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valle-de-sombra-de-muerte · 14 days

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Homestuck Reread: Act 4, Part 3/4 (p. 1669-1864)

Read the previous post here.

The second half of Act 4 starts here. And oh fuck no, it's the introduction of Hussie's self-insert.

Yes, it is a terrible idea. This whole bit should've died right here.

Hussie proceeds to recap the entire first year of Homestuck which really is just a big waste of time to read. If you're really lost about what's going on, you should just read all my reread posts up to this point instead! Which... actually isn't ideal because I'm not really writing a comprehensive plot summary here. This series of posts is mostly aimed toward people who are already familiar with Homestuck and have read it before. If you tried showing these to someone who has never read the comic before, they'll likely be confused. Err, fuck it, let's move on!

John is rightfully reluctant to listen to Terezi again. He typically shows resistance to commands only when they might put him in life-threatening danger. And since he finally decides to believe Dave's warnings, this counts as one of those situations.

I forgot to mention this in the last post, but Davesprite and Terezi's conversation was the first time "jegus" is used. Some people seem to think that this is the name of a troll analogue to Jesus, but really it's an in-joke between Dave and Terezi that gradually disseminates through their respective friend groups.

John's adversity shatters and he decides to start listening to Terezi again. It really didn't take much for her to convince him to do this. This is hardly portraying Terezi as some kind of "master manipulator." It's just another instance of John being a gullible moron.

Also, this will be the last conversation between John and Terezi until Act 6. Her conversations with the humans will be exclusively limited to Dave until that point. I guess she wasn't so serious about being John's "pal" after all.

Bro what do you mean you decide to name him? That's Rose's cat. You can't go into someone's house and rename their pets.

I do like that Davesprite immediately points out how dumb it was that John decided to listen to Terezi again.

John is such a massive fucking cunt. He's really going to disrespect the guy who saved his life like that? Even apart from that, that's his best friend, or at least supposedly.

Davesprite's reaction is entirely justified here. He's supplying John with useful info, only to be met with disinterested responses and being told to fuck off in favor of the other Dave. I really think "ok" is John's catchphrase, even moreso than Aradia's. Pretty much every time someone tries to talk to him about the game is met with him going "oh ok" or "wow ok" like some kind of spongehead.

This conversation is notable because Dave's entire persona is centered on being detached, aloof, and "cool" but here Davesprite sounds genuinely pissed. He doesn't even care about maintaining the facade because his "best friend" just revealed he doesn't even see him as a person worth talking to.

Dave thinks he can speak on Davesprite's behalf, which he's definitely not qualified to do. He spent four months living in a pointless reality offshoot with the full knowledge that everything in it is a mistake that needs to be rectified. Rose, the one person he had for company in that timeline, had to be essentially killed in order to fix the timeline. And even if there's still a Rose that currently exists, that single version of Rose he spent all those months together with was still destroyed by his actions. Her blood is on his hands.

All this is to say he's definitely not the same person as current Dave. They may share the same memories and past experiences, but everything Davesprite experienced past the point of divergence is uniquely his. He's his own individual.

That "yeah" right before signing off cuts deep. He is sick of John's shit. Not that I imagine John would notice at all.

Davesprite might be the most tragic character in this godforsaken story. Having Rose's death weighing on his conscious, being forced to mutate himself into a ghostly half-bird monstrosity, letting another version of himself live out the rest of "his" life. He did it all for the sake of making sure his friends have a future to live in, but said friends don't respect him or even like talking to him. To them, he's an extraneous copy of their existing friend. He isn't "real."

And the sad thing is that it's not just his friends who think that. Hussie didn't give a shit about him either. Wouldn't it have been crazy if this conflict was explored and Davesprite was a bigger presence in the story? If he was actually acknowledged as part of the team and the other kids had to learn to stop treating him as "the other Dave"

Well too bad because for one thing, Hussie cannot write convincing conflict. If two characters don't like each other, they simply ignore each other and don't speak. So instead of Davesprite being a ever-present source of awkward tension within the group, he's downgraded to an impotent background character. Tough shit, Orange Dave.

Oh yeah, the less said about Davesprite's ultimate end, the better. What a fucking travesty.

Dave really wants John to snoop around Rose's belongings. The little freak. At least he stops short of asking John to rummage through her underwear drawer.

Technically one of the journals does contain "important game stuff" but Dave doesn't know that. I bet he just wants to know if she wrote about him in her journal.

Dave is putting more effort into invading Rose's privacy than just about anything else prior to this point. Obsessed much?

My god, that "come hither" expression. Things are about to get steamy on Derse.

"Whipping Bugwinged Fuckall" is an amazing Kanaya quote.

Oh look, Sollux's first appearance. He and Kanaya should've talked more. It almost feels like they're co-workers and he's the guy she bugs for IT support. It's a fun dynamic.

Also, I guess Alternia has sex offender registries, which makes no sense. I feel like you'd get straight up killed by the drones for much less.

No I didn't leave this page open while the entirety of "Derse Dreamers" played. That would be silly. Also when I said things were gonna get "steamy" I obviously meant they'd get all sweaty from dancing. Jeez, what'd you think I meant? 😇

Cal is kicked out of the party for being a cockblock.

What are these "shenanigans" Davesprite engaged in to get the hammer from Hephaestus? Fuck if we'll ever find out.

Even though the two kingdoms are fated to fight each other and yadda yadda, there doesn't seem to be much enmity between them. WV is able to unify everyone with little effort.

[S] WV?: Rise Up is certainly a flash that exists. It serves as a follow-up to [S] Jack: Ascend, which I also wasn't really too enthused about. I didn't spend much time talking about it in the last post because I couldn't think of anything to comment about it. Which is strange, because you'd think the big flash to celebrate the comic's one year anniversary, as well as the one that introduces the story's main antagonist, would be a bigger spectacle.

But there's no action, no cool shots like in previous flashes, and ultimately Jack's "ascension" comes from the stupid bunny shit and not from any action on his part. The only real highlight of that flash is the killer tune that is "Black". Apart from that, it pales in comparison to previous flashes in the comic. Much of the same can be said about this one. At least "Skaian Skirmish" is a cool track.

When does this ever have a use? Just like with John, the only point of this whole alchemizing montage is to create a new outfit, computer, and weapon for Rose. The rest of these creations are useless junk.

I mention a new outfit, but the true irony is that the kids' best outfits (John's Vriska jacket, Rose's black dress, Dave's raglan shirt, and Jade's uhh... God Tier dress?) aren't even a part of these montages. For the first three, they're all acquired off-screen and we don't even know the recipes for them.

Trailing right behind Rose's montage, Dave gets his as well. Again, nothing of true value gets made here. These montages feel like Hussie padding out the page count. Seriously, who actually enjoys these parts of the comic?

The alchemiter can potentially create body parts, albeit at an exorbitant cost. Could you imagine if this was actually implemented? If one of the characters lost a limb or something and they got an alchemized replacement?

They could've done that with Vriska or Tavros so they wouldn't have had to use robotic prosthetics. Man, that would've been cool.

I like how this is essentially a "secret" SBaHJ page because it isn't available alongside the others and only appears in Homestuck.

The "most important thing"? My gosh, he really wants to get in her business.

Yes, Rose's story is overly florid, verbose slop, but it feels so similar to Hussie's usual prose when he's trying to be descriptive that I'm not even sure if this story is written to be intentionally pompous or not.

Has Hussie ever tried submitting something for the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, the contest to write the worst possible opening paragraph for a novel? I'd bet he'd win without trying. (If you've never heard of this before, look it up and go to the website to read the winning entries. They're hilarious.)

It is rather sweet that Dave likes the story enough to want to read more of it later, though.

Dave is able to figure out Mom Lalonde's intentions simply because he knows Rose well enough to tell when she's being dramatic. See, Dave doesn't even need to read Rose's journal to discover her true thoughts. He already sees through her well enough already (and she likewise sees through his act just as clearly).

The fact that Rose remembers "some things" about her previous self's existence sounds like something that should be investigated further, instead of being written off so abruptly.

Or is that "ok cool" a defense mechanism on Davesprite's part? Maybe talking to Rose is too painful for him, because she's not "his" Rose. Even if she retains all the memories from the future, she'll still never be the same Rose he left behind.

I really wish this was explored more. Davesprite and Rose never talk again after this conversation and it drives me insane. What if he actually tried pressing further about what she remembers about the timeline, trying to seek out remnants of "his" Rose? He could be trying in vain to reconnect with her, to apologize about leaving her to die, but all that ever happens is that he gets rebuffed.

And Rose might recall the moments she shared with another Dave in another timeline, but stamps them out as she continues to focus on the present and as she grows closer with Kanaya. Perhaps revisiting those memories of the doomed timeline, reliving the loneliness leading up to her demise, are too painful to recall. And Davesprite is a living reminder of them, so she pushes him away to make herself forget.

If only Hussie could write convincing and earnest tragedy. We were utterly robbed.

Dave makes it seem like Jade is the one who's going to freak out about the body. But somehow I doubt the girl who lives with the corpse of her grandfather, along with other taxidermied creatures, on permanent display is going to be fazed by another dead body. Yeah, I'm thinking Dave is the one who doesn't want to keep looking at his own corpse.

Also, I never noticed DD hanging out on the I-beam before. That's a neat detail.

This part of the Act is admittedly fun. Could it be because a lot of it had a healthy focus on Rose and Dave? It's amazing how much nicer the comic is to read when the focus is put on the stronger characters.

Unfortunately I already know that the next few upcoming pages are going to be one of my least favorite parts of the comic, so I'm not terribly looking forward to wrapping up this Act next week...

Read the next post here.

#homestuck #homestuck reread #john egbert #terezi pyrope #davesprite #dave strider #rose lalonde #daverose #kanaya maryam #sollux captor #wayward vagabond #jack noir

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