#Helio

[halcyon-autumn]

If I had a nickel for every time a cleric of Helio died, met Helio, and then starting worshipping a dead deity instead I'd have two nickels, which isn't a lot but it's hilarious that it's happened twice

[banchiedoingart]

AND NOW I KNOW HOW JOAN OF ARC FELT, NOW I KNOW HOW JOAN OF ARC FELT

[islandoforder]

the number of times that kristen has killed her god, buddy, my guy, you should not want kristen to return to the corn church if you don’t want helio to die horribly

[bounded-accuracy]

The funniest thing about the Buddy scene is knowing that him talking to the Applebees would have actually made things worse.

His art reads as Mormon, the Applebees read as mainline evangelical. Evangelicals view Mormons as a non-Christian cult. So while Buddy is technically in the same broad Helioic religion, the Applebees would think he’s also going to hell.

[voxmilia]

The difference between helio and logran soulforger kills me.

helio's chosen asks him an existential question and he waves her away

one of logran's clerics, not even his chosen just ONE of his clerics, calls him out for his silence and he looks her dead in the eye and says "I'm sorry, you deserve to be spoken to."

when helio's chosen strays from the path to forge one of her own, helio himself doesn't even seek her out - it's sol and galicaea who have to talk to kristen. helio himself never makes amends for his part in his chosen turning from his light on his own, without prompting from his father and aunt.

ostentatia, by contrast, hears that sincere apology and is able to see how hard her god is working. That his silence is not uncaring, his silence is caring TOO much about too many things. And she takes up a pair of tongs and forges at his side. And her devotion is rewarded - she's given near prophethood, a miraculous divine intervention, she saves countless jobs including her father's.

Because she was willing to raise her concerns and logran was willing to listen.

[theology101]

Season 4, we’re saving Helio from his abusive Dad and he gets to live with his cool Lesbian Aunts (and also that aunt who murdered the other aunt but its okay now)

[embraceweird]

It wasn't until ep 11 that I realized how fucked things must be for Helio and Sol

First Cassandra comes back, sister of Galicaea, a god they used to have dealings with but was long forgotten

Then it's night for 3 months and many of their congregation feel uneasy and lose faith

And while that's going on some werewolf teen is changing the worship of Galicaea, a long time confidant (and conspirator????) of Helio and Sol. And as we know, as above so below, so Galicaea is probably going through some changes

Now this other fiery summer god, who Sol once married off to Galicaea's sister, is back or trying to come back infringing on the status quo and reinstating a competing divine domain

And to add insult to injury the major catalyst to all these events was Helio's chosen one losing faith and creating her own

That's not even including the shady conspiratorial things that were probably going on between the surviving gods. Tough luck, man

[jammjar]

Average party with the Bad Kids and Buddy Dawn

[dropoutconfessions]

I think Brennan is truly fantastic at most things but how he represents evangelical Christians (specifically in fantasy high junior year) just shows that he was raised by progressive Wiccan hippies. He seems to understand that caricatures of Christians and I think Allie brings a lot of life into the dynamic through lived experience, but a lot of the time he misses the mark on why people rely on faulty religious structures as a form of self fulfillment. He doesnt really seem to get the reasons why people are drawn to it, and why someone born into it would stay. Idk. Maybe but the whole dynamic between Kristen and her family/bobby dawn/buddy dawn felt extremely hollow.

-

[bardly-working]

i saw another post about hoping that Buddy Dawn, having been betrayed and murdered by his own team, meets Helio in the afterlife and becomes hopelessly disillusioned with him before being resurrected by Kristen, and they can bond over how much Helio sucks. And I genuinely love that. But I also have this "Yes And" idea...

I hope all that happens. And then I hope Buddy Dawn becomes for Helio what Tracker is for Galicaea.

I hope Buddy gets to say "I see how you, the being that I worship, have been twisted by your own worshipers. I see how, despite my good intentions, I and my family and my church have all done that. And I will do my best to fix this, because not only do I deserve a better god, but you deserve to be one. You are the god of a grain crop. Corn is not wrathful. Corn does not judge. Corn is abundant, as should be your love."

Buddy may deserve better. Helio may not deserve his faith.

But who was Helio before he was this?

[friendofthedawn]

quick thoughts after the final episode, so massive spoilers for fhjy ep20!

buddy dawn creating a new deity, bacharath, out of sheer strength of belief is very comedic! of course i understand how it's funny to see yet another reflection of kristen bounced off into a strange new direction.

BUT. though i'll be thinking more about this when i've got time to totally wrap my head around the finale, i think that him creating this new deity out of blind devotion and running right back to his grandfather is very sad, honestly.

throughout the show, buddy has been shown to have a very impersonal connection to helio, the deity he draws his power from. when talking to kristen in the hallways, he mentions how helio uses him as a conduit to unleash his will into the mortal will, and that he has no control over what spell comes from his hand. of course, from the way we know clerics and worship works in the world of fantasy high, we know that this doesn't make sense and is not true. ankarna's followers used her powers to kill her sister's followers and kill in her name. she had no agency in this matter.

instead of a truth of buddy's relationship with helio, this moment read to me as a reflection instead of how his worship is conducted: muscle memory and memorization. he puts none of himself into worship and devotion because all that thought comes outside of him, totally impersonally, from his grandfather's ideologies.

we don't see this method of worship change when he changes his deity that is, to him, an unnamed god of rage. instead, he doubles down. "of course bacharath has to be the true name of the deity, we just aren't believing hard enough." the way he devotes himself (aka: impersonally, without introspection) has not changed. only the subject of his devotion has changed.

now, how did s1 kristen create a new deity in the first place? throughout fhjy, so many talk about how impressive this is. she creates a new deity by understanding deep fundamental truths about the universe.

this idea is cheapened by the fact that buddy dawn creates a new deity. he isn't shown to understand a deeper truth about the universe at play, and he isn't shown to change how he worships. instead, he believes so so hard, exactly the way he has his entire life, and this method of worship is then substantiated as legitimate by the narrative.

and then, he goes back to his grandfather.

now, i get that all this is a set up for a potential fh senior year, which is another can of worms that i won't get into now. but, in terms of just this season, i find this ending very sad for buddy.

[halcyon-autumn]

Huge L for Helio this episode I gotta say. Something about meeting that guy makes people want to go worship a dead lesbian

[firedancewithme]

guys. so we know buddy swore an oath or whatever that makes sure that he's actually willing to bring the bad kids from the dead right ? however. kristen did have a conversation with him in which he admitted that if any harm comes from him to his enemies, it will be THROUGH him and he will not consider it to be his personal responsability. so what that tells me is if Helio refuses to raise the bad kids, Buddy will still be respecting his oath. now do you sincerely think it's in Helio's interest to not let his former chosen one and her friends die ??

Kristen pretending to be back in Helio's path may well have just saved her life.

[bloodyshadow1]

the whole divine family is kind of nightmarish.

Cassandra and Ankarna have been through hell of course.

But even outside of them, Sol, Galicaea, Ruvina, three of their siblings who loved them, but because of their followers everything was ripped to shit.

Sol is currently one of the most worshiped deities on Spire, the whole country of highcourt seems to worship him and his son. they're homophobic bigots who believe they know better than anyone else and anyone who doesn't worship what they do are going to hell. But once upon a time, he was a brother who loved his sister and performed the ceremony so she could be married to her bride. He didn't want to be the only sun in the sky, he wanted them to be united even if it meant sharing the stage. Now he is the deity and the god of bigots.

Galicaea we don't know that much about before her but seeing how successful Tracker's revival is, it wouldn't be a stretch to believe that she was a loving sister if she is willing to stand as her sisters maid of honor. Yet her followers did their best to destroy her sister's name and unmake her. They succeeded and there is the nightmare king.

Ruvina, a goddess who constantly lost her followers to the followers of her beloved sister. but kept staying alive because the small part of the goddess that Ankarna became still loved her and Cassandra to keep them alive. That she needed to have her followers slaughter her sister's followers in their own defense despite knowing it could unmake her once beloved sister.

Sol, Galicaea, and Helio were all terrible to Kristen in the sophomore year finale, to keep The Nightmare King who they were so Cassandra could never come back. Do you think they were screaming inside their heads trapped in their own bodies because what they wanted didn't matter to their followers.

Ankarna and Cassandra weren't the only one violated against their will. The whole divine family is a tragedy

[viscountess-grabalba]

i know gods don't work like people but my brain keeps picking at Sol and Helio. like Sol as far as we've seen doesn't have a partner in the pantheon but he does have a son. helio is the god of corn and Sol is the sun. i feel like i'm red stringing but doesn't a corn god kinda make more sense as a child of a god of harvest and summer! like what if Sol stole their baby and Ankarna's domain. IDK i think i might be crazy tho, it's an interesting idea tho.

[vesseldraws]

graphic design is my passion

Link to post with all the full images!