#this is my friend Leah | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

perfectwitchcrown · 1 month ago

Text

Dante and Betrayal in Make the Exorcist Fall in Love

Ok so now that chapter 79 has come out I really want to discuss something I think is kind of interesting as a through line between Dante's Inferno and Dante in Make The Exorcist Fall in Love. This is mostly just word vomit haha. Also, asterisks indicate footnotes that I've left towards the bottom of the post!

Cw: discussion of sexual violence, victim blaming, and homophobia. Also, image of cartoon gore (when priest pulled out his eye in the first chapter) after the read more

In the Divine Comedy, the closer Dante the pilgrim moves to the center of hell, the more intense Dante the poet is casting the sins being punished there are. So, Dante starts in Limbo, which he presents as containing the least serious of sins, then continues on through a variety of different sins. The ninth and final circle of hell, containing what Dante the poet felt was the most serious of sins, is treachery. In the notes to their translation of the Inferno, Robert Hollander and Jean Hollander write that "The three most gravely punished sinners of the poem are Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus (founder of the Church), as well as Brutus and Cassius, who betrayed Julius Caesar (the first ruler of the empire" (639).

Dante Alighieri presents betrayal then as the worst sin possible, which I think has been carried through into Ekuoto Dante's perception of whatever happened with Vergilius in the past.

Specifically, I’m thinking of their conversation in chapter 20. Verge identifies Dante’s powers as relating to Lot’s wife turning to a pillar of salt when fleeing Sodom.

I think Dante’s response is pretty interesting for several reasons. For one, based on the paneling and what we see, he’s identifying Sodom with the church, not with Verge. Verge, as someone who fled then is Lot, and Dante positions himself as Lot’s wife, which is both fascinating in the way he’s presenting their relationship and that it implies that he views his decision to stay with the church as a decision of weakness, just as Lot’s wife turning to look back at Sodom is considered spiritual weakness.

It was his betrayal of Verge then that he considers his sin.

Frankly though I wonder if there’s an element of miscommunication between the two of them as well in regard to this.

This is the part where I get super speculative, because we still don’t know what happened in the panel depicted (although I wonder if we’ll be finding out soon). But, just based on the few things we’ve seen, there’s a couple things I’d like to propose.

I don’t think Dante and Vergilius in have ever explicitly told each other that they love each other. I could be totally wrong about this, but based on Dante’s reactions in this chapter, both to the homophobia he experienced and not wanting to talk about it with Verge, and his shyness around romantically charged physical contact with him (it’s Verge who holds his hand, Dante doesn’t hold it back), and just based on the fact that they were kids, I think whatever splintering in their relationship occurred it was before either of them had actually been able to verbally express what they meant to each other. They reaaaaally read to me as having still been in that first gay crush where you’re sort of together but also not really acknowledging it stage of their relationship.*

I wonder if Verge may have been victim blamed in some regard for what happened with that priest we see. I could see Arima Aruma making commentary on the way victims of sexual exploitation can be blamed if they’re “imperfect” victims. Personally, I don’t trust Abbott Nicholas like even a little bit in how he handles situations, and just based on the expression Dante has as a kid looking back at him, I wonder if he may have said something pretty fucked. Or, at the very least, not helpful at all towards Verge, and tinged in some way, by homophobia. Like, ultimately, at his age Verge was not capable of consenting whatsoever to what was happening. I wonder if because Verge was accepting money in return, Abbott Nicholas may have blamed him partially for what happened**

All of these proposals in consideration, then, I think potentially color Verge’s comment when he says “how cruel” in chapter 20. I wonder if Dante’s betrayal may have also been a deeper betrayal of their relationship -> not just that he didn’t go with him, but that he may have not acknowledged the relationship they had. In other words, if Abbott Nicholas may have victim blamed Verge in a way that also centered his queerness and Dante froze.

Returning to the conversation in chapter 20 then, if, from Verge’s perspective, Dante’s powers reference sexual intercourse between men, and Dante may have never fully communicated how he felt for Verge, that how cruel may have been because he was taking it as further shaming him for his own assault -> if the sin is having had sex with a man, and if Verge may have been blamed for his rape, then Dante’s powers may come across as further victim blaming towards Verge, that because Verge was sexually abused by a man as a form of survival sex work (not that he could have ever consented to that at his age), Verge has “committed sin,” whereas Dante has not (presuming that Dante has never had sex with a man, which like, idk but idk if Verge knows either).

Dante’s response, “that’s not my sin” then, wouldn’t actually refute that to Verge. It would just tie into that. “No, I’ve never had sex with a man, that’s not my sin” -> which also would function as a further rejection of the feelings they held for each other.

On the other hand, I don’t think that’s how Dante meant it. I think Dante’s perspective on it not having been his sin, especially with how he follows it up, and with what he said towards the beginning of the series about love, is that he doesn’t view his feelings towards Verge as sin at all. Rather, it was his failure to take his side that he views as his sin. His response he may have meant both as a “what I felt for you wasn’t sin” and a “what happened to you wasn’t your fault.” The panel frames the church as Sodom, so the sin of what occurred to Verge is not homosexuality, but rape, and Dante clearly places the blame with the priest.

And to tie into this, I think it’s significant that it’s not Dante’s personal money he uses to pay women at brothels to offer them the financial means to leave sex work should they choose, it’s church funds.***

TL;DR

To sum all this up, I think Dante and Verge may both have skewed understandings of what went wrong in their relationship and how they felt towards each other, but I think the idea that Dante betrayed Verge is central to it. I’m not sure that Vergilius thinks that Dante betrayed him though. I think this is Dante’s perspective of whatever happened that we still don’t know about. I am interested in seeing if we get any further information about their past in the next chapter or if we won’t be seeing anymore for a while.

Footnotes

*I think further in support of this is Verge’s reaction at the bowling alley when Priest falsely confirms that Dante is having sex with women in brothels. He teases Dante in their fight in chapters 20-21 for being worked up over him, but honestly, I don’t think he has confidence that his feelings for him in childhood were reciprocated in the same way.

**In support of this I think we should consider Dante’s reaction following Priest’s assault in the first chapter. Priest blames himself for his assault—“I looked upon a woman with lust. I am deserving of this punishment”—and Dante immediately thinks of Abbott Nicholas, and then immediately tries to impress upon Priest that consensual sexual desire isn’t wrong.

***Dante seems to consider his position within the church as one that enables him to decrease exploitation the most. Daniel, in one of the files, refers to the policy (that he instituted) post Mother Rosa death of banning the weak from serving as exorcists, as having resulted in the exploitation of children, who now make up the bulk of the exorcists. If Dante leaves the church at this point, he would be doing so as one of the remaining adult exorcists, leaving the work to the rest of the children

Random Extra Thoughts:

I’ve seen speculation that shit may have gone down between the two of them in-between the four year timeskip after the first chapter since Dante has become noticeably more pessimistic. Personally, based on Verge knowing about Dante going to brothels, and based on Dante knowing to look for Verge by speaking to sex workers at brothels, I wonder if they may have seen each other at a brothel. Vergilius would’ve been a witch by this point. I’ve had to go through parts of the manga again, but he’s been a witch for at least ten years at this point. Which is an interesting timeline, since Dante and Mother Rosa were both present 11 years ago at the fight against Beelzebub. Much to consider

Also, Dante and Verge keep referencing each other’s respective ages (that Dante has been aging and Verge is still young) and tying it not just to appearance but also behavior. With the potential miscommunication in regards to their feelings with each other, I sort of also wonder if Verge associates their relationship with their youth as well, and may assume that the romantic element to their love for each other is something Dante considers himself to have grown out of.

Tying into the above, I think it’s significant that we the audience haven’t yet seen an ordinary adult who is openly gay. Verge and the other witches who are queer (Erskine and Cyril based on their presence sharing a broom naked in the background of the witch’s sabbath, other various witches who’ve been similarly paired off) have all frozen themselves in time. Dante is gay, but based on his behavior at the brothels, not out. Also, and this could just be early series wonkiness, but when Abbott Nicholas tells Dante in the first chapter not to introduce Priest to a variety of vices, womanizing comes up as one of them. So, like, whatever happened in the past, I don’t think Dante has ever acknowledged himself as gay to Abbott Nicholas or the larger community.

#ekuoto #make the exorcist fall in love #exorcist wo otosenai #meta #mtefil #Also completely unrelated but god I hope we find out more about mother rosa #I also really want to know who in the one file called Dante to warn him off from going to collect her body #was it Nicholas?#We know that Beelzebub puppeted her remains in 2020 and Leah destroyed them so I guess he didn't give up #Also I am dying to know who Imuri's friend Cass is #Also I wonder if we’ll ever find out Verge’s name before he was a witch my money is on Beato

48 notes · View notes

soapywankenopy · 8 months ago

Text

SDV car headcannons

[this gets pretty specific because i've had way too much time to think about it]

1. Harvey

Harvey drives an old, beat-up red Ford Ranger. It's a standard transmission, and the clutch is super finicky, so when he tries to drive other cars, he has a bad habit of shoving in the clutch too hard (or if it's an automatic, slamming on the break, thinking it's the clutch). It was a gift from his parents when he started med school. It was old when they bought it, but Harvey does his best to maintain it. He's not a "truck guy," but he changes his own oil and keeps it running well. He would like to buy a Subaru because quote, "they're very safe cars," but he doesn't use his truck a lot as it is, so he doesn't see a need to get a new car.

2. Leah

Leah drives a silver Subaru Baja. You can not convince me otherwise. She views cars as a necessary evil. It wasn't really all that useful in the city, but she's glad to have it now that she lives in Pelican town. It's well-loved, and it's pretty beat-up, but Leah says it works fine for what she needs it for.

3. Shane

He drives a 1999 Ford Taurus in that weird pinky-gold color. It smells like pizza and pepper poppers, and there are feathers in the backseat. Sometimes, he'll let Jas sit on his lap in the driver's seat and let her steer while he works the pedals. Mayor Lewis caught them once and was not happy. Shane does it anyway because it makes Jas happy.

4. Sebastian

He drives a motorcycle, lol. I admittedly do not know very much about motorcycles, but it looks like a blue Kawasaki Vulcan to me, but idk. (If you know more about motorcycles, feel free to give your two cents)

5. Sam

Sam does not have his own car, but he frequently borrows the family van. It's a silver 2003 Honda Oddysey. The van lands him with driver duty for the band and their equipment.

6. Elliott

Elliott disagrees with cars ideologically. He had a grey 2004 Mitsubishi Outlander that he inherited from his aunt. He sold it before he moved to Pelican town. He thinks it's more romantic to walk everywhere, but if you ask him why he walks everywhere, he'll say, "Because of the environment."

7. Penny

Penny doesn't drive. Pam tried a million times to teach her, but Penny just doesn't want to. She doesn't trust herself with such heavy machinery.

8. Maru

Maru does not have a car but will borrow Robin's work truck if she needs to. Sebastian definitely taught her how to ride a motorcycle. One of her many ongoing projects is a custom bike for Sebastian. Demetrius was very insistant that she learned to drive stick.

9. Abigail

Abigail does not know how to drive. Pierre was too busy, and Caroline never felt the need to teach her. She's happy to explore by foot, so it doesn't really bother her.

10 & 11. Emily & Haley

Their parents bought them a 2012 light green Toyota Prius to share. Haley thinks it's cute and Emily likes that it's a hybrid. Haley says eventually she might buy a blue Volkswagen Bug.

12. Alex

Alex doesn't drive and it's a sore subject for him. Don't bring it up. He might end up crying. He's always said that he would want a green Dodge Charger as soon as he learns to drive.

I have more headcannons about the other characters, so I may put them in another post

#sdv headcanons #sdv #stardew #stardew valley #sdv harvey #sdv leah #sdv shane #sdv sam #sdv elliott #sdv penny #sdv maru #sdv sebastian #sdv haley #sdv emily #sdv alex #sdv abigail #why was i thinking about this? idk man #many thanks to my friend for helping out with some of these

116 notes · View notes