The Princess Bride is one of our favorite books and movies both. We quote often from the movie in these posts, although we suspect that our more obscure references fall in the blog forest with no one there to hear them. But there’s one quote that nearly everyone gets, as these days it falls in meme territory; we’re talking about when Iñigo Montoya advised Vizzini: “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
In The Princess Bride, Iñigo was referring to Vizzini’s frequent use of inconceivable as applied to the hero Westley’s dauntless movement forward. In Skyward Sword, we apply it to the word “imprisoned” with respect to the evil abomination, heretofore unnamed, that resides in the Sealed Grounds. We do not think “imprisoned” means what the Old One thinks it does; for that matter, the Sealed Grounds ought to be renamed the Leaky Grounds, or the Porous Grounds, or the Get Out of Jail Free Grounds, or similar.
Which brings us to the first subject of this post: After Levias advised us to visit the dragons below to learn the various parts of the Song of the Hero, we lost no time in parachuting into Faron. That is, we tried to, but the Faron Woods were inaccessible, so we had to detour into the Sealed Grounds. It’s like heading for JFK and getting diverted to La Guardia – very inconvenient but nothing you can do about it.
Battle with the Imprisoned
But not only were our flight plans to Faron International scuttled, we arrived at the Sealed Grounds just in time for the latest jail break by the (Badly) Imprisoned.
The abominable beast is again equipped with arms and feet, and the Groosenator’s still at Link’s service, so you know the first part of the drill: Slash the back toes, bomb-stun the beast with the Groosenator, geyser-hop to a place near its head to drive in the sealing stake.
For extra fun, after the first time you successfully drive in the stake, the Imprisoned sprouts a giant black halo, which apparently is like a helicopter, because now the beast can fly. (Perhaps he can get us a shuttle to JFK.) Fortunately, a bomb from the Groosenator stops the Imprisoned at least once or twice.
Regrettably, however, when the beast rises for the third time, Groose discovers that access to munitions has been blocked by rubble. (Spoiler alert: obscure Princess Bride reference coming.) Groose could try to explain, but there is too much, so better he should sum up: Link must hop in the Groosenator like a cannonball, land on the Imprisoned’s head, and drive the sealing stake in from there.
Credit Groose (and Link) for an idea well executed. Now, there’s nothing left to do but swipe the Master Sword this way and that, as denoted by the lines on screen, to reseal the Imprisoned One. Whether he stays so remains to be seen; we rather think it’s inconceivable. And we do know what that word means.
Great Faron Flood
Now, it’s back to our original destination. We need to get to Faron, which turns out to be flooded, so the regular bird statue landing points aren’t available. The land route is blocked by a dam placed by the Old One. Newly resourceful Groose has an idea, though: Let’s replicate the recent success with Link as cannon fodder in the Groosenator to catapult the hero into Faron![1]
Upon arrival in Faron, which is indeed flooded, you must get to the top of the Great Tree, by hook or by crook. For us, the hook was entering the base of the tree underwater, then swimming upward. We hear that by crook we might have used a floating lily pad and the Clawshots to get to the top; give that a whirl and let us know, will you?
Whether you take the high road or the low road, Faron the Water Dragon awaits you at the top of the tree. Faron listens to your plea for a segment of the Song of the Hero, but she’s not giving it up so easily. (Have we mentioned this is not our favorite dragon?) (Or game, Itzal snarks.)
Faron divides her portion of the song into several swimming notes, cleverly called Tadtones (which sounds like a lounge act from the 1960s), and strews them about the flooded Faron Woods. Your task is to collect them to re-assemble the song. The Tadtones swim in groups, duets, or solo; and each singing sensation is a color, such as purple, yellow, or green. The bad news is that you must gather all the notes in a given group, whether large or small, within a short period of time, or they don’t stay gathered; and they’re not always easy to corral. The good news is that once you’ve collected a given note or group of notes, they stay collected.
(This following section is for Itzal to add Zelder tips and whines, including his distaste for the dragon, who finally gives him the song, even though Itzal would argue that he had already earned/learned it, no thanks to Faron.)
Here again, we suggest you use an online map of the Flooded Faron Woods so it’s easier to locate the various schools of Tadtones. You might also want to stock up on some Air Potion at the Skyloft Bazaar, as some of these Tadtones are pretty deep underwater. That said, we found the really long string of notes/Tadtones, which looked the scariest, not to be that scary after all. We also learned that spinning under water (a) uses oxygen at a faster rate, (b) is not always as good an idea as it seems, but that (c) catching a Tadtone seems to add speed to Link’s swimming so you race ahead to the next one in line even without the spin/swim thing.
Stock up on heart potions, too, just in case. And you can get out of the water, travel back to Skyloft (we used an Amiibo so we didn’t have to deal with being dropped in the Sealed Grounds again), and replenish Link’s potions.
Speaking of replenishing potions, we recommend a Gin Fizz to accompany today’s play, in honor of all those bubbles you’ll need to consume to capture the Tadtones. Simple and refreshing, this classic cocktail goes down swimmingly, just like Link’s own Air Portion.
When both you and Link have your drinks replenished, and you’ve collected all the Tadtones, swim back down to the Water Dragon and tell her what you think of her silly quest. We’re pretty sure she was channelling her inner Princess Bride when she sniffed and allowed that for once, we’d done something right.
[1] Shades or perhaps foreshadowing of BOTW’s Yunobo, if you ask us!