Warning: This article contains spoilers of varying intensity for the Wrathgate world event, the new Arthas Novel , and the Warcraft Comic Series. It is also 3 pages long. Be sure to click the links at the bottom to head to the next part!

Among WoW players these days, it seems to be a popular opinion that King Varian Wrynn is a narrow minded short-sighted bigot who will lead the Alliance to ruin. This is an easy opinion to have, since he does show a considerable amount of anger at times when dealing with the Horde, and it's long been the general opinion that "no-one is truly evil" in the Horde and Alliance conflict. This is even the opinion of some of my fellow writers.

Here's my problem with this: The underlying causes of Varian Wrynn's anger are all unconditionally justified. Varian Wrynn is not angry at the Horde because of a series of misunderstandings and misinterpretations. He's been witness to or victim of multiple wrongdoings and atrocities perpetuated by the Horde time and time again, both the new Horde and the Old. Most, if not all of these times, the wrongdoings have been the result of outright maliciousness on the part of the Horde or its members, and in the case the so-called "peaceful" New Horde, there's been no sign whatsoever that Thrall is punishing or disciplining the perpetrators of these acts, and at the least, it is clear that he is not properly dealing with the consequences.
Regarding the First Fall of Stormwind

The first fall of Stormwind occurred when Varian Wrynn was a young man. So this was Varian's first encounter with the Orcs. Now mind you, this Orcish Horde had no justification for the war. They were not being driven from land, they were not starving or lost, nor were they addressing some ancient affront by the Human race. No, these Orcs were foreign invaders from another dimension

Consider, also, how they eventually razed Stormwind. They were able to do so by way of Garona, a Half-Orc assassin acting on behalf of the Horde. So Varian not only saw that the Orcish Army was a mindlessly violent army bent on the destruction of the human race, but that the one Orc who might have been different, the one Orc who appeared to have befriended humanity and proven that not how all Orcs were mindless beasts, betrayed them and proved herself an enemy to humanity by murdering Varian's beloved Father.

Horde apologists will tell you that Garona was acting under mind control. There's two problems with this. First, Varian has no real way of knowing Garona was mind-controlled at the time. All he knows is that an Orc gained the trust and friendship of his father, then used it to betray and murder him, causing the downfall of his kingdom and very nearly the downfall of all humanity. Secondly, Garona was still under the control of the Shadow Council, which was at the time solely an Orcish organization and the de facto leadership of the Horde. Either way, it was the Horde who killed his father and nearly wiped out his people.

On Varian's loss of his second father and Humanity's loss of their greatest Hero

[View Remaining 14 Paragraphs]