sunnysmomisdumbnotevil

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

Basil's flower is the daisy, not the sunflower

So I don't know how hot this take is, or if most people are already aware, but I have never seen a full write-up of all the evidence that supports this, so I thought I'll make a post about it.

WHY SUNFLOWERS?

Most people associate Basil with sunflowers because of this scene:

(don't know why he is telling a tree about this)

It makes sense, right? In this sequence, he goes through all the flowers in his garden and for each of them, he explicitly says that he associates them with each of the major characters. Lily of the valley for Mari, roses for Hero, gladioluses for Aubrey, cacti for Kel, and tulips for Sunny.

Except, he doesn't actually say this for sunflowers. It's just easy assume because that would parallel all the other flowers he discusses. Instead, he says that sunflowers represent what he wants to be like.

An unspoiled player won't know at this point that this is not the real world of the game, but instead just a figment of Sunny's imagination. That also makes it easier to take at face value, and by the time we learn about this we have already internalised this information and don't question it again.

I think it's reasonable to assume that real world Basil has said something like this, and this sequence is a representation of that in Sunny's headspace, because I don't think Sunny would come up with something like that on his own.

Still, it's important to keep in mind the nature of headspace Basil here as well: later, when we meet Stranger in Black Space, he tells us that Basil was "split in half". Stranger reflects the less happy aspects of Basil in Sunny's mind, the ones that confront him both with the existence of The Truth and also that Basil is a real person in the real world who is suffering because of Sunny's avoidance of the truth.

In turn, headspace Basil is an idealised version of Basil that only has his most positive traits. We see this in his introduction in the prologue. He is happy and cheerful and sociable around his friends, and even willing to immediately forgive and befriend a guy that wanted to kidnap him. Once we meet real world Basil, it becomes clear that this elides other aspects of his personality: his insecurity and awkwardness and skittishness and social anxiety.

They are inconvenient for Sunny's perfect headspace world, so that part of him gets banished to Black Space. So in a sense, headspace Basil may actually come close to the aspiration he mentions, coming close to what the sunflower represents. Insecure real world Basil, not really.

(This turned out really long so I put my evidence under a readmore. Please click through.)

RAIN AREA

Okay. So we have reason to be skeptical of the sunflower. But why daisies? The game gives a few hints. The first is this Black Space room:

When you pick up the key, you find this single daisy where Stranger has been standing. Why a daisy? It feels odd, because it apparently doesn't connect to anything. In fact, the whole room feels a little odd, because unlike other room it doesn't really reference anything from Sunny's memory (besides maybe the Rain Memory). That in itself makes the daisy significant.

This is what Stranger says to Omori before he disappears:

Notably, he addresses Omori as SUNNY here. And this is also the most direct plea he makes to him to do what he needs to do to come back to Basil and his friends.

Most direct connection to Basil, followed by the daisy.

A HOME FOR FLOWERS

My next piece of evidence comes from the soundtrack. As you know, Basil's theme, "A Home For Flowers", has several variations, usually named after flowers:

A Home For Flowers (Tulip)

A Home For Flowers (Empty)

A Home For Flowers (Daisy)

A Home For Flowers (Sunflower)

We know why tulips and sunflowers are here, given the above imagery. But again, what are daisies doing here? If we look at where these pieces are used, it becomes even clearer.

Tulip is Basil's house in headspace. It uses Sunny's flower because headspace Basil has been created to please Sunny. Empty is Basil's house in Faraway. Pretty sure the "empty" refers to Basil's life being empty of joy ever since Mari's death and Sunny's isolation, absent of the flowers that make him happy.

Where does daisy play? It's here:

Basil's meadow. It's the closest peaceful place to the truth, and its Basil is closest to the real Basil. Stranger confirms this:

So again, at least in Sunny's mind, daisies are associated with the actual Basil. In fact, this version of the piece is named "theme_basil".

What about the sunflower version? It plays during the Birthday Memory. Basil's birthday is one of the most important album memories centered on Basil and I'd wager it's one of his most precious memories from before the friend group broke up as well.

So the sunflower as a symbol of when Basil is and feels at his best makes sense.

HAIRCLIPS

My last piece of evidence is this:

Omori's Tulip hairstick. You get it (and similar hairclips with their associated flowers for the other characters) from Basil in the hikikomori route. But where did Sunny get the idea?

Right here. I think that's a flower hairstick just like they get in headspace. But everyone else got one for "their" flower, and this isn't a sunflower. It's a pink daisy:

And it would make sense that Basil would pick a flower that he thinks suits him best.

FINAL BONUS

I looked up the flower language meaning for daisies and would you look at that:

I think all of them fit to some degree. New beginnings reflects the good ending, and Basil's desire to make new memories with Sunny and his friends. True love certainly fits if you like the Sunny/Basil ship.

But especially the last one stands out to me. It matches Basil's decision to keep Sunny's secret even if it ruined his life so well that it's definite proof to me that this flower was a deliberate choice by Omocat.

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

on the other hand there are some characters that i KNOW in my heart are not cis but heres the thing . THEY wouldn't know. they would have no idea. or they're not acknowledging it. i love trans headcanons as much as the next guy but angel devil from chainsaw man does not know that he's not cis because all angel devil is thinking about is that he's got a job to do and he'd rather not be doing it but ah well its that or being killed. oh well

theres also some characters that if you took them out for drinks for like 2 hours and talked to them they would realize very quickly they arent cis. but the resources simply dont exist in the situation they are in. do you understand my vision

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

I don't care what you think of Sunny's mother; this is utterly heartbreaking

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

a comic i did for sunny's birthday ☀️ 🎨

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

Kel is transfem and Aubrey is transmasc btw. They told me themselves

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

"You...You couldn't have done it. It was something behind you...wasn't it?"

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

[IDK how cringe fanmix covers are but whatever] [also couldn't change the name of playlist on spotify] [yes I'm one of those people who wished 8tracks still worked]

[image without text under cut]

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

good morning kelsey nation ⛹️‍♂️🏳️‍🌈

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

Slow but steady battle against self-loathing.

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

What if Sunny was strong… wait- ayO??? 🧐🏳‍🌈

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Visiting Basil.

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

HeroMari Hades & Persephone AU ramble cause I'm too tired to draw

To clarify: Hero is Persephone & Mari is Hades (...kinda)

Their parents are the current gods of life & the dead, and they are raised to take over their jobs once they get too old (or tired, idk how the gods work man)

Mari (with Sunny) has been sneaking out since childhood to interact with Hero & the others (Kel is another life/harvest god, Aubrey is a furie & Basil is a faun)

Hero keeps complaining about his mixed feelings toward his parents & Mari decides kidnapping Hero is the most sane idea here

Hero is kinda spooked by it but otherwise is weirdly fine with it (mainly cause he has known Mari for years)

Mari & Hero are busy being cute together in the underground while hiding Hero's existence from Mari's parents (mainly her dad)

I'll think up more later, just wanted to write this down b4 i forget

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

I am once again thinking about Aubrey and Basil clumsily duct-taping their friendship back together. I feel like Aubrey would be the first to forgive Basil and Sunny because of how recently she did almost the exact same thing (pushing Basil into the lake and almost killing him the DAY BEFORE.) I think her and Basil by this point immediately try to make up again, but it’s not as simple as they want it to be.

They understand eachother too well to hate eachother or to ignore eachother, and they’ve tried both of those options. They have too much deep-rooted anger to really be friends yet, but dammit, they’re going to fucking make it work because they’ve been through too much and have too much of a past to lose eachother. It’s not as simple as just forgiving eachother, but they want it to be. So, so badly. But they sit in tense silence for ages. Aubrey will make too wild of a gesture or get too worked up and Basil will flinch away. Aubrey will have moments of wanting to strangle Basil with the same jumprope he used to hang Mari, and then hate herself for it. Aubrey gets paranoid when Basil’s out of her sight for too long. They’re afraid of being apart for too long, and they’re afraid of being left alone together for too long. They go to the lake with the others, but never, ever just the two of them. They’re extremely gentle with eachother, as if the other might break. They make eachother laugh and for a moment they’re twelve again. They make eachother cry and wonder when the other shoe’s going to drop, and wonder who’s going to strike first.

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

🍕🥤🥗🥪

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

cuddle with the homies (but with heavy romantic undertones)

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Some Kelbrey I forgot to post

[sunnysmomisdumbnotevil]

it means everything