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swordfright · 1 year

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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

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