I knew this was coming sooner or later. Oh man. We got the heartless. We nobodies. Somebodies. Anybodies? just loads of shit all over the place. The fact that we have Disney involved and also Square Enix means that this is going to get complicated very quickly. For the sake of brevity, I am only going to cover the very basics of the overarching paradigm. I am not going to go into anything regarding different worlds. 

Surface Level Lore

From what I can gather (from going deep, deep into YouTube University for the lore), there are multiple worlds. Tons of worlds. And there are barriers between these worlds that are normally unable to be breached. My understanding is that worlds are very vast—and not as small as they appear in the Kingdom Hearts games. 

Only Keyblade wielders can actually ‘unlock’ these barriers and travel between worlds. And only people who have an exceptionally strong wills are capable of being Keyblade welders. Back in the day, there were many schools that taught Keyblade stuff. Most of them are gone. This is important to remember—because the theory that I know is that the current Keyblade schools/traditions were/are the exception in their absolutism regarding emotions. 

Like people, worlds have Hearts. And the origin of all Hearts is a world otherwise locked (except to the Chi-blade) that is known as Kingdom Hearts. And all sorts of wacky shit can happen when you split a body from its heart. People can get split, merged, and all sorts of buck wild nonsense. 

Light and Dark

Oh boy here we FUCKING go. So Kingdom Hearts suffers from a huge issue—and that issue is the inherent racism in Light and Dark. Now, this is partially due to the Disney influence. But, within the canon materials, Light = goodness = absolute positivity and Darkness = any negative emotion = no good and horrible and bad. If a Lightside Keyblade wielder gives up hope, they can lose their powers forever. 

And I have a lot of issue with that without going into the details. Because oh boy that is a discussion for another time. 

The thing is, this is also the huge problem I have with the Jedi/Sith paradigm. As a fellow Geekomancer, and fan of Kingdom Hearts, has stated that going fully into this Light/Dark is “going full emotional constipation.” The theory is that Back in the Day, there were other Keyblade schools that were far more balanced in their approach to emotions. 

Equipment 

First and foremost—you have your Keyblade. In addition to being a weapon, a Keyblade can open any door—including the barriers between worlds. A Keyblade is also special in that it can damage Heartless. Keyblades can be made to suit different worlds by equipping Keychains. 

Yeah. Cute lil’ accessories. Now this, this I love. I am all about little accessories and add ons. My understanding is that Keyblades themselves can decide if a person is a good fit for them a lot. 

What is interesting is that the Keyblade fits both the role of the weapon as well as a key. In magic, Keys can open up possibilities, barriers, etc. But, they can also lock them closed. So because of that aspect, this paradigm is more flexible and useful than one that is 100% only based on combat. 

That said, based on the lore there were only very few people who could craft keyblades. But, as a magician who is very much interested in the creation of artifacts…this paradigm very much intrigues me. Crafting either Keyblades or Keychains, or both, sounds extremely fun to me. 

Considerations and Potential Drawbacks

Like my criticisms of the Madoka and Magical Girl Lyrical Nano paradigms, this one doesn’t have a shit ton of utility by itself. It seems most useful for astral travel/meditation/combat. If the practitioner is interested in pop culture spirits, then I can see this being super useful as a way to access different worlds. I also think this could be a very useful side-paradigm for any magician that works with multiple paradigms. 

At the same time, I am not surprised that Disney’s involvement has lead to a bit of (as Jynx said) Emotional Constipation within this paradigm. It is entirely possible that this would not be the case and would not have as many worrying aspects if Disney was not involved. That said, I won’t personally be traveling to any Disney Worlds soon.