#gosh im so unconfident about analysing any character that isn't tommy

[zeta-in-de-walls]

(this isn’t meant to be critical i am a c!ranboo enjoyer) ranboo’s interesting bc from how i understand him he like. thinks acknowledging his flaws without really doing much to fix them is enough to absolve him of them? if that makes sense? a lot of his monologues will follow the line of ‘oh well i also didn’t do this but at least i was aware of it.’ he’s friendly and altruistic yeah but he’s also those things in service of his own goals bc getting to say he’s selfless makes him feel better about himself lol. in doomsday you can see him talk around the situation with techno until he arrives at a viewpoint that still lets him see himself as a good person for going to live with phil. so he has a strong view on sides, he just...continuously shifts what he allows to fit into his view, i guess. not sure if any of that made sense.

Hey! Thanks for the discussion. I adore anons who leave such interesting thoughts in my askbox so cheers!!!

Yeah, I think I broadly agree. I see Ranboo as a cynical person. (Again I haven’t watched enough of him to properly judge so take this all with a grain of salt!)

I think he sees the world as not a good place and that people are all selfish but cling to false ideas in that they think they’re good. This contrasts heavily with Tommy for me, whom I’ve always seen as quite an optimistic and an idealistic character. He naturally trusts others and is hopeful always believing they can win and thats why he can be confident and determined. It’s why he didn’t think Wilbur would ever press the button, why he believed in challenging Dream and that others would help them if they went to war rather than him being exiled, why he has trusted people like Dream, Technoblade, Jack, and Sam. Tommy is optimistic. Why, he even let himself believe the egg wasn’t so bad, never believes he’ll get in trouble for his mischief stuff like that. Exile was very dark partly because we saw him losing his faith others, and started to doubt everything, believing the worst. 

Sorry for the Tommy tangent xD! Anyway, yeah Ranboo is the opposite. He’s always afraid. He recognised the Dream was the bad guy on the eve of Doomsday but he said there was no point in fighting him because they couldn’t beat him. (iirc) Ranboo is wary of others, and spends so much time alone getting more powerful to protect himself. That many totems is overkill for instance. 

This really jumped out to me on his stream reacting to Tommy’s death. And yes, he’s got this strange pseudo self-awareness where he thinks he’s the only one who sees the world clearly, everyone else blinded by their ideals. He may be weak-willed but at least he knows it. Of course, Ranboo’s perception is as warped as anyone’s. I also watched Jack’s reaction to Tommy’s death and I saw real contemplation, the grief strongly affected him. The world isn’t a dark place. They were able to defeat Dream and there is wonderful things about the world to appreciate and cherish. 

All that said, Ranboo’s character is also a very nice person. He is kind and thoughtful. He may cynical but he’s never unkind. He wants the world to be a good place, he just doesn’t really believe in it. 

Again, sorry if I got anything wrong about his character! Any Ranboo fans, please feel free to correct me. Using the Tommy’s death reaction as a standard is almost certainly a bad idea. Plus its end was cool in that it challenged his perception when he found that Allium - maybe people do care about others? And I should say, I do like how the character is written! I don’t consider this to be a critical post really, just my analysis. (I only don’t really watch as the type of story he’s been telling with his other self and the unreliable narrator isn’t so much my thing, (plus he often streams too late for me) but the character is cool!)