#its obviously deeper than that but lets joak | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

keylethwasleft · 5 years

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i honestly do think its interesting what sam's characters and both the immediate and the wider reaction to them says about the people who identify with them most (this is secretly a post about MEEEE). it shows that hiding everything about yourself thats vulnerable under even the thinnest veneer of Comedy/Class Clown antics, even self deprecating joakes, Works.

before nott's real backstory came out, there was a more prevalent (or at least something i noticed due to heavily identifying with her and trying to understand her early on) resistence to taking her very seriously, both within the game and in the fan content. there wasnt NOTHING trying to delve deeper into her, but there seemed to be a lot more people willing to take her at face value (including icly, which i assume the other players know sam well enough by now to know Better, but their characters may not have). when people focused on her attachment to caleb, from the start people assumed caleb was Her protector, and when she outlined how false that was, there was still a focus on how she can help Caleb. how good she is for Caleb. less on what it meant for nott. which is probably partly how sam managed to hide the most maternal character ever actually being a mom under all our noses. how easy it could be to lie about her backstory when no one sees it necessary to dig deeper into her (often self deprecating) reliance on comedy!

and it was MORE obvious with scanlan! even when he started turning to illegal drugs to deal with trauma, scanlans personality as someone who always wants to deflect from himself with Humor made the biggest takeaway that it was meant to be FUNNY. even to the players (who knows how their characters would have reacted; they largely didnt know). there was some concern from fans, but from what i saw few thought it was more than a joke. because scanlan presented himself as someone to be laughed at!

in fact, even after having to bring scanlan back to life two days in a fucking row? the other characters didnt think he might be completely traumatized by dying TWICE in TWO DAYS, and went so far as to prank him for when he woke up from his post death coma. THE PLAYERS WERE ALSO SURPRISED WHEN THIS BACKFIRED ON THEM, because of how scanlan presented himself normally.

it wasnt until scanlan had a full public breakdown at them that anyone, including a majority of the fans, realized how messed up he was at that point. because he wasnt being funny anymore. he was lashing out. he was being vulnerable.

and whats funny is... tary had less of this as a part of his personality, but he was a comedic trope. clueless rich boy longing for glory. and there was still hints of this going on with him, until he revealed the extent of his fathers abusive nature. BUT, because he was OPEN TO BEING VULNERABLE - playing his real fears straight, being honest about his background, being Open to changing (after some threats from pike) - and possibly also because he came in so soon after sam's bomb dropped with scanlan - people were more concerned about him emotionally very quickly. directly after doty died, before he had a chance to react, Most of the fans realized and were concerned that tary had just lost the only real friend he had that he didnt have to pay to let him stick around.

and since a good portion of the fans started at campaign 2 and didnt experience campaign 1 (and many still havent, and thats fine), even though nott has been a slightly more vulnerable character than scanlan - she has little of his confidence, and she is a ball of anxiety - she deflects by making it a joke... and many took it at face value. sure, she was obviously anxious and obviously full of self hatred, but shes Mostly funny, so shes not meant to be taken too seriously.

i dont know, as someone who mostly interacts with my own trauma and general Issues by joking about it... im really interested in what this shows about how people react to other people. its practically a cliche in the "comedy world" - though i have no claim to be a part of it - that people who are funny are hiding some deep insecurity or trauma. but people are still surprised when Funny People are human. ITS WILD! and makes me wonder how people react to me, whose main sense of humor is "its frankly hilarious that im traumatized" and etc, who pretty much is hesitant to be vulnerable without peppering some Joakes in there.

anyway shoutouts to my fellow idiots who identify way too much with sams characters

#critical role #cr spoilers #cr2 spoilers #cr1 spoilers #nott the brave #scanlan shorthalt #taryon darrington

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