The quote “Humanity stands as the single greatest threat to the Galaxy.” from the recent Halo 4 Gameplay release trailer. And it’s starting to make alot of sense now that I think about it. It fits right in with human nature, and the behaviour of alot of human characters in the recent franchise.
For starters, I’d like to make note of Humanity’s single most consistent behaviour. Humans fight. We are a species built on war. Every human nation that exists today only does so because they fought and conquered the land they have. Take any country in Europe, Asia, North America, or pretty much any continent. All the nations were born in blood and war. All the land won by the Sword, Spear, Bow, and Gun.
Early Halo history in the 2500s is the same. The insurrection war was the result of the UNSC’s basically Fascist laws. The Innies believed they deserved freedom, and became excessively drastic in their attempts to gain it. The response was war. Humans killing Humans over planet, instead of country. You almost feel bad for the Insurrectionists, honestly if it wasn’t for the fact that they go to any means, including suicide bombings of innocent civilians, you’d probably consider them the “good guys” of the pre-Covenant war.
Then the Covenant show up. And from 2525 to the Halo Trilogy in 2552-3, they lay waste to human planet after human planet, and wipe out human fleets in an instant.* (* = read next paragraph for a mini rant about poor storytelling). This was humanity’s only united war, in which they were ACTUALLY the good guys, or rather, the ‘innocents’. Reason being, the war began because of a lie. The Prophets only attacked humanity when they discovered the Covenant religion was “false” and the Humans, being Reclaimers, were the heir to the Librarian’s legacy. This is why throughout the entire early franchise of the Halo series, humanity has been portrayed as Heroic, and Innocent. Because the war was literally entirely about their survival, and not about their conquest.
*Or at least that’s how it was supposed to be, until the lore somehow changed to humans WINNING every battle, and always magically taking out MORE covie ships than UNSC ones lost. I know you want to write heroic stories, but honestly lets face it. If the UNSC we see and read about in the games (worst of all ODST), movie (worst of all the Package and Prototype), and books (Read anything with a human main character, even non-Spartans) was the Canon UNSC, the Covenant would have been STEAMROLLED by 2526. Bungie/343i did a REALLY bad job making it feel like humanity was desperately losing the war, in anything they did after the release of Halo 2.
Following the UNSC/Covenant war. And the Flood uprising, and defeat which has no real connection to the point. We come to the Forerunner Saga, and Glasslands Trilogy of books. I will begin with the Glasslands series. In Glasslands, we begin to see the darker side of Humanity for the first real time in “present” Halo. An earlier “hint” at this dark side was the short story “Mona Lisa” in Halo Evolutions. Here we see humanity begin to purposely manipulate the Elites, which after the events of Halo 3, for the most part are vying for peace with humanity, or at least to just be left alone. But ONI specifically, begins toying with them, and actually trying to pit them against themselves. This manipulation eventually leads to the alliance between Jul 'Mdama and Avu Med 'Telcam, and the beginning of a civil war between a group of Elites vying for war with humanity, and a group of Elites that want an alliance.
Now it isn’t all of Humanity that is like this, just like the Elites, Humans have Xeno-sympathisers as well, but unfortunately, because of the works of ONI and Jul 'Mdama, it seems peace is never an option. And so Humanity creates another war, this time with the goal of the complete annihilation of the Sangheili race. This war is then escalated when the Storm Covenant, which is lead by Jul himself, discovers the possible existence of a Forerunner God on Requiem. And learns that this God despises humanity and wants them dead.
Ok, now we flash back many thousands of years. The Forerunners live as a, basically imperial species, which “rules” over all others, and protects the Mantle, which I’m somewhat unclear about but appears to be extremely significant to their religion, and grants them power over the other races of the galaxy. The Forerunners are generally considered by themselves to be an innocent, and peaceful race. But they are not unlike humans, and were also born in war. They conquered the Precursors, and stole the Mantle away from them, which is how they attained their god-like technology and power. The other races seemed to worship them, but never truly understood them. The two races of note being San 'Shyumm (Prophets), and Humans.
The Precursors were not entire defeated though, they left behind a nasty gift, The Flood, and the Flood ravaged the galaxy, all the races alike struggling to survive, until eventually it was the humans that managed to force them beyond the rim of the galaxy. However the Flood wasn’t the only threat the Forerunners had. Humanity rebelled against them, and in an attack of genocidal intention, and lust for power, attempted to take the Mantle for themselves, just as the Forerunners had done to the Precursors long ago. When the Forerunners defeated Humanity, they de-evolved them for the sake of peace. The Forerunner leading their armies was the Didact. And after this war, he lost all trust in the Humans, and he began to see them as a threat, a much greater threat than the Flood ever was. If they got hold of the Mantle, they would abuse it, probably even worse than the Forerunners or Precursors ever did.
Fast-Forwarding back to the present, we have Halo 4. In Halo 4 an ancient evil is said to awaken. This is believed to be the Didact (Not a spoiler, Frankie said it out loud in an interview), but now I’m not so sure. If Humanity is a greater threat to the galaxy than the Flood ever was, and their bloodlust, and need to completely eradicate their enemies, whether it be each-other, the Elites, or the Forerunners, is becoming their one most apparent trait in recent Halo history, and now revealed to go back as far as the Forerunner rule, it begins to make it appear that Humans themselves, are in fact an ancient evil. That humans threaten to destroy everything to put themselves on top, to be the most powerful force the universe has ever known. But again, I’m not so sure. This behaviour was also noted in the Forerunners when they brutally wiped out the Precursors…
So what is the Ancient Evil. What is causing all this war? My final theory:
The Ancient Evil is The Mantle.
Much like the One Ring of Sauron, the Mantle grants unimaginable power to it’s bearer. And I believe it calls to it’s next bearer, and it creates a bloodlust in them, gives them the drive to take it by force from it’s previous owner, in this case, the Master Builder. And the Mantle wants Humanity in control next, it has wanted Humanity in control for over 100,000 years.
I am beginning to think Humanity will appear to become more and more evil as the Reclaimer trilogy progresses. That they will kill, slaughter, and give no mercy to anyone who stands in their way, any race who stands in their way. And until the Mantle is destroyed “Humanity stands as the single greatest threat to the Galaxy.”