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a charlie character analysis

feat. a little theorycrafting about Them, the nightmare throne, and as a result also maxwell and a little bit of wilson.

alternately titled: "why do i write charlie Like That in my fics" or "picking little crumbs klei gives us and using my little pea brain to extrapolate accordingly"

a quick preamble. we all know that the characters in this game are not profoundly fleshed out. for a very lore-heavy game, i don't think that the cast in and of themselves are meant to be these super complex layered and nuanced beings in canon because this is a goofy little gothic-y survival game. to be a good game and keep our attention, it does not need to have a cast full of little guys with bottomless depth and the kind of development you'd see in a heartfelt character driven drama film. that being said, it's actually really fun to treat everything as if it all is that deep and everything has a complex reason as to why it exists as it is. it leads to some interesting takes and perspectives as to why the characters do what they do and how they cope with the circumstances they find themselves in and personally helps me create distinct voices and more tension in my fan work. so just know i'm analyzing with this framework in mind. like, i may make a fair amount of reaches, but you will see me stretch real good beforehand ifykwim. i like to go nuts with it but i do like everything to start at the source and linger there for a little beforehand.

charlie's gone quite a long way from our first mention of her, before we even knew what gender she was. from just a character that was used moreso to flesh out maxwell to a character that is central to the goings-on of the constant in the present story's development. a character that (at least as far as human charlie goes) arguably may or may not be fully conscious and yet has a subconsciousness that informs quite a bit of the detours the shadow queen takes on her way to find what she seeks.

it's clear that the nightmare throne (and also much of the constant) is both responsive to the ideas and motivations of whoever occupies it, but also has its own separate role to play. it isn't passive by any means- it may indulge maxwell in his whims and give him the illusion of being in control for the events of don't starve, but ultimately binds him to itself. any survivor that takes his place (in canon that being wilson) appears to have no power granted to them in the slightest. that, or wilson was completely out of ideas by the time the epilogue finishes (which i have a hard time believing. like.. not even a little silly one?) but unlike it's prior occupants, charlie seems to cede the most of herself to the throne.

i had this interesting thought about the way that aspects of the shadow side of this universe and the way characters experience and interact with it could be also not just about literal shadows and darkness, but also about the psychological shadow. don't ask me what that means for the lunar side i could not tell you lol. persona? just like a person's individual shadow cannot be fully detached from the person themself, the shadow creatures cannot be fully detached from the constant's ecosystem. arguably, those creatures are what inform the ecosystem and are native to it. there's probably a chicken or the egg argument about the shadow creatures and the constant as we know it.

as a result, interacting with the nightmare throne could be a form of shadow work- not only literally but metaphorically. the only character who doesn't seem to do any shadow work on the throne is wilson. if the ending of the game is anything to go by, he's far too scared to do it. by the time "a new reign" rolls around, both he and the shadows have made peace with the idea that they aren't going to work with each other. wilson has provoked Them enough, and as a result, has also pushed himself and his mind (and with it, his understanding of the world he lives in now) beyond what he ever thought possible. he brute forces his way through the events of don't starve's adventure mode, freeing maxwell despite knowing his captors- whoever they may be- will not be happy about it. he might consider himself a bit beyond shadow work. magic's not really his vibe. he'll do it, sure, but he's more of a science guy. always has been. that dichotomy is shown time and time again with his relationship with maxwell and maxwell's reverse relationship to magic (shadow) and science (lunar.)

in a way, wilson almost serves as a control variable. for whatever reasons that may be, it is possible to occupy the nightmare throne as simply a warm body and not do anything while on it. those who do choose to do something on it are submitting to shadow work- again, literally and metaphorically. wilson simply doesn't. he somehow manages to resist it, whether out of fear, disinterest, or also potentially not even being aware of how to access that part of himself/part of the throne. he does not engage. his time on the throne doesn't just not change him, but also keeps him in stasis. while maxwell visibly ages, wilson doesn't even grow a beard. this could mean not a single day has passed, but knowing how time behaves strangely in the constant, we have no way of knowing for sure.

a person's shadow is a part of them and inseparable from them, but depending on what psychologist or philosopher you ask, there are certain actions one can perform with shadows that are advisable, and others that are less advisable. a shadow is not inherently a bad thing but a) part of the human condition and b) can contain positive traits and not only negative ones. interacting with one's shadow and being aware of it is part of personal growth and unpacking aquired belief systems, trauma, and reexamining your relationship to the world around you and the other people you are in community with.

you could argue that maxwell's been doing that psychological shadow work before he even made it into the constant. messing with shadow magic affects him mentally and his character development is seen physically; how he carries himself, how he dresses, etc. and when he sees the shadows manifest themselves and have a mind of their own, he is also forced to reckon with what he desires and how he can live with those shadows and therefore, how to live with himself. of all the characters, maxwell has known and seen to directly face off against and interact with his shadow the longest. an individual's shadow also has a relationship to creativity, imagination and dreams. shadow work can be done through creating things- as we see maxwell actively do.

and coincidentally, of the entire cast, this is the one character that has gone through the most psychological change. the question on everyone's mind is whether or not that change is real or manufactured to save face. put differently; has his shadow work lead to personal development through being forced to face it or has encountering his shadow only given him more tools to suppress it with his outward facing persona? we do not know.

there is the individual who serves as the unchanging control- of one who may have seen his shadow in passing and doesn't do anything about it. there is also the individual who meets his shadow face to face even if it scares the daylights out of him. now charlie is in neither of these categories.

charlie's psychological shadow is the most bare to the viewer/player. her time in the constant begins with that part of her splitting off so much so that it seems like half the time charlie doesn't even understand what has happened after the shadow overtakes her. she splits, literally and psychologically. it's an interaction with the ego in which two opposing ideas exist in one mind while an individual's awareness can only be on one at a time. it happens when she ascends to the throne and it happens when she sees winona in the portal. it seems that during that period she is self aware enough to know that something has happened, but not why or how. she grabs wilson off the throne and sends him straight back to the great rainbow character select screen in the sky and immediately after switching, doesn't seem to know why the throne's tipped over.

i think that her behavior as shadow charlie isn't just a consequence of the constant's weirdness, but is actually informative of the worst of her impulses. this is less a curse that has randomly afflicted her and more the consequence of repressing parts of herself either by actively hiding them or attempting to engage with this part of herself but failing to address what the shadow is trying to tell the rest of her mind.

pre-merge, the charlie that looks the most like the charlie that maxwell and winona knew may not be that woman but the qualities of her outward facing persona. of course that side of her is easily identifiable to those that knew her before, because it's the aspect of her mind that interacts the most obviously with the outside world. it is what is used to lure winona and wilson into a false sense of security before the shadow takes over and harms them.

depending on how much control you think charlie has had over her own self ever since she arrived in the constant, you could argue that her ego and charlie as a whole mental entity may not be in control because they were never fully present in the first place. maybe the only time the ego and the rest of her psyche has been able to resurface is not in her "good side" before her reign, but instead after merging with her shadow (and metheus.)

how ironic it is that the most herself charlie gets to be, the most whole she gets to be ever since she arrived, is when she's in the backseat to a larger mission to fulfill.

this constant sidelining and inability to be her own person has left her frustrated. you can hear it in her stage play. being the younger sister may have had her family believe that they could have been spoiling her with whatever she deserves, but to her, it must have occasionally felt more like smothering her. overprotecting her paternalistically.

to make it worse, when she does attempt to define herself and go on her own quest in search of meaning, she happens to either enter into a predicament or unknowingly create a situation for herself in which she has to cede ground to others and rely on them. it's always happened. in the short where winona recalls playing hide and seek with her, charlie attempts to assert her independence and thinks she's getting one over on her older sister only to scare herself hiding in the dark and running to winona for comfort. in hopes maxwell shares his talents with her, she ends up being gatekept from it with no idea that it's because those talents are really the result of an entity that she actually does need protecting from.

you can tell in all her flashback appearances that charlie is an incredibly vivacious person. she may be maxwell's assistant, but she appears to have more agency in her position and in her relationship with maxwell than what may be seen on the stage. while her intensity seems to surprise him and is an exact opposite of the way he carries himself, he seems to value it, and her, dearly. winona may worry about her, but she can't stop her from setting out on her own to san francisco, and knows that it'd be wrong to try. i see her as a person with a lot of feelings that are incredibly difficult to contain and keep to herself.

in contrast to winona's more tomboyish and practical way of manner and dress, charlie enjoys being feminine and pays attention to detail. while winona appears to be more of a rough-and-tumble blue collar worker, charlie's presented as more of whatever her era's analogue of a yuppie would be. in contrast to all the other handwritten parts of the william carter puzzles, her handwriting is very loopy and her word choice is more casual than maxwell's and i imagine she is direct with her written and spoken speech in a way that is reminiscent of winona. of course, there's also signing her notes with hearts. she dots the i in her name with a heart at the end of the forgone short. (now, whether or not that is a real note or part of that imagined world is still up in the air.) there's also the question of whose point of view the character skin descriptions are written in and who gives the player presents for skins. i don't think it's out of the question for charlie to be interpreted as the author of at least some of those.

she may be ladylike in appearance and initial disposition, but i think there's a difference between the femininity that she expresses that is natural to her and the femininity that she expresses that is more era-typical or more of a code-switch. while it seems like maxwell is similar in his traditionally masculine appearance and disposition and the kind of role he likes to occupy, i think that much of that is authentic to who he is in private. he is also, in contrast to charlie, very slow to warm up to others (which i think is not only a consequence of him having that british stiff upper lip, but also a general carter family thing. you can see it in wendy.)

this is to say that i think that the true charlie in private breaks more gender role rules than maxwell does, likely in part because of the way their personalities and desires interact with their individual presentations. (granted. no one in existence fictional or real ever follows all of the rules for their given gender and the rules are flimsy, change with time, and oftentimes contradictory. also klei appears to be disinterested in making things period accurate to the point of the characters having period-accurate views, and i'm also the same with my own original writing and also fan work. i digress.) the biggest and most obvious of these diversions in canon is her disposition to being a more active, pursuing individual that makes her attraction known as opposed to waiting coyly in hopes of being approached. if there's one thing that is immediately obvious about charlie it is that she is unafraid to show exactly how enthusiastically interested she is in maxwell to the point of literally throwing herself on him in his flashback short. she is unafraid to lead (most obviously as queen) and is unafraid to be the one who tells the jokes and stories. she has an outspokenness to her character that is well represented not only in her flashback self, but also in her shadow.

but the real socially unacceptable trait (and by this i mean one not just affected by gender roles but also one that in-universe is seen as socially unacceptable by other characters) that conflicts with her outward-facing traits is the trait that her shadow is most known for. when that drive and forwardness applies itself to her more negative thoughts and desires as opposed to her ambitions and love interest, it turns into ruthlessness. it turns into a deep, vicious anger and resentment. one takeaway from her stage play that i think both winona and maxwell notice in their reactions it is that charlie is way more of a grudge-holder than either could have imagined. i think that her shadow is composed of many parts, but the most obvious is this repressed and untapped anger. and it's not something that she must have felt like she had the space to express at any point in her life.

she reverts to that shadow self in forgone, it is after she sees what has happened to maxwell and winona in that dreamscape of hers. it's the first time we see that side of her in a while after she became queen. she sees the defeat in his eyes and the fear in her sister's eyes and covers her face away from in what i can only imagine is shame before changing form entirely into something unrecognizable. this could be the first time that charlie's whole psyche has finally caught up and come to face with what has happened ever since that night in san francisco. even if given full control over her body again, it seems like the knowledge acquired is too much to bear to the point where the more conscious and whole parts of charlie's mind are paralyzed back into dormancy.

that's another part of her that i really like to explore. just as big as her anger is her kindness. there's this constant push and pull between those parts of her. i don't think most of the characters in the don't starve cast, if faced with the knowledge that their love interest/friend and boss had a secret lair and scratched your name in the wall numerous times, would meet the moment with the kind of patience she does in the william carter puzzles. while she is open about the fact that the sight was disconcerting in her letter, she expresses a kind of tenderness that is even atypical in the modern era lol. not only that, but still is willing to trust him enough to mention the cabin in b.c. despite running away in tears at the initial sight, she gathers herself enough to reexamine the situation and assess it less as a threat and more as a cry for help and the desperate need for a break. this is someone who is willing to give the people she cares about many chances, and someone brave enough to face shadows- so long as that shadow isn't her own.

.... also she has a real case of FOMO. even as shadow queen. she was a clingy child as per winona's quotes and likely still a bit of a clingy adult (which could also explain her last letter to maxwell as well.) she seems to like a good race. she has her own carrat to race with and her own boat racer (that also plays dirty as hell lol.) she may describe maxwell to winona in her letters as stubborn and say that that's a trait that the two share, but i think that charlie might have a blind spot to her own headstrong nature. as per winona's quotes, it seems like charlie's also been a formidable pillow fighter. she also mentions having to win the toys for charlie at carnivals when they were younger- whether or not this is because she was too young, would get so frustrated she quit, or simply wanted winona to do all the work for her is up in the air. i like to think it depended on the game.

for such a central character that has driven much of the plot- arguably as much as maxwell and wilson have- i don't think charlie gets her flowers. i think that she's so integral to the plot of the game that it's surprising to see fan content that kind of walks around even mentioning her or giving her much of a role in things that would make sense for her to be behind. it's impossible to divorce much of maxwell and winona's character development from charlie. she is by no means a passive personality or stock character. many of her actions and inactions have been part of how we got to where we are now and i think that even klei occasionally understates how pivotal her role is and how much of the story has taken the shape it has because it is charlie specifically that is being used as a host body and not just any character in the cast. there's a lot of material in the game to work with and interpret whichever way you'd like, and i've had a lot of fun doing much of that. and man am i looking forward to anything remotely related to the shadow arc. hope klei gives my girl some love.

if you made it all the way through here thanks for reading, lmk if you've got any charlie headcanons! i'd love to hear some.

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