The blatant and utter mischaracterization of Lukas’ character has to be one of the worst things I’ve ever seen within a fandom and is forever why I’ll never actually look at anyone else’s posts with him
Lukas is often characterized as this soft shy weenie of a man when he’s quite the opposite and it makes me so tired. Just because Lukas can be soft-spoken towards his *friends* and people he *cares* about does not make him any less arrogant or full of himself. He’s complex and a very morally driven person, to see him boiled down to some pussy who can’t even defend himself is insane,
He provides a secondhand sense of leadership and call to action as early as episode 3, not because he “wants to be leader” but Lukas feels guilt and shame and that kind of self loathing makes him act out. Telling Lukas what’s wrong with Gabriel/Petra is the prime example of this, he expresses a sense of survivors guilt for not having helped the other and is bargaining with the idea that had he have done something someone important wouldn’t be gone, keep in mind that they don’t even know if people taken by the Witherstorm are alive at the time. For all Lukas knew, that person was dead because of him. He peacocks and puffs out his chest because he needs to feel good about himself, being leader or leader-adjacent means people look up to you and right then, everyone thought he was a coward.
Lukas is openly regarded as “arrogant” by Petra and he doesn’t hide it either, telling him “That thing your friend pulled really hurt my pig” just gets you “Okay, maybe, but I had nothing to do with that.” He openly doesn’t take any form of accountability for the things the people he himself surrounds himself with, maybe he doesn’t need to apologize for him but it’s the principle really that you look like a bad person when you surround yourself with bad people and they reflect behavior that you think is fine or acceptable considering you choose to be their friend despite all of it.
Not to mention that season 2’s opening already shows that he’s still full of himself, glazing himself as part of “these five friends” when back then he basically butted himself into the group because Petra is someone he feared and respected (Petra’s implied mercenary status, especially for a Nether Star which Lukas considers one of the worst monsters there is, though it’s debated if she fought for hers rather than through bartering or a controlled type of “farming” since she doesn’t put together that three wither skulls and soul sand make a Wither), and to call himself Axel or Olivia’s friend is laughable when he enabled the bullying his friends would engage in because “he’s not part of it” therefore he holds no responsibility.
But, he’s also no stranger to being in less fortunate situations, mentioning that it’s not his first rodeo when leaving the treehouse/shelter during the argument, and that he can handle himself when staying behind in the Order temple. His inner circle of friends, despite all of their flaws, were a sense of security to the life he used to live if it also meant being lumped in with rude awful people.
He develops past this when he learns the type of companionship within the New Order, of course, but it doesn’t suddenly erase his enabling. Being the leader of the Ocelots meant keeping his friends on a leash, him spearheading prosecuting Aiden is proof of that— He knows Aiden. He knows who he is and the kind of person he is, the things he’ll do and how far he’ll go out of bitterness, and he’s right. Aiden literally becomes a terrorist.
People don’t really touch on it, but Lukas is also very unforgiving. Aiden, Maya, and Gill were people close and dear to him, people he still goes out of his way to save during the Witherstorm’s reign of terror. When they prove to him that they are always going to be bitter and awful people, Lukas no longer cares about his friendship with them, hoping that they get put in solitary confinement where their only escape was death (i.e. a deep hole surrounded by lava) and when saving Romeo from death in the Terminal Space will imply that he would’ve left him there, saying that you saved him because you’re a better person than he is since he can’t see the good/redeemable in a person after they prove themselves to him. Even then, Jesse’s options about helping Romeo aren’t out of remorse or sympathy, they are out of pity. Because dying the moment you are powerless and held accountable is the easy way out of escaping your problems, a fate that Romeo doesn’t deserve, not by his own hand.
Lukas’ sense of leadership never dies, either. He might glaze himself in his own book, but it doesn’t make him less self aware. When he reassembled the Ocelots, he mentions it being a message, a message to remind people how things used to be, that he knows he wasn’t always your friend and he has no problem going against you despite how much he cares. In Sky City, running away with Milo is proof of it, not just because he runs to follow you but he’ll willingly comply with being arrested if you choose to stand with Ivor. In The Games, regardless of whether you save Petra or not, she will express mild disappointment about not taking Hadrian’s deal versus Lukas who consistently stands with you that it’s something you never should’ve done.
Lukas shows strength and courage, and the strategy to Petra’s brute force. He chooses to stand tall in front of the giant Prismarine Colossus in the name of protecting Beacontown despite the obvious advantages and even when challenged by the idea of an all powerful deity of chaos that was once his friend he still has the gall to break everyone out of prison knowing very well of the extent of an admin’s powers, including immediate death if he ever so chose to.
And it is disgusting you people could see him in a way that erases the strength in his character often times paired with thinly veiled racism when Jesse is darker skinned, because of course the *colored* (used ironically. Must I remind people I’m still “brown” just because it’s winter in the northwest hemisphere) person is dominant or aggressive over the white man. Regardless of them actually being the same level of strength when both are fighting over the amulet with *both* hands.
