fyi this is roses mom in the b1 universe, not b2 roxy (shes in another universe 428 years in the future)
wow unwarranted sadstuck thanks hiveswap team i totally forgot she had nobody to raise her, she was just dropped to earth on a meteor in the late 70s-early 80s. which explains why she and bro were not good role models to kids but at least mom lalonde wasnt influenced by a satantic puppet
it’s also possible GRANDPA raised her, at least part of the way and apparently indirectly because he hires her as a babysitter and keeps her close instead of adopting here.
but if so–well. we’re certainly getting a sharper look at how Grandpa is a flawed guardian/role-model, too, aren’t we?
It’s nice to have the canon finally focus on this stuff, i dig it
yes. the answer’s yes. Hiveswap has in fact already done this in the trailers.
I am talking, of course, about the sexy horse statue outside Grandpa’s manor. Some people immediately pointed to this as a random meta nod to Equius, which is really disappointing to me because there’s actually fleshed out canon lore behind it, which is so much more hilarious.
“Jade’s parental unit, as the Pattern Breaking parental unit, has a much larger variety of strange, off putting interests. Dad has FANCIFUL HARLEQUINS, Mom has EXSQUISITE WIZARDS, and Bro has RADICAL PUPPETS. Grandpa has not one, but FOUR such interests, of the same descriptive two word format. They’re all just as dumb though. One reason among several for this was to create an element of uncertainty over what kind of item Jade would prototype with . And by uncertainty, I mean misdirection, which is what I always mean by uncertainty.
Notice the colors of the lights in each room. Orange, pink, and cyan, corresponding with Dirk, Roxy, and Jane. The items have a loose correlation with the other three guardians too. Knights in that Dirk is a skilled swordsman. Roxy’s land is full of pyramids, Jane was grandpa’s long estranged blue lady. You see how the gears are always turning. Not only does everything mean something. It turns out everything means EVERYTHING. Now you know.”
–Andrew Hussie, Homestuck Book 3 Commentary
Hussie has confirmed that Grandpa’s INTERESTS reflect the Alphas.
Which means that if you use occam’s razor Grandpa’s interest in HORSES–
most reasonably has to do not with some random callout to a troll Jake never met and doesn’t care about, but with his memories of Dirk.
who is. you know. all about horses and muscley horse dudes. So yeah, Grandpa–and by association Jake–have been deliberately fleshed out further by the narrative, with the wrinkle that, given time, Grandpa took on Dirk’s interest in horses.
And he’s not even the version of Jake that dated Dirk, so…yeah. Whatever you think of their relationship, it’s a pretty powerful and funny look at their friendship.
Anyway Hiveswap is good. I’m excited.
I don’t feel like that’s what Occam’s Razor would cut it down to in this case, though. By putting the muscley horse statue by itself, it’s being removed of some context – it’s also in the same yard as this;
– and on the same property as a mansion that’s full of antler and antlered animal motifs. Sure, by itself, the muscley horse couldn’t just be a reference to an Alternian animal; but when obvious references to other Alternian creatures (Xefros and Dammek’s lusii, specifically in this case) crop up in the vicinity, it becomes a lot less unlikely.
Considering that the premise of the game is that Grandpa Harley had a portal to another world in his attic at one point, and taking into account Grandpa’s known penchant for taking trophies to Earth from other worlds (there’s a lich skull in the trailer too, so signs of his extradimensional travels are all there;)
(of course, I do agree that to say the statue refers to Equius specifically is being a bit short-sighted)
Huh, thanks! I hadn’t seen the argument for the Alternian influence before, and now I’m inclined to buy it.
That said, I think we’re looking at a case where both options are true. Your own response removed a bit of context from my post, too.
I emphasized that Grandpa’s interest included not just Musclebeasts, but horses in general–of which there are several in his manor. Some dolls that could be Joey’s, yeah, but also really expensive paintings and dignified looking statuettes and stuff that are way more in the price range of an adult man.
Like, the crucial thing here is that whether Grandpa remembers Dirk to some extent isn’t in question. It’s confirmed enough to influence his interests, so there’s no real reason to discredit Dirk’s influence here where they overlap so strongly.
horses in general are way more a specifically Dirk thing than a broad Alternian interest. It’s arguably a thing for Equius but I only really remember him mentioning musclebeasts.
Dirk’s interest in horses is pretty sincere and not necessarily fetishistic by comparison, which is more like what we’re seeing with grandpa. this kind of just means that the alternia stuff is as well-considered as the Alphas stuff which just makes me more excited, personally? thanks :B
Now’s a good time to remind peeps that Hiveswap has already fleshed out Grandpa’s backstory and told us some pretty interesting tidbits about him, including the fact that he seems to remember the Alphas!
Enough to collect furniture based off them, anyway. Who knows what that means for his state of mind.
it’s sort of a mix of stuff. I pretty much think the biggest contributing factor to AR’s descent is the absence of his connections to the other Alphas, and I think that’s true of Bro as well.
I mean that’s pretty much explicit. All four of the Beta guardians are unsatisfied, unhappy, or a wreck in some way, and the unifying thread between them is the lack of the others. This is particularly pronounced for Bro, who is not just barely-functional like Mom and Grandpa are, but profoundly destructive to others and himself when lacking their companionship.
This isn’t JUST about Jake, I could say things as relevant about the ways Dirk needs Roxy and Jane, but I wanna keep this short and you all know what I’m about so let’s use Jake as an example.
Dirk explicitly fears his own potential for darkness and hates himself for it and the reason he falls for Jake in the first place is because of Jake’s *faith* in him, in his kindness and caring and potential to do good.
Dirk is drawn to Jake because Jake sees the value in him and sees the good in him and Jake being able to do that makes it easier for Dirk to see it in himself, too. So without that influence in his life at *ALL*, even less than what AR got?
It’s easy for me to see how Bro would fall apart to the degree he does. For the most part, that’s all there is to say on the matter.
.
.
.
but. let me complicate the narrative for you a little.
I used to be firmly of the opinion that Bro’s actions had nothing to do with Lil Cal and were all on Bro, and the latter’s still true. However, @jadedresearcher kinda turned my world around when they pointed out a simple fact:
There are explicit, demonstrable influences that Lil Cal exerts on Bro, in terms of his personality growth at least. Namely, Bro and Dirk have a divergent interest.
Namely, the SAW-inspired snuff film/”I want to play a Game” stuff. Bro expresses an interest in it, but Dirk really never so much as mentions it. The Jigsaw aesthetic is Caliborn’s thing exclusively, and the only real narrative explanation it has in the story is Lil Cal acting as a transmitter for the interest.
So having this in mind I think there is an extent to which Cal’s influence can be implicated in Bro’s descent. Not that it excuses any of his assholery.
Lastly, here’s a bit of rarely indulged speculation:
We do already know Grandpa raised Mom, suggesting Grandpa may have raised Bro as well. Hell, Hiveswap even has a blurry as hell picture that may be of Bro facepalming that i can’t for the life of me find right now so i guess ill just post it later who cares, the point is
if it’s true Grandpa remembers the Alphas in some way, or if it’s true *Bro* does– given that he’s a Heart player, that seems plausible too–those could also be factors that isolated Bro and made him vulnerable to Cal’s influence?
That is, of course, purely speculative. It’s just one of many potential questions I’m excited to see if Hiveswap will explore.
Hey hey hey – @revolutionaryduelist, I am normally 100% behind your point of view but I take serious umbrage at the implication that the WORLD RENOWNED EXPLORER-NATURALIST-TREASURE HUNTER-ARCHEOLOGIST-SCIENTIST-ADVENTURER-BIG GAME HUNTER-BILLIONAIRE EXTRAORDINAIRE lived anything less than a radical and amazing life.
“This is particularly pronounced for Bro, who is not just barely-functional like Mom and Grandpa are,”
Dude – it’s a stretch to begin with to call Mom barely-functional, given that despite being afflicted by one of society’s most misunderstood and poorly considered diseases, she was still able to succeed as a scientist and a mother (and I’d argue she was a lot better at being a guardian than Bro was – most of Rose’s tribulations about her mother were entirely projections on Rose’s part), but it’s outright absurd to call Grandpa Harley barely functional. Given what we know about him, he seems to have functioned better than 99% of all humans in ecorded history.
And, hyperbole aside, I think you’re hard pressed to speak with any kind of textual authority about what kind of interior life Grandpa may or may not have had – we see far too little of him. Other than expressing grief at DreamJAde’s death, we don’t know anything about him other than his known actions (unconditional love and support for Jade, including building her a magnificent dreambot) and what was filtered from Jade’s earliest memories. We’ve got no reason to think Grandpa wasn’t riddled with depression and deep-seated anxiety, but then we have no reason to think that he was, either. Either-way, calling the man who plundered every tomb and beauty parlour on the planet, invented a dozen wonders, and slew monsters like it weren’t no thang “barely functional” is just… incorrect.
To clarify: I meant emotionally. Mom and Grandpa are definitely successful, don’t get me wrong? I guess I just default to including the ability to enjoy life and engage with it in a like, balanced way…in my definition of functional?
As for Grandpa’s inner life, I don’t feel that’s correct. Grandpa’s inner life is laid out for us about as richly as Mom’s, I think. It’s just told almost entirely through environmental storytelling and context clues.
For starters, the man is a chronic hoarder. We see his hoarding all throughout Jade’s house, and it litters his manor in Hiveswap, too. Hoarding is commonly understood as a symptom of anxiety and depression.
Mom and Bro hoard to some regards too, but with Grandpa I feel it’s particularly notable just through sheer volume of stuff. And he doesn’t just hoard, he arranges his hoards in a way that’s deeply symbolically meaningful to him.
He sets up the Distinguished Houseguests in his living room and remembers enough to, somehow, sort them by Moon. He places himself by the fire in the center of all their attentions. He sets up entire rooms like shrines to each of the Alphas. He remembers Dirk not as a Prince, but as a Knight.
And, in my view, more tellingly, this is a guy who seemingly just…up and leaves his house and his two kids to raise Jade on an island? And while he’s doing that, he lets Jade play with flintlock pistols she almost shoots herself with a pistol:
Though I don’t doubt Grandpa loves Jade a lot (and I don’t particularly buy the more damning accusations going on about him right now) the dude is still guilty of serious neglect. Which, you know, kind of coincides with Jade’s Aspect pretty strongly.
And when you look at what Grandpa is doing while, you know, not taking care of his Granddaughter who is playing with guns, things become telling.
The dude is literally playing pretend. We established through Hussie that the blue dolls represent Jane in his head, which means he’s literally making believe he’s with his friends on some level.
This is Jake “Aggressively ignoring his problems” English at his worst. Just like you can see glimmers of Bro in AR at his worst, so too can you see a version of what Jake COULD become with no hope and no support network in Grandpa.
Which honestly I can’t blame him for too hard since the entire rest of his life at this point is “wait for the fucking Apocalypse and to die.”
And also, he’s alone. Jake relies on his sense of camaraderie to get by, and without his friends’ (perceived) approval his sense of place and self falls apart completely. This is a Jake who never had a chance to grow into a healthier attitude to his self worth, because he never had those friends to depend on.
Even if he did know Mom and even Bro, he would have been in a position of power and responsibility over them. It would not be the same dynamic at all, now matter how much he cares about either.
I think Grandpa is an excellently crafted tragic figure, basically. The fact that Hiveswap not only kept this consistent, but also successfully built upon it through enviromental storytelling alone is maybe the biggest reason I’m excited for it.
Sorry, not feeling it. I have a hard time conflating his collections with hoarders – the hoarders I’ve known (a few, not many, mind) were compulsive in their hoarding, almost indiscriminate. Grandpa. by contrast, is meticulous – he’s a collector, a connoisseur. Someone who collects art and builds a gallery to house their art collection isn’t a hoarder, they’re an enthusiast – in a series full of kids who stuff their rooms to bursting full of the junk that most delights them, Grandpa is simply the only person lucky enough to have the resources to build a space large enough to house them all. You say “he arranges his hoards in a way that’s deeply symbolically meaningful to him” as if we should take that as a bad thing – come to my house and see my My Little Pony collection; I assure you it’s not symbolic of my personal misery.
I don’t see Granda’s dolls as sad or evidence of loneliness – the man spent his entire life having glorious adventures and now, as an old man, he’s content to withdraw into relative seclusion. Sure his hermitage is a bit grandeur than most of those outside Saint Petersburg, but that doesn’t make it less of one.
“the entire rest of his life at this point is “wait for the fucking Apocalypse and to die.”
At the time of his death Grandpa Harley was pushing ninety of not over it – his meteor landed in 1910, he was definitely dead after 1995 and before 2009, making his time of death anywhere upwards of 85+. If you’ve ever spent a lot of time with the very elderly, you’ll know that that they don’t consider ‘waiting to die’ a bad thing. Sure, not everyone wants to go gently into that good night, but for many they start to slow down, do less, and spend a lot of time in their own heads, getting ready for whatever the next step of their life may be. To borrow a phrase from Stranger than Fiction, Grandpa lived his life– and now, at the end of it, he’s happy to be a kooky old coot. He looted all the tombs, toppled all the urns, stole all the mummies in a dreadful display of imperialist presumption – and now he’s retired, enjoying his hobbies, and knowing that one day he’s going to die – just like everybody else who ever lived.
In order to see Grandpa at the en of his life as a tragic figure you have to believe that eighty years of adventure were unfulfilling, and there’s zero reason to do so. I hesitate to go even half as far as you in considering anything in Grandpa’s house as a ‘shrine’ to the Alpha Kids – it’s far more likely that Hussie went back to Grandpa’s house when finding themes for the Alphas than the house being an anticipation of the alphas (though your line “We established through Hussie that the blue dolls represent Jane in his head” intrigues me – care to elaborate or source?). You say “This is a Jake who never had a chance to grow into a healthier attitude to his self worth, because he never had those friends to depend on” but we have no reason to believe that just because he didn’t have Dirk or Roxy he was incapable of finding friendship just as meaningful – there’s a good seven decades of this man’s life that are an unknown country about which we know next to nothing and from which any firm inference is impossible. To be an elderly eccentric is not to b unhappy, lonely, or unfulfilled – Grandpa lived the life Jake only ever dreamed of having, and I think you do him a grave disservice in presupposing his life was unhappy just because the Derse guardian’s live were unhappy. Take Nanna, for example, the only guardian whom we ever get to see say anything meaningful about her own life: it had a rough start with an evil woman, but over-all it was happy: she met a good man, had a son she lived, lived the quiet life she largely wanted. Not perfect, but not a tragedy. I think it’s far too big a leap to say call an elderly man enjoying his weird hobbies in secluded retirement an “excellently crafted tragic figure,” because even if he did miss his alt-universe friends, that’s at best sad; hardly tragic.
(As to anything about Hiveswap it’s my policy that, since it’s a WIP, nothing about it I canonically ‘true’ until the game is out and in our hands and no-longer subject to revisions.)
Fair enough re: the hoarding, but my biggest reason for noting his unhappiness was his negligence towards Jade and aggressive self-delusion anyway. It’s behavior that we see with Jake when he’s stressed or dealing with things he doesn’t like.
I don’t really think it’s much of a stretch to link the two this way, either. Mom is pretty blatantly unhappy, which feeds into her drinking, which feeds into her co-dependence with Rose. Bro is Bro, and has downright suicidal undertones in his pursuit of the Scratch.
Nanna lived a relatively happy life, but repeatedly said that she felt unfulfilled and didn’t push her limits, and mourned the infinite possibility of life that she lost due to the batterwitch–which is the exact problem Jane has to work against indulging in her interactions with her friends, too. Nannasprite explicitly sees Jane as a way to move past her regrets in that regard.
I don’t think you’re obligated to think the way I do on this, though. Ultimately, this is me reading into the symbols and implications we’ve seen in the canon so far, and part of the fun of Hiveswap will be seeing whether my readings hold up, and if not, what changes.
it’s sort of a mix of stuff. I pretty much think the biggest contributing factor to AR’s descent is the absence of his connections to the other Alphas, and I think that’s true of Bro as well.
I mean that’s pretty much explicit. All four of the Beta guardians are unsatisfied, unhappy, or a wreck in some way, and the unifying thread between them is the lack of the others. This is particularly pronounced for Bro, who is not just barely-functional like Mom and Grandpa are, but profoundly destructive to others and himself when lacking their companionship.
This isn’t JUST about Jake, I could say things as relevant about the ways Dirk needs Roxy and Jane, but I wanna keep this short and you all know what I’m about so let’s use Jake as an example.
Dirk explicitly fears his own potential for darkness and hates himself for it and the reason he falls for Jake in the first place is because of Jake’s *faith* in him, in his kindness and caring and potential to do good.
Dirk is drawn to Jake because Jake sees the value in him and sees the good in him and Jake being able to do that makes it easier for Dirk to see it in himself, too. So without that influence in his life at *ALL*, even less than what AR got?
It’s easy for me to see how Bro would fall apart to the degree he does. For the most part, that’s all there is to say on the matter.
.
.
.
but. let me complicate the narrative for you a little.
I used to be firmly of the opinion that Bro’s actions had nothing to do with Lil Cal and were all on Bro, and the latter’s still true. However, @jadedresearcher kinda turned my world around when they pointed out a simple fact:
There are explicit, demonstrable influences that Lil Cal exerts on Bro, in terms of his personality growth at least. Namely, Bro and Dirk have a divergent interest.
Namely, the SAW-inspired snuff film/”I want to play a Game” stuff. Bro expresses an interest in it, but Dirk really never so much as mentions it. The Jigsaw aesthetic is Caliborn’s thing exclusively, and the only real narrative explanation it has in the story is Lil Cal acting as a transmitter for the interest.
So having this in mind I think there is an extent to which Cal’s influence can be implicated in Bro’s descent. Not that it excuses any of his assholery.
Lastly, here’s a bit of rarely indulged speculation:
We do already know Grandpa raised Mom, suggesting Grandpa may have raised Bro as well. Hell, Hiveswap even has a blurry as hell picture that may be of Bro facepalming that i can’t for the life of me find right now so i guess ill just post it later who cares, the point is
if it’s true Grandpa remembers the Alphas in some way, or if it’s true *Bro* does– given that he’s a Heart player, that seems plausible too–those could also be factors that isolated Bro and made him vulnerable to Cal’s influence?
That is, of course, purely speculative. It’s just one of many potential questions I’m excited to see if Hiveswap will explore.
Hey hey hey – @revolutionaryduelist, I am normally 100% behind your point of view but I take serious umbrage at the implication that the WORLD RENOWNED EXPLORER-NATURALIST-TREASURE HUNTER-ARCHEOLOGIST-SCIENTIST-ADVENTURER-BIG GAME HUNTER-BILLIONAIRE EXTRAORDINAIRE lived anything less than a radical and amazing life.
“This is particularly pronounced for Bro, who is not just barely-functional like Mom and Grandpa are,”
Dude – it’s a stretch to begin with to call Mom barely-functional, given that despite being afflicted by one of society’s most misunderstood and poorly considered diseases, she was still able to succeed as a scientist and a mother (and I’d argue she was a lot better at being a guardian than Bro was – most of Rose’s tribulations about her mother were entirely projections on Rose’s part), but it’s outright absurd to call Grandpa Harley barely functional. Given what we know about him, he seems to have functioned better than 99% of all humans in ecorded history.
And, hyperbole aside, I think you’re hard pressed to speak with any kind of textual authority about what kind of interior life Grandpa may or may not have had – we see far too little of him. Other than expressing grief at DreamJAde’s death, we don’t know anything about him other than his known actions (unconditional love and support for Jade, including building her a magnificent dreambot) and what was filtered from Jade’s earliest memories. We’ve got no reason to think Grandpa wasn’t riddled with depression and deep-seated anxiety, but then we have no reason to think that he was, either. Either-way, calling the man who plundered every tomb and beauty parlour on the planet, invented a dozen wonders, and slew monsters like it weren’t no thang “barely functional” is just… incorrect.
To clarify: I meant emotionally. Mom and Grandpa are definitely successful, don’t get me wrong? I guess I just default to including the ability to enjoy life and engage with it in a like, balanced way…in my definition of functional?
As for Grandpa’s inner life, I don’t feel that’s correct. Grandpa’s inner life is laid out for us about as richly as Mom’s, I think. It’s just told almost entirely through environmental storytelling and context clues.
For starters, the man is a chronic hoarder. We see his hoarding all throughout Jade’s house, and it litters his manor in Hiveswap, too. Hoarding is commonly understood as a symptom of anxiety and depression.
Mom and Bro hoard to some regards too, but with Grandpa I feel it’s particularly notable just through sheer volume of stuff. And he doesn’t just hoard, he arranges his hoards in a way that’s deeply symbolically meaningful to him.
He sets up the Distinguished Houseguests in his living room and remembers enough to, somehow, sort them by Moon. He places himself by the fire in the center of all their attentions. He sets up entire rooms like shrines to each of the Alphas. He remembers Dirk not as a Prince, but as a Knight.
And, in my view, more tellingly, this is a guy who seemingly just…up and leaves his house and his two kids to raise Jade on an island? And while he’s doing that, he lets Jade play with flintlock pistols she almost shoots herself with a pistol:
Though I don’t doubt Grandpa loves Jade a lot (and I don’t particularly buy the more damning accusations going on about him right now) the dude is still guilty of serious neglect. Which, you know, kind of coincides with Jade’s Aspect pretty strongly.
And when you look at what Grandpa is doing while, you know, not taking care of his Granddaughter who is playing with guns, things become telling.
The dude is literally playing pretend. We established through Hussie that the blue dolls represent Jane in his head, which means he’s literally making believe he’s with his friends on some level.
This is Jake “Aggressively ignoring his problems” English at his worst. Just like you can see glimmers of Bro in AR at his worst, so too can you see a version of what Jake COULD become with no hope and no support network in Grandpa.
Which honestly I can’t blame him for too hard since the entire rest of his life at this point is “wait for the fucking Apocalypse and to die.”
And also, he’s alone. Jake relies on his sense of camaraderie to get by, and without his friends’ (perceived) approval his sense of place and self falls apart completely. This is a Jake who never had a chance to grow into a healthier attitude to his self worth, because he never had those friends to depend on.
Even if he did know Mom and even Bro, he would have been in a position of power and responsibility over them. It would not be the same dynamic at all, now matter how much he cares about either.
I think Grandpa is an excellently crafted tragic figure, basically. The fact that Hiveswap not only kept this consistent, but also successfully built upon it through enviromental storytelling alone is maybe the biggest reason I’m excited for it.
i lowkey feel salty about having to come up to you and say that you were right and i was wrong. but you were right and i was wrong. you get a free pass to be as smug as you want for 24 hours
haha thanks, i joke around a lot but honestly i wouldnt want to be REALLY smug about this? I owe you big time for giving me that quote and no matter how much of the narrative i try to pull together authorial statements like that just give everything a sense of Weight that its hard for fandom to buy into otherwise, for better or worse
i’m just glad we understand the story better now you know? theres still stuff 2 learn…about homestuck. anyway thanks
Jade’s parental unit, as the Pattern Breaking parental unit, has a much larger variety of strange, off putting interests. Dad has FANCIFUL HARLEQUINS, Mom has EXSQUISITE WIZARDS, and Bro has RADICAL PUPPETS. Grandpa has not one, but FOUR such interests, of the same descriptive two word format. They’re all just as dumb though. One reason among several for this was to create an element of uncertainty over what kind of item Jade would prototype with . And by uncertainty, I mean misdirection, which is what I always mean by uncertainty.
Notice the colors of the lights in each room. Orange, pink, and cyan, corresponding with Dirk, Roxy, and Jane. The items have a loose correlation with the other three guardians too. Knights in that Dirk is a skilled swordsman. Roxy’s land is full of pyramids, Jane was grandpa’s long estranged blue lady. You see how the gears are always turning. Not only does everything mean something. It turns out everything means EVERYTHING. Now you know.
Andrew Hussie, Homestuck Book 3 Commentary
My pal @icel just sort of handed me the commentary for book 3, which is rad cause it turns out to confirm I’ve been right in arguing that Grandpa’s home decor reflects the Alphas for months. (Obviously doesn’t prove anything else linked there, though I stand by all of it. Just saying.)
I don’t normally argue based on Word of God cause I don’t like speculating pointlessly on Hussie as a person but hey! This is part of a product made for fans, and also it takes a lot of the legwork out of me getting to say I’m right, so like fuck it 😉
Apotheosis & Creation Myth
Horsin’ Around–Dirk as Physical Abuser
The Deep Blue of Weird Plot Shit– Dirk as Romantic Predator.
Pulling the Strings — Dirk as Manipulative Mastermind.
Tin Cans Don’t Have Feelings– Dirk as Unfeeling Robot.
HYPE ABOUT HIVESWAP: Grandpa, Alt-Life Memories, and Hiveswap’s lore.
This is a compilation of all of my written work on Homestuck, thus far. This is quickly turning into an ongoing project as I think of more I want to say about the comic and universe, and I wanted to have this stuff easily accessible on my blog for those who may be interested, so this is here to essentially serve as an archive link in my Analysis tag page.
On top of working on new pieces concerning subjects as varied as Spades Slick, Davekat, Vriska and (Vriska), character analysis of characters oft-considered ‘overlooked’, such as Jane, Jade, and Jake, the Retcon, and more–I’m also working on adapting these into video format! More on that soon.
For now, the essays:
Apotheosis & Creation Myth: A longform exploratory piece on Homestucks’ themes of metaphysics, Gnosticism, spiritual enlightenment and morality as a creation myth, and how these themes are reflected in the ending sequence of Act 7.
My views have grown and adapted somewhat since I wrote it, but I’m still pretty proud of this one! I stand by pretty much all the broad points I argued Homestuck was prioritizing, though I am looking forward to the chance to revise the details when I adapt it into video form.
A Defense of Dirk Strider: A four-part essay series questioning the commonly understood fandom narrative surrounding the events of Act 6, and providing a reading of Dirk Strider that I feel is more in line with what’s depicted in canon. I was expecting a lot of backlash for this one, but surprisingly I’ve yet to even encounter disagreement, at least that I’ve seen.
Each essay tackles a different popular misconception of Dirks’ character and puts different parts of the story under a microscope. They also sort of double as a defense of Dirkjake as a ship, and the Alphas as a group dynamic worth considering and celebrating as a whole, since I feel both suffer from how fandom typically considers Dirk and Jake in particular.
HYPE ABOUT HIVESWAP: An examination of Hiveswaps’ trailer, mainly noting it’s attention to detail with regards to Grandpa, the Alpha kids, and potentially even Calliope and Cherub lore, and comparing it’s approach to Grandpa’s character with that of early Homestuck, to determine how well it connects to the comic. (Spoilers: Very well.)
Includes some character analysis for Grandpa and raises new questions about the Guardians in general, but really I’m just incredibly excited and wanted to celebrate what looks like downright masterful environmental storytelling–something that should excite anyone interested in Hiveswap for its potential storytelling value.
Fans of Dark Souls and Undertale’s secret and clever lore nods should be quite excited for Hiveswap, if its trailer is any indication of the game as a whole.
That’s all for now, though you can expect to see more from me pretty much as soon as I’m able to get it to you, because writing about Homestuck is basically my favorite thing to do.
As ever, I regard everything I write as the opening of a conversation, rather than a definitive statement. If you have thoughts or questions on anything I’ve written that you’d like to share, feel free to send me an ask! I probably won’t engage through reblogs, however. I just kind of hate the format and find it inefficient and inelegant for archival purposes.
I should’ve mentioned this before posting it, but if you like this theory post and want to talk about it, the Hiveswap discord I help run is the place! We’re linked to the r/Hiveswap subreddit and working hard to make this a positive, welcoming place for old and new Homestuck fans alike 🙂
Flying through Storytelling 