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In _Fate/Zero_ and _Fate/Stay Night_ , while Saber was referred to as 'king',
she was always a woman.

However, watching _Fate/Apocrypha_ , we bring in Saber of Red:

> Mordred, who keeps saying they are King Arthur's (who is still the woman
> from _Zero_ and _Stay Night_ ) 'son'.

The above character even refers to King Arthur as father and calls themselves
'his' son...

I don't get it... why did they gender swap these characters to women, just to
have them refer to themselves as men (father, son, etc...). What did they want
the audience to do with this? Is there any purpose to this?


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question
type-moon fate-apocrypha
What is the purpose of the weird gender swaps of certain Sabers they throw in in "Fate/Apocrypha"?


> why did they gender swap these characters to women

originally the roles of Shirou and Arturia were the opposite genders as the
original concept for _Fate/Stay Night_ (now as _Fate/Prototype_ ) had [Ayaka
Sajyou](http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Ayaka_Sajyou) as the Master of
[Arthur](http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Saber_\(Fate/Prototype\)) with
Gilgamesh also vying for Ayaka's heart.

however it was Takashi Takeuchi, the artist of _Fate/Stay Night_ who convinced
Kinoko Nasu to change Arthur's Gender

> Kinoko Nasu's original story of Fate, Saber and Shirou were opposite gender
> to now. Takashi Takeuchi convinced to Nasu to change the gender of Saber but
> the essential theme had not been changed, it's the story about legendary
> heroes and "a boy meets a girl."

Source: [Saber (Fate/Stay Night) > Development > Creation and
Conception](http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Saber_\(Fate/stay_night\)#Creation_and_Conception)

In regards to Mordred, originally when Mordred first appeared in one of the
Type-Moon Character material books Kinoko Nasu originally hadn't decided what
Mordred's gender would be until _Fate/Apocrypha_ and originally was siding on
keeping Mordred male, however after Takashi Takeuchi put the idea of adding
Mordred into the lineup it was thought 2 feminine male characters would be too
much

> Mordred first made an appearance in Type-moon's Character material book,
> with Takashi Takeuchi responsible for the character design. At that time
> Kinoko Nasu hadn't decided on Mordred's gender until Fate/Apocrypha. It was
> Takeuchi's idea to put Mordred as a new addition to Fate/Apocrypha. As Saber
> of Red Mordred was originally going to be male like the legend, but it was
> thought that having two male characters look feminine, the other being Rider
> of Black, was too much.

Source: [Saber of Red > Development > Creation and
Conception](http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Mordred#Concept_and_Conception)

> Nasu: "Mordred is a girl, definitely. A man with that sort of outward
> appearance is... well, I guess a certain kind of person would consider it a
> prize, anyway. **1** (laughs)"
>
> Higashide: Saber was originally going to be male like the legend, but it was
> thought that having two male characters look feminine, the other being Rider
> of Black, was too much.

Source: [Saber of Red > References > Citation 4: TYPE-MOON Ace Vol. 8 -
Fate/Apocrypha interview with Yuichiro Higashide & Nasu Kinoko, p.080 What's
Mordred's gender?](http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Mordred#cite_note-TMA-3)

* * *

As for why, in universe, Mordred refers to herself as Arturia's "Son" she
could be well aware of her own legend. the Arthurian Legends in the Nasuverse
is still closely related to ours and in _Fate/Stay Night_ when Shirou
discovers Arturia's identity as King Arthur he does talk about how the Legend
of King Arthur wasn't clear on who the King was pointing out that some legends
suggested that King Arthur was a group of people.

since we know that when a Servant is summoned they are given extra knowledge
to adapt to the time period (ie. Arturia's abilities to ride a Motor Bike, not
thinking that the Airplane she flew in on was magic) we could suspect that
Mordred is made aware of her Legend.

There is also the fact she wanted to be King and the King is generally the Son
of the previous King but aside from that still male. Merlin helped create the
illusion Arturia was male by making into a ~~futanari~~ psudo-male so she
could conceive a child with Guinevere so Mordred may keep saying "Son" to keep
the idea and she can replace her "Father"

There is also the fact that she abhors any discussion of her gender and
displayed clear killing intention even towards her own Master, saying with no
uncertainty that the topic is never to be brought up before her. though
haven't not seen _Fate/Apocrypha_ or read it properly i do not know what the
discussion entailed and what she abhors about it (is it people referring to
her as a woman or man? or that she could be like Nero and doesn't consider
Gender an issue)

Out of Universe, we can probably speculate that either

  * Takashi Takeuchi just has a thing for it which is why so many of the [Saberfaces](http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Saberface) using Arturia's design are Gender Reverse from their historical basis (Nero, Okita) and is projecting that in the Nasuverse (do we really believe he didn't suggest Female Mordred for the _Fate/Apocrypha_ lineup when putting the idea into Kinoko Nasu's head)

  * Simply people like cute girls. Taro Yoko, the creator of _Nier: Automata_ said it himself [when being asked](https://archive.fo/d8dMy) why he designed 2B like he did. ~~Medea~~ Takashi [loves how cute Arturia looks](https://i.stack.imgur.com/qVoX2.jpg) and obviously the fans love them too, more so when you consider that the manga's target demographic is Shōnen and Seinen which are both male audiences which we can probably attribute to having been the same for the original Eroge Visual Novel and character design often is influenced by target audience (ie. why most Vampires in female oriented works (Kaname Kuran in _Vampire Knight_ , Angel and Spike in _Buffy_ and _Angel_ ) are handsome men)

* * *

1: i believe he's talking about Takashi here give [his noble
phantasm](http://typemoon.wikia.com/wiki/Takashi_Takeuchi)


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