#Hussie is trolling everyone

[grubsteak]

funny how homestuck fans can and will and have disagreed over which ships are "technically incest" or not; it all boils down to "the ships I don't like are irredeemable incest but the ones I do like aren't REALLY incest you're just looking too far into it"

[beescake]

PLEASE PLEASE MEGADUMP THE ARASOL!!! PLEAAASEE MR BEESCAKE I AM ON MY KNEES BEGGING YOU

HFHGHD GLADLY aaa i’ve been adding notes to it here and there for months but just hesitant to post it bcs im 🧍‍♂️🧍‍♂️🧍‍♂️🧍‍♂

also this is just my own takeaway of the events, it doesn’t necessarily comply to the Ultimate Truth of Canon-Alignment or represent the actual facts of what hussie intended! v sentimental smh but hopefully its still interesting to read

i love when characters inform each other by proximity, it's one of my fave things to see in media :') it feels even more significant when two characters deliberately choose to stick together, so that when one operates, you can tell the other is similarly aligned in associative solidarity.

sollux is a keystone of this trope — whoever he aligns with is a wordless statement, a nod of approval. this stood out to me bcs the main four humans were alr friends by default, but once you reach hivebent you realize the trolls can actively choose who they want to hang out with.

and as we all know, after assessing every troll's biases/loyalties, sollux is the only one who maintains his selective preference for innately Good 👍 people.

aradia is such a beautiful character honestly, she evokes such incredible feelings in me. she might not have been consistently written with care but the best parts of her character are truly stunning. i think it's easy to remember sollux as the self-sacrificing one bc he's so open about it (and his friends frequently react to his Moments) but when you compare him to aradia, it's always struck me

how much more. raw it is

to be so alone as an agent of time, having to orchestrate immeasurably harrowing events nobody understands or gives a fuck about

with your role painted in the story as one who must tend to the needs of the narrative, responsible to match every next note

because when you're given the capabilities, it becomes your duty to carry it out.

it becomes expected of you to keep experimenting and arranging the machinations to work for everyone, dusting off hundreds of necessary failures to keep going

and having to be so unwavering in your drive knowing miserably that there's no one who can help you but yourself.

or alternatively: to make things fun! so other people won't think twice about letting you go off on your own.

sure she's had some very good buds, notably thanks to Team Charge v Team Scourge antics.

and yet, at the end of the day, the one friend that kept choosing her time and time again was the friend with the highest standards.

i can see why people like to define arasol as moirails/matesprits but surprisingly i find the nondescript, unlabeled aspect of their relationship more straightforward to understand.

there's no shortage of people who would accommodate sollux. most of the surviving trolls are his oldest friends bcs he’d chosen them well. his transparency with his feelings had built him strong friendships that won’t falter or break, regardless of how much of a dick he can be. they’ve already seen and accepted him at his worst, and they still like him for who he is.

contrast that with aradia, who'd been so approachable, friendly and reliable in her exchanges it was super fun to talk to her. but the moment she became depressed, all her connections broke down.

her friends became hesitant to interact with her (until she became god tier, “happy” and amicable again) because her gloom and resignation didn’t serve them. she dealt with it alone.

there’s def something of note here abt the disparity between the way male & female characters are written+perceived in homestuck (esp parallel arasol with davejade) but i won’t go into that lmaoo

with this in mind i like to think of sollux as a gift to her, a loyal companion given to complement and commend her resolve. she's capable of doing so much alone but hussie took the time to build her and sollux's relationship as one of a unit; a set.

the ambiguity of their status does complicate things, but i do believe it makes sense with their characters. aradia's relationship with romance is a rocky one, the dubious stringalong equius had with her is a pointed reminder that her feelings of attraction are ultimately controlled by the author writing her.

unlike the other trolls who can openly address and own up to their crushes, aradia had romantic emotions forced upon her (especially when hussie implies 'she kissed equius back on her own volition'). and it seems like her character is so intrinsically neutral abt attraction that even when forced by the almighty powers above, she's unable to retain it wholly.

however, looking back to pre-game when she could actually "choose" her own feelings, she did have a crush on sollux.

their soft spots for each other were so obvious to the point where other people could see it.

taunting aside, when vriska comments on their unit as bf/gf it actually informs the audience that arasol's relationship is romantic in nature despite not aligning with the quadrant system.

even while dead, aradia could still describe her care for sollux, expressing that she would like to see him happy. if they had more time to explore their relationship on alternia, it's possible they could've settled in a quadrant once they grew older.

but going back to the lack of labels, their dynamic was affected once more when aradia became god tier.

to me, her ascension was both the perfect culmination and possible closure of her character. it's the light at the end of her journey toiling through countless of timelines where she had to actively assess and participate. that's why it's cool to see her being silly and having fun giving guidance, passively exploring and watching other people do their parts.

and yet the joy of her freedom makes it hard to explore further introspection. if we take her by her word, she'd already come to terms with the hurt she's been through and forgiven those involved.

i can't help feeling attuned to how impersonal and detached it can be, to devote and meld your identity so completely with your designated position as Maid of Time until you've become hard for your old friends (and even some readers!) to personally connect to.

idk post-canon but i assume there’s some degree of similarity to be bridged here with aradia's god tier and how the hs2 humans' Ultimate forms was described as a consolidation of all their possibilities. since aradia's classpect is inherently of service to Time, going god-tier may have elevated her beyond personhood with the "game construct" possessing her entirely. sollux doesn't realize the extent of it bcs he's still mortal, but a part of him may have subconsciously understood this.

i think there is a core aspect to aradia that was lost to the dehumanizing glory of god tier — a core aspect that may have contained an element of why sollux enjoyed talking to her in the first place.

to him, aradia hadn't just been a nice girl, she was a cool girl. despite not having much in common, he's still willing to chill next to her so she's not alone while she does what needs to get done.

back on alternia, they held a mutual and equal-level regard for each other that could've definitely settled into something permanent. but now, he's placed himself in a position where he can be kept around or left behind at will. the parameters of the relationship are largely in aradia's court, so any label she suggests to identify their relationship with he's likely to accept.

but that's why it's so difficult to label it. because god tier aradia may not necessarily Want quadrants or relationship labels. rather than the initial romantic attachment, their commitment to each other had evolved into one fundamentally of companionship.

no label? ok fine. no matter what, he still thinks she's a good soul worth latching on to. the best, actually. aradia > everyone else.

even if it gets stilted at times. there's an unexpected struggle to connect when sollux's go-to default for talking points is his feelings about things, and aradia may not want to talk about emotions all the time.

not to mention god tier aradia became an observer, especially of chaos. but sollux's avoidance of involvement comes partially from his innate pressure to get involved if something goes wrong. and he can't always tell when something goes wrong, because aradia doesn't mind if things go wrong anymore.

it's a non-negotiable preference that causes them to take the occasional time apart, a new boundary that wouldn't have existed before the game and aradia's god tier.

but just like how his friends tolerated his moods, sollux accepts aradia as she is. with no quadrants, their connection doesn't break down because there's no implicit romantic expectations to be disappointed by or resentful over.

sometimes when i see hs content that deliberately distances sollux from aradia, i assume this is the dissonance people might have felt. people might find it "easier" to be cynical about them bcs of this strange tension.

but idc lmao. grab that shit by the neck

lack of easy resolutions and cleanly tied ribbons is pretty standard of homestuck and imo it doesn't make arasol's dynamic any less incredible. with the right affection and consideration, there's still so much potential to develop the nuance of their relationship outside of the popular quadrant-based depictions.

hs has a lot of really great character compatibilities but the way aradia and sollux are in their own special orbit is why i can write this much about them in the first place. it's that frail innocence between first loves that makes it so sweet to me, two kids who grew up too fast playing guesswork without being clear where they're going.

ultimately i do think you're meant to feel a little tragedy for just how much they care for each other, even if they can't quite establish it in simple terms.

maybe they keep taking breaks to progress their own paths. maybe they remain as anchor partners while seeing other people. but even if you decide to separate them, they're still (awkwardly) texting each other updates all the while. and when they reunite it feels like coming home.

and well. more than anything, i like to believe that they do want to be exclusive.

they're just afraid. after all, they're still learning how to love, beyond the projections of the foursquare quadrant system they had inadvertently distanced themselves from since young.

they might not have everything figured out, but they'll get there eventually if you just hold them together and write them there.

optional post-canon segment:

one of the limitations of main hs is that (monogamous) relationships are often written as the go-to solution to wrap up character growth; it's an easy "patch" to imagine characters getting their happy ending because they have a partner, and those who don't end up with someone don't get that closure (most notably jade).

hs2 reaffirms this by suggesting that aradia's character cannot progress without letting sollux go, because happily settling in a relationship automatically locks your potential.

that pathetic panel of sollux staring emptily into the sky is still my fave hs2 spoiler ngl i find the impact of their parting so emotionally provoking precisely bcs they were written in original hs to be each other's forever, coming back together again and again

but now, they're subject to the decisions of the post-canon authors who might choose to deviate from that.

it's not new for them to part, but now there's an underlying worry that her dropping him off this time might be the last time. while i think the prospect of shattering their stability to make them grow separately sounds fun on paper, no amount of me desperately hoping for a good execution is gonna guarantee it

idk. i guess prediction-wise im expecting sollux in classic dramatic-hs2 fashion to tell dave to back off aradia LMAO. otherwise it's just gon be sollux and karkat pathetically watching aradia and dave from a distance swimming in their unresolved feelings for narratively-powerful time players smh obvs it sounds corny as hell but who knows its still plausible

srsly tho i hope they take the opportunity to develop arasol's relationship in a fresh direction that doesn't hurt me too badly...... and i hope they force sollux out of his comfort zone. i like watching him struggle :-)

[nekropsii]

Why do people call Porrim an MRA??? it's such a bad take I can't even begin to fathom the logic.

Uuuuugh. Okay, to my understanding, the logic is predicated on two concepts:

Kankri is Correct, there is no Misogyny on Beforus.

Since Beforus has a Matriarch, "complaining" about the Oppression of Women on Beforus is the exact equivalent... Men complaining about men being oppressed, despite us living in a Patriarchal society.

This is a terrible argument, because... Porrim literally explains in detail that that is not the case.

Yes, Beforus has a Matriarch... A Superficial Matriarch, where the woman in power is more of a Figurehead than anything. Law Enforcement and Politics are handled mostly by "Higher CIPs" - Ceruleans, Indigos, and Purples - which are predominantly born (hatched?) as men. ... If all of the Social Order and Politics are Enforced and Dictated by men... Then that... Is a Patriarchy.

So, we have it directly explained to us that Beforus is Superficially a Matriarchy, with a Governing Body largely composed by Highblood Men, who canonically benefit from the subjugation of women, because having women be of generally lower class than men means that... Men can cull women, potentially on the basis of being women. You know, that social system, enforced by the predominantly male-lead government that allows for what is essentially the ownership of people you deem incapable of caring for themselves as pets? The system that will take any excuse in the book? Sure, that may have been a social rule implemented by their version of HIC, Feferi fucking Peixes, but it's still being used as a weapon. Just because something was made by a woman, does not mean it cannot be used as a weapon against women in the name of misogyny. You think Alternian Culling doesn't work the same damn way?

There's a sharp cut of irony you have to feel at the fact that Porrim literally says that conversations of Misogyny on Beforus are often shot down using "The Matriarchy" as an excuse. If Misogyny wasn't a thing, why the fuck are Rufioh, Kankri, and Cronus literally, textually, purposefully Misogynists? Why the hell is Latula like that, then? I don't think this is a 1-to-1 allegory for the real world, man- Troll World Building has NEVER been a direct, clean allegory for the real world. I do not think she was ever intended to be read as an analogue to Men's Rights Activists, I think she was intended to be read as an Alien Feminist. If anything, this feels less like an MRA, and more like someone getting shut down for trying to have a conversation about how Misogyny Exists in, like, Thatcher-Era England or something. Well, there's a Female Prime Minister, isn't there? Misogyny is over, clearly.

Porrim is constantly posed as an Exposition Fairy on the same level as Aranea, just... With Politics and World Building rather than Character Analysis. Porrim is portrayed as cool, collected, and correct. Do you think Andrew Hussie - literal Andrew Hussie - would portray a fucking Men's Rights Activist with that level of grace and style? Because the answer is no! Every time a character is a Misogynist in Homestuck, they are comically terrible! Rufioh, Kankri, Cronus, fucking Caliborn! Hussie is a lot of things, and yeah, some of these things are bad, but none of these things include the label Misogynist. Hussie is well known for... Not doing that, actually, that's, like... A major appeal of the comic. The female characters in Homestuck are known for being really, really well written and really, really well handled!! If there was a Men's Rights Activist in Homestuck, we would know about it, because that character would be comedically terrible, constantly dunked on by everyone around him, totally bitchless, and posed as a relentless fucking menace who does not deserve to breathe the same air as any of the women in the story. You know, like Cronus! And Not Porrim!!

Also, can we all take a moment of silence to ponder how much of an L it is to have your entire point of discourse be based in the idea that straight up literal actual Kankri Vantas is correct? That is capital e Embarrassing.

[classpectpokerap]

What exactly does "gloves is canon" mean, if you don't mind me asking?

let's just fucking get right into it.

Ultimate Rose Pt. 2: Gloves Are Canon

if you haven't seen part 1, here it is. the tldr version of it was to estabish candy rose (at the VERY least) as a liar. i also have a headcanon about ultrose putting alpha earth rose into front in candy timeline, but that doesn't really matter too much. its just kinda fun

anyway. heres the theory.

so you guys know A Threat, Sensed, right?

it's one of the hs2 bonus comics. originally patreon exclusive, but was made public for everyone during the hiatus. and i think it contains some deeply revealing information.

you may be wondering... hey, isn't that the comic where ultdirk talks to hussie about yiffy? like, its hussie's one appearance in the comic. kind of weird.

ahaha. yeah. so. about that.

let's rewind a bit. what's the contents of A Threat Sensed?

dirk wakes up after having the shit kicked out of him in pesterquest.

rose is like huh? huh wuh? but dirk gives her a thumbs up. and then he goes to sit on his computer, and type to god.

and then after that delay, he gets a reply.

etc etc etc. they talk. they chat. hussie talks about his beloved daughter yiffy. normal stuff. hey roll that last one back

let's play in this space. lets play in this space. perspective. daughter.

who's daughter is yiffy?

---

let's rewind.

when homestuck act 6 dropped, it released with one very important page.

this page.

this page, where someone with seemingly grey skin is typing on a keyboard. holy fuck, what a reveal. new troll. oh my god. this is the 13th troll

like, they have to be a troll, right? theyve got the time stuff. theyve got a symbol. theyve got shit going on with them

ah.

they were wearing gloves.

this? this is fucking huge.

in homestuck we see that shot a lot. of fingers on a keyboard. but every single time we have seen it, we have also seen at least one shot of the person typing, right?

with two exceptions. one is callie in the act 6 reveal.

and the other is andrew.

er, sorry.

"andrew."

from the patreon post on A Threat Sensed:

those are fake hands. what. what . what. what.

so

if this comic has a history of having a reveal when it comes to characters where Only Their Hands are being shown

and gloves are canon to homestuck, and have been used to precipitate this reveal

then perhaps

gloves are canon here as well.

if you'll allow me to speculate. on the gloves are canon in question.

yeah of fucking course rose is pretending to be hussie because WHO ELSE WOULD IT BE adjKFJGSKDHdskjgjkfskjgdsf

ITS ROSE!!! IT WAS ROSE THE WHOLE TIME

LETS REREAD.

"is that why you were lying on the floor" a question that Rose had because she saw his ass lying on the floor!!!!!!!

MY DAUGHTER

MY DAUGHTER YIFFANY LONGSTOCKING LALONDE HARLEY

hm purple background. anyway im sure thats fine

hm. hm. hm. psychoanalysis. hmmm. hm.

now if i was rose

if i was ultrose. and i wanted an ultimate weapon against dirk.

if i wanted to Make A Weapon Against Dirk.

what would i do.

how would i create it.

who would i hurt in the process.

anyway. this is all leading up to part 3 of this fucking nightmare roller coaster. but uh. basically. i think this one is like all but confirmed????

like...

We’ve had quite a bit of speculation on whether this is “really” Andrew. To that, I think we’d say that it doesn’t “really” matter. If you’re asking are those Andrew’s actual hands, then no, of course not. Because those hands are fake hands that are on the computer screen.

this sounds like it's telling us no, it's not "really" andrew. and to look at the hands. and we KNOW from part 1 of this theory that rose is incredibly deceitful.

the delay in "andrew"'s response could have plausibly been rose slipping away into her little hidey hole, putting on the stupid fucking gloves, and only then typing.

andrew never confirms who he is. and i'll admit, some of the lines don't sound 100% like rose. but others do. others really, really do.

i like this theory because it makes rose and dirk's rivalry on deltrius interesting. it means she has legs up on him. he thinks he's talking to hussie, but he isn't. she has plans within plans. she's got shit she's cooking.

i like it because it contextualizes yiffy, too.

hm wow it sure seems like the candy timeline isnt actually all that sealed! it sure seems like theres something in there that is a corrosive paradox! something that affects both timelines!

something

or someone!!!!!!!!!!!!

anyway. yiffy is an ultdirk icbm created by rose . rose wore gloves. gloves are canon. that's my theory graaaaaaaaaahhh

part 3 coming soon :3

[dingodad]

What's the deal with the obscure cult thing

the trolls' introductions give us an outline of each troll's position in their society. we have to remember that, at the point of the trolls' introduction, the caste system was only kind of just starting to be born as a concept. gamzee's introduction on p. 2012, where we get the "You belong to a RATHER OBSCURE CULT" line, comes a whole 70 pages before we even get this exchange:

GC: SOLLUX, PL34S3 / GC: YOU 4R3 MR 4PPL3B3RRY BL4ST 4ND 3V3RYON3 KNOWS THOS3 4R3 YOUR F4VOR1T3 FL4VORS / GC: 3V3N THOUGH YOU TYP3 1N YUCKY MUST4RD / GC: WH1CH 1S W31RD >:\ TA: maybe there ii2 more two me than you thiink. [...] maybe ii ju2t want two giive the red and blue thiing a re2t for a change and not make iit 2o iit2 liike, oh look iit2 that prediictable fuck wiith tho2e two 2tupiid color2, iit2 amaziing how much everyone fuckiing hate2 hiim.

of which Hussie has this to say in the published commentary (Book 4, p. 101):

Terezi says it's weird that Sollux types in yucky mustard, even though his "favorite colors" are red and blue. It's really not weird at all, considering literally everyone in his blood class types in that color. But this idea may not have been fully locked in yet as an ironclad canon fact. While Hivebent continuously provides the scoop on what the facts of this culture are, it is simultaneously exploring certain nebulous ideas before fully committing to them. This is a very good strategy when it comes to improvisational worldbuilding.

when Gamzee's cult is described as "obscure", it makes no sense to interpret this as meaning "obscure within his caste", because the caste idea wasn't even fully formed in the author's mind at that point in time, let alone the reader's. what that line is saying is that Gamzee's cult is obscure within his society. and everyone seems to ignore the very sentence after that comment, which says exactly what i'm saying, almost explicitly:

The beliefs of this cult are SOMEWHAT FROWNED UPON by those dwelling in more common lawnrings.

Gamzee's beliefs are strange to commoners. the very clear implication being that among the upper echelons of Alternian society, being a juggalo isn't that frowned upon at all! sometimes Hussie leaves things unsaid about the world of Homestuck because they're not important or to deliberately leave them up to interpretation, but quite often things go unsaid because when you read between the lines they really should speak for themselves. the fact that Alternia's upper castes are more and more uncommon is one of these things (but to drive the point home, there's this comment from Formspring: "lower classes must be much more copious than higher classes. The lowbloods die off much more quickly, and so must be spawned in greater numbers.").

it's odd that this particular "obscure cult" line has become a sticking point, because Kanaya's intro does the exact same thing when it describes her as "one of the few of [her] kind who can withstand the BLISTERING ALTERNIAN SUN, and perhaps the only who enjoys the feel of its rays." we all seem to understand that this isn't claiming daywalking as a unique power of Kanaya's, but merely hinting at the fact that Kanaya is part of a rare caste with that ability. I guess many don't make the comparison because Gamzee's caste is never explicitly singled out as a rare one?

from there, what limited background we do get on the Alternian regime hammers home the point. "subjugglator" (this has the word juggalo in it. a lot of people try to get out of this one) and "Highblood" are used as functional synonyms in Scratch's intermission:

p. 4054: The highbloods were livid over the unprecedented heresy, and soon, a massive sectarian war followed, spreading across the planet and throughout the galaxy. The conflict was lopsided of course, with the Highbloods given full support from the Condesce and her sea dwellers. p. 4063: [the Condesce] could use her leverage to delegate oppression to the subjugglators, whose unique abilities and exceptional brutality made them natural enforcers. They too would delegate in their governance, exploiting the pride and loyalty of dangerous bluebloods beneath them...

the fact that the guy literally called The Grand Highblood is a massive clown is basically garnish; but the fact that the word Highblood with a capital H, even outside of the context of Gamzee's ancestor, was basically used exclusively to refer to purplebloods in the comic seems to have been largely forgotten. this only continues into Act 6, even when a lot of the fandom's misconceptions and reconceptions of the lore started to seep into the comic proper:

You're not really up on Alternian history, but apparently at some point the empress got fed up with the Subjugglators' stranglehold on the soda market, and released a drink that was said to be more loaded with sugar than even the wicked elixir itself. The Highbloods considered such marketing reports to be blasphemous lies, however. (Act 6 Intermission 1, part 2)

emphasis all my own, to make clear that basically no distinction is made between Highbloods as a political institution and the subjugglators as a religious authority. but really, Act 6 is when the whole clown thing should have started to become really obvious, anyway, with lines like "There was this sense that [the Condesce] just loved the idea of delegating the extreme subjugation of the world's population to a pair of demented clown rappers" and the increasing inescapability of Lord English's influence on the story only entrenching that the presence of these juggalos on Alternia had real significance and was not some one off joke.

years ago when it was at its peak, the idea that the subjugglators "were only ever meant to be an obscure cult" seemed to me to have originated among troll enthusiasts who dropped off the comic around Scratch's takeover and didn't really care for overarching plot points like Lord English taking prominence into Act 6. but I guess now that troll discussion has started to center the design process that went into the Hiveswap trolls, the argument has circled back around into the mainstream? but basically to answer your question the deal with the obscure cult thing is that it's bogus. people wanted to make fantrolls who weren't juggaloes because what they fundamentally forget is that a race of juggalos controlling alternia is actually meant to be, and is, really fucking funny

[thewertsearch]

Ask Comp 29/05

Anonymous asked: Having the car available as an alchemy ingredient now, what should John make first? ~DJ

John has unlocked the ability to fly, but I don't think he's as fast as he was with the jetpack. I think his best option is to merge it with Dad's automobile to create the Jetson Car.

Anonymous asked: the actor who played rufio in hook did his own homestuck liveblog back in the day. when he got to this part he was Somewhat Perturbed. @morganwick asked: Fun fact: around the end of Act 5, Dante Basco, who played Rufio in Hook, started a Tumblr and was immediately besieged by Homestucks pushing him to read the comic. So he started liveblogging it. Take a guess which scene everyone, including Hussie, was waiting for him to get to more than any other.

I can't believe I'm competing with Zuko himself on the Homestuck Liveblogging stage. How the hell can I measure up to that?

@wickedsick asked: The best part about the Wallet is that it's a physical object: you can give it to other people, send it across the tubes, and even store it inside another modus!

It really is a shockingly useful and versatile modus.

With this, his absurd physical stats, and his obvious determination, I feel like Dad would be an exceptionally talented Player.

@manorinthewoods submitted: >John is an immortal God >Still applies seatbelt, because safety is important ~LOSS (24/5/24) Anonymous asked: Obviously there is some deep, hidden classpect meaning to the sudden Seatbelt PSA!

Seatbelts are in cars.

Cars run on gas.

You expel gas when you breathe.

John is the Heir of Breath.

Checkmate, Scratch!

@marinerofthestars asked: Now that you’ve learned what Gamzee’s like sober, do you still reckon he’d be useless or actively detrimental as the Cavalier of Necromancer!Jade?

Oh, good point. A more focused Gamzee could certainly be a dangerous cavalier, especially if he shares the STRENGTH enjoyed by other highbloods. However, that presupposes that he's loyal to Jade, and the current incarnation of Gamzee isn't loyal to anyone.

Initially, I assumed that Gamzee would direct his violence primarily towards lowbloods - but said he was going to kill everyone, aristocrats included. Jade's status as Reverend Daughter wouldn't protect her here.

Besides, even if he was subservient to Jade, I don't think he'd be very reliable. Sure, he's probably better in a fight, but I don't think he'd be particularly useful when they're trying to complete their actual objective - namely, the Lyctor labs. Could you imagine Jade trying to pilot him in Imaging and Response?

At best, Frenzied Gamzee is a decent siphoning target - but that won't be much help either. In the original question, I gave the Houses their canon specialties, and the Ninth aren't siphoners.

In short, a sufficiently loyal Gamzee would be more useful in this state, but not a lot more.

@morganwick asked: So, you still think rendering Gamzee's text in all-lowercase makes him come off as a "chill guy" with a "Californian surfer dude accent"?

Forgot about that, haha. I think the contrast here is in what, exactly, Gamzee is saying in lowercase.

Lowercase Soporified Gamzee does sound like a surfer dude, because he's saying surfer dude things.

Lowercase Frenzied Gamzee, however, sounds like the Joker talking about his scars.

@morganwick asked: This is the part I was worried about your lax spoiler policy ruining things. When you opened the doors for people to offer up title suggestions for you that hadn't appeared in the comic yet Rage was one of the first aspects you got. At some point, if you'd bothered to keep track, Gamzee would have been the one aspect-less troll, and Rage would have stood out as the one non-joke troll-less aspect you knew about. So my concern was that if you started thinking about what it would mean for Gamzee to have Rage as his aspect, it might lessen the shock of seeing him now. A bit overly paranoid? Maybe, especially since Eridan being called the Prince of Hope came after Gamzee's "BlAsPhEmY" moment so more likely you'd have just connected it to the latter if anything, but we've seen some pretty perceptive bloggers in our time so this is to give some insight into the mindset behind a stricter spoiler policy.

It could definitely have been a problem - especially if I'd taken the time to enumerate the Aspects in detail. According to Cat, there were several asks requesting that I do so, which she filtered out in order to obfuscate Rage a little. Good choice, I think. If someone had called attention to it, I'm sure I'd have noticed that it was probably Gamzee's Aspect.

I still think the fun I was having with Aspect guesses was worth the risk, but I also see where you're coming from. Luckily, it never actually came up, so no harm was done.

@bladekindeyewear asked: VAGUE EXTERNAL MEDIA CLASSPECTING: According to certain theoretical fan frameworks, The Joker is a picture-perfect example of a Bard of Rage even across his incredibly wide variety of iterations, and Batman happens to be a good example of a Knight of Rage.

All Bards of Rage must be clowns, no exceptions.

Actually, Gamzee has both Joker and Two-Face vibes, doesn't he? He essentially has two separate quirks now, and he's also insisting that he's 'both' of his Mirthful Messiahs. Sollux is gonna sue someone.

Anonymous asked: So if going God Tier is merging the conscience of the real self into the dream self, what happens when a real self is prototyped with something else? Does Aradia still have some frog in her?

I certainly hope she does, but we haven't seen any yet.

As you pointed out, this is technically Aradia's dream self, which was never merged with the Frogsprite. It's possible that some internal 'froggy' traits were carried over from her realself when she ascended, but it's impossible to say for sure. We still don't know how this alternate form of ascension actually works.

@tacticaltaxonomist asked: im not rereading myself atm but i love following along your posts as you do, thank you for sharing! Anonymous asked: it makes me really happy to see new readers and I hope u have a good time :D

Thank you kindly!

I'm happy to be back and in the swing of things, and I'm even happier that I've been able to maintain a decent pace so far.

@krixwell asked: For what it's worth, Jack did "spare" PM when she proved she had the guts to actually go and actually get him the white king and queen's crowns, even though he had every reason to kill her. She was a Prospitian, had visibly just killed one of Jack's best men, had gotten the seemingly useless physical crowns rather than carrying out the murders they were supposed to represent (Jack likely knew this, since HB saw her get the king's crown), and was demanding one of Jack's most powerful weapons in exchange – Jack had nothing to gain from leaving her alive, and a fair bit to lose by honoring a deal that he used to half-heartedly offer to basically anyone who visited his office. As Hussie put it in recap 2, pages later but not many, "[Jack] came, and [PM?] traded the two white crowns for the green box, Jade's present to John. He appeared pleased to uphold the bargain, either out of the misunderstanding that he was still under control of its contents, or out of respect for PM?'s tenacity and brutality in pursuing the prize. Only he knows." Around the same time, WV was also left as the sole survivor of Jack's massacre on the Battlefield. WV was standing front and center of his rebel army, mere meters away when Jack killed the Black King, so it wouldn't just be that Jack missed him. (Recap 2: "Jack then killed the entire rebellion army, sparing only WV?. Perhaps to leave a survivor to tell the story, or perhaps out of respect for a fellow mutineer. Only he knows.") Before he got so powerful, there's also the time he released Dad Egbert from Dersite imprisonment, after the latter destroyed his jester hat. So yes, Jack has been known to spare people, at least pre-Becsprite… but only he knows why, and Eridan wouldn't have had access to any of these moments through the Trollian viewport.

The droll is beckoned. The bargain, honored.

That's a good point. Jack does appear to have a sense of honor, and I do genuinely think that these gestures were motivated by respect.

Eridan, though, he'd have zero respect for. I guarantee it.

@burntheupholstery asked: homestuck filtered through your comments is so much funnier for me because - and get this - i don't understand even a BIT of computer science

Give it a few more Acts, and I'll get you up to speed. >:)

@ipunchvampires asked: Minor gripe, but it's a bit annoying to me that the "Alterniabound" walkarounds have an obviously-developer-intended order of operations, but make no effort to signal this to the first-time reader. Like the dialogue in "Past Karkat: Wake up" is written such that going around the room counterclockwise with Karkat, then Vriska, then Terezi makes the most narrative sense, yet it's incredibly common for people to start clockwise, and when they get around to Terezi, Karkat acts like he's hearing about the humans for the first time even though he's heard about them from every other character in the meteor. @morganwick asked: There are, in fact, different conversations available if you talk to Kanaya and Feferi/Sollux as Karkat; it's just the items strewn around the lab that have the same flavor text. @helium--hydride asked: Did you check all of the interactions in this flash? You can be Karkat, and I think there was an interaction between Karkat and Sollux/Feferi that you missed.

So there is!

Not much to liveblog here, but it's good to know in the future that all combinations of conversational partners will, as a rule, yield new dialogue.

Anonymous asked: it’s a fun story and stuff but what are your thoughts on the music so far?? i mean we all know megalovania but do you have any fave tracks that stood out? top 5? the HS soundtrack is so unique imo (mine so far is explore remix - dave and jade made it together on freshjamz)

We've got a big enough library at this point that I probably can highlight some favorites. I think my top 5, in no particular order, are:

Sunslammer

The Beginning of Something Really Excellent

Savior of the Waking World

MeGaLoVania (Aradia version)

Descend

@elkian asked: "Oh, for the love of peace. Is there anyone that this globe-headed chucklefuck doesn’t have in his pocket?" - I don't know if you intended this pun about Cue Ball Head but I cackled

That one was on purpose. The guy's still an orb!

@abibeur asked: Honestly I was expecting your reaction to be like Prak from the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (see below) and I was not disappointed. “Tell us about it,” said Ford. “Oh, I can't remember any of it now,” said Prak. “I thought of writing some of it down, but first I couldn't find a pencil, and then I thought, why bother?” There was a long silence, during which they thought they could feel the Universe age a little. Prak stared into the torchlight. “None of it?” said Arthur at last. “You can remember none of it?” “No. Except most of the good bits were about frogs, I remember that.” Suddenly he was hooting with laughter again and stamping his feet on the ground. “You would not believe some of the things about frogs,” he gasped. “Come on let's go and find ourselves a frog. Boy, will I ever see them in a new light!” He leapt to his feet and did a tiny little dance. Then he stopped and took a long drag at his cigarette. “Let's find a frog I can laugh at,” he said simply. I can't believe Douglas Adams predicted Homestuck.

Can't believe Prak canonically learned about Sburb sessions when he overdosed on truth serum 😲

Anonymous asked: if bilious slick is the universe, then it stands to reason that the Vast Croak = the Big Bang

Or the Big Crunch, given that 'croaking' is a euphemism for dying...

@bladekindeyewear asked: AAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHA WE WERE WAITING FOR YOU TO GET TO THIS REVEAL EVERYTHING YOU'VE SAID ABOUT FROGS HAS HAD US LAUGHING SO HARD!!! don't feel bad this hits every reader and liveblogger the same way and it's GREAT nobody guesses it, it's like we're laughing WITH you not at you i promise, and gosh even just YOUR LAST REMARK ABOUT THE DOOR DURING THE RECAP AHAHAHAHAHAHH Anonymous asked: /post/749478863076196352 "We finally get to learn the function of the House Door – and apparently, it leads directly into the newly created universe. Makes a lot of sense. This, of course, nixes my theory that it leads to Bilious Slick." reading that was the fucking TEXTBOOK DEFINITION of dramatic irony Anonymous asked: you: oh, the door leads to the new universe, not bilious slick like i theorized! kanaya: Bet

Oh, god, I didn't even think about that. The door does lead to Slick, just in a way that was completely impossible to predict. I'm giving myself partial credit for that one.

@sanctferum asked: after everything the troll's black queen went through as a result of her refusal to defile her being with frogness, it is incredibly ironic that she would be bestowed the universal load-bearing powers she was given by Scratch upon becoming Snowman - and in so doing, have her own life force directly tied to that of a Genesis Frog. And you just know Scratch was insufferably smug about it too

@galaxa-13 asked: When I first read Homestuck and there were mentions of ol' B. Slick or any frog I just glazed over it. Oh, OK, just another weird thing in this tapestry of weird. On following read throughs, when I knew the significance, I still just glazed over it. Yeah yeah, frog is the universe, moving on. So when you started questioning all the frogs I got giddy, because I knew that YOU'D have a bigger reaction than I ever did.

Yeah, I was so lost with those frogs. I definitely didn't suspect that the answer would be anything as monumental as this.

I sure fucking didn't, Kanaya.

@drakethedeep asked: Congratulations on reaching the genesis frog reveal! Now, what are your thoughts on the metaphysical implications that universes are living biological creatures?

It gels well with a theorypost I was sent before about how Sburb's timeline system may have evolved naturally over time. The idea that universes are biologically alive certainly lends credence to the idea that the entire reality of Homestuck is fundamentally organic. Maybe the entire multiverse is actually inside another, second-order cosmic animal...

(Because it's Hussie, that animal is probably a clown.)

Anonymous asked: about the Vast Croak: (from page 2308) “[Frogs] go by many names, and so does the reviled patron god they herald - THE GREAT DETESTATION, KING PONDSQUATTER, SPEAKER OF THE VAST JOKE, or most commonly, BILIOUS SLICK.”

I didn't consider that Vast Joke could just be a corruption of Croak.

If so, then I'm not sure why Aradia's referring to it as if it's an actual joke. Curious.

@mapswithoutwyoming asked: This is a bit of a weird message, but: I’ve been plotting a Homestuck fanfic, and I was getting confused about whether the lunar sways I’d assigned to the main characters made sense. I was so deep into orchestrating the interlocking and paradoxical web of events that changing it even a little would have had catastrophic ramifications, but I was starting to wonder if it wouldn’t make sense not to. But you referencing your theory about the dispositions made my earlier decisions click for me. thx

Happy to help! And when I'm out of spoiler territory for the fic, I'd love to read it.

@ben-guy asked: In regards to your joke about Jerma in the tags… man, just imagine him streaming Sburb. "W-what? No chat, I'm NOT going to- I'm not going to prototype myself. That's an atrocious idea. I don't even know what that means! Listen, it's just not happening. Okay. Okay, a million off the boon-debt" Just imagine… Jerma imps. They would be insufferable. Also, his server player gets to play Jerma's Dollhouse for real. TBH, the Dollhouse steam has some minor HS vibes already… Making me feel totally justified in sharing this classic HS meme with you

Look, we all know Jermasprite would happen.

Oh, man - and prototyping him turns all the Underlings into chat members, so that when Jack is watching his progress through the Fourth Wall, it also contains a live feed of Imps and Orges spamming 'next session'.

Anonymous asked: Hey, you're right, the trolls might not have gone through the brooding cavern trials, since they were delivered to the surface on meteors, not birthed in the caves. Which would mean that when Vriska talked about how she remembered her trials, she was just lying.

It's possible that the meteors were delivered directly into the caverns somehow, but that's definitely not certain.

Vriska's assertion is suspicious either way, though - would she really have memories from being a newborn grub? If the trolls could remember their infancy, then they'd already know they came from meteors.

@manorinthewoods asked: I was going to write something about Locked Home (HS chars in Canaan House) being in the wrecked troll session, but upon further inspection, I can't see an easy way to set that up without opening a few of WV's cans of worms. So, instead, here's a different question - since lighting the Forge would clear LOFAF's frost, would lighting Kanaya's Forge have cleared LORAF's rays? What would that even mean? ~LOSS (15/5/24)

I thought it could have receded her oceans, but you're right - the Forge's environmental changes might always be associated with its Land's named trait.

Maybe let's split the difference, and say that activating the Forge intensifies LORAF's rays, causing them to boil the oceans away.

@divineerdrick asked: Hello again! Just wanted to say how much I love your analysis of what Jade is going through with Jadesprite. In fact, it's a rare treat to see a first time reader dig into how Rose and Jade and the events around their Dream Selves affect them. But I especially want to congratulate you on again pointing out something I'd never really noticed, and that is how playful Kanaya is with the text in her conversations. It really is a great gag, and I never noticed how consistent it was.

Thank you! Yeah, a big part of why Kanaya is so great is that a lot of her gags are very understated. Half the time, you don't even read them as gags - they just scan as charming aspects of her personality.

@heliotropopause asked: "Actually, can anyone confirm at what point the fic will be safe to read?" It's been a while since I read it, and I haven't read the fragment of TSG act three that only exists on tumblr since I didn't know about it at the time, but I'm about 85% sure you'll be good to pick it up once you finish act five. The whole setting is built on lore from late act five, and while it references something from a ways into act six at least once, i don't think there's anything there that could rightfully be called a spoiler. (And when you're done with TSG, you can pick up Taz's husband's The Vienna Game, which is even better, though of course doesn't tie into TLT. It should be spoiler-free after page 4468.)

I've still got a while to wait, then - but not quite as long as I feared. Works for me!

@manorinthewoods asked: That image of Vriska demanding that WV not interfere is… really weirdly creepy, and I can't help but feel like I missed that whole sequence. I guess it might not have stuck with me because I didn't bother translating the Morse code - which I assume the Homestuck Collection can do for you, which is another reason why I should have used that. ~LOSS (11/5/24)

Yeah, my heart sank when I read that part.

I really thought Vriska was about to do something to hurt WV, which would have sent her careening down the tier list faster than you can say 'main character syndrome'.

@manorinthewoods asked: "Why, though? I had assumed that these stations were going to be used to restore civilization on this planet. How are they going to repair Earth with no access to technology? Surely they’re not going to start from scratch?" Bold of you to assume Earth will be repaired. ~LOSS (11/5/24)

Terezi seems to think it will - but clearly, the stations aren't involved.

Maybe the game thinks it'd be cheating, or that using Sburb tech to build civilizations would make them too advanced to be threatened by its meteors the next time around.

@necrowyrm asked: The only possible thing you can liveblog after homestuck is now The Earthbound Halloween Hack in order to experience the original megalovania in all it's glory

You are SO right. I'll also make a quick detour through Smash Ultimate, of course.

@adhd-coomer submitted:

LMAO, that literally is what that is, isn't it?

@captorations submitted:

my birthday cake from years ago (but not many... but not *not* many.) deadname nuked from orbit. my sister who got me into homestuck arranged it and maybe one day i will forgive her #for the cake or for getting me into homestuck? yes. #note: this is a joke i was/am amused by the former and very grateful for the latter

Yes, oh my god! That really is the perfect Karkat face for a cake.

I'm going to be brainstorming Homestuck meals for the rest of the week.

[meraki-sunset]

Do the trolls get Nickolasnames too? What about the sprites?

Why is everyone calling then nickolasnames?? What am i missing??😫

But also, no, Nanna didn't gave the trolls longer versions or their names, because they're alien names and there's no longer version of those names.

Exept maybe Solluxander, that one was suposed to be canon acording to hussie, could've been messing with the fans tho

[caligvlasaqvarivm]

You might’ve already got this before, and I’m asking this in genuinely good faith.

Your essay was very interesting, and convinced me of Erikar as a ship reading. I also really enjoyed your dissection of Eridan as a very honest person drawn into destructive behavior. It very much lines up with his status as a Prince of Hope! One who destroys conviction/belief through conviction/belief.

What confused me was your insistence on the hidden hand of the author. Death of the Author and all that, what’s implied in the text can be taken on its own separate from commentary but you seem to be doing an autopsy— the text implies [this] so *Hussie* must have intended for [this] and then tried to cover it up. If they genuinely thought it was a better ending, why not do it? Why the secrecy, why the feints? I think it’s a little conspiracy-brained to insist on a secret “better ending” that we don’t have author’s word or drafts on.

I’m also a little drifted on your frustration with the deaths of the trolls? You write that the theme of Homestuck— a standard coming-of-age story, a reckoning with society and the exit from youth— is undercut by the deaths of the trolls, because that means they *had* to die, in *punishment*. I disagree. Their deaths are tragic, not just.

Homestuck has a lot of methods of revival, the choice to (for the most part) perma-kill some characters (the trolls for one, and then AR, WQ, and WK) is a deliberate choice to make death mean something. If dying doesn’t mean anything, what are the narrative stakes? Murderstuck marks Gamzee as a threat, Eridan as a tragedy. The deaths there are meant. To be sad. To demonstrate that sometimes kids don’t get to grow up, that sometimes the society they live in cuts them down.

Homestuck is a sad story at times! It doesn’t need an ending where everyone gets to live to keep its coming-of-age conclusion.

I hope this made sense. I’m not trying to attack you, I’m just skeptical of some of your points. I hope you go on to do more analysis in the future!

If you want to believe that, go ahead 👍 again, arguing my points on that front would require its own entire essay, lol, so I'm not really planning to do that as the answer to an ask. The only thing I really want to say here is that while Homestuck is often sad, as you say, its underlying tone is unwaveringly hopeful right up until Game Over/the Retcon, and even kind of beyond that. If you prefer a sad story, then you can have a sad story, but it's just not a reading consistent (to me) with the entire rest of what Homestuck is.

For example, the whole narrative grapples with the debate of predestination vs. free will. Do things happen in Homestuck because they have to, or because characters are making choices? But with the introduction of John's retcon powers, it lands firmly in the "free will" side of the debate: the retcon powers outright defy the power of stable time loops - a reflection of how Breath is associated with freedom and choice. This is the optimistic option.

Another thing the narrative grapples with is the realness vs. fakeness of magic. I don't think it's hard to argue that between LE's "evil wizard" status and Godtier!Calliope's wand-induced black hole that the arrow falls firmly in the realm of magic being undeniably real. This is the optimistic option (and yet another narrative element that Eridan is extremely relevant to).

Moreover, even post-Retcon, there are elements that are kept that soften the tragedy already present in the story - for example, the concept of the Ultimate Self, and the implication that all surviving characters will eventually achieve it, takes the edge off all their doomed and dead counterparts, who won't actually be relegated to double death in the dream bubbles, since in a way, they'll live on through their alpha counterparts. It turns those sacrifices from bitter to bittersweet, and serves as a counterpoint to common takes like John being sad that he doesn't know the version of his friends that exist post-Retcon. The inclusion of it in the post-Retcon story, even with its botched delivery, says to me that Homestuck is still intended to be optimistic at its core, even with the extreme Giving Up that Hussie did.

And let's not forget how Calliope gets to come back to life, no strings attached, and that her stated purpose is only to live. Up to the end, the tone is that of HOPE, and I think there's no mistake that HOPE is supposed to be what defeats LE.

As I said in replies on that post, as an artist, I just can't imagine spending literal years, and literally a million words and thousands of images, writing something that's so thematically and tonally consistent, only to hard swerve right at the end, without extenuating circumstances.

And the thing is, there WERE extenuating circumstances, and they're fairly well-documented.

The kickstarter got funded, and while the story is muddled, we know the production of the game was extremely troubled, and Hussie was having difficulty being a project lead for that while also grappling with everything else. Everything else being, of course, an ever-increasing number of irons in the fire - more third-party artists he had to commission and manage, more merchandise he had to be on top of, bigger updates to sate the demands of the fanbase.

Which, speaking of, was infamously one of the most awful and toxic fanbases to ever exist, and one that Hussie has deliberately attempted to distance himself from since. I can't imagine the kind of daily abuse, harassment, callouts, and worse that Hussie had to endure as Homestuck's creator during the fandom's peak years. I don't blame him at all for turning against them.

Therefore, given the way the tone and themes hard swerve, the way several characters get bent entirely out of shape (you're telling me Karkat had several means before him of bringing his dead friends back and WOULDN'T SAY ANYTHING???), the way several plot threads are simply left dangling in the air, and the way some characters reach really weird and unpleasant conclusions (davepeta, gcatavrosprite), I think it's actually LESS reasonable to assume that the ending we got was the original plan. Hussie saw that to do the ending he wanted to do back in act 4, he'd need to write for a year, maybe two years more, and then looked at his mounting stress and pressure, and looked at the fanbase he'd come to hate, and just went "nope." And I can't even really blame him for it, lol. In his position I'd probably do the same.

Also, please don't mistake "the deaths are undone" for "the deaths will not have mattered" - I think there's a reason that the game over timeline characters still exist post-Retcon. Their arcs don't end with their deaths, and their failures are weights on them that must be narratively resolved - I believe that they go on to be the ones to defeat LE, although I have much less evidence to support this. It just makes narrative sense to me - the post-retcon team focuses down the Felt, various Jack Noirs, and the Condesce - the latter of which is their final boss, as the ultimate representation of the shitty society they're doing away with on their path to creating a new one.

Meanwhile, the dead and "irrelevant" versions of the characters, the ones who grappled with and were harmed the most by what LE represents - immaturity, selfishness, and cruelty - go on to band together after death, and defeat him in the bubbles, a culmination of their vengeance for the havoc he wreaked. And with him being destroyed in the bubbles by the dead and irrelevant, symbolically, he will be rendered nothing more than a bad dream for the waking, relevant, and alive.

Thus Gamzee is still an antagonist, although it becomes (Gamzee) and (Equius) who go on to form LE. Those deaths and those failures still matter, they still happen, they still have narrative weight. Even without the Game Over versions of the characters still existing and still being important, the decision to welcome antagonists like Gamzee and Eridan back into the fold is rendered more complex and more significant BECAUSE we've seen how badly they can go.

The speech originally given by post-Retcon Vriska to (Vriska) is also, to me, a weird artifact of this hypothetical original ending - as it exists within the actual comic, it's said by the wrong person to the wrong person - Vriska with her character development reset to a (Vriska) who's had her characterization destroyed in order to make the first Vriska seem more right. I think originally, it would've come from (Karkat) to Meenah, the latter of which being the one whose idea it was to fuck off with the treasure, and who caused the Beforus team's worst problems, and who has a track record of fucking off whenever she's tasked with taking responsibility. Thus, it would serve as a conclusion to Meenah and Karkat's arc, as well as Game Over Sadkat's arc specifically, would convince Vriska to go with him, and would give Meenah some narrative commeuppance, which would kickstart some sort of Beforan troll feelings jam that would rally them together to actually be useful for once in their lives/afterlives and contribute to the LE fight.

Again, if you PREFER the sad ending, I can't stop you, but the reason I'm going in on there being an "original ending" that isn't sad is because the sad ending doesn't make narrative sense. Why is the ultimate self speech coming from a combination of two characters that barely spoke? Why is it triumphant that Meenah and character-development-reset Vriska get to be the big goods in the fight with LE? Why do multiple prophecies suddenly get dropped right at the end when all other prophecies DO come true? Why does Karkat spend so long being sad his friends are dead, and also why is he deliberately set up as the Friends Troll (blood = bonds), and then suddenly not care that multiple methods exist for bringing back his friends? Why bother softening the blow of all the dead/irrelevant alternate selves if they're intended to be fully tragic? Why introduce a mechanic that would let them save whoever they want consequence-free and then not use it to do that? Why does Roxy love wizards so much and then not get to meet the wizard boy? Why is the entire rest of Homestuck so carefully crafted, so narratively satisfying, so thematically and tonally consistent, and then all of it goes to shit right at the end?

So yeah lol this is the SHORT version lol this isnt even the LONG version of this essay

[pale-opal]

Hear Me Out:

I know that image and what I'm about to say has a chance of being incredibly niche, because I have no idea how much overlap there is between the Homestuck and Mega Man fandoms. But if there's anything I've learned from the internet, it's that no matter what fandom you're in, it's almost guaranteed that someone in said fandom has read Homestuck before. So I think someone out there will understand the rant I'm about to go on. But for everyone who hasn't read Homestuck before, here's a quick explanation: Homestuck is a webcomic that was written and published by a man named Andrew Hussie. It ran from 2009-2016. It follows the misadventures of four kids as they play a game called Sburb with the help of twelve other kids known as "trolls." Together, they go on a quest to complete the game, as the initiation of it has caused the world to end (so even if they wanted to quit, they couldn't. Whoops). It is currently available to read on mspaintadventures.com, however I do NOT recommend reading it if you are a minor, or if you have sensitivity to content that contains violence, strong language, etc. - There were also two (technically one?) epilogues produced afterward, as well as a sequel called "Homestuck^2". - The disclaimer above applies to those works as well.

Okay. Now that I've explained what Homestuck is, let's get into why I put these four Doctors in the squares that I did.

Dr. Cossack: Has read Homestuck, Knows What Homestuck Is - He just seems like the kind of man who casually knows a lot about a lot of things. - A "nerd," if you will. - I can see him reading this in college and subsequently getting totally invested. - He relates to John Egbert (one of the four kids I mentioned earlier) on a personal level. - He did not like the epilogues. - He likes Homestuck^2, though. Dr. Light: Has Read Homestuck, Doesn't Know What Homestuck Is - I imagine that Light was introduced to Homestuck through Cossack while they were in college. - Like, what if Light got sick at some point, and Cossack came over and showed him this random webcomic he found in an attempt to make him feel better, only for Light to wake up the next day, convinced the whole thing was a fever dream? - Cut to many years later, after the birth of Proto Man. - Light and Cossack are having a conversation on the phone: - Cossack: "Hey, Thomas. Do you remember Homestuck?" - Light: "...Homestuck?" - Cossack: "You know, that webcomic I showed you when you got the flu back in college?" - Light: "I'm not sure I-" - Cossack: "The one with the little gray people?" - Light: "Little gray- wait. Wait, that was real?!" - He has not read the epilogues or Homestuck^2. Dr. LaLinde: Has Not Read Homestuck, Knows What Homestuck Is - I think that Dr. Cossack would go on many coffee-fueled 2 a.m. rants to her during last-minute attempts to finish projects on time when the two of them were in college. - LaLinde would always listen respectfully, and as a result knows the entire lore behind Homestuck despite never reading it. - One day, she decided to give it a go. Here's how that went: - LaLinde: "Okay, let's see here- what? Eight thousand (8000) pages? Where am I going to find the time to read all of that?" - And so, she has to this day never read the darn thing. Dr. Wily: Has Not Read Homestuck, Does Not Know What Homestuck Is - The reasoning behind this is simple: he just couldn't get into it. - Dr. Cossack tried several times while they were in college to convince him to read it, but it sounded really convoluted to him. - Dr. Light tried to get him to read it before the whole "Dr. Wily becomes evil and takes over the world" thing after he remembered what it was. - That didn't work either. - Plus, the whole thing just seemed too long. - He eventually just forgot it existed once Light stopped trying to get him to read it. But here's something else about the Doctors: they all had kids. Kids who all grew up with different levels of parental involvement. Kids who would've probably heard their parents talk about this strange little webcomic at one time or another. Which brings me to my next point:

Blues: Has Read Homestuck, Knows What Homestuck Is - I imagine that he heard the aforementioned phone call between Light and Cossack, and asked Dr. Light about what they were talking about. - Light straight up tells him that he's not allowed to read it. - Blues accepts this. - Cut to Blues' life after he runs away from home. He's at the library. - He's also in the midst of his "I hate my dad" arc, and as a result is more than willing to go and read this comic Dr. Light told him was off-limits. - He spends a whole day reading the webcomic, its epilogues, and its sequel. - He is there from the time the library opens to the time it closes. - And once everything is said and done, he is a changed man. - His favorite character is Dave Strider. - He also used to like Dirk Strider and Jane Crocker, but then he read the epilogues. Bass: Has Read Homestuck, Doesn't Know What Homestuck is - Bass was just minding his business, until he finds Proto Man broke into his house... again. - I like to think Blues breaks into Wily Fortress sometimes, just because he can. As a treat. - And to visit any Wilybots he's friends with. - He goes to confront Blues, only to find him in the midst of his third reread of Homestuck. - He asks what he's doing. - Blues tells him to pull up a chair. - He starts the reread over so that Bass can understand what's going on. - Bass, too, ends up a changed man. Even if he has no idea what he just read. - His favorite character is Karkat Vantas. - He made a trollsona (basically a troll OC), but has never told a living soul about it. - Also, he will never admit it, but "[S] Game Over" messed him up on an emotional level (if you don't know what "[S] Game Over" is, don't worry about it. Don't look it up. It's okay. Just forget I said anything). Tempo: Has Not Read Homestuck, Knows What Homestuck Is - Quake Woman has not read Homestuck for the same reason her mother hasn't read it: She's simply too busy. - Blues tries to convince her to read it, though. - But here's the thing: Vesper Woman HAS read it... but she just thought it was just alright. This leads to conversation like this happening: - Vesper: "Don't listen to him, Tempo. It's okay at best." - Blues: "..." - Blues: "...would you like to elaborate on that?" - They get into arguments about different aspects of the plot a LOT. - Tempo just listens quietly while she works. - Out of curiosity, she ended up looking it up one day when she had free time, and ended up stumbling across Hiveswap instead. - Hiveswap is a spin-off game that takes place in Homestuck's universe. The first Act was released in 2017, and the second was released in 2020. - I will admit that I haven't played Hiveswap, so I'm not sure if the disclaimer I provided for Homestuck applies here. Kalinka Cossack: Has Never Read Homestuck, Does Not Know What Homestuck Is - My reasoning behind this is even more simple than Dr. Wily's: - Dr. Cossack does not let her know that Homestuck exists in an effort to keep her innocence in tact. - That's it. That's the reasoning. You can all go home n-. - ...wait. Is that ANOTHER image down there?

You see, there's one more set of characters that I want to discuss in this long, long post. Characters that wouldn't be influenced by their parents, meaning that whether or not they've read Homestuck would be more up to happenstance:

...I can explain.

Zero: Has Read Homestuck, Knows What Homestuck Is - Part of the reason I put him here is because he ended up being the opposite of what Wily wanted him to be. He wanted a ruthless killing machine, and instead he got someone who helps save the world on multiple occasions. So why not have him be the opposite of his creator in Homestuck knowledge as well? - (Although if you think about it, Zero is technically a ruthless killing machine, but that's not what we're here to talk about). - Another other part of the reasoning is that I thought it was funny. - Zero had trouble getting invested until Act 5. - After he reached that point, he was locked in. - He sees a little bit of himself in Rose Lalonde and Dirk Strider. - He has never read the epilogues, or the sequel. Once he saw the Snapchat bonus content, he thought that was it. - Zero successfully got Iris into the comic as well. - Her favorite character was also Rose. - I like to think he and Layer also became friends after realizing they were both Homestuck fans.

Axl: Has Read Homestuck, Doesn't Know What Homestuck Is - He found a dub of the series on YouTube on day while watching random videos. - He was invested almost immediately. - Axl would talk about it with the other Red Alert members a lot - especially to Red and Tornado. - But there was one problem: He didn't know the name of it. It just completely slipped his mind at one point, and he wasn't able to get it back. This led to stuff like this: - Axl: "And THEN John and his friends are losing to the Condescence, but-" - Red: "That's nice and all, but what's this webcomic you read called?" - Axl: "Uh... I dunno. I can't remember." - Red: "Are you sure you didn't just make it up?" - Axl: "Wha- Yes! Yes, I'm sure!" - Red: "...sure thing, little buddy." - After joining the Maverick Hunters, Axl casually brings up the plot of this comic he can't remember the name of. Zero soon says this: - Zero: "...are you talking about Homestuck?" - Axl: "That's what it's called?!" - He made a trollsona like Bass did, but is a lot less shy about sharing it. - His favorite character is Roxy Lalonde. - Axl got Palette into it as well. X: Has Not Read Homestuck, Knows What Homestuck Is - He heard Zero talk about it with Iris a lot, but it sounded a bit too violent for his tastes. - He did play the Pesterquest visual novel, though. - Yes, the disclaimer does apply for this visual novel. - I like to think that at some point in X7, X complains about Zero and Axl's interest in "overly violent media" and asks if Zero has started "corrupting the youth." - He is promptly told to shut up. - X is more open to the idea of reading Homestuck by the time X8 comes around though. But it isn't until Axl is recovering from the game's ending that he actually starts considering it, since he knows it'll make Axl happy. - Speaking of which: will Capcom ever give us X9? - I just want to know if Axl is really okay, or if Lumine messed him up somehow. - It's been almost 20 years since the game released. 20 years is a long time to leave part of a video game franchise on a cliffhanger (but then again, Mega Man Legends fans have been waiting for 24 years...) Sigma: Has Not Read Homestuck, Does Not Know What Homestuck Is - The reason Sigma is in this category is very easy to explain: - He deserves nothing that could give him any semblance of happiness. - Also, I hate him.

Alright, rant over.

The inspiration for this post, as well as the original template, can be found here.

...now you can all go home.

[cure-typhoon]

I'm kinda sad how I don't see enough of the Beta trolls as a whole friend group the same way we do with the Beta and Alpha kids..

And like it's obvious it's because of murderstuck, it's kinda hard to see them as a big friend group when one of the most important part of their story is when they fucking murderer eachother like they we're in Lord of the Flies

But like, thats the thing, they still cared for eachother and that makes it so much tragic. Literally everything was against them being a normal fuctional friend group and they still tried and at the end everything just ended awfully

We know about Karkat being genuinly heartbroken about the deaths in the group but I feel like we only think of him caring for all of them in the group because it's one of the few we were able to see the grieving process he was going through and was the one who reacted more like a human when it happened = anxious, scared and heartbroken

While Kanaya was pissed the whole time after she wake up, she was angry and attacked everyone who was a danger to the group and it might be because she had a fucking whole through her stomach and the matriorb but I also feel this was her way to express the pain she was going through the deaths of her friends, like people forget but she was very friendly to Tavros and tried to help him a lot, it's probably she made him the Tinkerbull plushie we see in the videogame. She was also very to Feferi so I doubt she was fucking happy after seeing that she got killed. We don't see her interact much with Nepeta and Equius (i don't think those two even interactúe with Kanaya) but she probably cared at some level for them considering she wanted to hunt down Gamzee.

Terezi is also an interesting case because the way she reacts to Tavros death is...interesting. Tavros was one of her buddies when they played Flarp but after she discovers his body she is barely affected by it? In the text it says because she had just cried out all for the doomed Dave but I think it had something to do with Gamzee

You can barely see the honk but it's there , we know Gamzee was probably messing with Terezi so she suspected Vriska for everyone's murder so he probably started things right away after Terezi found the body and after she did exactly what Gamzee wanted her to do, he probably ley go of the whole deal in her head and we see her react to the death of Vriska (and possibly also Tavros)

We know she was heartbroken after killing Vriska and it's the only character besides Karkat and Vriska that we see grieving by the death of one of the group.

Anyway I ended up rambling and I didnt talk about Vriska's talk with June after she killed Tavros, it's a whole deal and I barely get to make a point.

Basically we barely see them interact as a friend group or even grieve eachothers deaths but I feel that was Hussie's writting more than them not caring for eachother (in their own, sometimes fucked up, ways)

[casey-lalonde-egbert]

Why are you shipping grimdorks in the transphobic and homophobic way instead of shipping it in the trans and gay way

no way of shipping grimdorks is inherently transphobic or homophobic unless you make it specifically to spite others? ive loved grimdorks ever since i first read homestuck a long time ago and i was amazed to find out the fandom was more into rosemary at the time, some people even sent me rude messages when i posted about them (it seems more grimdorks fans have resurfaced and are no longer afraid of shipping them!) i see both john and rose as bisexual for once and the fandom has a pretty unexamined issue with biphobia, often imposing that characters like rose, dave and even some of the trolls like vriska and terezi can only be homosexual despite no canon trace of confirmation other than "post-canon", hussie's commentary (Which is full of revisionism" or just "Well they're dating/like their same gender so there" i may not be fond of june egbert as a thing, but i always found it distasteful that everyone wanted to impose their interpretations of a character that contradict stablished text in the story because it was the popular thing to do. being in a straight relationship isnt homophobic unless youre saying people can chose who they are attracted by to be... idk morally correct? thats just weird, bud.

[weaselmcdiesel]

i find your "katnep wouldnt work in canon" claim extremely incorrect!!!! they have shared interests and a themetaic connection. its just a shame that their dynamic wasnt explored much but their contrasting personalities are suuuch fanfic bait to me

You're definitely right about fanfic bait i think, i'm not the most clever when it comes to literary analysis so im listening to the podcast "homestuck made this world" and one topic it discusses is how the introduction of the trolls helped the comic breach YA novel status and how the fandom at the time was slowly shifting to accepting more shipping due to the new emphasis on character's interpersonal relations right. nepeta the character is also literally a representation of the shipping population of the fandom too so it's not unrealistic to think hussie wanted to push that ship (not to mention the disciple x signless haha)

unfortunately, i consider the ship near impossible due to the fact that karkat would have to go though a completely different char. development route to 1. learn how to reject/respond to nepeta's crushing instead of just ignoring her, and 2. somehow start liking her back? which idk it would require nepeta to be alive and i just dont know how that would look XD (thus why i draw them... in a completely different universe pahaha...)

but you ARE correct! not only do they share the interest in romance n would love reading romances together, but just like karkat nepeta really does care about the rest of their friends. even when she knew some sorta considered her weird or werent treating her nicely she would still be concerned for them. she WOULD support karkat when he felt like no one's listening to him when he just wants to help everyone. idk theres a lot there. imagine if nep survived after gam killed equius? and then saw karkat pacify gamzee like i wonder how she'd react to that

sorry for writing a lot im in love with them you must understand asdjf

[nekropsii]

More Reminders:

Karkat is a bootlicker. This is a prominent character trait. He’s rooting for the Alternian empire- yes, even though it’s ruled by a system that wants him personally dead- and really wants to be a part of its military.

Eridan has a “genocide complex” and is able to be roughly described as the troll equivalent of a white supremacist. This is one of the first things we learn about him.

The Beta Trolls are 13. All of them. This includes Equius. This includes Eridan. This includes Vriska. This includes Gamzee.

99% of Gamzee’s character is racial caricature. No, he is not intended to be a Dionysus parallel. He is intended to be a “satirization” of Black people.

Sapphic pairings have always held precedent over MLM pairings. They’ve always been more important to the plot, been handled with much more grace, and had more screen time. This isn’t a bad thing.

Doc Scratch is a child predator. This is an incredibly prominent character trait of his, and you’re way past due for a reread if you’ve forgotten. He has a particular fixation on, as canon puts it, “little girls”, and targets both Rose and Kanaya. Do I even have to bring up what he did to Damara?

Regarding the previous point, Rose and Kanaya both get very traumatized during the course of Homestuck’s story. They’re not well put together sophisticated “mom friends”, they’re 13 year olds just like almost everyone else is, and they’re going through hell. Rose in particular makes the effect all of this trauma has on her very well known. This is what Grimdarkness is.

Cronus is a child predator, too. During the course of the Openbounds and Ministrife, we see him unabashedly predate on three specific kids, and this behavior is made out to be extremely creepy. These three kids are Karkat, Tavros, and, yes, Eridan.

The Exiles were incredibly important to the plot, actually. You guys are just mean.

Almost every relationship in Homestuck is flawed in some capacity, that’s the point of a tragic drama. The main cast is literally nothing but traumatized and/or mentally ill 13-16 year olds. A good chunk of them aren’t even socialized, or grew up in an actively hostile environment. Or both. No shit characters mess up sometimes, or have unhealthy behaviors- it’s just natural in that situation. Some dynamics are substantially more healthy than others, but the main appeal of Homestuck is that everyone is flawed and damaged.

A good majority of Vriscourse was just people leaping at the opportunity to express pure, unabashed misogyny. I don’t think I have to elaborate upon this.

No, Jane is not a fascist, nor is she racist. She’s never been either of these things, that’s something that was invented out of left field by the Post Canon writing team. Being a fascistic racist was never within the scope of Jane’s character. No, it being “a result of her having grown up being fed propaganda by The Condesce” does not explain that plot thread in Post Canon for a single second, because Jane experiencing a major personality shift because of HIC literally already happened in canon with her going Crockertier, and she came out of that a stronger person. Never once has “racism” been on the list of problems she has.

Hemoloyalty is not intended to be a 1:1 metaphor for racism, nor is it intended to be a 1:1 metaphor for classism, or any other type of oppression. It’s not a 1:1 metaphor for literally anything, it’s intended to be flexible and contextual. This is not a bad thing, and is, in fact, a common storytelling method used by a lot of fantasy/sci-fi writers. Condemning Hussie for a lot of things in their writing is valid, but Hemoloyalty not being strictly analogous to only one type of real world oppression is patently not one of them. You do not know how metaphors work.

Official =/= Canon. No one is calling Pesterquest canon. You really shouldn’t be doing the same for Post Canon. The Homestuck Epilogues and Homestuck^2 are Official, but they are definitively not Canon. This is literally the first thing you learn about either of these projects. This doesn’t invalidate anyone’s enjoyment of any of these properties, of course, but it has to be stressed: Official does not automatically mean Canon.

[davekat-sucks]

i saw some draw humanstuck art today and drew meenah white, every single comment under the post was everyone saying “whitestck”, “white meenah scares me..” and someone even said “they whitewashed her..” you can’t white wash an alien with gray skin..

these are the same kind of hypocrites that when you ask them what the hell even makes meenah, the fucking alien, "black coded" they will then reveal their own racism through their very own reasoning, because they associate, for example, meenahs aggressiveness with black people, instead of associating it to the canon fact that all female trolls are aggressive and that hic was a violent genocidal conqueror of planets.

or another one ive seen, that Gamzee is "black coded" because the "coding" was he was portrayed as an, and I quote, "impossible to understand, dirty, drug-addled, ugly, stupid teen with an absent father and a religious devotion to rap/hip hop. Impossible to take seriously, until he becomes a violently abusive murderer because he got his drugs taken away"

but no, the real issue is the artist depicting the troll called sea hitler or the troll parodying ICP, two white rappers, as white... make it make fucking sense

id ask these people if they are americans and if they also believe that trolls speaking english makes them american in the first place, and if they say yes to both, then that also shows they are hypocrites again by their own logic

because, honestly and from what all of this tells me, not only some americans are racist enough to connect all these traits to a skin color, turning them into racial stereotypes, but also self-centered enough to miss that theyre doing exactly what "Americentrism" describes. judging an entire different culture, a planet of fucking ALIENS, as if its the USA, and centering everything around america and their issues as if their standards are the only valid interpretation of the story and characters.

and because all of this disgusting mindset is even encouraged by the current writer teams too, reminder that the hicu writers revealed that they made earth c to be literally just texas as an entire planet.

Pretty much. They say it is racist that Meenah is stereotyped black-coded. But if you headcanon them as anything else, it's racist still. At this point, what the fuck do these people want?! But yeah, most Westerners are self centered assholes. Why else they even go after stuff like anime/manga/video games and try to change the stuff there? Because they can't accept cultural differences that aren't United States. They can't accept some places have different moral standards than others. Technically, it was WHATPUMPKIN, not HICU, that made Earth C's flag just similar to Texas's. But it is still a point that James Roach and HICU do not want retcon or get rid of it. They want to """respect"""" the people who had worked on it. But considering the team behind it, why the fuck would you give them any benefit of the doubt?! TELL ME! James Roach and HICU were better off doing a hard ass reboot and wiped everything the previous team had made, out of existence. It is better than building on top of or dragging along the damage made within HS2/Beyond Canon. Because it just reminds people of the horrible past and the people behind it. Some may even think James Roach and HICU continuing to go along with it, means they technically still support people like Andrew Hussie and Kate Mitchell. And not just business standpoint, like they support them in beliefs and ideology.

[dingodad]

you can link to it if youve already answered it, but how do you think lord english “runs” his empire? by the way you talk about alternia, it sounds to me like you imagine he did play a role as some kind of shadow political leader that made active decisions in the structuring of alternia. is that the case? i think thats really interesting, i always wondered what his rulership over the condesce actually looked like. iirc lord english has only ever shown been screaming and destroying things so i’ve always struggled to imagine if he would even be lucid enough to make decisions or do anything other than mass murder. does doc scratch have some way to implicitly understand his desires and then deliver orders to the condesce on his behalf? or was the caliborn that the “kids” fight at some nebulous time in the “future,” the one who’s soul dirk rips out, not teen caliborn but an actually fully realized adult cherub caliborn who had already been fucking with alternia? idk if that makes sense, the part of the comic where the beta kids are described by caliborn to have been sucked into the juju has always been a little weird for me to wrap my head around. i always imagined the battle happened between them all as kids still but now that im trying to imagine a lucid lord english im realizing they could very well all be adults because we still havent “seen” it actually happen aside from caliborn’s claymation right? anyways. very interested in what your thoughts on caliborn’s active influence on alternia looked like

lots of really great questions! i'll try to get my thoughts in order here.

to start at the beginning of lord english's story: yes, it is an important point that we have no idea "when" caliborn's masterpiece actually takes place; how old caliborn is, where the kids who beat him up even came from... and I think this is because the details in that story don't necessarily matter. while i certainly believe there is a point in caliborn's timeline where a gaggle of teenagers show up and stuff him into a puppet, what we see play out on his claymation stage is a mythologised account of something that happens to him over and over again in many many different ways over the course of his time loop.

so while i wouldn't call that caliborn "fully realised", necessarily, i think we are supposed to see him as "caliborn-as-lord-english"; he has the peg leg, he has mastery over the felt, he's finally obtained the rainbow magic eyes, and while he certainly hasn't encountered the trolls yet, no, he has had loads of practice at being the puppetmaster of his own world as he hones his homosuck craft and uses the terminals left to him by his session to influence homestuck itself! (i don't think whether caliborn is ultimately "teen" or an "adult" is hugely relevant, because caliborn's specific circumstances mean that he doesn't really "grow" or "mature" by aging the same way a human does; he gradually acquires power in different ways.)

related to this, i tend to use the names 'caliborn' and 'lord english' interchangeably. which i know not everyone will agree with, but i think it aligns with the hussie's philosophy that act 6 is about the kid versions of the comic's grownup characters; while, yes, the lord english contained within lil cal also contains sprinklings of equius, dirk and gamzee, these characters are ultimately caliborn's servitors, and i would argue that subsuming weaker personalities into his own is kind of part of caliborn's Bag as a dominant cherub.

anyway, all that is just to say that it's important to be aware that lord english DOES act like caliborn, and isn't just a mindless, speechless force of destruction - at least not all of the time. when damara tries to escape his captivity, he speaks to her in caliborn's voice, and perhaps more importantly, tells us the one thing you must never forget about lord english: he is ALREADY HERE. never be fooled into thinking lord english only showed up at alternia's death and then fucked off into the furthest ring to hunt his sister - his first act was to travel back to the beginning of alternian history and become its architect. notice how as soon as lord english speaks, two things happen: first, the cursor changes into english's reptilian hand; second, we see the puppet hole in doc scratch's back - he was the literal puppetmaster behind scratch's actions the whole time!

so yes, lord english was an active participant in the shaping of the alternian empire, though i think "political leader" is probably the wrong description; he certainly never had any face-to-face conversations or gave any direct orders to any trolls, at least within modern troll history. but that's not what he's about: as the cuestick, and with scratch as his cueball, english's manipulations are more about lining up the perfect shot, executing a precision strike, and then letting events play out exactly as planned.

probably the most influential of these precision strikes was establishing the subjugglator cult, who worship him and his puppet as twin mirthful messiahs; while we don't know exactly how he did this, it's not hard to imagine it had something to do with appearing to them as an all-powerful angel at the very dawn of their society. compare this to how the condesce makes cordial visits to every planet she passes on her journey through the stars, then fucks off to let her army of trolls decimate the place. after all, scratch operates in exactly the same way: he doesn't waste his time constantly relaying orders to his proteges, but rather grooms them when they're still young, turning them into his unwitting soldiers so that when he finally does intervene he's only telling them to do things that "deep down, they already know they want to do." (commentary from Homestuck: Book 4, p. 216)

while the condesce formally becomes english's puppet when she kills the handmaid - inheriting both the rustblood's curse and essentially taking up scratch's role on earth - it's not like she was ever particularly hands-on when it came to helming the metaphorical ship herself. in porrim's words, she was "the Lo+rd's slave all alo+ng [...] thro+ugh manipulatio+n by his cunning emplo+yee", but what the condesce enjoys doing most is delegating! on alternia she gave most of her authority to the subjugglators, and then did the exact same shit again on earth. remember meenah never wanted the responsibilities of heiress, and ran to beforus' pink moon to escape them; the way i see it, the condesce rushing off into space to explore the galaxy instead of overseeing the planet she's responsible for is just a repeat of the same behaviour, and doing so left a power vacuum for english to essentially insert his own guys into. (possibly thematically relevant, since lord english's role is fundamentally to shoot balls into unfilled dark pockets.)

in short, english is cleverer - or at least, more competent - than we give him credit for. it's just that rather than a chess master who moves each piece to its proper place individually, he's playing pool; if you line up just the right shot, you only need to make one move, and the balls will play the rest of the moves off of each other. looked at another way, as the Lord of Time and master of the alpha timeline, english makes his moves by controlling inevitability itself. he engineers things so that events can only play out in the exact way he wants them to, and all other options are doomed. and to do that, he only needs to be present at key moments in alternia's history - most importantly its very beginning and its very end.

[thewertsearch]

@relaxxattack asked: honestly, my only explanation for the way equius and nepeta don’t seem to match up with moirallegiance correctly is the fact that hussie wasn’t exactly sure where they were going with it yet. some of the earlier troll stuff is like this— they say things that don’t quite make sense later on once contextualized (for instance terezi, sollux, and nepeta being confused about blood colors, when that is literally the framework around their whole planet and DEFINITELY something they would know). this, to my understanding, is pretty much just because hussie hadn’t completely figured out the details of that stuff yet, and was sort of dropping hints that “hey, there’s something up with this” while not totally matching the full understanding we get of those things later. at least, this is my reading; especially since equius and nepeta seem to act like “healthy” or “typical” moirails later on without an indication that much about their relationship has changed. it’s just one of those things that gets sort of smoothed over once the author has a better feel for it. (like a larger consequence version of only referring to a character by chumhandle until they have a name, and then suddenly everyone knows their name).

I'm inclined to agree.

I think the really uncomfortable stuff in early Meowrails conversations was a case of early installment weirdness. It doesn't gel at all with the way their relationship is later portrayed, and it speaks to a darker version of moirallegiance - one with rather unhealthy power dynamics, and one which never saw the light of day.

Equius and Nepeta were the prototypical moirails. I think Hussie used them to trial the quadrant, and that between their early conversations and the infodump, the definition of moirallegiance was changed, such that whatever this relationship was originally supposed to be is now an artifact of history.