#like the fact that consistently they go out and experience true unconditional love w/out fear or control for the first time

[meteortrails]

I really do like big mom as a character bc like. one piece DID need more toxic mothers to balance out all the angelic dead ones and by GOD does charlotte linlin fucking deliver…. genuinely I love how so much of the whole cake island arc is set within the context of like, Intense interpersonal family dynamics. linlin’s obsession with her dead, secretly evil mother and with family and belonging and the way that translates into her authoritarian chokehold on her children’s lives and the country that she’s running….. she needs all of them to stay, and the only way to make sure that they stay is to make sure they’re scared of her (after all, loving her wasn’t enough to make her mother stay). she needs a world where she can be accepted and belong and the only way to get it is to be the one in charge of it, to be somebody that no one can deny. god like she even has horrific emotionally scarring family brunches she’s PERFECT

[astrologista]

(@chiscribbles4smiles and @starxapple with this post compelled me to want to dig this mess up from my drafts........ i wasn’t gonna post it because as a Psychological Analysis I think some of this is definitely REACHING......... or iunno....... i wrote it a long time ago when i was In A Mood but i can prove that Varian needs a mom using psychological evidence so deal w/ it y’all)

(This is a very speculative analysis but if you like those, read on.)

So if you notice how Varian reacts when he sees his father frozen in the amber, his initial reaction is disbelief. He's saying "no, no, no" over and over, hoping it's just a nightmare, that if he voices his denial enough, he'll wake up and this won't be real. He's refusing to believe it's real, begging for it to be undone, that if he just doesn't acknowledge it in these first moments of shock, maybe it'll all just go away. But seconds tick by and his dad doesn't answer him, only silence does. It slowly starts to sink in for Varian that this is real and no one is coming to help him or clean up the mess, not this time. On the subtitles Varian actually says "Dad!" and then when that doesn't work, "Daddy..." His voice changes a bit, too, becoming higher and more childlike, and choked up with tears. Which, if that don't break your heart, I don't know what does. In moments of extreme stress and trauma, it's not uncommon for children or teens to regress a little so that they can feel a little safer by returning to an earlier frame of mind. Varian desperately doesn't want the weight and responsibility of this situation to be on his shoulders. His dad has usually tried to bear the brunt of the blame for his mistakes. But even though his dad's not able to do that right now (ironically tragic), Varian still goes into this mode of regressing and responding with uncontrolled tears instead of immediate anger at the Princess. He's tired, he's given everything he can give. He really does sound like the terrified child that he is at that moment. He doesn't know what to do and would very much like for someone to show up and hug him, tell him everything will be ok and help him fix the problem.

But let’s like, consider this. It can be said that children move on from their mother's guidance to their father's once they reach a certain age. Mothers are the first teachers, who provide the basis for sustaining and prolonging life. They teach you how to eat, provide the nutrients, and take care of your physical hurts and just calm some of your fears as well, and SO much more, giving you the basic primer on how to live your life. It's not that hard to make your Mom proud as long as you're good to her and learn how to use a spoon at the appropriate age. She loves you for nothing, as you are. But once you move on, it can be a long road from mother-love to father-acceptance. Not because fathers are inherently bad or highly demanding, they just tend to value different things in addition to those survival skills that your mom taught you. For true father-acceptance, you must do things worthy of recognition. Talk. Walk. Act like a human. Show moral character. Work in the field, perform feats of strength. That is how you show your worth as a good son. So many things a mother wouldn't require, but a father might really care about. 

Varian makes inventions because that's what he does, hoping his father will at last be impressed with him. Finally, he can gain that father-acceptance he so craves. He needs to see that "pride" in Quirin's eyes to feel that he's worthy of being loved. That get-for-free, endless outpouring of mother-love is no longer in Varian's life for whatever reason. And Varian is just a very sensitive little dude. He thrives on love. And nowhere better is that shown than in the picture hanging in Quirin's room, when both his parents were there with their attention entirely on him. Their love, entirely available. There was nothing he had to do to earn it. It simply was. And to Varian, that is his gold standard. Look at his cute smol face - bliss.

With the loss of mother-love, it's no surprise that Varian went just a little bonkers with the loss of his father. Research shows that when people go without physical / emotional affection for long enough, antisocial personality traits actually can manifest, whether temporarily or perhaps permanently. The onset of which can induce panic, irrational behavior and even temporary psychosis...

If you REALLY want to get theoretical, Raps and Cass provided a tiny bit of that mother-love and in Eugene's case, a little father-acceptance, enough to keep Varian wanting to hang around them. Like a drug, he soaked up the fact that they gave him even the time of day. That's how desperate he is for attention, because attention leads to love and acceptance, and those things make Varian feel safer and more secure in the absence of his mother. (And it’s so depressing to me that he feels he has to do so much just to earn a little scrap of love.) The loss of a mother in general is just very damaging, especially to someone who's sensitive to other peoples' rejection such as Varian. When developing, children sometimes are rejected by their peers or others, making the outside/external world seem unsafe. But they can use their mother as an anchor point to make that outside exploration less scary. That way, even if others reject or mock them (which in Varian's case is a lot, everyone in the village seems to exclude or just dislike him what with his inventions trying to kill them on a regular basis), at least they have someone who genuinely loves them to come home to. An anchor point, a person whose consistency and stability makes the world safe and encourages confidence. Varian needs that and only that, but it was taken from him, for whatever reason. (If we ever find out that there’s a character responsible for that loss... *takes out a bat* i just wanna talk.) Desperate for love, he'll attach to anyone who will listen or shows the slightest bit of interest or kindness to him. Raps, Cass and Eugene have all given him little mini-speeches on how compassionate and smart and unique he is, but it's barely enough. It's like getting a few bread crusts when you're starving for a three-course meal - it'll give you something to keep from going off the edge, but it's never going to fill that void. And he has to practically beg Cass to give her little speech, prompting her with "I was just trying to make you see something in me... something special... I was just being dumb." Most likely a subconscious fish-for-compliments move, but it gets the job done and he gets what he needs - a little validation.

Like others, I just find it kind of gross how far Varian has to go for love. If the people would just take a chance to get to know Varian, they would see that fundamentally, he is (well... was...) basically a harmless kid. Reckless, overconfident, excitable, yes, but he never wanted to hurt anyone. If anything, he only wanted to help them. 

No child should ever live in a society where they have to feel like everyone in their town rejects and/or hates them, and that their only parent is distant. The point is, there's not enough love left in Corona for someone like Varian, who craves and needs response and confirmation that his Dad is proud of him. That validation literally means the difference between his physical and mental health and not - it is enough to make or break him. It's basically the one and only thing he cares about, returning to that time when his family was whole. With adequate mother-love and father-acceptance, Varian could be his best self. He could be very well-adjusted and would probably not have as much maladaptive thinking as he does. He'd be less defensive, more genuinely confident and act more maturely, probably. He’d still be his excitable, lovable self, but with so much less toxic thoughts running through his mind. And he'd be more open to suggestions about how to improve his alchemy. In What the Hair he just came off as insecure and unwilling to change his experiment. But with genuine confidence instilled by his parents' support, he'd probably forgo his pride in the interest of making safer and smaller inventions. He wouldn't feel like he has to prove anything, because he'd know he has as much love as he needs waiting at home. With Varian, everything in his mind and body is out of balance (which is ironic for an alchemist), so it's not surprising that he is such a mess or causes so many disasters...

People might disagree with me on this one but I honestly think Arianna is / might be the key to Varian's redemption. He claims to still be seeking the father-acceptance, but to come back from where he is, he first needs to take a step back and get the purest and most unconditional mother-love - HUGS FOR DAYS YA FEEL ME? - to know that he is still worthy of being loved. He did kidnap Arianna because she was the weak link, but in a way, it may not be that much of an accident, and more of a reaching-out for that mother-love from Rapunzel's mother, on a subconscious level (or not. “i want a mommy so i’m stealing one. no one will stop me...”)

No wonder seeing Rapunzel and both of her parents embrace set him off. That pretty much symbolized everything Varian was trying to get to... but couldn't.  

tl;dr someone get me adoption papers NOW so I can adopt this child