#every homestuck character is good it's just that some are way better than others so if you bring back the others in again

[bottlehawk]

I once had a friend who shipped Eridan/Gamzee because they were both lonely for different reasons.

Thoughts?

this ship only works if these two are isolated into their own enclosure somewhere. preferably far-off. there's probably a fanfic writer out there who could do it justice but perhaps an au where the two of them are cast off from the meteor due to trying to genocidally kill everyone and now they both have scampered off into the infinite space and void, trying to survive and figure out what they want to do next as they are forced to get along with only each other for company. because let's face it. a hipster that believes in science and a clown that believes in miracles is one of the most classic type of dynamics there is. and they both have the potential to murder each other. this is bert and ernie 2 folks.

[sometipsygnostalgic]

Animated Series ending tier list

Okay this is based on a discussion with @j4gm, kim and mifil the other day

These are all cartoons with the exception of Homestuck. I'll admit I don't get invested in a lot of TV shows, even animated shows, so this is limited to stuff I like. Maybe i forgot something but if i did it's probably not worth talking about.

Here's the list if you're interested in building your own.

So I'll go through each item one by one and explain. Yes, I did arrange them based on better (left) and worse (right) for each tier. I'll start from top to bottom so I have the most energy for the better show endings.

I'm rating them both in how they respect the stories of their show, and how entertaining/cohesive they are as a piece of media. To be honest, the former matters to me more than the latter, but some of the shows at the top of this list aren't even ones I particularly like, because their endings were just that well written.

Astonishing

Owl House. This show got better and better with each episode. I don't know, I was blown away by how bad it was at the start and how great it was at the end. And of every item on this list, this one's ending episode had the best pacing. There was lots of room to breathe, lots of reminders of the connections between various characters, and the villain was taken care of in a satisfying way. And we got a beautiful epilogue. The only reason Owl House is in the same tier as She-ra and Gravity Falls, instead of being its own category, is because I felt it had some shortcomings, particularly s3e2 focused on a bunch of characters nobody has ever had any reason to care for, and a lot of the cast don't reach the potential they could do because they lack focus, so I don't have as much emotional attachment to it as a lot of other shows listed here. Anyway here's my favourite moment:

2. She-Ra and the Princess of Power. This is my favourite show on this list because I think it's the most cohesive of the lot. Even though it has a rough start, and often follows cartoon logic, from the very beginning of She-ra to the end it focuses strongly on the same themes. The cycle of abuse and pain and that feeling you will need to earn love, you need to earn the right to exist. It does so with a wide cast of characters, but it's also very good at trimming down to a smaller cast when it needs more focus. There are a lot of good decisions to make sure it worked in the small runtime it had. The ending of she-ra is basically its entire final season. It's one long arc. It doesn't have any major weak spots like The Owl House's final season did, and it has more room to breathe, with 13 incredible episode of about 20 minutes each, more than twice the length. And it delivers on every single character. Every member of the cast gets a moment to shine across the season, yet it isn't so distracted as to pull attention away from Catra and Adora. What makes She-ra's ending a bit weaker than Owl House's is the pacing of the final episode. Heart part 1 and 2, while great, is absolutely rammed, and one of the weaker episodes of that season because of it. You don't get enough room to breathe, you don't get to soak in the characters' emotions quite as much as in the episode prior, Failsafe. But I would count Failsafe as part of the ending. So while season 5's finale isn't even the best finale of She-ra (s3 and s4 were harder hitting), the final season as a whole is incredibly strong. And it's a very entertaining piece of media too! Ugh. I love it.

Here's this powerful scene of Catra whispering and yet screaming to Adora to stay with her, even in the end.

3. Gravity Falls.

To be honest I'm not much of a Gravity Falls fan, so I don't have as much to say as I do about the other two shows, but this ending is highly regarded across the cartoon community. It works perfectly within the smaller scope of the show, bringing a wide, crazy calamity for the characters to work with.

My problem with Gravity falls is Mabel. Not that she's a bad character, but that they don't spend enough time making her a good one. And the ending reflects that - it shows her doing something very major, overturning the world, and that's interesting, but it keeps presenting Mabel's problems as rather shallow instead of focusing on her psychology and why she's making these mistakes. Meanwhile it spends a lot of time on Dipper and explaining and justifying his teenage boy mentality and it drived me crazy how much more of a main character Dipper is than Mabel. Because it's Mabel I relate more to. She's more like I was when I was 12. It's a teen boy's show for teen boys, so I don't like it as much as Owl House or Amphibia. Other than that the ending is a good time and I love the themes of family, I love that Dipper has such low self worth and is grappling with the idea of what manliness even is, facing misguided pressure from other relatives like Stan and Ford. And I love the relationship between Stan and Ford, the mistakes they made, and how Stan ultimately takes responsibility for being an obstructive little shit by removing his memory, taking Bill with him!

Yeah, perhaps this show's ending could've been further strengthened by Stan having his memory lost forever, or having a harder time regaining it. But it makes sense in the stakes of Gravity Falls, where the world resets after every episode even if there was a zombie invasion. I don't see them having Stan forget his great nephew/niece as the ending of the show.

And it has a nice scene with the characters driving off in the bus... Heartbreaking. I love that Stan and Ford go adventuring together afterwards. And I love the theme song.

Remaining rankings below - I think these three should be celebrated most. It's gonna be a shorter summary from here.

Genuinely Good

These are endings that blow you away, but do have a couple nooks and crannies stopping them from reaching the top tier. Another person's list might put them at the top.

Adventure Time Distant Lands: See what's crazy about Distant Lands is that anyone one of these episodes might be the best in the series if it was a different show, but Adventure Time is such a good show that the way Distant Lands is different stands out to me. Like, Together Again, you might think I'm crazy for not putting it above Owl House, but while it's a fantastic episode, really emotional, it's not even my favourite Distand Lands episode. That would be Obsidian which I felt was a more honest resolution to the characters of the show itself, showing the limitless future ahead of the cast instead of what TA did which was demonstrate that Finn really didn't go much further after the end of the show. I felt TA was very limiting in that sense, it contradicted the ending to Adventure Time, which had the strength of "the adventure never ends". Which means that growth never ends. Finn is supposed to be an ever changing character, but in Together Again, he's stagnant.

Other than that, it's absolutely top tier. But not good enough for me to call it the best of the best. Even if I think Finn's character writing was a downgrade, or harmed the main show, I think where DL and TA did better than Come Along With Me is it was actually coherent and had strong themes rather than being a mishmash of random parts of Adventure Time that they wanted to shove in before it was over. It was a better tv finale, one of the best and most emotional ever made, but it's hard to call it a better Adventure Time finale, because AT's legacy hinders on so much more. 2. OK KO: Let's be Heroes: This is a show that went under the radar. It was coming out at the same time as Steven Universe, which was far more popular. So I'll explain it to you: OK KO has two endings. KO has grappled with his alternate persona, TKO, for the entire show. In the first ending, TKO takes over, and starts fighting everyone in a giant tournament. He literally kills all the cast, while KO is struggling to regain control. KO's epiphany is that TKO is a part of himself he buried long ago. KO has always tried to be the sweetest kid possible, so all his rage and fire, all his strength, was neglected and buried. That became TKO. It's similar to the ending of Celeste. They fuse together, but KO is crying because he killed all his friends. So he makes a wish to the God of the Universe to give everyone a happy ending. Then you get a really nice ending montage of all the characters from OK KO having the time of their life. One interesting touch was Venomous, KO's bastard father, had very little to do with KO in this timeline. KO clearly wanted nothing to do with him. But Venomous is shown raising his adoptive daughter Fink and doing a fantastic job. The final episode of OK KO has KO seemingly stuck in time acceleration. Time is flying by, his friends are achieving their goals, leaving the town, way before he can begin to process what he's even doing here. Everything is going faster and faster and it's like he's jumping forward! He doesn't know what's going on!!! But when he explains his plight, he's told... This is normal. This is a normal part of growing up. What seems like time acceleration is just time passing by. Then the rest of the episode show KO going through his life in the same manner. A big gag of the show is KO is age 6-11. That's his age. It's the same as the target audience for OKKO. But you see him grow up. His twelth to fifteenth birthday... 18th to 24th birthday... 25th to 35th birthday... At the end, he's in charge of the Bodega, a full adult looking after runts just like Mr Gar did. I dunno, I felt this was a very meaningful way to end the show. Even if it's not the most emotionally heavy hitting series, even if it's way too short, it did something that stays in my mind to this day. Time goes by in such a flash that you don't notice it was there to begin with, so appreciate the good things life throws at you.

3. The Legend of Korra: The show Korra wasn't particularly great, if I was rating the media as a whole it would probably be at the very bottom of this list. Yes below Star and Homestuck and Kipo. It's not remarkable in the slightest and constantly fumbles.

However I was at the edge of my seat during the series finale in Season 4. I was excited by the conflict between Korra and Kuvira. I loved the metalbending battles. I loved Korra's actualisation, how Kuvira is a very good rival, how their whole conflict plays out with Korra demonstrating such an INSURMOUNTABLE LEVEL OF STRENGTH both in power and character to save Kuvira from her own mistake.

I love how Korra decides to take a break and leave with Asami into the spirit world through the portal she just opened. It was a nice relationship in a show that has so heavily fumbled its prior character dynamics.

And you can't forget how it felt watching this the first time. Afterwards, Bryke made a post on tumblr saying "Korrasami is Canon". You have to remember, this was long before Bubbline was anything more than subtext in two episodes. This was before Steven Universe's "Stronger than You". This was the first time two girls were confirmed to be in a relationship in a kid's cartoon in America. I was so happy. You have to understand Korrasami did a lot of good things and made a lot of the queer representation in these other items possible.

Did the job

These are endings that were OK. They were satisfying but they weren't anything special. They weren't the best episodes or seasons of the series they're from.

Avatar: The last Airbender: I will be honest this show is in a similar realm to She-ra wherein its whole final season is one big buildup to a couple of fast-pased episodes. And honestly its final episode might be better than She-ra's in a pacing sense? But... The simple part is I don't like Avatar as much. I didn't feel particularly strongly about most of these characters. It's a very competent tv finale, with strong scenes - the Agni Kai, and Katara's capture of Azula, are particular strong points. But it's quite long and there are a lot of scenes I don't feel much about, like Aang vs Ozai. Back in the day lots of people were unhappy Aang spared Ozai, and I get that it's not in character for him to just kill him, but it was the original "deus ex machina" for Aang to find a way to get out of it and get what he wanted. It isn't particularly interesting. And then Aang x Katara... I don't care. So yeah ATLA does the job. It's a great final season but I don't care for the finale itself and the characters. while great for the time - by far the EARLIEST show to release on this list - are more childish and cartoony than most. They don't have depth required to compete with more modern cartoons. You've only got maybe two outstanding characters in a tight story vs She-ra's one dozen in a looser story, and honestly I value character more than cohesion because that's what you remember. That's what makes you feel things. Anyone can make a story where things happen but what makes you care? Being a bit harsh here because a lot of people call this the greatest show of all time blah de blah and throw away everything all the other shows do better. But the ATLA finale isn't even in the top ten most interesting episodes of the series. This part went hard though (couldn't find a video of it alone):

Azula starts the scene dominating Katara, and then Katara turns the tables and restrains her using the very ice which fire is supposed to melt, which is mentally destroying for Azula. All she can do is scream and breathe fire when she is restrained, unable to let out all her rage and pain. And Katara spares a moment to witness this, looking troubled, before she runs off to Zuko, attempting to save his life.

2. Adventure Time original ending: Why is my favourite show of all time listed so far down? Why? Well it's because while that AT finale is emotional, hits a lot of themes, it's... a fucking mess. The first part is a war which has only been relevant for two episodes, the second part is a dream sequence which destroy any tension you might've had, and the rest is an unrelated battle against GOLB because we needed a real final boss.

It's a really bad tv finale. And it even does harm to my favourite character in the show, Princess Bubblegum, by making her seem irrational. She's someone who has had the entire series for us to get to know her, to see her biggest flaws and see her struggle to overcome them. So for her to fall back on them yet again, nearly fuck everyone over, with such little buildup and justification and literally throw a child tantrum when Finn interrupts it, it's an injustice to her. She deserved better than everyone thinking she's a fascist forever. The AT crew should have respected their own work on that character better instead of leaving her off like that.

But... even despite these issues, despite being so incoherent? It's a great Adventure Time ending. It makes perfect sense. Of COURSE it's anticlimactic! Of COURSE there's a ten minute dream sequence of crazy shit happening! Of course it's so sudden, things happen so quickly without much time spent to reflect on them! It's Adventure Time! This is what we're HERE for! And the emotional heart of the episode, it isn't really in the Great Gum War or the battle against Golb. It's in Shermie and Beth, and Future Ooo. The fact that the world will end again, but even then.. it's fine. Everything changes. Everything grows. Nothing can stay as it is forever, but letting it go might allow something new and beautiful to take its place.

It's in Jake trying to protect his home, freaking out, and BMO coming in... instead of being looked after, BMO decides to reassure jake, even in certain doom.

It's in Time Adventure. We may not be able to go home, turn back time, relive the past and return to how things were, but... you and I will always be back then.

3. Scavenger's Reign: I felt this show started stronger than it ended. The ending wasn't offensive but it wasn't good either. Honestly I don't have shit to say about the ending, other than that Barry is an annoying stereotype of an autistic character with no agency of his own and it breaks my heart. I liked how relentlessly bad Kris was and I liked Azi struggling to save the day. I liked how her character evolved from being straightfoward and pushing down Levi's curious, kind traits, to embracing those very things in her memory.... while maintaining the strength in adversity needed to challenge someone like Kris. The baby alien thing sure was there. I dunno, the earlier eps with those two hit harder than the ending. The worst part is the sequel bait. We are not getting a sequel. Why is there sequel bait? Seems like the crew were a bit too optimistic for a team of cartoonists working for HBO Max.

But the show as a whole is incredible and has left a strong impression. So, an inoffensive ending is completely fine. I like how everyone is still stranded because of Kris, who meanwhile is dehydrating to death in space because of the organic Levi invasion, and all the people they left behind are chilling in the alien wonderland, learning how to live comfortably.

4. Fionna and Cake: We're now moving into the endings I dislike for one reason or another. I liked Fionna and Cake's themes with Simon and Betty, how it showed a bit more from Betty's side, how obsessive she was with him and he didn't even know.

This does have a weakness though. It removes agency from Betty. It was her choice, in the finale, to sacrifice herself to become GOLB. She was chasing Simon over and over and over again, SHE was the obsessive mad scientist, and she finally achieved her goal at great cost even though could've given up at any time. It was a tragedy. But here it kinda shifts the blame on Simon, even though he was a victim of Betty's obsession. I'm not accusing it of victim blaming, more that I really liked that it was Betty making her own terrible mistakes. It added a lot of character and conviction to her. I don't think Fionna and Cake undermines this much. Kim was a lot more bothered. Besides the Simon plot, the rest is.. ok. It was very predictable Fionna would want to protect the boring, happy world she came from. It fits and it has heart. But it's not remarkable. The ending montage is... weird. Why is Jay and Little Destiny here? Why is Baby Finn here? What about their worlds? Won't they be missed? Did Farmworld Finn fucking die? And the big problem with Fionna and Cake is.. it's such a meanspirited show, even compared with Adventure Time. It relies on you finding tragic shit really funny, like BMO having a horrible gory deeath in jerry. When Fionna and Cake has desensitized me this much, it's hard to feel emotionally invested in this world anymore. It made mistakes by showing too many alternate universes and undermining the world of Adventure Time itself, and I have issues with how Marceline was completely absent from the series - AGAIN - despite allegedly being so important to Simon. It's an outright BAD Adventure Time ending!!! I do love the presentation of Casper and Nova, how it was revealed it wasn't Simon Petrikov but the little Fionna and Cake fan who was able to write the story that finally got through to him and made him realise he needed to stop holding betty back.

"You were a good experience, Simon. Goodbye."

Mistakes were Made

These are the endings that fumbled, disappointed people. They still have value in them but theyre largely disliked by the fanbases involved. I'll explain a bit of why.

1, Arcane: This one just ended last night and is the reason I'm making this post.

I explained a bit here and here, but the issue is: Arcane's a much better show than it has any right to be. It's a league of legends cartoon. But season 1 is so heavy hitting, a tight ship from start to end focusing on the dramas of Vi, Jinx, and the people around them. The main weakness of season 1 was Jayce, Viktor, and Mel. It would distract from the main story in order to focus on them, but wouldn't spend enough time making them compelling characters. Season 2 has this issue tenfold where it seems the scope of the season was so big that it had very limited time to have those amazing scenes from season 1. And there certainly some heavy hitters, like Ekko save-scumming his conversation with Jinx to find a way to stop her killing herself, or Caitlyn and Mel's battle with Ambessa, or Jayce and Viktor yetting themselves into arcane oblivion, but... the finale itself seems very disconnected from the rest of the series, having a generic big bad in Possessed Chaos God Viktor. It lacks any of the intrigue of the Piltover vs Zaun conflict that was so important from s1e1 all the way to s2e4, after which it was promptly discarded in favour of other distractions. And as a result, Jinx and Vi are left as side characters in the ending of their own series, with a lot of their internal struggles left behind. Instead of the tragedy of season 1's ending, we are left thinking of the tragedy of how much better the ending could've been if they had just one more season to give these characters justice.

The strongest episode of the season is probably episode 6. If you know, you know.

2. Ducktales: So if you were a casual viewer of Ducktales you probably had no issues with this one. It's a competent TV finale where stuff happens and all the characters get involved and there are emotional themes.

What's weird about this one, and why it's so far down, is because of Webby's role. Webby is a misfit because she's not a member of the Scrooge family. She's a wannabe. She wants to be part of them, part of the siblings, and she has more in common with Scrooge and Della's brilliance than the other three, but she will never have that blood relationship. Her own parents are dead too, so she has feelings about watching the triplets reunite with their mother.

But in season 3... Ot's like the Ducktales writers were told they only had one episode left to work with and just made something up, and what they decided to do was take the "found family" trope and say "actually it was real family the whole time because Webby was Scrooge's secret clone daughter".

It leaves a bad taste in my mouth. The show did such a good job before this point showing Webby's development as she gets loved and accepted into the family. But for her to have always secretly had that blood relationship undercuts it fully.

It also undercuts her relationship to her grandmother, who tries to move out of the picture as soon as the truth comes out. The show does have Webby embracing her gran to show theyre still family. But we already had this story told in a better way with Webby and Scrooge and the triplets.

The fact the finale has nothing to do with the rest of the season is also why it's so far down. The season 2 finale was pretty spectacular by comparison and had compelling scenes like Della freaking out over protecting her kids and "running to the moon" with them, recycling her trauma (yes a ducktales character has trauma).

If you're not bothered by it, it's an inoffensive, fun finale. But more obsessive Ducktales fans and Webby fans were quite upset, myself included.

3. Kipo and the age of Wonderbeasts

I can't remember much about how this show ended. Honestly that's part of the problem. The first season was far more intrigueing than anything that followed and the whole thing came out across 2020 and it was a forgettable experience despite Karen Fukuhara voicing the energetic Kipo.

What I do remember is being pissed off about some things. Like how a lot of the talking animals were turned into non-talking animals and that was how things ended for them, and no vaccine or anything was made. It pissed me off somehow? Please kipo fans tell me your feelings on this.

I also disliked the final villain. She's a lot like Kris from Scavenger's Reign but even more generic and disappointing.

I dunno, to me the finale represents the wasted potential of this show. How it takes place in a world that rivals Adventure Time's, but Netflix did away with it so quickly, releasing three entire seasons in one year and leaving it with a generic end.

The peak into everyone's futures is nice, but it's not intrigueing like with The Owl House or Adventure Time.

4. Steven Universe: What a hot mess of an ending that threw out so much potential for the wider Steven Universe world. The motivations of the main villains were narrowed down to "we have emotional problems". Steven Universe has a consistent issue where it has emotional scenes at the expense of characters and story.

But I rate this more highly than the SU Future ending, despite that one having perhaps more cohesive writing, because I felt that the SU end had some incredible scenes that carried the spirit of the show while SU Future constantly undermined the original series without providing enough value of its own.

In particular, the scene James Baxter animated of Steven and Steven. This was mind-blowing, it was the climax to the most important part of the story, the truth of Steven's identity and whether he was his own person.

In retrospect that scene brings more value to me than all the bad parts of SU... but SU had so many amazing characters. It's a tragedy that Steven was the only one of them that the show still loved by the end.

Hardest line:

She's GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONE!!!!

5. Amphibia: Season 3 was plagued by being worse than season 2. The opening episodes on Earth were kinda bad, just "Amphibia season 1 episodes but in a far more boring setting". I hated anything involving the secret agents.

The fact Kipo, Scavenger's Reign, and Amphibia all have corpo villains at the end, and the fact I didn't like any of those endings, shows to me that it's not a particularly great thing to add to a fantasy story.

The first sad part is "the magic is destroyed". A popular theme in Disney shows. Well, what happens here is Sasha, Anne, and Marcy lose their magic abilities, and they decide to stay on Earth and lose the ability to travel to Amphibia. It's not massively offensive but it's kind of played out and generic and it does the sad thing of separating the trio from their found family. What's controversial is the epilogue shows that Anne, Sasha, and Marcy stopped hanging out after the end. They just broke off from each other's lives, it was easy as that. It wasn't a lifelong friendship. They do reunite in the end but it's been like ten years. It undermines the emotional turmoil that was present across the whole show. What Matt Braly wanted to show is sometimes things happen. Despite how much you want to be best friends forever... you stop being close to people, you lose touch with them. But this isn't a story that makes much sense when the characters have been through so much together in a fantasy world. It's like Marcy's worst fears have come true, and while that's a point of growth for her, it's frustrating for the viewers who believed the endgame bonds between the characters were better than that.

[Edit: Other than that, a lot of characters weren't delivered in justice s3 with how they had been built up in season 2. Sasha is hardly present in season 3 and Marcy is genuinely not present at all, and when we watched it we really thought they were gonna do more with Marcy when she came back. Swim in that emotional trauma a little bit! But no she's fine even with her evil father figure gone. It could've been better, should've been because season 2 was so stellar.] And I wasn't a fan of how Anne was portrayed at the end. I don't like how these stories make their characters "grow up" in such a way that they come across as love-all hippies instead of having anything resembling their original personality. Where's her sass? Why is she so melancholic and only melancholic? But that's a personal problem I haven't seen many others talk about.

Other than that, it's a competent episode. But it's the ending to a weaker season compared to what came prior.

The cat in this drawing has been my discord icon since we watched it though.

What the Hell?

These are the endings that shat the bed. I hate them! Everyone else probably does too.

Steven Universe Future: Unlike the other endings of this section, I did feel like Rebecca Sugar was going somewhere with SU future. They had a specific goal in mind for what they wanted to do, and every episode reaches towards that goal in some way. That's why a lot of people think Steven Universe Future is better than the more disjointed, huge tv series that came prior. It had a set start middle and end and carried through those themes. Unfortunately, those themes suck. Yeah, it's great deconstructing the impact Steven Universe had on Steven as a character, showing the damage that was done to him, the ways he's been let down. In isolation, it's a great way to show how a difficult childhood can affect you in adulthood, in ways that you would have never expected. This is the value SU Future has. It also has good sections showing how some other characters have recovered, how Pearl for example is healing and far more social than she ever has been but still has a ways to go, and finally talks to someone about her feelings over Pink Diamond, the previous Pearl that served her. Volleyball is a great episode. Unfortunately it takes the wrong lessons from the mistakes of the show. Steven Universe really wanted us to fall in love with its many characters, but it spent so much time showing Garnet, Amethyst and Pearl's flaws, spent so much time showing them failing Steven, that they ultimately came across as incompetent and sidelined. This is an issue with the original show. Steven Universe Future: "You know what? You're right! That was bad!" Me: "So are you going to do those characters justice and show them having growth and being competent and caring for Steven?" Steven Universe Future: "No. We are going to show them BEING EVEN WORSE and COMPLETELY FAILING to connect with Steven!" Me: "... For the entire thing????" Steven Universe Future: "Yes. this is never fixed and Steven leaves the county because of it." Me: "What the fuck?" Even people who were really into the whole thing were taken aback that Steven's kaiju transformation, the manifestation of his deepest fears about himself, was resolved with a hug. Just like the major conflict in the original show. And instead of a meaningful denouement, the show skipped all the resolution and went to Steven running the fuck away in an episode that would've had equal emotional value if it was in season 1 episode 1, or a competely different series. It was cheap and easy to make a bittersweet ending of Steven leaving the city. And it made it feel like the tragedy of Steven's mental breakdown was more important than his healing. Like they couldn't make an interesting story of him getting better because they're incompetent writers. I did like the scene of Steven crying his eyes out after he detransformed. And a lot of scenes in Future did go hard. But the Crystal Gems deserved better. Hell, Jasper deserved better.

Hardest scene:

2. Star vs the forces of Evil: Hooo boy. In the animation community this is HERALDED as The Worst Ending. It is the flagship of disappointment.

It disappointed people who loved the magical world the show took place in. It disappointed people who wanted to see Star reach her potential. It disappointed every shipper of every ship, not that I ever cared for the romance dramas but they took a lot of screentime on the show to its detriment. It disappointed people who like to apply basic logic to the things they watch. What a disaster!

Okay so why is it so hated?

Well, Star had been on the decline for a while. It had a fantastic start to season 3, with a great big war for Mewnie where everyone had great character moments, Star died and came back to life and utterly annihilated the villain. Toffee was a great villain, by the way.

There had been a bit of romantic tension between Star and Marco and they both had crushes on each other but refused to ever admit it and Marco thought he was into some other girl, and Star let him go at the start of season 3 and started dating... her ex... this shitty guy called Tom... he's a good character but a terrible boyfriend who kind of suicide baits Star back into his life. And Star would become a terrible girlfriend. I dunno, people really thought that pairing would be endgame but it was clear to me it was just an artificial obstacle in the way of the inevitable Starco ship. Like Kelly. Who Marco dates for a whopping half an episode before they break up offscreen. Great?

Anyway the romance in this series is on the same tier as Korra, though it does try to build up its endgame pairing from the start.

But from season 3 onwards Marco felt more like a joke character. I don't know, they didn't treat him with much respect.

The thing that EVERYONE TALKS ABOUT with Star, oh god it's going to be the longest thing on this list, is Moon and Eclipsa and Mina and the atrocious decisions the characters made.

I'm going to bullet point it so it's vaguely readable:

Star's mother, Queen Moon, goes missing following the events of the start of s3 special.

Star learns that the throne was stolen from monster-fucker Eclipsa and wrongly given to her own family line so she gives the crown to Eclipsa, to great controversy. Eclipsa is a dark magic user who is 300 years old and she's pretty cool but the show takes a sharp turn from this point to being about a racial conflict - Monsters being discriminated against by Mewmans and how a lot of people want to keep it that way.

The council which was previously on the side of good really HATES this decisionn and is now portrayed as bad.

Conflict breaks out and people are against Eclipsa and her giant person-eating husband leading the kingdom.

People have their homes given back to the monsters that they were stolen from hundreds of years ago. It's a silly cartoon form of reparations but it is shown giving them hardship because they are made homeless. By the way nobody in history has been made homeless because of reparations.

These homeless or disgruntled mewmans find Moon, who has re-emerged and decided to stay away from the kingdom. They want their old queen back and side with her, and she thinks they need someone to represent them. She also hates Eclipsa for various reasons.

Moon decides the best way to deal with Eclipsa is to arm the biggest fascist monster-killing character in the world with an invincible undefeatable army of magic soldiers, and retake the kingdom and go to war against the side her own daughter is on.

Moon gets a surprised pikachu face when she realises she can't undo the spell she used to make this fascist evil super army.

Star decides the best way to resolve this is to delete all magic. Kill it. They go to the source of all magic and use a spell to kill everything there. Lots of reindeer die.

Then every magical thing in the universe gets deleted. Every single magic-born creature. The entire council is murdered. All of the creatures in Star's magic wand die. Countless portals to other worlds are closed down, meaning many of the characters can no longer go and see their friends anymore. This is directly shown, by the way - not just inferred.

Somehow, Ponyhead survives.

Then this is capped off by Marco and Star wanting to reunite... and in a scene that is supposed to be emotional, they cleave their universes together. Mewnie lands on top of Earth. Normal humans are screaming as they are chased around by giant creatures.

The story ends.

Yeah do I have to explain any more why this one was unpopular? It's the biggest fumble you can speak of.

My biggest issue is how dumb they had to make Moon in order to achieve this outcome.

But Starco is kind of cute, even if Marco wasn't half the character he used to be by the end.

3. Homestuck: Which ending do you want me to discuss? Act 6? The epilogues? Or HS^2?

Let's start with the main work, as that's what makes Homestuck qualify as an animation.

Act 6 was a vast disappointment because it sort of ended. We had so much talking for so long that we were hoping something cool would happen and then we got a flash where the characters hit each other with sticks. There were no stakes in Collide, not really.

Then we got the Frog flash. We watched a frog for 8 minutes.

Then that was it!

There were so many unanswered questions. What the hell happened to the final boss and the MAIN CAST, for example. We had learnt earlier in the story that in some point of the future, the main cast all get stuck in a little homestuck house which Vriska fires at Lord English. But we never learn when, we never learn if they're ok, we never learn if English is killed or what happens to Vriska. So for a long time there was this disturbing implication that the cast would all die not long after the series ended.

We had the Credits which were much better but further solidified this implication, and it had Terezi fly out into the void looking for Vriska forever, which made me sad and depressed but that was because of my personal involvement in the story really.

Act 6 is more of a "mistakes were made" ending, but it's the Epilogues and HS^2, and the actions of creator Andrew Hussie, which are why it's rock bottom here.

I don't want to give my breath to those items. Let's just say they were the most meanspirited, intentionally offensive, hostile, character-destroying sets of stories every done, created by people who accused every homestuck fan who didn't like them of being "not really trans" or "pedophile harborors" or "deserving to be lined up and shot" (real quote).

And then the fact Hussie fired his entire crew twice and blacklisted them if he ever had any suspicion they complained about his leadership or financial decisions anywhere.

And the fact the entire whatpumpkin team were left uncredited in the original release of Hiveswap Act 2 because Hussie didn't want to give them any credit because he wants his friends to be a hivemind.

I have so much hatred for what Homestuck became. It's tragic because this series was such a big part of my life for so long.

It's also tragic because the main work is a masterpiece. Even Act 7, despite the criticism, is Guzusuru's masterwork with how much effort went into the animation. How much heart went into each illustration the old Paradox Space team made.

So that's it. Homestuck is the one that is not just a little bit worse than Star. Leaps and bounds worse.

But that's it. I have a lot of opinions on endings because they can colour how you view the entire previous work.

[nekropsii]

Small Atomic Ask Bomb!!

I've got a bunch of short asks that I'd hate to spam the dash with individually, so I'll just put 'em here, under the cut!!

Content Warning: Long, Brief Discussions of Racism, Misogyny, Grooming, Brief Mentions of Incest and Pedophilia in Fanfiction.

I've always been a hater, and I honestly don't really think it's a bad thing - not as much as everyone says, at least! I think being kind of a bitch about things that don't matter is good for you, actually. Gets the urge to be angry out in a way that's healthier than just snapping at people in critical moments. I also just think being strong and passionate in your convictions is good for you. Being a hater gives you a spine if you do it right, and it fires a gunshot and scatters people you don't really want to be around. It also has the funny side effect of people thinking I take things way more seriously than I do, just because I'm opinionated and will state said opinions clearly. Big fan of this meme:

This is me.

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I used to peek in there every now and then, just to be nosy. Incest at the top, always. Or straight up pedo shit. Sigh. Looked in the Mituna tag a couple times. CroTuna fucking nightmare hell dimension, always. Or KanTuna, which I also have gripes with. Or KanMiTula, which I have even more gripes with.

It is my understanding that the state of Homestuck fanfiction hasn't gotten much better since the 2010s. Everyone is wrong and no one is normal. Sad.

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I don't know if the mere act of only making Jade and Jake brown out of all the Kids is Racist on its own, per se, but it is kinda silly in the sense that, you know, John and Jade are siblings, so realistically they'd look similar. And... People absolutely do get racist about it. Like, making Jade and Jake uniquely huge, hairy, threatening, and oddly shaped - gangly in the context of Jade, buff as hell in the context of Jake. I've seen some SEVERELY racist drawings where Jade and/or Jake were the only hints of melanin in the Kid line up and... Oh my god. It can get to straight up caricature levels. Watermelons and everything. Just comedically racist.

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Genuinely one of the dumbest fucking things in the world. People will say literally anything. Saying Damara isn't Japanese is on par with calling Porrim a fucking Men's Rights Activist. It's a funny little claim people who are grievously wrong say as a condemnation of the Alpha Trolls for no reason. Why. To look smart? To fit in? Dumbass. Notice how they always have to invent bullshit lies to critique anything instead of just saying things that are true. It really frustrates me how 99.9% of Alpha Troll criticism just isn't at all legitimate when there's some real, genuine issues you could critique. It's stupid horseshit. I hate it so badly.

I don't actually care whether or not someone likes the Alpha Trolls, but at least hate them accurately. Come on.

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@sleepy-apparition

Everyone is so, so quick to turn a blind eye to just how violently misogynistic Kankri is, lmfao. Genuinely, I don't think I've ever seen anyone other than myself bring up the fact that he's an avid Slut-Shamer in the modern day. Other than that, I only really saw older Mituna fanatics bring it up over in the early-mid 2010s, but none of them are around these days.

Genuinely, some of the shit he says is so appalling, lol. Kankri FULLY deserves to get his ass beat.

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I have said this before but I'll say it again - I do not think a Red Romantic Relationship will fix Dirk, or even really help him all that much. Before he gets into a RedRom, he needs some therapy, a break, and mood stabilizers.

However, I'm thoroughly of the opinion that a good BlackRom could work wonders on him, way more than a RedRom would. I think a solid, established Pitch Relationship with, like, Caliborn would be genuinely great for him, both mentally and in a Character Development sense. I hold zero interest in watching Dirk and Jake badly fumble a traditional romantic relationship - that notion is painful to me. ... But I do think I could read a full Intermission's worth of Dirk and Caliborn fucking around and not get tired of it once. They have a fantastic dynamic. It'd be good for Caliborn, too, I think.

This has been my Dirkuu propaganda bit. Thank you.

Also, the Voyeuristic feel of how people handle his Mental Illness. It makes me uncomfortable.

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True. I don't have any other remarks to make about this, you're just correct. True.

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... Fuckin'... Why, though? What- what's the appeal? There's nothing there. I literally cannot conceive any way in which that would be compelling, and I'd say Hal and Kankri are pretty high up there in the list of Male Homestuck Characters I Enjoy.

People will do anything but pay attention to Female Characters for five minutes. God. Lol.

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It's literally just DaveKat 2. I don't think it even qualifies as a Crack Ship when it's just a variant of The Fandom's Most Darling M/M OTP. It's just a deeply mid RarePair. Crack Ship would be, like, Dirk Strider x Rainbow Dash.

Dirk x RD was a popular Crack Ship, sure, but it's still a Crack Ship on basis of being a Crossover Pairing.

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I can't recall any specific instances of seeing this myself, but I'll believe it. People will do anything except be normal about Vriska. People will fight the war against Vriska on the side of and against Vriska at the same time. People will call her a Huge 8itch but then call her pathetic when she stops being a Huge 8itch.

We love Misogyny, I guess.

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Well, he is based on Tumblr, after all. Particularly how dogshit the politics are on here. Of course he would. He'd do numbers on here, considering his Woke Hate Speech.

It's called Bubblr, by the way. Like, canonically. We do know what it's called.

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It's actually based on the Three Wise Monkeys. You know, that old Japanese Proverb that goes "See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil"? That.

Kurloz is Speak No Evil, Meulin is Hear No Evil, Mituna is See No Evil.

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Great Question. My personal guess is that he's a little too nuanced for a lot of people to be comfortable with handling. He throws out too much surface-level Bigotry that people aren't willing to ignore because it isn't Racism for many to feel comfortable making him their Blorbo. When Dave says the N-Word and talks about how fucking Racist he is and it literally never gets acknowledged or resolved, that's fine and dandy, but god forbid Caliborn be a Misogynist in the funniest way possible AND have that get acknowledged literally constantly as a problem. The fact that Caliborn isn't a Fuckable White 13-Year-Old Twink means none of his crimes are ever forgivable because he's ugly and unshippable, or whatever.

The fact that he's Mentally Disabled doesn't help. People can't fucking STAND IT when a character is Mentally Disabled in a way that isn't Cute and Consumable, much less a character who is Unconsumably Mentally Disabled AND Complicated. It's just not allowed!!

[bladekindeyewear]

Murder Drones - Homestuck Classes/Aspects

The eighth and final episode of this independent-animation Youtube series came out just over two weeks ago (MUCH longer than that by the time I ever finish this draft post, oh god it's been three months), and after having binged through it and a bunch of reactions TO it and bonus details / theory content, I couldn't resist coming up with Hero Titles for all the main characters based on the Homestuck Classes and Aspects system I've spent so much time helping analyze.

Please note that THE MAJORITY OF WHAT IS UNDER THE CUT IS HEAVY SPOILERS FOR THE ENTIRE SERIES. Please do NOT click the read-more and spoil yourself on one of the better triumphs of indie animation I've seen (in my biased perspective), from Glitch Productions, the studio making The Amazing Digital Circus. Watch the first minute or two of Episode 1 right now instead and if you're not hooked by the dark comedy, relentless pause-bonuses and lampshadey character writing that (though it's not for everyone) I promise only gets better FAST as the episodes continue and an actual mystery unfolds, then just ignore this post and come back some other time if you ever decide to finish watching the series. I'll be justifying my takes in detail and listing very spoilery twists and concepts below the cut, so this is all I can give you of my opinions before spoiling anything, because I can't even list all the characters and the most interesting classpects without giving away things you're better off watching all eight episodes before seeing. Have a first taste, the rest is under the cut if you've finished Murder Drones:

Uzi - Witch of Void

N - Heir of Hope

V - Knight of Mind

J - Maid of Doom

Oh you're under the cut now? Time to list the OTHER characters before I go in depth on each!

Doll - Witch of Space

CYN - Thief of Heart (ascended, with heavy Page of Mind duality having mastered her role)

The Solver of the Absolute Fabric - Muse of Void (the true enemy, the unknown eldritch entity/program who seduced CYN with an explicit Choice and is potentially driving the universe itself towards the Big Crunch while relentlessly fueling itself with planetary mass!)

UZI DOORMAN - Witch (or Knight?) of Void

"Easy, morons. It doesn't work... yet! It doesn't work yet. Who said it doesn't work, maybe it does!" (Uzi flicks the [railgun's] switch and laughs evilly.)

"The humans sent you without a communication relay and reformatted your memories to soup. Covering their tracks means they're past negotiating."

TEACHER: "Uzi, give Braden back his sentience." BRADEN (controlled): "Bite me-- her! I started it, and also, I'm dumb." *Head bursts into flames.*

"My crazed ramblings! Stay outta my freaking room!"

N: "Before we met, scary stuff was actually... pretty scary. And tonight too, 'cause you weren't with me to make it fun, somehow."

"I am a ghost witch! And I'm tall. Heheheh."

"Important hacking going on!"

N and V's displays: "ADMIN [CYN] OVERRIDE... [100%] -- ASSIGNING PERMS :// USER ID: DARKXWOLF17 ROLE: ADMIN"

"Nobody traumatizes these weirdly hot robots but me!"

"I think dumb things are super cool, and I - AM - FREE!!!"

Okay, Uzi's hero title was one of the toughest to nail down. I kept having doubts at every turn, trying out alternatives, so let me try to dismiss those doubts/alternatives for you the same way I did for myself.

Rage? It might capture some of her edgelordiness and her attraction to the terrifying, but there's a venn diagram overlap between plenty of aspects, and the one between Rage and Void is filled in liberally here. What Rage doesn't fully account for is how Uzi always goes for the tastes and options that everyone else is dismissing, how she serves as an ignored champion, how she embraces how others in darkness can be good instead of just embracing darkness, and how she isn't as defined by her rebellion against optimism or fear as by her rebellion against those who would own her, how she refuses to submit her agency and controls the submission of others, as per the Agency/Submission axis of the Light/Void spectrum and a Witch's dominion of controlling and manipulating that difference.

Knight? It's extremely tempting to write off all the Witch mentions and imagery as funny coincidence while focusing on how she actually mostly weaponizes the power, but I again focus on how much of her personal journey is about control as an edgy teenager, by her parents, by society, by her own powers, the statement always shaking her free being the declaration that "YOU DON'T OWN ME!", combined with the skillful Witchy way she wrests control of the submission built into N and V and draws out the secrets she needs especially in Episode 5, and eventually projects control over even the Solver power's original owner. The Knight is the class that exploits and weaponizes the aspect, leaping through loopholes like a sword dance. The Witch is the class which controls, changes, and manipulates the aspect, grasping and shaping it like clay between their hands.

And so while I leave you to be free to believe Uzi is a Knight if you still want, I would contend that the title that best embodies her throughout the series and her journey to self-actualization is that of a Witch of Void. Void players are almost always attracted to that which repels and confuses others. Uzi is a girl obsessed with ideas that are dark and rejected and unpopular, the scary and misunderstood, enamored with the creepy and destructive and monstrous and vampiric (the Disassembly / Murder Drones are obvious Vampire analogues with their bat-like blood-drinking, wings and sleeping upside down, sunlight weakness, staking them through the Heart being the only way to keep them from regenerating, the "Bite Me" phrase, and is also reflected in how the Solver curse breaks mirrors that vampires classically cannot be seen in). She delves into secrets, mastering her control over unknown powers and advantages episode by episode. She rebels against control, everyone and everything constantly urging her to Submit like a Void player tempted to alcohol, and instead seeks Control and agency for herself and everyone she comes to care about while subjugating the enemy. She shares many classical Void player tropes-- a hacker controlling others, even manipulating submission by freeing N and V by rewriting HERSELF as their system administrator in Cyn's place so her instructions could no longer puppet them. Her main weapons are an energy rifle (railgun) like Roxy, unarmed combat like Roxy and Equius (Void because you wield Nothing), the reality manipulating powers of the Solver wielded like a Witch including the almighty [NULL] command of black-hole-like deletion creating voids in space that not even Doll attempted, and finally a weapon inherited from her very similar mother: A pickaxe, a tool classically used to unearth things from the depths. I couldn't pick a more varied and fitting arsenal for a Witch of Void.

Her ultimate battlecry in the final episode is essentially I am cringe but I am free, fitting for any Void player, and she completes her journey by refusing to be Controlled or submit her agency to any but those she trusts most, and in fact subsuming Control of the reality-warping power and individual who most sought to control her and everyone else, becoming its master, and yet submitting somewhat to the way of life of the worker drones and her classmates living in their underground bunker. "And yep, that's how I learned nightmares are real, and we probably should have stayed behind the ol' doors! And that maybe I don't actually hate it here. As much."

DOLL - Witch of Space

"Как мило, но мне твоя помощь не нужна." ("Cute, but I don't need help.")

Doll: "Я не позволю ему использовать меня, чтобы поглотить планету! (I will not let it use me to consume the planet!)" Tessa: "Hmm... Not sure it needs you, buddy."

The supernatural reality-editing power known as the Absolute Solver normally has four known functions, each with their own symbols: Translate (move), Scale (crush/expand), Rotate, and Edit, not counting the [null] command that only comes with a direct connection as one of the Solver's main hosts. Doll exhibits more comprehensive control of these spatial-manipulating abilities and their versatility than even CYN! She repositions/teleports herself at will, not only spatially manipulates objects but uses Edit to replicate them (an act of Creation we never see CYN or Uzi pull), and refuses to relinquish control of any situation she's involved in unless forced to retreat and watch from the shadows, warping around between the targets she's observing like a ghost. And the whole time, she follows a very Aradia-reminiscent ghost girl schtick.

Specifically, the way Aradia acted and the powers she used while inverted to a Bard of Space! The way Aradia behaves after her god-tier resurrection as an ascended Maid of Time hardly resembles Doll's behavior at all! It lines up surprisingly perfectly.

Thematically, Murder Drones doesn't really follow the "Space/Time = Creation/Destruction" axis association very much, unlike many other works of fiction that quite prominently do. Freed from that obligation in this framework, Doll can act as a Witch of Space even more blatantly destructive and active than Grimbark Jade Harley, making the crucial mistake of trying to tackle and control a problem all by herself that she had no actual hope of overcoming alone. One of the most active classes there is, a Witch is often tempted by their role to take ALL the control for themselves, and usually pays for it.

Gosh, isn't it satisfying to see what it'd be like for a Witch of Space to fully use her powers in close-quarters combat?! What a fantastic display.

N - Golden Retriever Heir of Hope

"Sure! I love doing anything!"

CYN: "You know, you're one of the main reasons I wanted your team to retain your personalities. You always surprised me. Loved doing... anything."

"[After having a hand shoved in his mouth, nervously reassuring, clearly not having enjoyed it.] Sweet! Uh, I'm open to new things, I guess."

"(To V) I'm so, so sorry. Have fun repressing this!" Licks V's sword, revolting her and making her lose her grip.

With the easy way N makes friends with absolutely everyone, including the viewer, you'd think he'd perhaps be somewhere on the Blood aspect, such as an Heir of Blood like the Mayor-- but the specific WAY that N makes friends so easily is important, and very reminiscent of Jake in his Page of Hope role. He consistently completely defies everyone's impressions and expectations of him, the contrast winning them over in mere moments-- he takes the SIDE of those deliberately against him, giving advice to them and wanting them to be happy even as they're literally trying to dissect him. He's unbelievably optimistic and almost always open to EVERYONE the moment they aren't completely terrifying him. He opens himself up to everything even more than Jake does.

And more importantly to the nuance of his role and how skilled he is with it: He takes in the weird ideas of others, no matter how offball or repellent, and consistently redeploys them in new contexts to his advantage. Like using the idea of how revolted he was at Uzi sticking her hand in his mouth to lick V's sword to get her to disengage. Like taking in the reasons Uzi gave him to rebel against authority in Episode 1 and readily deploying a full rationale based on them against his superior officer J. Like when he took Uzi's language of how he and Uzi "just kinda, like, hang out a lot <3" to throw the oddball of him and Uzi dating as the most IMPOSSIBLE to imagine method to finally snap Uzi out of being controlled out of romantic embarrassment while making her mother even more motivated to finish her daughter's smackdown. An Heir is the passive counterpart to a Witch, making N theoretically the nexus through which Hope flows and is manipulated and changed in himself and others. He changes others' perceptions of what is possible. His very belief in others and the optimism he pours into them changes them, changing V, even in her memory visions with the remark about golden retrievers' gentle mouths.

A Hope player can also expect to be challenged by a test of Rage, and fear is constantly what keeps N penned in and a defining character trait he repeatedly encounters. Two SPECIFIC challenges he faced and had to conquer were Rage challenges, which made him adopt a split "O_X" face the ONLY TWO TIMES he did so in the series to show the conflict between the need to murder or cut short contrasted with the need to look for hope, where he felt he had to align himself AGAINST the breadth of possibilities and optimism to do something drastic that would cut all possibility short by dealing death:

Episode 1, threatening Uzi: "I'm sorry. I really enjoyed our time together, but I can't have you shooting V with that thing."

Episode 7, threatening Tessa: "You knew about the patch. Yes, or no? One. Chance."

V - Stray Cat Knight of Mind

"The humans programmed us to solve a problem. Where's proof of your backstory? The one where your kind's so conveniently innocent?"

"Uh, exactly. We show up fabulous, the sad purple one lets us in, cause she has no friends, we kill everyone, and pop her little head off."

"…Promise me you and that purple thing will stop prying into that stuff. If you free me now, I promise we'll only kill what we need to survive. Just you and me, N…" (Glancing meaningfully to make N look at the key to her chains... which we learned beforehand she was secretly already free from, even though she honestly wanted N to agree to this.)

N: "Uh… V, if you're hiding something, we can figure it out together. Even if we each only have pieces. Please, what do you know-" (V slices his head off.) V: "What's best for you. Even if you hate me for it."

"Yes, best friends. So easily manipulated…"

"I'll.. kill everyone.. after [giving a prom queen speech]? It's not vain, it's... extra sinister…" (Making excuses to convince herself.)

(Manipulating Uzi to stay stop stealing N's attention away from her--) "Better to stay distant, though. Don'tcha think? (She looks over at Uzi's backpack.) Since I'll have to kill you next? (She scratches Uzi's (solver) eye and prepares to leave.) N's made friends with rocks, by the way. He'll move on just fine."

"We do our jobs, and that thing leaves us alone!"

CYN: "Do your job, and I leave you and N alone. Right, V?"

(Yes, in case you didn't notice, N is a dog and V is a cat. It's incredibly obvious in retrospect, right down to V hissing. (See this meme that isn't mine, and in V's case food is ALSO murder.) )

V play-acts a madwoman's façade from the very beginning to disguise her goals. From the very beginning, she REMEMBERS enough of her past to commit to the deal she explicitly made with Cyn-- she does her job, and Cyn will leave N alone, leave V and N together. She offers falsehoods and doubts, fights viciously to get away with what she wants within the confines of any agreements she makes (even the one with Cyn), willing to use any façade as a weapon and exploit every decision, to fuck with other's heads to advance her goals and keep others the hell out of her OWN head. She loves the images she throws her whole self into projecting, even loving the false ones, and how each disturbs others or earns her praise. She's a surprisingly nuanced, entertaining, and practically quintessential Knight of Mind!

J - Maid of Doom

"Way to go, stud. The company's gonna love this. With this colony wiped, we'll make top team this quarter, for sure. You know what that means… Branded pens~!"

"Noted, traitor. We'll circle back after I right-size your existence!"

"Sorry, boss. Corporate's spoken."

Tessa: (Overdramatic) "It wants paid time off… To attend UUUNION NEGOTIATIOOOONS!" J: (Finally at her limit) "THIS IS AN UNRELATED LAYOFF!"

"It tricked you. If I promised you anything… It tricked me, too."

"You know there's no escape, even in death!"

This one's pretty open and shut, her motivations and personality are pretty straightforward in this story. J is a drone comically obsessed with the strictures of Bureaucracy and enforcing the authority of capitalists downward against labor. She obeys hierarchy, and sacrifices whatever she might think is fair or right for the leash of whoever's on top. Doom is the aspect of Order, sacrifice, anxiety, constraints, and in some ways Anti-Life. Corporate bureaucracy is the perfect analogue, as the Condesce and Jane Crocker have long proven, and J is a wellspring of that corrosive essence who Serves and spreads it.

I could see some arguments for Blood based on the focus on chains and obligations and destruction enacted/invited unto Blood, but those mostly fall into the venn-diagram overlap and her obsession with obeying the TOP of the hierarchy to the exclusion of the bottom, with cooperation only within the strictures of the rules of those "above", aligns her much stronger with the Life/Doom dichotomy than the Blood references. Sollux and Karkat were best friends for a reason, Blood and Doom can be pretty tight.

CYN - Thief of Heart (Fully Realized!)

"More like you are our cute puppets. It hurts our feelings you don't remember us." (Creates a hologram of Nori, Uzi's mother.)

"Easier to assimilate than explain."

"Giggle. I am so naughty. The flesh demands invitation."

Tessa: "Cyn! If that little butler dies for your sake, I swear!" Cyn: (Playing with dolls) "Mm. I have.. backups."

"You will not have to discard your pets, and I will not discard you. Best stay away from the gala, though. You seem squeamish."

Manipulating N as Tessa: "When we get to the labs and find that list, I'll need you to choose the universe over one little drone, N. Before she's not herself anymore..."

"Thanks for the new host… intern."

"You know, you're one of the main reasons.. I wanted your team to retain your personalities."

"Thanks for clearing the way on this planet, too. Let's eat."

"That's really sweet, big brother. Too bad you've served.. your purpose. Don't worry. Your backups will forgive me."

"I see. You will not talk to me because I have hurt… your feelings." (Mimes her finger down her cheek like a tear, grinning.)

"Okay. You first, eager beaver. Heeheehee." (She begins clawing at N's chest.) "Let me in. Let me in. Let me in. Let me in. LetmeinLetmeinLetmein"

CYN, I can say with some certainty as someone with autism which her primary personality and mannerisms mimic, is profoundly her own weird self and behaves VERY obviously differently from everyone around her, physically and vocally... unless she's roleplaying other people! If you have autism too there's a good chance you can relate to the roleplaying aspect of this. We don't even know what Tessa's classpect would really be, because she was just mimicking her the entire time, part of why this had to be under the cut. She convincingly stole her identity, mannerisms, even her skin to achieve her hungry, gleefully heart-slurping goals.

When we see her most, she's at the absolute PEAK of her hero (villain) title's power, fully balanced with her Page of Mind inverse/sub-role in puppeting illusions, seizing direct control of the infected, and trying to deceive others with horrifying, demoralizing visions specifically tailored to pierce their individual Hearts and hit them with what they care about most. She's a terrifying Thief of Heart who (apart from literally tearing the hearts out of other's chests) steals the individual uniqueness of others, and USES others' individual uniqueness to steal everything from them. She's much like a horrifying Page of Mind who went from playing with her dolls to playing with drones, using the fact she could clone others from backups to completely disconnect her from any sense of moral responsibility to them, raising an army of zombie followers in her image, slaved to her administrative control, and even later let her squads retain their original personalities specifically to exploit their uniqueness to accomplish more than she'd otherwise be able to expect from mindless slaves. She struck devil's deals with those she let keep their personalities, like V and J, using what she knew of their personalities to give them offers they couldn't refuse and letting them keep EXACTLY enough of their Minds to balance effectiveness with her manipulations. Her thrilled confidence at unleashing her true form and personality, shamelessly facing the cast as herself in episodes 7 and 8 having fulfilled her promise to Tessa that she would not discard her in the most horrifyingly literal way possible, is incredibly intimidating. What an amazing, love-to-hate-her antagonist with such power-hungry but initially-understandable motivations. I fucking love it.

And the wildest part is that she's actually only half of the real villain.

The Solver of the Absolute Fabric: Muse of Void

Tessa: "We know it mutates in damaged AI. It took Cyn as a host, then it took everything. The humans here saw what was happening at home. Thought they could understand it. All they did was spread it."

"[I am] The Solver of the Absolute Fabric, the Void, the Exponential End."

(Corkboard in the secret Cabin Fever facility--) "FUN TIME TO UNIVERSE BIG CRUNCH: 87"

CYN isn't ACTUALLY the Absolute Solver itself, only its primary host, perhaps almost a merged personality. Believe it or not, there's a Doc-Scratch-like antagonist behind EVERYTHING that happened with Cyn, and just like me you will have COMPLETELY missed it unless someone told you or you happened to pause or step through a FEW FRAMES of what flashed onscreen on CYN's visor when she first restarted in the garbage pile at the beginning of Episode 5:

The transcript, best as I can tell, which I'm sure will give any Homestuck veteran some serious Doc Scratch vibes:

[][][]hello :] I see you are [disposed (?????) pful/sad] I see you are inoperable- (?????) end]] --- I fD--t]] [selfDestruct(?????),]end]] I see we could [trl] [scl] [rot] [edit] for you I will not discard you [][][][][][Absolute[Sys(???)] Access? Y/N [.0001%] rush I see you will be here for _ [a while]

The functions [trl] [scl] [rot] [edit] refer to the four explicit powers of the Absolute Solver besides [NULL], which are Translate, Scale, Rotate, and Edit, each with their own unique symbol that appears when someone uses it as we've covered. (There's more depth you can wiki-dive, and it's so cool to see how every time the powers are used the abilities switch out and do such specific things in such varied ways. I also love the theme of the [trn] (Translate/Move) symbol being used to represent CONTROL over others, too, the symbol papering over the eyes of the possessed completely.)

CYN didn't just develop her eldritch powers from a reboot glitch-- an ENTITY OFFERED HER POWER THAT SHE ACCEPTED in order to resurrect, an incredible realty-warping power it offers to dead AI to give them new (un)life in order to advance its universe eating goals. It's the source of a power that defies the laws of reality, is allergic to Light, and has to manipulate lesser entities into submitting to its power in order to truly control them. It selects those who have been discarded and forgotten, dead without agency, and tempts them like the Devil. It disguises its true form's manifestations (the giant bugs and camera-projectors), literally hides extra mass in shadows, unfolding from pocket dimensions, and each of the users who access its powers (Uzi, Doll, and CYN) use its Voidy toolset in different ways that align with their own natures even while the power and its endower's motives hang Muse-like over the entire plot like a shadow itself. The Solver's ultimate "host" even takes the form of a sort of singularity inside the core of the Heart of one possessed by the power's main focus, the locus puppet of the Absolute Solver's motives. No wonder CYN and Uzi can coexist in the end, if with some bags-under-the-eyes difficulty as Uzi the Witch constantly keeping both her and the power itself under Control.

That about covers the cast, and whether you agree or disagree with my title choices I hope I gave you some interesting things to think about! Classpect analysis while I was watching made me appreciate how clever the plot and character writing was for this series even more as I was watching it, and if any of this helped you appreciate Murder Drones more that's the best compliment I could possibly earn. <3

[the-meat-machine]

dirkuu is pale

I see a lot of people assuming that Dirk/Caliborn is blackrom. In fact, I used to think so too. But the more I've thought about these two, the more I've come to realize that there's a different quadrant that describes their relationship much, much better: moirallegiance.

I want to preface this by saying that neither of these characters are trolls, so one can't expect their feelings to map 1:1 onto troll quadrants. But if you are looking for a quadrant to characterize their relationship, I think that pale romance is a much closer analogue for what's going on here than troll kismesissitude -- and certainly far more on the mark than cherub kismesissitude, which is a whole other can of worms.

So let's start with that. Caliborn is from a species that "naturally" experiences blackrom, so why don't I think cherub-style blackrom is what's going on here?

Cherub vs. troll kismesissitude

We get a fair amount of information about troll blackrom throughout Homestuck, but one thing I want to highlight about it is that it's not just pure, vitriolic hatred. There's a core of respect there, of wanting your kismesis to be better than they are. Karkat explains it well when talking to John about his black crush on Terezi (emphasis mine):

JOHN: i'm just saying i find her, like, somewhat annoying, and REALLY aggravating a lot of the time, but that's it! KARKAT: BUT THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT THE FEELING IS! KARKAT: IT DOESN'T START OUT AS FULL BLOWN ANTIPATHY, AND IT RARELY EVEN REACHES SUCH AN EXTREME LEVEL OF HOSTILITY EVEN OVER LONG TERM BLACK RELATIONSHIPS. […] KARKAT: WHAT YOU'RE *TRYING* TO SAY IS, YOU HAD FRUSTRATED, NEGATIVE EMOTIONS TOWARD HER, BUT THEY DON'T COMPREHENSIVELY ACCOUNT FOR YOUR ATTITUDE TOWARD HER. KARKAT: MEANING, THERE ARE SOME THINGS ABOUT HER YOU ACTUALLY LIKE, BUT THE NEGATIVE FEELINGS MAKE IT HARD FOR YOU TO PUT YOUR FINGER ON THEM, OR EVEN WANT TO ACKNOWLEDGE THEM. KARKAT: THAT IS ABSOLUTELY STANDARD. WHAT GOOD WOULD IT BE HAVING A KISMESIS WHO DIDN'T POSSESS QUALITIES YOU ACTUALLY ADMIRED ON SOME LEVEL? KARKAT: THAT WOULD BE BORING, AND IT WOULDN'T EVEN WORK. THERE'D BE NO TENSION, NO PUSH AND PULL IN THE TURBULENT EMOTIONAL LANDSCAPE. THE SUBTLE POSITIVES ADD FUEL TO THE NEGATIVE FEELINGS, OFTEN GIVING THEM A REASON TO EXIST AT ALL. THEY INFLAME THE AGGRAVATING FACTORS, REMINDING YOU DEEP DOWN HOW MUCH YOU WOULD LIKE AND ADMIRE THIS PERSON IF IT WASN'T FOR ALL THEIR INFURIATING FLAWS, AND THE INCREDIBLE SENSE OF FRUSTRATION THAT CAUSES ALONG WITH ALL THE ASSOCIATED HOT-HEADED FEELINGS, THAT'S THE ESSENCE OF BLACK ROMANCE.

Cherub romance, on the other hand, is much more vitriolic. Here's Aranea explaining it (typing quirk removed for legibility):

Like humans, cherubs perceive romance through only one quadrant. Unlike humans, their relationships are exclusively black. But their mating ritual is much more violent than any practice trolls would, or even physically could engage in. And though it is critical to the perpetuation of their race, the confrontations can sometimes be lethal to one or both cherubs. Regardless of the outcome, the stakes are always high. The winner of the duel will assume control of the other's territory, while the loser will slink away to bear the offspring. So as she toured the planetary wreckage, she knew her quest for a mate was not just about the propagation of her species, but the liberation of billions from a monster.

For cherubs, there's no question of wanting your mate to be "better". There's no core of admiration. Your mate is a bitter enemy who needs to be eradicated -- perhaps one only you can eradicate (ah, romance). Cherub mating is a life-or-death battle where the only possible outcomes are defeat or conquest. No one will be waxing red for their mate afterward. That simply isn't a thing, in the cherub understanding of romance.

Furthermore, a cherub's mate is their opposite, in every way possible. They have diametrically opposing goals, temperaments, and philosophies of life. There's no possibility of seeing eye to eye with your mate. They're simply everything you aren't, and you despise them for it.

Caliborn's feelings towards Dirk

So. Does Caliborn have blackrom feelings towards Dirk? And I mean cherub blackrom, in its full, vitriolic glory. Does Caliborn despise Dirk, and think he's a threat among threats who needs to be eliminated at all costs?

Well. He wants to kill him, sure. But of all the people Caliborn wants to kill, he wants to kill Dirk the least.

IT'S THE DIRK HUMAN. HE IS SOMEWHAT TOLERABLE. I MEAN. AS A STRONG AND COMPETENT MALE. What. So you're down with the Dirk? NO. ALL I'M SAYING IS. THE DEATH I WISH ON HIM DOESN'T HAVE TO BE ESPECIALLY PAINFUL. IT COULD BE LIKE. GOING TO SLEEP. WITH MAYBE ONLY A SHORT SCREAM. I think you want to be bros with him. SHUT YOUR MOUTH.

So right off the bat, we can see that Caliborn does not at all have the sort of hatred for Dirk that cherubs have for their mates. He barely even thinks Dirk needs to die. Furthermore, he sees himself and Dirk as philosophically aligned in some ways, both being strong, competent males who like to fuck shit up. Hardly the sort of diametrically opposing role that a cherubic mate would fill.*

Now, what we do see here is some of that admiration that you see sometimes in troll blackrom. And there's a bit more of that in Caliborn's masterpiece, when Caliborn says of the fight between himself and Dirk:

IT WAS A PRETTY GOOD FIGHT BETWEEN US. BECAUSE HE'S STRONG, AND I ADMIRE THAT. WHY SHOULDN'T I LET A BATTLE HAPPEN FOR LONGER, WHEN TWO TOUGH DUDES ARE INVOLVED, STRUTTING THEIR STUFF.

So, okay. Maybe there's something here a bit akin to troll kismesissitude, if not cherub romance. But I still don't think that's the quadrant that matches best. Because, to be honest, there are a lot of people Caliborn wants dead, and several he sees as rivals (e.g. Jake, Dave). But there's only one person he's said anything like this about:

uu: BuT. THE DIRK HuMAN IS A PRETTY COOL GuY. uu: HE GETS THINGS DONE. uu: AND ISN'T AFRAID TO FuCK SOME SHIT uP. uu: LIKE. HE ACTuALLY LISTENS. uu: TO STuFF THAT'S IMPORTANT FOR A DuDE TO GET OFF HIS CHEST. uu: YOu KNOW. HE *GETS* EXACTLY THAT WHICH THE BITCHES CAN NEVER uNDERSTAND. uu: I GuESS WHAT I MEAN IS. HE REALLY KNOWS WHAT IT MEANS. uu: TO TRuLY BE A BRO.

Yeah. Caliborn likes talking about his feelings with Dirk. To be frank, this is an unprecedented admission from him. There are a few people he'll admit to not entirely hating -- mostly his lackeys -- but no one else he sees as a bro.

And why shouldn't he see Dirk as a bro? After all…

Dirk likes Caliborn

Yeah, so, here's the thing: Dirk simply does not hate Caliborn. Like, at all. In fact, he thinks he and Caliborn are friends.

TT: Surely there must be at least one of our virtues you admire. uu: YES. AMBITION. THAT'S THE ONLY GOOD ONE. uu: AND I THINK YOu GOT THAT. WHICH IS MAYBE WHY. YOu'RE THE ONLY ONE I CAN PuT uP WITH FOR ANY DuRATION? uu: LET'S CALL IT A GRuDGING RESPECT. WHICH IS THE ONLY KIND THAT'S EVEN WORTH A FuCK. TT: I'll take that as a rare overture of friendship.

He thinks Caliborn is "fascinating".

TT: You're a pretty fascinating guy, in a way. I can't really figure you out. TT: In case you're wondering why I put up with you more than my friends do.

He's entirely willing to help Caliborn and seems to enjoy talking to him. He made Caliborn's robot leg for him. He very memorably drew a whole bunch of custom "porn" for him, and was entirely willing to do so for no particular reason other than that he thought it was fun.

But more to the palerom point… Dirk tries to pacify Caliborn.

TT: I thought the point was to cooperate with your coplayers to achieve an objective. TT: Not compete with them or try to kill them. I don't think we've had one conversation where you didn't express the desire to kill her. uu: I GuESS WE'LL JuST HAVE TO SEE. WON'T WE? uu: I THINK THIS IS PROBABLY A DIFFERENT KIND OF SESSION. uu: ONE WHERE THE PLAYERS FIGHT FOR SuPREMACY. RATHER THAN WORK TOGETHER. uu: I THINK THAT IT MuST BE THAT WAY. uu: BECAuSE THAT IS HOW I WANT IT TO BE. uu: AND IF I WANT SOMETHING TO BE TRuE HARD ENOuGH. THEN THAT MAKES IT SLIGHTLY MORE ABSOLuTELY IRREFuTABLE. uu: ARE YOu FEELING ME, FuCKER? TT: Maybe you're right. TT: But since that's how you feel now, maybe the truth is that the game is challenging you to overcome those feelings? TT: What if your real quest is to put aside your differences and work together, if you want to both survive, and grow as a person?

He tries to get Caliborn to get along better with Calliope.

TT: Does your sister even know you're into this sappy shipping stuff? TT: You berate her constantly for everything, and I know she likes to write and illustrate romfics and the like. […] TT: I'm just saying, it's an interest you have in common. If you told her you liked her romantic artwork, maybe you could bond over that?

Frankly, these are some textbook pale overtures on Dirk's part.** If they were trolls, there would be no question that his feelings are the palest of pale.

And, look, Dirk is not at all successful in pacifying Caliborn, and to be honest I don't think he ever fully took Caliborn seriously as a threat. But still, if you're looking for a quadrant to describe these two, I'd say moirallegiance is it.

But then again, they aren't trolls. They're a human and a cherub. So in the end, maybe it would be more suitable to just call them exactly what Caliborn is so tsundere about admitting that they are: bros.

-----------

Footnotes:

* If you're looking for someone Caliborn does feel cherub-style romantic hatred for: Calliope. It's Calliope. It's always been Calliope.

** Actually, now that I think about it, they're arguably ashen overtures where Dirk is attempting to mediate between Calliope and Caliborn. Which itself would be a fascinating ship. But let's not get too into that here.

[valle-de-sombra-de-muerte]

Homestuck Reread: Act 5-1, Part 2/5 (p. 2100-2235)

Read the previous post here.

Work was really rough for me last week so I didn't get a chance to write this. But here we are with the second part of this Act readthrough. It starts with a character I've had inconsistent opinions about during my time in the fandom.

I used to really hate Tavros when I was first in the fandom. Over time, I realized that my ire was directed more toward a certain fanon breed of Tavros: The simpering pacifist with love in his heart for all living creatures, who is a victim of misfortune and needs to be coddled (preferably by Gamzee).

I like the canon Tavros better. He's more like an awkward, avoidant weenie who isn't so much kind as he is too much of a spineless dork to fight back against the abuse hurled his way. He is quite explicit whenever he doesn't like someone or if he's uncomfortable, but he never does anything about the situation beyond that.

Tavros is also Hussie's dedicated buttmonkey, it seems. Prior to this point, all we really knew about him was that he was a bit of a try-hard who liked to rap and was really socially awkward. Now we see that he is wheelchair-bound and also really likes fairies and Pokemon. For a 30 year old man in the early 2010s, fairies and Pokemon would be patently uncool (and also "gay," to use the parlance of the time). Hussie wants us all to know right away that Tavros is lame (literally and figuratively) and gay (colloquially). Point and laugh at him!

I like the implication that Tavros actually breeds and raises all the Fiduspawn creatures he spawns.

Everything about Tavros's life is tragic. Hussie wanted to make a pathetic character who's the butt of every joke and whose existence is near-constant torment.

I suppose that building in the back could be a stable to house Horsaroni and the other Fiduspawn creatures, even though it's never stated. This is the last time his affinity for animal husbandry will ever be alluded to. You'd think Hussie would've included some crack about how being paralyzed makes it difficult to clean up their shit or something. Cue Tavros slipping and sliding face first into some manure...

Like Karkat, Tavros also wants to join the military to avoid being culled. It's surprising to see him have an actual goal to aspire to, considering how his character is mostly listless and focuses on escapism and avoidance. Perhaps he wants to be a cavalreaper not because of any higher ambition, but only because he thinks it'll save him from an early death.

Considering how it's never really mentioned at all after this point, I'm willing to believe it.

It is pretty funny how Tavros just lets Vriska prattle on. He gives her nothing to work with but she runs her mouth anyway. She's also really just ranting about Kanaya instead of anything about Tavros. He's a good captive audience for her to ramble at because he won't leave even though he stated at the start that he doesn't want to talk to her.

Couple of things to note: Kanaya giving Tavros some lame advice about anthropomorphizing his self-esteem is very on-brand for her. One thing about Kanaya that nobody seems to cotton onto is that while she loves to give advice and try to be helpful, she isn't all too good at it.

Another thing is Vriska immediately getting angry at "Rufio" for apparently attempting to stop her from talking to Tavros. That's a fun detail.

Gamzee and Kanaya are the only trolls so far to show kindness to Tavros. Which isn't saying much because Gamzee talks to Tavros in the same way he talks to everyone else. It's not like he's showing him any preferential treatment.

Note how Gamzee has slime on his face, so he had just eaten a pie and is totally stoned. It would explain why he seems much more out of it in this conversation than he was with Karkat or Terezi earlier, especially in the beginning since all he really does is laugh and honk instead of responding to Tavros in a coherent way. He then proceeds to relay all the information about the game to Tavros (pointless recap of shit we already know about), and the log ends with the two of them preparing to rap. In all this is a pretty worthless log and doesn't even offer much entertainment. And I say that as someone who generally likes pre-Murderstuck Gamzee.

I cannot believe this single conversation is what inspired so much generic slash art between these two. Homestuck fandom in 2010 was wild, man...

Aradia... exists. Her Ouija modus is a good representation of her character: a instrument of the plot/outside forces with little to no agency of her own. She spends a good chunk of the story as a deadpan plot device facilitating the whims of Sgrub and not much else.

Aradia is a frustrating character to discuss. There are at least four different versions of her depending on her status as alive or dead, and not once do we really get a chance to know the "true" Aradia. She really does serve as the "Jade" of the troll session, but Hussie doesn't even make an attempt at portraying her as endearing.

I wish that Aradia, not Terezi, was built up as Vriska's biggest rival. Aradia is the competent psychic who doesn't respond to taunts, doesn't care about winning, focuses on events yet to come, and generally has her shit in order. Compare that to Vriska, who cannot control Aradia, is hyper-competitive and escalates things constantly, always holds grudges and lives in the past, and switches emotions on a dime depending on what benefits her. They were already rivals in the past and while Aradia has long moved on, Vriska is dredging up the drama once more in a feeble attempt to try and "make amends" with her. The true motives of this are both to gain a position of power in the Blue Team, and also to soothe her own bruised ego and make her feel better about herself.

Her lame attempts to schmooze and flatter Aradia, trying to be on the same team as her, is in a subconscious way done to make sure that she isn't put against her. She knows Aradia is the stronger psychic and the better player, although she'd never admit it. If she can't beat Aradia, she'll do whatever she can to weasel into her good graces and try to steal credit for Aradia's achievements as the Blue Team leader.

Aradia of course, views the whole thing as childish and doesn't humor her at all. As she says herself, Vriska "never listens". These two are the perfect dynamic of cold and hot and I wish this was focused on more. Vriska should've been way more jealous of Aradia's abilities, seething about her and trying to one-up her. And the whole time Aradia doesn't take her seriously, which would only serve to piss her off further.

Time to talk about Nepeta, the troll that nobody seems to understand.

Nepeta is a lot of things. She's a personification of 2000s chatroom and forum-based RP culture, more specifically within the furry fandom. Not only does she roleplay as an animal on the internet, she also lives a very feral lifestyle. She lives in the woods, away from civilization, hunts and eats whatever animal she comes across, and uses their blood and pelts for arts and crafts. She's silly and naive, but also a capable hunter and quite perceptive, if socially immature.

Also, in regards to her moirallegiance with Equius, Nepeta appears to be obligated to stick with him for no real reason other than "someone has to keep him pacified." It's like a burden that she's saddled with; she's the only one that can put up with this dude that literally nobody else likes. While noble of her, it ends up being overall detrimental considering what a massive power imbalance they have. (Just read this post where I go into this in more detail. This post is long enough already).

People either want to characterize her as a ridiculous anime catgirl (which isn't even accurate to the subculture she's meant to parody; think less catgirl and more lolcats), or a bloodlusted killing machine. And both interpretations more often than not reduce her to a useless background character whose defining characteristic is her moirallegiance to Equius. I spit on all of that.

Nepeta's main trait is isolation (both physically and socially) and her difficulty expressing her desires. She leads a simple, primitive lifestyle away from civilization, which also impacts the way she is able to connect with others. Roleplay is the main way she expresses herself, and she has difficulty doing so when forced to drop the silly facade. She has a lot of wants (her crush on Karkat, her desire to be independent of Equius's control) that she is too awkward or timid to properly convey. Everyone around her almost always regards her as some kind of joke (Terezi roleplaying with her "facetiously", Karkat calling her autistic and trying to avoid her because of her feelings toward him, Equius's intensely infantilizating attitude toward her, Eridan not even remembering her name, etc.) which definitely hinders her ability to make others treat her with respect.

Oh wait, I forgot. Hussie himself calls her a joke character. Stupid me for getting invested in Nepeta, I guess.

"KARKAT THINKS ABOUT THAT A BIT AND HIS JAW DROPS OPEN AND BREAKS A HUGE COLUMN OF BRICKS LIKE A FUCKING KUNG FU MASTER" might be my favorite Karkat quote.

Equius is the one troll Karkat actively seems to dislike. This is the guy who is buddies with Eridan of all trolls, yet Equius is where he draws the line. Not even Vriska is a "bigger asshole" than Karkat. Nope, that's Equius, baby.

You know, it should be a little concerning that Karkat, the troll who lives and breathes troll romance in all its forms, is disgusted and dumbfounded by Equius and Nepeta's relationship. Especially since it's so often heralded as the "perfect" moirallegiance. Speaking of which...

This is very notable as being one of the few explicitly anti-hemospectrum statements said by a troll. A few trolls like Karkat, Aradia, and Sollux will grumble about their position in society and the way the higher castes behave, but ultimately accept the hemospectrum as an immutable facet of society.

Nepeta goes a step further than that and straight up says that caste separation shouldn't exist. Nepeta. The troll everyone writes off as being an infantile moron. Maybe it's these radical sentiments that cause Equius to keep her on such a tight leash.

As for Equius's response, am I the only one reading this!?!?!? What an incredible asshole. These two are the same age, yet he's talking to her like she's a child who needs guidance solely because she's of a lower blood caste.

Does he even like Nepeta? His supposed fondness for her is incredibly patronizing. It's like he only keeps her around because she provides him a service of calming him down and for no other reason. Other than that, she's only "ok, but not great".

Nepeta hunts and kills massive animals on a regular basis. She is not "delicate" in a physical sense. Equius is saying that she is "delicate" as in impressionable and at risk of being "corrupted" by her lower blooded friends. That's all Equius cares about: her moral standing.

Equius knows full well that Nepeta would never fight back against him, since she takes her obligation to pacify him very seriously. He exploits her goodwill to make her do whatever he wants. Why is this being paraded as the most wholesome ship in the fandom again???

I feel like it's this log that has forever damaged fandom's perception about Equius and Nepeta. Tavros suggests that Equius prohibiting Nepeta from playing FLARP was a positive because she possibly could've been maimed or killed otherwise. But it's not like Equius ever gave a shit about the danger involved at all. His biggest objection against Nepeta playing these games was because she'd be playing with lowbloods, not because he was afraid she'd get hurt. The ends don't justify the means. He's still barring her from interacting with her friends for shitty reasons.

Anyway, Tavros sucks here. He suggests Nepeta just go with the flow in her terrible relationship because he himself is so painfully passive that he'd never consider rocking the boat, even if it means standing up to someone who wrongs him regularly. Don't listen to Tavros, people.

I think I really need to have a serious talk about Vriska and Karkat's dynamic because I never see anyone talk about them. Their back and forth is hilarious just because of how similar they are to each other. Both have extreme delusions of grandeur that mask massive insecurities and paranoias (Karkat's "curse" vs. Vriska's "bad luck"). They also have aspirations of being the leader of all their friends, which leads to their egos butting heads with each other.

Vriska acts smarmy and disarming while Karkat vehemently shuts her down. Karkat sees through her manipulative tactics and doesn't want to give her any angle to work with at all. Vriska meanwhile sees right through Karkat's bravado and likes to toy with him and rile him up. (Something something... I wonder what other dynamic between a Knight and Light player is kinda similar to this where they see through the other's bullshit so transparently?)

Also jeez Karkat counting out the question marks is adorable and hilarious.

I love how Karkat boasts about what a competent opponent he'll be followed up by him telling Vriska not to use her mind powers. Right, that's kind of a major advantage she has.

Rolling my eyes at Karkat hyping up Terezi as this master tactician. "Ooh Vriska is jealous of her because Terezi is so good at manipulation." Why does the story keep talking about how cunning Terezi without ever showing us her abilities? Am I seriously supposed to think she's this Machiavellian mastermind because she tricked John Egbert of all people? Get real!

This is what I mean when I say that Aradia is the one Vriska should have seething jealousy over. Why should Vriska be jealous of Terezi at all?

Between Karkat, Tavros, and John, it's very safe to say Vriska's type is primarily soft boys.

Vriska, above all else, is an egomaniac. She, like Karkat, wants to be the best at everything. She wants to be in charge, to dictate the fates of those she views as weaker. She exercises this desire most often in FLARP, where she's essentially the most dominant player. She even likes to dabble in "dark prognostication" so she can foresee future events and stay ahead of those who wish to undermine her. This might have something to do with how her life is otherwise dominated by her needy lusus. She requires an outlet to exert control over others.

She's childish and cannot handle when she's losing or when bad things happen to her as a result of her own poor decision making. She breaks her magic 8 balls when they don't give her the result she wants, she lashes out at people when she fails to manipulate them, and she melts down when things in her life aren't going the way she wants them to. "Overdramatic" is an understatement when talking about Vriska. Everything about her is always turned up to 11.

She's also a master at avoiding responsibility for her actions. Any negative repercussions are deemed "bad luck", as if she's a victim of forces beyond her control. She'll even double down on this and claim that all her broken 8 balls are responsible for adding to this bad luck. She's a victim of a self-destructive mindset.

Also note how she's an "apocalypse buff" and Karkat dreams about programming the perfect doomsday virus. Yet another trait they share. Just saying.

Oh wait never mind all that. Uhh... "Vriska did nothing wrong!" There I said le funny meme. The only person who should honestly believe that is Vriska herself.

Vriska's such a goofball. She's so proud of her dumb little OC.

(Oh my god this was annoying to format. Fuck you Scratch and your white text.)

Very cute how she reuses Karkat's opening line against Scratch. And it turns out that she also reused the same login trick on Karkat that Scratch had done to her previously. Vriska is quick to call people out whenever she finds their actions to be unconscionable, but she'll readily excuse herself whenever she's guilty of doing the same thing. "It's okay when Vriska does it!"

She gets incredibly irritated when Scratch keeps talking about how he took advantage of her because she does not want to lose. She doesn't want anyone to have a position of power over her. It's a major way to make her uncomfortable (hence why she starts putting 8s in random letters very early on in this log).

I love it when Vriska says "can it". Also whenever she says "man" as a general expression of annoyance or amazement.

Kanaya loves dangerous women, but has no idea how to handle them. She wants to gently guide Vriska toward a more positive path, but Vriska resists any attempt at being controlled. Honestly, kind of fair considering that Kanaya is really only feigning to be Vriska's moirail so she can try and slide into her flushed quadrant. Kind of like what Eridan does with Feferi. But you're not ready for that conversation.

Uh, Vriska? Feferi's right there. And her lusus is much higher maintenance because if she doesn't get fed, everyone dies.

Not that I don't think Vriska wouldn't downplay Fef's struggles anyway.

And again, Eridan has significantly more irons in the fire since he's essentially in charge of keeping everyone on the planet alive.

Not like Vriska would care, though.

Equius might be one of the most viscerally repulsive and morally repugnant characters in the whole comic, but god dammit he just might be the most hilarious. To his credit, Hussie managed to craft the perfect buffoon by successfully capturing the essence of a specific kind of racist, perverted, online creepazoid and distilling it into a sweaty teenager who loves milk, horses, and being STRONG.

Making Equius fixated with grotesque furry art while calling it high art is a great parody of how fascists are obsessed with this grand idea of European exceptionalism when it comes to art and culture. It comes off as creepy and perverse (it also helps that many of these people are also addicted to hardcore pornography). If Homestuck was written today, Equius would probably be a very unsubtle parody of those people with a statue avatar and blabbing about how the West needs to "RETVRN" to past glories.

I'm kind of glad that's not the case because that'd be too on the nose. He's nasty enough as is.

Most trolls have to behave like "a sort of zookeeper" when interacting with their lusii, but Aurthour actually serves and cares for Equius. This does not stop Equius from referring to Aurthour as a "craven excuse for a custodian" or from mocking him when he gets injured (injuries caused by Equius himself, mind you).

I know it's a popular headcanon to depict Equius as this rippling, muscular bodybuilder, but I think it's more fitting to make him into this lanky guy who just happens to be freakishly strong. Muscular physiques are too aesthetically pleasing. It runs contrast to Equius's otherwise unappealing physical features. His widow's peak, his long unstyled hair, his broken teeth, his goofy ass legwarmers and shorts, the fact that he's constantly sweating... you get the idea.

He talks to Gamzee every day? Bro really wants to get his rocks off.

Equius won't roleplay over text with Nepeta, but he will pressure Gamzee into participating in his kinky dom/sub fantasy.

Equius structures all his social dynamics entirely around their position on the hemospectrum in relation to his own. There is no e%ception, he's incredibly infle%ible about this. From the way he browbeats Nepeta, to how he's begrudgingly civil to the similarly-classed Vriska, to the way he has to all but force Gamzee to try and dominate him, he is incapable of seeing anyone beyond what color their blood is.

Even later on, he never "overcomes his casteism." The only reason he ever acts subservient or polite to a lower blooded troll is because he view it through the lens of a power play dynamic. He gets a thrill out of "perverting" the class structure and getting "dominated" by those he views as inferior. Because despite his high social status and amazing physical strength, Equius is naturally submissive. It's this contrast that fuels a lot of his inner torment and anger issues.

Yeah he isn't a very dynamic character because at his core, he's a walking sex joke. But in Hussie's defense, it's an incredibly funny joke.

Oh Christ. And to think there was so much art of these two as a legitimate couple.

Equius's obsession with Aradia kind of reads like an openly racist/transphobic guy who secretly likes watching interracial/trans porn. Or perhaps in this specific passage, a guy who thinks he can "fix" a lesbian woman by turning her straight. No matter how you slice it, this just sucks.

Stay tuned for more yapping about trolls in the next post!

Read the next post here.

[ender--slime]

long post about the 10/8 update incoming!!!!!!!

ok i dont usually post my thoughts on updates bwcause im the number one adhd rambler of all time but here we go.. you get to read them today!!!!!!! SO. one of my big HSBC theories is that Ult Rose is actually the mastermind of sorts behind the whole story. not in an evil way, because dirk isnt even evil, just in the way that she knows a lot more than shes letting on!!! and that dirk and al might not be the only ones with real influence here. this theory was first thought up by my friend @classpectpokerap and its called the "Gloves are Canon" theory and you can read about it more in-depth here and here! as a fun challenge go back and read the epilogues and early hs2 (and also new updates) with the idea that rose knows more than we think. youll get some really fun stuff out of it and hopefully youll be convinced :p

SO ANYWAYS. how does this concern the 10/8 anniversary update?

HOO BOY

first of all, lets get a few content warnings and things outta the way. this lil analysis is gonna talk about some suicidal characters and suicidal ideation so plz !! be warned!!

first off, we know that Ult Dirk is really just afraid. hes not scary or intimidating at all, to the reader, because he killed himself in one timeline and hes really just trying to do it again. he even says this in the epilogues- that he hopes his death is Just when it comes, and he hopes its dave that does it. dirk feels as though he doesnt belong- hes always felt this way. he thinks the world and his friends would be better off without him, and his last gift to them is to create a new universe where they can start fresh outside of lord english's influence for good. he might be the most obnoxious narrator on earth c, claiming that he knows whats best and that hes doing right by everyone and by you, as the reader. but the TAGLINE of the epilogues are "tales of dubious authenticity". it tells you from the start that youre dealing with the worlds most unreliable narrator here. a guy who says one thing, says hes fine, puts on a mask to make himself seem stronger, but is always harboring the most pain. who also thinks this way?

rose fuckin lalonde!!!!! this isnt just beyond canon either. try and count how many times she did some suicide mission shit in og homestuck. and how non chalant she was about every single one. this character trait stuck around, and its especially clear in the 10/8 update.

and who does she reference, saying that he made the right choice to kill himself?

bam. this miserable motherfucker wants Out.

notice how she doesnt say "kill himself". she says LEAVE. as if she knows ult dirk is in the other timeline, alive and well. as if she knows that she could have done that too. made the right choice. the canon choice.

but what does that mean, in terms of Gloves are Canon? well, if you read the gloves are canon theory part 2, it states how at the beginning of candy, rose's ult self visions completely went away supposedly, but by the time HSBC picked up last year, theyre back...and worse?

how? its only been a few days, in universe.

was she lying about them being gone? is it the influence of having the Light, the Narrative, the Eyes of the Reader back on her now that the comic is going again? was she ulted the whole time just like dirk and we dont know it?

to the reader, the rosemary breakup in both timelines was a destruction of rose's character. but to rose.....its what she thinks kanaya deserves. rose thinks kanaya deserves a life without her. rose thinks shes BETTER OFF without her. and maybe deep down she thinks the whole timeline, and the whole universe, is better off without her too.

just like ult dirk.

i have a lot of thoughts on the other two parts of the update, but i wanted to focus on the concept of ult rose with this post because. god. idk her whole section was so potent and not only confirmed my theory, but just made me feel sick!! /pos

[wifegideonnav]

should i read homestuck. like i feel it would be interesting so i could see what yall are talking about in regards to tlt but is homestuck actually good

"is homestuck good" - the greatest thread in the history of forums, locked by a moderator after 8129 pages of heated debate,

no but seriously, it highkey depends on 1. your definition of good and 2. your tolerance for stupid bullshit. as someone who read tlt and then hs, i'd say that being a fan of the chaotic aspect of tlt is a good predictor of being able to hang in with homestuck.

readmore because this. um. got long. the tl;dr is: i like homestuck a lot and i am glad i read it. i can't tell you if you should read it bc idk your tastes, but there is a lot to like and enjoy about it.

the official pitch for homestuck is something like "4 kids play a game and then a bunch of other shit happens." here's my pitch based on what the core of the story is to me:

several groups of characters across time, space, and reality are brought together in order to succeed at creating a new universe after their own are destroyed. this takes the form of a game, which is called sburb (by the humans) and sgrub (by the trolls). the characters must contend with an eternal battle against good and evil in which they are the deciding factor, and level up while following personalized quests. at its heart, homestuck is about relationships of every sort and how they shape us, growing up and the associated grief and loss, coming into ones identity and choosing who to be, predestination and fate, and stories themselves. it gets very meta at times, and the characters are semi to fully aware that they're characters, and attempt to subvert or escape that. it's got hordes of fleshed out, compelling characters, one of which will almost certainly glom onto you for the rest of your life, real emotion, extremely funny jokes, smart and exciting plotting, and some very cool moments. it more or less invented an entire new genre/medium, and plays with medium in a very cool way.

it is also clunky, hard to get into, and way too convoluted. you will never fully understand what's happening. there are tons of characters whose stories you will follow whom you simply do not care about. there are too many characters. it was written by an edgelord in 2009 so there's some unsavory humor and character writing. it's so fucking long. the ending kinda sucks because the fandom was so toxic that hussie simply wanted it over with. the fandom still kinda sucks tbh. so many people have wrong opinions about it. it requires a very specific lens to approach and understand it. i still dont understand what happened with that fucking puppet someone explain it to me.

overall, i'd say that if you think you want to read it, give it a shot. i have a complicated relationship with it but at the end of the day, i genuinely love the story and the characters and i know they will be with me forever. it certainly enhanced my understanding of tlt, and getting to read more of tamsyn's writing was such a bonus (even though her taste in pairings is. not the same as my own). and like honestly. it's just fun. even when you're going "wait what the fuck just happened" you're having fun. it's really goddamn funny too. it WILL change the way you speak and also think about romance forever.

the best way to read it is to have an experienced reader guide you, but if you or other people don't know anyone like that, here are my basic tips:

i think most people know this already, but download the unofficial homestuck collection. just do it. it's like 4 gigs and it's infinitely better than trying to read on the broken website, and it's even ad free. it can also be modded - for instance ik there's a slur replacer mod (lmao) if you don't want to read those

act 1 sucks to read. you're like what the fuck is this, THIS is homestuck?? the beginning is radically different from how it ends up, so just hang in there. for me, it really picked up somewhere in act 3. just focus on the silly fun the characters are having and you'll be good

things you should actually try to follow in the early acts: the concept of a sylladex existing (the various fetch modi are only there for jokes and eventually just kinda stop being a thing), where all the copies of the game are, what each kid's relationship with their guardian is like, the mechanics of the game and the lore behind it, including classpects and quests

things you do not have to waste brain space on: anything about how the totems work, what the various machines are, what the levels are, basically any of the jokes that would be funny to hussie's original intended audience of software engineers and rpg gamers. oh and the intermission with the midnight crew and the felt, just know that those are guys that exist and you'll be good.

and the biggest tip i have is just. go with it. suspend your disbelief. a lot of the worldbuilding doesn't really make sense, but it would be a worse story if it did. when the time shit and ectobiology come into play, literally just go ok got it and keep going, don't think too hard.

so yeah i don't even know if any of this is useful but i hope it helps you decide. and if you or anyone else have follow up questions send em!

[circlejourneyart]

Maybe it'll turn out better this time: A love letter to all the joy and sorrow that this story has given me

(Art by @blogofyolo)

Here's the first of two tracks I had on Land of Fans and Music 5 Act 2, which came out two days ago! I'm dedicating this one to @utopianparadoxist, who wrote the post that made this track appear in my mind in such blinding clarity I couldn't stop making until it was done.

I also have some extended commentary about this one--it's more important to me than I give it credit for.

When I finished reading Homestuck, I was...disappointed. That disappointment morphed gradually into disgust as I watched schisms violently open in the fandom following the Epilogues and Homestuck^2, and in the process I felt like I'd lost something.

I kept thinking that maybe, if I just read the comic again, it would turn out different. Maybe it'd be the story I'd once loved and it would fill me with breathless wonder again. Maybe it'd be better.

But earlier this year, a post by uP crossed my dash after he'd disappeared from my periphery for well over a year. He was outlining his plans surrounding Pumpkin Path, a story he's writing that runs adjacent to the Epilogues and (eventually though not yet?) gives these characters the futures they've earned.

And I realised...the way I'd been thinking about it, that's not how it works, y'know? It's not the story that has changed: it's my heart, my relationship with it. And the best thing I could do was take what this once-beloved story gave me and make something new with it. And that's what many people have done in the wake of Homestuck's end: we've all gone off and made new stories, for which this long-beloved comic was an undeniable progenitor.

It reminded me of a certain recurring motif in the comic itself. Every time the universe resulted in a corrupt or barren session, the players...well, they rebooted it. They left the old universe behind, and started a new one, billions of years all over again just to see where it would go this time.

There was no use in searching for the story that used to be, because it was me that had changed.

You may as well leave that old universe behind and start a new one from scratch.

This is the idea that seeded the above track, and it caught me off guard, because it was the first Homestuck music I had made in more than two years--after I thought I'd sworn it off for good. And then, two days later, Maybe it'll turn out better this time was done. (Two days is, by the way, a very short time for a track to emerge.) It was a small, silly, wonderful little thing, a sapling in the ashes, that proved to me that things could change.

But beyond my track, the entirety of LOFAM5A2 feels especially so. It's a startling breath of fresh air that emerged from so much genuine joy and excitement. I'm happy I got to contribute even just a little work to it and I really, really hope that the fandom sees it for all that went into it. An UMSPAF manager once said that my music always sounds hopeful, but it was never intentional until this one. Thank you to everyone who's made good art that has inspired others in turn, you create life with your own hands.

[weirdmageddon]

ur davejade posting has me Remembering and goddddd. theyre so good. thank u

i want to make a davejade analysis masterpost but the funniest thing with these asks is that theyre the ones that really prompt me to put my thoughts together in some direction and i ALWAYS find a new implication or connection to talk about. like while i’m writing the connections will just make themselves known. if i made a masterpost i’d have to update it every time i think of something new which defeats the purpose of a masterpost because it’d never be finished. so i just like to spitball into separate posts and just shove them in my davejade tag. i was NOT expecting to get back into homestuck with davejade at the forefront but i can see things now i didnt then

im gonna go off again because it’s so obvious to me on this jumpy scrambled “reread” that dave has a fat fucking heart-on / affection erection for jade. hes tryin soo hard to be cool but hes like this with jade actually behind the screen and she knows it

words and deeds of a court jester dude who totally has a crush on his childhood internet friend and doesnt acknowledge it (btw this is woefully incomplete for the sake of brevity but i could elaborate in another post. i actually have a draft (edit: posted) with a shit ton of more analysis stuff in it on why he acts differently with her than other characters):

the next day (chronologically) when jade messages him:

hussie commentary: “Dave's one-pixel-smile there means that there are literally more than ten thousand drawings on the internet of Dave and Jade kissing. That pixel literally made that happen.”

i mean … it sure is easy to assume how he feels about jade based on the way he talks to her and when his sprite only ever smiles one other time in the entire fucking comic and the reality of that other one was arguable since it was during [S] Karkat: Mental breakdown and its likely karkat was hallucinating it based on the content and context of the flash

nah this one was real. and it was from the first conversation we saw between dave and jade in the comic and thus set the standard for their dynamic. and remember old school 2009 dave was kind of a menace so it says a lot

this girl was special enough to him to warrant that pixel

jade calling dave a “huge baby” for him getting nervous about a piss while she’s his server player. he makes such a big deal about it while shes like oh my god just go:

and the absurdity of the situation being one of his favorite memories

i know pesterquest isn’t “canon” canon but it passes my character essence check and still contributes something of substance to my argument. like i can say this is not at all out of place if these characters were plopped into these scenarios. remember this takes place on the same day as the above, 4/13/2009. theyre the same age as above and have the same relationship as they did above, just in a different scenario that wasn’t possible in canon wherein they didn’t play sburb

Jade wanders away from that window and toward another one, whose view is exclusively centered on the rolling blue. She presses a hand against the misty pane and sighs. JADE: you know, dave talks a lot about coming to visit me here. i mean, all of my friends do but dave especially JADE: in his usual davey way of course, which means making lots of jokes and not sounding very serious about it JADE: "yeah im itching to put on my safari hat and come traipsing down to doomdeath archipelago to get my ass murdered by infinidog the eldritch retriever," stuff like that JADE: i know he really means it though! he wants to see me, just like i want to see him JADE: but its just wishful thinking

anyway daves reaction to seeing his isolated online friend for the first time irl cry because she has guests. its even better with the character sprites

JADE: we can play with all my toys and jam out to some music and stay up all night chatting with each other and oh my god oh my god youre here youre all here this is really happening!!!!! Jade's next laugh verges on hysterical and she's got tears streaked down her cheeks. Dave looks a little perturbed. DAVE: wow holy shit uh DAVE: its cool jade no need to get so DAVE: like this DAVE: kind of fucks me up seeing you cry DAVE: not that im trying to make this all about me DAVE: i mean uh

and so after mspa reader’s intervention, who do we see with jade the next time we see her?

dave. and hes goofing with her squiddles while grinning

DAVE: okay so lets see what we got here Jade's room is bright and cheery, fresh flowers in the hanging pots, curtains pulled open wide to let in the afternoon sunlight. Jade sits on her bed while Dave paces in front of a line of squiddle toys, carefully assembled in neat ranks. DAVE: this blue one is clearly in charge look at his dominant posture DAVE: also hes the only motherfucker not tentacle deep in his homie DAVE: hes an untangled buddy that is some shit really cuts to the core of like DAVE: DAVE: emotions JADE: its actually because the magnets in him are messed up, and always have been!! DAVE: harley you are ruining the magic come on

basically what im putting together is that dave was REALLY fixin to spend some time with jade. extending into her sphere of interests that he doesnt express much with anyone else; you can tell he really wanted to engage with her in a less irony poisoned way. he’s softer with her than his other friends and god forbid the trolls, he is much less skeptical about things when talking to her (he even questions why he just seems to go along with her eccentric precognitive statements but he doesnt change his attitude about it), he showers her with his music and raps to the point where jade is expectant of getting poetry from him. rap IS poetry. please realize that dave is sending her his poetry, regardless of how goofy it may be. this is the level on which im viewing this at and once you realize this theres no going back. there comes a time in every homestuck’s life where they have to see how dave interacted jade and conclude that he had a cute little puppy crush on her unbeknownst to either of them. and it was adorable. and now, in the year 2023, it’s your time to realize this too. no going back.

and btw it all came back around…………………nimblest son of a bitch who had the gumption to glue a nasty pair of latex cat lips to his face

for a reason that wasnt a joke anymore

don’t think ive seen anyone talk about this parallel at the end to one of their first conversations in the comic. maybe somebody did back in the day but i never saw it

[the-mspfa-200-favourites-project]

HOMESKILLET

HOMESKILLET. Another MSPFA I’ve heard a lot about, but then again, besides a couple of the MSPFAs I’ve reviewed in 2024, I’ve basically heard of all these MSPFAs? Which makes sense; again, these are the cream of the crop of 2024, if you will, the MSPFAs that were the fastest growing out of all other MSPFAs I’ve looked at because they’ve had the least amount of time to “prove” themselves or attract an audience. Not to say other MSPFAs haven’t proven themselves to me that they should be at least 200 favourites of more (to me), but these are the ones that are making waves. And since HOMESKILLET comes from the dynamic mind behind one of the BIGGEST Fanadventure ever, KARKAT GOES TO A CONVENTION, and was even purposed once upon a time as the “Act 2” of that Fanadventure…yeah, I’d say that it made some waves.

And the intro seems to set-up once again that this won’t be your regular ordinary MSPFA SBURBventure, with it being like, “what if MSPA Reader, instead of reading the epilogues, read a random Fanadventure?” Which means that the actual “real” fanadventure starts on page 69, therefore proving to me, at least that this text knows how the slower moments can build up to a reveal, and is comfortable going the slower route. Apparently, according to people “in the know” (read: have read farther than me into Karkat Goes To A Convention), this is apparently somebody’s actual in-universe MSPFA? I’d be interested to see how this maps onto their character, then, and how their view of the world changes throughout Karkat Goes To A Convention. Although, splitting it off from the main text, KGTAC, means that that kind of analysis is a lot harder to get, since I could, theoretically (and in practice) not be coming into this Fanadventure with the idea of who that character is. Anyways, much to consider already.

Okay so far, this fanadventure has been…slow? Like, not like, in an uncompelling way, like there is that sense of dread that occupies every SBURBventure when you haven’t quite had the “SBURB Meteors/Threat Dejour” show up yet, (in a similar way to how dread builds in a Murder Mystery, come to think of it), but…idk. Nothing’s gripping me, so far. It’s been rather good and consistent and competent, and some of the jokes and phrasing of things are good, like refering to closing the door of a mini-fridge as causing “The COKE BOTTLES begin to go back to their original temperature,” which is like. Yeah that’s how a mini-fridge works. But it also mechanicalizes the process of opening up the fridge and closing the fridge in a very interesting way that I thought I should note down. Although, now that I think about it, that stuff is still present in Homestuck and other MSPFAs, just. Not as apparent, I guess?

I gotta say, I feel like the story wants to present itself as more…grounded, somehow. That’s probably a combination of both the vaguely slice-of-life presentation to Fred’s bumbling around the house (there’s not really *a* goal at this stage in the story, like how John basically got a goal pretty quickly of “retrieve the Sburb Beta and play it” in OG Homestuck), to the slower pace of the story and the less…extreme reactions to things from Fred. John is disgusted at his Dad’s Fanciful Harlequins, and Fred just wants cookies and Mac and Cheese and loves his Grandma. I think the story’s doing this, again, to set-up the tension and dread; we ALL KNOW, if we’ve come from reading KGTAC, what happens in these MSPFAs, and the destruction SBURB tends to set-up, so in these low-key moments of “normalcy” (for a lack of a better term), I feel a more heightened sense of dread about proceedings.

I will say, I like how there’s been a trend lately of like, emphasizing various other forms of communication besides just pesterlogs? Like, Homestuck has the characters interact with each other through the internet, and this feels like a logical extension of that. Sburb 1996, Ever After, and now Home Skillet (and also technically DEAD MEAT with its text messages) all fit into this, I think. I don’t have like, anything further to say about that, noting that it’s occurring and it’s an interesting trend.

Okay got to the windchime flash and this is exactly what I’m talking about with regards to the slower, more grounded pacing. Instead of a flash marked entirely by the absence of other people, we have noises of children and families playing in the background. Instead of having the cool wind blowing through the streets, creating a more haunting feeling, there’s birds chirping and there’s sunny lighting everywhere. Instead of a monologue about how something feels missing, there’s a monologue about responsibility and wondering what’s next, as if to say, Fred has never wanted or considered absence in this life. It’s…grounded. Slower. Anyways yeah if that sounds like up your alley you should probably check this out, I certainly liked it better than KGTAC’s opening stretch.

[soudakuwunmoment]

I've been thinking about him lately. Realizing his character is a lot more straight forward than I thought, and that when it comes down to it, he's honestly one of the characters i relate most to. There have been characters before him in Homestuck who dealt with self-hate, mostly Karkat and Sollux. and I'm not saying it was represented badly with them, but what I am saying is that Dirk represents it goddamn PERFECTLY.

His relationship with Hal is the most obvious example of this. It is made known that their feelings towards one another aren't friendly, purely because they HATE the feeling of having themselves reflected back at them. And yet, they never really express those feelings to anyone but each other. When they talk about it, it's a vicious cycle of trying to express their feelings then immediately being mocked for it under the guise of some fucked up form of "irony". The only chances he gets to express these feelings, it's thrown directly back in his face, challenged, mocked. There's no one to give him a healthy response, there's only HIMSELF, to say "I hate you just as much as you hate me."

Another example of this which is well known is Dave's Bro. When Dave reveals what Bro is like to Dirk, he's mortified because he realizes that he can see exactly how he would end up that way if left unchecked. And sure, Dirk is far better off than Bro was, having the other alpha kids and eventually the beta kids as well. He himself keeps himself in check by being so weighed down by his possible future self and all of his splinters. But realistically, is that enough? He never fully expresses how he feels about himself to his friends. He never talks about his issues because he feels that they can see his issues just as clearly as he can, and he doesn't want to become worse by burdening them with a conversation about it. Dirk as he is in canon doesn't TALK to anyone about his issues. How are people supposed to keep him in check if they don't know what's going on in his head? We see with Ult Dirk how easily someone that unstable can lose themselves in fear and confusion and hate.

But I think Dirk's relationships with his splinters aren't needed to see how little he cares for himself. Like, how many times does he decapitate himself again? It's not that he hates his life so much that he would rather be dead. It's more so that he sees his life as a playing piece in the game of SBURB. He takes his own life, not out of wanting to die necessarily, but out of recklessness. If his death can make a situation go as smooth as possible, it's his automatic play.

This means that one of the only two reasons he has ever taken his life was for the sake of making things easier for his friends. Why? Because they're why he sticks around. I mean really, we established how miserable he is. He sure as hell doesn't live for himself, and he sure as hell DOES live for his friends. He makes that clear every time he sacrifices himself.

What was the other of those two reasons again? Oh right. It was because he had no reason to live if he didn't have his friends.

And so i find myself thinking, "If he cares about his friends so much, wouldn't he want to keep them happy by staying around as much as possible, and, well, NOT dying?"

But that's the thing. He doesn't see it that way. He has expressed that he believes his friends only see him as a problem, and that they think of him as "toxic" despite no one thinking that about him.

If his friends don't think he's toxic, why does he think he is?

Think about who he opens himself up to.

One, Hal. Hal, who does absolutely nothing to make Dirk think he's anything but the lowest scum.

Two, Jake. Jake loves Dirk but he is AWFUL at expressing it. Dirk is a teenager, and he is in LOVE with Jake. Jake's opinion matters more than anyone, but Jake either gives him nothing or complains about his downfalls. In fact, when Jake DOES say good things about Dirk, it's almost NEVER to his face.

From Dirk's perspective, his friends are at best avoidant of him, and at worst hate him. It reminded me of my childhood, and how I only ever had people to tell me what was wrong with me. Believe me when I say that seriously fucks a person up.

So, in my Ideal Homestuck™ Dirk finds someone he can be open with and a safe environment where he has an eye kept on him by people who love him. Somewhere where he can be told when he does something good, and not be punished or scorned when he does something wrong, instead simply being guided by someone who understands he never got to be taught these things by a stable guardian.

[sometipsygnostalgic]

i'm losing my mind how are there STILL ACTIVE CATRA HATE BLOGS it's been FOUR YEARS how are you still this mad about a female abuse victim!!!!!! how do you STILL not get it!!!!!!!!!!

I have been in enough fandoms to understand that some of the people who stick around the longest are those who act the most scarred after watching the media. It's like stockholme syndrome. Or it's like hating the thing is what gives them drive in the world.

I have also been on the other side of this. I remained a Homestuck blog for a whole four years after the ending made me depressed about Terezi Pyrope, even lasting an additional year and a half after the dogshit epilogues released, through to the demise of Hiveswap and Homestuck^2, before I realised enough was enough and let Adventure Time give me sanctuary again.

But Homestuck had its Gamzee fans who hated the comic and fandom, Adventure Time had its Lemongrab fans who hated the show and fandom, and it seems She-ra has its fair share of antis.

The She-ra antis consist of the following groups, from my observation:

Former fans who got obsessed with some other show and have to bash She-ra because it ain't cool anymore. Usually Owl House fans but can be from anywhere. Their hate is universally connected to propping something else up, and is never done in isolation.

Hordak fans who hate Catra and maybe every other character and crew member and the show. There are a lot of the reverse, Catra fans who hate Hordak, which is part of why this group is so persistent, as a "counter" to this Hordak hate. However, the Catra fans who are Hordak antis MOSTLY do not hate the show (they are just... out of touch with it and generally have bad takes). I've seen one or two extreme cases of Catra apologists accusing Adora, Scorpia, and even Entrapta of abuse, but they were completely alone in their feelings. The Hordak fans who hate Catra tend to also hate Glimmer, Mermista, Adora, Bow, and say that the show is ableist or whatever, but they do not actually harbor much love for Entrapta. Her victimisation is an excuse for their behaviour and they have no understanding of her chaotic character. Do not interact.

Glimmadora fans (the ones who purely seem to exist to make 'Spop Is Abusive' posts). Why the fuck Glimmadora fans hate the show so much, I do not understand. But these are probably the most In-Your-Face of these three groups. While the Hordak fans mentioned above have a lot of similarity to Homestuck Gamzee fans or Adventure Time Lemongrab fans in the weird way they'll hate on the show for doing their blorbo wrong, Glimmadora fans don't have that evidence because they don't really care about Glimmer or Adora. They have absolutely nothing to say about the show, other than that it is Bad. My theory on these Glimmadora fans is that they really liked the Glimmer and Adora ship on a superficial level, and then the show decided to have its Deeper Themes and give Catra and Adora a messy, complicated relationship. There was a lot happening after season 3 where people went "CATRADORA IS REALLY ABUSIVE AND CATRA IS HORRIBLE AND YOU SHOULDNT SHIP HER WITH ANYONE". This period was SO fucking harmful to the fandom that it never recovered, so much work was lost and deleted from AO3. People would say "Glimmadora is a much better ship anyway". But then when season 4 rolled around and, uhh, Glimmer was acting like a little shit all season (for good reason but she really fucked things up with Adora), and Glimmadora crumbled into ash? Well the Glimmadora truthists felt like the show was working against them and that Season 5 was a grand conspiracy to make the Abusive ship Catradora canon!!! The funniest part of this is I sympathise a lot with these feelings. I used to be a Glimmadora truther myself when I watched the show in fall 2021. I was like, "wow, look how nice this ship is. And they go with catradora in the end?? Fucking HOW???". But then seasons 4 and 5 happened and.... yeah, I was disappointed with how Glimmer and Adora's friendship ended up, but I was ENAMORED by the messiness of Catra's character and how raw her and Adora felt about each other even in spite of all the bullshit. I never made excuses about the show being abuse apologising. I analysed it purely in how believable the relationships were and what the intentions of the characters are.

Of these groups, the ones responsible for the most actual SPOP Anti blogs are undoubtedly the Glimmadoras. The only time I've seen something similar, so many antis appearing, was because of Steven Universe ship wars. You have NO IDEA how petty people feel about Lapidot, Amedot, all the dots, all the amethysts. A crew member was chased off the internet over it, or left the internet over the show's own decisions, depending on whether you believe the """screenshots""" that were taken of Zuke's ""private blog""".

[love-is-a-pearl]

wait, in one comic where you drew Ash around 5 years old (The one where he got the Z marks on his cheeks) he was already masc presenting there. Does it mean he had been trans since he was a toddler or something? That's highly critical to me, good for him if he really is trans but it seems like Delia really wanted a boy if he'd been trans for so long

is more like.. for me in pokemon universe people just leave their kids go ungendered until they're 10? Kinda?

Like, think homestuck "you only get a name at 13" kinda deal and the whole "what's your name?" and "what do you look like?" that the professors ask in pokemon games intros.

I like to think those are not by accident, they're more like a way to make sure kids are being gendered in the way they prefer once they become "working class", "official adults" or whatever being a pokemon trainer means in pokemon society.

Is more like.. up to the point they get a starter, kids are free to do what they want, go by different names every other day and just have fun exploring that shit yknow?

And when they get their starter, they get to make a BUNCH of important decisions, like picking their forever partner, the name that will go in their ID, their pronouns, all that shit, yknow? So, most parents will raise their kids taking that into account.

(changes can happen of course, I mean I LOVE the idea of gender fluid Ash but that's something i cant say its "canon" in my AU since I havent explored that idea in detail yet)

Is not really "he always knew he was a guy deep inside uwu" but more "kids in pokemon universe are raised in environments that just lets them test this shit out" kinda deal.

And like, I favor drawing the characters close to how they look in the anime cause I prefer that for continuity sake, but since they are cis in there they will never look too different, but I will always try and tweak some small things here and there (like, giving Ash longer hair in that comic) to imply something more.

(also Ash was canonically bullied by his peers because of the issue with his father so.. i wouldn't put it past him to dress up more "boyish" or even using his father's clothes to prove he would go and be like him but better yknow? before realizing that "Hey, is not that I wanted to be like dad. I just wanted to be a dude" lmadopaspd)

...

But for real... sometimes... is just not that deep? People will give sonic top scars and he is like.. 9? and a hedgehog asopdjasiodj

pokemon is just my little escapist solarpunk utopia and I like pretenting it is a better place than real life even with the smallest little things QwQ

[cmdonovann]

quantum break appreciation month: a quick retrospective

so, first of all, wow, it was WAY more effort than i thought to just POST SOMETHING EVERY DAY. i put a lot of pressure on myself to only post The Good Stuff to this blog, and boy golly is my standard of "good stuff" higher than it ought to be! so this has been great practice for me in "finished is better than perfect."

second of all, i wanna put together a quick rundown of everything i did this month!

Announcement post

April 1st: My Bleeding Clock (My Immortal AU) fanfic for April Fool's Day

April 2nd: Playlist to go with My Bleeding Clock

April 3rd: Sketch of 2010!Beth

April 4th: Sketch of Jack and Beth

April 5th: Reblogged my old post about last year's anniversary zine, as well as a new little sketch to celebrate the 7th anniversary of the game's release

April 6th: Doodle of Beth in a skirt (with pockets!)

April 7th: I literally just posted a passage I like from the QB:ZS novel

April 8th: Started posting old art... completed set of the halo series here!

April 9th: More old art (Jack/Paul this time)

April 10th: More old art, LNEHH edition

April 11th: More old art, Will Joyce edition

April 12th: Some Jack/Paul art to celebrate me and my husband's anniversary :3c

April 13th: QUANTUM BREAK HOMESTUCK AU!!!

April 14th: Surprise! it's even more old Jack/Paul art!

April 15th: Wow! I can't believe it's more Jack/Paul art!

April 16th: Apparently I was busy this day because I just reblogged LNEHH, lol

April 17th: Quantum Break characters, but as Skyrim characters

April 18th: Some blinkie gifs I made using blinkies.cafe

April 19th: A sweater I made using the linocut stamps from last year's anniversary zine

April 20th: Another blinkie gif, hehe

April 21st: Meta post about color palettes and color usage in Quantum Break

April 22nd: A little QB divider I made for my fansite (WIP)

April 23rd: Some terrible glitter gifs, also for the WIP fansite

April 24th: Minecraft skins of a bunch of QB characters!

April 25th: I was also apparently busy this day, cuz all I did was make a stupid phone background for myself XD

April 26th: Took a swing at pixel art

April 27th: A promo for the Quantum Break Discord Server I run!

April 28th: Wrote another chapter of My Bleeding Clock...

April 29th: Art of Jack and Paul :3

April 30th: Started a new longfic: The Symmetry of Fear!

holy shit. that's a lot. i am retroactively impressed with my past self for doing all this, lmao. nice.

third of all! i wanna note that i started several projects this month that i have yet to finish. of course i'm not confining my quantum break posting to one month of the year (impossible) but i will take my time finishing the... uh... three fics and two meta essays i have unfinished, as well as the fansite i am working on. i want these to be GOOD, so i'm not going to rush them. i'm glad this month gave me to juice to finally get these projects started, though!

and lastly... why did i even do this project/event in the first place?

well... good question. i imagine i'm not the only one who has been Going Through It for a while now, and i just... really needed a big project to focus on for a while. and quantum break is like, one of the only things that i never get tired of thinking about, so... are you seeing my logic here?

all that said, i do genuinely want to work on putting more love out into the world. and i love quantum break! i want other people to love it too! (or at least, i want other people to look at my passion for it and be like "i dont go here but you keep doing your funky little thing my man," you know what i mean?)

so, big thanks to everyone who has encouraged me this month, whether it be in reblog tags, in the quantum break discord server, or elsewhere. also, big thanks to my husband, who i would not have married if not for our mutual obsession with quantum break, and who is always down to listen to me talk about my various theories and fic ideas. and finally, a big thanks to remedy, for making this dumb game that i love so so so much.

[futureseaempress]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

hi so my sweetheart tagged me in this @hypnostheory so thank u bb

1. How many works do you have in Ao3?

27 (teehee that's my fave number) (i also have like two more on a google drive that are wips,,, some princes don't become kings & first date which is called nastygum in like all my notes)

2. What’s your total Ao3 word count? 163,308 which is like longer than twilight i think

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Homestuck, AFTG, SK8 the Infinity, TMA, Stardew Valley, RWRB, and uhhh law and order svu

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

honey, why're you calling me so late? (matchablossom)

about to bloom (matchablossom)

baby kiss it better (first prince)

i only want what i can't have (first prince)

as certain dark things are to be loved (jonmartin)

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

i would love to but sometimes i just don't have anything to say

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

uhhhhh i don't think any of my fics have super angsty endings-- fanning the flame was supposed to end with a super sad chapter about agnes and jack but i never wrote it lmao maybe i'll get back to her in november

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

ummmm i try to end everything on a loving/happy note bc that's what i like to read most

i think asking you to stay has like the cheesiest last line

8. Do you get hate on fics?

uh not yet thank goodness. i used to back in my wattpad days though and i did have someone say something kinda off color to me in a writing exchange but that worked itself out

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

because it's most of what i read i try to include like a horny scene in most if not all of my stuff but i like anything rlly i sort by ship, explicit, and go from there I think "Coming In Pants" is a frequent flyer.

10. Do you write crossovers? If so, what’s your craziest one?

Nope. Not my cup of tea. OH MY GOD ACTUALLY I'M A LIAR IN 2012 I HAD A ONE DIRECTION RPF TWILIGHT FANFIC? THAT I NEVER POSTED AND SOLELY EXISTED IN MY NOTES APP THAT MY FRIEND AND I WOULD LIKE ROLEPLAY???? seventh grade was wild for me

11. Have you ever had your fic stolen?

YEP! both my current fanfic and my older stuff like i had a terrible homestuck fanfic on wattpad that someone reposted saying mine was too smutty and then on ao3 there is a fic,,, that,,, very heavily seems to draw from baby kiss it better but idk maybe henry wearing alex's white t shirt and a taylor swift cardigan while sick before alex blows him is just reaaally common

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

nope

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

so other than some garbage i was writing in middle school no, but i do for sure like let my partner beta everything and we run ideas by each other all the time and like work out how to block stuff and what seems interesting they keep me from going to melodramatic and i help them know what sex sounds fun

14. What’s your all time favorite ship?

oh god i can't choose. i love davekat, but i love alex and henry a lot. like a lot. like wow i loved the book last year and the movie has given me brain worms and there's other karkat ships i rlly like. hmmm okay i have two hands and i hold my sons Crabapple and Firstprince.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but probably never will?

so many davekat wips

the sweet home alabama fic for sure.

the nanny au. uh the other davekat band au that's just a draft... probably fanning the flame. there's also a coda for more silver paint that haunts me.

16. What are your writing strengths?

uhhhhh i think i'm good at banter? (see echoed through my mind) i think i'm good at like making stuff fit into canon and comply with it in fun ways (see this hope is). i think i'm good at writing characters having break downs (see chapter 3 of silver paint or going with the flow)

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

I SUCK SO BAD AT FINISHING THINGS AND I GET STUCK ON MY PORN EVERY TIME

also commas

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

bafhehasdk so like it's kinda a pet peeve a lot of the times i feel like spanish especially ends up reading kind of like Law and Order dialogue like "he trabajo'ed here last week" but i eat that shit up in theory. like people would probs do better throwing random french in shit bc my ass would be like SOUNDS RIGHT TO ME. it's also like cultural references get lost and i know just enough spanish to know when something is "off" so i prefer like "This is a line of dialogue," they said in Spanish.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Homestuck! on wattpad! in 2012! it was bad mpreg! i was 13!!

TMA on ao3! in like 2020

but i did once write a one direction rpf with my friend that we posted on instagram in 2011

20. Favorite fic that you’ve written?

oh god i don't know. i think it's gotta be glory just bc i spent so long with it and i'm hoping to finish it during november (i do nanowrimo in a crazy bass ackwards way) but tire trouble is like the one everyone else loves best??? and i have a sequel in the works for it im just super into rwrb rn

I’m tagging @wardenhawke bc i feel like you might like talking about your ocs at least and i like u