#cdream meta

[swordfright]

cyclical violence & the dsmp finale

I’m seeing a lot of folks on Twitter interpret the DSMP series 1 finale as “can you believe they forced an abuse victim to befriend his abuser in the end, that’s so sick and tasteless!!” and after a bit of pondering (i.e. absolutely rabid conversations with @ringenthusiast) I think I’ve realized why that interpretation bothers me. Personally I find it extremely reductive to read DSMP as being solely about abuse rather than as a story in which abuse happens and is explored, but even if you’re only prepared to consume it solely as an abuse narrative, you absolutely must acknowledge that the story is about both interpersonal and systemic abuses, and moreover that it’s about how interpersonal and systemic abuse enable each other.

c!Tommy is a victim of horrific interpersonal abuse. c!Dream is a victim of horrific systemic abuse. c!Dream is the perpetrator of the interpersonal abuse c!Tommy suffers, and his abuse of c!Tommy is later continually used as a justification (both in canon and in fandom) for why c!Dream deserves to suffer systemic abuse. This isn’t a coincidence, it’s clearly a very well-planted and thoroughly developed overarching theme: abuse is cyclical. Abuse perpetuates itself. One type of abuse perpetuates and enables other forms of abuse. That’s the point.

There are plenty of examples of this theme being explored outside of the “Dream vs. Tommy” conflict -- the instance that immediately comes to mind is c!Quackity being treated terribly by c!Schlatt, only to turn around and torture an incarcerated person, ostensibly for profit but also presumably for personal enjoyment. Again, abuse is cyclical. This is actually why I think it’s really important that c!Tommy and c!Quackity are, in a sense, set up as foils for each other. c!Quackity makes the decision to become as bad as (if not worse) than his abuser, and that decision is a source of strength and agency for him even though the audience is expected to understand it as a downward spiral. c!Tommy’s approach is different, after he sees c!Dream’s perspective from limbo. It has to be different because c!Tommy is different.

It’s kinda wild to me that anyone could watch the DSMP finale (not to mention the past two years of the show) and not see the final interaction between c!Tommy and c!Dream as a representation of restorative justice. You are not obligated to fix, forgive, or offer redemption to someone who hurt you... but you are obligated to at least try to see them as a person, because the alternative can and will enable atrocities.

This is both a positive ending for c!Tommy and a very uplifting message to end series 1 on. Remember what I said earlier about c!Quackity and c!Tommy being narrative foils? Well, they certainly are, at least insofar as the theme of cyclical abuse is concerned. c!Quackity is an abuse victim who becomes an abuser. That’s an arc that makes sense for his character and personally, as a longtime c!Quackity stan I’m happy with it... but it would be super depressing if that was how every abuse plotline in the series turned out. The final interaction between c!Tommy and c!Dream offers an alternative outcome: that abuse victims are not obligated to forgive or attempt to understand their abusers, but in some cases it’s worth it to try. The abuse c!Tommy suffered makes him neurotic and angry and depressed and fearful and paranoid, but he never lets it make him unkind. He never becomes an abuser himself. The message is clear: abuse can be cyclical, but it doesn’t always have to be. You can break the cycle. The snake doesn’t always have to swallow its own tail.

That, to me, is an incredibly meaningful ending.

#LIKE SORRY BUT i'm actually happy that c!tommy didnt get a contrived corruption arc or whatever HE DESERVES BETTER THAN THAT #tommy deserves restorative justice he deserves PEACE #also i'll add that i kinda hate the trend of categorizing every character in a series into ''abuser'' and ''victim'' #because i think it's reductive and waters down the meaning of those terms #but i decided to use that language in this post because uhhhh that's the kind of language twitter always defaults to when discussing media #so i was like lmfao let me say this in a way yall will understand #since everyone's coming here from twitter #dsmp finale #dream smp #dsmp #dsmp meta #dreblr #dsmp analysis #cdream #cdream meta #ctommy #ctommy meta #idk what else to tag this as lol i hate tagging

[blissfali]

Ive always thought about how, since the first time i eevr experienced and watched exile, that c!tommy never specifically built a houise in logsted. he built a tent, and when he built that tent, he built it specifically with the idea in mind that this would be temporary (i cant remember the exact words but i know for sure there is a quote about him saying something like this before he builds it).

in ctommy's mind, exile was never supposed to last forever. if he had to think about it as an indefinite amount of time, it wouldnt really make sense to him. instead of accepting cdream's "you leave when i say you can leave", he builds this hope throughout the entirety of it that he will be going home to l'manberg, at some point, whether it be in one day or one year. he held onto that hope that there would be a foreseeable end in sight, and thats why he only built a tent. he did not build a house or a shack, and he did not move into the house/van that ghostbur built for him, because moving into an actual home in logsted would mean it lasting "forever". he needed some kind of date in his mind that would mark the end of it, and by building tnret he kind of had a symbol for the fact that he would be leaving at some point.

there was no idea in his mind that ctommy would be barred from l'manberg FORever. he would go back even if he was in his 30's by then. it didn't matter when or how, it just mattered that that date Existed.

#dsmp #dream smp #exile arc #this is one of the things that always got me #he didnt build a tent just to build a tent he built a tent because a tent symbolizes a temporary stay #and in his mind exile was always temporary no matter what cdream or anyone else #dsmp meta

[aetherknit]

the thing about cdnf is that c!george is the part of c!dream that just wont die

#and yet he cares #i think turning this meta more widely works too like cdream ~WANTS~ to burn kinoko but hasnt and hasnt and hasnt #if you want to view it from cdteam more. my scroblies #.txt #Dorry until the meetup cdnf continues to be my lifeboat in this ocean.......

[barbiegirldream]

i’m honestly glad Dream’s idea of c!Dream getting trapped by c!Quackity never happened. it would make sense as a nightmare. But c!Quackity has never displayed the cunning that would be required to set something like that up. Like his grand idea to battle c!Dream was a bunch of one shot slime clones that c!Dream stack wiped with tnt. That guy is not building an elaborate trap for maximum mental torment. The prison was designed by c!Dream. c!Quackity exploited having him trapped with no gear no armor but the second c!Dream was out he was desperately afraid of the revenge that was to come. c!Quackity had nothing on the idea of tormenting c!Dream. But c!Dream’s revenge was making c!Slime take out c!Quackity he was going for the mental torment. That is c!Dream’s game. And that’s why I believe the fake prison cell trap could only have been a nightmare truly. 

#and when you think meta #ccDream is the one coming up with all that #ccQ has his own ideas for his character and which involves always losing and never winning #so for him to have gotten a one up on cDream on his own its just ooc

[zeta-in-de-walls]

Hey, remember how much I hate the staged disc finale - that Punz betraying Dream was staged and he was working with Dream the whole time, implying that Dream intended to go to prison as part of his plan?

Obviously it goes without saying that I hate it for how it muddled the great themes from the disc finale and also made Dream seem less realistic as a villain for how unrealistic his plan felt and also how there was no clear motives explaining why he’d want to go to prison.

I do remember people defending it at the time, suggesting it was an exciting twist that would lead to a good potential storyline for Dream and Punz and I dearly wanted to believe it would go somewhere too even if I hated the execution. 

Well, six months later and we’ve had nothing come of this so far. We can talk about setbacks of course but at the heart of it, it really feels like they did this twist for the pure excitement of the twist and utterly failed to capitalise on it with a good plotline. I’ll still hope for it to change, or a complete retcon but I’m not expecting much.

I’m not sure I’d say staged disc finale is the worst choice on the DSMP precisely but it stands out in its own category of being so very unnecessary. It’s a bad decision that could’ve not existed if you take out a five minute scene as nothing is actually built on it yet the damage it did to the prior storyline is so high. It’s not content I dislike as there’s no content attached with it, its just a twist - a bad one.  

#staged disc finale #sorry i had the urge to rant about it again #its the one thing that really soured me on cdream as a character #where he used to be one if favourites #meta #analysis #dsmp crit

[damnednyx]

I think c!dream believes that he's misunderstood.

/dsmp /rp

That surely if they knew why he did all of this, why he went through so many things, lost so many people, they'll all agree with him. And he did try explaining his motives multiple times but when that didn't work he took the road less traveled, focused on just getting what he wants by any means.

Because people don't want a reason to sympathize with their enemy. And he does understand that part. That he needs to play a villain if that's what it takes to get these people to fucking listen.

So he burned down their houses, built a wall, broke every relationship he could lay his hands on because they were all so consumed by their own little lives that they didn't see the why of things. No, that's not it. They did see the "why" of their own actions, they had lists of reasons and excuses and justifiable violent acts stacked up on top of each other, it ironically reminds him of the towering buildings of Las Nevadas. But they were too ignorant to realise that one day they will collapse on themselves, built on blood and flesh they will never last.

Dream often imagines what it would be like to get what he wants. Before the prison it meant forgiveness and second chances, it meant one big happy family. After prison it's all a blur, of walls of heat coming too close to his skin, almost burning, almost consuming. Dream feels like a badly written villain. A bad friend, a bad lover, a bad ally, a bad bad bad person. But of course if he's a villain for being a bad person then this server is full of villains building their palaces and cobblestone towers making drug cartels and casinos, testing nukes and betraying each other. Bad is such a bad word, isn't it? What does it even mean to be a bad person? He's not just bad he's not just evil. Where's the person in that? Where is Dream in all of what they perceive him to be? Is he even there? Did half of what they tell stories about even true? What's the price of going against their images of him? He already knows. It's resistance and denial.

So yes, dream does think he's being misunderstood. But not because they don't get him but because he wants no one to realise the large fucking mirror he'll turn out to be if they do try to understand him. Because he'll be a person. A bad-good, a good-evil, a foul rotten hurting scared person. And that's not someone who can get what he wants.

The road less travelled has one traveller to worry about and Dream wants to keep it that way as long as possible.

#with all the moral discourse i thought dsmp in rp will also have a moral discourse lol. #part of the charm of dsmp is that they fall into neat archetypes and roles whether they acknowledge it or not. #like dream does understand hes playing a role to an extent but tommy doesnt while tubbo does. #Wilbur thinks himself above such roles so he imitates a dm role sort of. #its fun to play around with this notion though. how their awareness is so far but falls short where it's needed and thats where they fall #and falling is just what characters do. so thats fun to write about. #dreblr #morality #evil charcter tm #c!dream #cdream #my writing #dream smp #dsmp meta #my post

[infizero]

prev rb ok ok i was having trouble remembering what i was trying to say but like adding onto what i said, c!dream’s whole focus of just continuing his “game” with tommy is inherently a childish desire. yes obviously its a twisted version but the fundamental aspect of just wanting to entertain yourself (through horrific means in dream’s case) for eternity with whatever toy or game you’ve fixated on is childish and immature. 

dream thinks he can get whatever he wants because he believes he’s entitled to it as the owner of the server, and he acts like he’s above everyone else in a really selfish and detached way. his way of dealing with conflict is also inherently immature; he jokes, he taunts, he “plays with his food”, he refuses to open up to people or talk things out unless it helps him get his way.

he’s just some childish loser who thinks he’s the coolest mf alive and that he’s always in control and that he can do whatever he wants because it’s his server, his discs, his playtoy that he can rip apart and stitch back up over and over and over again.

he needs to grow the hell up.

#ive said it a thousand times and i'll say it again a very important part of cdream characterization is his ego #he thinks hes some badass antihero who takes shit from no one and like walks away from explosions and stuff #when in reality hes just a pathetic little man who only cares about himself and will just continue to destroy himself #alone #in conclusion why didnt you just believe in the power of friendship and calm down you creep #serena.txt #I DID. NOT MEAN FOR THIS TO GET SO LONG #dream smp #c!dream #cdream #dream #dsmp #analysis #meta #????? idk sure why not. im jus talkin at 3am

[pointless-names]

please let volume 2 be a total character reset im begging. ik its probably contrary to the popular opinion but i really think it’d be to the benefit of the server for people to make new characters and start new storylines and ideas

#look i love the discduo storyline! i love horror stuff! #i was genuinely disappointed when the prison break storyline didn't eventuate into anything! #but it's very much run it's course and to a degree it a) does prevent either person from just logging on and causing shit #and b) as someone else rightly said cdream has just become too much of a villainous influence #both in terms of how his still being at large does prevent other arcs from getting more space to breathe #and how we've come to a point where it's going to be difficult to escalate further - i mean mans has blown up a nation several times #abused a child and tortured several people through killing and reviving them. like what more do you do at this point? #also in general a reset allows people to come in with a clean slate and make content with people they dont normally interact with #and it also allows for people who are enemies or directly opposed in vol 1 lore to come together or team up #i have heard that they might be writing vol 2 lore behind the scenes which does make me a little bit eh #i'd love to see a bit more organic lore where shit begins just because someone has the audacity to steal something or kidnap a pet #or because some people form a chaotic group that influences the server in a way #and it just escalates stupidly from there #basically season 0-1 lore lmao. causing trouble for trouble's sake and adding onto it #but hey as long as theyre having fun and the pressure to go further above and beyond is alleviated a bit then hey #it's been too long since people weren't traumatised is what i'm saying lmao it's time to let the people breathe #and to let new arcs have room to flourish #ah yes long tags discussion. the meta of pointless-names dot tumblr dot com

[gynii]

not to have dsmp meta thoughts in the year of our lord 2023...

but the real tragedy of cclingy duo (and cNIKI I CAN NEVER FORGET NIKI) was that they were caught in the crossfire of god complexes and duels of ego and pursuits of ever lasting legacy and the uncaring hand of politics and war when they just wanted to have a home. most of l'manberg's original citizens just wanted a place to call home, and they never stood a chance against cwilbur's ego or ctechno's politics or cphilza's loyalty or cdream's quest for power or cquackity's pursuit of legacy. They were never on the same playing board, but were caught up in the rules and implications of a game they wanted no part in.

ctubbo wasn't a tyrant replacing a tyrant because he took on the position of president, he accepted the presidency because he wanted to rebuild his home! cniki wanted a community again, in anyplace she could find it, she wanted to care and to be cared for again until it hurt too much to keep inside. ctommy just wanted safety, for himself and the closest people to him, but every opportunity for it was caught in webs of politics and ego that betrayed the unconditional safety he wanted.

they were twisted by the world around them!! by the ego's of other with agenda's that had nothing to with safety or community or building a home, and they were forced into a game where they had to compete with spite and betrayal and ego to get what they so wanted, what they needed! but there was never a chance, because you cant make a home out of legacy and you can't build a community out of ego and you cant be safe in a constant war.

#AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH #anyway i rewatched hog hunt and ozymandias #and by ctubbo neuron fucking activated holy shit!! #uhhhh i dont really want to tag this #mcyt #dsmp #for organization's sake

[sunlitmcgee]

so much meta, so many essays, so many theories about why cDream was Like That, and all along we all just had to listen to cRanboo

"It's because he's cruel"

#do you guess ever remember. doyou think about ti sometiingmes #guyys

[dreamhot]

Lee I’m having to unfollow sooooo much of my dash because of atrocious takes about the lore finale/what donos are appropriate to send streamers, and now there’s hardly anyone on my dash that posts about lore, do you have a rec list? I follow you (obviously) and judgehangman and carpedzem already but I’m in a lore void otherwise, any good blogs that aren’t Weird (/neg) and/or rabidly anti ctommy OR cdream?

HELL YEAH always love a chance to promo my lore pals. here are some ppl who i generally trust to be thoughtful about lore topics, largely in the same vein as the people you already mentioned :)

this is a mix of ppl (in no particular order) who post meta, writing, and art, so hopefully you find something you enjoy !

@theminecraftbox

@dr3amofagame

@call-me-apple

@lostshideyhole

@cdiskduoisms

@kiuda

@simplepotatofarmer

@hiding-in-the-vault

@cgogs

@dorito-with-no-weakness

@kenjo-arts

@vioarry

@the-final-sif

@deadboyslove

@f4c3

@bluest-of-bells

#I'M PROB FORGETTING PPL but if you fall under anon's description pls feel free to promo yourself on the post ! #smile.ask #anon

[swordfright]

c!Sam, Pandora’s Vault, and the Abject

In light of the recent c!sam lore, I wanna ramble about something that’s been on my mind a ton recently, which is that all the stuff that plays out during the imprisonment arc (and its aftermath!!!) reminds me so much of The Abject, which is this theory of psychological horror that basically claims the impetus behind much of what we call horror is the breakdown of our understanding of where the Self ends and the Other begins. I realize this already sounds wack but so is dsmp as a piece of media so like, hear me out.

Sam demonstrably struggles with issues of control and autonomy, and especially with understanding himself in relation to them. But also, interestingly, a secondary definition of the Abject concerns the recognition of desire: when the individual's relationship to its objects of desire (id/the Other) and of representation (ego/the Self) breaks down in a way they find too disturbing to confront, horror is elicited.

I don’t think it’s a crazy stretch to say that c!Sam is a character who is constantly teetering on the brink of confronting the Abject. He prioritizes his job as warden over everything else in his life (there’s so much text evidence for this idek where to start) because being the warden is an important outlet for him. It’s a role he steps into that, over time, helps him understand himself - not in a way that’s necessarily accurate, but in a way that is agreeable to him! Sam’s relationship to his object of representation (being warden) is supported and maintained via the structure of the prison itself: the existence of a prison necessitates the existence of a prisoner (without which, the prison is just an empty building), which in turn necessitates the existence of a warden (someone to guard the prisoner.) Pandora’s Vault is a place where Sam’s worldview makes sense and his life has meaning and purpose.

The “breakdown” stage happens whenever Sam is forced to confront his object of desire, which is of course, control over the prisoner. Sam wants to control the prisoner at all costs (again, so much text evidence idk where to BEGIN). Sam tells himself that the warden is necessary for protecting the server, but ultimately his words and actions show that his true motivation is not protecting others, it’s controlling the prisoner. During Daedalus, all it takes is a couple days in the maximum security cell for Sam to start panicking and questioning his own actions/worldview, because suddenly the roles of prisoner and warden are reversed and c!Dream is forcing him to experience a small fraction of what dream experienced under Sam’s watch. the reversal is horrifying because the thing that gave Sam’s worldview structure and meaning (his role as warden in relation to both prison and prisoner) is being turned inside-out. He is not enjoying the Abject, and this is part of why i personally think he doubles down on defending his past actions as warden after dream kills him and lets him go - his only option is to repress.

Another definition of the Abject is “a place of immemorial violence where meaning collapses,” so i’ll leave y’all with my final thought on the subject: for Sam, the Abject is his own desire to control the prisoner. But for Dream, the Abject is the Pandora’s Vault itself. It’s the place where Dream was forced to confront the fact that he fucked up, that his trust in Sam (a former friend) was dangerously misplaced, that the person he thought would protect him is instead enabling his torture, that he may never escape the prison he designed himself. And he designed it to be a home! He wanted the prison, it exists because Dream wanted it! And now, post-jailbreak, it occupies this liminal space: at once a home and a hell. If that’s not the Abject, i don’t know what is.

#and the difference between c!dream's vs c!sam's reactions to the Abject #is that dream embraces it and returns to the prison to reclaim it as the home it was always supposed to be #whereas sam represses it and doubles down on his worldview #claiming that his actions were justified and the ppl he hurt should just get over it #lmfao sorry guys #dont ever take me seriously #this shit do be driving me to madness tho #dreblr #cawesamdude #pandoras vault #dream smp #dsmp #dsmp analysis #goddd i hate hashtags #cdream #cdream meta #dsmp meta #vault duo #daedalus arc #csam armchair psychoanalysis #yes i deserve to be mocked #this is about characters not content creators

[dyketubbo]

oh yeah i agree with the thing about ctubbo not getting angry about things around people. reminded me of a meta i wrote back when the nukes went missing. it has been like. two years. but here's some stuff from that i think still applies

"he has to be very loud about his weapons and very quiet about the things he loves" "but he also can’t be too bold about it. showing that you have powerful weapons is also a good way to get targeted, so he has to toe the line of either side to even exist peacefully."

"move on, don’t look back, never try to take revenge because if you do the pain will only come back tenfold."

and it's kind of interesting because that last one changed i think! i think he got a lot more jaded at the end and began being more and more reckless and stuff like going after sam goes against that. but i think it just shows that he couldn't afford to care anymore about his own safety along with everything else. it was tearing him apart

this switch really happened when cranboo died i think. ctubbo just stopped caring at all everything was a game to him because nothing was permanent and while god killed everything around him it wouldn't let him die. god that plot sucked so bad

REAAAALLLLLLLLLL

the revenge thing with ctubbo makes me hmmmmm so often because like. im a ctubbo kills cdream enjoyer but not out of revenge just out of the conclusion of how far ctubbo has gotten in terms of dropping morals for the sake of safety/self defense. so the way he got characterized as a big revenge enjoyer to me (esp with how it was encouraged by ctechno and ceret) just felt ehhhh to me yk. tubbo isnt a pushover but he isnt Aggressive. hostile towards sam in the moment of Getting Michael but i cant imagine him naturally gunning for putting him in the prison lol in my mind he would like.. very heavily focus on getting michael home and then building up defense. defense over offense and all

plus like. he would have learned from the festivals shit. hell he Did learn. he refused to execute ranboo because it wouldnt be fair. also i think him being suuuper against revenge after all that makes him a better foil to both quackity (active revenge enjoyer) and techno (hypocrite about getting revenge) . BUT YES REALLLL esp the loud about weapons but quiet about what he loves ougghhgh. yknow one thing that irks me is when people have ctubbo like casually reveal to people that hes married after its been established that yk. he and ranboo are truly just keeping it as secret as they pawsibly can. he wouldnt trust people with knowing about his family he didnt even mean to tell fundy

#literally the only people they willingly told were phil tommy and ghostbur #like that is suuuuch a small collection #ranboo wouldnt tell techno or niki . tubbo wouldnt tell revivebur or quackity . revivebur and ghostbur are both just wil n all #but tubbo would make the distinction with who would be safe to tell or not #hes paranoid!! let him be unreasonably paranoid yet also reasonable at the same time!! #angel answers #tubbo #dsmp

[cupcraft]

okay quick meta while theyre live time.

so ceryn said that hes been ignored a lot and his rationalizing of that is "everyones so upset and i cant fix it" and caimsey responds with "its not your job to fix it" also after talking about how he has a cane now due to being pushed off the bridge by ctubbo. it sort of shows me how they both try to rationalize coming to this server whose inhabitants is so deeply traumatized.

Like ceryn came to this server wanting friends, specifically to rekindle with ctommy. ceryn also canonically can hear the screams of death which is very loud near ctommy's house and lmanberg crater. ceryn is being ignored yes he's walked into this world where people dont trust, are scared, and to a friend (ctommy) who is so deeply different due to exile and in constant danger from cdream and his brother figure has come back to life and they are working through a lot. ceryn feels like as a result he has to fix that. that he knows people are hurting and so he must fix it to have friends, at least thats what he thinks.

caimsey has lost a canon life and faced similar things to ceryn in this regard, like with ghostboo too. but caimsey has taken the route of "its not my job to fix it" a la her forgiving ctubbo for what he did to her.

srsly they make me soo sooo ill

#cup.aimsey #cup.erynstreams #dsmp #meta #add on if you want

[mahikamihan]

RUNS IN SO FAST I HEARD CDREAM AND LUKE CASTELLAN CODING.

i have no thoughts other than excited vibrating because they're both my favorite antagonists ive related heavily to at different points in my life and im SO GLAD someone else sees the similarities

IM SO GLAD IM NOT THE ONLY ONE. I just finished the PJO and HOO (I'm still on the fence if I should read TOA rn) and when I was reading tumblr metas about Luke, I was just like "wait a minute i think i've heard this before"

#yumi answers

[theminecraftbox]

hey super random question but about 3-ish (?) months ago there was this meta post doing the rounds on dreblr, basically speculating about whether cdream was pretty, whether he's still pretty during/post-prison, and whether csam and cquackity agree etc etc. was that your post? i've been searching for like a week, i was 1000% sure it was angela's post but she thinks it might've been yours?? i feel like i'm going insane thank you for your time

Not mine— here is probably what you’re talking about!