How Halo 2 Critiques Religion

Sorry to break it to you media literacy bros but Halo 2 is actually about being the strongest super soldier in the whole universe and blowing shit up all while jamming out to Blow Me Away by Breaking Benjamin.

I'm not sure how people got Halo as being anti religion. You put it so well. Its not about religion being bad its about people blindly following what they are told and using their religion to justify violence while ignoring the fact that what they are doing is wrong even when the being they consider gods are telling them they are wrong.

This kind of production quality and analysis is comparable with large channels. You also speak with a clear voice which is underrated. Clearly this is a channel that has the ability to grow large in size and I'm excited to stumble upon it so early.

I thought it criticized theocracy, rather than belief in any religion. Edit: also, there have been atheist nations that also demand absolute fealty from their officials and citizens. China is a modern example, but there was also the USSR, Albania under Hoxha, Pot’s regime, and Cuba. Castro was even quoted as saying that he required elected officials to be atheists because he thought it would make them obey orders without questioning them.

I didn't realize I was watching someone with 100 subs and less than 500 views until the very end. Really good work. I really hope this blows up super soon.

Well, if this wasn't the strangest intersection of my interests.

I'm just going to say that you're going to make it someday. This video was shot, written, and produced so perfectly. The fact you went to an actual Church and filmed inside of their for this he's insane. Keep up the amazing work

Bless the YouTube algorithm for recommending me this masterpiece

Just to further add on to the point at 5:38, Chief almost does die to save humanity. The gap between Halo 3 and 4 can be seen as the days where Jesus was in the tomb after crucifixion, but Chief doesn't actually die so it's another "almost" connection.

Halo is deeply religious in its themes, I mean even in the names of the things, like the ARK, the flood, the halos. It also kind of gives context to those events by saying that in human history the biblical tales where actually just the ancient humanity as forerunners dealing with the flood. Halo is so well done and its a shame people often misunderstand it or write it off as nothing. Halo deserves more love.

The fact that you don't have any views (currently) does not in any way reflect upon the quality of your content. I subbed to the channel 0:35 seconds into this video. Absolutely sick job, keep it up.

This is a superbly made essay. The parallel from Paul to the Arbiter is an interesting one that I've never considered. I've been playing Halo 2 for nearly 20 years at this point and it's ideas like this that made it my favorite story in video games for so long. At least until I finally played Bioshock a few years ago. I bet you could do a killer video on the philosophies in that game!

back at it again with these amazing essays also I love that you used halo 2 anniversary footage because that game's cutscenes are absolutely beautiful

Came into this expecting to see the standard, Twitter-tier fare of an atheist using Halo 2 to bash religious people. I was pleasantly surprised. This video was very well done.

YOU ONLY HAVE 200 SUBS??? Bro I thought I Missread that. The quality of this is wild. Keep it up!!

I think describing Halo's theme as "anti-fundamentalist" is a bit reductive. Of course it goes without saying that blind faith is central to Arbiter's character and the Covenant, but that is only part of the larger over-arching theme which is anti false prophecy. Bungie's Halo games are a somewhat direct allegory to the Book of Revelation, with the Prophets deceiving their alien subjects into rejecting God (or the Reclaimers in this case) and instead worshipping the rings which will bring about the end times, and also by incidentally releasing the flood in their defiance to God (or in this case by defying the Oracles when they try to tell them that Humans are Reclaimers as well as the true purpose of the Forerunner installations) which also brings about the end times. So it would be more apt to say that Halo 2 isn't really critiquing religion, but rather the rejection of true metaphysical religion by warning of false prophecy from a biblical context. By necessity this also requires critiquing fundamentalism since, after all, you would have to be blind in faith in order to literally defy God.

Severely underrated channel, here's to hoping you pop-off.

I’m Jewish. It comforts me that if my people weren’t enslaved by the Egyptians we wouldn’t have Halo. My favourite game of all time. Sorry to my ancestors but ur sacrifice was worth it.

the issues that halo 2s development led to the cliffhanger ending which received a very different conclusion than intended in halo 3. The original ending revealing that the prophet of truth wasn't just another fanatic, but someone who knew how to manipulate the faith of others to benefit himself. Unfortunately the ending we got never gave a clear explanation for his actions, which I believe plays a big part in people misunderstanding what halo is criticising about religion

I once had a friend describe Halo 2 and The Covenant by asking me "You know what came between Halo and Halo 2? 9/11. And The Covenant are in a lot of ways like non religious religious extremists. Non religious because they aren't going by pure faith and their literal Prophets are flesh and blood telling them what to do directly."