#c!dream critical

[hopalongfairywren]

the fact that c!Dream could have been such a cool villain if people weren't so hell bent on bending over backwards to give the murdering abusive necromancer sympathetic reasons for why he committed all of his atrocities... and the funny thing is like all of those excuses you fit ACTUAL other villains like the 'c!Dream is possessed by a dreamon that's why he's mean actually' fan theory.... does the egg mean jack shit for you?

[w3ndytheraccoon]

If I see one more post about why C!Dream is not a villain, I will rage-

C!Dream is a complex character with an understandable motive, and his spiralings was very realistic and I can one hundred percent see why. He is a very morally gray, albeit leaning more toward black than white, character. It wouldn’t be fair if I just label him as THE villain, because perspectives exist, and in some member’s perspective, like Purpled for example, he’s definitely not as evil as he is in, say, Tubbo’s perspective.

But that doesn’t change the fact Dream was a horrible person.

Just because he had a understandable motive, that doesn’t mean the shit that happened in Exile is justified. That doesn’t mean Doomsday is justified. That doesn’t mean all the manipulation and all the lying are justified. That doesn’t mean what he and Punz did to Vikkstar and Lazarbeam is justified. That doesn’t mean what happened in prison was justified.

Especially Exile and Vikkstar & Lazarbeam ! Exile is for isolating Tommy so he can’t cause trouble, not for abusing and gaslighting him to near the point of fucking suicide ! And what happened to Vikkstar & Lazarbeam was completely unnecessary ! Dream and Punz did NOT need to kill them over and over and over just to test the Revival Book, that is cruel and several violations of human’s rights.

Conclusion : C!Dream fucking sucks and I wish Punz didn’t brought him back. I’m an enthusiast, not apologist. His motive makes him explainable, not justifiable or excusable, and if I ever somehow manage to rip the fabric of reality and teleport to the DSMP universe, the first thing I will do is find Dream to deck him.

… But he’s still a complex character and one of my favourites.

Anyway, if I miss a point or something, do remind me. I’ll probably edit this and add more character analysis in the morning, when my thoughts are actually coherent and I’m not writing something from pure spite and anger.

Morning edit :

He also hurt Geogre and Sapnap. Sure, he never physically hurt them as far as we’re aware, but do you know how painful it is to watch your friend spirals and became the total opposite of how they were ? How helpless it feels when you realised your friend is too far gone and you can’t help them ? How guilty it is when you think of all the times you could reach out and stop them from turning out like this but you didn’t ? How badly that would take a toll on your mental health ?

But anyway, just because C!Dream is a horrible person, that doesn’t mean what happened in prison is okay. The whole obsidian cell with lava door and raw potato ? Yeah, that’s fine, I can get behind that, since it was his idea for prison to be like that. It’s just karma. What I meant is the torture part. Does he deserve it ? Depends who you ask. I personally think it was justified and deserved, but that still doesn’t make it okay.

EDIT: My opinion about c!Dream had changed and while some things are still the same, this post no longer mean anything besides frustrated 3 am rambles

[atomickittenland]

it's almost like seeing perspective of a crazy narcissist with a love for obscuring fact makes him seem more evil

giggling and rolling around bc for so long there have been people excusing c!dreams behavior as "we're just not seeing his point of view, he might have a good reason for what he does" and now that we do have a glimpse of his pov, he's murdering the elderly bc "no one will notice they're gone"

[sethdomain]

the narrative that c!tommy used c!techno is kind of diabolical tbh, people often forgot that c!tommy is fresh out of exile and doesn't consider the place that he's in.

He's running on pure instinct, fresh from suicide attempt and running from his abuser and the only one he can confide in is c!techno the criminal that destroyed his home country. Despite their history c!techno still took him in, but why? He could of just kick c!tommy from his house and let him run lose in the tundra of snow and let him survive on his own while c!drm sniff over his trails of footstep. But he took him in and protect him from the looming threat of his abuser.

And its sad, its very sad that even if c!Techno took c!Tommy in he used it as an opportunity. An opportunity to use c!Tommy as a pawn in his quest for anarchy. Now, you might be thinking, but c!techno took him in, take care of him and even defended c!tommy ,why are you painting him as this heartless villain that used an abused child for his own gains? Frankly, I try not to and maybe its also in the way i'am awful with articulating my words into something that make sense. I truly do not think c!Techno is heartless and his relationship with c!tommy does have a sincerity in it.

But I think my main point is that, there was a power imbalance between c!tommy and c!techno that people often overlooked. Like I said c!Tommy is fresh out of exile n traumatized n stuff and he's in a weaker position and his only hope in escaping his abuser is c!Techno since he is the only character thats is deadass near logstedshire and also one of the most powerful people in the esempi.

And also I just do not think painting an abuse survivor trying to find help as an act of... That, is a nice message you know 😁 haha- not to get real and get to the implication of stuff- but ahahaha, yk haha. ANYWAY.

I don't think c!techno is a heartless monster, like I said i think his relationship with c!tommy has sincerity within it. I think as time goes on, i think techno grew actual care toward tommy evidence by his interaction with tommy as time goes on growing more closer and affectionate and his strong reaction when tommy left him for tubbo.

But still, c!Techno treats tommy more of a pawn in his quest for anarchy, you also have to remember that he will send off c!tommy to his abuser again without a second though if c!drm used his favor. Of course, if you were in c!tommy place, why would you stay with a guy like that? He goes againts everything you stand for and you don't even know if you're safe with him. Maybe because he saved your life? Do you really owe him that much that you are willing to destroy your home and even fight your own best friend for him? Was it all transitional? Do I worth anything? Do I not matter as a living breathing human being? Am I not worth of safety?

I just wanna talk about my feeling about c!tommy and c!techno relationship in post-exile arc, because i think i find the narrative a bit icky if you are maybe a survivor of abusive relationship. I also wanna talk about the interesting bit of sincerity their relationship actually kind of have, that despite c!techno using c!tommy as pawn he does actually cares in the very end. Which is sad to think about

[jadesolayray]

Honestly, I'm in a weird middle ground where I liked the stream and its implications, but also strongly agree with the criticism, so I've just kinda decided to think of it as an alternate timeline or a what if senario.

It was fun to watch, I liked it. I liked the ending. I'm okay with c!quackity dying, because from what we saw of the character's mental state in the stream, he was in a horrible mental state, and after everything he went through, I get that. I can see how he might have reached that point between the last Las Nevadas lore stream and this one.

What I don't like is the implications that Quackity felt that in order to retire the character, he needed to kill him. Which seems to be an emerging trend in the Minecraft Lore space right now that Creators really need to take a step back from.

Your character does not need to die to retire them. I know people asking you to return to the character is annoying, but like, it's not a good thing to default to.

[appleflavoredkitkats]

no offense but HOW did dream go "i dont pick sides" "im centrist" in every possible situation he went through. what are you, c!ranboo??

[atomickittenland]

helping someone who has planned to use you for experiments definitely won't come back to bite you in the ass later.

"i needed to help dream escape it was business." that "business" involved helping a man who was literally planning to use you as a labrat in his revival experiments because you're "old and might die soon anyway" escape from prison. 😊💖

[simplepotatofarmer]

the biggest example of lack of media literacy in the dsmp fandom was when people got upset at the whole 'c!dream doesn't understand big words and he can't read a map' thing except those were just. literal canon facts. it was stated explicitly in canon to be true.

what do you even call that? being media illiterate on purpose??

[barzfrommarz]

RIP ladyddanger you were never afraid to say the truth

[cloffmoff]

been working on this for a little bit and thought ‘tumblr would like it!’ so here you guys go, happy birthday c!tommy the favorite character ever <33 im nowhere near an animator lol, just some guy with inspiration and flipaclip

[stemms]

I swear to the Primes that c!Dream apologists are ridiculous. I literally found one saying that c!Tommy deserved worse and that he was the villain, c!Dream was actually the hero, etc, etc. Like were we all watching the same thing or what? Looking at that made me feel like we definitely weren’t. It’s honestly ridiculous at this point. C!Dream was obsessed and it’s clear to everyone but his apologists. I just don’t get it.

They really are, I even sometimes find it hard to figure out whether their takes are infuriating or hilarious because they look like they’re not being serious at all, except they are. Bruhhh, that take sounds like something c!Dream himself would say lmao :) c!Tommy is literally just a kid? Kids are supposed to act like kids, what are they even on??? c!Dream apologists really should realise that their “clearly mentally stable and Good™” meow meow saw a teenager defy him and be a little loud, and decided that his number one goal is to make his life a living hell.

[w3ndytheraccoon]

C!Tommy is my favourite character, however, that doesn’t mean he gets a pass.

In simple word, C!Tommy is a narcissist, or atleast show alot of narcissistic traits. Self importance ? Check. Entitled to some degree ? Check. Arrogant ? Check. Jealous easily ? Check. Rarely believe something is his fault ? Check.

( Obviously, just because someone has some of these traits, that doesn’t mean that they’re a narcissist or a bad person, it depends on the context )

Now, I guess you can say that since Tommy is canonically 16, being a narcissist is expected, because most 16 years old is a self - centred asshole. But like I said many times, just because it’s justified, that doesn’t mean it’s okay.

Tommy has show signs of a narcissist ( Arrogant, entitled ) ever since he joined, and as the lore progresses, he starts to show more. It even gets worse when he got mad because he can’t fathom the fact Tubbo has a life out of him. He threatened to kill Michael for fuck’s sake ( I still love reading about them bonding tho ) !

And the whole “ Me and Tubbo vs Dream “ always gets on my nerves. Yes, Tommy has been hurt by Dream but he’s not the only one. What about Sapnap and Geogre who have to watch their close friend spiral ? What about Puffy who lost her fucking son and felt responsible for how he turn out ? What about Ranboo ? What about Niki and Jack and Fundy who lost their home when he blew up L’ manberg ? What about Vikkstar & Lazarbeam ? Dream has hurt almost everyone, not just Tommy, yet he believes he’s the only one.

Not to mentioned, he claims Tubbo is his bestfriend, yet hesitate when he’s asked to choose between him and the discs. Tommy has been an asshole to Tubbo and Tubbo has also been an asshole to Tommy times to times ( I will cover this more for when Tubbo’s post comes ). C!ClingyDuo is a shitshow (and when you include Ranboo and make it C!BenchTrio, it gets even worse ), they’re both bad for eachother. Sure, there are times where they act like actual, healthy friends, but half the times, their “ friendship “ is held together by shared trauma.

While Tubbo is treated like something comparable to the fucking discs, Ranboo is seen as an obstacle half the times. Yeah, Tommy covered for him when they burnt Geogre’s house, but that’s it. After that, whenever Tommy is with Ranboo, he’s just a tad bit more hostile and he always show jealousy when Ranboo and Tubbo are together. Like C!ClingyDuo, C!AlliumDuo is also toxic as hell and is barely being held together by the fact they have a mutual friend ( Tubbo ).

Don’t even get me start on Jack. I joined the fandom relatively late ( Post Prison Arc ), when the fandom’s opinions start shifting, and Tommy became a baby who can’t do anything wrong, so Jack’s death was pretty much brush over. It doesn’t help that I learn the lore solely through fan content, and as I said, opinions start shifting and Jack’s death got no acknowledgement. I didn’t even know why he was so mad at Tommy until a few weeks ago when I read a fanfic ( On Temporizing by LuckyMagicBelle ). No one in the fandom and the lore acknowledge it except Jack and maybe Niki, not even Tommy himself.

And that’s not even talking about all the casual crimes he commit, which I will not be getting into, because I’m pretty sure everyone have commit atleast 3 casually crimes at this point.

( Putting this just incase. Like in the one I made about Dream, just because Tommy is an asshole sometimes, that doesn’t mean the shit that happened to him is okay. And how he turns out is realistic imo, because I know that if I went through what he did, I’ll come out worse. But still, a flaw is flaw, and this is a call out post. He is child and someone should’ve show him how to be better, not let him continue to be like this )

Conclusion : C!Tommy is an actual war criminal that is in no way, shape or form innocent, yet most the fandom ignore that because they woobified him. He’s an asshole sometimes and it’s fine to be paranoid after the shit he went through but he needs to understand that Dream isn’t always out to get him. Also, C!BenchTrio needs to split up, have some therapy and spent some times for themselves before they’re ready to be friends again.

I still love him and will defend him with my dying breath though.

Edit : Y’all, I just saw a post that said C!tommy is a accurate portrayal of an abused victim, and now I can’t tell which of my points are actually him being an ass and which one is me being insensitive / overreacting and not realising that he’s intended to be written that way to be accurate. Please tell me because I do not want to offend anyone-

EDIT: My opinion about c!Tommy had change like, alot, since I decided to rewatch the VODs and I catch some stuff I missed last time. This post no longer mean anything and it’s just non sensical 3 am rambling

[hopalongfairywren]

So there was this post floating around talking about how egg arc fans were unfairly blaming inniters and just generally being bitter over the lore, I think I might have even reblogged because well I do agree with the sentiment somewhat, I don't think it's suprising or wrong to be at least a little annoyed given the absolute chokehold The Disc plot side of the fandom had and still has. Like of course people are going to be annoyed when you make every part of the lore about c!Tommy. I have been annoyed when people tag the eggpire in unrelated fancontent. Like, it's dsmp lore, I'm not trying to act like egg arc fans are some uniquely silenced portion of the fandom, but yeah. People did and do butcher other characters (often with female characters, in misogynistic ways) to fit the narrative of their fics. It is hard to find a fic without it being mostly about c!Tommy/Tubbo/Ranboo/ what have you, without filtering through a bunch of tags. It is frustrating to see fans who never watched the egg lore call it 'half-lore' or a side plot. It is annoying to see a storyline that has very little to do with c!Tommy, be made about c!Tommy. In animatics, in fanart, and in that one guy's dsmp netflix recap. And you know, this isn't exclusive to inniters. c!Dream fans too, are guilty of the same kind of 'need a filler character so let me just use c!antfrost or something' tropes, just in different ways. This would be a lot more eloquent if I remembered what that post said, and I hope this doesn't come off as too harsh, but yeah. Making c!Tommy the main character in arcs he comparatively had little to do with, arcs which are already seen as background lore and not important due to a self maintained cycle, and seeing your favorite characters butchered is annoying. Just because it makes you uncomfortable doesn't mean it's not true.

[thesacredorb]

"it's just a girl harmonizing with her ceiling fan"

No. Thats the sound of Dream's (biological) mother humming him to sleep when he was little, before their village was raided and burned, reduced to nothing but cinders and ash. That's the song Dream would hum quietly to himself when he was curled up in his hiding place, after he just went to check on his village to see if anyone was left, only to find burnt bodies and fresh corpses (friends, neighbors, his parents, and his siblings) and his home in ruins.

That's the sound of Puffy taking the time to search and search for everything she possibly could about Dreamons, a dying species, just so she could find the right lullaby to sing to Dream on the nights he would have nightmares. That is the sound of Dream humming with her because there wasn't any reason for her to learn it, but she did anyways to make him feel better. That's Foolish learning to do the same when he's old enough. That's Dream clinging to his new family, hoping and praying to whatever God is listening to just let him have this. That is Dream wishing the same thing when he first meets George and Sapnap, his two best friends that seemingly came out of nowhere when he needed them, doing everything within his power to keep them as close to him as he possibly can.

That is the sound of Dream occasionally humming that same lullaby to himself in the prison, when he really needed reminders of home, of his Momma, after he just had Quackity come in for the second time this week to try and get the revival book out of him and he refused. That's the sound of Techno doing his best to help Dream relax for once after getting trapped in the prison with him, that's Techno humming with him while fixing up the bandages wrapped around Dream's abdomen chest and arms, making sure they weren't too tight so the wounds underneath them could heal properly. That is Punz doing the same after the prison break, helping Dream come down from panic and anxiety attacks when he couldn't sleep, especially during the weeks he couldn't find Jobi (a young Dreamom -from a village Dream didn't know was in the SMP- who somehow dug through the obsidian walls looking for food, and decided hanging around and bothering Dream was her new favorite thing to do, and Dream got attached to her unknowingly) anywhere and assumed the worst. Assuming that Quackity found her and was either gonna use her against him or was doing something terrible to her that he couldn't protect her from.

That is the sound of Dream humming that same lullaby to Jobi, because she knew it too and missed it just as much as he did and humming it with him after finally getting reunited. After he finally got her back after weeks of thinking there was a possibility that she was gone because they had gotten close and everyone (Sam, Tommy when he got locked in there, Quackity, Techno and Bad) noticed. But she wasn't, she isn't, she's here and she's alright and that's all that matters to him.

That, is what that is.

[afmis]

Even if the dsmp is momentarily put in the back of my mind, whenever I do start to think abt it again I am ASTOUNDED by how genuinely amazing it was. I have genuinely never found anything as interesting, emotional, and captivating as the dsmp and the characters in it. The fact that those characters were real, fleshed out people at one point is what made is so unique and beautiful, and nothing else will top that. It was such an incredible thing and till this day I smile when I think abt it

[lasnevadaslaborunion]

Like, it's kind of surreal to see c!Tommy critics who hem and haw about how "exile was bad, BUT" repeat exactly how I felt about c!Dream and the prison torture before I had my Character Development™

Your first mistake was approaching either of these stories through the lens of "consequences gone too far" and not "challenging the whole concept of dramatized narrative consequences in a grey universe, questioning whether another deeply flawed character can ever enact said consequences in a fair and proportionate way, exposing how that which masquerades as justice can easily be degraded into a selfish power trip, and condemning abuse as cruel and impractical regardless of how unlikeable the victim may be"

There was no "right way" to administer punishment when the intentions behind those punishments were inherently warped