Daisy: You know after having spent 25 years alone and unloved I really thought searching for my birth parents would be the only way I could find a family but you know what this team is kind of-
Daisy: OK so at least one of my team is a traitor and my birth parents are alive they're just evil monsters. Cool cool cool I am once again not feeling very safe and secure
Daisy: Oh actually wait my bio parents love me? They want me? I can make a home here mayb-
Daisy: Oh never mind my mom just tried to murder me. And my dad is still a monster but he's agreed to have his memory wiped. At least he's still breathing I guess?
Daisy: Good news is I still have my found family parents so at least-
Daisy: Aaaaand found family dad is dead. You know what this is fine as long as I just have-
Daisy:
Daisy: Universe. Universe listen to me very closely. You bring back my found family mom right fucking now. If I have all four of my parents die on me I will destroy this world just like you all said I would
Daisy: OK good. We found a nice compromise. I get to keep one parent and don't have to watch four of them die. Oh hey it's my bio mom from another timeline where she didn't get tortured into insanity and could actually love-
Daisy: Are you fucking KIDDING me.
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You know, as shallow and cheesy as Awakening's writing can get at times, the way it handles Mustafa vs 3H's handling of Edelgard are kind of interesting when compared.
Mustafa is someome that we as players know for exactly one, singular chapter. He is a commander of a troops of soldiers, and he dies the same map he is introduced in. And yet, he has become one of Awakening's most beloved NPC's - if nothing else, he is certainly rarely hated outright. And that is because in his one, singular chapter, he manages to showcase to the player how much of a genuinely good person he is; he is helpless to outright defy his orders, but inspired by Emmeryn's sacrifice he nonetheless tries to plea for Chrom to surrender and avoid bloodshed. He takes their outrage not with anger, or defensiveness, but understanding and sympathy - he knows he is in no place to ask them to surrender, but he does so for the slightest chance of avoiding a fight ultimately he had no power to stop. And after the battle begins and his men start becoming despondent, he loudly tells them that should they want to flee the battle he will take any blame off of their shoulders for doing so. But his men stand by him regardless because they don't want to abandon him, and when Mustafa is killed his dying words are to please spare his men.
In just one chapter, Awakening managed to pull at the players' hearts by going out of its way to show us the kind heart of Mustafa, before forcing our hand in killing him, all while one of the most melancholic tracks of the game plays in the background, further cementing how tragic the situation at hand is for all involved. Most players recall it as one of the most impactful and emotional moments of the entire game.
In contrast to that - and let's assume that we're talking about strictly SS - you have half of the entire route's length having Edelgard by your side directly. As Byleth, you the player can directly speak to and support with her, and you see her perspective on the events of the story. And throughout this time, Edelgard shows herself again and again to be someone of poor character; she admits to being willing to sacrifice her men right after Lonato, Byleth eventually finds out that she helped kidnap Flayn, and that she was somehow complicit with Remire, she graverobbed a holy site and tried to kill Byleth and her "friends" with an army and Demonic Beasts.
And this only includes stuff that Byleth, as a character, finds out throughout the story. They don't know that Edelgard only let them talk with her (aka the player only gains her supports) once they gain the Sword of the Creator, for the explicit reason that she wanted to use them. They don't know that Edelgard didn't just waltz in after Remire randomly, but that she knew it was going to happen and did nothing to stop it. And this only includes stuff in pre-timeskip; they don't see her continue to use Demonic Beasts, or hide behind her citizens, or keep Rhea as a hostage so that she can keep using TWS's help.
And I look at these two characters and am kinda lowkey astonished at how different their writing is. When Mustafa's men grow angry at the soldiers who are shaking in their resolve to fight for Mustafa, I'm on the verge of tears because I know that Mustafa does not deserve death. When Seteth talks about how Edelgard can't be that bad of a ruler because her men follow her, I can't help but roll my eyes. When Henry mentions Mustafa off-handedly in a support chain, I get so sad because the only way to speak about Mustafa at that point is in the past tense. When I talk to characters in the explore sections and I hear them talk about feeling bad about Edelgard dying, I just mash through their babbling.
Because I am given ample reason to understand why characters would like, respect, and mourn for Mustafa. He is kind-hearted, self-sacrificial should it possibly save the lives of others, and does everything he can to make the lives of those around him better. In the collective fuckin' 10 minutes of screentime he has, he shows a quality of character that does nothing but suggest that he was a damn fine person thrown into an impossibly unfortunate circumstance.
But with Edelgard, everything I see of her only tells me that she is selfish, self-centered, and uncaring for the lives around her should they inconvenience her. Why would any character like, respect, or mourn for her, after seeing everything she's done? Even going under the assumption that the players gets all of her supports to the max as they are available in pre-timeskip; nothing, in any support chain, could ever dream of usurping her actions towards everyone. In both a "all of her friends" sense, and especially in a "all of Fodlan" sense. So when I see characters go out of their way to make sure the player knows how swell Edelgard is, I am simply unable to believe that anyone would ever genuinely believe that about her. Not when themselves, their loved ones, and their homelands (for Kingdom/Alliance students) are all being endangered by Edelgard's active, willful actions that she chose to make.
Which itself is another huge thing that makes it so hard to believe anyone in-game would believe in her outside of contrived writing. She's not someone forced to do what she does against all of her wishes, like Mustafa; she is the one with all of the power of 1/3 of Fodlan's political landscape and half of its territorial one. She is the one to spearhead and instigate the war - that is one of explicit conquest anyway, not for any altruistic purpose. Why would anyone cry and snivel and piss themselves over the fact that the person who had the power to make them suffer and did make them suffer lost? Why are they pretending that she's just some poor damsel whose path was so lonely, and not the conquering Emperor that she is and admits to being?
Soooo... yeah lmao. I just found that pretty interesting
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I want Mizu’s father to be a complicated character.
I’m a sucker for reformed fathers and while I don’t think it will happen, I want Mizu’s father to be VERY morally grey. Give me a man who doesn’t believe in fairness or goodness anymore. Give me a man who had been through so goddamn much he can’t even see the kindness for what it is. A man who sells souls and bargains with demons and kills people with equal amount of interest. A man who doesn’t believe himself to be a god or melomaniac but simply a practical man who knows what he is and what he is not.
A man who knows he’s not good, and doesn’t dare to think he is, a man who has been broken once and put himself back together out of sheer force of will.
Man who, at his heart, still remains humble street rat.
Man who is friends with horrible people because deep down he doesn’t believe he deserves better ones. A pact brother to Fowler, who he matches in strength and brutality but not exactly in tastes or debauchery.
Give me a man who once had a goal, he reached it or failed it and now has to keep going, because he made a lot of people dependable on him. A man who keeps his people fed and safe but doesn’t tolerate the littlest bit of resistance or disloyalty because he fell for that once before and he’s still hurt. (Sounds familiar?)
Give us man who maybe had a son or two already but secretly wants a child that he could protect and maybe save and who deep deep down dreams of having a daughter he could spoil rotten. His little princess.
And then he meets Mizu’s mother and he either falls in love or he doesn’t but he suddenly has a goal again and he would be damned if he loses it. And he does lose it, either by having his daughter stolen from him and killing everyone responsible for it, or by thinking both his daughter and his woman were murdered.
Let us see his breaking point, him losing himself in cruelty once again, because he had just what he wanted in the palm of his hand and he threw it all away for a business trip or a seemingly important deal back in London, which turns out to be his biggest mistake.
And then give us a man who sees his daughter again but she’s not his little princess anymore. She never was.
Give us a man who is furious at what this world shaped his daughter to be. Who sees himself in her and he’s seething because he very much wanted her to be the opposite. To be happy and spoiled and loved. And Mizu is not.
She is ruthless, she is vary and she rarely sees kindness for what it is, especially in a foreign land. And she doesn’t trust him, even as he offers help in killing men that Fowler made her hate with his meddling. Men she suspects are either her father or the devil he works with.
Give me man trying desperately to make connection. Even as he bends the rules for her and breaks his own promises and lets himself care again.
And if it all fails and if she discovers he’s her father, he still tries to find a way to keep her. To protect her, shield her. Even if it’s by blackmail, even if he holds her friend’s lives in the palm of his hand as he offers her all the power he has. Even as she hates him with that reckless abandon we all know her to possess.
Give us a man who made a clan out of outlaws and makes Mizu his heir and their princess, as she screams and kicks and tries to get out of this position.
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ok but im getting emo over heinkel again so im gonna talk about him again because yeah hes yet another sad character in a sea of sad characters and i love rezero for that but like he is a character consistently characterized by one loss after the other. it's a rollercoaster and its going straight fucking down and he is so miserable and absolutely alone and its both his fault and not his fault at all. but the way it starts is - its all out of his control. the more you think about the trajectory of his life the sadder it gets.
imagine you are heinkel and your parents are the sword saint and the sword demon and you come from a long line of knights and sword saints so thats almost definitely where youre headed, right? thats whats expected of you. you are nineteen years old and youre a knight in the royal guard, which was expected of you, and you have a wife and a beautiful baby boy, which was also expected of you, but at least you have so much joy and love for the latter while the former is just another chain on the astrea family line of people who are stuck to knighthood whether they like it or not. but your family is also just another chain because youre nineteen and your mother is still the sword saint and youre playing with fate here because either youre going to be the sword saint or your son will be.
your wife, the only equal you have, falls asleep one day and never wakes up. you are twenty-one years old and a single parent and then you are twenty-three years old and your son's fate is so much bigger than youll ever be. having the worlds love means that your love pales in comparison, doesnt it? everyone knows about your comatose wife because you keep searching so much for a cure that its just another thing to gossip about. every year that passes by she just continues to look the same as she did when she was awake and alive and loved you. (you dont know it yet but your son is going to reach the same age as her, because you dont find a cure for another sixteen years and you know that she wont love you anymore because who does? theres no one left because your son doesnt count.)
and everyone knows about you because of your family. because yeah, youre a good swordsman, but youre not liked by anyone in the knights. youre not a friend and youre certainly not a sword saint or sword demon. your son mind controls someone because he loves you so much that he would do anything for you and looks up to you like youre some hero, but youre just a wreck whos scrambling to keep what little you have. youre twenty-four and you lose your mom because you were too scared to go on the mission you were assigned on, because youre a coward and youre in over your head and you know, because everyone knows, that you dont measure up. you could never be prepared for this. in a long line of people who have to carry the weight of the world, you crumble easily. your mom goes on that mission and dies and your son becomes the sword saint like this was always going to happen. this is what being loved by the world means. you just killed your mom because you just couldnt suck it up and die on that mission instead. on top of that, your dad says that your five-year-old god of a son killed your mom. its just you and your son and the two of you both killed your mom but youre the worlds biggest laughing stock and your son is the up and coming hero and monster. but you still love your son. you really do.
right?
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i've been thinking about this moment from asos all day . . . and this is my reminder to write a thing about what dany considers to be unforgivable. but also, i need to write something about the fact that dany and jorah's arguments so often sound like a lover's spat . . . and i need to untangle that. there's this intimacy that is just so different for the both of them?? to me, the friendship dany has with jorah is so near and dear to her, as she's never really had a friend as open/honest as him. and for jorah, much of dany . . . represents lynesse, and from where i see it, there's some feelings of entitlement lingering there that he projects onto dany. anyways, jorah is supposed to be her greatest protector, her dearest friend, so she appreciates that they can be candid in their disagreements . . . but there is something about that step beyond that unnerves her. it disturbs her. and jorah's familiarity with her so often borders on the possessive . . . on the "you should be grateful" or the "you should feel this way":
“Have to?” It was too late. He should have begun by begging forgiveness. She could not pardon him as she’d intended. She had dragged the wineseller behind her horse until there was nothing left of him. Didn’t the man who brought him deserve the same? This is Jorah, my fierce bear, the right arm that never failed me. I would be dead without him, but … “I can’t forgive you,” she said. “I can’t.”
“You forgave the old man …”
“He lied to me about his name. You sold my secrets to the men who killed my father and stole my brother’s throne.”
“I protected you. I fought for you. Killed for you.”
Kissed me, she thought, betrayed me.
“I went down into the sewers like a rat. For you.”
It might have been kinder if you’d died there. Dany said nothing. There was nothing to say.
“Daenerys,” he said, “I have loved you.”
And there it was. Three treasons will you know. Once for blood and once for gold and once for love.
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