#kris isn't just skeptical of ralsei because he's an imperfect and overly-familiar asriel double

[nemesis-is-my-middle-name]

for my money i think the reason ralsei seems to ping as A Little Weird to so many people, and why kris doesn’t seem 100% on-board with them and prefers to talk to/seek comfort from susie when they get to choose, isn’t that ralsei’s a weird little saccharine asriel clone. or, it’s not just that.

it’s sort of unclear whose friend ralsei actually is. kris’s, or the player’s.

from the moment you meet ralsei, he’s hyping you up as the Hero of Legend, the one who’s gonna save the world from an eternal nightmare. he encourages you to be kind, but at the same time always lets you make your own decisions. making recommendations, never demands. not to you, at least.

he’s extremely reluctant to take “your special power” - the ability to ACT - away from you. actually, he very specifically wants you in charge, not susie.

even once susie takes away your “unique ability,” ralsei still asks you to pick whenever possible, and apologizes when susie chooses instead. a weird distinction when we’re both supposedly the same, right? lightner heroes?

not just that, ralsei’s obedient. you want him to eat the weird stump salsa? drink literal poison? sure! whatever you say, kris! he’s a perfect toy. obedient. kind. constantly encouraging you.

at the same time, he doesn’t want kris to think too hard about some things. he immediately tries to bury the spamton fight, insisting that it doesn’t matter. y’know, spamton, the one going on about breaking strings and being free?

except kris isn’t the one making all these decisions. ralsei addresses kris when he says “i think your choices are important, too!” but that sentence is not actually applicable to kris, at all. in fact, it sounds almost entirely directed at us. the player. the one actually making all the decisions. talking to kris won’t raise any eyebrows, since they’re the one standing right there, but maybe that’s just a front? maybe they’re addressing kris in name only, and their puppeteer in everything else?

i’m not necessarily saying ralsei’s doing this maliciously, or even deliberately. he might not even be aware kris and the player are two distinct entities. he knows way more than he should for a darkner, but that doesn’t mean he knows everything.

but keep in mind that kris knows all the same things we do. they are painfully aware that they’re not the one choosing anything. so having ralsei smile to their face and tell them to make good choices! probably stings. and they don’t really know his intentions either. is he really unaware they’re being puppetted, or is he on the player’s side here? that is ample reason for them to be suspicious or off-put by him.

Part 2: Susie

i think this also explains why kris likes susie so much more. it’s not just a “lesser of two evils” situation - susie is ralsei’s polar opposite in this weird inscrutable charade. almost her first words to you at the start of the game is your choices don’t matter. 

she’s constantly taking away kris’s agency. defying their orders, going off on her own.

she orders you around. i mean that literally. she orders you to walk into the dark closet with her, and kris does, with zero input from the player. in the opening chase sequence, she tells you to run!:

and in that upcoming chase sequence, even though you’re steering, you literally cannot stop running no matter what button you press. then she gives kris another order:

and once again, kris follows, with zero input from you.

this puzzle sequence, too:

in the two sequences where you, the player, see her perspective, you still don’t get to direct her. she ask for kris’s help with the puzzle in chapter 1, but outside of that, none of the choices you make matter. she’ll do whatever she wants, regardless. when you do finally get the ability to control her, it’s because she decides it’ll be the best way to get home, and it’s conditional. she makes it clear that she can still back out at any time.

even when she purportedly does give you a choice, like when you’re leaving at the end of chapter 1, it still doesn’t matter what “kris” says. you’re turning back around either way.

imagine how good that must feel for kris. they know their choices don’t matter. they are actually deeply, uncomfortably aware of that fact. they do not get to choose what’s going on. so first of all, here’s someone who’s - intentionally or not - validating that feeling, while simultaneously asserting their own independence. this person, at least, is not playing a game with their head. she has no ulterior motive.

and second of all, imagine how vindictively good it feels to see the entity taking agency away from you trying to make their decisions with your body, only to get told that they don’t get to choose either. 

no wonder that in cutscenes when kris gets to briefly move themselves, in the final confrontation with king or right after the spamton fight, they protect and cling to her. she’s freeing, briefly, and not completely, but without even being aware of it, she’s on their side.