#im never forgiving horikoshi for this tbh | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

dekusleftsock · 2 years

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https://www.tumblr.com/dekusleftsock/695140063574687744/httpswwwtumblrcomdekusleftsock69513673960551?source=share You don't have to apologize, I completely agree. I merely like to analyze said characters to see how they are reacting, since they don't always say so out loud. Also, when it comes to Rose Quartz I think I was in the minority who liked her better than Steven, flaws or not. I tried to like him, but as an extremely curious person his inability to ask questions frustrated me. Steven Universe in general had a good outline and message, but fell flat when it came to executing them. Ironically, despite never marketing itself as particularly pacifistic, mha has done better than a lot of shows at demonstrating forgiveness. Whereas the Steven Universe fandom weirdly grew more aggressive with time, the mha fandom has oddly gotten more open minded due to this series. People who once hated Endeavor and Bakugo began to like them and considered the actual message being sent: That bad people are still people. I think that's because mha engages it's audience. A lot of stories tell the narrative without trying to interact with the audience a bunch. You already mentioned it with explaining how to sneakily tell a queer story, but Horikoshi also engages the audience with Bakugo and Endeavor's opinion. The story starts off very disparaging of them, and gradually unearths their reasons and kinder side without forgetting what they've done. Due to that, most people in the mha audience relaxed their opinions and became more open minded than they were before. I think that's what mha did right that shows like Steven universe did wrong. Mha uses the audience's expectations against them, and then frames things in a way that holds the person accountable while also making them sympathetic.

(Sorry this took so long, I started this draft and then forgot about it sidndindudkd)

OMG IM SO GLAD YOU BROUGHT UP HOW MHA INTERACTS WITH THE AUDIENCE!

I’ll get to my whole thing with that in a sec tho, Steven universe time lol.

I think the main reason why Steven universe falls flat is because of how it really only knows one way to humanize a character: redemption arcs

What do I mean by this? Mha uses a plethora of architypes; from atonement with endeavor, to redemption with Katsuki. Steven universe though? It only knows how to use one: redemption arcs. And not even well! Tbh with you, Steven universe feels like it was written by a writer without much experience, or at the very least a writer who was never taught how to write by a professor. Which honestly makes sense with Rebecca sugar, since before this they only worked on music and character design in other shows (like adventure time) and they never actually WROTE anything. Unlike horikoshi, Dana Terrance, etc.

The ONLY character I think they actually wrote well was rose, and that’s partly to do with how she was the only character in the show who had an atonement arc.

And when they couldn’t make a “problematic character” a full redemption arc, they just… killed him and then revived him. Lars was abusive let’s be honest here. A total asshole (love him, but he was and I can admit that) and he was only given a redemption of any kind when he LITERALLY DIED! And with the other three diamonds it was so rushed bc they canceled the series (since a lot of countries banned the show due to ruby and sapphires wedding) and they TRIED to humanize them in the most.. spoon fed way possible and ughhhhhhhh. It’s just overall really bad. Peridot is the only good redemption arc in that show. Love her <3

ANYWAY, I think the reason mha ends up humanizing it’s characters so well is BECAUSE of how it interacts with the audience. Often times playing tongue and cheek with a few things. The “lip service” can, all mights secret love child, “sometimes I forget you guys are kids”, all of it. It’s all done to call out the audience in the most hilarious way to show a more pacifistic message. The most memorable scene in this series to me is when Katsuki is literally shouting his frustrations and feelings at the viewer; and I literally remember thinking, “wait… what?!” BECAUSE THIS IS NOT A NORMAL SHONEN THING! This is so out of character for a shonen anime! When you go into a shonen, you have a certain expectation of what is about to happen. The female love interest is not given a personality aside from a few side comments, the rival/bully is the “bad guy” to some extent, there is some form of love interest competition, and it’s absolutely not about forgiveness.

And the reason for why I personally love this scene so much is because in only a few short lines it manages to take a character from a show, and put them into the perspective of an actual person. When we interact with people and how they’ve hurt us, we tend to only see one perspective. That perspective being that this person is bad because they did bad things to me. It’s hard to put ourselves in the shoes of other people, and it’s just in general EASIER to dehumanize a bad person. (Endeavor, Katsuki, Rose Quartz, the list goes on) But it IS easier to like a villain (like shigaraki) when you frame the bad things they’ve done as something that you couldn’t directly experience. Not many people run into others with murderous rage and experience some sort of trauma from it. Most people were bullied or had abusive dads. Not only that but you also end up giving these characters with murderous rage very relatable problems; so it’s easier to separate them from their bad actions to solely focus on them being a victim in one way or another.

AND YOU KNOW THE BEST PART ABOUT THIS SCENE? ITS LITERALLY TELLING YOU, THE AUDIENCE, IN THE MOST PASSIVE AGGRESSIVE WAY POSSIBLE, THAT HE IS A TEENAGE BOY! He is HUMAN, he has FEELINGS. There are actual reasons for why he does the things he does! And my fucking GOD I could talk about for hours on why I think the internet cringifying fandom, and making the whole “why are curtains blue” meme, and Disney movies (derogatory) just ruined an entire generations ability to analyze storytelling at even a BASIC level.

People were SO SHOCKED and AMAZED when encanto came out because it didn’t have an actual villain in the story and that just makes me so MAD! Because there’s so many stories like this! So many where the villain isn’t actually a villain! But because it’s DISNEY and everyone always talks about Disney! People were absolutely baffled by it. So many people online had to explain a VERY BASIC analysis of the movie because people don’t understand how to analyze stories. Disney didn’t know how to make a realistic antagonist. No, instead they made characters like GASTON, and URASALA, and god, so many more. I wish people grew up in studio ghibli movies if they were gonna grow up on disney movies at all bc it at the very least teaches a different perspective on what makes a villain.

Mha is great though because, like you said, it started them from the ground up and then humanized them through very specific scenes. Endeavors was done gradually through a multitude of perspectives, while Katsuki’s was done through self reflection and action.

I’ve seen people make the argument when people compare endeavor to Katsuki that they are “completely different and have different motivations!!! Katsuki values his own abilities to be the best and get to number one on his own, while endeavor trained a kid to be the best from a young age that would surpass him!” Obviously they aren’t the same character. BUT, there’s an argument to be made that endeavor and all might are parallels of Izuku and Katsuki. And that’s just, a fact. All might even talks about how Katsuki is similar to endeavor.

That’s why Katsuki is actually inspired by endeavors ways of atonement. He learned how to atone through his actions with Izuku and then even apologized to him.

This is all to say that mha radicalized a fandom lol. I’ve seen people literally make the same anti cop arguments but for heroes; it’s great! It’s got a lot of wisdom in it.

#leftsock rambles

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