Dragon Age: Absolution picks off where Dragon Age: Inquisition ends. With a new team facing new threats in this animated Netflix show.
The Dragon Age franchise is probably one of my favorite game franchises ever. The games’ storytelling was invigorating, tense, immersive, and exciting.
And then there was the announcement of the TV show Dragon Age: Absolution so I already knew then that I wanted to see it. Because it’s Dragon Age.
The show revolves around a group of characters led by Miriam, a mage who managed to escape Tevinter slavery. And the freedom fighter named Fairbanks. Then there is the spirited Qunari mage, Qwydion. And there are many more characters who I will introduce while I review the 6 episodes. Each episode is about 25 to 26 minutes and the show is available on Netflix.
Episode 1: A woman unseen
We are introduced to Miriam and Roland, her best friend. They are after the Lyrium which belongs to the Templars and are guarded by them. We see 3 stooges who are trying to climb up the wall and are trying to steal the Lyrium as well. But little do they know that they are only hired to be the distraction. With a bow and arrow, Miriam cuts their effort short. They are only the bait so that Miriam and Fairbanks can disguise themselves and steal the Lyrium for their clients.
Miriam is a rogue and the way they portray her is pretty amazing. The animations with the bow and arrow look exactly like it does in the Dragon Age video games and that deserves applause. The same goes for Fairbanks, who is more of a soundboard for Miriam in the first couple of scenes in Dragon Age Absolution
The rest of the team is gathered together after Miriam meets her client who complains that his cousin was apprehended by the Templars. But she still got the job done so she still gets paid. Her client almost manages to kill Miriam with an arrow but quick interference makes sure that she survives and deflects the arrow only cutting off part of the ear of the client.
While her band of mercenaries takes shape, the team is introduced to each other and consists of the following: Lacklon, a warrior. Hira, a human Mage. Qwydion, a Qunari mage. Roland, a mercenary. And the party of five is complete. Hira is also Miriam’s girlfriend and lover. They dream of owning a cheese store one day after all this is over.
The mission is to get to Tevinter, Nessum to be exact, and steal an artifact called The Circulum Infinitus. After the Inquisition disbanded, people found out that the Tevinters kept that artifact a secret. What it does, no one knows but it involves Blood Magic and if there is Blood Magic involved then, it must be stopped as Cassandra Pentaghast says. Cassandra Penthagast was part of the Inquisition and she is a member of your party in the game Dragon Age: Inquisition.
The team goes on their merry way to Nessum and makes up a plan to rob the Tevinters of their precious artifact. They scout the city but find out quickly that there are barely any weak spots for entry into the castle where the artifact is.
During a night out, the Tevinter guards enter the bar and tell the Elf, Miriam, to scoot as she is considered less than they are and they have dibs on who gets to sit at the bar in that particular part of it. Roland tries to get Miriam away but the taunting of the guard sets him off.
An enjoyable classic bar brawl sets off and it is the first time we get to see the team in action. There is no magic used, only fists but hey what else is new after a night out of town? The Tevinter guards have their asses handed to them and that first impression of the team fighting is unforgettable.
The next day, the team has their plan ready and there is only one way in. Miriam has uncovered her Elven facial tattoo which was hidden under a layer of makeup. She runs into the palace and a guard tries to stop her but she shows her tattoo and the guard is scared and lets her in.
The other guards, who are playing cards, are not impressed so Miriam takes them down one by one. She doesn’t hold back at all. Her Rogue skills with knives make light work of the guards. But that facial tattoo…what does it mean?
She lets the team in and that ends the first episode.
Dragon Age: A world of racism and oppression
The racism shows early on in the show. Elves are not to be trusted because they are elves. The comments of suspicion that doubt their intentions, words and otherwise, show that Elfs are still heavily oppressed in the world of Dragon Age. And the same goes for the Qunari.
Actually, anything that doesn’t fit the “normal” norms and values in terms of looks and culture is branded untrustworthy and leads to racism. It’s not always subtle but right in your face. Kudos to the makers of the show who dare to put that in their show.
There are concerns about Miriam’s heritage as she is a former slave from Tevinter. The team is afraid that the enslavers are still hunting her and traumas are still haunting Miriam as soon as she sees home. They are afraid that she will go berserk. Despite Miriam saying she won’t, it remains to be seen if she does.
The Tevinter guards in the bar where Miriam is sent away, illustrates once more what kind of world Dragon Age plays in. It’s a tough world if you are anything other than a Tevinter.
Episode 2: The Will of the Maker
The second episode starts off with an introduction to Rezaren and Tassia. They are inside a dungeon with ancient artifacts and statues. Rezaren wields his magic whilst talking about unlocking the secrets of the past. While Tassia complains that if he really wants to do so then free the slaves’ corps that are buried inside the walls of the dungeon.
The dungeon turns out to be the Forge where the Circulum Infinitus was created. Rezaren basically had to beg to excavate the ruins to see if he can find out how it was created. Tassia, calls him out for that.
The Circulum Infinitus can’t ever be used, the Divine would disagree because it involves Blood Magic, Tassia argues. Rezaren has other ideas about that. He thinks it’s worth using because it can bring back the dead, even if you have to cross boundaries.
Rezaren summons a spirit and asks about the Circulum. However, the spirit refuses to answer all of his questions, the main one being who else wants the Circulum.
While the questioning turns into torture, the spirit turns into a demon and despite the magical defenses Rezaren puts up, the demon is smart enough to summon Shades who go full Kamikaze and blow up the magical defense of Rezaren freeing the demon who doesn’t survive for long against Rezaren and Tassia as they kill him after a tough fight.
After that Tassia expresses her concerns once more about Rezaren’s intentions while she gets ready for her guard duty. Rezaren tries to comfort her but he’s unable to take ALL of the doubts away.
Meanwhile, Miriam and her team are getting ready for their heist of the Circulum Infitus. They have the warriors distracted and the mages defuse the magical defense, while Fairbanks is trying to break into the vault.
Miriam is left behind to guard their getaway tunnel. But it’s not just the tunnel, the team doesn’t want Miriam to be triggered because she has a history in that palace. And then there are the flashbacks of her playing with Tevinter children but is quickly put in place with a heavy slapping that she is Elven and a slave. Slaves are nothing, slaves own nothing. But Miriam is triggered when a youngling Elf asks her to help her hide because she stole food from the trash. She is being chased by the palace cook.
After that, there is a scene where we see Miriam receives battle training. She is trained to be an assassin. Relying on stealth and her daggers. And then we see a scene where Miriam has murdered everyone in the castle. We don’t know who her victims are, they are not mentioned by name.
This once again, illustrates how the Tevinters treat their slaves. They are nothing, they are being tortured.
Fairbanks, the traitor
Meanwhile, Fairbanks and Hira are inside the vault to steal the Circulum Infitus. Fairbanks however does the unthinkable and stabs Hira in the back. A fight between the ensues and Fairbanks has the upper hand it seems.
But Hira is a mage and manages to magically throw rocks at a high speed so that they look like bullets. Fairbanks is mortally wounded. So is Hira, but let’s not forget that Hira is a mage healer who carries healing potions in her pouch. Hira heals from her wounds and in a last effort to prevent Fairbanks from running away with the loot, she activates the palace defenses. And that the defense isn’t to stop people from stealing the Circulum Infitus, but to kill everyone in the palace. Talk about a heist gone wrong eh?
The final scene of the episode is when Fairbanks and Miriam are found by the 2 warriors of the team. Miriam is covered in blood and Fairbanks is heavily wounded so there is your “oh boy…” ending.
The racism from the Tevinter’s side
The Tevinters Rezaren and Tassia are like fire and water. Rezaren is a bit indifferent when Tassia mentions the slaves. Tassia seems to take issues with the enslavement of people. While this episode was merely an introduction to the Tassia character, you can clearly see that not everyone in Tevinter agrees with the slave policies the Tevinters have.
Tassia is also the one who is most dutiful of the two. She loves and will protect everyone in the palace but won’t hesitate to take anyone down who fights against the Tevinter empire, even if it is the love of her life, Rezaren. She warns him that she will protect him from himself if he resorts to more extreme measures to research Circulum Infitus.
Tassia is also the one who talks to her colleagues and expresses her concerns that Rezaren might do something to cross the lines that will endanger the lives in Nessum.
More expansion of the racism theme came from the scenes with the little elf girl who is hiding from the palace cook because she stole food from the trash. They won’t even let the slaves eat properly so they eat it from the garbage can. The palace cook also racially slurs both Miriam and the youngling Elf.
Miriam is clearly haunted by her past as a slave and won’t do anything to prevent the cook from live cooking the little Elven slave alive. So that’s how corporal punishment works in Nessum: Elves get live-cooked for eating from the trash.
Episode 3: The Serpent’s Coils
The castle is in full lockdown and while we assumed that the defenses will kill everyone on sight, according to Tassia, there are some safe rooms for the vips.
The first thing the Knight-Commander does is get Rezaren in a safe room before the castle’s defenses kill him. This is yet another example of Tassia being able to put the job ahead of love and all else.
Hira and Fairbanks fate after the failed Heist in Dragon Age: Absolution
Meanwhile, in the last episode, we saw Fairbanks severely wounded and dropping in the arms of Miriam while the other two teammates run in and assume that she was the killer of Fairbanks. If only Roland and Lacklon had checked the wounds, they would have seen that they are inconsistent with the daggers Miriam carries around and that there are no items or objects in the environment that could have done that kind of damage. But they believe Miriam on her word.
Hira has been captured and put in an unbreakable jail. Miriam is doing everything she can to get her out but there is none. It’s an unbreakable jail and the team is under attack by the asinine defenses of the castle. While Lacklon and Roland are doing everything in their power to fight off the enemies and succeed, they only realize how much trouble they are in when the second wave comes in. But Roland is a quick thinker and remembers the bag of hand grenades Lacklon carries. And the fight is over before the Rage Demons can even blink if they actually do that.
Right before Hira sacrifices herself, she tells the truth to Miriam about Fairbanks. They were on their way to grab the artifact and he then suddenly stabbed her in the back. Miriam in turn tells her that Fairbanks has died and gave her the Circulum Infinitus. To which Hira tells her to run away to Kirkwall. The plan was to use Fairbanks’ contact but that may just be a trap. I am so happy they used Kirkwall and The Hanged Man tavern. They are direct references to the game franchise. It’s the little details that give extra depth to this already invigorating story.
Qwydion rescues the Elven slaves
Qwydion is trying to flee the castle on her own. But when she hears the crying and grunting of others, she turns around and helps the group of Elves who are up against a Rage Demon. Qwydion is one of the good guys, if she had run off like a coward, I wouldn’t have liked her as much as I do now. She stood up for the slaves so that’s a +10 in my book.
Tassia puts duty over all
Tassia meanwhile does her best to protect the VIPs in the castle and has her guard fight off the asinine defenses. What I like about Tassia is that she’s really able to put duty and country over love. She’s much like Cassandra Penthagast in that regard, except Cassandra doesn’t really make time for love. It is admirable that she would even take down Rezaren if he ever goes against the commandments of The Divine.
The episode ends with Rezaren and Miriam meeting and Rezaren calls her sister…that was my Darth Vader is Luke’s father moment. I couldn’t believe it. She’s an Elf and he’s a human. How?
Episode 4: Those Who Falsely Dream
The fourth episode was the most emotional one of all of them. After we find out that Rezaren is Miriam’s brother Neb, we see a big scene where Rezaren fights off Team Miriam. Rezaren is incredibly skilled and if it wasn’t Dragon Age, I would have thought Rezaren is a Jedi Master rivaling the skills of Master Yoda. It was incredible to see him go up against Team Miriam and wipe the floor with them with incredible ease.
Miriam however is up against the personal guard of Rezaren. She fights tooth to nail and he won’t go down until he does. She pulls off the mask and it’s the dead brother of Miriam. She is in shock and so was I. The scene really rivals the Darth Vader scene where Luke finds out who is father is.
Apparently in order to save his life Rezaren bound her dead brother’s body to a demon while Rezaren wanted to use the Circulum Infinitus to revive the dead. Including all the loved ones. The scene in the previous episode where Miriam is seen covered in blood and surrounded by dead people was her brother and Rezaren’s tyrannical mother.
Team Miriam flees the scene but not before she gets shot in the back by an arrow by one of Tassia’s men.
While they flee, Rezaren gets a vial of blood from the walls that belong to Miriam. Tassia is quick to tell him that if Rezaren uses blood magic, she will tell The Divine. But that doesn’t stop Rezaren from using it.
The history between Rezaren and Miriam revealed
Rezaren goes back to the altar where the Circulum Infinitus was being kept. It was being guarded by a stoned dragon who woke up after the artifact went missing.
After Rezaren put his house in order, he starts meditating breaking the vial of the blood of Miriam. Miriam is severely wounded and asleep. Rezaren joins her in a vision by trying to talk to her. Miriam tries to slap him but it won’t work in Dreamworld.
The two reminisce about what it was like. Rezaren is more optimistic about his youth and shows all the happy moments they shared. Miriam countered that by noting that she was a slave and trapped. On top of that, she showed her memories of Rezaren’s tyrannical and racist mother who told Miriam on every occasion that she was a slave and nothing more than that. Rezaren said it wasn’t fair because he was just a child.
The day that Rezaren had to undergo the ritual called the Harrowing to become a mage turned out to be a deadly one. When Rezaren started to fail the Harrowing, his mother interfered by trying to suck the life out of Miriam’s brother. Miriam, in a fit of rage, killed Rezaren’s mother with her daggers. After her brother was possessed for the first time, Miriam killed him in self-defense.
Rezaren, sad as he was at that moment, let Miriam go because she was right about everything. He didn’t lift a finger to stop his mother from attempting to kill Miriam’s brother.
Rezaren wants Miriam back at his side
Rezaren wants the Circulum Infinitus to bring back his mother and revive Miriam’s brother. He wants to have Miriam by his side. He names all the things she failed at. All the misery and all the mistakes. But Miriam countered that by saying that her mistakes and misery are her own and that there is nothing he can do about that since she’s ultimately responsible for her own actions.
But Miriam is being stubborn, she’s actually right, and thus when the blood magic doesn’t work, the visions and the trip down memory lane don’t work, Rezaren gives her a chance by telling her that Hira is still alive and she can have her back in exchange of the artifact. Miriam is skeptical but goes with it anyway.
The marking on Miriam’s face represents that she’s a family member of the house of Rezaren and that’s why she can just get past the guards by showing her facial tattoo.
This is by far the best episode so far. So many things come together like the history between Rezaren and Miriam. The tattoo is explained, the emotional trip down memory lane. We get to see Miriam’s brother before he was a demon. And Rezaren’s mother was a full-on racist tyrant. Rezaren’s motive to revive the dead is revealed too. He wants to revive his mother and give back Miriam’s brother.
Episode 5: An Altar of Fire
Heavily wounded Miriam goes back to the safe house and is joined by her team. While they recover they have a big discussion about what’s next. Hira is being held captive by Rezaren and Miriam is fed up with the mission. Simply because she doesn’t think it’s not worth the Circulum Infinitus anymore.
The rest of the team is still very motivated and ofcourse want to get paid as well. Which is the reason they joined in the first place. So they concoct a plan in order to free Hira from the evil hands of Rezaren.
Hira’s history with the Venatori and Tevinter
Hira’s motivations to steal the artifact become clear during a tough questioning by Tassia. When Hira was younger, her family was influential and rich. By then the Venatori came and burned everything they had to the ground. Ever since, all Hira wants is for Tevinter to burn to the ground. Tassia is being called away because there is someone waiting at the gate.
That’s when Rezaren comes in and as we saw in the show: he’s slowly corrupting and thus the interrogation turns into torture.
Rezaren’s corruption is quite apparent when he started to use Blood Magic and earlier in the season when he was always close to the edges of ethical boundaries when it comes to the use of magic. He wasn’t crossing the line at the time but all gloves went off when he used the vial of Miriam’s blood to commune with her.
Dragon Age: Where did the Qunari go?
While Tassia goes to meet the visitor at the gates, she finds Miriam all by herself. Tassia’s army is ready and waiting to take Miriam prisoner. Instead Miriam takes down the entire platoon of guardsmen and Tassia notices too late that Miriam is all alone and that the rest of team went down to free the dragon. While Tassia takes on Lacklon and Roland, Qwydion is off to free the dragon all by herself using her Mage magic.
Tassia figures out too late that she has fallen for another misdirection. But while Qwydion has all the time in the world Tassia is forced to take on both Roland and Lacklon, a fight that is super exciting to watch and shows how powerful the Knight-Commander really is as she wins the fight.
Meanwhile the Dragon is freed and so are the shackles of the slaves and they all run out and past Miriam on their way to freedom.
Miriam versus Neb
Miriam is taking on Neb’s body. His spirit has long left it and his body is bound by a demon. They fight and Miriam has the upper hand then the most difficult of things has to be done: she has to kill the thing that has the likeness of her brother and she does. She decapitated Neb and cried afterward. Well, who wouldn’t?
With the dragon freed and on his way to wreak havoc in Nessum, what will happen next to our heroes?
Episode 6: The Price of Salvation
Hira freed herself from prison and is on her way to the safe house and it is a mess. Hira is looking swiftly around the room to find the artifact, the Circulum Infinitus. She finds it and is trying to get away. At first, you would think that she is running towards Team Miriam but there is a huge major revelation coming up here.
Hira, as it turns out, was only using Miriam in exchange for the Circulum Infinitus…she was in cahoots with Rezaren all this time. In exchange for Miriam and the use of the artifact in order to burn down Tevinter as revenge for not helping them against the Venatori. She had hopes that the Inquisition would help her out but they were very political about it and didn’t want to cause any collateral damage. Fairbanks was on to her and tried to kill her. Hira was the traitor all along…
Rezaren uses blood magic and the circulum infinitus to revive Neb
After that story Miriam is broken and gives up to join Rezaren in his quest to revive the dead. Neb, who was resurrected using blood magic (another sign of Rezaren’s corruption) joins to complete the circle. While Rezaren performs the ritual using Miriam’s blood and Neb’s blood and his own. And augments that by cutting open the dragon to use her blood, a portal opens and we see Neb’s spirit come out of it in a beautiful astral blue form.
Miriam is afraid and apologizes for that day when she killed Neb. Neb however is far more empathetic and instead of inhabiting his old body, he vaporized it and the demon that was inside it.
Rezaren has no words for what just happened and goes in a fit of rage. But then there is Miriam, who fights off Rezaren and kills him by slitting his throat and ends up killing Rezaren. In the end scene we see Tassia crying over Rezaren and an angry face because she blames Team Miriam for his death.
Dragon Age: Absolution is a must-see for fans and non-fans
I loved the show. As stated in the first paragraph: I am a huge fan of the game franchise and I am looking forward to the 4th part that is coming out soon. The anime however is very well-written and greatly animated. The Mage effects look exactly like it does in the games and we find out more about mages and blood magic.
The thing I didn’t like so much was the ending of Tassia. I know that it is a set up for a possible second season but what I really would have wanted to see is Tassia going up against Rezaren as it is her duty to apprehend mages who use blood magic. And it would have been extra piquant because Rezaren and Tassia are lovers so it would best be described as lover’s quarrel plus.
The show doesn’t shy away from LGBTQ+ ness and they portray it very well in the show. Hira and Miriam are lovers. Roland and Lacklon find each other during the show. They kiss in the end. But Rezaren and Tassia are also a couple. So there is plenty to go around.
The second season, if the show is renewed, is going to be pretty amazing. The crimson knight and Hira while Tassia also wants answers from Team Miriam. All in all, the show is a must-see and worth every minute of your time.
