Homesuck: Vriska Rising

[Pip Boy]

I think its less likely that the trolls are permabanned from talking about their feelings, and more likely that the author just wants to give them a bit more exposition just before their deaths to make those deaths more meaningful. If Vriska died as an annoying psychopathic bitch, nobody would care. If she dies as an annoying ex-pcyhopathic bitch that finally decided to embrace her more human-like feelings, then everyone will be like awwwwwwwww.

[Solid Snake]

Originally Posted by Locke cole

...this was a lot easier when Vriska had no remotely redeeming qualities.

...Just to clarify: Having the author attempt to force remotely redeeming qualities down a character's throat is not quite the same as the character actually possessing remotely redeeming qualities.

[Pip Boy]

Nothing is being forced down Vriska's throat. She doesn't like killing people as much as she acted like she did. She's still a self-righteous bitch, its just that she isn't a sociopatic self-righteous bitch so much as a self-righteous bitch who feels the need to do bad things for the sake of social convention.

[Wigmund]

I just wonder how long it will be before we shift back to the "Oh this is supposed to be tense and scary" cliche...I mean clown.

[Geminex]

What Pip said. This doesn't feel forced. This is the first time we actually hear what Vriska is thinking, since the whole FLARP-maim-mentally-scar-mind-control-murder-main-triple-mind-control-main episode. So far, we've been judging by her actions. But what she's expressing right now perfectly fits the actions she took, expands on troll culture in a believable way, and, while not justifying what she did, does make her look way more three-dimensional than a simple BLUH BLUH HUGE BITCH.
This is the best update in quite a while, I think, and yes, I'm counting both the Flying Ford and Nepetabound.

[Dracorion]

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

EDIT: Although if Vamp!Kanaya decides to take a bite of Vriska in a seductive manner and make her life miserable, I guess I could settle for that, that wouldn't bother me much.

GA: Honk.

.

[Fifthfiend]

Originally Posted by Locke cole

...this was a lot easier when Vriska had no remotely redeeming qualities.

She still doesn't. Indulging in self-pity after murdering a kid, while giving your current sycophant your line of rationalizations about how you physically and mentally abused him for years ~for his own good~ and crippled him to ~make him stronger~ isn't redeeming, it's extreme narcissism.

Originally Posted by Solid Snake

...The reason why Hussie has to go out of his way on formspring and in updates to defend Vriska so intently is largely because a reasonable number of readers have challenged him on writing her into his own personal beloved Mary Sue who gets away with anything due to her inherent plot-bending powers.
...If everyone loved Vriska as much as he did, his angry meta moment with his avatar "possessed by Vriska" while enjoying a Neverending Story moment probably never would have happened.

I'm not saying that many people don't dislike Vriska, just disagreeing with the "most" part of that statement; there seem to be at least as many people who identify with this character and/or sympathize with her sociopathic, self-serving nature.

Originally Posted by NonCon

Midway through this conversation Eridan will shoot Vriska in the back with his science wand, instantly killing her, then a Nic Cage x Vriska montage will play as John mourns her death.

If this ever happened it would be the first in this string of deaths that legitimately surprised and impressed me, but really, there is no way this will happen.

[Locke cole]

I'm not saying I forgive the things Vriska's done.

...I'm actually not quite sure what I think about this, but it's definitely not that.

[Krylo]

Originally Posted by Fifthfiend

Homestuck, the internet's best measure of people's ability to empathize with narcissistic sociopaths.

She ~feels bad~ a bloo bloo bloo bloo bloo

These two things are mutually exclusive. The entire point of being a sociopath is that you don't feel bad about hurting/killing other people.

She was never a sociopath, she was never even painted as a sociopath.


FURTHER: Terezi already spelled out this entire update ages ago when talking to... Kanaya? Karkat maybe? Regardless, I think it was around the time she was trying to make Tavros use stairs until Kanaya hollared at her.

Every time Vriska does something horrible she regrets it and does what she can to absolve herself of guilt. When she blinded Terezi? She felt that she could be absolved of guilt when Terezi preferred being blind anyway because of the closer connection it gave her to her dragon lusus vis a vis learning to smell things. When she crippled Tavros? She spent the rest of their relationship trying to force him to overcome his disability so that she could feel like she hadn't actually hurt him. When she killed Aradia? She convinced Equius to build her a new robot body (whom they both planned to give to her/backstab each other) because once Aradia had a new body she could feel she hadn't actually damaged Aradia.

That you seem entirely incapable of actually understanding the character and, instead of hating her because of what is ACTUALLY broken about her (of which there is a lot), call her a sociopathic irredeemable monster, doesn't make you in some way more sensible or more moral than those of us who are capable of simple reading comprehension.

Vriska has always been extremely repentant over her crimes, but has never had any idea how to adequately express it between troll society and her own, even more heartless, upbringing.

It's not like this troll society stuff is new either. We've known that murder and killing was totally cool with trolls since forever. Through everything from Terezi's mock trials--execution is the go to penalty for basically every crime and executing the wrong troll was no more than a minor embarrassment to the establishment, straight up through the breeding process that involves the murder of teenage trolls that haven't copulated, and into their adulthood which is spent entirely out in space killing the shit out of other species. Even their relationships are based entirely on hate and pity. There are no, socially accepted, positive emotions.

Everything in this update has been explained, in detail, through the story. If anything I'm just finding myself annoyed that it's just now that a majority of people are beginning to realize that Vriska isn't just 'lawlmurder', and that troll society doesn't treat violence the same way we do.

But, shit, I don't know why I bother. You'll just call me horrible for empathizing with Vriska, and then I'll get pissed and go back to doing my best to ignore all the random pointless bitching about every single thing that happens in the story for another hundred posts or so.

Edit:

Originally Posted by Fifthfiend

She still doesn't. Indulging in self-pity after murdering a kid, while giving your current sycophant your line of rationalizations about how you physically and mentally abused him for years ~for his own good~ and crippled him to ~make him stronger~ isn't redeeming, it's extreme narcissism.

P.S. She was trying to kill him when she crippled him. The abuse after was her attempting to, in her fucked up way, get him to overcome the crippling because she felt bad about it. There's a salient argument, with how troll romance goes, that the feeling bad about what she did to him is the whole reason she ever tried to kiss him (Pity = RedRom, not love.)

[Fifthfiend]

Originally Posted by Krylo

These two things are mutually exclusive.

Not actually at all, no.

Every time Vriska does something horrible she regrets it and does what she can to absolve herself of guilt.

Yes, it's called the abusive cycle.

That you seem entirely incapable of actually understanding the character and, instead of hating her because of what is ACTUALLY broken about her (of which there is a lot), call her a sociopathic irredeemable monster, doesn't make you in some way more sensible or more moral than those of us who are capable of simple reading comprehension.

Insults about reading comprehension might carry more weight if you showed any actual understanding about this topic or what I've said about it.

But, shit, I don't know why I bother. You'll just call me horrible for empathizing with Vriska, and then I'll get pissed and go back to doing my best to ignore all the random pointless bitching about every single thing that happens in the story for another hundred posts or so.

Oh Krylo feels bad, a bloo bloo bloo