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I really hope they retcon the Halo 4 Elite design already
3 years ago
Trigger warning for those of you who actually like the Halo 4 design.
I extremely hate the Halo 4 Elite design. It is honestly one of the ugliest things in existence. It shouldn’t even be called Sangheili as it looks nothing like them. The design is like a Jiralhanae badly cosplaying as a Sangheili to infiltrate a Sangheili clan or something. It is nightmare fuel. I wish I could just erase it from existence. It is such a shame it exists because Sangheili were originally very cute, and this design has left a huge stain on the otherwise beautiful Sangheili aesthetic.
Anyway, this whole time I used to think that each Halo game had its own version of Sangheili, and that every Sangheili looked almost the same, and that the closest version to the real Sangheili look was the H2A design, since we’ve seen that version being used ever since, except for the H4 and HI designs. And I was happy with that. That meant that the ugly Halo 4 design was not real and couldn’t hurt me (with its ugliness). The Halo show even backed this up in an article that said they would be going with the ‘classic design’, and all the Sangheili in that terrible show ended up looking the same.
But Halopedia, for some reason, had it written that the different designs are ‘phenotypes’, with no evidence backing this up whatsoever. This started a debate in the Sangheili community between people who hate the H4 design and don’t believe in the phenotype stuff, and the other people who liked the H4 design and wanted them existing side by side with normal (classic) looking Sangheili.
Then earlier this year 343i released yet another Halo encyclopedia, and I thought “Hey, they might show us a female Sangheili, Sangheili civilian clothing or tell us more about the badly written Sangheili society (they never did and never will).” I found a leaked copy on the internet and browsed it, and to my horror, was devastated to see that they have Halo 4 Elites pictures alongside normal Sangheili. I took a quick glance at the Sangheili page itself, and it said something along the lines of: “Sangheili sometimes have different mandible structures” and maybe something else that I tried successfully to get rid of from my memory.
So…did they just confirm that the Halo 4 designs are canon? I still don’t think so, but I’m on the fence about it. You see, I’m pretty sure that at least half of the encyclopedia was written and drawn by fans, and they must have gotten their information from Halopedia, rather than 343i (who wrote that article mentioning the ‘classic’ Sangheili design). They also wrote in the Sangheili article on the encyclopedia that Sangheili have digitigrade legs, which is false because Sangheili don’t run on their toes, they have heels attached to their feet. And they didn’t even give the ‘phenotypes’ any names, they just casually mentioned that some Sangheili looked different. This is opposed to the horrible-looking Jackal design from Halo 4 which they actually named and can see alongside classic Jackals in the comics.
So yeah…I’ve been trying to let this whole thing go and to forget about it, but every once in a while I’ll remember it and feel sad. It shouldn’t affect me so much but for some reason I care a lot about the official Halo canon. Even though most of it makes no sense and is unrealistic, and is poorly written sometimes, especially with how poorly they wrote Sangheili culture (if you’ve read Cole Protocol or many of the other novels with Sangheili in them, you’ll know what I mean).
Today I found out that the majority of Halo fans dislike 343i (like myself) and want them fired from making Halo games. Apparently #Fire343 was trending on Twitter, which is awesome. I am completely in support of this, and hopefully if a new developer comes to resurrect Halo, they will add playable Elites, and more importantly to me, also officially retcon the Halo 4 Elite design once and for all.
I extremely hate the Halo 4 Elite design. It is honestly one of the ugliest things in existence. It shouldn’t even be called Sangheili as it looks nothing like them. The design is like a Jiralhanae badly cosplaying as a Sangheili to infiltrate a Sangheili clan or something. It is nightmare fuel. I wish I could just erase it from existence. It is such a shame it exists because Sangheili were originally very cute, and this design has left a huge stain on the otherwise beautiful Sangheili aesthetic.
Anyway, this whole time I used to think that each Halo game had its own version of Sangheili, and that every Sangheili looked almost the same, and that the closest version to the real Sangheili look was the H2A design, since we’ve seen that version being used ever since, except for the H4 and HI designs. And I was happy with that. That meant that the ugly Halo 4 design was not real and couldn’t hurt me (with its ugliness). The Halo show even backed this up in an article that said they would be going with the ‘classic design’, and all the Sangheili in that terrible show ended up looking the same.
But Halopedia, for some reason, had it written that the different designs are ‘phenotypes’, with no evidence backing this up whatsoever. This started a debate in the Sangheili community between people who hate the H4 design and don’t believe in the phenotype stuff, and the other people who liked the H4 design and wanted them existing side by side with normal (classic) looking Sangheili.
Then earlier this year 343i released yet another Halo encyclopedia, and I thought “Hey, they might show us a female Sangheili, Sangheili civilian clothing or tell us more about the badly written Sangheili society (they never did and never will).” I found a leaked copy on the internet and browsed it, and to my horror, was devastated to see that they have Halo 4 Elites pictures alongside normal Sangheili. I took a quick glance at the Sangheili page itself, and it said something along the lines of: “Sangheili sometimes have different mandible structures” and maybe something else that I tried successfully to get rid of from my memory.
So…did they just confirm that the Halo 4 designs are canon? I still don’t think so, but I’m on the fence about it. You see, I’m pretty sure that at least half of the encyclopedia was written and drawn by fans, and they must have gotten their information from Halopedia, rather than 343i (who wrote that article mentioning the ‘classic’ Sangheili design). They also wrote in the Sangheili article on the encyclopedia that Sangheili have digitigrade legs, which is false because Sangheili don’t run on their toes, they have heels attached to their feet. And they didn’t even give the ‘phenotypes’ any names, they just casually mentioned that some Sangheili looked different. This is opposed to the horrible-looking Jackal design from Halo 4 which they actually named and can see alongside classic Jackals in the comics.
So yeah…I’ve been trying to let this whole thing go and to forget about it, but every once in a while I’ll remember it and feel sad. It shouldn’t affect me so much but for some reason I care a lot about the official Halo canon. Even though most of it makes no sense and is unrealistic, and is poorly written sometimes, especially with how poorly they wrote Sangheili culture (if you’ve read Cole Protocol or many of the other novels with Sangheili in them, you’ll know what I mean).
Today I found out that the majority of Halo fans dislike 343i (like myself) and want them fired from making Halo games. Apparently #Fire343 was trending on Twitter, which is awesome. I am completely in support of this, and hopefully if a new developer comes to resurrect Halo, they will add playable Elites, and more importantly to me, also officially retcon the Halo 4 Elite design once and for all.
As for the halo 4 visual design, i didnt take too much issue to it back when before halo 4 released since i suppose the implication was that the Sangheili were mainly from Hesduros, and i just assumed it was kind of a racial offshoot like Ibe'shan kig-yar vs Ruutian. However then the comics and whatnot came out and just kept using the design over and over and over, and when halo 5 (unholy be its name) completely went with the idea that "nope this is what they look like now and as far as we care always have looked" and it just really felt like 343 was intent on burning every single good idea bungie had to the ground. I should say i don't hate the 4/5 design visually speaking but i absolutely despise it on principle because they tried to retcon it as being the way they always looked.
classic elites are best elites <3 especially obese male elites x3
Halo canon is it's own can of worms though I generally believe that they should've never made a direct sequel to Halo 3 and made effectively a new series with a new protagonist.