Post
by calamityCons » Thu Nov 21, 2019 4:59 pm
Vriska's nastiness and cruelty was not spurned by any sort of extreme traumatic event of the session, like Gamzee and Eridan. Eridan was driven to insanity by the hopeless situation they found themselves in and the nonexistent support system. In his attempt to get help, the person who knew him best, Feferi, didn't even TRY to convince him otherwise and immediately decided Eridan Must Be Stopped. This is not the same as what happened to Gamzee, where he got so mad that a video pissed on his religion that he decided to murder everyone around him because he's a highblood (basically all of the reasonings for Gamzee's behavior is utter nonsense and thus his actions, while reprehensible, are difficult for me to condemn because of Innocence By Reason of Insanity/The majority of my problems surrounding him come from bad writing rather than Gamzee's character).
Eridan is objectively a selfish, entitled brat who has homicidal tendencies and needs serious fucking therapy, but he also has shown evidence of genuinely caring for others, and up until Murderstuck Eridan didn't even KILL anybody, simply hunting lusii and feeding them to Feferi's lusus for selfish reasons or because he genuinely likes Feferi and wants to show her support and love through acts of service. Eridan's behavior can be interpreted in multiple ways, and his behavior and actions toward others are ambiguous enough that you can find reasons to excuse or explain his deeds beyond "he's just being mean because he wants to be mean."
Vriska is unique because she does mean and evil things simply to be mean and evil. She throws Tavros off a cliff and paralyzes him because she hates him. If she wanted his romantic affections then she didn't even seem to pay Tavros any attention at all, or she would have seen that gravely paralyzing him in a game of FLARP would NOT have engendered his ire because Tavros is not that kind of person to hold grudges. When she harrasses him, makes fun of his disability, mocks it passive-aggressively, then shakes him in his seat while demanding he APOLOGIZE to HER for BEING DISABLED is blatant gaslighting, abusive behavior, and textbook domestic violence. She does this because she doesn't like Tavros. That's her reasoning. She has no ulterior motive, no nudging by Scratch, no noble end goal or misconceived attempt at fixing the problem.
In fact, Vriska goes out of her way to create more and more problems in the search of a more extreme challenge to overcome and become the hero of the story. Vriska never stops bothering Tavros and making life miserable for him because she wants to have someone she can exert control over and prove that she has power. She looks toward getting "square" with people she's wronged by making empty gestures of gift giving and repaying the favor, which is infuriating because she doesn't even seem to understand WHY the people she wronged dislike her. She doesn't understand why Tavros won't hate her back. She doesn't understand why Aradia takes offense to this. She doesn't understand why killing Aradia in return was overkill and enough for Terezi to retaliate. She's despicable and her behavior strongly resembles that of real-life abusive people, particularly those with histrionic personalities or untreated Antisocial Personality Disorder.
She's an excellent villain. As is Caliborn, as he is a despicable misogynistic dumbass who refuses help and is overall a disgusting black hole of a person who causes destruction because he wants to. As is Bec Noir, who decided to murder thousands of innocent people because he views them as coffin stuffers. As is Doc Scratch, who is a manipulative asshole who uses sweet words and goofy games of strategy to fuck with children and invade their lives, abusing them horribly and creating no-win situations. As is fucking, Her Imperious Condescension, who is literally called Sea Hitler. And Epilogue Jane who is an extreme troll racist.
I may dislike and take offense to Vriska personally, but that doesn't mean she's a bad character. She's a wonderful villainous force and I rooted for her to be taken down. Alas, that wound up getting undone in the Retcon, so fuck it.

#ReviveSpadesSlick #WVForNarrativeRelevance