I love Zant. Or rather, I don't love Zant, but I love the role he plays.
The guy is bloated with power he didn't earn, doesn't deserve, and can't handle. He is unworthy of the authority he craves, and he knows it. The flashback to his meeting with Ganondorf is one of the scenes I found the most memorable. It's such a demonstration of sheer frustrated impotence! He will never get the throne. He will always serve people he despises. Things will not change. And he can't take it. He walks outside, alone, facing the terrifying infinite void of the twilight realm. He screams, he cries out in his pitiable high-pitched voice. He throws himself to the floor, bashes his own face on the cold stone in a berserk fit of self-loathing. In a way, on the surface, it's almost comical, but it's a display of crude emotion you don't see often in this medium.
And the thing is, Zant is not crazy. Once he gets his undeserved power, he tries to act like he's worthy of it. For a long time, he completely keeps his cool. There are setbacks, but he sees them as temporary. The way he allows Zelda to live, it almost looks like he's humoring his enemies; just after reviving Stallord, he makes a point of turning his back to Link before teleporting away. But at the final showdown in the twilight palace, it becomes obvious that he's a sham. His façade cracks. He can't resist ranting at Midna, he leaps about in the most undignified way, he contorts his body in positions that make no sense. It's like he's back on that balcony, face to face with his own pathetic self. He's been driven out of two worlds, cornered in the last room of his last fortress, without a hostage or an escape route, without imagination or skill. The only trials he can think of putting Link through involve obstacles he's already defeated, and when that fails, all he has left is a pair of swords he clearly has no idea how to use, another man's brute force, and a natural propensity for flailing around in blind, spastic rage.
And what happens at the very end? His false benefactor is beaten; his god is nailed to the ground by the sword stuck through his gut. Zant realizes, in a rare moment of true lucidity, that Ganondorf isn't worthy either. The Gerudo is confident, cunning, talented, almost suave, everything that Zant is not, but he too uses borrowed power to selfish ends. In a suicidal act of spite, he deals the final blow, and destroys the source of his own immortality. That was the only last word he was ever going to have.
Yeah I've been watching a TP LP, how'd you guess?
