reason Ansem had yellow eyes is because he's a Heartless. Even the opening cinematic for Birth By Sleep/the KH2 Final Mix secret ending shows Terra's eyes suddenly turning yellow in moment of desperation, this was of course a mix of foreshadowing and fakeout but it was still put there. In fact, after watching through every single opening cinematic, it is the only one that has such a fakeout. If Xehanort's eyes truly are naturally yellow without any kind of influence from external factors then he is the only one who's eyes are naturally yellow and there has to be some kind of meaning behind it. If there is one thing that this franchise teaches us, it's that everything has some double or triple meaning or underlying explanation. Not to mention how much of a coincidence it is that he and the Heartless just so happen to have the same eye color. There's even a breed of Heartless, the Darklings, that are explicitly born from Keyblade wielders succumbing to Darkness and they too have yellow eyes. With every retcon and every explanation that Nomura has had to give, there has always been some in-game evidence that could back them up even if it was minuscule but as of yet I can't figure out what that evidence could be beyond Xehanort's innate connection with all things dark. We know that eyes are important in this franchise, otherwise we wouldn't be getting closeups of the Seekers' eyes all the time, the eye poking out of their Keyblades wouldn't be such a big deal, and Riku wouldn't have needed that blindfold in order to control Ansem's power. Why are the eyes the first to change during possession? Half of the Seekers don't have any of Xehanort's features save for the eyes, not the ears (although it's hard to tell because many of them have long and potentially obscuring hair), not the hair, and not the skin tone. Kingdom Hearts 3 is coming, just hopefully four months away, and hopefully we will finally get answers. Or it'll just pile on more questions because that's what this franchise does.

I'm probably going to get into a lot of trouble for starting this and I apologize if this thread topic has already been made elsewhere but I really want a definitive answer or at least an accepted consensus to this question: what do yellow eyes signify in Kingdom Hearts? As of recent years, the most prominent answer is that it signifies possession by Xehanort but is that the only meaning behind them? We also know the recipients of Xehanort's Heart fragments (willing or otherwise) take on other aspects of his appearance, that being his hair, his skin tone, a and his ears. But how did Xehanort gain these features? Obviously his skin and hair color are naturally his but his ears and eyes have changed as seen where younger versions of himself have rounded ears and browner eyes. Some on this site, myself included, believe that these changes are a result of deep submersion in Darkness based on the idea that the vast majority of Heartless all have yellow eyes, the only exceptions being those who wear eye/face concealing clothing, have no eyes at all, or Scar for some odd reason. Others, seemingly including Nomura himself, claim that the yellow eyes are exclusive to Xehanort and his thralls but how does that explain all of the Heartless as well as Ansem The Wise? His eyes clearly changed between his time as Science King of Radiant Garden and his time as DiZ. Has he secretly been a Xehanort this whole time? If so, why was he fighting against Xemnas and the Organization? Obviously Xehanort's plans are ridiculously circuitous but that seems to be pushing it. Finally, there is Vanitas, the Darkness of Ventus's Heart made manifest. We know now that he is allegedly one of Xehanort's vessels but has he always been one? Yes, he had the yellow eyes back in Birth By Sleep but none of Xehanort's other defining features, and Ventus's connection with Sora caused Vanitas to take on Sora's appearance instead. But as of his appearance (at least in the trailers) in Kingdom Hearts 3, Vanitas is wearing his helmet again. But why hide his face when we already know what it looks like? As a Xehanort vessel, he doesn't look like Sora anymore which means he now looks like Xehanort which also means that the eyes of his old appearance can't be from possession. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go hide in a Flame proof bunker.

I try to avoid trailers but in the end I watch them because I don't have a choice, the bozos on YouTube apparently don't know how to make spoiler free thumbnails for their reaction videos. As soon as I load up the main page on YouTube, there's a spoiler character staring me right in the face. After that, the cat's out of the bag so I might as well watch the damn trailer. But I wouldn't be having this problem if Square didn't spoil everything months in advance. I get that they have to drum up hype but there are better ways of doing that: show off worlds, show combat footage, and if they have to show scenes with The Seekers, show the ones that we already know the identities of. Give us more Xemnas. more Ansem, more Young Xehanort, but don't spoil the whole big mystery. I'd be fine with it if they spoiled one, maybe two of the unknown Seekers but leave something for us to ponder. Dream Drop Distance built up all this tension of Xehanort possessing people and we didn't know who might secretly evil but nope, here they all are! And we already know the end of the game, it was told to us in Dream Drop Distance: it's Sora and pals fighting the Xehanorts and we already know that the heroes will win because that's how these games go. Maybe for once a character will actually die and stay dead but chances are slim. As far as I remember, the only things we got spoiled on were Ansem, Xemnas, Vanitas, and Young Xehanort, and even then we didn't know that they were real because the trailers said that we would be in the Sleeping Worlds, they could have been dreams accidentally conjured up by Sora and Riku. We also didn't know what they were up to, just that they're somehow back and antagonizing again.

Maybe there are some surprises left but that doesn't change the fact that they spoiled the whole setup from all the past games. Like, every past trailer for this franchise never spoiled anything, even the trailers for Dream Drop Distance managed to keep all the important stuff under wraps despite how close to the endgame it is. But now? Better front load everything! And another thing, what's the point of defeating the original Organization, turning some of them good again, only to turn them evil again? I mean for crying out loud, Even in Dream Drop Distance openly regretted what he did as Vexen but nope, Vexen's back and he's kidnapping Ienzo! I've stated on multiple other threads that I am not happy with all these sudden resurrections but come on! And stupid Repliku is back too!

I think what's even the point of playing the game now? This trailers literally spoiled everything we've been building up to. The mystery of the Seekers is gone, we now know who all of them are and if my math is correct, they now number much more than thirteen. And there isn't any point in speculating who might win and who might lose, this is a Disney JRPG so of course Sora and pals are going to win, that's just how these things go.

I mentioned the same thing in another thread and I even questioned why he's wearing the helmet even though we know what he looks like. Unless of course he no longer looks like evil Sora.

Does anyone else think that Vanitas looks kind of ridiculous? If he were wearing just the coat it would be one thing but the helmet makes it seem like he's wearing his full body armor underneath. And why does he have the helmet again? We already know what he looks like. Unless he doesn't look like Sora anymore?

Many of you who have replied to my posts know that I have a huge issue with how the Xehanorts are somehow still around despite telling us that they all had to return to their own times at the end of Dream Drop Distance. But for once I actually have an idea to contribute: most of them have been hiding out in the Realm Of Darkness. The Realm Of Darkness has no time so what better place to hide for people on a time limit? And they don't have to worry about losing track of time in there and coming out a like a hundred years too late, the Xehanort(s) who is supposed to exist in the present can stay in the Realm Of Light all he/they want and since they all share the same Heart, they can keep track of the passage time through the present Xehanort(s). It may not explain why they faded away like they did in Dream Drop Distance but it's something. I apologize if this has already been suggested.

I have two issues with this line of thinking: one, if they are the so called Lost Masters who were lost to the Realm Of Darkness after recreating the worlds and saving the people, how did they even survive thousands of years to the present? Aqua barely survived over ten years in there and she very nearly became a Heartless if it hadn't been for the echoes of her friends and Mickey showing up. And number two, if Ventus and Lauriam were supposedly Keyblade Masters, why weren't they that powerful in the present? You could probably say that losing their memories had something to do with it (which I find to be a huge cop out) but surely someone like Eraqus would have noticed that Ventus was so powerful. But, all this talk of the Realm Of Darkness having no time gives me an idea for a theory I'll post after this. That's the other main thing I've been confused about, are they all in a dream or not? If we're to believe that the Japan only part of the game takes place in the real world and is therefor the true version of the story (damn it, Square, you screwed us over again!) then how can there be Chirithies? They're Dream Eater's aren't they? They can only exist in the Realm Of Sleep so how are they in the real world? And if what you say is true, then that means that everything that we do is meaningless because it's not really happening.

All fair points but here's my problem: for as long as I've been a fan of this franchise, I've been very lenient in regards to all of the handwaves and "retcons". But as of late, particularly the great time wedgie of 2012, they've become a lot harder to ignore. I am beginning to tire of all these inexplicable reappearances and important info that only gets explained in guide books and concerts of all things. What I'm saying is that I don't want our impending grand finale to be ruined by a handwave along the lines of "oh, the age of fairy tales wasn't really that long ago, it was just like twenty years ago and everyone conveniently forgot because the world ending was like so traumatizing". I hope for a very good explanation that actually happens in-game and on screen for once but we all know the track record. Not to mention that we were promised a war, a war so devastating that it required a complete reboot of the universe. And yet all we got was a bunch of chibis smacking each other with big keys. At the very least they could have made a pre-rendered cutscene to make all of that grinding and money loss worth it. And yes, I admit that my bitterness toward the X game(s) might be coloring my attitude on the subject.

With the untimely passing of both the great Chikao Ohtsuka and the legendary Leonard Nimoy back in 2015, the role of Xehanort as been left empty. So I ask, who do you all believe should be chosen to replace these true legends and take up the mantle of hammy villainy? In any other case, I would give my own choice but I cannot for I believe that these two titans are irreplaceable.

1. My point exactly. 2. I don't see that as possible. The only places that someone can time travel to are places where another version of themself exists. But because Vanitas is part of Ventus and therefor part of Sora, Young Xehanort can't bring him along unless he's already a Xehanort. But that doesn't make sense because then a piece of Xehanort's Heart would already be inside of Sora thanks to Vanitas thus rendering the entire plot of Dream Drop Distance pointless.