#you know my post about how sympathetic characters can be wrong? that's about liliana.

[utilitycaster]

okay I've been enjoying myself and not terribly salty, but I do have one thing to say which is that like...look. I still think that Liliana could go either way. I don't think she should be killed on sight, obviously. I also don't think she is guaranteed to not betray Imogen. But it's absolutely wild the degree of leniency she was consistently granted, well beyond that of basically any other parent except ones who were already dead before the narrative. People were harsher to Marion Lavorre, who was certainly flawed and had, through her own issues, caused problems for Jester, but notably hadn't like, recruited vulnerable children into a death cult. People were worse to the Gentleman, who definitely did his share of horrible crimes but his closest allies never tried to TPK the Mighty Nein. People are less sympathetic to Korrin, who literally was just a normal high-strung parent with high expectations for his daughter because he was thrust into leadership and his wife was presumed to have died on her Aramente and he wanted to ensure this wouldn't happen to his only child. People were worse to Birdie and Ollie, who we know were directly mind controlled. And suddenly when Liliana turns up she's the universe's greatest, if I may use a term from TVTropes, woobie, for skipping out on her family and leaving her daughter to fend for herself in Gelvaan with no warning and no guidance, sending Imogen unsettling and unhelpful dreams, failing to answer her questions even as she clearly gets entangled in what Liliana was trying unsuccessfully to protect her from, and becoming involved in an organization that tried and frequently succeeded in killing the people who initially helped her. You literally get people who are like "abolition of the nuclear family" everywhere else on their blog being like "um well you see, Imogen is trying to connect with her biological mother and that is sacred." Liliana is not beyond redemption - I think that could in fact be a very satisfying ending for her - but there is a very real possibility she will betray the party, there always has been, and the fact that she was granted automatic and unlimited benefit of the doubt from a swathe of the fandom has really cast her many flaws in a far more revealing light than had she been treated in a more measured and nuanced fashion.