A Simple Question

[leeranspy]

Hello

Morphing heals the injured, right? If so, why didn't Elfangor morph to heal himself when he crash-landed in the construction site? Quite a glaring inconsistency.

[jsjosh]

#1 is pretty much full of inconsistencies (you know, Jake thought-speaking in human form, etc. etc. etc.) but I always sort of rationalized it as Elfangor just resigning himself to the fact that he was going to die. He was returning to Earth to stop the Yeerk invasion of the planet that he lived on for years and had a very close connection to. The Yeerks ambush the Andalite fleet, the Yeerk invasion of Earth thus seems inevitable, so all Elfangor can do is crash-land his fighter in the grass field where he buried the Time Matrix in order to change everything. That plan fails because it's buried under tons of concrete in an abandoned construction site, and the situation looks pretty terrible, but wow, in the distance he can see his human son and the four other human kids the Ellimist once told him would band together and become an incredibly important force in his current timeline. What a ridiculous coincidence!

I just feel like all of these circumstances lined up together at once and Elfangor just realized that it was his time and destiny (or the Ellimist, whatever you'd like to call it) was taking charge.

[Dameg]

There already were many discussions and ideas about that... There even would be a thread somewhere about that...

[Phoenix004]

I can't remember if it was here or on Classic, but I recall having a giant debate about this very question. There are about a million possible answers and none of them are really right or wrong. The point is that it had to happen for the series to happen so just go with whichever answer makes the most sense to you.

Personally I'd go with something along the lines of Elfangor believing that his time had come.

[CDJV]

Morphing takes energy, right? I'm guessing that Elfangor's wounds were so bad that he would use up all of his strength by morph and then be completely helpless, even if he was morphed.

[Dameg]

It was on this RAF, I'm pretty sure... I remember people talking about it not so long ago. They guessed many things, like for example "Elfangor wanted to die", "he didn't want his son and his friends to be in danger" etc.

[esplin]

Simple question gets a simple answer: In my opinion, he wanted to die.

[DinosaurNothlit]

You know what I think?  I think that, when the Ellimist saved Elfangor from his fate as a human nothlit, he simply didn't return his morphing powers.  Think about that.  The Ellimist only said that he would return him to his past life, not that he would have morphing powers again.  Plus, it's never mentioned that Elfangor tries to morph ever again after being returned to Andalite form.  One could even go so far as to assume that the Ellimist made it so Elfangor couldn't regain the morphing power.  Elfangor may have thus been the equivalent of an Andalite nothlit.

And it would have made sense for the Ellimist to do this, too, because if Elfangor could still gain the morphing power, what would stop him from going back to earth, finding Loren again, and going back to how things were?  Since the Ellimist wouldn't want that, he might have taken measures to made sure that wouldn't happen.

So, to answer the question, I think that Elfangor didn't morph because he couldn't.

[Essam 293]

You know what I think?  I think that, when the Ellimist saved Elfangor from his fate as a human nothlit, he simply didn't return his morphing powers.  Think about that.  The Ellimist only said that he would return him to his past life, not that he would have morphing powers again.  Plus, it's never mentioned that Elfangor tries to morph ever again after being returned to Andalite form.  One could even go so far as to assume that the Ellimist made it so Elfangor couldn't regain the morphing power.  Elfangor may have thus been the equivalent of an Andalite nothlit.

And it would have made sense for the Ellimist to do this, too, because if Elfangor could still gain the morphing power, what would stop him from going back to earth, finding Loren again, and going back to how things were?  Since the Ellimist wouldn't want that, he might have taken measures to made sure that wouldn't happen.

So, to answer the question, I think that Elfangor didn't morph because he couldn't.

Nice theory. I haven't heard this one before. I can definitely believe that.

I always just assumed that he was too drained to morph. He just fought on the battlefield, crashed a damaged plane, and then had to give the Animorphs their power so they wouldn't be so defenseless, with the Yeerks also up his butt, so time was against him as well.

[Dameg]

Yeah, Dinosaur found a good way to explain it.

[Bladeh Mercury]

I looked through my Andalite Chronicles. It did say he was too weak to morph.

I support the "he was too weak to morph" theory

[esplin]

Yeah but he could have tried, the animorphs morphed under much worse circumstances.  I support my theory, which I will restate.  He wanted to die.

[goom]

i think he knew it was his time.

[spoiler]maybe he suffered head trauma in the crash? [/spoiler]

[esplin]

See, goom has it right.

[jsjosh]

You know what I think?  I think that, when the Ellimist saved Elfangor from his fate as a human nothlit, he simply didn't return his morphing powers.  Think about that.  The Ellimist only said that he would return him to his past life, not that he would have morphing powers again.  Plus, it's never mentioned that Elfangor tries to morph ever again after being returned to Andalite form.  One could even go so far as to assume that the Ellimist made it so Elfangor couldn't regain the morphing power.  Elfangor may have thus been the equivalent of an Andalite nothlit.

And it would have made sense for the Ellimist to do this, too, because if Elfangor could still gain the morphing power, what would stop him from going back to earth, finding Loren again, and going back to how things were?  Since the Ellimist wouldn't want that, he might have taken measures to made sure that wouldn't happen.

So, to answer the question, I think that Elfangor didn't morph because he couldn't.

This is such an awesome theory.

I was thinking about it and realized a flaw, though: doesn't someone who already has the morphing power have to be one of the people touching the Escafil Device in order to transfer the power to others? (I'm just thinking about how they gave the powers to David, and to the auxiliary Animorphs in #50.) But then if you take that idea to its logical conclusion, you come up with the chicken-and-the-egg puzzle of how the inventor of the device (um, Mr. Escafil?) was able to give the power to himself when no one had yet possessed it. So it could go either way.

And, also, if the Ellimist had taken away Elfangor's morphing power, he could have also reinstated it once he had crashed just so that he could create the Animorphs.

[OrcaMorph]

Yeah but he could have tried, the animorphs morphed under much worse circumstances.

The Animorphs had more experience in morphing than anyone else ever had.  Morphing is like sprinting, and the animorphs are like greek messengers.  Most andalite warriors are like junior high track sprinters