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Fridge examples for ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTheWindWaker''.
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[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder: Fridge Brilliance ]]

* Ganondorf's [[WellIntentionedExtremist personality]] in this game is widely praised for giving the Thief King more depth and even lead to some sympathy for him. But, this was not only an extremely intriguing development of his character, it was ''necessary for his goals''. [[spoiler:It was stated in Ocarina of Time that the Triforce was split because when Ganondorf touched it, his heart was out of balance, seeking Power above all else. So he spent his time in exile contemplating where he went wrong. He gained the Wisdom of personal insight, analyzing his own motivations, acknowledging that it was his own envy and greed that drew him to seek Power. And when confronted with the reincarnation of the Hero of Time, he knew he had to fight with Courage, disdaining his magical abilities and transformations to fight him on equal ground (why he has become such an excellent swordsman). He has trained his body and meditated on himself so that when his plans finally came to fruition, he could make his wish on the Triforce, and not have it scatter. Too bad the King touched it first. (Who possessed the Wisdom necessary to make a Courageous, self-sacrificing wish for the Power to defeat Ganondorf once and for all.)]]
** [[spoiler:The King's wish being granted instead of Ganondorf's is meaningful in another way. It highlights the one aspect of the Triforce that Ganondorf never truly obtained despite his best effort: Courage. Although Ganondorf is brave enough to face Link with his swords, he never had the strength to let go of Hyrule even when it's long buried and forgotten by almost everyone from the surface above. He's still obsessed with the land, focusing all his resources to revive the kingdom rather than conquer the Great Sea. In contrast, the King accepts that Hyrule is gone despite the fact his deepest desires is to see it restored. And by resisting his inner desire in order to give the new generation hope, he has proven to be more courageous than Ganondorf and thus more worthy to touch the Triforce.]]
* The photographer guy on Windfall Island says it's his hobby to sneak up behind people. This is actually a very good skill to have if you're a photographer, and you want to take candid shots without people noticing you're doing it.
* [[FanNickname Toon Link]] is so emotive because he's a SilentProtagonist. It gives him a personality without him having to talk, much like a mime.
* Ganondorf duel-wielding. The only other Gerudo [[note]]Not counting TP Ganondorf[[/note]] we encounter in a straight-up sword fight are the women guarding the carpenters in the [=OoT=]'s fortress -- who ''also'' use two swords.
* The locations of the Triforce Shards are all rather spooky and creepy. Seems like coincidence, until you remember that the shards you're looking for form the Triforce of ''Courage''. It's only natural for you to have to prove your courage in order to find them.
* Why was Gohma attacking Valoo's tail? Well, aside from causing him the discomfort that it did, think about where the other two pearls in the game were originally hidden: in the care of their respective spirits, usually inside something that dangled, and swayed to and fro -- for the Great Deku Tree, the pearl was hidden away inside the highest part of his crown, and Jabun's was inside the lantern on his head. Upon closer inspection, Valoo's tail does have similar movement patterns to both of these, thus, it's likely that Din's Pearl was once held in the hook at the end of it, and that Gohma was sent there to get rid of it. If this were the case, it's pretty lucky that Valoo decided to bequeath it to Komali's grandmother as a gift -- if he hadn't, and it was still in that room when Gohma took over, Ganondorf would've successfully disposed of one of the three things Link ''needed'' to defeat him!
* At one point or another, Tetra and the King of Red Lions both berate Link for charging headfirst into a dangerous situation and never stopping to think things through...Not only does this similarity make sense given the reveal that [[spoiler: they're related]], but [[spoiler:the royal line of ancient Hyrule has long been known for its guardianship of the Triforce of Wisdom,]] which contrasts Link's hot-blooded, courageous attitude. (Even before he gets his Triforce piece.)
* Unlike the other games, Ganondorf doesn't transform into [[OneWingedAngel Ganon]] but instead uses a giant marionette called Puppet Ganon. It is brilliant in two ways:
** This is the only Ganondorf to be unambiguously defeated by the Hero of Time (as opposed to be ratted out in the Child Timeline or winning in the Downfall Timeline) and thus he knew that transforming into the real Ganon would be unnecessarily risky since that there was a good chance, in Ganondorf's mind, that Link was indeed the Hero of Time reborn. If he wants to win, he can't put himself in harms' way which also explains [[CombatPragmatist he simply pummels Link before he has a chance to make his move on top of the tower]].
** In his speech before unleashing Puppet Ganon, Ganondorf mocks the idea of that the goddesses sealed Hyrule with the hope that the people of the Great Sea would restore the land to its former glory. He insists that the goddesses destroyed them instead and that there was no chance of the people to achieve that hope. Combined with his later self-reflection on his upbringings in Gerudo Desert and his envy for Hyrule, it's all but stated that Ganondorf came to see the goddesses using everybody as playthings, to be used and then discarded. And thus Ganon, the feared King of Evil, is nothing more than a puppet on a string meant to play as the adversary to the hero and the princess in the cycle without end.
*** And how does Link do battle at first? [[DeathByIrony By cutting its strings]] and [[ScrewDestiny thus defying destiny]].
* This was later pointed out in the ''Hyrule Historia'' guidebook, but when Ganondorf is defeated, [[spoiler:before he turns to stone after being stabbed in the head (and no longer immortal due to giving up the Triforce of Power), his last words are "The wind... it is blowing..." Seemingly this has little meaning, but earlier, when he described Gerudo Desert, he said that no matter when it came, the wind carried the same thing - death.]]
* The music you hear [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFB4B5w0czg inside the Forest Haven]] has traces of [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ljqe4Nj7nBA Saria's Song/The Lost Woods]] playing in it. This makes sense seeing as how the Kokiri turned into the Koroks.
* The Great Deku Tree feels nostalgic enough to speak in ancient Hylian when he sees Link show up wearing the Hero’s Clothes, attributing it to his longing for an age gone by. Of course he would feel that way — the Hero’s Clothes are deliberately based on the Kokiri Tunic from ''Ocarina of Time''.
* Amongst the game’s roster of songs you can conduct, the two that stand out are the Earth God’s Lyric and the Wind God’s Aria. The terms “lyric” and “aria” both tend to refer to a vocal performance that’s accompanied by music, but the only music used in the songs comes from either Medli’s harp or Makar’s violin. So where are the vocals? Well, ''Skyward Sword'' does demonstrate that the Master Sword has a mean set of pipes on her, and both songs are performed in order to restore the Master Sword’s power. Who’s to say Fi wouldn’t want to join in the performances?
* The Iron Boots in this game function exactly how they do in "Ocarina of Time" and "Twilight Princess", with one exception: walking underwater. In fact, putting on the boots and attempting to go into the water will cause Link to automatically take them off. Because otherwise, Link would be able to sink under the ocean and access Hyrule Castle and Ganon's Tower before he's supposed to.
* In the Earth Temple, if you take control of Medli, you may notice Poes are unable to possess her, and ReDeads do not react to her presence whatsoever. It's possible that Medli, being a sage, is protected against them due to her powers preventing them from touching her. Other enemies are still free game, however.
* Most of the major locations from ''Ocarina of Time'' have their logical counterparts in this game’s islands; Windfall Island is Kakariko Village, Dragon Roost is Death Mountain, the Forest Haven is the Lost Woods, the Forsaken Fortress is where Gerudo Desert was, Greatfish Isle is where Lon Lon Ranch should be… but there is no notable island where Zora’s Domain was on the map. Greatfish is too far west and Outset is too far south. And water doesn’t flow uphill, so the kingdom’s water source must’ve been at a higher elevation than the rest of Hyrule. But consider the closest large island to where the domain would be is the Forest Haven; often described as a grotto, with many entrances and exits, a river of pure water flowing from inside, and within spitting distance of the Forbidden Woods, the overgrown remnants of Kokiri Forest. It certainly sounds a lot like Zora’s Domain. We know the Zoras flocked to Death Mountain as they evolved into more avian forms, which would leave their old domain free for the Koroks to settle closer to as the forest became overrun by vicious monsters.
* Speaking of the above, Greatfish Isle being Lon Lon Ranch is a bit of brilliance that’s based on several bits of evidence the game offers.
** For starters, Lon Lon Milk is listed for sale at Windfall Island’s cafe. The milk has to come from somewhere even if “Lon Lon” is just a clever reference.
** The seas around Greatfish are littered with enormous floating barrels, which could contain shipments of milk that hadn’t yet left the island.
** You can find small wooden buckets on the island’s beach, which would be an odd detail to include unless they were used for milking the cows.
** At the mail center on Dragon Roost, the blue symbol on letters addressed to Greatfish Isle looks like it could pass for a bottle of milk, or perhaps even a simplified cow’s head.
** Not only would the location on the map match up, but the beach where you land at Greatfish Isle looks a lot like the road to Gerudo Valley that ran by the ranch in ''Ocarina of Time''. And if you look up the hill to the east, you can glimpse the remains of a hut that used to stand at the top, right where the farmhouse and barn used to be.

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Fridge Horror ]]

* Just the fact that Link is basically the man of the house at about age 12, and that he has to test his mettle the same day of his coming of age by embarking on a journey to rescue his little sister.
* Considering what you learn about Tetra later on, things would've gone pretty badly if her pirates hadn't shot down the Helmaroc King early in the game and it had been able to carry her back to the Forsaken Fortress. [[spoiler:Not only would Ganondorf have gotten his hands on at least a fragment of the Triforce of Wisdom, but without Aryll being captured in Tetra's place, Link wouldn't have been in a position to embark on his journey to defeat him.]]
* In his debut in ''Majora's Mask'', Tingle was just a mapmaker who had a strange obsession with fairies -- weird, but not harmful to anyone. However, in ''The Wind Waker'', in addition to charging Link a ludicrous sum to decipher the Triforce Charts, he also enlists Ankle and David Jr. (one of whom isn't even related to him, by the by) to spin the Tingle Tuner while Tingle himself stands by and does nothing all day. It's even implied that he's abusive to them, as well, seeing as one of them excitedly describes how nice he is when Link comes to visit and asks that the hero do so more often.
* Ganondorf's motives as revealed in this game are made even ''more'' tragic with the release of ''Skyward Sword'', in which the supposed predecessor to his country...is shown to have been the kind of lush, green, fertile landscape that he's always wanted it to be, only to have been reduced to a desert not by any sort of natural causes as one might think, but rather because the selfish members of the ancient civilization that lived there managed to strip it dry and rob it of all its useful resources before leaving what little was left to rust away into a ruinous nothing...Guy's got a bit of a right to be bitter now, doesn't he?
* If you look carefully, you'll notice signs of civilization dotting the twisted remains of Greatfish Isle, implying that people used to live there. Considering you don't see any new characters elsewhere after it's destroyed, though, it seems rather obvious that there were no survivors.
** Building on this, if the Wind Shrine on Dragon Roost Island hadn't been damaged and Cyclos's monument destroyed before Link first arrived, it's implied you could've learned the [[WarpWhistle Ballad of Gales]] right then and there. Not only would this have made getting around a lot less tedious early on...but Greatfish Isle is one of the warp points you can travel to. With that song, Link might have been able to reach Jabun and get the pearl from him ahead of Ganondorf's attack, or at least in time to help defend the island and its residents from whatever it was that befell them. Who knows how many lives might've been spared if that had been the case?
* You may have known these two things separately, but I'll remind you of them here. First, there is a room with a cage that Aryll, Mila, and Maggie are kept in and are rescued from. Second, that room can be ''flooded''. Now, put those two facts together...

[[/folder]]

[[folder: Fridge Logic ]]


On the [[Headscratchers/TheLegendOfZeldaTheWindWaker headscratchers]] page.
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