Of all the expansion opening cinematics, BFA is the only one I don't rewatch anymore

[Mrbleedinggums]

Because the sylvanas fans are still butthurt over her actually being the villain that doesn't give a shit about her people, like everyone has been telling them since .. forever.

They weren't true Sylvanas fans, only the bandwagon fanbois that both sides hate. It's like football, true fans will stick with their team regardless of if they win the Super Bowl or if they just had another shitty year (I'm looking at you, Raiders! Get your act together already and win your fans another Super Bowl!) Same thing with Sylvanas. I personally don't think she's evil still, but I would consider her an anti-hero similar to Illidan. For them, the end justifies the means to get there.

It's like Arthas in Stratholme. He knew that the Scourge had plagued the grains and that the citizens already infected inside the city were certain to succumb to a fate worse than death. Uther and others pleaded that instead they should wait it out and give them the chance to overcome it. Arthas took the risk to help give un-infested citizens a chance at survival by killing those already plagued because if the plagued did succumb it would mean certain death for everyone in the walls instead of just them.

You also have a similar scenario in Starcraft 2: Sons of Liberty where you have to decide if the citizens that escaped the zerg and created a colony on Haven should be given a chance to be cured or purged. The protoss said that they found corruption on them and wanted to eradicate them all to prevent the infestation from spreading, while Dr. Hansen pleaded with you to give her some more time to find a cure and that she was certain to be close to it.

If we hold the following true that Sylvanas' endgame is to stop the Old Gods from taking over all of Azeroth, and that she knows from some source (which we still do not know for certain who or what told her) that only death and the Shadowlands can be the dagger to stop them once and for all, then the following must be asked: If you were in her scenario, what would you do to ensure that happens? What would you be willing to do in order to 1) bring both factions together, and 2) stop the Old Gods? Both factions have been at war since the Orcs first invaded Azeroth and while there have been some truces/peacefires, there has never been a unification or complete willingness to work together between the two factions. Even in the Ahn'Qiraj war, they put their differences aside only long enough to stop a bigger threat to both of them. They quickly went back to fighting each other though.

I'm not saying Sylvanas is benevolent or did this out of some altruistic reason, and honestly I might be giving Blizzard writers too much benefit of the doubt consider how much they've fucked up stories beforehand that make GoT's D&D writing duo look like geniuses in their last season. But until Blizzard fucks up Sylvanas' story and creates her into a generic villain, I'm giving our Dark Lady faith that she is doing what is needed to be done to bring both factions together and stop the Void from devouring our world. After the events on Argus and with the imprisoning of Sargeras, we no longer have our world shrouded from the vast emptiness that fills our universe anymore. The void will come, it's a matter of when not if at this point. You don't have to agree with Sylvanas becoming a Dark Knight to unite the "Gotham" of Azeroth together but to say that the only possible scenario that an expert tactician like her would do such things is only because "lawl I'm evil!" is a bit silly.

[gioderpington]

I would argue in terms of cinematic beauty/stand alone. It'd be BFA then wrath, then legion/mists/cata, then vanilla/BC/draenor. I personally did not like the draenor one. With how the expansions worked out after, BfA cinematic definitely feels tainted in a sense. It almost seems nonsensical knowing where the fight leads. At least with wrath, the cinematic still felt powerful even after the LK died and it still feels powerful now, nearly a decade later!
And now that I think about it, the cinematic is a good way to judge the feel of the expansion. Legion made sense, we followed through to the end and resolved the point created in the cinematic. MoP, we fight until the mist was lifted. The cinematic paralleled our journey. BFA, it was a teaser, it just showed us what sylvannas wanted us to see and though it fits the expansion, we did not like what was hidden underneath and it has ruined the experience of watching it again.

Tldr; you don't watch it because you know better about what is actually happening and you/we do not like it.

[Armakus]

Talk about scrapping the bottom of the barrel for weird complaints...

Definitely. There's enough to dislike about this expansion as is without scrapping like this, haha.

[Kyphael]

Why? It's actually one of the more exciting opening cinematics.

[ReleaseDay]

My ranknings, if we're talking about opening cinematics:
1. WOTLK
2. LEG
3. CATA
4. WOW
5. BFA
6. TBC
7. WOD
8. MOP

[Soeroah]

""Zappy Boy" was a meme I wish Bizzard never adopted and ran with"

They didn't, they already planned to use him in the story.

[Kyphael]

""Zappy Boy" was a meme I wish Bizzard never adopted and ran with"

They didn't, they already planned to use him in the story.

Hadn't they said they increased his role following his appearance becoming so popular? I mean, he's not in Safe Haven, and if you take him out of every subsequent cinematic, it wouldn't really change anything. Even at the end all he did was rush in only to get stopped by Thrall. He had a couple throw away lines, but it was all about Anduin and Thrall's relationship to Saurfang.

[FelPlague]

Why exactly did we need a whole thread about this?

cause its thottstation, what did you think?

[Lane]

Lorderaen would’ve been better without jaina and grey mane dying to save the others.

Greymane dying doesn't serve a purpose. It wouldn't change Anduin's character or have any effect on the direction of the story.

Not to mention with jaina, half the final raid bosses of bfa poofed out rather than die or be jailed. It’s bad story telling

Kind of like how Sylvanas banshee blasts off every time she's cornered? :P

Jaina is an old character she is expendable to the story and is used as a crutch for bad writing.

I would've agreed with you up until BFA, I hated Jaina. However, she's one of the few Alliance characters who wasn't a goody-goody.

The issue with "expendable" characters is Blizzard seems to like to mimic GoT when it comes to character deaths, but without introducing new ones. Horde has certainly suffered from this. We're at the point where if faction leaders die they're either leaving a gap (Vol'Jin) or they'll have to reach into obscurity to bring back characters no one's seen or heard from in years.

The writing is going to be bad regardless. Jaina's abilities would've simply been given to someone else if not her.

[Jalham]

I know this is mmo-champion and we supposed to use these forums to complain, but come on.

[Soeroah]

Hadn't they said they increased his role following his appearance becoming so popular? I mean, he's not in Safe Haven, and if you take him out of every subsequent cinematic, it wouldn't really change anything. Even at the end all he did was rush in only to get stopped by Thrall. He had a couple throw away lines, but it was all about Anduin and Thrall's relationship to Saurfang.

I don't remember them saying that. All I remember them saying is it amused/relieved/surprised them the community latched onto zappy boi because they were already working on Old Soldier, which heavily featured him, and made him an important part of Saurfang's arc.

[Greyfang]

An odd subject for sure, but I kind of agree with OP. The cinematic shows a great battle at the gates of Orgrimmar - but it is never EVER mentioned in-game afaik. The cinematic portrays an expansion entirely focused on the AvH conflict - it comes to happen that it's actually about Old Gods, and the AvH part could have been deleted in its entirety without any major plot repercussions. The cinematic shows Sylvie using Shadow powers Vs. Anduin's Light ones - when in-game both of the aligned races belong to the Alliance (VEs and LF goats).

Yes, like all cinematics from Blizz, it's pretty, almost flawless from a production POV. But from a story POV, it almost amounts to false advertising. It's as if in Legion you ended up fighting dragons or something after seeing the Legion kicking Horde and Alliance's asses.

Uhmm no, the cinematic takes place in the battle for Lordaeron, after the attack on Teldrassil. You play this very same battle in the opening scenario.

[Soon-TM]

Uhmm no, the cinematic takes place in the battle for Lordaeron, after the attack on Teldrassil. You play this very same battle in the opening scenario.

Without any blight to be seen? With Saurfang charging into battle like the badass mother!@#$er he used to be, instead of going all "omg muh honor uwu" like in the actual scenario? Without any raised Orcs or Tauren whatsoever?

Hell, I know that the writing team has a HUGE issue when it comes to consistency, but if the cinematic is actually depicting the Siege of Lordaeron, it's even worse than I had thought.

[Cosmic Janitor]

The writing is going to be bad regardless. Jaina's abilities would've simply been given to someone else if not her.

They could have the stormwind mage corps do something instead of having a singular character go complete looney toons and commandeer a fucking flying ship. This was pure rule of cool that someone from the writing team wrote in their fanfic blog and wanted to do ingame as well. Same for the whole "but you can freeze the blight", if that is the case why hasn't lordaeron been cleansed already?

[MrLachyG]

Talk about scrapping the bottom of the barrel for weird complaints...

welcome to mmo champ. home of the most ridiculous and stupid complaints ever conceived by man

[Cosmic Janitor]

Hell, I know that the writing team has a HUGE issue when it comes to consistency, but if the cinematic is actually depicting the Siege of Lordaeron, it's even worse than I had thought.

I mean we had 3 accounts for the war of thorns, 2 faction representations ingame and a written one in the CE and each one was different. This is bog standard for Blizzard..

Edit: In the written account Sylvanas also does not look as much of a stupid cunt as she does in the warbringers cinematic, where she got triggered hard by a dying elf commander and lashed out by burning down teldrassil (somehow). Apparently they now went with the warbringers version, which makes you wonder how they can't even coordinate their writing staff to that degree.. or you know at least not fail spectacular to represent the events ingame.

[Nerovar]

The BfA cinematic doesn't really have that same Warcraft feeling to me. Then again, I'm also not a big fan of the Cataclysm cinematic.

To me it's like Wotlk>WoD>Pandaria>Classic>Legion>TBC>Cata>BfA

[Shinrael]

I actually downloaded the cinematics for MoP and BFA because I love them so much. MoP is an all-time-favourite due to its theme (asian culture, pandaren, monks, GREEN AND FORESTS AND GLEAM omg <3) but BFA has one of my favourite characters manning up and just being epic as fuck. Both give me goosebumps. To each their own, I guess ^^

[Aeula]

Everything BfA touched in relation to the story has turned to shit.

[Khaza-R]

The BfA cinematic doesn't really have that same Warcraft feeling to me. Then again, I'm also not a big fan of the Cataclysm cinematic.

To me it's like Wotlk>WoD>Pandaria>Classic>Legion>TBC>Cata>BfA

Doesn't have a warcraft feeling. Literally the only intro with war in it.

Gotcha...