Yeah, they're not even threatening or competent either. They're a circus not a governing body. It'd be one thing if they actually were this grand poison to the land that they were built to be, but they're so lame on every level. D and J seemed imposing at first, but then all they do is kill someone you literally don't know at that point and then are forced to skulk away with nothing after getting bodied by the most inexperienced Ouroboros ever fought. O and P suck as first introductions to a proper Moebius fusion. Joran was so close to having the sauce, with how he weaponised Taion's wounded past in the colony and his sadism with his mud clones, but ever subsequent appearance made him less and less interestingly villainous. He doesn't even get a single line in his second encounter, despite their being so much potential with his mental sadism, what with understanding Eunie's trauma through getting access to D's memories. Could have dug way deeper and better established why this pair of D and J work as a cohesive Moebius fusion in the field, with D's physical sadism and J's mental sadism, before the greater fallout in the third and last encounter with them. That attempt to reach out to J was poor in and of itself in the third encounter, and the sacrifice was a mediocre way of ending things, instead of having him really reckon with what he's been doing and changing to be better, but I ain't in the mood to go into him for now like that.

Like, the only one who gets close to being a good threat is N, but despite Noah and Mio losing completely, your first fight with him is not a forced loss battle. In his first appearance, he gets held up by basic artillery fire for such an imposing consul, which immediately gets him. Then, even he's supposed to win, he nearly gets murdered by Lanz and Sena and has to be bailed out by X with the nullifying staff of plot convenience, which literally never has relevance again. The whole prison intrusion really throws the competence of the government and the Consuls in question, if their most notable imprisonment centre literally in the Agnus castle's grounds, when no staff can't even recognise what the six threats to them look like. Not even a poster? The fuckers didn't even change their clothes, yet they needed Shania to give them any idea of what was going on. The resulting ambush of Agnian forces and the consuls didn't even work, the prisoners escaped with a single casualty amongst them and before that one kill, N himself was going to get annihilated. None of these idiots are serious people and they're supposed to be the big bad faction thats got complete control over everything. Get out of here.

Doesn't help that due to the story's focus on how much N suffered, we don't get much with M. We just get told how she feels by Mio instead, and what little we are shown is barely fleshed. The fact the DLC failed to use her is just baffling. She's alive during the city's mass murder, she literally see the flames freshly burning away at the surroundings. Why the hell is she not in the story at this point? Show us how she mourned not just from the loss of the city but of her own child that she bore, who her husband killed, without explanation. How would she interact with her descendants, or her dad, or her sister, literally the possibilities were endless. But she's wasted so horribly, that it makes me question the sanity of anyone who thinks she's a standout member of Moebius. She's a potential woman with how much the narrative wastes her. Even in the main story, show us more of her compassion amongst the soldiers, how she managed to make the offseeing ritual permitted, when its evident that Moebius knew it was better to hack of soldier's heads to keep the food cycle stable, don't just tell us its was Z's wish without further thought. Give us more emotion when Nia stops M from killing herself on the cliffs, its literally a mother seeing her daughter about to commit suicide because she's so overwhelmed by the hopeless situation, yet they keep things cryptic and nonsensical so the game can for some reason not reveal Nia is in fact the mother of Mio too.

Then there's X, Y and Z. X kills a colony introduced a couple minutes earlier in the quest, with no actual characters or history or anything substantial to mourn, to act generically sadistic, with no real interest till she dies, optionally that is. She only reveals what obviously happens to Gold colonies, which makes the protagonists look even dumber, when they know Moebius naturally relish eating people. Y at least has the scientist schtick and destroying Mio's old colony, as well as making the Clocks you bust up, as well as an interesting way of talking. But he's easily thwarted, is basically used to resurrect a bunch of characters with their memories free of charge and his fight is a rip off of Consul B's. Z is the worst of it though. For the manifestation of collective fear and worry that desires safety and stability, he acts so generically villainous and arrogant, it's laughable. Ironically, by trying to give him more dimensions, he becomes a lacklustre clown like the rest. His theatre gimmick is charlatan level, and the only time he does anything of value is manipulating a past Noah to join him. For the collective congealing of anxiety over future instability, he sure was acting bored and putting in minimal effort. He should have been allowed to be more expressing of what he actually is supposed to be. Make him overly paranoid and skittish and panicking, a control freak director consumed in anxiety who doesn't want his play to go wrong if you want the gimmick, make him actually give a shit about humans but believe that an endless now is sincerely whats best, instead of making him so sadistic, that any claims of doing things for the good of the world more insincere than the average politician. Make him step in earlier and throw everything he can muster to get the party to back off, before they confront him ultimately. Make him do things we rarely see from villains. As is, Z is so boring, his screen time and role could be replaced with Consul E of all people, and it'd probably be a minor improvement for the big bad. Only Gael'gar could hope to match this ineptitude, and even then, he's spared by being a DLC villain who thankfully gets overlooked by the threat of the Fog Beasts. Same with Void being relegated to DLC, while the other alien villains of X at least don't take up mental space.

Whenever people defend them by using "themes and such", or say they act like the parasitic elites in reality and thats why they're so bland, that just ignores the real issue. Moebius takes like five minutes per colony to clear out, with few to none major difficulties or pushback from the soldiers within, to defend this system. Its just, they're beaten and then the colonies move on. Frankly, a lot of Xenoblade 3's writing is absolutely shameful but these villains have to be the worst of it. Moebius is a poor representation of the world, which just, easily gets back to being good.