It's ya boi, super scorn bro, back at it again with another scorn post
And today we'll be talking about the lore card IV: Saturno from the tangled web lore book
Spoilers ahead
So within this specific card we are shown Crows first real gunfight with the Scorn. It's mentioned that he's faced them before but mostly from far away, picking them off one by one.
However in this page the scorn have sent a raiding party to spider's store house, and Crow is tasked with clearing them out
Just gonna nerd out for a sec, omg the way the scorn were portrayed in this card was AMAZING. Bungie really leaned on the rotting flesh and body horror aspects of the Scorn here and I absolutely love it. Highlighting their boils and oozing flesh, brown rags tucked into dripping cavities etc it was all amazing
Anyway, in the card our dashing Crow is pinned to the floor by a Scorn Raider. The Raider starts clawing at Crow's stomach and actually starts gutting him, all the while speaking of Crow the entire time. Repeating the words: father father father
Now I wouldn't bring this up if Crow didn't state shortly after [quote]It was one thing to be torn apart by a mindless creature of madness, but this… this would not be allowed.[/quote]
Practically saying that the Scorn here are not in fact the mindless killing machines we took them as, but are self aware and genuinely ENJOYING what they're doing.
I always assumed the scorn were mostly cackling lunatics, and that the Barons were the real "brains" behind the army. But this shows us that at least Raiders and up have genuine sentience and revel in the chaos they create. And while definitely not sane, they aren't as mindless as the Taken or instinctual as a war beast
Man, I love Scorn
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Hate to be the technical guy but that doesn’t sound like it proves they are sentient. It’s very well possible crow meant it in a sense that he found the situation creepy even for a deranged zombie. That being said I do think that there are a couple possible explanations for “intelligent” scorn. Option A: the puppeteer theory. All scorn with exception to Fikrul are just puppets more akin to animals and any personality or sentience they display is them merely reflecting his own thoughts. In the case of the barons they’d all be mental reflections of how Fikrul perceived his comrades in life and their scorn forms just mimic his perception. Option B: day of the dead theory. Like zombies in Day of the dead the Scorn are able to develop individual personalities and only act as individuals when they overcome their based instincts. The barons somehow retained their original minds likely thanks to Fikrul. Either way the scorn are best boys.