#pre scratch dirk

[twistedshack]

Fuck it living my life and yes I'm back into homestuck, I'm officially a freak again Lmao

Decided to make the strider siblings into tandemause because why the hell not, in this household we hate canon bro strider but thrive for fanon bro

[methvapes]

biggest nothingburger ugly nothing artstyle picture he looks 2 good here vv

[bunbunsophy]

when you and your best friend meet a cursed object that tears your spatial-temporal consciousness to shreds so you're constantly forgetting and remembering how you got here.

How'd they meet that puppet?

[yanderes-galore]

Hello!! I'd like to request a Scenario/Short going off of the Bro Strider x Reader Headcanons you did, if that's alright! Same as last time, where reader (GenderNeutral) is liked by Dave as well and Bro feels Romantic feelings for them. (I do like to think Bro is the type to kidnap reader, if that helps for an idea BUT if you'd prefer not to involve that, that's OK!!)

Thank you so much for the opening!! /pos - dirk anon

Hm... I can see what I can do, sure. Bro is called Dirk in this.

Puppet Master

Yandere! Bro Strider Short

Pairing: Romantic

Possible Trigger Warnings: Gender-Neutral Darling, Post Kidnapping plot, Isolation, Toxic behavior/relationship, Manipulation, Possessive behavior, Dave is used to manipulate you, Toxic parenting, Neglect mentioned, Stockholm syndrome mentioned, Forced relationship.

Your encounters with the Striders started simple. For a long while you knew Dirk and Dave through a babysitting job. You were hired a few times to tutor Dave and watch him.

Your impressions of Dirk were that he was rather stoic and quiet. He never showed any emotions around you or Dave. It felt a bit uncanny to you.

All you really knew about Dirk was he was the guardian of Dave. He seemed obsessed with swords and puppets. Plus... you didn't really see him as all that affectionate.

You got along with Dave, his younger brother, more. You saw him as a sibling of your own, maybe even a kid. In your eyes Dave is a very good kid despite his upbringing.

Dave always looked forward to seeing you. You were always a breath of fresh air for him. Your kind words were better than the cold attitude Bro gave him.

Dave was not the only one who liked you.

Dirk, as cold as he is in this iteration, began to be obsessive towards you. It got to the point he used subtle manipulation to keep you around the apartment longer. After all... Dave likes you around.

Poor you never saw it coming.

Before you knew it Dirk had you in his grasp. You kept falling for his tactics... small promises of paying you more or even the fact Dave didn't want you to leave. You had no idea Dirk was just being selfish.

Right up until he locked you away.

Soon all you know is being at the apartment with Dirk and Dave. Most of the time you're confined to Dirk's room or even somewhere else entirely. The doors and windows are always locked... he doesn't care if you take up a sword against him.

He already knows he has enough control over you.

You begin to loathe Dirk and lean more towards Dave for comfort. You hide such a fact in fear that Dirk will isolate you even more. By now you know the truth of Dirk.

No wonder Dave liked you more.

Like an adorable doll or puppet Dirk controls you. He breaks you down to make you his own. With him and Dave being the only contact you have it isn't hard.

Dirk feeds you and takes care of you but you see little affection. He's obsessive over you but he doesn't seem to provide any good aspects of a relationship. He just seems to claim you as his... that's it.

A puppet... a doll... something/someone he can manipulate for his own comfort. Soon you begin to feel like you're losing your own autonomy. The answer to that is simple...

You are.

Dave is the only one that keeps you intact. You try to treat him as you did before. While you are slowly worn down by Dirk... Dave makes you feel like you can tolerate it all.

However... you fear when Dirk will find out.

If Dirk finds out he will prevent interaction between you two. You want to leave Dirk's grasp... but can't do it without fearing for Dirk. You simultaneously bring out the best and worst of Dirk.

No one's going to save you. You lost count of how long you're here with Dirk but you feel it's been awhile. Soon... Dirk even begins to act kinder as you've given in.

There's less cold neglect. He still says nearly nothing but certainly shows more warmth. You feel like... you're making things better.

So if being here makes life better for you and Dave...

Maybe you should reciprocate just a little bit for Dirk, hm?

Or is this all just another trick set up by the puppeteer himself?

[erkythehero23]

bruh

[atrophicgardenia]

i feel like people who headcanon bro as a good guardian or headcanon that bro was a good guardian before lil cal corrupted him have mad daddy issues.

guess how i know that.

[thewertsearch]

One down.

"One Act, right?"

No, not kids! I mean these curtain dealies. I still need to set up, what, like another five of these rigs? God dammit.

Six sub-Acts, then - and the first ended the same way Act 1 did, with a seemingly-fatal explosion at the Egbert/Crocker household.

Sounds to me like these six sub-Acts will be 'remixes' of Acts 1 through 6, with events that 'rhyme' with the B1 session. I doubt we'll be rehashing everything, but I think I can make a couple of educated guesses about the path we'll be treading.

Act 6.1, as we've just seen, was dedicated mostly to wacky shenanigans in our protagonist's home, as well as hints of intrigue surrounding their friends. It ended with our hero in mortal peril - although everyone knows they're not really in any danger. The story just got started, after all!

Act 6.2 will probably be similar, but I expect to see Roxy and Dirk take to the stage with their official introductions. It may also introduce Jane's Exile, which had better be a Problem Sleuth character at this point.

By Act 6.3, most of our heroes are entering the Medium, and we've come to understand their lives a little better. We might finally begin to get a sense of the Guardians' personalities - and if we're lucky, the Earth's First Guardian might finally show its face.

Act 6.4 is when things will go horribly, horribly wrong, as powerful antagonists finally emerge from the woodwork to wreak havoc on the session. It might be Jack, again - but it could just as easily be the Condesce, or Lord English himself. The session, at this point, seems almost unsalvageable.

If we're really lucky, Act 6.5 will bifurcate again, and we'll start with a remixed version of Hivebent - this time, with the pre-Scratch trolls, explaining what really went wrong with their session. Then, 6.5.2 will compose the meat of the B2 session, as the kids rally, and try to salvage this new mess.

Scratching isn't an option this time - or, at least, I don't think it is - so I'm not sure what'll happen here. I definitely expect to see some God Tier ascensions, and I'm sure the B2 kids will have some crackpot solution for whatever's tearing their session apart.

Finally, we come to the end of our story - Act 6.6, where the callbacks begin to get recursive. I have no idea what the shape of this Act is going to be - except that it'll undoubtedly involve kids and trolls from at least four timelines finally coming together to end the English problem once and for all.

And that, ladies and gaydies, is my big-picture prediction for the rest of Homestuck. As always, I'm sure a good chunk of this speculation is way off-base - but I am confident that, broadly speaking, the next six Acts will be reflections of the previous six. I'm here for it!

[plaidos]

i just dont get why they absolutely had to write june saying "i didn't even know how old she was" when talking about how she felt like she emotionally cheated on roxy

just seemed like a joke made with little reverence to the character that is going to transition on screen

idk if you see that (and Scott Pilgrim's whole thing with Knives) as a joke i think that's a you problem and you aren't ready to have the conversations this artwork is having. if you're uncomfortable with it, good, it's supposed to make you uncomfortable, Homestuck is and always has been an earnest introspection of how society normalises & recreates the conditions of sexual violence.

i mean, for starters, to clue you into a conversation i was having with a friend about this earlier today, compare John's relationship to Terezi -- a girl he fundamentally does not know the age of & whose ageing might've been slowed out in nowhere -- with Dad's immediate infatuation with Mom Lalonde when he first gets a glimpse of her pre-Sburb....... except, by the timeline elaborated to us in Hiveswap, Mom is like, only just barely an adult in that scene. this goes uncommented on because why would it? most of the characters don't even know it happened, nor do they have a frame of reference to understand what's a little ❓ about that. but it makes perfect sense for John to be in his pre-transition emulating all the toxic parts of his father (& masculinity in general), does it not?

i don't get how it's a "joke" at all to reference the Thing That Literally Happened In Canon, it seems more like you're bothered that it's being referenced at all rather than it having happened?? Homestuck has been about stuff like this, about the normalisation of child abuse & sexual violence to children by way of society. did you think Jane repeatedly statutorily raping Gamzee (who was explicitly a teenage boy when he comes out of the fridge) over the course of the epilogues waas just random Homestuck nonsense bullshit? What about what's going on with Tavvy? all the Doc Scratch/Dirk Strider stuff? Alternian culture revolving around coercive sex, and how that is supposed to be a reflection of how that is also true of Earth's own cultures?

like, idk, i thought it was pretty clear that the normalisation of sexual violence (particularly towards/surrounding teenagers) in society was one of the core themes of Homestuck. it's always patently wild to me, for example, that people try and decry Meenah as a pedophile when she's actually probably the only character in the comic who realised what she was doing was wrong and elected to stop being a willing participant in it. and like... the scene you're talking about isn't just relentlessly dunking on June, it depicts her being unfairly dragged for something every single one of them has been a complicit participant in. it's about transmisogyny, if anything.

[twistedshack]

Fuck it living my life and yes I'm back into homestuck, I'm officially a freak again Lmao

Decided to make the strider siblings into tandemause because why the hell not, in this household we hate canon bro strider but thrive for fanon bro

[calware]

Transmasc aranea is so interesting to me…do elaborate on your thoughts 👀

frankly i'm not really committed to this reading, it's just floating around in my head lol. not a "this should happen" idea but a "this would be kind of interesting" idea

the thing i AM pretty committed to is that she's TME, which is informed by comparing her to vriska; essentially, aranea gets to avoid a lot of the bad-faith perceptions vriska gets tacked on to her. vriska is a dangerous weapon that can't be trusted, aranea is just some annoying know-it-all who can't shut up. granted, both are bad labels to have, and both characters are targets of misogyny, but for a good amount of time there aranea gets away with a lot more than vriska does (for example, aranea idolizes her pre-scratch self and nobody bats an eye, but karkat goes running to john to tell him vriska is dangerous at the first sign that they might be into each other). so when you look at vriska through a TMA lens, aranea reads as TME by comparison

there are a lot of directions you can take this ofc, the "main" one being that she's a cis woman. that said, i think it's interesting that hussie posits characters who take on an "authorial role" as thematic representations of toxic masculinity, which was the seed in my mind that led to me considering aranea as transmasc in the first place:

"Much later in Act 6, we see Lil Cal is a juju vessel containing the splintered souls of various controversial characters in the story: Caliborn, Equius, Dirk, and yes...even Gamzee, which means he's actually here watching this ball drop in TWO forms. But all these figures are, in some manner, highly exaggerated negative manifestations of author avatars, who have amalgamated themselves within the body of English to wreak havoc on the story/reader. This is the galaxy-brained interpretation of the line. The most important character in the story is me, or more specifically, the most villainous, destructive splinter-composite of the author's presence in the story."

"Dirk and Equius similarly aren't even that unflattering as avatars either. You could do worse. And we do do worse. As far as demonic author-tiers go, English is the true monster. His dominating personality splinters are much worse too. Caliborn and Gamzee are complete hell-people compared to Dirk and Equius. They are also sort of author avatars in certain ways, but with a degree of cartoonishly evil exaggeration. They absolutely comprise the "authorial wrath" portion of the total Doc/English personality quagmire."

"I think when the time comes to show the douchebag cocktail stuck inside Cal, there's a brief temptation to regard it as an odd, semi-random melange of characters. But there are several layers of logic to the guys who all combine to form his personality. Much of the logic orbits around these negative traits associated with men, or more specifically, the "toxically masculine" aspects often linked to certain male personalities. Dirk has a lot of these traits, which are central to Dave's feelings of tension and abuse concerning his bro. The intellectual aggression, the power of assertion, the knowitall-ism, the mansplaining.

also, this line in particular makes me think of aranea:

As an alt-author figure, [Doc Scratch's] omniscience makes sense, since the author has sweeping knowledge of story details as well. Because I "know everything," he "knows everything" too. Of course, as I write the story, there are plenty of things I don't know yet, and the "not knowing" is always an important part of the process in this largely improvisational medium.

aranea starts out almost as a historian wanting to infodump pass down oral history of previous events; eventually, however, she becomes fed up with the story and decides to seize control of it herself, placing herself in an authorial position (or alt-author) so that she can steer the ship to the direction she that believes is best for everyone. ultimately, however, she fails, and gets herself re-killed by the condesce, a puppet of the real authorial avatar (english). the gendered interpretation of this is that a woman, she can girlboss (translation: be a woman in a man's position) as hard as she wants, but can never achieve true power under the patriarchy. she can play author all she wants (and hurt people along the way) but will never be allowed into the Boys Club

now, this doesn't mean that trying to be in a masculine position means a character is masculine (or even truly wants to be). but it's clear that she wants to be an author, she wants to know everything, she wants to wield the sword, all symbols of oppressive masculinity. and ONE(!!!!!) OF the ways to subvert/break that expectation is to figure out how to be true to yourself by reclaiming and embodying masculinity without succumbing the perpetuation of the patriarchy (which, coincidentally (or perhaps, not coincidentally?) is part of the basis for my transmasc reading of dirk, something i think he's forced to grapple with as well)

again, not my true + perfect vision that i'll die for or anything. just an interesting thought to speculate on

[relaxxattack]

Piggybacking off the last anon, what is it you like about Jane so much? I find my feelings on her kind of mixed but I lean towards positive.

okay i haven’t read act six in probably like 5 years so bear with me here. *cracks knuckles*

jane is sooo so interesting and it’s really a shame people miss like everything fun about her.

pre-scratch she used her detective work to literally succeed at tearing down the crocker cooperation, to the point that HIC has to fucking abandon ship and head into another universe to have another shot at her evil empire. pre-scratch jane is also fucking hilarious! if you didnt enjoy her antics with john as nannasprite you must just have no heart

meanwhile HIC breaches a new universe, and her FIRST fucking order of business is to NEUTRALIZE JANE CROCKER because of how goddamn detrimental she was to HIC’s plans the first time around.

not ONLY does HIC pump subliminal messaging and brainwashing into nearly every aspect of jane’s life, she also tries to straight up mind control her basically whenever possible! she ALSO sends assassination attempts after jane 24/7! (people will seriously try to say that jane lived a safe normal life… as if she wasn’t almost killed by walking into her backyard.) this is because HIC is fucking scared of jane, as she very well should be!

jane is also NOT a boring weepy annoying crybaby like everyone and their mother complains about. jane is literally the most fucking supportive friend and emotion-repressing dumbass you could ever hope to meet. jane combines john’s emotional repression and jade’s intentional cheerfulness together into one of the most fucked up cases of emotional repression in the whole comic

act 6 suffers from a LOT of shitty writing choices, but it’s not jane’s fault the whole act turns into a soap opera— and she’s ALSO not the only one who acts all soap-opera-y either! literally all of the alpha kids suffer from this, people just like jane the least so they project it all onto her. despite the fact that she did her very fucking best to NEVER talk about her feelings, to the point where she ONLY started telling people about shit when she was mind-controlled or took mind altering substances to make her do so! and you can say “ohhh that’s stupid she shouldn’t repress things in the first place how dumb” but, one she’s sixteen, and two, everyone eats that shit up when it comes from like. literally any other character.

people (cough hs2 writers) act like she would actually be “pushy” with a relationship on jake— as if she wasn’t literally the one who helped him make the decision to explore dating dirk?? because she thought it was the right thing to do???

jane is incredibly thoughtful and mature and people really throw all of those traits out of the window with preference for a version of the story where she Comes Inbetween Their Fave Gay Pairing as if she wasn’t, again, the one who got them together. jane is also extremely interesting in terms of queerness; she’s got the makings of a really interesting arc, not to mention she’s the only human girl that dresses mainly masc! there’s a lot there that people just don’t care to explore.

people just have less patience for the prospit kids in general. not to mention homestuck fans love to be misogynistic and berate jane for stuff they love the men doing, or claim she’s coming between them when she’s not, etc etc. and then because no one was writing fun meta posts about her, nobody ever rereads the comic to grab little scenes or lines to expand the online discussion about her! and then because there’s no discussion about her, people assume she’s boring and don’t go looking for bits to start discussing, which cycles on and on forever until we have the ripple effects we see of that misogyny today. which mostly consists of, “oh i hate jane because she was a villain is hs2”, or, “i know hs2 isn’t canon but i still don’t care for jane because she doesn’t do anything that interests me.” (and she’s only not interesting because of the cycle i mentioned before causing NO ONE to have meta discussion about her).

idk, it’s been a while since ive read so i could be talking out my ass but that’s what i’ve got.

TL;DR: jane is fucking COOL, she just suffers from intentional fandom ignorance. and she’s also a canonically hot, fat, masc woman, so i don’t know what else you could possibly want.

[bunbunsophy]

two guys before the horrors and discovering the Cursed Puppet

[first illustration uses a pose reference by @albanenechi]

[yanderes-galore]

OKAY FINAL REQUEST FOR NOW FROM ME. yandere Bro Strider headcanons? Reader is either a teacher of Dave's or his doctor from a callout appointment, either way someone Dave holds at a high regard in a sense, for how Bro would meet them perhaps. I feel like Bro could be a bit of an unstable yandere, like really nice at times but can be suddenly really mean and uncaring of their own comfort at others. I still want to kiss him though ):

Oooo, Bro content? I can try my hand at this >:D Sorry if he came off too harsh, I was trying to keep it from being OOC I guess.

Yandere! Bro Strider Concept

Pairing: Romantic/Platonic

Possible Trigger Warnings: Gender-Neutral Darling, Obsession, Mentions of child neglect because Homestuck canon, Manipulation, Stalking, Kidnapping, Violence, Murder implied, Forced companionship, Blood.

I'm going to start this off by saying in canon Bro is definitely a horrible parent/brother/guardian.

He isn't the most empathetic person and sees taking care of Dave as some sort of game, usually being overly harsh to prepare him for something.

Bro is very monotone and quiet most of the time.

He plays mind games and is unusually fast and stealthy.

However, even though Bro teaches Dave through harsh methods (such as physical violence and neglect....), he most likely cares for him somewhat.

Which means Dave no doubt has either a teacher or a doctor he sees for the sake of this concept. Maybe even a babysitter.

This could be where you come in.

Dave no doubt ends up attached to you due to the contrast between you and Bro.

You're nicer, keep him fed, and don't subject him to painful levels of... irony?

Bro seems like a yandere who'd be hard to read or even tell he has an obsession.

Far as you know he's just Dave's guardian, you don't have any connections beside taking care of Dave.

Wrong.

Bro isn't very vocal about his obsession so it brews while you're unaware.

He's perfectly capable of stalking due to his stealth and no doubt uses Dave against you.

Bro knows you care about Dave and often invites you over for something involving Dave.

Tutoring, Check ups, Extra care...

Things like that.

You don't mind since Dave is such a good kid with you.

I personally see Bro as an unpredictable yet calm yandere.

He's caring towards you at times while at others he may act like you did something wrong.

The biggest thing in this dynamic is the fact Dave is a bargaining chip.

You'll find out how Bro treats him at some point and may feel obligated to watch over the kid.

Which leaves you vulnerable to Bro's tactics of getting you close to him.

It's hard to tell his emotions at times, very similar to his post-scratch self.

He appears platonic but could very well mean romantic.

He isn't the most expressive.

Eye contact doesn't help as he barely removes those glasses of his.

In some strange way Bro cares for you like he does Dave.

He appears a bit blind to if he's hurting someone he cares about though.

For example, he has no issues with kidnapping you or taking a sword to those he hates around you.

He could be covered in blood and expects it to be okay because he did it for you since he cares.

He's not the worst Homestuck yandere but he's pretty bad due to his lack of empathy and tendency to do whatever the hell he wants.

I feel him hurting his darling is partially accidental yet also because he feels he's doing the best for you.

Kidnapping you and locking you in his room is for safety, right?

It's like he's selectively oblivious?

He chooses not to care sometimes when you're in distress.

If anything you're closest to Dave and are scared of the stuff the kid deals with.

I don't want to say everything about Bro is bad though.

Most of it is, don't get me wrong on that.

When he isn't pretending nothing is wrong, he's affectionate.

He holds you, pets your head, tries to make you feel comfortable and wanted.

He even praises how you take care of Dave.

He trains him... you provide care.

Bro's intentions unknown but they appear to be similar to Dirk.

But he's so harsh with it.

Bro's obsession is the definition of tough love.

He feels to protect you and Dave he has to do what he's doing now...

Even if it means neglecting your wants and needs at times for his own selfish interests.

[conceptofjoy]

jakey's... interesting. set up to be a colonizer with the last name english, her gender roles were established by HIC pre scratch and then elaborated on by the world around them.

what i take from beta gramps is that he was someone with a fragile ego, put on the air of someone important and powerful, used intimidation to avoid further confrontation, and never had any meaningful relationships in his entire life. yk, like a real man. having many children and owning multiple properties? he kept telling himself he was doing right. then he died and the only person at his funeral was his fuckin 5 year old granddaughter.

trickster mode jake didn't need alcohol like roxy did, she was just repeatedly telling themself that "everyone could have a piece of him" disassociated out his goddamn mind.

i dunno, it just feels like prescratch jake was trying to prove something by searching for adventure (running from HIC, who was in charge of his assimilation). looking for importance in (pretending to) being a "white man" then convincing himself that this was what he's always wanted. and when he was done with that then he was allowed to be "bored" because he's an important fellow and people else where would need his company. there is no brain ghost dirk around, but we can assume what he represents in jake would definitely exist within him anyhow. the continuous soul crushing drive to be a "man" instead of dissecting what he really wants out of life.

[chaoticsorceressztc]

So, seeing as Vriska is Hell Tier now and all, I have come to the conclusion she will be the biggest thorn in Dirk's side yet.

Why? Well if we recall back to Pre-Retcon Ghost Vriska...

We will remember that Dead Vriska once challenged the narrative before. And while this isn't our current Vriska, I get the feeling her involvement with Doc Scratch just MAY give her the edge against a narrative manipulator such as Dirk.

And if we're being honest here? Alt Calliope may have just created something even THEY can't control.

While I know Vriska's "normal now", I'm coping.

Also we know she can still explode on people as seen here:

Also I have no idea if this means she's ok with what Dirk's doing or not...

I hope Vriska sees how horrible Dirk has become and at least stops his interference with the narrative in some way

[ppdoodle]

i return once more....to Showcase: DIRK!!! (AGAIN) BUT PRE-SCRATCH!! don't let this flop yall 😰😰😰