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zememerr · 1 year ago

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Mini analysis of Amity from an autistic perspective

Amity is a character in the Owl House that I was fairly neutral towards when first watching the show. I quite enjoyed scenes whenever she showed up, but that was mainly because I got to see her dynamic with Luz, who is my favorite character. Being neurodivergent myself (autistic and potentially/undiagnosed ADHD) I suppose I had some tiny worries that Luz dating a supposed neurotypical person could be conflicting in a real-world setting. But, that of course begs the question:

Couldn’t Amity be neurodivergent too?

And to that, I’ll simply say yes, I believe she is. The most popular headcanon on this seems to be her being on the autism spectrum, which I personally headcanon. Autistic Amity as a headcanon sees some backlash, but I mainly attribute that to people preferring to stick to strict canon information. Admittedly, when first hearing of the headcanon myself, I didn’t fully agree with it either, but it’s definitely grown on me a lot.

Amity stands out as an autistic rep for me because of her less appealing traits, from a traditional sense. The cultural perspective on autistic people has seen a sudden shift to this near fetishization of “quirkiness,” where traits like stimming and hyperfixations have been uncomfortably romanticized to some degree. I think a good example of this sort of “quirky autistic” archetype is Marcy Wu from Amphibia; she’s a classic adorkable character who wears her eccentricities proudly, almost seeming too good to be true (which obviously Amphibia leverages later to show us Marcy’s… True Colors.) I by no means think Marcy is a bad character, she’s easily my favorite character from Amphibia and I prefer her to Amity as an autistic rep. Nonetheless, I do appreciate what Amity represents as an autistic character a lot in how she differs from someone like Marcy presentation-wise.

Amity starts off as a bold, arrogant top-student with a rigid academic lifestyle. She’s not great at recognizing other’s emotions or communicating her own. She pushes past all of her inner worries to maintain her classic Little Miss Perfect persona for a time. These are not desirable/romanticizable character traits, but they’re among common autistic symptoms. Given her collected, “conforming” attitude most of the time, most viewers, myself included, wouldn’t suspect Amity is autistic on a first watch. In short, early season 1 Amity represents a masking autistic individual. We see Amity slowly deconstruct the toxic lifestyle her family has forced upon her, and make new connections and start to rebuild a broken one (with Willow.) In her own words from Escaping Expulsion, she’s becoming the person she really wants to be.

The same sentiment is also why trans Amity works so well as a headcanon, but maybe I’ll talk about that another time

Amity’s journey throughout the show is about unmasking her own autistic traits through the support of people like Luz. We get to see her become more sensitive (and I use this word as a compliment,) throughout the course of the show to her own benefit and as a boon to those she cares about. The Owl House is a show about celebrating nonconformity, and I’m glad they allow Amity to push away from her restrictive way of living to become her true self, an autistic girl who trips after getting scared in a library.

A common criticism of Amity’s character is that the Lumity dynamic linearizes her character down to the role of “Luz’s girlfriend” and 180s her entire identity. I do believe the show depicts Amity’s development away from her season 1 self more gradually than some fans give her credit for. The power dynamic between her and Willow has an uncomfortable imbalance to it still, and she’ll occasionally make regretful remarks like “I was top student once,” she’s still changing, at times not the most elegantly, and didn’t spontaneously decide to become a new person for the heck of it. On the topic of her focus on Luz, as someone on the spectrum itself, I do think it’s perfectly reasonable. I’m guilty myself of hyperfixating on romantic interests in the past to the point where they’ll become the entire focus of months of my life, I can’t say I blame Amity for having so much attention on Luz. The show does an amazing job at making their relationship healthy and not surplussing angst for easy story conflict (call me boring but I’m a big fan of unproblematic relationships who actually work through things.) Case in point, I think Amity’s common writing concerns work to her benefit from an autistic perspective, it’s allowed me to enjoy her character a lot more, at least.

One last point before I wrap up, I wanted to bring up one of my favorite lines from Amity and how it gives me major autistic vibes, being from Eclipse Lake:

You know, you were right. We do have a lot in common. I grew up thinking everything was an opportunity to justify… existing! But there are people out there who won't make you feel worthless. You just have to let yourself meet them.

I’m mainly interested in one specific word here: existing. The emphasis on “existing” is important given the general profoundness of the rest of her statement. Amity wanted this message to be super inspirational and meaningful to Hunter, but she gets flustered in the middle of it, she’s worried about Luz after all, and gives a superficial choppy ending to one of her sentences. No “opportunity to justify my parents loving me/being content with who I am etc…” just one word, existing. I appreciate this line because a lot of autistic people, myself included, have incredibly vivid, articulately-crafted dialogues within their heads, and when it comes time to actually say things out loud, it sounds a lot less eloquent to our own dismay. This line for me highlights why I enjoy Amity as an autistic character so much, being flawed in a realistic, relatable way that isn’t traditionally appealing, and that’s ok.

This is the first time I’ve done a Tumblr analysis like this before, let me know what you’ve thought of it, or share it around if it was of interest to you. I have a lot to say about other Owl House characters (and also Marcy,) so I may make extra analyses in the future

#the owl house #toh #lumity #luz noceda #amity blight #toh amity #the owl house amity #headcanon #autism

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