Thanatos

February 28, 2021

Just when you think the Emperor is your ultimate enemy…jk it’s actually Thanatos.  In Greek Mythology, Thanatos is the god who personifies death.  He’s analogous to the Grim Reaper, and shares many aspects with mythological figures whose lives revolve around death itself. Thanatos wears a skull mask, and the remake shows that one side of his body has completely decayed.  

Like all Secret of Mana characters, little is known about Thanatos.  It’s possible he has a spiritual connection to Belgar, the talented sorcerer from the Trials of Mana (considered a prequel of sorts).  

According to the Wiki of Mana,

...Belgar was corrupted by the dark magic he pursued and became the Masked Mage, now possessed of a strong hatred for the living and obsessed with his plots of revenge upon the world...[He] succeeds in destroying the Tree of Mana...and reveals his true form, the Dark Lich...After a long and hard battle, the heroes succeed in defeating the Dark Lich, much to his shock.

Trials of Mana technically takes place in a different world, but the Mana games reimplement certain concepts throughout the series.  If we assume that the Dark Lich of Trials of Mana is the same idea as the one in Secret, it may help us understand Thanatos better. Both Liches are a partial skeleton in a sort of magical habit that floats about.  

Thanatos works with Mavolia, which is the proper name for the “underworld” in Secret of Mana.  Despite his spirit’s immortality, his body can still die, and when this time draws near, he seeks one that follows strict criteria.  This process repeats through the centuries until he finds the body he currently inhabits, and somehow comes into the employ of the Vandole Empire as Thanatos.  We have no clue as to how this occurred, but we do know that he’s a recent and perplexing addition to the team. The Official Setting Guide confirms that Thanatos became the Dark Lich hundreds of years prior to Secret of Mana.

The first mention of Thanatos is in the Witch’s Castle.  

ELINEE: He’s a magic knight from the Vandole Empire who’s working to crush the kingdom from the inside!

PURIM: Unforgivable!

ELINEE: Kekeke, already most of the kingdom’s people have been stripped of their will! Afterwards, Master Thanatos will assault the castle from the southern ruins, and that’ll be the end!

Naturally, Randi foils Thanatos’ plans in the Ruins but first, we learn a bit about his motivations.  We also witness the moment where he realizes that the virile young Dyluck just might be a good physical vessel.

RANDI: Thanatos!

THANATOS: Ku ku ku, indeed. I know all about you.  For someone like Elinee to be defeated…you’re no ordinary fools.

PURIM: Give back Phanna and Dyluck! Return the people of the kingdom to normal!

THANATOS: Hahaha, what a spirited little lady!  The “Phanna” you speak of… must be this girl, yes?  Sorry (mockingly, perhaps “what a shame”), but I’ve already drained her lifeforce (literally “caused her lifeforce to be drained”).  That girl’s already my faithful servant, you see.

PURIM: You did what to her!?

THANATOS: The absorbed life force of the people is sealed beneath this altar.  Pff, those who should have docilely submitted to the Empire are now, together with the Republic country, resisting [us].  Well, that, too, is only a matter of time. Before long, by means of [due to] the revival of the Mana Fortress, the entire world will be unified.  [Your] life force will be drained, your willpower lost, and then there will be no one who can face us [stand against us]!  [Give up your will] in just the same manner as this one!

PURIM: Dyluck!

THANATOS: That Elinee had trouble with him, and even I was somewhat troubled.  This man–perhaps he could… fufufu, my interest in him has come to be overflowing!  You three, also, are somewhat fascinating… I’ve decided to extract your life forces right away, [how about that?]!

(Randi and friends fall into a room with an evil living wall.)

THANATOS: Ha ha ha… Your life force will be taken by that room. Be docile, without kicking and struggling!

The Secret of Mana Fundamental Knowledge Compilation reveals that the evil wall was actually a summoned demon that didn’t materialize correctly, and got embedded in the building. The design of its eyes is hyper realistic, an impressive feat given the 16-bit hardware.  Based on what Thanatos says, we can conjecture that he summoned this demon to drain, or perhaps store the lifeforces he’s acquired.  

After the fight,

THANATOS: Oho, now I understand. You are the “hero of the Mana Sword,” as it turns out! This is most interesting. Yet, if this is the extent of the “hero of the Mana Sword”…Fu fu fu, the divine myth of the Mana Sword doesn’t amount to much, [after all]. Hm, I suppose I’ll let this time be said to have been my defeat. But…I’ll be taking these ones [two] with me!

Jema gives us more background on Thanatos here.  

JEMA: Oof…Randi, is it? …they took me by surprise; I’m sorry.  Thanatos is one of the Four “Shitenno” under the direct control of the Imperial Emperor (it’s this redundant in Japanese). That he came in person [is surprising]…But why, I wonder, would he carry out such an intricate/complex [plan/operation]?  It seems rather different from the Empire’s usual way of doing things…The aim/objective of the Empire is the unsealing of the Mana seeds, I believe.  But what on earth could Thanatos’ aim be…In any case, if he was here, I suspect that it’s only a matter of time before the main body [of the Imperial army] arrives in this area.

We don’t find out any more explicit information about Thanatos until Dyluck’s speech at the end:

DYLUCK: I’ll use the last of my power to reveal Thanatos’ true form! Having merged with him, I know it!  That true form…is that of an ancient sorcerer, one who sold his soul to Mavolia in order to claim eternal life.  But even though his spirit became eternal, his body continued to rot.  When that happened, he took possession of another, over and over again.  In time, even his spirit was eaten away by corruption, and so he became the incarnation of spite and hatred toward life itself: the Dark Lich!

THANATOS: Ooh! Silence!

Like many bosses in the game, the developers used special techniques to properly execute the Dark Lich sequence on the SNES hardware, including graphics tricks and a very intricate AI. It’s also a fan favorite for its head banging, which many assume is the Lich getting wild to The Oracle. But as regrs explains:

Dark Lich isn't actually a fan of heavy metal music. The head banging is caused by a simple lack of options...his movement script calls collision detection [in a broken way]. He [still] collides with you [if you're not moving] so the script tells him to reverse direction and move north. Then his movement script triggers again and tells him to move south. Repeat forever until you move.

While this is the extent of what’s revealed about Thanatos in Secret of Mana, we can compare Thanatos to his contemporaries in similar games.

In Final Fantasy VI, Emperor Gestahl also has four assistants—Celes, Cid, Leo, and Kefka, who’s the primary antagonist.  Gestahl is seeking to acquire Magicite, the remains of an Esper, a member of a race separate from humanity with inherent magical powers.  With Magicite, a human could gain the Esper’s power, but of course, they would have to be killed first.  Espers are somewhat reminiscent of the Mana Spirits in SoM, although they tag along with the party instead of dying.

Kefka becomes progressively more powerful as he acquires Magicite.  It gets to the point where he can defeat Espers at will, along the lines of how Thanatos deactivates Dryad’s powers in SoM.  He becomes obsessed with the warring Triad, a trio of gods who turned themselves to stone to end an ancient war.  If the balance of the Triad is thrown off, the world will be in peril.  This of course doesn’t stop Kefka, much like the fact that the Mana Beast will be unleashed doesn’t stop Thanatos from activating the Mana Fortress.  Nor does the fact that the warring Triad, like the Mana Fortress, was part of the end of an Ancient war that shouldn’t be repeated.  The Triad resides on a Floating Continent that’s raised from the ground by Kefka and Gestahl.  The Mana Fortress is on a Lost Continent that acts as a “switch” to activate it.

Both Thanatos and Kefka betray their respective Emperor to have power to themselves.  Each of them also have little regard for the other assistants in the inner circle.  Kefka eliminates Leo directly, manipulates Cid, and attempts to destroy Celes.  Thanatos resurrects Geshtar to fight for him, and leaves Sheex and Fanha to handle Randi on their own, which leads to their defeat while he continues to serve himself.

Once the world is thrown off balance, Thanatos uses his Mana Fortress to destroy the Mana Tree (like the Masked Mage), and Kefka uses his Light of Judgment to attack the world.  Both are confronted in their fortresses in each game’s final sequence.  

KEFKA: I will exterminate everyone, and everything! …Why do people rebuild things they know are going to be destroyed? Why do people cling to life when they know they can’t live forever? Think how meaningless each of your lives is! …I command the greatest power in the universe! You are all helpless before me!  I will destroy everything…I will create a monument to non-existence!

This is more explicit than Thanatos’ stated motive, but if we presume that Thanatos was once Belgar (again, this may be spiritual connection rather than literal), the two villains have the same contempt for all that is living.

Now, let’s take a look at Zeal from Chrono Trigger.  Like Kefka and Thanatos, she became more powerful and corrupted over time: 

MELCHIOR: The more energy the Mammon Machine absorbs, the further the Queen degenerates.

What Melchior is referring to is a Machine that could harvest the dreaded Lavos’ energy to make the Queen immortal and omniscient.  It’s placed in an Ocean Palace that eventually becomes the Black Omen, a huge craft not unlike the Mana Fortress, that was raised up from the sea and flies about the world.  The Queen is warned that the Machine could destroy the world, but, as you might guess, that doesn’t stop her from activating it.  In fact, she seems to think along the lines of Kefka:

ZEAL: Behold, my pretties!  Destiny, in its most brutal form.  All the dreams that might have been.  All the happiness, and sorrow, you might have experienced…I plan…to control the universe forever.  You will not get in my way!

A Ruby Knife is given to the protagonist, Chrono, to smash the Machine.  The Ruby Knife has elements of the Machine itself—similar to the relationship of the Mana Sword and Mana Fortress.  In fact, the Knife ends up becoming the Masamune (a legendary sword) in the presence of the Machine!  The Chrono Wiki states that the Black Omen is the final dungeon in the game, although it’s possible to defeat Lavos (the final boss) without entering it.  Queen Zeal does wait at the end of the ship, and her alternate form strongly resembles Dark Lich’s.  Zeal’s battle area is not unlike the Mana Beast’s.  Zeal, as well as Kefka, end up with a cult-like following that Thanatos lacks.

I’ll close with Thanatos’ lines in the Northtown Ruins, which demonstrate just how nefarious he is.  Most of this content was excised from the English script:

DYLUCK: Hahahaha!  I sent [Purim] to Thanatos as an offering.  The lifeblood of a maiden is needed…

(After a while…)

RANDI: So you were in here, [Thanatos]!  Purim!  Uwaaah!

THANATOS: Fuhahaha! Just stick around for a moment, won’t you!?  This maiden’s life energy is even greater than I imagined.  Truly magnificent….Ooh! What’s this!?  Ugh! Idiot! Why are you…!?

PURIM: Where am I? Oh! What’s wrong with you two?

RANDI: …!  I can move!?

THANATOS: … Is that so!?  I suppose this is Dyluck’s power!  Energy is flowing into you from him, eh!!?  Fufufu…With this, it becomes all the more necessary that I not let this one out of my grasp! Farewell to you fellows, then!  You’ve served your purpose! 

Localization Notes

• “Shitenno” is a common trope for high officials.  It literally translates as “four heavenly kings”, a reference to the Buddhist tradition of four gods who each oversee a cardinal direction of the world. One other use is in Sailor Moon to refer to Endymion’s four generals.
• When he first meets the party on the Super Famicom, he calls them, “tadamono”, “person(s)” which is usually negative or at least patronizing.