Homesuck: Vriska Rising

[Solid Snake]

Originally Posted by POS Industries

Well, we don't really know how long the two of them have been running around together. Given the "time doesn't really exist" nature of the Furthest Ring, it could have been quite a few years, and Tavros might have grown into the jackass he was always meant to be, or spending so much time with Vriska in an environment where she wasn't ACTIVELY abusing him had a negative impact on his personality.

I don't disagree with the underlying logic here, but it tends to run into the same trap that tends to underline a lot of my criticism of Homestuck as a whole (and it sounds like we share a similar criticism here, but I wouldn't limit it solely to the timeskip), which is that Hussie often demands his readers to make an endless number of unsubstantiated assumptions, then criticizes his readers for failing to grasp what was obvious to him and maybe that one other fanatic but has no substantial foundation in anything that's actually been told or shown to the reader.

Great writers toy with timeskips and other narrative devices that affect chronology all the time, but they make sure their readers are informed along the way so that major tonal shifts and shifts in character's personality traits and whatnot are justifiable within the narrative.

In this case, when Hussie's established that Vriska has abused, tormented and ultimately killed Tavros, there's kind of an important gap here where Hussie needs to flesh out why Tavros has suddenly completely changed his mind regarding feelings for Vriska, before expecting people who were otherwise completely disconcerted with Vriska's past treatment of a disabled / handicapped individual (who she inflicted said harms to) to feel completely okay with a sudden influx of redrom feelings from the abused to the abuser.

I mean I feel pretty squicky about it and I've never been a victim of abuse, I worry about how people who've actually been abused might interpret this as rather insensitive.

EDIT: On that note I'll quickly add that something that's sort of bothered me regarding Vriska and Tavros in general is that Andrew's narrative strongly implies a greater sympathy from the author towards the abuser than the abused, insofar as I feel that the majority of their story has either been told from Vriska's biased perspective, or insofar as Vriska's past misdeeds and abuse are sown alongside 'justifications' in the form of excuses for her behavior -- ranging from "It's just troll culture, and troll culture is different than human culture so we can't really judge her" to "But Tavros is kind of a selfish idiot, too" to "But Vriska's so badass!" even "But she's changed now, let's forget what she was like then" -- that just irritate the crap out of me.

EDIT 2: I mean if a foreign culture on Earth engages in -- for example -- an inhumanely misogynistic practice, none of us would ever dare say anything to the effect of "Well it's just their culture, therefore we can't criticize that behavior," so every time I hear that relating to Vriska I just want to snap things.

[POS Industries]

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

In this case, when Hussie's established that Vriska has abused, tormented and ultimately killed Tavros, there's kind of an important gap here where Hussie needs to flesh out why Tavros has suddenly completely changed his mind regarding feelings for Vriska, before expecting people who were otherwise completely disconcerted with Vriska's past treatment of a disabled / handicapped individual (who she inflicted said harms to) to feel completely okay with a sudden influx of redrom feelings from the abused to the abuser.

I agree. And it's kind of totally likely that we'll be getting that explanation shortly, since that's usually always how it goes. A surprising plot twist is revealed, the audience wonders why it happened, an explanation arrives shortly thereafter. This is how it's been for quite a while, and it's entirely probable at this point that this situation will be no different.

But for now I chalk it up to the very simple and firmly established reason of "Tavros is an idiot."

On that note I'll quickly add that something that's sort of bothered me regarding Vriska and Tavros in general is that Andrew's narrative strongly implies a greater sympathy from the author towards the abuser than the abused, insofar as I feel that the majority of their story has either been told from Vriska's biased perspective, or insofar as Vriska's past misdeeds and abuse are sown alongside 'justifications' in the form of excuses for her behavior -- ranging from "It's just troll culture, and troll culture is different than human culture so we can't really judge her" to "But Tavros is kind of a selfish idiot, too" to "But Vriska's so badass!" even "But she's changed now, let's forget what she was like then" -- that just irritate the crap out of me.

I don't feel like that's ever really been the case. The narrative has always been pretty plainly up front about how she's a terrible person. She did horrible things to people and she did face consequences for her actions on a couple occasions, but for the most part things tended to work out for her in the short run because her nature was that of a scheming villain, and that's how things go for scheming villains right up until something they didn't expect happens and they lose. In Vriska's case, it was her assumption that either Terezi wouldn't kill her or, if Terezi did, that she wasn't of the opinion that such a death would be just because she couldn't really see herself for the awful person that she was.

Hussie made the attempt to write her sympathetically, which is a difficult undertaking because it's usually not something that an audience can handle. People like things in black and white. They want their heroes to be unquestionably good and their bad guys to be unsympathetic boogeymen, because that's an easier pill to swallow. With Vriska, we were given a story about someone who had every opportunity to be the hero, who wanted to be the hero, and even saw herself as being the hero, but at every turn she just couldn't actually play that role, because it wasn't in her nature and she can't bring herself to change that fact even if it means her death. She's the old fable of the scorpion, a fact referenced even in her astrological symbol.

But we're seeing all this from her thought process and thinking that it's Hussie telling us she's a good person, when really the point is that it's Vriska constantly trying to reaffirm that she's the heroic main character. But, of course, she isn't. By the end of act 5, she's a footnote, killed unceremoniously and not even referenced in the EoA flash.

Which I think is a very interesting story, but I can see how it can be argued that Hussie maybe didn't quite pull it off as well as a better writer might have. He has some good ideas, but his failures in execution are many.

I mean if a foreign culture on Earth engages in -- for example -- an inhumanely misogynistic practice, none of us would ever dare say anything to the effect of "Well it's just their culture, therefore we can't criticize that behavior," so every time I hear that relating to Vriska I just want to snap things.

I don't like it being an excuse, either. An explanation for how she became that way, certainly, but it doesn't actually mean that she isn't a monster for doing it, and given the fact that everyone else from her own society seems to feel that it doesn't excuse her behavior either, I would have to guess that such a thing coming from her is expected to be taken as full of shit.

[Solid Snake]

Originally Posted by POS Industries

I don't feel like that's ever really been the case.

If you're right and I'm wrong, then I suspect the fault doesn't lie with the actual narrative as much as it lies with a legion of Homestuck readers who have apparently misinterpreted said narrative.
...Because, if the narrative itself isn't siding with the abuser, it's genuinely surprising to see the number of fans who adhere to that interpretation of the narrative. It's honestly easier to believe the narrative itself is flawed than believe that so many people misread it.

(It's also pretty funny how so many of the standard excuses for Vriska's behavior could be readily applied to Eridan, but most who defend Vriska nonetheless use very different, downright humane standards -- based entirely in human cultural standards, not troll culture -- in their condemnations of Eridan's horrific bullshittery.)

And I guess this is a good place for us to stop this conversation because I imagine Vriska's legion of defenders are about to materialize and condemn me for criticizing Vriska again!

EDIT: As for our different diagnoses of Hussie's thematic intentions in writing Vriska, I think -- as usual -- that likely stems from our very different expectations of how Vriska's story will ultimately end.
I'm still convinced Hussie's going to pull something out of his ass to let Vriska 'die' a heroic martyr and/or allow her to have long-term romantic happiness with Tavros or John.
If you're right and Vriska's story ultimately has more of a tragic flavor, I'll probably amend a few things and end up feeling that Vriska was an "Objectively well-crafted character I loved to hate"

[POS Industries]

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

If you're right and I'm wrong, then I suspect the fault doesn't lie with the actual narrative as much as it lies with a legion of Homestuck readers who have apparently misinterpreted said narrative.
...Because, if the narrative itself isn't siding with the abuser, it's genuinely surprising to see the number of fans who adhere to that interpretation of the narrative. It's honestly easier to believe the narrative itself is flawed than believe that so many people misread it.

Homestuck fans being completely unable to understand what's going on in Homestuck and formulating hilariously wrong opinions about it?

What a fucking shocker.

[Revising Ocelot]

Originally Posted by POS Industries

Homestuck fans being completely unable to understand what's going on in Homestuck and formulating hilariously wrong opinions about it?

What a fucking shocker.

At least I don't ship.

[Solid Snake]

But shipping is the best part!

[Locke cole]

Well, here we've got Tavros stuck with Vriska for who knows how long (two years? Less? More? Who the hell knows, in the bubbles? I mean, Tavrisprite happened in the Alpha session) So, a number of things could have happened.

Spending so long with only Vriska as company may have skewed his view towards her.

He may have grown very fatalistic about the whole thing ("wELL, IF i'M STUCK WITH HER, MIGHT AS WELL MAKE THE MOST OF THE RELATIONSHIP.")

He might be trying to placate her? ("sHE WON'T STOP TALKING ABOUT THIS HUMAN jOHN PERSON. i GUESS MAYBE IF i DO SOME BIG HUMAN CULTURE THING, SHE WON'T MAKE ME TREASURE HUNT SO HARD.")

Or maybe he thinks Vriska is flushed for him.

[Arcanum]

Originally Posted by Snake

there's kind of an important gap here where Hussie needs to flesh out why Tavros has suddenly completely changed his mind regarding feelings for Vriska

We've had two pages of dialogue. Pretty sure it's still possible for this to be explained.

[Locke cole]

Especially since Vriska is inbound. That should clear up some of the context.

[Odjn]

Plot relevant shipping! who'd have thought it possible?