Top 30 Final Fantasy Villains - #15

#15 - Yotsuyu

(Final Fantasy XIV)

I originally considering putting Yotsuyu on the same spot as Fordola, since they are similar characters in many ways. However, the two do have many differences and ultimately, I found Yotsuyu to be the superior villain.

Yotsuyu was a Doman child whose family wanted nothing to do with her, instead focusing their attention on her brother Asahi. Eventually they decided to make a quick buck and rid themselves of her by selling her to a brothel, where she got a front-row seat to the worst of humanity, giving her a deep hatred for her fellow Domans. However, her position just so happened to make her valuable as an informant to the Garlean empire during their invasion. When Doma was finally captured, they rewarded her by making her the regent of the area, and she relished the chance to making the Domans suffer in every way she could think of.

Unlike Fordola, whose vile actions were rooted in her allegiance to the Empire and belief in their cause, Yotsuyu is motivated by her sheer hatred for her fellow countrymen. Throughout the Doma story arc, she displays pointless petty cruelty at every turn, such as forcing a helpless villager to shoot his own parents simply because they are too old to work. In a worse game, this could have resulted in her being one-dimensional and flat, but Yotsuyu goes so far over the edge that it makes her insanely memorable.

Every word she says, coupled with some chilling voice work, is positively dripping in spite. Her design reinforces her personality as someone who sees herself as better than everyone around her and believes she deserves to inflict all this pain and death. And ultimately, her sadism winds up being not only her own, but her superior Zenos’s downfall by getting the Warrior of Light involved.

But much like Fordola, after her defeat in the main story of Stormblood, her character goes in a very different direction. After she supposedly dies along with the heroic samurai Gosetsu in the battle of Doma, they both come back alive and well- and Yotsuyu has suffered the loss of her memories, along with having her mind revert to that of a child. Going by the name Tsuyu, her relationship with Gosetsu continues to develop as she gets the childhood she never had and Gosetsu has a surrogate for his own late family. Again, if the writing wasn’t as good, it could come across as a cheap excuse to redeem a character with no redeeming characteristics whatsoever, but Yotsuyu, both in her original character and her Tsuyu persona, is incredibly well-written, and you legitimately believe she could have a second chance at life.

However, tragedy strikes when her brother Asahi suddenly enters the story and snaps her back to her old memories by bringing her abusive parents into the picture, as part of a ploy to jeopardize the uneasy peace between Doma and Garlemald following its liberation. After Yotsuyu rightfully murders her parents, she uses an ancient relic to transform into a powerful new form and we get a fascinating insight into her character, where she embraces her pain and gains power for it, even forming illusions of all those who wronged her, but when a manifestation of Gosetsu appears and appeals to the better part of her, Yotsuyu bitterly resigns herself to her evil ways, feeling she’s gone too far to have a second chance. What follows is one of the toughest, most intense boss fights in Final Fantasy XIV.

In the end, Yotsuyu is reprehensible, tragic, chillingly evil, and incredibly well-written both as a villain, and a victim of abuse. She may not be one of the most major players in the story, but she is easily the best villain in all of Final Fantasy XIV.