#up to and including just deadass ignoring what she's done and comparing her to character that are just morally better than her (Claude)

[butwhatifidothis]

"I still do like Edelgard" You sure don't show it much lol.

SSSSSSSTOP LMAO

MY LONGASS ANSWER GOT ATE SO the tl;dr ver. of what I was GOING to say before Tumblr said nah: I do like Edelgard’s character, but the writing that tends to surround it dilutes how good she could have been. Edelgard’s character, as is, for the most part, I have no issues with as a villainous character and in fact can find myself enjoying pretty easily, but the game has too many moments that try to force the player to feel bad about her - not because of who she is as a character, but because sometimes other characters (most of whom having little to no connection with Edelgard) say she totally isn’t all bad and really more like us than it seems, and Edelgard is now totally not all bad and really more like us than it seems. 

Which isn’t true. Most of the cast wouldn’t wage war on an overall peaceful continent. Most of the cast wouldn’t outright admit pointblank to being willing to sacrifice the lives of those under their care to achieve some “greater cause” - in fact the other two lords of the game outright and explicitly reject that notion. Most of the cast isn’t willing to kill their friends if they try to stop them from committing horrible, morally reprehensible crimes such as grave-robbing... well, any resting place, really. Most of the cast aren’t willing to use the people under their care as meat shields to hide behind as they hole themselves away in the safety of their nice fancy throne room. Most of the cast aren’t willing to specifically order one of their supposed friends to man a ballista on a hill that is specifically rigged to be set on fire should any enemy try to take it. Most of the cast aren’t willing to use Demonic Beasts as tools. Most of the cast isn’t willing to hide and work with a sect of murderous people set on killing everyone who isn’t them in order to use their cool technology (which includes Demonic Beasts). 

Along with all of the other things Edelgard does that nearly no one else is willing to do due to the horrific nature of the action in question. But the game never addresses these actions in full at any point. The closest we come to accountability being put on Edelgard is, again, AM, and it does an overall fine job at it, but even that route doesn’t acknowledge the true depths of all that Edelgard has done - notice how even AM never brings up the use of Demonic Beasts, which has absolutely no moral justification, just like no other route brings it up, because it’s objectively bad that she’s willing to use them and so it cannot be brought up ever.

And. Just. Byleth. Holy shit, among all the characters that Byleth drags down, Edelgard is the biggest fuckin’ victim. She becomes this lil’ baby back bitch who can’t stand to attack her pwecious teacher who she weally wikes to draw and she has such a big cwush on them and she needs them to get ~softened~ but omg they saw her dwawing!! //>~<// So embbawwasing!! And oh nyo!! >m< Scawy wats!! But Edelgard just sounds adorable when she screams, right guys? You can say it twice, that’s how cute it is! Not a creep move to make at all!

Byleth makes Edelgard a complete and utter embarrassment. Edelgard needs Byleth, Edelgard’s weak to Byleth, Edelgard’s so soft to Byleth - which is all a good thing, apparently! 

Like, you see what I mean? A lot of my faults with Edelgard aren’t actually with Edelgard - she’s a villain, and so I view her actions through a villainous lens, and in doing so I think she’s fine, for the most part. More than fine, really! She, as her base character with very minimal changes, can make a damn good villain if allowed! But it’s the game having so many moments that try to remind you that she’s this good girly who just does fucked up things sometimes, in the same way that Dimitri and Claude are good boyos who just do fucked up things sometimes, and in doing so they end up severely downplaying just how bad she is... which in turn ends up having a large, laaaarge portion of the fandom either deliberately downplaying her actions/overplaying Dimitri and Claude’s (and Rhea’s oh boy Rhea’s) actions or just deadass not acknowledging the actions in the first place in order to make her stand with the other good guys of the game.

That, primarily, is what shits in my cereal about Edelgard. I really really really want to like her route, for example, because of the idea of “overt tones = Protagonist good, undertones = Protagonist bad” being so appealing to me, but it’s ruined by the knowledge I have that the game actually will try to make Edelgard better than she is. Is CF supposed to be this propaganda route that tricks the player into seeing Edelgard as the good guy via the nice words and the powerful protagonist, or is it supposed to be something that’s actually, genuinely trying to make Edelgard a good guy by, this time, deliberately hiding her actions and now straight up changing the story to erase some of her more egregious ones (mainly what she does with Dimitri)? I wanna say the former! But the narrative ends up muckin’ up that idea, if that is what they were going for. 

[bondsmagii]

could you elaborate on king of scars? what did you dislike about it?

OK this will be an abridged version because I’m going to write up a full scathing review on Goodreads (and link it, of course) but here are the highlights:

(SPOILERS ABOUND, so if you’re planning on reading don’t watch out)

compared to the other books in the Grishaverse the writing is choppy, simplistic, contradictory, and overall poor

everything that’s been established about Grisha power? ignored or explained away in this book.

the book is supposed to be about Nikolai but he barely features as a character. sure, he’s in there, but it’s definitely not a book about him.

the book is actually about Zoya.

“surely that’s not so bad?” you think. oh, it is. Zoya -- a character I liked in the other books, if I’m honest -- has got a chronic case of Author’s Favourite Disease and it kills her character. she’s the best, most powerful (literally... she literally becomes the most powerful Grisha in the world after slaying a fucking amplifier dragon or some shit), most beautiful... she’s snarky, can do no wrong, acts like a petulant child and is rewarded for it... it’s nauseating.

literally Zoya is such a focus that in other chapters set in Fjerda, the characters have a prolonged conversation about how fantastic and wonderful she is

WHILE GOING TO BURY MATTHIAS.

there’s this one scene where like three powerful Saints that have turned out to be alive and trapped in the Shadow Fold all have a huge fight over whether or not to bring the Darkling back and on god it’s the cringiest scene I’ve ever read in published fiction

it belongs on a DeviantArt RP between three overpowered Mary Sue OCs written by 12 years olds but I actually think 12 year olds could have written it better

Nobody Is Allowed To Be Traumatised Except Zoya 

“the Darkling is bad because he killed people!” screams everyone, Leigh Bardugo included... as Zoya and Nina kill people left right and fucking centre and get celebrated for it

if you like the Darkling be prepared to have Leigh Bardugo tell you via the narrative in the entire book that you’re a freaque who’s stupid and should be ashamed

lots of cool concepts that are never done justice (the demon inside Nikolai... you know, what the book is supposed to be about, the Cult of the Starless Saint, Yuri’s entire character...)

everyone is OOC

Genya and David are like cardboard cutouts of themselves in this and I’m pretty sure in the final scene Leigh Bardugo just fucking straight-up forgot David

political intrigue plot that’s poorly managed and easily forgettable (deadass I forgot about the Fjerdan pretender to the Ravkan throne until I read @vestriis’s review lmao)

Nina’s grief for Matthias was honestly some of the most poignant, sad writing I’ve ever seen... and then it was ruined by her getting a new love interest literally as she knelt by Matthias’s grave having put the last bit of dirt down over it. this isn’t subtle, either. she literally sees Hanne and is like 👀 WHILE STILL SITTING BY MATTHIAS’S GRAVE.

side characters all suck tbh like there’s no meat to them at all

it’s very, very clear that Leigh Bardugo had no interest in this book and was just rushing it out to fulfil a contractual obligation so she could move on to better things. it’s a stain on a brilliant universe and she should have never written it.

there’s probably a whole load more that I’ve forgotten but like... I’m sure you get the picture lmao. I’ll link my proper review once I write it, but it’s gonna be a long one 😩

[butwhatifidothis]

I’m still flabbergasted by that one comment on Dimitri though. “he still wants to try and be a good person” my man (or woman), my dude. Trying to be a good person is ultimately what makes someone a good person, people are defined by what they do. Then again this fic does seem to function on the basis of someone being born an innocent or a monster and none of their action affect that so maybe it’s not surprising.

Honestly, I have no idea what about Dimitri and his actions that make him so unforgiveable in the minds of Edelstans when they... like EdeIgard. Like, what specific line did Dimitri cross and EdeIgard didn't that makes the former irredeemable and the latter fine?

Because, even if we're being flat-out wrong and say that Dimitri was always of completely sound mind when he did all of the stuff he did - trying to torture Randolph, charging into Gronder without thinking about his friends and men following him - and if we go so far as to say that his actions during the timeskip itself - killing Imperial soldiers, officials, children - were always 100% unjustified murder, when we compare that to what all EdeIgard's done?

Spearheading a war that lasts five years, being directly responsible for the deaths of what is, being laughably generous, hundreds of people. Laying siege on a building she knew held many, many defenseless people, without letting them evacuate. Starving her citizens. Hiding behind her citizens when backed in a corner. Invading a neutral nation. Assisting in the murder of Rufus by giving Cornelia troops. Conscripting her citizens (or, at best, being completely ignorant of what Thales is doing to her citizens despite supposedly keeping a close eye on him). Ethnic cleansing, both in the sense of driving out and actively persecuting the religious as well as wanting to end the Nabatean race. Utilizing Demonic Beasts. Keeping Rhea in decrepit conditions but still going on with her war despite saying that it was Rhea's influence that caused her to declare war in the first place - with it being revealed that she kept Rhea alive so that she'd eventually be given over to TWS. Spying on her citizens (Hubert's ending with Dorothea). Having a secret police (Hubert's ending with Shamir). Arranging political marriages in exchange for a country's freedom (Petra's ending with Hubert).

And that's just what she does post ts. And probably isn't even everything. And doesn't include things she does in pre ts that continue on to post ts.

So, again, even with the absolute worst interpretation of Dimitri you could possibly have (including just deadass lies), what on fuckin' earth makes EdeIgard of all characters the more morally sound option over him? She does far worse shit far more often and doesn't even try to make up for it, like Dimitri does his shit. She doesn't even regret what she does! By her own admission (in FEH at least)! All she does is never shut up about how her path is totally the only way Fodlan could ever ever get peace and- ohhhh, wait, that's all the fic has her do too. Just say shit and pretend it's true, without her actually doing anything to prove it. Nvm, figured it out lmaoooo