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Since UBW is getting a lot of unfair hate lately, I decided to shed some light on a scene that I think is one of the best directed scenes in the Fate series and one of my personal favorites. Retweets would be greatly appreciated, as I think more people should read this :)
The scene that I'm talking about is Archer's farewell scene. The reason why I love this scene so much is that this scene was basically the culmination of Archer's character arc. To explain why this is the culmination of Archer's character arc, let's go back to Archer's origins
Archer is a broken man. But before he was broken, he was an idealistic man that wanted an outcome where everyone would be saved. He wanted to save as many people as possible because he craved the happiness that Kiritsugu felt when he saved him from Fuyuki's great fire.
He admired Kiritsugu to an astronomical level and was left with Kiritsugu's wish, to become a hero of justice and save everyone. Archer believed in this idealogy, as he lived his life according to it and saving as many people as possible, even at the cost of himself. He wanted
to achieve this ideal world so desperately, that even after dying, he sold his self to become a guardian, someone who simply kills whoever is destined to cause conflict in the world, regardless if these people are good or not, just to save everyone. But that didn't happen. Archer
realized that as a guardian, he won't be able to save everyone, because gaurdians only kill people who will cause conflict, not save those who are in need. He despaired over this, felt betrayed by the reality that he cannot live by the ideals that pushed him thus far,
to the point of selling his soul just to live by them, only for these ideals to betray him after what he did, causing him grief and sadness. Even though Archer despaired over the betrayal of his ideals, he didn't give up. Archer came up with the conclusion that if he manages to
somehow kill the minority in favor of the majority, he can still save as many people as he can, while remaining on the moral high ground. He continued to kill the minorities over the majorities until he adapted to it. He became used to killing people, regardless if they were
among the minority or not. But something that Archer forgot is that being a gaurdian means that he has to kill whoever is destined cause conflict, regardless if they were good or not. Because of this, Archer was forced to kill the very people he sold his soul for and lived his
whole life for. The amount of good people that Archer killed kept on piling up endlessly, causing a ginormous amount of guilt to weigh down his shoulders. Archer despised the being he became and the actions he is taking. This wasn't what he wanted to become. This wasn't what he
sold his soul for, but that didn't mean anything to the reality that once again continued to torment him to no end. This betrayal is what triggered Archer's shift in personality. Archer realized that this world, the people who live on it, its reality, are all cruel and merciless.
Archer, after all that he did for humanity, after his despair, and hopeless endeavors, was sent to the gallows. Archer realized that his hopeless endeavors were doomed from the beginning. Archer broke down and gave up to the cruelty of the world, as he witnessed all his efforts
and sacrifices perish right before his eyes. Archer realized that the more he strived for salvation, the more he despaired. This is why he desperately wanted to kill and break Shirou's spirit so that this being, who will kill countless people for his ideals, who will
will be betrayed by humanity, would utterly die. Hopefully by now I established the fact that Archer lost any kind of hope in saving the world and that he despises himself and the ideals he believed in.
This is where his fight with Shirou comes in play. Archer wants to kill Shirou and to break his spirit, because he thinks that it's his responsibility to eliminate the person he was before it's too late. I also believe that this fight, in Archer's point of view, was the
determining factor that will decide whether his choice to abandon his ideals is right or wrong. Archer saw Shirou as the representation of all that brought him down and despaired him, while Shirou saw Archer as a representation of his fears. His fear of ending up like him,
a broken man. So, overcoming Archer wasn't a simple conflict, but a battle that will decide the potency of his ideals. Of course, in the face of Shirou's self-acceptance and his acceptance of his future, Archer lost, because he lacked Shirou's self-acceptance, as well as the fact
