[ SECRET POST #2338 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2338 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

01.


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02.
[Saturday Night Live]


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03.
[Homestuck]


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04.
[The Dark Knight trilogy]


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05.
[Star Trek]


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06.
[Daily Show with Jon Stewart & Colbert Report with Stephen Colbert]


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07.
[Neil Gaiman/Amanda Palmer]


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08.
[Late Night Talk Shows]


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09.
[Fruits Basket]


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10.
[Defiance]


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11.
[Phoenix Legend]


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12.
[Kim Possible]


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13.
[Rupert Graves]


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14.
[Hashirama, from Naruto]


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15.
[XXXholic]


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 047 secrets from Secret Submission Post #334.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

03. http://i.imgur.com/UVQQQfN.jpg
[Homestuck]

[insanenoodlyguy]

Also, there's the fact that Eridan's shitty apology, while shitty, was still better then Vriska's. Her's was unmistakably still about her. Eridan at least seemed to mean it with Fef.

OP

[(Anonymous)]

Technically, Erisolsprite meant it with Feferi -- but I am inclined to believe the Eridan half was really sorry.

[(Anonymous)]

I think their function in the narrative is also somewhat different? I mean, I am very far from an expert on Homestuck, but I quit reading it due (in part) to my dislike of Vriska - and it's not like I thought that Eridan was a better person or anything, he was just wayyyyyyy easier to ignore.

But like I say I'm not an expert and I haven't read Homestuck for a while now so maybe Eridan is the central protagonist or something! (For reference, the primary reason I quit reading it is because I didn't care about most of the characters, and it was just way too much fucking effort to read and keep tracking of everything that was going on with all the nonsense in the storyline)

[logicbutton]

Just popping in to say that I laughed out loud at the idea of Eridan being the main character. I think I would quit reading too.

[(Anonymous)]

It's kind of funny; I'll make excuses for Vriska and dislike Eridan, and it's mostly because she's female. Not that one bias is better than the other, but it can get a bit frustrating at times.

[(Anonymous)]

Same here. I tend to make excuses for Vriska whereas any attempt at all to redeem Eridan pisses me the fuck off, and I'm aware it's partly because I tend to sympathize more with female characters.

There's also that Vriska is fascinating and I want to have hot lesbian sex with her, whereas Eridan and his motives bore the fuck out of me.

[herongale]

"if redeeming-Cronus-vilifying-Aranea becomes a thing, I may vomit"

Well, it hasn't yet, and they've been around for several months now, so I kinda doubt it will?

But in terms of your overall point... you know, sometimes people just prefer one character over the other. And assuming that a lot of this imbalance comes because of what shows up on your Tumblr feed... well, the way to fix this is to be more thoughtful about who you follow on Tumblr.

[insanenoodlyguy]

Even Hussie admits Cronus is the worst character. Hell. ERIDAN admits it. We are probably safe from that redemption.

[cloud_riven]

She's got her fair share of apologists. You end up with fans who find her irredeemable, those who brush off everything she's done by blaming spider mom or troll society, and those who are absolutely sick of her getting screen time. It's a lot like Regina love/hate from Once Upon A Time.


Also, that Cronus Aranea bit at the end? Gdi I'm curious now.

[saku]

honestly i think a lot of it is because most of his atrocities were backstory and didn't actively take place as we were reading homestuck. some of it, yes, but in comparison, vriska severely abused another "main" troll, left him physically disabled and then finally killed him when he opted to stand up for himself and for his friends. for a time, she showed no remorse and her only excuse was that she wanted to "help" him grow or whatever. that's on top of all the other wrongs she committed, but that she wronged a troll that most people like to some degree, and that we saw all this happening as part of the story, places a notable difference between what she's done and what eridan has done.

in addition, eridan's personality isn't as cruel as vriska's is, even if a lot of what he does is questionable at best. nobody worth talking to denies that eridan is shitty/does shitty things, but it's presented differently than vriska's actions. even when he hurt sollux and killed feferi, a lot of readers acknowledge that those were done in some degree of self-defense. after he killed feferi he clearly went batshit and there's really no excuse for attacking kanaya's orb thing but i think people who sympathise with eridan realise there's a big difference between his douchiness and vriska's senseless cruelty. he acted out of anger at his worst moments. she didn't. she acted whenever she wanted a kick.

[(Anonymous)]

I actually see Vriska as feeling a lot of remorse, just not in a way that helps influence her behavior in the future. She wants to "fix things" with Aradia and with Tavros, but doesn't seem to understand that some things you can't fix. She knows she's not a good person, and she wants to be a good person -- she's just really, really bad at it.

Eridan, on the other hand, never seemed to realize he was being a bad guy while he was alive.

[(Anonymous)]

I tend to peg them all as messed-up and in need of serious help. I feel bad deeming a child unredeemable. (Does not apply to Cronus because he's nineteen and thus old enough to know better.)

[(Anonymous)]

I've seen people doing the opposite and saying that people who did like Eridan were brainless fangirls . I tend to view them about the same, and follow people who have the same standards for both. They do exist, I promise.

[(Anonymous)]

I think this is one of those things that depends strongly on who you hang out with. Cause yeah, I've seen the Eridan apologists around and they are stupid, but I've seen as many idiotic Vriska apologists hanging around.

Question:

[chardmonster]

Do you really have to make excuses for characters to like them?

I love Vriska, but the only excuse I can make for her is that she's basically a kid who happened to be raised by a spider monster. I'm in my mid twenties and teenagers are now kids to me, so it still applies to Homestuck characters after they're aged up. But she's still a kickass character. I'd say the same for Eridan. He's awful but hilarious. I don't have to approve of/rehabilitate a character's actions to like them, because they aren't real people.

I guess maybe I have a different relationship with fandom?

Re: Question:

[cloud_riven]

I think a lot of people do that, the excuses thing, for villains they like. Loki, Regina, Sylar, Azula, and Draco Malfoy come to mind atm. There's an obvious appeal for redemption arcs imo, though maybe some folk really do think they need to batman logic their way around to not accepting that their character is, in fact, a canonical dick.

Of course there's also a lot of people who don't try to justify liking characters like these. Not everyone thinks liking something means said thing is inherently moral or whatever nonsense. They're just kinda less vocal and annoying about it.

[(Anonymous)]

Well, I think we occupy very different parts of a very large fandom. I run into more people like Vriska and excuse her more than I run into people who do the same for Eridan.

Both have a decent sized number of fans and 'apologists', but as Eridan's been out of the picture for so long, Vriska's has remained more alive. Plus, she was a pretty big name character who still recently had face time. Eridan made murderstuck happen and all but disappeared off the face of the earth up until Erisol Sprite. Compared to Vriska, he's still nothing but a footnote.

[(Anonymous)]

I run into more people like Vriska and excuse her more than I run into people who do the same for Eridan.

this has been my experience too. i see a lot more demonizing eridan and excusing/woobifying vriska than i do the other way around.

OP

[(Anonymous)]

I think I made the secret thinking of a bunch of AUs featuring sympathetic Eridan and bitchy Vriska. I think with the strictly canon-based stuff it's tilted more towards Vriska, since she is around more.

[(Anonymous)]

Regarding the N!S: I don't think that's very likely. From what I've seen most of the fandom hates Cronus, and even his fans acknowledge that he's an insufferable jackass. Whereas Aranea seems pretty well-liked, even by people who hate Vriska and/or Mindfang.

[bored_bitch]

I hate Vriska more than Eridan just because her attitude annoys the everloving shit out of me.
The kind of person that, if I met in real life, I doubt I would be able to resist the temptation to punch all their teeth into the back of their skull.

I don't excuse what either of them did, though.
Also, I've never seen anyone excuse Eridan before they did Vriska. Maybe a few that think he "really deserves Feferi's love," but none that outright forgive him for killing her and Kanaya and destroying the Matriorb.

[(Anonymous)]

is it homestuck fandom circa 2011 again? ((why does everyone forget gamzee??!))

tbh vriska seems really well-liked and eridan does have apologists like any character, but i see fans who like him and acknowledge his bad traits, or fans who outright think he's the worst character. cronus i thought was the least popular character.

[rbhudson]

Agreed. Vriska is my favorite character. In fact, my friend made a scalemate of her for me for my birthday :D

[perfidiousfate]

I love both Vriska and Eridan because I think they're fascinating characters, and it makes me sad when I see hate for either of them (although I don't agree with the apologists either). But honestly, it kind of makes sense to me that Eridan has more apologists.

I think Eridan's been written as pitiful for most of his narrative. Kind of whiney, desperate, but he was still friends with Karkat and Kanaya at least, and was SUPER INTO magic but didn't want to let himself believe, and you kind of felt sorry for him ('it's hard being a kid and growwing up, it's hard and nobody understands'). When he attacked Sollux, Feferi and Kanaya, the shocking thing was that it was a subversion of the way you previously saw him - he suddenly became dangerous, not a humorous side character. But most people still remembered him as being pathetic, and realized that his actions were as a result of him losing control and becoming angry etc. The apology from Erisolsprite helped solidify that.

Vriska, on the other hand, was presented as dangerous from the beginning. She tried to manipul8 John into becoming rivals with Dave, she crippled Tavros and continually mocked him for it, and led John to his death on his questbed, and was basically a 8luh 8luh huge 8itch. It was later you started feeling sorry for her, when you saw spider mom or her getting a crush on John or Nic Cage and maybe wanting to try and be a better person. Still, the first impression you got of her is that she's dangerous. And after her death, she's reverting back to being demanding and wanting to be center stage.

Plus, as some people have mentioned, Eridan is a much more background character than Vriska. Vriska's narrative is center stage, and has been for a while now, while Eridan is a side character and has been out of the picture until Erisolsprite appeared. With that, his apology is kind of a wrap-up to his character arc - he grew, hooray. I doubt he has much of a character arc left compared to Vriska, who's still active and in the middle of HER character arc. Hussie seems to be setting her up for another redemption-or-not choice, so she's still not done growing; she hasn't really gotten any closure for her actions yet.

But basically, I like both their characters and wish that people wouldn't spew hate about either of them OR try to alleviate the severity of their actions. I'm interested to see what Hussie has in store for them.

(And, as a side note, there seems to be a real dearth of Eridan/Vriska fics, which disappoints me because I think the fact that they used to be in a kismesissitude is pretty kick-ass. How did that even work?)