Persona 5: 3 Surprising Spellcasters from the Magician Arcana
The supernatural entirely suffuses the Persona franchise, so it’s fitting that the Magician arcana, first of their original twenty-one numbered major arcana, would feature entities with some especially fascinating folklore. Trying to read tarot cards at face value is a dangerous enterprise, especially where the Magician is worried. An individual may be tempted to conclude that the Magician arcana in Persona is all about inexplicable phenomena, abstract realms, or maybe even intellect –the term”magi” historically suggests a smart man or heard scholar, after all.
As a tarot card, the Magician can actually signify immaturity, and most of the arcana’s virtues pertain to empowerment. If the Fool Arcana is all about limitless potential, the Magician is about taking the initial steps toward realizing that potential. Magicians capture the initiative, impact change, and doggedly pursue their goals by utilizing every tool available to them. They are less about possessing knowledge or power and more regarding the pursuit.
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Morgana is your confidant representing the Magician in Persona 5, and he is an apt match (if not quite as perfect as Yusuke out of Persona 4). He supplies Joker with the basic skills and knowledge required to kick off their experience, training him how to make tools, use personas effectively, and most importantly, the way to make paintings manifest in palaces. Magicians tend to be akin to alchemists; individuals versed in making the intangible attainable, which can be true of the tarot’s representation. Morgana’s aim to recover his human form is based on conjecture, however, and he lacks understanding of his own origins, which leads to insecurity occasionally.
Calling Card Masters: Zorro & Mercurius
However, when one looks at Morgana’s original character, Zorro, the metaphor appears to fall apart. Zorro, the Spanish term for”fox,” has been created by Johnston McCulley in 1919, debuting in the novel, The Curse of Capistrano. He’s a dashing, vigilante swashbuckler who defends California’s downtrodden native people from rich colonial invaders.
Though the personality is the ideal addition to the match’s thief theme, it is less clear what a Robin Hood-figure from contemporary literature has to do with alchemy, empowerment, and actualization. However, the response breeds the metaphor slightly, relying upon the aspirational and dynamic aspects of the character. Instead of fighting for private gain, Zorro aspires to better himself by defeating those who harm the world around them. Substance gain was always transient for the personality, and experience is his true calling.
Another notable feature about Zorro is his signature Z-shaped slash, which he employed as a sign of shame on defeated foes and as a calling card on the walls of areas he had ransacked. By itself, this has no bearing on the Magician tarot. Still, in the circumstance of Persona 5, calling cards play a critical part in making people’s abstract desires concrete, which is nicely in-line with the Magician’s theme of actualization.
Morgana’s second Persona, Mercurius, is a much more apt representation of the tarot as a whole. An alternate name of this Roman god Mercury, Mercurius is the god of finance, diplomacy, and the gods’ official messenger. He is also often related to cognition, the subconscious world, along with boundary-crossing. As such, he is frequently referenced in alchemy and seen as a vehicle for effecting change. As a celestial messenger, Mercurius is your god who would be likely to send a calling card into the Phantom Thieves’ goal.
