thedemonscrawler

[thedemonscrawler]

THAT I have no idea on XD Because it really could go either way. Since Davis plays both Dark Sun and Ruin, he could have planned it out that far, at least in a sketchy sort of way. Or he and Reed could have decided that there was a lot of fun to be had in sticking Ruin where Nexus could bully him, and Davis only came up with "and then he puts a bomb in Nexus" at a later point, and it fit into what they'd already done.

But however it was planned out, it turned out quite neatly!

God like over half a year later and it takes me plotting out a fanfic to finally realize why Dark Sun grabbed Ruin.

Ruin was insurance.

Okay so, Ruin finds i think what was supposed to be Dark Sun's dimension, goes to investigate and finds a badly damaged Moon. He chooses to put that Moon out of his misery, and in doing so ends up trapped in the same cell.

Or, flip it the other way--

Dark Sun baited a trap with a badly damaged Moon as a test, to see if Ruin was capable of killing a Moon who was "too far gone".

And Ruin passes. Just as Dark Sun hoped.

Because Ruin is who killed Nexus. Not Sun, but Ruin, by planting a bomb in Nexus' chest that went off when Sun used magic on him. And I'm certain a good portion of it was sheer spite (another reason to hand Ruin's leash to the man who hates his guts, to build resentment between them) but Ruin cannot act on purely selfish motives. He has to believe that he's doing some sliver of good with his actions.

And poor Nexus, half-dead from wither addiction anyway? A threat to himself and others, and a threat that would just get worse? Well, killing him would be a mercy, wouldn't it?

So yeah. Sun's choice was even more of a farce than it appeared to be. Nexus was always the one that was chosen to die, by whatever means Dark Sun could engineer.

[thedemonscrawler]

God like over half a year later and it takes me plotting out a fanfic to finally realize why Dark Sun grabbed Ruin.

Ruin was insurance.

Okay so, Ruin finds i think what was supposed to be Dark Sun's dimension, goes to investigate and finds a badly damaged Moon. He chooses to put that Moon out of his misery, and in doing so ends up trapped in the same cell.

Or, flip it the other way--

Dark Sun baited a trap with a badly damaged Moon as a test, to see if Ruin was capable of killing a Moon who was "too far gone".

And Ruin passes. Just as Dark Sun hoped.

Because Ruin is who killed Nexus. Not Sun, but Ruin, by planting a bomb in Nexus' chest that went off when Sun used magic on him. And I'm certain a good portion of it was sheer spite (another reason to hand Ruin's leash to the man who hates his guts, to build resentment between them) but Ruin cannot act on purely selfish motives. He has to believe that he's doing some sliver of good with his actions.

And poor Nexus, half-dead from wither addiction anyway? A threat to himself and others, and a threat that would just get worse? Well, killing him would be a mercy, wouldn't it?

So yeah. Sun's choice was even more of a farce than it appeared to be. Nexus was always the one that was chosen to die, by whatever means Dark Sun could engineer.

[thedemonscrawler]

adding to this is that I still want Ruin to be a cunty little bitch that makes Eclipse want to tear his rays out. These feelings exist simultaneously

I just wanna like

Put Ruin in a box

I wanna trap him, you know? Which he's been trapped before, so I really want to put him back in a box

And the frustrating thing about Ruin is that he's unflappable. The logical outcome to being stuck with a collar around his neck for so long is that he's numb to it-- his desperation has long since transformed into irritated determination. Even when Nexus went through his head to be an ass about it, Ruin's reaction was basically "oh FUCK you, you asshole". No matter what is done to him, he's had worse.

so i just kind of want to put him back in a box, and I want him to be miserable about it. I want him to feel miserable and hopeless and trapped. I want him to be unable to trust that anyone will care about his situation, to the point of wondering if it's worth the effort of asking for help

And then I want him rescued and hugged

Yknow just basic stuff

[thedemonscrawler]

I just wanna like

Put Ruin in a box

I wanna trap him, you know? Which he's been trapped before, so I really want to put him back in a box

And the frustrating thing about Ruin is that he's unflappable. The logical outcome to being stuck with a collar around his neck for so long is that he's numb to it-- his desperation has long since transformed into irritated determination. Even when Nexus went through his head to be an ass about it, Ruin's reaction was basically "oh FUCK you, you asshole". No matter what is done to him, he's had worse.

so i just kind of want to put him back in a box, and I want him to be miserable about it. I want him to feel miserable and hopeless and trapped. I want him to be unable to trust that anyone will care about his situation, to the point of wondering if it's worth the effort of asking for help

And then I want him rescued and hugged

Yknow just basic stuff

[thedemonscrawler]

man you guys have no idea how lucky you are that I'm primarily a oneshot author

because like, yeah waiting on updates for PS is a pain, but most of what i post is complete. you get the whole thing all at once.

meanwhile, I'm the one sitting there reading through my WIPs and going 'damn I hope the author finishes this' T_T

[thedemonscrawler]

oh yeah check out this fucking spoon I made 8D

[thedemonscrawler]

*Looks at ruin's monty dying on his lover's arms, then looks at solar dying on new moon's arms*

Karma really is a bit#h, wasn't it??

No no, that's what we call a Narrative Parallel.

Because it's the same situation, yeah? You have Ruin's actions that killed one person to save countless others (yes, i know technically it was "ruin killed 5000 dimensions", but we as an audience only care about the one person: Solar).

And now you have Eclipse + Charlie's actions that killed one person to save everyone else.

In both situations the death was unintentional; neither Solar nor Monty were directly targeted, they just happened to die as a result of the larger action. In both situations the person who died understood the motives behind it, and they left behind someone who is not going to take this loss very well.

It becomes more fascinating when it's applied to Ruin, because he's been both the victim of and the driving force behind the tragedy as a whole. He caused the series of events that led to the current dimension being formed, and was also a helpless participant in the destruction that sparked everything in the first place.

This parallels how Moon and the kill code are the spark of... pretty much everything, tbh. Moon leaving the kill code behind created Eclipse, but he only left the kill code behind so that he'd be able to be a better person. He causes the series of events that lead to his being reset, and thus the creation of New Moon.

Ruin is supposed to be a mix of Sun and Moon, but he's very Moon-dominant. And that's why he's counterparts to New Moon/Nexus, why their stories are intertwined. If New Moon's purpose was Eclipse, then Nexus' purpose is Ruin.

So it goes way beyond 'karma is a bitch' and straight into 'strangled by the red string of fate' territory imo

[thedemonscrawler]

Fair fair fair! I kind of overlooked how the show engages with Nexus' arc, and how the fandom reacts to that. Which like-- he's their character, they should be allowed to rag on him (and I have to wonder how much is their own feelings being soured by the fandom's response). But it IS shitty that folks will take that as an excuse to bully others, something that p much everyone else actively does not want. No one is approving of this! Not the writers, not the other fans!

I've got some dim memories of hearing about folks being rude about Eclipse likers (or simps, i think simps was still being used then), yeah. And Sun back during his 'I am going into the woods with a sword and this will definitely solve something' arc.

Liking Nexus and wanting to imagine him getting a redemption arc isn’t cringe, some of you guys are just mean

People go to great lengths to defend their faves, seemingly afraid they’ll get the same treatment Nexus did both by the fans and the series and become the demonised unfavourite - the scapegoat who can do no right. At the same time many insist Nexus and his fans somehow uniquely “deserve” this treatment (Nexus can’t, he’s made up - his fans don’t, some people are just mean) and that these things befell Nexus specifically for an actual reason.

They did.

The reason was the writers wanted something new for the character.

Not him not trying hard enough to grieve better or be a better victim of Ruin’s actions. Not him “liking Solar more than Sun”. Not New Moon being the “worse” choice out of him and Moon (meta reason given is Moon literally came back because they needed a Moon - of course Moon was the better choice out of him and Nexus who was an active threat at the time, the reverse would’ve been true if it’d been New Moon vs Moon with the killcode actively causing damage). Not him being more villainous than Ruin or Eclipse (I am not going to be debating whether genocide or murder is morally better or worse than verbally, psychologically and physically harming a small handful of people, sorry). Not something that was subtly established throughout his entire time as New Moon. Not something that was planned from the start. Just a change in direction. That holds literally no moral weight - that’s not something to hate each other over. The writers are allowed to do that - it also needs to be understood as being a writing decision that, although it was retroactively woven into the narrative to some degree, was made on a whim.

It could’ve more or less been any character this happened to. It still could happen to basically any of them. They’re made up, they don’t make their own choices, they don’t get to fight against what the writers want, they don’t get to make appeals on narrative decisions. You’re not watching a documentary of a fictional world where in-story choices aren’t made for a meta narrative reason - sometimes writing decisions are made on the fly due to the nature of the medium. And when the characters’ choices don’t fit within the established narrative aside from to be a change for the sake of change (literally the meta reason given for Nexus going evil) and the in-story reason that has been repeatedly established for the entire villain arc is literally psychosis plus ingesting a substance that made the character in question quite literally lose his mind as demonstrated and explained by multiple other characters - both mitigating factors that didn’t need to be included if they weren’t supposed to be taken into account when considering how this character got to where he got - when his villain arc alone required a mastermind interloper character to step in and manipulate his every step into villainy, his decisions can’t be reasonably treated as 100% informed or as part of his established in-story disordered “personality”, because we already know they happened because they needed to happen for the story to progress the way the writers wanted it to, and yet still effort was put into heavily mitigating his ability to make good choices, which shouldn’t just be written off or ignored because you want to bash the character or make his fans feel bad for liking him.

More food for thought: Nexus isn’t blameless or a good guy. He’s done bad things. Despite Dark Sun’s involvement, despite the nsp, despite the grief, despite the psychosis. You don’t have to like him, pretend to find him good or interesting, or give him a pass. You can hate his guts. But you know who else was unequivocally considered a bad guy who didn’t deserve a pass at the time he died (twice, maybe three times in fact)? Eclipse. You know who accomplished more damaging acts of villainy and had just as bad or worse intentions than Nexus at the time of his death(s)? Eclipse.

And the difference between the two - the thing that sees Nexus written off as an irredeemable “psychopath” (respectfully, both this and “narcissist” are misappropriated terms for stigmatised disorders so it’s best not to use them in this circumstance btw) while Eclipse is now praised for taking all these steps in the right direction - is that the writers chose to give Eclipse a redemption arc and they didn’t choose to go down that route with Nexus. Nexus was not more uniquely “deserving” of being the narrative unfavourite or the scapegoat. He just wasn’t chosen to get better - he wasn’t allowed to do better. That could have been Eclipse. That could have been Ruin. In this case it was Nexus. Like it or not, that’s just simply how it happened.

I’m allowed to care about that and imagine more possibilities. You’re allowed to not care about that and dislike him. You don’t get a pass for bullying people over it.

There is literally no good reason to demonise Nexus or his fans more than any other character or keep telling them what he is or isn’t “capable of” or “correct” them and laugh at them for imagining alternative outcomes they might like better. The canonical answer is: he’s not capable of anything anymore, he’s not in the story. The non-canonical answer is: let people use their own imaginations, especially when the writers have decided they don’t want to or have chosen not to use this character anymore. That’s not a diss on them. It is what it is.

Have you seen the DCA fandom? The DCA isn’t canonically a mermaid or a spy or a god or anyone’s love interest. The DCA doesn’t get adopted in canon. No one let that stop them from having fun, and honestly power to them for their creativity and acceptance even when they disagree. Imagination isn’t cringe - it’s a good thing. It’s great that people enjoy this character that much actually. We all have stuff we like and dislike and don’t care about and that’s a-okay. There’s a difference between that and constantly derailing people’s fun to say rude insulting things about the thing they like while they’re trying to talk about it. You’re not hurting Nexus - Nexus isn’t real, he isn’t capable of being hurt. You’re hurting real people for the crime of liking a made up character in a way you don’t like or agree with. Say what you like about things being cringe - that’s worse than cringe. I don’t care how badly you want to find someone or a group of people you can say it’s acceptable to bully for some reason. You’re not being cute and sassy, you’re just being mean. People are allowed to harmlessly enjoy themselves (especially if their fave happened to draw the short end of the stick in canon) even if you don’t like it or find it annoying - please give other people that level of consideration at least.

(And no I won’t be derailing this to debate Nexus’ morality or whether you think that I’m somehow saying he didn’t make any of his own choices or didn’t do anything wrong (tl;dr I didn’t). Respectfully, this post is about meta narrative analysis and fandom meanness and how yes, basically any character could’ve been and could still be Nexus’d.)

[thedemonscrawler]

I 100% agree with this, and I wanted to add on two points to the meta-analysis

Eclipse didn't get his redemption arc until after his death. Narratively, Nexus' whole arc is equivalent to Eclipse's first two lives, something that ended rather famously at the wrong end of a space laser. He wasn't redeemed within the scope of his initial plot. He didn't deserve redemption at that point in his story, and he didn't get it. Only after he had stopped being an antagonist was he eligible for redemption, because his plotline as the bad guy was over.

Eclipse didn't wake up one day as a better person. He woke up as a depressed, bitter, aimless bastard who got dragged inside like a sick feral cat because he no longer had a reason to be an antagonist. That was his role shift that made it possible for a redemption to be believable.

You know who else was eligible to be redeemed due to a weakened antagonistic motive, and were passed over? Bloodmoon. Their story was at a point where they could have been picked to calm down and be domesticated, yet the writers didn't want that direction for them. Because, like Fable said-- they're characters in a story. They have roles.

I will challenge one point in the post, and that's calling Nexus the 'narrative unfavorite or scapegoat'. In a story the narrative unfavorite is the character who isn't written or is pushed aside.

And unfortunately for Nexus, he was a favorite. The writers wanted to focus a plot on him, and they wanted to focus a tragic plot on him. Again, like Fable said, this was a decision that could have been made for any of the characters, because it's a story and stories have tragic plots. It's a decision that will be made for more characters, even if the execution is different.

And like... the whole point of fanworks are that they're transformative works. Fanfiction is literally looking at canon and going 'mmm but what if it was different'. Of course there are people who want to come up with a redemption arc for Nexus-- there's nothing cringe about that! There are people that wanted Eclipse redeemed way before the show did it. There are people that want Bloodmoon redeemed, or Solar's Moon, or any other antagonist.

So like. Don't be dicks about it? Let people play in their sandboxes?

We all have stuff we like and dislike and don’t care about and that’s a-okay. There’s a difference between that and constantly derailing people’s fun to say rude insulting things about the thing they like while they’re trying to talk about it.

Liking Nexus and wanting to imagine him getting a redemption arc isn’t cringe, some of you guys are just mean

People go to great lengths to defend their faves, seemingly afraid they’ll get the same treatment Nexus did both by the fans and the series and become the demonised unfavourite - the scapegoat who can do no right. At the same time many insist Nexus and his fans somehow uniquely “deserve” this treatment (Nexus can’t, he’s made up - his fans don’t, some people are just mean) and that these things befell Nexus specifically for an actual reason.

They did.

The reason was the writers wanted something new for the character.

Not him not trying hard enough to grieve better or be a better victim of Ruin’s actions. Not him “liking Solar more than Sun”. Not New Moon being the “worse” choice out of him and Moon (meta reason given is Moon literally came back because they needed a Moon - of course Moon was the better choice out of him and Nexus who was an active threat at the time, the reverse would’ve been true if it’d been New Moon vs Moon with the killcode actively causing damage). Not him being more villainous than Ruin or Eclipse (I am not going to be debating whether genocide or murder is morally better or worse than verbally, psychologically and physically harming a small handful of people, sorry). Not something that was subtly established throughout his entire time as New Moon. Not something that was planned from the start. Just a change in direction. That holds literally no moral weight - that’s not something to hate each other over. The writers are allowed to do that - it also needs to be understood as being a writing decision that, although it was retroactively woven into the narrative to some degree, was made on a whim.

It could’ve more or less been any character this happened to. It still could happen to basically any of them. They’re made up, they don’t make their own choices, they don’t get to fight against what the writers want, they don’t get to make appeals on narrative decisions. You’re not watching a documentary of a fictional world where in-story choices aren’t made for a meta narrative reason - sometimes writing decisions are made on the fly due to the nature of the medium. And when the characters’ choices don’t fit within the established narrative aside from to be a change for the sake of change (literally the meta reason given for Nexus going evil) and the in-story reason that has been repeatedly established for the entire villain arc is literally psychosis plus ingesting a substance that made the character in question quite literally lose his mind as demonstrated and explained by multiple other characters - both mitigating factors that didn’t need to be included if they weren’t supposed to be taken into account when considering how this character got to where he got - when his villain arc alone required a mastermind interloper character to step in and manipulate his every step into villainy, his decisions can’t be reasonably treated as 100% informed or as part of his established in-story disordered “personality”, because we already know they happened because they needed to happen for the story to progress the way the writers wanted it to, and yet still effort was put into heavily mitigating his ability to make good choices, which shouldn’t just be written off or ignored because you want to bash the character or make his fans feel bad for liking him.

More food for thought: Nexus isn’t blameless or a good guy. He’s done bad things. Despite Dark Sun’s involvement, despite the nsp, despite the grief, despite the psychosis. You don’t have to like him, pretend to find him good or interesting, or give him a pass. You can hate his guts. But you know who else was unequivocally considered a bad guy who didn’t deserve a pass at the time he died (twice, maybe three times in fact)? Eclipse. You know who accomplished more damaging acts of villainy and had just as bad or worse intentions than Nexus at the time of his death(s)? Eclipse.

And the difference between the two - the thing that sees Nexus written off as an irredeemable “psychopath” (respectfully, both this and “narcissist” are misappropriated terms for stigmatised disorders so it’s best not to use them in this circumstance btw) while Eclipse is now praised for taking all these steps in the right direction - is that the writers chose to give Eclipse a redemption arc and they didn’t choose to go down that route with Nexus. Nexus was not more uniquely “deserving” of being the narrative unfavourite or the scapegoat. He just wasn’t chosen to get better - he wasn’t allowed to do better. That could have been Eclipse. That could have been Ruin. In this case it was Nexus. Like it or not, that’s just simply how it happened.

I’m allowed to care about that and imagine more possibilities. You’re allowed to not care about that and dislike him. You don’t get a pass for bullying people over it.

There is literally no good reason to demonise Nexus or his fans more than any other character or keep telling them what he is or isn’t “capable of” or “correct” them and laugh at them for imagining alternative outcomes they might like better. The canonical answer is: he’s not capable of anything anymore, he’s not in the story. The non-canonical answer is: let people use their own imaginations, especially when the writers have decided they don’t want to or have chosen not to use this character anymore. That’s not a diss on them. It is what it is.

Have you seen the DCA fandom? The DCA isn’t canonically a mermaid or a spy or a god or anyone’s love interest. The DCA doesn’t get adopted in canon. No one let that stop them from having fun, and honestly power to them for their creativity and acceptance even when they disagree. Imagination isn’t cringe - it’s a good thing. It’s great that people enjoy this character that much actually. We all have stuff we like and dislike and don’t care about and that’s a-okay. There’s a difference between that and constantly derailing people’s fun to say rude insulting things about the thing they like while they’re trying to talk about it. You’re not hurting Nexus - Nexus isn’t real, he isn’t capable of being hurt. You’re hurting real people for the crime of liking a made up character in a way you don’t like or agree with. Say what you like about things being cringe - that’s worse than cringe. I don’t care how badly you want to find someone or a group of people you can say it’s acceptable to bully for some reason. You’re not being cute and sassy, you’re just being mean. People are allowed to harmlessly enjoy themselves (especially if their fave happened to draw the short end of the stick in canon) even if you don’t like it or find it annoying - please give other people that level of consideration at least.

(And no I won’t be derailing this to debate Nexus’ morality or whether you think that I’m somehow saying he didn’t make any of his own choices or didn’t do anything wrong (tl;dr I didn’t). Respectfully, this post is about meta narrative analysis and fandom meanness and how yes, basically any character could’ve been and could still be Nexus’d.)

[thedemonscrawler]

Adding my two cents into the ring cos oof oof ouch Ruin my beloved, he never stood a chance

Because he'd made a new life in the new dimension. 100% these folks ARE his friends-- but he's also deeply, deeply hurt that he was put into a position where he had to choose his new life or his old one, something that wasn't actually a choice because he Could Not live with himself if he didn't TRY to save Monty. And he's hurt because by nature of the situation, his friends HAD to pressure him to give up. They weren't going to place a stranger's life above their own. No one wanted him to do this. No one was going to honestly support him.

So now you've got this wedge of Ruin's decision in there, where he's putting everyone's life at risk for this sliver of a chance-- and he fails. as he tells Eclipse: "You got your cure. And I've lost everything." He failed Monty again. He failed his friends again. He still didn't manage to save any lives, he still didn't manage to help anyone. He actively made things worse.

Cos Ruin is so so so desperate to be something other than what he believes he is: a mistake. A virus. He hurt countless people for the greater good, he killed children with his own hands to save his own skin. He wants to believe he can be something else and maybe have an actual life now, he just wants to have something good in his life-- and he failed. He couldn't save the last pieces of his life as Eclipse.

He's just Ruin, now.

And of course he's going to lash out and seek revenge-- we KNOW he can be a petty, selfish person. He can't fix things, so he's going to turn to the only thing he knows will work: destruction. He's a different sort of Eclipse, but he's still an Eclipse. Sun's determination and Moon's selfishness.

But like... what else is he supposed to do? Shrug his shoulders and say "oh well" about the boyfriend who died in his arms? Apologize for being desperate, for caring about someone that he'd hurt before?

My mans is drowning in grief here, and i can only hope that he makes it to the other side of this intact, because i doubt he'll have anyone helping him QQ

[thedemonscrawler]

He haunted a sidewalk outside of a coffee shop in Atlanta for a brief period of time <3

[thedemonscrawler]

I was hoping to get chapter 19 finished BEFORE the end of May, but Beggars butted in and got finished first 8'D But I'm back from my trip so that means i can start back working on it!

all things considerd, it's probably a reasonable worry for Vanny

[thedemonscrawler]

Happy Birthday, Ruin (2160 words) by thedemonsurfer Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Five Nights at Freddy's, The Sun and Moon Show (Web Series) Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Cured Ruin Eclipse & Eclipse (Security Breach Shows - Web Series) Characters: Cured Ruin Eclipse (Security Breach Shows - Web Series), Eclipse (Security Breach Shows - Web Series) Additional Tags: Angst, Hugs, Fluff, Eclipse cares but is mean about it, Symbolism through terrible baked goods, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I wasn't going to write this but WHOOPS, Everyone Needs A Hug, and a nap, Ruin is feeling catty, Eclipse isn't much better, Ruin's Monty is here but adding about as much to the conversation as the cupcake Summary:

Fans ticking up in the imitation of a sigh, he holds the box out towards Ruin with stiff arms. “Take it.”

Ruin visibly flinches, though the small white cube doesn't come anywhere near him. After a moment of just staring at it, he moves his gaze to Eclipse. “Extremely unsubtle. I thought you were more clever than that.”

---

June 5th is Ruin's birthday. Eclipse remembers.

HEY I STILL HATE TRYING TO FORMAT ON MY PHONE I'm going to have to make my own HTML to display fic links I stg

Anyway. Semi-counterpart to Happy Birthday, Eclipse! Only less IC and more squish >u< ordinarily I'd have waited until the actual date, but as I don't even know if Ruin is gonna still be on EAPS after May, I decided to post it now.

[thedemonscrawler]

Read Chapter 16 Here!

Things get worse.

---

Well, it's not chapter 19, but at least another chapter has a cover!

[thedemonscrawler]

Chapters: 4/4 Fandom: Five Nights at Freddy's, The Sun and Moon Show (Web Series) Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Eclipse (Sun and Moon Show), Ruin Eclipse (Sun and Moon Show), Moon (Five Nights at Freddy's), Solar | Nice Eclipse (Security Breach Shows - Web Series) Additional Tags: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Comfort, Hugs, Ruin is having a Time Of It, so is Eclipse, look I just think they both deserve a hug, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, this was not the oneshot I thought I'd be posting first, accidentally no longer a oneshot, Derealization, Disassociation, mild on both counts, but Eclipse 3.0 is not okay, we solve problems with hugs here, Moon gets +1 chill the fuck out, Canon Compliant, Canon Parallel?, canon taking the highway rather than the freeway to get to the same destination, Eclipse 3.0 is now Eclipse 4.0, Eclipse 4.0 is REALLY not okay

Chapter 4 - Report/Empty Chamber Report: 1. give a spoken or written account of something that one has observed, heard, done, or investigated. 2. a sudden loud noise of or like an explosion or gunfire Eclipse dies. Eclipse comes back. Ruin is not nearly as bothered by this as he probably should be.

[thedemonscrawler]

It's really not all that surprising that the Daycare Attendant ended up being so popular, to the point that there's a whole subsection of FNAF fandom that's p much just the DCA.

For starters, there's Security Breach itself. Security Breach is a vastly different FNAF game from its predecessors. Instead of being a jumpscare-driven task management simulator, it is a free-roam exploration and puzzle game, also with jumpscares. Instead of a security guard with their butt glued to their office chair, you're playing as a kid trapped in the mall. That difference in format and story setup attracted a whole new crowd of players to FNAF.

Next is character design. Unlike the majority of animatronics in the killer robot furry franchise, the DCA is a lanky, vaguely human shaped jester with a dinnerplate head and a creepy fixed smile. That appeals to folks who might not be as much into the robot furries, but like lanky creepy jesters (I am one of those people).

Security Breach also FINALLY develops the animatronics into actual characters, rather than interchangeable jumpscares. It's not a coincidence that prior to SB, the most popular animatronic was Springtrap-- an animatronic outright possessed by the defacto main antagonist of the series. I still remember the sheer fuzzy excitement upon hearing the first teaser trailer where we found out that we would be playing as a kid and that Freddy was our friend. That's still so cool! Freddy is our friend!

But character is where the Daycare Attendant really blows everyone else out of the water.

Sun is, after Freddy and Vanessa, the NPC with the most lines of dialogue (ten). Sun and Vanessa are the only antagonists that speak directly to Gregory, rather than just having vague hunting lines. For comparison, of the Glamrocks only Roxy has a single line of interaction with another animatronic ("Get out of my room, Freddy!") and her pep talk in the mirror at the start of the game. Monty and Chica might as well be interchangeable, both only having hunting lines.

Hell, out of Moon's nineteen voice lines, eight of them are laughs, blowing away Vanny's whopping two lines in the entire game.

Sun is the only* FNAF antagonist that does not have a jumpscare sting when he grabs Gregory, and is one of the few antagonists that does not kill the player upon jumpscaring them. Sun is outright non-hostile towards Gregory, coming off as overbearing but genuinely friendly. In a FNAF game.

Kellen Goff's phenomenal voice acting further fleshes out the DCA's character, giving us solid foundations for their personalities. Sun is anxious, friendly, and bossy. Moon is a downright giggle gremlin, sadistic and playful. Both of them are childish, and the contrast between their personalities and their job as child caretakers makes them stand out even more.

It's also worth mentioning that the Daycare is one of the earliest sections of the game, easily reached within the first thirty minutes of playtime. This makes it very likely to have been seen by people who either ended up not finishing the game itself, or any let's play series they were watching. It's also one of the most complete sections of the game, with clear, easy to understand mechanics and a decent challenge, making it more enjoyable to play than some of the later puzzles.

So, yeah. Why wouldn't there be a whole subsection of fandom built around some of the most well developed and interesting characters in the entire franchise, from an installment that attracted a new crowd of people who were probably already looking for something different from the traditional FNAF experience?

*As far as I know there are no other FNAF animatronics that perform a jumpscare animation without an accompanying sound, but it's not impossible that there's someone in UCN that I've overlooked.

[thedemonscrawler]

Said this on Discord but wanted to say it here too--

hhhh i just. love sitting with Ruin in his misery and self-pity about his life prior to being 'cured'. it's what HE'S the most focused on. Other folks are concerned about the whole lying and dimensions snapping thing. Ruin is concerned about "the Creator twisted my arm into killing children to save my own life and I did it"