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Redeads and who created them

YIGAhim

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I was playing Smash 4 today, and went to buy some trophies. I was glad to see that not only the Cuccoo was one of the trophies available, but also the Redead trophy (I like getting LoZ trophies the most).

What it says for the bio of the Redead, is shocking (at least to me):
Redeads are not Human, but instead clay figures.

That makes things a lot weirder, especially for Ocarina of Time, when so clearly the people of Castle Town turned into redeads, and even the Royal Family of Hyrule is redead.

Any thoughts on how this could affect the timeline, if at all, and any theories on how the redeads got there?
 

Castle

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I wouldn't take those Smash trophies too seriously. And it's not the least bit clear that the residents of Castle Town turned into redeads. They could have, but for some inexplicable but mostly freaky reason, Hyrule Field seems to be a mass graveyard. Castle Town is closed at night because of the undead activity in the field. I speculate that given their lethargic state when they're risen, redead are slow to animate out of the ground or wherever they're laid out, but when they do rise it is to seek out a shady spot and just hang there waiting to ensare passersby. So when Castle Town was open to the field for so long, the redead came ambling in. They could have even been drawn there by Ganondorf or just as a natural byproduct of whatever dark magic The Dorf used to wreck the place.

And where is it ever shown that the Royal Family are redead?

The thing about them being made out of clay is stupid. I can only imagine where that came from.
 
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YIGAhim

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In the hidden chamber where you learn the song of storms there are redeads, and that was supposedly the tomb of the royal family
 

Castle

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In the hidden chamber where you learn the song of storms there are redeads, and that was supposedly the tomb of the royal family

Derp. :fpalm:

Ya know the lack of solid info on redeads is kinda irritating. Well, no less than anything else ninty doesn't bother to explain. Even without the nonsense clay golem stuff. I'd like to know where they come from or why they happen. And I'd like to know as much about Stal monsters as well. All we're given about Stalfos is that if you get lost in the woods you become one. I'm guessing that's not the only way they happen though. And of course many are sentient.

But I'm not sure I want to think about why there are so many Stal with child proportions under Hyrule field. But I'd like to believe that these could be more like Oni. Not undead perse but rather nature spirits or demons which often take on childlike qualities.

Regardless, I think it's safe to assume that on more than one occasion Hyrule Field was the sight of some terribly bloody conflicts. Or perhaps the negative energy from Hyrule's long and bloody history just manages to find its way creeping out of the ground there.
 
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Aku

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I'm guessing the Redeads only occur whenever Ganon is around, otherwise you'd end up expecting Hylians to cremate their dead to stop them from coming back.

As for what they are? They are naturally mummified corpses, most probably wearing clay masks placed on the face from some Hylian funeral tradition.

It would be cool to see some Zora/Goron/Rito Redeads for once, since it seems weird that non-Human allies can escape this 'zombiefying.'
 

Dio

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Smash isn't canon so I wouldnt take what it says seriously. Redeads are clearly reanimated human corpses. Their existence actually seems to not be connected to Ganondorf and are unlikely his creations seeing as they existed before he came to power and in places he had not visited.

I don't know why smash would claim they are made of clay. The official OOT artwork for them shows obvious veins and sinews on their bodies. Clay does not have veins and sinews.
 

Castle

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Clay does not have veins and sinews.
Well it does if you shape it like that :P

Still, dumb clay redead thing is dumb. And even though their faces do look kinda strange (oddly flat) I never thought of them as wearing masks but I can kinda see how that would be the case even if it isn't apparent by looking at em in-game. I always figured their flat heads were because their skulls were desiccated. Plus, the flat look adds to their bizarre and freaky appearance. I mean, there's the redead mask the Happy Mask Salesman offers but you'd be forgiven for thinking it's for anything other than cosplay like all the other masks. The concept and promotional art doesn't even make it obvious that they're wearing a mask. If redead do wear masks, I always figured they'd be made out of wood. Doesn't the Melee trophy say something about them wearing wooden masks? But the masks look more like clay in the concept art.

Come to think of it, it's weird how I never really thought of the redeads in the Royal Tomb as being the royal family. I wonder why that is? I guess I just figured they crawled in there from elsewhere. nearby graves and crypts? There's that one in the crypt with the fairy fountain. All by its lonesome. These redead could be Sheikah. Could they all be Sheikah? I'm trying to think of redead that appear outside of Kakariko...

People have drawn connections between LoZ monsters and mythological creatures from Japanese folklore. I wonder if the redead are similarly based? That might explain a thing or two.
 
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Dio

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Well it does if you shape it like that :P

Still, dumb clay redead thing is dumb. And even though their faces do look kinda strange (oddly flat) I never thought of them as wearing masks but I can kinda see how that would be the case even if it isn't apparent by looking at em in-game. I always figured their flat heads were because their skulls were desiccated. Plus, the flat look adds to their bizarre and freaky appearance. I mean, there's the redead mask the Happy Mask Salesman offers but you'd be forgiven for thinking it's for anything other than cosplay like all the other masks. The concept and promotional art doesn't even make it obvious that they're wearing a mask. If redead do wear masks, I always figured they'd be made out of wood. Doesn't the Melee trophy say something about them wearing wooden masks? But the masks look more like clay in the concept art.

Come to think of it, it's weird how I never really thought of the redeads in the Royal Tomb as being the royal family. I wonder why that is? I guess I just figured they crawled in there from elsewhere. nearby graves and crypts? There's that one in the crypt with the fairy fountain. All by its lonesome. These redead could be Sheikah. Could they all be Sheikah? I'm trying to think of redead that appear outside of Kakariko...

People have drawn connections between LoZ monsters and mythological creatures from Japanese folklore. I wonder if the redead are similarly based? That might explain a thing or two.

I always thought the ReDeads were wearing masks. The spooky mask from OOT is the same one the ReDeads wear. And if you look at the official artwork you can only see the teeth of the ReDead through the mouth hole in the mask. This is because the lips often recede on mummified bodies and I imagine whoever designed the ReDead took inspiration from that. Look up the mummies of Lady Xin Zhui or John Torrington if you want to see what I mean.
 

Jirohnagi

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I always thought the ReDeads were wearing masks. The spooky mask from OOT is the same one the ReDeads wear. And if you look at the official artwork you can only see the teeth of the ReDead through the mouth hole in the mask. This is because the lips often recede on mummified bodies and I imagine whoever designed the ReDead took inspiration from that. Look up the mummies of Lady Xin Zhui or John Torrington if you want to see what I mean.

Y'know those masks (they are masks that've fused to the corpse) are coffin masks literally made from their own coffins.

Redeads come about only from Dark Magic in the series or mummification and specific set of circumstances i think.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdJwH4s8LJY

if you can tolerate the squeaky voice you should be fine it's a good vid on redeads i think.
 

Castle

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I guess the more I get looking at the promotional art, the more obvious it is that they're wearing masks.
 
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I put up a lore video on ReDeads up on my youtube channel literally yesterday after hours of research and my brain is still floating in random information about ReDeads still so I'll give my two cents as a way to decompress my thoughts a bit :p

So the trophies do indeed make that claim, but they are secondary sources at best, and there are many, many, many in-game counterarguments you can use against the clay idea.

-The lakeside laboratory guy in OOT tells you their masks are made from the wood of a coffin, not clay

-If you wear a ReDead mask in front of Dampe, the GRAVEKEEPER, he'll ask you if you "know what kind of mask that is", implying heavily that it has to do with his trade. Which, once again, is gravekeeping.

-The poem you read when getting the Sun's Song from the Royal Tomb, a place overflowing with ReDeads, end with "Give peaceful rest to the living dead". It's obviously a hint that playing the Sun's Song will stun the ReDeads, but it also refers to them as the "living dead"

-The Nintendo Power official handbook refers to post-timeskip Castle Town as the "Town of the Dead"

-In Majora's Mask, one of the Gibdo will straight-up tell you that the dancing ReDeads used to be a dancing troupe, implying they were human at one point.


As for who created them, well it's likely that it was the Shiekah, as the three places built by Shiekan hands, (Bottom of the Well, Shadow Temple, Royal Tomb), are the three places overflowing with ReDead. And one of the places, the Bottom of the Well, is somewhere that Ganondorf didn't even touch, so it couldn't have been him. I'm sure Ganondorf was responsible for the Wind Waker and Tri Force Heroes ReDead, but I am positive that it was the Sheikah that created the original ReDead, pre-Ocarina of Time.

Phew, I feel better now. :p
 
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I think the clay thing could have some truth to it, especially considering their appearance in Tri Force Heroes... the myth about life being created from clay is present in many cultures around the world, so I think that's what ReDeads are... either failed or incomplete attempts to create life.
That said, I don't disagree with the references to them having been human in the past either... I think the most likely explanation is that they're the souls of humans whose original bodies have been destroyed, with the clay bodies having been created as a replacement.
In most cases I think this would have been accidental... caused by magic seeping into the ground, resulting in the more crude looking ReDead, however some (like those in WW) appear to be far more carefully crafted, so were likely created intentionally.
 
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I think the clay thing could have some truth to it, especially considering their appearance in Tri Force Heroes... the myth about life being created from clay is present in many cultures around the world, so I think that's what ReDeads are... either failed or incomplete attempts to create life.
That said, I don't disagree with the references to them having been human in the past either... I think the most likely explanation is that they're the souls of humans whose original bodies have been destroyed, with the clay bodies having been created as a replacement.
In most cases I think this would have been accidental... caused by magic seeping into the ground, resulting in the more crude looking ReDead, however some (like those in WW) appear to be far more carefully crafted, so were likely created intentionally.

I think Nintendo is trying very hard to retcon them as being clay because resurrected dead corpses is not very child-friendly, haha, but I think it is too little too late until Nintendo states in a first-hand source that they are not clay.

At the very least, I'd be willing to entertain the idea that the Tri Force Heroes ReDead are clay, but I really don't think the OOT/MM and WW ones are. Why would their mask be made of a tombstone? Why are the WW ReDeads literally stored in coffins until somebody walks by? There is just too many connections between ReDead and dead bodies for me.
 
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Why would their mask be made of a tombstone? Why are the WW ReDeads literally stored in coffins until somebody walks by? There is just too many connections between ReDead and dead bodies for me.
The lakeside scientist's line is a little misleading... it doesn't actually say that ReDead masks are made out of coffin wood, only that the Spooky Mask is.
It's worth noting that the WW ReDead don't wear masks, and the ReDead in TFH appear to have masks made of some other material (I'd guess stone).
I'd guess that the masks were made by the ReDead themselves to cover their malformed faces in order to make them look more human, and just used whatever material they had readily available to them (so wood from a coffin would make sense)... the ReDead in WW appear to have properly crafted faces, so would have no need for a mask.

If the WW ReDead were made intentionally, then their being stored in coffins could be explained by any number of things.
The most obvious one would be that they were left there intentionally as a trap to catch thieves.
I personally like the idea that if they were created as a replacement for a lost body, then the ReDead could have been laid to rest in the coffin in place of the corpse.
Then there's also the simple possibility that their creators just used the coffins for storage (if I remember correctly, you could find other items in the coffins, so this would make sense).
 
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The lakeside scientist's line is a little misleading... it doesn't actually say that ReDead masks are made out of coffin wood, only that the Spooky Mask is.

By itself the lakeside scientist's line might only refer to the spooky mask. But when you talk to Dampe, he makes it all but guaranteed that the spooky mask is a ReDead mask. He asks something along the lines of "Do you know what kind of mask that is? And you're still wearing it?"


It's worth noting that the WW ReDead don't wear masks, and the ReDead in TFH appear to have masks made of some other material (I'd guess stone).

I am pretty sure the reason that the OOT ReDead wear masks and the WW ReDead do not, is because OOT ReDead are blind, and WW ReDead can see.

If the WW ReDead were made intentionally, then their being stored in coffins could be explained by any number of things.
The most obvious one would be that they were left there intentionally as a trap to catch thieves.
I personally like the idea that if they were created as a replacement for a lost body, then the ReDead could have been laid to rest in the coffin in place of the corpse.
Then there's also the simple possibility that their creators just used the coffins for storage (if I remember correctly, you could find other items in the coffins, so this would make sense).

But why a coffin? Why not have them be in clay form and appear out of nowhere like in TFH? I feel like the choice of coffin has more meaning than just something random used for storage, especially since ReDead can be found in actual graveyards in OOT.
 

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